What do you all want to talk about?

We'll do that one.

As soon as we do this, we'll do that.

Okay.

Good morning.

This is a meeting of the El Paso City.

No, of the Mass Transit Department Board meeting for January 6, 2026.

It is 11:31 a.m.

Present in presiding is Chair Johnson and also present in council chambers.

Our board members Chavez, Acevedo, Trejo, Nino, Fierro, Limon, and Canales.

Mayor, we do have a member of the public signed up to speak.

Okay.

And that's Mr.

Diego Grajales.

Would you be so kind to come up to the podium?

His topic is mismanagement of Sun Metro.

Good morning.

Give me one second because it's I think it's frozen.

There you go.

Okay.

Good morning, Council.

Good morning, Council.

My name is Diego Garhalas, and I live at 1700 Hawthorne Street, El Paso.

I'm a retired project manager for 30 years, and I've been riding the Sun Metro bus line for the past three years from the experiences I have witnessed.

Sun Metro is broken.

Sun Metro is failing the citizens of El Paso County.

The supervisor of operations, Robert Dominguez, should be replaced with somebody who follows policy and procedures that look out for the citizens that pay to use Sun Metro.

Sun Metro drivers have a federal CDL license and violate federal law by using their cell phones behind the wheel.

And some of the Sun Metro drivers do not speak English, which also violates federal law.

I have spoken to several senior drivers and rookie drivers, and the senior drivers do whatever they want and disregard policies and procedures.

I have had conversations with rookie drivers, and they tell me that in training there are policies and procedures set in place.

But when they are out of training and they speak to senior drivers, these policies and procedures are now disregarded.

On top of that, the bus supervisors who are former drivers turned a blind eye to drivers' incompetence.

I have met with customer service manager at Sun Metro headquarters, Cecilia, for a half hour in November.

And she told me that she would call me to give me a ticket number about my complaint.

She never called.

This tells me that the customer service supervisor, David Garcia, should also be replaced.

His leadership is non-existent.

Please stop the ad campaign that Sun Metro has all over town.

That Sun Metro welcomes bicycles on the bus.

This is not true.

Bike racks are always broken, and I have told many drivers and supervisors of these problems, and no one is fixing the problem.

I've seen it happen.

El Paso Transit.

When the bus driver, El Paso Trend Authority, when the bus driver is seated and the driver pulls away from the bay, the driver could care less what happens on the bus.

I have witnessed people drinking beer, smoking, playing loud music, and the bus driver could care less.

El Paso Transit Authority.

Also, electric scooters have the ability to do it.

Thank you, Mr.

Garhales.

Your three minutes are up.

Thank you.

All matters listed under the consent agenda will be considered by Mass Transit Department Board to be routine and will be enacted by one motion unless separate discussion is requested by board members.

Prior to the vote, members of the audience may ask questions regarding items on the consent agenda.

When the vote has been taken, if an item has been called out for separate discussion, has not been called out for separate discussion, the item has been approved.

The Mass Transit Department Board may, however, reconsider any item at any time during the meeting.

Okay, is there a motion to approve the consent move to approve the consent agenda?

Is there any discussion on any of the items in the consent?

Ms.

Nunz.

And that would be item one is the December 2nd minutes.

Item three, it's the Sun Metro agency safety plan.

And item four is just for notation, the Sun Metro's Title Six program update.

And we do have a motion made by Board Member Canales, seconded by Board Member Limon.

And this is to approve the consent agenda.

Voting session is open.

Voting session is open.

Thank you.

And voting session is closing, and the item has been approved.

The consent agenda has been approved unanimously.

Okay, let's take regular agenda item number five.

Item number five is operational update on the mass transit department, Sun Metro.

Is there a motion to approve this one?

Just update.

Mr.

Anthony.

Happy New Year.

Happy New Year, Mayor.

Mayor, City Council.

Thank you for having me today.

Thank you for letting me give this this uh presentation.

So this is our mission statement and what we strive for.

And we understand that the reason Sun Metro exists is to assure our public a pleasant experience, which I think we do.

And I'm going to talk about that in these slides and what we do to make sure that happens.

The agendas that we will cover are some of the major functions of Sun Metro and what we are doing and how we are doing it.

As you know, the city is growing.

And Sun Metro is preparing to make required adjustments to ensure public transportation is accessible to all parts of the city.

Our long-term financial strategic plan has been in has to be in synchronization to support this.

We worked hard this year to be responsible.

This year the fund balance will increase $11 million.

And next year it is projected to increase another eight over the next three years.

Examples of oversight and financial management are internal contract reviews, where we saved in cost avoidance 1.8 million dollars by going through our contracts on a regular basis and make sure the right amount of money is allocated to each contract to make sure we are doing the right thing.

The bus purchase plan, 80 percent of our buses were grant funded, meaning the one half penny sales tax from the local taxpayers did not have to be used.

Discretionary grants, we got $2.4 million this year after our $32 million last year.

And one of these grants, also we just got another grant which uh for $750,000 for a study to um go out to the beast to take um Sun Metro transportation out to the beast.

Then we will also looked at our Sun Metro revenue generating programs, right?

And I'll just give you one example.

We have parking garages, but within our parking garages, we manage those internally with our with our own um with our own employees.

The parking garages made Sun Metro 1 million dollars last year.

And now for the next year, 2026, the budget decreased.

The a budget decrease of 5.8 million dollars for 2026.

All of this with no fair increases and absorbing salary increases.

So I just want to make a note.

The average employee at Sun Metro increased $3.25.

$3.25 per hour.

This is times $650 employees.

But you can do the math, it's somewhere around $4 million.

But we are able to do these things because of the other initiatives that we take to make sure we have enough revenue to pay for what Sun Metro services do.

As you know, just with the the half-penny sales tax and the fare box and the and the reoccurring grants, that is not enough to run Sun Metro.

We must do other endeavors like this to make things successful.

So we stay focused on overtime also.

Above the managers having to report their divisions overtime and why they have overtime on a regular basis.

We focus on specific areas to make a difference, reducing overtime by one, about one million dollars in 2025.

And it's projected to go down another half million dollars in the next year.

So some of the things that we look at two procedures that you can see on the screen, we optimize extra board drivers, meaning we don't have to call anybody in on overtime, and we increase the number of FTEs at Blutter Field.

So, and I'll talk about that in a little bit.

But this is the first time in about five years that the rate has increased for hiring drivers over the attrition rate.

And so now we're in a good place with the amount of drivers that we have and the amount of routes that we have, and we're postured and set and ready to go for Sun Metro rising that will happen in June.

Our OPT OTP continues to stay in that Sun Metro band of excellence.

While ridership has stayed above the transit industry, 73% for them, 71, 73 percent for us, 71 percent for the industry.

This includes the reduction of ridership since the 11 February incident, where ridership had dropped about 40,000 a month.

So we worked hard on the advertisement with our outreach team, letting everybody know that Sun Metro is back and we're up and running.

As you can see in the chart, November 24 to November 25, we have made a full recovery, and we're about to keep going and increasing our ridership with uh for Sun Metro.

I would just like to make a shout out for this fixed route operation.

Robert Dominguez and his team do an excellent job in making sure that the buses are there on time, giving safe transportation.

That's a hundred buses within 10-minute window at eight terminals, 2,349 stops covering 258 square miles every day, 365 days a year.

So I want to set a shout out to Mr.

Robert Dominguez.

The Sun oh price slides behind on that.

The Sun Metro goal for the OTP at the lift is also 90 percent.

Remember the industry is 80 percent.

You can see we continue to meet the standard annually, but in the two months of July and August, we implemented a new software.

So we expected for the OTP to dip a little bit during that software because we had to synchronize operations and the software.

Um we expected that to happen.

We expected the drop to happen, but we still beat the industry standard by 5% during those months.

But if you could see into the future now now we are fully recovered, and we're back at 90 to 92 percent.

Once you get it below 90 or 92 percent, it causes a lot of problems.

The industry gives you that buffer, actually they give you 20 percent, but Sun Metro's buffer is 10 percent.

Um they give you that buffer because there's accidents, construction, whatever happens on the road that you need that buffer zone for um to make it that on that on-time performance.

So I'm really proud of what Mr.

Dominguez and his team has done with that.

The increase in ridership at Sun Metro Streetcar is simply amazing.

It's outpacing the industry by a margin of more than 85 percent.

In FY24, a lot of people thought ridership had peaked, but it did not.

With the 168 percent increase, it looked difficult to continue to make that margin grow wider.

But we did.

We did by 48.5 percent, after increasing it 168 percent.

So I'm really proud of that.

In addition, we spent 520,000 less than projected as we focused on contracts, personnel requirements, and managing the number of streetcars that needed to be on the road.

Safety is an important factor, focus as we strive to provide safe and dependable transportation.

However, with the 100 buses driving over 4.5 million miles a year, there are going to be some accidents.

There are going to be some accidents, but we keep those accidents low by the safety team, which I want to give a shout out to Steve Perea, the head of my safety, um, for helping us with this.

But now, preventable accidents has decreased by 17 percent this year.

Total overall accidents have decreased by 13%.

Even with the decrease, we spent over 2,000, 226,000 repairing buses, repairing buses.

So that's not the greatest story, but we're going to keep working on safety so that that number continues to go down.

Safety will be a continue to be a part of the priority for the safety of passengers and to avoid escalating cost and repairs.

Sun Metro has done a great job ensuring fleet replacement and financial responsibilities being maximized.

By the end of 2027, for the first time, all of our vehicles will be in the 14-year life cycle.

That is required by FTA.

In fact, our average vehicle will be 3.6 years.

That's 8.2 years under what it started when this leadership team took over.

The importance to that is that gives us buffer room to see Sun Metro get established, make sure we have the right vehicles on the right routes, right?

And then determine which vehicles we're going to buy in the future to make sure it fits what Sun Metro is doing.

So over the last three years, we ordered a total of 72 buses, 72 buses, and they cost about a million dollars each.

64 lift vehicles, which cost about a quarter million dollars each, altogether costing about 120 million dollars.

80% of that was purchased using grant funding, again, saving the half penny sales tax that the local taxpayers pay so we can purchase these buses.

HR managing HR at division level and director level, with the leader of with the lead of the HR manager, um Jonathan Rudea.

Um we have accomplished a lot.

In fact, we've decreased vacancies by 3.6% in 2025.

So now the vacancy rate is 16.7.

This is an enduring effort we have made improvements on annually.

If you look at 2023, we were at 22.5, 2024, 20.3.

2025, 16.7.

So you can see we're working hard to make sure that we clean this up and have the right amount of FTEs for the right amount of uh for the the tasks that are that our Sun Metro task.

We also focus on retention, because if you just focus on recruiting, you're gonna have another problem.

So we also focus on retention.

Overall, Sun Metro's turnover rate is is 26 percent lower than the industry average.

26 percent lower than the industry average.

For drivers, it's at 13.5 percent lower than the industry average.

Now, for maintenance, maintenance suffered this year, uh, especially with the February 11th incident, um, which complaints correlate with with uh OTP and and other things at Sun Metro.

But we're still 3% above the industry for for retention with the mechanics, and we're we're working hard to fix that and bring bring their numbers back up.

Customer service, that's another KPI we track, to ensure safe and dependable service.

Customers that call into Sun Metro do it for two reasons.

Two, they have questions about routes, or they have a complaint.

And so I stand here today and I encourage anybody who has a complaint to bring it to Sun Metro.

Just like we address any issue that's brought up here, we'll bring up we if the issues brought up to Sun Metro, we will look into it and we will make sure that it's fixed.

You have my word on that.

That it was it will be from now until the time end.

You may not like the answer of what fixed is, but you will get what is legal, moral, and ethical.

That's what's gonna happen to make Sun Metro continue to move forward.

These calls are important to ensure that Sun Metro is making decisions accordingly and reoccurring issues.

That's the focus of the customer service line.

When customers call, we record that, then we send it to the division.

They have to answer that.

That comes back to the director.

The director looks at each and every one of those responses every week or every other week, depending on what what department you are.

And I personally make sure that each complaint is is handled and addressed.

Again, everybody may not like the answer, but it is handled and addressed.

Most of the time, it was confusion about how Sunmetro works or how the system works.

So monthly valid operational complaints decreased by 7.1 in 2025.

The top concerns were scheduled adherence and route disruptions.

Monthly customer service average calls increased by 15.27% in 2025.

The top inquiries were route schedules and route adjustments.

So the two mere.

Whether you call to complain or whether you're calling for information, the good news is that more people are calling, more people are getting the information, and more people are getting to the destiny that they want to get to.

So Lyft Customer Service is important as well.

The result of reaching out to the customer and actions took to remedy the problem is briefed to me bi-weekly.

The point is to eliminate systemic or reoccurring problems.

So monthly valid operational complaints decrease by 60.41% in 2024.

So it's hard to beat that.

So we do went ahead and did it.

And we decreased it another 15.8%.

And I project in the future that it will go down again as we continue to communicate with the community about the changes in the operations of Sun Metro.

The spike in complaints in August and September correlate with the um implementation of the new software as you can see on the screen.

This was expected as we synchronize software with operations, like I said.

It was also expected to stay above the industry standard of 80%, which we did by three to six percent in those in those two months.

Now the software is implemented, and we are standing in that Sun Metro band of excellence of 90% on time performance.

So as we look into the future, there are several initiatives that Sun Metro is undertaking.

Sun Metro Rising, as I briefed last month, to optimize all fixed routes.

The implementation date is in June.

These additional endeavors encompass partnering with the local community, which I know is important to all of you.

So Sun Metro is working with Fort Bliss to provide transportation for Fort Bliss soldiers and their family on Fort Bliss.

Not just on Fort Bliss, but it will be bring them to connection points where they can connect to the rest of the network.

Finally, the Greyhound station that we're working with Greyhound to put them in the UTTP, UPTT will facilitate transit in and out of the city.

It is the job of this management team to make sure we are good stewards of the money that we are provided and turn that into the best transit service in in the states.

And so that's what we strive for for every day.

So that concludes my brief.

I'm open to questions.

Representative Chavez.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Anthony, for your presentation.

I know that uh you worked uh hard on it, and I know that you have been working hard on everything that you're doing at Sun Metro, you and the team that's behind you and everyone else at your department.

I just want to congratulate you on your efficiencies, decreasing your overtime, I think is is outstanding.

Uh the grant that you received to uh increase capacity and and get to other areas of our city and no increase in fares.

I think all of those are are positives.

And uh you need to be congratulated for that.

Um I also just wanted to point out that last night at our community meeting, there was uh a constituent of mine that came up to me, um, and he was very grateful for the LIFT service.

And he was um instrumental in in that occurring years ago when he became wheelchair bound.

So I just wanted to make sure that you know that the community is grateful to the service that you and your drivers and everyone else that you provide.

And it's it's so important that we know um not only the data, because you know the numbers never lie, and they're important to make sure that we focus on them, um, but also the impact that you're making to daily lives to get people to work to school and to anywhere else that they need to go to doctor's appointments and whatnot.

So we appreciate you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I would just like to say my team does the work and makes all this happen.

And so the ones of Jerry DeMoro's my deputy, Claudia Garcia is my assistant director.

I have my grants people here also, and then Dwayne Arnold is not here, my assistant director of operations.

So there's a lot that happens in the synchronization coordination coordination to make this work, and the team is the one that makes all these great things come to happen.

But thank you for that.

Representative Rocha.

Thank you, sir, for coming and for your team for being here today and the the great presentation.

I think I've heard it um said that you lead firm but fair.

And I believe that that is a true depiction of what takes place within Sun Metro.

You're exactly right.

There's a lot of situations, and I know that that you all have come out and helped me with several constituent issues that have come up in regards to the the lift service in regards just to regular service in in general.

One thing for sure is that you are timely and you do provide that information to um to the constituent, and you circle back with us as well.

So you've been a really great partner, and that's Jerry and Claudia, and all your teams included as well.

I really appreciate everything that you all do.

I know that this gentleman had uh some questions today.

Right away, I saw Claudia get up, and I know that you will address them more than anything.

And you're exactly right.

It's not always a popular answer that you give, but you do give uh some type of answer in in regards to trying to close that response.

So thank you again for everything that you do.

And and this is just a a little bit of what takes in to really work on the machine that is Sun Metro and just everything that you do to provide connectivity to the citizens of the city of El Paso.

So appreciate it, sir.

Thank you for that.

Thank you.

And Anthony, I just uh have a couple of comments.

Uh I went through your safety plan, and there was two pages that really stood out to me was the federal funding that you get on page 25 and the amount of 97 million dollars, I believe.

Yes, sir.

And then your safety performance measures on page 40.

I think anyone that wants to just get a quick summary of how well you guys are doing, if they look at page 25 and page 40, they'll they'll be able to see the some of the results.

So well done.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

And I would just like to say um, based on your last comment, you know, given the feedback to to the council, um that is a program that the city manager set up, and then we had classes and we all learned how to to do that.

So that is a city program that we're involved in, and um I think it's making a big difference.

So that that's yeah.

All right, any further questions for Anthony?

Okay, Ms.

Nunes.

There's no action on that item.

Is there a motion to adjourn the meeting?

Second.

We have a motion made by board member Limon, seconded by board member Canales to adjourn the meeting at eleven fifty AM, and this is for January 6, 2026.

Thank you.

Okay.

Move to Recon.