Good morning again.

We are opening the uh a noticed meeting on JTA.

Um and I would like President Howland, if he would not mind to sort of explain why we're having a notice meeting today and what what is the plan for the future of the financial oversight committee.

Yeah, for certain uh Mr.

Chair.

So we just closed the financial audit and oversight select committee uh and its charge to look at unbilled water capacity fees for JEA.

That's that's now closed.

Um we will likely reopen this committee to now look at JTA matters.

Uh exactly what those matters are are as of yet undetermined.

I mean, as we there's uh uh so many things going on, and we can talk about that today.

Uh we all know first order of business is to stabilize JTA.

There's um now, as per the approved addendum on Tuesday night, there's a um bill out there to begin to do that, which allows uh LOGT funds up to 30 million dollars to be used um to pay down JTA's outstanding 20 million dollar line of credit.

Uh that will be debated during the October first week of committees and then passed um in whatever amended form, likely on October 13th.

Um that is a mechanism for GATA to help stabilize um the operation right now.

But then we're also going to want to look at how we optimize um JTA moving forward and the transfer needs of trans transportation needs of Jacksonville citizens.

That's where potentially working with the administration and JTA together to potentially open up local option gas tax projects again and look at them uh and readjust where we're spending that local option gas tax.

That's where I see we could potentially have um, and I need to determine this probably in the next um few days, uh, scope for the FAO Select Committee, because I think that's probably one of the most important things we can do moving forward to help and work with JTA and the administration to get um investments that people are paying through their gas tax uh into the right transportation for the city of Jacksonville.

So what I anticipate today um if you'd like is just to ask uh JTA where they are in their stabilization plan and then likely their opinion on how LOGT can be adjusted.

Now there's some um discussion with the administration uh about how we do that, but at the very least, that has this has to be a uh kind of cordial and civil collaborative three-way process between JTA, the administration, and and Jacksonville City Council.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Why don't we, since this is a new meeting, let's start with introductions to my far left.

Mary Stefopoulos, Office of General Counsel.

Philip Peterson, Council Auditor.

Brian Parks, Council Auditor's Office.

Ron Salem, group two at large.

Chris Miller at large group five.

Nick Holland at large group three.

So our plan today um is a an approximate thirty plus minutes or so presentation from JTA on many of the issues that President Howland mentioned, sort of to catch us up on what has occurred, uh and a little bit on LOGT, etc.

Um that should leave ample time for questions uh from the council.

Um if we have time, because of the time constraints today, uh, we'll have public comment at the end of the meeting.

Um, but any future meetings we have of of this of the financial oversight committee, assuming President Howland moves forward with some process, we will have public comment at the beginning.

Um but but the the way today is structured, I think it would be difficult, and I want to make sure we get the presentation out there.

So um Mr.

Ferguson, if you want to come up, and what I'm asking the council members, let's get through the entire JTA presentation uh before we have any questions.

That way we can ensure we get all the information.

There's a there's also a slide presentation that we will follow as well.

Mr.

Ferguson.

Thank you very much.

Uh Councilmember uh Salem, Council President Holland, uh Council Member Miller, Councilmember Gay.

Thank you for the opportunity uh to be before you today.

I'm joined by our uh senior vice president of public affairs, Jessica Shepler, our senior vice president and CFO Randall Barnes and our Vice President of Construction and Capital Programs, who will be making the uh presentation updating you on where we are with the LOGT2 uh projects through uh FY27.

Uh and so I am here uh uh quickly to say just thank you so much for the partnership over the last couple of weeks.

Uh it is uh you know certainly uh an incredible moment for the JTA.

In addition to that, we had to look at approximately 21.9 million dollars in reduction in force with respect to our staff, our colleagues, our friends that we've you know worked with for a number of years to uh to meet this uh mandate.

In addition to that, our board approved in July uh the need to uh engage a liquidity facility uh and which we have drawn down 25 million uh to take care of invoices and payroll.

Uh and as a result of that uh we have about a 64 million dollar gap that we had to close uh through uh the uh various uh decisions that we've had to make.

Uh as a result of that, uh we are now uh in the process of focusing on stabilization, and that includes this partnership uh discussion with uh the mayor and city council uh related to the LOGT uh funds that we have collected uh to date of approximately 47 million.

Uh and we are very thankful uh that this legislation was added to the addendum, and we look very much forward to meeting with all of the uh committees uh that have been assigned uh to review uh that bill uh as we move forward.

Uh and so at this juncture uh we have uh separated approximately 33 administrative employees, uh 16 part-time bus operators and 10 full-time operators.

Uh we are uh working uh day by day uh adjusting our schedule for uh the November 2nd service change that will uh ensure that we have a focus on the heaviest uh utilized routes uh in our system uh and uh really focusing on ensuring that those routes are on time uh and uh available uh for our customers, uh, which has uh caused us to make adjustments to nine other routes uh that are less utilized uh uh during the process.

And so we will engage from October 1 to November 1st and having uh the community become more aware of where those routes are, what the schedules are.

I will be intimately involved in those community meetings as we uh move through that process so that we can hit the ground running uh on November 2nd with respect to our service change for the fixed route uh services.

So the uh BRTs, our bus rapid transit routes, uh which are our most extensive routes will continue to run at 20 minute uh intervals.

Uh we have uh the one, three uh and 10 uh that will be adjusted uh for 30 minutes uh and uh make sure that they you know are on time to to meet uh that particular demand, and then there are uh uh nine other routes that uh will be at 60 minutes again to accommodate our focus on uh those routes that are most heavily utilized.

So services first, we are going to protect the service, that is the design uh of this uh service change as we move forward.

Uh, and again uh the ability to partner with the mayor and the city council uh to uh deal with our financial gap to so that we can start uh the beginning of FY27 as uh close as possible to balance.

Uh we this team uh will be focused on ensuring that uh we live within our means uh as we move forward through that process.