 Now we are going to have some reaction from Council on the World Heritage Work Plan and the Tri Centennial Work Plan as presented. Come on folks, hang in here with me, doing good, stay the course, don't make me do group stretches on you, come on, nobody wants that, nobody wants that, alright, so if anybody can lean their head out into the hall and holler at any straggling council members slash city managers slash mayors, invite them in, come join us, come join the party, alright, so World Heritage Work Plan, Tri Centennial, first up, Rebecca. Thank you. Laurie, just for clarification on the, a couple of things, first for the incentive fund, one of the things that was also brought out from the World Heritage Work Plan, and I think this is great that we're moving forward with this because one, it addresses a need of, because we have this World Heritage forever, and so it's something that we have to take pride in and also take the lead on in the entire United States too. But with the incentive fund, I'm very happy to see about the legacy businesses. One of the other things I'd like for you all to maybe take into consideration when looking at the budget too is not just for the legacy businesses, but also with legacy homeowners, and when it comes to curb appeal or roof repair, because I know we have the pilot program for roof repair, maybe we can look at somewhere in and around this area what kind of budget that would need just to enhance the curb appeal around Roosevelt Mission Road, those that are within the World Heritage area. And two, also for clarification with the complement of employees, right now I know we have two staffers that are in different departments that are working on a lot of World Heritage issues, so these people would just transfer over under the World Heritage umbrella. Yes, their job description would not change. We have a special projects manager that focuses on development within the south side area along the San Antonio River and within the World Heritage buffer area. We would move them over in the World Heritage office because it makes sense for all of that to be coordinated with the work plan, and then we have a facility coordinator that does programming at the Mission Marquis, so it makes sense to move that position over under the World Heritage office. We're only asking for one additional position, which will assist in the coordination effort among all the city departments and public agencies and other small projects within the World Heritage buffer area. And I think this is a very modest and conservative request as we move forward, so that's why I'd like to advocate for that. And in looking for next step with World Heritage, I would like to see what kind of things that you can identify for even certain areas within the World Heritage zone, if you will, for green space or possible green space for the bond and the upcoming bond, just to look and identify, make sure to identify those. Thank you very much. And first, to try Centennial, Edward, I have a couple of questions. One, I do thank you because I know the role of the commissioners, the tri-Centennial commissioners, one, has it changed, and if the roles have changed, what is it? And then also two, when looking at the funding recommendations for the hotel occupancy tax, if that's a recommendation, when would we sunset that? And also even, I know we're still working up to that, but also looking at even after that, because this is for a certain period of time that we're looking at the tri-Centennial commission and this department, if you will. So if you can speak to that, please. So the commission right now consists of 19 individuals that have been appointed by the City Council and the county. Those commissioners serve as the, they provide guidance to the staff as to the overall vision. Many of those commissioners, actually the majority of them, all sit on one of the, on the, there's seven different working committees. So either they're in the Arts and Culture Committee, Branding and Marketing Committee, Community Service Committee, so those are the working committees and we get additional direction, ideation, program ideas as far as what is envisioned for the tri-Centennial. The, going to your question regarding the sunsetting, the proposal here for funding from the city would be over the two, the next two fiscal years. So fiscal year 17 and fiscal year 18. The project would conclude wrapping up any sort of closure of finances sometime probably in the spring, summer of 2019 because our job will be done, but there'll be some financial and other sort of documentation that we'll need to do as part of the closing out the project. Okay. And then looking at it too, the seven positions, what would that entail? Is that, I mean, if it's $680,000, that's like $97,000 each per position, if you were to work that out equally across the board. But because I'm also trying to figure out, you know, what are the things that's happening here and also for travel or just different things, because we're trying to bring events here too and working them with so many other partners. So if you can speak a little bit about that. So the current positions right now, there's myself and then I have assistant director with Asia. And then we have two special projects managers that interface regularly with all of these essentially staff those committees. Then we have an admin position and then we have an individual that serves as the staff to the community service committee and the community service aspects. There is a vacancy with an event and marketing manager that has not been posted, but we're looking to hire someone. We are still evaluating what the additional need will be for fiscal year 17 that has not been identified. But right now we're at the staff that's in place is really to help facilitate a lot of the planning efforts. Right now we're doing a lot of ideation that will actually conclude here within the next few months because we need to get to a point of what all is wanting to, what sort of programs, exhibitions do we want to do? What can we afford knowing what our budgets are in securing that? Because by early next year in 2017, we want to have a finalized agenda to say here's all what's happening in 2018. Come to San Antonio and be part of that. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you. Chris. Francis School, World Heritage. Our initial investment on slide, the slide where it has the budget breakdown, we pitched in what, one million? In fiscal year 2016. There's $500,000 included in the general fund and then there was additional funding to fund a position for a director as well as a $250,000 that Convention of Visitors Bureau funded for international marketing. So it's around $900,000 that was in the fiscal year 2016 budget. And based on examples from the latest World Heritage designation sites, is that kind of on par as to what the types of funding that's needed to support that? Well, we're kind of, we're leading the effort in the US. And actually Councilman Villagran and City Manager Cheryl Scully were in DC and they spoke to the Department of Interior and they said that really San Antonio is looking to be the best practice. And so we are really working to make sure that we are staffed to be able to help increase the activity, both economic activity resulting from tourism. But also these are five missions which four in the middle of a neighborhood. So how do we strike that balance? And so this is a unique opportunity for San Antonio and it's a unique designation. So we're having to really cater and office to our needs. But we are leading the pack and several cities are looking to us to see how do we get the designation and how are we moving forward? Well, good, and I agree too. I think that it is very important that we offer the resources to ensure that that we are successful. It is a tremendous recognition for our city. And you know, Councilman Villagran, you've done a tremendous job in leading that effort along with the different agencies as well that are all involved. Then over to the tricentennial, Edward. Yeah, and Councilman Villagran kind of pointed out as well. But I just wanted to understand better the compliment of staff that you have. So I did calculate it as well. And that's just under 100K per seven staff members. Sure, one of the things I felt to mention. So within that budget, it also includes branding and marketing dollars. So we do have a contract with the marketing firm KGB, Texas. That is our marketing firm of record that's providing us support over the next three years, 2016, 17 and 18. So just rough math, it's probably a little less than, I guess, sorry. So it is about $600,000 for the positions. And then the rest is to support marketing and branding support. And there was also funding from the city to provide a commemorative book, a coffee table book to celebrate the tricentennial. And actually this morning, the commission took action to award that contract to Trinity Press, who will be the publisher for the commemorative book that we'll see in 2018. Okay. Thank you, Edward. I think it's important for us to have the details and be able to explain a little bit when we go out and talk to our constituents, because both of these initiatives are very, very important. But we also want to strike that harmony and balance of being able to explain and be accountable to the taxpayers as well. So, but appreciate the work that you're doing. Sure, thank you. Rick. All right, thanks. Most of the questions that I was going to ask have really been covered, but I wanted to take them a little bit deeper. I see the numbers that are here, and I'll certainly take your word for it that these are numbers that have been well vetted and that we're in good shape with what we have. The only anxiety that I have is we just came back from Spain and from the Canary Islands. And I was amazed at the amount of interest and commitment for participation on their side for our event. And I would say differently is for our event, theirs and ours. They kind of had a very significant ownership and a very big claim to their contribution to our 300-year foundation, right? So, I mean, how comfortable do you feel with these numbers? And I'm assuming that you've vetted them. And have we taken into consideration the very significant potential for a very big initiative that's come from the Canary Islands that we will have to reciprocate somehow, and it'll cost us money to do that? Is that incorporated in here? I mean, you were in those meetings, Edward. Right. So, Councilman, to your point, yes, we do feel that there will be opportunities where both the Spanish and Canary Island governments will contribute either in an art and culture exchange or some sort of public art component. In this proposed budget, that would address that. In our meetings with those government officials, they also indicated to us that they would be willing to provide funding to that. Right. Over the course of the next 12 months, we will have continuing discussions with them. They're planning to send us this fall a catalog of potential programs and services and budgets that are tied to that from their respective governments. And then the Commission will have the opportunity to decide, we want this, this and that. And then where does the Commission need to provide funding to, whether it's a venue or if there is some sort of other expense that's associated that the government won't pay for, then we'll take that into account. Specific to the Canary Islands, we did have a follow-up meeting. One of the evenings with the staff because this was, this was the second time we've had interaction with the Canary Islands when they were here in March. They've indicated that they have a preliminary budget of about $50,000 for programming. That is subject to change, but they are looking at providing that to support some performing arts, some sort of photography exhibit. Something that I did ask them to consider is some sort of public art installation that would have a legacy beyond 2018. They are open to that idea. They wanted to spend more time on that. So I expect later this fall that we'll get some recommendations from them, but again, that budget would be reflected here of any sort of costs that would need to be borne out of the Commission. Great. Well, I appreciate that. And you pointed out that looking for some legacy projects and the like, because that was the other component of my interest in making sure there was included in the plan. And that's why we're going to be very engaged in this 2018 celebration. Our city certainly goes on for another 300 years, well beyond that, and we want to be able to leverage into that by virtue of incorporating all of the things that Joe, you had reviewed as our assets through economic development, right? How do we merge the next 300 years? How do we tell the story about our biosciences and how that's going to be affected in the long term? How we talk about cybersecurity, how that's going to affect our community? And it ought to be an opportunity to celebrate the past, but indeed encourage the future. So I think that there's some CBB engagement here that needs to kind of leverage the messaging you're going to do. And then after 2018 that we continue that in some sort of a CBB environment that continue to sell our community and those new age industry. So that would be my simple encouragement. I'm not asking you to put more money into the deal. But don't shortchange it because it's a tremendous opportunity for our community. Thank you very much. That's the only comment I had. Great. Shirley? Mike, please? Mike, please? The budget, Edward, about the World Heritage. You mentioned a couple of sources. I'm sorry, not World Heritage, but the 3,000. I mean rather 300. And you showed a couple of alternatives about where that funding might come from. So when you talk about the alternative for the arts funding, does that mean it's taken from that existing arts funding pool? Yes. OK, so it's taken from the agencies that are already getting money? A couple of alternatives here. It's all hot tax funding. So arts funding is funded. That's out of the 15% for arts agencies. So you could decide to take a portion of that off the top and then fund the arts agencies with the remaining balance. One alternative keeps them at level funding. The other one means a reduction in funding. So they're receiving today about 5.9 million, is that correct, Lori? So 5.9 million. And that first alternative means they'd get basically the same amount with a little 100,000 to work with for new agencies. Alternative B would mean that there would be less funding for the arts organizations this year as compared to last year. So alternative A keeps them level. And alternative B means less funding. So actually, alternative A would allow them to stay the same, like Cheryl said. So fiscal year 2016 levels were at $6 million. And right now, the precentennial, they are funded out of the arts funding. However, alternative B, we would take less from the arts funding or be able to increase the art agency funding by $300,000. And then we'd take the rest out of another pot of hotel occupancy revenue, either the Convention Visitor Bureau revenue or the Convention Center, the CSEF funds. And then alternative C, none of the funding comes from the arts funding, which is a 15%. And that would allow us to increase our arts funding agency fund to $6.7 million. So provide $700,000 more in funds than we are currently doing today at $6 million. OK. So I'm concerned about taking money from the arts funding because aren't they already anticipating their budgets over the last two years? I mean, it seems like they haven't they already gone through the process and submitted? They've submitted through the application process. We received about $10.4 million in funding requests. And we only have about $6 million in capacity with alternative A. We received 55 applications in comparison to fiscal year 2016 where we had 48 applications. And so the need for arts funding has increased. But right now, the budget has stayed the same. And actually, the need hasn't increased. The funding request has increased. And the actual applicants have increased. But the budget is staying the same. OK. So I'm concerned about their funding requests since they have programming for the next two years and then programming for many years after that. But what about you, somebody mentioned the CBV. What is the opportunity for the CBV to come in and help with any of these programs for the World Heritage and for this one? Because Andrew is here. OK. But I'm sorry. Because Andrew, I'll let you answer the question. But I guess I really want the R3 Arts Tri-Centennial to be funded well because I think it's really important for us to show off the city in a way that is really spectacular and that the whole world will come just as they did in 68 and that we can celebrate, like to really celebrate our heritage. But I am concerned about taking money from organizations for the long term and how. And usually, again, I guess the arts agencies have not seen this yet because I usually hear from them pretty vocally. So I'm wondering if they haven't heard from this and haven't had an opportunity. We are currently in the review process and in the blackout period. We are reviewing applications. We will still be able to fund the arts agencies at the same level we funded them last year. And so the discussion today, option B and C, provide more capacity. So we provide more funding for the arts agencies. Okay, maybe Cassandra, you can answer the questions about what role the CBV can play in these two. Well, so we're very involved in both initiatives. So in our 2017 priorities, both 300 Tri-Centennial, kind of pre-messaging will be integrated in all of our marketing efforts outbound of San Antonio. We're looking at many different live initiatives, whether it's in Dallas and Houston and beyond. Already, World Heritage has its own specific funding within our budget, as well as we integrate it domestically within our existing messaging. So it is very much part of what our efforts and initiatives are moving forward. But can you dedicate any money specifically to these two agencies or initiatives? Specifically, can you say we're gonna fund, I don't know, some art project? Councilwoman, just to clarify, so of the hotel or currency tax revenue that we receive, there's an allocation of 15% to the arts, 15% to history and preservation, and then the balance will fund the CBV and the convention and visitors facilities. What we are recommending for the World Heritage is a couple of alternatives. One, in 2017, we can use a portion of the growth and the tax, so we're not impacting the current funding of the arts, the six million. We could take a portion of the growth and dedicate it to Tri-Centennial. Or we could take a portion of the growth, not impacting the 15% that goes to the arts, and before we start considering new programs, either in the CBV or the convention and facilities department, we can make that allocation to Tri-Centennial. So we're talking about the growth in 2017 that won't have an impact on the funding that we have today in terms of programs and arts agencies. Okay, thank you for clarifying that, Maria. Great, thank you, Ryan. I'll be brief. Just on the Tri-Centennial, Edward, I think I understand the operating budget, but I'm more curious about those, the programming side. In the materials we got this week, it talked about a $15 million contribution from various sources that would be fundraising from corporate sponsors. I mean, I think that we have great people at the commission, we have great people on staff, now it's about deploying the resources to make it a great program, and I see these four initiatives. Where are we on the fundraising part of this? So this will be a public-private partnership to make this a success. We are working closely with the commission, but then also the mayor's office and Judge Wolff's office to create another committee, a fundraising committee that will be charged with assisting us in securing those sponsorships. Over the last several months, myself and Asia have been meeting with a variety of potential sponsors from the Larrows to USA to Water Burger and other companies. Many of them have expressed interest, but sponsorships is a process, it's not just a, okay, yes, we're gonna do it, but it's more of a very lengthy discussion in securing what is aligning to their mission and what aligns to our mission. So working closely with this fundraising committee here in the next couple of weeks, we'll be working very diligently to start securing those sponsorships to support the overall effort. Okay, yeah, I mean, I think it would concern, I would be lying if I didn't say I wasn't concerned about our ability to fundraise on a very short timetable for a year-long celebration. So I think as much as we can assist with that effort and stand ready to do so, I don't think any of us don't want this to be a tremendous celebration for the year. In addition to asking those programming partners who may be doing their own programs to contribute to it and all the value that they bring ought to be considered part of the value of the tricentennial. So it may not be direct cash that's being contributed, but it's programming and it's concerts and whatever that they're doing. Absolutely, so to add to that, what we are doing this year is we're inviting all of the organizations that do some sort of event or activity. So for example, Fiest, the final for the Stock Show and Rodeo, all of those annual events that we celebrate as a community, we're inviting them to be part of the tricentennial. There's no cost to them. There's no cost to the commission, but it's an opportunity to showcase who we are from an art and culture perspective. We're having those discussions now and over this year we'll be announcing several partnerships and essentially sanctioning those events as official tricentennial events with no cost to us, no cost to the commission. It's something that the organization has already planned to do. Okay, well in updates on the fundraising, updates on branding and sanctioned events and everything will be of great interest to me, so if we can get regular updates on that, that would be appreciated. Thank you. Dorothy? Thank you. The last two are really, we're gonna be my questions. First I just wanna, I do wanna go back to the funding alternatives and just say I really don't support any money coming from the arts funding as it is. I mean, as I see it, it's already very much underfunded. So I hope we can find another alternative. Alternative C, it seems like. As I see it, it's not gonna pull away from arts funding. We wanna make sure that we have 6.7 million to the arts, is that correct? So just wanna mention that the second one was essentially what Councilman Nuremberg just brought up which was with regards to the fundraising and what can we do, what do you see us doing that can actually help make an impact so that we can, so we can get there quickly, is it? Is this gonna be a phased in approach or what can we do now? We would look to you to assist us with those corporations and businesses that are in within your districts that have an interest. Many of them have reached out to us or we've reached out to them. You know, fundraising is a science. It's not just something that happens, it's a process, but if you could help us with that, we would appreciate it. There's not a lot of time to accomplish this. We have about 18 months to fulfill what is expected for the tricentennial year. We feel through this proposal, this budget proposal that we could secure that $6 million from the private sector and then any additional funding that comes from the private sector would then be able to underwrite any additional programs or initiatives as part of the tricentennial year. Well, maybe you can give us some outlines or some bullet points that we can find some support. Sure. Thank you. Thank you for this. Thank you. Joe. Mike, please. I'm looking forward to the tricentennial. How many arts agencies do we fund? In fiscal year 2014, we funded 48 arts agencies. I wonder if it would be possible to do a side-by-side of who they were five years ago and who they are today, just to see whether there's been any diminution. And secondly, I hate to sound like a troglodyte, but as councilman, Sadanya knows, my very careful reading of the city charter does not indicate that funding arts agencies is a primary or core value of the city. And I would be interested in finding it. If you can't find it, I suspect I could get somebody on my staff to find it. How many cities in the last 10 years used to have a symphony that don't have a symphony today because I don't share the view that symphonies are essential to great cities. I do share the view, councilman, via ground, that World Heritage Sites are a mark of a great city. And I'm glad we have one. So it would be interesting to see how many cities have survived the loss of their symphony, as I suspect we would. Because if we look at the 10-year trend, the 10-year total of symphony funding, the common denominator is that we have lurched from financial crisis to financial crisis. And I'm now hearing reports that after our latest bailout, we may be lurching to another financial crisis because I gather our latest financial bailout may turn out not to be enough. So that's why I'd like to know how many cities have survived the loss of their symphony, number one and number two. You get on the list to be a funded arts agency and my guess is you never get off. Right now our guidelines allow any art agency to apply provided they're located in San Antonio and they meet certain criteria such as having an executive director and having a 990 on file and then it identifies percentages they're eligible for. And so we do not prohibit anybody from applying and our guidelines read that if you get below a 75, you do not qualify for any funding and then if you get a 75 or above, you qualify for funding. We are looking at revising those guidelines next fiscal year after we work on updating our cultural collaborative to look at how we can refigure those percentages and provide more equity and really identify what are the milestones we're looking for as these art agencies apply for funding from the city. Thank you for that explanation. Great, thank you. So as we conclude this segment, the recommendation for the sake of time, the air quality conversation was really a briefing that was requested, but is there a deliberation that the room would like to have on the air quality conversation or can we move on to the next section, which is the economic development or workforce development in smart cities? Yes, I would have a couple of things I'd like to talk about. Okay, good. Sure. So let's get to this page. Your recommendation was funding of a public health impact study of non-entainment, but I hope that maybe we can also take a look if we're gonna be looking at some studies of some of the things that can actually make an impact or her help. As was mentioned earlier, we have a roof project that we feel dovetails nicely into our sustainability efforts for the city and addresses public health in many ways. Can you talk to us a little bit about what can we do to make that part of what we're part of our strategy? In relation to the roof initiative that's going on, actually the sustainability plan does highlight a strategy around moving forward with cool roof pilot programs, both for municipal facilities and we're currently working with the city architect on updating the city's facility design guidelines and ensuring that we're including not only cool roof elements, but just air quality and resilience aspects into those guidelines. Another strategy related to that is working on high performance building standards, working with the development community, working with AIA, USGBC and start looking at how do we start building in these elements into our building standards. So it definitely is a high priority. So I just wanna make sure that we're on the same page because you're saying cool roof. Now cool roof is a terminology in this case and not discounted from this program, but rather high reflectance roofs is really what we're after because it's the most basic form of a cool roof. Cool roof is actually a technology sort of a step above a regular roof. Correct, I think it's basically various options, but the highly reflective roof is the simplest tactic. So I guess what I'm looking for is a way to talk about how we can include that in some of your efforts. We got UTSA helping with some of the metrics and the study of this particular pilot program, which is including 10 homes. But as I look forward to growing the program, I wanna make sure that we're involving your department and most importantly, we're getting more money. How can we do that? Yeah, I think it's continuing to look for one partnership opportunities. If we're talking about piloting and experimenting with new technologies and new trends, being able to tap into whether it's foundation resources, HUD sustainability money, EPA funding, and so we're actively looking for those additional funds to tap into. In terms of measuring this, one of the metrics in the sustainability plan is a urban rural temperature differential. And so as we start implementing, whether it's tree plantings, whether it's asphalt replacements projects in terms of reducing the amount of asphalt and streets or parking lots or white roofs, we should over time see that differential decrease. Okay, all right. Thank you. Thank you. I just wanted to take an opportunity to voice strong support for removing what will be the blind spot that's really necessary for us to carry on the work that Councilman Lopez started to get our movement on air quality initiatives here. We are going to be non-attainment next year. We need to have this cost of non-attainment study done from an economic perspective, but we remove the, or we add the common denominator for all the elements that we're talking to by including the public health component to it. So I am in full support of the staff recommendation to include that as part of the cost of non-attainment study. Yeah, thank you. Doug, could you put it on slide six? It's the one with the pyramid. There you go. That one's up there for effect because I want everybody to focus on the very, very top triangle. Are you, have you included in this year's budget of cost? You know, soon we're going to be getting a report on the whole idling ordinance and all of the components of that. I raised the discussion earlier about, you know, the incident management on highways. I mean, when there was accidents, the quicker we remove them, the less idling there is on the freeway. It's a big contributor. We can probably knock out 40% of that idling time simply by being able to give authority to some folks to remove cars that are, you know, ran out of gas or whatever. Have you included, or is there an item, a dollar a month that you are looking to attach to that if we decide to take action, which are what we do, on our idling initiatives? Yes, and we've been working very closely with Dr. Nathan in terms of figuring out what that cost is for a study such as this. The ballpark that we came up with was 75 to $100,000. Depends on scope. I think we need to do a little more work in terms of refining that number, but that's basically the general range. Good. Well, I know that I was in Houston last month and we had an opportunity to look at their program and cost was the reason that their program didn't move forward in the way they formulated it. It was funded through the MPO, which I'm working now to try to identify the dollars, but of course the first question that gets asked is, you know, who else is contributing and how much are there matching funds? I would encourage you to keep that in mind. Let me know, I wanna know what number it is that we're willing to put on the table from a budgetary perspective so that I can start moving the discussion forward at MPO to try to figure out how we contribute a significant way. And I think the alternative is the top of that pyramid and we don't want that to happen in our community and air quality is a huge, huge component to our quality of life, so don't be reluctant in putting that in there. Thank you. Thank you very much. As we move into our final section of presentations, we're gonna talk a little bit about some cross-cutting themes that showed up across many different categories that were affected by technology and innovation, workforce development, and economic development. So Jose. All right, good afternoon. My presentation is focusing on smart cities, so I'll try to be brief with my comments. In terms of a definition, what is a smart city? So as defined by the Smart Cities Council, a smart city is one that uses technology to enhance its livability, workability, and sustainability. In short, smart cities are constantly looking at innovative and creative ways to enhance city services, ultimately making government more intuitive. And this can happen in almost any area that a city touches, as you can see. For example, in a smart environment, we can look at areas related to energy efficiency, water, and air quality. In the areas of smarter government, our initiative is related to open data and digital inclusion. And in smart living, we can look at ways to improve the health and safety of our residents. It's a little bit of background. This is a timeline on the smart cities movement since about 2005. Since 2005, smart cities has expanded to include programs in the private sector, academic institutions, and of course, local governments. And between 2008 and 2012, companies like IBM and Cisco begin to launch their own smart city programs. In September of 2015, the White House announced a federal initiative on smart cities, and we see smart city efforts expand across the United States. Three organizations that have helped cities further their smart city efforts are Metrolab, which is an organization of 34 city and academic institution partnerships that are focused on bringing data analytics and innovation to city government. Envision America is a nationwide nonprofit that is focused on furthering smart city initiatives. And then Sidewalk Labs is a company that was formed by Google that has been working on projects related to transportation and digital inclusion. So why are cities investing in smart city technology? Well, some of the drivers are competitiveness, population growth, and technological capabilities. So as cities operate in a globally competitive environment for workers, tourists, and businesses, smart city initiatives help to attract elements that make up a vibrant city economy. Another reason is that we're expected to add over a million people by 2040, and as more people move into cities, cities need to find a way to deliver services more efficiently. And then finally, as the capability of technology continues to increase, it provides cities with an opportunity to improve services within the community. Over the past few years, the city has completed smart city related projects. Some examples of these include our conversion to LED street lights, which you heard about earlier today. And in 2011, the city initiated retrofit of municipal buildings helping to reduce annual utility costs. In 2013, the city launched municipal court kiosk at three locations city-wide, and these kiosks allow citizens to settle traffic citations by video conferencing without having to come down to our downtown location. So essentially making it easier for the resident. In addition to those projects, the city currently has several others underway. Later this year, the city will launch Opengov, which is a cloud-based financial transparency software that will make it easier to access budget information. BuildSA will allow us to provide greater customer service and increase operational efficiencies once it's fully implemented. And earlier this year, ShotSpotter was launched on the east and west sides of San Antonio. And this is just a sampling of the things that the city has done and continues to do with technology. Another effort is related to our gigabit community. Google Fiber and AT&T are currently in backhaul construction, and once completed, we'll begin connecting neighborhoods throughout the city. The community will have a faster path to the internet, and there's also a potential partnership to enhance our cosinet fiber. As we continue this process of creating a smart city plan, we will continue to engage the smart city community to learn more about best practices and how it can inform our strategy moving forward. These are just some of the organizations that we've been in contact with to learn a little bit more about what they've done and how they've done it and how we can implement some of those ideas here. And so we'll do that going forward. Staff is recommending that as part of our smart city plan, that we use SA Tomorrow as a guideline and look for innovative solutions in the areas of transportation, sustainability, and finding ways to digitally connect residents throughout the community. As we identify smart city projects, one option is to use SA Tomorrow regional centers as an area to pilot these initiatives. Another option is to just do them city-wide, and so we'll look for guidance on that. After we see guidance from the council, we look to do specific actions as part of the budget process and bring that back at a later time. And that concludes my presentation. Thank you. Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. I understand I'm the last presentation before your policy discussion, so I will be brief. I don't know why I was put last, but I intend to give you a compelling presentation here on workforce and then incentives. And I could have been tucked in with Malady, but workforce certainly has become a major topic in our community, both from the business sector and then also the educational community. From an economic development perspective, we really have to build and train our workforce to be able to help the companies that are currently expanding and then also to be able to help attract new companies. It is the primary discussion from an economic development perspective here in San Antonio and in the U.S. In particular, around the opportunity we have with middle skills jobs, and those are jobs that require more than a high school diploma, but less than a four-year college degree. Certifications are an example of this area. The Alamo Colleges, in fact, have determined there are around 8,000 jobs right now that are unfilled in that middle skills area, so it is a critical need. The challenge and the solution, really, a best practice is for the city to align its workforce and educational systems to be organized around career pathways that really integrate education, training, support services, and job placement. And so the mayor actually has been the lead in this effort, along with Judge Wolf earlier this year. They led the charge in establishing a community-wide effort that does just that. It is called SAWORKS. The charge of SAWORKS is to align and execute strategic initiatives within the workforce system. SATEC, as it was formerly known, has merged with SAWORKS, which was a chamber initiative, and it is a separate board under the Economic Development Foundation that was a recent activity. And its one and only charge is to focus on these three areas. These three areas came out of monthly meetings for the last six months or so, and these are sort of the priority areas. Number one is addressing that immediate need, addressing current industry demand by verifying where those talent gaps are and then creating a training curriculum around them. So that's a critical need. And there is some low-hanging fruit here in San Antonio that can address that need. We estimate around 220,000 individuals in San Antonio that have some college. So it's an immediate target. Opportunity youth, around 50,000 opportunity youth in San Antonio, the ages 16 to 24 that also fit that category. The second bucket is really a lot of heavy lifting. The Alamo Colleges is responsible for this area, and it's really creating some alignment through our K16 area from kindergarten to 16. HP5 House Bill 5, which authorized endorsements in the high school level, is tucked into this area. There are a lot of initiatives that SA Works has been working on for this particular key area focus, and that includes summer jobs, counselor externship, career specialist, job shadowing, CTE, so a lot going on in that area, and probably the most challenging of the three. And the third is connecting to the underserved, which is a great segue into what we do from a delegated agency standpoint. Our funds, and it really touches a little bit on what Councilman Nuremberg mentioned in a sort of indirect way, the city's focus has always been on aligning all workforce dollars with the underserved and the hard to serve, a lot of which are participating in a lot of the other delegate agency funding programming. So these are the current programs that we fund. We're currently in the RFP process evaluating the proposals that have been submitted, but for the most part, all of these agencies impact a certain hard to serve or underserved population. Kristallis, for example, the incarcerated or formerly incarcerated is their primary target. And you can see, I think Councilwoman Gonzalez was asking, give us an idea of how many people are served. And it really runs the gamut and their funding runs the gamut based on the actual services that they provide. We create two different buckets of services, long-term training and short-term training. Project Quest is an example of long-term training where they're providing support services along with attaining a certificate or an associate's degree in our targeted industries. The last thing I'll mention is that we also intend to make a recommendation to Council on how to provide essay works, some additional funding, to create a more long-standing and a more optimal delivery system. So you'll see those come forward when we join Melody during the budget process. And just very quickly, in addition to that, there are some other workforce agencies that we fund of particular note. It's, of course, the Alamo Academies. That funding comes through the interlocal agreement that we have with the Academies, so it's dedicated funding for them. But we've been funding the Academies, we helped create it, and we've been funding them for the last 10 years. So that just gives a very high-level introduction to some key workforce initiatives that we're talking about. And then I'll transition into the last presentation of the afternoon, and that is very quickly incentives. Generally speaking, economic development has a variety of tools that we use to help attract and retain jobs, the most common of which that you're very familiar with are tax abatements. And in addition to that, we do grants. With these tools, what we try to do is advance council priorities and use these tools to really facilitate moving the needle on certain priorities. For the most part, though, we look at some basic criteria at the beginning. What industry is it in? What types of wage levels is the project bringing us? With a priority on the high-wage job, what location are they considering? With a priority on the ICRIP. When that policy priority passed, we aligned all our incentives to that. And are they corporate headquarters, a regional office, or just an expansion? As with all of our contracts, they all have recapture and clawback provisions based on the milestones that we create. Every two years, we bring these forward to you. And in fact, just at the last EHDC meeting with Councilman Crier, we brought forward potential revisions and amendments to our Economic Development Incentive Fund. And the primary purpose of bringing forward those amendments is really to align, again, these guidelines with Council priorities. So we have begun the process of aligning it with the Essay Tomorrow Plan, and then also, or Forefront Plan, and that is the Economic Development Strategic Plan, both of which emphasize workforce development and, very importantly, entrepreneurial development. That is really the missing piece of the puzzle. For the longest time, we've really excelled at attracting companies and using tools to do that. And more recently, with city leadership, we added business retention and expansion. And now, the third leg of that stool is entrepreneurial development, and we are making, I think, pretty significant headway in that area. And so we propose those to EHDC and they unanimously approve those amendments, all bringing those forward to Council on June the 16th. Since it's the last presentation of the day and they hooked me up with a set, I didn't wanna pass this opportunity to bring up sort of how innovative we are as a department and the establishment of the SAEDC. It's another very unique tool that we have. We are one of the only cities that has these tools. We formed this corporation to be able to basically take an equity investment in companies. Those companies that are developing out new technologies or research, we can actually look for a return or investment with the goal of creating the self-sustaining fund. So a very proactive way to approach or start up community. And we do some very unique things with this tool. We actually invested in the University of Texas Health Science Center with their building at the South Texas Research Center. Lastly, the Center City Housing Incentive Policy, Lori and John Jax are here to discuss that, but it was adopted in 2012 to stimulate high density growth, housing growth, eligible projects in addition to incentives for housing may receive city fee waivers if they locate in the iCrypt and SAWS fee waivers. And the purpose of this last slide is to show the real value behind all of these incentives. This one really speaks to CCHIP is really though to leverage private sector investment, which both of them do. That concludes my presentation and happy to answer any questions. The first of the facts. Thank you. On the smart cities, I have a question about the gigabit community. First, I think in having the conversation, I think it's great, I think we need it, but what the big issue is is about what part of the community and to make sure that something like these gigabit communities in Google Fiber, AT&T Fiber, that it's affordable and accessible to everyone in the city. And I know it is private, but if we're going to be putting an investment of the city and making all these agreements, I think that it's available for all is extremely important. And on that note too, when looking at the bond, and I remember reading it somewhere in one of these pamphlets, looking at the bond when we're looking at either new parks or park enhancements or to something to that effect that we do incorporate in our bond, some Wi-Fi components for certain areas. If we can do that, I'm thinking, I don't know if Pierce Hall Park has anything like that, but I know Southside Lions has it, but having components, if it's a community thing, that we have that component built into the bond. Okay, gigabit communities in Google Fiber, AT&T Fiber. So currently there's nothing really that we're investing from the city monetarily. The intent of, I know in Google Fiber and in my discussions with AT&T, the intent is to expose that at an affordable rate no matter where in the city. As if you look at how Google Fiber is building out, their backbone build out is going to where they can touch all communities. And so it will have to do with their build out to the homes does have a threshold, which isn't that high. And I think there are programs that we could begin to work on as that progresses into these neighborhoods to help ensure that those areas do get that access available to them. They're also working on other programs that will touch into areas that are underserved. And originally in our discussions with them, it was going to be a lower speed type of connection. It was like a five megabit download and a two meg up. Currently their program has enhanced that to where in these scenarios where they work on these programs, it's actually a full gigabit speed to these homes. So that's all being worked out where we're looking at that in our digital inclusion program which they're both entities are a part of. So the way it looks now and the way we see the build out, that should be the dream that you have should be reality from the San Antonio's gigabit community world. We do look to the parks discussion. We do look at the investment it takes to get to some of these parks. We've been working with the parks department a lot on trying to identify which parks make sense. Some of the scenarios we've dealt with, some of the parks are so far out that there's not like a connectivity circuit to get there and it makes it a little bit more expensive for us to get to but we're definitely open to discussions about how to embed Wi-Fi and any program that we come up with and the intent is to try to get as much access out there as possible to the community at an affordable rate which most of ours are free. So it's a great idea and I think that we have the ability to do it. It's just a matter of how to invest best in those right parks. And finally for our incentives, Renee, when looking at the CCHIP and we're having our conversations about the regional centers and our essay tomorrow to maybe when we're looking at these as we move forward with CCHIP initiatives, what about in our regional centers, especially those within the 410 area to provide those incentives if possible. So the activity centers identified an essay tomorrow. There are eight activity centers. Two of them are the Midtown and Central Business District. The CCHIP addresses those two activity centers and then four of those activity centers are within the inner city reinvestment infill policy. So that's a very flexible policy that provides city fee waivers and tax abatements for eligible projects. So we already have incentive programs in place to address four of those eight and we'll be working with the planning department after essay tomorrow is adopted to create incentive policies catered to each of those activity center needs. And so the medical center will have a different need than what we have in the Central Business District and Stone Oak may have a different need than what we have in the medical center. So we'll work with the planning department and the economic development department to come back with the appropriate incentive toolkit for each of those activity centers. Okay, thank you. Rick? Let me just kind of make a little quick comment. Maybe we'll say this. Mike, please. This one might be for you more than anything else. I attended the smart city conference back in February and there were a lot of really cool innovative things that were talked about. And one of them, and I don't want to steal councilman's thunder or I know that councilman Gonzalez has been really, really focused on lighting, street lighting and the like. They talked a lot about that during the smart cities conference. Also the shot plotter, I think it's called, you know, of being able to get, you know, once the signal or an identification happens, not only does it send a signal to the police, it also sends a signal that turns lights up in that community, which are really, really cool. I know that CPS and our finance guys are looking at a particular vendor that is offering that kind of stuff ultimately will go out to RFP. However, I think Ben said earlier today, and that's kind of raises the question. He said that he didn't see the model having a whole lot of momentum yet in May, but they were still looking at it. And that's on the light conversion and the energy savings and all that, on that piece of it. But there are some components that I think are very cool, right? Whether it's connecting some sort of a management system to a shot plotter or a wayfinding from a lighting perspective, architectural lighting at the missions and down the river walk, things of that nature. I don't see that you haven't put any kind of a line item budget that would address that if we weren't able to get some sort of a agreement or a partnership with some company that can give us a reasonable ROI on this. Does it make sense to put some sort of a placeholder that allows us to go out there and still pursue having things, some management services tied to shot plotter, tied to architectural lighting, perhaps at the different facilities that we have. Some areas in our community that maybe are very focused on needing lighting, but we can't do it on a wholesale basis. It would seem practical to include into the budget some placeholder number that says if we can't get that deal done through the CPS environment, that we would still be able to go after some of those. Because those are clearly smart city kinds of things. Have you guys given any thought to that? And if you haven't, I'd encourage you to do so. At this moment, we haven't identified any specific projects. I mean, we can certainly evaluate it and of course talk with Ben and see how that fits into the old project. The only reason that I bring it up is because I think Ben's direction was kind of like we're looking at it. Don't know if it's gonna carry any financial benefit for us. And if it doesn't, then we probably ought to be looking at how would we go out and create some sort of a fund that would be able to get us some of these things that are incredibly important. And again, they were all highlighted during the smart cities conference. Sure. I'd encourage us very much to consider that. So Ray, if I could ask you to articulate a specific request or recommendation that you're making? Well, it includes some smart city technologies into the budget that we might be able to, at least initial investment and then some sort of longer term deployment schedule. It says, hey, this year we might allocate X number of dollars and then year two, three and four would allocate even more. I think it becomes even more important as we start to look at the tricentennial and all that kind of stuff. And the lighting initiatives that may come with that that will be very, very beneficial. You know, putting tricentennial lighting extravaganzas if you will, into all of that. I think it makes sense and all of it is tied really to smart city initiatives, you know, but I would strongly encourage you to do that. Excellent. Thank you. Thank you. Hal. Thank you. In regards to smart cities, and Ray mentioned the lighting, but ShotSpotter, because of the cycle that it's on, now we're supposed to analyze it after a year and that would be somewhere in the middle of next fiscal year. Will there be additional funds for increased area at that point in time? And do we have that planned in the budget? If you direct us to put money in the budget, we'll do that. We don't know at this time. We'll have to evaluate the program. And if we were to not put any money in the budget and we were showing that the program was successful, where would we be able to pull monies from in order to improve it? I guess I don't want to tie it directly to that if the program's not successful or maybe it's successful on one side and not on the other side, but I'd like to have the option to increase the area, especially if it's shown beneficial. And, you know, we have the support of the police department and everyone. Two options come to mind and Maria can add to this. The contingency fund number one or a mid-year budget adjustment after, you know, as we get closer to the completion of the pilot program would be two, Maria, are there any other options? I was gonna say suggest the same alternative in terms of the mid-year adjustment. Eric tells me that the current program results will be completed in April of 2017. So we could consider that as part of the mid-year adjustment for 17. I just don't want to count on a mid-year adjustment where we are seeing milder years or at least this year is a milder year. I don't want to look because last year's mid-year adjustment was a drastically different scenario than this year's mid-year adjustment. We'll take that into consideration as we prepare the budget, but the contingency is another option as well. Right. And then on the delegate agencies that Renee mentioned, I think this might have tied into Melody, but I kind of waited for your presentations to see. Are those agencies that are focused on job training and economic development, are they focused on the zip codes with the highest issues, i.e. the areas on the east side, the areas on the west side that have the high unemployment rates, high illiteracy rates, high high school dropout rates? Yeah, in my mind, I'm sort of cataloging all the different programs. And if there are not, is Melody still the way? I can guarantee you that the populations that they're serving are focused in on those areas that have those issues. I can't answer specifically if their strategy includes looking at the specific zip codes. Are we tracking? Yes. Well, if we are tracking it, could we track their use, especially since they're tied to city funding of those zip codes? Because the impacts that are made in those areas tie into choice and promise neighborhood grants, but potential future choice and promise grants on the west side are also a part of that. And we'd like to be able to have this information because in meeting with our partners with Alamo Colleges and the United Way, it's very hard to get this data. And as many partners as we can have at the table, providing that data to us would be beneficial. Right, right. So if that's not a component where we can find how many people they're impacting in these zip codes and getting employed in these zip codes, can we make that a point where we can use those resources since we're spending money in those areas already? Right, yes, we can do that. Right now, I think the way we have it segmented is by council districts which incorporate the zip code. So I'm sure we can capture that. The real challenge councilman is the real data that's the hardest to secure the sort of post-employment. And the reason I bring it up is the value of the RFP process. One of the criteria we put when we contract with individuals, and we just did this this year, was that it also co-enroll with the WSA. When they do that, then we're able to track them using zip codes or other criteria so it makes it much easier. So not only are we able to do it, but we're also becoming more sophisticated from a city perspective. Well, the only thing I can think of is incentivizing these organizations to keep that data after maybe one year of employment and tying that into the money that they're currently getting. That's certainly their goal. Making that a requirement is the challenge. I'll just pull an example out of the list, Dress for Success. A lot of their clients are homeless and so tracking them becomes very challenging. They normally do address their efforts in the actual proposal that they submit. So if your direction is only fund those agencies that are able to track employment, that really changes the mix of this list. Well, I mean, it ties into Councilman Gallagher and Councilman Crier's concerns that just because they've been getting the money, if they're not giving us everything we want, then that's definitely a problem. Just giving them the money because we've given them the money in the past. If our requirements change and they want the money, they can find a way to make it work if they're an efficient organization. Thank you. Joe. Mike, please. I hear observation that in the last 15, 20 years that one of the major changes in economic development has been this shift to things like the academies and project quest where we identify people who can be trained to meet the needs of a particular major industry. In our case, the academies and quest have been uniquely successful in terms of bang for the buck. Do you see that in other cities in terms of best practices? I think what we see a lot of movement nationally is creating specific training to those targeted industries. Yes, we see that. From a city perspective, from a private sector perspective, we don't see a lot of those programs addressing the hard to serve. So that is not necessarily unique to the city of San Antonio but from a public standpoint, that's where you really see a lot of that type of activity and those types of programs. From a private sector standpoint and the cloud academy and code up, those are great examples of the private sector saying here's our need, here's the curriculum, this is a short-term certificate that we need stood up and making that happen immediately. So it's a combination of both and I frankly enjoy the balance that this city council puts on that. There's a need, as Mayor Taylor has mentioned, to really provide that helping hand to the underserved and then there's a business need. I need those people trained right now and in the essay works slide, I showed you those three priority areas. The first priority area is just that, is where are the jobs and let's get people in the seats immediately. So I think it's a balance of both of those but yes, certainly in more recent times, proprietary training specific to industry is a trend and a best practice. And lastly, both councilman Nuremberg and councilman Villagran have pointed out that in our session yesterday, we had some very thoughtful offers that if we could help with some financial support, Dr. Henrich's presentation leaps to mind with regard to the cancer fighting aspect of it with regard to what some help on their CPS rate would do. I mean, what we're seeing is our number one industry saying, if the city can help us in some ways here, we think we can help the city by significantly growing our sector, our sub sector of this industry. And I think we owe it to them to come back with a thoughtful response. Yeah, they're giving us what we asked. We have been diligently working at this, the city manager and the evolution of the EDF started really the focus on targeted industry, high wage jobs. And so you see those industries now saying, here's what we need to propel our industry forward to create those high wage jobs. So it is a reaction to where we have been moving from an economic development perspective over the last five years. And frankly, I think what they're doing is challenging us now to say, here's what you've asked for now, how do we meet in the middle? I just wanted to expand on councilman Lopez's point about our street lighting. I think this is something, as we talked about, we came up in our last week's vote, we authorized this and I'm gonna get a little bit specific. We talk about all the benefits of LED street lights in terms of the energy efficiency, the kind of light, but we don't understand it in terms of the appropriateness of certain lighting systems in our city. And to further add to that point is that lighting is probably the most important, so I should say light is the most important element of any architectural design. And so when I see that we're gonna be retrofitting 1,500 LED street lights in downtown San Antonio, I have to just caution that nobody's talked about the impact of how much light that could produce, that that could wash up buildings, especially some of the more historic buildings. In this case, more light is not actually always the best approach. And so I'm kind of concerned that we have a strategy that is based on trying to create a usage of new technology and an approach that embraces sustainability, but again, I just wanna add on to what Councilman Lopez was saying, where is the design? And I feel like we have not layered that on this approach, and I'm concerned about that for downtown. Downtown is a very, very unique spot for our city. It holds not only many layers from the river walk to the street, to the building, but many layers of history. And so I just wanted to, what are we doing to address the design implementation of this much light? I think that's probably more, maybe a question for Ben. So I'll ask Ben to come up, but basically there isn't anything being done with regard to architectural design. This was a project that was approved by council members three or four years ago, and so we're in the process of implementing. And it was about energy conservation and adding more light for safety reasons within the downtown area. So we would have to, I don't know if you have particular buildings in mind or areas of specific concern, but we could take a look at that. I recall when we lit City Hall, it didn't used to be lit. In fact, we cleaned it, trimmed the trees, and had a lighting consultant come in about eight years ago and light the building. And so it used to be just dark. It didn't have any lights on it. And even the technology has evolved since we did that eight years ago. So Ben has a project that's ready to go forward. If you all want us to stop on that project or wait and then take a look at the architectural element of this, that can be done. We are looking for some direction today as a result of the conversation last Thursday about how you do want us to proceed, but there really isn't any effort underway right now to look at the architectural side. Okay, well, that's the point. And so I just want to be clear before Ben answers anything. When I say architectural, it's not an aesthetic only. I mean, it is just a understanding that light plays a huge role if not the most important role in how we interact with our environment. So I just want to say we do need to put a pause on this. 1500 lights in downtown is a serious enough impact for us to just take a step back and take a closer look. So Ben, please. I think Cheryl summarized it well. This slide we know earlier, the downtown one is underway. So we could pause it. I mean, today we've retrofitted 477 lights and we would define downtown. Again, it's the map you see here. It's bounded by Cesar Chavez in the south, I-10, I-37, I-35. Most of the retrofits have been done on the outer parts of this boundary. We've not done what I would call the downtown core. We have ordered the polls with CPS, but those have yet to come in. So if it's the desire of the council, we can pause this project and hold that one. The other one that is under your consideration that we recommended last week was all of the other residential street lights within San Antonio is about 30,000 or so. The economics now work that we can use the energy savings to replace all of those high pressure sodium, convert them over to LED, and we could move forward with that and we could have that done by October of 2018. But that would obviously be pending y'all's direction. I just think we need a little bit more time to take a closer look at this. And I realize, again, this was certainly well before I was on council and I just wanna advocate for a more thoughtful and purposeful approach to this system. This is a very different system. And I feel that we, I don't wanna stop this. I just simply wanna take a closer look at how we're doing it so that we're not creating a problem for stakeholders downtown. For example, we were on the Alamo Management Committee, for example, and how is this gonna impact the designs at the Alamo? How is this gonna impact hemisphere? How is this gonna impact new buildings as they're going up downtown? How does this impact San Pedro Creek? All of this is very, very important and not, it's more than just a simple light bulb change. A simple light bulb change. And 1500 lights is a serious impact. I'm simply asking us to put a pause on this and that way we can get a better design recommendation on this lighting. May I ask, so who are you thinking in terms of making a design recommendation? I guess we'd have to give that a lot of thought in terms of development community and cost and I guess the AIA could help with design lighting consultants in terms of the impact on historic buildings. I think we have our own Office of Historic Preservation that would agree with what I'm saying with regard to not just our historic buildings, but the impact of simply changing the intensity of light and what that means to our city character, our corridors, it's just very different and so I would like to work with your staff to help come up with that recommendation. So that's the answer, I think. As you mentioned, there's certainly people we could talk to, we certainly need to bring in some of the stakeholders downtown and have this discussion because I just think that if we're gonna be making this kind of investment that we just take the most appropriate step forward. So we'd have to take into consideration and have involved, we have competing goals. We have public safety, police specifically that want more lighting downtown to be able to address the safety. We have requests for more lighting downtown for pedestrian purposes and then we have the design aspect of it, the historic preservation. So there would be a lot, a lot of people involved and we can work on that if that's the desire of the council for us to do that. I do wanna say, the design does address public safety. I don't think that they're competing arguments. I just wanna mention it is doing lighting right actually helps public safety and that's why I bring it up. It is a multi-layered approach and benefit for our downtown to seek a more thoughtful design of our lighting for downtown. In many ways, you can make pockets that feel more unsafe and this is also important. The perception of safety is just as important the actual safety of our city. So I think that something like lighting, as you mentioned is gonna address or can include our public safety component. So I do believe that this is not a competing argument. It's helping to make this kind of project or this kind of investment go much further. So if I can ask a process point because this is a little bit different proposition, right? This is actually already a funded project that's already ongoing that you're requesting be paused. So I would ask the mayor and Cheryl, how do you wanna handle that procedurally? You posed the question. Is it the will of the council? Certainly it's a point well taken from Roberto but do you want to turf it to upcoming city council meeting or how shall we dispose of this request and recommendation? That's a good point. I think as you kind of pointing out it's not directly germane to us forming the budget for next year, but it certainly is worthy of additional discussion. So I think maybe Cheryl, myself and Councilman Trevino should huddle on it and then possibly the TTU committee could take it up for further discussion. Great. Excellent. And Cheryl, last comment to you. I'm just starting to get nervous about this conversation because I feel it urgent that we move with the lighting that we voted on a few days ago and I don't have any desire to wait. I mean, there are 20 people sitting back here that wanted to know just specifically how we're gonna light up their neighborhoods. That's why they're all here to learn about the budget and how that proceeds. So I just wanna make sure that doesn't get delayed. I got a little nervous here as the conversation went on and so while we're discussing the will of the council that is not the will of myself. So I better speak out because if I don't, then it'll be taken as support. But the other thing is I just, I also feel like I need to say that I don't support a couple of things that was discussed here. One of them was a housing incentive policy. The shrinking of that that was proposed a couple of days ago. There was a desire to make it smaller that just included the inside downtown and I don't support that. You know, it was, it's being presented here and I just, I feel compelled to say it so that it doesn't again get taken as a support. But I do very much support continuing with the EDF and the programs that we have for the delegate agencies and the dedicated funding that we have for that. And that's all. So just to make sure I got it right, that you support maintaining the current scale of the housing incentive program. Is that right? To keep it the way that it is. Yes, maintaining the current scale. Right. Great. Yes. Okay. Anything else on this one? So, very good. As you can tell, if you've been looking at your watches, the good news is the three minute limit that you all asked for worked in terms of keeping folks within that three minute, everyone deserves some applause for working really well inside that constraint. The bad news is it didn't particularly keep us from going over time. And certainly as our city's elected leadership, you absolutely have a right to weigh in on these issues. And so my question now is a process request. What staff has been working diligently to do and I've been going back and forth and we've been looking at drafts and weeding and thinning is to try and boil down the things that have been discussed today into two broad categories. One that we might call not the consent, but the consensus agenda as well as we could interpret it, which were the different points that came up today that seemed to have the preponderance of support behind them. Not unanimity, not everybody's favorite stuff, but that seemed to have the majority of council in support of those things. And then what were the few items that really had some clear contrast? My question to you as a matter of time is that we are now at time. So in fact, we're past time. So my question to you is are you game to give us more time to consider the summary that has been put together and react to that and engage in some exchange around that? Or would you, and it's your prerogative to do so, choose to conclude our session and find a different vehicle to provide feedback to the products of today? Rebecca. Thank you. I think there are still some points that I didn't get to say that where I was recommending or not recommending and then part of this conversation I'd like to bring in some more of my thoughts. So if there's a time that we could have before you bring a consensus, if there's a round robin time, or like you get a minute to say just your bullet points that you didn't get to say and then move on, if that's something up for consideration, but yes, I would like to do a consensus still. So your interest, you'd like to add more time to the agenda, very good for that. So if I get asked to straw poll, how many would be willing to add more time? So if we said we go to six to complete the work, how many of you would be willing? So one, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. All right, so Mayor Cheryl, I'll ask you, can we continue to six? Yeah. Yes, but 5.45 would be wonderful. I wish, I wish. So we have a recommendation on Rebecca's part that we give everyone an opportunity to say their kind of final thought. Here's a counter proposal I'd like to make, Rebecca. I would love it if you're willing, if we could present what's been put together first before reacting to it and discussing it, if you see that your thoughts and your priorities are on it, then you may have different comments, right? And then we do the comments and then we discuss. Would that work? Okay, great, so that way folks are commenting on that which they felt was not stated as opposed to. And again, before we pull them up, are we ready with those? Andrew, great. Remember gang, today is about consensus, so the weight of the room behind of a particular idea, not unanimity and not special projects either. All right, so as you think about your comments, certainly it is your prerogative to comment on whatever you feel inclined to comment on, but if the idea is that we wanna get the room behind it, I would say focus your energies on those areas where you think you can muster support in support of those things if it's something that hasn't already been said during the course of the day today. So without further ado, Josh, do my best, Dave Letterman. So as we look at some of the things that we heard today that felt like they had the weight of the room behind them, number one, I was pointing into my palm. All right, so it sounded from our first section today that there was by and large support for the current policy approach on the finance side and to stay on the same track. Next up, that street funding really ought to be increased from 50 million to 64 million. That sidewalk funding ought to be increased from 5 million to 15 million and or be augmented with the bond program. Next up, that we continue our ADA efforts, evaluate expanding senior activities and equipment for visually impaired at city senior centers. As you were asking, we had great consensus or I should say a lot of folks come out in support of staying the course with Lone Star Rail and allowing the process to continue playing itself out. Next, tremendous support, really great support on the public safety requests that came from both police and fire. Next, while certainly we had some contrasting views on delegate agency funding, the majority of voices were in support of continuing delegate agency funding. Within delegate agency funding, really increasing support to youth programming, including my brother's keeper, anti-bullying and teen dating violence. Next, increasing the funding to animal care services, particularly in the domains of education, outreach, marketing and enforcement in those areas with highest needs. Again, as we said, no terms on delegate agency funding, supporting World Heritage Incentive Fund, continuing to explore funding alternatives for the tricentennial, what's the formula, what's the mix, looking at supporting the non-attainment study that was proposed by staff, supporting smart cities, Wi-Fi Park, street lighting, ShotSpotter, continuing current workforce development and economic development incentive programs. So these were the issues that again, not unanimous, but that had the weight of the room behind them. Those items that seemed to have some split, and certainly there were other items that were mentioned over the course of the day that might have been put forth by an individual but didn't necessarily have critical mass or receive a lot of chiming in from other peers and colleagues, so certainly some of those were not included in the last slide. So these are some of the ones that had a lot of interest, but contrasting perspectives. One being developing alternatives to increasing VIAs funding. Two, so is that moving the ATD funds or other strategies, but how do we increase VIAs funding? Two, with the wage scenarios to 15, part of what we're looking for from a budget standpoint is are you saying, right, we've now gotten to $13, which is actually above the living wage, right? And so do you want to continue gaming out scenarios for the future or are you providing city staff with direction that you would like to see aggressive increase continue in the new year's budget, right? So is it, we've made progress, let's continue to research and study it, or 13, not far enough, put this in the budget for next year. And then a lot of discussion about the, most recently the street lighting program and what does that mean right now and what we want to do with that. So that is the recap of what we caught as the themes that came out of the conversation today. So now we'll do a round robin and we'll start with you Ray and invite you to share any comments. And again, my request is anything that you felt not covered by what we just shared. So when you put up the three glass bullets about discussion items. Yes. Are you looking for guidance or opinion? No, actually we'll still discuss those after. It's, is there anything that was important to you that wasn't included in any of the three slides? No, I mean, it was pretty inclusive of all the stuff that we were talking about. I mean, I don't have any additional, you know, comments to make on that. Okay. Okay. Al? I think everything was there. Great. Thank you. Ray? Great. Roberto? Vika? Great. Can we go back to slide two please? Yes. Discussion right here. No, the other one. That one. Okay. All right. Just for the record. No, I'm not in favor of putting a pause to the street light program and I'll take the 1500 lights in district three and then the ATD. We're gonna have more discussion about that, especially for legislative, correct? Is that part of it? Yes, we're gonna talk about that in a moment. Okay. Well, and can you go to the first one? What does it say in the bond? Do we have anything up here where increase, okay, increase the sidewalk for the bond? All right. That's good. Thank you. Great. Ray? I don't have anything to add to the summary. Great. Don't see Joe. Sure. And don't see Chris. So having said that, if we could go back to our consensus items, go back to slide one. So just as we look at this, and again, the question was not, are all of these things you personally support, but do you feel in good faith that what's on this list reflects what you heard in the conversation in the room today? I would ask if anyone disagrees that any of these had broad support in the room to speak up. Okay. So can I get a thumbs up that you feel this reflects the day's conversation? Excellent. Great. Next slide. So again, take a look. Do you feel that what's on here reflects the weight of opinion in the room as we went through the day. There's anything in here that you feel was not supported by the room? Would you speak up now? It's kind of like a wedding, right? Speak now. No, but don't worry. You're going to see these again and again and again over the months to come. All right, so thumbs up if you feel like these items reflect the weight of the group's conversation during the day today. Great. All right. So now to our discussion slide. So let's look at these three conversations, right? One, first up, the VIA funding question, right? So there was a lot of support around the question of VIA needs more funding, but there was a lot of exchange on what form that might take. So Ron, first comment to you. What I heard was that we have to let the ad hoc committee finish its work to present a recommendation, but within that we also had a suggestion that the IGR take up the issue of additional legislative solutions for a long-term funding fix, but and I support ad hoc committee continue to do its work and bring a formal recommendation first. Great. Can I, Francesco, I'm just gonna weigh in here. Yes, sir, go. The, any decision under the ATD scenario, none of them have implications on the 2017 bond. So I'm 10, 2017 budget. So we're going to go ahead and the co-chair and I are going to get an ad hoc committee consensus and come up with a recommendation that is then going to continue to be vetted by the council. Okay. So does that work for the room? Yes or no, I just wanted to comment. I mean, but the expectation should be then we should communicate that but it appears that there will be some formulary that'll come out of it that says we're going to shift some money over there and I kind of articulated one of the ways that we might be able to do that. So I think there should be, unless somebody feels not that there should be some expectation that there's going to be some money shifted over. We're just not sure from where and it could be something like I spoke about earlier where there are some dollars that are today being spent. We pull those out. We give them to VN and we supplant that sidewalk investment by virtue of capital investment from the bond. I mean, those are part of the scenarios because I do believe that we'll come out of it and I just think we should set that expectation on everybody. I think what's going to come out of it is we're going to redirect some sum out to VN. At the end of the day, I mean, if we're talking about mass transit being, you know, the wave of the future and the only way for us to survive the growth that's coming at us then we need to put our money where our mouth is as difficult as it's going to be. I do believe that it needs to be in steps a little this year, a little more the following year and the year after that. I think that's where we're going to struggle with Mr. Chairman, but that's just my comment on it. Rebecca. I guess I have a little trepidation on anticipating. I mean, I'm more leaning towards what you were saying, Councilman Saldana, let's go forward that way instead of saying at this expectation, this money is going to be moved. And so I guess I see that that's where the, that's not where my consensus was, having a further conversation with the ad hoc committee, yes, but I think there are more implications. I'm thinking staff position-wise that I need more clarification on before moving forward with one way or another. So anyhow, that's- And I would say, if I can ask for your consent on this, that was your thoughts were a pining and editorial, but not a reflection of the consensus for you to say that's fair. Right, good. So back to where we were, that the committee's going to carry out its work, make its recommendations and develop solutions to bring back, correct? Yes, that's the charge of the committee and so no need to make a decision today, but I think the Councilman was talking about expectations. Great. So now in the entry wage question, what city staff needs guidance from you on is two scenarios. Scenario one, we are now at $13, which is above the living wage and you're interested, there was some good consensus on wanting to study what future scenarios would look like and what their implications were, but there's a difference between, we've made this big leap above the living wage and now no change for this year's budget, but studying the future, or you'd like to actually see continued aggressive moves to increase that in this year. Mike? Scenario one, definitely. So, study or increase? Yeah, I would agree with scenario one. We want to at least know what options are on the table as we're considering, this is what we're doing, we're budgeting and we're doing forecasting in the future, I think that's what, we hope the charges to the staff is to bring us the options to consider and we'll study the issue. So, would anyone like to make a case for making an additional increase in this year's budget? Not necessarily, I would like to see, however, the implications of what it'll take to build it out in a definitive way, to say, you know, 15, a path to 15 will take us three years, it'll do this, five years it'll do that, I mean, I definitely want to see that number. So, there's definitely a consensus that we want to study and put together some really rigorous options and projections for council, but I'm not hearing a consensus, especially, that we want to continue that increased progression this budget year, right? No, I think the information that we would need, the scenarios and the forecasting we would need in order to make a decision if we decided to do so this year, we would need all that information and that's what I'm hearing we're requesting. Great, so any contrasting comments? May I just add, may I just add to that, certainly I'm fine with us studying, but I think any study or analysis on this should, again, take a broader look at additional options for these employees because, again, I just strongly believe that just providing an artificial increase in the long term doesn't help them as we intend it to, so I hope that we can look at what we're doing. I know we, I've talked with Cheryl about the fact that we do have some incentives and programs in place that allow employees to continue their education. I'd like to know how robust those are and if we made investments there, what the impact could be and just more information about the population of employees that we're talking about. So I just want to make sure that the study isn't just merely a financial study as far as the impact, financial impact for us, but instead takes a little bit of a broader look on investing in our employees. Certainly, how are we helping folks move out of entry-level jobs so that they don't just get in there and then stay there in perpetuity? Great, and so as long as we're studying that, I can't imagine anyone objects to that. Great, all right, so then that takes us to our last one, the Street Light Program and it sounded like, Mayor, you had proposed getting together with Roberto and Cheryl and working that. Is there anything that we need from this group right now on this one? Yeah, Mike. Yeah, I just think it's important that we talk about exactly the area that Councilman Trevino is referencing because I've heard a lot of worry that it's going to affect other areas in the city. So would you like to clarify that? Again, I'm talking about downtown. Just downtown, just? Since, yes, if we're in a court of law, I'll tell you right now, just downtown. No, absolutely. So let's be clear, obviously there is a need throughout the entire city to have more lighting, especially in our neighborhoods where we want lighting to serve our public safety, of course. I'm simply talking about last week we looked at downtown specifically having 1500 lights being installed and replaced. And so I was told that we could address it here. Again, we voted on it, we're pushing forward. I'm asking for a pause to take a closer look and I appreciate both Cheryl and the Mayor having this discussion with me because I'm just being specific about downtown. Don't wanna delay any other parts and that's all I can say. So what I had then based on the request about the neighborhoods is that we come forward on the council agenda. The next one we can get this on, but in June with those areas outside the downtown defined as Chavez to the freeway on the north, 35 and 37 on East and West. So that we'll talk about how to proceed, but we'll go forward with the lights in the neighborhoods. Is that what you all wanna do? Francisco in here just to comment, it is part of an innovative program, right? Where we're eventually going to be having some sort of interconnected smart system. So it wasn't just specifically the lighting, it's a whole smart system, which really seems, I'm very reluctant to delay even in the lighting because eventually we have to decide to invest in a smart technology that's not just about the lighting. So it also leads into the Zona Cultural, which is just right beyond there. It kind of leads into the mission. So I don't wanna delay at all and I'm very reluctant to say it, but it has to be part of the whole picture because the mission reaches also part of that. And then the Zona Cultural is gonna be part of that. And then we have a whole smart grid system that we have to consider. So yeah, I hate to belabor this, but I am concerned about stopping just a specific part of downtown because downtown is part of the whole city. It's not a separate part of what we're all supporting today. So I just feel very reluctant to support what the request that's being made here. So from a process standpoint as a layperson, if I'm not correct, the three of you would meet and then develop recommendations which will come back to council for disposition and then it'll either work or it won't work and the opportunity exists if it's not a satisfying recommendation that the council could vote to progress as planned. Is that correct? Right. I can just make a real quick comment. The comments that I had made early on which talked about the smart cities and the technology deployment and all that kind of stuff and that perhaps we should set aside some money that addresses that in case the study that is being done doesn't materialize into a ROI opportunity for us to engage with this company that's been working with. That kind of goes with this. I mean, the pause is gonna allow us to take a look at that, give them enough time to make that assessment without necessarily rushing it. Then find out, can we pay for those enhancements, those smart city initiatives and attributes with that application? And if we can't, then perhaps what we need to do and that's why I was suggesting setting aside some dollar figure that said if Ben's deal doesn't work, it doesn't pan out. If there's no ROI there, then we have some sort of an investment that we can do the kinds of things we need to do, particularly in the downtown area, particularly as it relates to lighting up buildings with the tricentennial coming up and all those kinds of initiatives. I think it's important that hitting the pause button for just a second to see if that works itself out, makes sense. In that timeframe, I think we need to kind of define if it doesn't make sense to do it with this application that Ben's working on, that then perhaps we set some money aside to do it anyway on just the attributes of it, lighting the cities, making sure the shop plotter has this tied into a smart system. I mean, to, I get it, Shirley, we want to provide the security at the street level as quickly and as aggressively as we possibly can, but not at the risk, I don't think, not at the risk of leaving something off that could have been even more beneficial. I really do believe, and I thought the one that gave me the most reason to smile was whenever they tied that smart approach to the shop plotter that said, here's a shot go off, it sends a signal to police, it sends a signal to the system and turns the lights off, up. That's good for our community. And if we're having an opportunity to deploy that kind of a smart environment, I want to do it. And if we hit a pause button for a short while to define if we can get it done, it makes sense. Because we're not looking at a long-term delay. We're looking for, I don't know, I mean, I don't see Ben sitting around, but I can't imagine it's gonna take more than a couple of months. I'm gonna blur the whistle at this point and say that is actually beyond the purview of this retreat because that's a request and then a response based on the current budget, the current work plan what's going on. So we're gonna turf that to routine city process. I think only to say that we had this conversation at a council meeting last week and we were asked to bring it here. That's why it's here. But we've got three things happening. Shirley wants us to go forward. You want us to hold up on the whole program for a couple of months till we sorted out. And then there's a request about downtown. So we've got the full spectrum here. We just need some direction on what you want us to bring forward. I just would like to be included in that meeting if you have it with the three of you also. Sure, we can do that. I just have a process question because I know how I voted last week. So does it require action for us to deviate from what the council decision was last week? And if it does, are we allowed to take that action here today? That's great. No, if we took a vote, we can't just avoid that without, we'd have to bring it back for a vote. So as long as what the discussions that we have don't interfere with the action that we took, then I think it's still okay. Cheryl, would you just verify the vote that we took? Was to approve the rates to implement the 30,000 lights. And so us having additional discussions on downtown doesn't interfere with that moving forward in general. Well, I guess what I'm saying is that in so far, there is a delay. I would imagine that because we took the action to proceed with the plan, it would require another council action to delay. And I don't think we can do that here. Well, we approved was the rates, the rate structure. Because prior to that, we had already approved the purchase and the 30,000. Right. So I posed the question procedurally. What would you like to do? As we discussed, have a meeting with the councilman and councilman Gonzalez has asked to be included in it. We'll do that quickly and let everyone know what the outcome is if it needs further review at the committee level. Terrific. Great, so last thing, we've had a great day. Hope all of you feel that the things that you shared with me during our interviews were addressed and wrestled with as we went through the day. We worked hard to give you all plenty of opportunity to hear from one another, to be heard, and to put your thoughts out there. Staff has gotten a ton of insight and input from you as to where the priorities are. And so now they begin their work, or I should say continue their work, but informed by you of developing these into budget recommendations that try and solve the Rubik's Cube and balance the whole that will be presented to you in August. I would say as we conclude, I'd love to hear a last word from each of you, literally in one to three words. How are you feeling at the end of today? And Mayor, we will conclude with you. So if we can start over here. Let these down. You've been faithfully with us all day. What's- No, I'm gonna take- Excellent. Mike, your last word. Good experience. We're all still awake. Must've been right. Excellent. Shirley? Great. Joe? Hopeful. Excellent. Ray? Jay, well been great. This is probably the one that's been the most engaging. The last three or four I think have been innovative in the sense of trying to draw us out to having dialogue. I think this one was incredibly well-participated in it. And I think the first ones were, where everybody seemed to be a little timid and not wanting to step on other people's toes. I think that kind of went out the window today. Which is good. Which is good. And that's a kind of lively discussion. You know, good, thoughtful, you know, councils need to have so. Excellent. Thank you. Job well done. Thank you. Al, last word. Looking around the state, San Antonio is in a good place. Great. I'm curious, but optimistic. Very nice. Alberto? I thought it was well-organized and I'm hopeful. Very good. Derricka? Hopeful, frustrated, more work. Great, your mic's, hey, your mic again. Got it. I thought that's good fun. Let's get it done sometime. Excellent. And then, Mayor, before you close us out for the day, Cheryl, I want to see if you had any comment. Trevor, thank you. And Mayor, take us home. Following up on what Ray said, I get to work hard, right? We got work to do, but this was very productive. So thank you everyone for your attention and your engagement, your commitment to making San Antonio an even better place. And I just wanted to know if anybody got more than one side of the Rubik's Cube. I got one side. Okay, so we'll keep working on the puzzles before us. Thank you everyone. Thank you everyone. That's a wrap.