If we will uh come to order, we do have two proclamations today.

Uh the first proclamation the chair will recognize Councilmember Davis for a proclamation recognizing August 1st to September 1st as Houston Restaurants Week.

Uh Vice Mayor Pro Tempek, if you're how are you?

How are you?

You get me today.

I get you.

That's that's beautiful.

Uh colleagues, Mayor Pro Tim.

We are indeed honored today to uh make this presentation, and I can't think of any other group that uh deserves it more.

Uh honored of this particular proclamation is the Houston Restaurant Week is the city's most anticipated foodie event of the year and serves as the largest annual fundraiser for the Houston Food Bank, the nation's largest food bank.

Houston Restaurant Weeks 2025 runs from August 1st through September 1st and mark its 22nd year.

More than 400 restaurants are participating in this year's event, offering multi-course special especially price menus for brunch at $25, lunch, $25, dinner, $39 or $55.

Each restaurant donates a dollar to five dollars for every meal sold during the event.

First held in 2003 as a one-week event.

Houston restaurant weeks expanded into a month-long celebration in 2012.

Its economic impact now generates millions of dollars for the local economy each August, historically the most challenging month for Houston restaurants.

Today it is often their most profitable month of the year.

Houston Restaurant Weeks was founded in 2003 by Cleverly Stone, who made it her life's mission to fight hunger in Houston with her mantra.

Dine Out, do good, affectionately known as the Diva of Dining.

Her 26 year career as a restaurant correspondent made a lasting impact on the city's culinary scene and her philanthropic spirit.

Stone passed away in 2020 after a long battle with cancer, but her mission lives on through the Cleverly Stone Foundation, founded and led by her daughter, Katie Stone.

Since its inception, Houston Restaurant Weeks has raised more than 22 million dollars for the Houston Food Bank.

This month long event not only showcases Houston's vibrant culinary scene, but also provides an opportunity to experience diverse dining while supporting a meaningful cause in the community.

Mayor Pro Tim.

Anybody here?

Oh, yes, they are here.

Thank you, Councilmember Davis, for this proclamation for Houston Restaurant Weeks, which has now turned into Restaurant Month.

Many of us do enjoy uh fine dining in August.

So we're very excited about um presenting this proclamation to you.

And so therefore I, Martha Castex Tatum, Mayor Pro Tim of the City of Houston, on behalf of John Whitmire, mayor of the city of Houston, hereby proclaim August 1st through September 1st, 2025 as Houston Restaurants Week in Houston, Texas.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

Brother Greg Howard.

Come up, Freddy.

Hi, everybody.

Thank you so much.

Uh Craig Howard, downtown business owner, ballroom at Bayou Place.

Uh incoming chairman of the Houston Restaurant Association, my wife Stephanie, ballroom at Tanglewood.

So we're just pleased to be here.

Restaurants, you know, we're the best city in the United States for restaurants.

We have people that come here, come back here, and move here because of our restaurants.

And there's a lot of hardworking people out there on behalf of the Texas Restaurant Association and the Houston chapter, one of the largest chapters in Texas.

Just thank you for your support always and for working with us on all of the permitting issues and bills and things to come because Houston restaurants drives the economy definitely.

Texas Restaurant Association and the Texas Restaurant Hospitality Workers is the largest employer in the State of Texas.

So I want to keep that going.

So thank you very much.

You're welcome.

Thank you.

Wonderful.

We have some Council members in the queue.

First up is Councilmember Alcorn.

Thank you.

And thank you so much.

I gain five pounds every August.

I love Houston restaurant weeks.

Last night I went to District A to the blind goat.

They had a great, great West Stop.

And it's so great that you put on the menu, like each restaurant week's meal you buy is like serves 15 people or whatever.

So it's worth getting the three courses and getting the dessert and all the things you don't normally do.

Just a great way to, it's worth those pounds.

And um it's it's uh it's a great way to visit some places you haven't been for sure because you're getting the best of their menu for what uh a lesser price.

So it's it's all great, and thanks for all you do.

I I heard uh I think on NPR or something, the whole story of Cleverly Stone and the whole background and and it it's what a great legacy.

I mean, what just an unbelievable great legacy and also helping our economy in August when people have the doldrums and they're not going out to eat, we're all out there.

So thank you for coming and thank you, Councilmember Davis, for bringing that.

Yeah, that's right.

That's right, another good restaurant.

Thank you.

Councilmember Martinez.

Thank you.

Uh great.

Hold on one second.

We have to do that.

Just wanted to jump in on the kudos as well.

Uh, just wanted to jump in on the kudos as well.

Um, we understand that food is what makes Houston, and so I just wanted to thank uh Councilmember Davis and Mayor Pro Tem for helping to highlight which on our doing as well.

Uh but also on a personal note, just want to say thank you for always opening up your space for organizations to have events as well.

Uh so thank you.

And uh with that kind of uh leadership and heart, we know that you're leading this effort as well with Grace's.

Thank you.

We're always here for the nonprofits.

They're 90 percent of our business.

Although we can't talk our landlord into being nonprofit.

We've tried.

Um, but that's why we're here, and that's we we kind of serve with our heart every day, and how can we help more people with a building that we have?

Thank you.

Like a small thing, but it's a huge thing.

Thank you.

Definitely.

Thank you.

Absolutely.

Thank you, congratulations.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

The Chair recognizes Councilmember Alcorn for a proclamation to lock arms for life in recognition of August as gun safety month.

Colleagues, hi.

I am presenting this on behalf of Councilmember Kamen, who is out ill, who recognizes gun safety month every every year, and I'm happy to be joined by Bill O'Dell, who is the board treasurer of Lock Arms for Life.

So with that, I'll get started.

Gun Safety Awareness Month, held every August, raises awareness about the dangers of unsecured firearms and reminds everyone to store guns safely and responsibly.

Unsecured guns pose significant safety risks, particularly to children.

When firearms are not stored securely and are accessible to unsupervised minors, the risk of death or injury increases substantially.

In incidents where children unintentionally shoot someone, the victim is most often another child, a sibling, or a friend.

In the United States, an estimated 4.6 million minors live in homes with at least one loaded, unsecured firearms.

Each year, about 350 children gain access to a loaded gun and accidentally shoot themselves or someone else.

Since 2015, there have been at least 314 unintentional shootings by children in Texas alone, resulting in 149 deaths and 177 injuries.

Studies have shown that between 70 percent and 90 percent of firearms used in youth suicides, unintentional shootings involving children, and school shootings committed by individuals under the age of 18 were obtained from the child's home or the home of a relative or friend.

Estimates suggest that even modest increases in the number of American homes practicing safe firearm storage could prevent nearly one-third of youth gun deaths due to suicide and unintentional injury.

Educating and equipping communities to practice safe gun handling and storage is a proven, actionable and meaningful way to create safer homes and neighborhoods.

Therefore, I, Martha Castex Tate, a Mayor Pro Tim of the City of Houston, on behalf of John Whitmeyer, mayor of the City of Houston, hereby proclaim August 2025 as Gun Safety Awareness Month in Houston, Texas.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Councilmember Alcorn and Councilmember Cayman for sponsoring this.

And really just for this is our third uh year in a row for the City of Houston to sponsor this, and we really do appreciate that.

My name again is Bill Oldle, and I'm a proud board member of Lock Arms for Life.

Our mission is real simple.

Every gun needs to be locked when not in use.

Unfortunately, my nephew John Ross was killed when he was handed an unlocked weapon at a party.

And no family should have to go through that.

And my sister-in-law started this nonprofit to help get the word out to make sure that guns are locked away.

Beyond just issuing gun locks, we started for the first time ever, and this is a first of its kind, a novel graphic novel book that is on our website that's both in English and Spanish that you can find that actually educates kids third through fifth grade about gun safety and about locking guns away, which we think is very valuable.

It's available on our, like I said, on our website.

I think it's really clear.

I think for children especially, stop, don't touch, walk away, and get an adult.

It really is that simple.

We know that, you know, if we can teach kids to be safe, we believe that they will make better and safer choices.

Um I also want to just say that we all need to not assume that our kids know about gun safety.

And so we have to get the word out.

And we really want to have these in every school library around the state of Texas and really around the country.

So go to our website, LockArms.org for the book itself, as well as just um understanding more about our organization, and thank you again for the proclamation.

Thank you.

Councilmember Davis.

Thank you, uh Mayor Pro Tim.

I I uh Vice Mayor Pro Tim, let me thank Sally U, and of course uh, you know, Cayman, Councilman Cayman, for this in building the efforts because one of the things that I always support the gun safety era because we initiated this drive for reducing teenage crime.

It all goes hand in hand because if we could do that, most people don't know that teenage crime is rising, especially with gun violence.

And so I'm an advocate for trying to do that.

I wish there was something even more we could do, and I'm trying from a legislative perspective, because our cities, we suffer that issue, and especially the sense around gun safety as well, because most kids don't know gun safety.

They really don't.

So I'm looking forward to the upcoming uh uh event sponsored on regards to that, and I want to certainly thank you for your your advocacy and your efforts to you and your wife.

Absolutely.

Thank you for everything you do.

Thank you.

Thank you, congratulations.

The Chair recognizes Councilmember Castillo for the invocate.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim.

And at this time, I have the honor of introducing Pastor David Smith from New Bethlehem Missionary Baptist Church to give our invocation.

He is a strong advocate of the East Tex Jensen community and has been instrumental in events like the Jensen Jubilee, as well as leading the Northeast Community Development Corporation for the area, and we're grateful that he is here today to deliver the invocation.

Thank you.

We go all praise and honor to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, to our Mayor Pro Tim, Mayor and his absence to all the City Council members.

Let us bow our heads for a moment of prayer.

Gracious Father, we thank you, God, for this day.

This is the day that the Lord has made.

We shall rejoice and be glad in it, according to your words, Psalms 118 and 24.

We thank you, God, for last night lying down and this morning rising as we slept in the very image of death.

But you touched us this morning with your thing of love, and we open up our eyes to see a brand new day.

And we thank you, Lord, that your mercy is new every morning.

And God, we just want to say thank you for grace and thank you for mercy.

We thank you most of all for your darling son Jesus Christ, who came to a lost world of sin, lived a sinless life, died a sinner's death, hung him on a cross, crucified him, buried in a grave, rose early on the third day, Sunday morning to declare all power, heaven and earth in his hands.

So we thank you right now that he's interceding for each and every one of us.

God, welcome praying today for our world.

We come praying for our city.

We come praying for our mayor in his absent.

We come praying for our mayor pro Tim and all of our city council council members.

We just want to say thank you, God, for their positions and their titles, and then how they advocate for us.

We thank you for those who bring their concerns to this desk.

Father God sum the lease, some loss, some are less.

But Father God, they bring their concerns because as I read on the walls that people are a part of the city.

And so, God, what this is a great city.

This is the great city of Houston, and we want to say thank you for allowing our city to be an example, to be an icon, even in the world today.

Father God, I pray as we move forward with this agenda today, God, that you would bless that you would move and that you would give justice where justice is needed, Father God, that there will be equality, Father God, that everyone will be treated fairly, no matter what neighborhood we live in.

If it's a hood or a neighborhood, bring us all together, because a family that prays together, a city that prays together stays together, and where there's unity, there is strength.

And Lord, please forgive us of all of our sins.

Wherever I come up short in this prayer, I know that you're able to make up the difference.

This we ask in your son Jesus' name.

All of God's people say Amen.

Amen.

Thank you, Pastor.

If you'll please stand for the pledge.

I pledge to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which you say one action under God with liberty and justice crop.

Thank you.

Mr.

Secretary, if you'll please call the roll.

Mayor Webmeyer will be absent.

Councilmember Peck.

Here.

Councilmember Jackson.

Councilmember Cayman will be absent.

Councilmember Evan Shabazz.

Here.

Councilmember Flickinger.

Councilmember Thomas will be absent.

Councilmember Huffman.

Councilmember Castillo.

Here.

Councilmember Martinez?

Here.

Councilmember Pollard.

Council Councilmember Castex Tatum.

Here.

Councilmember Ramirez.

Here.

Councilmember Davis.

Councilmember Carter.

Councilmember Plummer will be absent.

And Councilmember Councilmember Alcorn.

Need a motion to adopt the minutes of August 12th and 13th.

Tech new.

Second.

It's been moved and second.

All those in favor, any opposed, the item passes.

Any procedural motions.

If not, I do want to ask our speakers today.

I'm going to ask the Secretary to call the first speaker and then to announce who the next speaker is.

If the next speaker could come to the front of the chamber, that would help us to expedite our speakers' list and try to get you in.

Let us hear from you and then get you out as expeditiously as we can.

So that work for everybody.

All right.

Mr.

Speaker, if you will call the first person.

I mean, Mr.

Secretary, if you will call the first speaker.

I'm thinking about the speaker of the House.

Lisa Hunt to be followed by Marion Wright.

Hello, Ms.

Hunt.

Hello, good to see you all.

Good to see you.

My name is Lisa Hunt, and I'm a resident of the East End and a leader with People for Polk Street.

I want to thank the Mayor and Councilmembers Martinez and Carter for the fine work you're doing with Houston First to expand economic opportunity in the City of Houston.

People for Polk is a grassroots effort to advocate for the continued use of the entirety of Polk Street throughout the expansion of the George R.

Brown and 59 and into the future.

It's a vital connector.

We also recognize that viable alternatives may be required as we go forward with the expansion of the George R.

Brown.

We've joined together with Super Neighborhood 63, 64, 65, 67, 68, and 82 to offer proposed community benefits agreement between the neighborhood groups, the City of Houston, and Houston First for the benefit of all Houstonians, and in further uh to support Houston First planned expansion of the existing George R.

Brown Convention Center and related improvements, which in their present iteration require the closure and permanent abandonment of seven streets in downtown Houston.

Your time has expired.

Can I just have a Go ahead and wrap up?

Thank you.

In entering the CBA, the super neighborhood groups, the city and Houston First will seek to deploy both temporary mitigation measures for immediate relief from the proposed abandonment and develop permanent infrastructure solutions for long-term sustainability given the potential mobility challenges posed by the proposed amend uh abandonment.

Um this is not new.

We've done this as a city with the ION development, and so people for Polk Leaders look forward to meeting with each of you to discuss this option for development, which serves the entire city.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Hunt.

Next speaker.

Marion Wright.

To be followed by Maureen Leo.

Hi, um, I wanted to talk to you about the changes that they're proposing for telephone road.

And they've made compromises that everybody at Council, I believe, and the mayor, and I believe the council member Martins has made changes that actually seem to be what most of the public wants.

Um passing out something.

This is actually something right now that is on 11th Street, um, right across the street from Hog Middle School.

When you eliminate the center turn lanes or have center turn lanes, this is what happens.

They have this crossing median right now.

Someone this weekend ran over the cross and median.

These crossing medians are like death islands.

They're not safe.

They're just not.

When we put stuff like this in the road, we have problems.

Um there's some people right now from the bike advocates that are pushing to keep a center turn lane and bike lanes instead of having two lanes of traffic in each direction.

I'm not a traffic engineer.

I can't tell you what to do or what not to do.

I can tell you when you put center turn lanes and then you put things like this, this is what you end up with.

Someone one day is going to get run over on these things that y'all are putting in the middle of the streets.

They are leading people to believe that they're safe.

They are not safe.

People in Houston drive like maniacs.

We all know that.

I don't know what the answer is to make it, but telling people that they're safe standing in the middle of the street and these center turn lanes with these things.

Please don't do this to Telephone Road or to any other roads.

And Councilmember Castille.

This is what's going on.

If we can get this addressed or taken care of, we need to do something.

Okay.

And this isn't the only one in our area.

Right now, if you drive up and down 11th, they have multiple signs of everything on the case.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comments.

Oh, Councilmember Hoffman.

Thank you.

And thank you for bringing this to our attention.

I couldn't agree with you more.

It's so dangerous.

Um, and even I was driving around my district this weekend and saw multiple people standing on these very tiny medians.

One person had, he was in a wheelchair and had a dog, and the dog kept stepping off the media and into traffic.

And um, it's really important that people are aware how dangerous this is.

So thank you for coming.

Thank you.

Next speaker.

Maureen Leo.

To be followed by she.

To be followed by Ingrid Velasco.

Good afternoon.

Hello, Miss Leo.

Hello.

It's my first time, so if I'm making mistakes, I apologize in advance.

Um we are having issues across the street.

Uh we are houses on Good Hope Street and Scott Street.

Um, according to the police themselves, they said that that issue has been going on there for over 10 years.

So you have crackheads, you have prostitution, you have cocaine, you have really terrible things that are scary to even live there.

Um we haven't been able to live in that house because of that.

We brought the house in April, but you have people who are dumping trash there, but the highest thing that is scary is the criminal things that are happening in that area.

So the prostitution and the drug abuse and just solicitating around people's property.

That's very scary in that neighborhood.

Thank you.

Um Ms.

Leo.

I know that your council member um typically has staff here.

I do see Ingram here.

Um, Councilmember Shabazz.

Uh the constituents said this is at Good Hope and Scott.

I know that you uh typically um would like for your staff to address the concerns.

Um I know you said it's been going on for 10 years.

Um the council member and the mayor and um HPD have been working in that area to try to address some of those concerns, but um her staff could probably give you some some updates on on what's happening in that area.

Yes, because it's very scary.

Like I said, we bought the house in April.

We have not been able to live in there.

So we're paying mortgage, and it's very, very unsafe for us.

And we're young people, so you know that it's a big issue and a concern for us.

Councilmember Shabazz.

Thank you, uh thank you.

Thank you for coming forward.

I guess you kind of threw me off your address.

It's not in District D, so I know that my constituents director has not had the opportunity to speak with you.

But she is here, and you can certainly, she's right there, standing there.

You can certainly meet with her and we'll see what we can uh get done, see if we can get maybe uh HPD to you know put a tag on it or something, not a tag, but uh uh an alert slip uh to see because we certainly want you to be able to come to the district and live and live there safely.

So if you'll speak with Ingram right there.

Thank you so much.

Okay.

Next speaker.

Ingrid Velasco.

Ingrid Velasco.

To be followed by Aileen Fam.

Hello, Ms.

Velasco.

Hello, good afternoon, members of City Council.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.

My name is Ingrid Velasco, and I'm co-chair of Houston Energy and Climate Week.

And we're which is proudly hosted by Allies in Energy, the only nonprofit in Houston dedicated to advancing energy and climate literacy while drill driving united action.

Houston is a city of first, built on power of and from breaking barriers in space and leading advancements in energy, climate, AI, medicine, and the arts.

We don't just take on challenges, we redefine what's possible.

But we are facing growing impacts of climate change.

I ask, are we doing enough to lead?

Are we truly uniting communities, industry, academia, and government to build a resilient, sustainable future?

This year's theme, Unstoppable, reflects resilience and ingenuity of Houstonians.

With over 80 events and 3,500 participants last year, Houston and Energy Climate Week is more than a platform for collaboration.

It's a call to action.

Today I ask for two things.

Your participation in Houston Energy and Climate Week, scheduled for September 14th through the 19th, and your leadership in creating a task force to integrate and align efforts across communities, industry, academia, and government.

First, your participation in Houston Energy and Climate Week is designed to showcase Houston's leadership and foster collaboration.

We invite you to join us at one or more of the anchor events.

So at opening ceremonies, we're going to be celebrating Houston's leadership in energy and innovation, energy tech nexus pilot a thon, where we will be highlighting groundbreaking solutions, hack the heat hackathon, where we'll address challenges like extreme heat and energy optimization, workforce development day, where we will champion workforce upskilling and connect citizens with opportunity, and our closing ceremonies where we were honor Angela Blanchard and other city and county leaders for their contributions while celebrating our collective achievements with the community.

Your presence will amplify the importance of these efforts and demonstrate the city's commitment to sustainability and an inclusive future.

Second, we ask for your leadership.

We propose for the creation of the task force to unite communities, industry, academia, and government.

The task force will align the city of Houston's plan with Harris County's climate action plan, foster deep collaboration with industry and academia, and ensure that resilience and recovery efforts are integrated and impactful.

By breaking down silos and working together, we can amplify our collective impact and solidify Houston's position as a global leader in energy innovation and climate resilience.

Will you stand with us to lead this effort?

Will you show us show will you help us show the world that Houston doesn't just respond to challenges?

We set the standard for what's possible.

Together, we're unstoppable.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comments.

Councilmember Martinez.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Temp.

Ingrid, just want to say thank you for taking this lead uh of energy uh climate energy uh week.

Um I plan on support being there supporting as well.

Um and I definitely want to extend that invitation to my colleagues, uh of course the mayor's um as well.

And also uh when it comes to the task force, uh love to talk to you more offline about it, so I'll be reaching out soon.

Fabulous.

I also like to add that all of you should have received something from our great volunteers.

This event is all volunteer led.

I have uh over 35 volunteers that are leading programming operational things, reaching out to the community to make this big and get information out to the people because that's how we progress, right?

And so that's what I'll be doing throughout the week is just continuing the outreach, and with your support, I think we can really make this impactful year.

Thank you.

Next speaker.

Aileen Aileen Pham to be followed by Kennedy Luther.

Good afternoon, and thank you for the opportunity to be here today.

I'm so proud to introduce two young historians who care deeply about the future of our city and our planet.

First, my son Aidan, who's in fourth grade, has been learning about energy and the environment from his parents and wanted to share his big idea with you.

Joining him is his friend Alice, also in fourth grade, who believes that kids have a powerful voice when it comes to protecting our world.

Together, they represent the next generation of leaders who will one day guide Houston.

Today they want to ask you for your support in bringing Houston Energy and Climate Week to our school.

Please join me in welcoming two Changemaker Aidan and Ansel.

Hello, City Council.

My name is Aidan Tham, and I'm in fourth grade here in Houston.

I love our city, and I know Houston is called the energy capital of the world.

That's really cool, but it also means we should be leaders in taking care of our planet.

I want to ask for your help in implementing Houston's Energy and Climate Week in our schools.

This week would help kids like me learn how to save energy, protect the environment, and think about clean energy solutions for the future, as well as giving us the opportunity to take change uh to take charge of our own future.

With your support, we can show the whole world how kids and Houston are preserving our legacy as the energy capital of the world, and uh Houston is unstoppable.

Hello, Council.

Go ahead.

Hello, councils and everyone.

My name is Alice, and I'm nine years old.

Thank you for letting me speak today about something that matters a lot to me.

Energy and climate change.

Living in Houston, I've seen how powerful storms and hot days affect our city, our families.

It worries me that our future could be changed by these events.

I care about energy because it powers our lights, our home, and helps keep us safe.

I believe that bringing Houston Energy and Climate Week to our schools can help kids like me, Aiden, and my friends make a difference for our city's future.

I hope our city keeps listening to kids like me learning new ways to use energy wisely, protect our environment, and keep Houston a bright, strong place to grow up.

Thank you for hearing what I think.

Our planet's future is very important to me.

Wow.

So thank thank you both for uh coming to City Council today.

And I I must admit that I'm super impressed at your reading.

Uh one of the things that I I always know is that readers are leaders.

And so, council, I would say we're looking at two uh great leaders, especially in the space of uh energy transition uh in the city of Houston.

I know your request was for us to help you with a uh climate action week at your school.

Have you had conversations at your school with your principals about doing this?

Talk in the microphone so I can hear you.

Not really, because I haven't really seen the principal.

Not yet.

Okay.

So I would really suggest talking to the principal about it and then anything that we can do to help to help you in your schools.

Um I'm sure that the council member that is um over the area for your particular schools.

What um do you know who your council member is at your school?

Not yet.

Okay.

Well, we'll figure it out, and then if we can get some some help, uh, we will definitely do that once we talk to your principal.

Councilmember Pollard.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim, and good afternoon to everyone, and thank you all for being here.

I see, based on your address that you may be residents of J City, and that would make me your council member.

So uh what school do you all attend?

Uh the Rice School.

Okay.

Well, we will we will work with you and uh the council member that is uh over the Rice School area, and we will see what we can do to collaborate with the principal uh to see what we can do to have a climate week at you all school.

So thank you for being here, and we will stay in contact with you.

Great job.

Great job.

Next speaker?

Kennedy Luther.

Kennedy Luther.

Kennedy Luther.

Next speaker.

Annabelle Trajill.

Annabelle Trajillo.

Next speak.

Okay.

Next speaker.

Lawson Ichita.

Lawson Ichita.

I think we've got a procedure.

To be followed by Jassim Jacob Hi, are you Lawson?

Yes.

Go ahead.

We're ready for you.

All right.

Hi, my name is Lawson Etchera.

Uh I'm here today uh to talk about uh issue about security and the heads concerns that I have as a Houston resident.

And that involves what I believe to be the use of NASA tools, NASA technological tools on me.

Uh in fact that being uh too much on me in the last five years, and uh all the help I have tried to uh seek for none have been uh fruitful to me.

So that's why I came here today to ask the mayor whom I think is not here today, and all of you for your help.

Uh to see how I can reach out to NASA in order to make my concerns clear.

So you let me be clear.

You want to talk to someone at NASA about your health concerns?

Yes.

But seeking your help, the city uh council members and the mayor.

Okay.

About about your health concerns here that are on this sheet?

What I have is security and health concerns.

Uh there is a paper that's I distributed uh pictures of an accident and uh a rush on my scale.

That's what I believe is effects of that use of tools.

The use of the tools.

NASA tools, NASA to select surveillance, electronic surveillance on me.

Okay.

Um did Rebecca leave?

Can you um get him the contact to the health department and see if there's someone in the health department he can talk with?

Thank you.

We're gonna see if we can connect you with someone in our city's health department, and then they can maybe connect you with somebody from NASA if you want to share this concern.

Okay.

Uh I really don't want to see the mayor, but I don't think that he's here.

He's not here today.

Okay.

I have a letter that I want to uh I address to him, personal please.

Uh how can I send that to you?

You can give it to James and we'll make sure he gets it.

Okay.

Thank you.

You're very welcome, sir.

That's what's just to you.

Next speaker.

Jasim Jacob.

To be followed by Alfredo Williams.

How are you, Mr.

Jacob?

Mayor and council members.

My name is Jasim Jacob.

I am with uh my senior pastor, Father Abraham.

Um we belongs to St.

Mary's Clan A Catholic Church, located at 6400 West Viewquest Street, which is part of district care.

We are planning and we are hoping to build a crypt mausoleum for the use of our patterners when they are deceased within our property.

And we didn't know how to approach where to approach, so we contacted the state of Texas crematory and um cemetery authorities, and they said they have no such guidelines, they don't know anything about it.

So maybe you check with your city.

So ever since we are checking with the city, different officials, different departments, and all they could suggest that get a permit from the permitting department.

Right.

And uh we just want to make sure that we are not sight stepping or overlooking any guidelines in this matter.

If there is none, we would like to submit our application for the permitting department and uh request your approval for this matter, please.

So did you contact the permitting uh department?

Because you you're trying to build a crypt mausoleum.

So do you intend to have the deceased deceased people in the mausoleum?

Right.

On your property.

On the property.

Okay.

I don't know what the rules are for that.

Randy, I don't.

We suggested that they call permitting.

They called permitting.

Um permitting, told them to submit the plans.

Okay.

But they don't want to submit plans if it's not going to be permitted.

Do we have some?

So let me get this.

Let me zoom with him.

I'll talk to him, get his information, and I'll look into it.

Okay.

I'll work directly with him.

Okay.

We're gonna have the legal department um look into it, and then you can work with um them and permitting to make sure that what you want to do is something that can be done on your property.

Yes.

Thank you.

Okay.

All right.

Can we yeah?

Thank you, Randy.

Next speaker.

Alfrieda Williams.

Alfrieda Williams.

Alfrieda Williams.

Next speaker.

Alfredo Franklin.

Alfreda Franklin.

Alfreda Franklin.

Next speaker.

Clara Thompson.

Clara Thompson.

Clara Thompson.

To be followed by Irvin Thompson.

Hi.

Would you speak into the microphone?

Hi, I'm Clara Thompson.

I'm here today to speak with you all about my son being arrested for walking with the cigarette across the parking lot.

And four car loads of cops at my door, and then pulling a gun on my son and chasing him across the parking lot.

Is it against the law to smoke a cigarette?

And then my nephew was arrested three days later at a bus stop with a cigarette.

So I'm I'm here to let you all know that I I think it was excessive for cops to be at my door, four carloads, then six of them standing in the street, like I'm some kind of drug dealer or something, a drug bust at my house.

I I just think it was assessed.

Then they told me, well, we just want to talk to your son.

It's just a citation.

And once they were able to enter my home, they pulled a gun and I told them not in my home.

There's no threat here, sir.

I let you in, officer.

And then they arrested him anyway after they lied to me.

So have have you talked to anyone at in HPD?

No, but I'm since this happened.

No, I no, I came to let you guys know.

Is it a new law or new ordinance in the state that we don't know about?

I'm I I moved, I'm military, I moved to Kansas here.

Right.

Uh and I uh we only know what you tell us, so I don't know what the actual situation was based on what you're telling us.

I think that we probably should have um someone from HPD um talk to you.

We do have a couple of council members in queue.

Uh we want to follow up to make sure that what happened to your son, if there is a situation that and that's your son good to see you if this is a situation that was excessive and um should not have taken place that we um talk to HPD and see what actually happened.

Um Councilmember Pollard, did you want to um address?

Go ahead.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Um thank you both for being here.

What what was the charge that you were arrested for?

Of waiting the real son fleet.

And they made it into felony, and that submits to me the offense, sir.

Okay, I would I would encourage you not to say anything else.

Um we could talk offline.

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

Okay, Councilmember uh Davis.

Thank you, uh Mayor Pro Tim.

I'm I I would follow the well, let me just ask the question, Councilmember Pollard was clear about what you say, but I was just he asked the question about what was the charge once they entered your home, right?

Yes.

Okay, with with aiding.

Did they they say that I we have a rest warrant or no?

They did not.

Okay.

I think it was just assess it, like I told them.

Okay, very good.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

I have a good day.

Next speaker, Irvin Thompson, Irvin Thompson.

Irving Thompson.

Next speaker.

Angela Ross.

Angela Ross.

To be followed by Mark Rodriguez.

Hello, Ms.

Ross.

If you can speak behind that microphone.

I I'm in dire need of police help.

Over the last three years, I filed eight different complaints to the Houston Police Department, not one of them were investigated.

Since then, I've had never-ending cyber harassment from my ex-husband.

He has sent people into my home to ventilize my home when I'm away, and I'm following, he has people following me to ventilize my car.

And now the newest thing that he's doing is sending men around me to intimidate me.

I also have a open case in a family in the family court for post-divorce undivided assets where he is due to him being responsible for aggravated perjury and extra fraud.

And there are strong uh the strong evidence supports it.

But and the case is unopposed, but even if I win the case, he's not gonna comply with with the order because he has not complied with any order yet.

Presently I am in a need of an earnest uh honest attorney who would not take bribes uh as the previous attorneys unfortunately did.

All this time for the last four years, I've had to represent myself, and it becomes difficult.

My greatest my greatest problem with trying to find uh help is it's my inability to communicate because he hacks all my phones, any electronics that's coming to my home, he has hidden devices, and they they just they're plagued with viruses.

Um and if I try to, I can do absolutely nothing online.

If I try to make an appointment with an attorney, by the time I meet with this attorney, they have already been compromised by my ex-husband.

Uh, he is a dangerous individual because he has uh he uses his wealth uh to unfortunately bribe people and uh and also he hides behind the dark web uh committing all these crimes.

I I my uh for the last four years I have been in a virtual prison.

I I'm not able to function whatsoever.

Uh the last time I reported this to the police officer, I I was met with extreme aggression.

Actually, he made me cry because he he he he immediately dismissed me when I hear my whole case.

Uh uh well without hearing a complete complete complaints.

So uh there is something going on.

I cannot get any service whatsoever from the police department.

They won't they won't investigate anything.

And so I don't know if there's gonna if there's been any kind of enticement towards them.

Uh, but for whatever reason I have not gotten any service with eight complaints in the last four years, I mean three and a half years.

So uh Okay.

Councilmember Shabbaz.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim.

Uh and I'm so sorry to hear that you're going through this.

Um I want to ask you, there's a Sergeant Lahar that attempted to contact you.

Did you get a message?

And and that's another major problem.

I wouldn't know.

Uh half a lot of times my calls are redirected redirected.

My sister came over and she tried to call me.

If we were sitting right there, my phone wouldn't the calls went somewhere else.

And and uh I have no idea what's going on.

The major problem is that he's doing some serious hacking.

He has millions of dollars.

He's doing some serious, it's not about changing passwords, it's serious things that he's doing.

Yeah, and I need to connect you with with someone that can possibly help you.

Uh my constituents director is standing right there, Ingram, and there's also a police officer here.

They won't help.

I mean, that I'm sorry, but the policeman, I've spoken to them eight times, and no one follows up.

No one helps.

I can't remember.

Well, Rebecca, can you go with her and HPD to try to get her her case talked about?

Thank you.

Rebecca from the mayor's office will go with you and the HPD operatives to try to try to help you.

Okay, I do appreciate it.

Okay.

Thanks for the nervousness.

No, it's okay.

You're fine.

You going sound like a nightmare.

I've been trying to contact my counsel.

He redirected my phone.

I was not trying to have a point.

You can talk with it.

Next speaker.

Mark Rodriguez.

To be followed by Scotty Joseph.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim, and all the city council members for hearing me out.

My name's Mark Rodriguez.

I came a couple of months back to thank all y'all at large and the councilmember Castillo and Martinez, and of course the mayor for helping us with the zoo tickets, and we really appreciate that.

Right now we're having an issue with public works.

I'm representing my father who's a 92-year-old uh Korean war veteran and my 87-year-old mother who owns property in second ward.

Um right here, y'all should have a list on the top two paper on the top two order uh Don numbers, those are our properties.

Public works will inspect them in less than 24 hours.

And for one of them where they said, Hey, your grass is high, and there ain't even no high grass on the whole lot.

If you look down the whole list, these are a lot of things that have been reported since January all the way to April, and none of the all these same uh complaints are still there, junk vehicles, high grass, trash in the yard, but public work finds more interest to come tell me, hey, your grass is 10 inches around your house where you couldn't cut with your tractor.

And I think there, I think some of they need to get retrained.

We've tried a meeting with the council member and uh what was the name, Chris.

What?

Um right now we have a whole bunch of homeless people in our community.

They're staying at a lot of the addresses on the bottom, or a lot of there's abandoned bank, abandoned warehouses, but again, public works finds more interest to come tell me you got some rotten wood on the bottom of your house, you need to tear it down or repair it.

And I'm like, these order that should just work on who they choose to.

That's like putting a crowbar on who you want.

All these other properties down here, they've HPD has made a rest out of their felony warrants three in the last month.

Well, our community needs help.

That is a form of selected enforcement, and we can also lean on it, even discrimination because if they're coming at me this way, but they won't do my other neighbors who are a different race, it sure looks like discrimination or abuse of power.

These inspectors need to all treat everybody the same.

Some of the properties got six feet of grass, and they're telling me, hey, your grass is over ten inches on parts of your property.

The rest of it's cut where my tractor couldn't get.

Um another incident, um, we used to have a lady by the name of Myra Hippolyte, who used to work for department of neighborhoods.

I would encourage them to go under the way she used to work there.

She would do drive-alongs with community leaders.

I am a civic club president.

I am part of the PTO at my daughter's school.

I do volunteer a lot of time at the school, cutting the yard, trimming the trees, pressure washing the school to make it a better thing for the first day.

But and I don't expect nobody to overlook any of my 10 inches of high grass, but on the same token, public works needs to do a better job and making it all equal for everybody else.

If you look at the list, you're we have the list.

Um Councilmember Castillo is in the queue.

He'd like to address you.

Thank you, Mayor Proto.

Uh do you want to take 30 seconds to wrap up?

Yes, let me wrap it up.

Um it took five months on a bike trail where the man got killed last week.

It took five months for parks, public worked to clean up a whole block of the area with five uh with 15 feet of grass there.

And I think we need to hold our department leaders a little more accountable for when they're doing stuff like this.

And I would encourage any of y'all to please challenge me on any of these things.

It has my email and phone number.

I can provide pictures and I can provide dates of everything that I brought to your attention.

Thank you.

Councilmember Castillo.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim.

Um Mark, you know, I know this is frustrating because we've had a lot of conversations about this, and for you to have to come down here and and speak about what's been going on.

You the photos that you sent me yesterday, um, I definitely have some questions about, and I think it it uh could speak to uh a training gap, or there's something that that I would like more information on about um some of the citations and the yellow placards that are being placed where the grass is clearly recently cut.

Um so I have more questions that I'll be raising uh with the department um beyond the the gentleman that we met with to try and get some some clarity because to me there seems to be along with some of the other properties nearby, uh there seems to be some discrepancy.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Ramirez.

Thank you, uh Mayor Pro Tem.

Mark, thank you for coming down.

I know you've spoken to me about this before.

And I'm just curious, uh, why do you suppose you you're getting special treatment or what you feel like is special treatment?

Maybe because I report some of the buildings that are where the homeless people are, and maybe public works don't feel like they want to work that way because a lot of my names come out on a lot of the reports, and maybe that's why they're targeting me.

They're building some townhomes right next to my house, and I can see the people parade around the neighborhood with a little pad riding things down, but even them, they have three and four foot of grass with green water in their ditches, and when we complain about them blocking sidewalks, a lot of this started last year because these same people are doing this development would have the sidewalks blocked one block from an elementary school, and it would get very mind-bargling for me to see these kids walk into the street when they have the sidewalks blocked, and they still have them blocked to this day.

And even if they pull a permit to block a sidewalk, I think it's a 30 or 60-day permit.

This has been blocked for over a year.

But thank you, Councilmember.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Sergeant Corgi from HPD helps our community a lot.

Uh we we came out in the news last night over the homeless issue in our community, but I would like to thank him, and I need to send his commander a thank you letter because he does his job.

Thank you.

Thank you for sharing that.

Thank you.

Next speaker.

Scotty Joseph.

Scotty Joseph.

To be followed by Christopher Cato.

Hello, Mr.

Joseph.

Hello, good afternoon, Council.

Uh Pro Tim.

My name is Scotty Joseph.

I'm the owner of Scotty's Bikes.

I run electric bikes in here in Houston, Texas.

Um for the past two weeks on Thursdays, riders at the social ride that leaves out of Market Square Park have been arrested and accosted by the police.

Um we're trying to figure out what the deal is.

Um and the reason why I'm here is to find out what exactly is the problem, how can we fix it, and how can we move forward.

If it's an issue of lights, let us know it's lights so we can write that down and we can police ourselves.

But right now, what's happening with officers tackling people, um officers chasing after people just for recording them, uh trying to accost somebody who has sound on their back without talking to them.

Uh there's just a lot going on.

And I'm basically here to get some accountability from you guys to let us know how we should ride so we can pass that down and do what do the right thing.

So if you have any suggestions, I'm here for it.

Thank you.

So I guess the the issue is you said there was a a social ride and people were attacked.

Yes.

Uh every Thursday there's a social ride that leads out of Market Square Park at 8 o'clock.

Right.

For the past two weeks, police have been ramping up their assault on bike riders.

Uh, last week.

Uh one gentleman was knocked off his bike.

Now he has a second degree felony.

Another gentleman is a big deal.

He was knocked off his bike by an HPD officer?

Yes, by an HBD officer.

There's video footage of it.

I can share it later.

Um there are some other things that have been going on.

Uh granted, um we know that there are a lot of people who are in this community.

Uh we have a lot of me personally, I I'm doing something with seniors right now, and I want to bring seniors out on a social ride.

But how can I bring seniors out on a social ride that are veterans when they're being when police are attacking the social riders?

So, what I would like to know, and what I'm asking for the council is just to give us a uh uh rules that we should follow when it comes to the rides, so we have an understanding of what it is.

We can pass that down to the riders and we can ride accordingly and police ourselves.

Right.

Because right now, so as during the social rides, do y'all follow all of the bike safety rules when and I I ride with a bike group.

Yes, sir.

Um and we have bike safety rules that we we know that the streets are for bikes and cars.

Yes, ma'am.

Um and we follow the bike safety rules.

Are you are you saying that y'all are following the bike safety rules of the road and that there was um HPD officers who knock somebody off a bike and assaulted the riders?

Uh what I'm saying is that if if you have those, if you have those rules, if you can have them for us so we can put them so we can post them and let the other riders know.

Because it seems like the rules change.

So they're the regular traffic rules of the road.

Okay.

For for bike riders.

So I guess I'm regular traffic rules of the road.

Let me just address that right quick.

Right.

Um regular traffic rules of the road.

If you're on the sidewalk with your bicycle, should you be arrested for that?

No.

I mean, you shouldn't be arrested for riding your your bicycle unless you're not supposed to have your bicycle on the on the sidewalk.

I mean, so there are there are rules that have to be followed whether you're on a bicycle or in a car.

And so I think I mean I I wasn't there.

I don't know exactly what happened.

I mean, the rules are the bike safety rules of the road.

So there's not a specific set of rules that I can give you that says these are the rules you should follow.

The transportation rules of the road for cyclists, cyclists are the rules that should be followed for a bike ride.

The only problem with that is that the police are the ones that discern which rules are passed and not.

So if we could just get an understanding of what HPD is allowing and not allowing, so we can follow that.

That's what I'm asking for.

Okay.

Councilmember Pollard.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim.

Um my questions were similar to the Mayor Pro Tim as it pertains to um what HPD was maybe relaying to you all on what uh or what reason they were giving for either approaching uh what reason they were giving for um if there is any arrests made.

There were arrests made.

Okay.

So is there any communication between your uh bike riders and HPD on why they were approached in the first place?

Well I think that's why I'm here.

I'm trying to find that out.

So I just wanted to bring it to your attention first.

From there, if you'd like to teach if you'd like to pass that down to HPD, and we can have some type of conversation to find out.

Um I think yeah, I think it would be great for all of us to get on the same page.

It would be great for all of us to even see the video of what may have occurred uh during that situation, but I can say that from what I have observed with some of these mass rider um, I guess, gatherings, that the regular traffic rules are not being followed by many groups.

And they're either running red lights, they're either bunched all up into multiple lanes, um, they're going in different directions, they are not following some of the the signage that's posted, and because of that is causing um disorganization and chaos on the streets, especially for you know walkers or those who may be in vehicles.

And so there does need to be an understanding of when you have these gatherings of cyclists that everyone's on the same page of what are the rules to follow.

And from my understanding, the rules are just the regular rules of the road, right?

And whatever a motor vehicle can do, those things are applied to cyclists.

And so bunched up, not following traffic signs or traffic signals, those type of things are going to cause HPD and law enforcement to approach, right?

And if if there are commands that are given by HPD to stop or to come back and they're not being followed, then the expectation is that they are going to uh further their um their ability to try and enforce the traffic rules of the road.

So um let's find a way to get those traffic rules over to your group and others so that everyone can be safe as they ride.

Um but if certain traffic laws are not followed and law enforcement sees that, then their job is to enforce the law.

And so we want to make sure that everything is done in a safe and appropriate manner.

So I appreciate you bringing that to our attention.

If you want to send us that video or send us information on the gathering so we know more about it, then we will work with you directly on uh making sure that you all are safe and have those rules readily available for your membership.

Who should I send that video to and to all of our offices, which you can find our emails online, and then we will follow up with you.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Councilmember Davis.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tim, Mr.

Jose, thank you for coming and bringing this trial attention.

Question Um your bike group, is a club, is it a group?

What let me correct you.

It's not my bike group.

Okay, it's a social ride.

I'm a social rider.

Okay, folks.

Okay.

So but you you were mentioning a group, but it's just a social ride.

Yes.

There is a name group, but I don't feel that I should mention their name because I'm not a part of the group.

That's fine.

So, next question.

When you all get together, do you gather?

I notice you indicated cyclist downtown.

Yes, at MSC.

So Market Square Park.

Where?

Market Square Park.

Market.

Market.

Square.

Okay.

So that your social riding.

Y'all gather up there at a certain time and everybody's riding, right?

Okay.

Now, last question.

Are there any particular legal identification as to when they arrested?

One, two, three.

How many.

It was four.

I think four people uh were arrested this past Thursday.

Okay.

I'm not exactly sure your question.

So the question is, what was the offense?

What was it?

The offenses, uh, they ranged.

I I don't want to speak uh incorrectly.

I can get that information for you.

However, one person was arrested for having music.

You know, having sound, I guess playing sound too loud.

Okay.

You know, when you have trucks that are revving their engines, you know, loud downtown.

So it was various things.

Really, let's just call it what it is.

They're they're just targeting the social rides right now.

Um, I don't know the reason for it, but there has been an uptick in the arrests and then just the the assaults against against cyclists I'm not sure if it's if it's associated with the scooters or what it is, but the the normal riders have been assailed as well.

So how often do y'all meet at market?

Every Thursday.

Well, actually, there are social rides that leave from Market Square Park.

I want to say four out of the seven days of the week.

This has been a place where social rides have left, uh, I want to say for at least the before the pandemic.

So this is a place where people know to meet to ride.

Several other people.

Yes, sir.

When I say uh people, I'm talking about the social riders around town.

Okay.

That are not, you know, it's not necessarily associated with the ride group itself, but that want to ride.

They know to come to Market Square Park at 7:30 on a Thursday to ride.

So but but for you feel like but your group been targeted.

I feel like the police are targeting all by all cyclists.

Oh, all person.

Okay, all right.

But in particular, the Thursday ride, because it's the largest ride, it's downtown, and I guess we want to clean up downtown for a FIFA or something.

I'm not exactly sure what that's all about.

How many riders are um participate on average Thursday?

Wow.

Right.

Uh it can range, it can vary.

Um, I know that I've been on a social ride and it could have been up to 500 people.

So we're talking about, you know, big ride.

We're talking about big rides, and with that, I'm not saying that we need to police ourselves.

We need to police ourselves, you know.

But in order for that to happen, we have to have a clear rule of understanding of what that is.

It changes.

I think I think that makes sense.

Um Rebecca, can you uh get his contact information and then maybe talk to the HPD team, the cycle team at HPD, and let's see if we can um find uh happy space to land on with the social rides and um what their concerns are with HPD.

I appreciate that, Mayor Protem.

All right, take care.

Thank you all for the best wishes and be safe out there.

Thank you.

Next speaker, Christopher Cato, Christopher Cato Christopher Cato.

Next speaker, Theodore Carrero, Theodore Carrera to be followed by Juana Hawk.

Okay, thank you for having me today.

I submitted one of these, I had a conversation with uh Gordon Kwan, LLP uh immigration chairman of uh law firm.

I gave a packet of this to the mayor and uh to Mr.

Davis.

I spoke with him yesterday on my birthday.

We were at Barnes and Noble having a conversation.

Uh he was talking about credibility, so I figured, all right, let me come here and say my name is Theodore William Carrero.

I'm a marketing consultant for supply human demand.

Uh Mr.

Quan's one of my best reference references, so is Mr.

Larry Payne.

He's no longer with us, so is uh Randy Schuenstein.

And so I'm trying to continue.

I've been coming here since January of 20, I believe, 24, when the mayor was inaugurated.

So my goal today is climbing.

I'm trying to follow up, Mrs.

Uh Mrs.

Ingrid Velesco.

She's talking about climate literacy.

My my uh thing is climate awareness.

So this is what we're given.

This is the preparation guy.

I gave uh I submitted Mr.

Davis notes of a conference.

I'm sure you guys are all familiar with the American Leadership Forum, Event Bright, the Sunny Side Redevelopment Community Community Organization, the OEM, Office of Emerging Management, The Future, The Center of the Future of Houston, Arcades, Greentown Lab, Sunnyside.

I gave you guys a couple articles.

I'm not sure if anybody's composting, if you're composting your foods or anything.

Council Member Alcorn is a very big fan of the I've given you guys, I think, some of my marketing resumes with my stuff on it.

Because you're probably like, all right, this guy's talked about parks.

He's talked about homelessness.

He's talked about HISD, immigration.

So, you know, I have goals, I have a burning desire.

Um, I was at Acres Homes with uh Judge Didra Davis, uh Sergeant Constable William Wagner and all the sheriffs on Sunday.

You can find me regularly at Rice Village on Sunday with the assistant director.

I'm donating blood on Friday.

Tonight I have uh Bible studies at St.

Cereal.

All I'm trying to do is uh you know be a part of the team.

I'm I'm donating uh I've left my messages of Councilman Pollard's team to do abatement and beautification, waiting on Miss Jackson to do it over at West Montgomery.

I got a call from Tiffany Thomas today, her staff, because she's pro-advocate for domestic violence for the Asian society.

I'm just trying to be, you know, a friend of the street.

We appreciate it very much.

And now I'm part of the 50-year-olds, you know.

Yesterday's my birthday, so I got my ARP.

And so uh I'm looking to, you know, donate my time so that you guys know who I am, and that I can land some kind of contract, whether it be with the whichever community, Latin community, black community, whichever religious community.

And so I appreciate you guys for having me.

You guys have my resume.

I'll be coming back next month talking about bicycle safety.

Okay, which we've been hearing, we heard about, and more so the uh the roads, and then I'll follow that in October with gratuity.

So thank you for having me.

Keep the good vibes and good energy.

Know that we're all in this together.

And thank you, Mr.

Carrell.

We appreciate you being here.

I appreciate it.

Thank you very much.

Best wishes to you.

Procedural.

Councilmember Castillo for procedural.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

I move to suspend the rules to add John Rowe to the bottom of the three-minute non-agenda list.

Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved in second.

All in favor.

Any opposed?

Item passes.

Next speaker.

Wanna Hawk.

Juana Hawk.

Juana Hawk.

Next speaker.

Tar She Wright.

I'm here.

To be followed by John Rowe.

Correct.

Yes, ma'am.

How are you doing?

Doing well.

Y'all probably pretty much familiar with me.

When I came, I was kind of irritated and everything.

I'm off.

All my medication and everything.

I'm coming to uh discuss today.

Who's the mayor?

Never got to meet the mayor.

Is he here today?

He's not here today.

Okay, that's fine.

I'm great grateful for what I got.

So I want to uh discuss today.

Uh the city tree falling on top of my uh bought and paid for a car.

It is an old car, a 2009 Nissan Ultima passenger car, and a tree collapsed down on top of my car during the time I had taken a foul in my house and I couldn't move.

So my neighbors were kind of like banging on my door, and some people were trying to wonder like who car was that?

It was a complete tree on top of my car.

I had to uh it fed itself really good through my windowshill, and I had no other choice but to back out.

That would be the smart idea instead of going forward because it was just with a bash more glass inside my face, uh probably injured my eyes.

So I'm here today to discuss uh to agree to disagree.

I'm willing to uh give y'all my car, the title and everything, and take one of y'all cars.

I just don't know, but right now I got some estimates for that tree falling on my car at the gallery because I am disabled.

I am unable to really walk and find all these places to get different estimates, and that estimate came up to about $8,000.

And I didn't spend that much on that car.

I spent about $3,500 on a car.

So uh either you guys can work with me and to try to uh fix it or give me $3,500 so I can get another car or switch me out for one of y'all city cars that y'all not using anymore, and I can give y'all my car with the title and everything because I do like the Crown Victorious, they ride really good, they're fast, you know, they're really good cars.

They're fast, you know, they're really good cars.

So I'm willing to take one of those whether than it'll be without a car at all.

Because I have uh phantoplassiitis from walking a whole lot.

I did I'm from New Orleans, you guys.

So I did some walks out here, like I was in New Orleans and I damaged my feet.

So I walked for 33 years.

That was my first car.

That is my favorite car, the B exact, and the car is still in good condition.

I mean, like running and everything, but the bumper is gone because when I backed out, the Katri, the tree continued to collapse on top of my car, breaking my headlights and breaking the bumper off.

And I'm just When did this happen?

This happened uh July 9th.

And there's a lot of construction going on over there.

It's a lot of trees that's falling over.

I'm on Barron Drive, close to the Galeria.

Right.

And they have a lot of trees that's like old and rotten and out, they are falling over the power lines.

You can also check with some of the.

So tell me what what what was the address of where the tree was located?

Okay, 2250 Barron Drive.

So the report I have here is that the foresty forestry team went out there and there were no public trees along 2250 Bering Drive.

Okay.

Okay, I'm gonna let you finish.

Okay.

And then they are reporting to us that all of the trees in that area are located on private property and under the responsibility of the adjacent Miramar townhomes.

Is that sound familiar to you?

Uh they are connected to, I think that's the name of them, but those apartments, because I used to uh specialize in architect and design, they build around those trees, the apartment complex, so it's like a like a loop.

And I was parked on this uh side street uh due to uh registry because I did some chronic homelessness in my car for two years.

I was affected by the pandemic uh really bad.

I bought that car during the pandemic before we knew it was a pandemic, and y'all shut everything down when all my registration was good.

So when all uh my registration went bad, y'all opened everything back up and excuse me.

Go ahead.

Uh y'all opened everything back up and everything was already expired and everything, and I did not have a chance to get things together due to my chronic homelessness and everybody helping uh helping me.

So I have been working with this uh organization called Village Connect.

This man is struggling.

This man has also been shedding his own blood, giving blood to help uh the people, the few people that he do have.

A lot of people have left him because he does not have the money to pay the people to work to do the work that I need.

So he's more tasked testing two things at MD Anderson Lab and plus uh some others uh in a coffee business to help me because I'm the only one that's really sticking by this man.

His name is Tron Lamb, and he runs the Village Connect.

So uh I'm just gonna go.

Miss Wright, I think what um we need to do because the tree that fell on your car, the responsibility for that would be the townhouse, the town home property manager and the forestry team uh did uh leave that message with that leasing office.

So I think if your your concern is the tree falling on your car, we probably need to have a discussion with the town home property that is responsible for those trees.

Excuse me, may I ask what's your name?

Martha Cassex Tatum.

Hey, Miss Martha.

So I did go over there and I spoke with Miss Bur uh Miss Rebecca Rack.

Okay.

Okay, she's uh coming from New York, and I guess she's more tied to us in two buildings.

She has said that there that is not their tree, that's the city tree.

That's why they build around it.

We already talked about it.

I don't want to have to file a lawsuit against the apartments because these people do have the money to fight this back and point this back to y'all.

That is y'all tree that fell, uh that fell down on my car, and they also have another tree that's also leaning the same way, and the tree was pretty big.

You could sit on it for a stool.

So once the tree, once I got my car backed out of the tree, they came, somebody came and chopped up the tree and just threw it in the corner.

So somebody is reliable for the tree, because the apartment is saying it's not my tree, and the city's saying it's not my tree.

So who tree is it?

I love trees.

The tree ain't just magically appear there.

So I want somebody to take responsibility.

Hey, Miss Uh Shabbaz.

And also I want to uh thank Miss Evelyn Shabazz for helping me during the time of chronic homelessness along with Mr.

Stephen A.

James, the uh city chief of homeland security, because at that time they shut down their prostitution on Bisonette, and I was unaware of that, and I was being attacked and harassed a lot by these men because they lost the women that they needed to make their money.

So the whole deal is I need to get back in my car.

Or I could swap the car and give y'all a title to it, and y'all do whatever with it, and y'all give me a city car that y'all are no longer using because I see that y'all are in the new Ford Expeditions and the all charges and stuff like that.

I can't get no leaner than that.

That's all I'm asking for, sweetheart.

Okay.

Miss Wright, I'm gonna ask James if he'll help you with that situation because the information.

Oh, Councilmember Huffin, did you want to address Wright?

Yes, thank you.

Um so you're saying that the tree that fell on your car has been removed, it's no longer there.

It's pushed in the corner.

They basically chopped it up and pushed it in the corner where it's you know where the uh apartments like kind of curves around it.

So right now it's just trash in the corner and it's been there for about a month.

And I also took some more, I took a video also of it.

I don't know if anybody wants to take a look at that video on my phone to uh see where they put that tree, but you basically sit on it for a stool.

It was a very big tree, and it destroyed my car.

So the estimates from Crash Champions that was close to me where I can get to it is saying it's gonna cost about $8,000 because I had fog lamps.

It's a top of the line car.

It was a really good car, and I was keeping it up.

And Mayor Pur Tim, do you know when Forestry went out there?

This morning.

Okay, so they're out there this morning.

So if they went out this morning, because I know they did mention one tree that looked like it.

Yeah, that's one of the trees that was like that.

So if that tree, hold on one second.

So if that tree was so if that tree was the townhome property, do we know if the tree that was removed or no trees on that block were so the trees are on the other side of the sidewalk, which is the property of the town homes and not in the city right away.

All right, thank you.

May I say one more thing?

Yes, ma'am.

I walked that property.

That property owns no oak trees or anything.

That property is pretty sophisticated.

They have a lot of palm trees on their property, and they also have a lagoon that's way better than my apartment.

So they have a lot of uh palm trees, and the trees that they do have bloom these pink flowers and they're really thin.

They don't have these big trees, and I'm assuming the reason why that that apartment complex built around those trees is because they were not their trees, they belong to the city, so they could not just cut them down.

I want somebody to take responsibility for it because if I do something, y'all totally want me to take responsibility in Texas for whatever I do, and I want the city to take responsibility for that part.

Now, if I have to go after this apartment complex, they do have the money and the lawyers and the investigators to go out there to say, hey, that's not our tree and point it back to you, and then y'all have to pay the 8,000.

So the thing is I'm trying to make a deal with y'all.

Either take my car and give me one of y'all old cars that y'all now use one of them good old uh crown victorious or whatever them all.

Right, we don't have any old Crown Victoria's to give to citizens.

But I get what you're saying here.

And but let me let me let uh James trying to be able to do it.

James, can you get the the the leasing agent's uh contact information for Miss Wright uh maybe help her?

I don't think I have our car with me.

No, no, no, no.

We're gonna we're gonna see if we can get you the contact information to the leasing company of the folks who actually own the tree that fell on your car.

So hopefully maybe they have a car that you can see.

Right.

It's all curved around the city trees, and the trees have been collapsing.

You can also check with City Point.

We also had some out uh power outages because of that, because the trees falling over the power lines, and they had a lot of construction going on or whatever for about three years, they didn't finish it up until I got over there.

And Miss Wright, if you file a claim with your with your car insurance, then they'll be the one settled.

I wasn't able to get car insurance at that time.

Everything had went out.

I was chronically homeless, and I just had moved to that place.

Uh and Mr.

Stephen A.

James helped me uh get settled down in that place, and I want to thank him.

He also uh bought bed pillows and everything for me and supplied a hundred dollars worth of groceries for me.

So I also want y'all to give him some type of badge.

We will definitely give Mr.

James that's because Miss Shabazz referred me to welcome her.

That's like one of my moms.

But thank you, Councilmember Shabazz, for your help.

Ms.

Wright, uh James can help you.

James, if you'll if you'll um help Miss Wright and make sure she has the leasing contact for the So what's gonna happen with the leasing agent?

What they're gonna I'm not sure.

We're gonna get you their contact, and then you can reach out to them and let them know about the concerns you have about your car.

So they'll take care of the damn.

Thank you, Miss Wright.

Yes, ma'am, they sure will.

Thank you, ma'am, for having us.

You're very welcome.

All right.

Best wishes to you.

All right, sweetheart.

Thank you.

Next speaker.

John Rowe.

Oh, case I'm all whacked out of my mind.

John Rowe.

All right.

Thank you guys for looking at the best wishes, Miss Wright.

To be followed by Alfredo Franklin.

First of all, uh thank you for the opportunity to speak.

I I know it was kind of wedged in at the last minute.

Um I'm the backup back to the two that you heard earlier.

I'm the co-chair of Houston Energy and Climate Week.

So that's why I'm here.

I want to thank the City Council and the Mayor Pro Tem for the opportunity to speak this afternoon.

I also want to just maybe you don't hear this from every speaker.

I want to say thank you for what you do.

For everyone sitting in this chair, thank you for what you do because I'm gonna emphasize something my remarks this afternoon called stewardship.

I've heard Councilmember Alcorn say this many times, right?

We believe in that stewardship.

My faith tradition teaches that we should be good stewards.

So Houston has been long recognized as the energy capital of the world.

For generations, the work done in the city of Houston has powered homes, created jobs, and fueled growth around the globe.

But as the world changes, in my opinion, so must Houston.

Energy and climate leadership today isn't only about providing resources, it's about protecting the health, safety, and the future of the people who call Houston home.

That's why Houston Energy and Climate Week matter so deeply.

We're just gonna give you an analogy.

A few weeks ago we had an organizing event, and it was an overflow room of people who just came out to volunteer to produce uh participate in Houston Energy and Climate Week.

These are people that are taking time after work outside of their family commitments just to participate.

And that site was just amazing to me, right?

We're in a different political climate.

We all know that, right?

And some people have forgotten that we have a climate issue, right?

But whatever your beliefs are, right?

We have to be good stewards of our world to protect our our children, the air that they breathe, our families, our friends, our neighbors, or that are safe from extreme weather, right?

And all the community should have an active voice as to how we go forward.

So my my ask for the city council today is come and participate in Houston Energy and Climate Week.

Show up, show up to one event.

You don't have to show up to every event.

Show up to one.

And I know you're all very busy people, but we all have time to come and make it to the opening event, the closing event, or a week, uh something in between.

We can help you uh decide what works best for you guys.

But I want to thank you for your support and help us to make Houston to be unstoppable.

Thank you.

Councilmember Alcorn.

Thank you very much for coming and for the work you're doing for Energy and Climate Week.

You know, it used to be where we talked about climate a lot.

We really did, and we all want to be good stewards of this earth.

And in this climate, it's talked about less.

So I appreciate your keeping the conversation going, keeping the discussion, the important discussion going.

We need to be leading an energy transition here in Houston.

And I just want to say thank you, and I'll look through the calendar and show up to something.

Oh, and and and there's always room for somebody to participate.

So thank you again, and thank you for what you do every day.

Thank you.

Thank you for the invitation.

Next speaker.

Alfrieda Franklin.

Alfrieda Franklin.

To be followed by Kiva St.

Ford.

Hello, Miss Franklin.

Hello, good evening, everyone.

Um I came back here again today.

And um, the last time I was here, we did receive an email asking um this is about the biker situation, the motorcyclists on the roadways.

Um we were asked for a date for the park proclamation.

Um we did suggest uh May 1st, which is bike month.

Um, May 1st, uh starting in 2026.

And also we were also asked about a day that the bikers could ride as of now, since you know bike month is now gone, um, which is May, and um, we also decided October the 5th, which is on a Sunday, which there's not too much traffic.

Um, also the bikers will be able to, you know, to ride and also we want um some of the police officers to ride with us as well, as in leading.

It's not basically escorting, we want them to ride with us because they're also going down as well as the the um regular riders on the street.

So I come here today to get those answers because I was also told um last week that I would well know two weeks ago that I would have an answer within a week, so no one called me.

I keep emailing, I emailed the mayor's office, I signed up.

I've done what I supposed to do, so I'm trying to do everything that I can, you know, to help these motorcyclists instead of them taking it in, like I said, in their hands.

So you're asking for a proclamation on May 1st of 2026, uh, for the biker day of remembrance, and that's what I was sent.

Okay, um, and then also um the ride for October the 5th, um, which is coming up.

Right.

So from my notes, I was told that you were working with Rashad Kay from the from the mayor's office.

Have you reached out to Rashad to get an answer?

Yes, I did.

I was actually at a um a school back to pack giveaway drive that we were, you know, helping with, and I saw him there, and then I spoke to him about that, and that's when he had given me the information they were supposed to get back with me within a week, you know, or whatever, and it's been you know, some time, and I you know emailed him okay and um I get it.

So the information we have said that the the mayor is on board with the with the bike ride.

I would reach out to Rashad Um to get the information that you need so y'all can make the plan for that, and then May 1st of 2026.

Um many of us will be here May 1st of 2026.

Um, I think that you are a district K resident.

My office can sponsor a proclamation for for the bike ride.

And that'll be great.

That would be greatly appreciated because um we're just just like the um we're actually doing uh a balloon release for the rider that we talked about that his daughter, you know, got on, and we're doing one for him tomorrow.

Okay, you know, this is the stuff that we do for bikers, and not only that, we were just in your housing authority situation.

I mean, well, you know, over there helping the children, you know, with the backpack uh drives and everything, and we went to one of y'all worst areas, and we we did a great job.

I have videos, pictures, everything of it, and it was really nice.

We help a lot of kids over there, so that's why we're just asking y'all to help us so we can help keep helping and putting back in our community helping you all, not letting all us, you know how it gets crazy out there, and we appreciate Rob and then all kind of stuff by trying to give back, and they don't have to steal for the kids, steal food and all that because we set up food drives, we set up everything, you know, to give back, and that that's all that they're wanting.

They're just wanting a day um so they can do a day of remembrance.

You all be there with them if y'all want to.

Um, also, like I said, the ride, because a lot of riders has fallen, and no one is paying attention to it, and that's what they want is the attention, and I did see that y'all put up the um the flashing lights when you go around the high the high freeways.

I did see that because I traveled several of them to see, and I did see that y'all did put that up, so that also helped, you know, and that's something that the riders are seeing as well.

And now the only other thing is like the billboards or something.

We will help come up with the money.

It's not that we're putting it on the city.

We will help, you know, with the money and fund the money.

If we have to, y'all can help us or whatever.

We're just trying to get something up for everyone because that could be anybody's family, and I'm sure a lot of us in right here in this room has bikers in their family, a motorcyclist that ride motorcycles, and y'all don't want to get that call.

It's a horrible call when you get that in the middle of the night.

Right.

I'm sure no one will want to do that, but I do um so I think we're we're all good for May 1st of 2026.

We'll definitely um have to reach out to you to get some verbiage for the proclamation, and we can set a date to uh present that proclamation here at City Hall.

Then we can um uh Rashad's do you have his email address?

Yes, and I have his phone number.

I would definitely just reach out to him.

The notes that we have say that um the mayor is on board with it.

Um so it's just a matter of communicating with them to set it all up.

And that's it.

I'm just waiting on the he said he was waiting on the police officers.

Okay, or whatever, but if they need us to talk to them, we can talk to them because they escort a lot of our funerals to be honest with you.

They can they can definitely help with that.

I would definitely reach out to Rashad.

Okay.

Well, thank y'all so much.

Thank you, Miss Franklin.

Good to see you.

Next speaker, Kiva St.

Ford.

Kiva St.

Ford.

To be followed by Christopher Jenkins.

Hello, Miss St.

Ford.

Hi.

How's everybody joined today?

Doing well, thank you.

Great.

So I'm here again to request that there be a quiet zone made in my community because of the excessive loud trains all throughout the day.

Um, and the only way I feel like I can get anybody to pay any attention to me is if I come to these city council meetings.

I don't know what's going on with this process.

Councilmember Martinez.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

So we've emailed you the application.

Have you received it?

I received an application.

I filled out the application.

So we have been communication and we are being responsive.

I think I had mentioned to you a few weeks back when you showed up that this is not a you know uh overnight process.

This is a lengthy process, expensive process as well.

Um and and so we're moving in the right direction, but I want to be very honest with you, it's gonna be a slow, slow process though.

Uh this is not the application that was sent to me, it said that the city ran out of funds for this in 2019.

So is that accurate that the city ran out of funds?

That is accurate.

So the last right now we are working on the Harrisburg line uh that was submitted over ten years ago.

Uh we're almost at the tail end of that one to finally create a quiet zone.

Um and it's not just city dollars, it's also um gonna be in partnership with whatever railroad and more than likely it's Union Pacific, who also has to accept this application and work with us as well.

Okay.

So is there uh council just district service funds that are available for something like this?

There is.

Um, why can't we we tap into those funds?

Because we receive about a half a million on the operation side and half a million for construction projects.

Um each of these intersections are about a half a million dollars.

For each intersection uh at great crossings.

So I'm not saying you're not doing your job, and I've said several times that I will help you with this, like if you need someone to maybe write some grants so we can get money to help my community, you know, what what needs to be done so we can kind of expedite this process?

So it's again, it's not just gonna be public works uh doing this, it's gonna be Union Pacific, it's gonna be, you know, even possibly FRA, uh Federal Railroad Administration helping out with this as well.

So this is this is if you want, we can do Union Pacific and FRECO.

Um this application is the first the first part, and if you want, we can sit down and have some coffee.

I offered that the first time that you came, have coffee.

We let's talk through it, just figure out um so and again I'm just gonna be very honest about it and give you realistic expectations as well.

Um, should I just stop coming here?

It's it's something that's not going to be.

What I would say is allow us to go through the process.

The application that was sent to you, it's been submitted.

Um I've already asked Juan Pablo and my team to make sure that we keep it on our radar, follow up with public works as well.

Councilmember Flickinger.

Ma'am, I just kind of wanted to give you some more information, like Councilman Martinez has spoke to you about.

Um I don't have the exact same situation, but we are building a road over uh the Union Pacific Rail line at uh 494 and in North Park up in the northeast part of town.

Uh the railroads were given an immense amount of authority in this country when they were originally building the railroads out.

Um I mean when it comes to authority, it's God and then the railroads.

Uh the railroads move at their own pace.

Um it's not something that you can do and for you know him to try and set the expectations.

He's absolutely correct.

It's a long process in doing anything with the railroads.

It's not impossible, but it is going to take a long time to take care of it.

If I can ask just a few more questions, Ms.

St.

Fort.

Um how long have you lived uh there in Fidelity?

For two years.

Two years.

Have you spoken to any other neighbors about the application process, gathered some support as well?

I'm happy to meet with you and them as uh just so that way we can make sure that again I don't want to say that it's not gonna happen as I mentioned to you.

We're finally seeing the end of the road for uh the Harrisburg line.

Um, but I also want to make sure that we're having conversations with you to let you know where we are and what what expectations we can give as well.

So have you spoken to any of your neighbors?

Yes.

And if you come to the super neighborhood meeting, which I do.

Right.

So I mean, we can talk about it there, we can discuss it there.

So I'll I'll plan on um what I'll do is I'll um I'm gonna go through my second wave of civic club tours.

I usually go in the beginning of the year, and the end of the year.

I'll plan on going again starting September.

Uh so I'll be at the meeting.

Um happy to bring it up there at the meeting with the rest of your neighbors and I just you know uh thank you for being here, thank you for your advocacy, but I also you know I just don't want to give you some unrealistic expectations that it's gonna happen and when these intersections to upgrade them, uh not just uh the uh equipment there for Union Pacific Track, but also the infrastructure to make sure that there's ballers, higher curbs, the the infrastructure work that happens to the public works.

I I can definitely share all this information with you and and the and the rest of the neighbors um at the next Civic Club meeting.

Well that would be great.

Okay.

But I do, I guess I just question.

I know that this takes a long time.

Yes.

I'm aware of that.

I've done the research.

I know it takes a long time.

But in certain neighborhoods, they have to went through the same process to make their neighborhood a quiet zone.

And it didn't take as long as this is taking.

Because when I first originally went to you about this issue, you said this is something, right?

That has been brought up to you before.

Not so in Park and Fidelity neighborhood, but it has in the East End.

You're the first person from Clinton Park Fidelity that has mentioned this.

And I've worked out of the office for 10 years prior to being in this seat.

Um, so we haven't had any um a need for a quiet zone in the Fidelity Clinton Park neighborhood.

Uh but we have consistently had uh requests in the East End, Eastwood, Magnolia Park, Pecon Park, because that's where a lot of the trains converge at the end of the day, and so there's definitely a lot more train traffic there.

And so we have had the conversation in other parts of the district, hi.

Okay.

Well, you know I'll be back.

Yes.

And like I said, we can let's just set up a set up a coffee, please.

And let's just sit down and have the are you available next Tuesday?

Um 9 a.m.

perhaps.

I can let's I'll step out and we can talk about it.

Maybe yeah, maybe you can just kind of get on the calendar.

And I will tell you that we we got a quiet zone in District K at uh Hillcroft and 90, and it did take a couple of years um to get the application approved in the process, and you just have to stay vigilant on it.

It it's a frustrating thing to hear those trains um throughout the day and throughout the night.

Um, but I would definitely just stay in touch with the with the council member to keep the um process moving forward um so that hopefully you'll get some relief with from the train horns because I mean we do have a lot of trains coming through Houston, and um I don't I don't think that that's going to change.

Um, but um if we can get quiet zones, especially when people are uh being disturbed um at night early in the morning, um it it would be helpful.

It would be, and that's all I'm asking for.

I know.

So thank you.

You're welcome.

Thank you, everybody, for your time.

But if you did have a Crown Vic back there somewhere, let's see.

Next speaker.

Christopher Jenkins.

Christopher Jenkins.

Mr.

Jenkins, Christopher Jenkins.

Next speaker.

Joseph Omari.

Joseph Amari.

Uh, we should all agree with by last uh city council statement that 200 trillion dollars sub plus social is American interest, and we're fighting the war and start over.

Uh we went off of all this.

Uh American Social Security System benefits is a sacred trust.

Uh that we should have never this generation politician should never have portrayed.

President Franklin Rosebrell and World War II generation created the Social Security Trust Program for our senior citizen disabled workforce.

Both the Democrats and Republican part agreed about having this national sacred trust for America's senior citizens disabled workforce.

We ever changed our social security benefit policy for the worst and not the better, should be filed, impeached and prison.

Do you agree?

And our social security benefit desk continue to grow up, grow while the government can't end up more owing American senior citizens more and more money without any SSCI or SEDI backpaper.

The social time income benefit cases are Social Security attorney feel they that they could never lose in front of any United States federal judge.

Thank you, Mr.

Amari.

We appreciate you being here.

Thank you for your comments today.

Next speaker.

This completes the list of speakers.

Council members, we stand in recess until tomorrow at 9 a.m.

Municipal Utility District No.

612.

Item 26, ordinance finding and determining that public convenience and necessity no longer require the continued use of Ira Street from North Eastwood Street West to its terminus, said Street being situated in the SM Williams survey abstract number 87.

Item 27, ordinance approving the issuance and sale of Coastal Water Authority Contract Revenue Bonds Series 2025 to the Texas Water Development Board.

Item 28.

Ordinance approved and authorizing advanced funding agreement for surface transportation block grant program and supplemental transportation program off system project between City of Houston and Texas Department of Transportation for Hall and Drive at Hillcroft Avenue Project.

Item 29 ordinance appropriating 26,000 as an appropriation to advance funding agreement for supplemental transportation program off system project between City of Houston and the Texas Department of Transportation for the International Management District Intersections Project.

Item 30 ordinance approving and authorizing advanced funding agreement for supplemental transportation program off system project between the City of Houston and Texdot for the International Management District Intersections Project.

This item shall only be considered after passage of item 29 above.

Item 31, ordinance appropriating 26,000 dollars as an appropriation to advance funding agreement for supplemental transportation program off system project between the City of Houston and Text Dot for the Hartman Middle School and Alcott Elementary School Safe Routes to Sue Project.

Item 32 motion to set a date not less than seven days from August 20th, 2025 to receive nominations for positions 10, 11, 12, and 13 of the Houston Archaeological and Historical Commission Board of Directors for two-year staggered terms.

Item 33, motion to set a date not less than seven days from August 20, 2025 to receive nominations for position eight of the Board of Directors of the Houston Civic Events Inc.

City of Houston, Texas, for a term to expire January 1, 2027.

Item 34, review on the record and make determination relative to the appeal from the decision of the sign administration on denial of an off-premise sign at 11700 Wilkes Drive file by Christopher W.

Rothfelder on behalf of Sign Ed Limited.

Item 35.

Recommendation from Director Houston Public Works for approval of final contract amount and acceptance of work on contract with Persons Services Corporation for FY 2020 drainage rehab work orders number three.

Item 36, ordinance approving and authorizing and advanced funding agreement for supplemental transportation program off system project between the City of Houston and Text Dot for the Hartman Middle School and Alcott Elementary School Safe Routes to School Project.

This item should only be considered after passage of item 31 above.

Item 37, ordinance approving and authorizing an advanced funding agreement for a surface transportation block grant program off system project between the city of Houston and the Text Dot for the wall drive package one project.

This concludes the reading of the captions for the agenda August 20, 2025.

Stay tuned for the next session of Houston City Council to begin at 9 a.m.

And with that, I wish everyone a happy Wednesday.

Council, please come to order.

Next, we have the mayor's report, and I'm pleased to report to you that our solid waste director, Mr.

Hassan, should get probably a phone call from each one of you telling him what a great job he's doing.

You know, we all know it starts with leadership.

And I am so impressed.

He not only is so transparent, but he's got that can-do attitude that was missing.

What he's discovered at Solid Waste was alarming.

Daily, maybe 30, 40, 50 trucks in the repair shop.

And it gets down to members, and we see this, and I've seen it in my career.

You can't fix something if you don't know about it.

So he is very clear about one, he needed more trucks.

Previous director and previous operations for several years were hiding the fact that you couldn't search the nation and find trucks.

He got on the phone.

I backed him up, and we found 31 trucks in Albuquerque.

Hadn't been put in operation in Albuquerque.

We sent out nine Monday morning.

It's making a difference.

He's had hiring for these trucks.

There are 19 more on the way.

Should get here by the end of the week.

That'll be 31 trucks.

As you know, we didn't waste time painting them.

We want them on the streets.

Save $3,000 per truck for a paint job.

Plus, there's 19 more going to receive be received in September.

So by the first October, there'll be 50 new trucks on the road with personnel to drive.

So you learn a lot by being here and asking questions, having a can do attitude.

I think the previous director, for whatever reason, some conflict of interest, some funny math.

We're not doing the job that Houston's expected.

Very soon there will be 50 new trucks on the road.

We're not stopping there.

Obviously, I know we've had discussions about a revenue stream to support solid waste.

I said when it was brought up previously, you don't throw money at a bad model.

Talking to the rank and file, the morale is good.

The disgruntled individuals that came before council, not all of them, but certainly a few had been part of the manipulation to where one individual was getting $63,000 in overtime because Wednesday was an official off day, but if he'd come in, he made $63,000 last year.

So this mayor's report is very significant because it affects every one of us.

I think we need to continue to monitor it.

Certainly it's one of my highest priorities along with public safety, our infrastructure.

I think you're going to be excited about some infrastructure announcements very soon.

But today, Mr.

Hassan is on the job working.

He has some new leadership advisors, but it's a good day for the Solid Waste Department.

We're not through, but it certainly is very positive.

And I'm pleased.

Councilmember Pollard.

Thank you, Mayor.

Appreciate that update on solid waste.

As we're talking about the city employees, I know I have received calls, and maybe some of the other members around council have received calls from retirees who took that uh package.

Um there have been reports that they have not been paid as of yet.

Can you give us an update on what your uh discussions have been with HMEP and why things weren't put in place for them to receive their pension payments within the 30 to 60 days that uh they were told?

Thank you for asking.

As you know, because you've been here longer than most of us, that the pension fund is independent from the city of Houston.

Totally independent.

Board is elected by retirees and active members.

Human resources, Ms.

Cheeks and her group did a great job, and everyone was celebrating the day that they filled out their papers.

We admonished the board to be ready.

Ms.

Cheeks told the pension board the volume thousand fifty-eight.

A very successful program of incentive benefits for retirees, unlike previous administrations.

I think Anise Parker fired 1,700 people.

We were more compassionate.

There are a couple of retirees that have had hardships, one or two that were interviewed by the press.

I have one appointment to that board.

And we have been very direct with the pension that they have to do better.

They're doing better.

300 people will get their checks today.

Another couple hundred next week.

And with the exception of one or two that have some technicality, red tape, disagreement about the number of years of service, it will be complete.

So there again, you can't fix something if you do not know that it's broken.

A very supportive of the retirees.

They're getting their checks 300 this week, 200 next week, and that'll pretty much finish it.

There were a couple of hardships mentioned, but certainly I'm certainly you're aware that it is an independent body.

By design, the the mayor's office, this council is not to direct the pension fund on investments, operations, makeup of their board, but they got our attention.

And is that going to have a small factory?

I wouldn't want us to put forth expectations for these employees who have been working all these years for the city and then come to find out that the expectations that they have are not being met because we didn't put things in place.

But another thing I think we ought to review going forward is the governance of our pension boards.

The problem is, as you can imagine, the conflicts of interest when we start calling over and telling them how to run the pension system.

Fire police are also independent.

But that operation is chosen by active and retirees.

We have met our commitment to them of health care, three months' pay.

I was here when they were signing up.

Plenty of good experiences, and they're going to be complete this week, next week, with the exception of a couple that have particular unique difficulties on calculations.

But thank you for bringing this to our attention.

I wanted to, but quite frankly, the pension board knows how I feel, and uh we've actually in the process of setting up a hotline for anyone that needs additional information.

The real frustration was, Councilmember, they were not answering their phones over there, and that was the frustration of most of the retirees.

So I welcome your any contacts you have over there, but they have a real clear understanding of how I feel, and they've got to do better.

I've known a couple of the board members in previous uh discussions, and they know I'm a no-nonsense person, and it's getting fixed immediately.

Thank you.

That's all.

Next.

Ms.

Secretary, would you deal with the uh consent agenda?

Under the miscellaneous category.

Item one needs a motion.

Cast extate to move.

Motion made and second.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion pass.

Under the accept work category, item two has been removed for separate consideration.

My apologies.

Under the purchasing and tabulation of bids category, item two has been removed for a separate consideration.

Item three needs a motion.

Motion is made and seconded.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed nay, motion passes.

Under the resolutions category, items four and five just need a vote.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed, nay, motion passes.

Under the ordinances category, since your list has been distributed, item 23 has been received.

Item 7 and 728 and 37 have not been received but will be considered if they're received before the end of the meeting.

Items 2, 24, and 27 have been removed for separate consideration.

Again, those numbers are 22, 24, and 27.

Need a vote on the balance.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion passes.

Items removed for separate consideration.

Item two needs a motion.

Cast a move.

Councilman Cayman.

Thank you, Mayor.

Good morning.

I normally talk about vehicle items when uh we are not seeing EVs or hybrids, so I wanted to take the opportunity to spotlight this item, thank our airport system and everyone that worked on this because these are electric vehicles that are going to replace uh traditional vehicles at the airport.

And when we talk about EVs, I have said I understand we don't have the charging infrastructure to cover the entire city, but when we have vehicles staying in a particular area, it makes a lot of sense cost wise and health wise.

So thank you for this item.

Looking forward to supporting it.

Thank you.

Just need a vote.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed nay.

Motion passes.

Item 22 is an ordinance.

Just need a vote.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion.

Councilman Castillo before after the vote.

Before.

Okay.

Sir?

Before.

You got it.

Um Chair recognizes Councilman Castillo.

Thank you, Mayor.

This item uh is our ERP system uh SAP.

And we've had a presentation at government operations on this.

Um couple of things that just peaked my interest.

When we got an RCA summary last year that this item was coming to committee in February, it had a $65 million price tag for three-year contract with two one-year options.

Um there were a number of questions I had, and now we're seeing this before us as a three-year contract with two one-year options at a $22 million cost.

Um significant drop, but wanting to fully understand uh where that came from and the full ecosystem that our SAP uh ERP has.

Um there are a number of other products that go along with this.

There's a number of other professional services contracts that we have to support our SAP system beyond just what we're looking at today, which is three years for $22 million, two one-year options.

Um we are projected to spend an additional $24.7 million in professional services to support implementation of SAP.

That's going to be coming to us uh potentially in December of this year.

Um that's gonna be in addition to this.

Uh in the 26th budget, uh, we have 3.2 million of the 24.7 uh for professional services to support staff augmentation.

Um that doesn't include some of the other costs related to uh S4 HANA, related to the ERP transformation office, um maintenance and other things.

So uh there's a lot more to this than just what we're seeing with this contract three years to one year options.

Um I do want to continue to take a closer look at this and how much it's going to cost the city overall over all of these years.

We have been using this system for quite some time, and these millions of dollars, they add up uh when you look at the bigger picture.

So I do plan on supporting the item today, but do want to raise those cost concerns as we look at technologies.

Well, thank you for your leadership.

And you and I have discussed this in greater detail.

And we have learned from the director that as we look at other options, which would take up to maybe two years to even implement and rising costs, that it would be advisable to support this.

And you and I and the council, before we do any two-year options, this will be closely scrutinized.

And looking at options of other services to see if there is a more cost-effective system.

And so we will hold Ms.

Kent accountable.

You have full access to the director to learn as much as you would like.

I look forward to being a part of those discussions to get ready.

But I think it is advisable to go forward because if we change we would be looking at a two-year or more window before we could access another service company.

So thank you and appreciate your your interest.

Councillor Alcorn.

Councilmember Alcorn.

Thank you, Mayor.

And thank you, Councilmember Castillo.

You've really emerged as being a leading voice on these technology matters.

A lot of us old people, I mean, it like us.

So I really appreciate that you are digging in on this.

These are tens of millions of dollars.

And I have total faith in Director Kent.

She's been here a long time.

She is sharp as attack.

And but I do appreciate the deeper dive you are doing into this and all of the roll-up activities that go along with.

And I too am interested in the in the drop.

I guess that is made up by the other services.

If we were expecting to spend $65 million, and we're it's a good drop.

We want to drop and not raise.

But thank you.

Thank you for being for leading on this, and I look forward to more discussions on it.

Very good.

Councilmember Maris.

I want to second Councilmember Alcorn's uh remarks.

I appreciate the work that Councilmember Castillo has done in trying to ensure that we are financially responsible on these contracts.

I would like to see more competition, frankly, and am concerned at the amount of money that we're spending, and I hope that uh in the next few years the City will will seriously consider um opening it up, because I think competition leads to lower prices in general.

And uh we have talked about the pattern of three-year contracts with two one-year options.

Uh we see that, tend to see that a lot.

Um, and I'm I'm wondering whether more of those contracts should come before council before the option years are picked up.

But it is something of noticed and it is a matter of concern.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

What just need a vote?

All in favor, say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion passes.

Item 24 is an ordinance.

Just need a vote.

All in favor, say yes.

Tag Pollard.

He's Huffman joins the tag as well.

Okay.

Tagg by uh Councilman Pollard and is that you're Huffman and Kamen.

Huffman and Cayman.

Next.

Item 27.

Item 27 is an ordinance, just need a vote.

All in favor, say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion passes.

Item 32 is a motion.

I'm sorry, item seven item 32 needs a motion.

Castic Tatum move to receive nominations for position 10, 11, 12, 13 of the Houston Archaeological and Historical Board of Directors on no less than seven days from August 20th, 2025.

Motion made in a second.

All in favor, say yes.

Those opposed nine.

Motion passes.

Item 32, item 33 needs a motion.

Castex Tate a move uh to receive nominations for position eight of the Board of Directors for the Houston Civic Events Inc., City of Houston, Texas, for no less than seven days from August 20, 2025.

Motion made in second.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion passes.

Item 34 needs a motion.

Cast X tate a move.

Next second.

Motion made and second.

We need this is the review on the record.

I got it.

Okay.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion passed.

Pollard, no.

So Councilman Pollard, no.

Motion passes.

Next.

Item 35 needs a motion.

Council Martinez.

Councilman Martinez.

Thank you, Mayor.

I take this item last week because this was uh dollars for SWAT, the stormwater action team uh projects.

Uh since then, I want to thank uh, of course, Public Works and Director uh as well for providing the response.

So we do have $3.7 million that will return to the fund, and at that point we're gonna be able to rebid uh for continued SWAT programs.

And that's ultimately what I was really trying to get to the bottom of.

Make sure that we are continuing to invest in drainage projects.

And so again, I'm supportive of this.

Um appreciate uh public work for their the response as well.

Needs a motion.

Sorry, it does need a motion.

Need a motion.

Cast X tate a move.

Motion made and second.

All in favor say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion passes.

Item 36 is an ordinance.

Just need a vote.

All in favor, say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion passes.

And item 28 has been received.

It is an ordinance.

Just need a vote.

All in favor, say yes.

Those opposed, nay.

Motion passes.

This completes the items on the agenda.

Very well.

Thank you, Mayor.

And um I wanted to uh give a bit of an update.

Um I'm not sure if all of y'all have seen, but the cullin apartments um have been a real challenge in the media.

Um, to give you a little bit of history.

In 2019, that was actually one of the apartment complexes I visited, and one of the moms had her baby um her baby pin on top of a dresser.

Um and I asked her why that was there, and she said because the rats were so large.

So this has been a converse.

This is actually what stemmed my push to create some level of apartment inspection reform ordinance.

So I want I want everyone to under to know that we are moving forward on this.

Um ASEC, which is the apartment standards executive committee, is having the third meeting today.

It is really important to roll this out the right way because we don't want to create homelessness or we don't want to create displacement of people.

And so I just want to assure um Houstonians and all the people that are living in in apartment complexes that are really not habitable.

We are working on this.

It is going to be coming to council very, very soon.

We just have to roll it out the right way.

And I want to give a special shout out to Josh and to all of the department heads for really helping us do this methodically and um in the in the in the proper way.

So when it comes to council, I want council to know that we have done the work and um in ensuring that um every single person in the city of Houston lives in a safe space.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Next.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um just wanted to give a shout out to uh the chance of hope and prosperity group over in the district of destination this weekend.

Who did a fantastic job with the back to school bash?

You know, it's when community comes together to really to support youth and to make a difference that I mean it just makes it makes the difference.

And also my neighbor here was cutting a rug and really teaching line dancing over there.

On Saturday, I told her I'd come prepared.

I thought it was a back to school event.

Um, secondly, uh Veda Academy, which is a great charter school in the city.

I encourage everyone to learn about it.

A little bit more about it, opened a new campus this weekend with great support.

It's over in kind of borders on the edge of District E, if not right in E.

But um anyway, wonderful school was proud to be over there to see them uh start the school year off.

And then um kind of on a personal note, uh, want to wish uh Director Stephen Williams a great retirement.

Um I think he's certainly in 21 years seen a lot and and done a lot.

So certainly want to wish him well.

And on that note, um, and working with his program, as you all know.

Uh I made a hire this year of a young man in the program, uh Clay Williams, who I'm uh Clay Williams, good Lord.

I think his last name is Britton.

Anyway, Clay uh we recently uh uh hired him off the grant to keep him and promoted him to uh deputy chief of staff.

Oh he's certainly very capable and very proud of him.

Clay, are you out there?

Stand up and say hello.

And uh on that note, I do want to uh take a moment and say that um we ask for your prayers for my chief of staff, Hugo, who is back um battling for life again.

Um so um it's been a little bit of a uh rough road for him for the past few weeks.

So if you are of of the faith and and praying, please continue to keep him in your prayers and thoughts and um we hope to see him back around around the hall uh in the future.

But uh most important, right now he needs to work on regaining his health.

So uh if you all need anything, certainly uh Clay is your go-to in my on my team, and and thank you for the please let him know that he has our prayers and you brought it up in council to your uh what did you call him, deputy, assistant chief?

Deputy chief of staff.

There, and it's another real example that second chance works.

And uh I've admonished uh or requested human resources to be a little do a little better job of uh looking at the applicants and giving second chance after do review, proper review to uh certainly getting back to solid waste.

They're uh they're giving folks second chance.

So certainly we're doing some work on that as well, and and hope to continue to work with the employers out there to to offer to to get them to offer second chances to be able to do that.

Steve uh Williams innovated a lot of that.

I've spoken to their graduation classes for the probably the last 15 years.

It continues to grow.

And the one that you and I attended, folks were lined out the door.

So hundreds.

It's uh we're committed to it and we'll do better with a real city re-entry program.

So thank you for bringing all that to our attention.

Uh Councilman Evan Shabazz.

Thank you, Mayor.

I certainly want to lift up Hugo.

Uh he's been a longtime friend, and he certainly is in my prayers.

And uh we're just hoping that he can overcome and God will cover him and that he can return.

I I want to say uh I'm gonna also mention the cohab uh wonderful back to school bash at the third ward multi-service center.

It was inspiring to see so many families come together, and I especially want to thank Councilmember Carter and Councilmember Pollard for their support in making that event possible.

Now she said that I was doing the line dancing, and I didn't try to teach her that, but I did teach her how to pop the fan, right?

And so she'll be she'll be ready the next time.

All right, you know, teaching the day it's a bit a little challenging.

You know how rhythm can be.

But at any rate, um, I want to take a moment to recognize and wish a very happy birthday to Mrs.

Clarice Freeman, who turned 105 on Thursday.

Mrs.

Freeman is so full of life and just so aware of everything and and still active in the community.

Uh, she's a little upset that they took her car keys, but uh she still moves around a great deal.

Uh she is a valued member of our community, and I'm grateful for the many ways that she contributes.

She actually uh went with me to Mayor Sylvester Turner's funeral, and the people were actually biting over her.

We want her to sit here, we want her to sit here.

But at any rate, uh she enjoyed enjoys getting out in public, and I'm so very honored to be her friend.

She was also my music teacher when I was young, girl.

Young girl.

And um, which I thought was such a wonderful thing.

She and another African American woman were lacking entrepreneurs.

And that was back in the 60s for women, and that was really unheard of.

And so now, for some pressing concerns, uh Houston does not have zoning, which leaves neighborhoods like South Park vulnerable to incompatible developments.

Just last Friday, Councilmember Davis and I hosted a community meeting where residents spoke with one clear voice.

They do not want a container yard next to their homes.

The recent media coverage captured those concerns, underscoring that this is about protecting health, safety, and quality of life.

And I have to say that the owner and the person that's going to lease the property were present, and we have come up with some things that might be able to move forward.

And I am uh very thankful for the collaboration of uh Cynthia Farms, Travis McGee, those that were involved in the meeting, and we're gonna make this work for the community.

Also, I want to thank my colleague uh Councilmember Plummer for speaking about Cullen Park.

And we are working to bring a safe environment there, and it's been extensive reporting.

Certainly, you all probably have seen the the videos of the infestation of rats, but it's even more uh troubling than that.

There's mold.

Uh we went into an apartment where the floor was actually wet, where the sewage had gone into one of the bedrooms, and the daughter cannot sleep in there.

And so, Mayor, I want to thank you because when I reached out to you, you deployed city staff to go out there, and right now I am so elated that HUD is making an uh inspection of all 250 units, and I have asked that they put the per the people in other places, other in hotels or whatever, because I don't want them to be impacted.

If it's something that cannot be done in a healthy way for them to while they are living there, they need to move.

And I'm really concerned because of the heavy rat infestation and the chemicals that are going to be used.

They certainly may need to move around.

But uh accountability must continue until every family has a safe, dignified and dignified housing.

Uh the company has taken action.

They have removed some of their personnel.

Uh, you know, things happen because you are there to serve people, and you must have uh an open door where people can come and know that you're gonna listen to them.

And so I'm thankful for their move motion and movement, but I want to let every slum lord know that we are coming for you.

All we need is reports, and then we're gonna come for you to make sure that you are in compliance.

I believe now, because of that action, they are now inspecting Wesley Square, which is 252 units, which I'm told is in even a worse condition.

So again, I thank you, Mayor.

I thank all of those that have been involved.

And um, you know, these examples remind us that action is being taken, communities are engaged, and we must remain steadfast in delivering results for the people we serve.

If we are not out there working for the people we serve, we need to be at home watching these on TV and not present, because that is why we are here, and that is to serve people.

I won't preach, don't take up any collections, but thank you.

That concludes what's going on in the district of destination.

I get a little passionate.

Sorry.

Thank you.

Item 37 has been received.

Councilmember Castillo.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Um this past Monday, I volunteered along with the District H staff at the Houston Food Bank, and we built uh pallets for the Brighter Bites program.

One of the pallets was actually going to North Line Elementary, which is in District H.

Um.

Food banks are being hit hard by funding cuts right now, and and they rely heavily on volunteers, so we wanted to to be out there to support them and encourage others.

If you have time to give uh go volunteer out at the food bank.

They do such vital work in the region, and uh they they absolutely need the help right now.

I want to give Director Horde and her team uh a big congratulations on a successful community meeting that we held uh in District H around the 2023 disparity study and some of the new programs that are in development to help our small businesses do business with the city.

Um we had a great presentation from the director, good conversation, good questions, good discussion, uh, and see some some positive momentum coming from that.

And her and her team uh did a fantastic job, so I want to thank them for that.

Saturday, I was able to visit the U of H L GQ Alumni Association's Red Dinner, uh, which is their annual event that raises money for scholarships and crisis support for students uh who right now don't have an LGBTQ resource center on campus that was closed uh a few years ago from Senate Bill 17.

And so the work that they do to support students in times of need is is critical.

Um they raised money to support uh scholarships that were awarded and had a great time uh honoring some other individuals that have made contributions and uh look forward to attending that event again in the future.

Um that event started as a backyard fundraiser and uh uh just to help get some folks together and now it's growing into their their signature event.

So they've done a great job.

Um I want to also congratulate Director Williams on his retirement.

I was able to stop by his uh celebration last night.

Um he had a uh a great crowd, he got some good awards.

Um, I used to work at the health department, and before that, when I finished grad school, my first job was at a nonprofit called Enroll America, uh, helping get people signed up for health insurance through the Affordable Care Act.

And Stephen Williams was one of the first people I met in Houston uh as um we built a partnership to help get folks in Houston enrolled.

And the health department, under his leadership, really stepped up to embrace us, embrace a com a number of other organizations.

They formed a whole coalition around it, and he treated uninsured Houstonians as a public health crisis, and he went and restructured the health department into the incident command structure, put resources behind it, um, was able to help thousands of people sign up for health care, so much so that at the time the White House sent Vice President Biden down to Houston to meet and congratulate him and and the group he put together.

Um he took a really proactive approach to public health from C to succeed, getting kids eyeglasses, going into the schools and screening, dental screenings, and it had a profound impact on me at the time as a uh fresh public health grad student uh who just graduated to see that type of leadership and that type of work.

And so I I want to thank him for all of his service to the city uh for all his mentorship and guidance over the years.

Uh, we're gonna miss him and he's done a fantastic job.

And uh I also want to encourage folks.

Next week is our first evening public session on Tuesday uh to sign up with the City Secretary's office.

Uh we will be hosting uh public session at 6 p.m.

here in council chambers on Tuesday.

Um and registration for that will close 3 p.m.

on Monday, August 25th.

And you can reach out to the City Secretary's office to sign up to speak.

And uh finally, I do want to uh wish Hugo uh speedy recovery and and let him know I'll be keeping him in my prayers.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh Steve Williams has been a constituent of mine for about 50 years.

Uh as a senator, I worked with him closely.

Uh, his innovation of the reentry program.

He gets full credit for bringing that to the health department.

I've worked with him on the glass program at the Heights Health Multi-Service Center uh to get volunteer optometrists, a lot of students from U of H.

And then Kmart would furnish their frames.

The challenge was getting the school districts to participate, bringing second graders.

Uh we would demonstrate what a second grader that cannot have glasses was seeing.

And of course, they were not learning to read.

And Steve and I teamed up to get uh school superintendents to to bring their second graders there.

So I cannot say enough about his innovation and vision and really caring.

You know, and I think of Steve Williams is just caring.

So we uh we applaud his public service.

Uh I'm told that item 37 has arrived.

Members, if we could get a motion, we will just need a vote on it.

Actually, just to vote.

All in favor say yes.

Those proposed night.

Motion pass uh item passes.

Thank you, sir.

Council Member Flickinger.

Just mentioned the mayor that uh I know I'll say things that my staff has no clue as what I'm talking about.

You referenced Kmart.

I think there's probably a few people that don't even know what that is anymore.

Enlightened people who KMR was.

I took my staff on an exotic excursion here Monday.

We went to the recycling center.

Uh got to take a look at that operation.

I didn't realize before going out there that it's since is essentially a sorting facility where they sort out all the different recyclables and end up with uh what they call contamination.

And uh I didn't realize that they actually sort everything, and then the contamination is what they end up with that is not recyclable.

Uh want to thank uh Solid Waste, Desmond Allen from Solid Waste went out there with us.

Uh we also had uh three members of Keep Kingwood Green.

Uh they worked the recycling at the uh Metro Park and Ride uh in Kingwood, and uh they came out and I think everybody learned quite a bit.

Um I know there's been a lot of discussions recently about transfer stations and that type of thing in order to save money.

Um of the things that we can do now to save money that is not negatively impact anybody is to reduce the contamination in it, the products that get in there that are not recyclable.

Uh they report on this number quarterly.

Uh the last quarter was 48 percent.

Um staff uh was been here for quite a while.

Uh she talked about uh a program that the city had years ago where they would actually go and take a look on the streets that were set up for the recycling, open the container up, look to see what was in there, if there was product that was not recyclable that shouldn't be in there, they would tag it and let let the homeowner know.

And they said uh a lot of times the homeowners would take care of it before the recycling truck even made it out there.

So I think a lot of this is public education.

Uh I mean, there was some stuff I've been involved in recycling for a long time on large scales, and there was even some stuff that I didn't realize when one of the issues we have got, and I don't think this happens everywhere, but I know in Kingwood we have got roll-off containers that they use, and they've got the uh all plastic recycling program where they tell you put it in a plastic bag, put it inside the container, styrofoam, everything, which is great, but at the same time, we don't want the other stuff bagged because that's a problem at the recycling center when they go to sort.

So we've kind of got some some mixed messaging, but I think there is absolutely an opportunity for us to save quite a bit of money without negatively impacting anybody if we can just get the contamination down to where we've only got the products that should be recycled in there and in educating the homeowners on this.

Um while we're talking about saving money, Mayor, you talked about not painting the garbage truck, saving $3,000 per truck.

I'm perfectly happy with the garbage trucks being white, and I think most everybody else in the city is.

And if we want to maybe put a placard on there that would cost us a couple of hundred bucks instead of three thousand dollars, but you just saved a hundred thousand dollars with those thirty trucks.

I I think that's great.

So that's all I got.

What do you want to placard to say?

Thanks, Mayor Whidmar.

I hadn't thought of that, but I guess you didn't know.

No, no, no.

Just joking.

It will be a city seal that's on them currently.

So thank you.

And in on the recycling, it is an education process, which will continue and improve.

Councilmember Kamen.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um couldn't agree more with you, Councilmember.

Thank you.

Um I'll be giving testimony today um at the EPA, urging them not to repeal the endangerment finding as well as the their rolling back or proposing to roll back um protections uh on vehicle emissions standards as well.

Um as a region, we have experienced 11 federally declared disasters in nine years.

Uh we are seeing the impacts uh of of climate change specifically, and I want to encourage residents and other colleagues if you would like.

Um written comment is being accepted by the EPA through September 22nd.

You can also sign up for oral testimony at the public hearings that are occurring through the 22nd.

Registration is still open and information is on EPA.gov's website.

So I wanted to um flag that for everyone because the endangerment finding uh has been even upheld by the Supreme Court and uh is imperative for the safety and well-being and health of Houstonians.

I wanted to lift up uh not only the parks department, but a lot of our residents have been focusing and giving love to Bell Park.

Um volunteers have been enhancing this park at the corner in university place.

Uh and Mayor, one of the things that our office has been working through is kind of the legal red tape.

All residents wanted was a literally a walkway to get to the park from one side of the sidewalk.

And there was a lot of question as to who had the property, whether it was City of Houston.

But it took months to cut through that red tape.

So I want to thank parks for working with us.

And as of this month, thanks to the voice of residents, uh they have a new entryway to the park.

They don't have to have kids walking through the mud.

Um, but it's those little things that day-to-day make an impact for residents, and I really want to w lift up Barbara Xomet for leading the charge, student volunteers from Post Oak School for their volunteer efforts, and of course, HPARD, including Deputy Director Michael Evans and his team for making this a reality.

The annual Memorial Park 24th Infantry Camp Logan audio stories reopens this Saturday.

Um Memorial Park Conservancy and Buffalo Soldiers uh Museum at the Clay Family Eastern Glades do this every single year.

Uh you can bring your own headphones.

It's a walking history and tour for those not familiar with the story of the 24th Infantry, um, or if you have children that may not be familiar, this is a really important uh part of Houston history, but also national history that we lift up.

Um again, this is a tradition recognizing what happened 107 years ago on August 23rd uh when the riots took place.

So uh we will be participating as always, but want to encourage folks to come out to learn about the history and lift up soldiers that gave their lives and were treated um under a Jim Crow system uh horrifically.

Uh and I want to also recognize uh that we worked over the past few years, Mayor, um, in partnership with um South Texas College of Law, Buffalo Soldiers and the Descendants uh to have those convictions set aside.

And uh that was a big thing that has never happened in the in U.S.

Army history uh that we were able to accomplish right here in Houston.

I do also want to excuse me, um, thank Director Williams for his service, um, which has literally saved lives in Houston.

And even though he is retiring now, there are projects in the works, uh, including something I've been partnering with the health department on on uh data analytics that will continue to save lives long after he is gone.

So, director, I thank you for your love, your compassion, your dedication and your belief in science.

Lastly, uh I want to wish my husband, Matt, a very, very happy birthday.

I love you.

Uh I love walking this life with you and the inventure that we have, and you are the most incredible father to our son.

Councilor Hope.

Towards the end of last school year, a crosswalk was installed in front of Lamar High School on West Hymer at the intersection of East Side and West Hymer.

Um although it was at the request of Lamar, and even though it followed all of the state guidelines, um, there's major safety issues with this traffic with this crosswalk.

Yesterday, a boy leaving school about 3 49 p.m.

was hit at that crosswalk.

It was a terrible accident, and he was transported to the hospital.

I've heard that he's in stable condition, but I haven't had an update today.

Um I went to the location yesterday afternoon, you know, early evening, and I saw three more children almost get hit at this same crosswalk.

There's a few things to note about it.

Because of how east side aligns, the crosswalk doesn't actually align with the sidewalks.

So the crosswalk kind of zigzags across the street, which I think is causing some confusion.

There's no lights or signals at this crosswalk.

But here's one of the most important things.

There are two crosswalks about a block away, one on River Oaks Boulevard and one on Ferndale that are that have lights that flash.

And so I think it would be better to direct students to those two crosswalks that have the flashing lights and get rid of this zigzag crosswalk.

It's extremely dangerous.

Um, but also we want to remind people that school is back in session.

Please drive safely through your neighborhoods.

Um observe the school speed limit zones.

Um we're all back in school.

So if you could help with that, Mayor.

Can't fix something I don't know about.

Of course.

And really talk to Randy.

Well, this just all kind of went down yesterday.

I haven't yet.

Well, that would be the first thing you and I need to do.

So if it's a bad model.

It should have been noted sooner than yesterday.

So we're on it.

And when we get up from this meeting, we will address the issue.

But uh the interesting what HISD's participation was, not to mention the community.

So there are it's my understanding that there that HISD requested the crosswalk, and under the Texas Transportation Code, it says that a local authority shall install a crosswalk.

Okay, right.

Well, so I think that's part of the problem.

But there are two goods.

But we can accept it and we can push back.

And we do it before someone is injured, and certainly unfortunately the young man that you mentioned, or I think you said it was young young man.

We're on it.

Thank you, May.

We will get busy, but uh.

You know, it's interesting to me the the whole crosswalk uh decision making by HIC.

I can show you crosswalks that are in the not in demand right now because of shift in some of our communities.

But we'll get on it.

And you don't have to wait to pop off.

You can call me any any time because we probably should have made some alterations even this morning, if it's as dangerous as described.

But uh we're on it.

Okay.

Thank you.

Councilman Mayors.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um had the opportunity last week to tour the Harris Center's new neuropsychiatric center at Ben Tob General Hospital.

I should say remodeled neuropsychiatric center, and it's a much brighter, uh more appropriate place for those in mental health crisis to receive assessment and be on their way to treatment.

Um I just want to highlight the great work that the Harris Center does to try to address mental illness uh in our city and throughout the county.

They are very much a part of our homeless response and our efforts to divert those folks who are in mental health crisis out of the criminal justice system.

So under the direction of Wayne Young over there, they do wonderful work, and so I want to give a shout out to them.

Also had the opportunity to tour One Safe Place Houston, which is um a supportive housing campus that is operated by the Houston Area Wim Women's Center.

I know a number of council members were there at the grand opening a few months ago, but the purpose was to bring uh a couple of uh women who work with um uh women victims of domestic violence who are Muslim.

There was there has been a reluctance and an uncertainty on their part about whether or not their their needs, their cultural uh needs would be met at uh one safe place uh Houston.

And and I'm happy to say that at the conclusion of that tour, they were as impressed as I was at that facility.

They have literally thought of everything.

It is a beautiful facility, and um I'm um I'm very proud that that's a part of our community.

So I wanted to give a shout out to Sonia Corralis and her team over there at the Houston Area Women's Center.

Finally, a couple of committee meetings coming up that I want to highlight.

One is the Ethics and Governance Committee meeting that will meet this Thursday afternoon.

We'll hear a presentation from legal on uh count council rule changes as well as personal uh campaign finance disclosures and personal finance disclosures as well.

Then next Tuesday morning there'll be afternoon, actually, there will be an important meeting of the uh budget and finance committee and economic development dealing with the capital improvements process, during which we will uh take up uh amendments that were offered a couple of months ago by Councilmember Peck and myself.

Thanks.

Mayor Pro Tim Castle Statum.

Thank you, Mayor.

I have a couple of announcements.

Uh the first one is uh we'd like to wish uh Barbara Heid a happy retirement.

Uh many of you know Barbara has worked for four council members here at City Hall.

She worked for Mark Goldberg, she worked for Ann Clutterbug, she worked for Councilmember Larry Green, and then she um finished her career at the City of Houston as the Director of Constituent Services in our office.

So we wish Barbara an incredible retirement season and hope that she is doing very well.

And then I'd like to introduce our new Deputy Chief of Staff in the District K office, and she's here.

Um staff is Justice Coti McCullum, very excited to have snagged her from the At-Large Five office.

She knew.

Justice brings uh great fresh perspective and energy to the District K office.

We're very excited to have her join our team.

Think she's going to be a great asset on our policy and all of the wonderful things we continue to do for our constituents in the district, District K office.

She has a heart for public service, and we're very confident that she'll help us to continue building on the work that we do in our office.

So welcome, Justice.

We look forward to working with you.

Colleagues, our economic development committee meeting is today at 2 p.m.

here in uh the chambers.

We will have a presentation overview from on our TURS budget and the schedules.

So I know there's always a lot of interest on when the TURS budgets will come before us.

Um so we'll have that presentation, and then we'll also have an update on the MWSBE policies from Director Hoard.

I do want to echo Councilmember Castillo and give a big shout out to Director Hoard.

She's been on a tour across the city talking about the MWBE program and all of the opportunities that we have as a city for our entrepreneurs and um small businesses.

So today we will have a presentation on the updated policies during our economic committee meeting uh economic development committee meeting today at 2.

If you are interested in national battle of the bands, it is happening on Saturday.

So we are excited that that happens in District K at NRG Stadium.

Um we have lots of fun.

We've got um several bands coming, HBCU bands coming to the city of Houston.

It's always a great event.

Lots of money raised for scholarships uh for students.

Um so if you are interested in attending, um, you can get more information about those tickets at the National Battle of the Bands dot com.

Uh, we look forward to celebrating this culture, music, and tradition while also inspiring our youth and strengthening our communities.

Um we have our HPD Southwest Pip meeting.

Um, you all hear me talk about the PIP meetings all the time because this is such a great way for our residents to get um familiar with the officers that serve us in our community.

Those officers give out their cell phone numbers.

They really want to get to know the residents in the community.

Our next PIP meeting uh will be talking about gun safety.

Um councilmember came in.

We presented the gun safety proc on your behalf yesterday.

Councilmember Alcorn and I did.

And so this month we will be having our PIP meeting, and we will talk about gun safety, and they will be giving out the um the gun safes.

Uh so hopefully residents will attend on Tuesday, August the 26th, 2025 at 7 p.m.

at the Harold Preston Police Station.

And then finally, um, colleagues, once again I'm serving as the honorary chair of the 40th anniversary of the UNCF walk run bike on September 13th.

And I know y'all all want to come out and do a 5K uh walking and running.

Councilmember Alcorn came last year.

Um we'd love to have you on Team Martha.

Um it's September the 13th from 7 a.m.

to 11 at Tom Bass Park.

You can walk, you can run, and you can, or you can ride a bike.

There's some hybrid bikes out there, and um if you don't want to run.

Oh, and they're also gonna have the big trikes out there too.

So if you don't want to run a walk, you can ride a bike.

But this is a great um fundraiser to make sure that students that want to go to college can go to college.

The average scholarship for UNCF is about $5,000.

So it's a wonderful fundraiser.

Uh mind is a terrible thing to waste, but a wonderful thing to invest in.

Uh be kind to each other and make it a great day.

Thank you.

Vice Mayor Pro Jim Peck.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, first I want to thank all of the firefighters who responded to uh big fire in District A last night and an apartment complex on Teague.

Um I went out there last night and the firefighters were so amazing.

They did an outstanding job as always.

Um, and also thank you to the Red Cross and Memorial Assistance Ministries.

They are both on the scene today, um, assisting families.

There were over um about a hundred apartment units that either had fire or water damage and 389 units altogether that were affected in some way.

So thank you so much to HFDE, Red Cross and Memorial Assistance Ministries, and HPD was there as well helping with traffic and all kinds of things.

So thank you to everyone who responded last night.

Um next, I want to invite everyone to the Vogel Creek Community Champions Ice Cream and Snow Cone Social.

It will be this Thursday, tomorrow, August 21st from 6 30, 8 30 p.m.

at 7443 Maplet Drive.

And thanks to the community who puts us on every year in Vogel Creek in the Vogel Creek area and also to the Houston Park Sport.

Thank you.

Councilman Martinez.

Thank you, Mayor.

First, I just want to uh thank you, Mayor and Director Hassan for your commitment to improving the solid waste operations.

You know, the next step is on demand.

Uh pilot, I'm looking forward to continuing to do this operation.

I will not let go that we will eventually need funding to pay for these trucks, pay for facilities.

Um look forward to um continuing to have this conversation on solid waste.

And then I was happy to be with you as well Monday morning, early Monday morning, uh see the trucks roll out.

It was a beautiful thing to see, and then uh you know that same day I was getting text messages from uh uh residents who are seeing the white trucks uh in the neighborhood, so they're excited about the outlook uh of how we're moving forward.

Um last night uh we had a meeting uh with Telephone Road Reconstruction uh with at the TURS, Harrisburg Tourists is leading.

Uh great turnout by residents, uh stakeholders, business owners.

Um there's uh it's uh it was a lively conversation, but at the end of the day, I think we're moving in the right direction.

Um there's uh focus on pedestrian uh safety, which uh excited and appreciate your support, Mayor, having uh sidewalks that will allow for for students.

There's about seven schools that connect to this uh major therapy.

I went to three of these middle elementary, middle school, and high school.

Um, but then also the drainage project that's gonna be happening.

So um I'm excited.

Uh, I think the TURS is gonna be looking at this on Monday and happy to support this as well.

Um lastly, uh just want to um also remind folks about rail safety.

Uh District I has 17 critical crossings.

I know that we've uh launched Train Watch um on city uh website.

Uh I want to thank Jesse Bounds from the Office of Innovation, uh Jack Hanagraph from the East End District, who also works part-time for the city with with uh Jesse.

Um and just want to highlight that this is some work that we've been doing since 2021.

So quick shout out to uh former co-worker Daniel Santamaria as well.

Um next steps are uh to get this on uh onto Transstar so that way it's synced in as uh so we can uh uh sink it in with apps like Waze and uh Google Maps so folks know where there are block crossings.

Um we'd like to see great separation as well, and so again, just a quick shout out to Jesse Bounds.

Uh, we've been working on this for some time already, and so to have it live, um, just you know, uh it's it's good it's good for uh mobility in the East End where we have all the trains converging.

Um and then actually lastly, I know we've been at school for about a week uh for elementary to high school, but I want to also uh wish folks going to college, university uh this coming week and upcoming weeks, uh especially my son who's gonna be starting his sophomore year at UH.

Um so uh good luck on on your semester.

Councilman Pollard.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um we all heard recently that news has come out that the federal government uh has cut over a billion dollars uh in funding for public media and specifically for NPR and PBS, which trickles down to their local affiliates, and we have um stations here in Houston that rely on those federal dollars for programming and salaries.

Uh and yesterday I was proud to announce that our office was able to allocate $50,000 each uh to Houston public media as well as KTSU, uh two public broadcasting stations who do exceptional work in informing Houstonians on a myriad of different issues.

Uh we always know that uh public media is there for entertainment, but also education and specifically relied upon many times doing emergency situations.

Um Houston Public Media, they um put forth that based on these funding cuts, uh they were losing about 10 percent of their budget, which equates to about 200,000 dollars.

KTSU, uh they said these funding cuts hit them at about 25 percent, uh, which was about 250,000.

And so uh these federal dollars, these public dollars are really important, and we thought it was important for us as an office uh to find local dollars to support them and bring forth resources that are critically needed.

So I encourage everyone who uh depends on public media and these broadcast stations for inf information to also uh do your part to support um they rely on philanthropic dollars and sponsorship dollars, and they do an incredible job uh for the city of Houston.

Um also I want to thank Director Williams for his service.

Um exceptional job in his role and sacrificed a lot over the years, and I wish you well in retirement.

God bless you all.

Councilman Alcorn.

Thank you, Mayor.

And um for the record, I discovered Justice Cootie McCullum.

And you know you got a good staffer when they get stolen, and I've had two poached over the years, so there you go.

She's able to climb up the matter, and apparently it's a big deal to work for the mayor pro tem.

So I wish Justice all the best if our new improved title, and I know she's gonna thrive.

She's an outstanding young woman, and um you owe everything to me.

Um also, Mayor, I want to talk about a little bit about food trucks.

I was talking to my colleague here.

I did go out to the food truck.

I know you had a uh uh a team go out to the one at Chimney Rock and kind of clean that one up.

We've had uh there was a committee meeting this week, quality of life.

We are uh I'm getting some answers from legal about what we can and cannot do since the state is kind of taking over with some state bills that pass, taking over the permitting and regulation of food trucks, also null and void, interestingly, and null and voiding our ability to enforce noise at food trucks, which is a huge issue on Washington Avenue and other places.

If there is a way to set some distance limitations from residents like 300 feet, like Austin does, um if to have to regulate the hours if you're within a certain number of feet from residences, um limit those hours, um shut it down at 10 o'clock at night or something like that.

I'm very interested in working with the administration to set something like that in place because uh these food truck parks, uh a lot of them uh have a lot of help code violations and everything else, but uh it would be great to to regulate those if they are near residences.

So want to work with you on that.

Thank you.

One night um riding with the chief.

We went to Chimney Rock, and after one of the operators saw the health department police fire a group of uh regulators and enforcers from the city, he ran.

He ran from his food truck with items being cooked.

Uh probably the largest asset the gentleman owned, but he took off uh he was left alone, but the city confiscated his food truck, and Houston Fire had to come handle the uh the meat that were on the burner.

So anyway, it's uh it's an issue that and we're reviewing the state's uh involvement, which uh unfortunately the state just does not understand local control is the best models historically the one that everyone supported.

But uh there's new new attitudes in Washington and Austin as we're all aware.

Thank you, Councilmember Kamen.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, going back to the crosswalk issue, and I want to thank Councilmember Huffman for bringing it up because District C and District H share West Timer and that crossing, and we have multiple crosswalks in District C.

We've been working with the departments.

Um, but students are going to take the path that they choose, which is why I'm assuming HIC said, hey, we need a formal crosswalk here, right?

They're not going, they're not thinking in terms of safety necessarily.

Um requested is assistance either with raised crossings or making those crosswalks more secure because the kids are gonna go there regardless.

Um, and we don't want to see any more kids hit.

Um so there's a few more I'd love to send over to you, um, but especially on this one with Lamar would appreciate being kept in the loop as well on that.

Thank you.

Uh I'll go look at it at lunch, but obviously we'll depend on the engineers who get Randy involved.

Could be uh we need a flashing light there.

And certainly we need HISD's uh cooperation, but let's uh let's be proactive as we can be.

But uh you're right.

These are children, and so we need to uh assist them in order what's the safest route.

But so we'll check it out immediately.

I appreciate it very much.

Um and again, thank you to Councilman.

Um I mayor, I still have two more things.

I forgot to sorry.

I'm sorry.

It's okay.

Um Gary, I didn't thank you uh for helping me get home, but I really want to thank you.

You're here pretty much every week.

Um just thank you for everything you did.

Uh and lastly, Mayor, um I appreciate the city's eyes um on the concrete batch plant issue um next to Audi.

Uh I just want to sound my voice.

We have so many parents reaching out to our office right now with school starting.

Um there's a lot of legal loopholes, it seems like this operation is working through, and uh I want to add my voice because again, not just being right next to early childhood centers, literally next door, but there are countless schools in that area um and this should not be happening.

So thank you for the city's eyes on it.

Um but we we gotta shut it down.

Thank you, Counselor Plummer.

Thank you, Mayor, and I want to just chime in on Director Williams.

I didn't realize yesterday was his last day, so my sincere apologies.

Um he was such a is an integral part of the cancer cluster.

I mean he was his voice, his office, um just making sure that we're doing the right thing for folks in fifth ward, but just in general, working with him through COVID.

I mean, just there's so many things I could say about him.

So he's definitely gonna be missed, and um I wish him the best of luck in his retirement.

No, that's it.

We stand uh adjourned.