Good morning, everyone.

I'm Ellen Cohn, your chairperson.

Thank you all for being here.

Madam Secretary, would you please call the roll?

Yes, Madam Chair.

I will begin the roll call now.

Chairwoman Cohen.

Here.

Bye.

Chairwoman Baird.

Here.

Director Vacas.

Present.

Director Durfee?

Here.

Director Silverman.

Director Corrales?

Here.

Director Yu.

Director Murzah.

Director Huff.

And Director Gush.

Here.

And that concludes the roll call.

Madam Chair, we have a quorum.

With that, let's proceed to agenda item three.

First of all, I want to thank those of you that are here for being here because it's uh it's summer, and we have a lot of people traveling.

But these meetings are important, and we need to cover quite a bit of business today.

We have several very important business matters to discuss on the agenda.

The first one is obviously our budget.

I want to personally thank Mayor Whitmeyer and Council for their support in approving a seven percent increase to our budget for this year.

Having been a council member, I know what goes on in these budget meetings, and I can assure you it's no slam dunk.

So the fact that we actually have a 7% increase is really to the credit of everyone on the board and certainly to Peter because they know the kind of work we're doing.

So thank you.

And although this increase is less than what we approved in March, we understand the tough choices.

We still have several challenges to navigate this year.

So we look forward to hearing from our staff about how HFSC will tackle the work before us.

And lastly, I want to thank everyone who's touring the HPD property room today.

How many people do we think we're gonna have touring?

Six?

Very good.

We've been discussing the plan to transition management of that facility to HFSC for many years.

Yet most of us have not seen it for ourselves.

I know the tour will help us better understand the challenges and opportunities we will encounter.

Thank you to the staff members from HFSC and HPD who will lead the tour, and for everyone who's working to make the transition successful.

With that, I conclude my report.

At this time, we'll open the floor for public comment and invite any member of the public that wishes to speak to come to the podium and address the board.

We ask all speakers to sign up in front of the room so we're aware of your presence and that all comments be limited to three minutes.

You may speak on any matter concerning the board and HFSC.

At this time, do we have anyone in the audience who has signed up for public comment?

Okay.

Seeing no members of the public in our audience today, we have signed up.

We have signed up for the comment.

I will close the public comment period.

Now we'll consider meeting the meeting minutes from the May 8th 2026 board meeting.

Does anyone have any corrections or additions to the minutes as presented?

Everybody had a chance to look at them.

Okay.

At this time, we'll conduct a voice vote to approve the minutes.

May I have a motion and second to approve the minutes?

So moved.

Okay.

Second.

Okay, thank you.

Um, did you get that, madam secretary?

Okay.

Please unmute your mics at this time for the voice vote.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

All opposed, nay.

The motion carries and passes unanimously.

Members, in addition to, hold on one second.

Okay, in addition to Dr.

Stout's report, we will also present, he will also present the corporate goals and objectives for year 2027 in agenda item seven.

We are at the point in our annual schedule where we consider Dr.

Stout's proposed corporate priorities and goals for the new fiscal year.

At the conclusion of his presentation, we will vote to accept these goals or modify them if the board decides that action is appropriate.

The approved goals will become part of Dr.

Stout's evaluation in 2027.

Dr.

Stout, you're on.

Good morning, y'all.

All right.

Knowing that the meeting always goes as long as I talk and we've got a tour.

I.

Thank you, Dr.

Stout.

Yeah, I'm sure the last meeting you enjoyed it probably being really short since Amy did this and probably did it a whole lot faster than I do.

Um first thing I've got here if the uh-oh.

It's on.

Just hit just advance the slide for me, would you?

They work so hard to get a clicker that works and that they have spare clickers, so I don't steal the clicker.

I'd like to note the director Merza is here.

All right, there we go.

Now it's working.

All right.

First up, I want to acknowledge uh Director Silverman, Jed Silverman's uh participation in our board and work on our board.

Um I started to get to know Jed actually a fair number of years ago when he was president of the Harris County Defense Bar, and I've really appreciated his perspective on a lot of stuff.

Uh so his term has ended.

He gets the box.

Um made of a box.

We'll get that to him, but I really appreciate having Jed on the board uh for the years that he's been with us.

So I wanted to say thank you to Jed.

Uh so those company priorities.

Now, remember this year we've talked about this, that we are in the process of reengineering how we do performance evaluations.

Um, as HFSC has grown and changed over the years.

We have tried many times to find how to do performance evaluations and merit increases that are fair, objective work to move the organization forward.

We were realizing in the eleven years we've been doing this, we have changed the system 13 times, and now we kind of need to take a timeout and let the organization spend some real time engineering this.

So that's the first major focus, and it's also why I called these focuses and not goals.

Is basically what we've said is we're taking a pause on the performance evaluation as we've been doing it, in favor of we'll just do a flat increase across the organization and give the organization time to focus on how do we do this for real and give the group time to do that.

But that's the the first of the focuses move that evaluation forward.

Um we are in the process right now of starting uh what's called voice of the customer.

These are lean six sigma terms.

It's basically across the organization interview groups to get information from the organization.

Uh so they'll be working through that.

Then we will also have surveys that we put out to staff, so we've got multiple tools for them to give their input and help in designing what works for the organization.

Obviously, we still got cases we got to get out the door.

So kind of has to be the case.

There's a focus on get back to work and get the job done.

Um get the cases out the door.

We still have to get stuff done in a timely fashion.

We still have to get stuff done in a fashion that is a quality result.

So there are expectations within each of the sections that focus around those things as we've always had.

Those are a focus of the organization.

And then the third one is, and we've talked about this a little bit.

Uh, it is now being called CLR.

It is the statewide discovery portal.

For just a little reminder of history.

Um, we had uh the the case that's called Ex parte Cologne.

It was a death penalty capital case out of um Jefferson County.

We had an analyst that did the analysis under that, working for DPS, uh, actually out of Beaumont.

Um, between when that case went to trial and he was working there, he came to work for HFSE.

So this wasn't our case, wasn't our work, wasn't our anything.

But the case went up on appeal, um, and in that appeal process, um, it was discovered that there was a note that that analyst had created at the time that they processed this that pointed at the key evidence in the case having been potentially compromised and how it was stored, and it was found in a styrofoam container, and the note said it was in a pool of foul-smelling liquid, was supposed to be stored at frozen and it was at room temperature, all of these things.

Well, that note never made it into the original trial.

So there is also an overlay of this that no one in a death penalty capital case requested discovery in that, and so they prosecuted the entire case without having all of the laboratory notes.

Now, unfortunately, it unfolded that that analyst made some really poor choices in their testimony in both an affidavit or in um um deposition and other things as part of the appeals process.

So it ended up with Texas Forensic Science Commission.

There was a court of criminal appeals decision reversing the original guilty verdict, um, and that analyst had um findings of misconduct and negligence.

He no longer practices in the state of Texas and is no longer licensed.

This has created over the years a big issue for us, remediating the about a thousand cases that he handled for us while it was there.

But statewide, it became evident that there are records that reside within all of the laboratories that have the potential to not make it to trial.

Because I mean, let's face it, prosecutors, defense attorneys, courts, they're all slammed, don't have enough resources either.

If they don't ask for it, they're not going to be provided it.

And that kind of doesn't really fit with the spirit and intention of what has become called the Michael Morton Act or 3914 that says there is a positive obligation to disclose anything impeaching, mitigating, or potentially exculpatory, uh, without necessarily it being the discovery order.

And as a statewide group of laboratories, we've realized we don't have that's not what's happening.

Um, unless somebody asks for discovery, they're not getting all of those things.

So two legislative sessions ago, this was passed to create a statewide discovery portal that gives the that the prosecutors are the ones that are charged with making sure that the defensive record has access to it, but it is a mechanism for these records that are within laboratories to be available to anybody dealing with a case.

Um we've got a lot of work to do, as do all laboratories in the state, of how we put these records in uh in a form that they're available to this portal.

Um so that's also what we've got a fairly significant records management project underway.

Uh Akila and Hope's team is the one, and actually Teresa, who's our public information officer, is the one that's really in charge of it and doing a fantastic job of it's a lot.

Um we generate a lot of records.

Um, but that is it won't be in this next year that we are necessarily connecting to it, but it is in the process.

Um, so that's one of the focuses of this is to continue the work that we need to do in order to help with that statewide portal.

So those are the focuses for this year.

I guess we'll deal with a vote after I'm done here, but that's those are the focuses for this.

Can I ask one question, please?

So the evidence room.

What are your thoughts on having that in a focus?

Oh, we certainly could.

I mean, it's it will also be in the process of this.

I mean, that's that's not a bad one to add of continuing the work on the transition of the property room.

Okay.

All right.

So a few things on lab operations.

You all are getting kind of used to these three, um, because these are the three big backlogs.

We keep in mind we also have one with drug toxicology.

That one has been less of a concern, less of a focus.

These are the three big ones.

The biology.

We've made immense progress on biology, really gotten to a pretty uh sustainable situation there.

We'll talk just a little bit about that when we talk about the budget stuff.

Um the uptick that you've seen in the last few months is really.

Remember, we had a um uh a piece of equipment that failed that's kind of a central piece of equipment, and that I mean, this this is still where the everything's at.

We have one piece of equipment go down, it shows up in numbers.

We lose one or two people, it shows up in numbers.

There's very little, it's not like any of the labs have any excess capacity to absorb much of anything.

Uh, but really, biology has become pretty stable, which is you think about where we were 10 years ago, is just miraculous.

Um firearms, the single biggest pain point, the backlog that everybody is most frustrated with.

Uh, actually, our newsletter that hopefully we can get out next week will be entirely about firearms because clearly we need to help people understand all of the stuff that goes into why this is such a tangle, and it will continue to be a pain point for a while.

Um, and then CS Drugs has been making good steady progress there.

That is pretty reflective of we've got people that we've gotten signed off.

You can kind of see the the orange line and the blue line are basically the difference of cases with and without uh the marijuana cases because marijuana, oh I hate hemp.

It's just an ongoing thing.

But uh in working with the DA's office, we have been resolving quite a few of the marijuana cases that are in the backlog that just don't need to be tested.

So that's that is a constant work with the DA's office about how to get those cases out of the backlog.

And you can kind of see the the gap between the orange line and the blue line is narrowing.

Any questions about that stuff?

Okay.

Uh included in here since we started this uh when actually I was presenting to uh City Council a month or two ago, just to update you on the various kind of major things we've got in the pipeline of production changes.

Uh the 3D crime scene mapping tool is launched and working and underway.

Um rapid DNA.

Uh we successfully got that scope expansion completed.

Uh so we've got all the that's now officially part of our scope.

Um, and that is for the reference swabs, not evidentiary samples.

Um you've got later down there DNA, rapid DNA for evidentiary samples that sits behind work that FBI is still doing, as well as a statewide working group on rapid DNA about what kinds of evidentiary samples would be eligible to be used by this.

So that'll be out probably somewhere early 2027 before we see evidentiary samples.

But right now, reference swabs, that's something that we've got in production and going.

Uh YSTRs, which is a marker on the male chromosome, the Y chromosome.

Um we used to have this in our scope years ago.

We backed away from it because we just we got very, very few requests.

Well, with the advent of genetic genealogy and the work that HPD has increased on cold cases, why STRs have become much more important because on the progression to being able to use genetic genealogy, um, YSTRs are one of the steps along the way.

So we're getting a lot more requests for YSTRs.

Uh we were gonna have that uh scope expansion here sooner.

It's as we've been looking at what we need to do for our assessment, staffing, things like that.

We decided it was the better part of Valor to push that back.

So it will be early 2027 along with audio processing that we'll probably put both of those together for the scope expansion.

Um in between here and there, it really won't have any impact on casework because we do have an outsource mechanism to be able to get those done while we're getting this in place.

Um, but we're just we move that to early 27 when we'll probably seek that scope expansion.

Now, the audio processing, like I say, that is for audio files.

That this sounds like people who like music.

Um audio F-I-L-E-S.

Um that uh for processing of those things.

Again, this is something that we had in our scope, but in staffing changes, we lost all the staff.

Uh now we've been putting that back because we're starting to see requests about this from HPD.

Uh so that will be out there for that.

Um, and then just a reminder that we've got the high resolution tandem uh mass spectrometry, those mythical LCQs that I think I have mentioned at every board meeting for at least a decade.

Um there's all the validation work that we've got to do on that.

So that'll be out somewhere the latter part of 2027 before we start to see those instruments come online.

Any questions about those things?

All right, so budget.

Um, as mentioned, the budget that we sought was larger than what the city approved, but the city still approved a 7% increase, which is fantastic.

Um it will mean a snugger year for us because that's not what all the parts that we were planning.

So we're gonna have to make some choices, and I just wanted to kind of lay out those areas.

Nothing's set in stone yet.

Um everything's in flux.

There's as every year goes down, we see shifts and changes, things that we've been able to predict, stuff that we can't predict that happens through the year.

We've been pretty successful over the years of figuring out how to make stuff work and work pretty okay.

And you know, a seven percent increase.

I think we can we'll we will do okay.

Um we're gonna have to make a few choices, but we'll do okay through the year.

Things that we will have to consider, so like the incentive plan and overtime that we've been doing, particularly in biology and seized drugs, we've already tapped the brakes on that.

We were figuring to phase that out across the course of this year, anyways.

We've just slowed it down and stopped it sooner than we were expecting.

So that will have some probably noticeable impacts in the rate at which, like the seized drugs backlog is going down, but I still expect we probably will see those backlogs continue to go down.

But that's something we just you know that's not really something we can afford in the shape of this budget as we've got.

Um training budgets, those opportunities, travel is always something that is real high up there when you are snug on budgets of things you've got to choose.

We have been extraordinarily fortunate over the years of the number of people we've been able to send to meetings.

So this isn't just a no and we're not doing it, but we need to be a little more thoughtful about who we're sending and how many we're sending.

Um, it will have things that we need to choose of just how fast and how much we outsource.

Again, as we've been talking in forensic biology, this was the year that we were looking to start transitioning a lot of what we've been outsourcing to staff that we now have on board.

Um, but we'll have to look at how at those types of things.

What we're doing for capital investments.

Good news is we've already purchased a lot of the equipment that we were looking at.

Um, but you know, we if we have a big piece of equipment go down, that's something we're gonna have to really think about because there's just not the room to absorb something big that we've got to do.

Um, when you say we have a piece of a big piece of equipment go down, does that mean we can't replace it?

It might be we well, we would have to make some real choices about what we do to replace it.

Um, must have been replaced if it is that critical to whatever.

It could be, and that might be that we're gonna have to have if we've got something like that that happens across the year, we may have to go have conversations with the city about what would be a budget adjustment in order to accommodate that.

Um, you know, it's it's again it's not impossible, but it's different choices that we need to make.

Um health insurance to put that on everybody's radar, because unless you really live under a rock these days, you gotta understand health insurance costs are pretty much out of control for everybody.

I don't know what we're gonna see.

Uh we are expecting to have some conversations.

Ty and David are gonna have conversations with our uh brokers here in September to start getting a handle on what kind of increases we can expect.

I have had some conversations with the city about what are the possibilities to join some of the city's groups to see if that's.

I don't know if that necessarily would help contain our costs.

It's not like this is going terribly well for them either.

Um, but exploring anything and everything we can to try and contain these costs, but they could have a real wild card for us.

Um, and we are expecting to see some pretty I mean we had about a twenty odd percent increase this last year.

Um yeah, it's it's it's something I worry about.

IT costs are another one I worry about because uh again, you see all of these articles.

We were just talking before the meeting about AI, those data centers are consuming components that go into all of the things that we everything's got a computer attached to it.

All of those have chips and screens and memory.

Those are the comp the components that are getting consumed by these data centers at exponential rates.

Um probably the the single easiest thing to look at that characterizes our cost situation is like if we put in or look for a quote for laptops for staff, like new staff coming in.

We used to be able to get quotes that would be good for 60 to 90 days.

Right now we are doing good if we get a quote that's good for two weeks.

Um the pace at which these costs are changing is alarming.

Um, and it's gonna mean we're gonna have to make some real choices around IT stuff and how we try and attempt to contain those costs.

But I mean, this is something again, everybody's struggling with this.

So those are things that will, you know, we we just have less latitude and we will have to make more choices around these things across this year.

Any questions I can answer on stuff.

Yes.

Go ahead.

Oh, go ahead.

Oh, thank you.

Um so I mean 3.92.4, it's to me sounds like a pretty big discrepancy.

Do you anticipate that we would get any grants that potentially could come in that may cover some of this?

Um there is some potential because particularly with the state apprenticeship program.

Um, talked a little bit about this.

So that was uh Senate Bill 1620 that passed in this last legislative session uh that Senator Huffman was kind enough to carry.

Multiple authors on that bill that created what we now call the forensic analyst apprenticeship program.

Um that has the state reimbursing for training of apprentices in the first couple of years.

Uh I think there I I can't say specifically yet how many apprentices we could expect, but I think there is we've got a bunch of people we just hired in the three areas as a state that we're planning on are blood alcohols, seized drugs, and biology are the three disciplinaries that we're looking at uh for apprentices in this first round.

We've been doing a lot of work with Sam Houston State University and with University of North Texas standing up all of the mechanisms for the university support around that.

That's most of what the group's been working on to this point.

Um I've been talking with labs around the state about who is interested in doing what with apprentices as a program.

We were targeting having about 18 apprentices statewide.

Um, and we've known that Texas DPS and HFSC are in the best positions to this first round deal with the variability that's likely to happen.

I mean, we this this is all new, um, and we're in the best position to probably deal with the unknown of it.

So I suspect we're gonna have more of those apprentices than we might otherwise just because we're in a better position.

But that could help offset some of this.

Um otherwise, grant grants aren't looking great.

Um, yes.

The the question I was asked that it's along the same lines.

Um have we have we had any discussions with uh any of the our law enforcement partners who have access to forfeiture funds for forfeiture fund awards, you know, to address maybe some of the backlogs they want to prioritize.

Um short answer is yes.

The longer answer is nobody ever likes coughing those funds up.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, it's it's a constant conversation of how we try and share that and how we try and address those things.

Um but yeah, the the the landscape for grants is not particularly good.

Um I think again, you've seen in the news lots of changes in how the federal government has approached these, that has had serious impacts in the forensic world.

Um the main grants that we deal with, you've heard me mention capacity enhancement backlog reduction, which is the funding under the Debbie Smith Act was badly, badly delayed getting released this year.

We have gotten our funds released on that.

Um the other major program that's available to laboratories is called the Paul Goverdale grants.

That has been badly, badly delayed getting released this year.

Um they have released the solicitations for next year's funding cycle, but I have no idea what is likely to happen there.

Um RD grants that have been available, have are just not there.

Um, so yeah, they the it's pretty almost basically everything that we have available is through Department of Justice, either National Institutes of Justice or Bureau of Justice Assistance, and Department of Justice is in bad shape.

Um they've they have hemorrhaged people.

It's pretty grim.

Sorry.

That'll end a conversation.

Any other questions, budget wise?

All right.

I've got one accreditation disclosure.

Uh the Texas Forensic Science Commission meeting this quarter is right at the end of the month.

I just want to recognize Director U who joined us.

Yes, I'm I'm here.

I was gonna give you grief if you didn't show up.

Jeez.

Uh okay, so we've got one disclosure that we have submitted for this one, and I wanted to explain it a little bit because it's we could easily spend the rest of the afternoon talking about this one.

It's got a lot of nuance to it.

However, I really don't want to make everybody's eyes roll up in their head.

Um, so this was related to a sexual assault case back in 2014, um, and it's toxicology data.

And it is about what's what gets called raw data or the native data that exists within the software that runs the equipment.

Um, we had a discovery request from a lawyer here in town who's a really good lawyer, and he is probably about the only one that would ever ask for these data, but he asked for these data, and it happens to be that 2014 to 2015 stretch was when we were transitioning from HPD to HFSC.

We had pieces of equipment that were being retired at that point, and their the data from their hard drives was being backed up into the HPD network.

And there is a gap in there.

Some of those data did not actually get backed up or transitioned or whatever.

We can't find those data.

Now, the good news in this, we know the gap that there is, it's from about April 2014 to May of 2015 or where these exist.

It's not everything.

Um it's also the way data were handled is the actual records that we would have used to make the conclusions to do the analysis are all there.

These are the data that exist within the software, and I can see Jordan over there going, I know what this is.

Um, and it gets really nuanced of what data exists where.

All of we can provide all of the data that were part of the decision, and all of those records are there, but it is there are data that would have been native to the software that we don't have.

Um so we've disclosed this.

I don't foresee it being material really to anything.

Um, but we wanted to make sure that people were aware that we've got gaps in data that were intended to be stored, and this is, you know, long since solved this issue.

Um we've got far better ways of backing these things up now.

Um so I don't it's not an issue going forward.

It's just this gap, and most of the cases that are back that far are uh DUIs that are long since gone.

It just, you know, a case like a felony sexual assault that actually has a much longer arc to it, that's what's gonna be in there.

So make sure everybody's aware of it, and that's what the disclosure is.

Any questions on that?

So last thing I have, I know we've already sent these links out to you.

I really would encourage you to go and take a look at the uh virtual tour, the videos there.

We've got more.

Um what have we been calling it?

Bonus content.

Uh Natalie and Vicky have done an astonishingly good job of this.

The video is I've I've dealt with a lot of these videos over the years.

They did a really, really good job of this thing.

Um and then all the content that's going with it is it's when this thing's all together here shortly, it's gonna be really cool.

Um so I'd really encourage you to go run it the the video runs about 20 minutes.

Um and it's really really good.

So thank you for all the work that y'all have done on that.

I just want to say kudos on it too.

I watched it last night.

It is so good.

And you are a great voiceover.

Um, all of the content, and I loved using the employees actually at their workbenches and and doing the work, and it it was impressive.

So, it'll be fun to see the the next deep dives that they're doing.

So they've done the the big one and now they'll do individuals.

But congrats, really represents your organization, well.

So that's all I've got.

Any other questions for me?

All right, you're rescued from me.

Okay, thank you.

Okay, I have to hold on one second.

I have to call for a vote.

I'll call for the phone.

Have a motion.

So moved.

Second.

Second.

All in favor.

Aye.

I think it's a good one.

I think it's been actually I was just talking with Jody Klan, who's the um director up there yesterday.

Um, and she was very complimentary actually of working with our staff about stuff and how easy it's been to work with them.

And she and I both agreed this has been a really useful um arrangement for both of us.

Uh and I mean it is it's essential to us these days to do this, and it I can't emphasize enough.

Terrant County is the only source of any possible outsourcing.

Um and actually her folks have been pretty busy because DPS is looking at them.

Uh Fort Worth, there's in Texas.

In Texas, yeah.

No, actually, really kinda in the country.

Um there just there just isn't any place to outsource.

Uh Fort Worth has been struggling.

Dallas has been struggling.

If it this is a struggle across the state.

So we're all really appreciative of what Jody and her team's been able to do.

Any other comments?

Question.

Do we have any kind of reciprocity with them?

Do they send any any of their stuff to us?

Um, because we got the backlog.

It's I guess the way to look at it is Tarrant County's not quite as shooty as we are here.

Um, just shoot it.

Uh shooty.

They just don't have the same demand for the firearms up there that we've got down here.

Um, so they they've had some capacity that the rest of us just haven't.

Where every where we have the backlogs is where everybody else has backlogs.

So that's.

If there are no additional questions, we'll now have a voice vote to approve the agreement renewal members.

Please unmute your mics at this time.

Do I have a motion to approve the interlocal agreement between the corporation and Tarrant County Medical Examiner's Office for firearms evidence comparison services budget for the service budget not to exceed a hundred thousand dollars?

Do I have an emotion?

So thank you.

Second.

Is there a second?

Second.

So okay.

At this time we all have a voice vote.

All in favor, say aye.

Aye.

All opposed, nay.

Vote carries.

So Dr.

Stout, please execute the agreement on behalf of the organization.

Yeah, I ma'am.

Okay.

And you're excited and pleased to do it.

Oh heck yeah.

Uh-huh.

Okay.

Um.

Now I have a presentation from Mr.

Leach, Treasurer and CFO.

Who jumped the gun a little bit about 10 minutes ago.

But now it's your turn.

So excited.

Um 2026 year and renew review proposed fiscal year and reallocations and proposed fiscal year 2027 amended uh budget.

Please carry on.

Thank you.

David Leach, uh CFO, crazy excited to talk about numbers.

This was done.

Hold me back.

All right.

So we'll I'll go over two things with you.

I'll go over a reallocation of this last year's budget, fiscal year 26.

It's the same process that we've gone through in the past.

Net change is zero, just have to move things around.

So we'll go through that and then I'll also talk a little bit more in detail and get your approval for the new budget that Dr.

Stout already discussed.

So we'll we'll start there.

Uh I just I just want to take a couple minutes here to set the stage uh for our business process.

And I don't like calling it a business process because nobody running a business would do this process, but this is what we do.

It's not a business, it's a service for you know people, so it's different.

But two to three months before our year starts, right?

We find out how much money we're gonna have for the next year.

Right.

We just talked about that.

And typically, um historically there have been years where it's flat.

Thankfully it's never been negative.

Um, but it's never been as much as we requested, right?

It's close and and the city has been very kind to us given the struggles that they're going through financially.

So we're uh in the scheme of things very appreciative to have what we have, but that's what we do.

And then it's but what what's important in my mind is our job is to effectively use every penny that we are given to help society, right?

It it I don't sleep well if I well, part of me sleeps well because I've got a bunch of money in the bank and it makes my job easier, right?

But there's another side of me that's more important that says we could have done more to help people who need to be exonerated, should be exonerated or shouldn't be waiting trial or to get somebody off the street who's gonna go do something bad again because we didn't get the work done, right?

So we we as a business we're trying to utilize every penny, but as you can imagine, that puts us in a very precarious situation at the end of the year, because if I'm supposed to go to zero, and this year I got pretty close, okay.

If I'm supposed to go to zero in cash, right, and I can't borrow money, and yet I've got to wait a couple weeks to get the money for the next year, and I don't even know what my budget is gonna be.

Those of you who run businesses or whatever, you know that that's just that's a pickle.

Um, because you you can't do any long-term planning, right?

You just have to, when the year comes, you just gotta say, okay, this is what we got, how we're gonna make it work.

Okay, so I just think that that's important to understand that's our business cycle, not complaining about it, but I want you to understand it because this year it uh it's meaningful more so than in past years, and I'll get into that in a minute.

Okay, so with this year's, uh weren't this one isn't mine.

I can't talk to that stuff, that's the important stuff.

I need numbers, but uh fiscal.

There you go.

This one I know.

Okay, so I I am going to keep pushing this button, and nothing's gonna happen.

Okay, I want to go to the end of this because you see those two green boxes.

That means that in total, nothing has changed.

So what I'm asking you to approve is a net zero, right?

So back over a year ago, you guys approved the fiscal year 26 budget, and in accordance with what we do, we are not allowed to overspend any specific line item.

So I come back at the end of every year and I move things around, right?

So that uh when it's all said and done, the budget amount that you guys approved that's on the record, the actual amount that's spent is equal to or a little bit less than so that we're not overspent on any line items.

So that's the exercise that we go through every year.

Now, in the past few years, we haven't spent the entire amount.

Matter of fact, the last three years we were right at two million dollars left over, which going back to my other comments makes my job easier, but it's not a good thing because that's two million dollars we could have used to get more of the backlog done.

And there's dynamics that go into that.

Um, but this year, actually the bank account balance this morning was 354,000.

Think about it.

We've got over 200 employees, and I'm sitting on 200, I'm sitting on 354, and I'm not allowed to borrow money.

Okay, so this year, I finally did my job well.

Other years I didn't do it as well, but it was a lot easier because I was sitting on two million dollars, I didn't have to watch the bank account twice a day to see where it is.

So I say all that to say is in these line items that you see, I usually only present this once because I've got some room because we didn't spend all the budget.

This year we spent it.

So I'm going to ask you to approve these adjustments, but when the actual final numbers come in, I'll probably have to ask you to approve it again because it's so close, I'll probably end up with a few line items that need to be plused and a few line items that need to be minus.

But in total, again, it's a net zero.

Okay, so it's on the record there for you to be able to see where the pluses and the minuses are, right?

Uh didn't spend as much or spent more in uh HR or less in outsourcing typically because we had the 2.6 million dollars that was given to F bio to go through this process of bringing on more people and outsource less.

I don't know exactly the timing of that.

So that that moves and other items move.

We received uh health insurance increase last year that was significantly more uh than expected, so you know, had more money there, took it away from other places.

So I can go through these line by line with you if you want to, but I don't know why you would want me to do that, but I will.

Well, why don't we just let everybody look at it for a minute.

Okay.

Pause if they have a question or do it so?

Good idea.

We'll take 60 seconds to okay so do you do you guys have it on screen do you want to do it or do I need to flip through the do you have a book in front of you they should have it.

Okay.

So if you'll just look through those individual line items if anyone as Director Cohen has uh pointed out jumps out just ask I'll try to answer your question okay okay move forward any specific questions that I can try to answer questions from the board on this item can you I'm sorry director can you move forward and put your mic up yes ma'am where do we find the money on um the rental um expenses so the increase that we were given included the known rental costs that we were going to do or we wouldn't have been able to enter into that agreement so that was included in the budget increase for the year.

How are we doing this?

Yeah that was part of all of the negotiations.

And since you haven't been on the board with some of those leases if if you want we can walk you through how those leases work because really we're a sub lesse to the city who's directly the the lease so there's been a lot of there's a lot of negotiations but there's the lease costs are things that we can actually project and get account accounted for in budgets.

Yeah it just it just looks like we saved three hundred thousand dollars um from the project from the original well on that one is the move in date was later than what was originally projected no it took a little longer to to get it ready so we saved a couple months cool thank you any other questions all right I'll need a motion to approve the reallocations for the fiscal year 2026 budget.

Please unmute your mics at this time do I have a motion to approve.

So moved okay second second.

Okay.

Exactly okay um all in favor aye opposed the motion carries now I'll need a motion to approve the revised fiscal year presentation oh sorry we'll have to do the presentation first yeah I was about to I'll go over the fiscal year 27 okay so here's a a chart you can see um last year's budget was 34 uh million eight hundred and eighty uh we received uh well initially we requested um an additional six uh employees for property room and then another nine employees for the property room those were granted and we requested a 2.7 million dollar increase to our budget that's what you guys approved and that's what's on the record right now to be able to handle all these things that we're talking about and that was a 3.9 million increase in total or 11% what the city came back with was a 2.4 million or a 7% request so that's a drop of 1.5 million so I don't remember somebody said that sounded like a pretty big drop or something it's it's a 1.5 million dollar uh decrease from what was originally approved to what has been approved.

Again I don't want to be thought of in any way of not being appreciative of what we receive we are appreciative but what that does mean is all those things that Dr.

Stout was talking about.

Even if you assume that the costs stay constant year over year, which they aren't.

Everybody knows that prices are going up all over the place on multiple things, right?

So even if everything stayed the same, and the fact that we actually spent the money that we had this year, so there is no excess cash to start the year on sixty six.

There's a there's a one point I don't want to call it a problem.

We'll call it an opportunity.

There's some work for us to do, right?

And then also the fact that we started with two million dollars, that means that last year we spent $2 million more than the funding because we started off with some.

So we can't do that this year because now we're actually at zero, right?

So it's just the truth of where we are is probably somewhere between his optimism and my pesticism.

That's probably where it really lies.

But this is going to be a challenging year.

We've been here before back in 19 and in 22, it was tight, we didn't come in with much.

But uh this will be this will be a good opportunity for us to exercise our executive management decision making ability.

David and I balance which way we consume roll aids in vast quantities.

So that that's a high high level picture of where it is.

You know, the devil's in the details of can you advance it one?

Um, just pop through those.

These are things that Dr.

Stout already talked about.

These are the areas where we have opportunity, right?

Um 65% of our cost are employee cost, so something's got to give there, either whether it be hiring freezes or or just some something's got to go there for us to hit a number this big and other places with health insurance costs coming in who can absorb them, things like that.

That's on the board to your discussion about equipment.

If one of these $400,000 machines goes down, we do not have the money to replace it, and we do not have the money to sign a new lease for it.

Now, can we go and ask for it?

Sure, we can, but that's what we'll need to do.

The money isn't there to first a big surprise.

So we'll just pray for a boring year with our equipment.

Um, or we'll deal with it if it happens.

Can you advance it, please?

So just like on the other page, you then have all the detailed line items.

So what I have shown you in this graph that you can see is this is our forecast, the first column.

That's where I think we're gonna actually finish this year.

This is the new budget numbers because the budget that you had approved previously is no longer valid.

That's uh a million five too high.

This is the new budget by line item, and those line items are the difference year over year between where we think we're actually going to finish this year and the budget that I'm asking you to approve.

So I will ask you to approve the budget, but I'll just let you know that in prior years, I usually just come up at the beginning of the year and at the end of the year I ask you to reallocate, right?

This year, probably in the next board meeting or the board meeting after that, I'm gonna need to come up to you because we've got some work to do on how this is gonna work, and once I know where we actually finished the year and what we're working with, these numbers are gonna move around, they won't change in total, but I'll probably be coming up to you more than just twice a year to talk about the budget because it's gonna be a lot tighter, and we just want to make sure that you agree with strategic decisions that we're making on where to use the resources because of how tight it will be this year.

Does that make sense?

Okay.

So I'll leave it with you if you want to look over it, or I I mean, the total number won't change.

Let me see if there are questions right now, and on a personal note, I I've worked with you in many years ago when I was on council, and one of the things, and I know that Director Corrales would agree with this.

We were at rape kits in the terms of over six thousand untested rape kits, because we didn't have the money to test the rape kits, and that was shocking, and it's going on even now around the country, there's still that problem.

But you and your and your passion for making sure that that was attended to, we now have no backlog of rape untested rape kits, and I don't know if uh, Director Corrales, I don't know if you want to add anything to that.

No, that is um that is remarkable, and I I appreciate everything that you do and the level of detail that you take for the budget and the care that you have for the community.

Uh I am as excited about it too, but I think you gave the credit to the wrong person.

Uh it's the team that does it, but what we did do this year is we said, hey, we can't finish the year with two million dollars.

We need to spend that money and get this work done.

And Amy and her team, that's why they started doing the special program, and that's why the numbers have gone down.

I wish we could continue to do that, but you know, we'll we'll do it where we can, and we'll just make sure that we get as close to zero, and Peter will buy me a bottle of ROLAIDs and we'll make it work.

Well, we thank everyone who's involved.

I was just gonna say bottle.

I think it's more in the cases that we consume.

So any other comments?

All right, now I'll need a motion to approve the revised fiscal 2027 budget.

Members, you don't know this.

Members, please unmute your mics at this time.

Do I have a motion to approve as presented?

So is there a second?

Second.

All right, all in favor, aye.

Opposed?

Nay.

Motion carry.

Thank you very much.

I do have a quick question.

Um if one of those capital equipment, one of those machines goes offline.

We obviously don't have the budget to replace it.

Could we, do we have the budget to outsource it to Tarrant County?

Not really.

Okay.

This is this is the snug reality.

Is we don't there is there's n no latitude.

Um, and yeah, it's it's it's a worry.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you again, Ms.

Thank you.

Quick follow-up.

I thought we have the equipment or something.

Oh, we have service contracts, and all of these things.

You know, we we have we do what we can.

So so my point is though.

For layers there.

The risk is there.

Yeah, the risk is there, even if it's happening, we should have something to do.

We have done what we can to try and mitigate those risks, but you know, we we to be clear if we have a real catastrophic failure in one of these capital pieces, it's gonna hurt.

Okay.

Okay, thank you all very much.

We'll move on to agenda item 10 for Jackie Morel.

Quality director, and it'll include overview and updates on quality.

Hi, hi, good morning.

Can you hear me?

Perfect.

Let me see.

Um, there is some technical problems with the clicker, so we'll see if it wants to work this round.

Um, I'm just gonna be like pointing and just why do we have some we'll protect it and guard it for you.

Good morning, everyone.

So I will be talking about quality giving you some quality updates.

Uh the first one, I think Dr.

Sark kind of already commented a little bit on it.

Um I'm excited to announce that effective June 9th, we uh officially received our ANAB uh certificate and the scope um where we now have rapid DNA as part of a discipline, right?

Now, as you remembered from my presentation in the last meeting, um, this is only going to be specific um uh for reference samples, right?

Um while well, it's specific for reference samples.

We are quietly in the background validating the evidence cartridges, so we are set in a better place that once the FBI approves the evidence cartridges to be up for evidence to be uploaded into CODAS.

Um, and the Texas Forensic Science DNA working group um publishes guidelines and requirements around rapid, um, because we already have the accreditation, it sets us at a very good spot of being able to implement the evidence um once we validate it internally um to implement this immediately.

My other topic for today is on internal audits.

Now, I really love internal audits because it's a great self-evaluation tool uh to ensure that we are complying to all of the plethora of the different requirements.

Now, if you ask my team, they probably won't have the same answer in love for this, right?

Because it's a lot of work.

It's a very intense and immersive experience that we usually seek out internal audit volunteers from staff members to be able to complete this, right?

And this last year we had like 60 helpers helping us out with internal audits, and that wasn't enough.

We actually needed more because we have a lot of sections, and you know there are some sections that have over 30 or 40 people, and we have to do case file reviews, right?

You can't just do one, you have to do a sampling for each person within a time scope.

You need to do witnessing.

You have to look at all of the requirements, right?

And from ISO IEC 17025.

You also have to verify that they're complying to the AB AR 3125, which is basically forensic specific requirements from ANAB that are tied to ISO.

So we have to make sure that we're also complying to them.

We also have to make sure that any other additional policies and procedures from the quality manual are being followed.

We have to check that all the 40 OSAC registry standards that we've implemented since forever ago, that we are still complying to them, as well as the section SOPs.

And what was most important is that not only you have to verify, but you also have to ensure that you have a record to back that up to say that yes, this is exactly what we're doing.

So as you can see, this was a whole four-month process.

And so I'm glad we wrapped that up.

We do have an August coming up our audit for CSCM, but that's for an independent accreditation program for the property and evidence.

And in October, we're projecting to do our safety and security internal audit of our facilities, but that again, the bulk of the internal audit season has concluded.

For that, for the results, we had a total of seven nonconformances that were that were documented or noted, and 14 opportunities for improvement, right?

So the way that I like to see nonconformances is I don't see that as a punitive thing.

I think it's a really proactive way to identify areas that we need to strengthen and gives you areas to improve and not know, you know, three or four years down the line that you had this nonconformance, right, or this issue.

So again, being proactive in nature, we also look at opportunities for improvement that, and we document that we document those in our internal audit report because again, opportunities for improvement are areas that you might be conforming at one point, right?

But if you steer a little bit to the right or the left, we can see or foresee that this could be a nonconformance in the future.

So it's a way for the sections to be really preventive and and address those situations.

So as part of my presentation, I kind of wanted to walk you through some of the nonconformances that we had.

Um, and there was a lot of commonalities that while it may have happened in one section, it doesn't preclude it from happening in another one.

So that's in their company meeting.

I try to more so kind of go over the different themes and what the sections can do to kind of be more proactive and awareness to prevent that from happening in their section, right?

The first one is reagents, the majority of all the sections use reagents, right?

And for example, in this instance, we had a situation where we found several reagent bottles that were correctly made and were correctly labeled, as you can see.

There, you know that that's the AUI wash.

Um, however, they didn't have the required hassard labeling, right?

If you can see that diamond safety haphazard in the label, and that needs to be filled out.

Again, this has no technical impact, right?

This is very administrative, but the whole intent behind this is to ensure that we have a reliable and above all a safety laboratory environment, right?

We want to make sure that staff members who are using that chemical, they know all of the different components and hazards associated to it.

So again, nothing technical, but we do still notice and address these.

Um, we take them also um of there're the same importance, right?

Another one that we saw was an evidence labeling, right?

And it's really important to have all evidence items not only labeled but uniquely identified, right?

You don't want to you want to differentiate between item 1.1, 1.2, or 1.3, right?

And in this instance, we had a situation where um we found bullets that did have the forensic case number, but it just didn't have the item number.

But that's something that you know all the sections handle very small evidence items, right?

And it's really hard to label things that are tiny, like you see like a bullet.

Specifically for this case, you can't just grab a sharpie and put the gray like you know, put the markings in the bullet.

You actually have to engrave it, right?

So that sort of like increases the likelihood of you know missing some little things.

So again, we acknowledge the risk of handling numerous small items, right?

But we still want to give importance to make sure that we are following our requirements.

And uh last, um, my for my last topic, I wanted to update you and make you aware that we have our upcoming AB reassessment that is scheduled for the week of August 31st to September 3rd.

Now, our 17025 accreditation program runs in a four-year cycle, right?

So every fourth year, which is 2026 is our fourth year, we need to be um audited all of our sections, all of quality, every single corner of our facilities, every laboratory has to be audited by A and A B in order to renew our accreditation program for the next four-year cycle.

Okay, so this one is going to be very comparative to the internal audit, very immersive, very intense.

However, it's going to be conducted by A and A B.

We're gonna have a team leader and we're gonna have a lot of different uh technical assessors that are gonna come and audit us um to all of the different requirements that I talked about.

Um, so yes, we are gonna be very busy that week.

And of course, just like internal audits, they need to do they need to check all of our records to make sure that we are complying.

They're going to be doing case file reviews uh for all the staff members, even the departing ones, if they conducted work within these last four years, they need to review those cases.

They're also going to be doing right the document review to make sure that we're complying and all of our records, and they're also going to be doing witnessing, right?

So they actually directly observe the analysts conduct the work to make sure that, like, yes, you are following your SRP to detail, or you're able to see so much when you do witnessing, right?

You're able to not only see the instruments and equipment, but um I actually do like a lot of witnessing because it you can cross a lot of check marks with just one observation.

Now, with that said, uh it is pretty intense process.

So the quality division is working behind the scenes and creating some videos to help staff set expectations, not only for them, but also what are the expectations from AB and the technical assessors and what they need to complete to kind of mentally prepare them for this day.

Um we are going to be releasing the first one in the series next week, and um I will work with Natalie um to try to share that video with you guys so you can also prepare with us for this reassessment and kind of get the little behind the scenes.

Oh, I'll say, so that was one that quality team made, and they did a really good job of it too.

I was watching it last night.

It's like, wow, this is good, and it's like accreditation stuff, and I'm interested.

We did have a small cameo from Dr.

Stout too.

Yeah, thank you.

Any more questions?

Any questions of the board?

Um, in your uh extra data that you put in here, the testimony data shows so much time in court, Scott.

You were kind of thinking, was there a way to reduce that?

That maybe there were places that or things that could be done to reduce the wait time when people are going to court.

Oh, we've talked about it lots, you know.

It's it is a consistent.

Yeah, this it's also a consistent challenge everywhere.

Oh, this is something that uh when I get with crime ladder directors, we we all lament the fact that court is messy and difficult, and never really terribly predictable.

And we end up with people sitting over there for lots of time.

Yeah, and yeah, that that is I remember now what we were talking about.

And and you're right, the the problem you run into is uh the good old Sixth Amendment right to have witnesses appear in court and and uh and you're only as good as the the willingness of the judges to accommodate scheduling and um and and try to work with uh the the forensic witnesses to to accommodate their schedules and some judges just want their highest priority is going to be you know maximizing the jurors' times and and they'll make y'all wait.

And that's just you know, but what what we can do is we're you know is talk to uh um the the people who really kind of manage the criminal justice system, the the stakeholders and just see if there are ways that they can appreciate you know our efficiency challenges.

And I think there was a a conversation or a uh an idea that perhaps there could be a space allocated that they could be on their computers and doing some work while they were waiting.

Yes.

Yeah, I I I can I'm gonna follow up on that.

Okay.

At least that would help and I think about budget and so forth.

Also, remember they just added in this last legislative session, six more courts to Harris County, which were the first six district courts that have been added in about thirty years, but they had to build those courts in that building, so they've cannibalized a lot of space in the building for courts.

Okay.

I have one question.

Sure, go ahead.

Um first of all, I commend you for the for this.

This is one of my favorite parts of of the entire report.

Well, because I think internal audits are so important.

And my question is um when you look at your internal audits and everything that you do, how does it align with your internal audit performance?

Like does it validate it?

That did your internal audits, are you picking all the right things?

And they I don't think internal audits is enough, right?

Okay.

So I think um we do have other initiatives and programs um to monitor our system from different um from different scopes, right?

Um so that's one of the reasons why we have the blind program, right?

And that's a great um way to it's like proficiency testing, but it's more like real-time monitoring because we actually see how the analysts treat the evidence, right?

Because they they think it's evidence, not they're not they don't know that they're being tested, so that's a great way to monitor our processes and um and again if something was to happen, we want it to happen in the blinds, right?

We don't want that to happen on cases.

So we're actively working in the blind program, right?

Um we also have a blind verification program as well for the for firearms and lay in prints.

Um we also have a tr uh, we have um a blind transcript program where we request transcripts um and we blind the credentials for staff members and we build a committee to evaluate the transcript to see like does this make sense?

Well the committee is comprised of one tech technical person, one quality, and one lay person, meaning somebody who's not part of the technical section, and basically they evaluate the transcript to make sure that like from a technical perspective, what they testified on is accurate.

Um but then from the quality we look like, well, did do you know all of the different quality processes or whatnot?

Was those testified in accurate manner?

And then the layperson um reviews it to make sure that like does this make sense to me, you know, not being part of the section.

Would have I understood it if I was part of the jury.

So we have that program, and in addition, um, for court per court purposes, we have a requ we set ourselves a requirement of having every staff member who testify to testifies in court to be monitored at least once.

But there are some sections that go and monitor their staff um more, right?

And that's allowed.

Uh so we do have that program because you know that's another output or service that we provide our stakeholders that we want to monitor as well.

Um, what else do we have?

You know, internal audits, post-mortems.

And then we have management reviews.

Postmortems.

Yes, and we also have postmortems, right?

Where we review the results.

Um so for a specific time frame, um, we have the technical sections, audit, a sampling of reported cases to see were there any issues identified on it, and can we address those, right?

Because again, those reports have already gone out the door.

So that's sort of all the different that we have or tools that we have in our toolbox to monitor our system from all different um.

And I would imagine that it helps whenever you have the your your single audit.

You have your all of these things and everything that you do helps with the all this records, like when we compile all of these records, that is basically what we use to demonstrate compliance to all of these requirements through all of these different reports, right?

Because if we don't document it, it never happened.

So it's a lot of uh you do it, but then you need to go set to time to actually document it and record it and sign it and whatnot.

So yes, it's a lot of work.

So there's a good opportunity here for me to point out the work that Jackie and her team do, because I've actually was just recently on a couple of workshops nationally talking about the limitations of accreditation and forensics, and to point out for everything that crime laboratories do, the central nature of what this evidence is, our reassessment cycle is once every four years.

When I was in the military system and in workplace drug testing, so something that's just gonna get somebody fired.

Those laboratories get a reassessment four times a year.

The difference in what happens in crime laboratories is kind of jaw-dropping.

And I've for years I've used the shtick of um restaurant inspections, and in North Carolina, this worked great because it was an ABC kind of thing.

And you could stay in business serving stuff until you had a C minus.

And so the way I'd frame it to people is in general in this country, a laboratory that certificate on the wall means the laboratory got a C minus.

That's all you know.

So if you go to a new barbecue joint here on one of these nice, lovely, warm January, July days, and you see they got a C minus on the wall.

Are you gonna try the egg salad?

That's what you know about a lab from the assessment system.

So, what is the difference between that and where we're at is what her group does.

Of course.

I just I'm just really interested in the witnessing process.

Is are are you a passive observer, or when you're watching a process and you see an error or or or something that's outside of the SOP?

Do you intervene or is it just a do you watch the process and then after the fact counsel the person?

Um, well, I think it's very different techniques, right?

Like I can kind of speak to myself when I use when I go and do assessments, right?

As a technical assessor, um, yes, it's passive, right?

You know, you you want actually we just had this conversation in the company meeting of the importance of setting expectations before carrying on your witnessing, right?

Um, to make sure that the silence is not as awkward and just let them know that, like, hey, I'm gonna be observing you, I'm gonna be writing down in my notes what you're doing.

And yes, if you are doing something egregious, or be like, hey, I don't see that in the SOP.

I think it would be natural for me to stop them and be like, hey, can can you explain where we're what you're doing here?

Um, and also at the company meeting, I was just kind of letting them know that or I use the analogy because sometimes I over-explain things and you end up being like a tour guide.

Um, just to be like, please don't feel that you need to be walking them and explaining every step you're doing because we don't want them to be pipetting and talking to somebody at the most crucial point or the risk point in their process to not do it in the right well or the right balance or whatnot.

So it's more of those knowing what you want, what you can say and do, and that's part of like the series, the prep series that we're gonna be doing just to people to say maybe what it might be obvious to me, but there's so many new people in our laboratory, um, that I just want to make sure that people understand more of like the expectations and you know, it's okay to set them or what is okay or not, or like we don't expect you to be caring or talking, right?

It's more passive flying the wall kind of watching.

Okay, any other questions?

Good question.

Yes, thank you.

Thank you very much.

Um quality director morale it was really really a good presentation.

Thank you.

Thank you very much now the agenda item eleven which is the adjournment do I have a motion to adjourn so moved because nobody wants to adjourn we'll just stay here and you want to order lunch is there a motion to adjourn so moved thank you is there a second second good all in favor say aye aye opposed we are adjourned and we will see you on September eleventh which is the next uh board date wait director you as a what did you think something different no okay we'll see you on the eleventh have a good rest of your summer thanks everybody