The Chesapeake City Council met on September 9, 2025, for a work session from 5:15 p.m. to 6:01 p.m., followed by a regular meeting from 6:30 p.m. to 10:19 p.m. (including a closed meeting from 7:40 p.m. to 10:19 p.m.). The council unanimously approved the consent agenda, several regular agenda items, and an initiating resolution to begin the process of adopting the Chesapeake 2045 Comprehensive Plan. Two nominations were announced to fill the vacant council seat.
Can we write it? Okay, do we have burning? Can we report it? I want to thank everyone for being here. We're going to begin our work session here. We have two really exciting topics tonight. Can't wait to get into this franchise renewal thing. So looking forward to our topics, Mr. Manager. Thank you, Mr. Manager. I'm glad you're excited. We also are excited. I'll welcome up our friends from HRT first. You've heard from HRT a few times this year about possibilities for um uh modernizing and and uh bringing some new service and critical corridors today is about optimizing the existing system. So I'll turn it over to um uh William and his team. Thank you so much, Mr. Manager, Mr. Mayor, members of council staff, and members of the public. We're pleased to be before you. And uh as the city manager has indicated, we really are focusing on the efficiency of the organization, and this is a strategic topic that we believe will position us well for the future. Um Mr. Riamaruso, our chief of planning and development will provide an update. Mr. Amaruso. Thank you, Mr. Harrell, and good evening, Mayor West, members of council and manager price. We're very happy to be here to talk about our system optimization plan. I'd like to recognize that we also have one of our TDCHR commissioners here, Mr. Tony Goodwin in the audience as well. He's he follows us around at every city council briefing. We were in City Council Portsmouth last night, briefing them at the work session, and I admire Tony for doing that since he emanates from Portsmouth, but he goes and visits these foreign lands called Virginia Beach and Chesapeake and North. So uh just wanted to say hello. And I'm really excited today to talk about the system optimization plan. It is a key initiative for Hampton Roads Transit as your regional transit service provider. Um and we face some challenges that I'd like to share with you. This is a study that's been underway for some time now, and we're at a point to share some information with you. Uh we've been working diligently with your staff, so they've seen most of these recommendations. But I'm here to talk about the system optimization plan purpose. Um in its very essence, it's its core need is exploring how HRT can put its limited resources to its best use by reducing low ridership bus service and reinvesting those savings and routes with high ridership demand. And what do I mean by that? So there are two types of resources. The one we're always familiar with is financial resources. Um you all have seen us often enough to know how we fund services here and our complex compact that created Hampton Roads Transit. We get federal and state operating assistance that helps pay the some of the costs. You you get revenues from the fare box, and then what's left over the cities pay at the margin. So collectively among the six member cities, after the allocation of federal operating assistance, state operating assistance, and fair box more or less is about 40 percent that each member city contributes to pay for the cost of the services in their cities. We live in challenging times. State operating assistance, while we've had some heady years in the past few years, we're being told uh that it might be more challenging. Uh agencies that do well have effective and efficient routes in terms of carrying productivity of additional passengers on their routes.