I'm Andrew Moore, the mayor of the town of Erie, and I'm calling to order the study session for the town council on September 30th, uh, 2025.

And we are here tonight to do the interviews for our first ever in house council.

And so with that, um, I think we can bring Brina in the feels like a test.

Yes, there will be no AI for this test.

All your materials need to be closed.

Welcome.

Thank you very much.

I'll let you get settled in there.

I appreciate that.

Good to go.

Yeah, thank you.

All right.

Well, we have about 30 minutes uh just to ask you a series of questions and to get to know you a little bit.

Uh, there's eight questions in total, but the first one is uh the one I'm gonna ask, which is just to get to know you a little bit.

So that's just a brief summary of your professional background, why you're seeking new opportunities, and why you would like to be Erie's next um town attorney.

Well, good evening, uh Mayor, council members.

My name is Brina Meng, and I have spent my entire career in the service of local government.

I really enjoy being where the problems are.

Local government is innovative, creative, we solve problems.

And so since I have only been in local government, I understand what those are.

I've done procurement work, I've done sales tax work, law enforcement, CORA, open meetings.

I've done that gammon.

I'm currently on a real estate uh patient in Denver.

And part of that comes with the opportunity to serve the public.

I've seen your comprehensive plan, and I've also seen your transportation and mobility plans.

Your citizens are looking for diverse transit needs.

I've represented the transportation department.

I've done first mile, last mile transit.

I saw that you've got flex ride coming, which is going to be a great boon to your citizens.

I also know what it's like to have a fixed route provider in your municipality that you don't have a lot of control over, that you can negotiate some with, but you're at somewhat limited uh opportunities to move that needle.

So you need to be more innovative.

While I was in Chandler, I did a deal with Lyft to provide that first mile, last mile service because it's difficult to take transit in Phoenix in the Phoenix area in August.

It can be 115.

It's really hard to get folks from A to B and convince them that transit is a good idea.

Similarly, I have some low-income housing uh background.

I know that you're doing your village at Cole Creek project.

That's a really fantastic opportunity to have uh new new facilities in your town as well as some open space, some parks, some trails, as well as the housing that your residents are looking for.

I've done a low-income housing tax credit conversion or a light tech project where we took existing Chandler housing stock and converted it.

Those are uh technical and require a lot of uh fine work.

I worked with outside council.

I'm used to working with a budget and being mindful of that budget.

As for why I'm looking for a new opportunity, I'm looking for a new opportunity in Erie because I really like what you're doing here.

You're innovative.

I think that the way that your departments work together and your plans is something that you don't see a lot in municipalities.

I've been in a exponentially growing organization.

I was in Gilbert, Arizona.

In 1980, Gilbert had 5,717 residents.

By the time I joined, there were 220,000 residents from 1980 to 2000.

Every five years, they were doubling their population.

I was the final person hired when they brought outside council in-house.

I know what that transition looks like.

I know it's really important to go and meet the customer-facing employees to meet with the state, the very stakeholders, including the directors, because there are a lot of folks who have ideas who who would like more dive in, some really good, solid, deep legal work that sometimes doesn't happen because there's other needs that have to be prioritized because your departments are fiscally responsible and they want to make sure it's some of the hot issues.

But there are a lot of probably innovative projects that could use some existing uh dedicated legal support.

I'm also used to developing training programs to bridge that gap.

And so I would be wanting to take all of these particular pieces and bring them forward.

I have a very close family friend who is a detective in your police department, and she's been here almost five years, and she has talked really wonderfully over the years about how supportive she's felt as a member of the police department and as a person.

And when this opportunity opened up, I really really was fascinated.

And as I move through and talk with your department directors, this is you're building something really wonderful, and I'd love to be a part of it.

All right, wonderful.

I'm gonna turn it over to Councilmember Baer.