 Good morning everyone we're going to get started here in a minute My name is Mike Crumb. I'm the director of the public events department for the City of Fort Worth and This morning. I want to welcome you to the Fort Worth Convention Center and our town hall meeting concerning the National Finals rodeo as many of you know NFR is the Super Bowl of rodeo And will be one of the largest events that this community has ever hosted There is an extensive Effort underway to prepare for the hosting of NFR And this morning you're going to hear from both city and hospitality leaders About those efforts and have a chance to ask us some questions So without any further ado To kick us off this morning. I would like to welcome councilmember Dennis shingleton to the podium Dennis Thank You Michael. That's it's great. Well, I expected a lot more people here But my colleagues in the council and Zeta's here so we can begin right in I will tell you how excited generally the population of Fort Worth is to be hosting this plethora of visitors for the National Finals rodeo. This is this is a great opportunity for us to showcase the city It's a great opportunity for us to demonstrate this welcoming and and certainly The team that you're going to hear from today Has been working diligently to make sure all the preparations both here the stockyards the will Rogers complex and even in Arlington that the experience For our public for our patrons for our residents is going to be just extraordinary. We're going to have a great time with this Of course, there's this added challenge of the COVID virus and We're going to be talking about that today, but With this increase in cases we're going to be Emphasizing vigilance and compliance and and demonstrating even on our side personal responsibility, so Anything then everything that we can do as a city to educate to the governor's current orders. We're going to do that We have some masks out there today, is that correct a whole bunch of masks out here today, so My have a pickup truck if you want to haul some out of here, we can do that We also have fire police code here and to answer your questions the governor's order on occupancy limits and All sorts of things we want any confusion We want to make sure that that's that's embedded and tightened up so that you have the best experience as a Businessman and that we and our patrons have good experiences in the city the mayor has asked that we lead this today with a Educational first to ensure that you have the resources. I think that you need to operate Safely in this current environment. I think we're also going to have a team of ambassadors Out in the city, but I think there's a few here today But out in the city to kind of direct and help and assist our patronage as we begin Fort Worth's known for its hospitality Fort Worth's known for its handling of with grace visitors from all walks of life in all places in the in the country and that's not going to be any different this time around To I'm excited for the NFR, but I'm also excited that we can once again Demonstrate our question here equestrian heritage and our love of the Western Lifestyle, and I'm sure that we all the visitors that are coming here are going to be Excited about how we are showing showcasing this incredible city that we live in As the mayor says this isn't our first rodeo, and it won't be our last with that, I guess I'll turn it over to Jason and Jason Sands from visit Fort Worth these guys have been working a day and night Jason. Did you get an hour of sleep last night? Okay, okay. Yeah, well it does. Okay. All right. I'll get out of here just a second Thank you councilman, and thank you all for being here as councilman said I'm Jason Sands. I'm the director of sports the sports commission here at visit Fort Worth and our team has been working Around the clock since the day we found out about this. I wanted to talk to you really quickly About just the impact of this event in general So this event as you heard it's the Super Bowl of rodeos not the super spreader Super Bowl of rodeos And it's been hosted in Las Vegas for 35 straight years So Las Vegas has said that the impact of this event is 150 million dollars to their local economy 100,000 rooms and 50,000 people. So that's in a non-covid year. That's what this event is So to host an event like this It takes generally speaking over a year and a half of preparation to plan for something like this We are doing it in under three months in the middle of a hundred year pandemic So again, I wanted to take a second just to thank all the people in this room police fire City mayor's office and all of you for all your efforts to pull this together and get a good plan together to Provide a great experience for this group as they come in. So this is huge And our ultimate goal here is to put on a great experience provide a safe environment and make a run to get them back full time That would be our hundred percent goal. They're up for 2026 is the next year that they're open for a contract We've already been in conversation with them about coming here And if we could drop in a non-covid year the impact that this has from basically the day after Thanksgiving All the way leading up into Christmas that would be a huge impact for our city and that's one of our folks this year So a lot riding on this event. I Wanted to kind of go through just what we've got planned as far as Events going a lot of different things happening as you know The rodeo is going to be a global I field in Arlington. They've sold about 14,500 tickets for 10 straight days They sold out of that in about five seconds after they put it on for public sale. So a high demand for that We know that those folks are coming I'm going to start at the cultural district so the cultural district is hosting the nch a fruity event But they're also partnering with group W to host. I think over there. It's the country Christmas So they're going to have a whole vendor village available over there that people can come and shop and check things out Much like the stock show and rodeo has out there So that's going on then dickies is going to be hosting both an awards banquet and a welcome reception I think that's a the Monday and Tuesday leading up to the the events So that's the experience at the cultural district the stockyards has got so many different things going on They've done a great job of really kind of filling the calendar here So they're hosting the junior rodeo finals So that event will take place all 10 days goes from 8 a.m. To 4 p.m. Every single day generally speaking they have about 800 or 900 participants for that Kids event so that's going to be going on at the cow town Coliseum after that event's done They're going to have a watch party for the rodeo because that's another thing That's very important for these folks in Vegas. They say most of the people that come to it Don't have a ticket to the rodeo. They just go for the experience. They go for the watch parties So there's going to be a watch party at the cow town Coliseum Once that junior rodeo is done every single day and then it'll lead into an after party at the cow town Coliseum as well So they'll have concerts and music and different things going on for folks that want to participate in that That's called who we fest if you hear that that's what that is Billy Bob's is also going to be hosting concerts every single night. So they've got things going We know Billy Bob's knows how to do this So they're going to be activated for all 10 nights as well as there's going to be cow town Christmas out there So again a vendor village also put on by group W So they're going to have shops and different experiences for people to buy different things out there So they're basically going to be going from 8 a.m. Until possibly about 2 a.m. Every single day at the stock yard So that's where a lot of action is going to be and then downtown which I know You know the folks here a little bit more interested in we've got the cowboy. That's I'm trying to remember there's cow town Christmas There's cow country Christmas. We are cowboy Christmas and in the convention center here So that is generally speaking in Las Vegas. They have over 400,000 square feet They utilize of the cowboy Christmas and thousands of people attend that daily Over here. It's going to be about 300 plus vendors They're using every square inch that they can here in the convention center and you know The attendance is planned for about 10,000 daily So you can expect that it's going to be more ramped up on the weekends We've been keeping an eye on the hotel kind of occupancy and doing the best we can to try to estimate How many people are going to be coming here for this? So basically what it looks like as of earlier this week We took about 23 hotels mostly downtown and the surrounding hotels and they're running on the weekends We've got about 4,000 rooms booked each night and then during the weekday. It's probably about you know 2,500 to 3,000 rooms now again Not every single one of those rooms booked is for this event, but just give you a sense of the type of people that are in You know occupancy-wise and that continues to grow every single day So that would give you a sense both the weekends are going to be pretty busy on this We're also trying to do we've got general worst square. We're gonna have an activation out there Mitch will talk a little bit about that when he comes up from our marketing team So the idea is as all these folks come in and come to the convention center We want to do everything we can to drive them out to our businesses in downtown and make sure that they're Experienced in the full Fort Worth authentic Western experience So we want to try to get them from the convention center when they're done with that experience to come out to general worst square There's gonna be a big screen out there where they could watch the rodeo There's gonna be live music that is gonna be activated for on the weekends and and some other sponsor activations as well So it should be a good experience and hopefully we can start to direct them to each of your businesses too And Mitch is also going to talk a little bit about how we can kind of go an extra step to make sure we're driving folks To your businesses because we want them to understand that it's not just the convention center There's the stockyards. There's a great downtown so much to experience in Fort Worth And we want them to get that full experience and to that end We are working with Trinity Metro to make sure there's transportation Go into each one of these from downtown to the cultural district and at the stockyards We've extended those hours because they had shrunk them during the pandemic. We've extended those got them going later So we're trying to provide some public transportation as well for those visitors that are in town I think that's that's the schedule Any questions on that or all right, we'll keep on moving down the list and thank you much. Thank you, Jason we'll go ahead and now move into the plans that that the city of Fort Worth has to Help manage this event in a safe and healthy way First up this morning Was originally Leanne Guzman deputy city attorney Who is going to talk a little bit about clean zones and free speech areas now? I'm not an attorney. I don't play one on TV I will attempt to to do Leanne's presentation justice so Events cities that host events of The caliber like NFR like the Super Bowl We'll regularly use The concept of a clean zone To bring a higher level of management To an event so what does a what does a clean zone gets you well in the area that is included in the clean zone? You can prohibit the sale of bootleg merchandise for example you can prohibit Ambush marketing so this is the Wrangler national finals rodeo We don't want somebody Unfurling a giant pair of Levi's off the top of the Omni right so that's that's an ambush We also clean zones also Give us the opportunity To bring a higher level of encouragement to our attendees in terms of mask wearing and social distancing and so Well Mitch will talk a little later about the positive proactive encouraging friendly approach a Fort worth approach if you will that we're going to employ in terms of encouraging Everyone to wear a mask a little bit later, but let me let me show you What the clean zones look like so this is the this is the clean zone for the stockyards It is focused primarily around East and West exchange Street, which will be closed during the day and into the evening to facilitate better flow of pedestrians during the During the event clean zone also Includes Free speech areas so we have We have to identified for the stockyards area there with the red stars and then downtown The clean zone is focused Primarily on the the blocks That cover the convention center and the Omni again with Free speech zones established at Lancaster and looks like 8th Street For that So Those will be implemented starting December 3rd, I believe and will run through Noon on the 13th of December clean zones coincide with the work the city's transportation and public works department is doing to Support NFR so You will see Street maintenance teams out working this week and next week to To pretty things up For our guests as we noted earlier with the clean zone Establishment will be closing East exchange and a portion of West exchange up in the stockyards During NFR will also be closing 9th Street between Houston and Commerce Again to facilitate the flow between what's happening at general war square and what's happening in the country Convention center We've been working with our ride-sharing vendors to to geofence the for pickup areas On the on the borders of the clean zones and we'll have announcements coming out about that later As we get closer to to NFR and then a big Lesson that was passed along to us from from the folks in Las Vegas or the folks who have been to Las Vegas was the importance of Having shuttling available for attendees to move between Your your nodes of activity for NFR. So for us, that's the stockyards downtown and the cultural district so In partnership with Trinity Metro Will be ramping up Route 15 which runs from downtown to the stockyards We will be Increasing service for the dash which runs from Downtown to the cultural district As well as bringing back Molly the trolley service Which had been suspended because of the pandemic So Ready to go across a broad front transportation and public works You can see some of the work that TPW Is going to be doing here rehabbing some crosswalks Painting some light poles and making sure that everything works Both downtown and in the stockyards. We have traffic control and street closure plans That are are currently being finalized and that of TPW will be doing that in partnership With chief Krause's team over at Fort Worth PD Speaking of Fort Worth PD I'm going to ask chief Krause to come up and talk about first responder preparedness for NFR chief all right, so I Can't speak everything the fire department med star doing but the fire department is going to have extra crew on on-site at the different locations As well as extra crew staffed up to respond MedStar as well will have Dedicated ambulances in the areas where we're going to have large crowds During those times so they can respond quickly MedStar typically also has roving patrols in the areas where their paramedics will be on foot With the medical bags and I believe the fire department is planning that as well As far as the police department we have Received a grant from the federal government to help deal with some of the coveted related issues specific to police and so we are checking to make sure we can use that grant to Put extra officers in these areas on an overtime basis and that is the plan for us Not only are they there for security, but we're going to task them with making sure people are Being responsible wearing their masks Socially distancing and directing them to sanitizers throughout the areas where the crowds gather It's easier to control things here in the convention center because if somebody's absolutely refusing to To do what we ask them to we can simply remove them from that It's a little different in a public space like the stockyards But we will have extra officers out there to deal directly with that We work very closely with the fire department and the code department Even prior to NFL are starting we have issues out in the West 7th Avenue or area with a bunch of the bars And we have a developed a task force made up of code fire and police that go out there to make sure people are social distancing that they're in compliance inside the bar with masks and social distancing and That they're not gathering up in crowds Without taking proper precautions So we're going to continue that through the NFR and like I said, we'll have additional officers out there Beyond what we typically staff on any given day Thank You chief appreciate you filling in for chief Davis Next up I'd like to ask brandon Bennett the director of code compliance to come up and talk about COVID preparedness during NFR Okay, it's gonna get exciting now Thank you all for coming and I know that we are also Recording this so that we can replay it for those who didn't come. It's important that we stay at home or stay in our Offices that are secluded from other people as much as possible these days So I appreciate that we were able to record this and people will be able to pick up the information On the backside. So for those of you that don't know me. I see some familiar faces I am brandon Bennett and I Often refer to myself as the director of the junk drawer department because I tend to get all of the different city services That don't fit neat and clean someplace else. So I not only have Zoning and code enforcement, but I also have public health environmental protection solid waste Animal control and a few other things and today. I'm really here just to kind of give you an update on What we see as as potential issues or concerns that that will arise in a few weeks from now and We had some agenda items from the stockyards But I'm going to maybe talk more generally because as I look about I see a lot of faces from downtown And not all of these things apply to the downtown folks probably the one thing that's on everybody's mind more than everything else is The increasing number of cases for COVID and how that's going to impact NFR and the guests that come to Fort Worth. I Was very active in developing the Super Bowl plan Back in the day Many of you may recall The restaurants and the bars and others we had a series of some Meetings that we had with folks and we said You know, we we better order in a lot of sand because there could be a nice storm And we better be ready because water mains could break And the restaurants will get closed when they break and how do we get the restaurants back open right away? That there's a lot of planning that goes into these things and sometimes that planning seems Unnecessary but for those of you that were around for the Super Bowl We got an ice storm And we had water main breaks and and a lot of the things that we thought we were just planning for just in case Actually were things that came to fruition and if you recall on the national news There was a number of stories where it showed people walking out of the hotels in downtown Dallas And they were slipping on the ice and falling and if you looked at downtown Fort Worth It looked like we had dirt roads because we had put so much sand out And we filled up Sundance Square and and just had a great time for that event so for NFR one of the one of the unique things that facing Fort Worth is that the event itself is happening in Arlington over a global life field and They will have their own Protocols over there for getting people to social distance as they go to the event and I think that's the easy part The harder part is going to be when people do things before The rodeo and when they do things after the rodeo and so we're gonna make sure that During the day that there's going to be a lot of people from out of town And it may not be distance out of town It could be just from Weatherford or some of the places that are a little bit closer And they're gonna come and they're gonna show up at Hawke in other words It's not a scheduled event. They will just show up and and like you know eateries and other Things around different entertainment venues I think we all should expect that when the rodeo ends every night that there'll be a lot of folks That'll come back to Fort Worth You have a Sundance Square draw on the stockyards draw and we could see lines of people trying to get into restaurants into bars people gathering in public spaces and And there is no way to effectively Manage that occurring so you have to find a way to effectively manage it as it occurs And so we will be asking the restaurants and other businesses to of course follow the governor's rule And that is that There's occupancy limits. It's 75% for Restaurants right now Most of the bars have converted to restaurants. So that applies to them also There is in the governor's order that if we hit 15% of the available beds or COVID patients for seven consecutive days that that 75% occupancy will drop to 50% We've been running right around 14 to For the last three days and the number continues continues to go up in a one-week period We went from 10 to 14 and then now it's doing a more gradual climb So you need to keep that in mind if you are a restaurant bar owner that once we reach 15% For seven consecutive days that those occupancy limits will go down So one of the things that we're trying to do is focus on the open spaces the public spaces I know in the stockyards one of the reasons why we're closing the exchange Street Street is not to necessarily have tents and Outdoor events there but to allow people to socially distance to give them more space And that will happen For a number of reasons at a number of different times But most certainly for downtown and for the stockyards when you have a rush on the bars and the restaurants with a limited occupancy That we have in the declarations that people are gonna have to wait outside You're not gonna have enough room inside so I'll be thinking about that for downtown, too You have much wider sidewalks and much bigger blocks downtown I think that'll be less of a concern, but nonetheless and we know if there's a lot of people waiting to go in an Establishment they're gonna kind of wander out into the street anyways So we'll be watching for that not just on exchange, but other parts of town The noise ordinance that applies if there's any type of outdoor music We do get noise complaints downtown if there is Late night music particularly if it's amplified I see that more as perhaps something in the stockyards where they they are gonna have Some event. I know that there's been some talk about Adding some additional outdoor events But I will tell you with the way the numbers are going right now Anything that attracts a public gathering where people are going to come and kind of mean not mingle But kind of come and and stand together for a longer period of time There's a lot of health risk with it So we don't want to discourage it But we do want to encourage that if you do think about that that you work with the city on how we might mitigate different different risk strategies With that the the current order says that if you have a gathering of 10 or more people outdoors you have to get Permission from the mayor to do that The way that you do that or get really any question answered As you can call 817 392 1234 it's pretty easy. I will make sure that we put that up on the screen as this gets republished and For those of you that missed it earlier There is a packet with some information about the clean zone and other information that people are receiving here And I believe we're going to put electronic copy out on the web as we move forward tent and table permitting that's Also something that you can call that number about we don't have anything for downtown We have it primarily up in the stockyards and there are folks In the stockyards that are managing that for us and then street cleaning cleaning and trash collection That's mostly up in the stockyards area They have a public improvement district like downtown does if we see a problem with downtown We have to run some street sweepers down the road in the middle of the in the middle of the night We will so we will do that, you know, our whole idea is to put our best face forward for this event And then I guess lastly I missed this on the public health briefing on you is We're back in March. We were at about a hundred cases a day and and The everything got shut down and now we're at you know Sometimes 21 or better 2100 or better cases a day and there's a lot of things that are open And I want everybody to remember that back in March that we were facing a shortage of mass gloves disinfectant hospital beds Testing that that we just didn't have a whole lot of of the mitigation and safety things that we have today So you can't say because we were at a hundred then and we're at 2100 now That we need to go back to closing everything down because it's a different world The other is is that we as Texans have done a really good for worthians and Texans have done a really good job at social distancing and wearing masks And really what's driving the numbers to go up right now are the smaller gatherings not the larger gatherings So, you know over time period were social people. So we're starting to see more fat family gatherings The kids back in school the schools themselves don't seem to be driving the numbers as much as it is Activities that occur after school right that that the kids are kids that they get together. They play They're having sleepovers. We had Halloween where there were small Halloween parties instead of trick-or-treating That the kids get the virus they transfer it to the parents And we're seeing that parent age range as age range as driving it over the last couple of weeks it's people primarily between the age of 25 and 44 but in the last seven days We've seen as as is expected in any type of viral Transmission that it's moving from that core group now into the group where we'll see higher hospitalizations And and morbidity numbers. So the elderly I know in Dallas. They're seeing a Big climb in people over the age of 75. They're now contracting the virus and that certainly will drive the hospitalization And the death rate higher. There's vaccines, you know in the near future. That's good news We don't see wide distribution of that until probably the second and third quarter of next year Probably the first quarter will be for frontline workers. Keep the doctors the nurses Working I will tell you that that from an emergency operation center perspective We are busy right now trying to find additional resource staff resources for the hospitals and different health care systems Because their people as you imagine the general population is getting sick They're also having nurses that are getting sick as we see exposure rates go up They have exposure rates that go up, but there's nothing critical or anything they need to worry about It's how we manage things and how we manage the things moving forward even with the higher numbers the three best mitigation strategies that we have available to us are Wear a mask get everybody to wear a mask not just you but others remember a surgeon when a surgeon puts on a mask He's not protecting himself from the germs of the patient. He's keeping his germs from going on to the patient That's why a surgeon wears a mask most people are worried the surgical style mask So you got to get both people wearing a mask So don't go to places where you know public places in particular where there are strangers make sure that they're you know Everybody's wearing a mask if they aren't maybe you need to pick a different place to go But you certainly wear a mask because you do get some protection from that even in that environment The other is social distancing We know if both people are wearing a mask and there are three feet apart you get about 70% reduction in risk if you get six feet of feet apart you get about a 90% or better Reduction of risk and then the better the mask you wear the more distance that you create that number continues to go up And then the other is is the time that you know if you are just passing somebody on a street the risk is relatively low But if you spend time in a closed environment with other people the risk becomes relatively high Even if you're wearing a mask these are very small droplets You know if you're wearing an N95 mask and it fits right, okay, maybe you'll be alright. I wouldn't chance it on that though So limit your indoor Exposure rate as much as much as you can And with that I think that covers everything. I'm trying to think if we anything on the fire department testing so we are working on some additional testing resources for NFR because we'll have a lot of people concentrated around the convention center for cowboy Christmas and at the stockyards for The bars and the rodeo and different things up there We're gonna try to have Some testing areas at both facilities particularly for the people that are out of town that may not know how things work But for all of you here at everybody listening in You can go to either the city website or Tarrant County website Tarrant County comm It's not go the data comm address go to the testing link and We can get you in often times same day We have more testing resources today than we had back in March And and we still have capacity if we don't get you in today We'll get you in tomorrow the turnaround for test results is about 42 40 48 to 72 hours So things are going well there again if you feel sick stay home If there's other people that look sick stay away from them and don't forget that you know 60 to 80 percent of the population are asymptomatic They could be carrying the virus and they don't know it and you don't know it You could be carrying the virus and you don't know it. So always wear that mask. Thank you Thank you Brandon just to reiterate what Brandon was telling us The fundamentals of managing through the pandemic are unchanged, right? wear mask socially distance Wash your hands and if you cover those three points If your teammates cover those three points if we encourage our guests to cover those three points We can manage this successfully so that's the takeaway from today concerning the pandemic and So speaking of how we are going to encourage our guests to help us manage through The pandemic is Mitch Whitten with visit Fort Worth who is going to talk about our ambassador program, Mitch Thanks, Mike. Good morning My job is to build on what Jason and Mike have been sharing and give you a couple of key takeaways About how we're trying to move forward safely and that really is the big takeaway We really think about it We started back with Charles Schwab in June and councilman singleton worked very closely To try to have a perfect one of the first golf events sports events in the country safely And uh, that was without fans, but then we moved on and we had texas motor speedway And then we had pbr at dickies and here we are with this nfr special opportunity So how are we trying to promote your business? But do it in a safe way because together as mike said we're building a bridge to the future Let's get this done right then we move on to the next step and build our momentum So we've been advertising this for a while people in our region should know that the national finals rodeo is coming to fort worth Working with jason's team. There have been ads on radio tv and billboards But we're also adding to that Responsibility messages about wearing a mask and about taking the steps that mike talked about So for example, one of the tools we want to make sure is that you have the ability to have masks You need to give your guests or your staff So at the back of the room, we have mask distribution with a business card or write down your email You can take away 250 masks today at the visitor center across from me casina on main street We will have mask distribution Monday Tuesday and wednesday if you need masks or need someone to Or have a friend send them by There's a facebook group if you google visit our facebook visit fort worth Mask distribution from 8 a.m. To 2 p.m. Each day you can drive up contactless and we'll put those in your car for you There are also as part of this campaign. We're developing with the mayor's office and mike the city Wear a mask campaign Next week you can go to y'all wear a mask dot com and download a sign to put in your business Or you can take one of these posters with you today. We have them in the back free of charge Both in english and spanish So we're trying to get the word out a lot of people put these red signs up from the summer Saying y'all wear a mask and we're continuing that effort now now when we get to nfr during the event We will still be distributing masks as has been said. We will have an ambassador program Really a network of ambassadors who will have hand sanitizer Masks and really doing their role is to encourage people in a hospitable way You'll see these ambassadors on the street They'll be wearing red jackets on main street in the late afternoon and evenings as the christmas market winds down as people move forward Into downtown and eat and find their way to your businesses or to and from our hotels The those ambassadors will have those supplies on hand They will also have our new visitor information guides Helping people find their way around. We will also have those ambassadors on the street on exchange avenue in the stockyards Both east and west Morning and evening there in the stockyards and anticipating that activity I know that mike's team will have ambassadors in the facilities In the convention center in will rogers Helping people as well We are also working with the downtown fort worth ink ambassadors if you're familiar with that program They will be trained in all this as well and are will be there to support our guests as well Where can you get more information brandon's mentioned some websites? Jason's team and mine have worked on a website fort worth.com slash nfr You can find out those bus schedules that are going up today You can find out where you can get masks You can find out all the stuff in the handout working with the city if you post yourself Please post hashtag wrangler nfr and nfr texas As jason said we want you to benefit as much as possible from this opportunity Now and we want them to come back. So let's show as much love as we can while we're being safe to the nfr team Finally, uh, we talked about transportation a few other options. We have Trinity metros running extended schedules uber and lyft will have some presence although Not as much as as on a normal schedule because they have reduced activity But they will be out there But we also have a new service in town and gary from e-frogs and the green shirt has a new free ride service They can go on facebook and find out about e-frog. So more transportation options than we've ever had here in fort worth Molly the trolley will run 10 a.m. To midnight every 10 minutes And this information will be at fort worth.com slash nfr Bus route 15 connecting downtown in the stockyards will run 5 a.m. To 2 a.m. Every 15 minutes And the dash Will run 9 30 a.m. To 2 a.m. Every 15 minutes these buses will be marked with nfr branding And indicating to our visitors where they go For example, the dash will be marked that connects downtown and the cultural district slash will rogers Also, one thing I didn't mention earlier if you are a restaurant or a hotel or Another business that has a special offer you'd like to make two nfr guests You can see austin in the back. We will add it to the visit forth website Or uh contact me at my name's on the on the agenda mitch witton at fort worth.com We'd love to add your information your promotion To that on our website People who want to use the bus services that I just mentioned these three We'll be able to grab a picture show it to the driver and ride for free trinity metro is underwriting the cost of ridership So the routes I mentioned will be free to nfr guests with a pass available for a quick download on the website So the key takeaway again as mike said is let's move forward safely together We have masks for you. We have people in the street to help you And you can reach any of us if you need more information. Thanks so much City will be on full alert if you will During national the national finals rodeo december 3 through 12 If you have questions if you have concerns The uh the city of fort worth call center Will be operating from 7 a.m. To 6 p.m. Each day 817 392 1234 If you call after hours The call center team will Respond to your message the following day You can also email At 1234 fort worth texas dot gov and again Uh we'll have somebody monitoring that during business hours And then responding to anything that comes in Overnight before we move to questions. I did one more time want to thank Our leadership of the city for being here Dennis shingleton who kicked us off and zeta who Was out at the stockyards and is here with us this morning and then Kind of in city manager's office style y'all didn't see deputy city manager j choppa and city manager david cook Slide in the back and then before I could call them out they Slid out the side door to to tend to Some other important piece of city business With that, uh, do you have any questions? Yes, ma'am I believe that we're restoring it to normal service, but we'll get confirmation on that Yeah, as as jason pointed out in his his presentation the the direct spend For this event is calculated at right about 72 million dollars That puts it on par with for example A national political convention So we have a lot of people come into town They're not afraid to Spend in hotels and restaurants and retail It is a great business opportunity for our city Now Not that i'm aware of At the moment a lot of a lot of the food truck program I think down in the stockyards is being facilitated by stockyards heritage as as part of You know creating the the stockyards atmosphere During nfr, but I And and brandon this is i'm sure part of the junk drawer that you oversee, but Is there are you aware of any? Any food truck activity that is going to take place during nfr? That's a really good question So we know whenever there's large events We're going to have these roaming itinerant vendors including the food trucks And you're we're going to have people that try to show up downtown and around the stockyards With a barbecue in the back of their pickup truck trying to make a dollar So the zoning rules do not allow food trucks to dispense food from a city street downtown It's actually downtown has a special district where that's not allowed that we want people to go to the stick built restaurants Unless it's a larger festival in the downtown Folks have all agreed to have food booths or food trucks there What we anticipate is when that does happen is we will ask them to relocate to a a more lawful location Same thing with the people that show up to sell t-shirts and glow sticks and and other things that pop up It is part of the normal course and i'll stick around afterwards if there's any follow-up to that And you had a second question After this so on and so forth With social distancing in mass, I know we've reached education education education But any given night you go through the stockyards West seven you look at these lines outside the bars and restaurants the restaurant owners are doing an incredible job of enforcement inside But is that on the restaurant owners to then enforce outside as you have 200 300 people waiting in line face to face talking We're now at the streets over in stockyards people drinking, eating obligating groups talking. How does that then Translate back into the safeness of the customers coming into our businesses that we don't know Have been following the rules So i'm going to hand it back to brandon His team has had a lot of experience with this over the past several weeks Particularly working down in 7th street And that's a good point And i've had a number of Really good conversations with bar owners and and the larger restaurant bar owners And i'll tell you i had cove it early on i have a lot of antibodies I'm probably less of a risk of getting it the second time around So i've been spending a lot of time at the bars Both late evening and into the early morning hours Which is a challenge i guess as you get older What i'll tell you is with the reduced occupancies i mentioned earlier That there are people that wait outside and one of the things that we have said to the the the folks Particularly on west 7th is The better job that they do kind of reaching out to folks On the public sidewalk and reminding them to to wear a mask to socially separate The better off that that their industry is going to be in the long in the long run right there's not a requirement for them to do that It's just good Social public thing to do For this event, uh, you know actually for any event right now remember That it's safer for people to be outdoors than indoors It's safer for them to socially distance no matter where they are But if they're outdoors that under the governor's order, it's very limited on what enforcement that we can do The exception to that would be in the clean zone up at the stockyards because that kind of makes that public space more of a private space Uh, but we'll be we'll have police officers medics coat folks Our idea or our our concept is not to be heavy on the enforcement side To be really good at education and to be helpful to hand people the mask So forth and so on I will tell you at the western events that we've seen Across the nation A lot of these folks come from rural america that don't have the Higher density living that we have in fort worth that that the virus to them is something very Different than than the virus to the folks that live in in these these big cities And so we know that there'll be a challenge there for the restaurants You know, that's a choice that you all will have to make What I what i'm seeing which is really nice about the bars is for the most part not across the board but for the most part People know to wear a mask as they go in they know to wear a mask when they go out They know to wear a mask when they run to the restroom And then when they're at the table the mask comes off the more they drink The less mask compliance that that there is and it's not because they're fighting us. They just Forget They get distracted and they forget So I don't know if I totally answered your question, but for everybody out there to understand if they're outside We'd appreciate your help to remind folks but on their mask socially distance while they're waiting in line That's good public health. It's good for your business It's good for People that post videos and stuff that that may be a little angry about the number of people that are around But certainly, you know, you can leave it to us and others to to help and get people to do the right thing outside So it's an area that is established as part of the clean zone where If you have Someone who's got something to say Rather than have them walk Down the middle of east exchange street with their message They are they're directed to go to this open public space Where they can say whatever they Have to say sure. So the question was will there be Fort Worth police department presence inside any of the businesses during nfr and Chief Krause's response was that That If a business needs to To have an officer working inside That they'll have to hire That officer through off-duty employment And just remember that the officer will be Charged with the The same responsibilities That officers who are working in the public right of play are charged with Restate the answer to the question this This town hall is being recorded and will be available To be Seen on the mayor's youtube page Mitch Okay, do you want to do you want to Issue that as part of the FAQ Or do you want to come up and talk about it? Whatever Okay, anything else for the good of the group It was brought up that there'll be activations downtown public spaces Has there been any discussion with ownership of sunday and square to open that public space back up as it is the annual if you will of our city it's an activity down there because I've noticed last couple we're seeing less and less traffic downtown due to the closure of that big public space and i know private space I don't know if there's been any discussion with that group to maybe get that back up and running The our understanding is that sunday and square is going to remain as it currently is through nfr we've uh Christmas tree is on the way for for the holidays Hopefully that'll bring a little life To that part of downtown, but for For the purposes of nfr what you see currently is what you get Well, we we have a have a sense of that through what prca the The promoter of the national finals rodeo and and all the ancillary activities has Shared with us and for example, they're they're telling us that Our average daily attendance for the christmas event here in the convention center should be about 10,000 So that's uh, you know in our in our business of hosting public shows in the building. That's a pretty healthy number We expect similar numbers in the cultural district Uh revolving around the cutting horse association futurity Uh and the christmas event that'll be in the exhibit space at will rogers and then Probably a Larger daily number out in the stockyards because of the local interest in the visitor interest in attending events out there Okay with that. Thank you for coming today. If you have any additional questions, we'll be around. Don't forget Uh eight one seven three nine two one two three four if you have any questions or concerns. Thank you