First thing we'll do is do a call to order and rule call, and um we'll have our chief legal officer uh Bob Fry.

Do that, please.

Good afternoon, directors.

Please indicate your attendance when I call your name.

Director Smith.

Yeah, yeah.

Director Slash.

Director Fagan.

Director Wilson, present.

Director Gardner.

Present.

Director Hong President.

Mr.

Chair, we have a quorum.

Thank you.

Next awards and accommodations, and that will be done by our president and CEO, Jennifer Pearr's.

Good afternoon, everybody.

It's Jennifer Pierce, President CEO.

I'll start as I always do with safe drivers.

So for the month of October, we have a number of folks who were recognized with the National Safety Council patch pen and certificate.

There's a list on the screen for us.

Thank you all for your service.

And I'll highlight the first name on that list is Michael Flowers with 34 years of safe driving.

He's been working for us for 39 years.

So congratulations to Michael.

Next, we have our October Garage Employee of the Month, Shane Treesh.

Shane from his nomination.

I will read Shane played a huge role in the month of September, replacing breaks on a number of BYDs with a smile.

If you're on us virtually, can you please make sure you're muted?

Thank you.

He never complains and has shown a lot of growth as a diesel mechanic, considering he has been a career automotive technician.

Shane has always had a great attitude and is willing to jump right in and help.

So congratulations to Shane.

And then our October fleet employee of the month is Derek Payne.

He is a facility general laborer on our team, on our facility team.

His nomination says despite recent staffing shortages, Derek has gone above and beyond to keep our facilities running smoothly.

He's always willing to come in early, takes initiative, and covers multiple areas, including operations, admin, maintenance, break room, and restrooms.

Derek's positive attitude, reliability, and teamwork make a real difference every day, and we truly appreciate his dedication.

Mr.

Payne holds himself to a high standard and takes pride in his work.

He's always willing to lend a helping hand when and where needed.

Mr.

Payne consistently strives to keep the areas tasked to him clean and well maintained.

He's proactive in identifying and addressing issues before they become problems and is always willing to lend a helping hand when needed.

Derek's strong work ethic and team player attitude make him a valuable part of our facilities team.

So congratulations to Derek.

And finally, I don't have a slide for this one.

Um, but I received word today that we were awarded $14.75 million for 10 buses under the low or no emission grant program.

So I want to make a special note of that.

And that is all I have, Chairman.

Thank you.

Okay, thanks, Jennifer.

Uh moving on to item three, committee reports.

Uh, without objection, we will enter into the record the governance and audit committee report for this meeting that took place uh earlier today.

Any objections?

Okay, thank you.

Next is a regular agenda and item number four, and we'll begin with action item A1, which is consideration approval of the board minutes from October the 16th, 2025.

And are there any questions or comments from the board members concerning the board minutes?

Move we adopt the minutes.

Okay, second.

Second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed.

Let the record show there's no opposition.

So approved.

Thank you.

Um public hearing for consideration approval of adoption of ordinance number 2025-02, which is authorizing the acquisition of real property for the blue line and local bus improvement projects.

And uh our chief legal officer Bob Forey will make the presentation on that.

Good afternoon, directors.

Um, it is recommended that the board of directors adopt proposed ordinance number 2025-02 authorizing indigo to acquire certain real property interests necessary for local bus stop improvement projects and for the blue line bus rapid transit project.

So I'm not going to go through the whole presentation because you heard a presentation on this last month when uh the ordinance was introduced, but uh in sum, the board is empowered by state statute to acquire real estate uh interest um that are necessary or convenient to the operation of the transit system uh in basically any any manner uh in which you could uh acquire a property, meaning by uh it could be granted to us, uh we can purchase it, it could be gifted to us, a lease, imminent domain or otherwise.

So um the board for um per statute has to adopt an ordinance uh declaring that we have an interest in acquiring the property and also also authorizing indigo to use eminent domain if necessary to acquire the property.

Um as you've heard me say before, and I believe uh director of development uh chief development officer uh Brooke Thomas told you last month.

Hindi goes strives to never use them in a domain if we don't have to.

We we work as hard as we can with property owners to uh acquire the property and adjust uh and fair price.

And uh, but sometimes you just can't reach an agreement, sometimes you just can't find a property owner, and imminent domain is necessary.

So again, before we could uh proceed down that path, the board has to approve it through adoption of this ordinance.

So as mentioned, it's a two-stop process.

The ordinance was introduced last month.

This now is a public hearing, which we will open up for uh anyone from the public who might want to speak to the ordinance.

Um the public hearing was advertised uh per law in the Apple Star and the Court and Commercial Record.

Um so with that, um I will try to answer any questions board members may have, but we also have some members of the uh capital project staff who could who could answer questions about the projects themselves if needed.

Okay, thanks, Bob.

Um mentioned this course of the meeting is a public hearing on this proposed ordinance.

And if anyone desires to speak, uh we need for you to come up and sign with the board's administrative staff.

Uh and then when your name is called, you can come up to the podium, state your name, your residence uh zip code, and you'll be given two minutes to provide comments.

And uh we currently ask that your comments be directed solely to this proposed ordinance number 202502.

So do we have anybody that wants to uh come up and speak?

Okay, I don't see anybody, Bob.

Do you okay?

See no one from the public wishing to comment.

I will now close the public hearing and turn this matter over to the board for discussion.

Are there any questions or comments from the board members?

All right.

Uh with that, we'll now close the public hearing and uh turn this matter uh as we've already done onto the board and seeing no questions.

Uh would like to call for a vote on the adoption of proposed ordinance number 2025.

Move to be adopted resolution.

Second.

Second.

Uh directors, given that this is the adoption of ordinance, we have to do a roll-call vote per your for your bylaws.

So please indicate your vote on proposed ordinance uh 2025-02 when I call your name.

Director Snow.

What director slash?

Director Quick, Director Fagan.

Aye.

Director Hog.

The uh ordinance is adopted.

I'd also like to note that uh what during that presentation, Director uh Quirk arrived, so she has present now.

Thank you.

Next is uh action item A3, and that's a consideration or approval of contract with Anthem for group health, dental and stop loss insurance.

Uh Brett Griffin, our chief development officer will uh make the presentation.

Brent?

Good evening, directors.

Britt Griffin, Chief People Officer.

As you know, this is an annual event for us, so I'll get started here.

It is recommended that the board of directors authorize the president and CEO to enter into a contract with Anthem for employee group health, dental vision insurance and stop loss coverage for current for current member enrollment at an annual estimated cost of 12,754 and 678 for medical, 391,346 for dental, and 80,750 for vision, respectively, subject to increases or decreases based on our future enrollment.

Also, our vendor from LHD, our vendor will be here soon.

He just texts me and said he's on his way.

He's stuck in traffic of 465.

But to provide a little background, as I said, this is an annual enrollment that we actually go through with Anthem.

We take pride in being able to provide a healthy workforce by providing them with benefits that will assist him in being healthy as a part of the benefits package.

IPTC provides this workforce with insurance coverages to help employees offset the cost of health care and to help the employee maintain good overall well-being.

To provide a little bit more information as it relates to Anthem, Anthem is the current vendor, incumbent vendor provide who provides group health, dental envision insurance for us.

The health plan with Anthem is self-funded.

And the Gilles Benefits Advisory Firm LHD benefits advisor was able to secure a rate hold on Anthem administrative fees for health plan and also a rate hold for stop loss insurance premiums as well.

So we're going to implot them for that work.

LHD sent out a request for RFP to reinsurance carriers, but Anthem stop loss offered provided the best overall financial coverage for indigo and health plans.

Also this year, the new 2026 Indigo Indigo will offer a new high deductible health plan option for employees, which may have slightly lower premiums for employees compared to the current high deductible plan.

Overall, there will be no changes in terms of network disruptions for the medical dental envision for the plan year of 2026 staying with Anthem.

So open up for any questions from anybody.

Number one, uh, do we do any kind of an audit uh on the enrollment and making sure that folks that have been on it or maybe not eligible to be on a more like if their kids are over a certain age?

Yeah, great, great question, and great time.

As this is Bob Paia, who is our uh broker for LHD, he provides a great service for us and has been with us for a number of years, so I think he's well positioned to answer that.

I apologize.

I apologize, Greg.

Can you paint the question?

I was asking, I've been asked this by several people about do we do any sort of an audit to make sure that the people that are on the policy that shouldn't be on, like the the one example I keep getting asked is well, if they're children who are eligible up to what age 26.

Correct, correct.

So yeah, if they're over 26, are they still on the policy because nobody's looking at it?

It's that kind of those kind of things.

Yeah, well, Anthem has our claim uh TPA administrator, they will come across situations like that possibly in a claim if it's submitted, and they identify that that dependent's not eligible due to the age limit, for example.

Um, but in terms of an audit, um, when you're a self-funded employer group, that'd be something that you would take on yourself internally.

Um or externally, there's an external vendors you can hire as well.

We have assisted clients uh do those type of audits and go through that process.

It can be uh somewhat extensive because besides children, you also want to audit eligible spouses as well.

And that process can take some time because you typically um need to give people advanced notice that we're gonna be requiring you to provide some documentation in terms of like marriage licenses that you're you know, a legal married couple or uh documentation by your eligible dependents, you know, and verify their truly eligible dependents under the plan.

So that is something that uh indigo could consider um for your self-funded health plan.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

That's good to know.

And uh and the reason I think the question came up is people obviously with the cost of health care continue to go up.

Are we doing anything we can to make sure to keep the premiums down and not have people on the on the plan that shouldn't be there?

That's kind of how the issue was approached to correct today.

I think it is a a bid to do.

It's something that most of our clients don't do every year, but um they do every every few years, every three, five or so many years when they feel like it's just do an audit to make sure everybody that's truly covered by the plan are truly eligible, uh dependents for the plan.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

You know, go ahead.

Um I just want to clarify something in my mind.

I'm looking at the PPO plan, uh, assuming wellness discount.

We have an employee-only price, an employee and spouse price, an employee and child or children spot uh uh price, and then we have an employee and family.

What's the difference between employee and children and employee and family?

Uh the jurisdiction's two categories is basically a spouse.

So if you're in the family category, it's the employee, uh the spouse, and then uh children, a child or multiple children.

It could be one child, it could be as many.

So like a single parent would be a uh employee and children, and employee and family would be the employee, the employee spouse, and that's correct.

So yeah, I said thanks.

Correct.

Unclear to me what that's the employee and child or children categories and employee and one child or multiple children, but no spouse.

Single family homes.

Thank you.

Correctly, there's no um increase in the premium for the employee for the PPO plan.

Yeah, there's just a slight increase.

Yeah, the there is a slight increase.

Uh it's uh four percent for the employees.

Um the overall needed increase for the health plan for 2026 was like close to 8%.

I think it was like 7.8% rounding up.

Um but through uh review of the premium shares and and with agreements, um uh the indigo is not sharing the full increase with employees, but the employees are seeing a four percent increase.

And that is good.

I've heard of organizations where the increase has been uh double digit.

So thank you.

One of the things I want to applaud Bark Kirsten Secrets is not here today.

And um also Bob is as we stated earlier, we did have a rate hold on the stop loss insurance uh and also the administrative fees from Anthem as well, which I think is excellent.

Yes, so our fixed costs are in the plan in terms of the administrative fee that we pay Anthem to administer the plan for us.

It was a rate hold.

Um we have reinsurance, which protects Indigo from high cost claims.

Um we were able to make secure that as at a rate hold as well for for 2026.

So the increase that you're seeing is terms of uh projected claims, and that's by reviewing historical data and projecting forward what would be a reasonable expectation of claims based on the population.

Um, and then obviously I'm sure I apologize for being a little late, but we are introducing a new health plan option as well for 26.

So people have an additional option to consider as well, um, which will be of a slightly lower cost.

Brett, do we have any historical data on the number of employees that actually utilize the wellness piece?

We do, we do.

Um we do have that uh from marathon, and we're examining that each day.

Uh one of the things we're working with Marathon on is not only the usage, but the type of usage.

Um we've had some some challenges there that we're working through with them.

We recently met with their CEO to talk through some of those things as it relates to their availability to actually see our employees, and that's an ongoing discussion with them.

Yeah, okay.

Okay.

Any other questions from the board?

Okay.

Um, thank you.

With that, um, can I get a motion for consideration and approval of the contract with Anthem for group health dental and stop loss insurance?

Seven second.

Okay.

All those in favor signify by saying aye.

Aye.

All those opposed say nay.

The director show there's no names and the this is approved and passes.

Anyone else on the bottom you want to add?

Okay.

Motion carried.

All right.

Next is uh action item A4, consideration approval of new foundation board members.

There she is.

Uh in the new uh Indigo Foundation executive director will make a presentation.

Good afternoon, executives.

My director, excuse me.

My name is Emily Mo, and I'm the executive director of the Indigo Foundation.

Uh excuse me for my voice today.

Um here to request approval of appointing three new members to our board of directors.

These members have been vetted by um the Indigo Foundation board at our October meeting.

Um, and we're here to request that you all approve them.

The three members are Keith Johnson, uh Hardik Shaw, and Jeff Pellin.

I have their bios there um listed for you that to preserve my voice.

I'm going to not read them all.

But if you have any questions, I'm happy to answer that.

I think some of them may also be on the call.

Um we did invite them to this in case you wanted to talk to them.

So that's not sorry.

And where are they replacing people or these addition two?

So we have um our bylaws let us go up to 19 board members.

We had two board members um resigned this year due to changing their jobs, um, like Adam Bertner moved to Washington, DC because he got a promotion.

Um, like Adam Bertner moved to Washington, DC, because he got a promotion.

Um so happy for those members, but we're down to 14.

And so this would bring us up to 17 having these.

So yes, replacing, but also adding.

Okay.

Uh any board members have any questions for Emily.

No.

No, I do.

Well, I do want to point out, and just in case anybody asks that Hardick Shaw is the husband of our former colleague.

Um, and so the indigo foundation board did have some discussion about we know was this a potential conflict of interest, or was there something in in both of them being involved in the board?

Um, and we really can't figure it, can't figure out where that would be.

But I'm in the in the spirit of full transparency.

I wanted everybody to know um that there was that connection, especially since Artie is going to be the chairman of that board next year in 2026.

So just wanted to get that on the record.

Thanks.

And we did discuss that perhaps we wouldn't have them be chair and vice chair at the same time.

Um that's spreading out their um their service on the executive committee.

So well, uh, can I get a motion for consideration approval of the new indigo uh foundation board members?

So move.

Okay.

There being a motion, a second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Uh any that are opposed, say nay.

No nays.

So that passes.

We've got three new board members.

Pretty painless, Emily.

Thank you.

Next action item is A5, and that's consideration of approval of purchasing 20 new Gin Fair Fast Fair fare boxes.

Treasury manager uh John Mann, there he is.

Uh, we'll make the presentation.

Good afternoon, directors.

Uh, it is recommended that the board of directors authorize the president's CO to enter a purchase agreement with Ginfare for 20 new fast fare fare boxes for a total cost of 381,365 and 63 cents.

Our current fleet of fixed route fare boxes consist of approximately 100 fast fare boxes and 128 Odyssey fare boxes.

Oh the Odyssey fare box was introduced to Indigo in 2007 in 2020, December 2022, excuse me.

Uh Genfair ceased production of those Odyssey fare boxes and replaced them with the manufacturing of its new fare box type, which is the fast fare.

Uh, this purchase will be the fourth purchase of our annual partial replacement of fare boxes, which was included in the five-year capital plan.

Indigo will continue to operate with both Odyssey and Fast Fair fare boxes for the next several years.

All fare processes will remain the same for everyone involved, including writers, coach operators, and treasury personnel.

These fare boxes typically have a 10-year life expectancy.

You see that I note that these um fare boxes typically have a 10-year lifespan.

Um, and so in 2022, they quit making them.

I'm assuming that we haven't purchased any since 2022.

We have not purchased Odyssey Fairbox.

Yes, Odyssey Fairbox.

Yeah, so by 2031-ish, these are not going to be serviceable any longer.

Is that accurate statement?

Um we'll continue to use them as long as they last.

Actually, we actually use the parts as well.

They're interchangeable with the the fast fare fare box.

So I guess my so I guess my question is um are we are we planning to have replaced all of the Odyssey fare boxes with the new fast fare boxes within this five within the five-year capital plan time frame?

Yes, as long as we continue to purchase additional in the next few years.

All right, thanks.

Any other questions from the board?

Okay, if there are no other questions, can we get a motion for consideration approval purchasing 20 new Genfair fast fare boxes?

So move that three times.

We've got a motion in a second.

Um there being a motion and a second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

All those opposed, nay.

Let the record show there were no nays.

And so item action A5 passes.

Thank you very much.

Thanks, John.

Uh next is action item A6, and it's consideration approval of current brinks cash collection contract through 2026.

And uh John will speak to that as well.

Good afternoon again.

We meet again.

Is recommended that the board of directors authorize the president and CEO to extend the current brinks cash collection contract to the end of 2026 at a cost of 135,000.

This cash collection contract is the daily Monday through Friday collection of fixed route revenue at the West Campus and CTC retail desk revenue as well as the monthly revenue collections on the on the BRT routes, the 64 ticket bidding machines located there.

Extending indigo's current Brinks contract minimizes operational risk, maintains continuity of service, and provides the opportunity to evaluate how the transition to Masabi's fair validation system may affect TVM usage revenue handling and future armored transport requirements.

This approach will ensure that our next procurement strategy aligns with both current operational realities and future system changes.

The original board approval was in August of 2019 for the current brinks contract for the amount not to exceed 1.5 million dollars for a five-year agreement.

As of as of now, we've only spent 831,018.50 cents.

Okay.

Can we get a motion for consideration approval of current Brinks cash collection contract through 2026?

All three.

Okay, we've got a motion and a second to approve.

Um those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed saying nay.

Let the record show there's no nays and uh approved unanimously.

Okay, thank you very much.

Action uh item A7 is consideration approval of task order for construction engineering services, far east side bus stop improvements, and Rachel Wilson, our project manager will make the presentation.

Thanks, Rachel.

Afternoon, members of the board.

It is recommended that the board of directors authorize uh the IPTC president and CEO to execute a task order with Burgess and NIPL for construction engineering and inspection services related to the far east side bus stop improvements project and the amount not to exceed 288,121 dollars.

So some background.

Uh this is part of our long-range plan to improve local bus stops and make them all ADA accessible across the city.

Uh we've been doing uh many packages each year to just tip away at that goal.

So this is the next round.

We have 55 bus stops that we plan to bid in early 2026 and build out in 2026, possibly into 27 a little bit.

Um but this particular task order is for the inspection services where Burgess and NIPEL has an existing on-call contract where they've done a couple other projects for us in the past and have done good work.

Um they are out there in the field, making sure our contractors uh are building the plans per specifications and keeping up with daily logs and field reports and just overseeing the quality of the project overall.

So funding of this task order is included in the 2025 local budget.

And they did put in some XBE effort of 2.4 percent commitment from JQOL, LADS consulting, and project photo docs.

Are there any questions?

Any questions from the board?

I guess the only question I ask is if the 2.4% is appropriate.

I mean, I don't know what services.

I know JQOL, I know that company, but it just seems like 2.4 is a little low for this kind of work.

Um it does seem lower.

And there is opportunity, they can uh other these other staff can go out and and do some of the inspection.

I know the project photo docs, that was a small amount for taking photos of the project before and after.

Um that's just what it was this time.

That's just for this task order.

I believe overall for their contract, it's it's higher.

Yeah, no, I know that's why I'm just thinking that we're up into the pins uh on one morning participation, and just seem like this was awful low for this kind of a contract.

But if you're happy with it, that's what counts.

It's okay as long as it is overall, they're they're putting in the good faith and and get doing the work.

What's the value of the total value of the contract?

This the total um it's an on call.

So it's uh I don't think there's a ceiling established on it.

This is the sixth task order, so they're a little over a million between all six task orders.

Okay.

So it's like Greg said 2.4 percent of uh the total of just this 288,000 dollar task order.

Okay, all right, just to find.

Thank you.

Can any other questions?

Can we get a motion for consideration or approval of task order for construction engineering services for the far east side bus stop improvements?

Some of them second, second.

All right.

Uh there'll be a motion and second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

All those opposed, nay.

But the record show there's no nays, and passed by unanimous vote.

Thank you very much, Rachel.

Next is action item A8, and that's consideration approval to enter into insurance brokerage service contract.

And uh director of our risk and safety, Brian Clem will make that presentation.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, board of directors.

Name is Brian Clinton, uh, director of frisk and safety.

Is recommended that the board of directors authorize the president CEO to enter into a three-year contract with two one-year options with Aon Risk Services Central Incorporated.

The total cost of the contract is not to exceed 182,364 for the initial three years, or 318,459 for all five years if each year option year is executed.

We have in your proposal today is a table uh to help reference the yearly cost as well as the community costs throughout the contract.

Some background, Aon is our current incumbent for broker insurance coverage of our cursed commercial insurance and self-insured program, as well as auto liability.

Some discussion that we've had was on September 5th of 2025.

IPTC published a request for proposal for insurance weber services.

Four proposals were received and were evaluated by a panel of five Indigo employees, and the firms that submitted the top two proposals were asked to submit a best and final offer or BAFO.

Upon receiving the BAFO, the evaluation company selected the proposal submitted by Aon for Contract Award as best value.

This project is funded with the yearly budget submitted through our operations budget.

Sorry, a little redundant there, but but it is an operations uh funded budget uh each year.

Ladies and gentlemen, that um concludes my report and recommendation of the board of directors.

I'd be more than happy to answer any questions if you have any.

It's it's me again.

So uh so this is bro, these guys are providing a brokerage service.

We're not paying for insurance, he's got to go around finding the insurance for us, right?

So they're probably getting something from the insurance companies, but yet their costs go up every year by about what is it about quick math in my head, eight percent maybe.

Um can you explain why that is?

I mean, if they're just providing brokerage services, why are they jacking the price up every year?

All right, so I'll explain that in the next five hours.

So broker services, and you're exactly right, Rick, how you mentioned you have to be licensed to enter the insurance market to be able to engage underwriters to submit a quote back for your level of risk.

We call it total cost of risk is what that is.

So with those services, there's a fee to that, the broker services fee and their licensing fee.

So that's what this is what those fees are every year, or what the contract is for them every year.

This proposal was written as we've done in the past.

As we're good stewards of taxpayers' money, we put in our proposal and our scope of work in our contract that these are to be underwritten, our insurance is to be underwritten at zero commission to our taxpayers in the indigo.

So when we when they engage underwriters to write property coverage for us or whatever type of coverage it is, I said property, it could have been one of the other ones.

Uh it is listed at zero commission for us.

So there is a cost for a broker to underwrite insurance, and then there is a premium cost with the underwriters that we would also pay.

So there's two types of pay.

The really expensive one is what type of risk we have and how much is it going to cost with the underwriters.

The brokers are the ones that are brokering the deal, which is in best the best value for indigo uh and the best coverages for indigo.

So are they backloading the contract then?

You mean with cost?

Yeah.

I think the cost is uh reflective of uh potential market inflation with the brokers.

I'm not a broker myself, and I don't underwrite insurance, but we are proposing the the brokers with the best experience to do that for I'm just curious because it just seems like they're you know it's a pretty significant increase year after year after year after year after year or so.

But it is what it is.

But thanks, thanks for the explanation.

Uh I will mention though that if it helps when we evaluated the the cost estimates for the bid cost offer four million RFP.

This was in line for what we saw with the other proposals.

There was a uh increase year after year for that broker fee.

So this wasn't out of range for anything the evaluation committee saw.

It does seem like that it was apparent that there was an increased cost over year over year.

Thanks, Brian.

Thanks, Brian.

You always I always beat you up on this every year.

I apologize, but but uh but good job.

Thank you.

Is it also I'm just speculating that it goes up, it's also going up because of the building of the blue line?

And um, is that got anything to do with it?

Uh no, not on this uh part of the contract.

What we actually did was uh we executed a separate task order and we did use leverage our contract with our broker services when we did the blue line.

So the blue line wasn't a part of our normal um profile because it was an additional project we did.

So uh the blue line was kind of a carve out that we needed.

Uh what we also try to do is we defer risk when all whenever possible, if it's in the best interest of IPTC.

So on contracts, we look at is it cheaper for the contractor to provide the insurance uh through a um ISIP versus an OSIP, which is owner controlled insurance program.

And on this blue line project we did, we chose to do the owner controlled, which actually reduced our cost typically.

It's about 24 24 percent cost savings on premium if it's uh administered by the owner versus a um uh contractor.

So it's not the blue line.

Okay.

And just follow up with with Rick's question.

This was the uh there were I assume several people who bid on this, right?

It was an RFP.

Yeah, there were four, there were four bidders that were found responsive and responsible that submitted bids that were evaluated through the evaluation committee.

Okay.

And was this the cheapest one?

I mean, was it all based uh decision?

I'm sure that like you said they had to qualify, and then was this the least were they the lowest?

Yeah, let me check with my counsel real quick.

Terry Clay, senior director of procurement.

There were two bidders that were found uh responsive and responsible within the competitive range after the initial evaluation was complete.

So those two bidders we went back to and asked for best and final offers, and then that was resubmitted to uh to the committee for um for them to review this was the lowest uh price in those that were found in competitive range.

That's what you wanted to know, Matt.

Well, no, well, yeah, yeah.

Okay, it just bothers me when we do these X-year contracts, and and it's it seems like we get been over by software companies and by insurance companies and all this stuff, and we keep paying, you know, every year just keeps going up and going up and going up and going up.

I thought the whole idea behind these X-year contracts was to lock in a price so that it didn't keep going up and going up, going up.

I just I don't know.

I just it's it seems to me that well and if I will note that when we did the best and final, we we um benefited from a savings, I believe it was about 40,000 in the life of the five-year contract.

So that was helpful in the overall cost.

Okay, okay.

That's good to know.

Thanks.

All right.

Any other questions from board members?

Okay, can we can I get a motion in a second?

Second.

Would be in a motion in a second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

All those opposed.

Hearing no nays, this uh item action item eight passes.

Thank you.

Thanks a lot.

Okay, next is action item a nine.

Consideration of approval of resolution number 2025 oh nine for free fair days for uh 2026, and uh chief of public uh affairs officer Carrie Black.

Hello, directors.

Yes, I am Chief Public Affairs Officer, um Carrie Black, and it is that time of the year again, so it is recommended the board of directors authorize the president and CEO to approve free rides for the following days in the year of 2026.

Uh transit equity day, that's on February 4th, and election day, Tuesday, November 3rd.

I will note these two days are pending funding.

That is because the exec uh the Indigo Foundation is entering their final steps in um securing uh donors for those two dates, but that's just a step away, and that should be taken care of.

Uh, then the rest of the days include Thanksgiving Day on November the 26th, Christmas Day, December 25th, and New Year's Eve after 8 p.m.

on December the 31st.

Um, just a little bit of background.

The foundation has supported free fares over the last five years for various holidays, election days, sponsor days, and special events.

It is always the agency's top priority to ensure that we're removing that cost, that barrier of transportation costs, promoting safe travel uh and alternatives during these important times in our cities.

So these are promotions that that can really help support, attract um and retain new riders.

So ridership revenue, those are always important things.

And by having these free fare days, it's an opportunity for folks to sample our service and then hopefully continue to ride with us.

Uh that concludes my presentation, and I'm open to any questions.

Um not a question, just an observation.

Since this requires board action to uh authorize these fare-free days.

I think it would be wise that your staff doesn't put out we're going to do free fares at 11:30 in the morning on the day of the board meeting when we have not yet voted on it.

Does that make sense?

So the free fare that so the fare for the day that uh so these are prepares for 2026.

The the notice that we put out today for Thanksgiving is 2025, which the board approved last year.

So okay, I was just want to make sure that I was clear on that because it that's uh it it talks about the fare increase and it talks about um well if I'm gonna uh I withdraw.

Thanks.

Thank you, Kerry.

Thank you.

Can I get a motion for consideration or approval of resolution number 2025?

So move.

Oh fair days for 2026.

I was just getting the job, Mr.

Chair.

Oh, sorry.

Oh, I'm sorry, Stan.

How would that how would you pay for those?

Would Indy will have to pay for those and not the foundation?

If we excuse me, if we do not um secure the funding for those two days that I mentioned, transit equity day and election day, then we would not offer free fare on those days.

Okay.

All right.

Thank you.

Well, that we would secure a funder, a donor from somewhere would be the ultimate.

Mr.

Chair.

Well, your question is what about the other three days?

That comes out our high.

We pay for that.

Okay.

I mean, I think what Carrie means is you have a right to fund those days if we don't find funding.

Okay.

So the board can fund any day for fair free.

She what I think she's saying is we'll withdraw our request for those uh fair free days if we don't find funding.

So we'll report back to the board on what the result is of that.

What I meant.

Let's try it again.

For consideration.

Oh, we have a motion and second.

We had to do it again after questioning.

No, but but we do have to take a roll call vote because it's a resolution.

So yeah, we have a second.

Yes.

Yeah, we had a motion and a second.

Pretty certain.

Oh, yeah.

Right.

Go ahead.

So there's some gazes at me looking confused.

So pretty pretty sure I heard a motion in a second.

So directors on the present motion to approve resolution number 2025-09.

Please indicate your vote.

When I call your name, Director Smith.

Director Slash.

Director Coy.

Director Fagan.

Director Wilson.

Aye.

Director Gardner.

Aye.

Director Hunt.

The motion carries and the resolution's adopted.

Thank you.

Okay.

The next is action item 810.

And that's consideration or approval of fuel supplier contract for the 2026 calendar year.

And director of fleet services, Devon Smith will uh make the presentation.

And Devin Smith, Director of Fleet Services.

So it is recommended that the board of directors authorize the president and chief executive officer to execute a contract to purchase 1,710,000 gallons of premium ultra low sulfur diesel fuel from Gresham Petroleum at a total cost of $4 million $31,667 to fuel IPTC's bus fleet through the 2026 calendar year.

So this is a continuation of what we brought to the board last month with the final numbers.

So what the bids came in at is was correction 2.36 dollars per gallon, um, which is up four cents from last year, but still um pretty good price.

So I think we did pretty well there.

Um yeah, there's no real updates from that.

If there's any information you guys would like me to present this time, please let me know and I can clarify any information.

Do we have any questions or comments from the board?

Okay, can I get a motion for consideration approval of fuel supplier contract for the 2026 calendar year?

So move.

Second.

There being a motion or second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed nay.

Let the record show there's no nays and a 10 passes.

Thanks a lot.

Well, you're up next to aren't you?

Action item.

A11 consideration approval of two 40-foot battery electric buses for fixed route services.

Once again, uh Devin Smith, director of fleet services.

So recommendation, it is recommended that the board of directors authorize the president and she's the executive officer to purchase one 40-foot battery electric bus, including associated equipment and services each from New Flyer of America Incorporated and Gillig LLC at a total cost of $2 million, 836,356, plus an additional three to 15% for potential tariff cost increase.

So a little bit of background on this.

In 2022, IPTC received funding from the Indianapolis Metropolitan Planning Organization to facilitate the purchase of two 40-foot battery electric buses to determine the viability and feasibility of incorporating in incorporating them into our fleet so that we can test them under real-world conditions and see how they function within in Indie Eco.

Um the IMPO federal flux funding exchange program uh is being administrated as a grant through the federal transit administration authority or FTA, sorry.

Now, so the two buses that we're considering the one is from New Flyer of America.

Um that particular bus, the XE40 costs 1.4 million dollars and it comes with a 660 kilowatt hour battery pack.

The Gillig BEB costs um also 1.4 million dollars, slightly more expensive at uh 1 million 426, and includes a 588 kilowatt about our battery pack.

Both of these vehicles would be purchased through the um state of Washington contract, same as that we are doing for the blue line new flyers.

Um the fiscal impact of this, so 80% of the funds would be from that grant and 20% would come from the capital budget.

And for this, the DBE and XB transit vehicle manufacturers are required by the FTA to maintain their own DBE programs.

Happy to answer any questions on these.

Yeah, and you mentioned um that you want that we were gonna, I guess this is proof of concept of whether or not these buses will work on our fixed route as opposed to the BRT lines.

Correct.

That would be we'd be studying how they do so that if we did want to electrify the feet in the future or move in that direction, this would be uh allow us to make informed decisions around that.

So do we have a uh uh a scope on that?

Is it like a one year study, a two-year study, six month study?

What are we just gonna be just kind of ongoing through the life cycle of the vehicles?

Or how I guess I'm trying to understand.

I understand we get free money from the feds.

Yep.

Um, and that's always nice.

But the electric, I mean, the experience that we've had in the past with electric electric buses on our BRT lines is not good.

And I'm I'm not are we anticipating that the technology has uh evolved to make these things more practical for our fixed route.

Yeah, well, it's it's interesting that you bring up the BRT lines because this isn't some ways a response to that, right?

Because we moved from the BRT lines, we kind of jumped straight in without having done this process.

Whereas now we have the opportunity to get these buses and really try them out and see how it is, because many of the problems that we had with the the BYDs is that they didn't quite perform as we expected.

And we built a service around vehicles that haven't done what we thought they should do.

And so by looking at these, we'll be able to get that data and make you know a genuinely informed decision on what we can.

And so the uh to be your technology point, the technology on these vehicles continues to improve um at a regular basis.

In fact, I was talking to the sales rep for New Flyer today, and they had already made some adjustments to the battery packs.

Um, so just to show you the rate when we got this quote back in July, and they've already made some changes to improvements.

So is the plan then to put these buses into regular revenue service on a route or on various routes throughout the system, then to to actually see how they perform on a on a daily rotational basis, then yes, sir.

They would just be part of like we'd be using them similar to what we use the diesels right now.

Um ideally we'd be able to put them in on similar routes.

So we you know, we tried to get the most like for like performance that we could, you know.

So instead of putting on the one that's route that's out for 12 hours or whatnot, we'd try to find a way that they were treated somewhat equally so we could get a decent comparison because not only are we trying to discern whether the electrification is a potential way forward, but do we want to move forward with the new flyer?

Do we want to move forward with the gillick?

Um only choices.

The new flyer and Gilly are the only ones that make up fully electric bus, 40 passenger buses.

Does that meet the appropriate buy America grants and that they're also we can get them through Washington State?

So they were the main options.

Got it.

Okay, great.

Thanks.

Hey, Devin, just real quickly, two questions.

How will you report progress back to us on this?

And then the second, um, when will these get here tending we approve this today?

Yeah, so the the second part of that question is easier.

So we have um once it gets into the DS portal with Washington State, they have 18 months to deliver.

So we should see them conceivably uh summertime of 27, right around when our blue fire blue line new flyers should show up as well.

Uh as far in the data aspect, so the biggest thing that we'd be looking at is range charging times, things like that.

So, how far can these buses actually go?

How does the weather affect them?

Um, you know, how does a full passenger load affect them?

Because all these things tie into where you know what it is.

Do they not do very well in the snow?

These are things that we just want to monitor all aspects of their performance to understand where their weaknesses are and what their strengths are.

Like I said, so you know, I think that's but those are the two big aspects range, how they charge, and then how we can, you know, how quickly we can spin them around and go that and we can put numbers to almost all of those aspects.

Okay.

Can you can you also look at the like the cost of operation?

I I don't think I've ever seen any data, and it's probably not fair because this the BRT buses are large articulated buses.

But it would be interesting to me to see what the our cost of operation or especially like with regard to maintenance costs, because you know, diesel buses require a lot of maintenance.

And I just don't know.

I'm not familiar at all with what the maintenance schedules look like for uh for a fully battery operating bus.

Uh maintenance department does keep a um cost per mile, like a dollar per mile count for all of our vehicles.

So we can maintain that.

Now there is a challenge we will admit with the electric buses right now, because one of the the main cost per mile aspects of a diesel is the diesel that's going into it.

However, from the electrical charge, that's much harder.

Um I know Saturgy is here.

He can probably he's been working on that for the Nelson and NyGard study.

But you know, how do we separate out what electricity is going to towards these lights versus what's going into our charges for the BYDs?

Um we don't have a very good process for that yet.

And we're working on, you know, how to better understand that.

But for the cost of the bus maintenance itself, we do keep pretty close track um of how much each one of these will cost.

Thanks.

Good answer.

Any other questions from the board members?

Thanks, can I get a motion for consideration approval of two forty-foot battery electric buses for fixed route services?

Some moved.

All second.

All right.

There's being a motion and second.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, say nay.

Approved by uh unanimous vote.

Thank you all.

Thank you.

Okay.

We have uh item five information items.

Um first is item I one, and that's the financial report presented by uh our CFO Bart Brown.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Good evening, Bart Brown, CFO for Indigo.

This is our October 2025 financial summary on the revenue.

Uh federal assistance revenue came in under budget for the month by 848,795.

That is due to the fact that we have uh we've been reimbursed for all the preventive maintenance um that we are eligible for for the year, so we got that in early.

And the remainder of the reimburses are for ADA paired transit operations.

Year to date, this revenue is over budget by 1,373,000.

Other operating revenue category uh came in over budget, five million three hundred and eighty-six thousand six hundred and seventy-five dollars for the month.

Five million was received from DPW for uh their share of the 15 million uh to toward the blue line, and then 500,000 for east side bus stop improvements that you heard about earlier.

And for the year, we're over budget by 4,731,000.

Passenger service, good news was over budget by $6,525 for the month.

And for the year, though, we're still under budget 220,004.

Uh our PM PMTF grant, property tax revenue, and local income tax, the longwest service or reimbursement are all on budget for the month and for the year.

So our total revenue for the agency was over budget for the month, 4,701,000.

For the year, we're over budget 7,866,000.

Turning to expenditures, personal services, fringe benefits or under budget for the month, 460,000 five eighty-five.

For the year, we're under budget four million four hundred and thirty-three thousand five thirty.

Overtime expenditures were over budget, 235,927 for the month.

And for the year, we're over budget 1,817,000.

Then for salary expenditures, we were over budget for the month, 266, 267,256.

And that was due for because of a fifth payroll week for union employees.

And then year to date, we're under budget 3,861.

Personnel services category and total was over budget for the month, 42,598, and under budget for the year, 6 million 477,000.

Other services and charges, claims were over budget by 181,400 for the month.

And for the year, though, we're under budget, 945,789.

And then miscellaneous expense category was over budget by 23,196.

And for a year, we're under budget by 314,768.

And going forward, uh with the suggestion by our chair of the finance committee, we're going to start adding a couple of the some of the uh categories for that because miscellaneous just doesn't do a good job of describing what we're spending money on.

Then uh purchase transportation categories over budget by 106,450 for the month.

For the year, we're over budget 592,470.

And then services expense category under budget by 80,031 and under budget for the year, 11 million eight thousand for the month.

Utility expenditures under budget 16,828 for the year, utilities under budget 98,383.

So for all services and charges category, we're over budget for the month, 214,187.

And for the year, we're under budget 11,75,000.

And then finally, materials and supplies.

Fuel and lubricant category under budget by 163,812 for the month, and for the year we're under budget by 1,460,000.

And you can expect uh to see that going next year with the great pricing we had for the fuel that Devin just told us about.

Uh we budgeted $300.25 cents.

So we're almost a whole dollar under the budget going into next year.

And I guarantee you that Justin Andre will make sure that nobody spends that money without board approval.

For the month of October, the maintenance materials category is over budget by 220,000, and it's over budget for the year.

Materials and supplies under budget 42,732 for the year under budget 8257, and tires and tubes categories under budget in October 19,680, and then for the year we're under budget 29434, and for all materials and supplies under budget 6,062 for the month, and for the year under budget, 2,528,000.

And then for all total expenditures, we came in over budget by 250,723.

And year to date, we're under budget 20,071.

And there were no non-budget requests for last month, Mr.

Chair, that concludes my report.

What questions can I answer for the board?

Well, I Bart and I have these long in-depth conversations once a month prior to the board meeting.

Um, but I do want to commend uh the his whole staff.

I mean, they uh we sat down and we're looking through some stuff and and and just they're finding incredible ways to leverage um the resources that the organization has and Terry as well with the procurement stuff.

I'm just really excited about especially in light of my obsession with fiscal sustainability.

This is this is really um kind of a really good news story.

And I shared with the finance committee members, I'd share with the rest of my colleagues on the board that Bart's going to start similar to the um unfunded budget requests that he's gonna put a little chart for those for those um miscellaneous expenses that'll outline what those miscellaneous expenses are so that we can all we all have trans some transparency and visibility on where that money is going.

I personally just can't stand miscellaneous categories.

I although I do understand they're necessary because I mean you don't want to create a budget line item for you know a one-time $500 purchase, but um, but some of these some of the things that are in that category are fairly substantial cell phones, for instance, training trial, all that kind of stuff.

I think the board needs to be aware of.

So I'm grateful, Bart to you and your entire team for uh really opening this thing up.

Thank you.

Thank you, Rick.

Any other uh comments, questions?

Are we on the calendar year?

Okay.

Well, yes, sir.

Yeah, so our fiscal year starts January 1st.

Anything else?

Okay, thanks, Mort.

Uh let's see.

Next item I two, and that is a report from Indigo Foundation.

Uh director in William.

Good afternoon, directors.

I'm Emily Mo, the executive director of the Indigo Foundation.

Go to the next slide.

Happy to present to you all for our quarterly report that is um outlined in our um MOU together.

So updating you all on some things we've had going on lately.

Our fifth annual golf outing happened in September.

Our net was 85,000 on that event, and we had 175 golfers with 100 companies involved this year.

Um we made a bit less than we have in the past, about 15,000 less than last year.

And so our event follow-up has been heavier for that reason, but also just we're getting better at our communications with donors and in getting more individual donors.

So before the event, we identified the attendees with the highest propensity to give.

And then Jenny and I were on a golf cart with a with a photographer.

We made sure to get pictures with those people first, and then as many other foursoms as we could.

And then some of you may have seen in our follow-up thank you letters.

We sent actual pictures from the event to people, and so that was really well received.

We got um some great feedback on that.

Um and then our golf impact report was emailed to participants six weeks after the event.

Um, and then I think it's even my next slide.

We have lots of other communication things um planned, actually, in a couple slides, but I'll do this first.

Um so this morning we had our first Near East or our first bus stop tour.

Um, this was to celebrate the completion of the project or almost completed for the 79 bus stops on the Near East Side.

I know Rachel has presented to you all um in the past about these stops, and then the next group of stops is the Far East Side that was talked about today.

Um so we had several of the funders there.

Um I know Director Wilson and Director Gardner were able to join us this morning, so hope you enjoyed that.

Um the bus stops are something that it just looks like concrete a lot of times when you're looking at it.

It can be kind of um uneventful, I guess, when you see it.

Um concrete's very expensive, but when we were able to look at the whole corridors like on 34th Street, um all together, it's um really wonderful to see how these um improvements at each stop are are impacting the community.

Next slide.

A little background for you all about how this um is a little over two million dollar project was funded.

Um so it was a public-private partnership with a mix of funds secured by the foundation and by Indigo.

Um so I have that split up for you all.

Um the I mean a million of it was from DPW.

They have a an Indianapolis neighborhood investment project, something it's a cost share that your nonprofits are able to apply for.

And so the foundation has applied for that for the last four years.

Um, I believe it was two years of that went to this Near East project.

We this year secured our fourth, and that will be going towards the Far East project.

Um, and then we were able to match some funds um with IU Health, Fifth Third Foundation, and MIBOR to complement what Indigo secured with the federal grant, an FTA grant, and then Indigo's local funds.

So it really is um coming all together from different sources, and I think this is a great example of what we can do with the foundation is finding as much money as we can to support this public infrastructure.

Um so I'm happy to see that this was one of these projects take years.

I mean, literally four years.

We've been working on funding and um all that.

So happy to see it come to life.

Next.

Maybe this is what I was referring to about just some of our communication activities that are going on.

It takes about a dozen touch points on general that you're trying to get in front of donors every year.

And so we have um newsletters, we have um thank you letters, like our board just is in this past week have been sending handwritten thank you cards to our first-time donors this year.

Um, we have a holiday card coming up.

We're finalizing our corporate sponsorship packet to talk about 2026 sponsorships.

Um, so there's always something going on and always something um that we're working on to get out and um whether it's a stewardship purpose or the purpose is more solicitation.

Um we're trying to get in front of people as much as we can all throughout the year.

Next.

So some summary things that I typically um share with you all.

This is our chart that we've been using this year to show you all how many donor meetings we've had.

Um those have been ramped up a little bit lately.

We added a new um fundraising consultant in September, October time period.

Um so she's been adding to our list of um donors that we're able to meet with.

Um Yvonne and our team has submitted 63 grant applications this year, which I think is a record for us.

Um we're finding with our grants, um, as you all probably are familiar, the nonprofit world this year has kind of been flipped on its head in a lot of ways of how funding for the nonprofit world is working.

And so we're finding grants this year to be incredibly competitive.

Um, it's not for lack of trying.

I think we've I know we've put in more than we have before, and we're doing more than we have before in terms of building those relationships with funders.

Um, there's still several grants that are out there pending that we're waiting on.

Um I was just telling someone earlier today.

I think this week's probably the year or the week that a lot of organizations are having their end-of-year board meetings, and we probably will get those decisions in the first week of December.

Um, so that'll be coming soon.

Nick Emily, can I ask you a quick just a quick question?

So of the grant.

So what I'm reading here, it looks like you had 11 of the 63 grants have produced some fruit.

So far, yes.

Okay.

There's still um 500 and thousand so pending.

Um, I'm not sure how many that equates to how the number of grants that that equates to, but yeah.

Okay, thank you.

And I will say some of those grants are um like Walmart, we have to apply for each store.

Um so sometimes it might be a thousand dollar request, um, sometimes it's a hundred thousand dollar request.

So those are all mixed in there.

I did want to highlight for you all a couple donors um today just to show you the donor cycle or how things are working.

It's hard to believe I just celebrated my fifth anniversary with Indigo Foundation.

Um, and so looking back at some of these donors and relationships that were started um early on in 2021 with One America Foundation.

We got our first gift from them, and then they had staff changeover, and then they had uh priorities change.

But we continue to try to meet with um donors like that every year and stay in in touch with them.

This year, um, Yvonne and I met with them, um, which led to some further questions about what would BRT sponsorship look like.

And then we got Carrie involved with some meetings with Indigo, and several meetings later um this fall, we have a commitment from them to support the Transit Equity Day celebration as the presenting sponsor for that.

And then there's a verbal pledge that still has to be approved at their January board meeting to support free fare on transit equity day.

So that was something that Carrie mentioned pending funding.

Um it's a procedural thing.

We wanted to be sure we had your approval so that we can act quickly because February 4th comes up really fast.

Um, and then also um today you just approved an ex one of their executive team members um to be on our board.

So it just shows that these relationships take a long time, but eventually um they they start finding their place.

Um I think One America, if if our partner Denise was here to tell you they really see transit equity day as something that they want to own and get more involved in.

So happy to have that kind of partnership.

And then next I wanted to highlight a smaller business, um, Midwest Pre-Sort Service and the Scales family that owns Midwest Pre-Sort.

They're um a small business operating in Indianapolis since the 80s.

Um we do a chamber mailing, so a mailing to all chamber members.

I think every year we've done that.

Um sometimes we get, you know, maybe a couple gifts of a thousand dollars back, and then sometimes we get ones like this.

So they responded to this mailing with a $5,000 gift.

Um, they attended our transit equity day event.

They have continued to give every year.

We started last year, I think it was like they're a mailing service.

We do mailers, why don't we use them?

Um and so we started using them for a few mailings a year, and then this year they doubled their gift um without us even asking.

So sometimes these things just take time to start building that relationship and trust with donors.

Um, but we're starting to see the fruits of that.

Next.

This is our the chart I show you every time I'm here of where we're at with our donors.

Um, I've mentioned before we're a little behind where we were last year, so that's a lot of this end-of-year outreach is to try to get up that individual donor number so that we have more donors than we have in the past.

Broadening that base.

Okay, next.

And then I always share with you all the inner circle giving.

So this is both boards and then the executive team and then our foundation staff where we're at.

So we still have room to go in the next month.

Um, so if you haven't given yet this year, you will be hearing from me, I promise.

Um, and we hope to get that number to 100% before the end of the year.

That this is the thing that a lot of times funders will ask us, what is your board engagement?

Um, and so we because of our relationship with Indigo, we look at both boards um and their engagement there.

Okay, next.

I wanted to give you all a summary um of an event that we were part of recently.

Um so Jennifer Griggs on our team is our programs manager, and she's the one that manages the relationships with all of our nonprofit partners.

She's also one of the chamber ambassadors and is the one of our team that's out in the community the most.

And so on her Mary Travels, um, met a woman who's a professor at University of Indianapolis and teaches nursing students, and one of her classes is social determinants of health.

And so what came from that was the idea of getting these students in class to learn about transportation because it is a social determinant of health.

And so she partnered, Jennifer partnered with Molly at Indigo, the mobility manager.

Molly led travel trainings for the students in September.

And then part of their, I think, final exam for the class might have been they had to um go on the bus themselves and see if what they test what they learned in the travel training.

And then after they did that, um, in November, Jennifer organized a panel discussion that included people like Ted Grain from Eskenazi, who's on our board, um, to discuss what happened and what they learned about it.

And so a lot of these students um had great feedback about um how they uh had never thought of writing indigo before.

Some even said um it was cleaner than they thought it was gonna be.

So um good to see changing minds and and gaining new riders.

Um a little bit out of time.

Next we applications closed for our next round of mobility access fund grants.

These are the free fare grants to nonprofits that we've done every year.

Um we've received 139 applications from organizations, total amount requested in the fair market value was 475,000, which is a 20% increase over last year.

So every year this keeps growing.

Last year we funded 119 organizations.

Um we knew at some point we were gonna start hitting a point where we couldn't keep up with demand or our funding wouldn't be able to keep up with demand, and it appears that this might be our year.

Um in the past, we've been able to fully fund all requests, and it's looking like um, I mean, I said earlier we're waiting on some grants to come back.

Um, but at this point it's looking like we won't be able to fully fund everything.

But our goal is to ensure that um every organization that qualifies gets something.

And so we're at the point in the year where we're figuring out how much money we have coming in, and then our at our December board meeting is when we'll um approve or our board will approve those grants, um, and they're they will be notified by the end of the year.

Yeah.

Emily.

What when you say total amount requested in fair market value?

Are you is that the what you're selling it to the So this is the free fare grants, and why I say fair market value is this is not including any discount from Indigo.

This is just the total value.

If if we were to pay full price, if they were to pay full price, it's 475,000 worth of classes.

All right, that's what I'm saying.

Yeah, it gets a little tricky with these numbers when you factor in all the different things.

Um then we also know that with the fare increase next year, these funds will not getting as many transportation days as we have in the past.

So, you know, every year we've been able to show charts of we're growing, we're growing, we're growing.

Um, and so this year I'm just giving you fair warning, it's not gonna look the same.

Um, but that's part of part of our growth as an organization, and um, we're working with our nonprofits to ensure that it's still helping as many people as possible.

And finally, the last one.

Um, so Trans Equity Day, I mentioned earlier, it's February 4th.

That is Rosa Park's birthday.

We don't choose February 4th.

That is her birthday, so that's when we celebrate.

Um this year, or I guess next year in February, we will be moving it well to lunch last year.

We're moving to an afternoon reception, a little bit cheaper that way.

Um, but doing it at the Idol George Museum.

Um, and so it'll include a reception and then presentation.

We'll have, I'm sure Jenny will present and then we'll have a panel discussion like we did last year, kind of folk thinking of this event as our state of transportation equity and moving this event in the future to be a fundraiser, like an event where companies can buy a table and be the place where all the transportation loving people in Indianapolis come together and talk about um where the city's at with that.

Um so this year, or sorry, in February, we'll be having our mobility access fund sponsors, so the donors that support this, and then our nonprofit grantees will get a comp ticket, and then we're asking others to purchase a ticket and then have sponsorships.

So our we'll start promoting that event in the next week, probably or two, maybe right after Thanksgiving.

Definitely by Tuesday, which is giving Tuesday December 2nd, we'll have a newsletter going out that day and a video.

Um, and so we'll be definitely promoting it by then.

That is all I have for you today.

I'm happy to answer any questions.

Um I get a quite well, we only have a statement.

Okay.

Um, as you know, I've sat on a number of not-for-profit boards over the last 20 years.

And it is incredibly important that uh every board member on your board, as well as this board, uh donates to the foundation.

And I can tell you that I've seen hundreds and hundreds of applications come through.

And a lot of times it's almost an automatic no.

If they see that the board members aren't contributing to their own foundation.

And so I would just highly, highly uh recommend that you and your staff talk to your board members.

And I would say the same thing to my fellow board members, and it doesn't matter whether it's $10, $25 something.

And especially in the environment we're in right now, with applications going up amount of money going down.

Everybody, you that's just an easy way just to have them toss our application out.

And it's handcuffing you.

Uh and I'm not telling you you don't know.

But I just think you I appreciate hearing it though.

Keep going.

Well, I'm just saying, I mean, we all want this to be successful.

We put a ton of time and energy into it, and you and your staff has as well.

And uh when these applications are going through these not for profits, you know, I meet with probably two a week anymore, wanting to know what else they can do to be successful.

And I'm not even on the board, they're just asking me for my opinion.

And uh, and it's so competitive right now.

But that's just an almost an automatic way for them to say, okay, you're not even supporting your own uh foundation, so why should we?

So we've been recommending for board members staff or people that are part of this inner circle too.

On our website, we have an option where you can make a monthly gift, and then you don't have to think about it or remember have I given this year yet?

Set that up for 20, 25 bucks a month or 100, whatever you want to do.

Um yeah, that's option, but thank you for bringing that up and encouraging the board to support it.

And I hope the three people you just brought on that you had that discussion with them.

Yep, it's in our board um requirements, and then this year the board um approved a give or get of a thousand dollars for the foundation board.

Okay.

Um so that's the first time that we've ever set an amount.

Um, I've got one quick question about this the Transit Equity Day celebration.

You're noting that you're asking quote other attendees to purchase tickets.

How are you defining an other attendee?

For example, board members that might want to come.

That's what I'm putting out early.

Um we have we're thinking that the presenters we would have complimentary, but any donors that want to attend, um, we invite, we'll invite all of our donors to attend.

Um, but unless they've don't like sponsored specifically this event, um, we are gonna be asking them to buy a ticket.

So this is like a transition year of easy $20 low cost ticket, um, moving into more of a in future years, I don't want to say gala, but like a luncheon type buy a table corporate sponsorship thing.

So is this a fixed cost or is this a suggested donation, or how are we how are we?

Yeah, so when you register online, you're buying a $20 ticket.

Right.

Yeah, okay.

I'm just saying we're not trying, we're not going out of the gate with a hundred dollar ticket for an afternoon reception.

But next next future years, we'll make it there.

Any other questions from board members?

Okay.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Uh with that, uh, we will adjourn tonight's meeting or meeting for November.

And on behalf of myself and staff and the other board members, we'll wish everyone a uh happy Thanksgiving.

And uh please be careful as you travel, because I know this is the biggest travel weekend of the year, and we'll see you all in December for our year end meeting.

We're adjourned.