Well, good morning, everyone.

We are going to get started.

Ms.

Prime.

Good morning.

This is a work session of the El Paso City Council for Monday, October 27th, 2025.

It is 9.04 a.m.

Mayor Johnson is present and presiding in Council Chambers along with Mayor Potem Chavez.

Representative Acevedo.

Representative Madonato Rocha.

Representative.

Representative Nino.

Alternate Mayor Potem Piero.

Representative Limon and Representative Canales.

Mayor, we have a core.

All right, thank you.

Representative Sevilla, would you lead us in the pledge?

All right.

That brings us to item number one, and this is Envision El Paso comprehensive plan update on the future land use map.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Good.

Um so my name is Casey Schnell.

I am the comprehensive plan program manager with the Urban Planning and Design Division.

So I'll be presenting on uh the future land use map, which is a major component of the comprehensive plan update, envision alpassing.

Can you all see the presentation?

Yeah, you have it right.

Yes.

Yeah, okay, there we go.

I was like, I don't see it up just yet.

Um, so again, the introduction to the future land use map.

Just wanted to share the process to date, uh, what the what we're proposing for the place types and what our engagement process has been.

So this is a major component to Envision El Paso, which is our comprehensive plan update to the 2012 Plan El Paso.

Envision El Paso is our guide to sustainable and fair investment and land development and uh to improve opportunity and growth for all of El Pasuans.

It is being guided by these project themes, which were identified through our engagement process last year.

They include housing affordability, mobility choice, sustainable living, economic development, and fiscal responsibility.

Our process so far has been that in 2024 we completed our vision and goals framework and our community priorities framework.

This has all been led through community engagement process.

We are now at the point of our future land use map, which I'll share the updates so far.

Um, and we are working on our infrastructure management plan as well as our economic development and housing strategies.

So all of these uh plans and reports come together to then create our envision El Paso plan, our comprehensive plan update.

So the future land use map, what we also call as Flume for short, is a community shared vision for how the city should grow and develop.

It helps guide land decisions, um, land planning and and land decisions.

Uh so again, the the flume is our overarching land use policy, it's the vision, it's the guide.

We want to make sure that we always say those words, the vision and the guide.

Whereas zoning is the site-specific land regulation for how uh something is built and developed through setbacks, heights, and densities.

So the flume is used to help ensure that we have consistency in our long-range land use planning.

Um it helps to inform our zoning updates and our regulations, it helps to guide uh our infrastructure investments, and we also want to ensure and communicate back that this is always developed through a uh shared vision with our community.

So comprehensive plans.

Um, when a city updates its comprehensive plan, it is then uh regulated by the Texas local government code.

Um, and the implement the way that we see that implemented is through the flume and through these land use changes.

So a lot of times you see these applications come through and they're changing the land use, whether that's through a zoning change or special permit, um, whether that's through a subdivision and plot review, ensuring connectivity of infrastructure or an annexation request.

So always referring back to the flume to ensure compatibility and can making sure it's congruent with what uh we had decided as a city uh for the types of growth and development we want to see long term.

So, why do we need a new plan?

Uh the last plan was adopted in 2012.

It's been, you know, by best practice, we update these plans every 10 to 12, 14 years.

And what you may have been seeing in your time here is that there's starting to you're starting to see a few more amendments to the plan.

So oftentimes you'll see those zoning changes, and the zoning changes are related back to the plan, whether they're whether that's the type of growth we want to see or the type of change we want to see.

But when it's an amendment, it's showing that there's uh it's incongruent now.

That kind of land use is not what we had already set out in our flume.

It's a different sort of change.

So instead of uh when you start to see so many of them, it's starting to say instead of having these piecemeal approaches, it's time to look at a holistic and a comprehensive approach to ensure that the way that we want to guide growth and development in the city is consistent across the board instead of these one-off changes.

So we've been working with planning and inspections over the past year and a half to really understand the way that they operationalize the flume, the types of you know opportunities that they're seeing, the challenges that they're seeing, and we've come together alongside our community input to create these land use goals.

So in our updates to the place types, we want to ensure that we're encouraging diverse land uses in our communities, we're really enhancing open spaces, we're making sure there's strong connectivity, and we're increasing opportunity for both mobility choice and housing choice.

And so in our current Flume, they're called land use designations, and what we're leading with is the place type.

And so place type really goes back to sense of place.

We feel like our community is really tied to how their neighborhood feels, um, and that uh the vibe, the look, and everything like that.

And so in our place types, that's where we're leaning towards the character of it.

So when we're proposing these changes, whether it's increasing density, diversifying land uses, we want to ensure that those changes are gradual, um, so that we're not proposing to put you know 20-story building next to a two-story building.

And so that's what this diagram is showing.

Uh, the other element that we heard, you know, through our conversations with other departments and planning inspections is that the current land uh the current flume kind of leaves a little too much wiggle room, it's a little too broad, a little too general.

And so we wanted to create these uh additional criteria within it so that when there is an application for an amendment or a change, that you can look back to these criteria in the place type and ensure that is it meeting this overarching vision for that neighborhood, is it following the types of street types and connectivity to public realm or the public realm or integrating into it?

Are the transitions, the building heights, the land uses, are are they compatible, do they make sense?

Um, and is that intensity and setbacks and building siting?

Is there a consistency versus a really stark change?

So we have essentially 11 place types, and they can be categorized into these six categories.

We have our neighborhood place types, our complete neighborhoods and urban neighborhoods, uh, we have our regional corridors, we have centers, neighborhood centers, urban centers, and downtown, we have employment innovation, light manufacturing and logistics heavy industry.

We have our civic campuses, which are our educational medical campuses in Fort Bliss, and we have our natural and open spaces.

And really what we're saying here is that these are essentially place types that exist.

Our neighborhoods exist, our lower density neighborhoods are exist, our higher density neighborhoods exist, our regional corridors exist.

But what we want to do in this flume is uh amplify their existence.

So we want to increase the diversity of land uses within these place types.

We want to increase the opportunity for housing options and for mobility choice in these uh areas in these land use areas.

The way that we're packaging this all together is essentially showing a uh some imagery, so the projected imagery of what that place type could look like, what we mean when we have this criteria of different uh land uses and densities in those transitions alongside the language with it.

We want to make sure that it's very easy to read, very easy to digest and understand for someone who may not have a developer background.

We also try to include some local imagery to start to give you know lending back to some of these these place types are existing, but how can we get them to a next step to amplify their land uses?

So our engagement process essentially has been you know, we want to educate people may never have heard of the Flume.

They're like, what the heck is that?

Um we want to ensure that they understand what that is, how we at the city use it, and what these updates look like.

And so in our first um uh workshops last year, we hosted one workshop per district.

We you know, we're asking people what kinds of development do you want to see in and around your neighborhoods, what kind of city, what kind of El Paso do you want to see in the next 10 to 15 years?

This information helped us to inform our place types that I just shared alongside the criteria.

What we heard was people just want to be close to things to do, whether that's uh recreational, whether that's social, whether that's being in nature.

Um they want to ensure that they can walk and not only have to get in their car, but they have option of how they get to these places and ensure that that uh option is also you know safe and accessible.

They want to have a diverse use of land uses and spaces to be in and around.

So that was really helpful in us informing our place types.

In our most recent workshops, we hosted one per district plus three additional, and we were asking people where do these changes then take place.

Again, reiterating what do you want to see in your neighborhoods, but also where do you see these changes, where do you imagine this shift happening?

And so that led us to then um start to create this map uh with their input.

So uh again, overwhelmingly, we hear connection to open space, having that connectivity, really having this neighborhood serving commercial.

People don't want to go in every which way direction to access one separate thing.

They want their essentials um nearby.

So what our next step will be is to then create the map.

And before we create the map, one, we want to understand what other engagement we should be doing and make sure that that's exhaustive, but also we want to show people this is how this is your input, this is how it relates to the map, this is how it was included, and if it wasn't included, this is why.

So this past year we hosted 11 workshops, 175 participants, so low numbers there.

Um, and then we had 12 additional meetings um with different uh people who influence our our our development.

Um some of those were our own city departments, and uh the rest were mostly uh uh realtors or uh developers.

And so what we want to do is before we get to the map is really understand, you know, how can we work with you all to do further engagement?

We want to, you know, really enable and encourage everyone to be a part of this process so that as different zoning applications come through in the future, they understand why those are coming through through, or they're not just coming to be in opposition to that single one, but they can be um a part of really creating the vision for that growth and development in and around their neighborhoods and citywide.

Uh so that's our ask with you today.

Um so we you know are in the process of setting up those additional meetings.

Um we, you know, again, just over uh sharing again the project process of where we're at um with our future land use map and the the other elements to envision El Paso.

Um and you know, in our most recent conversations with with uh representatives, we were able to secure a district three meeting coming up in November 5th.

So we'd love to, you know, join you all in your recurring meetings or understand any other creative ways that you feel like your constituents connect um and we're happy to figure out whether that's something more hands-on or if it's a presentation.

Um and then upcoming, we will then have a well, let me go back.

I'll say we want to make sure that that's exhaustive and we can go into the new year into January having those meetings and workshops so that when we come back with the map that it's clear that how those uh workshops and input is then connected to the map.

Um, what we'll have coming up uh in November is we'll be presenting on our housing needs assessment and an additional workshop.

So thank you.

Very kind of wrapped up that last bit.

Very good presentation.

One quick question for you on page all right chart number 27.

Uh-huh.

Oh, thank you.

The outlook where you had 11 workshops with only 175 participants.

Yes.

Are you doing any of this through uh have you thought about doing any of this through polls or social media or any other mediums of getting more participation?

For like a survey or for outreach.

Um for so for outreach, we use social media, um, but we haven't facilitated a survey through this uh phase.

Okay, because it seems a little low.

Yeah.

Yeah, you know, we try, we put it out there.

Um, but it's I think it's reaching people and getting them.

I I think there's ways, it's also like if they've never heard of the Flume or like how connecting the dots as to like how this is impactful to their everyday life, you know, it's like why, why should I attend, why should I go?

And so really figuring out how to make those connecting points and where to meet people.

Okay, very good.

Representative uh Nino.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you to the team and everyone who has worked on this.

I know that we've had great conversations.

Um the last you know, Plan El Paso was adopted in 2012, and I can stop to think about you know the process that took place to adopt that even a year or two before, right?

When I think about you know, the plan O Paso, uh District 5 had a growth of 47% from 2010 to 2020.

And I've tried to analyze the plan O Paso, I have the original binder that I've oftentimes visit.

And I I I've read where you know there's a need for infrastructure for public spaces for pools for senior centers and whatnot.

And I know I mentioned this to you and Alex as well as to how um trying to understand of what you know this comprehensive uh envision opaso plan will have and for it to have tangible results because I mean that plan that's already you know 14 years old and trying to understand of how we've implemented different policy or requirements, even when it comes to like the street manual that I've read um and trying to really make it all combined.

Yeah, I think it's a challenge, right?

Because we're talking about Plan O Paso and then we're talking about the housing plan.

So I really think that um I will love to really understand how we will have tangible results in a shorter amount of time and and and be able to accomplish what these plans come forward with, right?

Because I think that there's so much in Plan O'Passel that essentially we haven't also completed, right?

So can you give us a little bit more about like the tangible results and the time frames that potentially some of these recommendations could have?

Yeah, I mean, I think um with the housing strategy, so we'll have the housing strategy and we'll have the infrastructure management plan.

So as part of the infrastructure management plan, we're looking at the street design manual and making um essentially updates or recommendations to what changes should happen in those different policy documents as well as coordinating efforts across departments to understand how they're investing um their departments in time and budget over the next couple years and how there's where there's overlap for synergy or um I don't know enhancements or I don't know the the proper word for that.

But um as far as a timeline, I would I'm I'm thinking or guessing it's gonna be you're gonna see uh improvements like over two years as we're aligning with strategic planning and trying to follow the implementation of what comes out of those alongside our housing strategy, alongside our infrastructure management plan.

So as we set up those goals, you know, it'll be incremental, but we're the the reach and the goals that we're uh outlining those strategies, like for our housing goal, there's a number that we want to reach as to how much we want to increase that supply.

So we're gonna be breaking that down into your increments and how we can achieve that.

Um I don't know all of the n nuts and bolts coming out of the infrastructure management plan just yet, because we're in sort of the midst of that.

Um, but sort of the same thing is like understanding what are the policy updates that we're gonna have to take um or work alongside other departments, support them into updating or operationalizing, and then with the Flume, again, that's something that another department uh manages, but really under understanding what is the list essentially like the policy audit um that comes out of it and creating a timeline plan for that.

So can't give exact years or updates to that, but that's essentially the next steps.

Anything else to say?

No.

No, and I'm grateful for the work that you know has taken place and I'm glad that the mayor uh asked about the input or you know, in getting more attendance.

I know that in other conversations I've mentioned how different districts have different demographics, you know, I have a young population, young families, and oftentimes for them to attend something in person is sometimes not achievable.

And I know that when we talked about the Parks Master Plan, the Animal Service Plan, I said, hey, maybe we do some sort of survey or you know, if we do a texting campaign, I don't know what it is, right?

But again, um every community i is different.

Um and also one thing that I would like to navigate is you know, we've done the budget workshops, we've done other um community events that we've been able to receive data and input of kind of what the community wants and is looking forward to.

So maybe really, you know, the collaboration between the departments of the the budget workshops or any other community event that we have had to kind of input all the input that we received uh could potentially help, even like the Chime In survey could potentially have some data of what the districts are saying what they want could potentially um help even further with the engagement, but um have no further questions.

Thank you for all your work and looking forward to to doing more outreach in the district.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

Thank you, Representative Chavez.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you for the presentation.

Um I know that every district is different in the city, and so sometimes that can be challenging when when trying to to cover everybody's needs, right?

And trying to see how we can best move forward so that it could be reflective of how we envision our our city to look for for a few years to come.

I know um a few people here in the room, like Kevin and Joaquin know the intricacies of district one and how complicated that can be because you know I represent different types of of neighborhoods.

So in that regard, I know that we spoke a little bit about this.

And my my only um I guess question is is on on page 17.

I I really like the the fact that we're trying to evaluate things regarding different place types.

And I and I appreciate you know um you know the effort that has been put behind this.

My only concern is, and I know I've mentioned it before, is you know, trying to figure out a process where you know it really tries to be as objective as possible and not so much subjective, only because you know, like for example, the first criteria character, it could lead itself to just basically um lending itself to an opinion versus you know, maybe a scoring system.

So I would just suggest possibly integrating a scoring system into like character, whatever.

You know, I know I know you were working on that still, so um just because again, different neighborhoods do have different characters tied to them, and it's difficult, right, to know unless you've been working, you know, alongside that specific neighborhood for a while to know what the needs are specific to them or what the character of the people that live in that area feel um is appropriate to be defined for themselves.

So um I don't know if you want to speak a little bit about that and and your your uh place types a little bit more and how you will make sure that try to keep them as objective as possible.

Yeah, um I mean I think it's interesting to hear of like a rubric.

Um so the way that it's structured is essentially is like the characters, the vision for that place type.

So again, you're like you're saying a little bit more open-ended, but then as you go down the different criteria, there's a little bit more specificity to it.

So there's a little bit of a balance of not being too prescribed to allow for some openness of change, but not being too open to allow just for you know willy-nilly change.

So um I think that everything kind of after characters starts to speak into uh the more of the like specific criteria, heights, um, the way the relationships of land and buildings to each other, which make it harder to be too objective, you know.

So it's you're doing more of like an assessment and looking back into what's there contextually um on the ground uh versus someone just being able to be like, oh yeah, it feels this way, you know.

And so I think that's that's really the intention for is like characters creating that vision of like what that neighborhood is and feels like and all of the elements after it are like well, actually, this is the heights that we're gonna go to, these are the land uses that we're uh suggesting in this, and this is the way that this you know setbacks and everything else should work with each other, and so that there is a existing um sort of uh baseline um and then outlining how to uh align with that or what what's um what we're allowing for change within that baseline.

And and I appreciate that.

I know that earlier this year there was a rezoning proposal for something in my district, and planning and inspections really walked me through that proposal, but it was very valuable because they they knew um just basically the needs for that specific neighborhood and some historical context in it as well.

And so my only question would be you know, whoever's doing this type of evaluation for them to maybe even reach out to others, right?

That might have a little bit more context in terms of of building, you know, uh these changes within a respective neighborhood that maybe has some historical context tied to it that uh should be considered.

Yeah, neighborhood expertise is always great.

Thank you.

Representative Lima.

Thank you, Mary.

This uh past weekend I had an opportunity to visit with some students out of Texas Tech, the architectural program.

Um they're on the landmarks project, which is a semester long project through the Southwest, and it's a really fabulous um.

One of the young students that was there who's a PhD candidate was sharing with me that he sits on the Lubbock City Planning Commission, you know, that he's on that board.

And it just made me think.

So looking, I'm really concerned when we don't have good turnouts at these meetings.

Uh we really try to broadcast, but unless there's a hook, they're just not going to be attending.

So my thought as a result of that uh meeting was possibly opening up.

I mean, the architecture students here that might be a really good presentation to give some input.

And then the second one that I will um help in coordinating would be to see if we could do um a planning session or an information session for the young women's leadership academy in Isleta.

I think they're really like incredibly sharp, sharp women who would really um learn from this and could possibly provide some good input.

So I'll be I'll I'll I'll be in touch with you on that one to see when we can coordinate and then also if you I'm sure you can reach the School of Architecture.

Yeah, I think we have some alumni in our yes, that's good.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Representative Treho.

I mean you were gonna call me.

Did you forget my name?

No.

Thank you, Mayor.

I see you next.

Thanks, Casey.

I appreciate the presentation and thank you and Alex for coming and agreeing to come to the community meeting.

I I think one of the things that that we hear here is, you know, bring in these additional stakeholders, right?

And and I know we talked specifically about district three because we're district three is really landlocked for growth.

And so it's very different than the outer districts, right?

We we need um we need we need something specific to be able to help bring those people back into the district or into just the inner portions of the city.

So with that said, um I do agree that we need to bring in you know these additional stakeholders, but I also challenge all my other colleagues to have you all out at the community meetings, and I know we're all open to that, but just to to make room for that, because the thing that I love the most about the Flume is that it's very uh it's very centered on whatever the the individual is looking and wanting and what they what the community wants.

So it's very community engaged as far as what the feedback is and how you all take that in and work through the planning piece of it.

Um so I would definitely challenge everybody to to have have you all there.

I know on the November 5th, we did also snag strategic planning.

And so that's huge to be able to collectively do the work at the same time to be able to use those resources as best as possible.

So thank you again for for the presentation and the the push to to get you guys out there.

Yeah, thank you for setting that up.

Representative Trail.

Thank you, Mayor.

Now it's my turn.

Uh thank you for putting this together.

I do want to, you know, invite you to come to our community.

I know you've been there.

Uh we had a very small turnout, but it is important, I think, you know, to coordinate it with our office so that we can also, you know, uh put it on our newsletter and things like that.

One of the things that I have you uh done anything with EPCC, UTIP, maybe going in there and doing any presentations.

Uh so we started talking with um the I want to say it's the planning cert.

I don't know the exact uh degree that it is, but it's a certification in urban planning, and they have an alumni group.

So we are coordinating coordinating with them to get some sort of presentation going.

Um our colleague uh host Sway did a presentation at EPCC.

Okay, cool.

Well, you know, I'm sorry, we have a hot mic.

Please make sure you're muted in teams.

I was like, what's going on?

Um our colleague uh did a presentation at EPCC um uh around Envision El Paso and the Flume, uh, but that was more of like a presentation versus a workshop.

So we could do a follow-up to that for sure.

How we I think those are good ideas.

How was the turnout for that?

Yeah, that was part of a larger sort of um seminar.

Um so I think he when they did the breakout sessions, he had somewhere between 20 and 30 students in his session, which is great, you know, especially if it's part of a larger collective.

Have you all had any thoughts on maybe putting a survey together, something that could be emailed through our newsletters or maybe even to the students at EPCC engineers, things like that.

Yeah, I think it's coming up a lot more, so it's definitely something we should put pen to paper to.

Yes.

Yeah, inner interactive uh maybe something within your website or you can do something interactive.

I'd like to see maybe we can schedule something at the EPCC in Trans Mountain uh along with our district so we can see what we can do to have something there as well.

Okay.

Um let me see what other things that I have on my notes here.

As you're working through this, would you how far along are you in this process?

Can you share updates to our different uh districts as as to the information that you've gathered so far or oh yeah, absolutely.

Um I think in the first round we sent district updates.

Um the way we shared that was like a summary and then the specific comments that we received.

We tried to follow this the similar format, but we can well, we could send updates.

The idea is that every time we do a kind of phased or like a round of engagement, um, is that we want to make sure that we're capturing the the themes that are coming out of that and that sentiment while it's fresh, um, and we can continue to share it out with you each time.

Okay, great.

Thank you so much.

Representative.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um appreciate all the work on this and coming several times to my district to to talk through with uh my constituents.

I I think um from what I've gathered just from hearing my colleagues speak today.

I I really like what the mayor suggested in terms of getting more feedback.

And what I would really love to see is more scientific surveys that are are informing a lot of this work, right?

I think the community engagement piece is really, really important.

But for example, the community foundation is working on a survey, and a lot of the data that they're gathering, I think we could have really partnered with them because I know surveys are expensive, um, especially when they're scientific, right?

And we we could do a little bit more of that more communicating, where we're doing a two birds what stone type of thing, and we could get get some data for us, and then they get data for themselves, but a lot of that data they're sharing with us and really nice reports, right?

So I I think that's something to consider in in the future, because I think they might be doing something like this every year.

And and then as I'm kind of looking through this in-fill development is really important to me, and I know we kind of discuss this a bit, and I've been having a few conversations specifically with DPIC.

I think we need to bring Isletta into the fold, um, maybe other school districts to really discuss how we can be intentional about infill development, and we're we're we're needing to combat the people that are going to the outskirts, right?

And I I was just with somebody um a few days ago, and I'm like, you're contributing to us um not having infill development because you're living out over there, right?

And it was all all joking, but I think it's it's important.

Uh, you know, my my district has the core of the city, and I I would really love to see that more clearly stated in here, right?

Where there's something on attainable housing, ADUs, multifamily buildings, stuff like that.

But I think a big piece to that is infill development where there's a lot of affordability that comes into housing, more of a definition on what affordability and housing looks like, right?

Homeownership and and connecting people to different programs that we might have at the city, whether they're state.

Um I I think that is really important on really clearly defining those objectives of what affordable housing looks like.

Because I think that that word has been thrown out so much that people think public housing immediately, but more it's like what is DD, what is the city doing to make things more affordable for people because the economy isn't doing well, or we have a lot of different issues, right?

So, how how can we make that easier for people to get that home ownership for the first time and start creating their individual wealth and where are we putting all of this?

So that I think I really like how you've put this together.

I just want to be a little bit more intentional, more clear about really saying we're going after infill and and this is what we're gonna do.

And I know that um we have some consultants working on a new infill policy that is almost ready, and and I think those are are good steps to take, but we we really want to make sure that the info comes to life, or at least I do.

Yeah, thank you.

Good point.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Great presentation.

I think that's it.

All right.

Thank you so much.

Good job.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Item number two is a presentation and discussion on the capital improvement grant funded program.

Five-year capital improvement plan, CIP.

Good morning.

Morning, Mayor and Council Joaquin Rodriguez with the Capital Improvement Department.

Item two on the agenda is the five-year capital improvement plan for the grant-funded program.

Um you all have been seeing these capital improvement plans over the past few weeks, and this one is specific to our grant funded program within the capital improvement department.

Next slide, please.

Next slide, please.

This is just a little bit of background on what our project does.

Our main focus is federally and state funded infrastructure projects, but there is a second component to the grant funded program that focuses on long-range transportation planning initiatives.

So primarily we're working on projects that are established as regional priorities by the Transportation Policy Board of the El Paso MPO.

In addition to that, we work on discretionary grant funded projects, and then on the transportation planning side of the house, our focus really is on Vision Zero and Complete Streets.

The majority of our work is driven by the MPO's regional mobility strategy.

This is a comprehensive 30-year planning document adopted by the MPO every four or five years.

We wanted to give you some background here.

We've exchanged emails with your offices over the past year on the RMS 2052 process.

So this is the current process to update their regional transportation document that includes all of these transportation projects and concepts that are then translated into formal projects through the MPO's planning process, moving them from the MPO or from the MTP into the TIP.

We responded to that recent call with approximately $733 million in project requests.

I want to be very clear that's not to say that we will get all of those projects.

We took a very broad sweeping approach to submitting as much as we possibly could for consideration by the Transportation Policy Board.

That included 10 roadway reconstructions, nine shared use paths, three bridge reconstructions, two feasibility studies, and nine roundabouts.

These are throughout all districts in the city.

Next slide, please.

This is how that breaks down in terms of the types of projects.

Again, 733 million total projects.

The types of projects that we submitted are really aligned with the funding categories that the MPO has available for local projects.

Next slide, please.

So that's sort of the broad overview of where projects come from.

The focus for this presentation really is on 25 to 2030, but primarily our program runs on the four-year TIP.

That's the transportation improvement program, and that's adopted at the local level and then adopted also at the state level through the statewide transportation improvement program.

In total for the next four years, that's FY2025 to 28.

FY29 and 2030 are yet to be programmed by the MPO, but we're looking at a total of 181 million dollars worth of projects.

Only 31 million of those dollars are local match and local contribution dollars.

The TIP focuses on a number of funding categories that are available to us at the local level.

That document is overhauled every two years, but if you follow the MPO, you'll know that the TIP is updated on a regular basis, essentially every month at the MPO.

The funding categories that we primarily are able to submit projects in are category five CMAC, we call that, that's congestion mitigation and air quality.

These are projects that have a demonstratable improvement to air quality in our region where we can actually measure what those reduced emissions will be.

This is the most flexible of our funding categories that allows us to do full reconstructions and added capacity projects in addition to alternative transportation projects as well.

Category 9 is specific to those alternative transportations.

Things like bike paths, shared use paths, even transit projects can be funded through category nine.

We also work in other categories that are less represented in terms of dollars.

That's the highway bridge program, the highway safety improvement program, and one that's not listed here, which was a recent allocation is the carbon reduction program.

In terms of the FY25 to 28 tip, this is how the funding breaks down for the city of El Paso.

The majority of our projects are in the service transportation program and the congestion mitigation and air quality program categories.

We also have some DOT discretionary grants thanks to Omar and his team and their grant writing abilities.

We're able to pull those funds down, the majority of which are infrastructure projects in our portfolio.

We have some work in the highway bridge program.

The other program listed there, that's state funding for intelligent transportation systems.

And then our transportation alternatives program is also there.

So where is that money coming from in the TIP?

The majority of it, thankfully, is coming from federal sources through the MPO through the federal aid highway program.

That's almost 57% of our total program budget over the next five years.

We have about 23 million in federal discretionary grants, state funding of about 23 million.

Some of that state funding is also federal money that comes down to local governments through the states.

But the biggest takeaway here is that on the local side right now, we are at about a 17% match ratio.

So what we bring down from the federal government, we're only matching that total investment at 17%, which is really great for our department and really great for the city because we're able to multiply those funds into, as you saw earlier, almost 130 million dollars of total investment.

So recently compete completed in FY24 and 25.

We have the Rojas Drive widening from LUB 375 to Bill Burnett, shared use path along McGoffin Drive here in downtown, the completion of the South Campbell Street reconstruction, mini station at Montesillo, that is almost 100% complete.

We're waiting on a couple of elements to just wrap that up.

And the Paso del Norte Roundabout that you see pictured there.

Next slide.

Here's a little detailed look at the Rojas Drive reconstruction.

Again, a $14 million project, big contribution from El Paso Water, and over $8 million coming from Textot and Federal Highway Administration.

Next slide.

This is an aerial view of the McGrawin Street Shared Use Path.

Total of about a million dollar, or sorry, 1.6 million dollar project, construction at around a million with $320,000 city contribution.

We have a number of projects in design.

All of these will be let within the FY 25 to 28 tip.

That's a playa drain shared use path from Yarbrough to Midway, the reconstruction of Buffalo Soldier, shared use path on Sunland Park, downtown bicycle improvements is currently about to start construction, a shared use path on Brown Street, reconstruction of Sun Valley to from Gateworth from Gateway to Kenworthy.

And then one of our largest more complicated projects is the Traffic Management Center upgrades.

That's a five-phase project to update our traffic management center and associated infrastructure across the city.

Next slide, please.

One of our signature projects in District 4 currently that we wanted to highlight is the Sean Haggerty Drive extension.

This is a bridge over the Greenbelt Levy in the Northeast.

Total of around $34 million estimated project cost, $23 million coming from Text Otta and Federal Highway, 3.7 from El Paso Water, and around 7.3 million in city contribution and match.

That construction has already started, is well underway, and we expect to complete that project by spring of 2027.

Additionally, in construction right now, we have the intelligent transportation systems.

This is for the off-system side of the project, state funded.

That's $18 million estimated project costs with only $248,000 city contribution.

This is expected to complete summer of next year.

Is also working through that on their ITS projects.

We wanted to highlight at the end of the day, capital improvements as well as the grant funded program.

We're really a service department to our other city departments.

One of the I guess one of our biggest customers, you could say, is international bridges at the grant funded program.

We have a project manager who is assigned pretty much full time to international bridges.

But we're working on a number of projects with them.

The East Leta Port of Entry Restrooms, ITS infrastructure off system, Eastlet of POE pedestrian improvements.

I won't go through the full list here.

You saw this in their CIP presentation last week, if not the week before.

This moves us on to the second side of the house at grant funded programs, the transportation planning side of the house.

Um this is where we focus on long-range transportation planning initiatives, um things that you've seen uh at council or you've heard us talk about in the past, uh safe routes to school, vision zero, and complete streets.

Next slide.

Uh additionally on the transportation planning side of the house, we were able to secure uh almost 10 million dollars in federal funding from the Safe Streets and Roads for All grant program in fiscal year 23.

We are still awaiting a federal funding agreement on this uh grant award, but once received, um, you'll see signature improvements to the Yarborough corridor south of I-10, um, doing some physical infrastructure improvements surrounding our high priority schools, which were identified through the Safe Routes to School Action Plan, uh an education campaign for Vision Zero, and a number of quick build projects for Vision Zero.

Of that 10 million dollars, only 2.1 of that would be coming from local MASH.

Uh moving on, then another uh set of grant awards here.

This project will be kicking off soon.

The bike plan update.

Um, this was awarded through the FY23 Areas of Persistent Poverty program to update our 2016 bike plan with an emphasis on uh connecting active transportation to transit service.

Um we were additionally awarded through the FY24 raise uh program, a total of 900,000 for a countywide mobility plan.

We'll be working closely with County of El Paso on this project as well as a pretty broad stakeholder group we've put together to identify countywide transportation uh policy recommendations and prioritization of new projects for our regional transportation planning initiatives.

So that's uh our five years in a nutshell, um, keeping in mind the FY29 and 2030 will be programmed by the MPO, hopefully in the in the next few months, and that will likely change all of those numbers.

But um, we plan to come back to you annually with an update to these.

Very good.

Um I think I know the answer to this, but page seven.

I'm sure I know the answer, but just in case.

Can you move funds from one category to another?

You can if the expenditure of those funds is consistent with the requirements of that category.

Um so one thing we've been doing recently at the MPO, um, our CMAC money has been reduced pretty significantly, but we're able to use um CMAC dollars on other projects if it's within the CMAC realm.

So if we're building a shared use path on a project, um, we can use CMAC dollars and then for the rest of the roadway reconstruction, use STP dollars.

Um, with the addition of the carbon reduction program, we're able to supplement other projects on the project elements that are consistent with that funding category.

Um we had one project that was previously CMAC funded uh part of the Baselo Dante Trail system that because of the reduction in those CMAC dollars, we were no longer able to afford that.

We were able to squeeze it in with the category nine carbon reduction program funds.

So as long as the expenditure is consistent with that funding category, you can uh move things around to maintain fiscal constraint.

Okay, perfect.

Representative.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Joaquin, for the uh presentation.

I just have a couple of questions.

I know that you mentioned that this is something that you will provide yearly.

Is that correct?

Yes, we usually come back with uh sort of year-in review for the grant funded program.

Um but with this new emphasis on the five-year plan, we'll be updating that on a rolling basis to keep you all updated.

Thank you, and I and I appreciate that.

The only thing that I'd ask is that um when it comes to like projects and design, it and I'm referring to to slides 13 and 14.

It looks like there's no estimated date of completion.

And I like to see that because I like to see you know what we can expect and when.

And then if there's an issue that comes up or it's at risk and not being completed in time, we can have those discussions as to why it's at risk.

Um, but I think it's important for for not only us but for the public to understand when these projects are going to be completed or when that date tentatively at this point is.

Um, because I see it on on you know the bigger projects like Sean Haggerty and the ITS infrastructure off system programs.

And so I I think it's important to add it to maybe the ones that are in design or they're in construction, but we really don't know what what that looks like at this time.

We can definitely add that.

One thing that we are forced to stick to with federally funded projects.

Every project has a defined letting year.

Right.

And we're not really able to change that without approval from the MPO from TextOt from Federal Highway Administration.

So all of these projects that you see listed as under design will let within the FY25 to 28 timeline.

We can go back and add those, and I'll follow up with your office.

Yeah, or maybe just adding it.

Maybe adding that disclaimer on there just so that we understand, or myself, I should speak for myself, so that I understand what what the reasoning behind that is.

But I think it's just good information to have.

Thank you, Joaquin.

Appreciate it.

I agree.

Representative Chavez.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Joaquin.

I know that many of these projects, you know, are massive, right?

And they require a lot of funding and a lot of dollars.

So I want to know how do you prioritize the projects in terms of what year they're gonna be let or you know, basically how do you prioritize them?

So we were able to, you know, sort of work through that process recently.

Um there's definitely room for improvement in the process, but essentially we start with identifying council priorities, past planning projects, past projects identified in past planning studies, um, and working with staff to identify where where the where the need is.

Um we're really constrained to what type of projects are possible with the federal funding.

Um, you know, for one thing, we we can't use this for any type of project that could be seen as maintenance, right?

This has to be capital improvements, capital expenditures.

Um, refine things based on need.

That's one of the things we look at.

Um so looking at the age of infrastructure, um, we work with our partners at El Paso Water to see if there's room for collaboration there in terms of stormwater facilities that are needed or aging infrastructure that could be replaced at the same time.

Um, and then we look at other aspects like connectivity, um safety.

So we we do a number of different checks into whether a project makes sense, um then we align that with the scoring criteria that the MPO has developed, um how they're gonna rate projects.

At the end of the day, we try to just submit as much as we can to them and leave it up to the transportation planners at the MPO to develop what they feel is a higher priority and move that forward.

Um ultimately the transportation policy board is who approves that final project list.

Um I believe you all will be seeing that um in the month of November, if not December, um, what that final list for the 2052 RMS will look like.

Okay, and then like on slide 16, you know, where it um it says the estimated project cost and then the city contribution.

I'm you know the dollar amount is so exact, right?

So how do how do those uh proportions come to be in terms of percentages?

Is it a percentage or is it like a dollar amount?

How do you determine what the city's contribution is gonna be?

It it is a percentage.

Uh the percentage changes depending on the year.

So typically what we aim for is the 80-20 split.

Um when funding is coming through.

This project's probably not the best example because this was a I believe this was a rider at the state level that funded this project.

But as federal funding passes through the state, the state has transportation development credits that they're able to apply.

That exact percentage changes every year.

But some of our projects, you'll see that the final match is seven or eight percent to the city.

The state covers the rest of it to get up to that 20% that the federal government requires.

Um, so that varies.

When you see very exact dollars coming from us, that's usually when a project has already let, so we know exactly how much it's gonna cost.

We have an advanced funding agreement with the state where we've defined exactly what the cost share is earlier in the project development process before we have bids before we have uh that advanced funding agreement.

Really, we're working on our best estimate of what we think the total project costs will be.

And we do those best estimates prior to adopting a budget to see what the city's contribution is going to be for that year.

So depending on when projects are gonna be let or whatever the case might be.

Correct.

We we do those uh very early on in the process when we submit the projects to the MPO when they move from the RMS into the TIP, we update that based on whatever inflation has been, just whatever the cost will be in the year that it's actually programmed.

Um we continue to update that throughout design 306090.

Um what we've been looking at right now is requesting um SIB loans for our matching dollars.

So we have to lock that number in at some point, right?

We can't wait for the bids to issue the SIB loan because at that point it's it's kind of too late.

Um so we're continually updating those estimates and trying to have our best guess with a little bit of contingency as to how much money we need to actually uh borrow or allocate if it's a different city funding source to that project, but we don't know the exact dollars until construction and and even then the construction contracts that council approves, even those are estimates, right?

They're they're based on unit costs, they're based on what we expect construction to be.

But at as construction proceeds, those uh those item quantities may change and the total construction contract changes.

Thank you, Joaquin.

I know this is uh a big undertaking on your behalf, so we appreciate the presentation and the work that you're doing.

Thank you.

I just want to thank Joaquin as well.

So I mean we've worked very closely together, working on those estimates.

I mean, we've got the list of all of the projects, what the city's contribution is going to be, really working on the timing of when we're gonna need those funds and how much we're gonna need uh for those particular projects, and so I mean we work obviously very closely to ensure we've got those amounts captured.

I'm gonna see if I can change my engineering degrees in for accounting degrees and good luck with that.

Representative.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Joaquin, for all your work that has taken into this.

Also meeting with us and and just you know collaborating and having the input.

Um I did go over the memo that you sent us and also the list of all the projects that are part of the RMS.

Um and you mentioned a few minutes ago that this is not for maintenance, it's more for capital projects, right?

Correct.

I know when we met briefly in 2022, council had given direction to the city manager to work with the MPO, the county, uh, to do a east side traffic study.

I know that we touched bait uh briefly on that.

Um and I had also requested that I don't think we should do the investment until we know the projects are complete, like the Monwood extension, John Hayes.

Otherwise, if we work on a plan now, and then there's gonna be new infrastructure that's gonna happen in the next year or two, it would to me it would be a waste of money without having that uh those projects completed, right?

Um do we foresee since I'm sure what I'm trying to understand is it's no maintenance, it's capital projects.

Would that specific um direction fall under the RMS projects or not?

I'm not sure I'm understanding the question.

In regards to funding, in order for us to fund the actual traffic study, how we had given the direction to work with the county, the MPO.

Um I know that we have briefly talked about it when we met to see what the status of that specific project was.

But again, I know the the proposal was about a million dollars.

Um, but again, I didn't think the expenditure would be justified if there was projects in the queue that are gonna essentially uh enhance traffic mitigation in district five.

Um I was just trying to understand in regards of the comment of saying maintenance versus capital projects.

Does that um that direction specifically fit to apply for an RMS project?

So the the maintenance limitation is not necessarily a policy direction that's you know something at the MPO level, that's really just a restriction on the federal funds.

Okay.

Those federal funding programs are not to be used for uh things that could be considered maintenance activities, so resurfacing of a roadway would be considered maintenance activity.

Um what we can use it for, and what you see in that project list specifically for district five, where the biggest concern is congestion.

Are the CMAC program really fits um the installation of roundabouts, right?

Um when you look at district five and and how development has occurred over the past 20 years, it's very difficult to go in and change any of that, right?

And Alex and his team will be more appropriate to look at strategies and policy changes we can make in terms of land use to impact that, but from a transportation infrastructure standpoint, the only tool we really have to address the level of congestion that you see in that district and you know, really on the east side in general are roundabouts to to keep cars moving um you know as quickly and effectively as possible.

So that's really what we've focused on.

Um in terms of that traffic study, I think we need to restart the talks with uh the county and with TechStot.

The primary points of contact are with both of those organizations are no longer employed by those organizations.

So we can restart those talks and see if there's an appetite to do that.

I think that study really only makes sense if it's sort of an intergovernmental approach.

Um a lot of the congestion that we see on the in on the east side is not necessarily because of residents of the city of El Paso, right?

These are county residents, uh horizon residents, these are folks who are coming off of state highways.

So we really need to have a collaborative approach to coming up with those solutions and probably a collaborative source uh approach to paying for that study.

Um it's definitely something that we can we can revisit and something we can discuss with the MPO to see what sort of resources they could put towards it as well.

Yeah, I think that will be extremely important for me.

I know again, I know that we have a lot of projects in queue, like the Monwood extension, the John Hayes extension, and there's a new development happening right outside of District 5 of 15 to 20,000 new homes.

So if you multiply that by two cars, it's going to be about 30 to 60 vehicle, 30 to 60,000 vehicles that are going to mitigate through the district when we're great locked in when we have very minimal, you know, our two road roads to connect.

So I'm looking forward to supporting you and those conversations as well, because I am interested in ensuring that we we continue the conversation of what that means.

And like you said, um, ensuring that it the growth that has happened in the county, we also collaborate with them to ensure that we all communicate and ensure that the traffic helps uh everyone as a whole.

So thank you.

Thank you all, King.

Great presentation and keep up the good work.

That brings us to item number three, and this is a presentation and update on the City of Al Paso International Policy Agenda.

Yeah, we have to morning.

Good morning, Mayor and Council.

I'm Adriana Fulesio with the Economic and International Development, and I'm here with an update on our international policy agenda.

And before I get started, I would like to say hello to some of our guests that are here with us today from the National League of Cities that are interested in the work that we're doing on an international sense and are here to learn more.

So if you'd like to say hello.

We're really just pleased to be serviced.

And where are you from?

Washington.

Okay.

They'll be with us for today and for most of tomorrow.

So we have an opportunity to interact and share a little bit more about what we do.

Very good.

So our international policy agenda lines up with our first goal in cultivating an economic an environment conducive to strong economic development.

And we'll talk a little bit more as to why that is.

So our agenda today is pretty brief.

We're just going to start with an overview of what our international policy agenda is.

This is a quick refresher.

How it links to our other policy programs, the implementation actions that we have engaged in, and how some of our partnership updates have progressed since April.

So in a quick overview, the international policy agenda was approved by council on April 14th of this year, and it's had a lot of movement since.

It has three main goals.

We are looking to establish and maintain relationships with the three orders of government in Mexico, so municipal, state, and federal, improving border infrastructure, and facilitating a cross-border trade.

It basos uh international policy agenda integrates that federal, state, and cross-border efforts to drive economic development and that shared infrastructure.

Before we get too in-depth in our in our agenda, I'd like to take a moment to say thank you to all of our city departments that were part of this effort because we are recipients of the International Economic Development Excellence Award for regional cross-border partnership.

We submitted for this award just a couple of weeks after we had this initial conversation with you.

And uh, with such a short history to it, we still got an award and got that recognition.

So we are going on an excellent track.

What we're doing has been recognized as being groundbreaking and being truly essential to what we're doing and something unique to border communities.

So just thank you to Strategic and Legislative Affairs, International Bridges, Foreign Trade Zone 68, Airport Destination El Paso, and all of the city departments that have come together to have this effort ongoing since February.

And now Johnny, you're supposed to pause there and we're supposed to clap.

Congratulations.

Well, thank you very much, sir.

And we've been invited to apply again next year, hopefully in the company of other communities that are now following this direction, and this has gone from a policy innovation to a regional movement.

So it's something that we should all be very proud of.

So next up here is how all of our policy programs link together.

And this is a slide that you've all seen before, but the new addition here you'll see is our connection with the Department of State and with all of the foreign service officers that work in this region.

And that deepens our connection with the international side and with the federal policy development, which is a fairly new addition to the policy programs that the city is working on as well.

So we're still working closely on that rapid response strategy, grants, legislation and policy changes, implementing it, the programs and strategies we have in place for international business, now considering the business one stop shop, looking at the international transition assistance program and the work that we're doing now to help our business community be more aware of changes in tariffs, bringing together those workshops and different initiatives for growth.

Going now into our implementation actions and where all of this comes together, the international policy agenda has four areas of focus.

And we're looking at infrastructure, foreign direct investment, and support for other city departments, strategic and legislative items.

So we'll take them one by one for this update.

Starting with the infrastructure side and our ports of entry as a top economic development assets that our communities here deeply depend on.

There's a lot of ongoing advocacy and legislative policy associated to land port development through a grant with Congresswoman Escobar, the International Bridge and Port of Entry Modernization Act of 2025 through Congressman Gonzalez and Senator Cruz that are now included in the state version of the Natural Defense Authorization Act, National Defense.

So we can see a lot of that effort and movement between departments to try to push this forward.

And there's also opportunity zone designations that city staff is working on.

So we can have these by our ports of entry as well.

And here's another opportunity to say thank you to strategic and legislative affairs that have taken the lead on this with urban planning and design and the team at community development working towards this achievement.

We'll see that there's a little bit of a parallel already with bienestar en desarrollo.

That is a national designation that Mexico has had close to the port of entry in Santa Teresa.

So it lines up to this effort that we're doing.

We do have a lot of opportunity zones in place, but this will just really enhance those opportunities for economic development growth and help us bring in more investment to the area.

Next up, looking at our strategic and legislative affairs side of it, we have formally requested that the government of Mexico include it Isleta Saragoza port planning into their documents.

They have had some other priorities in terms of infrastructure, but we've been able to make that petition so we can work on these together and make the best of investments that are coming up.

We have launched together with the Department of State.

We're still working on the branding.

So we're calling it the El Paso Ports Task Force or the MAT for the Mexican American Trade and Transportation Committee.

And this is an opportunity that is important to highlight because in a lot of these conversations, when it comes to ports and it comes to infrastructure, we haven't always been at the table.

We haven't been a part of every conversation.

But we are now.

We've built a new table with them.

And everyone is invited to have those conversations and to be a part of the decisions that we make as a region for our well-being for the improvement and for our regional success going forward.

So this is the first of many efforts this way, where we are making sure that the city is a part of these conversations, that all of our port assets are being taken into consideration as we look for growth into the future.

We're also continuing to engage with the Maquiladora industry and with other industry groups like Cana Cintra, Wasejota, and other higher education institutions so we can have that unified vision for the future and continue our collaborative work and now formalizing advocacy and support for these Leta Saragoza port and all of the efforts going in that direction.

We've been able to support Sud Juarez, the municipal government of Juarez in making short-term improvements through the Zaragoza ports and making sure that we have that communication that has been requested of us for the past few months so we can have that regional approach and again make sure that we make the most of our planning efforts and investments that are coming into our structures.

This is a new group we plan to meet every couple of months with a general goal of increasing by national communication and developing short and long-term solutions for cross-border trade.

Right now, in the very short term, we're looking to mitigate the impacts of the BOTA commercial closure and how we as a region can come together to inform businesses, develop resources, and make sure that we can all continue growing and attracting investment.

And in the long-term sustainable, the long-term growth is the design of more sustainable solutions for ports of entry that are truly designed around user needs and the consumer behavior that we've been able to observe.

And this is an effort that the economic and international development team has taken on in approaching companies on both sides of the border, different transit companies and speaking to the drivers and really helping them kind of get all of the knowledge that they need to make those decisions and informing them of what's going on.

On the foreign direct investment side, we've been focusing a lot on international collaboration.

And you will learn a little bit more about one of those efforts through an MOU that my colleague Israel Alvarado will go into more depth, but we have a few more coming down the line.

The work that we've done has received some attention and some recognition from other national organizations in Mexico, and they want to know more about what we want about what we want to do and how they can work together with us.

We're planning to increase the impact of our international transition assistance program, supporting companies from across the border to set up here and be a successful part of our local economy and being able to grow business on both sides of the border.

We have a joint strategy with Ciudad Juarez and now one in development with Chihuahua for industrial growth and aerospace development.

And we're continuing our work with impact that the terrorists have had.

We update it every Wednesday with all of the news that has happened with tariffs and how it can impact companies locally.

So this is something that we share with absolutely everyone.

We want to be that source of trustworthy information so we can make those well-informed decisions.

And thank you for the role that everyone here has had in speaking to our our guests and engaging more with Mexico.

They're very happy the municipal government truly appreciates the increased presence and effort that we're doing as a city to have that stronger connection.

So it's this good news all around, and it's something that we're very happy to share.

Wrapping up with our advancing city department priorities, we have our international affairs committee.

We get together every month.

We started off in February when we were having these conversations about the international policy agenda.

We have our next meeting coming up today, and it serves as an interdepartmental communication mechanism.

And all city departments that work with Mexico in any capacity get together.

We discuss projects, things that are going on, and how we can support one another.

We started getting a few guest speakers from Ciudad Juarez and from Chihuahua.

They've all requested to be regular members, and now the group has grown quite a bit, but it's become a very interesting platform for us to discuss and to have more of those opportunities to connect.

From this, we've got five new international partnerships that have had significant impact on the CEDs on the foreign trade zone summit that took place this week, well, this past week now, and now our Juarez, Doña Ana, and City of El Paso collaborative that gets together every quarter to make sure that we have all of that information and that we continue to build relationships.

Quickly on our partnership updates.

We are proud to share that there are other communities that have decided to adopt the same sort of policy work.

So now we have six communities that are developing their own international policy agenda that are mirroring ours, and we're happy to help them and develop it and implement so that now it's a truly regional approach, and that we have a standardized and that we have policy behind so we all know how to work together and have that common vision for the future.

And some of our new partnerships that have come from this effort, some since January are with Concanaco Servitur, Frente Norte, Chihuahua Global, and other organizations that work with economic development and want to learn more about how we can work together.

So it's it's fantastic to see all of this growing effort and all of these partnerships that continue to grow.

So Israel will tell you this shortly.

He's coming right behind me for the next one.

But the MOU that we're going to discuss is something new for our community as well.

It will be the first of this kind of memorandum of understanding that we sign outside of Sister Cities International.

So we're taking a step further in engaging with companies and getting a good understanding of what they need, who they are, and how we can connect them to the resources and to the programs that are available in our community.

So this is the first of a few that we have in development right now.

We've got about four national-level organizations in Mexico that want to find ways to work with us a little bit more and to develop those bonds.

So it's something that we are excited to bring forward.

And with that, we've got our next steps.

And again, I I cannot convey my appreciation to having so many council members working together with Ciudad Juarez and being part of these meetings and these conversations that are shaping our region.

Next up, we are still aiming to promote regional impact and adoption of international policy agendas across the region.

We did move our binational city council meeting to next year.

There were a little bit of issues with visas, but we're hoping that we can get that scheduled early in the year, where we will revise the current text of the policy agenda to include a clause for tourism and cross-promotion of cultural events by request of our partners in Juarez.

We will continue working on collaboration with higher education institutions and universities and continuing to promote your participation in these efforts and finding more ways for you to interact with other council members and with other initiatives that are happening across the border.

Very good.

Well, I it was intentional by me and Mayor Cruz Petis Square to make sure that we were going back and forth.

I'd be visible and what isn't he would be more visible here.

So I'm glad to hear that everything that we're doing here as a council is paying off in Mexico and our colleagues are recognizing we're we're really stepping that up a little bit.

But uh again, me and the mayor were very deliberate on making sure we were going to do that when I got into office.

So that's good to hear that it's working.

Uh representative.

Thank you, Mayor.

First and foremost, using your words, congratulations to the team behind you.

Your leadership is just amazing when it comes to the award, and it's very well deserved.

The work you all do is amazing.

Um, you know, there's been many roadblocks and obstacles that have been put before this this group and this before you have some of it being tariffs, uh BOTA.

And I love the when you said that uh, in spite of all that, you all just made your own table.

So thank you for your leadership, thank you for your work, and uh just continue the great work.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you, Mayor.

Yep, good presentation.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, sir.

Okay, that brings us to item number four, and this is discussion and action on a resolution authorizing the city manager to sign a memorandum of understanding by in between the city of El Paso and the Confederation of National Chambers of Commerce, Services and Tourism of the United Mexican State, Concanaco Survey Tur Mexico, to establish a framework for cooperation and promote trade and investment opportunities through the promotion of goods, services, projects, and dialogue spaces by implementing strategies that ensure the successful execution of specific action for a term of two years.

Good morning.

Good morning, mayor and council.

My name is Israel Alvarado.

I'm a senior economic development analyst at the Economic and International Development Department.

I believe we have our partner, uh the director of industry development and global investment at Concanaco Servitur, Marcelo Pasos.

He'll be connecting online.

So I'm here to present the proposed memorandum of understanding between the City of El Paso and Concarnaco Servitor, Mexico.

The Confederation of National Chambers of Commerce Services and Tourism.

This agreement formalizes a collaborative framework to strengthen by national trade and investment between El Paso and Mexico.

It is part of a broader effort led by Adriana Pulesio, Karina Vrazgala to position our city as the leading international hub, advancing council's international policy agenda and our department's foreign direct investment strategy.

Okay.

So the requested action is discussion and action on a resolution authorizing the city manager to sign a memorandum of understanding by and between the City of El Paso and Concanaco Servitur Mexico.

The Confederation of National Chambers of Commerce Services and Tourism of the United Mexican States.

Before I go into detail, I'd like to give you an outline of this brief presentation.

I'll start with an overview and talk about how this MOU aligns directly with the international policy agenda.

Then I'll provide a summary of the MOU, followed by information about our partner, Concanaco Servitur.

After that, we'll review the benefits for the city of El Paso.

And then with next steps in our recommendation for approval.

Okay, so this MOU is a direct derivable of the international policy agenda approved by Council on April 14th this year.

This agenda prioritizes three areas.

Strengthen uh partnerships with Mexico, facilitating trade and foreign direct investment, and building collaborative frameworks across chambers, associations, and governments.

Therefore, this MOU is an actionable step that translates those directives into measurable results, connecting El Paso's business community with Mexico's largest network of enterprises.

Summary of the MOU.

This MOU creates a flexible, non-binding framework for cooperation, focused on trade, investment, entrepreneurship, and innovation.

It does not create any legal or financial obligation for either party.

Instead, it enables a structure for collaboration from joint training and business outreach to coordinated trade missions and more, all designed to strengthen El Paso's role as a binational economic hub and attract more direct investment into our community.

Now let's talk about our partner Conconaco.

Concanaco Servitur is Mexico's national official national network of chambers of commerce services and tourism.

It represents 258 chambers and about 5.2 million businesses nationwide.

It also covers roughly about 60% of Mexico's formal employment and about 64% of its GDP.

Concanaco Servitur is a public interest institution established by law, and it serves as an official advisory body to the Mexican federal government in these sectors.

So by partnering with Concanaco Servitur, we are creating a direct bridge between El Paso and Mexico's most extensive business ecosystem.

What are the benefits for El Paso?

This partnership directly aligns with our foreign direct investment strategy goals, particularly business attraction, innovation, and entrepreneurship.

Through Concanaco Servitur's network, El Paso companies create El Paso companies have access to markets and resources to expand into Mexico.

At the same time, we'll create a path for Mexican firms looking to establish operations in El Paso by connecting them with our local incubators, accelerators, and technology partners.

All of this comes at no additional cost to the city, as we'll be leveraging established business support programs.

What are the next steps?

Well, moving forward, the economic and international development department will continue to monitor and coordinate the activities under this MOU.

Our next steps include monitoring and reporting, ongoing business support, and connecting companies through the international transition assistance program and the business one-stop shop.

Our next programs will help us identify business opportunities, provide training and support, support trade missions between El Paso and Mexico.

And to summarize, this MOU is one of the first deliverables of the international policy agenda.

It aligns directly with our foreign direct investment strategy.

It supports goal number one of the city's strategic plan, which is to cultivate an environment conducive to strong economic development.

It also advances council's goals by strengthening El Paso's role in global trade, by expanding opportunities for our businesses, and by supporting job creation and supplier integration.

Most importantly, it does all of this at no additional cost to the city.

So our recommendation is for the city council to approve this MOU by authorizing the city manager to sign the memorandum of understanding between the city of El Paso and Concanaco Servitur, Mexico.

Is there a motion?

So move, Mayor.

Is there a second second?

All right.

Representative Chavez.

Thank you, Mayor.

And thank you, Jael, for the presentation.

I know that economic development is at the forefront of my agenda and others on council as well.

And I know that we approved the you know the international economic development policy earlier this year.

That policy uh did call um for some specifics, and so I just have some questions regarding your presentation today.

Uh the policy says that the city of El Paso and Ciudad Juarez will launch a joint effort.

Um, what type of engagement or collaboration did you do with Sud Juarez prior to putting this MOU together?

For that, I'm gonna defer to Adriana Pulesio or Karina, who are gonna answer.

So for this particular effort, we went to Concanaco at the national level.

So last January, we had an event here at the Blue Flame where we brought together a lot of different mayors and kind of stakeholders for that binational relationship.

I think you were you you were there too, Mayor Johnson.

And that is when we met Marcelo Pasos.

We both gave a presentation and we realized that it was one-to-one almost the exact same content.

We were really looking to do the same for the same people.

So we decided to formalize a relationship and just kind of draw a line between both programs and make sure that we can use all of the resources and assets that we have to create that support system on both sides.

Ciudad Juarez does have their own chapter, but our engagement with them has been a little bit more through the municipal government and kind of taking their lead on what they would like to see that were yes.

And I did notice that their local chapter is a part of Concarnaco Servitur.

Mayor Johnson, did you have an opportunity to speak with your counterpart in Ciudad Juarez regarding this MOU?

I have not yet.

And I haven't talked to Mayor Petisque about this at all yet.

Yeah, and and you know, the the policy that we adopted does say that it would be a joint effort between the city of El Paso and Ciudad Juarez.

So I think maybe there should be an opportunity for that discussion to take place.

In terms of Concarnaco Servitur, I know they are a for-profit uh company organization, rather, in Mexico.

Um what due diligence was perform to evaluate, you know, any risks or implications for municipal government to enter into an agreement with them.

We did have that conversation with our legal team and made sure that everything in the MOU is within city policy.

There's no commitment of anything financial or anything along those lines.

We are doing what we already do, but now with the additional purpose of supporting those uh businesses.

So it is an MOU with the with the national organization, not so much with the individual chapters.

They will look within their membership and help us identify those companies that would do well here and that are ready to internationalize.

And on clause five, I know it says that there's no cost, but on clause five, it says resources and funding.

Each party will be responsible for the resources and funds necessary to fulfill their respective responsibilities.

Um, like what kind of responsibilities would that mean in terms of resources?

I know that that it does also say about trainings and forums and things like that.

So would there be funds allocated to maybe travel to some of these trainings or forums?

More along the lines of uh trainings and opportunities that we already provide.

So, say like the tariff workshops that we've developed, it will be an opportunity for those participants to be aware of the information that we're sharing as well.

And would those workshops be here in El Paso?

Okay, so we wouldn't be uh doing any trainings or forums or any types of uh engagement over there?

Um potentially it's something that we would come back to city council with if we had a maybe a large summit or something that we wanted to organize or if there was something that we wanted to do between both parties, but right now we're just prioritizing what we already do and just extending that invitation in that connection, and they will do the same.

Okay, and I think it would be valuable to understand you know where taxpayer dollars are going in terms of strategic sessions or round tables as stated here on uh the MOU.

Do we have an MOU with our local chamber here in El Paso?

Hi, Karina Brazcala.

Um, the city and the department uh have had MOUs in the past with both the chamber, we have an existing one with the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

Um, they are in our entrepreneurial support organization network.

Um it's typically been programmatic, but I think as of right now, we do not have any active MOUs with the El Paso Chamber.

So if they're probab okay, just by using that word problematic.

Do we foresee this maybe being problematic in any way?

No, we've done similar programs in the past.

Um it's not an issue, right?

We work with membership-based organizations.

Uh, that's you know, we've got close to 30 of those partner MOUs.

Um, they provide services, some of those are at cost for their members.

Um, we typically see that as a pipeline, same as anything else, the leads that we get from the state, from borderplex, from UTAP, from EPCC.

Um, everybody's got different focuses, and so if there's good alignment, we'll bring them in.

If not, these are services that the department is already providing under that international program under that business attraction, and so we continue to provide those services at no cost uh to leads and tech companies that are interested from any other source.

Okay, and in terms of serviturning means servicio y turismo, which is service and tourism.

So did we engage other stakeholders like destination El Paso?

Were they a part of these conversations informing this MOU?

The purpose of this MOU is very strongly focused on that international transition assistance program.

And so it's focused on the business aspects.

That would then give us the authority to add those types of services to this MOU and others.

Thank you, Karina.

I just feel like many times, you know, we've spoken on council regarding bringing stakeholders to the table.

There are a lot of different organizations like Destination El Paso, the Chamber, the his the Greater Chamber, the Hispanic Chamber, the Borderplex Alliance.

All of us, you know, should be leveraging our strengths to make sure that we are all on the same mission to bring economic development to the city.

And it seems to me like in this particular case, we're working as a silo.

We're not even reaching out to Sud Juarez to see what their opinion is regarding an MOU or other stakeholders.

Does Concaraco Servitur have other MOUs with other people in the United States right now?

I think that actually might be a good question for our guest online.

Is he online?

Yeah, if you want to double check.

Marcelo, are you able to connect, unmute yourself?

Morning.

Good morning.

Yes.

Good morning.

Morning, Mr.

Maidor.

And good morning.

All of the participants who most of you I had the opportunity to meet in January during our BC on behalf of our President Octavio de la Torre.

We would like to extend our gratitude and our respect to the city of Paso.

And we are really glad to follow these consultations on the possibility of signing a memorandum of understanding.

On regards to the question whether we the Confederation of Chambers of Commerce Services and Tourism has another memorandum of understanding, the United States of America.

No.

In other states or the United States of America, or with the we don't have uh any other memorandum of understanding uh this moment.

Uh we would love to expand in the future or sign other memorandums of understanding, but no.

Uh the Confederation is a non-profit organization created by LOT.

Um, it covers uh most of the national territory through the CANACOS, the chambers of commerce.

So CONCANAC is the confederation that coordinates or covers 258 uh chambers.

Um that being said, for us as a national as the national level, these will be the first memorandum of understanding we will be signing with uh public entity in the United States of America.

Uh well that will be um it for this opportunity.

Thank you very much.

And Mr.

Major, my pleasure to see you again.

Thank you.

Good to see you too.

Thank you.

Uh thank you.

Um, so just given you know the extent of this conversation and things that we've talked about, again, I want to reiterate that economic developments at the forefront of our agenda.

I do believe that we should be um leveraging our strengths as a community and bringing other stakeholders to the table as we move forward with these types of initiatives.

Um, and so I would like to make a motion to postpone this item to the city council work session meeting scheduled for December 15th in the interim that staff shall engage with key stakeholders as referenced in today's discussion, including Borderplex Alliance, the El Paso Chamber of Commerce, the El Paso Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Destination El Paso, Visit El Paso, and you know, most importantly, Mayor Suil Juarez, I think you you need the up the opportunity to speak with Mayor Cruz Pérez Guayat regarding this and to gather input and ensure their perspectives are incorporated into the next phase of consideration.

I am not saying that I am against you know moving forward with this item.

I just don't think that we've brought enough uh opinions and making we need to make sure that we are considering all of the things that we've discussed at today's meeting, and so I'm proposing this.

I've sent it to uh Laura Prine so she could send it to all of you, but again, just moving to postpone this item for December 15th.

Is there a second?

Second.

Okay.

Any discussion on this one?

Could I just ask for staff clarification?

Are you asking that those stakeholders be asked to review this particular MOU with this entity or that we look at like other MOUs and partnerships, like a more broadcast?

Yeah, I think that there are a lot of people that are trying to bring people to establish themselves here in El Paso.

I just think that we should be again leveraging our strengths, not making not necessarily having them review the MOU, but making sure that we're not you know working in a silo.

I want to make sure that we are talking and communicating with others that are trying to do the same thing for our community so that we can be more successful and so that we can really um ensure that we are being held accountable in terms of you know whatever we're gonna spend resources and time or whatever we're gonna be doing that we do it collaboratively with others in our city so that we can be more successful.

Okay, I'll just note for council reiterate what Adriana just presented, right?

We have several different committees.

We are working on more of these MOUs focused on different programs that align with the specific organizations we're entering into them.

Um so I just wanted to clarify that that we weren't asking you know, six different uh groups that are not part of this MOU in particular to look at this specific language, um, but looking at partnerships in general, very supportive uh doing that work across this agenda and many of our other efforts, uh, but happy to take that back.

Okay, represent Lamont, did you want to talk on this particular I think we need to no not not this one?

Okay, I do not wish to speak on the postponement, but I would like to stay with you.

On this postponement meaning, I don't have a question about question about the actual contract.

So representative canalis on this.

Okay.

All right, is there any further discussion on postponing this until the December meeting?

Okay, hearing none.

Ms.

Brian, call for the vote, please.

Yes, sir.

And the motion was made by Mayor Pro Tem Chavez, seconded by Representative Madonado Rocha, and this is to postpone this item for seven weeks until the meeting schedule for December 15th, and then the interim that staff shall engage with low key local stakeholders, as referenced in today's discussion, including Border Plex Alliance, the El Paso Chamber of Commerce, the El Paso Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, destination Al Paso, visit Al Paso and Ciudad Juarez to gather input and ensure the perspectives are incorporated into the next phase of consideration.

On that motion, call for the vote in the voting session.

And that motion passes 6 to 2.

Representatives Le Mont Canales voting nay, the remainder of council voting aye.

The motion does carry.

Okay.

Okay.

We'll take that back.

Thank you.

All right, thank you guys.

Thank you.

Ms.

Pry?

Yes, that brings us to executive session.

Okay, do we have a motion to adjourn into executive session?

Motion to adjourn.

Okay.

Is there a second?

Was there a second to retire?

Second.

Thank you.

There's a motion and a second to retire to executive session.

All in favor?

Aye.

Anyone opposed?

And the city council of the city of El Paso may retire to executive session pursuing to section 3.5a, the El Paso City Charter and the Texas Government Code, Chapter 551, sub Chapter D, to discuss any of the following.

Executive session item one, William C.

Haywood versus El Paso Police Department et al.

Cause number 320-CV-00114 under 551.071.

Executive session item two, application of El Paso Electric Company to update its generation cost recover writer related to Texas Solar One, PUC number 58834, HQ number utility-75 under 551.071.

And executive session item three, statement of intent of Texas Gas Service Company, a division of One Gas Inc.

to increase rates within the company's incorporated areas of Central Gulf West North and Rio Grande Valley service areas.

OS-25-00028202 HQ number utility-67 under 551.071.

These matters are taken into executive session under 551.071 consultation with attorney.

It is 1042 a.m.

Okay, Miss Prime, I believe we're ready.

Is there a motion to come out of executive session?

Motion to there's a motion and a second to come out of executive session.

All in favor?

Aye.

Aye.

Anyone opposed?

And the work side session is back at 1129 a.m.

Mayor POTEM EX1.

Thank you, Ms.

Prime.

Motion made, seconded, and carried that the city attorney's office in consultation with the city manager be authorized to deny defendants' officers' request for settlement authority in William C.

Haywoods versus El Paso Police Department officers, Isaac Guevara, Michael P.

Otero, and Rubén Escajeda in cause number three twenty C V 00014 KC, and to take all steps necessary, including the execution of any required documents in order to effectuate this authority.

Second.

Okay, there's motion and a second, Ms.

Prime, call for the vote.

Yes, sir.

The motion was made and read into the record by Mayor Pro Tem Chavez, seconded by Representative Canales on EX1, and this is to deny the defendant officer's request on that motion.

Call for the vote.

Representative Trejo.

Aye.

Thank you.

In the voting session.

And that motion passes unanimously.

EX2.

Motion made, seconded, and carried that the city attorney in consultation with the city manager be authorized to hire and retain outside council and any other necessary consultants and to file an intervention in the application of Al Paso Electric Company to update its generation cost recovery writer related to Texas Solar One under the Texas Public Utility Commission docket number 58834 in matter number high Q utility dash 75 and to take all steps necessary including the execution of any required documents in order to effectuate this authority.

Okay, is there a second?

Representative.

Just wanted to say my disclaimer for 1750 from the Paso Electric Employee PAC.

And also we're not getting the votes on the screen.

Just wanted to throw that out there.

Thank you.

IT, if you can please display the votes on the screen.

That will be helpful.

Okay.

There's a motion and a second, Miss Prime, call for the vote, please.

Yes, sir.

The motion was made and read into the record by Mayor ProM Chavez, seconded by alternate mayor pro tempiero on EX2.

And this is to intervene and engage outside council on that motion, call for the vote.

In the voting session.

And that motion passes unanimously.

IT, we don't see the votes on the screen.

EX3, Ms.

Pryne.

EX3.

Motion made, seconded, and carried that the city attorney in consultation with the city manager be authorized to do the following.

Number one, engage in settlement negotiations with Texas Gas Service, TGS and the other intervening parties in the statement of intent of Texas Gas Service Company, a division of one gas Inc.

to increase rates within the company's incorporated areas of the Central Gulf, West, North, and Rio Gran Valley service areas in the matter number high Q Utility-67 under the Railroad Commission of Texas RRC docket number OS 2500-28202 and to take all steps necessary, including the execution of any required documents in order to effectuate this authority.

Number two, schedule a public hearing on the statement of intent to increase rates filed by TGS during the November 17th, 2025 City Council meeting.

And number three, request that TGS attend, participate, and provide a presentation at the scheduled city council meeting.

And number four, request that TGS conduct community meetings between November 4th and 17th with each council district if needed.

Second.

Okay, there's a motion and a second, Ms.

Prime, call for the vote.

Yes, sir.

The motion was made and read into the record by Mayor Pro Tem Chavez, seconded by alternate mayor Pro Tem Pierro.

This is on EX3.

On that motion, call for the vote.

And the voting session.

And that motion also passes unanimously.

Okay.

Is there a motion to adjourn?

So moved.

Second.

There's a motion and a second to adjourn the work session.

All in favor?

Aye.

Anyone opposed?

And the work session for Monday, October 27th, 2025 is adjourned at 11 34 a.m.

Thank you, Council.