House, it's December.

We think everybody's old chapter, but you're here.

And so we are grateful.

Um, I just want to go ahead and get us started.

Um I think we have public comments.

So we can just go ahead and transition into hearing from our residents.

Do we know who's up?

Uh Ms.

Yeah, Ms.

Public Comment.

Good morning, right?

Speaker.

Okay, thank you so much.

Great morning.

Um, thank you all again for allowing us to come and have a conversation or discussion about paratransit experiences in Broward County.

I want to thank you for your attention and influence that helped us elevate concerns shared by disabled community members and their families who will rely on the Broward County Penny Surtax funded paratransit programs, including tops and riders' choice.

We are happy to share that our engagement with this board in October paved the way for significant collaborative discussions with Broward County Transit's leadership team.

Thank you.

Outcomes directly credited to this board's interest in real solutions include BCT and County Administration staff finally responding to our request to connect and talk about the unique challenges and opportunities to improve customer care for disabled neighbors, especially visually impaired paratransit customers.

This board helped open communication flows with BCT representatives as well as Transportation America regarding serious safety risk related to contracted drivers' job performance.

We have commitments from BCT and the for uh for the formation of a community work group that could more effectively capture facts, safety events, diverse hazards, expectations, and opportunities to create tools for community continuous process improvement and potential new program offerings that could uplift customer confidence and satisfaction in Broward County's commitment towards disabled persons using public transportation services.

Now, although the contractor responsible for the dispatch services and ride scheduling has not reached out to any of our community partners, we are working with Broward County Transit to assess how paratransit dispatchers handling of riders' reports of customer care complaints, safety events, and incidents related to non-compliant vehicles and riders' environments on the on the vehicles from the time of pickup to um they reach their destination.

And another significant outcome is that we are thankful for the confirmation from the chief auditor that the long-anticipated paratransit audit has finally commenced.

Am I out of time?

Okay, I thought I was one more minute.

Okay, one more minute.

Okay, one more minute and ten seconds, right?

Okay, we learned that the paratransit audit started two weeks ago in response to our team's advocacy at Broward County.

I'm sorry, during our team's advocacy at the Broward County Commission meeting this past Tuesday.

Thank you for inspiring the opportunity to enhance the integrity of the complaints and investigation processes, as well as reinforcing safety for all riders relying on BCT paratransit services.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for helping us highlight to BCT and the contractors the importance of respecting the rights of disabled persons to expect pleasant, safe, and appropriately accommodating public transportation experiences that all people deserve.

Thank you for demon helping us demonstrate that this board believes that disabled vulnerable community members matter and that the public transportation programs are accountable to sustainable reliability, dependability, compliance with the contract terms, enforcement of disincentive disincentives, and verifiable, measurable quality assistance systems in the best interest of BCT paratransit customers.

We can't again say thank you enough for allowing us to speak back in October.

It has encouraged our group as well as the persons who are using BCT paratransit service and their families that somewhere in the near future they will be able to have an adequate system to report their complaints, follow up with those complaints, as well as see significant improvements in the overall experience for our vulnerable neighbors in Broward County.

So again, thank you, thank you, thank you, and happy holidays.

All right, all right, thank you for your advocacy.

And I'm happy that we were able to respond accordingly, and things are moving in the right direction.

So good job.

We have two more.

All right, can we just invite our next public speakers?

Yeah, Ms.

Tenil Brown.

Thank you.

Good morning, everyone.

My name is Tanil Brown.

The name of my organization is Reuben Stacey Studio for Innovation and Education.

Um first like to thank you all.

Can you speak an upper left?

Absolutely.

My name is Tanil Brown.

The name of my organization is Ruben Stacy Studio for Innovation and Education.

Um, I would like to thank everyone for allowing us to come before you today and speak.

Um, this originally started with us working on food security projects.

So we're grateful that we're able to even bring these sort of issues to your attention.

So thank you so much.

Um, what I would like to do is highlight a few things uh before you today.

I'm here to address critical mobility issues that affect some of the most vulnerable members of the community.

The visually impaired writers, the visually impaired riders, seniors, and individuals who rely every single day on Broward County Transit and Paratransit services across our county.

We are seeing ongoing safety challenges that must be addressed with urgency.

Writers are experiencing inconsistent driver protocol, unsafe or incorrect drop-off locations, and a lack of proper guidance from the vehicle to safe point of entry for visually impaired and mobility challenge riders.