Good afternoon.

My name is Greg Hahn, Chairman of the Indianapolis Public Transportation Corporation, and we welcome you to our September board meeting, which is September the 18th is Thursday, and it's now 401.

And we'll call it in the session.

So at this point in time, I would ask our counsel Bob Fry to make the roll call, please.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Directors, please indicate your attendance when I call your name.

Director Fagan.

Director Wilson.

Present.

Present.

Chairman Hahn.

And then is Director Smith, I understand, maybe online.

Are you present, sir?

Director Smith, if you're you might be muted if you're trying to respond.

I'll just give you another opportunity if uh could you indicate if you're present.

Okay.

We can go ahead and proceed.

We still have a more uh if he comes along, we'll acknowledge him if he's able to next is our uh awards and combinations, our president CEO, Jennifer Purz will present those.

Do we have any for September, Jennifer?

I do.

Thank you, Chairman.

This is Jennifer Pierce, President CEO.

I will start off as I always do with our safe driver recognition.

The operators listed here were recognized in August for their safe driving record and received a National Safety Council patch pen and certificate.

Um I'll recognize Mr.

Samuel Abibbee, who has been working with us for 12 years and has 11 years of safe driving.

So thank you to Samuel for your service.

Uh next is our operations employee of the month, Joanne Sanders.

Joanne's uh nominated her, wrote to us that she is a team player and is willing to assist whenever needed.

Recently, she was operator for a special event driving and hosting a cooling bus at the state fair.

During the event, and extremely high temperatures, Joanne displayed patience and fortitude in navigating a detailed situation regarding some complications.

Um enjoyed the cooling bus, setting up outreach materials and making sure guests were comfortable and welcome.

She is a pleasant communicator who exhibits outstanding professionalism.

Congratulations to Joanne Sanders as our operations employee of the month.

Next is our fleet employee of the month, Mr.

Michael Jones.

Uh his nominator wrote to us that Mr.

Jones is an exceptional team player whose positive attitude and dedication make him a true asset.

He consistently picks up shifts and works overtime to ensure our fleet is ready for revenue service.

He approaches his work with a smile, engages respectfully with others, and goes the extra mile without hesitation.

His performance professionalism and strong work ethic reflect his commitment not only to indigo, but to the community who depend on having reliable transportation.

We sincerely appreciate his dedication and contributions to the team.

Congratulations to Mr.

Michael Jones.

Next, we have a retirement, happy retirement to Robbie Wagner.

After more than four decades of dedicated service, we are recognizing and celebrating the retirement of Mr.

Robert Robbie Wagner, who officially concludes his remarkable career with Indigo after 46 years, two weeks, and one day of service.

Robbie began his career August 21st, 1979.

He started as a general laborer before transferring to the role of a defect mechanic.

Later he accepted the role of facilities mechanic, eventually finishing his career in the body shop.

He has served with ATU Local 1070 as a shop steward and for a period of time served as their president.

He also served on the Union Executive Board for several years.

His work, work ethic, knowledge, and commitment to excellence earned him respect over the years, and he contributed to the training of others, always willing to lend a helping hand.

He was instrumental in organizing pitch-ins in the garage area and was known to take up collections for co-workers who were in need.

Robbie's last day was September 4th, 2025.

Please join me in congratulating him on a long, successful career, and we wish him health, happiness, and fulfillment in his retirement.

All right.

We are adding a new board member who unfortunately had um some car problems on the way here.

So he may be joining virtually, so I'll introduce him anyway.

If not, he will be here for our next meeting.

But we're thrilled to welcome Stan Smith to our board of directors.

Stan brings over three decades of leadership experience across public and private sectors, including in executive roles at IBM, Bentley Systems, WSP, and Level 5 Engineering.

He previously served as a commissioner at the Indiana Department of Transportation, where he led a 5,000-person organization focused on employee development, customer satisfaction, and continuous quality improvement.

His career reflects a strong commitment to infrastructure innovation, strategic growth, and community engagement.

Stan has held numerous leadership positions in service to the community as well, including with the Miss Circle City Classics Scholarship Committee, Martindale Brightwood Community Development Corporation, and the community organization, Faith, Hope, and Love.

We're excited about Stan's leadership and welcome him to the board of directors.

And then finally, last but not least, I'm thrilled to announce that we officially took the interim modifier off of Annette Darrow's title this week.

Annette Darrow is our new chief operations officer.

She brings a deep background in transit operations and strong customer focus and is going to make a great addition to our executive team.

She has nearly 30 years of experience at Indigo and 33 years total in the transit industry.

Since joining Indigo in 1996, she's advanced through key positions in several departments and is currently or was previously acting as senior director of service planning right before this role.

Annette's leadership has shaped many of Indigo's most transformative projects from securing a hundred million dollars in grant funding to deploying new technologies and leading four comprehensive operational analyses.

She helped develop the Carson Transit Center.

She planned through our three bus rapid transit lines and spearheaded the Marion County Transit Plan and through it all has developed a trusted collaborative relationship, not only with our ATU 1070 members, but all of our leaders.

I'm super excited to have your expertise in that and your experience, and I look forward to your leadership.

And that is all I have.

Thank you, Chairman.

Okay, thanks, Jennifer.

On behalf of the board, I'd also like to welcome Stan to the board, known him for many, many years.

Great, will be a great addition.

And also to Annette.

Welcome.

I know you're been here the whole time.

So next on our regular agenda is item number three.

And we will begin with action item 81, which is consideration approval of the board meeting minutes from August 21st, 2025.

Are there any questions or comments from the board members on the board minutes?

Okay.

We'll need to vote on that, do we?

Or do we?

Okay.

Yes, you do.

But I'd like to do the roll call.

If I may, uh Mr.

Chair, could I could I request one more time to see if uh Director Smith Director Smith, if you can hear us and uh intend to participate in the meeting, could you please indicate your presence?

Okay, Mr.

Chair, it was my it was kind of our understanding that uh unfortunately, Director Smith got in a car accident on the way here.

So even though there was an indication he had logged in, it doesn't seem he could communicate.

So in that case, um, you know, the open door law does require that a virtual director be able to communicate both ways.

So we'll just I I recommend we just proceed as if Mr.

Smith is not participating today in official action.

Um we can just consider him like he's listening in this month, I suppose, to learn.

Uh, and so I would recommend we can proceed with the a regular um voice vote.

Okay.

After an appropriate motion and second.

Do we have a um motion to a room?

So moved.

Second.

All those in favor.

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Let the record show there's no opposition, it passes.

Next, um let's see, we do the board.

We just did the board meetings.

Okay.

Next is a consideration approval of on-call scheduling services.

You know, chief operating officer Darrow will make that presentation.

Good afternoon, thank you, Annette Darrow, Chief Operating Officer.

And I'm bringing forth uh the on-call scheduling services.

So just a little background.

Um of the core functions of the service planning department is to schedule all the buses and the services that you see on the street.

It's a very complicated niche kind of uh thing to do and to find people to do it.

Um in the past, people would do it manually, they actually cut pieces of paper and run cut and try to make a put a big puzzle together and how to figure out how to put this work together.

Um back in 2005, we bought um the HASTA suite of software, which you've heard me talk about before, and so um we've moved fully into that, but it's also you have to still understand how to do the scheduling and run cutting to build it in the software to know what kind of result you're getting and if it's good.

Um the scheduling and run cutting is affects um our labor cost because it's how much we pay the drivers, and you know, we follow the ATU contract, and so this software takes all that into account.

So um, even when we bring new people in to do this work, which it's not often, but when we do, it's it's it's a long journey to get them to be proficient.

So our current scheduler with been with us for 46 years, and so um we've had some people in their roles for you know five or six years, and they're still learning.

So it's it's this very complicated to get the most efficient service out there, but also meet the needs of the operators and um you know make that balance.

So um what we've done previously is we engaged uh CSCED with as a contractor to help us with their experts in HACSIS and experts in scheduling, and so um we've had them on contract since 2000 or 2021, and so they're there when we need them, they're on call, they can step in, they can work in our system, they can train our staff.

So we've used them on and off for ad hoc projects and other things, but we could also you know call them up as needed just to look at what we've done in the system or do it for us if we if we so needed to.

Our goal is to grow people internally, but we need them on the bench to help support us.

And they did support us greatly when we you know when we moved to rostering.

That was huge because we didn't have any experience with it, so they were able to support us with that.

So um I'm asking that the board um authorize the president and CEO into a three-year contract not to exceed 173,325 to provide that support to staff.

So if there's any questions, I'd be glad to answer them.

Any questions or comments from the board?

No.

No, I'd be at about this last night at council meeting.

So I'm I'm I fully support um what she's what she's asking.

Okay, and I get a motion for consideration and approval of the on-call scheduling service.

Stronger.

Second.

Second.

Okay.

Uh all those in favor signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

The record show, no opposition.

And the motion passes.

Thanks.

Thank you very much.

Okay.

Next is uh A3 consideration approval of 6410 charging station.

And Annette, you're going to make that presentation as well.

Right?

So you have to bear with me on this one as I this one I was a little less familiar with, the scheduling for sure.

But um, this is for the a con we're asking that you authorize the president and CEO to enter into agreement with Ride, formerly BYD, um, for improvements to the 6410 uh BRT charging station not to exceed 128,000.

So we have a charging station, but we ran into issues earlier this year, maybe around February.

I was told that um the charger stopped working.

And so um the equipment uh was commissioned in 2021, but then um after the initial project was complete, the warranty had run out.

But um we had some water issues earlier this year, and so the system is offline and not working.

So we've um done a deep dive into trying to figure out what went wrong along the way with uh WSP taking a look at all of the different areas.

Um the charger was provided by a company called Induct DV, which we do have chargers at Fort Ben and at the CTC that are working that were provided new with the purple line, but this was the original one at 6410.

So the technology was also a little bit different.

Um in doing this, we've tried to work with Ride now, or formerly BYD to come to some agreement on how we can move forward to get this charging station hopefully on back online before winter, because when the charging station isn't working, we're not getting the bumps in charge that we need to keep the buses running throughout the day.

So when it's really hot or really cold, um, they may not make it all day.

And so that sort of causes the scramble by staff who have to swap the bus out, get it back in, charge it, and or tow it in sometimes.

And so by getting those bumps, it it can help reduce um the need for that and help us make it through the day because when that happens, then the service suffers because then we pull the bus.

It may not come.

Granted, on the red line, it's 10 minutes now on weekdays, but weekday weekends it's 15.

So you'd have 30 minutes between buses instead of it might be 20 on the weekends, so or weekdays.

So by getting this charging situation resolved, we hope we could have less interruption and customer impact, and then also with the staff, it they can better or move the re resources around.

And um, so we're trying to do a deep dive and take a big holistic look about how this is how we can better manage this.

I mean, we do collect a lot of data on a daily basis.

Uh, we try not to let any buses go out that are less than 95% charge, but that's not always possible, but that is the goal.

And so we track each bus every day, what it went out at, what it came back in, if we had to pull it, why, um, how many charging opportunities did it have at the charging station and how many were successful.

We have a team that works with the operators, but so we're trying to look at every avenue just to uh protect service.

So that's what this um approval of this recommendation we hope would help solve that or put us in a better position.

So I'd be glad to answer any questions or if I can.

Yeah, so Mr.

Chairman, colleagues.

Um I had a very detailed conversation with our CFO about this when I found out about it.

Um, and and you know, those of you who know me know I'm a data guy.

We just don't have any data.

And or the data that we have isn't telling us anything.

And I think that we need some more time to be able to put this package together.

However, this is kind of an emergency thing.

So I would like to amend the ask here to let's let's go ahead and approve the 100,000 or 128,000.

100,000 of which is actually going to the fix, the 28,000 is going to the warrant, the extended warranty.

Five-year warranty.

So let's let's approve the CEO being able to enter into a contract with the caveat that's we don't know what we don't know.

We're not going to spend it until the board's informed on.

So if it if they if it's an emergency thing, we've got to get it done.

Just an email, she says we got to do this.

If not, then come back in October and tell us what the what the issue is and what they've been able to find out so that we can actually have some actionable intelligence with which to make a decision.

Does that make sense?

Okay with that.

Yes.

Bob is um, can we do that?

Okay.

All right.

So you want to make a motion?

Yeah.

I'm gonna I'm gonna move that we accept uh uh action item 83 as amended to uh allow for the C C resident and CEO to execute on this in an emergency by informing the board uh uh and if not then bring it back in October so we know what we're getting ourselves into.

It may be that it's gonna cost us more than 100 grand, you know, or it may be that there's some other option.

We just don't know what we don't know yet.

And I and I hesitate, I hesitate not to give the CEO the room to maneuver in the backfield, right?

Um, but I also don't want to be just arbitrarily spending money that we may or may not need to spend.

Does that make sense?

Yes, okay.

So that's my motion.

Okay.

Um can I get a motion for consideration and approval as amended on 6410 charging station?

Seven.

Second.

Okay, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye.

Uh aye.

Any opposed?

Let's work and show no opposition and motion is amended.

Thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

Thank you, colleagues.

I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Uh this brings us to agenda item number four, information items and item um I won is the finance report presented by our CFO, Mr.

Burr Brown.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

Good evening, Bart Brown, CFO.

Uh, this is the August 2025 financial summary under revenue or federal assistance revenue came in over budget for the month, 173,118.

And for the year, we're over budget by 2,117,398.

Other operating revenue category was under budget by 37,055.

And for the year, we're under budget 796,329.

Passenger service revenue is under budget by $31,337.

And for the year, we're under budget by $259,861.

And we received our PMTF grant for the year.

Property tax revenue came in on budget for the month of August.

However, uh probably in October, we'll start to see uh early distributions for the fall collections.

Local income tax came in budget.

I put here the service reimbursement program revenue was on budget.

However, we made a change.

My staff continually looks at this report and all our revenue expenditures, and they decided, and I agree with them that our taxy vouchers, which we're reporting here, that we get reimbursed from federal dollars should go up under federal assistance.

So for this month, we didn't have uh everything uh hold over directly, so next month we will update that to make sure that is correct.

The total revenue for the agency is over budget by 104,726 for the month for the year three million forty-two thousand two hundred twenty-nine.

Moving down to expenditures, our personal services, fringe benefits under budget for the month by sixty-nine thousand two hundred and fifteen dollars.

Year we're under budget three million five hundred and thirty-eight thousand.

Overtime expenses were over budget by 149,726.

And again, that is trending lower than we have in the past, which is a good sign.

And for their year, we're 1.3 million under budget.

Or I'm sorry, over budget.

August salary expenditures are under budget $392,000 for the month, and for the year under budget $3,833,000.

So for all personal services, we're under budget for the month, $311,567.

And for the year, we're under budget $5,980,987,319.

Other services and charges.

Claims were under budget by $331,867 for the month.

And for the year, we are under budget by $1,781,879.

Miscellaneous expense over budget by $43,282.

For the year, we're under budget $262,659.

Purchase transportation category is under budget by $123,034.

For the year, we're over budget $478,271.

Uh service expense category under budget by $323,000.

And for the year, under budget by $10,262.

Again, this category, we're starting to see uh more charges against it with our uh new contract.

And I I believe we will see in the next couple months that uh we'll be either at budget or maybe spend a little bit above.

That is why we carried over uh so much money from last year to this to this line.

And then utility expenditures under budget $96,156 for the year under budget $147,274, and finally, under materials.

I'm sorry, service of charges under budget for the month 270,608 for the year under budget 11,975.

And then finally, materials and supplies.

Fuel and lubricant under budget 119,764, and then we're under budget for the year 1,148,000.

Uh for the month of August, maintenance materials category under budget 36,670, and we're under budget for the year 43,014.

Other materials and supplies category under budget 82,989 for the month, and under budget for the year, 71,210.

Tires and tubes under budget for August, 30,893, and then for the year, uh, we are under budget 257,608.

So for total materials and supplies category, we were under budget 270,317, and for the year under budget, 2,150,500.

And then for all expenditures, we came in under budget for the month, P52493, and for the year, we are under budget by 20 million 113,000.

And then under non-budget requests, we had none for August.

And finally, I'd like to report that last night the team went and presented the budget to the municipal corporations committee of the city county council, and we will go back on October the 6th for the full council meeting uh for approval.

Mr.

Chair, that concludes my report.

Be happy to answer any questions the board may have.

Any questions or comments on the board?

Thank you.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

Uh that is the end of our agenda and the end of our meeting.

And thank you all for being here either in person or virtually, and we'll see you in October.

Thank you.