 Mike, I see you there. Commissioner Brown, when we open the meeting, if you could just let us know the timing for public comment so we can change that on the back end. Yes, I will do that. I was going to wait and I was going to go with two minutes in general and then wait and see what the crowd looks like for our big items and may go to one. OK. I'll let you know. Thanks for the reminder. Yeah, I think given the. Likelihood that this will be a long meeting will start with two rather than three. Thanks. Thank you, Ian, for making that change. There is your one minute warning. I need everyone quiet. I will begin the broadcast right at 9 AM. And yes, Sonia, before we get started, will you just remind me? It's yes. Sorry, I got it here. Star nine and star six. Just I always forget that. Thanks. And we're ready to go. Hey, so we'll go ahead and get started. Hi, everybody. Welcome to the February 3rd meeting of the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission. It is 9 AM and we will get started with a roll call. Commissioner Bertrand. Present. Commissioner Brown. Here. Commissioner Johnson. Here. Commissioner Montecino. Commissioner Caput. Here. Commissioner Montecino. Here. Commissioner Alternate Schifrin. Here. Commissioner Koenig. Commissioner McPherson. Who's your mutant? Thank you. Here. Commissioner Peterson. Present. Commissioner Alternate Quinn. Present. Commissioner Northcott. Here. And Commissioner Rockin. Here. And Commissioner Scotties. Present. You have a quorum. Thank you. We'll now move on to oral communications. This is a time for members of the public to address commissioners on an item that's not on our agenda today. The commission will listen to all communications and in compliance with state law will not take action on items that aren't on our agenda. Speakers are requested to state their name clearly, so it can be accurately recorded for our minutes. And I'm going to just make an additional announcement before we open up for oral communications to say that we have a long agenda today, as most of many of you are aware, if you're here. And there are strong feelings about some of the issues we're going to be taking up, and those will come later on in the agenda. So please do try to keep your communications to items not on the agenda and refrain from personal attacks, group attacks, and try to stick to the substantive issues. I'll be reminding folks of that as we move through the meeting. So I'll open it up for oral communications now. And just opening up to see hands up, I see six attendees. We'll start with Barry Scott. Well, thank you, Commissioner Brown. And I just want to speak real broadly to the state rail plan and not to any of the specific action items or discussion items on the agenda. It's been a real pleasure, honestly, and a privilege sometimes to watch as our county has moved from simply owning a rail line to designing a trail, a rail with trail, and implementing parts of it. And I'm just very encouraged all the time to know that so many studies have been done that indicate or approve that rail transit is the right thing to do, that we have the Unified Corridor Investment Study and the Transit Corridor Alternatives Analysis. And we have a lot of fans around the state and the region that are supportive of us pursuing our rail transit plans and building this fabulous trail. I do become concerned sometimes that we're not doing as much as we might to repair, make repairs that are needed. And I'm discouraged sometimes when I hear a messaging that seems to suggest that there aren't funds. And I think that there are funds. And I think that the commission can aggressively seek funds. You don't know that there aren't funds unless you seek them first. So I encourage our planners and our staff and our executive directors to do everything they can to find the funds to repair the rail line and stay on track with the rail with trail plan. I'm happy to see that the plans are still for rail with trail. But now that we've done all our study, let's dedicate all of our 8% of Measure D to seeking matching funds to make the repairs that we need to bring our rail line up to SNF. So again, I want to thank everyone. And that's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Scott. Next up, it sounds like someone will mute your devices. That would be great. Thanks. OK, next up, we have Judy Giddelson. Good morning, commissioners. I'm Judy Giddelson. I'm a Watsonville resident. And I support your work. I want to remind the RTC to be the leaders that you are. And I'm quoting from your agency overview that the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission is committed to delivering a full range of safe, convenient, reliable, and efficient transportation choices for the community with a focus on long-term sustainability. That's what I want to underscore, that that's your mission. And as a citizen, I hope you can stay with that. And then I'm quoting from March 8, 2019, public letter from Guy Preston to Susan Branstad. And it says, the RTC is committed to meeting the requirements set by Proposition 116 and CTC Resolutions, and dot, dot, dot. While there have been proposals by some community members and groups to rail bank or remove railroad tracks in January 19, after extensive analysis and public input conducted through the Unified Corridor Study, the RTC Board unanimously, unanimously, affirmed its commitment to leave railroad infrastructure in place, maintain freight rail service, and institute high-capacity public transit service. So I hope Guy Preston, as the leader that you are, you carry forward with your declaration to the director and the State Transportation Commission. Thank you very much. Madam Chair, can I ask how many hands you're currently showing on oral communications? Sure. And Commissioner Rockin, I believe you can also see these if you open up participants. But right now we have seven for oral communications. If that number expands, let me make a comment if I can. I know people are well-intentioned, but I can't see them. And I totally, despite the fact that I might agree with the last two comments, I think you need to be rule with an iron hand here. People making any comment that relates to rail or trail or the court or really are talking about an item, it's hard to not have. If I were on the other side of the comments that were made, I feel like I have to jump up and respond to them. And I think you should tell rule those people. That's your judgment. I'm going to just make this comment. Just rule these people out of order. It's on the agenda to talk about this question. And these general comments, as well as intenders, they may be, I think, violating your general comment at the beginning that they should stay off of items that are coming up on the agenda. Yeah, thank you, Commissioner Rockin. I recognize the concern and I assure you I will be monitoring this very closely, unfortunately, because the items are specific to the later items are actually more specific. I'm going to give folks some latitude here, but I will, when we get to those items, be very clear that folks should be talking specifically to those items. So the question of adverse abandonment and the question of an alternative valid initiative, in particular, I think you're thinking about here. So I appreciate the call out to the community, as well, to please address us on issues that are not up for debate today or discussion. And with that, I will call on Brian from Trail Now. Hi, and I can appreciate that. If you could share my slide, I appreciate it. I will keep it not related to the topic item. If you're sharing it, I can't see it. But anyways, we're calling Brian Peoples from Trail Now in support of the North Coast Farmers. Did you see my slide? Yelfsa, it's not showing. Mr. Peoples, we did receive your slide. That's fine. I'm not sure if we can't get it up. We do have it for us. No worries, no worries. So basically what shows on the slide is Congressman Jimmy Panetta visiting with the North Coast Farmers and seeing the issues of what's impacting them, the loss of farmland by the RTC not working with the North Coast Farmers. And we support at Measure D. Actually, all of our supporters gave most of the highest volume of money for Measure D for Trail Now and Greenway supporters. So we felt that Measure D was very important, but we felt that the farmers weren't really getting their fair shake on working with the RTC. Now, granted, this was the former leadership for RTC. So we're hopeful that the RTC will work with the farmers, the North Coast Farmers, as we implement the North Coast Rail Trail. Thank you for your time. Thank you. So Mark Mercedes Miller, it is your turn to speak. Good morning, Commissioner Chair Brown and fellow commissioners. I'm here today to just talk about a problem that we all face, and that's global warming. Global warming is getting worse, far worse, and people in Santa Cruz County are suffering right now. Transportation accounts for more than half the greenhouse gases generated in our county. In our city of Santa Cruz, it accounts for almost 60% of the greenhouse gas emissions. We need to improve our public transportation system and give people an alternative to driving around in cars. Traffic congestion and commute times are unbearable. People are suffering. We need a more robust public transit system. And to get that, we need funding. We all agree, everyone agrees, we need funding. Sales taxes are out. I want to tell you about what's going on in other communities. The city of Portland, using a collaborative model, engaged with its citizens. Some 30 or 40 different community groups got together and developed a plan to fund public transit expansion in that region. That effort resulted in seven different near term strategies and three long term strategies to raise funds. None of those 10 strategies involved sales taxes. I am calling on you, the commissioners, in charge of transportation in our community to join with the community, engage the community, and let's figure out how to fund the public transportation expansion we need. Thank you. Thank you. OK, Linda Wills-Husen, you're up. Thank you and good morning. My name is Linda Wills-Husen, and I live in Live Oak. And I have two requests for your consideration. First, I'd like to request that the RTC agenda please list both commissioners and their alternates on the first page of the agenda. And that all commissioners, alternates, RTC staff, attorneys, and consultants have their names shown during the Zoom meetings. It's very difficult for members of the public, especially via Zoom and especially newcomers to your process to understand who's who. And it's nearly impossible when commissioners and alternates trade off with each other during a meeting. Second, I understand that the February 17 RTC meeting will include information about the proposed Highway 1 widening project between State Park Drive and Freedom. I'd like to request the agenda materials for that item on February 17. Please include the Highway 1 bus on shoulder concept of operations study prepared in 2019, as well as any updates to that study that may have been prepared by the RTC, or Metro, or Caltrans, or your consultants. Thank you. Needed, Sandy. Thank you, Ms. Wills-Husen. David Dean, your turn. Yes, thank you. My name is David Dean. I live in Live Oak. And I would first like to thank the RTC for doing what amounts to a very thankless job. Everyone contacts you when they're upset, not when they're happy. And I understand that it is very difficult to make these kinds of decisions and things. That being said, I would like to ask that the RTC try to get out of this cycle of ever-increasing automobile dependence. Widening Highway 1 with these auxiliary lanes is, at best, a temporary solution. The bus on shoulder project, as it's called, is not even going to be bus on shoulder. It's going to be buses in auxiliary lanes and buses in the exits. This is not going to help us with the climate crisis. This is not going to reduce traffic. We need to really stop investing so heavily in highways and start investing heavily in public transit of all forms. We need to invest in taking away free parking. We need to invest in making more buffered and protected bike lanes. We need to take some space away from highways and automobiles and make them specifically for pedestrians and cyclists. This is very important to me, and it really is the only way out of the climate crisis. Thank you. Thank you. OK, Michael St. You are up. OK, thank you, Chair Brown. And good morning, commissioners. This has nothing to not concern with any of the items that we're speaking of today. I'd like to second to Mark and Settie Millers and the last gentleman's comments. They were very, very good. For a year advocate for sustainable transportation in the sustainable environment for our Tri-Count area, I have concluded that our government entities, specifically RTC, AMBAG, and those in charge of planning and executing of transportation projects seem mostly comfortable with business as usual and limiting their efforts to follow the state of California's climate policy. After studying EIRs from AMBAG and Caltrans, it seems most of the effort goes to finding ways to avoid following the state of California's environmental mandates. The governor's executive orders on climate action and getting around and ignoring SQL requirements. If the same energy could be used on ways to help mitigate the effects of climate change during our planning efforts, it could be on our way to slowing down the existential threat of our planet and life as we know it. Ignoring these mandates is allowing the effects of climate change to continue its increasing effect on global warming. All decisions concerning transportation projects, housing infill, and sustainable planning should have at its core, we are helping to mitigate climate change. There is no excuse to not to do this. We are still focused on car infrastructure and trying to appease a car eccentric voting base that has been uninvolved and a leadership that is unwilling to make the tough decisions. As a climate activist, I'm very concerned about the lack of concern our governing bodies have over climate change. Thank you for letting me speak. Have a nice day. Thank you, Mr. Sains. So I do want to make another quick announcement because a commissioner asked how many names are up and the hands are up and they're continuing to go up. And so I just wanted to let you all know and you all should be able to see this. We now are again at seven. So I'm going to stick with the two minutes but as we get into, if we get a lot of people who want to speak to oral communications, I will have to switch to one minute. I know people want to get to the items on a regular agenda. So I do want to try to move us through this efficiently and also give the public an opportunity to speak. If this is an urgent matter, you want to address the commission on and then please do feel free to do that. And if it's something that you feel you can communicate to us in writing or at our next meeting, we'll be here. So with that, I'll call on John E. Hello, first time, Zuma here. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Okay, I would just, John, my name is John Erdkamp and I would just like to say that I support the railroad infrastructure as a tourist. My family has lived in the Bay Area and elsewhere and we come to Santa Cruz very, very often in a tourist role. So having a railroad infrastructure and active railroad, it would help with tourism. And I know that being a member of several railroad clubs, we would like to have railroad conventions in Santa Cruz and having an active railroad would help with those railroad conventions and help with tourism. And I would just like to say that it would help your city bring in tourism dollars. And I will yield the rest of my time. I know you're busy, thank you. Thank you. Next up, no longer in Kansas is it's your turn. Hi, my name is... Sorry, we're having trouble hearing you. Hi, my name is Terry Fagan and I'm a resident of downtown. I'm a native Southern Californian and five years ago I moved up here and could be able to afford to live up here. I decided in addition to the climate issues and everything I would not be able to afford to have a car. So I, as a senior, I need the transportation of the train and all of the connections that it makes. And I just thought that you might want to take into consideration in addition to tourist and the holiday train and all the wonderful things that the train brings our city town and character, you might want to consider your seniors as well. Thank you. Thank you. Luke Lindrath, you are up next. Well, I just like to thank the regional transportation commission for the opportunity to let me speak. But to add on to the climate issue, we need to be less dependent on our highways. And in regards to a train, freight trains omit less CO2. And according to the Environmental Protection Agency, excuse me, an average freight locomotive omits 22 grams of CO2 per ton mile compared to truck operations, which omit 65 grams per ton mile. Since every gallon of gasoline burned creates about 8,887 grams of carbon dioxide, that means that more than 40,000 grams of carbon dioxide are put into the atmosphere when cars are stuck in traffic. Having Roaring Camp take over freight operations on the Santa Cruz branch line would be instrumental. Sorry, I'm sorry, Mr. Lindrath. I just wanted to remind everybody, we are going to be talking about Roaring Camp and its freight operations on our regular agenda. So I'm sorry to interrupt you, but just make sure that your comments are. Not targeted, not specific to that item. I'm sorry, but my main point is that we need to be less dependent on our highways. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. Todd Marco, you are up. Hello, and thank you. My name is Todd Marco, and I am Executive Director for Nicene Rio Gateway in Aptos. I'd just like to very briefly recognize that emotions are high and misinformation is seemingly rampant. There seems to be a lot of concern that the future of rail transit and recreational rail in Santa Cruz County is currently threatened. After substantial research, I've come to understand that the future of transit in Santa Cruz County is still a large prioritization, but the details of that future have not yet been established. I believe that the public is currently very misinformed about the substantial common ground between warring parties here. Freight rail is center stage in the technical details at play, but it appears to be all the absent from the publicity campaigns of third party advocacy groups. I would like to make sure that the public is in a position that it's in. I've asserted previously and would like to now reassert a comment emphasized by Guy Preston. The way to move forward here is to find, excuse me, clear my throat for this. The way to move forward here is to find a way to work together and reach an agreement. Thank you. Thank you. Rebecca Downing, you are next. Yes, good morning commissioners. I would like to express my gratitude and appreciation to RTC staff. Specifically the maintenance department for their work on the rail corridor. Since the passage of measure D. Maintenance staff have become more and more responsive to issues that have been reported along the corridor. Specifically, I would like to address maintenance of drainage. I would like to say thank you to the commissioners for the removal of graffiti, trash and camping. Sometimes we don't even have to report it and just see it. And then the next time we see it, it's gone. So I just want to thank them for their work. And I wanted you to know about it. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Downing. Lonnie Faulkner, it's your turn. Hi, thank you, chair Brown. This is just an emotional appeal to say that. I would like to thank the commissioners of the RTC and staff to move us away from. Public transportation and instead trying to implement yet further widening of our freeways. It feels a lot like we're moving back into the 1940s and 1950s. Where this country has been steamrolled. And I would like to thank the commissioners of the RTC for implementing more and more freeways that through the future will require more and more funds to upkeep those highways and freeways. This is an opposition to everything we know that will serve us environmentally. And our health in terms of not just greenhouse gases, but the amount of tires that are producing volatilized fuel. So I hope that this recent strange and unusual back to the future of the 1950s might rectify itself. And that we might have once again some forward thinking progress through the RTC that looks at the environmental picture. And looks at rail and buses and buses. So I hope that we will be able to make sure that we continue to make sure that we continue to create our crisis with our environment. Thank you so much. Thank you. I'll call on Warwick Bolton. Next. I live in Actos and I'd like to say something on behalf of cyclists and the use of the rail corridor. What's been apparent to me over the last two years is that cyclists are on the roads as well as ordinary bikes. Many of the electric bike owners are older. They don't cycle so well. And they have to travel on the roads of Santa Cruz county, which are not always well maintained, as you know. And particularly at the side of the road, which is where cyclists ride, it is dangerous, very dangerous indeed sometimes. But if the rail corridor was turned over to be a communal asset for the whole population as a great highway stretching from the bottom of the county to the top county, then you'd have a form of active transportation for people who have become enthusiastic about that. And this would be for the population as a whole and for its health, not for specific commercial interests. Not for tourists from out of town, not particularly for people who like Santa Cruz as a bedroom community and want quick access to Silicon Valley over Highway 17. So what I'd like to say is that the rail corridor could be a wonderful, healthy, inspiring and extremely convenient way of getting around the county for people who live here. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Bolton. We have one speaker left for our oral communications agenda item. And so I'll call on Sean and then we'll close oral communications and move on to our consent and regular items. So Sean, your turn. In November, Anna issue made a transportation infrastructure update. She let us know that she had she had helped get over $5 billion for infrastructure, much of it specifically for public transportation. She also helped to repair and replace the CalTran crossings, bridges, electrifying buses, and helping to repair and replace parts of a road system that was built in the 50s. This was money that was already secured or was guaranteed. The money for public transportation is there. It's a build back better infrastructure all day long for months. There's no excuse to not be informed. In 2018, the vision, no, 2017, the vision Santa Cruz County meetings, an expensive process that everybody on this call paid for. It was, it was meant to gather information to find out what people in Santa Cruz want included in their in the county, the county plan and Davenport. This meeting is online on YouTube. You can find this yourself. Climate change, clean water and infrastructure, maintaining the rail and highway one corridor and being left out by North County and failure county follow-up follow-through were all their main concerns. Thank you, Sean. Okay, so that concludes oral communications. And we will move on to our next item. Are there any, this is item three additions or deletions to the agenda. Yes, thank you, Madam chair. There are handouts for items eight, 22 and 23. There's a attachment to, to item 21. And a replacement page for item number 22. All of these documents are available on our website. Thank you. So we'll now move on to our consent agenda. This is items 14 through 17 on our agenda. So before we do that, it looks like Mr. Mattis, did you want to make a comment before we go into consent? Yeah, well, it's related to the consent calendar, Madam chair. On agenda item number five, which is the minutes from your last meeting. The staff has received a increase from members of the public with regards to the vote. The commission will recall that I reported out of closed session, the direction given last time and reported that there was a 10 to 15 vote for that direction. Subsequently to that, the staff has received inquiries about the, which members voted in which way in favor against the motion. And so staff would propose that the council, if the commission wishes to consider just adding to the minutes, the votes that were identified by the commissioners on that motion. I'm happy to read that in the record, if the commission would like to add that to the minutes. So before we open up for all communications and I'll finish my, or excuse me for public comment on our consent agenda. I will take that item and see where, how commissioners feel. I did have a conversation with director Preston about this. And prior to the meeting and wanted to make sure before we included that in the minutes that there were not objections on the part of commissioners. I think in the, personally, I'll just say in the name of transparency, I do think it's a worthwhile thing to do. We've had requests, we've had, you know, concerns about the legality of that. And rather than continuing to debate that, I think it would be in our interest to include that in the minutes. That's just my perspective, but I didn't want to make that decision on behalf of the commission. Commissioner Rockin. You weren't just do this asking if there are objections or a quick motion would now discussion being a quick assault. We'll let you rule on that. Yep. If, if folks are ready to make a motion and nobody's got any things. I'll move the way I'll move that we attach the names to the votes on that decision. I don't even remember what they put myself, but like, it's not, I have no, no particular political aim in that. Let's just do what was recommended. I'll second the motion. Okay. So we have, we have a motion and by commissioner rock and a second by commissioner Caput and commissioner Schifrin, you are. You have your hand up. Go for it. Yes. I don't have any problem with doing that, but I think procedurally we don't need a motion. Okay. Okay. So that is recommending that the minutes be changed to add people's names. That's staff makes other replace their replacement pages, which are staff recommendations to change particular items. Staff recommended to change the minutes. And if we're going to have to vote every time we are changing the staff recommendation to an item on the consent agenda, we're going to waste a lot of time. So the commissioners are concerned about this. They should pull this item. If not. What I see is that the, that the consent agenda is amended in a number of ways that include listing the names of the commissioners who voted on that item at the last meeting. So, I mean, I just, I think this sets a bad precedent and is unnecessary. We have a staff recommendation. Let's just go with that as an as a proposed amendment, amendment to the consent agenda. We, that's certainly. I'll withdraw. I'll withdraw my motion. Okay. So we will proceed then. Make sure the second withdraws is as well. Yeah. Commissioner Caput, does that work for you? We'll just amend those minutes and adopt them with the whole with the consent agenda. That's fine. Okay. And so we'll go ahead and do that. Thank you. To our staff for bringing, pointing that out for us. And so I will now ask if there are commissioners who would like to pull any of the items on our consent agenda. Including, but not limited to the minutes from our last meeting. Commissioner Koenig. Thank you, chair Brown. Nothing that I had requests be pulled. I just was hoping that staff to comment a little bit more on item eight, which are the repairs to the Pajaro rail bridge, which received a number of questions and comments from the public about why this bridge is not being planned for some kind of pedestrian or bike facilities in addition to the rail. And there were questions of whether there's still possible to add bike pedestrian access to this project that we are being asked to improve today, or if it would be possible to add that to the project in the future. We have a question for staff on. The question to deputy director Luis Mendez. Great. Thank you. Mr. Good morning. Good morning commissioners. Thank you. And the master plan for the moderate of eight century city trail network. It shows that a trail going across the apartment river would actually be on a separate bridge next to the next to the existing bridge. So that's, you know, that that's, that's the plan in place. Because the, you know, the existing bridge as it is yet wouldn't be on the rail next to it. And the grant award that the RTC received from Cal transfer the short line rate rate improvement program is just for improvements to the bridge for. From freight rail purposes that it is short line railroad improvement program. So that would be enough money to make improvements for that. So there isn't, there wouldn't be enough money to reconstruct the bridge to also add a trail. Like I said, the plan is to have a bridge next to it based on the moderate of eight centuries and straight on that master plan. All right. Thank you for the clarification. So basically extensive additional engineering work would be needed in order to redesign this project for the construction of the bridge. And currently that's actually not the plan at all to see the separate bridge. Correct. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Before we go out to the public, are there any commissioners who want. Again, either if you're, if you don't want to pull anything, have questions or comments on any item on the consent agenda. Okay. And so we will. Recording in progress. Okay. So we have a bit of technical issues. So maybe we can just wait a second here. If you like, I could time two minutes. Yeah, I can, I can go ahead and do the time as, as we. People are thinking of their comments and hands are going up as we wait here. So if we want to just get started, I can go ahead and, oh, here we go. With that. Brian trail now. You're on. Hi, this is Brian from trail now. Thank you for the time. Thank you. Thank you. So in 2019, we were commune talking with progressive rail. Actually lawn, Ben. German. Lawn, actually the banks brought lawn back. So to say, right. The ship is what he said to us because. The freight. Business wasn't good. And he specifically told us that Watson bill freight was terrible. And they were looking to abandon. This is back in 2019. It's so. What's happening. What's going to happen is that local tax basers are now going to be funding. This freight in Watson bill. And you can look at the Sonoma smart train as an example, they're going to be spending $2 million a year just to subsidize a freight train that has limited business. So this, this is a message for our community to say, Hey, wait a minute, why are we subsidizing these freight? At $2 million a year. So we asked for public transit funds. Well, we're wasting it on a. Trying to sustain a business that isn't sustainable. Now, if we went and looked at rail banking it to. The UP yard. Union Pacific yard. Which is about a half a mile from the customers. Truck services could sustain that. So we can open up the Pajaro river bridge. As a pedestrian cycle path. And as an emergency path. That would be a game changer for the local Watsonville community. So we encourage you to look at. Do we need to subsidize these. Freight operations in. Watsonville when it doesn't really make sense. Let's. I'm sorry. I don't want to waste our tax dollars on poor decisions. Thank you. Okay. Next up, we have J. T. Verbeck. And please let us know which item on the consent agenda. You are referring to. I did not have my hand up. I'm sorry. Okay. No problem. Thank you. We'll move on to Barry Scott. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm grateful for Luis Mendes pointing out that the. Paro bridge. Paro river bridge. We'll have a separate dedicated. For engineered by can pedestrian trail. I was a little surprised that commissioner Koenig didn't. Understand that. I'm happy to share. And I hope that all the commissioners understand that the. Paro river bridge. And I think that calls for the same solution on almost every rail bridge. That the rail bridges don't. Need to share space with the railroad tracks and a trail. That in almost every case. A new. Dedicated. Safe. Modern pre-engineered. I can pedestrian bridge will be built. Next to the rail bridges. And I think that's an important point for our commissioners to understand. Thank you. You. Bob Burlach. Hope I got your pronunciation Bob Burlach you're up. That's close enough. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Thank you. This is Barbara Lodge with the creek lumber company. I'd like to respond to the previous speaker. Talking about the county subsidizing freight recipients. Our company has been receiving freight by rail at our company. We've been in the company for a long time. We've been in the branch for 50 years. That's 40 years before. The county acquired the rail corridor. And at the point in time, the county went through the process. Of acquiring that corridor. To our knowledge. No issue was ever raised. About subsidizing. Private businesses. We're going to talk about the reduction in freight services. There's a very narrow. Slice of time. And, you know, certainly from our perspective, our freight needs are going to increase. And my understanding is that it's the same with most of the other freight recipients. The last thing I'd like to point out anything that your commission decides to do with the rail line, the rail line, it wouldn't be a very friendly or appropriate argument. Argument could be made that anything you do with the rail line is a subsidizing. Of somebody. At taxpayers expense. So I don't really appreciate. Our company or the other Watsonville companies. Being in the bull's eye. We've frankly been doing for 50 years and appreciate the opportunity to provide that clarification. Thank you, Mr. Berlage. I am. Want to remind people again that's a reminder to me to. Make comments that. Do not cause people to feel attacked. I know that's very difficult under the circumstances. But just a reminder to. Speak to the policies. As opposed to individuals or groups. Mr. Wilson, Brad Wilson with agron. You're up. Hello, can you hear me okay? Yes. Okay. Hi, my name is Brad Wilson with agron bioenergy out of Watsonville, California. We purchased the biodiesel facility in November of 2017. And we have not used the rail service that much between now and then, but we just so happen to be embarking on a time when we have brought 26 rail cars in. Actually 20 so far and six more to go here in the month of February. From September of 2021 until February of 22. And then starting in March, late March, probably April. It'll be 40 to 80 rail cars a month. We're going to be bringing in. To Watsonville. And that's biodiesel. It's very good for the environment. It's helping achieve California's. Low carbon standard goals. Reducing carbon and being net zero carbon. So just wanted to let you know that it is, it is going to become way more active than it's, than it's proud than Watsonville has seen in a long time. And, and that's a good thing that rail is there for, for, you know, to help businesses thrive. And when businesses thrive, the community thrives. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Wilson. And we have next up. And this will be our last speaker. For items on the consent agenda. David. Thank you. Thank you. I'm a President of the train riders association of California. And I wanted to correct the record and earlier speaker. Spoke about the Sonoma Marin area rail transit. And his statement was completely incorrect. There is no such thing as subsidy afraid. So I can't say anything about other costs. such thing as subsidy of freight. So I can't say anything about other comments he made, but I can tell you for sure that that was a completely false statement. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chambron. We, I see hands going up and I'll just remind folks that the intention here is to speak directly to items on our consent agenda. I appreciate the interest in responding to other public commenters, but we are, the purpose of this is not a dialogue or a debate among the public comments. And I'm sorry about that. I know it's frustrating, but I do wanna just ask you all to really focus your comments on the items as they are presented in our agenda. And so we now have one more hand up that would, that is Elaine Rulfs and I believe that will be our last speaker. Ms. Rulfs, you are up. Okay, thank you. I just came in late, so I didn't hear everything. I just heard the last three speakers, but I am very interested in keeping the rail line going. I think it's, I think we're crazy if we do not keep the trains going. Ms. Rulfs, we are actually talking right now about our consent agenda, which includes other items related to regional transportation commission business. So- I don't see the consent agenda on here. Alls I see is my picture and the time that I'm talking. I don't see nothing on here that I can relate to. So- Where's your consent agenda? Our consent agenda is available at the Santa Cruz regional county regional transportation commissions website. Go there, you can find our agenda. We are on consent. That includes items, review of minutes, for example. And specifically the previous commenters, we're talking about a project on the Pajaro Valley river rail bridge. So general discussion about the rail and trail are forthcoming, will be forthcoming. Thank you. Okay, I will now bring it back to- Move approval of the consent agenda. Second. Okay, we have a motion and a second on the table. Any discussion? Let me come- Madam chair, if I can just confirm with the motion maker that that includes the amendment to the minutes. That's correct. Thank you. Okay. So we'll go ahead and have a roll call vote on approval of our consent agenda. This is items four through 17 on today's agenda. Commissioner Bertrand. Hi, Bray. Commissioner Brown. Aye. Commissioner Johnson. Aye. Commissioner Montecino. Yes. Commissioner Caput. Aye. Commissioner alternate Schifrin. Aye. Commissioner alternate Quinn. Yes. Commissioner Koenig. Aye. Commissioner McPherson. Aye. Commissioner Peterson. Aye. Commissioner Northcott. Aye. And Commissioner Rockett. Aye. Commissioner Bertrand, did you have a comment? Hands up, Shawn. Your hands up. Oh, thank you. I did want to speak. If I'm being called for a roll call vote and I don't answer, it's probably because my internet connection is unstable. So, swing around again and give me another chance. We heard your vote on this one. Oh, no, I know. But it's been intermittently unstable. So noted. Thank you. Okay, we'll now move on to our regular agenda. And we'll, so we have item 18 is commissioner reports. If there are members of the commission who have announcements or updates for us, now is your opportunity to provide those. Seeing none, I will move on to the director's report. Mr. Preston. Thank you, madam chair and do respect to everybody's time. I'm going to keep it short. I'm just going to make one quick announcement that on February 17th, we will be having a transportation policy workshop meeting at 9 a.m. And the focus will be on the environmental impact reports that are currently being developed for rail projects on our travel, excuse me, travel projects on the Santa Cruz branch rail line from Santa Cruz to Rio del Mar. That concludes my director's report. Thank you, Mr. Preston. Are there questions from commissioners? Okay, I do need to ask if there are any members of the public who would like to comment on the commission, the director's report. I see no hands. So we will move on now to the Caltrans reports. And that is Mr. Eads. I believe you are up. Okay, good morning, chair Brown, members of the commission. Scott Eads here again for Caltrans. Just have a couple of items, I'll keep it quick. First is that Caltrans is providing an incentive and it's expanding to new counties or we're just a few in the state. Now it's expanding to all counties throughout the state for a $250 incentive for adopt a highway volunteers. So if you're cleaning, if you have an adopted section or if you sign up for a new one, every time you clean litter on the side of the highway, it's $250 stipend that comes back to you. And it's broken down in smaller ways like $262 for each ramp, $250 for all ramps if you happen to be doing around an interchange. And there's other locations as well, such as bike paths, park and ride lots and other types of facilities that can qualify as well. You do have to submit as a volunteer information including the date, location, the amount of trash collected and other information when you do to qualify. And if you're interested or others are interested, you can visit cleanca.com for more information. I'm happy to send additional information as well. The thing I wanted to highlight is that there's a new project that just began construction. It's a side hill viaduct extending it to restore a portion of highway nine that was damaged during the 2016, 2017 rain season. Construction is occurring Monday through Friday. So do expect some delays. That's near Brookdale. And then there's intermittent traffic control work on highway nine also that's ongoing for utility work. So that's near the community of Boulder Creek. That's all I have for today. Happy to take any questions. Thank you, Mr. Eads. Are there questions from commissioners? Commissioner Schifrin. I don't really have a question, but I wanted to thank Caltrans for their participation in what's called the North Coast Multi-Agency Working Group, which the county has set up to increase coordination among various entities, public and private regarding the development activities on the North Coast of the county. Of course, the commission's very aware it's a rail trail up there, but there's a whole bunch of things going on and the county set up this working group and got to receive the grant from state parks and the coastal conservancy to do some management and facility planning. At the last meeting, which was a week or so ago, the Caltrans has been participating. I think their participation has been very positive and I wanted to sort of publicly thank them for that willingness to allocate some staff time and support the work of that North Coast Working Group. Thank you. So I don't see any other commissioners hands up. I do see a member of the public. And so I, Ms. Rolfs, this is a Caltrans report and so if you have comments on the Caltrans report, I will call on you. Otherwise, you can leave your hand up if you're interested in the next item or future items. So if you're wanting to speak directly to the Caltrans reports, Ms. Rolfs, go ahead and you are on mute. Okay, thank you. I just wanted to hear again that they're paying people to pick up trash on the road. Are they paying individuals or counties? And how much are they paying them to pick up trash? I'm interested in, he gave a figure, but I didn't hear it clearly. $250. And per what? Per day, per month, per year. So Mr. Eads, if you could provide some additional clarification on that. Yeah, Chair Brown, happy to do that. It's every time that there is a, that you pick up a section of the highway, the way it works is that as a volunteer, you will adopt a section of highway. And once you do that, you'll be given basic materials and some instructions about what's involved in the task. And typically you're committing for a duration of time. And then every time you go out there and clean up, then you would receive a $250 stipend back. And there are some reporting requirements in terms of clarifying what you cleaned up, how much trash you cleaned up and the like. And if you contact Caltrans, there's more information on the website you could look, you could just type in into Google, Caltrans adopt a highway program, and there's information there that'll help you sign up and a local contact person. Thank you, Mr. Eads for the clarification. So I think the point of entry for this is the website, the address that you mentioned, and glad to know that you're bringing the community on board in this effort. Thank you. Okay, we will now move on to item 21. We will be talking, this item is on the Watsonville to Santa Cruz multimodal corridor program update. And Sarah Christensen, our senior transportation engineer, will give us an oral report. Thank you, Chair Brown. And I would like to share a presentation. Let's see if this works. Like it's... You see it. Oh, that's cool. Okay, thank you. I'm Sarah Christensen of your staff today, giving an update on the Watsonville to Santa Cruz multimodal corridor program. This program was a result of a very robust planning effort that the RTC took on, that completed back in 2019. And that was the Unified Corridor Investment Study, or UCS. Okay. So just a little background about the program, the Unified Corridor Study or UCS looked at multimodal transportation improvements between Watsonville and Santa Cruz along three parallel routes, which are SoCal Drive and Freedom Boulevard, Highway One and the Santa Cruz Branch line. The UCS acts as the RTC's multimodal corridor plan, which makes the RTC in our county and any project along... Any project along these three routes eligible for funding? Slide jammer needed. It's probably that pesky called to renew her car insurance. Right. She's taking that phone somewhere on the other side of the planet. You're muted, Sarah. I'm going to reshare my screen. Hopefully this works again. Okay. Off to a rough start here. I apologize for that. So the cycle two project included two projects along Highway One and one project along SoCal Drive. The two projects along Highway One included auxiliary lanes and a bus on shoulder facility. Two bicycle and pedestrian overcrossings, one at Shanaklear Avenue and one at Marvis Drive, as well as the replacement of the Capitola Avenue bridge. The SoCal Drive improvements included about a five mile stretch of multimodal improvements, 23 signals, buffered and protected bike lanes, intersection improvements for bikes and pedestrians, and transit signal prioritization. These are the various modes that we'll see improvements by these projects. So just about every mode, including motorists, transit, bicyclists, pedestrians, there's ADA upgrades, there's crosswalk upgrades. This is a significant investment in multimodal transportation. That's going to really transform this area of the county. So as I mentioned, the Senate Bill One funding, which is going to be a significant investment in multimodal transportation. As I mentioned, the Senate Bill One funding programs, there's two programs that our projects are competitive for, which are the solutions to congested corridor program and local partnership program. Solutions to congested corridors is really focused on multimodal corridor throughput, and the multimodal corridor plan is an essential part of that. So the UCS makes us eligible for those funds. And the partnership program is just, it's a program that is available to self-help counties or counties that have dedicated sales tax measures for transportation. The three projects combined were 150.6 million. The grant award that we received from Senate Bill One, solutions to congested corridors and local partnership, was a total of $107.2 million. What I'd like to highlight is the level of local investment that was made. It was a very significant local investment made by this commission and by the County of Santa Cruz. This was a total of $43.4 million. That was a measure D funds. That also includes the STIP funds, state transportation improvement program funds that were programmed to the Highway One projects. That includes County funds that they put forward to pay for the pre-construction and the local match for construction for the Soquel Drive project. So I'm going to go through a quick update on the Soquel Drive project. This project is between La Fonda Avenue and Santa Cruz, all the way to State Park Drive and Aptos. There's 23 signals that will be upgraded. There are VA ramps. I think close to that will be made along Soquel Drive. The figure on the left is a buffered protected bike lane with a sidewalk. The photo on the right is a flashing beacon. There are two public workshops. The schedule for the project. They're in the final design phase. Actually just went through a process of getting community input on the design. There were two public workshops that happened last month. And they were very well attended with more than 50 community members and attendants. They plan on having one more round of community input prior to the final design. So I'm going to go through a quick update on the project. The project is scheduled for later this year. On to the Highway 1 projects. The Cycle 2 project included Phase 1 and Phase 2 of the Highway program. There's currently three projects under development. The first two projects of which are fully funded and part of this update today. The project improvements include the addition of auxiliary lanes on the outside. The second project is the facility and the bottom figure is the improved facility. You can see the auxiliary lanes on the outside and most of the widening being done in the median. A huge part of the project will be a replacement of this old capital avenue over crossing. This bridge has very narrow spans and low vertical clearance. The second project includes the bridge with the longer span bridge. Standard vertical clearance. And the project development team for this project. Has proposed to make this bridge a community identifier for the city of Capitola. That's really exciting because it gives us an opportunity to really showcase on both sides of the bridge. You know, signifying Capitola as a city. There's options for aesthetic features. If you take out your phone and open your camera. You can scan the QR code there that will take you to a video. And a survey and you can give your opinion on what types of aesthetic features you'd like to see. On that new capital avenue over crossing. We are soliciting input on those aesthetic features. And we are also soliciting input. Through February 23rd. So please participate. It would be great to get your input. And lastly, the Mar Vista bicycle pedestrian bridge. This bridge will be. Connecting the south and north side of highway one. There will be intersection upgrades at the McGregor and Mar Vista drive intersection. As you could see in this figure. It's going to be great for both bicyclists and pedestrians to use. The schedules for the two highway one projects, the so Cal, the 41st project. We wrapped up final design and have handed the package over to Caltrans Caltrans will be the implementing agency for the construction phase of the project. Instruction is expected to begin later this year. The second project, which is between Bay Porter and State Park Drive. We hit the 95% final design milestone just late last year. And we are working on wrapping up the final design and right of way phases. By the end of the calendar year. And we anticipate construction to begin in 2023. Now I'd like to talk a little bit about the upcoming grant cycle. As I mentioned, these competitive funds are available in two year cycles. Staff has been working very, very hard on putting together a package of projects. That would be competitive for this next cycle of funds. Currently, the cycle three project includes additional improvements on so Cal drive south of State Park Drive. So the improvements include between State Park Drive and Freedom Boulevard on so Cal drive. Very similar improvements to the cycle two project. So that includes transit priority at signals, awkward and protected bike lanes, sidewalk gap closures, ADA ramps, crosswalks and rapid flashing beacons. The highway one project will be that third and final segment of the auxiliary lanes and bus on shoulder facility. We also are working with Metro staff to include in our grant application for zero emission buses for the purpose of Metro's cross county routes to use that bus on shoulder facility and make the 91 X more attractive for folks taking the 91 X from Watsonville to Santa Cruz. And finally, the coastal rail trail. The project will include the one and a quarter miles of coastal rail trail along the branch line. There will be new crosswalks and flashing beacons at all of the great intersections. This project has a lot of bridges. There's two bridges over highway one. There's two bridges also over so Cal drive, up top creek and blood sea creek. So this project is really going to transform the area. If you remember the optos strangler, this project will address the optos strangler and really provide multimodal improvements that will be beneficial to the optos area as well as regionally. So here's that last segment is just the one and three quarter mile segment of highway one. You can see the two bridges over the highway. This is just the highway one improvements. Here's a map on the larger map of the three corridors. So you can see where our cycle two project completed. And then cycle three will bring us all the way to Freedom Boulevard. The cycle three project includes, as I mentioned, some zero emission buses for Metro. We're also looking at including transit stop upgrades for the Metro 91 X route. Here's another map. Just want to show off our fancy graphics here about cycle three project. We've been working very, very hard with staff from the county of Santa Cruz public works. Thank you, county. Thank you, Metro staff, as well as Caltrans. This project has been nominated to Caltrans headquarters for consideration to be included as a partnered application between RTC and Caltrans. We're patiently awaiting the results of that. So next steps for the cycle three project. We're going to continue to develop these projects. County is developing the project of so called drive. We're working with Metro on the other transit elements. And of course, the highway one and segment 12 rail trail project are continuing to be developed. Complete the sequel analysis. This is required to be eligible for these funds. We're going to continue to do outreach to the community and just make sure that we are taking it in as much input as possible for these multimodal corridor projects. We'll be bringing some information back to the commission. As I mentioned for cycle two, there was a significant local investment and we anticipate the same. If not more local investment. For this next round to make us as competitive as possible for these funds. And with that, staff will be recommending the programming of measure D funds as a match for construction. That concludes my presentation. On the update for the Watsonville to Santa Cruz multimodal corridor program. I will stop sharing my screen so I could take your questions. Thank you. Chair Brown. Thank you, Ms. Christensen. It looks like. Commissioner McPherson has a question or hand up. And then. Yeah. I just want to thank Ms. Christensen and the RRTC staff for putting this together and being very aggressive and getting these funds. It's highly competitive. And once again to thank the people by more than two thirds who approved measure D. We would not be in this. This arena without being a so-called self help county. These are highly competitive. Grant opportunities for us. But it is going to result in a safer, more inclusive and more efficient transit. Network for our county. I really appreciate going back to 2016 when voters approved measure D that we're able to do these projects. It's going to make for a better transportation system in Santa Cruz County. Okay. Commissioner Bertrand. You are next. And then commissioner Rock and I see your hand. Okay. Thank you very much, chair. And Sarah, thank you very much for the great presentation. I love the graphics. It helped me quite a bit actually. And, you know, I'm almost going to have to take a copy to walk the segments to see, you know, how different colors change for, you know, what you're actually identifying there. I do have a question. I hope you don't mind. So the, the brief segment from the park avenue interchange, you know, from the capital aside, leading to so Cal drive. So are any bike improvements anticipated for that? I think it's like two blocks or three blocks length. And the reason why I bring it up is because a lot of new Brighton school students take that path. And I noticed that coming up Monterey Avenue, I think the name changes after it goes underneath the freeway. On the capitol side, we have a four foot bike lane. And then you could go up Monterey Avenue, which doesn't have a bike lane, but there's a sheriff's. So. So that's a long line. Excuse me. Is that a long. Yeah. Well, I think the name changes after it goes underneath the freeway. On the capital aside, we have a four foot bike lane. And then you could go up Monterey Avenue, which doesn't have a bike lane, but. There's a sheriff's. So the students know they have the right of way to do that. But from so cal drive to, you know, going underneath the freeway and then coming either to. Kennedy or to go continue on Monterey. Excuse me on Park Avenue. I was just wondering about that segment. Is there anything planted? It's kind of a narrow road, not much parking and not sure the bike lanes the best. That's all. You can answer later. This is, I know a lot of students use that route. So. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. It's not included in this package of projects, but I could look into that and. Work with your city public work staff to, to see what's playing there. Yeah. Well, it's in the county. It's not, you wouldn't talk to Steve in this case. But okay. Thank you. Okay. To be continued. So commissioner rock and you had your hand up. I'll call on you next and then back to. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I just wanted to echo Bruce McPherson's comments. Our staff always do excellent presentations, but this was above and beyond it. The use of graphics and the ability. I mean, it's one of the virtues, I guess, the virtual meetings that you can do such wonderful graphics. And they're so accessible. And this was really a fantastic job. Thank you, sir. That's it. Thank you. Mr. Koenig. Thank you, chair. I want to echo the appreciation. And I just want to say that I'm really excited to see that we're thinking about the highway as our sustainable transit corridor. I mean, and the inclusion of the four zero emissions buses really, really emphasizes that. You know, we've heard a lot during public comment about the need to an urgency of addressing the climate crisis. And you know, what I see in this presentation is, is that, that's what we're trying to do here with these, with this project. We have a lot of people in the city that are working with us. We have a lot of people in the county on the highway. One and so Cal drive. And so deep thanks for that. Quick question was just, you know, kind of the math around the, what we've, what we've received grant funding so far. And what we've had put up in terms of local match. It seems like we've put up about 30% of the funds. Is that what we would expect going forward? And is there any estimates of what phase three of the highway is going to be? Right. Between the pre-construction, which is the environmental design. And the construction match. It is about a 30%. We, as a rule of thumb. 20%. Local match is probably the baseline of being competitive. And so what we're going to do with that is just going to make us more competitive. And the highway one and segment 12 project is a. Expensive project. As you probably realize, there's many bridges involved. And. We're widening the aptos. Creek bridge. Of highway one. That's a significant cost as well as the, the cost of the highway. And. Additional information will be. Brought to the commission at the TPW later this month. We are still working on estimates. Right now. They have gone down a bit since. The last time we. I suppose we, we went through a couple of iterations with our commission. We've sharpened our pencils and we've made some great improvements to the estimates. They're still preliminary. And so we'll be presenting some information with some disclaimers that they, you know, the estimates are preliminary construction costs are constantly changing. And it's our job as staff to keep up on those. Changes and do our best to. Estimate these costs. And. Thank you. Thank you for receiving that information. Just the understanding that the more local match we provide, the more competitive we are as helpful as well. Thanks. Thank you. So Mr. Eads and Mr. Preston, it looks like you both have your hands up. And I wanted to check before we move on to the next. Questions and comments. If you wanted to. If you wanted to. Robert Queen also. Yes, I see commissioners with additional questions. I'm just asking if Mr. Preston or Mr. Eads, you want to respond to the prior question from commissioner Konig or. Previous. Okay. So we'll. Yes, you do. Yes, I do. And then we'll go back to into the queue. So I just wanted to note that last cycle when we received $107 million. The only county that received more than us was Los Angeles. We did extremely well. That was a very high amount to receive. For a county of our size. And. We are. Very positive with the feedback that we've gotten from the California transportation commission and Caltrans about the possibilities. But the funding is not limitless. And we're going to have to be very careful. So we're going to have to be very careful. And so I really think that is a. I think that is a good point. As to how we package this. That Caltrans does. Value. The CTC does evaluate these projects. On a cost-benefit. Ratio. So they're, they're looking at. Both the improvements in the costs. So. Depending on how we package these, we may have to come up with more match. months. Thank you. Okay, Commissioner Quinn, you're Oh, thank you. Thank you, Sarah. And thank you, Chairman Brown, Sarah and team. Thank you very much. Really pragmatic and practical. One question I need clarification on as a frequent victim of the Aptos Strangler. Can you speak to the sequencing on SoCal and Highway one? Because if they happen concurrently, I'll be swimming to work. So I'll I'm going to interject just for a second. They are going to be under construction at the same time. But I want people to realize that Caltrans is very particular about when they will allow lane closures on Highway one. Highway one lane closures will not be permitted during commute hours. They probably will be restricted to evening hours only. So both lanes will be open when the majority of people are traveling. So even though both projects will be under construction at the same time, I don't necessarily think that that's going to make it any any worse than it already is. Thank you. I'll just add that we are aware of this upcoming potential challenge and staff from county public works as well as RTC, Caltrans. We are going to be putting together a public information campaign. Another piece of it is it goes all the way into the city of Santa Cruz. And so we're working with city Santa Cruz as well for the Murray Street Bridge. That may overlap as well. And staff is going to be putting together a robust public information strategy. Make sure that we are alerting motorists and bicyclists and pedestrian of all of the construction activities. So that is in the works as well. Thank you. Okay. Commissioner Schifrin. I think Mr. Ede had his hand up before me and I thought you were going to call on him. I was. I'm just I'm sorry about that. I'm just going through the order in which the emoji hands are listed on my participants screen. But so I'll kick it to you, Mr. Ede. And then we'll come back to you. Commissioner Schifrin. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Chair Brown. I just wanted just to highlight the fact that appreciate the Commission staff and others partnering with us. Caltrans had a kind of an early deadline for submittal of this nomination. And so I think we drove the process in terms of timing. But the work that the RTC staff did as well as the Caltrans and others that were involved really worked as a solid team and prepared a lot of great information to go into the nomination. It was just submitted last week, actually this week, earlier this week, and just appreciate all the work that went into this and where we remain hopeful that we'll be successful in this joint application. But thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Schifrin. Thank you. For me, I mean, I certainly share the appreciation of how successful staff has been in achieving, obtaining the funds for the projects. And they, you know, it is a real accomplishment. And while this next round seems very ambitious, the Commission staff has been very successful in the past. And listening to the presentation, though, I was reminded that the reference to the Unified Corridor study, really, that study was mostly about the rail corridor. And we're not doing any, we're not going after any funds for rail corridor improvements. And I've, you know, been, I've raised this concern with staff. And I know there's a concern about the lack of competitiveness for freight funding or upgrading their tracks for freight. But there is a commitment by the Commission that rail is a preferred alternative as a result of the of the TCAA that public transit on the rail line was unanimously approved as a preferred alternative with the Unified Corridor study. I would like to urge that for the next round, the staff really start to think about what it would take to get some significant state funding for making improvements for the potential of passenger rail service. It may require the higher levels of local match. But as we've seen with many, with some of the rail trail segments, there is funding from other groups that could be brought to bear. And I think we need a strategy to move forward with with the potential for passenger rail on the line, besides just saying that it isn't competitive. So these funds could be used. I think what we need is a staff commitment and a commission commitment to get some funding to move forward with Commission's commitment to public transit on the rail line. Thank you, Commissioner Schifrin. I'll just use my prerogative as chair to echo that sentiment without repeating it. It looks like Mr. Preston, you have a response. And then we'll I'll call on you, Commissioner or Mr. Hearst acting as commissioner. I'm not sure. Yes, got it. Okay. Thanks, Mr. Preston. I definitely hear the desire for Commissioner Schifrin to look to these programs for the possibility of passing your rail. One of the requirements to be able to apply for funding under these programs is that you have a completed environmental impact report. We do not have an environmental impact report for passenger rail. And the very small location of this project only includes about a mile of the rail line for which we are proposing to include the trial project, which will be environmentally clear. We would not be eligible to apply for these funds for passenger rail until we have a completed EIR. And that EIR would have to have with a independent utility and logical termini. We proposed a commuter rail project that goes from, you know, Watsonville to Santa Cruz is much larger than this project. But it is something that in the future we could look to for solutions to congested corridor. But before we could do so, we would need to environmentally clear the project. Before we break on Commissioner Schifrin, did you want to ask a follow-up question or respond? Well, I certainly, I mean, I hear what the effective director is saying, and I think it would be useful for the commission to receive a report on how much it would cost and what are the potential funding sources for the necessary environmental impact report. I can understand why it would be necessary. And I think it's entirely consistent with previous commission actions to prepare that report. That would then make the commission put the commission in a place where it could be eligible for funding to upgrade the line. So I would ask that Steve come back at a meeting soon with a report on what, how much it would cost and what are the potential funding sources for an environmental impact report as mentioned by the executive director. Okay, thank you for that. I'll just, I'll echo that request and perhaps we can work offline to get that get something prepared to bring to the commission or an FYI at a minimum. And I think we can do that without taking any official action here. So I will now call on Commissioner Hearst, patiently waiting. You're up. Well, thank you very much, Chair. You know, I am patient because I was first elected in 1989. And I followed these issues pretty closely on and off since then. I just wanted to echo and support Commissioner Sheprin's thoughts and ideas and yours as well. Let's get Watsonville moving and let's get the whole county moving, but let's don't forget Watsonville and certainly our need for freight taking all these semi trucks off of highway one or not all of them, but certainly some of them and making sure that we can get our workforce to work. You know, every morning it's jammed up going to Santa Cruz. Every evening it's jammed up coming home. I think we can do better. And I want to appreciate and express my appreciation to staff for their grant writing abilities and their futuristic look. And let's get these EIRs done. Let's get the whole county moving. We've got a great big economy at stake. And I just want to reiterate the need for equity and Watsonville and our ability to get our workforce to work and get cargo moving. Thank you very much. Thank you. Okay, I do not see any other hands up from commissioners. So we will take it out to the public. And we are going to stick with our two minutes here for our speakers and Brian trail. Now you are up. Thank you. Multimodal corridor. Hey, yeah, this is Brian from trail now. Phenomenal work, Sarah, phenomenal work. Guy Preston, you've really driven this organization to new level. You're doing great work, bringing in the money, designing transportation systems that work. And the reason we know they work is because you're getting the funding. That's why we know when the when you receive funding from the states, we know that I want to remind you that we have three main corridors, highway one, so Cal coastal corridor. It's absolutely critical that we open up the coastal core trip, Santa Cruz coastal trail before the construction begins. As Sarah mentioned, Murray Bridge by the harbor is also going to be under construction. It's going to be a terrible situation for our community. This is why it's so critical that we do the interim coastal trail that guy Preston has been promoting and will be having a meeting on on February 17 to continue to drive us in that direction. We really need to open the coastal corridor. And then finally, I like the comment about the the request for an EIR on a train. You know, staff is already at their limits. Where are we going? It's it's we don't have they don't have the time to keep doing studies to keep doing analysis there. What Sarah presented today is exactly what we need them to do. Execute on design and and getting the money and going forth. Let's start listening to guide Preston more and and and striving in the direction we're going. Great work. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Peoples. Next up, we have Judy Giddelson. Hey, good afternoon. Good morning, commissioners. Sarah, I have a question directed to you and maybe I had the answers from Andy Schifrin. But when your first slide came up and then you took the phone call, you said their plan multimodal improvements, they were three sections. Highway one, the rail corridor and so kill freedom. And as Andy Schifrin said, I didn't see a spit about the rail corridor. And as you have a huge audience today, all invested in the rail corridor, I believe the rail corridor, both the EIR and the improvements should be top of mind with that. That is number two, or is the orange line in your first map that I think deserves at least a third of the funds allocated. And we all know that more is available through the current Biden plan. So I just want to say the public is here today. We know that they're watching and I think Andy Schifrin said it right that that should be top of your presentation. And as I said earlier, I believe the RTC's job is to make transportation available for all of us. And as rail being neglected, I'm just astounded as a citizen that it was not in one of those first two, I think you ought to redraft this proposal and put the rail at the top of that as it has the largest potential future impact on the most citizenry and improvement. And I appreciate Andy Schifrin and I appreciate little Hearst for bringing that out and the rest of you commissioners, please let known that there are citizens who are watching your behavior and that it's your job to bring transportation to the public. Thank you. Okay, next up, we have Trink Praxel as Praxel, you're on. Okay, can you hear me? We can. Okay, great. I just I want to just briefly support what Judy said and what Commissioner Schifrin said and others that I'm appalled that in a multimodal corridor study, there is no mention whatsoever of the rail. And you also in this meeting heard previously a couple of local business people saying that freight is a growing business for them freight rail. I think it's time we begin to finish that create that EIR and put some focus back on fundraising, especially now with the new federal infrastructure funds coming in on the rail, both passenger and freight. And in fact, that ends, I'd like to end with a question on why the rail overpasses on the in the Aftos area are not mentioned here. And what happens and does that assume if they're not created a trail? Is it just assuming that that we are in fact going to rail bank this line for freight? And perhaps someone could answer that question for me. Thank you very much. Thank you, Ms. Praxel will I'll keep note of the questions that come up during comments and we'll come back around to those after the public has spoken. Hands are going up. Continuing to go up. So we'll stick with two minutes for now. But I just want to remind everybody we have two big items up next. And so I'll call on Mr. Scott next. And you'll have two minutes on the multimodal corridor. Okay, thank you. I I think the staff for for the presentation, I wish there had been some public notice that changes were being made to the nature of the crossing of the rail line in Aftos. I'm looking at the project fact sheet that shows the picture of the plan of record for a new dedicated bike and pedestrian bridge and new longer rail bridges, which are absolutely required. There's no there's no justifying not keeping this rail line. There's no justifying widening the highway for motor vehicles with climate climate change before us and not replacing those rail bridges. It's it's unacceptable. I'm hearing the executive director mentioned the need to we haven't done an environmental there's a need to environmentally clear project. Well, then my question is, when are you going to do that? I mean, that's simple. You need something, then do it. If you can't get funding without an environmental clearance, then by all means go and get the environmental clearance. I think missioner Schifrin and Hearst for their their comments. And I find it just unbelievable that we are moving in this direction of ignoring the rail line. We're ignoring the unified quarter investment study. We're ignoring measure D. We're ignoring the transit quarter alternatives analysis. And with all of the there's this piling up of evidence that the rail line is the right thing to do and we're looking at destroying it. So please do the work that's required to stick with the Monterey Bay Sanctuary seating rail with trail plan and pursue whatever it takes to get our rail line fixed and useful. Bye. Thank you, Mr. Scott. I will call next on Marion Malatesta. Thank you. This is my first RTC meeting and it's been really enjoyable. I have three comments. One is a hopefully I didn't see a link to Sarah's presentation. So maybe that can go up afterwards with the minutes. I don't know if that usually happens. A comment on other than I've been living in Santa Cruz since 1980, my family's been coming here since the 20s, but I lived in Boston during the big day and, you know, talk about, you know, lots of construction going on for a while. I'd be happy to see it happen all at once and just get it over with first to strain it out for years and years. And when thinking about widening the freeway, I also think, you know, and if I'm looking in 25 years down the road, I think there's going to be a lot of autonomous kind of small vehicles that can use that space to get around because I don't think cars are going away as much as we'd like to all be riding bikes and have a public transportation. So those are my three comments. Thank you, Ms. Malatesta, for your participation and for your comments. Michael St. It's your turn. Thank you, Chair Brown. Just a few couple of comments. Sarah, that's a wonderful presentation. I really love the graphics involved. And I think all the biking and pedestrian improvements are excellent. No issues with any of that. Of course, as you all know, my issue is with highway widening. And I don't know if you all got the same impression I got and open public communications and issue oral. There was a lot of comments about not widening highways and supporting car use, and mainly due to the terrible result of climate change, much more than I've heard before. And I do hear new people coming on. So that's all positive for us advocates. Sarah, I have one question. Maybe this is for Director Preston. On these capital overpass as well as the bike and pedestrian overpasses, how long are those going to be? In other words, going to be long enough over the highway to be able to do the tier two project of the ox lanes, or are we going to go even further to support the tier one widening, which eventually gets up to eight lanes, which is ridiculous. But I just that's my question. Are you going to make these things wide enough to your one project, which is down in the future? Thank you for your time. Thank you, Mr. St. I'm and I will I've recorded your question. Okay, next up we have Lonnie Faulkner. Hi, thank you, Chair Brown. I just want to reiterate and appreciate Commissioner Schifrin, you Commissioner Brown and Commissioner Hurst for your input about the rail. Recently, I was attending a Department of Transportation Federal Rail Road Association grant preparation workshop for these large amounts of funds that are coming available. And they were very, very clear. This is the direction that our country is going rail. This is the direction that the the globe is going rail. This is the direction that the state is going rail. Yes, of course, cars will not completely go away. But considering how toxic cars are even e cars have a level of toxicity and requirements that hit on our environment that are significant, we need to do everything we can to support public transportation. That means more e buses. And that certainly means investing in rail. Now, one of the things that was reiterated over and over again at the DOT FRA meeting, was that communities need to do the pre work in order to prepare for these grants. And we're not even setting up to do the pre work, we're sitting on our hands. When I say we, I'm going to actually point this towards certain people in the RTC are sitting on their hands and not even doing the pre pre work that we should be doing that allows us to actually go to the next step of doing pre work, and then applying for these grants that are only available for 60 to 90 days and will only be available in the entirety for about a five year period. This is just disgusting, quite frankly, that the majority of the population, the global directives, the state and national directives are being completely ignored. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, next up. Todd Marco, your turn. Hi, this is Todd Marco, Executive Director of Mancine Rio Gateway in Aftos, the future of our county's three primary transportation corridors is bright thanks to all of your efforts. These three corridors converge in Aftos as the frightening Aftos Strangler. What is now a transportation bottleneck is envisioned by energy as a transportation hub. The three corridors fanning out from Aftos Village extend across Santa Cruz County. Solving the choke point problem will position Aftos as a center point for the county, equally accessible for Santa Cruz city residents and Watsonville city residents and all others in between. Furthermore, and critically, it will increase accessibility to the Redwoods and C for all residents via all transportation modes, whether private vehicle or public transit or bicycle or e bike or walking or running or strolling in a wheelchair or pushing a stroller, everyone, no matter where you're from or where they live, should be able to travel freely through our incredible county. Thank you. Thank you. Elaine Ralfs. It's your turn. Thank you. I just wanted to thank Commissioner Schifrin and hers for their words that they were saying in in support of getting getting the rail going. So keep on keeping on. Thank you. Thank you. Linda Wills Houston, you're up. Thank you, Madam Chair. I have one clarification. I'd like to have asked about and that's about the joint application with Caltrans and the RTC. It's not clear to me what project or projects are included in this joint application that was already submitted. And I'd appreciate that. And secondly, I just like to remind everyone or note that Measure D that we voted on in 2016 did not include the new Highway 1 widening segment that's under discussion. And I think if it had and if people had had a chance to vote on this, I think they might have been concerned and that actually the outcome of Measure D might have been different given some of the shenanigans with this project that are going on right now. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, we have Jack Brown. You are up. And I was about to say last speaker, but we're hands are continuing. So Jack Brown, you're up and you have two minutes. I thank you, Commissioner Brown. I'll try to be quick so we can move forward. Just wanted to say thank you, Sir. Christensen for the great presentation. It's great to see everything moving in the right direction. And although, you know, Schifrin, Commissioner Brown and Hearst are pushing towards going more into rail study and we're getting some kind of emotional responses from others on the rail side, it's probably not really a good time to be starting this. The Yes Screenway initiative will be on the ballot in June. And hopefully later in the conversation today we'll be striking the rock and propositions because I don't think we should be spending a million dollars on measure D funds on something like this. But I think let's wait until after the election's over and see where the people really want to go. This is the first time we've directly voted on what to do with the corridor. And from that, then it makes sense to say what are the actions that are required for environmental reports and what we're going to do. So please proceed that way. Thank you. Thank you. So next up, Sally for rail and trail. Thank you. So I have a couple of clarifying questions because I just think we must be misunderstanding this situation. So if I heard it correctly, there are not yet accurate estimates and no funding yet identified for widening this highway, South of State Park Drive and all those bridges and everything. And part of and the rail bridges have just been omitted, just like okay forget it, we're just by executive fee deciding we're not doing rail. And then it's but it's still this project is on the constrained list on the RTP and is whereas rail as I recall from the TCAA has about 50 percent of the funding identified and is on the unconstrained list. And then there's all these questions about the FRA grants that was raised by an earlier speaker and perhaps the staff is doing a bunch of work to prepare for those and we just don't know about it. And so on your list of questions that you're making there, Chair Brown, I would love to have those things addressed because this is rather alarming and perhaps we're alarmed for no reason. Perhaps we misunderstand this situation. So I'm looking forward to some clarification. Thank you. Thank you Ms. Arnold's and we have one more hand up and and after this we I'll close our public comment. That would be Tina Andreada. You have two minutes. Hi good afternoon or good morning. I just want to thank Commissioner Hurston Schifrin and also thank Linda Wilhilsen for bringing up Measure D. I support the Coastal Rail Trail project. The county supports it. Watsonville supports it. Felton supports it. And just move forward and let's stop with what's going forward with the planet. Thank you. Thank you Ms. Andreada. I'm gonna let's see. We have one additional hand. I am going to there and here they come. So okay we've got a couple more people who would like to speak. Please speak directly to the multimodal corridor projects update. And Sean you are up next. So let's talk about what is the about which is the correct use for this multi-use corridor. Nobody is I haven't heard anybody mention evacuations. Well a lot of us were feeding firefighters and answering the increased number of domestic violence calls and clothing the children of the coastal farm working families and driving up food from the valley and you know parking next to the FEMA trailer at the Boulder Creek Recreational Center. Well some of us were doing that. Our members on this commission working to tank the use of the rail corridor on the coast. We're all you know a lot of people are going to need that to get out. Not a single one of you has talked about emergency evacuations and the fires. How much harder do nonprofits and first responders have to work year after year to keep us safe when Santa Cruz doesn't want to take care of itself. You know a lot of us are Santa Cruz strong. You know you all are independent yet you don't want to spend the money to take care of yourselves. And it's valley you know in between you know valley go home summers. That's who's up here donating and working hard and providing services and evacuating people. Thank you Sean. Okay Henry Hooker it's your turn and this will be our last speaker. I'm going to close public comment on this item after the speaker. Go for it Mr. Hooker. Thank you for taking my comments. I will not take a long amount of time to say what I have to say which is that I'm a new listener to RTC meetings and I just wanted to share the outrage that I feel that the RTC is not moving forward in a realistic way on the rail. This is the future of our planet. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Hooker. I'm going to now bring it back to the commission for any final comments. This is not an action item but we do have a couple of questions that I wanted to make sure we got a little bit of response to so maybe we'll all start there and if there are other commissioners who want to follow up we'll give you the opportunity. So the first I think is an easy one. Somebody requested a link to the presentation. Can we can staff make that happen via our website so people can actually see these wonderful slides? Yes ma'am sure we will make sure we provide to the application and it'll be on the highway program website. Great thank you and then I think a series of questions asking for some form of clarification around what is in the so I guess first I'll start with the overpass questions and measure the clarification about the inclusion of the overpasses and their role and measure D's role in that is one and then clarification on the intention around the width of those overpasses for tier one bus on shoulder tier two bus on shoulder or the tier one if you could just talk respond a little bit to those and then we'll move on to the question of rail in the overall. Thanks. Yeah so the question I believe was about the length of the spans of the bridges. Yeah so those bridges will not preclude the future vision for the highway 1 corridor which is the HOV lanes so it will put the abutments at the location where that bridge would not have to be reconstructed if the highway were to be widened in the future so for the bicycle pedestrian overcrossings I believe the landings are almost outside completely outside of the Caltrans right away and then the Capitola Avenue overcrossing the abutments are within the right away but the width underneath is going to basically not preclude those future improvements. And then as for the the bridge structures that the train uses I want to assure the commissioners and members of the that our environmental impact report will include the replacement of those rail bridges they're currently not long enough to accommodate the additional width of the freeway. There will be options provided to the commissioners you know we talk a lot about the project and you know constraints and whatnot but no decisions have been made we are still working through that and trying to figure out the best way of moving forward. We have been working with Caltrans to try to come up with a package to nominate but the application to the CTC is not due until December of this year so we have some time to figure that out. Right now we're just looking at the project features which includes auxiliary lanes, bus and shoulder improvements, the trail and the improvements to Sotel Drive and the bus purchases. We you know I stated earlier we cannot include a project for a new train service simply because we don't have an environmental impact report. The cost of the environmental impact report was fully disclosed in the TCAA study and we did come up with a plan as to how we could move forward with a training project but that would be a future project for commuter rail and would not be eligible for this application. I hope that helps answers finish answering that the first two questions that you asked. Thank you so another question was maybe to get a little bit more clarification on the components the specific projects in this joint application with Caltrans. I think I have a pretty clear sense but if you and but others might want to just get that laid out and and like an overview of what the projects are kind of in within the categories. Sure so I think the question was what project was just nominated to Caltrans headquarters for consideration of a joint application. So Caltrans has yeah so that's the that's the clarification I think that's needed. Caltrans actually has a process where on a statewide basis there are multimodal projects that are chosen to be nominated to Caltrans headquarters and Caltrans headquarters makes a decision whether to partner on an application and Mr. Eads can provide further clarification if I'm not correctly describing the Caltrans process but the cycle three project you know the question was what project was nominated and it was that final set of auxiliary lengths and bus on shoulder improvements and the segment 12 trail project as well so that the package also includes the so-called drive improvements and I could bring up a map if that would be helpful to show the improvements again but sir Mr. Eads if you had anything you wanted to add and Ms. Christensen if you want to pull that up and just show the map I think it you know where we are pressed for time but I think it would be helpful thank you Madam Chair I don't have anything to add beyond the description that Sarah has already provided so all if she wants to go back over that that's probably the best way to go okay thanks the cycle three project is between state park drive and freedom boulevard on highway one as well as on so-called drive and the segment 12 which is a mile and a quarter of the Santa Cruz branch rail line coastal rail trail and that let's see another map showing a zoomed-in version this is the current phase three highway project and in addition to that there are some Watsonville transit improvements that are being proposed as well with the zero admission buses that was a project that was nominated that I think it was sent up to headquarters on Monday hopefully that answers the question thank you yes that was that was helpful and thank you for the reminding me nomination for application okay um I think those were uh the questions I guess um the the other question was you know some clarification about um our ability under measure D to um come to include those projects with her measure D funding and so I am not I think people may continue to have questions about that so if there's anything else staff would like to share before I take it back to commissioners for follow-up um I'll just add that um measure D brings in about it's going up about 26 million a year for um our expenditure plan 25 percent for the highway the highway includes um uh pedestrian and bicycle over crossings we are hopeful that we will be able to have and find enough match money available we've already used quite a bit on our cycle two project but as Sarah mentioned in her report there we may have options to bring some of that money forward we bring it in over 30 years so we don't have it all at once and so we do plan on providing some more information on potential bonding or financing off the future revenue to come up with that match this is a complicated study and concept of how to bring as many improvements to the county as soon as possible and so we'll be providing the commissioners who are decision makers with options moving forward so that you can make the best choice possible okay um so we do have commissioners who uh would like to speak and I'm going to go in order here commissioner shifrin then uh Hernandez and then commissioner rock and I do see your hand and so noted commissioner shifrin thank you I wanted to thank the member of greenway who testified on this item because I think he really identified the essence of the issue that's before the commission if green if the argument that was presented as I understood it is that if the initiative passes and greenway is approved then it makes no sense to go forward with uh EIR on the potential of rail because there can be no rail and I think that is certainly what the greenway supporters want because greenway will require the removal of the rail tracks and so while greenway is in effect and if you believe that that isn't forever um I'm not sure on what basis that comes from essentially what if if we want to move forward with rail as the commission has indicated before we need to move forward with rail but we need to move forward with it in the recognition of the context that if greenway um if the commission decides to try to move forward with greenway what the greenway supporters want is essentially to rip up the railroad tracks and that's what it comes down to um and I think that unfortunately um it is I support staff's contention and that the projects that are moving forward with are consistent with measure D they um that's been very successful and may well be successful with the the next application there is certainly the potential of having um a good improvement to the rail trail projects segments as a result of that but I think it's also true that we need to start being more serious about seeking funds for rail public transit on the line and I hope that there'll be a willingness of the commission as a whole to do so irrespective of um the fact that the initiative is moving forward I don't think it really is clear one way or the other but I appreciate the advocate for the greenway making it clear that from the greenway point of view um it's bringing it forward means that rail road there will not be there will be no possibility of rail service on the corridor hey uh commissioner Hernandez I before I call on you I just want to say that um in just you know respecting the a comment that was made at oral communications about being clear about who is present for what in under in what role um on our webinar or um uh meeting today uh I believe that commissioner Hernandez you are you are filling in now that Mr. Caput has had to leave and so you are acting in that role as commission alternate is that correct and I think you're muted correct yes okay I just wanted to be so the public is it is hard I sometimes I'm not sure so I just want to make sure we're all clear um and I will call on you commissioner Hernandez uh for comment questions etc yeah so you know I also just wanted to uh thank commission to Schifford and Hearst for their comments and that I'm in full agreement with you know this is really about you know equity equity for the county equity for south county you know it's about our environment and keeping the rail line it's about you know reducing greenhouse gases and reducing vehicle miles traveled and it's about our economy you know we need to preserve the rail line and restore the bridges for rail because number one we need to preserve freight number two south county is the backbone workforce for the county uh not just the county but Santa Cruz as well for the tourist economy for the re for retail sales the restaurant industry and you know we need to preserve that as well our local economy so we need to analyze this take funds and we need to protect and preserve the rail line and take the necessary steps to do that as well um you know like I said this is about equity throughout the county and being responsible stewards for our environment and our local economy that's it thank you commissioner rock can you're up next thank you for first um in terms of identifying ourselves there's a procedure on the zoom calls where you can rename yourself and I would suggest not now but for future meetings that the commissioners all put in front of their name c o m m or something brief so it has space to fit on the bottom there along with their name and the alternatives have alt commission alt com or something so that might be an easy because the staff can't make that happen I don't think so easily because we name ourselves or our computers name us I have to change mine to mike from Michael every time so that might be something just a short suggestion maybe staff could think about that and send out a memo suggesting a way to fix that problem um my comment um I need to be corrected if I'm wrong but I I think we had proposed in front of the commission a business plan that um failed on a six six vote that business plan included within it a 30% engineering design and an eir on that 30% uh design that would have been the eir work necessary to be applying you don't have to I don't think believe more than correct me again if any of these things are wrong that we don't need to do more than a 30% design of the rail in order to have the environmental work done necessary to apply for these state funds that we're talking about and other funds that we're talking about at the conclusion of that our executive director guy Preston said that although you know it didn't pass but it also it wasn't as if there's a clear majority where the logger heads at a six six so the business plan was not approved the staff did not get to work on the 30% engineering design which you know cost money and so forth sort of I think waiting for some clarification of where the commission wants to go again any of these things I'm saying please correct me if I'm not understanding this however when asked directly guy Preston said that didn't mean the staff weren't still looking at the issue of where they might get rail funding in the future and so forth we had that in a public meeting an announcement about it now there's been some suggestion that that you know the commission hasn't certainly given clear again the six six folks not clear priority the critical that we get going on the the IR work on the rail but there also is not a clear rejection of that the commission didn't say stop we don't want rail we want to move to a trail now people are suggesting that we'll have a vote I'll say most of my comments on this for a later item on our agenda but that there's that we're going to have a vote that might clarify where the commission wants to go on this or maybe the public vote would change somebody's mind about might change mine I'll say that on where we want to go depending on what happens in that vote this June um do I understand correctly the situation that we're in and I guess I want to ask guy again our executive director guy Preston whether in fact the staff's in a position to apply for funding for the environmental work that was called the pre-construction work that's necessary I think a lot of people ask that question I'm trying to get on point on that on that question the passage of the business plan was not really the it's not really an issue with being able to to seek funding and move forward was the business plan was its own plan of how we could potentially fund commuter rail in the future the price that was fairly high the overall price is you know almost a half a billion dollars for a commuter rail project and then 25 million a year for operations and maintenance we put together a plan of how we could apply for grant funding including for the EIR but that requires a local match and we could use some measure D funds for the environmental document but that same measure D pot that would allow us to use funding for the environmental report is also used to preserve the rail infrastructure fixing bad fixing any that that we have to use to to work on the rail line right now for freight rail which is we'll bring up later so we're spending the money that we could be using for the EIR on improvements that are needed to preserve the rail right away for freight right now and it seriously limits our ability to fund an environmental impact report any project for the rail line would have to again and I mentioned this earlier have its own EIR and have the logical termini and independent utility our project was for a full system between Watsonville and Santa Cruz it's a fairly large price tab this program alone that we're applying for would not be enough there were several different programs that we looked at that we would have to couple together along with local funding to be able to fund a rail project surely applying for a piece of a commuter rail project that didn't provide the actual service would not compete well for this wouldn't compete at all the state looks at these things very seriously other counties are applying for the funding as well and they're going to direct the funding for its projects that have the environmental clearance necessary and a full funding path to develop to deliver the full project they don't consider benefits for a future project that's not funded so adding costs to a project that doesn't come with the benefits makes your project compete poorly so we would need to first identify a way of moving forward with an environmental document and then we would come up with an entirely different strategy for delivering passenger rail then the strategy that we're using for the highway and the multimodal corridor projects that we're moving forward with right now which are centered on the highway with bicycle industry improvements and I hope that answers your question it does thank you oh there's many want to comment on that the choice we have or what the alternative in effect the only other question I have is too big for this meeting today but what the alternative ways of perhaps getting the environmental piece of it funded you know without the business plan without the you know request for the you know the half billion dollar whatever the cost might be in the future but so we actually are a practical position to start applying for the environmental work that would make it this at least eligible to begin thinking about those kinds of commitments I'll stop with that thank you okay I see commissioner when you have your hand up go for it oh thank you chairperson just two comments number one it's a bit disappointing to hear comments from the public and even ourselves that impugned the motives of the RTC staff for what people are doing I don't think there's good guys and bad guys I think we all agree we need to get the county moving and reduce greenhouse gases and the debate should really be about using the data what's the best way to achieve those goals second I just want to clarify we've heard a lot about freight and I would ask chairperson president to confirm when was the last time freight was moved on the line and what was the experience of the last couple freight carriers director president I'm going to discuss a lot of this in my report moving forward but the rail line has been down since 2017 so there's been no freight on the line since 2017 there was some minor freight prior to that up until about 2010 going backwards 2010 the cement plant closed and that was the last time we had significant freight on the line beyond Watsonville all right thank you for the Commissioner Johnson Randy Johnson go for it thank you chair I just wanted to emphasize the interaction between guy president and Mike and I so fully appreciate the answer right I mean his response was it does not compete and I fully appreciate executive director Preston because he's a professional he's been around he knows these things and in some ways the public and it's and this is not a slight against them and also to certain commissioners we're kind of amateurs okay so people who were upset that we're not doing enough we're not doing this we're not doing that there's kind of a rational reasons why we weren't doing that and yet people tried to impune and express total satisfaction I don't see spit and I can't do this and why aren't you doing that I just want to say that I appreciate having a professional of that of that character and magnitude that kind of guides us through pretty tricky stuff and so that's really all I have to say thank you thank you Commissioner Johnson Commissioner Rockin just really really quickly I think Randy's correct in his attribution that some of the members of the public were making attempting to make a tax on the staff or the executive director let me be really clear that was not my intent I'm just trying to clarify where we're at I have huge respect for the high-pressure and the work that he's doing for us and I don't think I said anything directly and I certainly didn't mean to imply in any way that somehow something was amiss I was just trying to clarify what how we're moving forward and what we're moving it's in a way to try to get an answer to those even though they were put in the hostile way the questions people were asking where are we at in this application and if we're not applying through this one kind of fund you're another why is that the case so let me be really clear about that I hope it's clear Randy that was not my intent at all wasn't directed Mike it wasn't directed at you at all so we're good okay I'm gonna bring it back around it looks like we commissioners who have you know wanted to comment or ask questions and clarification on this item are finished and this is an informational item an update for us so I want to get us moving on to our two big items we just first I'll say I want to just say you know really thank you so much to our staff Sarah in particular for putting together this presentation all of the work that you've done to make this happen and you know while our discussions tend to get however intentionally or unintentionally migrated over hijacked by the the rail corridor and what is to be that debate there is all of this other work going on that's absolutely part of our our transportation planning and you've done an amazing job of making it happen and presenting it to us so I just wanted to and with with that comment and we will move on now it is 11 almost 11 30 and we have our our next item up that is you know hotly hotly contested and debated and discussed and wide interest on this item it's item 22 an informational report on the potential preservation of the Santa Cruz branch line by rail banking including future potential adverse abandonment actions for heavy freight rail only and termination of the ACL agreement I want to set up this item so that we can move through it as smoothly as possible and again with you know strong strong encouragement to keep your your comments and and the the discourse that goes on civil and to be focused on the issues and not impugning the motives or reputations of various stakeholders in this process we will have a staff report and then we will have an opportunity for commissioners to ask questions about the staff report and and the issue we will then go to public comments and I given how long it is taken to get through the first items here and that we have another potentially an item of interest I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna start I would like to start with a minute and a half for comment when that time comes I'm just laying this out here before we get started so we will do a minute and a half and there are 184 attendees of this meeting I want to appreciate our staff for setting it up so that we could have up to 500 people participate in this meeting given the great level of interest in this item and related items so we are we are here and we have a lot of people who are likely gonna want to speak but like to start out with that staff presentation and then we will take a break for but before we go to public comment so staff presentation and then we'll take a break that'll give people a chance to shake it out and dance it out or whatever you want to do get your feelings and your comments in order and we will and then we'll proceed Commissioner Rockin questions from you yes could you you are Executive Director Preston clarify that whether this is or is not an information item and what what Barry and that has on whether we can or cannot make decisions today about anything yes absolutely that's that that was my next I made I even made notes so I made sure I had to cover everything yeah so this is so this item has generated wide interest and so I'll just give a couple of comments about from my perspective we've received most of us I think have received all the same messages over 6000 messages on this item there is some confusion about what the purpose of the well the issue in general is very complex so it's going to take some time to work that through and and you know hopefully we can get people's questions answered but the intention today is to have this on our open session so that we can have a conversation about it learn more and it is not anticipated that action will be taken today so for those of you who are here simply to say vote no we we will not be voting today so please just give your comments on on the item at hand and you know how you feel we'll do that with a minute and a half each after we get a presentation from Mr. Preston and I don't know if our RTC attorney if a council has anything you want to include in as part of this but I'll open it up to Director Preston and Mr. Mattis and then we'll take a break Madam Chair I do not have anything to add to your comments at the moment to Mr. Preston for his presentation great thank you okay so Mr. Preston you're up thank you Madam Chair commissioners and members of the public first I'll start out with an apology my presentation is not going to be as sexy as Sarah's I don't have any graphics to share with you it's just going to be discussion you know as you say that this is an informational report on the preservation of the Santa Cruz branch rail line staff recommends that the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission consider this informational item take public comment and advise staff of any additional questions or information requests the commission may have regarding the potential for preservation of the Santa Cruz branch rail line by rail banking including potentially filing adverse abandonment actions for heavy freight rail only on the Santa Cruz branch rail line and the Felton branch line and allowing for the termination of the administrative coordination and license agreement with St. Paul and Pacific Railways as this is an informational item only there is no commission action anticipated as part of this item we'd like to start today's discussion with an acknowledgement about the concerns questions and divisions that this item has created for our community the public process is extremely important this discussion about how best to preserve and use the Santa Cruz branch rail line in order to address transportation needs and move forward with a successful program of projects is part of that process although this commission has stated its interest in ultimately using the Santa Cruz branch rail line for commuter rail and a trail this report is focused on freight rail but also discusses the current use of the line for recreational rail and the challenges associated with building a trail within the railroad right away roaring camp is separate from and roaring camps felt mine is separate from the Santa Cruz branch rail line but the two lines connect on chestnut street about the intersection of maple street and downtown Santa Cruz roaring camp uses a portion of the Santa Cruz branch rail line for their iconic each train which RTC respects but absolutely like to see remain long term roaring camps film branch line is also part of the federal freight network and Santa Cruz and big trees railway owned by roaring camp is a designated common carrier of freight with the obligation provide freight service unreasonable demand roaring camp will be affected by whatever RTC does or doesn't do on the Santa Cruz branch rail line ever since our current operator St. Paul and Pacific Railroad provided notices of intent to terminate the administrative coordination and license agreement and I'll herein after refer to that as the ACL agreement and abandoned the Santa Cruz branch rail line the commission has been considering options including potential assignment of the ACL agreement termination of the ACL agreement and potentially rail banking malign rail banking has come up at several prior RTC public meetings but there is a need to discuss key issues and more depth so that commissioners and the public gain a better understanding of the potential benefits and key challenges this will be an opportunity to learn about community concerns and to understand what additional information is needed to make future decisions so let's start with some background on the ACL agreement RTC is not a freight operator we contract our freight service to a short-lane operator the ACL agreement is that contract the current ACL agreement contracts freight rail to St. Paul and Pacific Railroad who holds the freight easement on the Santa Cruz branch rail line this ACL agreement is our third such freight license agreement since purchasing the line in 2012 the template for the ACL agreement is based on the concept that the rail line could primarily pay for itself with revenue from freight and recreational rail in 2018 after Iowa Pacific our second operator neglected the line and used the line mainly to store rail cars in the Watsonville area RTC sought its third operator however the line was down and in a serious state of disrepair 2017 storms completely washed out two locations and there was storm damage to a total of seven sites RTC needed a degree removal contract for the entire line therefore when St. Paul and Pacific Railroad negotiated the current ACL agreement with RTC they required that RTC perform initial repairs on the line initial repairs include all storm damage as well as damage bridges overpasses trestles culvert and track RTC secured FEMA funding for the storm damage repairs we now also have measured deep to use on rail preservation and studies however the cost of all repairs far exceeds available revenue state and federal funding for freight repairs is also limited and the Santa Cruz branch rail line does not compete well against other high priority freight projects in other regions of the state a high priority freight transportation project in California would be work at the Port of Oakland the Port of Long Beach or one of the railways or highways leading to those facilities RTC has expended approximately five million dollars in repairs on the seven storm damage projects alone and we are awaiting reimbursement from the federal emergency management administration or FEMA it is possible that we will not receive full reimbursement we have also spent about a million dollars in measure D rail preservation funds for an emergency bridge repair near Galligan slew we awarded a $700,000 contract for a retaining wall above Manresa Beach at our last meeting and spent significant funding on drainage repairs track repairs vegetation control and other work needed for the rail line we haven't we had an item on today's consent agreement excuse me today's consent calendar for an agreement to rehabilitate the Pajaro bridge although the state is providing 50% of the construction funding RTC is covering the balance the Pajaro bridge is the only freight rail project that we have received competitive grant funding for and that is because it is located in Watsonville where we actually have freight service despite that progress staff estimates another 50 to 65 million of additional repairs necessary to restore regular freight service this estimate is for repairs needed for only freight service it's not for commuter rail it's not for the trail as good a time as it may seem to apply for and receive grant funding to pay for rail repairs the likelihood of getting funding for freight will be based on project performance measures since we don't currently move freight and have limited prospects for freight service beyond Watsonville we will not compete well for federal and state grant funding programs designed for freight movement so why is RTC discussing rail banking initially RTC started discussing rail banking as a potential response to St. Paul and Pacific's notice of intent to abandon the Santa Cruz branch rail line if St. Paul and Pacific were to follow through with that notice and RTC were to take no action RTC would be at risk of losing the continuity of the rail line so why is that railroad title issues are complicated RTC holds a mix of B and easement ownership interests in the Santa Cruz branch rail line upon complete abandonment a railroad may lose any rights to possess or transfer parcels of land within the quarter to which it nearly held an easement whose use is limited to railroad purposes RTC understandably took the abandonment notice very seriously and staff started exploring rail banking as a possible method to preserve the right-of-way so what is rail banking rail banking was designed to prevent railroad easements from reverting under state law to an underlining fee owner after a railroad discontinued service rail banking provides an alternative to completely abandoning a railroad right-of-way by allowing a railroad to negotiate a trial use agreement with a prospective trial operator while preserving the rail right-of-way for potential future freight reactivation rail banking is a voluntary process whereby a freight railroad company and a trail agency enter into an agreement to use a rail corridor that has been approved for an abandonment as a trap or for some other use including commuter rail or rail with track until some future time when the railroad might need the corridor again or freight rail service as RTC explored this option we also found that rail banking would provide relief the property rights issues associated with our planned construction of a trail within the Santa Cruz branch rail line right-of-way even if there is no desire to remove the rail as mentioned earlier some of the rail property is held as easements for rail purposes which creates potential complications in constructing a trial as underlining property owners could claim that a trial is not rail and is therefore not permitted on the easement although this situation may not seem significant since RTC holds most of the title and fee and RTC could negotiate for those rights the objections of only one property could significantly impact the trial project rail banking doesn't eliminate potential property owner claims however after rail banking any property owner claims that alleged that the trail is not permitted in the railroad easement would be directed to the federal government which has a process for addressing their financial claims rail banking thereby provides protections to the RTC from potential financial liability associated with building an active transportation trail along rail easements in any configuration rail banking will facilitate trial construction on the whole of the branch rail line it is important to note that the Sonoma-Marin area rail transportation or SMART did not rail bank freight and built a trail adjacent to the commuter rail service SMART was recently sued by adjacent property owners for inverse condemnation rail banking would avoid it now if RTC were to rail bank a portion of the line RTC would be responsible for preserving the rail bank right away for future reactivation of freight rail preservation efforts allow for a trail but one is not required RTC could leave the rails in place we could reconfigure the rail for rail with trail and continue planning for future passenger rail service RTC could even choose to continue some freight service on the line while the line is rail bank prior to any advanced discussion on rail banking RTC and St. Paul and Pacific Railroads reached out to Roaring Camp as a potential freight operator and successor to the ACL agreement however Roaring Camp had concerns about taking on any significant responsibilities for maintenance of the rail line and I can understand why as I know firsthand the cost of owning and maintaining a 150 year old rail line is extremely expensive therefore at this time staff believes that abandonment of the freight easement in association with termination of the ACL agreement and rail banking will eliminate ownership constraints related to RTC's use of railroad easements for a trail eliminate the duration eliminate for the duration of rail banking the need to complete extensive repairs necessary for freight rail service only deferring the need to divert discretionary funds from other projects or to implement a new dedicated local funding source to pay for the freight rail repairs preserve the rail corridor in a manner that would provide local control and flexibility on decision making including possibilities for future commuter rail service with a trail provide an avenue for the current rail operator to exit the ACL agreement an agreement that St. Paul and Pacific Railroad Roaring Camp and RTC all find to not be financially viable however there are a number of other factors that the commission should consider in determining whether and how to pursue rail banking on the Santa Cruz branch rail line these issues include that the process of rail banking would require the filing with the surface transportation board of an application or request or exemption or authority to abandon that St. Paul and Pacific Railroad continues to hold the freight easement on the Santa Cruz branch rail line that's chosen not to follow through with the filing of their notice of abandonment even though St. Paul and Pacific Railroad still desires to terminate the ACL agreement and extinguish their ownership of freight of the freight easement the felt line is also a freight rail line and rail banking the Santa Cruz branch rail line would effectively leave Roaring Camp's potential freight operations as a stranded segment and finally Roaring Camp has voiced opposition to rail banking the Santa Cruz the Santa Cruz branch rail line which is owned by RTC but if an agreement with Roaring Camp and St. Paul and Pacific Railroad cannot be reached it appears that RTC's only method of rail banking would be to file for what is called adverse abandonment and how the federal surface transportation board decide whether these two lines should remain part of the federal freight network adverse abandonment is a process when a person or entity that does not own the freight easement and this would be RTC files a request with the surface transportation board to order to force the abandonment of freight services on a rail line this process is typically initiated when there is no active freight service on a line and when the requesting party desires to have the freight line taken out of service so that the railroad right away can be used for purposes other than freight service and including rail banking for the RTC to be able to rail bank the Santa Cruz-France rail line Roaring Camp's objections must be addressed RTC staff prefers to address Roaring Camp's concerns through negotiations and to reach an agreement with them in lieu of any potential future decision for future adverse abandonment although RTC could file for about at that excuse me adverse abandonment and rail bank the rail banking of the RTC owned Santa Cruz-France rail line allowing Roaring Camp's objections to be settled as part of those potential proceedings adverse abandonment and rail banking of the Santa Cruz-France rail line could be a long process due to their objections another potential legal approach would be for RTC to file for adverse abandonment of freight only on the Felton branch line as an initial step for rail banking the Santa Cruz-France rail line a determination of abandonment of freight on the Felton line would be based on whether there are realistic expectations for profitable freight service on that line as mentioned earlier the STP does not regulate recreational rail and the RTC would only be seeking to gain clarification as to whether the Felton lines current freight status can be used to stop rail banking on the Santa Cruz-France rail line this action could potentially provide resolution of the stranded line argument in advance and separate of potential subsequent actions to abandon and rail bank the Santa Cruz-France rail line and terminate the ACL agreement if the STB finds cause for abandonment roaring camp could leave their rails in place and continue their recreational rail service including the beach train roaring camp could also choose to use their line for a fire break which was a notable concern by the fire chiefs of the San Lorenzo valley roaring camp could rail bank their line if they wish to secure federal protections of property rights associated with any easements that they own similar to what RTC is contemplating for the Santa Cruz-France rail line RTC has no interest in having roaring camp remove their rails nor does RTC desire to build a trail on the Felton-France rail line to reiterate any adverse abandonment action is not the preference of RTC staff staff believes that a negotiated agreement with roaring camp to address their concerns and do consideration of RTC's financial situation is preferred however staff understands that this is a complicated and difficult issue which will require collaboration and we seek solutions to complicated problems to start RTC has offered roaring camp a long-term lease of the portion of the Santa Cruz-France rail line that roaring camp uses to ensure that they can continue to run their recreational service to the boardwalk RTC staff has also discussed the possibility with roaring camp of expanding recreational service to Davenport nonetheless roaring camp still opposes rail banking in all due respect to roaring camp what rail road would have wanted to be disconnected from the national rail network being disconnected can have implications and limitations for a rail road's ability to receive new equipment consideration RTC has discussed financial considerations to help move equipment by truck if possible however those negotiations did not go very far and roaring camp has indicated they prefer the status quo over any attempt to rail bank the Santa Cruz-France rail line roaring camp has been functionally disconnected from the main line since 2017 this situation has left two of their locomotives stuck in Watsonville and able to travel to Felton RTC was hoping to have all repairs completed by now so roaring camp could move their engines unfortunately the capitolat and seascape's trestles have been deemed out of service and RTC has identified other costly repairs necessary to restore great service which RTC simply cannot currently afford and sees no realistic possibility of funding in the foreseeable future RTC could just choose to leave the ACL agreement in place until its termination date of 2028 however doing so would not make it more likely that RTC will find funding and be able to complete necessary repairs and reconnect the lines in the meantime we are being challenged in developing other projects on the line project designs are restricted by the need to fully accommodate freight, rail and the short term even though the line is non-functional and RTC cannot afford the repairs property right issues for these projects are on the critical path to prepare for construction so it will be necessary to understand whether we will need to acquire additional property rights fairly soon we understand that more information is likely needed to understand the problem and assess our options staff is interested in hearing feedback and expects to be able to provide more information over the next several months in the meantime we remain interested in working with Roaring Camp and St. Paul Pacific Railroad to find a mutually agreeable solution that ensures the long-term success of Roaring Camp while protecting the fiscal sustainability of the RTC and the taxpayer money that we are expected to manage in a responsible manner I'm joined here today by Steve Mattis RTC General Counsel and Eric Hockey RTC's Railway Council who are available to answer legal questions associated with the abandonment and rail banking process Madam Chair that concludes my report and I hand it back over to you for commissioner questions before taking a break and then opening up the public comment and commissioner discussions Thank you Director Preston I will take this time to call on commissioners for questions only I know there's a tendency to move into the comment portion but I these are for clarifying questions technical questions about this report and I'm watching the hands go up from the public we will take that break after questions and I'm gonna try to be you know an enforcer on the questions versus comments dynamic right now thank you and commissioner Koenig you're I see your hand Thank you Chair Brown I appreciate the emphasis on questions at the moment so first question Director Preston will your comments be available online I know they are largely match the staff report but there were a few updates I think in response to some public comments for example you know regarding use of the the line for fighting fires etc and you would be useful if it was posted as a on an RTC web page it was a PDF link but is that the intention it was not my intention we do make a video available I can see about making a presentation version of my staff report available all right thank you don't we post a don't we post a video of our meeting at the end yeah the so the videos are posted perhaps we could do something like a notification about a timestamp for when this when this presentation began for people who want to find it if if we don't pull it out entirely but yes you will have access yeah all right yeah I mean there's just been so much confusion and misinformation about this topic but I think the more we can do to help clarify for the public the better you know I wanted to acknowledge the letter we received from roaring camp which really clearly outlined some of their concerns and use the opportunity to ask about a couple of those the first is you know there is roaring camp seems to be expressing the concern that rail banking the Felton line would expose roaring camp to lawsuits is there any reason to believe that I mean my understanding based on your report is that actually rail banking helped shields people including the RTC and presumably roaring camp from lawsuits but could you elaborate on that a little I only discussed the property rights issues I would have to defer the roaring camp or my legal counsel about potential lawsuits that they might experience I would add to that and commissioner that we're not aware of the lawsuits that they would be identifying rail banking we do not believe would expose them to that but but we welcome roaring camps comments on that okay and then last question it seems like another big you know point of anxiety for roaring camp is this the ability to get equipment to the Felton site and you know we've discussed whether or not that's possible via truck I'm just curious if any more and roaring camp seems to believe that it's not for other reports that it could be you know does any of this work that we're doing on the highway and the on the bridges impact that at all what what research has been done whether equipment could be moved by truck and if it's possible to get roaring camp their equipment that way we would need to engage with roaring camp understand the full specifications of their equipment and see what options exist you know it's not easy to move a locomotive by truck I certainly respect their concerns it's also not unprecedented to do so I did discuss this a little bit with St. Paul and Pacific Railroad and they said yeah we have moved locomotives by by truck before so I think it would really depend there's some real issues associated with overloads on bridges that they may have to travel over clearance issues for bridges that they would have to travel under including the two rail bridges on the highway one so more investigation would be needed to really make a determination on what could or could not be done okay thank you that's all my questions at this time thank you Commissioner Koenig Commissioner Johnson Randy Johnson here up thank you chair I just had a quick question in the event however unlikely it might be that you had passenger rail and also freight rail sharing the same track does freight take precedence over passenger rail in terms of its ability to be the one that is the primary user of the track I'm gonna have our legal council Eric Fox our railway council Eric Foxy comment on that Eric if you would don't mind Mr. Huck you're on mute sorry about that I've been sitting so quietly so long it really depends on the type of passenger service as to what gets priority you know on excursions freight would take priority over excursion traffic if you have commuter rails that can be different rules that apply as to who gets sort of the priority in terms of scheduling you know Amtrak has a whole different scheduling you know we're not talking about that here I don't think so you know it would be really up to the parties to determine priorities and and how that would you know be work there's right now with there being basically very little or no freight service there would be no problem scheduling freight service around passenger service schedules thank you was that all from you commissioner johnson questions okay commissioner shifrin your turn just a few questions I was a little unclear about the liability risk with and without abandonment could you clarify what they would be with abandonment and then without abandonment guy would you like me to start with go ahead Steve thank you commissioner shifrin are you referring to the abandonment on the Santa Cruz branch line or the felt of branch line just want to make sure I understand the question well either one well the one that were the one that we've done more analysis are more familiar with again based on the prior response that I gave are the Santa Cruz branch line and so the liability issues that that RTC potentially faces are the liability issues associated with the segments of the line on which they own easements versus fee interest in the property and so the the utilization of that portion of the line for for instance the trail or other uses that were not anticipated in the easement do create potential liabilities with regards to the whether or not RTC would have to essentially acquire additional property interest to be able to build the things that they would like to build within that right of way so they're alive the difference would be with without abandonment there's these liability risks with abandonment and rail banking then those risk shift to the federal government is that the that that is correct yeah that is correct with rail banking if rail banking were to occur on either of the segments then the ability to place trails within the right of way is is specifically authorized under federal law and you're correct than the the cost exposure does shift to the federal government pursuant to the rails to trial side my next question really has to do with what this easement liability might turn out to be from I appreciate the attachments three in our staff report that showed areas of the line that have easements where there are easements and I appreciate the response my question that sort of has to follow up on that that I sent privately in terms of the number of parcels that have where there are easements it wasn't clear how large those parcels are but let me ask right now there is a rail easement so as long as the rail is potentially operable the property adjacent property owners cannot use the property they could say that if the commission wants to do put in a rail trail adjacent to it that's not part of our right so that would have to be purchased but can you give any sense about how much it might cost to purchase an easement where the property owner can't use the property anyway well we have we have not done any type of analysis of what the actual cost would be we do have some indication of what the cost have been to acquire property up in the up in the segment five issue but we have not analyzed that but your point the other point as part of your question is correct that to that an appraiser would look at the encumbrances that exist on the property and in determining valuation so a property that has a rail easement on it is arguably less valuable than one that does not have a rail easement on it right now is our situation on the north coast right where we didn't even own the property correct we actually are acquiring additional properties okay my next question changes the subject somewhat and it's the guy would the construction of the proposed greenway require the removal of the tracks or the greenway defined in the greenway initiative yes it appears that it would require removal of the track thank you very much my next question is to the chair and it's really I guess a suggestion that maybe given that so much of this discussion concerns roaring camp and there's been a question about what roaring camp position is would it be possible if they wanted to give roaring camp more than a minute and a half to make their presentation I think that would you know only be reasonable thank you commissioner shifrin for that request I do think that's a good idea I have been contemplating how to handle that because I don't want to put roaring camp on the spot but since we are taking a break before we go to comment put it out there and I can't scroll through and see exactly who's here while I'm chairing so if a representative of roaring camp is here Melannie Clark or someone from the board and wants to address us I will give you some additional time and we can start with you when we come back for everybody else I want to take this opportunity for a break I think five minutes seems a little light for the amount of time we're going to spend in this meeting today so I think maybe 10 minutes we'll take that break and come back at 12.15 and so folks who are interested in speaking please you know be prepared get your hands up and it's going to be one and a half minutes but we will start with a representative from roaring camp if you'd like to provide your perspective and address any of the issues that have come up thus far okay I see Commissioner Quinn you have your hand up do you have a question or are you wanting to respond to something you've heard I'd like to get I had a quick question a quick follow go for it quick question follow-up to Commissioner to Executive Director Preston we've heard a lot about removing the rails is there any scenario in which the rails as they currently exist would be viable for future use there are sections of the rail line that could be viable for future use you know going back you know certainly for freight rail it is we did identify a good portion of the rail that would need to be reconstructed for commuter rail commuter rail has different standards we'd be looking at operating at higher speeds we would want to really do an analysis of the vertical and horizontal alignment of the rail line to determine where it should be so for commuter rail I would say we would be reconstructing a good portion of the rail line for freight rail you know a good portion of the rail line would be usable the issue is more the bridges culverts drainage issues slide and slip outs that we've experienced on the rail line we have some sink hole so but that's different than the trap thank you thank you I'm gonna now I'm gonna send us into a break time and 12 15 is no longer 10 minutes so I'm just gonna say let's we'll be back at 12 20 give you a little over 10 minutes commissioners you will have an opportunity to ask questions again we will bring it back around to you so let's take this break and come back prepared to be attentive to the community thank you all okay welcome back everyone if you're here please turn your cameras back on so we know that commissioners are ready for our public comment portion of the this next item on our agenda this is item 22 as a reminder and we've received an oral reports as well as a written report in our packets and I'm now going to open the comment period up please raise your hand if you are interested in speaking on this item I also want to remind the public that this is an informational item as it's been presented to us today and that we will take that public comment with the understanding that the commission will not be acting I do see Commissioner McPherson's hand up and so I wanted to give you an opportunity to speak before we go into public comment yeah I'm interested I know that I have and each of you has received hundreds maybe thousands of emails and I just want to thank everyone for their interest in this I can understand it fully I just like to begin by repeating concerns I express at this week's Annapurse County Board of Supervisors meeting just previously from some of our commissioners now some questions have been asked that I was interested in as well but frankly I'm really disappointed that after all these years of studying discussion we continue to have such deeply entrenched factions on how best to use the corridor this device of this has done nothing to solve the undermining fundamental issue of how best to move to a larger the large number of communities between Santa Cruz County and the North County and that goes on every day every weekday for sure and there are core social justice economic and climate issues we are supposed to be solving through this process which really get lost in the debate and what we need to do is continue to gather as much information as possible in order to make informed decisions and I thought the outline by our guide Preston was excellent today and today's item was placed on the agenda so we could openly review the possibilities that have been discussed in closed session last September after the current operator made it clear that they wanted to exit the current their contract with RTC we really have a fiduciary obligation to investigate all of the possible options regarding the rail line and this will be the third operator who wants to exit their contract because they are not able to make financial make financial make it make French freight service financially viable on the rail line that's a fact that's why we're into this situation because they don't want to do it they can't afford to do we need the public to understand how to how complex these options are and we need to partner together to meet mobility needs of all county residents especially south county residents that's been stated so in the coming months more and more information will be coming forward that we hopefully can get community talking to one another rather than what we have been doing for the several years now which is talking past one another because of the election requirements Santa Cruz county voters are scheduled to vote and weigh in on the greenway ballot measure on June 7th environmental impact reports for three segments of our rail corridor with all options scoped and financial impact identified will be presented in that course of discussion I believe before the election but in the meantime we need to have a better more disciplined discussion regarding the financial reality of continuing with freight service along the corridor people say that we have the money to do it but as our guide president had mentioned we only have so much money coming in from measure D and the rail line their corridor is getting 8% of that or $2 million a year that's far short of what we need to do to really do anything substantial on that rail line in fact I'd like to see a market analysis conducted on that topic both from the regional transportation commission and from our current provider roaring camp and I'd like to reiterate that at no time have I ever heard from a commissioner or staff say that they want to do anything that would diminish the financial success of roaring camp nobody has if in fact there is a direct connection between the impact of determining the future of freight and the future of passenger rail service I would like that to be clarified the letter submitted by roaring camp brings up some interesting points and questions and I know we're going to hear more from them that I also would like to see clarified and I'd like to make a motion to that effect that we have some more information from both parties if you will RTC and we're in camp so we can really get to some factual legitimate criteria rather than what we've been experienced for the last two or three years we've got to change the course of discussion on this and gets more civil about so that's my basic comments and I understand and I appreciate the questions that were asked previously thank you thank you Commissioner McPherson I wholeheartedly agree and thank you for the reminder about just for for everybody who's weighing in here on how we frame our comments and our perspectives recognizing the very strong feelings around this issue that we stay on task and treat each other respectfully and recognize that we are all you know in this to support viable sustainable transit and transportation infrastructure and services for our community and so with that I will open up to the public and beginning with Kyle Kelly wait excuse me children you had asked whether there were representatives from Roaring Camp oh I'm sorry I did I'm so sorry yeah I did do I did do that I didn't see a hand up so I'm gonna there are two individuals representing Roaring Camp that would like to speak okay Rosemary Sarca and Michael Conoran okay so those though they are here gotcha okay so we will start with Michael Conoran I see your name here and then and Rosemary and I'll give you about let's see if three minutes to talk with us if you need more time then I'm happy to give that but I do want to keep us moving so with that Michael Conoran I'll call on you hi I'm Michael Conoran representing Roaring Camp I was actually pleased to hear the executive directors comments this morning I think he went out of his way to present things in a in a neutral manner and try to inform the public let me just give you a couple of the concerns the main concerns of Roaring Camp I think the first one is really the loss of the protection that that a rail carrier has from being in the federal jurisdiction I know Director Conagass about lawsuits that it's not really lawsuits the concern is it's really with the protection of the federal jurisdiction and very qualified council and Mr. Hockey I'm sure he can explain that to you if you have additional questions the main issue I think really for us is the economic viability of the of the beach train and the ability to get rail equipment into Santa Cruz given the limited clearances of many of the bridges we've raised this with the commission a long time ago I think it would be helpful for us to have additional discussions about that and perhaps to explore that further you know we're the business whose whose viability is being threatened and so I think it would be you know I think it's incumbent upon the commission to help work with us to try to see if there's a viable way to resolve this but also I think we feel there is a viable we at least that there's a viable chance for rail we'd like to explore additional freight options we have had expressions of interest from potential freight carriers that potentially could make this a viable line we have submitted questions and comments to the commission staff regarding negotiating an alternative to the ACL it's our view that those negotiators were never fully pursued so I'd be happy to enter into additional talks with them I think from the perspective of Royancamp there's just been so many changes here this line was bought with the anticipation that it would be that the Santa Cruz line would be kept open the Royancamp gave up a right of first refusal when the commission first bought the line and we've really had sort of a decreasing interest enthusiasm on the behalf of the commission there's some understandable reasons for that but it does really cause a disruption to our our investment and our expectations and finally I just want to note you know there is an important something to just a historical note in terms of utilizing the line for emergencies 1906 San Francisco really relied on the Southern Pacific Railroad to assist them with rebuilding the city so there is some historic precedent finally the real concern with the APTIS project is that those the cost of taking away those bridges and having to replace them again is going to be prohibitive basically end the history the chance for rail service in on this line thank you thank you so we I'll now call on Rosemary Sarka to provide additional comments from the from Royancamp can you hear me yes we can thank you I do want to take a moment to clarify that Royancamp did not reject an offer to take on the ACL we were approached by RTC and we our response was that we would prefer to discuss some of these details more clearly and we did not get a response back from that and I do understand that there are many reasons for that right now but we did not reject that offer I will restate some of the things that Michael Connorin said we need our equipment we if we don't get a chance to replenish equipment the company will die there was not an opportunity otherwise to bring in equipment and our loss of federal protection is our safety net that's what we have counted on that's what we were promised without federal protection we are at the mercy of whatever agreement that we wish to get or we could get from the county and that is obviously not sufficient given the fact that we are now in this situation of being told that what we were offered before is being withdrawn and we also think that freight service is very much possible and we have looked into that our passion for this stems from much more than our personal advantage or disadvantage and we know that if we lose these protections the whole branch line is in jeopardy that is one of our strongest motivating factors it affects us but it affects all of us we are the first domino to fall and we're very very concerned about that thank you that's all thank you Ms. Sarka so I will now take it out to the general public and back to our first speaker that is Kyle Kelly Kyle Kelly you're up and we will be just due to the nature of the high level of interest and the length of the meeting we will have one and a half minutes for comment Greetings Chair Brown Vice Chair Koenig commissioners and RTC staff I'm Kyle Kelly I serve on the city of Santa Cruz as a Transpiration and Public Works Commission I speak to you now as an individual a parent a taxpayer and an advocate for inclusive communities it was only three years ago on March 8, 2019 that the Santa Cruz RTC wrote a letter to the California Transportation Commission stating their obligations under state law requiring Proposition 116 bond funds to be used for a inner city passenger rail projects connecting the city of Santa Cruz with the Watsonville Junction or b other rail projects within Santa Cruz County which facilitate recreational commuter inner city and inner county travel in the letter your Executive Director Guy Preston unequivocally stated begin quote the RTC is committed to meeting the requirements of Proposition 116 and CTC resolutions the RTC and short line operators have made significant repairs and upgrades to railroad infrastructure in Santa Cruz County voters approved measure D in 2016 which includes funds for rail line maintenance and repairs since that time the RTC has evaluated service options for public transit service in the corridor including potential station locations cost ridership projections and schedules I'm going to skip forward because I realize I'm out of time and thought I had two minutes the RTC board unanimously affirmed its commitment to leave the railroad infrastructure in place maintain freight rail service and institute high capacity public transit service end quote thank you Mr. Kelly and apologies for the shortened time we are we have a lot of people who want to speak the next person on the list here is Gina Cole is Cole you're up okay how about now there you go we can hear you thank you good afternoon commissioners my name is Gina Cole and I am a resident of Watsonville regarding the inconsistency with regional transportation policy taking action to abandon and rail bank our rail corridors will directly conflict with all plans and policies adopted by this commission with plans and policies adopted by other regional and state agencies with resolutions adopted by this commission and with tax measures and ordinances approved by a healthy majority of local voters measure sorry misleading statements and words the connections between the FBRL and the SCBRL between freight and passenger rail and the multiple potential uses of the same infrastructure are complex some public statements from members of your staff and other commissioners mislead the public into thinking it's a simple matter to just reject a freight line while claiming to support passenger rail in the sometime distant future versus via rail banking commissioners and others now are copied too often by local media further spreading intentional or unintentional misinformation technically heavy haul freight refers to truck and rail freight that exceeds allowable limits and requires special permitting there is absolutely no evidence that excessive freight weights have ever been carried on so Ms. Cole if I apologize we are going to keep to the schedule here if you want to send us any additional comments we are receiving them and we'll take them into account okay David dates you're up can you hear me can okay yeah members of the commission and and really to the public I'm kind of dismayed by the level of campaign misinformation and even conspiracy theories coming from friends of the rail trail and roaring camp you know they're calling a rail banking or the conversation of rail banking a dastardly act fueled by special interest and it's completely unfounded as as Guy Preston's report you know he's telling us this is a necessary step to preserving our rail corridor and I'm sorry that you guys are getting the brunt of this misinformation campaign through these robot emails you know click here sign here and shoot an email to 20 people's personal and professional email addresses this has got to stop and I think it really steps it really starts with bringing this issue to a county-wide vote and and really stripping friends of the rail trail of this you know of this talking point that they are operating through a community consensus that we have all agreed to commuter rail and we have to sink more costs this is the other their their primary argument is the sunken cost fallacy that we've continued this mistake for so long that we must continue to pour money into it and I think the the regional transportation commission and staff I think they finally realized that this is not viable and I appreciate your efforts thank you thank you so I as I said previously I just want to remind commenters that we are trying to stick to the item at hand I know there are a lot of related issues and concerns and perspectives that come up for for folks as we consider this item and related items but I would ask folks to please speak directly to the item and the commission's role we are at an RTC meeting and debating campaign talking points and you know other issues related to a broader public campaign about an item that will go to the voters is this is not the place for that so please speak to the the item at hand and just uh just just wanted to remind everybody what we're here for okay uh Jack Brown you're you're up next thank you Commissioner Brown and to be clear to alternate Commissioner Schifrin I am Jack Brown and I'm speaking as a resident of Aptos thank you Executive Director Guy Preston for the very thorough honest informative report and Commissioner McPherson in his remarks regarding public comments I agree with the report wholeheartedly I believe everything on this topic comes down to being realistic about freight no one wants roaring camp in its tourist train to go away but saying that there's freight business going on or any possible realistic freight movement isn't close to being financially viable it really comes down to where we want to spend our limited transportation funds when someone earlier noted evacuations reminded me of something that actually happened last weekend I was leaving our home to pick up dinner one of our favorite Aptos restaurants I was driving down Cliff Drive in Rio de Mar when an ambulance pulled in front of me taking one of my neighbors to the hospital the ambulance was only able to travel down our main road at about 15 miles an hour because the state of district here of the road even at low speeds our poor neighbor was still being jostled around in the back of the ambulance our roads are in dire need of maintenance I hate to see funds diverted for a freight maintenance for freight business beyond Watsonville but simply does not exist please roaring camp come to the table work with the commission and freight rail banks so we can use our precious transportation funds on viable public transit alternative transit and maintaining our roads thank you thank you okay David Schoenbrunn you're up and you're going to want to press star six there you go thank you I'm David Schoenbrunn president of the train riders association of California we were among the creators of prop 116 which enabled the purchase of the branch line we do not consider this agenda item to be consistent with the prop 116 grant the effort of a few to kill passenger rail service is a direct attack on the county's future sustainability here's the part the rail opponents don't understand traffic in your county is going to continue to get worse more people equals more cars are you willing to sacrifice the future in your county so that a few people don't have trains running near their backyards I know a lot about rail banking the staff report completely garbled the subject it's backwards contrary to the staff report rail banking opens the door to litigation our organization has been very involved with the STB we will file an opposition at the STB if you attempt adverse abandonment on either branch line here today thank you excuse me and thank you Mr. Shonbrunn a reminder that no action is anticipated today we do thank you for your comments and next up we have Brian from trail now hi it's Brian from trail now let's count on Guy Preston the expert in legal counsel to move forward let's enable him to rail bank he knows what to do it's a day-to-day slip on opening the coastal corridor until we the rail bank roaring camp will likely lose access over highway one and highway nine because of freight loss they can't drive an amusement park train over those highways that's a Caltrans decision and it is a fact trail and obviously nobody wants roaring camp to lose out the great community business but let's us trail now has actually offered a proposed plan where a new railing camp boardwalk park is established and e-trollies from the boardwalk to Felton along the Felton line would be created that would open up new transportation for Metro on the Felton line as well as a trail to Felton so let's work with roaring camp let's enable them let's make give them money give them some money make them successful but roaring camp please come to the table we believe there is an alternative to it and we understand what your issue is in the way of compliance to railroads going over highways not good thank you thank you Mr. Peoples I'm just going to keep doing this as we move through just a reminder again this is a regional transportation commission meeting and the commissioners are trying to understand where the public is at and what the issues are related to this very very complicated question and so please direct your comments to the commission and you all know I'm quite sure how to communicate with each other the the various stakeholders out in the community so again this is commission information day and so I'll just ask folks to to stick with addressing us and and what you think the commission ought to do okay so next up we have Linda will Susan thank you madam chair and commissioners I'm Linda will Susan former executive director of the RTC from 1985 to 2005 yesterday I was talking to a friend and trying to explain some of the arcane details about what's going on with the rail and trail and at one point they said to me so do I get this right some people think that rail banking is needed to solve the problems that rail banking itself creates well yeah unfortunately that's right it's rail banking itself that would create the problems we need to solve by rail banking rail banking is not like your savings account at the bank where you can put your dollars in when you have them and take them back out when you need them unlike your savings account rail banking is a way to permanently convert rail lines to exclusive rail use rail banking is a way to use federal tax dollars to pay a few current property owners who now on property that previous owners over 130 years ago allowed the railroad to use to pay these current few property owners for the right to use their property only as a trail rail banking is a dead end thank you miss wilson our next speaker is david dean oh yes thank you for your time I am very disappointed that the public is very dismissive of freight and in fact even the director preston said that there's no viable freight however if I could refer you to the 2045 transportation plan where they said that in 2012 for rail freight was five percent by volume of all the freight coming through our county also in that same document figure 3.15 states what the daily truck volume is on our highways highway one has 5,220 trucks five percent of that converted to rail would be 26 rail cars per day that's not tiny highway nine for the felton branch is 1785 trucks per day that would be about 10 rail cars per day there absolutely is interest in freight and prospects for freight and that is tens of thousands of tons of carbon from our atmosphere per year that would be fantastic to have for our community thank you thank you mr dean our next speaker is jacob was that was that I got that right go for it good job mr wasaki I think you may be breaking up a little bit we're not able to hear you internet connectivity okay so if mr wasaki returns will get you back in the queue and so next up we have james jim harville good afternoon chair brown commissioners jim harville president of placerville and sacramental valley railroad current home of sac of santa cruz portland cement number two the chigan locomotive our the line in which we operate is the one of the first if not the first rail bank corridor in the united states I was pleased to hear the comments of davis schoenbrunn and linda wilschusen about the pitfalls of rail banking and their point that which is the point that I wish to comment on is that rail banking does not protect you in easements all right we spent seven years wrangling that out over here and if it is an easement rail banking will expose you to that litigation and it does not transfer that responsibility fully and completely to the federal government but what it does do is force you into an imminent domain proceeding so I hope to be able to contribute further to this this discussion I do feel that the ACL does need to be renegotiated to make it viable for any potential freight operator and you know look look forward I want to compliment staff on the job they've done so far thank you mr harville our next speaker is brad wilson with agron hello can you hear me yes we can all right well just want to start off by saying you know I hope the commission supports the the you know rail freight and do not rip up any any track trackage that that is not good support roaring camp and all they can do you know when we bought the facility and in Watsonville in 2007 we were told that we would always have freight being able to go to that facility and and any talks of of it being removed or shut down or slowed down as bad like I said earlier it looks like we're going to be taking forward between 40 and 80 rail cars a month into into Watsonville and that's to that's to bring in low carbon fuel and I know a lot of people are all cracked up on electric but just remember biodiesel is here and it's now it's helping California meet its low carbon fuel standards and reduce carbon and you know this electric if you think you have brown out problems now just wait till the infrastructure needs to be put in place to try to supply all this these e vehicles that you keep talking about we are here we're now let biodiesel do its thing thank you thank you I I want to I see that Mr. Jacob was hockey hope I'm pronouncing that right is back on so I'll just move you back up to the front of the queue since you were already speaking if you're ready now is your opportunity to address us think we have there we go Mr. was hockey if you're ready it's your turn and I see you're on unmute but we can't hear you it does appear that you're the star nine is is or star six is working but we still can't hear you I'm I'm sorry about this okay so we I apologize for the challenges here we'll try to get back around to you Mr. was hockey if you can work on your volume your your microphone next up we have Lonnie Faulkner hi thank you I would suggest to one commissioner that adverse abandonment in itself is not a civil action equity transit or just the commission to immediately cease any further consideration of adverse abandonment of the Felton branch line and abandonment or rail banking of the Santa Cruz branch line as these actions are unnecessary and an unethical attack on a successful local family owned business and our county's future roaring camp has been owned by the same family since 1963 that's 59 years Georgiana Clark was a community minded well respected woman of color who left the business to her daughters when she passed and Milani Clark Georgiana's daughter now runs the business everyone who works for roaring camp feels that they are a part of a family not just a part of a business's bottom line roaring camp relinquished their first right of refusal in purchasing the tracks so the RTC could bring passenger rail to our community and I paraphrase Milani my family was assured the rail line was an extremely important asset to the county and that the RTC had worked hard to line up funding from the state and that the sale to the RTC was for the benefit of the entire community the RTC assured roaring camp that the line would be used for rail thanks to funding from proposition 116 which specifically calls for a commitment to rail service in response to roaring camp cleared the way for the RTC to purchase the line and now the RTC is targeting roaring camps Felton branch line as a first steps towards forced abandonment of the full Santa Cruz branch line thank you Ms. Faulkner I will now call on Barry Scott okay thank you I you know for roaring camp the federal freight easement is the is the one greatest protection against short-sighted local decisions and I don't blame them for not giving it up but it's also what protects our entire branch line from short-sighted decisions I want to say that yesterday I had a 30-minute meeting with Mark Stone and he and he twice I think he said if you lift the tracks even part of them they never come back we need to understand this there's a lot that has been said about a lack of freight interest well look we had the damage in 2017 the contract to progress have been 2018 and we haven't done any repairs and now we're saying oh my gosh there's no freight well no wonder maybe we need more time for funding but we mustn't remove the rail line or rail bank which is an irreversible process sorry to say and it conflicts with every prior RTC decision and study rail banking is a hostile action for both freight and passenger operations in the future you don't have to make transit happen today but you sure don't have to destroy it you don't have to destroy the rail line or or the chances for are using that rail line either keep it intact keep it viable and reaffirm your commitment to leave the infrastructure and maintain great rail service and institute high-capacity public transit for your letter to the CTC in March 8, 2019 thank you Mr. Scott it is our next speaker is Collin Miller hello hey uh so I've lived in the Solano-Renzo Valley for 20 years the roaring camp has always been a major component of what uh offers some uh culture and identity and helps the economy and it seems kind of seems kind of weird that basically it's uh we can't can't maintain a a system so let's tear out and put in a new one so I don't know it just seems a little rush the uh the commuter train obviously roaring camp can carry people it brings lots of people in and out of Santa Cruz lowering traffic um I mean basically tearing out the track and say well we can put new ones later but now we have money maybe we don't have money um so I mean sorry I'm not more prepared for this um I'm just looking at what I've heard on this meeting and it seems kind of uh a little bit of a red hearing so well thanks for listening though thank you Mr Miller it's it's understandable one can prepare substantially and still feel unprepared this is very complex thank you for weighing in our next speaker is Stacy hi you hear me yes we can okay the we have voted on this um multiple times before I don't see why the RTC is taking an action which violates the will of the people I moved to Santa Cruz 25 years ago and lived along the line in Soquel and watched the freight trains roll through with no it no interruption to to people's lives with how quiet and we're talking about adding electric trains and how would we do that if we don't finish what we already voted to do thank you thank you our next speaker is Sally for rail and trail hi well you're not going to be surprised friends of the rail and trail urges the commission to immediately stop considering adverse abandonment of the Felton branch line or any or the Santa Cruz branch line either as you can see from the public outcry even attempting this action is causing community distress it creates economic uncertainty and it destroys public trust in our institutions and frankly the negative impact of adverse abandonment are not well understood and moving forward right now would be a mistake we urge the commission to table this item for now direct the staff to fully explore and analyze all the alternatives to abandonment and rail banking on the corridor including just proceed with the plan of record as described in the Monterey Bay scene next century trail master plan on the 25th of January Fort sent a letter list of questions about rail banking to the RTC and those questions really need thorough and complete responses as well as input from the public before this commission can consider itself well informed enough to properly consider any abandonment of any kind lastly you know the law may allow the commission to conduct votes on this matter in closed session but it does not require this to be dealt with in closed session we appreciate that it got brought out into the public for today and we hope that the the large public outcry against this proposal will be enough to convince our public servants to drop it but if you don't any further work on this project should be done in plain view of the public thank you thank you Sally okay our next speaker is David loves public transit hello can you hear me all right yes we can hi this is David Van Brink good afternoon I I hope we're all of us enjoying this Robert Wilson scale operatic meeting today and I guess this is only the second act so look I totally appreciate that the SEC RTC staff and director and commissioners are considering all the various interlocking economic temporal and legal moving parts and how they interact it's it's darn complex and I wish I wasn't paying attention it it seems to me that because there are opportunists quite eager to permanently remove the railroad entirely it complicates what could otherwise be pragmatic conversations conducted in good faith that's all this could be straightforward but for the anti rail opportunists good afternoon that's all folks thank you Mr. Van Brink our next speaker is Tina Andreotta hello there hi hello hi firstly there is no need to rail bank the quarter to finish building the now under construction rail trail the approved master plan calls for the trail to be built as a rail with trail facility because rails with trails avoids the problems associated with abandonment and rail banking rails with trails are the fastest growing type of rail trail across the US according to the national rails to trails conservancy the number of rails with trails in the US increased from a total of 162 in September of 2013 to a total of 399 in January of 2021 a phenomenal increase of 250 percent and a little more than seven years there are many reasons for this rapid growth that they all boil down to this it simply works the best best way is to stay on course specifically with the Monterey Bay scenic sanctuary sanctuary trail master plan from 2014 stop this nonsense about abandoning and rail banking are irreplaceable rail lines keep the trail and rail moving forward thank you rail banking is a dead end thank you Ms. Andreotta our next speaker is David Dean I think I already had a turn I think you already did I know you did speak before and I was trying to track if it was the last item and yes you did so sorry we're gonna carry on thanks for reminding me okay and our next speaker will be Patrick Wiseman Mr. Wiseman you want to hit star six to unmute yourself because we can't hear you and you're still on mute if you hit star six we'll be able to hear you or we should be able to hear you Mr. Wiseman I think there may be an issue with your microphone possibly so if you can figure that out well we'll make sure to come back around and call on you and now we will try third time's a charm Jacob with Saki can you hear me this time yes we can okay thank you new device sorry I apologize to everybody um as a first district district resident I strongly oppose adverse abandonment of the Felton branch line and I have some major concerns about this report while the community is struggling to comprehend this issue through the fog of both intentional and unintentional misinformation this report describes some purported benefits of rail banking while presenting minimal information on the surface transportation board's decision-making process in these cases and proposes at least one action that in the past has been deemed an abuse of STP processes detailed in my written comments commissioners need to understand the expense length and likely futility of an adverse abandonment case long before RTC staff began preparing reports to help commissioners figure out what rail banking is roaring camp went down went down the list of surface transportation board items that will be used to weigh the public and convenience and necessity of adverse abandonment and checked every box that will be considered in their favor I understand some community members may feel frustrated that local concerns or even a public vote can be preempted by federal law however we should remember that this federal body of law preserves a continuous network of rail that delivers goods and also passengers across the country without being threatened by undue interference from local interests that would just prefer not to have a noisy train in their community I support roaring camp and protecting their property rights with all available legal tools and form the RTC to avoid this destructive pointless duplicitous course of action thank you Mr. Waizaki we our next speaker is John E good day can you hear me yes we can thank you I understand no decisions are being made today it's just information gathering so in the spirit of information gathering I would just like to point out that once the rails come up they will never go back down that is 100 percent certain so just be aware of this an example is Dunbarton bridge across lower san francisco bay Dunbarton bridge has not had any rail traffic since 1989 but they still keep the rails in place just in case just in case they want to use it at a later date the southern pacific railroad now the union pacific railroad the largest railroad in america understands this very well should they pull up the rails they will never go back down so they have kept these rails in place since 1989 just in case thank you thank you our our next speaker is Charles Hicks yes hello can you hear me okay yes okay yes I would just like to say two things the first one is that I always believed in compromise and it seems to me there's a lot of people in our community who would like to have a trail a lot of people would like to continue to have to keep the rail and it seems like having a rail in a trail is the perfect compromise not everyone is totally happy with it but it's a good compromise and it just seems like that's the kind of thing we need to do in our community the second thing I wanted one of the commissioners brought up a question and that is how much of the line is fee simple in other words this pressure seems like that's coming down on us right now we got to do something real quick because we're going to get sued by the landowners and so forth why couldn't we just go and either renegotiate the lease on that part of the land that where we might have trouble or just buy it and you know make it fee simple anyway that's just the question I had thank you very much thank you Mr. Hicks I see one hand up and this is Mr. Wiseman Patrick Wiseman who it looks like your audio is fixed and more hands coming up I do want to just encourage folks if you are interested in speaking on this issue please raise your hands now so we are aware of how many people we anticipate and all with that I'll call on Mr. Wiseman thank you very much can you hear me now we can all right thank you rail digging is a mistake abandonment of any existing rail line in Santa Cruz is a mistake attacking roaring camp and offering them lousy compromises is appalling also discussing the risk of easement violations and shifting our dirty work to the federal government is appalling roaring camp needs equipment shipped by rail because their business serves the community directly they need equipment shipped by rail yeah that's pretty much all I have to say thanks thank you okay our next speaker will be Christina Lofranco hi there can you hear me we can hi I'm Christina Lofranco a fifth generation Santa Cruzian born at Dominican hospital and raised in Felton California I now live in Santa Cruz proper and growing up in Felton my twin sister and I had season passes for the train we would ride our bikes down to roaring camp the conductor would load our bikes onto the train and through the redwoods we would go down to Santa Cruz and it was our outlet to a bigger life it was how we were able to safely get to Santa Cruz's kids and explore what Santa Cruz had to offer and as we grew as Felton kids with this link to beach life we would sign up for junior guards down at Cowles being raised by a single mom it was the only way we were able to get home from junior guards mom would drop us off before work and the roaring camp train would take us home after junior guards and as an adult grown now living in Santa Cruz I take the train back home to Felton to visit my family the hour long ride enables me to center and ground myself to slow down and route to my roots and I love it the train was and still is the only safe accessible and open to the public way to get from Felton to Santa Cruz my hope is that whoever is the younger version of me and my twin sister those grassroots Felton kids of today and tomorrow can still enjoy the opportunities that we have thank you thank you our next speaker is Debra Still all right can you hear me yes thank you so I mostly have a question I'm just wondering in considering the Santa Cruz branch line abandonment whether that procedure would be done through an agreement with the ACL I think that's who's doing the freight or whether that would also be adverse abandonment that's mostly that's my main question I think in general I certainly support keeping the option of rail in our county and I would also just say that as a possible suggestion for Mr. Preston I found him difficult to hear often and perhaps an improved mic system for him might be beneficial thank you thank you Ms. Still our next speaker is Saladin Sale thank you Chair Brown can you hear me yes great capability on both lines between Felton and Watsonville is essential to the county's ability to respond to the effects of climate change year-round fire season is a reality in California Henry Cal Redwoods and the Pogonip lie between Felton and Santa Cruz in steep heavily forested terrain accessible only by trail and the Felton branch rail line the fire service has introduced a game-changing new tool the fire train the typical fire train is comprised of locomotive fire suppression car two water tenders and a command center caboose fitted with firefighting spray nozzles the train carries 56,000 gallons of water or fire suppression retardant this technology seems tailor-made for the densely forested areas along the San Lorenzo river between Felton and Santa Cruz the ability to send a fire train north through Watsonville to this inaccessible area would be lost by design if the RTC cuts off the Felton line from the state rail network the fire chiefs of every San Lorenzo Valley fire district are on record opposing any abandonment and either the Santa Cruz or Felton branch lines for this reason don't make the potentially catastrophic mistake of abandoning the tremendous potential of our fire train capable freight rail lines thank you thank you Mr. Sale our next speaker is Buzz Anderson hi thank you I want to thank Mr. Preston and RTC council for the facts on rail banking which has been done in hundreds of communities and I want to reiterate that there is really no viable freight on the Santa Cruz Watsonville line the last three operators have failed successful freight operators they make their money by hauling mostly fossil fuels such as gas, coal and oil also aggregates sand, rock, and cement which they did for the cement factory and concrete factory up in Gavenport fertilizers, granular or liquid shipping containers and some large bulk goods and that's really not going to happen on the Santa Cruz Watsonville line also I want to point out that the estimated cost of 60 million dollars to repair the Santa Cruz Watsonville tracks more than likely that's going to increase possibly close to a hundred million dollars and I think the public should not have to spend that kind of money for the benefit of any private or profit enterprise thank you thank you our next speaker is Rebecca Downing thank you I would just like to add for informational purposes for your discussion making money they tried and part of the reason they tried was because the RTC owned the line but it was sold to you by Unipacific who was operating at a loss and that is when the cement plant was actually functioning so please consider that as you proceed the only other thing that might be helpful to know on behalf of Roaring Camp is how much freight was shipped from Roaring Camp to Watsonville between the time they acquired the easement in 1985 and the time that the RTC purchased it thank you thank you next up we have the Fort Zoom host not sure who that is but you can go ahead and introduce yourself and you have a minute and a half my apologies I thought I was on my personal account this is Faina Siegel I would like to talk to you today about the repair costs that are being quoted in the most recent RTC report these report estimates we couldn't find any background on them so it would be very nice to hear where they got this estimate from and then just like to point out that the repair costs are not taking into account the five to one return we normally get from state and federal grants in fact the item eight on today's agenda demonstrates that only 20% of measure D funds were needed as a match to repair the Paho river rail bridge that means that the money we get from measure D should should be times five when you take into account state and federal grants that are much more likely to come if we keep our freight easements in place thank you so much thank you let's see the next hand up is Judy Giddelson and I'm apologize I'm on tracking it I think you've spoken on this issue but if you have not you'll remember better than I and if if so go for it it's your turn thank you I'm just going to address this one very briefly I think on this call we've heard from three freight carriers or more that freight is a real viable future option in the Santa Cruz branch line and the whole way and that we shouldn't eliminate that period so I think keeping the option of rail and keeping the freight accessible as well is something that's been shown to me today so I just wanted to chime in on that thank you and I think the reverse abandonment is not a positive thing for our community thank you Ms. Giddelson our next speaker is Sean funding and roaring camp railroads and money invested all of that is searchable and verifiable does if anybody thinks roaring camp isn't telling the truth then what you're saying is that the local fire chiefs are lying to you as well nobody on this board knows better knows better than the collective knowledge all of these fire chiefs put together you know local local Jeff Denholm brought a gel fire suppressant to market that extends the value of water by a factor of 8 to 10 does the job faster and reduces water hauling needs and expense it's non-toxic so better for well water in the mountains it's it's biodegradable it's safer for firefighters to use and firefighters deserve the right to access the tools that they decide are safe and efficient for them to use and these old railroad lines some of their history is that they're the ones that supplied San Francisco with a railroad with a redwood lumber to rebuild all of those all of those buildings that's part of the legacy here supports your firefighters they saved your very lives thank you Sean our next speaker and potentially final speaker if I don't see additional hands come up is bud colligan uh chair brown can you hear me yes we can okay thank you just wanted to say that I really appreciate uh commissioner McPherson's comments and also commissioner alternates Quinn's comments about data I just want to make three comments first if there is a viable opportunity for freight I think it needs to be demonstrated we've had three failed rail operators and if you count Union Pacific that would be four so where's the data where are the specifics on freight they have all left because they couldn't make money secondly we're in camp uh said that their business would die but I think the question that needs to be answered by them is what will they do for the next 25 years they have existed for five years without you know access to Watsonville the capitol attressal and a couple other bridges are out of service so how will they survive during those 25 years it's it's important for them to figure out their business and lastly um regarding uh comments about public comment and overwhelming support I think that 13,315 uh certified signatures for the greenway initiative are uh testament to a strong feeling by the public otherwise thank you thank you Mr. Colligan our next speaker uh um we do I do see more hands coming up uh so we will carry on our next speaker is Charles Hicks I thank you for the mention and that sort of has to do with the whole squad of Eve and you know enjoyment of your life and one of the things that I would love to do personally would be able to take my bicycle go to a train station and take my take the train down to Watsonville and get off and ride around Watsonville with my bicycle I'm not it's it's difficult for me to consider taking my bike from here all the way to Watsonville pedal it myself and I'm also not particularly interested in getting on a bus and going down there but a train would be fantastic um so anyway that's just another aspect of it thank you thank you Mr. Hicks our next speaker is Mary Offerman Mary you're up I unmuted can you hear me yes we can okay great we're talking a lot about choosing to abandon the the rail rights because we can't pay to maintain or we found it difficult to maintain our freight our freight necessities or the necessities the repairs to continue I didn't ride this in advance sorry um at any rate I think that we can't necessarily we see what the future brings in terms of necessity for freight because climate change is changing our our focus to local local resources and local networks more than before um so I I don't think that projecting future use of freight is necessarily based on pastures of freight but mainly I want to address the fact that I believe that the rail line is an essential artery between Santa between actually between Davenport and Watsonville and we mustn't cut the blood between among all of us I want to see our county united and I'm very and very strong in favor of equity transport that serves every one of us every color every economic status and so please do not abandon the rail lines thank you miss Offerman our next speaker will be Cheyenne and do you want to press star six to unmute yourself myself there you go yay so hi my name is Cheyenne Howe and I am a lifelong resident of San Lorenzo Valley having sat through this meeting and hearing all presentations and public comments I keep circling back to the notion that roaring camp quote needs to come to the table as far as I can see they weren't adequately invited to the table and the terms of their arrangement are being renegotiated without their involvement with all this talk of them coming to the table moving forward roaring camp needs to be allotted more than two three minute talking segments when discussing their future that is all thank you for your time thank you Cheyenne okay so I we have speakers left with hands up and I'm going to do a last call now for speakers if we get a lot more hands coming up I will reduce the time to one minute I'm hoping that we're getting towards the end here and so I'm going to go through these last few speakers and call on you but anyone who wants to speak after Salvador Allen you will get one minute and well let's keep moving through so our next speaker I'm going to call in and I am calling on people who have not already spoken on this item I I do see hands up and I believe from people who have already spoken so I'm going to call on the next speaker who has not commented and that would be Eric Hansen hello commissioners this is Eric Hansen I wrote to you previously in regards to my concern over your capricious and arbitrary disregard for california state legislation uh and policy uh the california freight mobility plan 2020 supports short line railroad improvements through infrastructure upgrades and advanced technologies stating short line railroads are often overlooked as transport solutions this strategy would develop a short line rail improvement plan to encourage track upgrades industrial rail access improvements advanced technologies clean alternate energy considerations to improve system efficiency increased speeds reduce emissions and promote cost effective shifts of truck to rail that is our state legislation thank you thank you here next speaker is Richard Murphy hi um I've found it interesting that all the discussion has been that freight can't make profits while running this route and actually I think the proper way to think of this is that freight is symbiotic with the passenger options freight can help defray the cost of the line so that the passenger operation doesn't cost the community as much the RTC bought this line with the purpose of increasing transit in the corridor and I think they need to think about it holistically so anyway that's all thank you very much bye thank you okay um next up Salvador Allen hey I hope everyone's doing well today so I have a couple comments a couple questions nothing crazy um back before the RTC bought the rail line Union Pacific offered three different forms of excursion slash passenger service the RTC said no to all three the question is why I just don't know any reasons why the RTC abandoned those thoughts from Union Pacific second no one's discussed IO Pacific and other holdings companies and their business practices and how poor they were IO Pacific holds the nickname IOU Pacific for going bankrupt not because of Santa Cruz but because other poor investments doesn't prove that Santa Cruz freight isn't viable because they had to leave for their own poor investments uh Santa Cruz history super super deep in rail Santa Cruz and its county its rail built California multiple times it's incredible um now I just want to leave you guys with little you know quote famous quote little saying you don't know what you've got until it's gone I just want you to think about that and I yield my time thank you Mr. Allen okay I so I um I'm gonna call on Adrienne Brandt and I did say I was gonna reduce to one minute but since you are the ostensibly the last speaker let's just go ahead and I'll give you one and a half minutes doesn't seem fair oh here we go okay so Mr. Brandt I'll give you one and a half minutes and and we'll regroup but I am gonna I'm going to cut off public comment pretty soon here so on to you Mr. Brandt or Ms. Brandt Adrienne okay just copy on me thank you thank you yes so I just food for thought you know I I've heard today several comments disparaging the concept of transportation infrastructure benefiting private businesses very disdainfully spoken that's what transportation infrastructure is highway one bridges whatever counties cities all over this country build transportation infrastructure it's not a profit-making business and it's there for tax paying businesses and commerce and for taxpayers in the form of rail riders or people who are enjoying the fact that certain traffic is no longer on their roads and on the rails so just keep in mind that that to me is a fallacy it's not a point against making prudent long-lasting investments in public infrastructure this this is a corridor that the counties all over the country and cities all over the country would kill to have it sure it needs work but it's something that is absolutely a jewel you think about the cost of the real estate to acquire or create something like that from scratch and it's essentially cost prohibitive and impossible imagine if it wasn't there so it's definitely a matter of preserving what you have and do not be afraid or deterred by specious arguments about investing in infrastructure for private thank you okay I am so we're going to go to one minute regardless of what happens at this point that madam procedural comment commissioner rockin both the spirit and the law of the brown act do not require endless meetings the people who are listening to us have gone down we've lost 25 percent of our viewers and I think the public's right to sort of not spend we've already been four and a half hours here to be able to watch our actual discussion and you know comments from the commissioners is equally important as the last three or four comments the people who joined this call four hours after it began apparently because you've asked for them to join several times so please feel free I'm not telling you what to do I'm making a suggestion to end this after the last we're now looking at one two speakers don't allow anyone else to speak you have that right both on the spirit and the letter of the brown act thank you commissioner rockin that was what I was just about to say because I do see that hands continue to go up and you know we at a certain point we do need to to move on but I so I will so our last speaker will be Todd Marco I want to ask Stacey if if you I believe Stacey has spoken on this item so but this could be a different Stacey if if you are a different Stacey who has not spoken I will call on you you will have one minute but if you have already spoken then we need to move on so not hearing anyone I I'm sorry same Stacey same Stacey but you've used less than half of this public comment period for public comments understood we have a lot of people want green way petition has been advertised misleadingly saying that it would make the trail happen quicker which is untrue and the number of signatures I'm sorry I'm sorry Stacey but I do need to cut you off here I recognize your your strong interest in this issue and I you know I I'm not trying to curtail public comment but we are speaking to a particular item and again the broader campaign in the community with the voters will take place elsewhere I'm sorry that's frustrating we do want to just keep moving so with that I'm going to give uh Mr Marco you have one minute and that you will be our last speaker on this item and then we will move on to item 23 thank you thank you I'll keep this short uh hi this is Todd Marco executive director of my senior Rio Gateway in Altos I just wanted to emphasize again that this discussion uh excuse me this vicious debate is about freight on our rail quarters it is not helpful to entangle this difficult discussion with misinformation regarding rail transit or to bring into question whether or not rail banking would preclude development of rail transit misinformation does not help the public and the absence of truth is always demonstrated over time please fellow members of the public please understand that you are being misled all right um so we will now bring it back to the commission for discussion uh commissioner McPherson yeah I mean this is not an action item as has been stated before but I'd like to just make a general request for direction for our RITC staff to reach out to Roaring Camp again and to get updated communications with them I think it's I think everybody can see that this is dearly dearly needed and I think that I'd just like to ask our staff to pursue further communications and negotiations with Roaring Camp very general thank you commissioner McPherson I I would agree with that and I you know I think we have been having that conversation and I appreciate you reiterating that here um and and hopefully that that will happen as we move forward uh commissioner Schifrin you are up next thank you I want to stop by agreeing with commissioner McPherson I think that's where I was going to end up although that wasn't where I was going to start because I think this is an opportunity to try to especially since we while we have many members of the public who have been here before we have also other members of the public who are here for the first time and it may be helpful to take a little time to put this into context the staff report I think was very detailed and provided a lot of information but if you're new to the game it could be very confusing it was somewhat you know difficult to understand even for me who's been in the game for a long time so I wanted to talk about why is rail abandonment even an issue why are we talking about it and really it's about what do we want to do with the rail line with the rail corridor and in the end the choices are simple although the details are extremely complex if I could give a little background there are two types of transportation on railroad tracks there's freight service there's passenger service freight service is regulated by the federal government passenger service isn't historically the Santa Cruz rail line has been used for both freight and passenger a freight easement on the line gives a rail operator the right to run freight trains on the line when the rtc bought the rail line it bought the property but union pacific sold the freight easement to a private company the rtc has an agreement with the current owner of the freight easement where each party has rights and obligations a freight easement can be abandoned in two ways but it must be approved by the federal surface transportation board the stb the owner of the freight easement can voluntarily apply for abandonment or a public agency or others like the rtc can apply for an adverse abandonment the company that holds the freight easement now has refused to apply for abandonment voluntarily ostensibly I think because it's based on the opposition of rtc the stb will only approve abandonment again as I understand it based on evidence that the freight service is no longer viable and won't be in the future I think that's the context in which we're all sort of dealing with this issue what are a few what I think of as indisputable facts the rail line from Watsonville north is currently inoperable for either freight or passenger service that needs significant repairs before trains can run on again and we've heard of got a lot of testimony about how much those repairs may or may not cause but they need to be repaired it's inoperable now secondly there there is a proposal from greenway to to um for a 20 foot wide uh trail in the existing right of way the the greenway is defined as including two lanes of wheel traffic on a paved path a divider and a separate walkway for pedestrians with a shoulder on both sides this trail as I understand it would be about 20 feet wide as the direct the executive director said earlier the greenway trail proposal would require the removal of the tracks for it to be constructed because the record is right away is not wide enough for both the greenway trail and the railroad tracks the railroad tracks however cannot be removed as long as there is a freight easement the only way to remove the freight easement is to abandon it either voluntarily by the owner or through adverse abandonment the surface transportation board as I said must approve any application to abandon it so in the end the greenway trail requires the removal of the railroad tracks and this cannot occur without the abandonment of the freight easement so this that's the you know this is where we get into what one of the motives of the various participants in this discussion that we've been hearing from it's confusing because not everyone has the same motives for wanting abandonment the rtc staff favors abandonment as I understand it because it will make it easier to build the the rail trail along the corridor greenway supporters favor abandonment obviously because the greenway trail can't be built without it roaring camp opposes abandonment because it fears that it will eliminate their opportunity to provide rail serve a freight service and maybe even passenger service in the future on the line so the arguments are that the benefits of abandonment from the rtc staff perspective are that they would make constructing segments of the rail trail easier by dealing with liability issues and by reducing environmental impacts and of course the supporters of rail service oppose abandonment because they see it as the first step to removing the tracks greenway advocates as seen in the definition of the trail itself recognize and support the removal of the tracks so that the trail can be constructed however unfortunately from my perspective greenway advocates make a number of misleading arguments that only confuse the issue they argue for one that the rtc only wants to remove the freight easement because of cost of preparing the tracks for freight is expensive and it's not about the kind of passenger service rtc can't provide this is true but ignores the fact that by removing the tracks no no train service will be possible greenway advocates also argue that abandonment does not require removal of the tracks this is probably them from my perspective the most disingenuous argument since while it is legally true it doesn't admit the fact that without abandonment there can be no greenway greenway advocates argue that even if the tracks are removed they can be put back if funding for rail service becomes feasible how likely is that especially should the greenway initiative pass greenway advocates argue that rail banking requires that the rail corridor be preserved this only means that the right of way can't be sold off with rail banking the tracks can be ripped up the greenway initiative has now qualified for the ballot and will be voted on in June it's related to the abandonment issue because the supporters of the initiative have made and will continue to make the argument that the initiative would not prevent rail service from returning to the corridor even if the greenway trail is built is it realistic to think that public transit would ever return to the return if the initiative passes since it adopts the trail as county policy and all but eliminates references to rail in the county general plan despite the misleading rhetoric if the freight easement is abandoned greenway supporters will undoubtedly advocate that the rail tracks be removed and if they succeed the likelihood of rail service ever returning between Santa Cruz and Watsonville is zero to none based on all this I do not support the adverse abandonment of freight easement and if we could vote on it today I would be voting no finally in a fundamental way this whole debate as some speakers have said that the commission seems like an exercise in futility among the over sixty six thousand emails I've received opposing abandonment was a letter from the salarins of fire district supposing abandonment based on the potential need of an operated operable rail line during a natural emergency like a devastating wildfire there has also been email and testimony from private companies indicating that they would lose the line to move their products if the line was in operate operation given these and a strong opposition from growing camp I think it is extremely doubtful that the scp would have approved an adverse abandonment application the most important point to remember from my perspective is that the greenway that will require the removal of the tracks and can only occur if the existing freight easement is abandoned if there is to be a solution it will be based on compromise and cooperation I urge us to move forward I urge us to move forward in that direction and I hope staff as indicated by commissioner McPherson will take up to the growing camp often negotiate and see if it's possible to work out a mutually acceptable agreement thank you very much thank you commissioner shifrin I see uh uh commissioner rockin your hand up and then commissioner Hernandez I've got you next so fortunately I have very brief comment because I want to basically associate myself with what Andy just said um I am not going to repeat his points um the only thing I would offer is that I see in the negotiations and to be clear there may be different views about how how those negotiations have gone to what extent uh either uh growing camp or the rtc staff have been you know forthcoming with willingness to be flexible and so forth I won't get into that I see that these negotiations offer the possibility because it's not wouldn't be adverse abandonment but the possibility that we have some kind of an agreement that would be an alternative a middle ground alternative I don't know we'd ever get more than you know three votes for one maybe um but that we might be might be possible to arrange in some of the segments not all of them some of the 20 segments on this corridor to arrange ways to realign the track some of the track if you do passenger service needs to be realigned anyway it's the cursor too sharp for past past passenger service so forth so I'm interested in the possibility of additional flexibility that would um allow us the possibility of perhaps modifying where there's not tearing out the track turning out for all time but modifying where the track goes switching where the track is compared to where the trail might go it won't work with a double wide greenway trail as Andy pointed out but it might well work with a trail that the rtc has been working on um so that's the only thing I want to add to what Andy had to say I also would be you know unless there's some negotiated alternative that allows everyone to protect their interests including warring camp I also would be voting no on the proposal for adverse abandonment in fact I would be voting no on adverse abandonment I might be voting in favor of a rail banking arrangement in which there were certain protections for bringing back a complete passenger rail service thank you thank you commissioner Hernandez you're up you know I want to I want to first I want to I agree with both uh commissioner uh shifrin and uh rockins comments and want to thank uh commissioner shifrin for uh clarifying a lot of those points um you know this is a difficult situation we received I received that counted them over 5200 emails and I did a search and uh we had over about 200 emails from south county so you know it's uh I have a difficult time putting one of our premier tourist destination sites in our county in jeopardy of closure uh you know this is really concerning to me um you know but what's more concerning is abandoning the rail line um you know I'm fundamentally opposed to rail banking um which will most likely you know lead to the loss of the rail line uh like one of the public commenters commenters mentioned uh quoted mark stone if you lift lift the tracks you lose the rail line and that ultimately leads to the more greenhouse gases single occupant vehicle miles travel and continues to promote inequities in our county you know if we lose if we lose the rail and we lose freight and the possibility of a passenger train you know watson mills 56 000 residents that are 85 latino tend to lose everything from jobs transportation equity to quality of life you know we need to preserve the rail lines we need to protect our county's jams like warring camp as well as our economic interests our assets in south county our job providers in south county like agron like big creek that's all I have to say okay thank you commissioner Hernandez I will now call on commissioner Bertrand and you are on mute thank you chair um I've been accepting every single call that's come to my cell phone um shout out to Luna and her brother and her father who made that call possible um you know kids and family tradition was very meaningful to me um took my daughter on the rowing camp and we've attended weddings of her friend one wedding of her friend and you know rode that as a kid too so it's it's been mentioned to me through many of these calls that people come from all over the state actually because they've had those ties to this railroad and they make it a big family event and in many cases I told people you could get a share of the railroad and even pass it on to your family members to keep that tradition going so I I deeply hear that and the calls had a lot of effect on me um the other thing that had a lot of effect on me is uh what the family that runs the railroad feels and um so I actually talked to Milani Clark's sister and I got a deeper understanding of how the family feels I haven't talked to Milani Clark I didn't think that was proper um but I had that conversation so I hold that dearly and um I think we're trying to as a commission provide service to the county residents and it was mentioned earlier that we have a fiduciary responsibility to spend our money accordingly and I think the commission holds that also very dearly that that particular um responsibility it's a hard one it's a hard one because the issue is so complicated and there are conflicting interests so I'll end with this um too many of the callers I said it's incumbent for Guy and Milani I actually put it this way to sit down and have a cup of coffee together as a lot of you know when I talk when I organize meetings with individual members of the commission or people who are interested in the issues I always ask let's meet somewhere Lulu's Pete's wherever we're a couple of coffees so we could sit down and see each other face to face and you know how our interests are presented by Guy I have full confidence in that and I think Milani Clark will do the same but I think it's incumbent that they actually get together and have that conference no lawyers just to see who they are yield each other out and understand where they're coming from it is critical that we preserve that option for roaring camp to use our segment to get down to the wharf that is a real critical issue that we need to recognize um that they're focused on and so we need to hold that in our conversations with them and maybe real bank is the way to do it I don't know but I think we need to have agreements to actually focus on what their main concern is and so that's my last point thank you thank you commissioner Bertrands uh commissioner Quinn your turn oh thank you chair Brown for navigating through that that was extremely uh enlightening to hear from the public you know when when Zach asked me the alternate commissioner I really take this responsibility seriously and we have some very difficult decisions to make its clear emotions are running high and I'd like to recommend uh to director Preston and others that as we wade into this decision we ground ourselves in the facts again will the trail do the studies indicate that the train will in fact get our county moving again can we afford it what are the options I think we have to be realistic we've heard a lot of aspirational ideas about freight and the train does the data support that this is really going to disimpact our county and get us moving and maybe you know the uh staff gave an excellent overview on the rail banking I wonder if a synopsis of the studies to date would help inform the public on the data points we have to help guide this decision thank you commissioner Quinn uh I see a commissioner Johnson your hand Randy Johnson yeah thank you chair you know um maybe it was 10 or 12 years ago uh I met with the president of CEMEX he was deeply concerned about not being able to move his product through uh on the rail line all the way to Watsonville and at that time he he gave me information with respect to how many truckloads uh if if you stop uh train service it would translate into how many truckloads it was a fantastic number it was hundreds I believe um per week or per day I kind of forget that went away and I think um I think the viability of of freight service kind of went away too because that's when Union Pacific pretty much said okay we'll sell we'll sell you the line um we're 11 whatever million plus 10 million that that the RTC had so um I was a big big believer in freight until that kind of went away and then we then I just looked at the the data and just started counting noses with respect to how many people would actually use freight service on on the rail how many companies and it was diminishing diminishing diminishing and I kind of opposed the short a short line uh providers based on that information um people are always sanguine about the fact that you know uh freight service going to work freight service going to work well it's been demonstrated specifically through earlier Union Pacific uh Iowa Pacific progressive uh the very same people today that are saying this you know that it'll work it's viable we'll just give it a chance um our ignoring history okay it's not really going to work I think distilling kind of the uh main issue with uh roaring camp who I respect and believe me from from you know uh the interests of scott's valley you know one of the big reasons one of the big ways that are we support our our city is through hotel tax and they are responsible for a lot of the hotel hotel uh um traffic that we get people know that that company they come here they stay here in scott's valley it helps us nobody's interested in seeing them go away believe me um but one of the you know one of the interesting things is that um I think probably if you distill it down they're interested in preserving their future and I think the risk that they see is that the ability to obtain the equipment that gives them a sustainable future now we keep talking about and again I'm whistling in the dark here so to speak because I don't know about highway one I don't know about you know going underneath certain places in on highway one I do know that there is a 101 and 17 where people travel all the time I don't know if there are bridges and so forth that are a problem there but I think that we can solve that problem and give them an ability to kind of make sure that that section of their business is guaranteed or at least has a future I think a lot of their issues may go away and so I would try and pay particular attention moving forward for our staff and also for them is let's do a pretty good analysis in what it takes to move um you know large locomotives through through with uh trucks and see if it's viable it's been done we know this okay I think I have videos showing that so if you distill that down maybe some of the objections go away and it helps both parties thank you thank you uh commissioner Montecino you're up thank you well first of all I just want to acknowledge other um well other county folks that email me or called me um in regards to this abandonment issue and supported of um supported of our local business um you know one of those you know I think everyone's has gotten to that um done that trip over over a time but you know I associate myself with um you know um commissioners difference remarks made it really clear uh you know what the issues are upon us and and do support you know send it back to staff to see if we if we can um get a compromise or get together that would be an agreement with both of us for um our local min six and we still have you know some freight service and and are and are you know in south county I mean you heard from granite rod you're um you didn't hear for Del Mar foods but they you know you should use them and now the bio these are agron um so they're you know we do we do have some business and and freight so thank you thank you are there other commissioners who would like to address the audience uh and the commission before we move on so uh uh mr hers I see you have your hand up and I um I'm I think you are representing Watsonville and um not as a commissioner today I'll uh give you an opportunity to uh share your thoughts and um and then I have a couple of things I'd like to say before we uh conclude this item before thank you very much chair yes I am uh an alternate uh for the city of Watsonville and um oh I and I'll keep it brief uh you know it hadn't been my service in uh in Watsonville all these years that that um causes me to speak today but it is my um experience in in traveling the world and having ridden bikes uh in Kathmandu and Cusco and walked on some very narrow trails all over the the world that I know that many things are possible here certainly if you look at history and history sometimes repeats itself that millions of millions of dollars of freight have moved on this line historically and who knows what could happen if the line was repaired perhaps millions of dollars of freight would move again and so for me abandonment is a no go and certainly rail banking is uh when the rails are gone they're not coming back so let's get moving let's put some money into repair of the line let's put some things on it that are light and electric and move people let's get moving thank you very much thank you um okay commissioner shifrin I'll very quick question based on what commissioner McPherson said and others what are the next steps here I want to ask the executive director what he sees as the next steps after this non-vote today um I see um but the commission really wants to try to work this out I think the commission listened carefully and understands the concerns of both roaring camp and the RTC and and I believe um without without a vote directing me to there's a desire and um a willingness to open up discussions again with with roaring camp that understand their concerns to see if they can be addressed um and um and I'm willing to do that um so that's the direction I'm going to go and we'll continue to provide information to the commission in various different ways and and I would see that as our next step thank you okay I um thank you uh commissioner shifrin I that was my question that I was going to ask and before I uh uh close this item I do want to just say a couple of words myself um I want to appreciate uh members of the public who came out and all of the many people who did communicate with us many of those messages were standard messages auto messages and many were very heartfelt uh messages about uh both roaring camp and the future of the rail line and so I just I wanted to appreciate that there are many many people who have an interest in this issue and it is a very confusing one uh um and I appreciate commissioner shifrin for laying that out in a way that I think um you know really resonated for me and so I I uh third or fourth or fifth I'm not sure where we're at right now those comments again without repeating them um I want to provide uh some full disclosure this is uh kind of a follow-up to the earlier request that was made about disclosing the votes on uh bringing this whether or not to bring this item and how we would bring this item to the public agenda many people reached out were concerned about this uh being a discussion on potential adverse abandonment happening in closed session and we wanted it to be out in the open I agree whole heartedly with that um I was in full disclosure I was one of the no votes uh at that time at our last meeting in closed session and I was a no vote because I precisely because I was so concerned about the potential for this item to really rile up um emotions and concerns in our community that um we were not prepared to uh adequately address as a commission we are um as those of you who are observers know um we are in a bit of a stalemate about what to do with the uh the rail line at the moment uh as kind of evidence through some uh six six votes and because I felt like we didn't have enough information and we really weren't there I was concerned about how the community would respond and not so much not wanting to hear from the community but concern that the community that this was going to cause people to get really upset and it has and um give and I also want to agree with Commissioner McPherson and others who have said uh we really do need uh more information I want to reiterate that and confirm that um apparent consensus I haven't heard any objections to uh and directing our staff to go back to the uh the negotiating room and to have uh ongoing conversation with Roaring Camp I absolutely support that and until we can get some more clarity about that and um and also uh from the from the public um I think we do have uh an election coming in June and uh we'll be talking about that on our next item so I'll leave that um but until that time I think it's really um not a productive conversation for us to just kind of recycle uh so I that was my um my rationale it was not about uh a lack of transparency or disclosure I am all about uh transparency and public decision making uh so I just wanted to be clear about that when you see those of you who are watching see the minutes um again um I I'll just say without any additional uh commentary that um at this time I I don't support I wouldn't support adverse abandonment of the rail line if we were to take a vote uh today I think there's a lot more work to be done and um I look forward to being a part of that conversation uh in the spirit of transparency and and also um efficacy trying to move us forward uh so I'll leave it there and uh seeing no other hands up uh we'll we'll close this item and move on to our our next item on our agenda I believe this is our last item yes it is and um another item problem to get interest I don't want I just want to really quickly Commissioner Rockin before I turn it over to you I'll go to the staff first actually yeah okay that's right thank you intro I just heard your voice so I thought you wanted to jump in okay so um item 23 we'll move on to item 23 uh this is a proposal for a potential alternative ballot measure regarding the rail and trail uh Luis Mendes our deputy director will give a staff report and then I'm going to turn it over to Commissioner Rockin uh to make a few comments about the proposal uh which did come from myself uh Commissioner Rockin and Commissioner Montecino and um I and then I will um go through the we'll go through the commissioner questions if there are questions and then we will open it up to the public depending on how what happens here in this this first uh step uh and what at that time uh I will be giving one minute once again we are kind of have we're having a very long meeting and uh we want to just get through this so um with that I'll turn it over to uh deputy director Mendes for a staff report and possibly uh our RTC council see Mattis good afternoon commission commissioners my best to be very brief and interesting time um uh staff just simply recommends that you consider this uh commissioner request for a potential advisory ballot measure for the uh june primary election a couple of things to to note if the is the commission does want to proceed with the potential advisory ballot measure uh the deadline to submit um what is needed to the accounting board of supervisors to place the measure on the ballot is march march of 11th so that'll be very quick and so you would need you would need to you know make sure you agree on language for a ballot measure uh and the question that would be placed on the ballot and would need would want to have that um you know the review necessary from legal council in order to do that you know by march of 11th so you don't have very very much time and then also we did get in a cost estimate from the elections department and wondered what might my cost to the commission if and such an advisory measure was placed on the ballot and uh it was an estimate of half a million two million dollars and that depends on the number of things um and it's one of those is the number of registered voters in the county how many of the ballot measures are sharing the cost uh so that's why it's kind of a wide ranging estimate with that you know that's um say staff like when you consider this this request and thank you okay mr. Mattis do you have anything to add i do not i'm provided the count of the commission advice on this issue all right yes thank you uh so you all should have received a written memo about this item and um if if you do have questions uh we'll get we can provide time to for those um i guess with that we will uh turn it oh i'll turn it over to commissioner rockin uh who was going to make some introductory comments about the item since it did come from commissioners thank you very much chair brown first of all i will be brief i'm not going to repeat all of the we have i think a very clear um introductory uh report from the three of us about you know what our intentions are in doing this i will briefly summarize them but not make every point and i'm also going to try and do this in a way i mean i'm sure people may object to the characterizations i make but i'll do my best to not be uh bombastic in the way i do this so people feel compelled to enter in some you know huge debate about it uh but i think people need to be clear about why this is being proposed and i think it's fair and there's also a uh attachment which shows the actual language that the three of us are proposing for what the ballot measure might say the first thing to say is i really we aren't loggerheads in a six six vote at this point and it it's difficult even if we had seven votes or clear even stronger majority uh in favor of let's say for example uh make proceeding with the passenger rail and doing everything we can to get there we've already heard on the earlier item today the one before this one that there are other barriers uh to doing that than simply having a commission that knows what it wants which is not so clear uh in terms of our collective actions but the my own view is that one way to possibly break out of this this uh six six tire this loggerhead is to get a clear indication from members of the public on what they really want and i unfortunately do not feel that the greenway measure does that in a clear way i think that they uh again i don't mean to attack the motives of the greenway people just saying in terms of what's put in front of us there um the measure on the one hand defines a green what a greenway is in a way that is a double wide trail i've been put in simple terms that really prohibits the possibility of future rail unless you tear out the track you put the that the trail you've put in you won't have rail in the future there are other arguments the public have made about once you remove the rail the difficulty of bringing it back that's not necessarily on greenway but i think that's a political reality not not a legal question of whether you have a legal right whether you have the practical and political possibility of ever bringing rail back once any any say any segment of it is taken out and something's built there are recreational facilities built there in its place so the greenway measure in effect says yes we want to trail we want it to be our priority that makes it very clear it goes so far as to say let's take every reference to in fact the only actually the actual action as opposed to advisory issues in the measure is that the county take every reference to rail planning for rail out of its general plan which suggests that you know how would you ever get back to having rail come back if you do know planning for it for the next 20 years or however long you think that process is going to be before there's money available some kind of a deus ex machinist that the rail's going to drop out of the sky but you've done no planning for it so again if there were clear votes in favor of rail in a strong way from the public and we knew that that's really our first priority we could continue to work on with difficulty on the variety of trail segments and they are more difficult i think than my members the public fully understand several of these we work on those but in the meantime we only get two million dollars a year out of measure d for rail and some of that has to be used on fixing bridges and making that stuff happen that's really important some of it needs to be used on matching money if we're going to go for grants um uh and so you wouldn't be able to build it out of any one year's measure d a lot but you might build it out of six or five and be at some point where if you were saving that money up and it really was your priority you had the votes to do it you would move ahead and eventually you would actually get the ir done that was talked about earlier and then you would be able to go and apply for money to make this thing happen when the conversely if the people really want trail to be their first priority and they care less about rail on some level i can only speak for myself i'm i am guided by the public on these kinds of questions i don't know that i'd be guided on a 51 majority one way or the other but if you had a decisive vote of the public saying this is what we want i'm someone who would open my mind uh other alternatives quite honestly but i don't think the greenway measure will be persuasive to me on that whether it passes or fails one way or the other um just because it's again the the campaign is already being run on the basis of well you can have a trail now and then you could have rail in the future i don't think the way it's being planned you would ever have rail in the future if that uh measure were passed and then followed through with uh by the commission so i wanted to offer and i my colleagues i think joined me in this on sandy brown and edwardo montecino that we want to put something on the ballot that would give a clear litmus test a clear indication of what the public really wants that would allow us to feel that it really was expressing public opinion and then we could make a hard choice about this i don't feel that the greenway measure provides that you know again if they were to pass overwhelmingly uh in its form it might still be a question of people did people vote for it because they thought they could have rail someday and which seems to me under andy's comments virtually impossible so that's them that's what's being proposed here um i don't think we're gonna have a huge debate about this it's an expensive measure to put on the ballot we don't have a lot of time unless i get some indication that there are commissioners beyond the three of us who think this is a really great idea to put this on the ballot i'll be clear i may not may even make the motion to do so um i i don't know what the point of having another six six vote would be if that's where we're gonna come out on this thing so i'm not trying i'm interested tom it's late in the day i'm not trying to drag this out forever but i want people to be clear about why i put this on the agenda and why i was joined i believe my colleagues joined me in putting this on the on the on the agenda and just get some reading of sort of how commissioners feel about whether and again should we not be proposed prepared at this moment to put this on the ballot perhaps if there's an ambiguous result one way or the other out of this june vote on the greenway measure this could be a measure that's brought back and make a lot of sense in november or some other time in the future i don't want to rule that out uh but but at this point i i don't want to get a reading on whether it's worth any more time this afternoon um and certainly our time our staff's time and everybody's in a real rush to get this on a ballot by june i think it was 13th we were told on june 11th i forget the day 13th was it louise seventh it's seventh yeah i mean that's coming right up so that that's what's going on uh let me ask edward or uh sandy brad if they want to add anything to my comments everybody has his hand up so i'm that he's championing to say something here yes uh commissioner mattesino go for it thank you for that you know i i joined this effort with mike because i thought you know um it's a great idea you know um because i have the same sentiment that it's not a very uh what's going to come to the electorate is not you know it's not a very um yes or no vote so um my interest was you know both sides you know whether you agree with one side or the other both sides claim they have the public underside and you know this would be an opportunity for uh the public to really weigh in um and and say i i want rail or i just want to try out um that was you know where i was coming from and and like i said and i agree with a lot of the comments with that commissioner rockin said um you know we we gotta get you know it's the community together it's it's ripping the community apart whether more zanakers than in washington but um i can see there um you know it's it's tearing the community apart we're and here at the commission we're at six six and it seems to be no no moving forward on on either front so like i said we just wanted to put that out thank you thank you okay so i i do see other commissioners have hands up and i want to uh make time for questions right now and we do have people who want to speak on this issue for which you'll have one minute so if we could kind of try to keep it to questions here and then we'll come back for uh comments and any further discussion on the part of the commission uh after the public comment uh commissioner shifrin i have a procedural request not so much a question at this point um while i agree and that the proposed initiative is confusing and contradictory uh along the lines that commissioner rodkin has indicated and i think that the proposed advisory measure would be desirable does ask a much clearer question i am concerned with the um legal issues that have been brought to our attention given the timing and given the um some issues around clarity about what the commission can do and can't do um and given all of that i i think it would be better to um withdraw the proposal and just not move forward with it at this time i think we need more information on the legal situation and um it is rushed and while i while i think and i'm very supportive of the measure itself uh and i think it is a good idea i don't think that we should uh move forward with it at this time or as i say legal issues and timing issues so i don't know maybe we could ask uh steve uh our attorney what if um the commissioners who have brought this forward would be willing to withdraw from the agenda what would be the result of that and i guess i'm asking you uh whether you'd be willing to consider that asking me whether i'd be more concerned yes and also since it comes from the three of you but i think first maybe asking our attorney about what the procedure would be what would happen if the um proponents was asked to withdraw the recommendation um this still have to go through the the whole process uh no you do not if if the if the if the proponent this is a commissioner a sponsored item and so if the commissioners who brought this to the attention or uh put it on the agenda withdraw it from the agenda then the commission can end its discussion on the issue now um if you want to consider whether or not to put it on or have a dialogue about it then i then you do need to um take public comment as i think everyone understands clearly thank you mr mattis uh i so i will now then ask uh my colleagues who brought this forward with me uh where you how you're feeling about this and if uh based upon what i'm hearing from uh our uh rtc attorney uh we do withdraw it then we would just close the item without uh having a discussion amongst the commissioners in the in the interest of saving saving our commissioners and the public a lot of time can i just ask bruce McPherson uh to really up or down whether you think this is a good idea or not and then we quickly respond yeah and i and i really appreciate uh mr rottkins uh coming up with ideas some i support some i don't but i i do not support this for several reasons uh you know it doesn't have the signatures that the others did that work two months together and um it'll require the cost estimated at least a half a million to a million dollars but i i think it only serves to confuse the voters and continue the arguments that we've seen recently and i hope that are going to be changed and regarding the greenway ballot measure i just want to point out that on my motion tuesday before the board of supervisors i and i have not taken a position and not planning to take a position on greenway i want to make that clear but i just asked the board of supervisors that we gather more information regarding the impacts of to the county if the greenway measure passes it has to do with everything from the general plan on and so i want to i think it's going to we're going to get a clear uh thought of what the real impact of it might be from the county's perspective and its general plan and so forth um but i i just for the cost purposes for um clarity purposes i guess you'd say i mean people are going to vote it up or down and i think i'm going to say yes or no and i think with more information from the county we can be more direct in what those issues are that we're trying to to address so i would not i'm not going to be supporting this and and that in all due respect to you commissioner rothkin thank you very much uh with the concurrence of my two uh fellow uh commissioners who put this forward i i'm gonna with again if they support this i don't want to leave them stranded uh remove my motion or my uh the item i'm not going to propose it um people can certainly i'm sure people want to tell me they think who think it was a bad idea won't like to let me know uh my email is open up opnup at ucsc.edu feel free to comment to me about it i'm not trying to shut off your ability to speak up but i really think we shouldn't drag everybody through a long hearing on this again i'm going to ask sandy and edward or whether they agree that withdrawing at this point is acceptable to them yeah just because um just the legal issues in in the timeline is i i concur let's remove it from the agenda and i'll just say i concur as well thank you then it's withdrawn and i think we can move in the meeting at this point thank you very much and again i i think i had very straightforward and honest motives in putting it forward but i don't think it would be productive at this point to proceed thank you okay so uh with the the guidance from our attorney and the uh concurrence of commissioners who initiated this item uh we will uh go ahead then and withdraw it from consideration and uh move on to our final uh item for today which is uh announcement about our next meeting and um let's see director prustin did uh announce that we have a transportation policy workshop uh scheduled for february 17th that's uh the third thursday and our next meeting for the rtc general meeting will be thursday march third at nine a.m see you then thanks everybody thank you sanny it's a superb job of chairing this meeting my god i mean absolutely absolutely and and also thank uh executive director prustin for his report which i think was excellent and probably reduced by half the number of people that felt they needed to comment after he was done thank you thank you all for your uh clear and and your restraint in in commenting today i appreciate it um we're adjourned