I know.

The time is now 2 01 p.m.

on February 24th, 2026, and the meeting of the Economic and Workforce Development Committee is now called to order.

Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Councilmember Castillo.

Here.

Councilmember Galban.

Councilmember Messa Gonzalez.

Councilmember Spears.

Chair Viegran here.

We have quorum.

All right.

Thank you.

The first item on the agenda is approval in the minutes.

Are there any corrections to the minutes?

Can I get a motion?

And a second?

All right, we've got a motion and a second.

Uh all those in favor say aye.

Aye.

All opposed say no.

Motion carries.

Madam Clerk, are there any citizens signed up to speak on the items for public comment?

Chair, we have no public comment.

Great.

All right.

Um we have item number two and three.

We only have two items.

Love it.

Okay, so we have two items.

Uh item two, Chair.

Uh, go ahead and uh let's talk about I'm sorry, Madam Clerk.

Um everybody will have five minutes to speak the first round, three minutes to speak the second.

Um then item two is an update on Brooks, and there is a staff presentation.

Can we go ahead and get that?

Yes, ma'am.

The staff presentation is actually gonna be given by um Leo.

Leo Gomez.

Okay, thank you.

Leo, come on up.

The floor is yours.

Thank you, ma'am.

Good afternoon, madam chair.

May I call you that?

You are chair of the committee.

It's a it's wonderful to join you all and the council members and Ms.

Alex Lopez.

Uh pleasure to be here.

Uh, my first question is who's driving this presentation?

Is there a I think it's you ah never say that this is San Antonio doesn't have great technology.

All right, got it.

Got it.

It really is a pleasure to be here and provide you with an update on Brooks where we are, uh, what we've accomplished over the last 10 to 20 years, actually, and uh also get to where we plan to go moving forward and some requests that we may have of you all strategically in the long run.

So if I may, I'll go ahead and get started.

Okay.

With that, I'd like to really show us what Brooks used to look like back in 2003, about the time that it was conveyed to the city and then to the Brooks Development Authority.

You can see the established runways and plenty of open fields.

At that point in time, the campus plus the 1200 acres around it that make up the Brooks Turs were valued at 36.8 million dollars.

Fast forward to today, those runways are gone.

Most of them have been converted into streets.

Many thanks to some of the investments through Bond uh proceeds in the past from the City of San Antonio and its voters, and we thank you for that.

But today's value in terms of development is 2.1 billion dollars.

I would do the quick math for you and tell you that that's a 57-time uh improvement over the 36.8 million dollars that it was valued at in 2003.

Okay, 2.1 billion dollars that we've done there.

If there is a headline regarding Brooks that I want to share with you today, is the fact that our community of 1308 acres plus some developments in the immediate area is gonna have a projected population of 10,000 residents, right?

10,000 residents on 1,308 acres.

We have seven residential communities today, and seven on the way.

Actually, let me back up.

And so for that time period, it's been mostly market rate.

Going into the future of the seven that we have coming, we have our first affordable community, which is actually an independent senior of 55 plus that will be located there at Brooks opening soon, actually, and then we have a second affordable commute community that's actually a multifamily development, plus another five market rate developments, all again coming online within the next two to three years.

And if we project a minimum of 2.2 or 2.3 residents per apartment or something like that, we're gonna be at 10,000 people.

Okay.

In addition to our market rate development and our first foray into affordable housing, we've worked with Sam Ministries on permanent supportive housing.

We own 55 acres, uh, just half a mile, uh, less than half a mile from Brooks up Press Street, and we work with Sam Ministries to make a portion of that parcel available for their development of what will be known as the Commons at Aseca Trails, a total of the 200 units there, and we uh hope to continue to work with them to develop that 55-acre parcel in a way that is really uh developing the community that permanent supportive housing will work, including a mix of other types of residential opportunities and retail.

The business environment at Brooks.

I I point these out because we have six companies at Brooks that are the direct result of four and direct investment.

We have two companies that are whose parent companies are originally from based in France.

We have two from South Korea, a third company is a prospect that would come for from South Korea, by the way.

We have Nisei America from Japan, and we uh, which one that I have Oaken Process, which is originally from the Czech Republic.

We're excited to have these.

You all had a presentation from Greater SATX, the whole council did a week ago, and I need to share with you all that we really enjoy our partnership with Greater SATX.

Every one of these four indirect investments representing over 2,000 jobs started out as the lead from Greater SATX.

Our job was to make sure they had a shovel ready site for these prospects, and then help uh close the incentive package that needed to be provided to secure these companies for San Antonio, and we're glad to have them all.

Education.

I love telling people that on the 1,308 acres at Brooks, simply put, there are three high schools for people to choose from.

We have a high school that has a dedicated medical curriculum.

We have a high school that's a STEM-certified curriculum, and one that is an IT curriculum.

In addition to those three high schools, they have their their partnership middle schools, and some a couple of them are K through 12.

We also have the University of the Incarnate Words School of Osteopathic Medicine with a student body of 800 there at that medical school already working in our community while they're students there, by the way.

We also have on the advanced manufacturing side the county's Texas Fame program, which provides us with a steady stream of advanced manufacturing technicians, not only for those companies that are at Brooks, but throughout Bear County.

And they have a real need for advanced manufacturing technicians.

We're gonna be glad to be the home of that for Alamo Colleges.

1.8 million of that has already occurred, and we got a little over 300 million that is on the way.

That will be by the end of this year, and we have some wonderful prospects going forward.

As I talk about those prospects going forward, we have a number of zones and incentives tied to some of these zones to make sure that you all understand what we have to offer.

So you have the Brooks camp, the Brooks TURS, which is the diagonal striping that you see there.

It again includes the Brooks campus plus 1,200 acres uh immediately adjacent to the Brooks campus.

If you consider the Brooks campus plus the greenish color to the left of that map, uh that's includes two additional census tracks, uh those two census tracks, but plus Brooks make up the Brooks opportunity zone, which I will address a little later, but that obviously makes Brooks and investment at Brooks uh of good appetite for investors in our part of town.

We're proud to be the town center or the focus of the Brooks Regional Center, the first Brooks, the first regional center completed in the San Antonio Tomorrow plan by the City of San Antonio.

Uh the TURS, I uh I don't know what to say, but that I love TURS, right?

And I would love to be sharing with you all all the successes and some of the challenges that we had along the road on developing the TURS to the capacity that it has.

The TURS is making it possible for us to cover the cost of a lot of infrastructure investment at Brooks, and we'll have incredible capacity going forward.

I need to take a moment and thank you and the city staff for working with my staff to make sure that we were able to refinance our infrastructure debt this last year, and the proceeds from the TURS for the next seven years are going to help offset 17 million dollars of that debt, equaled by 17 million dollars contributed directly by Brooks to bring down our debt.

It really is going to put us in a very sustainable position as we carry debt going forward or lesser debt, is really what I should say.

Okay.

The opportunity zone impact.

In essence, all of the opportunity zone investors, and if you total them all up from the two office buildings to some of the residential units to a climate control facility with business offices, et cetera, it's nearly 500 million dollars that we would have probably had a tough time attracting, but for investors being able to take advantage of the fact that Brooks is a designated opportunity zone.

The available properties are the ones that are in color here.

Everything else is taken for uh already.

Uh the the middle of it is primarily going to be a town center in the lighter pinkish color, reddish pinkish color, and in the blue in the center of it.

We hope to develop as a medical center office complex along with some commercial office development.

Aside from that, we have two parcels left really that would be available for light industrial development, more uh advanced manufacturing, but those are the only two that we have left.

In a nutshell, we have uh about 300, I say less than 300 as of today, with a pipeline that we have that's available in terms of acreage for additional employers.

Okay.

That's good news, but it's also bad news in that we're running out of land to keep attracting companies.

Before I go on to talk about what we can do about that, let me share this with you.

Uh, this is the revenue to the city, to the Brooks TURS, and to the county from various taxes collected within the Brooks TURS.

I submit to you that in 2023, the City of San Antonio benefited to the tune of $9.5 million from taxes collected within the Brooks TURS.

Okay.

That's aside from the money that goes to Brooks from the TURS.

That's aside from taxes collected that goes to the county.

And I'm not including the school districts and other tax eating entities in here.

But of that nine and a half million dollars, if you were to ask me what makes up most of it, I would answer sales tax.

It's amazing.

Our development of retail and restaurant development, 150 plus in the Brooks area, generated $8.5 million in sales taxes that go to the city alone, not to mention what goes to the state of Texas, et cetera.

So it's incredible in terms of that kind of development and what it has produced for the city of San Antonio, even though we're a designated TURS, and most of the property tax goes towards that TURS and benefiting Brooks.

But our vision shouldn't be doubted.

Our vision is to have a very positive impact on the region surrounding Brooks.

And that region that surrounds Brooks, the Brooks Regional Center, over the last 10 years, has had household incomes go up by 36%.

Compared to the same period, San Antonio household incomes went up by 32%.

So well a few good percentage points ahead that uh ahead of that.

The high school graduation rate up by 10%, poverty rate down by 2%, and the unemployment rate down by 4%.

What we are doing is working.

If you think that economic development is not just about employers' incentives, but about creating jobs for people that give them a really good paycheck, uh, well above the poverty level, plus a good health care package and the opportunity to support their kiddos going to school.

That's what's happening in the neighborhoods around Brooks, and we look forward to partnering with you to continue doing that.

Upcoming priorities for us is the opportunity zone 2.0 designation.

Of course, your wonderful city bond package of five billion dollars.

Did I get everybody's attention?

No.

All right.

Uh, whatever it may be.

We obviously will have a project.

We're very grateful for what the city has done to support infrastructure projects through past bond programs, and we will have a project to submit to you all for this next one.

We also are developing a plan to identify publicly owned parcels surrounding the Brooks campus, which we theoretically could take ownership of and continue developing as sites ready, shovel ready sites for continued uh attraction of major employers to this corning of this corner of San Antonio.

I've already mentioned the Palo Alto facility, but I'll have a few more words to say about that.

The opportunity zone again is the Brooks campus plus two census tracks to our west.

I will uh confess to you all that the Brooks campus itself is a census track, does not meet the poverty rates that an opportunity zone would have to meet alone.

It's because we've added the two census tracks to the immediate west with poverty rates of uh 23% and above to make up a part of the zone that we qualified as an opportunity zone.

We will be resubmitting for redesignation.

Uh the city will be making its nominations to the governor's office and then the governor's office to HUD and the administration over this next year.

We will work with Brenda and her team as we go through the process, Miss Alyx.

Um, and hopefully, because of the success that we've had with the opportunity zone, we won't be penalized but incentivized to keep doing the work that we are doing.

Okay.

And we would certainly appreciate your support as that comes before you and the council over this next year.

The bond program.

Again, I will start by saying thank you.

And the last bond issue, there was $15 million to help rebuild our main street, Sydney Brooks.

That's the main road that goes east to west, right through the middle of Brooks or the Brooks campus.

Outlined in the yellow there is the $15 million project that was in the last bond package.

That two-lane street of today will be turned into a complete street with two lanes in each direction, plus a median turn lanes, 10 foot sidewalks, all utilities underground, et cetera.

Uh a contractor has already been identified by the city of San Antonio, and we expect construction to commence this spring.

Okay.

As we look at our submittal for the next bond package, uh we have no doubt that it's going to be to complete the second half of Sydney Brooks.

And it's outlined there in the bottom left in the yellow.

So it's from New Brownfuls out to Pressa.

And that project is about the same length as the other as the current one, but the difference is that it goes over a floodplain, and it will require a bridge to take the road out of the floodplain.

So I am telling you as of today that you know we will be making a request of over 15 million dollars, uh, equal to the project that is starting this spring, but acknowledging and understanding that this next one will include a bridge to get the road out of the uh floodplain and therefore will be more costly.

We're working on finalizing our numbers, and we'll work with you, Councilwoman Viagran, as uh we fine-tune those numbers and prepare a request that would come to the council for the bond package.

This is a graphic that shows all of the publicly owned parcels of land surrounding Brooks, and they are designated in that baby blue color.

All right, light blue, baby blue uh is is what it is.

And those are owned by either the city, the county, school districts, San Antonio River Authority, and other public entities, uh, all available and currently off the tax rolls.

Most of them do not have development or improvements upon them today, and we want to work with your, we have been working with your planning department and want to be working with your economic development department on identifying some of those parcels that might be available to be added to the inventory that Brooks can continue to develop.

Uh what gives them or or makes them an obvious target for us is that they're already owned by public entities and therefore already off the tax rolls.

So theoretically conveying a parcel to Brooks would not take a piece of property off the tax rolls that today our public entities are benefiting from.

There will be more to come on that.

We've got a lot of work to do, but do want to share with you that as we finish developing Brooks, and it's 1,308 acres.

Again, we have less than 300 acres, closer to 200 acres that are available today.

This is going to be our plan going forward that we will be working with you and sharing with you as we move forward over the next couple of years.

Palo Alto College, uh $98 million investment.

As I've already said, I will tell you that if there is a need that all our manufacturing firms have on Brooks, and actually I would extend that to all our manufacturing firms in San Antonio, is the talent that is needed to fill positions for skilled maintenance technicians.

People who have the skill sets that involve plumbing, electrical, and computer science, all those together, the people who manage maintenance and operate the robots within our manufacturing facilities, the manufacturing lines within our facilities.

I'm delighted that that facility will be at Brooks.

Of course, it will be there not just to serve the Brooks employers but the entire San Antonio community, and I'm proud of the partnership we're gonna have with Alamo Colleges.

With that, Madam Chair, I'll conclude my presentation.

I'd be glad to take some questions.

However, I'd like to take a quick moment to introduce our team that is here, and I should have done to begin with.

Okay, shame on me, because they're the ones to get the work done.

I'd like to recognize Samantha Burke, who's our chief operating officer, who has been with us at Brooks for over 13 years.

We have Connie Gonzalez, who's our chief strategy officer and has been with Brooks over 10 years.

We have Stony Burke, who's our chief financial officer, and has been with us nearly 10 years.

Is that sounding familiar?

All right.

Now, the newest ones, we have Victoria Shoemaker, you all might know her.

Uh, who how long have you been with us now, Victoria?

Seven months, okay.

Not quite a year.

And then our newest edition of us this week is Monse Monserrat.

So Montse, welcome and thank you for being here.

Uh I'm glad to take any questions, Madam Chair, and uh look forward to the conversation we might have here.

Thank you, Leo.

And uh thank you for the presentation.

Brooks has been one of those uh stories with thoughtfulness and the community coming together and making the right moves.

We've seen some great success there, and so I'm very thankful for your presentation.

As y'all know, my headquarters are there.

I know Councilman Castillo has come by to visit, and I think Councilman Mesa Gonzalez has too.

So, you know, it it's just a great story of what we can do when we work together as a team and when we have conversations and build collaboration and coalition.

So thank you for that.

Uh I understand the asks.

I think the only thing that we are looking at, and you addressed it a little, is that right now at this council, it is that the two things that we're looking at is one housing, because with stable housing brings a lot of opportunity, and then two, if you can talk about not just the jobs but leveling up for the jobs, and then um what opportunities they have there if there's a lot of movement between the companies on the campus.

First of all, housing.

The additional publicly owned parcels around Brooks that I talked about for economic development, we actually could theoretically do housing development there too.

So we could partner with you on affordable housing on those parcels.

Uh we've already visited with the school district, for example, on some needs that they might have for teacher housing and school district employee housing.

We haven't been able to make it quite work yet, but we continue to visit that, and that's something I really think we should work together on and explore with whatever resources the city might have on the affordable housing side.

Uh so please know that that we welcome that opportunity and would be glad to work with you all on that.

Uh, on the wages side, uh, let me tell you we are in interesting times.

And uh I've got to share with you that while we have a good number of employees or employers on campus, they're all doing well.

But this environment of um not knowing what your costs are going to be regarding your inputs and into your product and your process, uh, namely I'm talking about tariffs, and what that does, as you as you saw, six of our companies at Brooks, six of our major employers are foreign-based.

They have partners from throughout the world, so they buy their a lot of their product, a lot of their inputs uh from internationally, and so the tariffs are are causing uh some instability in what they might be able to do going forward.

Uh I would submit to you that a couple of them would have already announced growth in terms of their employment, but for that in decision caused by the instability that is brought about by tariffs.

So as we go to SA to DC, as we talk with the federal government, uh the the closer and the sooner some of these final decisions are made regarding tariffs, the sooner these companies can make their business decisions.

Related to that and and jobs and wages, uh I've got to share with you that we have a continued conversation, as Alex well knows on our board, and and we're very grateful to have Alex on our board.

Uh, and and please don't change anything about that.

Uh it's it's good to be working with uh with Alex on our board and and be able to sort things out before they become a problem.

And so we're very grateful to that.

Uh I mean that, Alex, and we appreciate you.

Uh let me tell you, we work very hard at attracting high-paying jobs.

We've also got to provide jobs for the families that live in the neighborhoods around us, right?

And you know, if you don't have a high school diploma or if all you have is a high school diploma, uh a job that pays 80 grand a year is probably not a job you're going to be able to fill.

And I've got to submit to you that Brooks for a long time was a place where people drove down from other parts of town, came off the highway, earned the paycheck, and then took it with them at the end of the day.

And we got to find a way to balance the good paying jobs with the jobs that are needed by the surrounding community so that that community can earn a paycheck and spend it in their own community because that's what's creating the economic development that leads to that 36% increase in household income.

That leads to that 10% increase in high school graduation rates, that leads to that drop in that 2% poverty rate.

Okay, thank you.

Um Councilman Castillo.

Thank you, Chair, and uh thank you, Leo, for the presentation.

And I really appreciate you highlighting uh the tenure of your team.

I think it's very telling of leadership and the board and the initiative and the ways in which y'all work collaboratively.

Uh, just always grateful to hear when folks have been with the team 10 plus years.

Um, so just grateful for that work.

But I would be remiss if I didn't thank the councilwoman and her predecessor for leading this initiative or helping to facilitate rather uh in district five.

This is often where my constituents share that they will go to shop and or like enjoy and spend their money uh is at Brook City Base because it is the closest shopping center uh to us with a direct um interstate taking them to Brook City Base.

So I think what would be helpful in terms of the request for bond support, I think there would be value in seeing in terms of the public investment that has been made and the return, right?

I know you mentioned that um whether it's with Bear County or City of San Antonio taxes, um, this development, particularly through the sales tax, has generated millions of dollars in revenue.

And I think what would be helpful as we navigate those bond conversations to see the return of investment of those public dollars, which uh is impressive, and the record of impact that y'all laid out is is is really impressive, particularly with the household incomes uh and then the high school graduation rate as well.

Um so just I I think that can help us in terms of when we're having those larger bond conversations to justify the return of investment of those public dollars.

Well, thank you.

We will I'll have a map party with my team and we'll we'll get to those right numbers.

And in addition to that, not only in terms of the various because there's there's sales taxes, there's hotel motel taxes, uh, there's personal uh property taxes, et cetera, and and we'll be able to show you all those numbers and how your investment has really increased that over the last 10 to 15 years.

But also, councilwoman, uh I'm gonna ask my team to take a look at the numbers that the city through its bond program has invested in Brooks and how many jobs have been created at that same time.

Because I would suggest to you all that an investment in infrastructure at the end of the day, is what helps us create those jobs.

Yeah, absolutely right, and that's the intent to demonstrate that oftentimes you sometimes you have to spend money to make money, right?

Uh and I think this is potentially one of those examples that there is a huge return, whether it's uh wages, sales taxes, so on and so forth.

Um, one thing that's exciting every time I visit Brooks is to continue to see the residential development that's occurring.

Um, there's already a lot of single family homes constructed in terms of some of those initiatives.

Um what what is that look like?

What is the timeline?

Uh I know y'all have several different moving pieces with uh housing.

Uh can you just give me uh a quick um what y'all got going on related to um residential housing in that area?

Okay, well, we got a number of multifamily developments in uh development right now.

Uh again, I mentioned the senior affordable and the multi-family affordable, along with two, is it two Connie?

Two more multi-family market rate, or is it three?

Two more.

Uh in addition to that, we're continuing with the development of our single family for rent neighborhood.

That's probably the first phase has been completed.

They'll be moving into their second phase.

That'll be a total of 500 homes at the end of the day, and we are actively visiting with developers on the development of an 18-acre single family for sale neighborhood.

So we have uh a number of choices when it comes to residential opportunities.

Multifamily market rate, multi-family affordable, the single family for rent, single family for sale, and of course, working with Sam Ministries on the permanent supportive solutions.

And I've really appreciated the mixed use development that y'all have out there that y'all have a spectrum of housing options, um, all within that specific uh footprint.

So just uh really grateful to see um that that initiative and you know it's focused on that area.

Um lastly, in terms of the opportunity zone, uh Alex, can you help me understand like the city's relationship as that gets developed and the city and city councils role with that piece?

Yes, ma'am.

So there is a whole process that has already been identified for how um communities, how cities would put forth recommendations.

Um we are anticipating an official list, I think it's from the US Department of Treasury, um, that would provide them the map of eligible census tracks.

Um our process through Brenda's team is to review that, collaborate with community partners, um, really get feedback and input from these different um geographies and stakeholders in those geographies, and then come to this committee.

I believe we're shooting for May, um, because we need to submit that up in June.

Okay.

And then uh I don't know how many seconds I have left.

One last question.

Um I I I think in terms of the public-private partnership.

I understand that the primary focus has been market rate.

Um, however, if there is that relationship with public-private uh particularly with public land, uh my expectation would be that it's in alignment with the strategic housing implementation goals, which would mean uh 30% to 60% AMI, um, just to ensure that we continue that balance out in that area.

And and we really uh as I said uh a little bit before, I I think the opportunity is in some of that vacant land that is around Brooks, uh, in close proximity to Brooks.

Some of those parcels might be owned by the city of San Antonio.

I I know a couple of them are owned by the school district, and in the best uh thing we can do is to partner and address that affordable housing at those levels in on those parcels.

Great.

Thank you, Leo.

Appreciate you and your team, and thank you, Chair.

Thank you, ma'am.

Thank you.

Uh Councilman Galvine.

Thank you, Chair.

And thank you, Leo.

First of all, I want to shout out the incredible district six resident we have here presenting today.

Um very proud to have you here and have you in our community doing some incredible work uh across the board, not just at Brooks, but across our entire city.

Um quick thing, I know we've talked to this before.

Um folks may not know this, but I never officially lived on Brooks campuses, but I was there very frequently when a special person in my life lives there.

Um until she was a district six with me.

Um, and so I really enjoyed being able to live uh enjoy the luxury of being there, um, just because it was nice uh seeing the new development come online.

Being there uh was it 2022?

Um it was a really it was really interesting to see the new places come around, the walkability of it all, the and the clearly thought-through um master plan development that we talked a lot about replicating or not replicating but being similar to Mueller uh in Austin, uh was very familiar to to myself, of course.

Um, but I think it's well deserving for the city and for the South Side San Antonio in particular, right?

Um we do well planned and well thought out communities we can make it to where a lot of young families are there now and still going there.

Um a lot of seniors are now gonna move in as well.

And so it was very interesting being able to be a part of that community briefly.

Um, and now it's always nice to come visit too when I visit my not yet in-laws uh just down the road.

Um so it's always a good time to go back to Brooks, I think.

And I want to just thank you for the work that you and your entire team has done to make that uh vision uh a reality.

In particular, always very happy to share too with Via being there.

I mean, it's an incredible hub for the entire community, um, and not just for the south side for the entire city, because it's very uh very easy for me to commute to go visit uh on the 103 in the 552 from the district six all the way out to district three uh in a pretty quick time where I got to read, not think about too much, not have the transfer multiple times because we invested in transportation there too.

Anyway, and that's my big uh celebrations for Brooks.

Um there's always more to celebrate, but I wanted to share that for my personal story.

Um I did want to ask a couple quick questions on slide two and three.

We talked about assessed value and development.

Uh is there a reason there's a difference in using assessed value the first slide than development the next slide?

Yes.

Um because we don't have the assessed value for the entire uh TERS to compare apples to apples yet.

Uh although we completed that a year ago.

24 24, right?

So uh that's why we don't have the direct apples to apples comparison there.

Okay.

And even if we did that assessment through the appraisal district, which we would then get a value for, it would not include the projects that are underway right now.

Right.

Right.

So uh it's it's a matter of I could have gone that route and ended up with a smaller number, quite frankly.

I'd like the bigger number, council.

Fair enough.

It's always good to have the projects coming online as well, including.

And that's the reason because of the projects that are coming online and not yet being assessed by the appraisal district.

Yeah.

I think that'll be helpful with Council Ricastill's point about the kind of return on investment.

I think this, of course, just development alone, right, is still a significant number there, but I think having the value or the apples to apples for both ends is really good.

Right.

Uh as much as we can.

Um supportive of the affordability component when we talk about it, of course.

I know we've had a conversation too about the market rate and the affordability conversation there, and I think it's very similar, right?

We got to make sure you have the base there to stabilize it, and then you bring on everything else you can uh for the community benefits overall.

So uh just a grip for the mix.

A mix is the end of the exact you know, we we've got to provide residential opportunities for doctors and nurses and residential opportunities for those who need help paying the rent.

Of course, especially the folks that we're helping find the good secure jobs if they can't live nearby, then what right?

What's it all for?

Um so all that said, uh appreciate that point in support of making sure that we're still looking at affordability to make sure that folks are able to live on the campus everywhere they can.

Um slide four for the projected residents.

Um is that within the the campus or the larger regional it is uh 90% within the campus.

Okay, and then two of them are with within a quarter mile of Brooks.

Right.

Okay.

Just wanted to ask about the specific number.

Um the educational aspect, I wanted to ask a little bit just because of course we're always hearing conversations related to um the ISD's uh difficulties in the nearby area minus East Central.

I think they have a different uh playing field at the moment, just down the road.

But uh what's the coordination been like?

Of course, I know uh cast uh med is on campus, um, but what's been the coordination like with uh the ISDs, the partnerships in the area?

Uh our partnership with uh with the school district, SISD in particular, as well as Central, uh has been there from the get-go.

Connie Gonzalez, her chief strategy officer has sat, I've sat uh on the SISD foundation, for example.

Right.

Uh Connie uh sits on it today.

I guess they still keep me as one of the old men of the council, something like that.

Um but you know, we really have a good working relationship with them to the point that we've had those serious conversations about teacher housing and housing for school district employees, and we'll continue to work with them.

And we're big supporters of the cast high school that's there on the Brooks campus, and uh do what we can to support them uh to make sure that high school uh thrives and is sustainable.

Thanks so much, Theo.

Thank you, Chair.

All right, thank you.

Councilman Meskinz.

Thank you.

Just quick, thank you for the presentation.

Um, and really just appreciate all the work.

Um, really just comments, really uh I second what my colleagues have said, and uh especially as far as uh the champion you have in councilwoman uh via grand, the Via Grans, right?

Her and her sister, I think have just been uh such champions for the work that y'all are doing, and you really couldn't ask for anything more.

So in fact, I was like, wow, this is kind of like a medical center-ish type thing going on here.

And I I wish we had a multimodal slide like you do in the medical center, because I mean it's just hitting on everything from jobs to education to transportation, housing, um, all of those things that right that propel us into the future.

And um, you know, growing up around this stuff and around this work and being in this work, you I would hear a lot of times, and you've heard it too, that uh we just don't have the talent.

Um, and that's we can't say that anymore.

No.

Uh we just are not.

We're in 2026, and we have all types of technology around us to bring in that talent.

And so I'm glad to see that here um at Brooks.

Um I really uh love the work with Palo Alto with Texas Fame, uh Sam Ministries.

Um yeah, just congratulations, and um look forward to seeing more.

Thank you.

Well, thank you.

And and I need to share with you that I I really and thank you for pointing out the Via Grants.

You know, uh my tenure at Brooks of What is it, you all?

I claim 13, 14, but it's 12?

13.

13 years at Brooks.

I'm bad at math.

I need to ask them.

Um 13 years at Brooks have all been with a Viagran on the San Antonio City Council.

What we have accomplished at Brooks has been a partnership with Councilwoman Rebecca Viagran and Councilwoman Feliz Via Granz for thanks for recognizing that.

And I shared earlier how appreciative we are to have uh a manager's designee on our board, and I mean that sincerely, and we're grateful to have Alex on the board.

Uh I'm grateful to each of you and the rest of City Council for the board members that you provide us.

You uh you give that thought, and we have really good people uh to be working with us and guiding our process there.

And when we get a little out of line, we've got Alex to get us back in line.

Uh I say that lovingly, of course.

Uh but but thank you all very much.

Okay.

Thank you, Leo.

And the last thing I want to bring up in terms of the multimodal, and I know uh Councilman Galvan has been working on this, whether how we're looking we move in the future, and I know he's working with VIA and and you uh sit on the board, Leo.

Is that when we look at a multimodal transportation hub like we have on Brooks, it really is a pilot where we can look at how we move forward.

So in our discussion, whether it's reduced fares, no fares, this fares, I think what we need to do is look at if we want people ridership.

We need ridership to go up.

So we need to look at the green lines and the silver line and say how fast are they going?

And I think if we can get people from if we can get people to where they need to go faster, if I can get someone from my headquarters uh or my field office to downtown within 15 20 minutes, they're gonna pay for that ride if it is fast.

And that's where I think we have opportunities with our multimodal transportation, and I really think what we've done here in Brooks is the future in hubs and spots in every district.

So there's opportunities there.

I think it's one of those things where we we try a mix of things uh before we find out what really fits with via.

But the great thing about uh Brooks is that we can pilot a lot out of there to see what works best in each district.

So uh thank you for bringing that up, Councilman Mesa Gonzalez and Leo.

I thank you for you know, not only just willing to serve there, but stepping up and serving on the via board because you know how important that green line is and how we want to get we want to get people north-south, but we need to get them east-west also.

So um, thank you for that.

Any other comments?

Does anybody else want to chime in one more time?

Rick, yes.

Just really quick.

I wanted to ask on the education one.

Do we know how many elementary age students live within the Brooks boundaries?

Uh no.

Okay, no worries.

We can also know there's we find out, of course we could, but I I don't know off the top of my head.

Just because I think it's crucial when we talk about I know some of the schools have some closures over there, but there are also new elementary schools coming online from different districts, and so just interested to see what that growth looks like and how it relates, of course, to the work we're doing with the education opportunities committee.

Um that's the only question.

Councilman, you know, you raise a good point, but we're visiting with Sarah uh Barray, and and we love what uh they've developed out there by the whole uh property, and and we've so we've visited a couple of times.

We are scheduled to meet with her here sometime soon.

We want to see we can work on a satellite of that literally on the Brooks campus to support all the employees uh that go to work there every day.

Uh but child care is definitely something that needs to be addressed, and I think there's a very natural partner in the in a city related or city supported program that we can partner with to make that happen on the Brooks campus.

Good.

Thank you for that.

Last thing I wanted to say was I'm sorry, uh several people in my life, including a very special person, but also multiple, uh, are very thankful for the green line.

And so I just wanted to shout out that because it's one of uh our favorite places to go, even still uh we take a little bit of a commute from the 6-6 to walk around there.

It feels good memories for us, but it's also because of the environment you've built there to make it to where it's safe.

Well, I look forward to seeing you on the Green Line Park uh more and more often.

Thank you for having come over for an actual formal tour of Brooks.

It was obvious then that you already were very familiar with it, and so uh I thank your future spouse and your future in laws uh for that.

I'm just always always welcome.

The next green lines coming for the 66.

We'll see.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, thank you, Leah.

All right, thank you.

You all have a good afternoon.

Bye-bye.

All right, we're gonna move on to item three.

This is an update on the, and I don't know why media didn't want to stay around for this.

The procurement process review, and I believe there is a staff presentation.

Um so uh is it Victoria and Anna presenting?

Yes.

Okay.

We're gonna give Troy a break today.

Um good afternoon, Chair and Committee members.

I'm Victoria Rader.

I'm the deputy finance director, and I'm here with Anna Bradshaw.

She is our economic development assistant director to give you all the procurement process review update.

Um the agenda for this presentation is we're gonna go over the background, like why why we're doing this, why we're here, and then Anna's gonna talk a lot more about capacity building, supplier engagement, and I'm gonna conclude our presentation and talk about the procurement process.

What were the recommendations?

What were some the ones we implemented, and what are we still looking to do specifically with the SAP upgrade?

So a little bit of the background here.

The mayor did charge the committee with taking a closer look at the procurement process and seeing how we can make it more efficient.

So we looked at two key areas, or we've been looking at two key areas.

The first would be that economic development.

They looked at how they're gonna col they've been collaborating with our divest diverse business stakeholders, and then finance.

We looked at our procurement process in general and how can we make this more efficient.

Back in this past December, we had recommendations to city council.

We looked at how we're gonna conduct this review.

We gave the proposed timeline and we committed to coming back to you all and letting you all know where we're at and what we'd still like to do.

So the focus areas are broken down into three different areas.

Um, like I said, Anna's gonna go over more detail with two of them regarding capacity building and supplier engagement.

And I'm gonna talk more about the procurement process review and how we worked with civic initiatives and took their recommendations and used those as our transformation roadmap.

Good afternoon, I'm Anna Bradshaw, Assistant Director in Economic Development, uh, and happy to be collaborating with the procurement team.

Uh, we share the 18th floor over in City Tower, so have had the opportunity to work closely.

Um, but our focus uh in economic development has really been on capacity building and supplier engagement.

You may recall back in May of last year, we presented on our overall strategy, so this fits right in.

I mean, in the area of capacity building, we're really about helping those small businesses compete and win the contracts, and when they're on them, successfully complete them.

And our shining star in that is our vendor development academy, formerly known as the mentor protege program, but it's our partnership with the Alamo Colleges.

And over the last year, we've completely revamped that program and giving, including giving it a new name.

And so now we've reduced it from a three-year program to a one-year intensive program where the vendors had the opportunity to participate in Alamo College's classes, working one-on-one with the program administrator and also being paired with a mentor who's also in business.

Uh, some of these are businesses who are on city contracts and we're able to leverage our Sabata program requirements uh to cultivate those mentors, but some of them are just businesses who do it as volunteers.

And so we're excited with this current new cohort of 15 businesses who have been uh paired and are completing the training now.

And um, as part of our revamp of the program, have really looked at our metrics of success to ensure that the businesses participating are are getting out of the program what we're we're seeking to do and are really looking at those city opportunities and able to work through the process with their mentor and leverage those classes they're taking, including estimating uh bonding, their business finance, different areas uh so that they can really be prepared and compete for the contracts.

Uh the other area we're really focusing in on for capacity building is our partnership with Supply SA and wanted to recognize Melanie McCoy, executive director is here, and Leo just left.

Leo's other hat is as the current chair of Supply SA.

So we have been participating in this partnership for a number of years now, where it's looking at it on a more regional level, so a systems-based level of how can we look at our vendor community and recognize they're not just bidding on city projects, they're also looking at the other public entities and focus on certification through Supply SA, which is really become that first point of entry where Melanie and her team are able to flag perhaps they're having issues with their business finance and are able to refer them to launch SA to SBDC to look at those issues before they are seeking bidding on our public sector contracts, as well as building out the procurement navigation services.

So, one of the things we do here through our outreach is it's difficult to do business with public agencies, and they want someone to walk them through the whole process.

And so recognizing as public agencies, that's not something we can readily do on the solicitation specifics.

But if we have a partner who's able to understand our solicitations and provide that information, that is one opportunity for them to become more successful.

In addition, we continue to look at bonding and insurance requirements, making sure that we are able to provide that information to the businesses on our various requirements along the way.

And then in the area of supplier engagement, the outreach and engagement, it's really about increasing that pool, making sure we're casting a wide net.

So one of the things we implemented back in October of last year is monthly office hours at launch SA.

We actually have our next one coming up later this week.

And it staff are there at the library to answer questions, both uh economic development staff, procurement staff, as well as we've added staff from Supply SA, so really creating that one-stop shop where the businesses can come in, ask all their questions.

They may be able to start the certification process while they're there.

Um, and we look forward to continuing to do this, and then coming spring and summer, we're looking to go on the road to the various libraries and have these office hour opportunities.

So more to come on those those future outreach events.

In addition, our team, along with capital delivery, public works, and aviation are contacting those stakeholder groups, the professional and trade organizations.

I can tell you, we do an excellent job during the disparity study of going out and getting feedback from the businesses and these associations.

But when the study's done, when the Sabata ordinance amendments are done in the past, some of that engagement has dwindled.

And so with this, we're making conservative effort to go out on a regular basis, get their feedback, but also share our information, whether it's the annual procurement forecast, which the procurement team goes to the trouble of putting all together, or again, being able to address those concerns more in real time rather than waiting every five years with the study.

And so you can see a list of groups there we've been engaging with along the way and look forward to continuing to do.

So I'll hand it back off to Vicky.

And the last thing we talked want to talk about is the procurement process.

So, like Anna said, we've been working in collaboration with economic development, and it's been over the last few years.

About two years ago, we worked with civic initiatives to come in and take a look at our procurement process and see where there are gaps and how we can fill those in.

So civic initiatives went out to our stakeholders and they asked them what are the challenges that you see did you have when you want to bid on an item?

And from that, they gave us a list of recommendations, and we've implemented some of those recommendations.

Here's a list of all the recommendations from a high level, you know, they said, can you eliminate some steps to make it more efficient, make the process go a little faster?

What can you do to simplify the procurement methods, the thresholds?

Um, tell us some identify potential resources of deficiencies and adjust your procurement plan.

Take a closer look at the organizational model more for strategic procurement, have training, and um of course establish more of a proactive approach with our internal and external stakeholders.

Sorry.

So we took those recommendations, and here are some of the things we've implemented over the last couple of years.

The first one being the city manager delegation, allowing the city manager to authorize approved contracts for those three different categories.

So if it's a fleet item, as long as it's approved by the budget, um, if it's goods and services up to two and a half million dollars, and any sort of construction professional services or architecture and engineering and other services up to one million dollars, the city manager or his designees able to execute those contracts.

So by doing that, we're able to shorten the procurement process and get the contract done faster.

Another thing we looked at was the high profile process, redefining that, right?

So now there's direct placement of projects that are less than five million or any on-call or annual contracts, they're directly placed on agenda instead of going to both pre- and post-audit uh solicitation.

So, of course, we know the audit committee is really important, but by doing it this way, we're able to save some of that time.

And like Anna mentioned a minute ago, also our annual procurement forecast.

So, two things here.

First, we developed a template and a training for our stakeholder, so let's see how they can use that.

But we also included the forecast now, includes um items that are 50,000 or more when before it used to be a million or more.

So, like this past fiscal year, there's 300, or excuse me, fiscal year 206, there's 386 items on there.

And this live gives our our vendors the time that they need to, which ones they want to bid on, which ones they want to look at, which ones make more sense for them too.

One of the feedbacks we have already heard though is that is to update this on a quarterly basis, right?

Because things do change, so we don't want them wasting their time on something that may not happen this fiscal year.

We also did a finance procurement reorganization.

So our procurement specialists, they used to be a shared service.

Now we brought them all in-house, and we have them actually into four different areas.

We have them under construction, goods and supplies, um, professional services, and administrative services.

And one of the more recent things we did was we have now a training team.

So this training team is not just for internal stakeholders, it's also for external stakeholders, and they're gonna play a big role when we do our SAP upgrade and helping our vendors with that.

These right here are a list of some proposed um improvements that we're looking at.

The first would be are we consider aligning with the state regarding the competitive bid business bidding threshold?

Um the state went from 50,000 to 100,000 this past September.

If the city were to do the same thing, we'd have to go to city ordinance to do that.

But rather than going through a formal bid that takes about an average of 90 days, now departments can go ask for quotes for informal bid.

Also looking at maybe consolidating our preference programs that's under different departments.

For example, local and veteran owned are under the finance department, Sabeta is under economic development, and DBE is under Airport and CD.

Another improvement that we're looking at is consider increasing the administrative approval limit for a change order to 250,000.

Right now it's 50,000 or 100,000, depending on the type of funding.

And these are just some of the things that we're looking at because as we get stakeholder feedback, things are gonna change, specifically with the SAP upgrade.

So, as you might be aware, we are upgrading our ERP system, and we're actually gonna come to um B session in April to deliver to as we picked our system integration service.

These are this is the company that's gonna help us integrate the new SAP.

And what we're gonna want them to do is we're gonna want them to reach out to vendors and contractors during the design time and get their feedback.

Let us know what are the pain points, what are the technology issues that they have, and what are we can we do as we as we upgrade SAP to make it easier for them.

This is a timeline I'm sure you've seen before, but I wanted to point out the last arrow because it's because now it says ongoing, it doesn't have a set date anymore because we're going down two multiple paths here.

Of course, working together, but EDD, they're looking at a lot of the supplier engagement and capacity building and finance.

We're looking at the procurement process specifically with SAP.

So we want to continue discussions with our suppliers.

We want to engage our vendors and suppliers in the SAP upgrade, and of course, we want to continue to brief you all, this committee, and get your feedback on what we can do to make this process easier for them.

This concludes our presentation, or here for any questions you might have.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um thank you, ladies, for the presentation.

Uh, I I want to add a little to the background because this did start with.

I'm very thankful that the mayor put it on our calendar to make sure that we moved fast.

But again, I was on economic workforce and development before.

Terry was on economic workforce and development before, and this really started with uh um started well before then, and this is why you guys were able to move so fast, and it's like, wow, they got this done in seven months.

No, they had been working on it.

We just kind of gave them an end date.

Uh, and I I do want to acknowledge Congressman Castro who made a lot of phone calls uh to a lot of people uh to make sure that we were working on this and looking at how we streamline this process, and the other is just seeing how this works in conjunction, and and Troy is here and he knows that with audit when we talk about procurement with with audit also.

So it does help that your chair of economic workforce development and two of the members also sit on the audit committee, also.

So thank you for this process.

I think as we move forward, we are looking to make sure that this process is easier, especially as um things become more expensive and what they're going to bid on and what do they order and when do they order it, and um you know, Leo alluded to the tariffs and things like that, is we do want to be mindful of this procurement process.

So this is for briefing only.

I would love to get y'all's input on where you would like the updates and whether that's in emails or if committee members could attend the meetings just to kind of watch and uh and see where the discussion is going.

Um we have tons of opportunities uh at the different government levels for this, and we just need to be mindful of that and thoughtful.

So thank you again for the presentation.

I know you've guys been working on this forever, but there was a time where we were like, let's put it all on pause because we got to talk to the beta before we move forward.

And now I think we're at a good point where we can continue to engage the vendors, we're getting the technology we need, and we'll be able to uh give our congressional leaders the information they need to go up to Washington and say we give this money back to the community when we get these federal grants and and we ask for federal dollars.

Um so who would like to go first?

Councilman Ganval?

Thank you, Chair, and thank you for the presentation today.

Um a couple quick questions I had on slide 10.

Um I think it's primarily just the recommendations.

Yeah.

Um things I wanted to ask with that was do we have on average or yeah, I guess do we have on average the difference in uh procurement on our end um from changing the limit, the change of the administrative approval limits?

Have we seen any new speed in terms of the vendors that were able to work with?

From the 50,000 to the hundred thousand, yes.

So it would be like this past past fiscal year, it would have been like 33 more of them that we would have that's a change there, and they'd be things like um replacing the carpet at the Alamo Dome or something like that.

Got it.

Okay, and uh moves a little bit further back with supply essay, but just kind of putting it together.

What I wanted to know, I guess was do we uh do we have a list of the kind of the changes in terms of the investment we made in working with the small businesses and working with uh local groups about how many new vendors have we brought into the procurement process through supply?

So um last year, one of the other things the team did was working with procurement is to uh re-verify our vendor registry.

So each entity we have our own system, and so as part of a process we went through to ensure that the businesses there were still operating and and wish to do business with the city.

So we did see a decline from I believe we had over a thousand businesses, small businesses registered to it's down to I believe it was 400, but we were seeing an uptick in that number, which is really speaking to the outreach that the team is doing, um, including six nine.

Oh, sorry, 690 is how many small businesses we have registered as of today, and these are all people who have affirmatively said we want to do business with the city.

Um, and so we keep doing that outreach, which I also didn't mention.

We are calling vendors now saying, you know, we have a solicitation for car washing services.

We see your you do car washing, you're not registered.

Are you interested in doing business with the city?

And so we've seen some interest coming from that direct outreach to the businesses too, in addition to the general kind of putting it out there.

Got it.

Okay.

Well, it's helpful to know just because I think you know, we always want to make sure that these are hitting the metrics that we're looking for here.

Um, but I think it will take that approach, right?

So I'm grateful that y'all have implemented that uh to reach out to kind of almost like the grassroots level of just bringing the folks in where they're at.

Um was I had it at some point.

Uh oh, uh I think it's on slide 10 as well about aligning procurement.

Um yeah, aligning procurement activities with cities' broader economic development goals.

What uh what's the kind of background for that?

Was it was there a disalignment at some point?

And if so, what would that look like?

Or is it just new?

I wouldn't say disalignment, but recognizing that the city's purchasing power is very powerful and can really help elevate our small businesses.

So making sure that we're we're aligned with that as we go through EDD's strategic framework discussions, you know, making sure we're bringing in those stakeholders too who are participating that and when we look at our incentive guidelines refresh uh towards the end of the year again.

How are we leveraging that procurement that happens, whether it's private or the cities, to make sure that we're looking at it as a part of the bigger picture?

Okay, I see.

Um I guess I'm just interested in what has it been like so far in terms of our economic development goals prior to the strategic framework refresh.

What has the alignment been like?

Sorry, I'll jump in here just to basically kind of highlight the fact that since the inception of the Sabata program 30 odd years ago, it's always been part of economic development.

We've always seen procurement specifically of our local small businesses as that tool for economic development.

Like Anna mentioned, circulating that dollar here locally really has that kind of impact.

So we've always had that kind of approach within the economic development department.

Got it.

Okay.

I guess I'm just gonna hung up on the words of the alignment.

I just made me feel like was there something that we're missing with it.

But okay, understood.

Um I think those are my questions for now.

Thank you so much, Chair.

Thank you, Anna.

Thank you.

Councilmember Castillo.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Victoria and Anna, for the presentations.

In terms of the focus area, primarily uh on the communications channels.

I know you just mentioned, right, that there is direct outreach, but can you elaborate a bit on uh the communication channels that you all uh are now implementing or what's changed in terms of communication channels?

So for our our direct outreach, so we will like I said we call vendors now.

Um we definitely post um online our office hours events, we're sharing them with our our partner agencies out there so they're aware.

We're also sharing through supply SA because we know some people are going directly to them so that they, when they're providing those navigation services, can refer them uh to it.

And I'll let Victoria talk more about what they do on the um procurement side when they're advertising.

Thank you.

No, thank you, Councilman.

Uh Troy at Chief Financial Office for as communication, there's a lot of channels that we focus on.

I mean, just getting the message out there.

We talked about the the forecast.

So the forecast is a great tool for just basically advertising.

These are all the things that we're going to solicit for the city for that course of the year.

One of the changes that we looked at making as well is that used to be a stagnant one time a year.

We're looking at refreshing that quarterly because from the time we present that to you the next day, it's changed.

And so keeping that refreshed, it gives our vendors an opportunity to see what we're gonna be doing.

There's a lot of other things similar to what Anna said, we reach out to our vendors, we try to dig up the you know, dig up um the opportunity for people to bid.

We advertise in the paper, we advertise on TV, we reach out to um reach out to key stakeholders or target vendors that we're aware of, but we try to saturate the the market so we can make sure that we're getting the message out there and making it as available as we possibly can.

Thank you, Troy.

I appreciate that.

And then regarding the office hours that you all conduct, about uh how many businesses are participating in the open office hours.

And have y'all seen it increase uh good afternoon.

My name is Ivan Suarez, I'm the supply engagement administrator on the economic development.

Good afternoon.

Um it's my first time speaking to the committee, so please bear with me.

Um we we see good turnout um uh all across the different business uh spectrums.

Um I think we're not we're averaging about 15 uh coming to our sessions, and as Anna mentioned, we're looking to take those on a row to kind of meet people where they're at in a little uh a little more intimate settings.

So um about 15, we're hoping to grow it.

Um but it's it's looking pretty good so far.

Yeah, it's a good turnout.

Yep.

I appreciate it.

Thank you so much.

And then uh on slide eight with the recommendations um for the updated procurement process.

The recommendations that have been implemented are uh have are these the ones that have already been adopted?

Uh I know it says recommendations, but the following slide says implemented recommendations.

I guess I guess the root of my question is uh as those opportunities to eliminate steps are identified.

Will that come back to committee?

Uh or what would that process look like?

Okay, right.

So these are the recommendations, and yes, you're correct.

The next slide are the ones we've what we've implemented based on that.

And yes, as we come up with more, there's more.

We're gonna come to the committee and get your um feedback on that um before we move forward with them.

I'd just like to add one thing, and and Vicky talked about this, but I think we have a really great opportunity right now.

You know, Vicky mentioned the SAP upgrade, and as part of that upgrade, it really gives our vendors a voice into how the system's going to be designed, what challenges or opportunities there are.

As we have those conversations with the vendors and we get that feedback, one of the things that we want to do is have that discussion with this as a committee, kind of show you kind of what the concerns that they're expressing, then what opportunities there are to address those through either the SAP implementation or through changing our processes.

But we do intend to come back to you and update y'all throughout the entire process.

Thank you, Troy.

Appreciate that.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you.

Councilman Meskinzals.

Thank you.

Thank you for it's too close.

Thank you for the presentation.

Um had a couple of questions on slide five.

Um, on that vendor development academy.

I I think it's just such an important um partnership to have currently as we are talking about these big projects.

Um, whether it's the baseball stadium or sports and entertainment district, or you know, typical bond programs, uh, to make sure we really do have um those local vendors that are supporting this.

And so I just I almost want to make it a goal that we can point to um a number of vendors that have gone through the academy that are on these projects.

And so I don't know if there's a goal in mind that you have when we're talking about these big projects, or if there's an opportunity for us to create a goal as we move forward, and um so that way again we can point to these folks to say they were part of this vendor development academy, and now they are on this whether it's a bond project or those two larger projects I mentioned.

Yeah, definitely is is a goal of ours.

Um we I think the the biggest success metric we also have is that we have a large number of our mentors who are past participants in the program, so they see the value and are paying that that knowledge forward.

I will share that we will start recruitment for next year's cohort um come this summer.

So if certainly if if if you as members have recommendations um on folks we can invite to apply, we'll definitely be blasting it out as well.

But you know, if if there are these opportunities and we'll work with public works and capital delivery to identify firms, but it's not just for construction to make sure that you know we provide the opportunities.

We also want to recruit more mentors.

We're a little bit limited by the number of mentors we can attract to the program.

So if there are recommendations in that area, we're we're happy to do the outreach and get them on board.

Thank you.

And you're right, it is more than construction.

That's absolutely true.

Um, but yeah, just really happy to see that um and really want to be supportive as in any way that we can.

On the uh on that same slide, the focus on certification and procurement navigation services.

Can you share more on on what that means?

So our solicitations that we place a goal on a subata goal on, um, we'll either place a small business goal or emerging small business goal, emerging small businesses are 25% of the maximum SBA size for a business.

So, in order to get those points, if there's points associated with it, or to satisfy subcontracting goals, we require those firms be certified through supply SA.

So a lot of times that's the first place they'll go if if if whether you know they're interested in participating is or we refer them, it's to supply us a to complete the certification process.

Okay.

Um, and then from there, Melanie and her team are then able to build that relationship with them if they are you know in whatever industry and say, you know, are you aware city, county, saws, CPS have solicitations in this area if you're interested, and then work through that process of understanding our various requirements, um, help them build that submission or review things and and then be able to to submit it to us.

Great.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

So is that like the um what was it?

The uh they were looking for a new, I remember the South Central Texas.

So Supply SA is formerly known as the South Central Texas Regional Certification Agency.

Okay, got it, got it.

Okay.

I thought you were working with the South Texas.

No, you are supply SA is okay.

Understood, thank you.

Um, and then I think I just on Councilman Um Galvan's point on the aligned procurement activities.

I I think it's kind of like streamlining procurement activities.

Is that what you're is it more is that that's certainly part of it is stream streamlining.

So many departments, I guess.

Right, and then just recognizing that when we're we're applying goals and tools that it's procurement is not a standalone, it fits into economic development just in a in a different way.

That when we're growing the small businesses, um, that's good for our economy.

That's you know, keeping the dollars local, as Alex said.

We have you know, we can leverage our buy local data that shows that 60% of a dollar when spent locally stays in the community.

That's that's good for our economy, that's good for San Antonio, and because we buy so much that that has a multiplier effect across the community.

Understood, thank you.

And then on slide 10 on the consolidation of preference programs, that is a recommend a recommendation or implemented.

So that was something that was recommended through civic economics.

I mean, sorry, civic initiatives that study.

Okay, and then what what's required for it to that's something I guess a policy decision that would have to happen?

We'd have to explore the implications.

Each one of those programs has separate requirements.

Uh DBE is administered by the Federal Department of Transportation, um, local preference is governed by state statute, as well as veteran and civata is local ordinance.

So we just have to figure out if things could potentially align and they could be all housed under one department.

So then all of those proposed, sorry, one more, sorry, all of those process improvements were brought to you by the civic initiatives.

Correct.

Okay, got it.

Okay, that's all those are my questions.

Thank you.

All right, second round.

Anyone?

All right.

Well, thank you so much for your efforts.

We look forward to you getting those updates.

And again, council uh committee members, if you have anything that you'd like to specifically see or sit on, please let us know so Alex can get you that information.

The time is now 316 and the meeting is now adjourned.