Telling you every day okay.

Believe in his feelings, believe in his source.

I sit with stillness.

I'm hearing his voice, telling me okay.

Black of the noise, only steals.

Do you hear his voice?

Telling you okay.

Believe in spirit, believe in his source.

I sit with stillness.

I'm hearing his voice.

Telling me everything's gonna be okay.

Or para discard la agenda de la Junta de hoy.

Visit la pagina web de la ciudad de San Antonio, S.A.K.O.V.

Diagonal TV SA.

Good morning.

The time is now 9.05 a.m.

on April 2nd, 2026, and the meeting of the San Antonio City Council is now called to order.

Madam Clerk, please call roll.

Councilmember Corps.

Councilmember Mickey Rodriguez.

Councilmember Via Gran.

Councilmember Mungia.

Councilmember Castillo.

Here.

Councilmember Galvan.

Here.

Councilmember Alderete Gabito.

Here.

Councilmember Mesa Gonzalez.

Councilmember Spears.

Councilmember White.

Mayor Jones.

Here.

Mayor, we have quorum.

Great.

Thank you.

Councilmember Castillo is recognized to introduce today's invocator.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, and good morning, everyone.

It is with great honor to call up Cody Ford.

Cody and his wife, Julia, co-founded Worthy People, a San Antonio-based nonprofit focused on re-entry support and reducing recidivism as well as prison outreach.

Cody and Julia traveled to prisons with a message to remove the labels of society by accepting all people as Jesus does.

He survived the projects, the foster care system, and life on the streets at 18 years old.

At 20 years old, in the Texas prison system, three years into senten into his sentence, he desired a new way of life.

When he learned his worth in Jesus, it changed him and he never looked back.

Today, Cody and Julia lead the number one podcast in prisons nationwide with over 80 million views, crafting a network of engaging podcast content and ministry connections, both inside and outside of the prison that serve as a robust support system for inmates and their families.

Worthy people is here for the incarcerated their family and the forgotten.

Thank you again for being here today, Cody, and we'll hand it over to you.

All right.

Thank you for having me.

Let us pray.

Heavenly Father, we come before you today with gratitude for the city of San Antonio, a city rich in culture, history, and community.

We thank you for the people who call this place home and for the opportunity to gather and serve for the good of all.

Lord, we lift up our mayor, our city council members, our district representatives, and every elected official entrusted with leadership in this city.

We ask that you give them the wisdom and their decisions, clarity in times of complexity, and unity in moments where differences arise.

A place where families flourish, businesses grow, and communities are strengthened.

A place where people are proud to live, work, and play.

Give these leaders servants' hearts to listen well, to lead with humility, and to always consider the people behind every policy and every vote.

We pray for peace across every neighborhood, for unity across every district, and for a shared vision that moves this city forward.

And it's in Jesus' name that we pray.

Amen.

Thank you for that, Cody.

Please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

One nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Okay.

Hearing none, is there a motion for the approval of the minutes?

Second.

Great.

Okay.

There's a motion and a second.

Please vote.

Okay, the motion carries.

Thank you.

So today is uh we are celebrating National Public Health Week.

I will read a proclamation and then invite Dr.

Jacob with Metro Health to speak.

The City of San Antonio recognizes that the first full week of April marks the observance of National Public Health Week established in 1995 by the American Public Health Association to raise awareness of public health issues and promote initiatives that strengthen and build healthier communities.

And whereas the 2026 theme, Ready Set Action, calls upon each of us to reflect on our individual progress and to commit to taking action to ensure an even healthier future.

And whereas the City of San Antonio Metro Health Department remains dedicated to its vision of healthy people thriving in a healthy community and recognizes that public health requires proactive efforts to prevent the spread of infectious diseases, promote healthy behaviors that enhance quality of life, and protect communities from environmental health health hazards.

And whereas for the third consecutive year, San Antonio has been awarded the 2025 gold medal rating from City Health in recognition of the city's commitment to implementing policies that enhance the health and well-being of its residents.

And whereas San Antonio remains one of only seven cities nationwide and the only city in Texas to receive this prestigious honor for three consecutive years, as recognized, recognized by the De Beaumont Foundation and Kaiser Permanente.

So now, therefore, I, Gina Ortiz Jones, mayor of the city of San Antonio, in recognition thereof, do hereby proclaim April 6th through 12th, 2026 to be national public health week in San Antonio, Texas, and call upon the community to work together because good health does not just happen.

We are all public, we are all public health.

It starts here and it starts with us.

Thank you, Dr.

Jacob.

You're recognized to speak.

Thank you, good morning, Mayor and members of the city council, and thank you, Eric, for the opportunity to be here today.

I'm Dr.

Collar Jacob, Director of Metro Health, and I'd like to recognize our fantastic staff and our valued community partners who are joining us here today and work who work every day to improve the health of our community.

I'd also like to acknowledge Dave Loffy, Texas Director of City Health as a special guest joining us from Austin, as well as Dr.

Adriana Rota Garcia, CEO of the Center for Health Empowerment in South Texas.

Just know that it takes a village to do this work, and each April, communities across the country join the American Public Health Association, also referred to as APHA, to celebrate National Public Health Week.

This is the we've been doing this for over 30 years, and this year's campaign is taking place April 6th through 12th, and it highlights the critical role that public health plays in keeping our communities safe and healthy.

Just know that at Metro Health, as you've heard from the mayor, we are guided by our vision of healthy people thriving in the healthy community.

Our focus, our work focuses on preventing disease, promoting healthier lifestyles, and protecting our residents from environmental and public health risks.

So just know that we know that strong partnerships are essential to this work.

Our team collaborates closely with Bear County, the healthcare systems, the community organizations, schools, and many others to ensure our efforts are impactful and responsive to the community's needs.

Also want to invite the public to join us for our annual public health fest that's taking place next Thursday, April 9th, from 3 to 6 p.m.

at Rosedale Park.

The event is free and will include uh health resources, screenings, immunizations, food demonstrations, and family-friendly activities.

We're also excited that later this fall, the City of San Antonio will host APHA's annual meeting and exposition, bringing public health professionals from across the country to our fair city.

This is a significant opportunity to showcase our work and strengthen partnerships that advance public health nationwide.

So finally, again, I want to thank our incredible staff and members of the public health steering committee for organizing a week of meaningful events in recognition of National Public Health Week again, taking place next week, April 6th through 12th.

So for more information, please check your website.

Um.gov forward slash nphw.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, uh Dr.

Jake.

Would anyone else like to speak?

No.

Okay, great.

And my council colleagues, Councilman Vieck Don.

Thank you.

I uh I do love uh Health Week and uh I do want to encourage everyone to go out.

We've had it, I think at least twice in District Three, and it has always been an amazing time.

And I encourage everyone to get out there to get go ahead and go in and get your blood pressure checked, make sure you do that, and make sure that you're just taking the time to understand that you're a whole person and we have a whole uh a whole lot to take care of from our mental health to our physical health.

And I want to thank you, uh Dr.

Jacobs and the team for every year coming out with the different departments, whether it comes from the uh the toothbrushes to the food portions.

We really look forward to it.

So I'm looking forward to seeing how how the Rosedale Park does with their uh festival, because of course I want it back in District Three, but uh we'll see how that goes.

All right, thank you.

Councilman Mungia.

Maybe next year will be in District 4.

Um and so no, just thank you all so much.

Uh and uh we actually all three of us right here actually had recent uh health fairs in our our own districts, in addition to count uh commissioner Clay Flotas and pre-pandemic, that didn't exist, right?

We weren't talking about that, especially as public officials, and we're doing a lot better job because of your work.

And of course, I couldn't go without mentioning my predecessor, Dr.

Russell Garcia, who's in great work with Chest, uh, and who did a lot of work during the pandemic to bring public health to the forward.

So it starts with you all, and as we have our discussions later in this council, I want us to remember that having healthy kids, having uh health care for folks is where we start for the foundation of our society, really to truly make it safe.

So thank you for your work.

Appreciate it.

Councilwoman Castillo.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Dr.

Jacob and team.

I wanted to briefly thank you all for your work and dedication, but to uh strongly encourage my colleagues to join the Metro Health Department over at Rosedale Park.

It's an event like no other I've seen the city of San Antonio host uh the attendance is beyond any town hall budget town hall uh that I've seen during my tenure on council.

But I highlight that because it demonstrates the need, right?

It's San Antonio residents all throughout the city looking to get connected to resources, activities, and so much more.

And as we navigate the 2026 budget, I think it'll demonstrate the importance and the impact that your department brings to residents of the city of San Antonio and the importance to ensure that we continue to support the Metro Health Department uh as much as we can as we navigate federal changes.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilman Galvan.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Claude, for the wonderful words, and thank you to the entire Metro Health Department for all the work you uh do now and what you've been doing for years and years and years that uh other cities only wish they could do here and have that kind of connected trust in our communities as well, to be able to look out to not only our community health workers, but to anybody in the Metro Health team and understand that they can get uh not only healthcare services but social services too that help uh ensure that they have the foundational needs that they need to be able to thrive here in our city.

I often think about uh of course the budgetary conferences we're gonna have later this year, and wanted to make sure that throughout the community health uh committee conversations, we've been highlighting a lot of the work that Metro Health has been doing that is unfortunately at risk at this time, right, due to national politics and other kind of state funding.

Um, but I'm eager to say, and I feel confident to say that I believe the city of San Antonio, the folks up here will be able to fight tooth and nail to ensure that Metro Health uh will have the funding it needs to preserve many of the programs and hopefully expand too wherever we can to ensure that we're uh supporting the health of our kids, uh our families, our seniors as well, in a whole holistic way, right?

It's not just about the health care acts, it's about the environmental aspects of it, it's about the uh the civic life of folks, it's about the health and recreation of them as well.

And I'll end with this just because I think it's important to remember about this that I have tried to keep in mind uh whenever we talk about this because a lot of folks when I talk to them in the community will say, Well, is that part of maybe the basic uh parts of our city?

And I go, yes.

Section three of our charter, the first paragraph says quite clearly that as needed uh for the government interest, welfare, and good order of the city and the interest of welfare, health, morals, comfort, safety, and convenience of its habitants, we have the abilities here to invest in our health system.

And so that's how we do it, Metro Health.

And so I'm just grateful to have you here.

Uh not only public health week, but year-round.

Thank you.

Councilwoman Mesa Gonzalez.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, everybody.

Uh uh on Metro, I'm sorry, the Metro Health Public Health Week.

Sorry, lost my my words for a minute.

Uh, just wanted to thank you for all the work that you guys are doing.

Uh District 8 is home to the medical center, and so making sure that we keep that a priority is important to myself and the residents of District 8.

Um, so April 30th, we are working with Metro Health uh Jesse Higgins on a teen mental health town hall with UT San Antonio, Metro Health, our San Antonio Youth Commission, and SAPD.

So look forward to that event, and thank you for all the work you're doing in our community.

Okay, great.

Thank you so much.

I want to um, Claude, you do great work.

And a lot of your work is buttressed by federal funding, half of your budget being federal funding.

And so we know, as man as I already alluded to, when we look at the budget, when we look at um uh the Medicaid 1115 waiver program that will end here shortly.

Um I am proud to hear some of my colleagues already thinking um as we have had these conversations, not only about how do we close that gap, not just the funding, but the real consequences of that and what that means for the trajectory of not only kids going to school but kids showing up to work healthy.

Um that's not an insignificant amount of money, eight million dollars is if I have that correct.

As we're also anticipating the impacts of the cuts uh due to the one big beautiful bill, Medicare, Medicaid, chip, and SNAP.

And again, it's not just our awareness of the money that is not coming into our community, but our understanding of who it's impacting, who it's disproportionately impacting, what assumptions we're making about who may or may not be able to help us cover down in that, um, and certainly how then do we offset potentially offset some of those things and in the budget, but then also communicate, unfortunately, things we're not going to be able to offset.

And how do we understand what that means uh for the long-term health of our community?

I think it's also important, you know, as we have an opportunity here uh later on this year, we'll we we will review our economic development policy.

And it will require us at the local level to help us ourselves as much as possible.

We have to think not only of the consequences of the cuts that I just talked about, but also the rollback of protections, the endangerment clause, for example, with the EPA and what that means to our air quality and thus what it means to the public health of our young kids in in particular.

Um, I was just at the port probably a couple of weeks ago, and um the port, uh Port San Antonio, it's great to see the good work that Standard Arrow and Boeing does there.

Um I was uh maybe not super surprised, but I was shocked to hear about the investments that they themselves are having to make in their own medical care.

Um, as when you look at the workforce, for example, of Boeing and others, um, it's a different caliber of health uh than in other communities.

And so that rests on all of us as we think not only of of the health investments, but also then the the economic development um asks and cut and considerations we should be including.

So again, my my hats off to you for the good work that you all do.

Thank you for recognizing this important week, and thank you for always keeping this topic at the forefront.

Thank you, everybody.

Thank you.

This month is also Fair Housing Month.

Um, so I'm proud to read a proclamation as well.

Oops.

The City of San Antonio recognizes the Fair Housing Act enacted on April 11th, 1999, 1968, excuse me, which enshrined into federal law the goal of eliminating racial racial segregation and ending housing discrimination in the United States.

And whereas the Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination in housing lending and insurance based on race or color, religion, sex, national origin, familial status, or disability, and commits recipients of federal funding to further equal access to fair housing in their communities.

And whereas the City of San Antonio is committed to the mission and intent of Congress to provide fair and equal housing opportunities for all residents, and whereas diverse and inclusive communities strengthen our social fabric, economy, health, and environment, and whereas discrimination and other barriers to quality, affordable housing opportunities persist more than 50 years after the passage of the Fair Housing Act, and such barriers are repugnant to a common sense of decency and fairness.

Now, therefore, I, Gina Ortiz Jones, mayor of the City of San Antonio, in recognition thereof, do hereby proclaim April 2026 to be fair housing month 2026 in San Antonio, Texas.

I think this is a particularly uh timely topic, and frankly, we understand the intersections between housing and public health.

Uh just yesterday, in fact, we discussed a um uh an ordinance that would have um provided protections to uh protect against source of income discrimination for veterans.

You'll hear when I when I read through who the Fair Housing Act uh prohibits discrimination against, you did not hear veterans.

You did not hear veterans.

And unfortunately, um that is continues to be a significant um source of angst and frustration um in here here in Military City USA.

Um and so I am thankful for the work of groups like American GI Forum uh that have um shown the way uh communities like Fort Worth that have also demonstrated that it is a possible, in fact, uh to pass to pass an ordinance to prohibit discrimination on the based on the use of a veteran using a voucher.

So I know that ordinance is going to uh it had will make its way to PCDC and will exit quickly to ensure that we are not needlessly discriminating against veterans for one day any longer than needed.

Um I will now recognize Councilmember Castillo to speak.

Thank you, Mayor.

Grateful to hear yesterday a consensus from council to support the non-discrimination orderance and ordinance to support veterans.

But as we know, for much of the 20th century, housing discrimination was deeply entrenched across America, especially in San Antonio, where the history of redlining continues to impact our public schools, our public housing, and overall community investment.

This month, it's not just about observing historic legislation, it's also about challenges that continue to work towards affiliate affordability, accessibility, and addressing systemic inequality.

We must acknowledge those who work towards these ideals year-round, from NHSD and their fair housing team to the San Antonio Housing Trust and their successful tenant protection policy for all of our housing advocates and organizers.

I'm grateful for Veronica Garcia and her NHS team, as well as Justin Hawley and uh Councilmember Leo Angiano Castillo and from of Thrive Youth Center and the Housing Commission.

Uh, if you all can join us at the podium to share a couple of words, we'd greatly appreciate it.

It's a little chilly in here.

But good morning, and thank you to uh city council for recognizing Fair Housing Month.

As we all know, the Fair Housing Act of 1968 was a very critical and necessary step.

It was about opening doors and creating access where there had been barriers for far too long.

It made it illegal to discriminate in housing based on race, color, religion, sex, and I want to emphasize sex here or national origin.

And while we recognize how important that moment was, we also have to be honest about where we are today.

Because for a lot of young people, especially the youth we serve, access to safe housing is still not always guaranteed.

At Thrive Youth Center, we work with LGBTQ plus youth who are navigating housing instability every single day.

And many of them didn't just lose housing, they were pushed out of it.

LGBTQ plus youth are also overrepresented in our homeless population, not because of who they are, but because of rejection, discrimination, and systems that weren't built with them in mind.

So when we talk about discrimination based on sex, we have to be clear that those protections must include LGBTQ plus youth, because when they don't, our young people are the ones who pay the price.

And even that isn't enough to meet the need that we're seeing every single day.

At a time when protections are being questioned and rolled back, moments like this matter even more because fair housing isn't just a policy issue, it's a human issue.

And it's about whether a young person has a safe place to sleep, whether they feel affirmed in that space, and whether they have a real chance at a future.

And so the Fair Housing Act created a foundation, but our work is about making those protections real, especially for LGBTQ plus youth who are still being pushed to the margins.

And at Thrive, we're proud to be part of that work to close that gap.

And we will always be that space where young people are not just housed, but respected, supported, and able to show up as their full selves.

So, yes, today is a celebration, but it's also a reminder that equity in housing isn't just finished.

And it's on all of us to keep pushing forward until every young person has not just a safe place to stay, but a place where they belong.

Because housing is more than just a roof.

It's safety, it's dignity, and for many of our youth, it's the difference between surviving and actually having a future.

Thank you.

Thank you.

In closing, sorry in closing, uh, as the council member mentioned, as we ground ourselves in history and understand the ways in which systems uh oftentimes get proposed under the guise of progress, and we see the perpetuation of inequity across the city.

Uh, I would be uh remiss if I didn't highlight right the ways in which actions we take today um can impact and perpetuate those systems, and highlighting um one of our strategic housing limitation partners, Opportunity Home, uh, and how they voted to approve their ready to work program to eradicate public housing.

Uh, this is the trend that we've seen all throughout the United States and how it impacts and increases homelessness across the city and creates more barriers to access to housing to support our housing partners.

So um with that being said, right, I would uh hope and request the mayor not support a letter of recommendation to Opportunity Home to support the eradication of public housing.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you all.

Councilman Via Gadon Thank you.

Thank you so much, and thank you for um we understand that this is historic, that we have made some progress, but we what we don't want to do is go back and thank you for bringing up um the issue of discrimin discriminating based on sex, because uh as we know, the L LGBTQ are facing it, women are facing it, uh people identify as women are facing it, um, and we need to continue to move forward.

And with your efforts and working together, I think that we can continue to make sure that we get people in housing and in homes, and um and we can sound the alarm if we see people are discriminating and banks or discriminating against those trying to get loans, couples trying to get loans, because we we are needing to pay attention to what's going on here and uh completely in support.

We the councilwoman brought up redlining, and they used to do that based on region, used to do that based on color.

But I think we're seeing a red line, red lines come in based on um how you identify, how you um where you spend your money, what you what you done and how you served.

So I think that is key is as we move forward, and we do have some great legislation right now, uh policy right now to discuss with the veterans that we remember all the groups that are currently being redlined and pushed to the side.

So thank you for your efforts.

I look forward to working with you guys on the housing trust, and as we find that missing middle, and as we make sure that we we get people into homes and we get people feeling secure on where they're staying.

Thank you.

Councilman Mungia Councilman, we miss you.

Justin, good to see you.

Uh, thank you for the work that you do at Thrive and across the community.

You're doing some of the most important work across the city, which is making sure that kids and young adults have a home and a safe place simply for being who they are.

Uh and as you said, a lot of folks are forced out of their home for um being honest about themselves, and it's a true tragedy in the society that we have.

Um so public housing, fair housing is is very important, and thank you for your work on the supply task force also.

That's something we're trying to do, right?

Making sure that certain populations that are kind of missed throughout our our society and our housing uh are thought of and have a safe place to live.

Um and having a stable home, having health care are the true literal foundations of public safety across our city.

So I think we should also remember that as we have our discussion today.

But thank you all for your work uh and look forward to continue working with you all.

Thank you.

Councilman Galvan.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you for recognizing the Fair Housing Month this month.

I mean, uh something that I always uh find interesting about Fair Housing Month and the Act itself in the 68, was that it was the most and continues to be historically the most filibustered bill in all of United States Senate history.

Because it's one thing to say everyone should have a place to live.

Everyone deserves dignity.

One thing to say everyone should be able to have access to this.

It's another thing to actually deliver upon it.

And the act was intended to ensure that every city in America, every place in our country was able to find housing, create housing for people, no matter their age, no matter their uh their sex, their origin, all the above.

And they didn't because there's a lack of enforcement on there, and often it was because of decisions made at the local levels.

Because decisions made worried about racial concerns, quote unquote, worried about uh non-discrimination overall.

What about changing the culture here in our communities?

Finally turning back against the redlining that we'd seen here in our city and across the country, and about actually delivering results for our communities.

Could we imagine what this what this country and what our city would look like if we were able to actually deliver on these things, not only in that 68, but all throughout, instead of turning away as our country did in 1971.

That's still the history that we have to deal with today.

And I'm grateful to be in this in the struggle for better housing across our across our city to ensure that people are able to afford to live here in our city as we continue to grow.

That's a commitment we have to continue to make and push back on that history, right?

And say instead of being the cities that uh resisted and fought against uh integration and delivering on actual housing and being able for people to live anywhere in our city, that we actually do that.

We actually deliver upon it.

Um and so I want to say thank you to Leo, thank you to Justin for all the work you're doing every single day, all the organizations that continue to push um for fair housing in our city and understand that it's not just affordable housing, right?

It's also it's not just vouchers, it's not just uh homeownership subsidies, it's all those things and public housing too.

So all that to be said, uh very grateful for the conversation today and the recognition of it.

Uh and thank you again for the comments.

And we uh miss you up here, Leo.

Hopefully, hopefully uh we can get two tax arising folks back up here one day.

And Justin, again, incredible work and grateful to all of the conversations we've been able to have and continue supporting the work that you all do and Thrive.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilman Aldrette Gavito.

Thank you.

Um I just wanted to thank uh my colleague, Councilman Terry Castillo for highlighting this.

Uh it is important.

And I also do want to thank you, Leo and Justin, because um I couldn't have said it better uh than Councilman Galvan, but it it is that work of making these protections real, and like how you said housing is safety.

Um that takes consistent, you know, um consistent work every single day, and it's tough work, and y'all are in the midst of it.

And so just thank you for pushing the rock on this for us, um, chipping away at the rock.

Uh, we we need it, and um, and we're here to support you.

Thank you.

Veronica, if you'd like to come up and say a few words.

Wonderful.

Thank you, Councilwoman Castillo for highlighting this item.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, I'm Veronica Garcia, I'm the director for our neighborhood and housing services department.

During Fair Housing Month, we celebrate the progress we've made to help people find affordable housing, as well as the work that remains ahead to ensure that housing is accessible for all people in San Antonio.

This week we did thank you, Mayor, for highlighting the uh progress we've made with our affordable housing bond.

We just celebrated that we now have over 3,000 homes completed with the bond and an additional over thousand more that are in progress.

Ensuring fair access to the housing that we are preserving and producing is very critical.

Affordable housing strengthens neighborhoods, ensuring families can stay close to work in school and close to the people that they are their support system.

Our team provides services to over 1,000 households every year.

We help renters understand their rights and responsibilities.

We help mediate tenant and landlord issues such as leasing issues or make repairs to their home.

We help homeowners buy their first home through mortgage counseling services, home buyer classes, and offering up to $30,000 in down payment assistance.

For families that are facing a mortgage crisis, we work directly with the homeowners and their financial institutions, helping them restructure payments so they don't lose their home.

We also um this month invite the community to join us at a renters' rights workshop, our property tax help sessions kick off this month, um, and we have so many more other educational opportunities.

We ask them to share our resources, share flyers with each other.

Uh fair housing is a community responsibility, and we work well beyond this month.

Our team, our city, our fellow departments are here every day to help families find housing and stay housed.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Veronica, for again the hard work that you and your team do every single day.

Thank you, um Justin and Leo.

Justin, thank you uh for serving as my um appointee on on that the commission, the housing commission.

Um, I also want to thank you for your contributions to the uh special supply housing task force uh that I established and had um make made sure it was working through uh PCDC.

Um that includes not only um certainly making sure that we've got housing supply for our LGBTQ youth, but also for seniors, those with disabilities, um, and of course our veterans.

So thank you for your contributions to that.

Um I I do want to make sure that I um frankly thank and and congratulate the team at Opportunity Home for the good work that they've done.

Um, the moving to work plan is an important step in the right direction.

And I've thought about this issue not only for our community, but also my own personal experience.

Uh it was a Section 8 voucher that allowed us to live in a place that was safe and that was clean.

Um, it was not a concentration of poverty.

Um, and I have seen some of the housing projects and I visited some of the housing projects, and unfortunately, we cannot say that for some of the supply in our community.

Um, we are in fact the last big city in Texas that has not even started this process.

Communities like El Paso are already done.

When I talked to mayors across the United States of America, they were done with this 20 years ago.

20 years ago.

Um so moving forward uh to reposition and ensure uh that folks have a safe, clean, affordable place to live, which is what they will have.

It makes a lot of sense, and I look forward to supporting that.

Okay.

Um it is also National Poetry Month.

I will now read a proclamation for National Poetry Month.

The City of San Antonio recognizes that for more than 25 years, the N the American Academy of Poets has celebrated April as National Poetry Month to increase awareness of the importance of poetry and encourage the reading, writing, and performance of poetry.

And whereas San Antonio is a community known for the vitality of its arts and culture, including the literary arts, and whereas in 2012, San Antonio became the first major Texas city to appoint a poet laureate, and the city's Department of Arts and Culture launched the National Poetry Month San Antonio Initiative to promote poetry readings, workshops, spoken word and slam competitions, and other community activities throughout the month of April.

And whereas for 12 years, Viva Pocia has been has been held at Mission Marquis Plaza next to the historic Mission San Jose and serves as the city's official kickoff event for the National Poetry Month San Antonio, taking place this year on Saturday, April 11th.

Now, therefore, I, Gina Ortiz Jones, mayor of the city of San Antonio, in recognition thereof, do hereby proclaim April 2026 to be National Poetry Month here in San Antonio, Texas.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Council.

It's a great joy to be here this morning to celebrate National Poetry Month.

Such a big joy that I brought my family here from Ohio.

My niece, who's 10, my nephew who's seven, are in the audience on spring break.

So after this, we're gonna go enjoy some great uh poetry throughout the community.

Uh National Poetry Month did begin in 1996 and has since blossomed into one of the largest literary celebrations in the world, reminding us that poetry doesn't sit quietly on a page.

In San Antonio, we live and breathe poetry.

All April we are celebrating the Lurry literary arts with more than 65 events throughout the city.

From dynamic poetry slams to moving performances and conversations that reflect the rich, unmistakable voice of San Antonio.

We hope that you can join us uh for the 12th annual Viva Poesia event held at historic Mission Marquee Plaza, as the mayor said it is on April 11th from 6 to 10 p.m.

And that's also the San Antonio Book Festival Day, so just have an entire day of literary arts.

This year's theme uh is Dose Voces Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Poetry, and it celebrates 250 years of our nation's journey through powerful voices, bold stories, and a whole lot of creativity.

So if anybody would like to follow along and join us at these events, you can visit sa.gov/slash arts.

We're on all social media platforms at Git Creative SA.

And now I really am excited to invite some inspiration and poetry to your morning by uh welcoming San Antonio's poet laureate Eduardo Eddie Vega to the sta uh to the stand.

Thank you.

Good morning.

I um looked all over my files and could not find what I read last year, so I had to write a new poem.

This poem is dedicated to you, Madam Mayor, to you, the rest of the city council, to the departments of arts and culture, visit San Antonio, Parks and Recreation, the World Heritage Office, the Fiesta Commission, the Bear County Sheriff's Office, the Red Enchilada Library, the Fiesta the San Antonio Spurs, the San Antonio Missions, both the baseball team and the actual missions, the taco truck on St.

Mary Street that doesn't even open till 9 p.m., the Riverwalk, the Almost Park HE B, the Boots at North Star, the Tower in King William that looks like it's giant chess piece, the quarry, the ghost trucks, the Stone Oak, La Cantera, Las Palmas, Las Chili Queens, the does a sell candy apples at the street corners, the kids that sell banana bread at the gas stations, the people that sell Easter blankets and Dallas Cowboy blankets and Easter baskets and Dallas Cowboy blankets on just about every other street, all the paleteros, eloteros, taqueros, mild embusteros, and all the people who, when asked, are you ready, respond with Yamero?

This Burrough San Antonio poem is for you.

For the woman and her grandson at the bus stop on Mary Louise, for the man that fixes flat tires on Culebra, for the skaters at Rosedale, the handball players at Cassiano, the pickleball players near New UTSA for every soccer mom, every cheer dad and every sibling sitting on a sideline somewhere just waiting for this game to end.

For every human seeking refuge and sanctuary and hope.

For any and all dealers of pupusas, falafels, crispy dogs, spring rolls, egg rolls, sushi rolls, pizza rolls, cinnamon rolls, and Phyllis Ochoa, who reminds us that this is San Antonio, where we roll, where we roll, where we roll.

Yeah.

Poetry is found all over the city.

It moved to the beat of a taco truck spatula, dances to the tunes of Flacco and Augie, stands at attention at Fort Sam, marches down MLK, strolls the rainbow sidewalk.

It's a grito from Campanas de America and spread as far and wide as Victor Wembbanama's arms.

This is a city of poetry of Jesse Cardona's Pandulce and Anthony Flores' huevos rancheros.

Amalia brings the punk out.

Garman tells us a story.

Volcab sings her words.

Octavio paints them.

Jenny carries them abroad.

Lauriane reminds us where they came from.

And Naomi tells us how beautiful we all are.

This is a city of poetry.

From the payaya to the friars, the missionars to the fighters, the Natuka to Velasquez to Popovich.

We live in a legacy of verbal warriors and wordsmiths, myth makers and truthsayers.

We will always remember the heroes of the Alamo, so long as you never forget the horrors of Jim Crow.

Tragedy does not triumph here.

Injustice does not weigh us down.

We are a city of love, of joy, of fiesta of blooming Mount Laurels and singing Censantles.

We are San Antonio.

We are a city of poetry.

Thank you.

Councilman Viegran.

Thank you.

Thank you, Eddie.

And my favorite poem still is I bring it up every time is the paleta man.

He is our superman here in San Antonio.

I invite you out.

Poetry is amazing.

It is one of those things that speak.

I have been on the stage, so I invite my council members out and have been inspired by Eddie and Anthony the poet to just create a poem, a poem right there as I stood on stage about mission marquees.

So please come out and share.

It's very um cathartic to hear these uh these poems and these young people and reflect on the universe and love being the universe.

So please come out to Viva Poesia.

We are very proud of this event.

Um it's a great way.

And I do ask that my council colleagues prepare a poem and come out and share.

Uh this crowd is very forgiving, so it does not need to rhyme either.

And I am looking at you, Jalen, because I know you can you can put something out that's that can rhyme too.

So um please come out.

Thank you so much.

Crystal, thank you for continuing to move this forward.

And uh, as we move forward, just remember arts, culture, that this is why we we live, and this is where we're why we're here.

So thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilman Mungia.

I would love for all of us to do a poem and have you judge it honestly.

Uh no, but thank you, uh Mr.

Vega, and Kelly says hello to you.

And uh, I just know that you're such an inspiration to your students, also, uh, as well as being a creative artist.

So thank you for uplifting us every time you come here, and maybe we have a special spot for you when times get tough you can give us a poem and lighten the mood a little bit.

But and thank you, Crystal, for recognizing this in our community, and there's so much to um so much poetry around the city that we need to be aware of.

So thank you all for that.

Appreciate it.

Councilmember Castillo.

Thank you, Eddie.

I will now have this San Antonio anthem song stuck in my head for the rest of the day.

What does it sound like?

He did a good job.

No, but with that being said, I just wanted to thank you, Eddie, for your work, and I always highlight the story.

I believe it was about 15 years ago at Body Obada Stuff or a spoken word night.

Uh, I got to see you perform one of your poems, and I don't remember the title, and I always forget, but it's the number of a bus.

Uh, and at the time I always highlight how I didn't get my driver's license till like about three months before being elected a council member.

So that was a poem that resonated for many reasons, right?

Because the story within your poem of what you're observing along the route was just so powerful and something that's always stuck with me.

So just want to thank you for your work and sharing with us this morning, and then of course, um encourage folks to go to the event in district three.

I had an opportunity to go believe a couple years ago, and I read a poem from Sao Hernandez, an award-winning poet here in San Antonio as well.

Um so just a great event and encourage folks to go uh visit in District Three.

Thank you.

Councilmember Galvan Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Crystal, for bringing this uh up to the council today, and thank you, Eddie, for all the things that you've done uh to inspire not only your students but everyone here in our city.

And I do agree with Councilman Mughia's statement.

Uh we need you here more often, frankly.

Um, because I think something that we uh maybe goes unsaid or whatever it may be, uh maybe is left out is when we talk about the arts overall, right?

It's always a kind of conversation of well, maybe it's a nice to have, it's a nice thing for someone else to look at, etc.

etc.

But it's quite literally the the foundation of who we are as humans, right?

Particularly the art of the spoken word and the written word is not only uh something that we just express ourselves with, but it's how we connect to each other.

It's how we move folks to do things and to inspire them to do things as well, inspire ourselves to do something.

When we talk about all the other we should talk about today, public health week, right?

The connections our community health workers make every single day is through the art of the spoken word and those commitments and that trust that's built with that.

The inspiration to have that person finally say, you know what, I will go see how I can address my diabetes.

To bring someone in and say, you know what, I will find a way to work to build uh a better community for our each other, and so that there's probably uh quality health in that conversation too.

We talk about fair housing.

The only reason the Fair Housing Act was passed was because of immense civil rights organizing that took place immediately after, a week later, after MLK uh passed away and was killed.

And it was because of the art of spoken word, because of the art uh of the written word as well, of the advocacy that comes with that to push people here on the dies to do things and even what we do with each other, right?

So I just wanted to leave that there uh just because I think it's you know, poetry, I think is the most beautiful form of it, but it's the practice of doing that too that gives uh folks like us the ability to then make decisions and push and our residents too to do the same thing that can change our entire city and structures and cultures here.

Thank you, Mayor.

Councilmember Altate Gavito.

Thank you.

Um gosh, I have to follow you again.

Wow.

This is hard.

Mic drop.

Um, no, thank you, Crystal, for all your efforts.

Thank you, Eddie, for um exciting us today and and treating us with that.

All of us were laughing, um, and just giggling, you know, just because you're just drawing out memories um of San Antonio for all of us.

So thank you so much for for that.

Uh, you know, my nephew uh Joe was in a little poetry slam the other day, and it was so cute to see him reading poetry in his Spurs jersey.

So I love that it's passing on from tradition to tradition.

And um, Councilwoman Via Gran, maybe my girls and I will take you up.

I'm not sure you want me to write a poem, but but um I'm open to taking them out there and and listening in on that.

So thank y'all so much for sharing that with us.

Thank you.

Councilwoman Messa Gonzalez.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, thank you for your words and celebrating National Poetry Month.

I just wanted to highlight an event that we're having in District 8.

Uh the Poetry Circle at Igo Branch Library, uh, April 20, April 20th from 6 p.m.

to 7 p.m.

Thank you.

Great.

Okay, we'll move on to um points of personal privilege.

I'll recognize Councilmember Spears for two points of personal privilege.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, I want to start by honoring the life of my friend Bob Bruce, who passed away earlier this week.

He is a well-known San Antonio resident, and uh he cared deeply about his community and the people in it.

He was known for being engaged, candid, and willing to step into conversations that many would avoid.

He believed that everyday residents uh deserve to understand and have a voice and decisions that affected them.

He brought the same mindset to his public surface service, including his role on the Bear County Appraisal District Board of Directors.

In that role, he worked to represent taxpayers and advocate for transparency and accountability.

Bob has also also spent many years in business here in San Antonio and building relationships and contributing to the local economy.

But more than any title or role, he will be remembered for his presence in the community and his willingness to stay involved.

He was a man of faith and family and conviction.

And those who knew him remember a man who is direct, thoughtful, and unafraid to speak his mind.

He had a genuine desire to do what he believed was right for San Antonio.

And on behalf of District 9 and the city of San Antonio, I extend our sincere condolences to his family and friends and all who knew him.

His contributions to this community will not be forgotten.

I will miss his radio voice, his friendship.

So please keep his wife Nancy and their family and your prayers.

Thank you.

But on to uh I want to recognize April as distracted driving awareness month and highlight the unimportant effort happening right here in our community at Johnson High School, who many have joined us here today.

Do y'all want to stand up for a second?

Thank you for coming out.

A special call out to Melinda Cox, who started this initiative.

They participate in an eyes on the road initiative that brings attention to the very real dangers of distracted driving.

This is especially important for young drivers who are just beginning to build lifelong habits behind the wheel.

A quick glance at a phone or a moment of distraction can have life-altering consequences, not just for the driver, but for everyone on the road.

What makes this effort meaningful is that it is peer-driven and rooted in awareness, responsibility, and care for one another.

This these students are stepping up to lead by example and to remind all of us to be more mindful when we get behind the wheel.

I want to thank the students, faculty, and community partners at Johnson High School for taking this issue seriously and for helping to keep our roads safer.

I encourage everyone in our community to take this message to heart.

Put the phone down, stay focused, and keep your eyes on the road.

Small decisions behind the wheel make a big difference.

So thank y'all for coming down here through the heavy rain and making it.

And we really appreciate all your hard work and effort and taking the lead.

So thank you very much.

Thank you.

First off, I'd like to invite the family of the beloved Doris Griffin here with us today and call them up to the podium, if you don't mind.

On December 25th, 2025, at 95 years of age, San Antonio Law is one of the most impactful women our community has ever seen, Miss Doris Griffin.

I'm humbled today to be on to be able to honor Doris, who truly was larger than life.

My office prepared the following certificate of recognition for Doris' family.

Day after day, she was instrumental in advocating for the needs of older adults, ensuring that they maintained access to support and services needed to live an active, healthy, and fulfilling life, and always with, and she did so always with grace.

Her outstanding achievements and success will endure for generations.

Doris lived a long and full life, with much of her time being dedicated to family, travel, faith, and her service to our community.

Advocating for older adults was her calling.

Her efforts changed the landscape for aging people in San Antonio.

She worked for 27 years as the executive director of the Jefferson Community Outreach for Older People or the Jeff Co-op, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars to support older adults.

She also co-chaired the City County Joint Commission on Elderly Affairs representing District 7, served 12 terms in the Texas Silver Haired Legislator, and co-hosted a TV program called Live Longer and Love It.

In 2015, her contributions were formally recognized by the Wellmade Charitable Foundation and the City of San Antonio when the Doris Griffin Senior One Step Center was named after her.

She never wavered in her commitment, and we all know that she did it in style.

Doris was always known for showing up with a pair of high heels, and that was her iconic signature look.

And she told me constantly, girl, don't stop wearing your heels.

So I'm not.

To know Doris was to love her, and I'm sure no one feels her absence more than her family.

I want to express my sincere gratitude to the Doris Doris's family for sharing her with the community for all these years.

Her impact and legacy will be felt for years to come.

Let's please give a round of applause applause for the life of Doris Griffin.

And and if y'all if y'all would like to say a few words.

Well, I'm Joy, and as you see, I am not wearing my heels, so I can't follow after her words.

But I want to thank the City of San Antonio and the city council, and especially Marina.

I know my mom worked tirelessly with the District 7.

And I would like to also recognize friends of my mom that came to support her today.

But we are very proud and honored that y'all uh recognized her for all her hard work.

She loves seniors more than anything, but she would help anybody of all age.

The minute she heard somebody had a need, she was in action.

And it took a village to do it.

But I'd like to also recognize um Marina's mom, Chris Alderetti.

She was uh co-host with my mom, or my mom was co-host with her on the Live Longer and Love It.

Can you come up?

And then Jenny Brown is from OASIS Continuing Education.

And I said to her, I said, Oh wow, you're getting a proclamation.

She said, No, I'm here for your mom.

So I'm really proud of that.

And Kelly.

And then is Peaches here?

Yeah.

Peaches Hall is the director at the at the Doris Griffin One Stop Senior, and she brought a whole van of seniors today, so I would like to honor them too.

Come on up, guys.

Again, we appreciate you honoring my mom, and we love her and we miss her, and we know that she's up in heaven helping seniors up there too if they need it.

Yeah, come on in, guys.

Y'all want to see me on one comment?

One way.

Thank you, guys.

Thanks for being here.

Doris.

Thank you.

Thank you guys.

Thank you.

Today I also have the privilege of helping kick off Child Safe's Cardboard Kids Reveal Day.

Thank you so much to Randy McGibney, president and CEO, and Louis Guzman, Chief Development Officer, for being here with us today.

Y'all can come up to the podium.

This is uh the third year of a in a row that I've had the honor of kicking off this day at council.

I'm excited to keep this tradition alive.

Child Safe is Bear County's designated children's advocacy center, which coordinates services and support for children and adolescents traumatized by abuse, neglect, or exploitation.

In 2014, Child Safe created Cardboard Kids, a citywide public awareness campaign to draw attention to the pervasiveness of child abuse and the fact that every story is different and every child is unique.

The campaign serves as a start to an often difficult conversation around child abuse because staying silent can mean more suffering for a child.

Cardboard kids are the cute cardboard figures you see all around town every spring.

They represent the one of the thousands of children that are abused and neglected in Bear County each year.

Every year, Reveal Day is celebrated the first week of April, coinciding with the start of child abuse prevention month.

I want to give a huge thank you to Child Safe for the crucial work you all do in our community.

There is nothing more precious than our children, and it's on all it's upon all of us to keep them safe and make sure they are heard every day when they reach out for help.

I'll turn it over to Randy to say a few words.

Thank you, Councilwoman.

I really appreciate you having us out here.

You know, I I look at you guys holding up these cardboard kids, and I I've been listening to the poetry earlier and the family that we just honored, and I'm just reminded about the collectiveness of everyone and what it takes to create change inside of our community.

And so I'm honored to be here as your special guest again and to be able to speak to the diocese.

So many of you guys have come out to our organization, has spent a little bit of time with us to learn a little bit about us and and who we are.

Many of you guys have personally sponsored the Cardboard Kids campaign to launch this year, so this is something we can't do without the community and without our civic leaders and support of our civic leaders in our community.

You know, we started Cardboard Kids.

I I want to say it was 2012.

I've been with Child Safe for 16 years, and I we started it in 2012 as a way to raise awareness around Child Abuse Prevention Month.

Um the first year we distributed about 6,500 cardboard kids, and that was really to recognize the confirmed victims of child abuse that we had in Bear County for that that particular year.

Um over the years, we've we've given out, I think, 1.2 million uh cardboard kids throughout the community over 12 years, I think it's been.

Um but I want to go back to that 6500 number real quick because what you'll see now today, uh I was le at the CASA reflaying ceremony on Friday, and they made the announcement that we've we've have a confirmation in Bear County of 4500 cardboard kids, and that's a misnomer.

Um a couple of years ago, the Texas legislation changed the definition of neglectful supervision inside of the state of Texas and made it a little bit more difficult for CPS to confirm victims of child abuse.

And I want to I want to stipulate this.

I think it's important to point out.

Just because there's a confirmation doesn't necessarily mean that there's a removal of a child inside of a home.

A confirmation means that we need to work with that family to engage that family to ensure that that family receives the actual services that they need so that that child can stay inside of the home.

Coupled with the reflaying ceremony, what they're doing there is they're honoring the number of children that have died as a result of abuse and neglect in our community.

Thirteen children were honored on Friday outside of our courthouse.

Um that number is astounding to me because it's been a number of years since we've been that high at 13.

It's usually seven, eight, nine children that I've seen.

And I can't help but believe it's a direct correlation to the change in the legislation that we decided to make to make it more difficult to engage these families early on during neglectful supervision.

68% of the children who die in our community from child abuse and neglect die as a result of neglectful supervision.

These cases get more serious as they progress, and now that we can't engage with these families earlier on in the process, we're seeing the acuity of these cases come through our door raise every single day.

I work very, very closely with the sheriff's office.

I see Sheriff here today.

I work very closely with law enforcement, the DA's office as well.

They're actually housed.

Many of those Sheriff Salazar has a number of investigators housed at our facility as long with us along with SAPD and the Department of Family Protective Services.

And many of those individuals sit on our board.

And their talk about the acuity of these cases and how serious this issue is in San Antonio.

So if we're gonna change this, if we're going to put a dent in this issue, this is a this is a scourge on our community.

It's gonna take civic leaders like yourselves.

It's gonna take days like today where we do reveal day, where we hold up cardboard kids, and we begin to change the narrative around this thing.

The children who sit at home and they're suffering in silence from abuse aren't gonna speak out unless us as leaders inside the community raise our cardboard kids.

We celebrate today as reveal day, and we change the narrative to say it's okay for you to come forward.

It's okay for you to say no, it's okay for you to protect your body.

So I thank you guys.

Thank you so very much for the opportunity to be here to celebrate today as reveal day.

Thank you for being for allowing us to be your special guest today.

I really, really appreciate you guys.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Thank you, Renhee.

Thank you.

The next item is the city manager's report.

Eric, do you have a report today?

Yes, ma'am, thank you, Mayor.

Uh, three items.

Um the first, uh, shared a memo with the council earlier this week, but I wanted to make sure the full council was aware of an item that was presented at the March 20th audit committee of this uh this month.

Uh I am proud to share that for the eighth year in a row, uh the city's external auditors have produced a report of no findings in our FY2025 end of year external financial uh report.

Uh this is an independent review of our financial statements and how we manage our financial records.

It's an annual required uh audit of those records uh and accounts and was completed by an independent external audit group.

You know, given the size and complexity of our organization, uh this is a significant accomplishment for uh to have uh no audit findings or um in any given year, but uh we have achieved it over an eight-year period.

You all know we manage a wider range of services, operations, complex projects, different types of revenue with different types of rules.

Um the annual financial report is uh is located on our city's website um and is used extensively for rating agencies and investors.

So I wanted to recognize um and thank uh the entire finance department and all of the departmental fiscal administrators that are located throughout our organization.

Uh in particular, I want to recognize uh Vicky Roder and Melanie Keaton, our two deputy finance directors, Elizabeth Juilliard, our city controller, all of our department fiscal administrators and the entire finance team, and I think some of them are here with me today, so I wanted them to stand up and be recognized.

Great job, y'all.

Uh the second item, and I've heard a couple of the notices go off uh in the council chambers, but we've sent uh uh this the state of Texas is doing an emergency uh uh notification uh of the uh test today.

So throughout uh the morning, uh we all should be getting those emergency notifications.

Um the um uh the city has been actively uh making sure that the public has been aware of that and prepared for it today uh over the last week.

So uh wanted to share with it uh with all with this with you all here, but also those that may be watching that if this goes off, it's a very important aspect of uh ensuring that settings are are on on your phone and that you are able to receive those emergency alerts.

And then lastly, Mayor, uh our spotlight video is on a public works employee, specifically a river maintenance uh employee, uh James Simudio, uh, who's one of our stormwater uh operations supervisors.

Uh James has been with the city since 2016, um, does a great job and leads a very important team.

So let's roll the video.

We're known as a river city, uh all eyes are on the river.

I maintain the water levels for the riverwalk.

Right now we're at the San Antonio River Tunnels Inlet.

This is the start of the San Antonio before it goes to the downtown area.

Right here behind me, you see the trash racks.

It's like a conveyor boat that's in the river.

We collect all the debris that gets screened out before it gets clogged over.

We don't want to create any damming that goes down to the downtown area because it creates flooding.

We maintain the gates, we maintain all the sensors throughout the riverwalk.

During the rain event, we uh divert the water to the tunnels to protect the city when it's drought like it is right now.

We actually collect the water and we recirculate the water back into the San Antonio River.

Traffic Division staff at our transportation and infrastructure management center work very closely with the crews here at our tunnels and other stormwater crews during flooding events to make sure our roadways are safe.

There are two core values that the public works department exemplifies.

The first is teamwork, not only as a staff within our department, but we have to work with other departments.

The other core value is integrity.

We are out there all the time, whether people know that we're there or not.

And we actually prefer if folks are able to go about their day and not know that public works was there to make their day better.

Just wanted to say thank you to the nearly 700 employees of our public works department that are out there on the streets every day.

That help us to be able to be successful in keeping the people of the city of San Antonio moving safely and efficiently.

That's it, Mayor.

Thank you.

Thank you, Eric.

Items eight through 28 are on the consent agenda.

This means they will be considered as a group and there will not be a staff presentation unless pulled for individual consideration.

Are there any items council members would like to pull from the consent agenda to be heard individually today?

23.

Okay.

Councilmember um Core uh is pulling item 23 to be heard individually.

Are there any others?

Okay.

Six is individual, an individual item.

Anything else from consent agenda?

No?

Okay.

Okay.

Um item 23 has been pulled by council member core for individual consideration.

Um there are, let's see.

Several individuals.

Okay.

We have several individuals from the public signed up to speak on the remainder of the consent agenda.

I will call on individuals in order of sign-up for all items on the consent agenda.

The first person is Herschel Boyd, followed by Jack Finger.

All individuals will have three minutes to speak, and groups of three or more will have a total of nine minutes.

But no matter what happens in this meeting, I want you to know that I will be at every meeting via board meetings as well as City of San Antonio as your ghost of imminent domain passed.

I want you to know that this is wrong, how it was done, what I found out about some of VIS practices and making it happen.

But the law itself is wrong.

Real estate decisions made by a government entity should not be conducted behind closed doors.

I understand why it is, just as I understand what via why via would want this very unique lot and building.

Sir Sir, do you have any comments specific to item 12?

That's the item that you you signed up to speak on.

Yeah, that was the imminent domain.

I think specifically though, sir, the um acquisition of a conservation easement over the Edwards Aquifer.

There's there's not a mention of uh well relation to the uh it's uh I feel like you're not really giving them enough money for the land, but I don't really know about that as far as uh how much uh like a small tract of land because via property and uh they refuse to lease it and they there's even a six billion dollar sign outside the building there.

Sir I we certainly want to hear your feedback um and public comment on Wednesdays would be the most appropriate time to share that.

Um whatever you have though, if there is anything potentially in your comments related to item 12, you're you're welcome to submit that for the record.

If not, we look forward to your comments on on Wednesday or to any of the individuals up here.

Okay, like I said before, on Wednesday at five, I can't make it because of um I have a night class.

I noticed that the session B is like changed, but the public comment part didn't, so I'm still not able to speak there, so this is really my only way to speak.

Uh but there is something um that I just encourage you to to uh speak to the people that are gonna be affected by it, because I would uh want you to know that I had plans for the building.

I was gonna go back to school as a school librarian or back to work with an extra three thousand dollars a month to supplement that very low income that you know educators get.

Um I was gonna use those profits to pick up fix up the outside.

Um I just want you to imagine you know, working at a place and and some of these people might be working at these places on this land without telling anyone and coming home to an empty dark house because your family's all asleep, and sometimes you only cat you know get there to uh play catch with your kid at night because you were working over there.

And then right after that you get a letter from via saying that we're they're gonna take all of your profits.

And it's just not a good way to do it.

And I hope that you would have reached out to those people at those at those lands and made sure that they weren't in this same situation because it is very difficult to um comprehend, in fact.

But Sir, you you can submit the rest of your comments for the record.

Thank you.

Okay.

What uh what where would I send that?

Debbie's gonna reach out to you right now.

Thank you.

Okay.

Jack Finger.

Madam Mayor, other members of our illustrious San Antonio City Council.

For the record, my name is Jack M.

Finger.

There's a couple items I wish to bring up to your attention on this just a joke portion of the agenda.

Item uh 21, 22, or about some lawsuits that uh the city has been engaged in.

Uh basically, uh item uh 21, our a police officer collided with a uh a motorist.

Uh and uh is causing us to shell out about uh a hundred and over 147,000 dollars in in damages.

Item 22, similar situation.

Um a garbage truck driver apparently uh caused another accident, and uh we are shelling out 135,000 dollars in that case.

The question always arises if uh police officers, garbage truck drivers, any employee driving a vehicle or causing any kind of accident here in the city of San Antonio.

Do they ever get reprimanded for the accident that they caused and that we had to pay for?

Yeah.

I can understand if it happens only on rare occasions for a certain individual, and you you can say, well, they're if they're they are a uh an employee and they routinely drive uh city vehicles, uh these things uh do happen, and sometimes it's their fault, sometimes it's not.

But what happens if the police officer or the garbage truck driver have had a history of causing accidents like this?

And we have to continue shelling out money for these things.

Do these people ever get reprimanded?

It's a big question.

I I'm still waiting for some answers on this.

I think a lot of citizens would like to know the answers on what the policy is for these things as well.

You know, so anyway, uh if anyone would like to publicly state what the answer is, we we'll be looking forward to it there.

Thank you.

Okay.

All individuals signed up to speak have spoken.

Is there a motion to approve the balance of the consent agenda?

Exactly.

Okay, it is moved and second to approve the consent the balance of the consent agenda.

Council members, uh, know there are a few to highlight.

Let's see.

Councilmember McKee Rodriguez, you have a highlight.

Thank you, Mayor.

Yes, I'm excited to uh highlight item 19, approving the reappointment of Monica Civino to the Historic and Design Review Commission for the remainder of uh the term.

Uh Monica has been a huge district two advocate and a preservation warrior.

She is also an architect and a member of the Dignity Hill Neighborhood Association, and we're so glad uh and grateful to have her serve as our appointee now going on five years and counting.

Uh thank you for agreeing to serve.

I I really appreciate that HDRC as one of the commissions.

I do not have to worry about too much, uh, and so I look forward to continuing to work alongside you, Monica.

Thank you.

Councilmember Mesa Gonzalez.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, as it is public health week, I'm proud to highlight items 25 and 26.

Item 25 is an ordinance approving an agreement with the San Antonio Area Foundation to distribute small grants to community-based organizations working to reduce food insecurity and increase access to prenatal care, mental, behavioral health, and housing services.

Mental Metro Health, along with the San Antonio Area Foundation will collaborate to provide grants to organizations providing services and resources to address access to food, respectful and respectful health care services, including prenatal care mental and behavioral health, along with housing services.

Priority will be given to organizations serving communities in San Antonio Bear County with the greatest need.

By providing grants to trusted community-based organizations, we are strengthening the local network of support that families rely on every day.

Ensures that resources are directed where they will have the greatest impact, helping us reduce disparities and build healthier, more resilient neighborhoods.

Thank you to Metro Health and the Area Foundation for stepping forward with a model that uplifts trusted or local organizations and strengthens the foundation of health and stability across our city.

Item 26 is an ordinance amending an agreement with the University of Texas Health Science Center to add 135,000 dollars for a total amount up to 295,910.

Funding is from the Medicaid 1115 waiver.

Excuse me, to provide diagnostic and preventative health care for children at no cost to families who qualify for services.

On an annual basis, the oral health program serves over 17,000 children, most of which are living at or below the poverty guidelines by providing preventative and restorative dental services in non-traditional settings such as Head Start, early head start, and on campuses of local Title I elementary schools.

Far too many of our families face barriers that prevent them from accessing routine dental care and untreated oral health issues can lead to serious pain, missed school days, and long-term medical complications.

But providing no cost diagnostic and preventative dental services, this program directly addresses a critical health disparity affecting our most vulnerable residents.

District 8 is home to one of the San Antonio's most diverse immigrant populations, and we know many of these families have historically lacked access to consistent preventative dental care.

As we begin weighing budget priorities, I strongly urge my council colleagues to recognize that programs like this are not optional.

They are essential public health investments.

Thank you.

Councilmember Spears.

Thank you, Mayor.

I am highlighting item number nine, which is approving some funding for class and stooping park improvement improvements.

This is the most popular park, I think for sure in District 9, but for many across the whole city.

These improvements build on this foundation by enhancing access, mobility, and overall usability throughout the park.

Investments in parking, pedestrian infrastructure, and general park upgrades are not just about convenience.

This is about ensuring that more residents can fully experience and enjoy this space.

It reflects a thoughtful use of bond funding and reinforces our commitment to equitable access to public amenities.

For many families, Mitchell's Landing adaptive equipment makes this one of the few places where every child can play, explore, and feel included.

And I appreciate the work of our staff and partners who have moved this project forward.

I am proud to support this investment in a park that means so much to our community, and I encourage my colleagues to support this item.

And a special shout out to my friend April Chang for all her efforts to move Mitchell's Landing forward.

So thank you, Mayor.

Having been to April the landing place.

Oh my gosh, it's amazing.

And is really kind of a standard.

Actually, when I was there, we um were walking around and there were folks that had driven like 25 miles because there's nothing like that on any other part of town.

So it's a true testament to I know a lot of that was also privately funded, so I appreciate April and her family family doing that.

Um Councilwoman Corps.

Thank you, Mayor.

I wanted to highlight item number 18, which is my appointment to the Transportation Advisory Board, Michelle Martinez.

She had to leave, but she I love her story.

She's a proud Tefoya grad and is now currently the steering chair of LSA 50, which, as you guys know, has been a very uh amazing experience for our very own Kat Hernandez, who's a part of the class and my chief of staff, Leah Payne Drayton.

But she also is the co-owner of the local SATX, which has been working with us for South Alamo to provide free shuttles for folks across Southtown as the last mile transportation solution.

So I'm really excited for her and what she's going to do on the transportation advisory board.

Also excited for our appointment, the new mayoral appointee for the arts commission as well, who I'm sure the mayor will recognize in a second.

Thanks, Mayor.

Councilmember Mungia.

Thank you, Mayor.

I'd like to highlight two things very quickly.

Item number 15, which is a grant from TCEQ for local air monitoring efforts.

Uh, as we know, that's a huge issue in our community, especially with asthma, especially on the southwest side of San Antonio, where we have a lot of industrial activity.

It's very important to monitor air quality in that area.

And I also want to highlight item number 20, which is an agreement with Bissell Pet Foundation for Spay and neuter services, is very important to our community, especially the District 4.

Um, and there's a wonderful graphic somebody put out that for one dog that does not get spared neutered, the effect and generations that can happen after that is astronomical.

So I appreciate that and look forward to more spay neutering.

Thank you.

Councilman White.

Thanks, Mayor.

Uh, just briefly highlighting item eight, which is uh funding for the Eisenhower Northwood Devonshire Phase I drainage project.

It was money that was approved in the 2022 uh bond program.

Uh, gonna be a lot of good work out there.

Um, CPS Energy is gonna do some work to replace the gas main and associated gas service line.

SAWs is gonna do some sewer work, including replacement of the sanitary sewer mains and um some other things, and as we know, drainage has been a um big issue uh in the city over the last year or so, uh if not more, and so very appreciative that this is moving forward.

Thanks.

Are there any other highlights?

Okay.

Um I would like to um highlight uh Miss Lindsay Andrews, uh, my appointee to the San Antonio Arts Commission.

As many of you know, she um is uh very active in our community on a number of issues and does a great job highlighting the intersection of of so many issues that affect our LGBTQ community, but also just in general, affect equity in our community.

So I'm very thankful for her and uh and her husband and all that they do uh for our community.

So thank you, Lindsay, for your service on that.

Okay.

Okay.

Uh there being no further discussion, there's a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda.

Um absent item 23, which is pulled for individual consideration.

Please vote.

Okay, the motion carries.

Thank you.

Item five.

Um, we'll move on to individual items.

Item five is the results of a special meeting memo by council members Casillo, Aldreste Gavito, Spears, and White.

Madam Clerk, please read the caption.

Item number five is a item number five is a briefing on proposed ordinance to address jury service fraud fraud and other scams using Bitcoin kiosk and ATMs.

Thank you.

Okay.

I understand staff has a presentation.

Good morning, Mayor Council, Assistant Chief Jesse Solomon, SAPD.

Uh before I start uh my presentation today, I'm gonna turn it over to Sheriff Javier Salazar.

Thank y'all so much.

Good morning, I'm Sheriff Javier Salazar.

I appreciate the opportunity to come in and speak to you all this morning on this topic.

Um, as you all know, getting two government organizations or bodies to agree on anything is a monumental task.

But this is just that.

It's I think it's poetry in motion to be quite to be quite frank.

Um look, scams are a big business, unfortunately.

Uh, and they're they're milking San Antonio andor Bear County residents out of millions of dollars every single year.

But uh we have the ability to stop this, uh to prevent this crime from even happening, which I believe is the best approach to crime is to prevent it for prevent it from actually happening in the first place.

Um we have seen uh an upsurge in in scams involving these Bitcoin machines that are located throughout uh San Antonio and Bear County, where uh in the most common scams that we're seeing, scammers are calling victims, either uh the families of of those that are incarcerated in the Bear County jail, uh, or just folks that are sitting home minding their own business, they're getting calls from people claiming to be government officials, usually from the Bear County Sheriff's Office, saying one of two things.

You either miss jury duty and you have warrants outstanding for your arrest, or your loved one is in jail and we have the ability to help you get them out on an ankle monitor.

They then will keep these people on the phone for upwards of eight hours in some instances, having them go from retail establishment to retail establishment, depositing money into these these what they believe is it is an ATM machine that they're paying a governmental fine, but in reality what they're doing is purchasing Bitcoin.

Uh and in these cases, we've seen uh upwards of 25,000 dollars in some of these scams, people being taken.

And while we're making our best effort to get their money back for them, that we're also meeting with mixed results.

And so thankfully, having recently gone to the Sheriff's Conference in Washington, DC, and having had the pleasure of meeting uh Sheriff Hansen from Douglas County, Nebraska, shared with me that this issue was addressed in there in Omaha, Nebraska, uh, with two things a city ordinance, uh addressing mainly signage, like similar to what we're what we're looking to do here today, uh, and also a state law in the state of Nebraska, which we're also looking forward to to trying to get going uh with y'all's assistance as well.

Uh and so I look I I thank you for your work in this in this effort to this point.

Uh, and I certainly look forward to continuing to work with you all to continue to see both of these projects through to complete fruition.

Thank you all morning, everybody.

Uh uh, we'll start off again.

This is the digital asset fraud prevention ordinance.

Um by way of agenda, I'll just give you a quick background.

We're gonna talk a little bit about the background, how we got here today.

Uh, I'll give you a high-level overview of some of the SAPD cases and our current efforts, and then I'll uh conclude with some staff recommendations.

Uh before I uh get really started on it again.

I want to thank uh council members Castillo, Arrete Gavito, Spears, and White uh for your leadership on this and uh bringing us here today.

Uh won't uh rehash everything that the sheriff said, but on February 12th, the letter that was sent to Mayor and Council uh specifically requesting that the city of San Antonio pass a Bitcoin ordinance to address jury duty scams.

Um it's exactly how he described victims are tricked into believing they have a warrant, and then they've go to a Bitcoin ATM machine withdraw money uh when they feel like they are talking to a legitimate county employee.

And so uh on February 25th, uh this was requested uh and submitted for a special meeting, which is what we're gonna discuss here today.

Just give you a high level overview of the difference between crypto and cash scams.

Um scamming people out of money is uh is old as time as long as money's been around, there's been scammers.

Uh the criminals today don't need to do it face to face anymore.

They can use email, text, and phone numbers.

Uh I guarantee you, each and every one of you have gotten a call or a text from some of these scammers.

Um they are highly organized, they are fast moving and they are evolving very quickly to stay ahead of law enforcement and stay ahead of the of the laws that uh are about we'll talk about later that really don't exist for this particular type of crime.

Um they all look different, but on their face and what they're really about, they rely on three things, which is pressure, fear, and manipulation.

And um, that's what we're gonna talk about this today.

Uh the crypto scams are really difficult to enforce, they're difficult to trace because they are very fast, and once that money goes, you it is gone within minutes.

And so um the common tactics that we saw here with our data is some version of your loved one is in trouble, you owe money to the government, your utilities are about to be shut off.

There's a lot of fake investment opportunities, romance scams, tech support scams, and impersonating law enforcement.

Um again, some of the highlights that we discovered when we started really digging into this data is there's not a single crime category for cryptocurrency scams.

So there's no law on the books that addresses cryptocurrency um crimes in general, uh, specifically.

Um because of that, the criminal behavior varies.

Um, but again, the goal is the same, it's to get the money.

Um, and it's just the methods, the way they use threats, coercion, and manipulation to get that is what's different.

But because there's no specific law, uh, these cases are reported under a bunch of different offenses.

Um we again we had 25 625 reports just using the words cryptocurrency, bitcoin, and ATM on a keyword search with our reporting.

Um, and what we did an analysis on this is we'll talk to you a little bit about the issue here.

If you look at this chart here, um, it shows both the scale and the challenge.

And again, we identified 625 reports tied to cryptocurrency.

Uh 534 of those were criminal cases.

There would they were categorized across 53 different crime type categories.

So these cases involve multiple units to uh we've got a lot of documented financial losses and a lot of demographic demographic data that really underscores the issue that we're dealing with.

Let's talk about the victim demographics in the city and the reported losses.

Um I mean, right off the bat, this impacts everyone, and you see we had victims from 15 years old to 92 years old, but no surprise to anybody on the dais, I'm sure, is that our older adults are always hit the hardest, especially when it relates to this type of scam.

Um a lot of the reported losses were under $50,000, which is substantial.

We had a few cases that were uh multimillion dollar losses for the victims.

Um if you look at this on the national uh picture, if you uh the FBI publishes a report every year, the FBI Annual Internet Crime Report.

Uh reported losses last year exceeded 16 billion dollars, which was a 33% increase in the previous year.

Victims of investment fraud, uh specifically those involving cryptocurrency reported the most losses, which was over 6.5 billion dollars.

And as a group, again, no surprise, people over the age of 60 suffered the most losses and nearly five billion dollars.

Again, I appreciate the sheriff bringing this uh forward to all of us and working on ways to collaborate.

What we had already been doing uh with our two detectives that are assigned to the United States Secret Service Task Force.

Uh they had recognized that there was an issue late last year or early this year where they wanted to do some outreach and some education.

Um part of that was I don't was identifying these Bitcoin locations that were across San Antonio.

Uh the United States Secret Service uh made a sign, the stop cryptocurrency scam sign.

Over the last uh between the the February and March, in all March, they were able to put signs in 103 of those identified locations.

The task force detectives reported that most of the uh business owners and the managers were supportive of the effort.

Uh there were some that were not uh supportive and didn't want those signs, and so I think that's important when we talk about what an ordinance might look like.

Um this was the warning sign that was created again by the San Antonio Field Office of the uh United States Secret Service.

Um I think that there's a sign that we're looking at with the county that I think would be more appropriate for our community.

Um, you know, this is a good start.

Uh this is uh something that uh it it reflects all the scams that we're seeing in our community, but we're looking to coordinate more with our partners uh here locally to do something that's both clear messaging and in English and in Spanish.

We've got 193 locations across the city.

These are known locations because Bitcoin machines aren't regulated.

There may be other locations that we're not aware of, but of the ones that are documented, there are 193.

Uh surprisingly, or maybe not surprisingly, we lead uh the state of Texas uh to include Dallas, Fort Worth, um, and Austin.

And if you look by district, uh there's the breakdown of where these machines are located.

Uh the highest concentration is in uh district one, district two, uh three, and five, but they are uh every corner of the city across the city.

So I want to conclude with my last slide and talk about the staff recommendations based on on the uh information and the work that we've done so far.

Uh my main one is that we would like to expand the proposed ordinance.

Uh, as I mentioned earlier, uh, while jury duty scams are one of the identified concerns, our data shows that scammers are using a variety of narratives uh which present, I think, additional opportunities and challenges for us to uh engage with prevention and outreach efforts.

Uh I think those are gonna be the most effective prevention is absolutely gonna be the key to trying to stop um these crimes from even happening.

Uh on the legislative level, the expansion of this discussion will include um some discussions with our legislative team.

Uh last session, SB 1705 was introduced, and that bill aimed to regulate crypto ATMs.

They were going to require registration of those things, a lot of consumer protections, including fraud and error reversibility warnings, uh, included a seven two-hour hold.

That bill did not carry, did not pass.

Um the federal side, there was a proposed crypto ATM fraud prevention act, which would again require the fraud warnings and the added safeguards.

And again, that was not successful, so I think that's something that we would obviously support from our legislative efforts this year.

Um a public awareness campaign, we're going to partner with CNE.

We've already begun the discussions uh to form a work group to include us, um, the Sheriff's Office, uh, the uh DHS and our federal partners.

We want to develop a coordinated multimedia bilingual awareness campaign uh that's got the accessible designs and the clear language uh that we can do outreach to um everyone that needs to hear this message.

Uh, we would also want to engage the council offices for that as well.

Uh our outreach efforts will simultaneously we'll coordinate with DHS to make sure that we are reaching our senior centers and other stakeholders like the City County Commission on Elderly Affairs to determine the most effective way to amplify this issue for our senior population.

And then lastly, for SAPD, we've got to develop an enforcement strategy.

If there's an ordinance and we've got to make sure that officers are aware of their responsibilities and their follow-up and the guidance so that they know what to do and how to enforce this, and then we need to build in mechanisms for our officers to ensure compliance and so we can go out educate and issue citations if needed if that's something that we're gonna do.

Um I think the other the last thing and most important thing is we need to coordinate our efforts on the investigative front, and that's a gonna be an investigative um you know a team or a task force if you will, consisting of SAPD.

We would like to get the sheriff's office on board and our federal partners.

These are multi-jurisdictional cases, and they do not have any boundaries.

Uh oftentimes they actually leave the United States.

So we're gonna need our federal partners to help us with this.

We'd like to catch these folks and bring them to justice.

So uh this is we're gonna get this started very quickly.

We're moving fast, but we're being very deliberate.

So we've got a our plan is to present to public safety on April 21st.

Uh, update the committee on all the efforts that I just described, and ultimately want to bring this back in May for a consideration for an ordinance.

So that concludes my presentation.

I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you.

Uh, there are no members of the public that have signed up to speak on this item.

Uh this is an item that is for briefing only.

We've got several folks, uh, council members that have signed up to speak.

Councilmember Castillo is recognized.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chief Salami, for the presentation.

Uh I wanted to also commend Sheriff Salazar for uh identifying this trend and proposing a resolution to city council for us to consider, and here we are today.

Um whether it's one, 200 or 300, one scam is one too many.

And oftentimes when we have constituents call our office because they've fallen a victim, whether it's a romance scam, uh a sun solar scam or bitcoin scam, these are some of the toughest cases for our constituent services team to handle uh because oftentimes they've already made the report reported to adult protective services, uh, and and there's not much in terms of providing a resolution.

And what we have here is a preventative approach to ensure that folks that may be going to a Bitcoin machine, and with staff's recommendation expanding that beyond Bitcoins to remind folks that it may be a scam that they may be falling for.

Uh and then of course, working with uh federal agents agencies rather in terms of accountability, uh, because as you mentioned, uh oftentimes there are actors not in the in the states.

Um and just wanted to highlight, right, that over 50% of the victims were 56 and older.

And the recommendation that Sheriff Salazar has put forward was also supported by AERP who's also submitted a letter of recommendation uh on this ordinance as well.

Um, you know, this is something that we've had constituents again come to open office hours to just ask for help in terms of following victim to these financial scams.

And I believe it was I'm not too sure it was the sheriff's office, they've provided us one, and I'm not too sure if this is from PD, but the amount of money that folks are losing is is uh a huge loss, right?

Whether it's a $500 loss or up to the $33,000 loss, this is very impactful and impacting the future um of our seniors and families.

So grateful for the solution that's put forward.

I'm supportive of staff's recommendation and moving this forward, but I'm also grateful for council member uh Marina and Mark White and Spears for moving with urgency to have council have this conversation sooner than later, and of course the city staff and Chief Salome for um providing this recommendation.

Um, this is something that we have proposed a council consideration request to how can we mitigate solicitation by creating parameters, um, but also how can we support enforcement because um this is something that came to the public safety committee um a couple months ago and the trends were alarming.

Um so that's why we drafted the council consideration request on how can we take action uh and those signs can potentially prevent someone falling a victim.

And I've shared this with staff and a sheriff and chief as well.

Uh my brother works uh in sales, and uh in that industry, if they are found of facilitating a transaction that's resulted in fraud, meaning if someone goes buys gift cards at a specific store, and the customer then calls corporate or that uh store saying, like, hey, I just was a victim of fraud, that employee gets fired.

So this is also protecting employees uh by putting this uh preventative measure at the kiosk, and then of course, um, as it moves through public safety, um, addressing other um scams in community.

But this is something I'm supportive of.

Thank you, Sheriff Salazar, and thank you, uh Chief Salome for y'all's work on this.

Thank you.

Councilmember Aldate Gavito.

Thank you.

Um, I also want to thank um Sheriff Salazar and Chief Salome for all y'all's work on this.

Um, also I want to thank my colleagues, Councilwoman Castillo and Councilman White and uh Councilwoman Spears for y'all's help with this.

As Councilwoman Castillo said, we do have to move with a sense of urgency because we're seeing this skyrocket in our community.

We know that our older adults are being targeted, and so this is exactly where the local level of pol uh of elected officials can move in and work quickly.

Um we we just need to keep our public safe from financial exploitation.

I do have a few quick questions.

Um my understanding is that mapping these kiosks can be difficult.

So what efforts are we make are are taking to make sure we're trying to account for all of them.

Yes, ma'am.

So we're working with our uh data analyst team, and so we're using all the available public data.

So there are there are websites that um there are some level of registration where uh there's a network of a particular bitcoins.

Um, but that's so we're looking at that.

I think the Secret Service has indicated that they are aware of other uh locations that aren't mapped.

So we're bringing those those uh our two groups together to make sure that we have a really accurate accounting of of how many we actually have.

Yeah, we actually had a really good conversation with AARP or um earlier this week.

Um, and you know, they were saying that they were using the websites to kind of map the kiosks, but I can't remember if it was Bitcoin Depot or CoinFlip.

I think it was Bitcoin Depot.

They were seeing that in each zip code, the max was 20 of the kiosks that were um notated.

So they're like it it just kind of seemed weird look looking zip code after zip code and only seeing a map, you know, all of them being 20.

So it kind of gives us a sense that something's off.

And so, you know, um trying to catch the the number of kiosks is gonna be difficult, and I do think it's alarming what you said, how some of them didn't want that signage there.

Uh and so I I yes it's gonna take all of us to to attack this.

Um I'm definitely supportive of the recommendations on on um slide 10, uh fully on board with deploying signage at the crypto kiosks.

Um and I also think we should look at deploying signage at our senior centers because again, we know that this is targeting um our seniors.

So the more exposure and education that we can provide, the better.

Um, in addition to staff's recommendations, I do uh I I know all of us did get this letter from AARP.

And so I would uh I want to bring AARP into this discussion and also to consider their expertise.

Um they've done a ton of work to combat this issue over the last few years, and so I think that they're a good trusted resource.

Um so in addition to also what staff is recommending, I would like to us to look into their suggestion that we consider zoning and land use changes on where these kiosks can go and see how we can prevent it that way.

Um these kioska are popping up everywhere, and so I feel that with zoning and land use changes, we could potentially get ahead of it.

Um I'd also like us to look into expanding SAPD's financial crimes unit, uh including additional officers or more advanced technology to investigate these crimes, as uh Councilwoman Castillo, I mean uh mentioned when they come to um our council offices, and as you all mentioned, I mean these crimes are really difficult to track.

And so, however, we can boost um either SAPD's financial crimes unit or more advanced technology.

I'm I'd be supportive of.

So I'd like for city staff to look into these additional considerations and and in that public safety committee meeting um see if and how that can be feasible, but also too um as Chief Salome, you mentioned, we have to act quick.

So I do appreciate the urgency and coming back to council in May so that way we can get this done.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Councilmember Viegeran.

Uh thank you for the presentation.

Uh Sheriff, thank you for calling me and making me aware of the situation.

Uh I'm very alarmed at slide number 10 in terms of the number of locations.

District 3 is at 25, we border two, we border four, we border five, and these are all um, these are all high numbers.

So are they targeting seniors and people with uh socioeconomic lower socioeconomic status?

Yes, they are.

The other thing is they're I know my district, they're targeting people that probably haven't paid tickets also.

And where how they're finding out this information or where they're getting that, that's that's another conversation.

So I think as we move forward, there are two things we need to do.

One, and I'm committed to and I'd love to see uh both of the uh both the sheriff's office and SAPD come with me to get into the the senior centers or to get out in the public and tell them this is not legit.

This is not how you pay for a ticket.

So that's one thing.

The second is I think we as a city need to look at if we're gonna have people pay for things online that we look at certifying it, work with municipal courts to make sure that if they do have a ticket or they know their brother gets in trouble, you know, that they have legitimate ways to do this, that we have vetted and certified as what can be helpful.

And so I think that there's that they're they're basing it on lack of information and fear.

And it's a scam.

We know it's a scam.

I think uh putting out this is a Bitcoin machine, labeling it just a Bitcoin machine and not certified by uh either department is key also.

Um and we need to work with municipal courts of if they have the money, if they just want to pay and they don't want to go into the litation or they don't want to see their brother, because you know he's done this so many times before that they can just give them the money and do that, and how do we do that here?

So I'm looking forward to having this go back to public safety, have them have the conversations, and I'll be sending out uh invites to both of your departments to come and talk to my community about how they take care of it.

Thank you.

Councilmember White.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh, I want to just thank my colleagues as well, Councilman Spears, Aldreta Govito, and and uh especially Councilwoman Castillo for for sort of spearheading this uh on our end.

Um it's a very real problem and it's growing, and and as has been said today, uh our seniors are really the target, and we have to do everything that we can uh to protect our seniors.

I'm supportive of the staff's approach.

I think we need mandatory physical and on screen signage requirements, a bilingual awareness campaign, community outreach efforts especially I I like the idea of going to the senior centers and and talking with the folks there.

And then a a clear enforcement strategy with certainly uh significant penalties um for noncompliance.

So I I also want to point out uh you know thank you to Sheriff Salazar and and this is really something that that I've been talking about for two years that we need more of city county collaboration.

There are so many areas where we can work together to solve the problems facing our community this is certainly one right here there's many many others where we have um overlap or redundancies in programs where we could save the taxpayers money or we could just be more efficient or effective in in what we do for our citizens.

So thank you to Sheriff Salazar and also of course RSAPD for for getting involved and and let's uh let's take care of this problem sooner rather than later thanks Councilmember Spears thank you Mayor well I also I'm gonna say a lot of what we've already heard but um thank you Councilwoman Castillo and thank you to Councilwoman Aldreto and Councilmember White for supporting this effort and I am so happy to be collaborating with the county I'm probably the happiest about it.

And so thank you Sheriff Salazar and to Chief Salami.

So this is we had a district nine resident that lost 2500 and they were seniors and it's infuriating because these are the kind of financial losses that seniors cannot absorb they don't have a future earning capacity and how do they how do they get that money back and it's often very very challenging and often they're on fixed incomes and so for me it's it's really about protecting the vulnerable populations in our county and city they lose a significant portion of their savings and and often their financial safety net this ordinance is is a simple one is putting basic protections forward and putting them in place before the harm happens it's a proactive approach it's practical it's low cost step that the city can take and it protects our residents and especially the most at risk but at the end of the day it's our job to to work to protect people preserve financial stability and to make our community um difficult to exploit so I fully support the staff recommendations under your guidance and I want to encourage my colleagues to include all of this information and graphics about this scam in your town halls at your senior centers and your newsletters and on your social media and I'm ready to work on this at the state and federal level as well so thank you so much.

Councilmember uh Mesel Gonzalez thank you mayor uh just wanted to uh show my support for this item and uh staff recommendations and if we can include on the public awareness campaign uh neighborhood news they're responsible for a lot of the um neighborhood newsletters that go out um there's just an easy source to put a one pager there and also our local malls a lot of our seniors use our local malls in the morning for getting their mile in um so if we can put some postings around there I think that would be helpful and obviously senior planet so um thank you for all the work that uh we've done on this and to the my colleagues who presented this item thank you thank you for the presentation um and thank you sheriff salazar for initially raising it um can you help us um understand just I know again this is going to come back to us eventually but the um when we talk about prevention but I'd also welcome understanding um how well uh the signs worked in the other community in which this was implemented if we have any data that suggests it was uh it was effective sure well and I brought some samples with me these signs and the signs that we're eventually looking to make uh proud to say are actually made in the in the Bear County jail so we have a a number of job training programs in the jail and one of them is we're teaching and certifying uh some of the inmates on how to run the equipment that makes these signs so these signs will eventually be made uh free of cost to the taxpayers which is a great thing uh to hear Sheriff Hansen tell it uh as far as what happened in Omaha uh he said they had great success in preventing these crimes through this signage now we've we've between us and this and these the Secret Service we've actually already got signs out there that we're voluntarily asking people to place that are similar to this but but not necessarily the finished product and they've had they've met with some success uh last night we actually had one prevented sign um and so this is this is something that we're seeing at least one or two a day come in to my to my email here recently it's picking up in pace but it does work uh and I believe that that just like Omaha had great success we will too of course the signs are the low-tech version of it we also the accompanying uh public can public awareness campaigns will certainly help along with all the ideas

And they've had they've met with some success.

Uh last night we actually had one prevented by a sign.

Um and so this is this is something that we're seeing at least one or two a day come in to my to my email here recently, it's picking up in pace.

But it does work.

Uh, and I believe that that just like Omaha had great success, we will too.

Of course, the signs are the low tech version of it.

We also the accompanying uh public can public awareness campaigns will certainly help, along with all the ideas that the that the council members presented as well.

Councilmember Corr.

Thanks, Mayor.

Thank you to my colleagues for bringing this forward.

I look forward to having the discussion at public safety.

Some of the uh data when we do bring it back to April that if we have enough time to gather, I'd be interested in learning the breakdown of the age group.

So you all gave us the a percentage over 50, but it if you already have that, you can share it, or you can just bring it back to public safety since we're gonna discuss it, particularly the teenage group, because it said you'd started at 15.

That's one thing.

The um second component that I'd like to see is as kind of the mayor was asking.

I noticed that Dallas had also a very high amount.

It was the second, but then Austin was the lowest, which to me is kind of counterintuitive.

But I'm doing do we dig into kind of why that is.

No, but we think that it's probably uh again what's what's being reported and documented through one of the particular websites, the the Bitcoin website.

Got it.

Um I I would venture a guess that there's a lot more in Austin for sure.

That was surprising to me too.

Okay.

Um well, I'd be curious to see if we can reach out to your colleagues in those two cities just to better understand what they're seeing.

Um I don't know if because there is more technology focused in Austin that that is why they're not tracking there as much.

So I'd just be curious to see what they're doing and to see if they're doing anything else on on similar to what you all are doing with signage, et cetera, um, to help create the awareness piece.

And the last thing I'd like to have a little bit more detail on when you guys come back is the educational awareness campaign.

What would that look like?

How long would it span?

What metrics would we track?

And then similar to what you were saying, Sheriff, if we can start tracking how many how many um crimes we're seeing decrease as a result.

I think it'd be great to maybe come back in six months and say this is what we've seen over the last six months as a result.

And Eric shared with me the uh news article that came out about the partnership that you guys have.

So congratulations, thank you for being ahead of this and look forward to supporting.

Thank you.

Eric has something he'd like to say.

Yeah, thank you, Mayor.

So I I I just wanted to uh I wanted to also echo something that both um the assistant chief and the sheriff mentioned.

Um and it's one of the distinctions in in Nebraska.

It was signage, it was public education, and it was a state law.

So as part of that element of conversation of public safety, and and both the sheriff and and uh and Jesse mentioned it, um, likely needing to work together maybe with other urban areas, uh, cities and and counties to develop um a state law that allows us collectively to to also try to prevent these things.

So it's kind of a multifaceted approach, and I wanted to make sure that I just reinforced what uh what both of them said.

Thanks.

It's a key point.

Thanks, Eric.

Um, Councilmember Galvan.

Thank you, Mayor.

And thank you to my colleagues for bringing uh this uh this item forward.

It's a critical issue in our community, and I'm very grateful for the work that's being done, both the county side and the city side, and the ability to work together on this uh it's incredibly scary, frankly, issues been going around.

Um for people of all ages, of course, we see in particular seniors, but also our youth too, right, being sucked into this.

Um I'm very supportive of the ordinance moving forward and going to public safety to make sure that we have all the tweaks we need there.

Um also supportive of the requests of AARP to look at expanded further expanded uh things we can do with the city side with land use and zoning with signage with uh working with the financial crimes units as well to make sure they're well prepared to address some of these issues.

Um then also, of course, I think a couple of my colleagues mentioned it, right?

The senior centers, making sure we're working with missile courts, um, but also seeing if we can work with uh, of course, parks and rec or any of the other public facing um buildings and uh services we have, community centers, parks and rec, libraries, even our financial empowerment centers.

I know we have a few of those in our city, and so seeing if we can do with those would be really helpful.

And I don't know if there's any room to partner with some of our financial institutions uh here in our city with credit unions with banks, et cetera.

Um to just be able to provide the educational um uh material to hopefully slow down and hopefully end all this kind of financial abuse that we're seeing in our community.

Umgoing issue, it's tough.

Um, but I'm grateful to see the joint work here and happy to be supportive wherever I can on these issues.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

Councilmember Cass Um anyone else on first round of this discussion here.

Okay, Councilmember Castillo.

Thank you.

I wanted uh emphasize what Eric laid out in terms of the legislative agenda and uh working collaboratively with the county to uh initiate a state law.

Uh what stood out in the letter that uh Sheriff Salazar submitted to council uh was when he highlighted that when passed in the city of Omaha, the Sheriff's Office reported an 80% reduction in five financial losses from cryptocurrency related from 2024 to 2025, and additionally reports of people being scammed at ATM crypto kiosk dropped 20 percent, right?

This is huge impact, um, but we understand it needs to be coupled uh with uh several other initiatives, but just grateful uh again for the collaboration and of course Sheriff Salazar for highlighting this trend and proposing a solution for us to get to work on.

Thank you.

Great.

Thank you, gentlemen.

Um item six is uh the result of a special meeting memo by council members uh Spears, White, and Aldrate Gavito.

Clerk, Madam Clerk, please read the caption.

Item number six is a resolution affirming council support for hiring sixty-five officers in fiscal year twenty twenty-seven, consistent with the city's implementation plan responding to the Weiss consulting staffing recommendations.

I understand staff has a presentation.

No, no presentation.

Okay.

Okay.

Item six, we have several members of the public that have signed up to speak.

Not for the public comment.

Yeah.

Okay.

Got it.

Okay.

Uh the first individual signed up to speak, Ananda Thomas.

Followed by Christian Nunez Ramirez.

All individuals will have three minutes to speak in groups of three or more will have a total of nine minutes.

Uh so we spoke with the city clerk up front about speaking as a group for a total of six minutes together.

And oh, I'm sorry, this is Christian.

Yeah, for the record, Christian.

Okay, yeah.

You'll have three minutes apiece.

Okay.

Yeah, thank you.

Yeah.

Um, is Christian and uh so represent so resident of the district number of cinco.

One second.

Actually, if you're gonna speak in Spanish and you need a translator, then you get double the time.

Um would you like that, or would you I don't need a translator?

You don't need a translator.

Okay.

Okay.

All right, go ahead.

Uh inclusive mass can see se nos diskams much personal.

But the criminal form.

Um is unpremacel, it's a problem of administration.

Thank you.

I'm speaking against the resolution to hire 65 more police officers before budget season, and more so before an audit, not a financial review of SAPD happens.

We must be fiscally responsible and smart in a time of crisis like we're in right now.

And to be clear, when I mention auditing SAPD, I mean start there because it's the largest funded department.

We are currently in contract negotiations.

This resolution is being proposed outside of a budget cycle.

And our own investigation found millions of dollars in overspending on a single line item.

And we know it doesn't just stop there.

And audits of departments shouldn't just stop at SAPD anyways.

It should be noted that the city has not released actuals for FY2025, despite our open records requests, claiming they cannot share until June.

If we do not have these numbers, and if you do not have these numbers in front of you today, how can you confidently vote for a resolution outside of budget season that's going to cost millions of dollars?

SAPD has overspent its overtime budget three years in a row.

And FY24, they nearly doubled what was budgeted for them, spending 34.4 million dollars against 17.8 million dollars that's approved.

And every year we add more officers, our overtime continues to increase by millions, despite claims that more cops mean less overtime and less burdened officers.

The math does not add up.

Some have also stated that cops would have stopped the string of shootings or crime the other weekend.

This is incorrect.

Police mostly respond to crime, they don't prevent it.

Crime is down 13% overall.

Homicides decrease 17%, yet overtime keeps spending keeps ballooning.

Why?

Further, studies prove that community programs do far more for crime prevention than cops ever have, because again, prevention and response are two different things, and we have to fund both of them.

Their citywide audit found well over 250 million dollars in savings without layoffs.

Meanwhile, during public health week, Metro Health is facing is poised to lose almost a third of its budget and funding, which thousands of San Antonians rely on their programs for both survival and safety.

Identifying millions of dollars in wasteful or unnecessary spending can save Metro Health.

But only an audit, again, an audit directed by council, not a financial review, can show us that.

So I ask you to vote no on this resolution or push push this decision back to budget season where it belongs.

And I call for an audit of SAPD, especially related to compensation and line items where we see overspending again and again and again.

Audit first, then decide in the proper venue and time on this decision.

Thank you so much for your time.

Lisa Wright, followed by Juliet Thurber.

Lisa Wright.

Okay.

Juliet Thurber.

Juliet Thurber.

Okay.

Bianca Maldonado, followed by Gary Hudman and Katie Scott.

Good morning.

My name is Bianca Maldonado, and Gary Hedman is going to yield his time to me.

Yeah, I'm Gary Hudman, District 7.

Okay.

You have six minutes.

Go ahead.

Thank you, Mayor Jones.

Councilwoman Govito and City Council members, good morning.

My name is Bianca Maldonado, and I'm the president of the Monticello Park Neighborhood Association located in District 7.

We are a community based within the original 36 square miles of the city, and we're supported by the West Subside, the West Substation.

The West Substation is one of the busiest, if not the second busiest substation with respect to calls for service.

This past Monday, our neighborhood association passed a resolution to support the hiring of additional SAPD officers in the upcoming fiscal year 2027 city budget.

The support for this resolution was unanimous.

Additional resources for SAPD, specifically patrol men and women, is important to creating a safe environment within our community and for our growing city.

This resolution is a direct response to the lived experiences of residents and our continued commitment to support and partner with SAPD.

SAPD call response times is inconsistent or at times does not exist, and this is changed.

This is a dynamic that has changed in our community.

Response times for our residents have ranged from 15 minutes to two and a half hours, or sometimes not at all.

And this is based on the call volume at the time of when they're calling in seeking service.

Some lived experiences.

In October of 2025, several calls were made to SAPD by business owners and residents regarding a suspicious young individual walking the streets, hitting cars, and trespassing.

Less than three weeks later, he bludgeoned two people to death within 24 hours.

This individual had been downtown and arrested multiple times in the three months prior to coming into our neighborhood.

Suspicious people walking and trespassing within the community is a daily occurrence in our community.

Another example is a business owner trying to gain entry to their property, and there's an unknown individual blocking access, a call to SAPD.

More than two hours later, there's no response from SAPD.

Their call is still pending.

A homeowner was outside watering their yard, and there were two cars that were exchanging gunfire with each other.

They exchanged 15 rounds, and a minute and a half later, they exchanged 15 rounds more.

More than two hours for SAPD to respond due to the call service log at that time.

Burglar of a habitation, uh the two homes that were broken into.

It wasn't the detective who was able to find the and recover the stolen merchandise.

It wasn't the detective that linked two uh burglars of habitations together.

It was the neighborhood, and it was the vigilance of the victims in the situation.

We need more detectives.

Several homeowners call SAPD as an individual is when an individual is actively scoping houses for two and a half hours.

This is captured on video, and it's called in multiple times, but because of the call service, it's not a high enough priority.

An SAPD may respond, but that person is long gone.

The safe officer got engaged, but the behavior continued.

These calls for service continued and response times lagged and at times did not occur.

Turns out this gentleman had an active warrant, had a crime on the south side, brought it into our community, and SAPD showed up with the SWAT team to serve his warrant.

And folks, that's Eagle One overhead for 45 minutes, a perimeter, the masked casualty unit, uh, the SWAT vehicles, and also an ambulance on site.

And we had elderly residents witnessing this from their front window.

So there's escalation, and if the opportunity to be able to respond to these incidences could help curtail that, that is what we're we're seeking.

Also, SAPD impounded a vehicle for excessive speeding and doing burnouts in our community.

We're a small community, and to have an escalation of these types of events in our community, it's not that our crime is going up.

It's these people who are coming in and out and through our community causing these situations.

They're egregious examples, and they're becoming far too common.

When a resident calls SAPD, the expectation is that the city will have adequate manpower to have an officer respond timely.

The study commissioned by the city supports our lived experiences.

We continue to actively engage with our safe officer, our safe sergeant, our substation captain, and all who respond, the patrol men and women.

Thank you.

Katie Scott, followed by Jack Finger.

Katie Scott.

Okay, Jack Finger is our final speaker on this item.

Well, Madam Mayor, other members of our Sanitary City Council, once again, my name is Jack M.

Finger, and item six deals with law enforcement.

Item five, similarly dealt with law enforcement.

And I and just a little aside, I couldn't help noticing something the county sheriff mentioned.

Did he say that jail inmates are creating signs for the benefit of law-abiding citizens on how they, the law-abiding citizens can avoid the crimes that the criminals are committing?

Sounds like a little conflict of interest there to me.

Anyway, on this item.

Yeah, um, well, something a little confusing here.

You want to hire 65 more officers, but the I don't know if y'all didn't get the memo or whatever here, but the news reports saying that crime is down.

Yeah, hey, I'm just going by what the reports are.

Property crime dropped.

Overall crime declined by 13%.

Property crime dropped by 18%.

Vehicle thefts by 26%.

Vandalism by fail by 30%.

Additional crimes, kidnappings were credited half by 31%.

Yes, uh why now?

Why would we need more police officers if crime is supposedly dropping?

I mean I'm just curious.

I yeah, um now at the risk of making enemies out of my friends with the police department.

I I just want to say, you know, we uh, if this was, I mean, try try telling though those reports to the guy who had his catalytic converter stolen not long ago, you know.

I mean, as is rampant in the city.

If this is uh truly happening, well, could it I've heard also heard reports that the police department is not reporting all the crimes that are called into the department?

Could that be why these reports are stating what they are stating?

That the police department is not reporting all the crimes that that the police citizens report.

You may want to ask those questions.

But in the anyway, the the thing is if you want to hire 65 more officers, please, what's stopping you?

What has stopped you for the last year or two?

I think you were asking for these things as as recently as the just a year or so ago.

What stopped you?

By all means, please do it and do it soon.

Thank you.

That was the final individual signed up to speak on this item.

Is there a motion to approve item six so we may begin council discussion?

Motion made.

Okay.

We'll now move on to council discussion.

Councilmember White.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um I'm glad we're here today on this because we always talk about how public safety is our number one responsibility as a city government.

And today is really about reaffirming our commitment to the public to do all that we can uh to keep them safe.

And so let's talk a little bit about how we got here.

And um if the audiovisual folks could could put up the the first slide.

Uh in 2023, before um I was on council and and a few of us were on council, there was a study done where the city paid more than a hundred thousand dollars for an outside group to come in and look at our police staffing needs.

We could hit the next slide.

You can see here on the on the first slide, just and I'm only gonna go over a couple of these, um, what the goals were of the study uh and what some of the considerations were, right?

Including our our growing community, uh responsibly spending our tax dollars, uh, and heightened expectations from the public about what they wanted in terms of uh in terms of what a safe community looks like.

The main issue here as to why we need more officers, of course, is to move to this 6040 model that the police chief has talked about, where sixty percent of our officers will be out on the streets on patrol, while 40 percent will be on call.

And of course, the main point in doing this is right there at the top.

It's about crime prevention, because we all know, and we're gonna look at a study in a second, but even without the studies, we know that when officers are patrolling the streets, there are there's less likely to be crime in those areas.

So, what did the recommendation of this independent analysis show?

It showed that we needed 360 new officers to reach that 40, uh, that 60-40 ratio I just talked about.

We needed to get them on the streets in the next three to five years.

And uh, and there you you saw what they recommended for the 2024 budget.

And we were on pace to follow this recommendation up until last year, where we only funded, I believe it was 40 officers.

So the first part of this analysis, I think, has to come with the independent study uh that city management and city council agreed in 2023, we needed to do this study, we paid for it, we got it done, and there was the recommendation.

Then last year, during budget season, Chief McManus was at the podium, and I wanted to hear from our head law enforcement official here in the city to hear what he said.

Okay, so but but let me let me ask it again and and see if I can simplify it and just get the answer.

Getting to this 60-40 ratio with with adding the officers like we've talked about doing, in your opinion, will that make San Antonians safer?

Yes, it's important.

And and and and the reason you say that is because by doing so, we will hopefully deter more crime.

Yes.

Okay.

And Chief, uh, I would I would say then that you would agree, since since getting to 6040 will make San Antonian safer, the quicker we can do that, the better.

Yes.

Okay.

Um those are my questions for you, Chief.

And and uh so we have our our head law enforcement officer saying we need to get to the 60-40 ratio, and the quicker we do it, we will be a safer community.

And then finally, I want to put this slide up from a couple of weeks ago in our public safety committee, where UTSA gave us the latest results of their crime uh prevention study.

And while it's true, and you can see over there on the left that crime crime is down overall.

If you look at those second, third, and fourth bar graphs right there, you can see that crime is significantly down further when officers are on the streets in these high crime areas and visible.

So you've got the data, you've got our head law enforcement officers saying we need them, and we have an independent study all saying that we need more police on the streets.

Now, Maria, if I could ask you to come to the podium, we we we talked the other day because I got a question, I think it was from Councilwoman Corps about why, why this 6040 ratio, and what was the methodology, what what were the factors that were considered uh in coming up with this ratio, and you mentioned uh workload, community policing, and employee morale.

And if I could ask you to briefly expand on that.

Sure.

Uh good morning, Marion Council.

Um, so yes, some of the the benefits that were highlighted from this uh staffing study, the goal to reach um 6040 ratio, meaning that our police officers would be proactively addressing issues in the community 60 percent of the time and 40 percent of the time on addressing calls or reactive.

One of the benefits is enhancing public safety, meaning that higher levels of proactivity, invisibility directly reduce crime in the community, and it also improves response times.

It also increased community engagement by allowing the police officers to engage with the community to patrol their neighborhoods and areas of their districts where there's high crime, and finally, the other uh uh aspect was improving employee morale and health, uh, meaning that when a police officer is going from coal after coal, uh doesn't give them an opportunity to uh engage with a community, doesn't give them an opportunity to um have a more balanced mental health, so it improves morale and mental health by having a 60% of their time uh again engaging with the community doing proactive work and 40% engaging in direct calls.

Thanks, Maria.

So again, some of the reasoning to add these officers, right?

We heard that the visibility directly results in a reduction in crime.

We heard about police officers mental health, uh and we heard about it gives the officers more time to be in the community with the residents.

The case for adding officers in the 2027 budget, I think is extremely clear.

Some of the arguments that I've heard against this, I want to briefly address.

Number one that we need to address, be addressing the root causes of crime.

I 100% agree.

But this is not an either-or.

We can address root causes of crime, we can fund very various programs that will help us do that, but that does not alleviate the need to put officers on the street now.

I've also heard there's other things we can do, such as lighting, right?

Lighting, of course, we we know that that helps make areas safer, and again, I completely agree.

We can add more lighting, we can take other steps to make the community safer, but it does not replace the effectiveness of putting police on the street.

I looked at the crime data that our our SAPD and Eric gave to us last year regarding 2024 crime, right?

Over 33,000 crimes against people, over 100,000 crimes against people's property.

Crime may be down, but we can do better.

And let's not let this be political.

This is not about winners and losers.

This is about making our community safer.

And we will prevent crimes against our citizens.

We will prevent more of those crimes in the coming years if we have more officers on the street.

It is our duty to put money in the 2027 budget to add police personnel to our SAPD.

Our community wants it.

It's the right thing to do.

And it will make San Antonio safer.

Thanks, Mayor.

Councilwoman Via Caran.

Thank you, Mayor.

With a new chief that we're looking to hire, the new substation that needs to be staffed, new technologies that we were made aware of, including drones and all sorts of information that help officers do their job with a budget deficit that we face and a crime rate that is down.

I move to continue item six to the first meeting in May of the Public Safety Committee for further review and deliberation.

Second.

Did you want to say something, Andy?

Yeah, Mary, if I may, with a motion to continue, that becomes the primary motion, and the discussion should now simply focus on whether we continue or not.

When I say I'm sorry, whether the council will continue or not.

Thank you, Andy.

So there's a motion and a second to continue this item to the first week in May for that public safety meeting.

All those in favor?

Do you want to sorry?

Discussion on that item, excuse me.

Yeah, go ahead, Councilman.

Um you do on the on the item on the continuance, correct?

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean I can build that into my comments.

Okay.

Yeah.

Um thank you.

First off, I do want to thank uh Bianca Malerano and Gary Hudman for being here with us today.

Um, I'm gonna mention a couple of things that Councilman White said.

You know, we know that public safety is our top priority.

They tell each of this, each of my council colleagues and I that it is it is and continues to remain the top priority.

You know, we know that people want to feel safe, and we also know that people want people held accountable for the crimes they commit.

Um, one of the the um stories that Bianca was sharing was that gentleman who well, uh guy who literally took a wood stick and killed two other homeless guys who had no chance of surviving.

And these are the horrific crimes that we are seeing happen in our city.

So to me, it does not make any sense to pay for a consultant and then dismiss their recommendations.

I do understand that we're look we're facing another budget deficit, but that doesn't mean that we uh decrease the funding or or not listen to the recommendations of what our residents are telling us that they need, quite frankly.

They need safety in their neighborhood.

So, you know, we can look slice and dice the budget all day.

Um, you know, I know that we've mentioned before I I don't think we have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem here, and so that we need to keep public safety as the as the top priority.

We have to make tough choices.

We know that that's gonna that's coming up, but but that does not mean wavering on residents top priority.

Uh Ananda, thank you for your comments about looking at overtime.

I'd also argue that if we were to have stayed with the staffing recommendations, we're not gonna see that overtime charge that we're looking at.

So we need to follow the recommendations that we pay for.

I also agree that this is not an either-or.

We can absolutely continue to look at crime prevention measures as well as making sure that our community stays safe.

We are seeing um we we need residents expect quick response times.

There's no reasons why, there's no reason why people are waiting for two hours for crimes being committed in their neighborhoods.

That that that is unacceptable.

You know, with our population rapidly growing, our police staffing has to grow it as well.

We are going to see an uh increased call increase in 911 calls.

So staying on track with the plan will help improve response time, it will help keep our streets safe, it will help ensure our officers have the capacity to support programs that address the root causes of crime.

And I would would say, and we we can definitely look into this, it will will cut the overtime numbers.

Thank you to my colleagues, uh Councilwoman Spears and Councilman Mark White for co-authoring this resolution with me.

I look uh forward to the support from the rest of my colleagues, and and I do support uh it going to public safety.

Thank you.

Is there any other discussion on the motion to continue?

Councilwoman Corr.

Thank you, Mayor.

I'll be brief.

Just wanted to make sure everyone was like I will be brief.

I'm looking forward to the discussion at public safety.

I spoke to many of you about this last week about the data, and you all know how much we love to look into it.

And I found out that while we have the presentation that was provided, we don't actually have the report because unfortunately the gentleman that did do the do the report for us has passed away, and we never had a full copy of it to be able to share.

So we're extrapolating a lot of this data from another report that we have been similar to looking at from Albuquerque.

And I do have some questions about it.

So I think maybe for Maria and I can get together for our public safety committee meeting in May and make sure we can do a little bit deeper of a dive on exactly uh how this came about and maybe what the gaps are and how we can fill in those gaps as we go into budget season budget season and can discuss this more when it comes to budget season because I do think it's important, like you have shared, Councilmember White, that we look at this comprehensively, and public safety is a very important issue if we are addressing it in a comprehensive manner.

And there's always trade-offs.

We have just heard um a bunch from public health today, and we know some of the deficits that we're facing, so there's always trade-offs when we decide to fund one thing over the other, and we just have to make sure we very well understand what those trade-offs are if we move forward with continuing with more officers, not to mention we are in the midst of an ongoing uh negotiations with the the police union.

So let's talk about this at public safety.

I know you're gonna now that you're on public safety, you'll be there with great questions and a great presentation.

We don't need to see that video again, though.

So I think we're good there.

Thanks, Councilmember.

Thanks, Mayor.

Anyone else I would like to speak on continuing the item?

Okay, Councilmember Mesa Gonzalez, and then Councilmember Spears.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um thank you to uh my colleagues who brought this up.

Public safety continues to be one of my top priorities, and I strongly support ensuring SAPD has the staffing levels they need to respond quickly and effectively to our community.

Uh my community and district eight has consistently reaffirmed this at every town hall we have or neighborhood meeting we attend.

Public safety issues are our top of mind for folks.

So during the last budget adoption, I supported authorizing 65 positions versus a 40 that were approved.

And as we prepare for the next budget cycle, I remain committed to supporting those positions, which is why I will be supportive of moving this to public safety.

So thank you.

Those are all my comments.

Councilmember Spears.

Um, I just want to to reaffirm what um councilman White and Councilwoman Aldratica Vito and I were we're really pushing forward here.

Um public safety is and remains the number one concern from all of the residents in District 9, and I venture to say across the city.

When push comes to shove, who are you gonna call when you need help?

Just think about that for one second.

Who would you call and can they get to you and can they help you?

It's the number one thing we need to be thinking about.

I've can I've been very consistent in my position on this.

We must grow our police force because we're a growing city, and we can do this in a meaningful way in a holistic approach with all the programs that we've talked about, but you cannot replace boots on the ground, and they're in fact deterrence of crime across the city.

Um residents overwhelmingly tell me that they feel less safe today than they did five years ago.

I uh every event I'm at, I hear those remarks.

This is not political posturing.

We need to have these discussions now.

City staff did ask us to make apparent our budget uh priorities for 2027 as early as possible, and that's what we're doing.

That's exactly what we're doing.

And uh we're seeing continued concerns around violent crimes, property crimes.

Residents are looking for a stronger presence and a clear sense that we are being proactive and not reactive.

We are asking for more officers than we are asking more of our officers now than ever in the past.

They their their lifestyle, we have a responsibility to make sure that we are able to retain good quality talent and that they are well taken care of, that they're so that they can serve our community well.

This is a this is a challenging career, and it's an act of service for our community, and we need to remember that.

Just even two weekends ago, local media reported there were six shootings within a 48-hour period.

A child was among those victims, and two of the incidents proved deadly.

This is me listening to my residents talking about this.

And if and when your residents tell you they do not feel as safe, they do want to feel more safe that you have the courage to act and get behind this measure.

I think this is an appropriate time to talk about this as we approach the budget.

And as we move forward, we we really can't step away from that what's being recommended.

That every time we we lower the number that we're hiring, we just fall further into the hole.

I I've been asking for a hundred police officers from the beginning, and I maintain that.

In fact, I may go to 150 because it is just that important.

Uh, I look forward to more discussion on this and how we can position ourselves.

And um, I know we will find a way to put this into our budget, and this is definitely my top priority.

Thank you, Mayor.

Any other council members I'd like to speak on the motion to continue?

Okay, council member White on the second round.

Go ahead.

Yeah, so I I'll support the the motion to send it to public safety simply because you know it's gonna allow us to have an another conversation about this.

And and we can't we can't talk about this enough.

Um in terms of the budget, I mean whether we have 1.7 billion dollars in the general fund, 1.8, 1.6, 1.2, it just simply doesn't matter, right?

$4 million or $5 million, whatever whatever it will be to hire 65 more officers, that's where you begin when you do the budgeting.

You begin with the public safety and then you do everything else around it.

To not do so would be government malpractice.

We've talked a lot about um following recommendations from our chiefs.

We have our chief giving us his recommendation here.

We have the independent study, we have the data.

Uh so again, uh councilwoman, I look forward to uh uh to sitting on your committee and and and talking about it again.

And and I would just ask my colleagues as we move forward and we do get into budget season.

Um let's remember taking care of our resident safety has got to be number one.

Thanks, Chair.

Mayor.

Um, Eric, you had a comment unless you want to do it at the end after you hear the other council members.

I'll do it at the end, Mayor.

Sure, go ahead.

Um, Councilmember Castillo.

Thank you, and thank you for the presentation.

I also believe that this isn't this isn't a uh that this is a this and conversation, right?

And right now we know addressing the root causes of violent crime and crime in general, particularly through our violence interrupters are are at risk of having their funding reduced through federal cuts.

So uh while I do believe it is important to support uh the efforts to ensure that our police officers have the resources necessary, it's important that the and part of our violence interrupters are fully funded and supported.

In terms of morale, right, it's important that we highlight that uh as we discussed this morning that Metro Health Department is primarily grant funded, and being a city employee that's grant funded, navigating the current climate crisis uh does impact morale.

Um I'm supportive of having this conversation within the public safety meeting uh because this will run parallel to our budget conversations.

Um Thursday, May 14th is a council A session for the mid-year budget adjustment, May 22nd special session for city council council budget goal setting, so supportive of having this conversation run parallel.

Uh, I also also encourage that we speak to the rank and file police officers because if you ask what they need, it's a decibel reader, right?

So when they get a call about loud music, they have the resources necessary to measure uh the music at the site.

Um, and also, right?

I'm thinking about um specific units and the impact they have.

I think it's easy to say yes, more patrol, but we need to think about what's actually needed to address the crime in our communities, and oftentimes it's additional resources like a decibel reader, uh, and also supporting uh our detectives with the necessary equipment to actually address the crime, and then of course, accountability for the victim uh as well.

So uh just a bunch of moving pieces, uh, looking forward to the conversation in public safety.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, I really want us all to be on the same page here.

Uh none of us are debating whether or not we should hire more officers.

Uh I know the headline that I read was council set to square off over more officers.

That discussion will happen in the budget, uh, and we may very well support the addition of however many officers.

Uh, but we'll do it alongside a handful of other challenging decisions.

The reality is that we don't know what our financial outlook is, but we have a sense that it's bleak.

Uh we don't know how many cuts we'll have to make to public works, to metro health, to parks and rec to libraries, animal care services, our fire department, our housing programs, code enforcement, the nonprofits who provide essential and wraparound services to our community.

We don't know uh if we're gonna have to raise property taxes alongside utility rates to afford any of this growth.

I'm very interested in the fire department's needs assessment that is in the pipeline as well as the feeds the feasibility study for a second animal care services department that's looking at the needs of our eastern sector.

And I'm also interested in ensuring that the work of the integrated community safety office is able to continue and expand.

So I'd I'd also like for us to recommit to our strategic housing implementation plan, our climate action and adaptation plan, our ACS strategic plan, our SA tomorrow plan, our SA forward plan, which may be at greatest risk uh with the loss of federal funding.

So it is of each of our constituents concerned that when we make our decisions about staffing and departments, that we are doing it with all of the information needed.

I'll also add that we can't be flippant about four or five, six million dollars.

That is a lot, and people are going to be experiencing it when we have to cut a department that serves them.

I will support sending this to public safety and discussing it further, and at our budget goal setting session, when it's appropriate to have this conversation as a body, I would invite my colleagues to share the cuts that they're willing to make uh to make within the budget.

Which services are you really willing to cut?

We're in the middle of contract negotiations.

Are we willing to sacrifice wage increases for officers?

Are you willing to sacrifice projects in your district?

Uh are you going to support a strong financial audit of the department to identify even further cuts?

If we can find four or five, six million dollars within uh within the existing budget, add the officers, won't fight you.

Uh but we need to do we need to make any of these decisions with as much information as possible.

So for that reason, I'll support today, and I look forward to a very robust conversation and for us to really square off over police hiring.

Thank you, Mayor.

Okay.

With any other item, any other folks like to speak on continuing the item.

Councilman Galvan.

Anyone else after Councilman Galvan?

Okay.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, just uh a couple quick things.

Well, first of all, you know, I certainly appreciate any early conversations around budget conversations.

I think we have those pretty often in our committees, um, particularly in community health.

We often talk about it a whole bunch in relation to Metro Health programming.

Um, but I think frankly, you know, this conversation could have been saved for May 22nd during our budget goal setting session where we collectively shape our upcoming fiscal budgets uh within the context of how much revenue we have or are going to have, all the needs of all the different departments so we can really look at the way that we uh look at a dynamic city budget uh for one of the largest cities in America versus piecemealing it together.

Um all that to be said, you know, I we all know SAPD is a crucial part of addressing public safety here in our community.

It's easy to say that, and also easy to pigeonhole the concept of public safety into just that.

What's difficult is ensuring that we have uh holistic public safety investments to address all aspects of public safety.

But that's not what we're looking at recommitting or re-affirming our commitment today about.

With this resolution, we're ignoring the plethora of data-driven plans that STIES has adopted before.

Kelter McKee Rodriguez listed out a bunch as well.

The ACS strategic plan calling for more ACS officers being more proactive in our communities.

The vision zero, complete streets and bike network plans, all calling for infrastructure investments to reduce vehicle and pedestrian deaths.

The climate adaptation plan, calling for investments in climate proofing, our infrastructure and buildings to prevent flooding and air pollution.

SA forward plan, as we've mentioned a bunch of times as well, um, which includes the stand-up SA program, who work proactively to break cycles of gun violence in our communities with data-driven uh resources that we see across the country, and has an extremely high success rate here where it's being used.

A program that's in fiscal peril for the upcoming budget.

The senior service strategic plan, which calls for investors in reducing senior loneliness and nutritional health, public library strategic plan, the parks and recog strategic plan, uh all calling for investment to expanding library access and community center and green space access to communities to improve mental health outcomes and keep our kids out of trouble.

Our SHIP and SU Tomorrow plans, which call for housing investments and land use changes to ensure that all of our families are able to afford to live here in our city in dignified places, and reduce certain industries like vape shops or even Bitcoin kiosk from being nearby uh in our communities.

And of course, we know Councilmember Kiwajiga has introduced the needs assessment for the fire department, which are actively being util or uh looked into how we can support our fire department too.

So I just I think this conversation uh could have been had later, but we have it every single time.

Um and I think frankly, if we're gonna talk about all these things, which one of these plans are less valuable to public safety?

Less valuable to crime prevention, less valuable to provide prevention, ACS, street safety, flood infrastructure, keeping our kids off the streets, keeping people off the streets.

And this whole concept of this can't be either or.

I mean, we live in Texas.

Our state laws require a balanced budget.

That's what we did last year.

We added 45 new offices because we couldn't afford to add 60.

And if that's you know an issue for some folks, that's fine.

That's our opinion, and we're gonna work to try to address those concerns.

But that's gonna require either cutting programs or raising taxes.

Happy to hear what the solution is there.

Because here's the thing with that too.

These are not one time dollars that we can just throw out.

They're permanent dollars.

They require revenue.

They require permanent cuts to programs too, if we don't get any more revenue into it.

And so it is either or.

It's easy to say it's not, but that's just physically responsible to say that.

And unrealistic.

So if we want to rediscuss established priorities or plans previous council have adopted, I'm here for it.

Happy to have the conversations.

I think it's healthy to have those debates.

We do them every year in our budget process.

And we also do it in our communities year-round.

So that's why I'm supportive of moving this to conversation public safety.

Um moving forward the motion here.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

I won't belabor the point.

Um this is not about anyone's you know, commitment to uh to public safety, which we all recognize to be our number one responsibility, of course.

This is an issue though, of the fact that we don't have endless resources and that we lack a lot of uh the information that Eric and the team would provide to ensure that we are balancing needs across our community, certainly in light of our fiscal fiscal deficit, but also uh the changes at the federal level that are contributing to public safety concerns, whether you talk about public health, uh mental health, et cetera, et cetera.

So um, Eric, I know you wanted to say a few items, a few things here, but I do support uh continuing this item to the appropriate time during budget season.

Eric, go ahead.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um I was just gonna make one point, uh, and it was something that Councilman White said.

And look, I all of you, every one of you who have spoken have talked about the uh anticipated work and conversations that you all will be doing with the staff as we prepare for the budget.

And and every year uh there are consistencies and there are adjustments, but nothing that you do and nothing that the staff does is government malpractice.

It is it is government, it is local government, it is prioritization by elected officials, and it's execution by staff.

But it is not government malpractice.

It is so I just want to for those of you that that may be watching at home.

I don't want uh a comment like that hanging out there without without addressing it.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you, Eric.

Okay, have all members that would like to speak on continuing this item spoken.

Okay, there's a motion and a second to continue this item uh to May, the first public uh public safety meeting in May.

Please vote.

Okay, the motion carries.

Item seven is interviews for the planning commission.

Actually, let's um we're gonna take a quick break.

Uh we'll recess for about 15 minutes and then come back.

Thank you, uh Councilor, we're gonna reconvene.

Okay.

Item seven is interviews for the planning commission.

Staff has a presentation.

Good afternoon, Mayor and City Council.

My name is Debbie Rocka Sitter and I'm the city clerk.

All board appointments go through the city clerk's office.

Uh the planning commission was created under section 117 of the city charter and has the principal duty of acting as an advisory body to the city council regarding both amendments to the master plan of the city and the unified development code.

They serve as a final authority pertaining to subdivision plats within the city of San Antonio's city limits and the ETJ.

The planning commission is composed of nine at large citizen members, the city manager, one council member, the zoning commission chair, and the zoning board of adjustments chair.

And members serve for two overlapping terms of office, two-year terms overlapping, and those no limit on their terms.

The city clerk's office opened applications 98 days before the expiration of their term, which was July 8th, 2025.

We worked with the communications and educ and and communications department and engagement department for web posting, social media postings, TVSA and texts.

Through November 22nd, we had the applications open and then reopened them January 13th through January 28th to get more applicants.

So 39 residents submitted their applications by the revised deadline of January 29th.

They were vetted by the city attorney's office, and 32 were eligible.

They were provided questions and in advance that were questions provided by the council, and those questions and answers were re were given to the council in advance.

So the council has been reviewing the questions and the answers provided.

And then they've all been invited to the interviews.

So we have four seats open for the remainder of the unexpired term, which is through October 6th, 2027.

These individuals wanted to provide provide an update.

Rebecca Contreras is not here today.

She had some car trouble.

Kevin Cooper is here, Chad Denny is here, Antonio Freaks is here, Chris Garcia has withdrawn.

Remegio Garza Garcia, my apologies, is not here today.

Naomi Muller, Wendolyn Miller, and Barbara Wallerstatt are here today.

Matthew Pinya and Steven Strain have provided written statements, and David Sharon has withdrawn.

That leaves us with seven folks to interview today.

But we do have 11 applicants to be considered.

So what will happen is each applicant who is here today will give an opening two-minute statement.

Some applicants have provided a written statement, and you have those written statements provided today, and the ones that were provided in advance.

City Council will interview all those shortlisted applicants that are here today, break into exec session for deliberation, but no formal action will be taken in exec session.

Then the city council will reconvene and a member will make motion to appoint the candidates for each of the four open seats.

And that concludes my presentation.

If you have any questions, I'm available.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

There are no members of the public that have time to speak on this on this item.

So as mentioned, we have 11 applicants for the four available at-large seats on the planning commission.

Seven of them are present.

And again, those folks that are not present will still be considered.

Some have left a uh have provided a written statement for consideration.

Okay.

So each applicant will have two minutes to provide their opening statement, then we'll move into interviews.

Um, a reminder uh for my colleagues.

If you if you ask a person a question, we have to ask that same question to every um every individual that is present.

Okay.

So the first person that we have is Kevin Cooper.

Sir, you have two minutes.

Go ahead.

Thank you, and thank you for this opportunity.

So I'm a San Antonio resident who's been living in the city for 10 years.

Prior to that, I was in Chicago, so I've had the pleasure of relocating to this wonderful city.

For the last decade, I've been working for Becton Dickinson, a Fortune 500 health care company.

I began in the operations, specifically customer service, and then moved into ethics and compliance and now serve as an ethics and compliance manager.

I specialize in health care professional interactions and global transparency reporting.

My duties involve preparing reports for submission to the government of many different nations, including the United States, Japan, South Korea, and Indonesia.

I have experience with interpreting policy and ensuring that with accurate reporting, interpreting feedback when needed from staff and from our sales staff.

My core approach is using evidence-based decision making, ensuring that every single report that we prepare or system that we implement is accurate and uh and that we have proof as to uh what needs to be submitted.

I respect the established processes and the staff experience that appear before me, and that uh provide feedback on my processes.

I prefer long-term thinking over short-term pressure and ensure that all reports are accurate and are not rushed.

And I would approach this role with consistency, transparency, and a commitment to decisions that serve the long-term interests of San Antonio.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Go to questions from my colleagues if there are any.

Okay.

You do.

Council, Councilman of Viegadon.

Okay.

So what um what inspired you to choose this that we have tons of committees for uh that you could serve on?

What was it about planning?

I've always had an interest in planning, and I did have more familiarity with it back in Chicago.

Uh, and I've decided that my skill set being that I'm good at uh interpreting policy and enforcing things fairly.

And I felt that the planning commission was a good fit to my ethics and compliance background.

Can you just for the public certification?

Can you speak to um your philosophy on um how you would approach your your work on planning commission with economic development writ large in the community?

So when attempting economic development, I would review all of the policies related to our planning and the essay next documentation to decide what the best pathway forward to ensure that we're we're performing equitable, equitable planning across the city.

And okay.

Additional questions from my colleagues?

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

The next individual is Chad Denny.

So you have two minutes.

Okay, thank you.

Um Mayor and City Council, thank you for this opportunity uh to introduce myself.

My name is Chad Denny, and I'm a resident of District 1.

And over the past decade, I've lived in multiple districts over the city.

Um I believe that gives me a good opportunity to see you know different infrastructures and issues that the city has.

Um my professional background is in industrial construction as a journeyman millright.

In that field, we build massive industrial systems from the ground up.

That work demands precision because there's no room for guesswork.

If machine is off by even like a fraction of an inch, uh, the entire system fails.

The experience taught me that success is entirely dependent on the quality of the initial plan and the efficiency of its execution.

Currently, I'm continuing my education as a student data analytics.

This allows me to bridge the gap between physical construction and modern technologies and analysis.

Um the industrial world, we use blueprints and the planning world, we use data.

Uh, both serve a good purpose, you know.

Uh, they ensure that the decisions we make today do not become expensive liabilities for the future.

Um I'm seeking the seat in the planning commission because I believe San Antonio needs more voices focused on precision and uh and objective data.

Whether we're discussing smart density or correcting historic historical infrastructure gaps, my approach will be the same.

What does the data tell us?

Is this plan efficient?

Is it sustainable for the next 20 years?

Um I want to use my background in both the industrial and the analytics field to help this council make informed decisions that protect our city's future.

Thank you, woman.

Uh thank you.

Councilwoman Viegodon.

needs more voices focused on precision and uh and objective data whether we're discussing smart density or correcting historic historical infrastructure gaps my approach will be the same what does the data tell us is this plan efficient is it sustainable for the next 20 years I want to use my background in both the industrial and the analytics field to help this council make informed decisions that protect our city's future thank you woman uh thank you councilwoman vieaked on the yes uh and you mentioned it a little but with all the committees that we have that deal with data uh that the city has what drew you to this planning committee in particular I feel like with with my background you know uh I I really have uh a good understanding of plans and how they have to be implemented and the importance of of you know following through with those plans and being very efficient you know and I think the the fact that I have you know some sort of understanding of from different fields of that it really drew me to this council committee thank you uh would you please share your philosophy uh about the work that you would do on planning commission and how it fits into overall economic development in our community oh that's a good question so can you read that one more time sure uh your philosophy what would that be as you think about your work on the on the planning commission and how that would fit into economic development in our community well I just think as you know overall we have to you know we have to be fiscally responsible you know and I think as a city our we've we've sprawled a lot so we have to make sure that we don't become have fiscal traps of you know low density areas that aren't efficiently um built so we can you know so we have um we need to be able to provide the correct systems for all parts of the city and if we don't you know build build out properly we can't do that thank you thank you the next person's Antonio Fritz good afternoon mayor and council it's sincerely an honor to be here with you today seeking appointment to the planning commission of the city my name is Antonio Fritzi I'm from live and work in San Antonio Texas and I believe that we have a shared responsibility to respond to the gifts we've received with a willingness and effort to build a better future together I learned that from my mother who raised me in the shadow of Fort Sam Houston and worked very hard to send me to a Montessori school and then a Catholic high school and ultimately away to college in New England.

Now I'm sure many of you will empathize with the experience of learning how special San Antonio is by having to live somewhere else it's that specialness and sense of responsibility that brought me back here and motivated me to volunteer with interfaith organizing environmental advocacy and take part in the North Central Community Area Plan process and it's that motivation that leads me to seek appointment to the planning commission today.

Thank you for your time Councilwoman Viecadan Thank you with all the committees the city has what drew you to the planning committee my experience on the North Central Community Area Planning Team illustrated to me how impactful planning decisions are in the lives of everyday San Antonians so I think there's no better place to make real decisions of consequence than on the planning commission thank you.

Would you describe your uh philosophy about the work that you do on the planning commission and how you think that fits into economic development in our community real large thanks sure absolutely so principally it's first and foremost getting to understand the needs of the community in relation to the comprehensive plan and unified development code economic development has to fit into those three buckets if it's going to be successful and ultimately contribute to a future we want to see for generations to come okay thank you thank you the next person is Brian Lopez thank you mayor and council for the opportunity to speak today as way of a short biography I'm a native San Antonian I grew up here in San Antonio the Northwest side through parents who uh grew up on the historic west side and I went to school downtown and after attending school in Austin on a short stint in Dallas I moved back to San Antonio and lived in the District 10 area and for the last 12 years have been downtown in the River North area.

To that end, it's been my great pleasure to have served on the planning commission for the last four years.

Um my background in real estate law and the development process, I believe has allowed me to contribute to our ongoing civic dialogue into how we collectively envision our city and how we want it to evolve and grow.

And the commission sits really at the intersection of our political will, private property rights, and the science and art of urban planning.

In concert with the dedicated staff at DSD, the commission is asked to discern what the wants of the neighbors are, the needs of the neighborhoods, and the best interests of our growing and dynamic city.

I've been inspired by the enthusiasm and tenacity of neighbors and neighborhoods, impressed by the professionalism of DSD, and encouraged by the thoroughness of the innovation of the developers and landowners and their plans for the future.

And it would be my honor to continue to serve on this commission.

Thank you.

Councilman View Garan is not here, but she will return.

Yep, you have a question.

Okay, go ahead.

Thank you.

As you're aware, there's a number of boards, commissions, and committees that you could uh you could seek to serve on.

Uh, what drew you to the planning commission?

Uh it really is in my mind, because of my background, because of my business, um, it is one that I thought I could really contribute to.

There's a lot of great boards out there, a lot of needs out there that covers subjects I don't have the experience in, and so this one seemed natural.

The other part may be more personal, and that's the idea that I've spent a lot of time, again, I chose to return here, grew up here, raising my family or have a business here.

I think we're in an amazing opportunity as a city compared to many, many other ones in terms of the way we grow, the way we have grown in our opportunities.

And to just be a little part of that, I thought it was a great use of kind of my service time.

Can you share with us your philosophy about the work that you would do on the planning commission and how it fits into economic development in our community real large?

Well, it's um again, it it's it's it's one piece of of obviously a much broader ecosystem.

But I believe that the ability for a city to consistently express its wants and needs about how its land is used, is important for two aspects.

On the one hand, people who chose to invest here and grow here need to understand what they can expect, have some understanding that that a proposal for land use that is responsible, responsive, equitable is something that can be accepted.

On the other hand, people who live here already need to understand what they can expect about their own real property rights, about what their own neighborhoods are gonna look like.

And so that's the combination of I think what economic development needs.

People need to expect, people need to be able to predict the future in some meaningful way.

And I think land use, again, being a small part of it in conjunction with zoning.

Um, those things really work together.

I think they can contribute to our broader wave of how we continue to be a great place to live and then hopefully become an even better place to live.

Thank you.

That was the final question.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate your time.

Uh the next person is Naomi Miller.

Good afternoon, Mayor and Council members.

Thank you for your time today.

My name is Naomi Miller, and I'm honored to be considered for appointment to the planning commission.

Uh, I live in District 10, uh, but the first half of my life I was a proud resident of district three.

My career sits at the intersection of public policy and implementation most recently with infrastructure.

Through my work with ACEC Texas, I partner directly with engineering firms, public agencies, and community leaders, including here in San Antonio, to advance projects that shape how our city grows, moves, and functions.

I see firsthand how planning decisions move from policy into real world outcomes, and I understand the level of coordination and accountability that requires.

In addition to my professional experience, I've spent more than a decade serving my community through boards and commission roles.

That experience has shaped how I approach public decision making with preparation, accountability, and respect for the responsibility that comes with serving the public.

I also bring a strong analytical foundation through my recent graduate work at UT Austin in public leadership, where I focus on data-driven decision making, organizational strategy, and long-term planning.

Much of my work centers around understanding what drives investment, participation, and sustainability.

Insight that directly translates to how we think about land use development and community impact.

San Antonio is at a pivotal point.

Growth is not a question, it's a reality.

The question is whether we shape that growth with intention.

And the planning commission plays a critical role in making sure development aligns with infrastructure capacity, supports housing accessibility, and reflects the long-term vision of the SA Tomorrow Comprehensive Plan.

If appointed, I will bring discipline, consistent, and fair approach to every decision, grounded in both technical understanding and community awareness.

At the end of the day, planning is about legacy.

What we choose to build today defines how San Antonio functions for decades to come, and I'm ready to take that responsibility seriously and contribute from day one.

Thank you.

Councilmember Viecodon.

With all the committees in San Antonio that we have, what drew you to planning?

A new challenge, I think, just because we're, like I said, we're at a pivotal moment in planning with all the different things that are happening with the comprehensive plan with the sports and entertainment district and different things.

And I just like to see my community grow responsibly.

So that's what attracted me to the planning commission.

Sure.

Would you share with us your philosophy about the work you would do on the planning commission and how that fits into economic development writ large in our community?

Because we have to look at the city as a whole with when with planning and zoning and things like that.

And if we're as we plan different items for the community, they've all got to fit together for every council district and for San Antonio as a whole.

And so I would look at that holistically.

Thank you.

That was the final question.

Thank you so much.

Wendelyn Miller is the next candidate.

Good morning.

My name is Wendelyn Miller.

Growing up in San Antonio, I've seen how much our city has grown and evolved.

I've also had the opportunity to live overseas in Europe where I experienced different cultures and ways of life.

Those experiences gave me a deeper appreciation for San Antonio and what makes it unique.

Our city has a strong cultural identity rooted primarily in Hispanic heritage, but enriched by many different cultures and traditions.

That diversity plays an important role in shaping our future from where people choose to live to how our communities and businesses grow.

San Antonio is more than Fiesta or the Riverwalk.

It's a city built on generations of families while also attracting new residents nationwide who choose to call this place home.

I earned my bachelor's degree in business management from Texas AM San Antonio and my master's degree in public administration from Weyland Baptist University.

Professionally, I serve in a civil service role.

Sorry, with the Air Force, where I've gained experience in public administration at both the federal and military levels.

During my graduate studies, I developed a strong interest in public works, communication, and how strategic planning shapes the growth of a city.

What stands out the most to me is how these decisions we make today directly affect us in the future.

This is why I'd like to join the planning commission.

While my current role has given me valuable insight into federal operations, my passion is in local government, where I believe the greatest impact is made.

I want to contribute through thoughtful and responsible growth of our city.

I currently live in District 6 and have also lived in districts two and eight.

I attend a university in District 3, which has also allowed me to build connections and gain perspective across San Antonio.

I care deeply about this city and its future.

As San Antonio continues to grow, the decisions we make now will shape the quality of life for generations to come.

With a background in public administration, I'm ready to help support smart sustainable development.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Councilmember Viegeron.

Yeah, Wendellin, you mentioned it a little, but if you could talk with all the committees in San Antonio and then with your experience, what what expand a little more about why planning?

What drew you to planning?

Planning was interesting to me because a lot of times, so because I've lived in different places for different reasons throughout the city.

Sometimes the highways would change, sometimes a business would be built and people will complain, and we wouldn't know why.

And so me being in my late 20s, I've been down to St.

Mary Strip, and a lot of the residents there were complaining.

And so just looking into the dynamic of how did these businesses and bars get approved, why are the residents upset?

Where can we find a middle ground and just different issues growing up in San Antonio like that one attracted me to the planning commission?

Thank you.

Thank you.

Would you please share with us your philosophy on how your work on the planning commission would intersect with economic development writ large in our community?

Thanks.

I think I bring a different perspective.

And so connecting that with economic development would be how businesses grow here.

Does the community approve of it?

What businesses thrive here?

And that's what I would contribute.

Thank you.

That was the final question.

Thank you.

Barbara Wallersted.

It's the final candidate in person.

All righty.

Good afternoon.

And thank you for the opportunity to be here today.

My name is Barbara Wallersted, and I am a San Antonio native with deep roots across the city.

I grew up on the south side.

I've live then moved to the west side and went to Jefferson and then Holmes High School.

And then I lived on the east side, and now I live on the north side in Stone Oak.

So I've had the experience with the experience, it's given me a unique perspective on living in all parts of the city.

And I have a uh a connection with the different parts of the city.

During my husband's 22-year Air Force career, I supported him for 19 years, and 13 of that was living outside of San Antonio.

I lived three years in Japan and 10 years in Colorado Springs and living in other communities and returning home has given me a renewed renewed appreciation for San Antonio throughout and how important thoughtful planning is how is how our city continues to grow.

Professionally, I have over 20 years of project management experience, and I hold both a PMP and a PSM certification.

And including seven here in San Antonio.

Which that has given me a direct experience with housing development and the challenges that impact neighborhoods.

Today I serve as vice president of my neighborhood HOA board where I stay active in the in and engaging the community issues and residents concerns.

Thank you.

That's that's the your time.

Councilmember Viegeran.

Thank you.

Barbara, with all the committees the city has, uh, what drew you to planning?

Uh could you repeat the question?

With all the committees that the city has, what drew you to the planning committee in particular?

Well, you know, working in real estate, you know, I have kind of had a connection, you know, with that, uh, being trying to find affordable housing.

I had one investor in the past that would look for Section 8 housing, and it's very few and far between.

And so I felt with the Planning Commission, I could you know, impact, you know, where we could uh based on the infrastructures, we can ensure that there's affordable housing in all quadrants of the city.

Would you please share with us your philosophy on how your work on the planning commission would intersect with our economic development and the community writ large?

Right.

Well, you know, this south part of the city is an area that is uh is prime for growth.

We just need to support the infrastructures so that we can then support the businesses that would go into those areas, and then we could uh follow that with affordable housing and also encourage more businesses to go down there, allowing for more jobs in the southern sector.

Um since I've lived down there, I have a special place in my heart.

That's where I grew up, and I feel that has been kind of neglected.

Also, living on the east side, I feel that it'll is also an area that needs expansion as far as jobs and and housing.

Thank you.

That was the final question.

Thank you.

I appreciate your time.

Have a good day.

Okay.

So with that, we'll go into um executive session.

The time is now 1241 p.m.

on April 2nd, 2026.

The San Antonio City Council will now meet in executive session to consult with the city attorney's office pursuant to chapter 551.071, Chapter 551.074, the Texas government code, and to discuss the planning commission applicants.

The time is now 108 p.m.

on April 2nd, 2026, and the San Antonio City Council now reconvene in open session.

No official action was taken in executive session.

My thanks again to those that took the time not only to apply, um, also to be very thoughtful in your in your answers as well as making time to be with us and answer our questions today as well.

Um appreciate your willingness to volunteer and um the ways in which many of you already serve our community in looking through your your resumes.

Um so thank you.

Uh we had many great applicants.

Um unfortunately there are only four open seats.

Um but again we look forward to hopefully hopefully you all applying for other opportunities to serve our city and community again for those that are not ultimately selected here.

Um is there a motion for the appointments of four planning commissioners?

Yes, Mayor.

I move to appoint the following individuals for the four at-large seats to the planning commission for the remainder of the unexpired term, which ends October 6, 2027.

Kevin Cooper, Brian Allen Lopez, Naomi Miller, and Barbara Wallerstein.

Second.

Great.

We have a motion and a second to appoint Kevin Cooper, Brian Allen Lopez, Naomi Miller, and Barbara Wallerstedt to the planning commission.

Is there any council discussion?

Okay.

Okay.

Um Councilman McKee Rodriguez.

Thank you.

Uh thank you all so much for applying and congratulations to those who who are going to be appointed.

Um what I would like to convey is that uh quite often, if you're familiar with planning, right?

You know that we've we've invest a lot of resources into our planning documents and into, and these are considered somewhat promises that we're making to the community, and they have an idea of what's to ex what's to be expected in their in their area and the development patterns that are gonna be taking place.

And very often we see that nearly all plan amendments are approved.

And so there's a concern uh amongst my residents and I'm sure throughout the city that uh we're not giving deference to the community engagement and to the planning efforts that uh again read as promises to our community.

And so my ask is that you really think about how can you protect uh our residents from displacement, from development patterns that are inconsistent with their neighborhood and that are leading to harm.

Uh and so that's gonna be my task and my challenge for uh for you all who are appointed.

Thank you.

Wouldn't any other um council member like to speak on this?

Okay, great.

There being no further discussion, please vote.

Okay, the motion carries congratulations to the four individuals and to those that applied.

Thank you again.

And please continue to apply for opportunities to serve our city.

Thank you.

So yeah, thank you.

Okay.

Um our final item today is um an item that was pulled from consent for individual consideration.

This is item number 23.

Um council, this was pulled by council member core.

Um, madam clerk, please read the caption.

Item number three is an ordinance creating the mayor's commission on voting to identify and recommend to city council ways to increase voter participation across San Antonio.

Great, thank you.

Uh is there a motion and second for approval so we may begin discussion.

I move to continue this item to the next available B session in April or May.

Second.

Okay.

I did not hear the date.

What was the date?

April or May, the next available B session.

Okay.

Yeah.

So there's a motion and a second to move this item to April or to May.

A B session.

Yeah.

On continuing the item, yeah.

The second was, I think who was the second?

Was it Vieh Gran?

Yeah, Council Member Via Gran.

Okay.

I'm gonna provide a couple of comments right now though.

Great.

Okay.

Um the reason that I um thought it'd be very helpful for our community to have a much more focused and and timely effort when it comes to voter engagement and voter participation is frankly just in the last 90 days, uh, we have seen unfortunately real attempts uh at the federal level to make it harder to uh for folks to to vote, um whether you're talking about the SAVE Act, which would disproportionately impact married women, um uh disproportionately impact those that don't have access to documents like a passport or birth certificate.

Um so all of that to say, on top of, of course, on on top of uh the recent executive order um by uh President Trump, which would uh essentially call for a a state registrar of voters.

Um these are very challenging things for us to grapple with as a country, which I think really calls upon us at the local level to identify ways in which we can hear from our and protect um our community and ensure that they're heard at the ballot box.

Um if you looked at the resolution um that you all were provided probably about a week ago, you'll see that the timing of this is quick in terms of the product that would be asked of of the members that would be appointed, um, three appointed by myself, and then of course one each from from your council districts to ensure we had we had a good um a good diversity of perspective and and expertise to ensure we're helping our neighbors um be informed voters and then of course participate in the voting process.

Um in you know, a very short amount of time, we'll celebrate our country's birthday.

250 years, um, many of which many of us up here would not have been able to vote uh at that time uh as a woman or as a as a person of color, all the more reason uh for us to, which is why I really focused on that date by which um you know, should the commission be up and running asking for them to provide actionable steps that we could then uh work to employ and execute to ensure we um helped our neighbors vote uh as we approach the 2026 election.

Again, this was a very timely effort.

That would that being the initial piece, um, and so uh given the the real consequence and the real opportunity that we have at the local level to hear to have our vote our neighbors be heard at the ballot box and have a community entity that is up and running.

Um again, these are just the steps that we know of now.

Um unclear what may come down the pike uh when it comes to uh additional steps at the federal level or at the state level that make it more difficult for our neighbors to vote.

Um so I I really think this is a responsibility that that we have to continue to ensure that our community is in is is engaged and we are reducing removing barriers as best able uh to ensure our neighbors can vote at the local level.

Um so I uh I personally don't support um continuing the item to a B session in April or May because I think that just reduces the amount of time uh that we would have to hear from our neighbors that would serve on the commission on about ideas they could have that we could employ around 2026.

Um is there any other uh discussion on continuing the item?

Councilmember Via Gran.

Yes, thank you, Mayor.

Uh I I think I think the commission is a is a great idea.

I think you're right that we need to move fast.

My concern is as as we were having conversations as council members.

I think there's needs to be some clarity on the scope and the begin date and the end date of this commit this commission on how long we want this commission to go, and then also in our appointees.

I have an idea of who I want to appoint.

However, if the scope is going to change and we're gonna keep this further than the 2026 election, which is possible that we could and have them move on towards um elections in 2027, under really understanding what the scope of this advisory committee is.

So I I think if we can get this on the next available uh B session, and then we can all agree on some some policy and some uh some parameters moving forward that we can move rather quickly on this.

But I think this is an opportunity for us to think about what what we were thinking.

The one concern I always have as as we create new boards and commissions, and even with the term advisory, is that we set up and um councilman custody always brings this up a pseudo uh committees that act pseudo as a pseudo-elected government committee and make decisions that are outside their scope.

So I think if we can just tighten that up so that we're all fully aware of what what the role of these appointees are going to be, we we can move forward on uh what you put for what what you've asked us to do in terms of uh really finding a San Antonio solution to how we get these voters to come out.

So I'll I look forward um Eric to you trying to make room on these B sessions that we have coming up so that we can discuss this, and I look forward to my council colleagues really putting in some thoughtful questions in terms of what they think about in terms of scope and responsibility of this advisory committee uh and how often we we plan for them to meet, whether it because of because the tight line the timeline is tight, will it be once a month, will it be twice a month, and um uh up until we get into that May election and making sure that we are uh we're having the turnout that we need here in the city of San Antonio.

So um thank you.

I I look forward to seeing this committee formed and getting all those questions answered.

Great.

Um thank you, Councilwin Via Granon.

I um I did want to to highlight some of those are identified in the draft um in the draft um ordinance.

Um just for the this is posted, of course, so those um following along um could easily identify these things, but just in the interest of of laying it flat, um the purpose and the function identify approaches to help Americans participate in the voting process.

Secondly, avoid unnecessary duplication.

I certainly don't want that to be the case.

Um by reviewing the findings, conclusions, and recommendations of other appropriate task forces, uh committees, commissions, or entities related to community engagement and enhancing voter participation.

Thirdly, identify barriers in local election policies, processes, and activities and solutions to mitigate these barriers to ensure strong voter registration and participation.

And then fourth, submit a report to the mayor and city council on its findings, conclusions, and recommendations to to strengthen voter participation in elections.

Um that report, um, as I mentioned, the key date there is July 4th.

Um, so not later than for July 2026.

Shall the commission submit a report to the mayor and city council with initial findings and recommendations as have been agreed to by a simple majority of the appointed members of the commission.

The report shall include at least five recommendations recommendations that the commission believes can be implemented at the local level.

And of course, the report shall be made available on the City of San Antonio uh website.

To your point about um how long the commission would uh would live on.

I think you know this is something that uh there would be benefit um just like status of women or some of the other commissions, this is something that I mean, voting is the hallmark of a citizen, right?

So the ways in which we can continually identify ways to ensure that our neighbors are engaged and participating as much as possible.

So this is that it is designed uh to to live on, certainly past this council.

Um but to that point after the report, the July 4th report submitted to the mayor and city council has been made available to the public, the commission will review the findings recommendations um and uh and recommendations of the report at least biannually.

So there is a specific task in there by which they would uh review those to make sure they were maintained appropriate.

Um you asked councilman about the meeting schedule, um section nine of the of the draft ordinance notes, uh the commission shall meet and begin the operations of the commission as soon as practical.

Um in general, the commission shall meet no fewer than once a month until the release of the report to the mayor and council after the release of the report, commission shall meet at least twice a year to determine whether subsequent reports after under excuse me, section four are necessary.

So I did want to make sure that that information um was uh reiterated as meant as seen in the in the draft ordinance that was posted online and and shared for your comment.

Okay, Councilmember Mungia.

Thank you, Mayor.

Uh I do support this commission.

I think it's important, especially considering that I've mentioned before the district four is uh continues to be the second level of voter turnout district in the city.

So uh I have a duty and obligation to to make things happen in that district and get more of our voices heard of the city.

Uh I do understand some of my colleagues have some other additional questions and and perhaps want to get input.

So I understand the the move to B session.

Uh but I will also note that this is now the fourth item between yesterday and today that is now moving backwards to somewhere else.

Uh that's an incredibly and for me that's a little frustrating because again, that's four items that are going back somewhere else that we could have spent this time doing something else.

So I think that's for different reasons, but I think we need to do better as a collective to ensure that when we get here, things aren't going backwards.

So that's just my input on that.

But I will support the idea of having our colleagues add um additional input and get additional questions answered at a B session.

Thank you.

Councilman White.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um Ghia.

Completely agree.

Um completely agree.

And and I think we can we can do better.

Um getting more people to vote in San Antonio, extremely important.

I'm all for it.

I also absolutely hate boards and commissions that that are either redundant or don't really serve a relevant purpose anymore.

Uh I mean, we we know we have 90 what 90 plus boards and commissions.

Um some of them aren't active, uh, but all of them expend city time and resources.

I hate that.

So um defining the scope as the councilwoman uh mentioned earlier, I think is extremely important.

Um I've got questions on this too.

Like I mean, Mayor, you you want you want three appointments out of uh I mean I don't I don't personally understand why why I mean I think they did that sort of way back when, right?

Mayor with three and all of us with one.

I don't understand why we wouldn't all just have one appointee.

Um happy to happy to hear you out on on your reasoning on that.

Um but so I I do think that that having a B session uh where we can define the scope, the length, uh, the length of time this this commission will be active and what exactly they're gonna do, and of course, make sure that there's not other groups out there doing uh doing the exact same thing, I think is important.

So I'll I'll support the uh the councilwoman's motion.

Thanks.

Uh councilmember McKee Rodriguez.

Thank you, Mayor.

I'm neither here nor there on the continuance on the issue of the um the commission itself.

I'm supportive, and I think what I'm hearing in regards to the continuance is uh the desire to create a timeline for potentially the sunsetting of a commission of this sort, determining the scope about the commission and their their work and making sure that they don't overlap with others, and then issues of the makeup of the commission.

So to the point of the you know, timeline, I don't think and what I really want to get at is are we going to meaningfully change anything between now and the time it goes to a B session and then the time it goes to an A session, or are we essentially going to be voting on this exactly as is in a couple months from now?

And could we just get it out of the way now?

And I don't think that we need to pre-prepare for the sunsetting of a commission that it that has and will continue to evolve, the landscape of elections and uh and voter engagement and civic duty and rights and whatnot continues to change and is going to uh have challenges in perpetuity, and so the work of the commission could evolve, and I don't think that the sunsetting part is I'm not sold on that necessarily with regard to the scope of the commission.

I don't feel like I'm in the dark as to what the scope is.

It sounds to me like in simple terms, the goal is for the commission to identify gaps in our voting ecosystem that are either barriers or inhibit voter participation in some way, and then figure out what efforts are being done to uh to address those and what role can the city play separate from that and for them to make recommendations to us fairly broad, but becomes narrower as they accomplish the goals that the mayor laid out, including the report in July.

And so I and even the makeup, I mean commissions and boards all have different makeup.

I if it's gonna be the mayor's commission.

I think to the point that council member Mungia made about items going sent being sent backwards.

The challenge I have is that we've sent a lot of things directly to A session, or we've sent things from committee to A, or we've done we've done things that prevent everybody from weighing in, and that leads to um conflict and challenges.

I think once we do make it up here.

And so I would just encourage all of my colleagues for um not just this item, but for any future considerations, anything that is going to majorly impact policy or uh engagement throughout our city.

I think we all want to be able to weigh in on that, and we want to do it before an A session.

So I would encourage that maybe so that we don't have this sort of back and forth go on that that we do that.

Um I also understand that this is a very simple action in my eyes, and uh I understand I disagree with some of my colleagues.

I'll now that I've talked my way through it, I think I will be voting no on the continuance.

I understand it will likely pass, and I uh look forward to all the feedback from my colleagues on what this what this takes shape is.

Thank you.

Councilman Galvania, thank you, Mayor.

Um I feel comfortable with the commission overall.

Uh I think there's some parameters I would throw in there just to think about uh as we're looking at uh adopting it.

I think something on the expectations about uh collaborating with the county elections office, the county uh election commission, the city clerk's office, school districts, animal colleges districts, whether or not that's specific uh seats on there, or it's just make sure there's topics uh kind of laid out in that.

Um just I think expectation, whether it's in the resolution itself or otherwise, um would be good.

I think it's a good idea, frankly.

I know it's my idea about throwing it out there.

Um I I just think uh that's helpful just to make sure that we're looking at this in the most comprehensive way given the fact that it would be a larger commission.

Don't want to limit ourselves only to what the city does or uh focus in on by being able to really connect all the other folks that are involved in elections throughout our our area.

Um that's one part of it.

Uh I think one question I well uh on the the reoccurrence of it or the timeline of it, uh I feel fine with uh meeting it at least twice a year post the report.

Um I'm even comfortable with once a year.

Just I would like to get that discussion to the commission a bit, um, but I think either twice or once is fine.

Um just given like if there we give a really good comprehensive report on July 4th, um then it's just checking in from there, uh which I think was the intent anyway.

Um the appointment component, uh I think I prefer the the one appointment each.

Um, but I think it'd be fine with the mayor's appointee being the chair, given it to the mayor's commission.

Um question I did have about it beyond those was uh and this can be uh I think either for the mayor or for uh Debbie about uh the ethics commission.

Does any overlap there with the campaign finance conversations?

I know a lot of our charter, maybe it's not chartered, but some of those cleanups go to the ethics commission.

Would there not overlap in a bad way, but more so would there be ways for them to collaborate on that if the commission was created?

The ethics commission is uh charter board, and it can you cannot serve on the ethics commission and any other board.

Right.

So there could not be that kind of overlap.

Uh however, there could be discussions that this committee might have about elections that could be referred potentially to the ethics commission if if they found something like that.

Just wondering on the clarification of that.

I know it's what we do in committees too, right?

If there's in the educational one, there's a lot of overlap with other ones, and so we often talk about sharing it with PCDC or public safety, etc.

Uh some of those timely items.

Um I mean, I don't feel too strongly either way about moving forward with it today or moving it to B session or A session.

I'll I'm supportive of the the motion just because I think it's worthwhile to at least have the conversation a bit more.

But those are all my I think my questions are clarifications uh on it, and so I don't know what more I will push there.

But happy to have the conversation and just continue to see where we're going with it, whether today or excuse me, or in a B session or A session next time.

Thanks.

Thanks, Councilman.

Um on the draft that you were that you received, that the point about collaborating with others is absolutely um uh paramount.

Um and when it says avoid unnecessary duplication by reviewing the findings, conclusions, and recommendations of other appropriate task forces or committees, commissions or entities.

Um that's certainly what the what that is referring to.

Um don't want to be doing things that others are doing, especially given the short time frame by which we want to act and serve our community.

Okay.

Um is that the any others that would like to speak on the continuance?

Okay.

Okay, so there's a motion in a second to continue the item to a B session um in April or in May.

Please vote.

You did, sir.

You did, sir.

Thank you.

Yep.

Um, can I just bring him up now?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Go ahead, Jack Vinger.

Well mayor Ortice Jones.

Other members of our illustrious sanitary city council for the record, my name is Jack M.

Finger.

You're undocumented uh gadfly.

The uh this item regarding a push to uh try and increase uh voter turnout.

Um wonders I just I was thinking about this and wondering if if certain uh certain questions arose in my mind, and I'm just wondering if it rose in anybody else's.

Uh just one telling question would be would there still be a push to increase voter turnout if there were absolutely no conservative or republican elected officials here in this city and county.

No conservative in district ten, no conservative in district nine, no conservative and uh uh county commissioner precinct three, etc.

Yeah.

Tell me, would there still be a push for this?

And if you say, oh Jack, not a problem with we don't care about anybody's political philosophies on these things.

And I would say thank you for giving my me a good laugh for today there.

So yeah, um, but I know that you are a very creative council, and I think uh and I I can foresee the day where you uh will actually think of a real good way to to increase the the voter turnout for four-year elections here.

Yeah, I think you'll look back on the uh well, just a couple of years ago during the Biden administration.

We were uh San Antonio was a hub for all kinds of well, yes, illegal aliens, and we were flying them out to uh Los Angeles, Chicago, New York.

I I I think uh I wouldn't doubt it that that uh someone from this council will call call up the those those cities and say we want them back, we need our voters.

Yeah.

I I wouldn't doubt that uh coming from this council.

Thank you.

Okay.

Uh that was the only uh member of the community that signed up to speak on on that item.

Um before we vote, I I do want to say um if there weren't active attacks on any community members' ability to vote.

Um we might be focusing our efforts elsewhere.

Um, when uh there is legislation being passed, um, and frankly, all other legislation being held as bounty uh until this thing that would disproportionately disenfranchise poor voters, um uh married women, uh, et cetera.

I mean, some of these things amount to a poll tax.

The fact that you'd have to have a passport, half of the community doesn't have a passport um or uh or access to your to your um to your birth certificate.

The urgency with which some are working to make it more difficult for certain communities to vote is why the urgency we should match that urgency at the local level to ensure our community is heard at the ballot box, the mark of a citizen, the mark of a citizen.

So there's a motion and a second uh to continue this item.

Um please vote okay.

The motion carries Mayor, you please just one uh based on that vote and some of the council's conversations and I'll work to we have a pretty busy April or May, well, from now until June actually, but I'll make some we'll look at some options to schedule the April May.

But uh I just talked to Andy a second ago, and I think based on some of the comments uh to make the B session conversation a little bit more fruitful in line with what some of the council members said, and we can talk about this offline.

But is there is there um somebody with with obviously you mayor and maybe uh one or two other council members to work on something so that it's because otherwise we are gonna present the same thing at the next B session.

So we maybe a work group to uh to address some of the comments in that way it's uh a fruitful conversation for the council.

Yeah, we can take that offline.

I think that's helpful.

Um and uh for folks, I mean this is again the draft that was what that was shared via via email and that was posted, but we'll make sure that we um incorporate folks' feedback and understand exactly the scope that folks are interested in that may be different than that.

Thanks, Eric.

Okay.

Okay.

On um April 2nd, 2026.

The City Council of the Sand of the City of San Antonio will now meet in executive session to consult with the city attorney's office pursuant to chapter 551 of the Texas government code and to deliberate or discuss the following items.

Economic development negotiations pursuant to section 551.087, the purchase exchange lease or value of real property pursuant to section five five one dot zero seven two, and legal issues related to litigation involving the city, emergency preparedness, and collective bargaining all pursuant to section five five one dot zero seven one.

Thanks.

And the San Antonio City Council will now reconvene in open session.

No official action was taken in executive session.

Um I will now recess this A session at 216.

Um to the time is now 230, and this is reconvening the A session from um earlier today.

We will now though go back into executive session.

So the time is 2 30 p.m.

on April 2nd, 2026.

The City Council of the City of San Antonio will now meet in executive session to consult with the city attorney's office pursuant to chapter 551 of the Texas government code and to deliberate or discuss the following items.

Economic development negotiations pursuant to section 551.087, the purchase exchange lease or value of real property pursuant to section five five one dot zero seven two, and legal issues related to litigation involving the city emergency emergency preparedness and collective bargaining all pursuant to section five five one dot zero seven one.

The time is now four thirty-seven PM on April second, two thousand twenty-six, and the San Antonio City Council will now reconvene in open session.

No official action was taken in executive session.

The time is now four thirty-seven, and this meeting is adjourned.