Thank you.

I call this meeting, Committee of the Whole meeting to order.

All counselors are present or will be present this evening.

Counselor Baca will be here in a little bit.

Councillors Lewis and Penya will also be here soon.

Councillor Basan and Tayas are joining us joining us via Zoom.

We will start with a moment of silence, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance.

And I think Mr.

Cornelius is going to put the pledge up on so we can follow along.

I pledge allegiance to the Planet of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

All right, thank you.

Once again, we need to move on.

I'm sorry, madam chair, I should have unmuted.

We needed you here.

Okay, tonight is the second of three public hearings the council is required to hold on the city's operating budget.

Tonight's meeting will focus on the physical goal departments, which include municipal development, planning, general services, environmental health, transit, animal welfare, legal, solid waste, internal audit, inspector general, human resources, technology and innovation, finance and administration, and city support.

Aviation was heard last Thursday, and tonight we will hear from youth and families.

On Thursday, May 14th, the council will hold a third committee of the whole meeting to consider amendments and/or substitutes.

No live public comment will be taken on the city's operating budget legislation, which is R 2617.

However, live public comment will be taken on the objectives legislation R 2628.

Written comment will be accepted at the May 14th meeting for both items.

At the end of the May 14th meeting, the budget as amended and or substituted will be sent to the Monday May 18th City Council meeting for adoption.

Live public comment and written comments will be accepted at the May 18th council meeting.

Members of the public, city staff, excuse me, and the media have the ability to view this meeting in person and on live streams through four different platforms: GovTV on Comcast Channel 16, the Gov TV website, YouTube, and Zoom webinar.

The live streams can be accessed by most smartphones, tablets, or computers.

Also, this meeting is closed captioned, and you may enable the closed captioning services on your television or device at this time.

The video recording of this meeting will also remain available for viewing at any time on the city council's website.

Finding the videos online, please call 505-768-3100 for assistance during business hours, which are Monday through Friday from 8 to 5.

Members of the public have the opportunity to address the committee if they have signed up for public comment per the rules published on the agenda and on our website Friday.

We will now move to public comment.

Here are the public comment ground rules.

Each participant has one minute to present.

Comments are to be addressed to the counselors only.

Any disruptive conduct will result in removal from the meeting.

We have over 50 people this evening, and I'm so glad you're here.

And we look forward to hearing your comments.

Mr.

Cornelius, will you go ahead and call the first speaker?

Thank you, Madam Chair.

First up, we have Althea Atherton, followed by Gina Levi.

Madam Chairwoman, thank you for talking about the evergreen dinner table issue in my house, which is can I transport myself and my children tomorrow?

And I'm asking you tonight to ask all of yourselves.

What will it take for you to support public transit?

What will it take for you to not say, oh, well, this doesn't cut bus service to acknowledge that the bus service was already cut?

We are operating at a 35 to 40 percent loss of pre-pandemic bus service.

This buzz is not going to cut service, it codifies the service we already lost.

This body approves the ABQ ride forward.

You all voted to approve the ABQ Ride Forward Network, but it's gonna happen over 16 phases in three to five years.

So 16 times.

Families are going to have to look at the schedule and look at the new roots to figure out how these changes are going to impact us personally.

So what will it take for you all to support the drivers?

These tiny raises, treating them um, or not treating them fairly or patriotically for that frontline service that they provide to us on a daily basis.

Um I want them to be able to focus on piloting a vehicle safely.

I want them to have fewer disruptions, and I want them to have more bathroom breaks.

What will it take for you to acknowledge that every parent in this room knows that the bus is the safest way to transport children in the city?

There is safer than a car, it is safer than walking.

Because with all this talk about the mother road this year, I'm asking that you think about the mothers on the road who ride Route 66.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Madam President, you're coming.

Counselor Lewis.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um, and you know, thank you all.

I mean, we're looking forward to hearing from everybody tonight.

I think I just wanted to to clarify and point out that what's what's on the table right now.

I mean, what what this council is discussing in this budget is the mayor's proposed budget.

Um, and there'll be a time when when this council uh puts amendments together and possibly its own budget.

Um, but but we're discussing the mayor's proposed budget.

Counselor Lewis, are you responding to me directly?

Uh ma'am, I'm not responding to you directly.

Because it sounded like you were responding to my comment.

Um, I'm responding in general and and certainly not.

But why didn't you have this conversation before public comment started then?

Um I'm glad to have a conversation with you if you'd like, um, or even to respond directly to your comments.

And really, I what I want to say about your comments is thank you.

I mean, thank you for the we have already had our time cut down, so I'm just asking that you respect the public and let us get our conversations.

Yeah, you get all the time that that you know we can we can give you.

No, and I and I I appreciate your comments.

Um, I just want to make sure that's clear because I think oftentimes it's not as clear.

I think sometimes the um in a budget hearing like this, we're discussing the council's budget.

Uh and this is the mayor's proposed budget, and so if there are cuts right now, if there are reductions or cuts uh that are on the table right now, it's because that's what the mayor proposed.

Um, and if and it's because he's proposing money to be spent in other areas.

And so now we have an opportunity to be able to come in and either add back and and recognize the needs that that many of you all point out and recognize, uh, for us to come back and be able to add amendments, but keep in mind when we when we decide to let's say let's take the mayor's budget, now we're gonna fund something or add something to it, which which we will.

I mean, we will in various ways.

Um, you know, we're also gonna have to take away um what the mayor has prioritized and proposed in other areas.

And so this proposed budget is the mayor's priorities.

This is what he's proposed as the as his priorities on where he wants this um you know uh the dollars and the revenue to be spent.

So again, I'm not I'm not really necessarily addressing your comments.

I appreciate your comments.

You know, thank you for it, and thank you everybody else for uh your comments.

We're looking forward to hearing from you.

Um just want to make sure we're you know, I guess for what it's worth to have that perspective.

Thanks so much.

Thank you, Mr.

Lewis, Counselor, Mr.

Cornelius.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Gina Levi, followed by Laura Cunningham.

Madam Chair and Counselor, hello.

I'm Gina Levi, a private citizen working on my own with the unhoused around First Street.

I give out pet food and supplies, and I help get vet care for the animals in need.

I see the need.

I'm asking for your support to fully fund animal welfare with no cuts.

Madam Chair, there are people here who'd like to stand for a moment to show support for not cutting the animal welfare budget.

Thank you.

We need to add more animal officers and to keep the jobs of all animal handlers and adoption counselors.

In our big city, two officers per shift are not enough.

The heart ordinance was a good first step, and it cannot be properly enforced without officers.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Please, this is your first warning.

We have to have decorum in there.

Okay, thank you.

Laura Cunningham, followed by Grace Dukes.

Thank you for hearing me.

Law and order, neither is any good without the other.

Right now we have a strong law in place with our heart ordinance, thanks to each of you who worked on it.

But it does us no good if we can't back it up.

According to the AWD website's data dashboard, just last week, from Thursday to yesterday, one week only dogs in our two shelters, 211 intakes.

Of those 211 dogs, 11 were strays.

Why do we have so many stray dogs?

It is a direct result of the heart ordinance not being enforced.

Our animal welfare department is doing the best they can and God bless them for the vital work that they do, but they need your help.

Counselor Lewis, on August 4th of last year in this very room, you point blank asked Carolyn Ortega, what do you need?

Do you need more money?

Please ask that question again today.

You have all done a great job of establishing the law.

Please now fund the order.

Thank you.

You all please, this is your second warning.

You have to follow the rules, please.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Grace Dukes, followed by Liz Wolf.

Can I be overhead, please?

With me, I have a briefing on the issues with the budget and how they can be addressed.

So first off, the administration is starving the inspector general's office, which holds them accountable.

Um Albuquerque ride forward is being defunded during a gas crisis.

I paid $50 for gas today.

Um, the library system IT is classified as non-recurring in violation of DFA guidance.

Um, you see here the fee freeze was broken by the administration.

Four million of that is phantom revenue.

47.6% of the general fund goes to public safety.

Vacancies that were applied everywhere else were not applied here.

The homelessness 10% increase headline conceals the gutting of the department.

Other cuts not mentioned, including animal welfare, which I'm here in support of.

There is a lack of metrics that is clearly showing that this process is flawed.

I have with me some amendments for you to consider.

Um this briefing was also put in your email inboxes and handed out to you.

I would like to meet with all of you to address my concerns.

Thank you.

Madam President, we'll quickly counselor Lewis.

Thank you, Madam President.

I mean, real quick, uh Mr.

Mosco.

Both both transit and animal welfare.

Um in the mayor's proposed budget, both of those departments were they both reduced this year over last year.

Madam Chair, Counselor Lewis, that is correct.

Okay.

So we're we've so far tonight, this is great.

I mean, I appreciate all the comments.

You know, these are in the mayor's budget.

The proposal, the the administration that runs these departments in their proposed budget to the council has said that we want to spend less money this year on transit and less money on animal welfare.

Um, and again, I I just wanted I just want to make sure it's clear.

I mean, now we have an opportunity as a council to hear from the public to be able to evaluate this proposed budget and uh you know and make those adjustments.

Well, Mr.

Mosco, what was the what which department had the largest increase in the mayor's proposed budget?

It would be HHH, right?

Madam Chair, uh Councillor Lewis.

Multiple departments were increased this year, uh including ACS and HHH.

Yeah, HHA is what about 40 million dollars more?

I could get that number for you, but that's yeah, it's a massive amount.

So, so again, some departments the mayor proposed massive increases in spending to others.

I'm not the one.

Okay, that's out of order, Madam President.

So, look, I I you know, I just want to make sure that's clear.

We really looking forward and really appreciate all the comments, but I think um I would I want to make sure that the the everyone understands that this is the mayor's proposed budget based on his recommended spending and his recommended, you know, you know, forecasts.

And um, and and you know, we want to hear from you because we want to we want to know how what adjustments that you know we need to make in amendments and other proposals, and so um thank you, Madam President.

Thank you, counselor.

Uh Mr.

McCornelius, Liz Wolf, followed by Tim Osman.

Tim Osman, followed by Zayn Dixon.

Zane Dixon, followed by Dennis Gromelski, Dennis Gromelski, followed by Catalina Laner.

Madam Chair and uh Councillor, my name is Dennis Gromelsky, I'm executive director of Fusion, and I'm speaking on behalf of support for Fusion, maintaining support, as co-founder in the non-recurring uh uh funding.

Um our organization is deeply committed to community development um through the arts, starting with a uh the purchase of a facility on First Street after having leased it for 15 years.

We purchased the campus, created uh two indoor theaters and outdoor performance space and co-op office spaces for the arts community.

Um we've importantly focused on the neighborhood on community continuously with a deep commitment and widening impact.

Um, fusion has served as the founding chair of the downtown arts and cultural district, which created a downtown cultural plan that passed unanimously through this council.

Uh we also served as an originator of the rail trail project, which is lies adjacent to our campus.

Um President Pena, the governor, the mayor, and I all spoke at the press conference announcing the state's matching funds.

Uh we uh just finish your statement and then okay, we we urge you um to continue to support fusion and deeply appreciate your support.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Catalina Laner, followed by Jacqueline Reed.

My name is Catalina Laner.

I'm a resident of district nine.

I'm asking that cuts not be made to the animal welfare department's budget.

The four percent proposed reduction will adversely affect the animals.

As a shelter volunteer for 12 years, I have seen firsthand how hard people work on the front lines, and we need more support, not less.

And since 2014, I've paid attention to cat numbers at the shelter.

There used to be about 220 cats on the website, and now there's usually about 50 or so on average, and euthanasia is down.

This success was achieved because of a partnership with an organization called Street Cat Hub, getting cats fixed and a shelter keeps the shelter population low and saves lives, and this is a very effective program.

However, a 50% cut is proposed to Street Cat hub's funding.

It wouldn't take much to restore HCH's SCH's funding, especially in some departments are showing increases of 17%, 16%, etc.

So I request that you please fully fund Street Cat Hub and support Albuquerque's homeless pets by not cutting AWD's budget.

And then if you must cut, please consider a two percent cut rather than the 4% proposed.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Jacqueline Reed, followed by Alison Peoples.

Hello, counselors.

Chair.

I'm a founding member of Fusion.

We've been in existence for 25 years, and we've been funded by the city for 20.

In all of our tenure with the city, I can't think of a single thing that we said we were going to do that we did not do, and then sub.

So in this very challenging time where you're having to make financial decisions, I'm asking you to consider our tenure and to consider the fact that we are unique in that we're as strong business wise as we are artistically.

We brought a union presence to this town, paying artists pension and health care that had never been done, and we've been going for 25 years.

25 years, you can just take and put a human being on the planet proactively in less time.

I know I've done it, we're here, we're committed, and consider what we've brought to this town.

That's it.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Alison Peoples, followed by Conrad McGaffey.

Hello.

My name is Allison Peoples.

I'm a resident of District 8, and I serve as the economic resilience analytics team lead at Argonne National Laboratory, which is out of Chicago, but I get to luckily work here full time remotely.

I am here to talk about the reductions to the ABQ ride and transit.

I greatly recommend against this, both from a professional standpoint.

I do a lot of work around making sure local governments are prepared for disasters.

I think right now we're experiencing some uncertainties with oils and gas prices.

And the bus system is a direct support of our community members.

I am a huge fan from a personal standpoint as well.

I think we are very lucky to have a bus system that is free for people to use.

Every time I I use it, I think of me in high school trying to scramble for 35 cents to get on the bus, which was daily.

And so I think supporting that system is an integral way to make our city safer and better and a more future resilient space.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Conrad McGaffey, followed by Jordan McConnell.

Jordan McConnell, followed by Farah Lachuga.

Hi, good evening, counselors.

My name is Jordan McConnell.

I'm a district two downtown resident.

I'm a transit writer, and I'm someone who chose to live where I do based on transit access.

Like many people in my generation, reliable transit's a major factor in whether we stay in a city long term.

I'm asking you to restore the transit positions proposed for removal by the mayor and to support full implementation of the ABQ ride forward recovery network.

Our system is already operating at roughly 60% of pre pandemic service levels, even as ridership rebounds and many residents are increasingly depending on affordable transit, particularly as gas prices become volatile.

We should be investing in our drivers and mechanics with competitive pay and retention strategies, not slowing the recovery.

Cities facing similar fiscal pressures like Chicago and Detroit have shown that rebuilding transit positions is possible.

You can do it.

Transit's not just an expense, it's the smartest long-term investment a city can make.

It connects people to jobs, lower transit costs, supports economic growth, and strengthens the tax base over time, especially when paired with housing.

So please implement right forward.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Sarah Luchuga, followed by Nikhil Ananda.

Nikhil Ananda, followed by Austin Schubert.

Hi.

Yeah, I'm here to speak uh around the same issues that many others have brought up that uh I also raised uh a week ago about the mayor's proposed budget, uh, including major cuts to our transit services and and many other important services that others had mentioned.

Uh I think the the counselor alluded to an important point that a lot of these cuts are because of other spending priorities that the budget has chosen to favor instead.

And I think it's important we spell out what some of those are.

Uh the largest by far is APD, which has seen a massive, massive increase in the proposed budget.

Uh I think this is interesting because in 2025 uh Albuquerque saw a 10-year low in homicides and significant reductions in other kinds of violent crime.

Uh I think it's important that we broaden our understanding of public safety to not just include more funding for police departments, but also things like having public transit available if you know you've had a few beers out at night and you need a ride home.

Uh there's other ways we can provide for safety beyond just increases to the police budget.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Austin Schubert, followed by Carlos Michelin.

Hello, my name is Austin Schubert, and I'm a resident of District 9.

I'm speaking to you all today in support of the Albuquerque Ride Forward Recovery Network, restoring transit positions proposed to be decommissioned by this budget.

Having a better bus network, give us more freedom in how we choose to get around town, uh freeing up congestion as well as giving better access to important services.

Is a former UNM student better bus network, would it help you know incentivize me to take the bus from the Northeast Heights to avoid parking costs from either private lots or buying UNM parking passes?

Yeah, even with a parking pass, I still had to drive to a lot, take a butt wait for a bus for five minutes, and then take the bus to campus for five, there's ten minutes.

So even driving, I still had to take the bus.

So a better bus network would help computalize all UNM students as well as every other community network.

So again, I ask you to continue support of the Albuquerque Ride Forward Recovery Network.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Carlos Michelin, followed by Don Helfridge.

Um, Madam Chair, Counselors, um, I'm a research engineer at the labs and I live in district two.

When I bought my condo, proximity to the art was non-negotiable.

I think the odd to be friends had an uphill or go for a hike on the busque.

It shapes our transit system and the cuts to it, shapes how I experience the city.

Beyond my own use, transit connects people to jobs, and it's essential infrastructure for financially resilient and healthy and thriving city.

And right now we are failing to deliver it.

And to um Control Loose's point, this council has for five years funded the level of service that we used to have before the pandemic.

And the administration has failed to use it, leaves money on the table.

And we're operating on 60% of pre-pandemic level.

And we know what the issue is.

It's been identified by national experts, at least in two different studies.

We do not pay commeture to the difficulty of the job.

Transit drivers have a tougher job than other drivers in the city.

Transit mechanics have a tougher job than other mechanics in the city.

And we don't pay them enough.

So we have the money, you guys send the money, and we failed to use it.

So I'm asking you, restore the positions, don't cut them.

Because I'll just make it look like we solved the problem on paper, and to fund them appropriately so we can actually recruit people.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Don Helfridge, followed by Michael Chase.

Hi, my name is Don Halfric.

I'm a recent retiree from CNM.

In 2001, I started working with rescue and started working with the shelters then.

It was then my understanding that the uh euthanasia rate was about 19,000 that year.

By 2010, the rate had been dropped in half.

This was also from shelters wise management improved uh improved spending as well as rescues helping.

Uh now I foster a medical foster for both the city and the county shelters.

With these foster adoption programs, expanded clinic and better trained field officers.

Albuquerque has made a lot of improvements serving the rejected, neglected and abused animals in the community.

All parts of the sheltering system need to work together as a whole, cutting any portion and dangerously animals served.

Our city takes pride in helping the helpless.

Albuquerque is nationally listed as a dog-friendly community.

Please now is not the time to cut funding to the animal welfare department.

Post-COVID influx is still high.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Michael Chase, followed by Alex Applegate.

Good evening, Madam Chair, and thank you to the committee for the opportunity to speak tonight.

My name is Michael Chase.

I am the conservation policy and strategy specialist for the New Mexico Biopark Society and the nonprofit support organization for the ABQ Biopark.

I am here to again highlight a key issue for the biopark on the non-recurring designation for animal funds or for funds for animal diets and medications.

This would be the third straight year that these funds have been designated as non-recurring.

The biopark is one of 40 zoological facilities in the United States approved as American Humane Certified for providing excellent animal welfare.

With over 400 zoos and aquariums across the country, this means we are in the top 10% when it comes to animal care.

In addition to this, the biopark is regulated by the USDA, which enforces the Animal Welfare Act.

To meet and go upon federal standards in animal care, this funding must be included in the bioparks' annual operating budget.

I appreciate your consideration of this oppressed.

Thank you for your time and attention.

Madam Chair.

Yes, Miss Sir.

Sir, I just a point of clarification.

I want to make sure I heard you correctly.

This is not that the funding has been removed, it's just that it's not on a reoccurring issue, correct?

Madam Chair and Councillor Champagne, that is correct.

It's been designated as non-recurring for three years, and our concern is that without it being included in the operating budget, that it could be lost at any time in the future.

Okay, perfect.

Thank you for the clarification.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Mr.

Cornelius.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Alex Applegate, followed by Hindi Samud.

Madam Chair, Counselors, my name is Alex Applegate, and I am exhausted.

Both of my 90-year-old parents have been in the ER within the week, and my mom just had heart surgery.

Instead of being in bed, I'm here to ask you to counter the mistakes of the Keller administration.

And instead of curtailing the growth of ABQ to expand it, I ask that you imagine what the streets of Albuquerque would be like if art, the fifth busiest transit system in the nation, disappeared.

If all the riders were forced to drive where they needed to go, the congestion, the last hours of production, the wear and tear on the streets, and increased amount of repair that were required, and the additional police kept busy monitoring crashes.

Can you imagine all that?

Now imagine the additional relief the city were to even went even further than the city's ABQ Ford network plan.

Imagine if we expanded our fifth busiest rapid transit system in the nation, north on courses.

Imagine the number of cars that we get off the streets on the west side of town.

Decrease congestion, less wear and tear in the streets, and so on.

Can you imagine it?

I can.

Please expand APQ rides budget.

The future of our city requires it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I hope your parents get better.

Hindi Salmoud, followed by Kimberly Velasquez.

I think I see Madam Chair Hindi in Zoom.

So Hindi, I will come to you when we get to the Zoom portion.

Kimberly Velasquez, followed by Michael Devon.

Good evening, Madam Chair and Counselors.

I'm Dr.

Velazquez.

I'm a veterinarian in Albuquerque, and I'm here today to ask you to not cut animal funding in Albuquerque.

Spain neuter programs are not just about animals, they're about public health, public safety, and responsible city management.

Every time we reduce access to affordable veterinary care, we increase the number of unwanted litters in our community.

That means the stray animals in our communities grow.

Our um shelters get overcrowded, we get higher euthanasia rates and greater costs to taxpayers over time.

Preventing the problem is far less expensive than reacting to it later.

When families cannot afford veterinary care, the city feels the impact.

Shelters become overwhelmed, animal control calls increase, rescue groups become exhausted, and ultimately animals suffer unnecessarily.

Investing in animal welfare saves money in the long run because prevention works.

If an AWD traveling clinic such as Animal Balance sterilizes a thousand animals in one year, it can prevent tens of thousands of future births over time.

That is a direct reduction in shelter intake, stray populations, and long term municipal costs.

But beyond the numbers, this is also about what kind of city we want Albuquerque to be.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Michael Devon, followed by William Pentler.

Madam Chair, thank you for your time.

I'm speaking today to urge you to not reduce funding for ABQ ride.

During the 1970s energy crisis, of course, gas prices were surging, much like we're seeing today.

And a survey from Princeton that looked at national transit use nationwide from April 1973 to April 1974 saw uh transit usage spike 10.5%.

It doesn't make sense to cut transit when really we need it the most.

Even if the current surge ends in gas prices, removing the positions erode the city's ability to add them back in long term.

And I understand uh funding cuts is challenging and there's not enough money to go around to give us everything we want, but transit should be the last thing we should be cutting with gas prices spiking and more people needing to depend on transit.

Yet in the proposed budget, it's being proposed to cut among the most positions of any department in the city to the transit department.

So I urge you to maintain the current levels of funding and avoid the elimination of ABQ ride positions.

Thank you.

Thank you.

William Pentler, followed by Sebastian Fierro.

Good evening.

I may be off topic, but I'm here to talk about the cuts to open space.

Um at this time when budgets are tight elsewhere, this is when everyone gets outside.

Last month there were over 21,000 people that visited the Atlanta Gaigo salon.

These cuts that are projected would take park attendance down to one.

We'd lose all temp staff, we'd lose a park attendant position, we would have one park attendant, two parks across town that are open seven days a week.

This also would decrease trash pickup maintenance.

We really would have no means to monitor and maintain these lands.

Please reconsider this because everyone comes out to open space.

Um you gave us three positions for the Bosca last year.

These cuts would take them away.

We would have no one in the Bosque, we'd have no one in the parks.

Reservations are picking up.

This is summertime.

Populations as a whole are visiting the spaces.

Please reconsider.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Sebastian Fierro, followed by Teresa Storch.

Madam President and members of the Council, good evening.

My name is Sebastian, and I'm a president of District 8.

And I come with concerns with the reductions in the 2027 city budget for public services, especially ABQ Ride.

Pre-COVID levels of service have not yet been achieved with ABQ Ride, and these kit in these cuts to their to their workforce and their funding would severely limit the ABQ ride forward plan, which aims to return us to that level of service and also improve it.

This service is critical to many working Albuquerqueans, and it's in my opinion, it's not optional for a city to to have a connected and accessible transit service.

So please prioritize those tenants when considering this budget.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Teresa Storch, followed by Diane Sauder.

Thank you, Madam Chair, Counselors.

My name is Terry Storch, and um I'm here to ask you to not follow the mayor's budget um proposal for animal welfare department cuts.

Um, one of the serious cuts is to 14 staff positions, which amounts to about a 9% cut in staff.

I volunteered the west side and I began volunteering perhaps out of grief for our loss of art to herding dogs who we had from puppyhood to old age.

And um I found that I was working there with staff and with other volunteers who are professional, dedicated, um, cared deeply about the animals and were very very hard working.

This cut will um it what it says is you cannot do the same with less, and that's what this cut is about.

We are looking at more animals coming in, and this cut will be devastating.

And who will bear the brunt of it will be the overworked, thinly stretched staff and the dogs.

There will be dogs who good dogs who will not ever come home because of these cuts.

Thank you.

Diane Souter, followed by Jasmine Arius.

Hi, my name is Diane Souter.

Thank you very much for the opportunity to address you.

I know um open space was in last week's agenda, but I was out of town enjoying some other open space.

Um, I also was a National Park Service employee, the first uh employee at Petroglyph National Monument.

And in this very building in 1990, the phone rang, and the voice at the other end of the phone said, Listen, honey, rocks don't vote, people do.

I'm here today to talk on behalf of the rocks, the trees, the animals, the trails, and the visitors here.

Um, and I really wish the mayor would was watching to see what the impact of the cuts are.

Thank you, counselor Lewis, for bringing that to my attention that this is really the administration's budget.

As William Pedler mentioned, there are cuts to the Boski techs.

Um, these are the people who plant the trees, but most importantly, the park attendant positions are fundamental and critical to face of open space.

Thank you.

Thank you, Miss Diane.

Um, tonight you people can talk on any of the subjects on the budget, so you're still on topic when you're here, Jasmine Arias, followed by Joel Via Riad.

That was my first question.

Make sure he got a list.

Good evening, Madam Chair and Champagne and everybody on the council here.

Um, just a quick note.

I was at a transit meeting with uh Eugene Luhan, he just became the manager over there.

He had to cut the meeting short because he had to drive the sandbads because he had people calling out sick.

Um I sit at department meetings with APD management all the time.

People and I investigation with APD dispatchers and call takers getting sent to IA for calling out sick or not being able to fill up force of 16 hours because they have doctors' appointments the next day.

So cutting 14 dispatcher positions as call taker positions, and we are still underfunded.

What I thought suffer more about all this going on, and I really hope you guys take this all into consideration, is at the end of the day, these positions that you guys are cutting are people who are working over time right now, 16 hour days, and there's just not a solution for that.

So I I once again at these meetings I sat with you guys before to have that piece of mind.

I just got the status of the 91 calls.

Um, 68% of calls were not answered in 15 seconds because of shortness of staff.

So there's a piece of mind for you guys for this budget.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Joel via Rial, followed by Ian Gates.

Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the committee.

My name is Joel Biarrial.

I'm proud of a proud union member and proud to be able to represent the workers that uh work here within your city.

Here representing the ASME locals in Albuquerque.

Um, just wanted to say uh something with regard to this budget and the process that we've been going through here at the meeting where it where the uh funding for the gross receipts tax was turned down, right?

At that point.

The city was already in in need of revenue, and at that point, we were told that you all didn't think that it was right or that it was fair that we were going to have to fund our own raises, right?

That was the excuse for not fun not funding the GRT, which would have cost our citizens five cents for every 10 bucks, 50 cents for every hundred dollars that they spent in order to be able to fund the projects that we have here, right?

In fact, many counselors were even confident that they could find the money within this budget if we didn't find if we didn't have that funding.

But yet here we are, right?

There was concern and universal agreement that our employees needed to be fairly compensated and meet that class and compensation structure.

Yet what we have found now is not only are we being asked to fund our raises, our positions are being asked to fund the city's budget now.

And that is not fair.

What we are asking for you all to do is do the right thing there and find the money to be able to fund our raises.

If it comes down to where we're funding our own raises, which was what it's looking like, make sure that we're funding our raises and not everybody else's.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Royale.

Ian Gates, followed by Augustine Romero.

Uh good evening, Madam Chair, members of the council.

Uh, once again, please give us our two minutes back to speak.

And I'm talking again to y'all about the proposed cuts for ABQ ride.

Um, there's no reason to cut transit budget by 14%.

And on Monday, I talked about the actions we can take to hire for those unfilled positions, but there are also some improvements we can make uh to improve the system.

And I think the biggest and most important one is giving raises to our bus operators.

They work so hard, they're amazing, and they really deserve it.

But also, having a higher salary for that position will help us recruit and get back up to that 95%, as a lot of people here have been mentioning.

Uh, we can also add more shade and benches to bus stops around the city.

We can add more restrooms and such transfer stations and stops, and then of course, we can also add more accommodations for burcanios with disabilities because ADA is just bare minimum.

We can really improve.

Um, and then also please um show up for the animals too and restore that cut.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Augustine Romero, followed by Megan Dugan.

Good evening, everybody.

Um, my name is Augustine Romero.

I'm the president of the M series council 18.

Um, I'm here to really bring some caution to how this money's being spent, where it's coming from.

For example, um, they're eliminating 247 positions to save 30 million dollars.

That 30 million dollars could easily uh pay for our class and cop study, which we've been waiting for years.

That money is not even coming toward the employees who deserve the money.

Uh it's going toward other programs that the mayor wants to promote.

And may I remind you, it's people like me who do the work that you guys benefit from, that you guys really get to enjoy the city.

I work at the museum, I do shows at the South Product Cultural Center.

Uh it's it's people like me and my co-workers who who really make the city function in such a beautiful way.

When you have 35 million dollars, that's not going toward us, and it's going toward other programs.

It's a disservice to all of us.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Romero.

Megan Dugan followed by Joseph Greenwood.

Good evening, counselors.

I'm here today because animal welfare services in Albuquerque are not a luxury.

They are a public service that protects both animals and people.

Every day, our animal protection officers, animal handlers, and adoption counselors respond to emergencies, reduce risks in our neighborhood, and help families' pets stay safe.

Their work directly affects public health, public safety, and the humane values our city stands for.

Cuts to these services would not simply reduce convenience.

They would create real consequences.

Fewer officers mean slower response times when animals are in danger, or when residents need help.

Fewer handlers and adoption counselors mean overcrowded shelters and more animals on the streets, and more strain on stretched teams.

These outcomes cost the city far more in the long run.

Albuquerque deserves a responsible, compassionate approach to public safety.

That means maintaining full support for people who protect our animals and our community every single day.

No cuts to animal welfare.

Thank you for your consideration.

Thank you.

Joseph Greenwood, followed by Kyron Young.

Madam Chair and Counselors, I'm a resident of District 2.

As a longtime user of ABQ Ride, navigating between downtown and the Northeast Heights for my various jobs.

I would like to speak to my concern about the vacant stop positions.

I want to see, as many others here do too, a full implementation of the ABQ Ride Forward Program.

I want to see a commitment to supporting its full operational goals to simply restore what we once had at pre-pandemic service levels.

We need to properly staff our bus system in order to do that.

To add to the discussion around vacancies, I would like to draw special attention as somehow already to the wages of these bus drivers and other staff members.

They're some of the lowest in the country, and to be competitive with private businesses and others here, we need to pay them properly.

Without this proper pay raise for our hardworking staff at ABQ Ride, retaining talent will be difficult.

I ask that you please protect the vacant positions and enhance them as well.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Kyron Young, followed by Roberta Price on Zoom.

Roberta Price, followed by Maria Gere.

Hello.

I'm Roberta Price, Albuquerque Public Library Foundation Board Member.

And I'm coming today to talk about two issues.

Although our city is at the bottom of the list compared to all other cities in the West per capita for library spending.

But the two issues I'd like to talk about are making the library system IT budget a recurring budget item at $500,000 level.

This sounds like a lot of money, but it covers the expenses for 449 public access computers, contracts covering the integrated library system, software use for public access computers, and energy monitoring.

The commuters are in the libraries are seven years old on average.

They'll realistically reach their end and need replacement soon.

Replacement, not including monitors and keyboards, will cost over 400,000.

Many Albuquerque residents rely on the library and make to connect.

If this isn't budget, then the uh staff will be short changed and there will be less staff.

Last year, thank you, Mrs.

Price.

Thank you, ma'am.

Thank you.

Maria Geere, followed by Cheryl Gibson.

Good evening.

My name is Maria Gear.

I uh like Roberta Price, I'm a member of the Albuquerque Public Library Foundation Board, and I've previously served on the library advisory board.

Our libraries are essential to the welfare of our city.

And for the past several years, the mayor's budget has treated IT, which is an essential element to all of our library services, and has treated it as a non-recurring expense.

IT is clearly an essential and always recurring expense.

We are asking that the uh mayor and that the council uh change the budget to include at least five hundred thousand uh for IT services as a recurring element for the library budget.

In addition, we ask that the staffing be stabilized.

I thank you for your attention to this matter, and have a good evening.

Thank you, ma'am.

Cheryl Gibson, followed by Paul Kolpinski.

Good evening.

My name is Cheryl Gibson.

Thank you for this moment.

Um I appreciate your time.

Um there have been a lot of very well-spoken people here talking this evening about the importance of our animal welfare department, our libraries, our recreational centers certainly need to be mentioned.

Albuquerque ride, our open spaces, our 911 service, the biopark, all of these things are very important to the culture of Albuquerque, and if we want to be seen as a nice place to live, these are aspects of our culture that need to be nourished, not stripped of funding.

So I encourage you to please enhance the budgets for all of these very important projects in our town.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Paul Kopinski, followed by Sue Leidig.

Madam Chair, Counselors, my name is Paul Kolpinski.

I live in downtown, and I support the comments that Miss Gibson just made, and I want to um support her uh overall big picture of it, but I also want to talk about ABQ ride.

I own a car and I use ABQ ride as part of my transportation options, which also include walking and bicycling.

I'm counting on the restoration of the Albuquerque transit system to 2019 service levels and appropriately pay drivers and maintenance personnel.

Growing citywide acceptance of public transport and increasing ridership results from several policy and budgeting factors, and you've already begun to address some of them like zoning changes along transit corridors, changes to parking policies in downtown, restoring bus frequency, reliability, and service designation uh destinations aligns with those other systemic changes.

Reliable public transit is not a luxury or an on service, it's a fundamental part of a vibrant and prosperous city, and Albuquerque deserves that.

I urge you to fund the total investment needed to fully implement ABQ ride forward.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Sue Ladig, followed by Barbara Wysoff.

Thank you, Madam Chair and Counselors.

Good evening.

My name is Sue Lidig, and I have served on the run for the zoo committee for 25 years, have served as the race chair for past three years.

Over this time, it is quite an experience knowing that I've been part of raising four million dollars for the biopark.

As the biopark has experienced staffing cuts over the past several years, New Mexico Biopark Society has also been impacted.

We haven't been able to expand our fundraising efforts like run for the zoo, food at the zoo, and other activities outside of normal operating hours that would generate hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue.

Eliminating staff for Biopark is a step backward for our city.

Because of Iowa Park doesn't currently have an events supervisor, we're using administrative staff to work overtime to cover the events that occur outside of normal business hours without the event supervisor position.

We have to say no to adding additional activities.

For example, we're no longer offering weddings at the botanical garden.

We hope that you will see Bio Park as a jewel of the city and support it as such.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Barbara Weissoff, followed by Lewis Sutherland.

Hi.

I'm not good with numbers, but when the people talking about the library system mentioned $500,000, that is nothing compared with the $6 million of our taxpayer money that went to pay fines because Mayor Keller refused to comply with an IPRA last year.

We need better social services.

We need not to criminalize poverty and homelessness and things that people don't want to see and don't want to have, you know, that's a big part of Albuquerque.

Poverty is a big deal here, and the way to for long-term success in dealing with homelessness and people sleeping on the streets is better social services, not $500 fines.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Lewis Sutherland, followed by Julia Youngs.

Council members, my name is Luis Sutherland.

I'm a transit writer and a homeowner in District 7.

I asked the council to do what's needed to maintain the budget for ABQ ride by keeping the existing funded positions.

We need to keep these positions to fulfill the ABQ ride forward plan.

Implementing this plan is needed to bring our transit system back to its baseline level of service.

Public transit is critical for a healthy economy, and it's a solid return on investment for the city.

It is a fundamental service and just as essential as filling in potholes.

We need good public transit and we need to support our transit staff.

I ask all council members to do a basic search on the computer in your pocket.

Pull out your phone and do a search for public transit return on investment.

Again, do a search for public transit return on investment, and you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Thank you.

Julia Youngs, followed by Patricia Wilson.

Thank you, Madam Chair and Counselors, for the opportunity to speak here today.

My name is Julia Young's, and I'm here personally in support for continued funding for arts and culture in this year's budget as a vital sector of our city's economy, contributing nearly two billion dollars annually.

I've dedicated my life to the importance of the arts in driving economic development, and this conviction was shaped directly by one of the organizations here today, Fusion Theater.

Fusion was my first full-time job out of high school many years ago, and the first time I was paid for my work in the arts, and that fact solidified my lifelong commitment to increasing social and economic opportunities for artists.

I cannot speak highly enough of the work that Fusion has done for over 20 years to provide artists with a living wage and benefits to transforming our city by connecting the arts and urban development and to helping build pathways to employment and economic mobility for those just getting started.

I encourage Fusion's continued funding and the funding of the arts and culture in this year's budget as a sector that helps drive our economy and bolster the cultural richness that defines the Albuquerque we know and love.

Thank you.

Patricia Wilson, followed by Kelsey Erickson.

Madam Chair, I have not done a deep dive into the budget.

I'm still exhausted from the passage of the unknown number of amendments in the 2025 IDO update.

But I do know this.

Libraries, pools, parks, and buses are essential ingredients in the quality of life for Albuquerque citizens, especially our youth, especially in summer.

Early in my career, I commuted by bus.

I walked one block, caught a bus on central, that dropped me right off outside the tech area on the base.

A route change 40 years ago, then made it impossible to continue riding the bus to work.

Subsequent bus trips happened only when time wasn't tight, going to the state fair or shopping at the malls.

With additional flexibility in my schedule now, I look forward to taking transit more often as the ABQ ride forward recovery network phases in.

Where we spend our money is critical.

On a national level, priorities are favoring Bobs over benefits.

On a local level, I'm afraid we are prioritizing handcuffs over housing.

Please examine budget priorities with an eye towards our future.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Kelsey Erickson, followed by Blake Eliason.

Hello.

My name is Kelsey Erickson, and I resonate with what a lot of people have already said, but I'm especially concerned about the cuts to open space.

As a biologist and a hydrologist, I'm very concerned about the future of the Rio Grande.

It's drying now for the second well, this is the third year.

It's been dry within the last 10 years and it's set to dry in Albuquerque as early as May this year.

We need parks and rec programs to funds that can sustain the animals that depend on this river, do whatever we can to protect silvery minnow, which is critically endangered and possibly could be extinct as soon as this year.

We're not seeing hardly any eggs this year, which is really um really grim.

So as a young person who has a kid myself, I'm concerned about the future of the river for them and for all of us.

So I would really strongly urge you not to cut any funding for the ABQ biopark for parks and rec and as a lot of people have said.

I think it's outrageous.

Thank you, Manson.

Thank you.

Blake Eliason followed by Leslie Padilla.

Hi, good evening, all Madam Chair and Counselors.

Uh, my name is Blake Eliason.

I am a resident of District 7.

I was hoping to attend, I was hoping to be able to attend this meeting in person.

Unfortunately, though, my wrist uh broke recently, and with that, I cannot properly break on my bike.

Can't squeeze the handlebars very well.

My next option was to take the bus, but I live 30 minutes by foot from the nearest art stop, and my local regular bus only comes every 30 minutes or so.

No matter how you swing that, I'm I'm on a 45-minute bus ride to uh to get to Civic Plaza.

Uh if this council passes the budget as it is currently written, the council is choosing to cement our current reality into our future reality.

Uh while my broken arm that prevents me from biking safely uh maybe temporary.

Uh the proposed budget makes long bus trips a staying force.

Uh what do other folks in our city who rely on the bus do?

Uh it is myopic to sacrifice the improvement of our city's bus system.

Uh uh to the austerity gods in the name of projected budget shortfalls while simultaneously increasing the budget for policing.

Our city needs better transit, and we had a good plan to advance it.

I urge you to vote no on the proposed budget or amend it so that we could keep moving forward on ABQ ride.

Thank you.

Leslie Padilla, followed by Galileo Zen.

Hello, uh Madam President, counselors.

My name is Leslie Padilla.

I'm a three-year volunteer at the uh animal welfare department, but a 15-year volunteer at other shelters, both municipal, excuse me, and open intake.

Sorry, I can speak.

Um, so I have a good basis of comparison.

I think for uh Albuquerque's animal welfare.

Um, I'm very grateful that Albuquerque is an open intake shelter um and that uh and a shelter that cares for uh uh um sorry, rehabilitate and finds good homes for its animals.

Um, but unless we want to start euthanizing on intake, um, AWD needs more resources, not fewer.

Even with existing resources, animals are not getting the care they need um at for a good quality of life at the shelters.

Um, dogs in particular, and that's who I volunteer with, often spend multiple days in their kennels without a break, they don't get out of their small concrete kennels.

It's not humane, uh, and with fewer uh resources, things are only going to get worse.

I also wanted to um just say that I agree with the prior commenters who link to animal welfare to help, um, and uh safety public safety, so please view it at that lens and please reject the mayor's recommendation for AWD.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Miss Padilla.

Galileo Zen, followed by Sherry Bruggeman.

Uh hello, madam chair, and counselors.

Uh, my name is Galileo.

I live in the North Valley in District 2.

Uh, I'm here this evening to voice my opposition to the city's uh proposed uh austerity budget for next year.

My neighborhood bus line, uh the 36 had already been completely cut in past years, and I would like to make sure that other bus lines in the area area, primarily the 10 and 8 actually expand service and frequency according to the Albuquerque Ride Forward Initiative rather than cut it.

Um this time we should expand transit access and funding when gas prices continue to rise instead of uh unnecessarily increasing the APD budget when violent crime and property crime are at all time lows in the city.

Uh thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Sherry Brogeman, followed by Izzy Maxon.

Good evening, Madam Chair and member counselors of the committee of the whole.

I'm Sherry Brugeman, and I'm also speaking today on city support funding for one of Albuquerque's outstanding arts organizations, Fusion, as part of the FY27 budget.

Over the past year, I've had the opportunity to volunteer with Fusion and work closely with Dennis Gromowski and the entire team.

I know Fusion from my former role managing the city's public art urban enhancement division, because regularly artists and emerging arts organizations would come to us in the public art program looking for help with rehearsal space, fiscal sponsorship, technical support, mentorship, or simply someone willing to believe in a creative idea that would impact city residents that didn't fit within the city system.

There are only a handful of organizations we consistently trusted enough to recommend, and fusion was always at the top of that list.

What makes Fusion special is they don't just provide space, they build creative community.

Supporting Fusion is an investment in Albuquerque's creative future.

Thank you for your consideration.

Thank you.

Izzy Maxon, followed by Renee Horvath.

Yes, hi.

Um my name is Izzy Maxson.

I'm a local artist, and I've been living in Albuquerque for 20 something years, and the buses are really a lifeline for me.

I have um I have what's called strabismus, so my eyes are offset.

I can't drive.

So the buses are a lifeline for me.

And we have this misconception of the buses that they're just, you know, rolling flop houses or something.

That's people, but normal people ride the buses and normal people need the buses.

And uh I urge you guys not to cut the budget to the buses.

That is all.

Thank you.

Renee Horvath, followed by Hindi Sahmud.

Uh, good evening.

My name is Renee Horvath.

I live here on the west side, and I'm here to speak uh on the budget, and I have a lot of concerns about cutting the open space uh budget because we do have a lot of open space here on the west side between the boski and the petroglyphs, the volcanoes, and we also have the mountains on the other side.

And these are all wonderful resources that we've always enjoyed that really make Albuquerque great.

And a lot of tourists come here to see these beautiful landmarks, and we need staffing to protect them.

And so I'm always hearing lack of staffing.

We're so busy, it's hard to keep up.

And so I am worried about maintaining the staffing for open space.

I know they cut staffing for petroglyph monuments, and so uh open space and the monument staff always work together to help uh protect the monument, but with those cuts, because of federal cuts, I'm worried that about cutting open space.

And I do agree with the other people that spoke, and I'm just wondering can we maintain what we have and find some money elsewhere to help with the stuff that the mayor wants to do?

Thank you.

Hindi Samud.

Hello, everybody.

I'm a resident of District 7.

I'm also a law student at UNM, and I'm here because we need a people's budget.

You might have received over a hundred letters, a hundred people's letters by now, about a thousand letters demanding a people's budget, one that prioritizes the needs of all our community members by funding people services like transit, like animal welfare, like libraries, and especially our city workers.

We don't need Dan reminded us, the mayor's austerity minded budget, especially in a state with the fourth largest sovereign wealth fund at nearly 70 billion dollars with a B.

But we don't even need to look to the fit for more revenue.

We can cut police spending.

Climate at an all-time low in the last 10 years, and the mayor's proposing to increase 30 million dollars for police funding while cutting so many other departments.

And as um Councillor Lewis reminded us, this body has the power to make Albuquerque a leading city in this country by choosing to invest in our public transit, protect people and animals, pay city workers wages that are competitive with private sector, and house the homeless instead of policing and criminalizing their assistance.

This body has that power.

Let's be creative, brave, and reimagine what our future can look like.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

That concludes comment.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh Miss Althea, would you like to finish or speak again?

Counselor Lewis asked that um that you speak again.

He wasn't directing his comments to you.

And really appreciate it, Councillor Rogers.

Or sorry Council Crowd and Counselor Lewis.

Sorry, I'm a little nervous now.

So thank you again for talking about how it allowing me the time to talk about how I get around.

Again, this is a classic uh kitchen table issue in my house.

Um, when we ask how we're gonna have tomorrow happen, a big part of that is asking how I, as a mom who's driving is not an option for how am I going to parent tomorrow?

How am I gonna be an independent parent tomorrow?

And so current and former and would-be bus riders are all asking for your bravery right now and your empathy and understanding that we just want what what we had before the pandemic.

That's what we're asking.

We're asking for a restoration.

Um, and you know, and I think it's important for everybody on this council to ask, you know, what is your line?

What is what is it going to take for you to support public transit?

What are you needing to see from this budget to support families like mine?

Um, and you know, again, I know it doesn't cut service.

Um, the mayor even did a little Instagram where he responded to a comment and he was like, Oh, well, it doesn't cut any less service.

It's because it already happened.

You know, I think we all know that now.

Um, and I think you know, um, with the 16 phase, three to five years, I think that the department is doing everything it can, and I really applaud the department for doing everything it can with what it has, but we have to start getting creative.

We have to start getting a little more understanding about why we have a bus driver shortage, why is that happening?

Um, and that means being creative about safety.

That means being creative about wages, um, and and also their jobs, right?

Um, you know, I just want to applaud um, you know, the transit department.

Um, they've done so much, but I also think that we need to give them more.

Um, and instead of just giving back money when we have failed to spend it, that needs to be spent within transit.

Um, and yeah, and so um I just want to um, you know, reiterate that um it's the safest mode of transportation for for people.

Um, if you look at the numbers mile by mile, my kids are safer on a bus, and when you deny my kids the opportunity to take a bus, you are putting them in a in danger.

And I just want you to all um to to all understand what that how why I'm shaking right now as a mom because I care so much about them and their safety.

Thank you.

Thank you for your advocacy.

Thank you.

Madam Chair, yeah.

May I may I say something?

Sure.

I just want to clarify something because I've heard a lot of people talk about cuts to positions, and I just want to clarify that in years past, there had been a negative line item on the budget for vacancy savings, and the council had requested that that line item be eliminated, and so as a result of that, we had to identify specific positions to be inactivated.

So a lot of the positions that people are seeing this year on the budget have been held in previous years for vacancy savings.

So I just want to make that clear that there is not huge position cuts happening, but rather we were asked to identify positions rather than holding a negative line on the budget.

And the other thing I want to add is that in doing that, I understand why city council requested it, but in doing that, it did take away a lot of flexibility from the departments because what they were doing is if a position became vacant, they would then fill another position, knowing that it would take some time for that newly vacant position to get filled.

So I just wanted to add some clarity.

Counselor Lewis.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

And that is that is partly true.

Um and it's it's also not true.

I mean, there are um what you might call uh you know cuts to you know certain departments.

And tonight, you know, Madam Chair, we heard um uh, you know, I mean the public express, and I I um I'm on the same page.

I mean you expressed uh uh you know concern over reductions in spending um you know to transit reductions in spending to animal welfare uh to open space um you know about our our worker pay that there's not enough in this uh in this budget to work or for worker pay um but these are and the and these are real cuts to these departments uh but what's unfortunate what's disappointing um is that there's there's not a cut to the budget.

There's not a cut to overall spending.

You know, I've I've been around at a time when we actually had to make cuts to a city budget, but we had to cut about 150 million dollars out of a city budget, and and that's not what the mayor is proposing here.

What he's proposing is cuts to some uh uh departments and increases to others, and so this is a cut by reprioritizing.

Um the fact is we have more money this year than we did last year in the general fund by by millions of dollars.

There's more revenue this year than there was last year, and so um, you know, and again, tonight uh as you know, the same as last last last or last budget meeting.

This is our second budget meeting.

We're gonna review and look at the mayor's uh proposed budget and get to some clarity, you know, regarding this, and I and certainly the the administration will weigh in, I think, on why uh why they reprioritized um some of these things, um but uh again this is a you know these first two budget hearings are listening to the public, and we certainly appreciate hearing from you, but also uh this council getting a better understanding of what the mayor's proposing, um and uh and you know, and and certainly because of again it's a it's reprioritizing uh a budget, not cutting a budget, it's reprioritizing it and cutting certain you know programs and and certain uh departments uh then you know this the the administration needs to clarify that and answer to it.

Um and you know, and then you know the council will uh come in at a certain point and offer amendments, um, offer changes, um, but you can see how it's pretty difficult to do that uh when the mayor begins the budget process and says this is what we need, and these are the priorities, and so you know those changes are gonna be very difficult, which is why it's important for to hear from you on this.

But this started, this budget started uh with the mayor and his priorities in these departments, you know, that we're we're we're cut.

Um, you know, many of you voted for them.

Many of you said, hey, this is who we want doing this job.

Uh not my district didn't vote for them.

Many of you did.

Um, and and this is how the city government's set up that this mayor starts with the budget process, he puts his priorities in it.

But I want to make it real clear, we're not in a situation this year where we had to cut anything.

Um this is the mayor's priorities, and so we're gonna learn more about it tonight and have some questions.

I hope you all will stick around and and uh we'll we'll get more to the bottom of some of the of some of this.

Thank you.

Thank you, counselor.

Um, at this time, um, Mr.

Noel is going to lead our presentation, providing an overview of the physical goal departments.

Um following each department presentation, counselors will have an opportunity to ask questions and engage in discussion.

But before we move into the physical goal department presentations, I have a few follow-up questions for the administration regarding state funding for gateway and the city's plan for ongoing operations.

So madam CFO.

More than a month ago or a month after we received the proposed budget to council, the administration has asked this body to consider a six million dollar reallocation within the general fund to address costs that were not included in the triple H budget.

This request appears to support ongoing gateway operations as the city transitions away from state funding.

So before we move forward, we need to understand the full scope of the city's ongoing gateway network obligation and how it will be funded going forward.

This committee is not going to move forward without that level of clarity before considering any changes.

So at this time, my first question is when did the administration determine that the general fund would need to absorb these gateway operational costs?

Madam Chair.

Um I believe this body received a memo in December of last year indicating how we intended to absorb these costs.

Okay, the next question.

What is the total annual cost to operate the gateway network in fiscal year 27, including all facilities and services?

Madam Chair, that would be need to need to be answered by the department.

We did request because we got the request this morning officially for them to attend this evening.

We we uh conveyed to your staff that they could not be here until eight o'clock because they had personal commitments, okay.

Well, then we'll ask them when they come in at eight.

Um, is the six million dollar reallocation where um that we're being asked to consider enough to cover these costs?

Madam Chair, as we talked about last week, um, what I conveyed to you is those costs would help get them through the first part of the fiscal year.

Okay, and just so we're clear for the committee and the public, this request represents a shift from the time limited state funding to ongoing general fund support.

Is that correct?

That is correct.

Okay, so we'll when um the administration or when somebody from the department comes, we'll I'll follow up with that first question.

Okay, thank you.

Um, oh counselor feeble corn.

Thank you, madam chair.

Sorry to interrupt, but I just wanted to clarify the letter that was referenced or the memo that was referenced that was sent to us around um the ongoing gateway um expenses that was apparently set in December.

Um I'm only finding one, and that was in January, um, and it was a copy of the letter that was sent to Secretary Nyer.

Is that what you're referring to?

Madam Chair Counselor, yes.

Okay, well, I I don't know about other counselors, but when I got that, I reached out and said this this seems um problematic.

Uh we're taking 1.5 million dollars from transit to fund the gateway system, and I was told, oh, this is just an idea of how we could cover this.

Um, and so that's the last I heard on that until we got this budget down here.

So I just wanted to clarify if that was what you were referring to or not.

Thank you.

Thank you, madam uh counselor.

Okay, um, at this time, Mr.

Noel.

Uh, we'll turn it out the presentation over to you.

Um, and also we are going to hear from Miss Chris Christine Borner.

She's the city Economist.

Um, she is going to provide an update um on the gross receipts tax from last week.

So sorry, go ahead.

Madam Chair.

We don't have to go over the first 15 slides that were in that packet.

So we're inferring.

Yeah.

So where should we start?

Madam Chair, for clarity, I agree with you.

In the interest of time, we should not go through the slides we went through last week.

But would you like to start with Ms.

Borner's presentation, or would you like us to start moving into the department?

Well, I would like for her to give us additional information that she that she's gotten over the week.

Okay.

So let's start with her then, Madam Chair, and then we'll move to the department.

Okay.

Thank you, Madam Chair, members of council.

I have just four quick slides for you.

All right.

So I did verbally give you the GRT update for for February, but here's the graph that I typically provide for you.

And so this was February.

Most sectors did well, particularly health care, information, education, I think professional and scientific services, as well.

However, construction finance, manufacturing, and others did decline a bit for this month.

Okay.

And we need to keep in mind that we would have to for the next four months grow at 4.6% in order to maintain the 4.6 year to date that we have.

And I'm not saying that's not going to happen, but in uh February, the Iran war didn't start until I believe the last day of February, and so we don't yet see how uh Albuquerque consumers businesses are going to be reacting to those gas prices and other um uncertainties.

Alright, so we don't we don't know how FY26 is going to finish up.

But yes, fortunately, February was was strong.

We can go to the next slide if you would.

And as promised, we have uh the cannabis.

I verbally mentioned this last week as well.

Uh I still don't know why February's um cannabis was particularly high.

Again, it was some anomalies, I believe, with previous February's.

Uh, but that did bring the year-to-date into positive territory at 1.9%.

And I don't believe the next slide, please.

I don't believe I've shown this before, but this is uh this is cannabis since the beginning.

I think I just excluded one month, it was a partial month.

And so this doesn't include administrative fees, penalty, and interest, but this is sort of what it looks like long term, and you know why we did see um some growth.

Uh it really has flattened out, and I've got a trend line there, it might be hard for you to see, but really it's hanging around 300,000, a little over 300,000 a month.

Okay.

All right, and then the final slide.

So, as you're this is why you wanted me here today.

This is the um the information from from uh my Bieber meeting last early Friday morning.

Um, some of this national data you won't be surprised to hear.

Um, there were revisions to employment data, and so it looks like there were almost no employment gains in 2025 for the US.

And honestly, uh 0% growth is expected in 2026 with uh 0.1% expected in calendar year 2027.

We have still uh slow GDP, slightly higher inflation, fewer job openings, interest rates coming back up a bit, consumer confidence, as I've mentioned before, um, and real wage growth is fairly positive.

So now when it comes to New Mexico, that first data point, that first uh bullet point, I pulled that directly from one of Bieber's slides.

Um the the data generally is moderate but beginning to slow, and particularly for Albuquerque.

Now I think the reason why Albuquerque is signaled singled singled out there is that uh Albuquerque was really the only municipality that we expect in 2026 FY26 to have that negative growth in employment.

Uh the other municipalities did have some growth, not a ton, except for Santa Fe.

Santa Fe is a little bit of an anomaly.

Um Santa Fe actually grew five percent their employment, but it it's almost entertaining.

It's because state government grew 40 percent.

Um yeah, so uh but the others grew rather more modestly.

Um and then some of the other data points that Bieber put out, um, housing set sales it sold and closed or down from the beginning of last year, median sales are our median prices a bit down.

Um, and then I've got some detail on employment here.

So uh Albuquerque is expected to decline in 2026, FY26 uh 0.2, that's about 647 jobs, and then you'll notice in FY27, we're growing a little bit, but we're still not recovering the jobs that we're projected to lose in 26.

It's not a lot, but still, and then the unemployment rate, it is expected to increase slightly from FY26 through FY28.

Um, and although year-to-date housing permits are actually looking a little better right now, um, Bieber's projection were for two years of slight declines in total permits.

Um, and I that really concludes my presentation.

I will say though, what's happening in Albuquerque in New Mexico, it's not substantially different from what we're seeing around the country.

And I looked at some of our peers, some of them experienced some declines and declines in in employment um uh for February, and um, and as I mentioned, uh other municipalities, they may not be in negative territory, but they're also going quite growing quite slowly.

So that's that's my update for you.

Um it's not terrible, but there is some downward pressure on GRT revenue, slight downward pressure.

Thank you, Councilor Lewis.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um, I mean, again, you know, trying to draw some conclusions and some takeaways because that's the reason why we have these reports.

And you you you made some uh conclusions and some assumptions as well.

Um, but you know, I think that says a lot, you know.

When we we have had negative growth, we're showing negative growth, uh future negative growth, um, but surrounding municipalities uh do not have negative growth.

And uh and and maybe you can mention some of the you know, I guess partners or sister cities or um, but you know, when I look at Phoenix and um Amarillo and uh Colorado Springs and Denver and Salt Lake City, I see growth.

You know, I see pretty good percentages of growth, and so despite any kind of you know downward um, you know, downward pressure, I guess as you might say.

Um, you know, I think Albuquerque is pretty distinctive as a pretty horrible economy right now, and not trending very good.

Um, I do have a question.

I mean, where so where did the national study come from?

Was that UNM study you guys say you were waiting on?

Um Madam Chairmember uh Lewis, we contract with um IHS market for the national data.

Uh both Bieber and uh Albuquerque pay for that data, the same data, and so that's what informs Bieber's expectations for local uh employment, but it it's very much coming from the national data, and as far as projections go, it's all coming from IHS because they have their own employment models.

So they normally do the local studies for us, but then they added this national, some national data and study that they got from somewhere else.

Um Lewis, it's we it's a quarterly thing.

Every quarter we get new data, federal data from IHS market, and then Bieber uses that quarterly data for in their models to estimate local employment.

So it's just it's just the way I use Bieber data in our GRT models to model growth.

Bieber's using the IHS national data in their models.

Does that make sense?

I guess I don't want to understand how we use and maybe just some to think about.

I mean, how do we use national data and I mean what weight do we put to that from that from a study like that?

And because you know, I'm I'm I'm pretty widely read.

I think I you know, I uh I've seen you know dozens of forecast studies on the national economy over the last few weeks, and I've seen some, many of them, and I'd say majority of them who are predicting some pretty incredible growth in our economy.

And you'd agree with that, right?

I think if you read those, if you're if you're if you're reading and looking at you know some of these national forecasts, there's uh studies that I would say even say the entirely opposite, or certainly not you know uh negative growth.

And so I mean uh I I would think that we would look at some a wide range of some of those national forecasts and studies and maybe look at an average, maybe um, you know, or at least take all that into account.

Um, but I I I wouldn't draw conclusions from one study or one source of data uh and somehow say this is the cause of Albuquerque specifically having negative growth when when especially when every other city around us and our you know surrounding states are experiencing positive growth.

Um and again, the the whole reason for this data and these, you know, is to be able to, you know, look at how this shapes policy, you know.

And um I I would conclude from the reports that we have regarding the city of Albuquerque and our economic state that at very best it's stagnant.

Um at worst it's uh declining, you know.

I think in a very real, you know, certainly the studies you mentioned show were declining.

Um and the policy conclusions I would draw from that, or say whatever we're doing is not working, and it's probably and I again this is this is uh you know data primarily, probably the most important data that we could get as an administration, you know, as policymakers and administration of a city like Albuquerque is to go, where do we need to change course?

You know, and what what do we what policies do we look at and say, you know, we've got it we've got to change course, we've got to try something different because what we're doing is not working.

But anyways, thanks for the data.

I think a couple coup I guess with a couple suggestions that that is you know, I'd like to see some maybe an average or some look at some other data that would give us a better picture, maybe.

Madam President, I I don't know if I if you'd like me to make another comment, um not necessarily councillor Rogers.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Just a couple questions.

Um thank you for bringing the extra data on cannabis.

I think for me, that's what I'm watching all the time.

Um and thank you for sending the slides that weren't in our packet because I found them in our IP or iPads, because that was helpful.

So I could drill down and look at those.

So when you talked about Santa Fe's growth, do you think it has anything to do with them raising their minimum wage to 1750 an hour?

Um Madam Chair, member Rogers, this these data is actually number of of jobs, and so um I think it reflects.

I mean, it's hard to know exactly what they were, but given that they're state government, it's probably state government jobs, perhaps legislative jobs.

That's someone's guess, right?

Um I can't speak to whether it's not I'm not looking at um what's being spent on wages, these are just jobs.

I mean, but I I I would imagine that they're increasing wages, yes.

Yeah, thank you, Madam Chan, I think that's important to note, right?

That if we are paying higher wages even in government, because even at the city of Albuquerque we have minimum wage-paying jobs, right?

Um being that Albuquerque, if we look at Albuquerque's economy, it is heavily dependent on government jobs, healthcare jobs, um, our labs, and all of our labs, which all have positions that are minimum wage positions, even at the labs when I was looking.

Um, and so, you know, just economics 101 says that if we do want to change course, counselor Lewis, we should increase our minimum wage, which is all that's absolutely any economist would tell you that because we have dependence on government and federal funding.

Um, so that's also contributing to our slowing job growth and key successes there.

Um we know that in Albuquerque our housing costs are rising faster than our wages.

We know that our lack of economic diversification, you know, we have strengths film, aerospace, research, health care, renewable energy, but the economy is still smaller and less diversified than the pure cities that I think that you've mentioned.

Um, and so workforce and talent retention, I think is another uh something we don't do with the city really well, is you know, sharing, having succession plans and things like that.

So I think there's a lot of ways that we could could do that, and I just wanted to get your opinion on wages because I think that's the fastest way to grow our economy.

Let's pay our people more if they can afford more things, they can do more things in our city and spend more money.

Um so thank you for answering that.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you.

Thank you, Counselor.

Thank you, ma'am.

Appreciate you.

Mr.

Noel, we're gonna let you go.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

So the physical gold departments that we'll be reviewing tonight start with municipal development, then planning, general services, environmental health, transit, animal welfare, youth and family services, legal, then solid waste, Office of Internal Audit, the Office of Inspector General, Human Resources, Technology and Innovation, Finance, and Administrative Services, and wrapping up with city support.

So starting with municipal development, Jennifer Turner is the director.

The FY27 proposed general fund general fund budget is 41,522,000.

There are 218 positions in the general fund.

For other funds, the budget is 11.5 million with 59 positions, and some of the highlights are that they are right size their budget to address ongoing operational costs, and the other funds are hiring positions for striping and line spotting to reduce reliance on outside contractors.

And Director Turner is here for questions.

Thank you.

Good evening, Director.

Madam Chair, Counselors, I just want to briefly thank all of the Department of Municipal Development employees who uh design, build, and uh maintain our city.

And with that, I stand for questions.

Thank you.

I'd like to say real quick, um, counselor uh Pena is on Zoom as well.

And Counselor Teas, you have a question, ma'am?

Yes, thank you.

I appreciate it.

Um, Director, how are you this evening?

Yeah, Madam Chair, Counselor Teas.

Great, thank you.

Great, great.

I have a couple of questions.

Um, one of the things it looks like um fund 282 right now, it looks like currently it's managed by holding vacancies and reducing services.

Um can you tell me what services and how many vacancies um were held to uh manage that fund?

Um Madam Chair, Counselor Tayas.

So fund 282 is our gas tax, which is funded um through the state gas tax revenues.

The revenues in that fund have remained flat over the last few years.

However, um the costs associated with those services have gone up.

We have 59 positions that are funded through our gas tax revenues and all of the associated maintenance costs.

Um, these are my frontline workers who maintain our streets, as well as some of our construction inspectors.

It's really the backbone of funding for my streets division.

And so when the when we are overspent and when this fund is unfunded, what that means is we have to make it up through as you alluded to vacancy savings.

And so that means not filling our street and not filling our streets positions that support those services.

So regarding your question on vacancies, so that evolves over time, as people leave and as they're promoted, those numbers of vacancies change.

So we had provided you a couple of months the lists of it was about almost 10 street drainage and maintenance positions that were vacant.

We have had a couple of those positions leave and a couple, a couple be promoted.

And so we are averaging over 10 positions in streets, sometimes more that are vacant at any given time.

Regarding your question on whether that impacts services, of course, having fewer workers means that services are impacted, although we do our very best to use overtime and also just to prioritize emergency street situations first, and then addressing more routine maintenance.

So I hope that answers your question.

Yeah, thank you, Director.

It does.

It becomes a long-term sustainability problem.

And it's not just fund 282.

I see it in fund 691 in transit, fund 250.

I mean, this is basically all over all over the department.

So I these are troubling risks, and it's even more troubling, I think, because these are positions that you say are the backbone positions of the department.

And so when we are using backbone positions to balance our budget, it's essentially allows the problem to persist and get any worse.

Was there any guidance from the administration to you to help, you know, was there any guidance to give you some alternative options that you could do rather than balancing the the fund off the backs of vacancies?

Madam Chair, Counselor Tayas, yes, I think that is why you will see the increase in funding for my department compared to some of the other departments, is because we were asked by CFO Martinez to be very transparent about our needs.

And so I was given the opportunity to say that there is this chronic underfunding of the gas tax, which is flat and addressing what I think I've heard called unfunded mandates.

Um, and so I was asked, what do you need?

Articulate your needs to write size this budget.

And I think as Kevin Noel highlighted on the slide, this year, through adding additional funds to the um gas tax that frankly we had not received in last year, um we are right sizing that budget and ensuring that July 1st, I will not be in the red, and I will be able to fill those critical positions.

Thank you.

Counselor, thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Counselor Lewis.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Uh thanks, Director.

So your your FY27 budget assumes uh about four million in stormwater uh fee revenue.

The legislation presented to council projects closer to eight million.

So which which number is accurate.

Madam Chair and Counselor Lewis, so the budget that you have before you today um has the four million dollars projected in revenue because that is the fund that is directly tied to the budget the operations budget you have before you stay.

Um, so that that is our focus.

However, as the revenues associated with the stormwater um service charges come in, it is you correctly stated that additional revenues um are anticipated, um, but that is at a later date, and today um we are focused on the four million dollars in the budget presented to you.

So a later date, meaning what, like six and months into the budget?

You go, okay, we got more than the four, and now we're gonna spend the rest of the eight, or uh so uh Madam Chair and Counselor Lewis.

Um as everyone probably knows, um, the Department of Municipal Municipal Development also oversees our automated speed enforcement fund, which is a separate fund, which is where we've seen revenues go up.

Um, and through, for example, the mid-year cleanup, we are able to, you know, as we see what revenues look like, we're able to address any um sort of uh either surpluses or deficiencies in the revenue that we that we see.

So we anticipate those additional revenues.

The stormwater ordinance that um that I know was alluded to last week, it was uh introduced on Monday.

Um it does have a breakdown of how those funds will be spent.

So does it have a breakdown of the whole eight million where it would be spent?

Uh so Madam Chair, Counselor Lewis, it specifies money for operating and then it specifies a percentage for um green stormwater infrastructure because again, we do not have the detailed breakdown of the revenues that will the revenues haven't come in yet, so we don't have that.

Um it does not it does not give the full breakdown of the eight million.

Okay, then one more quick uh so we were talking about gas tax earlier.

At what point do we acknowledge that that gas tax is no longer sustainable on its own and is effectively being replaced by tax support?

Uh Madam Chair and Counselor Lewis, um, I I think that this budget does do what we can with what the state gives us.

Um I I just want to answer the question because I'm often asked it like well, gas prices are fit, you know.

We heard you pay $50 to fill up a couple gallons, so why isn't our gas tax revenues going up?

And it's because they're actually tied to the amount of gas that um people are filling their tanks with, not the dollar amounts.

I always find that's a helpful clarification because we're all paying a lot of the pump.

Um but yes, this budget uh does I think address our gas tax deficiency by adding those additional funding, and I am happy.

I'm sure the administration is happy to have a conversation about um going forward in the future, but unfortunately, it is the state that that um has determined what funds we get.

Madam Chair, yeah, it's a I mean it's a declining tax, it's a declining revenue.

I think it always will be uh regardless of the price of fuel.

I mean, I mean uh gas hit its peak in the 70s, you know, and it's it's gone down ever since as far as usage, and so as a long-term, you know, way to fund um our you know, roadways and you know and infrastructure.

I mean, I I again I I mean I think it already is.

I mean, we're we're replacing it with our with other revenues and um, but you know, I mean at some point we're gonna start looking at uh uh you know other you know revenues and dedicated revenues to build our road roads, you know, build our infrastructure and do the things that um you know we're gonna need in the future, but anyways, thank you.

Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thank you.

Oh, counselor, okay.

Counselor Champagne.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Uh just a couple of quick questions, Director.

Um you had mentioned this the automated speed enforcement.

Uh it maintains $2.5 million in contractual services.

What uh what's the annual revenue offset of that with the tickets coming in?

Uh Madam Chair, Counselor Champagne.

So the we started the program about four years ago, and we switched vendors uh about less than a year ago, actually, and so the vendor charges us, our new vendor charges us differently than our old vendor did, and we continue to add new cameras, so it is very much a growing program, and our costs to the vendor and for all of the um city internal um support for that program keep going up as well.

So, for example, when we were only reviewing 800 citations a month, that was a very different um workload on city employees than we're looking at right now, and so um we our our amount that we're paying the vendor, as I said, goes up and up, but with those revenues going up, then um as council just enacted through its uh overhaul to our traffic code, um, all of those revenues go into our um into our vision zero program overall over the lifetime of the program.

Um we have paid all of our vendor costs, and then after we cover recover all of those fees, um we then have to pay the state half per state statute, and we've paid over the last four years over 9 million dollars to the state for our program.

Um, and then we've had nine million dollars go into our uh vision zero funding, and so if that kind of gives you some rough ballpark of our numbers, and then I did receive a follow-up question for lots of math and lots of spreadsheets that um are due to you next week, so you can see the full the full breakdown then.

Perfect, thank you.

Uh Madam Chair.

I'm seeing so you're at 41,522,000, which is an 11.8% increase this year.

Uh Madam Chair, Counselor Champagne.

Let me, I don't want to um, there's a lot of numbers in the budget, and I want to get it exactly right, but yes, um, one second, sorry.

It is I have a lot of stickies because there's a lot.

My department does a lot, so I apologize.

But yes, I think it was 4.4 million dollar increase, which was around an 11% increase overall.

From the $37 million you got last year.

Uh Madam Chair, Counselor Champagne, that is correct.

And that includes the budget cut of cutting seven people, transferring attorneys to two attorneys to legal uh reducing the uh line spotting to doing it more in-house at 750,000.

Um, bring line spotting in-house, which reduces MWI contract by 750.

And then by bringing striping in-house, you create a crew of four to be capitally funded at 782,000.

Correct?

Uh Madam Chair, Counselor Champagne, we did eliminate uh seven positions with regards to all the other comments.

Yes, we were able to and um do not a number of efficiencies related to paying outside contractors a lot more money than it's going to cost to do it in-house, and I think we'll do it better.

Um, and so yes, that's those are you you you cited some of the highlights of my budget.

Okay, so we're reducing our cost by bringing more stuff in, but you need a bigger budget.

Uh Madam Chair, Councillor Champagne.

Yes, that is correct because as I said, we have been chronically like underfunded for the uh what again are unfunded mandates.

Um you alluded to our Dolcia contract, for example, and pumps stations, those are we have to keep the lights on, we have to prevent our streets from flooding, and so those are services that we have to provide, and my budget until this year didn't address those, and so this year uh the increase in the budget is to address those also increasing costs.

So then moving forward, madam.

Madam Chair, so then moving forward, we probably won't have an increase next year if we're making these adjustments to get you to a solid ground, correct?

And I ask that not because you I'm asking you to predict the future, but at the same time, part of economics is knowing where we are, projecting where we can be based on the adjustments that we're making.

So in that sense, we should not be at 11% or yeah, an 11% increase, almost 12% increase, maybe a little lower next year.

Um Madam Chair and Counselor Champagne, so I'll leave it to the city economists to predict the future.

But um, so what we're finding is that construction costs and sort of the operational costs associated with those critical services like lights and um things like pump stations, they are growing at a really high rate.

I think I've heard all of you complain about how a speed hump used to be like $2,000 when I started at the city, and we're now looking at 15,000.

And so costs are actually growing faster now in my view than they have in the past.

Um and on the slide you saw what that was up earlier.

I have we all, all the directors, but myself included, have taken a hard look about what we can do better for cheaper.

I've reorganized a lot of my department to be more efficient and to avoid duplication of duties and to try to deliver on construction projects faster.

And so, yes, costs go up.

Uh we can't predict the economic.

Well, I can't predict the economic future, but at the same time, um, we are constantly looking for ways to do things better.

Perfect.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Director.

Thank you, Councilor Teas.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I appreciate it.

I sorry, I just had a couple more um questions uh related related directly to the general general fund.

Oh, sorry, that's my annoying dog.

Um, my apologies, everyone, for having to hear that very loud mark.

Um, so I with regard to the again um the savings and everything that you were asked to find, and then you were asked um what you needed.

My question, I just want to find out again.

No alternatives were suggested to you by the administration that that don't rely on general fund um subsidies because right now I just am curious if there is any sort of thoughts around what fee or rates could fully replace that general fund subsidy, you know, the one million one time and the the recurring.

Um are there any other alternatives?

Um for cost containment or um linked infrastructure um fees or anything like that.

Um Madam Chair and Counselor Tayas, um the administration is always asking me to look for alternative sources of funding, and I'm always looking um uh just actually early this week.

We were brainstorming about applying for state money to address some long-standing infrastructure needs with our pump stations um we also do flag for the issue of our state legislatures that capital coming online which is a source of funding for us is not just to fund for example community centers but it also could be used to fund um when we bring new lights on uh online for example in the past year we put I think over 500 new lights some of them funded by you around our city and we all can speak highly of how lights improve safety they improve quality of life all those things but all those lights also have a cost and so yes we are always being asked and I'm always looking for um for ways to address some of those costs of my CIP coming online um and again that is federal funding state funding um you know solar lights for example I would hope had a much lower PM cost than um you know traditional lights um we just put almost 200 solar lights on central for example um so we're yes we are always thinking outside the box and getting asked those hard questions and I think this budget does it it tries to um get some of those needs met and then we'll continue to have those conversations thank you um do you know which which costs in fund 282 are truly operating costs and which um qualify as capital preservation or capital maintenance uh um madam chair counselor teas so traditionally it has been like as I said the day-to-day frontline workers um I actually have a list of positions so I can even read them out loud because things like our street maintenance workers who are sweeping our streets who are filling potholes who are sealing cracks and cleaning out our drainage ponds in our arroyos that that is the definition of operations and maintenance in my view and we have communication centers specialists who are um tied that's our dispatch when as issues come in we have um some construction inspectors who handle the inspections of all of the above so these are um as I said even the titles tell you that they are focused on uh operations and maintenance um we have been looking at whether any of those positions could be funded in other ways um but as of now this budget includes the 59 positions that I have been alluding to the titles.

Thank you director and just one more clarification um back to um counselor Lewis's questions regarding the stormwater um revenues um that four million dollar revenue assumption is made again on the assumption that the ordinance is gonna pass um the ordinance just was um just kind of was entered um and I don't see any sort of clearly identified again contingency plan in the proposed budget um materials should the ordinance um not be enacted has that been a conversation how are you um planning to just because we're asking to be adopt to adopt a budget that relies on you know a four million dollar um legislation that hasn't passed yet so what's the fallback plan?

Um madam chair counselor Teas I think you know the response to that is that this is the mayor's proposed budget and in that proposed budget is the four million dollars for stormwater fees well I just and thank you for that um CFO have you back to my uh other question for director um is when the when you the administration um departments for you know provides cost reduction directives um I almost always that should come with some sort of policy guidance, some sort of strategic priorities um and decision making parameters from the administration.

Otherwise, I think departments are kind of left as you know onto an island onto themselves and are forced to make these operational decisions for what you you very clearly um pointed out is the mayor's proposed budget.

Um, and so I'm curious how are you providing guidance to make those type of operational decisions for these departments, so that because you know, without some sort of real guidance municipal guidance uh from the administration, you know, we open a door to unintended service impacts and governance risks.

Um, and so that's kind of my my concern here is from a municipal governance perspective.

The administration's role is not just to say cut X dollars, but it should also provide guidance and at and so I'm wondering what sort of um frameworks that the administration provides to departments to help them make these decisions.

Uh Madam Chair, Councilor Teas, I I guess I'm not sure what you mean by guidance, other than we did sit down with the departments, we had conversations about each of them individually in their budgets and ways in which they could be more efficient.

And to your earlier question to Director Turner about, you know, did the administration and her have conversations about creative ways to raise revenues, raise funding, the stormwater fees is a is an example of that.

Great, thank you, Madam.

Let's see.

So the type of things I'm referring to when it comes to guidance, um, which is especially important because again, departments are just not, you know, uh, they operate under executive policy and direction, and they operate through legislative appropriation.

So, you know, for the mayor's proposed budget type of guidance would generally be things like, you know, are you having conversations about what it means to freeze vacancies, to delay, you know, maintenance, cutting training, reducing, you know, type of preventative programs, um, what type of technology upgrades might be deferred.

So a lot of different things typically uh includes conversations around what are clear fiscal targets and administrative priorities, risk tolerances, materiality, um, cross budget coordination.

Um, so those are the type of that's the type of guidance I'm wondering.

Um, and it's not to mean that administration should, you know, micromanage every cut, because obviously the departments know their operations the best, but I'm just wondering what type of policy framework and priorities within those decisions are made that is led through administrative leadership to help you know them guide their operational uh impacts.

Um Madam Chair and Councilor Teas, thank you for that clarification.

And yes, everything that you said is reflective in this budget.

For instance, you see cross collaboration happening amongst the departments.

You see where triple H has said that ACS could better utilize uh this funding.

You will see cross-collaboration against across departments where they're streamlining operations and sharing staff.

Uh, you know, Director Turner mentioned that she has made the decision to increase staffing to have less dependency on positions.

So this is happening.

What you your question is reflective across the board in the budget that was presented.

Okay, thank you for that.

Because I am seeing some departments with pretty heavy risk when it comes to those cross cutting risks.

Um when you look at staffing capacity gaps, um, the departments most effective there, affected there tend to be, you know, municipal development, transit, animal welfare, all the departments that many of our constituents here are coming public comment on.

And so I'm also seeing, you know, other departments affected with, you know, within solid waste and aviation regarding um enterprise and general fund comparability and a lot of fun shifts and hidden subsidies when it comes to general services and municipal development and solid waste and transit and city support.

And that's why to me it didn't seem like those conversations were had, because you know, there's a lot of these risks that I have seen from these cross-cutting, you know, dollar exposures and risk themes.

So thank you for letting me know that you do have those conversations.

I will um I have a list of where my biggest concerns are regarding that type of exposure and that cross-cutting that you mentioned.

So I'll send that over to you.

Maybe you can help clear up my questions about those risks.

Thank you, counselor.

Counselor Rogers.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Director Turner.

I don't have a lot of questions.

I just wanted to give your department um some kudos because we've been working a lot with Councilor Grout and I and your department on pedestrian safety and Route 66.

We we all have seen the headlines that it's been listed as the danger most dangerous corridor for pedestrian deaths uh over the last 10 years, according to the department of transportation.

And so I just want to say thank you, all the lights that we put in on central, all of the hawk lights, striping, lowering speed, all the things have amounted to finally over the last two years, a drop in pedestrian deaths.

And so 2023, we're at 108, 2024, 94.

Um, and so we're seeing that um go down.

That's been in the news recently, and so I just want to say thank you to the DMD folks that help us do all the things I'm pointing to my buddies over there too.

Um, because that for me and my district is it's saving lives, and I know it adds cost to our budget, but it is saving lives, and so I just want to say thank you to the entire department.

Um, we still have work to do, and we're um applying for grants and doing a lot of collaborative work, and so I just want to say I'm so grateful to you, your department, all the folks doing the work, and Counselor Grout for the collaboration because it's working, it is saving lives, and that is what we're supposed to do.

Lessen suffering, and that's what I think we should be doing with our tax dollars.

So thank you, thank you, thank you.

I just cannot say thank you enough, and I know we're gonna continue to see those drop.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, counselor.

I have just a couple of questions.

Are you staffed adequately?

Um, Madam Chair.

So we have a number of vacancies in my department, as I alluded to, and so um my first priority is honestly filling all of those positions because we have had to get creative and and kind of re-prioritize things to get all the work that needs to be done done.

Um, so again, first priority is filling those positions.

Um I think once all they're all filled, then that would be a time for another conversation of where we could use some extra help in some of those.

I know several of you will probably say crack sealing to me.

Uh, it's one of the number one requests that I get, and rightfully so.

Um, and so uh yes, I I probably could always use some cock sealing positions, but I also know that this is a tough budget year, and so I'm also mindful of how that would impact the other departments.

Um, I did uh deactivate seven positions, and so like uh every department will tell you those were um painful cuts.

I think they were the least painful cuts that my department could do.

Um, but they are, you know, obviously losing any positions.

I lost, for example, a deputy, which means I think I'm doing like three jobs right now, so uh and there were many other other six other positions as well.

So um, yes, there were cuts, there were challenges, but um I am optimistic about this budget being able to fill some of those vacancies.

Thank you, Director.

How many positions do you have vacant right now?

Um, Madam Chair, so when we submitted the our lit our vacancy list on March 1st to you, there was 35 positions listed, minus um the seven that are deactivated.

So that's 28.

Um since then we've lost a few additional provisions, so that number would be higher, but we actually have a number of positions posted right now.

So if you know any engineers or other street maintenance workers, I encourage them all to apply.

Um, and so but that's a typical vacancy rate for us is you know around that 30, 30 positions mark.

Thank you.

How long do they typically stay vacant?

How long have those positions been vacant?

Um Madam Chair, Counselor Grout.

Um it depends here, and I actually think I might have some numbers on here.

Um so it depends on the position.

So, for example, our street maintenance positions, we can fill those, like they're advertised.

We have applicants tomorrow.

Some of our engineer positions, those are in, you know, up to like a hundred days for because those are much harder to fill positions.

Um, so it really depends, it depends on the position.

Um, ideally, we'd like to keep this these numbers as small as possible.

Um, but I again it depends on the position in question.

Thank you.

Um the increase to the Dalkia contract uh 2.4 million.

What is that increase?

What does that get us?

Um, I know that we've had a huge problem with copper theft.

Um I'm going to ask your department to get me a list over the last five years of the how much we've spent on copper repair through the Del Kio.

You don't need that tonight, but I'm gonna want that.

But what is the 2.4 increase for?

Um, Madam Chair, so every time we add a light, it costs five dollars per light per month.

That's new lights.

So a lot of those um increases are associated with simply the fact that we continue to add new lights to the city, um, and there are also increased costs associated with as time goes on, it takes more time, it takes more money, more resources to um uh operate and maintain those lights, so those as well.

Um, and then I I have actually our vandalism numbers for the last five years.

So we are happy to provide those to you.

Thank you.

Um, thank you very much.

Counselor Bassan, Madam Chair, I this is not really a targeted question to Director Turner, but you reminded me when you were asking about vacancies.

Uh, just something that I had asked staff to start making sure to ask, and I'd like to make sure to notify the administration as well that when we're talking about vacancies and how long they've been vacant, we've been asking this question for years, and I think that it dawned on me this last week during the briefing that we need to start also trying to get the information of how many applications have come through for those vacancies because I think that might be beneficial when it comes to figuring out what we're looking at with.

I mean, a vacant position that's there for four years with no applications.

There's a different issue there.

But if we've had a vacant position and there's been six applications, what is that reason for a continued vacancy?

And so I guess I'm just gonna take a quick second just to ask the administration if you all can maybe start providing us that information as well, and again, not be surprised when staff also circles back with you on it later because it's something that I think might be a new metric that we should kind of marry the two concepts together.

Thank you, Counselor.

I think that's a great idea.

Um Madam Chair, Council Counselor, or Madam CFO.

Oh, sorry, um, Madam Chair and Counselor Basson, yes, we can provide that.

The one point of clarification though is as I mentioned in the past, the administration was holding positions vacant for prudent program, and so those ones would not have been advertised and therefore had applicants.

So there will be some um, but again, as the city council has requested, we are deactivating many of those.

So moving forward, it shouldn't be as as complicated.

Perfect, madam chair, and I I completely understand that.

And then I mean I guess if there is, or you know, if that one's one of the I know that's being deactivated, but if for some reason something comes up along the way that ends up saying this is a new, hopefully not, but a new prudent program, whatever it may be, just maybe add that in there.

This is vacant because I think that it's really gonna be telling for us to find out.

Are people applying to the city of Albuquerque?

Do we have to refine some of the other approaches for our HR process or for the application or advertising process?

I mean, this might be a nice metric, I hope, to be able to reevaluate that so that we can have more people apply and get hired to fill a lot of these vacancies.

Thank you.

I think that's a great great suggestion, and we should probably add it to our objectives, Bill, right?

Thank you.

Thank you, Director.

Thank you, Mr.

Noel.

Planning is next.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

With planning, we have Alan Varela as director.

They have their budget for the proposed.

I'm sorry, their FY27 proposed general fund budget is 24.7 million.

They have 194 general fund positions.

The budget is a 1.1 million dollar increase over the FY26 original budget.

There is an additional 100,000 included for certified building official specialty pay per approved memorandum of agreement.

And it includes three new positions that were created in accordance with legislation R2025-045, which allocated 450,000 dollars to improve timelines and permitting efficiency.

And Director Varilla is here for questions.

Thank you.

Good evening, Director.

Good evening.

Counselor Lewis has a question for you.

Were you gonna say anything before director?

I don't know if you had something prepared to before I asked.

Okay, no worries.

We'll just jump right.

It's a pleasure to be here, and I'm uh here to answer your questions as best as possible.

I have some of my top-level subject matter experts in case I don't have some particular details, and we'll try to get those to you tonight.

If not, we'll follow up like we always do.

Sure.

Thanks.

Um just uh, you know, director, you're you got some fee increases, and you you guys are still acknowledging that staffing remains a bottleneck for you.

Um, so I guess a couple things.

How much additional revenue you feel like those fee increases are generating?

And uh, I want to relate it to a faster turnaround.

I mean, how how do you how do you expect that to translate into faster turnaround on permitting?

That's a great question, and perhaps the slide that should have been up wasn't put back up, but if we could please put that back up showing the improvement on the turnaround for permitting, I greatly appreciate it.

There's your answer right there, counselor.

We've reduced permitting speeds by 70% over the last two years, in large part, thank you personally to you and professionally to you for the extra money that you provided to us last year during after the main budget process.

I told you that with that 450,000, I would be adding some very important plan review staff.

Uh those are experts that have to review hundreds and sometimes thousands of pages of codes, compare them with plans, provide guidance to applicants, and then provide uh meaningful requests for technical corrections and comments.

We did add that.

We also took a little bit of the money and enhanced the uh one of the features for ABQ plan, that's our software system.

And as a result of that, we've cut our processing time down now by 70 percent.

Um I'm a person who really pays attention to performance measures and our performance measures.

You will see that our plan review time has gone way down, but that's an output measure.

I like outcome measures uh just as much, if not more.

And if you look at the outcomes, you're gonna see that our uh numbers for average turnaround time for commercial permits as well as whether it's a residential have dropped by that over 70 percent.

Uh I we went and made special effort to make those uh measures true and reliable.

I had found when I got to the department that for some reason the measures on turnaround times were skipping what I call the limbo time, which is from the time when the applicant submits their application to when a plan reviewer has it in their queue.

That was sometimes taken days and sometimes months.

I added that time into the calculation.

So what you see here with a 70% reduction is an actual valid outcome measure from adding those staff.

What is that turnaround time today?

That turnaround time today, and if we'll go to the performance measures.

So if we go to performance measures for building permits, the average turnaround time for residential permit issuance and days in FY24.

When I got to the department, it was 40 days.

Uh we're now down to 12 days.

Okay.

And for average turnaround time for commercial permit issuance and days.

When I arrived at the department in FY24, it was 98.

We're down now to 27.

That's our average.

So that's that's the average it could raise.

The average, that's exactly right.

There are outliers.

We do have the occasional person who is turns in a perfect application, and it's faster.

And we have those people who are very unfamiliar with apparently building codes, and uh we have to hold their hand and sometimes have five or six series of plan reviews with them.

When we get to their third review, we call them up, we bring them in, and we actually will sit down with them.

And I've been in some of those meetings to make sure they understand what corrections are needed.

We're seeing fewer and fewer of those though, uh, but uh still those averages are real averages.

Okay.

I I also want to add, uh, counselor Lewis, that I have heard other states say that uh you know they're so much faster.

I've investigated that very, very carefully.

I uh I've learned that uh we're now just about the fastest anywhere.

I met with somebody today who uh is actually uh uh contractor and engineer who does insurance work all across the country, and he was telling me that Albuquerque is the fastest that he knows of in any of the states that he does business in, he does business in over 20 states.

Okay.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I think it's my that's my uh four minutes for this department.

Thank you very much.

Council Lewis.

Uh counselor, Councillor Rogers, four minutes.

I got it.

All right, thank you.

Thank you, Director.

Just a quick question.

Because I'm always asking what's the goal.

So I see that what is the department goal for processing time.

Like what are you achieving aiming for?

Because that's always my pet peeve because objectives never have the goal.

And so I know if we're getting.

And council chair and and counselor Rogers, or I should say committee chair.

I I have a dream that we make fast tracks, which is a guaranteed uh processing time, probably time of 10 days or less, and a lot of large projects they want that guarantee, even though we're usually faster than that anyway.

My goal is to make that obsolete.

That's that's one goal.

The other one is I want Albuquerque known uh, which it is now I want it sustained as the fastest permitting jurisdiction, certainly within New Mexico and within the region.

I am like everybody else, um, fully acknowledging that places like Utah, Texas, Arizona, Colorado to some degree have much better economies than we do, and a reputation for doing things so much better.

There is nothing they have intellectually that we do not have right here in Albuquerque, and we're making darn sure that we're going to show show them up.

Yeah, thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and I appreciate that.

I've I've long before we were both at the city, we were with Quality New Mexico.

So I appreciate the the difference between outcome measures and process measures.

Very different numbers, and and uh outcome measures is I think what we're really focused on here.

And so I just appreciate that you're thinking about that in your department, and I just would hope that we can reflect that also here so we know what the goals are because I know you have them.

And I think we I agree we have the talent, we have the wherewithal.

But I have a question just like my last question to keep the four minutes, is um around the ABQ, the new software.

And so I remember from mid-year cleanup, there was some software needs to finish the build out.

Have we have we short all that up?

Like, it's completely built out to all the mechanisms that help staff make their work more efficient and faster, or do we still have some needs there for technology?

And uh committee chair and counselor, we have completed the build out in February of this year.

We celebrated the one-year anniversary from the initial launch.

Uh, we spent that year learning even more than we did during the uh the the year of due diligence prior to that, how to go through and modify the system.

The advantage of this system is that we can modify it and improve it ourselves.

Uh over the course of the last year, and really now it's about 17 months.

We have made 190 modifications ourselves.

So when somebody calls me and says people are confused because X, Y, and Z either goes to a dead end or the terminology is not clear, we go in and we can fix that now.

And so we've done that.

So the answer is yes.

Now, will there be future improvements that will be costing money?

The answer to that is also yes.

One of the reasons that we went with that technology, which we have branded locally as ABQ plan, is because you can add on artificial intelligence features to it as those capabilities evolve out there in the marketplace.

Um, we we are going to be on the leading edge, not the bleeding edge of that.

We have had some people say, oh my goodness, uh Hawaii just went fully AI with their permitting system.

Well, the fellow that I met with today who does business out there tells me it's taking them up to a year to get a permit.

So we knew when we studied that, and it was for residential only that it was uh untested, it was um limited in what we would need, and it just wouldn't meet our and the pricing was absolutely out of this world, ridiculous.

But we'll continue to study that.

We're gonna be continuing to add that on as time goes by.

Thank you, Madam Chair, thank you, Director.

Thank you.

I have just a couple of questions about the senior code enforcement specialist that was cut, our offices get lots of calls for um weeds, litters, um, buildings they think need direct um help.

How how big will this budget cut be to that service that we have?

Every department doesn't have a whole lot of fat, as you guys all know.

Uh we have a department that uh was not firing all cylinders, and it now is, and so every position that's held, and in that case, it was held for uh prudent savings uh purposes.

It wasn't actually deactivated on the deactivation list, um, but it uh it does have an impact.

It does have an impact.

Uh my goal during the once the dust settles from the budget process here is I will go through and I will analyze uh which positions uh we can actually go through and rearrange and fund, and uh and so you'll see me coming back during fall cleanup to possibly reactivate some of the deactivate positions and to take the hold off those positions that have been held to meet the prudent program savings.

Thank you.

I um you know you have made great improvement to services to the to our constituents, and so some of these cuts I think would take us backwards, and I don't want that to happen.

Um, construction examiners.

We hear when people are doing their their remodels or whatever, and they have to wait for an examiner to come look, you know, make sure that the planning that the the um electrical is done right so they can move on.

Is that what this position is for construction examiner?

What is that?

And and council uh committee chair, I'm so glad you asked that.

You're talking about inspectors.

Uh-huh.

Inspectors.

We uh we are the fastest inspection jurisdiction within New Mexico, nine over 98% of our inspections are conducted within one business day of when they're called for.

Very good.

And that includes electrical.

Now, electrical, as you all may remember, approximately a year ago, we took a big hit because our competitors, the county, uh Rio Rancho, and the state radically increased their salaries for electrical inspectors.

I commissioned and got permission from the 11th floor uh for a very a special out-of-sequence uh salary study just for our inspectors, and then we went through and we found the money and we gave all our inspectors a healthy raise, and that problem went away.

Within six months, some of those inspectors came back and we filled the rest of the vacant positions.

Thank you.

That's great.

Good job.

Yeah, thank you.

Good job.

Um, board-ups for adapt non, um, you've got some money in in the budget.

Is that enough?

And uh council, uh I mean committee chair, it's adequate, it's adequate.

The we find the money when we have to find the money.

The challenge with board-ups and with demolitions and such is although we have some track record that we can use to predict the future, it is not always possible to predict the future.

A demolition, for example, on a house is going to run about $30,000.

Uh, a year ago, we went in the hole because there was a commercial property that had to be demolished, and that ran over $100,000.

Okay, yes, I understand.

And we we um don't want buildings to be dangerous, um housing or or built commercial buildings, so we need to make sure that we have enough to take care of that to keep us safe.

Thank you.

Any other question?

Counselor Lewis.

Madam Chair, thanks.

Yeah, um, so director, I ran your claims about uh permitting through AI, and uh it's it you're pretty accurate.

Good job.

So, for the most part, I think it's been reading your press releases, but but uh it also talks about the reality on the ground and um and uh so I think it's more than just your press releases, and uh and there is there is some there is some uh uh real uh you know data, obviously, to um to the to the increase and to the just the the you know the the quicker permitting and and that so anyway thanks thanks so much.

Great job.

Thanks for implementing some of those things that that were put into place last year, and you know, certainly can see some improvements there.

So thank you.

Thank you again.

Counselor Teyas, four minutes.

Thank you, manager.

I only have one question.

I am just curious about the turnaround time for the permitting.

Um, does the average does that um does the average that you calculated for the improvements?

Did that include um just normal applications, or did it also include the fast track when you did your calculation?

And counselor Tayos, that's uh that's a great question.

I have my uh data team here, and fast track is like I can say this, and uh committee chair, fast tracks is a small percentage of the overall, so I don't think it would affect it all that much, but let me find out.

I have Angelo Metzger here who is helping lead that effort.

And and the answer is it's the entire universe of our permits, so it includes fast tracks.

Now, the good news perhaps is that even when our numbers were lousy, it included fast track set.

So one thing that you learn in this world is although your yardstick may not be perfect, don't change yardsticks if you're trying to compare one year to another year to another year, right?

Well, I wanted to thank you for confirming.

Can we um get the information calculated without the fast track so we can have more of a normal sample to kind of understand um what that that looks like um from that?

Because I I understand that the fast track was a two-year pilot, and so that was approved.

We recently extended it back in April, right?

Is it the same process is two different things?

And uh oh great committee chair and and uh counselor Teas.

You're talking about the fast housing program, which prioritized housing.

Um anything that was gonna add new housing within certain areas of town.

That's different from the fast tracks program.

The fast tracks program is available to anybody anywhere in the city who wants to pay extra in order to have a guaranteed turnaround time for their plan review processing.

The fasting the recent resolution that we extended is different, and and counselor Teas and committee chair, yes, those uh they overlap to some degree because we took the fast housing projects when they were identified as qualifying for fast tracks treatment without an extra charge, and we ran them through the fast tracks program.

Okay, but they are but they are different, however, you made me think of what I think is a really good idea prompted by what you said, which is I'd like to separate those out anyway, because since my goal is to compare fast track speed with non-fast track speed, we should be doing that anyway.

Yes, thank you, because that's really what I'm curious about, and I think it's an important um sort of accountability and metric point, right?

So that we can understand how the expedited permits are included in the overall ad average and how you know it it affects the prioritizing of certain permits overall and help with those outcomes that we were talking about, right?

The outputs versus the outcomes.

So that's really I think a critical thing that I would like to see, um, and maybe we can get those calculations if possible.

I would like to see that.

Um I I'm just also curious how much um revenue um is do we generally lose out on because of now.

I'm going to the fast track pilot conversation.

So um the one that we just extended again.

Um do you know how much revenue we um um lost to that in those two years?

And uh committee chair and counselor, we know the number of permits that were processed through that.

Uh we can go through and look at the valuations on those, and then we can calculate if they would have paid for fast tracks, how much more that would have cost.

We do not know that they would have paid for fast tracks.

That's a big presumption, so I do not think it would be candid of me to come in and say we lost a million dollars when we may have only lost a hundred thousand dollars.

And that's totally fair, and I think that's another one of those metrics that we can build into our um outputs versus outcomes measure measurements, um, depending on how many of those um applications were submitted through that pilot program, um, doing a survey to say if this wasn't available, would you have paid?

And that'll help us understand um I think how it you know helped or didn't help, or um, on different aspects.

So that would be super helpful.

I appreciate it.

Maybe we can tie that into the reporting um requirements since we just extended that um two-year pilot so we can see what that looks like in two years.

Thank you, counselor.

Thank you, thank you, Director.

I think we have some hungry bellies.

So we're gonna take a break.

Um let's uh come back at it's 7 38.

Let's be back at 8 05.

Okay.

Thank you.

Are we live?

We're live?

Okay, okay, we're back from our break.

Um, I hope everybody enjoyed their real quick break.

Our next, let's see, Mr.

Noel is there.

Uh, general services is your next department, sir.

Yes.

Duran is the director of general services.

Their FY27 proposed general fund budget is $22.4 million with 174 general fund positions.

Their other funds budget is 20 22 million, excuse me, with 87 positions.

They have the one they have 1.1 million dollars in their budget, consisting of savings from deactivating 12 positions.

$345,000 is set aside for raises for metro security.

And the city county facilities fund, fund 290 has been consolidated into the general fund along with three positions and 636,000 dollars in budget.

And Director Duran is rolling down right now.

Good evening, Director.

This is a new position for you.

It is a new position.

Welcome.

No one told me there was an initiation process.

But that was quite the quite the entry.

Welcome.

How are you this evening?

I'm doing good, thanks.

Okay.

Counselors, do you have any questions?

Counselor Champagne.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um it says in here that there is budget cut of 12 personnel for 1.1 million.

Correct.

Uh how long were the positions open for?

Um, Madam Chair, uh Councilman Champaign.

Um, some of them were open for a little while.

Security positions, that's why we got open for a while.

Okay.

Um they were security positions.

We cut those positions to be able to we're having some issues with retention and security.

So we decided to cut those five security positions and offer raises to our metro security officers and our metro sergeants in order to retain them.

So we were having, and I'm I apologize I'm out of breath.

I was wheeling fast.

You didn't roll, you didn't run.

So it's not as easy to control these things.

Um so we were having issues retaining, and we made the decision that we're having a hard time filling them.

Let's just cut these positions, retain some positions, um, and we can compete with uh transit security officers, because that's where my good officers were going.

They were um making the jump to go to better paying positions.

So we decided to try to retain them by cutting those positions and then offering uh we'll use those savings for uh increases for the metro security officers and metro sergeants.

So when you say a while, what are what's a while to you?

So we have some metro security officer positions.

I can pull it up for you really quick.

Uh so we had some metro security officer positions that were vacant for uh the longest is 283 days, and then you have 253 days, 205 days, uh, but then you also have one that is 33 days.

Okay, thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Director.

Thank you.

Counselors, any other questions?

Counselor Rogers.

Thank you, Madam Chair, hello director.

Congratulations.

Um, I just had a question around the consolidation of fund 290.

Um, I'm understanding that that's a city county fund that when we both shared city hall to do building maintenance, and I know that we have one building, the LEC building that is still shared.

So can you talk to me about the revenues like eliminating that and what are the implications?

Is any money for the county?

Is it all a lot?

Like what how do we dissolve that?

Madam Chair and Council Counselor Rogers.

So 290 was uh fund that was put together for uh, like you said, the purpose of running the LEC.

The problem that we had, and we were trying to figure out why the 290 fund was created in the first place because the city's actually spending more money than Burnley Oak County.

It is sort of Burnley County money, it's kind of an internal fund.

We make the the facility upgrades, we do the fixing, and then we invoice them.

So they they did give us money, but in the long run, we ended up spending more spending more money than the county did.

So we just decided it was easier for us to track and put it in general fund like we track all the other funds.

Thank you madam chair so there the money that's in the fund that we're going to be uh eliminating that's all city money no county money that in other words that there's no split that needs to happen while we dissolve that's all madam chair and councilmember rogers no councilwoman rogers no the 136 that's in there is projected for FY26 that's what's gonna be left but that is going to be our money and it will be spent by well we hope by the end of the fiscal year.

Thank you madam chair I think that's all my questions.

Thank you Miss Director thank you before we go to the next department I'd like to ask uh director Ramirez to answer a few questions.

Director thank you for being here this evening and your team thank you sir.

Mr Director it it appears that the funding for the gateway system is outlined in communication between the CAO and Sarita Secretary Sarita Nayer was not included in the fiscal 20 fiscal year 27 budget why not sir the administration.

As we spoke last week I think frankly there was a drop in communication when we had critical individuals leave our administration in the middle of the budget.

Okay so when I read this um email or the letter that you all sent December 31st to the secretary that was from the CAO.

Madam Chair that that is correct and all of the actions that are outlined in that memo did occur and then some however the money did not get placed in uh triple H's budget.

But the um the person that you said left was um not included in this budget like they didn't have anything to do with the budget planning so let's move on miss uh director what is the total cost to operate gateway for 12 months madam chair the gateway system which is inclusive of and I'll go over all the programs your quick answer is 35 million uh 15,683 dollars that is inclusive of Gateway West operations the case management contract it is also inclusive of men's housing and treatment navigation women's housing treatment navigation first responding receiving area shared cost for the operations medical respite medical solvering gateway recovery gateway family and also gateway family lease or the licensing for the hotel okay would you repeat that 35 million?

15,68300 or 683 dollars.1563 okay thank you okay thank you for that um before you got here CFO Martinez stated that this uh would not be enough to operate gateway for 12 months but she said it would fund the first part of the year could you please clarify what first part of the year means.

Madam Chair that reference is specific to I believe the offset of the state funding that we received roughly the 16 million dollars in fuse for certain programs that uh open or began um so the proposed technical adjustment that I believe is being submitted for just over six million dollars uh would be a portion for us to be able to uh go into contracting with our current um providers and then with the actual accountant drawdown really get a better snapshot for that by the mid year and then do that projection for the backfield meter, which we are estimating projected to be about nine million.

Nine.

No, nine.

How do you intend to make that uh make up that shortfall?

I'm sorry what I think you intend to make up that shortfall?

Um, madam chair, we would be closely monitoring the budget for the next six months and be making determinations of where that funding will come from.

Will you be asking departments to um find vacancy safe, you know, to hold back positions that are vacant?

Um, madam chair.

Are you talking about ones that will be left after we deactivate the positions you requested us to deactivate?

Yeah, um it's dependent.

I mean, I think we'll be closely monitoring the spend downs of all of our departments.

How much do you um do you anticipate requesting from council at the mid-year cleanup?

You already said nine million, so sorry about that.

Okay, is this six million increase to uh triple H's budget enough to satisfy the requirements for matching funding from the state?

Madam Chair, it's not the total cost, it's a portion of it as projected that we may need with the remainder, of course, as I said, uh, to be made up at mid-year.

So the answer is the six million, does it meet the total sixteen million?

No, ma'am.

No, okay, all right.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Okay.

Okay, let's move on now.

Thank you for being here this evening.

Let's move on to environmental health, Mr.

Noel.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Environmental health has Director Paul Rogers.

Uh their FY27 proposed general fund budget is 5.4 million.

They have 39 general fund positions.

They also have the air quality fund at 5.4 million with 33 positions and 15 grant positions.

The budget proposed the proposed budget realigns operational functions from general fund to the air quality fund and transfers 163,000 to fund 242, the air quality fund for salary adjustments and a realignment of 305,000 in funding for sustainability positions.

It also includes or fund 242 also includes an overall increase of 242,000 or 4.7% above the FY26 original budget.

And Director Rogers is here for questions.

Good evening, Director.

Thank you for being here.

Good evening, Madam Chair.

Thank you.

Counselor February.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks for being here, Director.

Um, I just noted that we were reducing the Tyler Tech contract, but in a lot of the materials that were provided, you know, that contract has really helped us with efficiencies and moving forward.

So can you just talk about the reduction in that contract and how much the reduction was for and what specifically is being reduced?

Madam Chair and Counselor February, could you repeat which contract that was?

The Tyler Tech.

The Tyler, we have implemented it on the uh consumer health side of the department.

We have suspended at this point and are analyzing how we're going to use it on the air quality side of the department.

So that's represents that deduction at this point in time.

Okay, thank you, madam chair.

So it's a reduction for the air quality side of the software, but the um but the other the part that's already in existence is not being reduced, madam chair, council feeble corn, that is correct.

Okay, thank you.

Counselor's yes, counselor champagne.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'll ask you the same thing I asked the last one.

You're cutting it by you're cutting it by the personnel by two people, correct?

Madam Chair, Councilor Champagne.

That is correct, and we are reallocating some others.

Okay.

And of the two positions that you cut, how long were they vacant for?

One of the positions is the accounting assistant.

I'm sorry, Madam Chair, Councilor Champagne.

One of the positions was an accounting assistant that has been vacant for 439 days from when we submitted the paperwork for the budget, and most of that time was due to prudent program savings.

I think he's looking for the second position.

There was only one, Madam Chair.

Madam Chair, Councillor Champagne, that would be the um cannabis inspection of field operations officer that was assigned to our consumer health protection division.

How long was that open for?

That uh Madam Chair, Counselor Champagne, that would have been empty since last fall, vacant since last fall when the person that had been occupying that position retired.

So, 365 days is a good general number.

Madam Chair Council for Champagne.

I'm sorry for the delay.

No, no, she retired at the end of the year, so it's been four months.

Four months, perfect.

Thank you, manager.

Thank you, Director.

Any other questions, counselors?

Thank you.

Thank you, Director.

Thank you.

Okay, let's move on to transit.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Transit has Leslie Leslie Keener, director.

Their FY27 proposed operating budget is 62.7 million with 488 positions.

The budget includes recurring support from the general fund to support the operations of the department.

It also has a $3.8 million budget savings from deactivating 52 positions, leaving over 100 vacant positions available.

And Director Keener is here for questions.

Good evening, Director.

Thank you for being here.

Councillor People Corn.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks for being here.

Director Keener.

I just have I think you heard there's a lot of concern.

I share that concern.

I share the dismay that the proposal that was given to us drastically reduces funding for transit, which is a basic service that the city must provide.

So I just wanted to ask you for a couple of numbers.

I've said this a lot quite a few times to many of my colleagues.

I think that we have way too many empty positions for drivers and for mechanics, and I think we have those because we don't pay enough.

And I think that the class and comp study was great.

It looked at lots of different places around the world, but it didn't look at Bernalio County and Rio Metro, which are right down the street.

And we can we can lose people to those two, and we do all the time.

So I would love it if you could talk me through how much you think your drivers and mechanics need in pay increases to be competitive in this market.

Um Madam Chair and Council of People Corn, um, first I just want to say uh give a shout out to the transit department and just thank the staff, the public servants that we have for all the hard work that they do.

I mean it truly is an amazing department, and I think we've been able to do some really great things here over the last year.

And then also just the people that that spoke on behalf of public transit for for coming out and showing support.

And I've got to say, like it really warms my heart because I have not sat through meetings like this where I have had such positive talk about transit, and it just really means a lot.

So thank you to everyone there.

Um to your question uh about pay.

I I do think that um that's particularly our mechanics are on the lower end of the pay scale right now, and we have seen that as an issue of trying to get experienced mechanics, particularly on our mechanic three position.

Um we have over what, 20, vacant?

16, 16 on the mechanic three.

We have 16 um mechanic three positions that that are currently vacant, um, which is a big deal for us.

Obviously, if we we can't keep up with the bus maintenance, then we can't meet light up and we can't continue to grow our plans.

So that in particular is really important.

And the mechanics also do work across other departments within the city.

So they're not just transit mechanics, mechanic threes are also in solid waste and in other departments.

So you know what we choose to do affects those other departments as well.

Um they are in negotiations right now.

Um so I don't know how much I can actually speak to to the pay.

Um, I do know that we do have 685,000.

That's in the budget summary that's for negotiations for frontline employees.

I think that would likely be enough to cover the mechanics, but I do not think that would be enough to do an increase in pay for for our drivers at this time.

Um, and it was um for every what $165,000.

For every $1,685,000 we would need for a pay increase for our drivers.

I'm sorry, repeat that number.

For one dollar that we would add to their current pay, we would need an additional six hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars.

Thank you.

That is that is the number I was looking for.

Thank you.

Um, and then one more question, madam chair.

Um I note on the slides that we were provided tonight, it says there's no reduction in current services proposed.

The department will be able to proceed with ABQ ride forward plan implementation service changes in FY27.

And I think I'm not doubting that that is a true statement, but I do have very large concerns about implementation of ABQ ride forward in 20 in FY28.

And I would love to think through how many positions do we need to authorize this year, even if it's in the second part of the year, so that you can continue ramping up staff so that we're ready in 2028 to continue that.

We need a lot more drivers to implement FY28 plans for ABQ ride forward.

Uh Madam Chair and Council People Corn.

Yes, so currently we have 150 drivers that um that we have working for ABQ.

These are MCO drivers, so um I'm speaking particularly to that because that applies to forward, not our paratransit drivers.

Um we did have a really great session of interviews.

I I just we've just turned over on our HR department, so we had a little bit of a dead time here for about a month and a half when we weren't ringing on drivers, but we had a very um very good interview session today, actually, in which we've extended about 20 offers for employment to for MCO drivers.

So that would take us back up to about where we were in February.

We had 165 drivers that that were on board.

Um so that's really good for us, right?

I mean, that gets us um about a plus 30, maybe plus 40 when we hit the fiscal year over last year.

Um to get to fiscal year 27 and be able to implement at the phases of forward that we would like to implement there, we would need to have up to 164 or 199 drivers, which is what we would have still allotted as vacancies to be able to fill up to that number, even with the 52 cuts.

Um, and I do want to note that the 52 vacancies that were cut are not all driver positions.

So that was only 34 were driver MCO positions.

Um, and the year prior for our prudent program savings, we were holding back 31 MCO positions at that point in time.

So for we'll be sitting pretty good, I think, as we go into fiscal year 27.

Um we we figured we needed to add about 35 drivers to get into fiscal year 27.

Um, but again, if we're and that would get us to 199 drivers to start implementing into fiscal year 28, we're figuring we would need about 29 drivers for the phases throughout that.

So, I mean, even if we could get 15 drivers, that would allow us to then build into fiscal year 28.

But we would need 29 drivers as we went into that.

Now, again, the mechanics is is a key part to that too.

So we could have all the drivers we want.

If we can't get the the mechanics into the shops and starting to work on that, that's when we'll start to see some struggles and not being able to proceed with the plan.

And for that, I would say we still need to build up on on our mechanics side.

We've probably got about 11 mechanics that we would we would need to add.

Thank you, madam chair.

So I just want to make sure I got the numbers right.

Um for fiscal year 2027, we are set for fiscal year 2028 for drivers.

We would need 29 more, so it would be helpful if we got 15 more released this year so that you can continue ramping up.

And then for mechanics, we would need to add 11 positions in 2027 and or 2028 to get us to the full implementation of ABQ RAD forward.

Well, let me take that back because we do the Madam Chair and Council People Corn, let me take that back because let me look at the needs here.

So let me go back to that statement.

So the knee is 15 more driver positions and preparation for five more mechanics in 2028.

Yes, uh Madam Chair and Council People Corn, and the five would be for the entire year.

So even if we got one or two mechanics, we we would be okay to continue the rollouts into 28.

Okay, thank you very much.

Thank you, Counselor.

Any other questions?

Counselor Rogers.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Hi, Director.

Thanks for being here.

I just have a couple of follow-up questions about the network.

Um, and I'm gonna ask Garrett to pull up a chart that one of our constituents did, um, who just it really for me put into perspective the pre-pandemic numbers versus the post.

If you just go down to the first chart there, when I saw this, it really put it into perspective the drop-off in services post pandemic to now.

And so I just wanted to show that because and this is just just straight from pulled from our data and visualized in a different way, that shows the level of service.

Even if you look at I think that's 2021, right in the middle where the at the red line it kind of tips to the red line there.

That's 2021.

And look how much services we've dropped down till now January 2026.

And so this helped me visualize the services as a whole, which is hard to visualize.

Um, and so I really appreciate Carlos Michelin and the audience for um really taking the time to visualize the data in a way that we could digest.

Um, and so I also, and I'm sorry, Garrett, I didn't send it to you, but in our packets for, and you can take that down, thank you, Garrett.

Um, you know, Jeff Hertz is our transit guide at council services that really dug into the recovery network, and his just based on the network and the and I think your department may have um provided this table, which I think you were reading off for counselor feeble corn.

Okay, um, you know, FY28, you said 29, and you gave us the cost of 1.7 million.

Uh FY29, 28 with 1.7 million there, and then uh FY30 with four with 244,000.

And so my question for you is is similar to counselor feeble corn.

If we were able to just put half of the positions back, how many vacancies do you currently have for drivers and mechanics?

Separate from these ones that are that are that are proposed to be cut, madam chair and counselor rogers.

Um, yes, so we currently have uh 50.

Well, if we're talking about with the positions that are going to be deactivated, we currently have about 49 positions that are vacant for MCOs.

So that would get us up to that 199 number for um for or is it for fiscal year 27 that we're trying to get to?

And then we currently have uh 16 mechanic one vacancies, but this mechanics chart's a little bit misleading or mechanic three vacancies.

The mechanics charts a little misleading because it does include mechanic helpers, uh, mechanic twos and mechanic threes, which I believe we have um more like uh 2022 vacant 23 vacancies.

I think for for all those together.

Okay, thank you.

So so are do you feel confident we can hire to those this year?

Uh Madam Chair and Councilor Rogers, I'm very optimistic, just given the fact that we've been able to, like I said, I think we'll finish the year with an increase of drivers around 30.

Um, that's we haven't been able to do that in several years.

Um so we'd still have to fill 50 driver positions over the next year.

I think we can do it.

Our our staff has a pretty good pattern that they're going through right now and how they're scheduling stuff and getting people in on an every two-week basis so that we have a class every two weeks.

Like I said, we've been able to have drivers in the classes over the past year in every class, except like the last month and a half, because I had that little bump where I was having to retrain some HR staff.

It's the mechanics again that I am a little bit nervous on.

And you know, we have had a maintenance tech that we've had over at Ken Sanchez to help us keep up with with these, but it is at four times the cost of our mechanics.

So I'd much rather be able to bring on our mechanics in-house so that they could support this instead of having to contract that workout.

But at some point, I mean, even the maintenance text that we have, we've tried to ask and get another one, and they don't have the ability to staff up either.

Okay, thank you.

Um I think my question next is just about what are what do you think the barriers are besides pay to the retention of drivers?

Um Madam Chair and Councilor Rogers, I I think we've actually done a really good job with retention this year.

Um, you know, a lot of uh the issues that we've seen have either been discipline related or they have been just retirements that we've had.

Um we have had a couple drivers leave, but they've left to do other things, not actually to use their CDL driver.

We've had some that have gone to Amazon and aren't using their CDL right now.

So I think we've done really good with that, and a lot of that I really believe has to do with just the changes that we've been implementing and making to the culture of the transit department, and then also just the safety enhancements that we've had out there too with the transit safety officers, and you know, I I hear that from staff that they feel much more supported out there.

Um, and and then also just listening and getting feedback and making changes in real time.

I think one of the simple the most simplistic things that that the team has done over at Ken Sanchez is just put up some whiteboards in the driver's lounge, and they are able to just write down any questions that they have as they they come in and out during the day and will answer the questions every you know 24 48 hours, they wipe it down and they start over again.

So people are able to get those responses to the concerns that they're having in a much more real-time fashion.

Same thing with safety and security.

You know, we have a system map that is out there that they can actually you know mark notes on for us so that we can help in the deployment of our resources as well.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair, and I'm glad you brought up safety and security because that's the next question.

I see that we're spending 5.4 million dollars on security, whether that's metro, APD transit, shimmel.

I'm not a favorite of shimmels.

Um, but um what are your thoughts around actually using some of that money on a true paid ambassador program, similar to what we've talked about, where we have violence interrupters that are trained, like in all the de-escalation.

They are trained in security type measures, they're also customer service customer service agents.

I know we have the ambassador volunteers, um, but personally, I feel like we could use some of the security money.

Implement that type of a true violence interrupter ambassador program and save some money.

So, can you talk to me about your thoughts?

I know we've talked about this a lot, so just wondering if you've put any more thought to that instead of spending five point four million dollars on security services outside of, I mean, only 1.9 of that is our internal um APD.

So, yeah, Madam Chair and Council Rogers, I think that's a great question.

I mean, we talk about um transit safety and security.

We've been talking about it for a long time since since I've been in this role.

And um, you know, ultimately the safety and security, the long-range implementation plan that we had is the reason why we have the transit safety officers, and that's our ultimate goal is actually to get away from using the contracted security and putting that money over to APD TSOs.

Um, we have 1.3 million dollars that we currently have that we're using towards contracted security that we are planning on moving over to APD for TSOs as they can staff up.

Um they currently have 27 budgeted positions for TSOs and three uh transit safety sergeants that they have.

All three of the sergeants are full.

They have 20 of the TSOs filled right now, and they have four in training, so they're getting pretty close to filling that that gap to where we'll hopefully be able to transfer over some of that money so that they can get another six on board.

But you know, as as we've been communicating, we're still gonna be short two and a half million dollars to be able to get to the 87 that we're trying to get to in both TSOs and transit safety sergeants.

As for uh the ambassadors, that's more of a customer service role.

So I don't know that I would they would capture that in the safety and security realm.

And again, our goal is to not really have the um the guard of world guards on the buses, but we would have more of a mobile structure with the TSOs going forward.

Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair.

I I mean, and I get that.

I think we just need to think of safety differently.

We don't think of safety, public safety as a customer service role, but it should be, in my opinion.

We used to call police officers peace officers.

We don't call them that no more.

So I really feel like we need to think differently about what safety looks like, and it doesn't always mean a person in a in a security uniform.

Especially because knowing our security guards can't even enforce anything.

Schimmel and Garda World, they're just there to look like they're keeping someone safe, but they can't enforce anything.

They still have to call our TSOs, they still have to call our city security.

So it's just for optics, in my opinion.

If they can't do anything to actually keep me safe or intervene in any way, then it's a waste to me.

Um, and I think we could think differently about, and cities have already done this, cities have already done this uh on buses with violence interrupters specifically that do serve both the public safety and the customer service role.

Um, and I think that we would get a lot further than hiring security guards that can't do nothing.

Madam Chair and Councillor Rogers, if I could, I will say the ATC since we brought on Schimmel has has been night and day difference, and they've done an amazing job there.

Um, you know, they're really good at um at having conversations with people at de-escalating situations.

We have really seen our incidents drop at the ATC with their presence.

Yeah, thank you.

I uh I'm hearing different from my constituents when it comes to Shimmel, not just at the transit stations, but also I got chased down by Schimmel on Civic Plaza the other day.

Me, I got chased down by Shimmel, Lieutenant Justin or whatever his name was.

Literally, they're not, I just don't feel like they're they're welcoming people into the city spaces in a way that makes me feel welcomed, and that's what my feedback is for them.

And I've said this directly to them, to their their people because we we also want to have welcoming spaces, um, and I just don't personally feel my interactions with them personally have not felt welcoming.

Um so that's a that's enough, that's not about the budget.

So I'll stop there.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, counselor.

Uh counselor Teyas.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just have a quick question.

Um, of the 52 positions that were cut, um, what operational work um disappeared?

And then of the personnel costs that move to grant-related services.

What happens if the grant expires?

If they're delayed, um, are those personnel costs that were transferred?

Were those allowable and sustainable under those grant rules?

Madam Chair and Counselor Tez, um, I'll answer your last question first.

Yes, those um those positions that we are um charging, it's about 95% of the personnel costs to um the grant has been pretty stable for us for uh quite some time.

Um so we don't see any issues with that going forward, and in fact, we're we're looking at a few other positions that that we believe can charge a portion of their time to that grant as well.

And then of the 52 positions, again, none of those.

I mean, they don't have an operational impact right now on current services or on our ability again to to grow through the first couple of phases um through fiscal year 27 of ABQ ride forward.

Thank you, Director.

Thank you, Councilor Lewis counselor lewis thank you madam chair um director um so there so that's real quick about just we're making a pretty big investment um in zero fare transit so um can you show the actual ridership increase that's attributed to that policy uh madam chair and counselor lewis that's really tough I mean we started um zero fares right right during COVID um you know right out of COVID as COVID was recovering we're coming on to about 85% right now of our our 2019 ridership numbers um and continuing to grow our para transit is um really skyrocketing right now actually where we're seeing some some major growth in that area and we're continuing to see growth on our um on our fixed route ridership it's actually up eight percent this year um will sunband ridership is is increasing up to eight percent this last year too and you know it's continuing to rise as well um and then we also have our connect services too um which which are actually up 14% so far this year so yes I I think you know part of it too has to do with our service levels so that ridership at 85% is with only 67% of the service that was available before the pandemic so that's a big key and then if you all remember last year we were missing a lot of service too so it wasn't reliable and people couldn't depend on it and and that was really hard for them we've seen a 90% decrease um this year in misservice and we're down to just missing at the most you know um anywhere between 10 to 20 hours on on a weekly basis and many hours we're not missing any certain or many weeks we're not missing any service so that's been really impactful for us and I think the more that we're able to um you know continue with that reliability to increase the hours of service that we have I think we'll continue to see that ridership come back strong especially with everyone was saying you know we've got uh a lot of things going on in the economy that are really driving people um towards transit and it is a big cost savings um you know for every one dollar that's invested in transit five dollars comes back in economic returns and I think that's what they were asking um you know you to Google there earlier that that's a pretty known fact um that APTA puts out um so it's really important and you know we talk a lot about housing and uh you know housing's the number one cost that most people have transportations really close second and if people can avoid having to have a car even one car in their family they're able to save about $13,000 a year and that's huge for somebody when you think about trying to make rent or trying to buy food and so it is it is really important that we continue I think with the zero fares um people have really had a lot of positive things to say about it you even heard that today in the public comment thanks Madam I'm trying to keep my time down here so he only has four minutes got it.

My question was about five seconds so um so would you attribute any increase in ridership due to the zero fare policy.

Madam Chair and Counselor Grout yes I definitely would again you know you you talked to you even heard in public comments the the college person that was mentioning having to come up with change and just find that to even come you wouldn't be surprised when you're really strapped and how much that that means for you to be able to to get somewhere and if people can't afford it then they choose not to ride and a lot of things just they are they're not connected to their lives right they have to make choices on the work that they're able to do on you know where they're able to shop the people that they're able to see and we have taken that burden away from them.

I'm not I'm not like questioning the validity of the the program um I might my point is um the go if the the goal is to increase ridership with that policy right I mean we I think you've said that you've seen it and the goal is to increase it.

Like the hope is that the zero fair policy would just, you know, we would would really help just flood our buses, you know with with users, right?

Madam chair and uh counselor lewis, I think that's one of the goals, but I definitely don't think that that is the only goal.

Another goal is to help people, you know, have some upward mobility and have access to the things that they need to get that upward mobility.

No I understand that.

I I mean I I get that, and I'm not arguing that whatsoever.

I'm just saying that if the I mean, part of the reason that the zero fair policy was implemented is to you know increase ridership, you know, so that more people would would use it.

And I mean, if that's the way it's headed, um, you know, are you know are we maintaining service through a sustainable model, you know?

I mean, if that's part of part of it, or are we making temporary adjustments that need to be re maybe need to be reversed sometimes?

So the costs are gonna go up.

I mean, if part of the zero fare policy is uh to increase ridership, as we increase ridership, the costs are gonna go up.

Um, there's not a uh uh a revenue source, you know, for those costs related to that policy.

Um is it sustainable if it works?

Um Madam Chair and Councillor Rogers, and I think one of the things that was on my slide too was how we are also looking to continue to increase revenues in different ways, and so one of the ways was a change in technology that we had on the paratransit side, and it's allowing us to capture county travelers within paratransit.

We were realizing we weren't um we weren't capturing that very well, and so we had a six hundred thousand dollar increase just for that and being able to capture you know the county's costs of the para-transit.

We're also working on um, we just had an RFP close, we're getting ready to award here shortly on ring credits for RNG that we you know, we've lowballed I think anticipated about $250,000 a year there.

But I mean we're hearing that we think it's gonna be more than that, so that will also be something that will be helpful to us, and then even on the advertising size, we did open up our um our newer buses or 300 and 400 buses to the advertising, so we'll see some increases in revenue there.

So just continuing to be um you know resourceful in the revenues that we can bring in and um you know to help support support it as it continues to grow.

Thank you, Councillor People.

Thank you, madam chair.

So I don't know that this is a question for the director, it's more for the administration.

Um, but I I note in here that we are asking um transit to pay APD about 1.3 million dollars to cover the cost of security.

Now it's my understanding that security was moved from transit to APD.

And I'll just say these numbers out loud.

APD's budget is 25, 278 million, 238,000 dollars, 31.8% of our budget, and transit's budget is 25 million, 257,000, which is 2.9% of the budget.

Why is the decision being made that one of the smaller departments that is already being decimated in this budget being asked to pay back 1.3 million to APD?

Um, Madam Chair and Counselor Peoplecorn, I I guess I can kind of walk this back as a little bit of a history of transit security.

And you guys really are waiting to hear this.

Um so back in fiscal year 18, we used to actually have transit security in-house.

Um, we had 40 positions that got moved to um DMD.

All the funding, the positions moved with them.

Um they then eventually ended up moving to GSD as metric metro security, um, and then to APD as now transit safety officers.

Um we didn't get all of the money back for that.

We we did end up losing about 1.8 million dollars in that whole transition just for the numbers and how everything transferred over.

Um, but we were able to find some fuel savings that we had out there, and the you know, it was given back to us um to be able to pay for contracted security, and so that's what we're using as that fuel savings to be able to continue because transit safety is is really important for the department, obviously, and so we prioritize that to be able to move that 1.3 million dollars, which was actually almost 1.8, because we have transferred over part of it.

We're still keeping it, but we're you know, we're we're J um journal entry, and it over as they're able to fill positions just so we can keep the contracts security.

So as they fill the positions, then we back off on the contracted security, and they can continue to increase the TSO program.

But like I said, we're still gonna be short that two and a half million dollars.

Yeah, no, I I get all of that background.

Um, but the reality is that transit security officers are APD employees, and APD has a ginormous budget, and I think that it is strange that we are transferring 1.3 million from one of the smaller departments to the largest department for paying their own employees.

Um, and it just happens to be that what we heard from Director Keener earlier was that we need 15 more positions.

It's about the same amount of money, and so I feel like we should find some way to have APD absorb something that really wouldn't hurt their budget at all, um, and let the transit department maintain that money and spend it on the things that we have heard tonight are absolutely necessary, so um, just leave that with everybody.

Counselor Champagne.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um, I really didn't have anything until you brought up a point about FY18 that you have 45 security officers for transit.

How many do we have now?

Uh Madam Chair and Counselor Champagne at that time we had 40.

We actually ended up transcending transferring over over a total of 57.

So it happened over three fiscal years.

Um, as our that brought on, we got additional funding for those positions that eventually ended up going to um DMD and then to GSD.

Okay, and Madam Chair, then how many do you have now?

Right now we have um 27 transit safety officers, we have um three sergeants, and then APD is also providing us 10 PSAs, so I will say that's like awesome that they're doing that for us, as well as a um there we actually just got a lieutenant from them and then a deputy commander, and the lieutenant and the deputy commander and the 10 PSAs were all um we didn't give any money uh to APD for that.

Okay, madam chair.

So it obviously isn't at the same caliber that it was in FY18.

Um, Madam Chair and Councilor Champagne, if I could too, and in FY18, we had we had much more service out there as well.

So um, you know, I think that that's part of it.

What do you mean?

Um we had more hours of service, we had more buses operating, more routes going.

It was before the pandemic.

So we were a little more busier, we had 40 security officers.

Now we're not as busy, and we're shorthanded on security officers.

We were busier, we had 57 security officers, and now that we're not as busy, we have um, yeah, we have 10 PSAs and we have 27 TSOs.

So that's 37 right there.

But you need more.

Uh Madam Chair and Counselor Champagne, yes, that's that's the plan that we've been building off of the long-range security plan, which calls for uh 80 TSOs and um seven uh security sergeants, um, and that includes uh taking back the ATC as well.

So that was not originally in the plan, but now that we're having to cover the security there, that that's additional um TSOs and sergeants that we needed to add to it.

Madam Chair, what do you think the big difference is in in again?

Was we point you pointed out FY18 with 40 securities that now like 10 years later.

What's the what change that causes this big attention that we need a lieutenant and a DC and PSAs and if we're not as busy?

Um Madam Chair and Counselor Champagne, you know, I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that that we just um, so and I okay, let me start with this.

Uh so 57 of those, we never had those all filled.

So I should probably start with that.

That was that was just positions that we had budgeted that were full-time and play positions.

Um, you know, I do think that that's there wasn't as much of a focus on safety and security.

I do see that as when I started here four years ago, um, you know, we didn't even have dedicated transit security.

We had Metro that we would just sometimes call and and you know they would they would come and show up, but we still had plenty of incidents going on.

Um, you know, so I think it's a lot of that of just trying to get the incidents under control, trying to get the safety back into the network, and I think we're seeing a lot of success with that right now and having that presence available and that quick reaction.

I think it's also what's starting to help us with our driver retention too, because they, you know, when I first got here, you could call and they just stopped calling because people weren't responding to the stuff that was happening out there, and now they can get a response very quickly, and our TSOs are dialed right into APD too, so if they need them, it's it's so quick, too.

But we're seeing our security incidents come down.

You saw that in the last quarterly report.

You'll see it again in the one that's going to be introduced next week.

Um, you know, they're down about 20 20 percent.

Um, and I think we'll continue to see those going down as well.

Okay, thank you, madam chair.

Just one last question.

And out of curiosity, uh for public comment was why aren't we reinvesting this stuff in there?

And it brought up a question, and maybe you can answer C about.

Um we have enterprise funds that everything that's built in is redirected back into the department.

How why isn't transit in an enterprise fund?

Madam Chair, Counselor Champagne, they are an enterprise fund.

They are yes, okay.

So the money being taken out or whatever's being cut, it's just being redistributed throughout that same department, correct?

We're not moving the savings that they say they're cut and anything into gateway or I'm sorry, madam chair, counselor champagne.

They do receive a subsidy, so I think from the general fund.

So I think that's what's been referenced previously is that there was a reduction in that subsidy from the general fund.

Okay.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you.

Counselor Pena.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just wanted to say um to Director Keener that I really appreciate, you know, one of the challenges that we have in the Southwest Mesa is adding new lines is always so expensive, and and we were underserved here in the Southwest Mesa for so long, and um, you know, we would ask to add a new row, uh new route, and you know, it was in the millions of dollars, and it just as you all know with what we're going through now with the budgetary constraints that we have, and you know, director um we looked outside the box and um really bought in brought in that ABQ Connect.

And I mean, I think this is the future of transit in many ways, and it has really transformed how people here in the Southwest Mesa that have to walk long routes to even get to a bus stop, have um service come to their door, and um it's improved um not only that and with um sunban as well.

So I just would really want to tell her how much I appreciate that.

Those are some of the calls that I used to be flooded with, and to be honest, um, this is what made me talk now, is because I really don't get those calls, so I haven't called Director Keener in quite a while.

So thank you, Director.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh councillor, counselor Baca.

Thank you, madam chair.

You know, if I was kink for a day and had my magic wand, I'd throw out a couple streetcar lines to the West Side and Mesa del Seoul, and you know, maybe a few more art lines too.

Um, while that's it.

Thank you for all the work you're doing under the constraints you have.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And I I want to say that I think one of the uh ways to get increased ridership too is to have um safe bus stops.

And I know I I text you often, not as often as I was, because they are better now, and they are more inviting, and um that's important.

So I think it starts starts with with the bus stops.

That's where oftentimes we've heard that people don't feel safe, and so it it is nice to see it isn't improving, so thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you, Director.

Okay, we are going to move on to animal welfare.

Mr.

Noel, thank you, madam chair.

Animal welfare has Carolyn Ortega as the director.

Their budget for FY27 is almost 16 million dollars.

We have 145 general fund positions, it includes non-recurring funding of 100,000 for the preventative clinic lease agreement, and 70,000 in cost savings by bringing spay neuter blitzes in-house to the preventative pet care clinic, and director Ortega, see if we questions.

Good evening, Director.

Thank you for being here.

Hello, madam chair.

Thanks for for having me.

Welcome.

Counselors, any questions?

Counselor February.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Director.

Um, so I have quite a few concerns about animal welfare's budget, and we heard from the community that they share those concerns.

Um, I think one of the biggest ones for me is the loss of three field positions, and so I'd love to hear what we will do if we are not able to fill those positions.

Um, I don't know about the other counselors, but I certainly the number one request I get from my constituents in regards to animal welfare is more enforcement of our heart ordinance.

Um so can you just talk me through how we will possibly enforce heart in the field with only two animal protection officers per shift, madam chair and counselor feeble corn.

Um first I'd like to start by just thanking the group of people that came in today.

I think that's what I love most about my job is they're very passionate in both directions.

Either they're gonna be super opinionated about what we do at animal welfare and or they're going to support us and they're gonna come out to to support us, and and I'm I'm happy that it is the latter because it hasn't always been the latter in animal welfare, as many of you know who who um have lived in Albuquerque for a while.

Um, our animal protection officers.

I think for the record, I want to make sure that that everybody really recognizes our animal protections officers as public safety.

I think for as long as I've been here, they are not recognized as public safety.

They are sworn officers who show up to crime scenes to take animals out of homes where there's dead people, they show up to fires to take animals out of uh buildings that that um that there are animals in the perimeter to help out the firefighters.

They show up to accidents when someone's getting taken to the hospital, they take the dog to the shelter, they get called out to help ACS when ACS is finding someone a place to go, but won't take their services without them having a place for their dog to go.

So these animal protection officers every day are out there, not just for our constituents, but for the other departments that need their support.

So I would like for the record for us to start calling them public safety.

Um, as far as the cuts go, um, we had to go through a very rigorous uh activity for this budget year, and my heart hated it, but my business side and my accounting side of my brain understands it.

Um we have one pie, and we're all part of one pie.

That pie has not gotten any bigger.

And for mayors, going back as long as as I've been alive, mayors have priorities, and when you have priorities, then those priorities get the bigger pieces of the pie, and the other departments have to take slivers of that pie to support those priorities, and that's what has happened in my department.

Um, so I get upset about that because we it took me six years to add 13 positions, and this year I'm losing 14 positions, so it takes me back six years, and all of those outcomes that counselor Tayas likes to mention every every meeting, um, are going to take a hit.

We have had positive outcomes on every single initiative that we have instituted in animal welfare, and um having to make the tough decisions because our department runs solely.

Um I made a every day I'm making cuts.

Um I do cost-benefit analysis and I make cuts to our budget every single day.

Today I made a $5,000 cut to our budget.

Last year I made multiple cuts to our budget.

I saved 90% on pet food.

I closed Lucky Paws, but the timing wasn't right.

I made all the cuts, and then we get to a tough budget season, and I have to make more cuts from a very lean budget.

So that's had I had I had any other choices, I would not have cut positions.

I would have cut zero positions, but I didn't have any many other choices.

So the animal protection officers, because they're usually the higher turnover, they're usually the ones that are higher to harder to feel.

Not that we can't fill them, they're just usually harder to fill.

They got caught up in those cuts, but they weren't the only ones.

I wanted to make sure that each division was equally impacted, that no division was wholly impacted.

The only division that wasn't impacted was the clinic, because they are our proactive way to make sure that the population in our shelters are going down, because if the population in our shelters are going down, the need for staff are going down.

However, we have never been had the number of staff that we need in animal welfare in the whole history of animal welfare, which is why we need five, we have 500 volunteers, which is why we need 300 fosters.

Um but I can say that because our population is going down and because we closed Lucky Plaza last year, we were able to pull those resources into the shelter and absorb them, which again is why our numbers are going in the right direction as far as outcomes.

What is going to happen with cutting the animal protection officers?

Last year we set a goal of a 25-minute response time for priority ones.

So that means if APD calls us to go out to a crime scene, that means if uh the um the gateway center calls us out because there's a dog fight, that's a priority one.

If there's a a dangerous dog on the loose, that's a priority one.

If there's an injured dog, that's a priority one.

If they are selling puppies and kittens, that is now a priority one.

So our officers had a 25-minute response time because in many cases because of things out of our control, like people uh being on FMLA or people calling in sick.

There are times that we have one, maybe two officers at a time to cover all 550,000 residents in Albuquerque, one on the east side and one on the west side to cover the entire area.

So our response times are gonna go down.

We get 26,000 calls for service in animal welfare a year.

That's gone up since last year.

We had 25,000.

This 2025 we had 26,000.

So the calls are not going down, they're going up because we now have more laws.

We are now enforcing laws, but it does make it difficult because we try to assume goodwill and we'll give warnings, but warnings take time because if you give a warning, then you have to come back and follow through on the warning.

So now it's going to turn into more citations, more civil fines, slower response time, and um, and a tougher ability to get to where we need to get before people just leave, and probably and I get calls from all of you when there are complaints, and we're usually on it right away, um, but you're you probably can expect more calls.

Thank you, madam chair.

So um I appreciate that answer, and I appreciate the fact that uh, you know, you were told to cut.

Um my questions around field services are specifically because, and we heard this from several commenters tonight.

Animal protection is uh public safety, right?

We we cannot have animal issues in our public, stray dogs, vicious dogs.

We can't have those things happening and not respond if we are gonna pretend that we care about public safety.

And I think that it is clear that in the current budget, we don't really care about that level of public safety, and so um I'm I'm just curious.

Um, first of all, let me just say I I think I know the answer to this, but why were those three positions open?

Why had they not been filled?

Madam Chair, Counselor People Corn, uh a couple of them were on the prudent savings, um, and we were able to remove them from the prudent savings um for a bit because of my deputy director became available, so I moved that into the prudent savings, which as um CFO Martinez mentioned, is when they were in prudent savings, it gave directors the flexibility to if I had other vacancies, which like the vet.

The vet is very hard to fill.

If I have that vacancy, I put it into prudent savings to save for that year until we can fill that position, and I move something else out and try to fill that.

So it's all about moving things around, which in this environment is very important to be able to do.

It's important to be able to say, hey, I'm I'm I'm gonna save some money in operations now, five thousand dollars, so I want to be able to move that over here.

Um so mostly because of prudence savings, yeah.

Uh, but then as um as uh director Allen mentioned um when the smoke clears, we're ready to start start hiring those, but the smoke hasn't quite cleared yet, and and they were on the on the list um that was vacant, and again, I didn't want to had I had I not selected animal protection officers to be on that list, I would have had to select three more animal handlers or or a or a vet or uh uh vet assistant.

Thank you.

I mean, I think that's my point is that we have put some departments that were just um maximizing efficiency and maximizing what they could do with a very small budget.

We have treated them like every other department, well, except for APD and AFR who didn't have to cut, um, and we've just said you're gonna cut a certain number of positions, and we didn't take into account what that actually does to public safety, not to mention what it's gonna do to our euthanasia rate, which is going to go up under this proposed budget, and I certainly hope that this council will fix that because we have worked a very very long time when I first started working on animal issues in the city of Albuquerque, we were killing 19,000 animals a year, and I have seen this director and this staff do miraculous improvements and get that number down to we were at 90% live exit, which is incredible.

And for us to be even contemplating for a split second that we can just go backwards, is really really upsetting.

Um, so I just want to last question.

Um, in addition to the increase in euthanasia rates, which I know will happen under the current under the proposed budget, would you have the current staff needed to go out to all the ACS and HHH pop-up events to provide services?

Madam Chair Counselor Feeblecorn, we will continue to support ACS and HHH.

It just may not be at the at the volume that we have in the past, but we all of our services will continue, but I will look at every area of operations and adjust accordingly.

So that's that's um unfortunate as well because we've been spending the last four years of me pushing for more interdepartmental work, and I want um you know, animal welfare to be at all of these pop-ups because that is the community service that the community deserves, and we're gonna have to say no to some of them under the proposed budget.

But I do think that we can make some changes and make this better.

Thank you.

Thank you, counselor.

Counselor Champagne, thank you, madam chair, director.

Of the uh 14 positions that are being cut, are any of them filled currently?

Madam Chair, Counselor Champagne.

No, they are not currently okay.

So nobody's gonna be put out of a job, correct?

No.

Okay, and what's the average day that these openings were available or on the market for filling?

Madam Chair and Counselor Champaign for all of the positions that are going to be cut, the average, the average is probably two hundred and thirty days.

Maybe closer to 300.

Okay.

Thank you, Director.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Counselor.

Counselor Backa.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Uh Director Ortega.

I really appreciate your candor tonight.

I'd like to grab lunch with you after all this.

Thank you, madam chair, counselor Bacca.

Counselor or uh Director, um, how much do you need?

Madam Chair, Counselor Counselor Grout.

How much do I need for what do you need?

Um what do you need?

Uh Madam Chair, Counselor Grout.

Uh, of course, every single department needs something, but I'm asking you.

And I know that you won't give us an outrageous number, but what do you need?

If if I were to ask for one thing, it would be my animal protection officers back.

Um, how many?

Three three, okay.

Anything else?

No, I I think um I'm I'm creative, I'm resourceful, and animal welfare has been through tougher times, so I will find ways to partner with other departments, like calling Chief Emily and having her come help me hang something that's 26 feet high, and calling uh counselor um Simon and having him come spread wood chips for me.

Um I use all of the city resources to help animal welfare, and and I do appreciate that all of the departments do come through when I ask, and we want to do the same for them as well.

I think that's very nice.

I'm glad to hear that they do that that you do that.

What did you uh say and in your $5,000 cut today?

What did you cut?

I to day I cut um the armored services, they are no longer going to three locations, they're only going to one location, and I was able to save five thousand dollars on that and still be in compliance with the 24-hour deposit.

Okay, what is an armored service?

They're the ones that come and pick up any fees that are gathered, it's the money.

Oh, it's the it's okay.

That service, okay, got it.

Yes, okay.

Well, that was smart.

That's good.

Very good.

Okay, well, thank you.

Alrighty, any other questions, counselors?

Thank you.

Thank you, Director.

Appreciate it.

Okay, we are moving on to youth and family.

Mr.

Noel.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Youth and Family Services has Director Jess Martinez.

Their FY27 proposed general fund budget is 25.9 million dollars.

They have 143 general fund positions and 70 grant positions.

If the budget includes 500,000, a 500,000 dollar investment in new youth programming.

800,000 in salary adjustments for part-time staff, and 575,000 dollars in non-recurring funds for after school programming, sponsored initiatives and events and support for the Westgate Bike Shop.

And Director Martinez is here for questions.

Good evening, Director.

Good evening, Counselors.

Madam Chair.

Thank you for being here.

And by the way, just tell all your directors how wonderful they are.

We um provide a wonderful service to all of our children in the community, so thank you.

Counselors, any questions for Director Martinez?

Let's see.

Oh, Counselor Tayas has some.

Counselor Tayas.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Actually, I don't have any questions.

I just wanted to thank the director for taking time to meet with me and go over questions that I did have already.

So thank you, Director Martinez.

I appreciate it.

It saves a lot of time when we can have questions answered beforehand.

So just thanking you, and I appreciate the job that you were doing.

Madam Chair, Councilor Teus, thank you very much.

I appreciate that.

Thank you, Councillor Rogers.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Hi, Director.

Just a couple questions just about the cuts for teachers for early childhood.

Are any of these due to new closures or just wondering about our status of the child development centers?

Madam Chair, Counselor Rogers know they have nothing to do with the early hip start program.

These are all vacant positions.

On average, they were vacant approximately 639 days.

Got it.

Thank you.

And I'm also just want to say I'm appreciative of the funding for youth programming, especially the teen programming.

I know we talked a lot about just the teen center for Heights Community Center and the pay challenges for being able to attract good pay folks to work with our teen.

So I'm grateful for that and look forward to working with your team on that.

Madam Chair, Cultural Logis, thank you.

Thank you.

I think we're done.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Alright, we're just whizzing right through now.

Sweet.

I know.

Legal, Mr.

Noel.

Thank you.

Madam Chair.

Legal has Lauren Keith, the interim city attorney.

Their FY27 proposed general fund budget is $8.9 million dollars, roughly.

They have 55 general fund positions.

The budget includes a 400,000 increase in recurring funding for the diversion program to address the cycle of low-level nonviolent offenders being detained without treatment or a long-term solution.

And it includes a realignment of budgeted positions to increase transparency.

And uh attorney uh Keith is here.

Or I'm sorry.

Good evening, ma'am.

How are you?

I'm great.

How are you, Madam Chair?

Good, we're doing good.

Uh counselors, any questions?

Counselor February.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Can you talk a little bit about the diversion program and why that is important to add those positions in the city's legal department right now rather than funding another type of diversion program that's housed elsewhere?

Um, yes, madam chair, uh counselor feeblehorn, yes.

And in fact, um I kind of have a two-fold answer.

One of which is the more recent is that um we I I've had multiple conversations with multiple potential partners about how to implement uh diversion, and we are implementing diversion not just in legal, but you know, at every point in the process, a lot of that is now happening within APD.

Um, but we our most recent meetings have been with the judges at the Metro Court about how to process citations uh issued by APD.

And Metro Court has decided to start a Friday scheduling day, and so every Friday in Metro Court, there will need to be attorney an attorney present to handle the scheduling of hearings on citations, and on those Fridays, uh the public defender's office will be there with diversion resources, including the providers, and that needs to be handled by an attorney.

Currently, most uh misdemeanor prosecutions are handled by APD, but because this will be a single day in a single courtroom, there needs to be an attorney there, so it needs to be city legal that provides that attorney, and that we have agreed to do that, and that will start in July.

So I have actually just approved the advertisement for that attorney today.

And but so but the other the other reason that it needs to be in city legal and not elsewhere.

City legal currently runs a traffic arrangement program where if you get a speeding ticket in the city of Albuquerque, you then get a call from somebody from my office who will offer you a plea bargain, and that's in order to expedite those proceedings.

So city legal already handles these types of programs.

Um and so this was to some extent modeled on the same idea that city legal can offer a plea deal to somebody who has received a citation, but but that will be to you know send them to a program to set get them into a case management uh program or or a rehab program or something like that.

So it does make sense for city legal to handle this type of program, including the fact that when if we aren't able to reach a deal, on some of these cases, city legal will be handling the prosecution.

Okay, thank you, madam chair, and then one unrelated question.

Um, you know, you guys gotta increase your moving a lot of the attorneys from around the the um city into city legal.

Um do you feel that the proposed budget is adequate for doing some of the enforcement work that you and I have talked about many, many times, like short-term rental enforcement, business license enforcement.

We're not doing those things, um, and I you know, I always got the impression that that was because we were um you know not funded, we didn't have people to do that.

We're getting more money to you, more folks to you, taking on new work that we weren't doing in the past with this diversion program.

Is there is there resources?

Will there be adequate resources to do some actual enforcement of our existing laws?

Madam Chair, Council of Fubercorn, I think there will be, but just to be clear, these aren't new resources in terms of the city, it's just moving these resources from the departments to, in terms of those seven positions from departments into city legal.

So these aren't new positions and the it won't create new capacity within my department for work for additional work.

So it was my understanding that there would be new people hired under the diversion program for the diversion program, yes, yes, um, up to three new positions, but for um, in terms of the seven positions that are being moved into my department that they won't have, however, we are have um worked with the clerk's office on ways to streamline the hearing process of the independent hearing office.

Um what happens when when city council passes a new ordinance to expand enforcement?

You know, very often there comes with additional resources to code enforcement, sometimes not.

Uh, but when code enforcement does more work, city legal has to do more work.

And I think you saw in our numbers a very large number of hearings that we handle for, you know, that are mostly driven by code enforcement or by automated speed enforcement.

Um, streamlining those hearings in the hearing office will mean that we can handle more without having to bring in more attorneys.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Counselor Teas.

Hi, thank you.

Um, thank you, Madam Chair.

I have a question for you, Madam Esquire.

Um, do you know what are the most common types of citations that Metro Court is really dealing with that kind of led to uh the suggestion of this diversion program?

Um Madam Chair, Council Taez, I do well, I don't know that the answer off the top of my head, but I uh believe that I have a list and that I could get it to you and all the counselors, so you can see, in fact, the number of citations by um statute or by ordinance.

Uh, and this um the Metro Courts program will focus on violations of city ordinances, the the Friday hearings that they're going to be holding.

Um, and so I did kind of lose my track train of track until what else I wanted to say to in response to your question.

Um, but there are there are a variety of of ordinances that we've been trying to enforce, you know, including the new ordinance prohibiting public camping and the ordinance not to have articles that obstruct sidewalks.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Because that's kind of the question I was gonna ask now.

Do you know what type of fiscal impact you know the new ordinance 02614 if if signed by the mayor will have on your department and have you done any sort of cost calculation about that?

Um Madam Chair, Council Teas, I don't expect that ordinance to have a large impact on city legal.

I think that will really just be a question of focusing resources in certain areas.

I think for APD in legal, what you will now see is the possibility of citing somebody for physically blocking a sidewalk even if they're not blocking it with articles.

That would be new.

Of course, it would be limited to the specific areas designated by the mayor, mayor and then approved by city council, but I don't expect that to generate a much additional work for the legal department.

Thank you.

So much additional work outside of these extra funds you're asking to create a diversion program, because those I assume that's where these type of citations would go.

Madam Chair, Councilor Tea is that's correct.

And you know, we have again we've been talking about diversion for quite a while.

Of course, going way back, the McClendon settlement agreement that was signed in 2017 as a requirement that the city explore ways to divert people out of the criminal justice system, and we actually have been uh putting together in the last couple of months the list of all the ways that we have actually been doing that since 2017.

Um, but in the past couple years in particular, we've been really talking about what else can we do.

Um the goal in issuing a citation is not to get somebody to MDC, the goal is to control uh something that's going on in a specific neighborhood that's impacting businesses and neighbors, and to you know, just to to put an end to that and to get you know to get somebody into resources to get somebody in a position where they're not with a tent on a sidewalk or in front of a business.

And so we've been talking about multiple ways.

I think APD is really exploring ways that they can do that out in the field, and um, so then I started talking first with the district attorney's office about city legal doing it for people who had already received citations.

Thank you, Ms.

Keep.

Yes, no, I don't get me wrong, I strongly support diversion programs.

I worked uh at the third judicial district court for many years, and I I know how well they work.

They produce great outcomes, reduce recidivism, I they connect people to service.

Um I really do understand and support diversion programs.

Um my concern is whether we're expanding citation-based enforcement in ways that can increase the need for diversion rather than reducing um underlying causes that bring people into the system in the first place.

And so that's where my bigger concern um lies is sort of the um the fiscal impact of needing a diversion program when there are alternatives um approaches uh outside of enforcement only, um, because you know, then the city has to absorb all those costs later, like funding a diversion program instead of um you know funding um better service based uh programs that aren't punitive.

So thank you.

I appreciate your time.

Thank you, counselor.

Um, I just have one question.

Um, there was a hundred and thirty-nine dollar technical adjustment from budget per the CFO, um, and in the CAO hearing packet.

Did it make it into the budget?

And it says um, let's see, in the fiscal year 25 budget, council directed that funding position um be transferred out of legal.

So my question is to date the legals department operating operation funding has not been restored.

Can you tell me where that money is?

I'm assuming that's a question from Mr.

Noel.

Yes.

Okay.

Well, yes, that would be a good one, RCFO.

There you go.

So y'all took it out.

Where'd you put it?

Because it was supposed to come back to legal, correct?

Madam Chair, I don't think it was supposed it was supposed to come back to legal.

It wasn't restored to legal.

Originally, it was the budget was removed by council when in FY26, when there was a I guess an attempt to realign funding and positions.

And so the amendment had taken the budget from operating, and then subsequently when the position was taken the follow up this year, going into FY27, both the position and the fund the funding for the position were moved out of legal.

So that is the amount that I think.

So the answer okay.

Let me let me just read this so that we're all on the same page.

In the in the fiscal year 25 budget, council directed that the funding for position one zero zero zero nine zero two eight.

It was a policy and government affairs administrator, be transferred out of the legal department.

As a result, $139,000 was deducted from legal's operational budget.

In fiscal year 26, the position was funded and transferred out of the legal department.

However, the deduction in operating was not reversed.

Legal requested that these funds be restored to its operating budget, but the request was not granted.

Legal subsequently raised this issue with admin, reiterating the need for the 139 to be reinstated to date.

So my question is: what did the administration do with the 139,000 that was appropriated appropriately budgeted for legal, but was taken out via technical adjustment?

Madam Chair, though, yeah, you just explained what I had already explained.

Um then CFO Martinez did you have a um Madam Chair.

I was I was talking to Mr.

Noel.

I know this is a conversation we've had.

We had a conversation just yesterday or the day before about a technical adjustment around uh shifting some monies between personnel and operations, but my understanding, Mr.

Noel is a technical adjustment is not needed.

Am I accurate on that?

Um, no CFO Martinez.

Um actually, yeah, there is a technical adjustment of 400,000, and that's going to be moving uh just the 400,000 from operating for a portion of the 400,000 from operating into personnel, so about $300,000 for the diversion for the diversion program for because they're going to start staffing up on that.

Um but then the remaining hundred thousand dollars will will remain in operating, but that's not the same amount of the hundred and thirty-nine thousand that we're talking about here.

But but madam chair, it is being left.

The conversation we had was specifically about leaving that hundred in relation to um trying to shore up a bit the operation.

Clear is that right now, but we'll figure it out.

We'll we'll follow up afterwards.

Thank you.

All right, any other questions, counselors?

Okay, thank you.

All right, let's move on to solid waste.

Mr.

Noel.

Solid waste has Director William Gallegos.

Their FY27 proposed budget is 95.8 million dollars.

They have five hundred and forty-two positions.

Uh the risk assessments related to workers' compensation tort and recovery decreased by eighteen thousand dollars.

And the proposed refuse disposal operating fund budget includes 1.1 million dollar, a 1.1 million dollar decrease in overtime.

And Director Gallegos is here for questions.

Good evening, Director.

Good evening.

I continue to be amazed by what your department does for the city.

Thank you.

It's it runs like a clock.

Thank you very much.

Our trash gets picked up every week on time.

Um it's it's amazing what you do.

So um counselors, any questions?

Counselor February?

Thank you, madam chair.

Hi, Director.

Um, just a couple questions.

Um, one is that last year in the budget process, um, the committee chair um added in funding for an ambassador program, the Duke City ambassadors for uptown and east central, and I note that those are not in the budget this year.

Um, can you can you say where they went?

Madam Chair, Councilor February.

Uh, we still include those and we use utilize our Better Way Forward program to uh perform that services in the uptown area and on the R corridor.

Okay, so why isn't it listed in the budget or in any of the budget questions that we've asked about this item?

We were told we're doing downtown and knob Hill, and so I'm just trying to understand.

You know, is there a contract in place and is uptown still getting service?

And will they be getting service for the entire next year?

Madam Chair and Council February, yes, it's still getting serviced, and yes, we propose to uh reapply and put out an RFP for hospitality, which will include those areas.

Okay, so it was just we just forgot us.

That's why we're not in.

Okay.

Um, and then um director, what happens to uh solid waste fees under this budget?

Excuse me.

Is there a change to solid waste fees that residents pay under this budget?

Uh Madam Chair, proposed budget.

Madam Chair, Council February Corn, uh no, there's no increase to the citizens' uh wild parking fees.

Is there a decrease?

Um Madam Chair, Council February Corn, no, there is no decrease either.

However, we are gonna get less service.

Um the question, the answer came from y'all, not from me.

Um the reduction in overtime will come from um a proposed transition of recycling pickup to every two weeks, and so that is half the service at the same price.

Uh Madam Chair and Councilor Februar, even though it may seem that's half the services, we will be utilizing the drivers to help perform our trash uh pickup.

Um, so you will not lose service at this current rate.

We are actually the trucks are going to uh barkle half field currently as we speak.

So we did an assessment of some of the areas um and did barrel counts and how many barrels were out.

Uh we do have some information that pertains to that.

Um, on average in some of the districts, it's anywhere between 45 and 65% participants in some of the areas that we did get.

Um specific to your areas you had we did probably 10 routes in your general district area, and again, it ranged from 45 to 65 percent.

Um some of the other districts did have a little bit higher range that went up to maybe 75% participation, uh, but that's that's that's the efficiency that we do have.

Uh, some of the trucks are going in with only three three and a half tons of uh recyclables, and that's pretty much half a load.

Okay, so what has been done to increase the uptake of recycling um or to educate consumers about not um not mixing in non-recyclables with recycling, rather than making a policy decision to just stop providing recycling service half the time.

And you can say that that's not the case, but I put out my recycling every week, and so I will be getting less service, and I will be paying the same amount.

So I'm just, I would love for somebody from the administration to say, is this is this the mayor's policy that rather than working to increase recycling and to work on a circular economy moving forward, we are gonna just throw up our hands and say no more recycling because you didn't do it well enough, and that those of you that use this service every single week and pay for it, tough.

By doing that, there's several aspects to this.

And number one, it is you are paying for your service.

Within that, you are also paying for many other services that the city provides through the department as well as our clean cities department.

So when we're going to every other week recycling, we're really focusing on a couple of things, and we've been looking at this for a long time.

Yes, I know you've told me that, and I've said every time that I don't like it, and yet it's in the budget.

Council Chair and Council Feeble Corn, we've continued to look, and what we're trying to do is reduce our carbon footprint, reduce the amount of times a truck goes down a street because there are other costs associated with it, and I wish that everybody was as good a recycler as you, which is great because that would benefit the city, it would benefit all of us.

But the reality is as you look at some of the data that Director Gay was just talking about, we're looking at numbers that show not just now but have shown historically.

Where you have I'll look at recycle route number two on a Monday, there are 1,300 cans.

Only 648 were put out, 744 were kept at the curb, were kept inside.

So it doesn't matter that the cart is kept there.

Still has to send a truck down that street every week, which does one of two things.

It increases emissions, it increases the carbon footprint, it increases oil that's being used, it increases wear and tear on the tires, which produces more tires that have to eventually be taken to the landfill because they're changed more frequently, but it also has an after-effect where it's causing wear and tear on your residential streets, which DMD doesn't service as much because they're not used as much because of uh commuter traffic, where you're putting a heavy truck that's going there every week, four times a week for half the amount of recyclables, to where it's really counterproductive to what we're trying to do with our recycling program, which is to optimize the best thing for the environment, which is to send a full truck as many as little amount of times to our recycling plant, as opposed to sending that truck down the street every week and increasing all these other variables that do that and saying, well, you know, we just want to send it down every week because they're paying for it.

And if you look at our cost of service, well, if you look at our cost of service, which we do annually, for $18, the amount of service you're getting far exceeds the $18 that you're paying.

And if you look at the numbers that we've been looking at for years, we are the cheapest solid waste company in most of this side of probably tends to say probably throughout the US for the services we provide.

You can look at Bernalio County that charges $20 every other week recycling.

Tucson, $26 every other week recycling.

Portland, Oregon, up to $40 every other week recycling.

Eugene, Oregon, $48 every other week recycling.

Seattle, every other week recycling, almost $40.

And it goes on, Las Cruces, $20 every other week recycling.

And the thing about that is, I apologize, is that most almost all of these municipalities that do every other week recycling and charge more and do this practice, and they've they've worked it through there too.

And just because you put a can out every week doesn't guarantee you're gonna increase the amount of recyclables you get.

It just but what it does guarantee is that you're increasing the amount of fuel, oil, tires, and all those other factors I said are going down and gonna happen.

But they don't provide, they don't have their own landfill like we do, which costs, and that's built into that $18.

They don't have three convenience centers, which we charge five dollars.

But if you look at our cost of service, it costs us $24 for every load that goes into one of our convenience centers.

The actual cost of our cost of service is 24.

So the city is covering 19.

And when I say the city, I'm not saying the general fund because it's an enterprise fund.

We have to operate within an $18 structure where if you go through our cost of service that we do every year, our consultant tells us you guys are charging way too little, and I've just named two things.

We also do median maintenance all throughout the city within that $18.

We do highway and litter pickup all throughout the city with that $18.

We do large item pickup.

You need your large item picked up, call.

They'll come get it.

We have a graffiti crew, which is 18 trucks that go throughout the city seven days a week.

The goal for them is to eradicate graffiti within 24 hours before people call 311.

No other city does that.

We do um green waste twice a year to help with our our green waste at the landfill.

We do encampment cleanups.

We do nine recycle sites in addition to curbside recycling.

We have nine recycle sites that people can go to and drop off their recyclables.

We have our keep Albuquerque Beautiful program, which goes in to educate.

We spend a ton of money on education, and I know being part of this department for a long time, we spend countless amount of money and we are always re-evaluating how we do that.

And it's not just billboards.

There was a time when we did billboards.

There was a time during COVID where we did, you guys can remember the funny videos, keep talking trash Tuesday, and the recycle ferry was a big one that we did, and we've had to adapt.

Now we've started to see that in certain areas, the best way and the practices that we've been looking at is to catch people when they're young.

So what we've been doing, as a matter of fact, today we had a class over at our solid waste facility doing all the learning about recycling because if you can get somebody to recycle right at a young age before they even hit middle school, they're probably going to continue it.

And it's not a brand new idea, it's a marketing idea that Nike uses.

Many uh fashion products use that.

If you can get somebody wearing and brand loyal by the time they get to the seventh grade, chances are they're gonna be brand loyal all the way through their life.

And I say that to say this: a lot of people think that there is a recycle ferry, that's why we use that term, because they think if I just throw it in the blue can, it's gonna be recycled.

And they don't see the truck coming up and down the street every week picking up every other house or every third house, which is bad for the environment.

And we want to educate people, and I'll say this for myself, and I've gotten myself in trouble many a times using this example, so I don't mind using it because I've already paid the price, so I can use it.

My home, we have a trash can with a blue and a black can.

I don't know how many times I take my blue can out and I take the bag out and then I sift through it because I've tried to educate somebody who loves to recycle, but doesn't understand the complexities of recycling and seems to think I don't know what recycling right is, although it's all over.

But my daughter has learned and she knows like nope, don't put that in there.

So we're really targeting more focused uh group of how we can get it because we're looking for the long term.

So we're trying to optimize everything we can.

So I wouldn't say it's a reduction in services, it's an optimization to make sure that we're doing what's best for the environment and what's best.

It's not us throwing our hands up, or if we were just throwing our hands up, we would just keep picking it up every week, and our contamination rate would continue to go up.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

So I agree with almost everything you said.

Um I think we have a great deal on um solid waste services.

I think we could um obviously charge more and it would still be market rate.

What I don't agree with is that the way to max to minimize our carbon footprint is to encourage people to put things in the trash rather than in a recycling van.

And that's what this structure will do.

When you provide, I'm speaking.

Um, when you provide trash pickup every single week, and you provide recycling every other week, you are by the price structure that you are providing, giving an incentive for people to put things in the trash.

If you want to lower your carbon footprint, you want to maximize the amount of recycling and minimize the amount of trash.

So, if anything, if you're concerned, if you're actually concerned about carbon footprint, you would be going to every other week trash pickup and encouraging people to use recycling more.

So I don't think this is consistent with the mayor's stated policy on reducing carbon emissions, reducing carbon footprint, maximizing the circular economy, and making sure that we are doing the right thing for sustainability.

This is the exact opposite of those market signals that we need to be sending.

If you can show me a city that is doing every other week trash pickup, I would love to be able to speak to them.

I mean, I would that would be best for us as well.

And the places that we look at and the people we talk to, it's every other week recycling weekly trash.

Now, if you look at the the set out rates that we're talking about, like we're talking about here, that only 46% on a Tuesday on recycle route to put their cans out.

If you look at that same rate, because we we monitor that or director Gregos monitors that through his department, you will see I would basically say that the trash rate weekly is up in the 90s.

Correct.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

So that may be true, and I don't think we have to do what every other city is doing.

I think Albuquerque has sustainability goals that we tout a lot, and we should be walking the walk, and we're clearly not with this reduction in service.

Um I will say that it would be nice if we were leaders ever once in a while on something to do with sustainability.

Uh we just did a survey of the citizens of Albuquerque.

It was a pretty extensive survey, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that the fact that people wanted not only recycling but expanded options for sustainability like compost glass recycling, um, more green waste pickup.

I believe those came out on top on that survey.

And so we are not listening to the people, we are not living up to our climate claims, and I'm really shocked that this is the official position of this administration.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you.

Um, real quick, um, when I visit my daughter in Dallas, every month they pick up, um, they have a large item pickup or a green people just put stuff out on the curb and they put little signs out so we know that um that they that they can put all their green waste and it's anything and it's all out on the curb.

Have we ever thought about doing something like that?

And it's green, it's it's yard waste, it's old toys.

I mean it's it's very interesting.

And I've seen it also in Phoenix, they do that too.

Uh Chairwoman, uh, we actually are in the process of green waste this week.

This is our green waste week.

We do two weeks.

Well, I know we do it twice a year.

Okay, I'm sorry I didn't mean to erupt, but um, I know we do it twice a year, but I'm wondering could we go to once once a month or because you know, when sometimes when we when we uh trim our yards and so forth, we do it more than just twice a year.

Correct, uh Council Chairman.

Um, with that in regards, the effort it takes to get it twice a year, is very undertaking.

It's a lot of resources that we have to put to that.

Um, I mean, could we get to that spot?

We could probably come up with a plan somehow to work to that.

Um, but currently when we do this during the time the twice a year, it takes all hands on deck from our clean cities division, which is around 100 plus individuals, uh, to pick up all the greenways throughout the city.

Uh, so it is an undertaking to do that type of work.

Um, and uh, Council People Corn to also to your question on how we're doing outreach.

Um, we currently through the KAV grant, we've reached over 6,000 students, K through A, four or five thousand residents aging from different ages, they come to our fix it clinics.

Um, we do our recycle coach where we get probably 5,000 hits a month.

Um, and then we do social media.

We have 180,000 exposures to social media uh on the recycling, so we do paid campaigns.

So we are doing an outreach for that.

Um, could we do more?

We're we're gonna try to do more.

We are actually currently doing more.

Councilor Key.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

So my question was not around that, which I think you do a great job.

You have a great public information officer at Solid Waste.

It's specifically around the um co-mingled um contamination within the recycling bins that people put out.

I spoke with a neighbor who has been recycling incorrectly for years.

I pointed it out.

They said, I had no idea.

I've been putting this out for years.

No one has ever told me that it was incorrect.

There are a lot of things that we could be doing, including just leaving, you know, like a little sticky that says, do you know that this is contaminated and why?

Um we're not doing those things, but we're just gonna cut the service.

That's all I'm saying.

Thank you.

And I want to say, sir, you went past your four minutes.

You were talking about it.

Madam Chair, no, we're just I'm joking.

Counselor, did you want to talk?

Yeah.

Okay, counselor, Lewis.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Um, I actually thought it was a great answer.

I mean, I and you guys are I know you you've been around a long time, and I think you're the you're experts on recycling, and uh I I actually I thought that was really well put so um I did have just just questions uh we we referred to this a little bit at the last budget hearing, but um uh I mean we we do have there are there are some proposed uh additional solid waste fees for commercial collections um and and we know that because you built it into your budget.

I mean the budget's the budget's uh um built on it.

Um so maybe this is for Mr.

Well and I mean or Wayland uh when is the when's the administration actually planning on bringing that legislation to the council regarding those additional fees?

Madam Chair and Councillor Lewis, are you talking about um at our convenience centers or were you talking about the commercial the uh commercial collections solid waste fees for commercial collections, which I'm assuming would be small businesses, restaurants, all that uh counselor Lewis.

Uh yes, what you're referring to is the solid waste five percent commercial increase fees.

Um that is something that's built into our ordinance that we can raise every year at 5%.

Um we skipped last year and we raised it this this previous year.

Um on average, we did an average to calculate if you were to look at some of the small businesses which you're referring to, we have roughly around 338, which are in our class 20, we call it, which is kind of a badge service, which would be the smaller companies.

Um from FY24, if you added the 336 of them, it would have uh 9,316 a month total.

But now with the new 5%, it's at 9,842, so roughly around $500 difference for all 38 businesses.

Uh so it works out to four or five dollars a piece extra a month to those small businesses.

Um we do have all the other classes down, it's very minimal.

Um, trying to think which other classes would be now.

We do have some higher classes that would be in the what we call the 90 90 class.

Um, they would be up in the higher dollar range, but even still then it would be five hundred dollars roughly for for some of the larger businesses a month.

So, I mean, after this discussion last time we we you know took a good close look at that legislation, and um it's we think it's pretty clear that that's only the convenience fees, yes.

Or staff that the convenience fees really that it applied to as far as um the you know automatic ability to increase without come to the council, but but this is uh an allowance, right?

And and maybe Mr.

Motsco, would you help or would if you guys could help a kind of our art interpretation of that.

Explain that a little bit better, Madam Chair, Councillor Lewis?

Um there are two increases in the solid waste proposed budget.

Uh one is the the 1.51.8 for uh commercial pickup for city residents, the other is the out of city convenience centers.

We're still looking up the um, okay.

So we're we're going through the ordinance back and forth.

So it looks like it's the convenience center fee that doubles for out of city residents that needs an ordinance.

We know one of the two does, but we're still researching them.

We believe it's the convenience center fees that's going from five dollars to ten dollars for out of city folk.

Okay.

So I mean, there are some there are some increases, you know, however we want to call them, and uh whether they're whether you're gonna you know send them to us or not for uh approval.

I think it should just because you know it affects again it's it's uh it's affects affordability and bottom line in people's pockets and people we represent, that's just gonna mean more money out of their pockets, and you know it's the council's role.

I think to again, I mean the city government is set up for some you know accountability and uh you know the voice of the people of the city that are taxed, uh, to be able to be able to say, I mean, you know what what are the and have a discussion, have a specific over it, not just in the budget saying we're just assuming you're doing this, but to be able to say, you know, what what are some measurable um improvements that taxpayers should expect this next year uh that goes along with an increase of of tax of money that's gonna contain just to come out of their pockets, additional money out of their pockets that'll go toward the department.

So and I'm asking this now, but I'm I also want to say, you know, the reason why I'm I mean the the reason why we would want these to come to the council is because that's how the city government is set up.

I mean, we represent those uh the the people, and you know, we we need to have the discussion and the ability to be able to assess that.

So I'm asking the question.

Madam Chair and Councilor Lewis, so the convenience store surcharges that you're talking about, those are coming to the council as for out of uh out of city residents, as they use and those are part of this budget as they do use our convenience centers, and as I noted earlier, um everybody who uses it who's not a city resident is getting a five-dollar tipping fee, is what we call it charge when it really costs twenty-four dollars.

So that gets passed on to our current residents who are covering those costs because they do pay a monthly fee for our services.

The commercial rate increase did come before council back in 2021 and was brought to council and approved, and with the way it was written, and uh we've looked it up, and I think Mr.

Motko has that is that commercial rates could be raised up to five percent annually, and that was what was approved by the council.

It doesn't state that it has to come back to the council every year, it just states that that can be taking place to keep up with the cost of um servicing commercial clients.

Yeah, I think we've established that.

My question is what what are the measurable uh improvements that taxpayers can expect with the additional increases of fees?

Madam Chair, uh Council Lewis, just like uh C O Whelan mentioned it would be the commercial collection fee of five percent.

Um the risk additional money that you're referring to for the convenience centers uh is the additional five dollars, but it's for residents that are not in the city of Albuquerque in the Metro Park, they're outside in the Bernalito County and for other residents that are in Sanibor County, Torrance County outside of the county.

There are additional fees that are whether it comes before us or not.

There are additional fees that are gonna by city residents.

So what what are the what are the measurable improvements that we can expect to see because of the additional revenue that we're gonna madam chair and counselor Lewis?

So when it comes to our convenience centers, um our convenience centers are overused as they are, um, so they are they are in need of some upkeep.

Um the enterprise fund doesn't receive geo bond funding, it outbreaks as a true enterprise.

It doesn't receive from the general fund other than services that it charges for.

So it works with planning with board-ups, and it's done that way because planning used to use an outside service, but it was cheaper for us to do it within the solid waste department, so that was a benefit to the city, and it was a benefit for for the residents and for us to be able to respond quicker.

So there are raises for those.

There are needs at some of our convenience centers, and we look at it.

I mean, we just had to repair the floor, if I'm correct, just within the last two years because of the excessive amount of use that's on that floor at Eagle Rock.

So there are those kind of needs that have to be addressed when it comes to the commercial side.

Um we are trying to keep up with rising costs, and that's a measurable outcome because as you can tell, everything is going up, and it's going up by a lot more than five percent.

And uh the other thing is we're able to keep up with the raises that council approves, or that's proposed by the administration, because even though a three percent raise is given, solid waste doesn't raise their rates by three percent, they're stuck at eighteen dollars for residential.

So when a raise happens and it's about six hundred and it's between five hundred and eighty thousand and six hundred thousand per dollar, as um Miss Keener said through transit, it's very similar.

Um we have to absorb that in the current budget.

So whenever a raise is given, we have that rate dollar amount, because we can only charge people 12 times a year, and we have a set amount of what we can charge them.

Then we'd have to go back and find if it's a dollar that $600,000 within an existing budget that's already tight.

Um so those are the measurable outcomes is being able to continue to provide the level of service, even expanding some of our services, which we've done over the last years.

So I think those are the outcomes that we're trying to achieve.

All right, and I and I think you know, to a certain extent, especially when it comes to a true enterprise, that uh, you know, there's there's some justifiable like they do that.

Still, I think it's important to communicate that.

I mean, same way if you know we you do a I mean, cities do a uh, you know, I mean, public safety tax.

I mean, you should see just have some measurable, you know.

Hey, we're gonna get this truck, we're gonna get this fire truck, we're gonna, you know, you have a um, you know, uh uh quality of life, you know, tax for a new event center, you know.

I mean, there's an attachment in people's minds that yeah, it's gonna cost me this much more, you know, per what I buy, things like that, but this is what we're gonna get for it, you know.

I think we're gonna do a good job of um uh of really showing those measurable differences.

Uh otherwise, you know, what what happens is each year it's incremental.

There's just incremental, you know, cost of city hall goes up and up and up and up without um yeah, without people seeing you know what City Hall is supposed to be doing, you know, and uh so and the improvements that we're supposed to have, and so anyways, I think that's important.

Thank you, Director.

Thank you, Counselor.

Counselor Teas.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just have um do you know uh let's see.

In an umrdance 2224 under that section authority 9101 eleven K, which is the one um about the contingency appropriation.

Is there a reason why we have not um increased that from two dollars and thirty cents?

Could you recite the ordinance number, please?

Yep, yep, it is um ordinance twenty-two-24, and then so it's enacted in um twenty-two, and in the budget it says the proposed budget um includes a contingency appropriation for the cost of fuel when it exceeds two dollars and thirty cents per gallon, and we have not on average in the United States, been at $2.30 um per gallon since probably 2005.

So I guess I'm I'm curious how over the last let's just say five fiscal years.

How long has this con how many times has this contingency um appropriation been activated?

Councilor Diaz, I I think you're referring to the fuel surcharge at the two dollars and thirty cents.

Counselor James, thank you, no one doesn't have to look.

Um I don't know how long it's been out, but I know we use it.

Um Counselor Tez, we'll have to get back to you because that is part of the fuel hedge.

And Treasury actually sets the fuel hedge.

We don't send it.

Oh, okay.

Uh Councilor Teus, uh, according to our fiscal manager, Treasury sets the price on the fuel hedge two dollars and we need to put our answer.

Does that have to do with the hedge?

No, madam chair.

To your question, uh Director Sandoval is saying no.

No, we have not implemented the charge.

No, she's saying it's not directly related to the hedge.

It's not directly rated related to the hedge.

No, this is a trick question.

It's not a good question, I promise.

And this year we've done we're doing it now.

Do you want to be my answer?

Okay, yeah.

Um councillor chair, madam chair, uh counselor Tees, we're doing it now.

So as soon as the diesel fuel exceeds 230 a gallon, that goes into effect.

We calculate it every month based on what the fuel charge is.

Right.

So here's my question.

So the contingency authority in the ordinance allows you to appropriate um when the cost of fuel exceeds two dollars and thirty cents per gallon.

We have exceeded the cost of fuel has exceeded two dollars and thirty cents a gallon, probably for the last 20 years.

Um, and so my question is it no longer becomes a contingency appropriation if we're using it every year.

Um, and so it it then becomes um an operational expense, it's a it's a structural expense that should be budgeted transparently and not just triggered um as a as a contingency appropriation, and so I guess my question really becomes um what when do we get oversight over that extra appropriation?

Because we certainly I don't believe have it if you're utilizing it as a contingency appropriation and the costs to provide current levels of service are supposed to be calculated each year and presented to city council as part of the budget process in that ordinance, and I don't believe we've received those either, Madam Chair, Councilor Teas, I believe that this is based on our fuel hedge.

So we when we it's based on our fuel hedge.

So we have in the past seen it go to zero where we haven't charged the citizens, our residents anything, and at times we do charge them, but there's times where it doesn't go into effect.

How many times how many times have you done it over in a row in the last let's say five years?

Have you used that contingency appropriation consistently over the last five years?

I'd have to give back to you on that number.

Um Madam Chair and Counselor Tees, it's an enterprise fund, so the contingency fund, the contingency is actually used to pay for gas.

That is what we use it for, is to go back through and pay for our fuel to make sure that we can cover the cost of our fuel.

I understand what you're using it for.

My concern is that it's being used as a structural budgeting mechanism, disguised as a contingency, and that weakens transparency over this over this money.

So when we have a fuel price assumption built into a base budget, how often are you using the contingency authority?

If you're activating it year after year after year, it's not truly contingent.

And so that's why I want to know how long have we been activating that contingency because it becomes a governance issue.

And at what point, you know, does that become where it should actually be a structured operating expense and not something that's contingent because we should be receiving notification quarter quarterly reporting approval opportunities if you're going to be using a contingency fund regularly?

Can we have a follow-up on this?

Let's do this offline so we can learn more.

Yeah, Madam Chair, and Counselor Tears.

I'd love to meet with you in the department and we can walk through this.

Actually, CAO single.

I just wanted to uh follow up on this because I think Councilor Tea is it is by ordinance passed by city council, which is the authority and action of city council that this contingency language was is within the ordinance, so they have the authority within that to what uh to assess the fuel charge based upon the authority you all have given through that ordinance.

So that is um structurally appropriate based upon the fact that it is by law uh the ordinance that was passed.

Thank you, Dr.

Single.

I appreciate that, Madam Chair.

I realize that that is in the ordinance, but it we're not supposed to become dependent on contingency appropriations.

Um that is the definition of a contingency appropriation, you only do it when you need it.

It becomes need based for for you know um it once once you sort of take advantage of the authority of a contingency use, it no longer operates in that way, and it becomes a structural risk to the base budget.

So that's why I think it needs to be reevaluated.

Um, and so that's why I'm asking how many times have we utilized this contingency appropriation over the last several years?

Um does it need to be reevaluated?

So those are the questions, those are the answers I'm trying to get so that we can answer that question.

I think counselor, I think these are great great, it's a great question, and I think that the administration has some homework to do to get back to us on that to get your answer so that we can uh make better decisions, and we probably should take a look at that ordinance as well and see if we need to update it.

Do you think?

Yes, I think so.

Thank you.

Thank you.

It does raise some some questions.