 Alright. Okay. I think everyone's back. Have a quorum. Okay. I thought we would start on, we can queue up that slide over there for me, 13. These were the three top areas that were identified through, I think it was over 30 budget meetings and 1,900 comments were shared. In person 300 comments were shared social media. You have a report that was shared, provided to you this morning by Maria, sort of encapsulating that, sharing with you the numbers and all that. I thought it might be helpful to at least discuss these because especially around, just in particular, around street sidewalks and drainage and then parks and rec, those were two very popular areas in the one-on-one meetings I had with you on Monday and Tuesday that you were sharing to say, what's our approach to those? What do we want to try to do more with those? So, I'm just going to suggest that if you want to have a discussion about the streets, because it wasn't one of those agenda items, is there an appetite among council to want to discuss the street sidewalks and drainage? Just says to share with Cheryl about the emphasis of this into the budget. Yeah, mayor? Yes. Okay. I'll kick it off a little bit and try to be brief here. But going back to our meeting at this time last year, I think the consensus at the time and the direction we gave the manager was that we wanted to increase the street maintenance budget. And we did that with the adopted budget, but the caveat was that we had to achieve savings in other places and we weren't able to do that through resolving the contract negotiations. I would like to see us again increase that portion of our budget because we hear consistently from constituents all over the city that that is their top priority. On sidewalks, I would like to see us develop some sort of comprehensive strategy related to sidewalks. I think right now it's more just kind of catch us catch can. And I'd like for us to have some sort of assessment on what the and maybe we do have it. I don't know if it's outdated assessment of the true city, citywide sidewalk needs. I don't know to what extent that's been discussed through the planning plan process. But I want for us at some point, it may not be that we achieve it obviously through this budget. But I want for us to know what is the scope, how much is needed and start phasing in and coming up with some a plan towards achieving more connectivity. We made some progress on the sidewalk to schools program. I thought that was a good place to start. But those are the things that I am particularly interested in on those. Thanks, Mayor had Councilman crier than Lopez, then Trevino. So Councilman crier. Yeah, I'm one here loud and clear that the number one area we need more new money in is streets and drainage. Secondly, we did mayor and with the support of this council begin investing in completing school zone safety in every district in San Antonio. And I think that's an essential item. We had another little girl hit and run over this week outside Frank to hate it. Middle School and we are as Councilman Lopez knows as long as we have little children, we're going to have little children who aren't always paying close attention. So there's going to be accidents, but we can make things as safe as we can. The only new observation I have on this topic is this because I got a lot of feedback on it from constituents. And it's it goes like this. Hey, you guys said last year that the number one priority for new dollars was streets and drainage. And then the second council had to meet to cut back the budget because we didn't get a union deal. The first thing we cut back on was streets and drainage. And so their point is can we develop a budget and agree when we develop the budget that if we have to cut back, the first thing we cut back on will not be the thing that we said is the most important thing we wanted new money for. And I don't have an answer for that, but I'm sure you're a genius and can give us a good answer for that. I'm not a genius, but I can give you an answer. So we gave the council several alternatives and the choices were difficult. It was in half of the expense was to just hand scratching. Oh, okay. I didn't know if that was a hand signal. Okay. Strike curveball, but okay. So we gave choices and they were difficult ones, reducing library hours, reducing parks maintenance, reducing the amount of cleaning of our creekways. Thank goodness we didn't do that given all the rain that we've had this year that would impede the flow of water and then flood the neighborhoods even more so than they were flooded this spring. So those were tough choices and they weren't easy and you all deliberated about what to do and some of it. Remember, we said hold vacancies. We did not cut any positions in the police and fire departments, but we did hold vacancies. In fact, 75 vacancies in the police department was what the council amended the budget in November. There were vacancies that we held with the budget adoption in September, another 35 in November to help us balance the budget. And then that 9 mil of the 14, we had to cut the budget by 14 million when the contracts, labor union contracts were not settled and that was to be able to fund health care at the current level. We held vacancies in both departments and then we cut the street budget. So I understand what you're saying and what we did was reduce the amount we had recommended to be increased. So we increased in this proposed, in the proposed 2015 budget increasing street maintenance by 15 million and then you reduced or deferred those projects by 9 million. So yes, it's a number one priority. We had recommended increasing it in the budget and you had to pull back on that increased street maintenance in November to cover the public safety health care costs. I hear what you're saying. I agree. It was the number one issue by far that we heard in the 32 meetings that we've hosted over the past month and from the online comments and our speak up San Antonio budget input process, streets, sidewalks and drainage. And we hear that loud and clear. Well, I thank you for that. And I guess my suggestion is that when we adopt the budget that we try to think through the answer to that in advance if we can. So we kind of know where we're going to go. If we if we get into a crunch, if these rains continue for the next six months, I mean, in my neighborhood, the rate of pothole growth has just been exponential since we've had these rains. And I suspect that that will continue to be exponential, which will cause even more people to say, please start spending money to get ahead of this problem. So thank you for that. I think it just for it causes us to think we're going to have to make some hard decisions when we adopt the budget to try to plan ahead. Thank you. At Council and Lopez, then Trevino and Gallagher and work. Thank you. And I'm going to take the liberty of speaking twice as long simply because I was asked by Councilwoman Gonzalez to speak on her behalf. So I'll speak her stuff and that'll be mine real quickly. And the good thing is she was much more thoughtful than certainly I and maybe most of us here, I'll pass these left and right, one for all council members and the manager. And it's basically a list of 13 different priorities that Councilwoman Gonzalez would like to have entered into the record. And I'd like to read what she asked me to read. So I would like to ensure that the following priority items are included in the budget process that needed the needs of district five or tremendous our district lacks much of the basic infrastructure, which is present throughout the rest of the city. I have spent many hours talking to residents in district five and feel that these are that these recommendations help address some of the most common and pressing concerns. She gave me the top three of the 13 that are on here. And quite honestly, they are all part of what's up on the top three priorities that are up there. One one has a well already all three and 15 million dollars in sidewalk and street infrastructure, which is up on our priority list, $2 million in public funding for parks, which is up there as well. And then she's very specifically talks about $1 million additional funding for the light up district five program to bring more street lights to the district. And I know we all realize that that's a passion of hers and several others on council. So I'll submit that on her behalf. Manager, if you'll just kind of take that and move it forward. What I'd like to say just real quickly is we've all had our meetings. Clearly, those are the issues that my community came up with. We had a level of discussion on more than anything on their version or their vision on how we should set priorities. And one of the things that we collectively agreed on and what I'd like to, you know, throw out there as my recommendation is that we set some sort of priority that talks about leveraging our dollars in these areas with other investments that are being made by other entities. Example, if via is going to go in and do a project for their, you know, for their that we should turn around and compliment that with some, you know, some of the sidewalk work that we do, if the county is going to go in and build a bridge that we add additional dollars to finish the remaining part of that road that attaches to the next intersection. Because oftentimes what winds up happening is is the county will build a bridge, but they really don't address anything beyond the bridge. And then you wind up having something that appears to be a incomplete project and might the group of people that we were talking to during the speak up, or basically saying, you guys seem to think it's San Antonio's money than Bear County's money via his money and the school district's money. And to be honest with you, it's our money, all of it. You guys need to figure out a way to get together. So what came out of that was asking for us to give priority, wherever we have leveraged funding from an infrastructure perspective, leveraged by other entities that we use those as priorities for this type of infrastructure build. That way, we're not building our thing, they're building their thing. And of course, what came up several times was, you guys build a road, then we'll come in and do something and cut it up or saws will come in and cut it up. So the message was very much, you know, leverage funding. The other example that was used quite a bit. And I have a very active linear Creekway contingency in my district was that as we build parks, for example, that we complement the investments that we're making with our prop money, prop one and $2 that go to linear Creekways and build our little parks next to them. In addition to the Creekway that's coming by, again, that whole concept of let's figure out a way to leverage dollars and spend our dollars in those prior from those priorities with parks or senior services or sidewalks and the like, and leverage them with other governmental agencies. So that that was their recommendation. I thought it was a great one. So I figured I'd either a adopted or give them credit for it and adopt it as well myself. So that's my my contribution to the process here. Thank you. Thanks, Councilman and Councilman Trevino. I think you had a comment as well. Yes, thank you. With regard to some of these priorities. Yeah, I want to kind of answer some of the issues that were brought up with regards to cutbacks and where we allocate certain monies, I would I would be a proponent of trying to make sure that, for example, street sidewalks and drainage, if we look at sidewalks, for example, that we invest our money in trying to innovate our methodology. What I mean by that is invest in design first. So my hope is that we can can look at something that we think is very simple like a sidewalk, but really truly look at how we can innovate. How can we have the best sidewalks in the country? How can we have the kind of sidewalks that last an appropriate lifespan, something that that will outlast, you know, many other communities? You know, I think one of the issues that we have with a lot of the programs that we we fund is is the lifespan that they exist. In some areas, a sidewalk will last 25, 30 years. In other areas, it'll last three years. So my hope is that we can look at our methodology. We want to make sure that we we're constantly innovating our ways of doing something here in the city. And sidewalks is just one small example of that. So it's just it's just being smart about how we're doing something. It's are we do are we are we using a cookie cutter, or we truly, you know, tackling something surgically really truly addressing it with a strategic design approach. So that's where I hope we can put some of our money in the forefront. Other items like we see here social and senior services. This is right here is the issue of our time. We have a aging population. It goes it connects with with sidewalks that connects with parks and rec, because it's an issue of accessibility. I look at it as an issue of equality. And people want to to to have access to things people want to feel that they're connected to their community and connected to parks to outdoor activities. And you know, what's curiously not on that list is public safety. I would suggest that a good strategic approach of all three of these addresses public safety really truly does because you know, this is this is what we we want to complement all our efforts that we're already pushing forward of the public safety by doing these kind of things. So I you know, my hope is that we have a very design oriented strategic approach to our methodology and how we approach these priorities. And so that those are my suggestions. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Gallagher. And then Councilman work. Thank you. And Patrick, I think you really want us just talking about the first one right now. Preferably, yes. Yeah, okay. Street sidewalks and range. I was really pleased to see that this this did come out in everybody's district because I won't think is I'm sick of hearing it. I really am. So I'm really glad that that's a case. I think the situation with sidewalks is really interesting, but it's a bit problematic because I think in a lot of cases that home ownership has a lot to do with how that sidewalks going to get fixed or not. I mean, that is where the responsibility lies in a lot of neighborhood. So that's something that I don't think we communicate properly to the general public because they want the city to come in and fix everything right away when maybe it's their responsibility. But I do Councilman Trevino like your idea about innovative ideas and especially the sidewalk area. I believe in our district we have a lady that's had a rubber sidewalk put in that's porous or something like that. And she's absolutely thinks it's the greatest thing that ever happened. So I mean, you're right, innovation is one of those things that we need to be looking at in that area. The other one I'm just wondering about as far as innovative ideas is where this road damage occurs. And I like the idea of the partnerships, you know, getting involved with is it via buses causing the problem or who's doing it and should they be involved in helping with the those repairs, but also private industry. I think of the cement trucks that drive by the trucks that are from the quarries and so forth, causing great damage as well. I'm just wondering, is there a way for us to focus on them and say, Hey, it's partly your responsibility to help get this straightened out. So I hope that's something that in future we can be considering. Thank you, Councilman. Councilman Wart. Yes, I had a focus on safe sidewalks to parks. I think that's something that we've noticed from the district two office, a number of the bomb projects that the mayor, when she was a district two councilwoman approved were in parks. And I've done a lot of ribbon cuttings for these park grand openings, but I've noticed the last quarter mile or last half mile leading up to these parks is just grass along the street where how do we expect our kids to get from the neighborhood that has sidewalks to the park safely without any issues. So yes, if we build it, they will come, but will they get there safely? So that's something that I think we could focus on on a city wide level. And then for the county parks that also have the same issue, for instance, Comaching Park and District two, we could partly partner with the county to get some funds for the sidewalks leading from those communities to those parks because right now we don't have any sidewalks. Thank you. Councilman Narenberg and then Medina and then Councilwoman Vieira. Go ahead. Great. Well, I appreciated Councilman Lopez's argument for consolidation of Cine County operations. I mean that there is a strong element of inefficiency with regard to us doing projects that that halfway look like they're done from the user's perspective. And it's only because it's coming out of one pot of money. But I would say I wholeheartedly concur with the idea of prioritizing on leveraged funds. We do that as a matter of course through the MPO and other agency projects. But with regard to picking projects with limited funds for us at the city, I think we should do the same thing. I support a sidewalk enhancement effort, whatever form it takes. But I also agree with Mike that a lot of that, the trouble we see with sidewalks happens to be on areas that we don't have any control over, at least their property of homeowners and their buckled sidewalks haven't been fixed because people don't have the money to pay for them. And there's also some confusion about who owns them. I think a great deal of enhancement and improving quality of life for people in the neighborhoods would be if there's somehow we could help incentivize the repair of sidewalks. And we talked about this about two years ago in infrastructure and growth, potentially creating some sort of new pilot program where we could take a source of revenue, a small source of revenue, but maybe incentivize through homeowners associations or through the homeowners themselves paying 25% or 50% of a sidewalk repair so we can speed the process of repairing. Because I personally, in terms of improving quality of life, I would rather see us work with residents financially to get sidewalks done even though we aren't, the greater San Antonio community may not be on the hook for that sidewalk, we all benefit when that sidewalk is fixed. So I would love to see if we can come up with a creative approach to help speed along sidewalk repair in neighborhoods. With regard to streets, we just had a much bally hooded, I think successful effort for a speed reduction pilot program last year. I think there were nine sites. My community has been clamoring for not just the results of that, but some sort of action as a result from it. And I would love to see us. I got an initial report on some of the sites, or one of the sites in District 8. I would like to see us put some funds behind that as a priority also to the findings from the speed reduction pilot which is intended to slow down cars and trucks and traffic within neighborhoods. I would like to see us put some money that is in the streets budget behind that particular program, the speed reduction. And then just in general, I don't know if we'll get a chance to talk about this, but it sort of feels like springtime in San Antonio in the sense that our economy is doing pretty well, nationally it's doing doing pretty well, or it's getting there. Now is a time in my mind that we need to be very concerned with conservatively budgeting our out years. We've successfully gotten ourselves to a 15 percent fund balance at the end of the year. I know our rating agencies continue to push us on that. It's a policy of this council to maintain a AAA bond rating, especially as we go into a new bond cycle. I would like to see us push very hard on that and be very reluctant to spend additional funds when the sun is shining because we know that it's going to be very difficult in the year or two from now when we go back into a cyclical, you know, if not recession, a decline in how well our economy is moving. So I would like to plan now for that. And so whatever we can do to sort of, you know, dampen the enthusiasm, although I know that's not what we want to do, I think, would be prudent. And on that note, I'll just end by saying that we spend a lot of time on one side of the ledger, but with regard to the earlier discussion on taxes and fees and how we're going to deal with the revenue needs of the city, I think we need to really buckle down on that because if we're not all about dampening enthusiasm and preparing for the future, we need to be very concerned about not being too aggressive on reducing revenue requirements right now if we're going to pay for all these programs. So thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Councilman Medina. Thank you. Yeah, a lot of great discussion about this, and there's no without question that the community has got it right. These three items are you hear them every single day on the community. So on streets and talking about leveraging of dollars and funds, we are doing that right now in District 7 with a project around Jefferson High School. And I think that city staff has done a good job in working with the school district and TCI and leveraging the taxpayer dollars to maximize the work that's being done in the community in those older neighborhoods. The sidewalk approach, I agree. Councilman Warwick brought up a good idea about making sure access to our parks, to our schools. I think we've been successful in years past in doing that. And on the drainage though, because drainage projects are so expensive, how we pay for that, how we're able to leverage dollars working with the county. Doing all we can because that is such a huge, huge priority in my district and my community. And I think we just kind of talk about it in general, but the cost of those types of projects are a challenge, and we have to work to find solutions to that. Another kind of piece that I just want to add in there that's so important to, and I remember then Councilwoman Taylor, now Mayor, bringing up about the importance of lighting. And it came up time and time again how folks feel that we do not have adequate lighting. So working with CPS Energy, how we can expand that, how we can make folks feel safer. And I know the lighting is there for motorists and drivers, but it's a piece of mind for folks to know that they have a streetlight that's on and that we have a program that's constantly looking at replacing those bulbs when they go out. But looking at that policy, looking at how we can expand that I think is beneficial and helpful. Thank you. Absolutely. Councilwoman? Yes. In order to be brief, yes, I'm an agreement with we need to increase the side, straight sidewalk and drainage and also in agreement with the sidewalk strategy. And also part of that is looking at a strategy of how we can also communicate to our residents just what our current code says and the responsibility of commercial properties and then some older neighborhoods that I have in my district that do not have sidewalks and why that is. It's because the original developer did not put them in just something to have those kind of points made forward as well. But looking at an option of what we can do to coordinate our efforts with VIA and SAWS when we need to put in new sidewalks or fixed sidewalks maybe. I also do believe that we need to look at as was mentioned earlier drainage is a huge issue in my district. Looking at maybe maybe you have this already Mike with a drainage inventory of the spots in the area in our districts that have high amounts of drainage issues, flooding issues or ponding water issues because that came up in many of my it's always happening whenever it rains in my district having to have this water get taken out of some of the streets so maybe putting that together so we know how to strategically move our dollars in order for drainage projects because I do believe we'll probably have a large bond number of bond projects for 2017 for drainage and yes pedestrian safety and street lights I I put street lights with pedestrian safety more than with vehicle safety because I think having that approach is very important and so you all know coordination with our other utilities CPS SAWS and and VIA very important and I thank you for bringing that up councilman Gallagher about the other streets because when the other trucks because we have a high number of 18 wheeler trucks going in and through some of our streets in the district and maybe and even tour buses that go through my district we get about three million visitors that come through district three in and around our missions and we need to make sure that our our streets are taken care of on those corridors as well and curbs just curbs on streets is very important in my district and I think citywide too so these are some of the points wanting to bring forward and one other thing to make sure that when we have these street maintenance issues that come up I guess Cheryl as we move forward with the street drainage infrastructure when we make the coordination with SAWS that the contractors that SAWS and CPS use are at a good high standard because those are some of the input that I'm getting back from my residents as well that it's not there so we have to have that coordination as well so thank you thank you councilman work here another comment yeah just briefly about the street lighting I was thinking about potentially maybe a similar fund to NAMP but just for street lights so we could kind of earmark those projects until we have a comprehensive plan together in this meanwhile period because the need is there but I don't want to set something out that's premature before the comprehensive plan is done but a NAMP fund that could be earmarked just for street lights or the upgrading of street lights as well so either new street lights or a LED street light would be an ideal situation in the meantime thank you councilman Saldana yeah Patrick if I can quick story 2009 the Spurs drafted Duam Blair and he was suggested to be a power forwarder or center but he was too small to be a power forwarder center and he was too big to run at the perimeter so they were they called him a tweener and there's a real problem I think we have in this city with respect to streets and drainage because we have a lot of tweeners with respect to the street projects some that are too small for the bond and some that are too big for us to cover in our imp or our NAMP projects so these are the ones that these are the projects that would provide streets and and street rehabilitation curves and sidewalks but they're in the seven or eight million dollar range that I have no solution for and there's streets that come to mind and I'm sure I'm not the only one on the council that has these streets that we say well you know I can try to fix it in the bond but it may not qualify because it's a neighborhood street and it's not a very large one and we certainly don't have a solution for it in IMP in a reasonable way so I think that's something we need to figure out because we really have no solution for for these streets and and we have nothing but excuses I at least I have for residents who have been far too patient with me on these these tweener situations the the other is to talk about a point that I think fits right into this discussion which is when I go to neighborhood association meetings like we all do this is one of my top concerns which is that how do we get people to stop to to slow down in our neighborhoods they're going too fast and they're speeding down our neighborhoods it's a raceway and the lever for us has always been to talk about speed bumps and speed humps and I have developed an inventory of about 30 or 40 in that waiting list that I know I'll never be able to get to because I fund those opportunities through NAMP and I do think it's I don't think that that speed bumps are the solution I know that they if anything they do help somewhat slightly I know they don't solve the problem but to that person in that neighborhood who I say look if you want speed bumps here's the process go out get your application sign get your neighbors to agree and all those folks within that list of 30 have done that and and now I think we're having a conversation about those not qualifying and so I think for a lot of us if we want to help help ourselves is to come up with a solution for these speeding situations in neighborhoods and if we do need a little help within the council districts funding some of those speed bump projects that and I will lay all the blame on the private developers who didn't set these up ahead of time we are paying for a we city doesn't build sidewalks it was the developments in those communities we're picking up the slack where they didn't and fortunately we've fixed our UDC so now it requires that sidewalks are built to a certain extent what we don't require I think is is calming devices so a subdivision being built now they're just waiting for that to be handed over to the city so that they can call the city council and get speed bump requests so I think we need to talk about what that language includes for the UDC so that we're not fronting the bill for those things okay thanks thanks councilman in order to try to stay on schedule right we've got just a few minutes left we want to still wrap up a 330 mayor is that the appetite of the council yes Cheryl are you good with the discussion that they had about these three items about the level of emphasis on it okay so before I hand it over to the mayor wrap up seems as though that that well it's evident the discussion today was very textured passionate thoughtful and there's a lot of city you're all very supportive trying to build a stronger San Antonio community a lot of competing priorities trying to figure those out you're trying to essentially assemble a puzzle and not necessarily know what the cover the box looks like and that's real challenging in local government so my hat's off to you in doing that I hope you feel as though today's discussion people were earnest and thoughtful and you had a chance to share your understanding that's really critical as a governing body we didn't get to all the items some of those items that you may still be you know sort of have you're itching to talk about hopefully have a chance to talk about those at some point in the near future I hope you found today to be helpful and productive and in the spirit of Mayor Harando I help you you and the organization get better all the time so I'm going to hand it over to the mayor to wrap up okay all right thank you very much I think we've had a great discussion I'd like to thank everyone for being so thoughtful for being engaged thank you to our facilitator and thank you to the staff that prepared informative yet concise presentations that gave us some good information on these key issues that will need to be addressed through the budget process in thinking about these last three issues though I just like to challenge all of us to constantly think about the connections between all these various issues and thinking about streets parks and social services you know that speaks to neighborhoods that speaks to safety that speaks to vitality and so sometimes we get caught up you know in the weeds on a specific project and we are weighing sidewalks versus something else when actually sidewalks may facilitate something else that we're trying to do and I know it's hard to always make those connections but I'd like to challenge us to try and think thinking that way so I think today was a good discussion I did have one question for Cheryl though kind of as framing the whole process you provided a great your staff assembled this document that provided us with input from the meetings which you've kind of reorganized into this essay speak up campaign in the past there were meetings both before the development of the budget proposal and after and I was unclear on whether there would be additional or what the community engagement component would be after the um August 6th proposed budget is released uh the budget input process will continue we welcome comments at all of our community facilities as well as online and once I present the budget on august 6th we will go back out to the community and we're strategizing now in the best way and the most effective way to get input from the residents you know that we had 32 meetings so for the past uh month and perhaps too many and yet we received uh 2000 comments on the budget and those are assembled here so there will be more community meetings and we'll come back to you when we present the budget with a proposed strategy on how we continue the transparent process to obtain more community input okay great perhaps council members can be thinking uh and possibly provide suggestions to you on what might be appropriate in your district maybe you might have events coming up where the budget discussion could be part of the event or some way that we can ensure we get the maximum participation and involvement and feedback from our citizens as part of our transparent budgeting process so I think that is it for today guess what we get to spend tomorrow together too so tomorrow will be a little looser um and uh not as policy heavy so I'm looking forward to seeing everyone in the morning have a pleasant afternoon