Plan Commission - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon everyone. Sorry for the delay, but we're ready to go. Welcome to the January 2026 meeting of the city plan commission. I'm Alfredo Borggo. I chair this commission and I call this meeting to order at 149. First of all, I'd just like to wish everybody a happy new year. And I'd like to also welcome our newest commissioner, Miss Kim Reagan.

Thank you. Next, please. Um, Commissioner Massud, waiting for your call. Okay. Statement to the public. The city plan commission has sole and final approval authority over subdivision maps which is statutoily limited to the ministerial examination of the applicants conformance to all applicable code provisions. The staff report for an agenda item may may include conditions, exceptions or modifications. The commission may approve the item with all staff report conditions, exceptions or modifications, including additional measures regarding the item as imposed by the commission. Otherwise, the staff report with all modifications, exceptions, and conditions is approved and the applicant shall comply with all provisions of the staff report. Commissioners will consider all agenda items other than subdivision items in the form of a public hearing. The normal process is as follows. First, the commission will hear this a staff report followed by a statement from the applicant. Then members of the public may speak followed by any final statement from the applicant. Finally, the matter will be closed for further discussion or a motion among the commission. The commission shall then make a recommendation that will be forwarded to city council. Thank you, Commissioner Massud. Um, are there any changes to the agenda?

Good afternoon. Uh, Luis Amora with Planning and Inspections. Uh, we have one small change. Uh, item six. Uh, we're requesting to be presented after item three. So item six is annual legal training uh after item three and that's it.

And that's it. Okay. I'll entertain a motion for the changes to the agenda. Second. Any discussion? See none. All in favor say I. I. All opposed. Motion carries. Thank you. We now go into call to the public for public comment. If there is anybody on the phone or in the public to speak to this commission, now's the time to do so. Star six to unmute. One more time. Call to the public. There's anybody on the phone. Star six to unmute. Seeing and hearing none, call to the public is closed and we move to the consent agenda.

Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and second to approve the consent agenda. Is there any discussion? Seeing and hearing none, all in favor say I. I. All opposed. Motion carries. We now move to uh item number two. That's uh the election of officers and uh I'll take the first one and I guess Mr. Smith you can take the second one. Okay. So for the chair for the chairmanship of this commission I nominate Miss uh Commissioner Hansen. Miss Hansen, do you approve? Do you accept?

Yes. Do any more nominations? Seeing none, nominations are closed. All in favor of uh Lauren Hansen for being the chairp chairwoman of this commission say I.

I. All opposed. Motion carries. Congratulations. Thank you very much. Okay. Thank you, former Mr. Chair and Madame Chair. Um now we'll take nominations for the uh the first chair and again the first chair is is there to uh run the meeting when the chair is not able to attend. So are there nominations for the first chair?

Mr. Brago, Commissioner Brago. Uh no I decline. I'd like to nominate uh Commissioner Babo. I nominations for first chair. Okay. All those in favor of Miss Pado I

Any opposed? Okay. Motion carries. And then finally uh we'll take nominations for the second chair. I nominate uh

I nominate Mr. Albert up. My term expires in like a couple of months. So second term. Excuse me. We're out. Mr.

Okay. Any other nominations? I think we went through everyone. [laughter] Okay. All those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? Motion carries. All right. And I will turn the time over to I believe Miss Hansen. Okay, we'll go ahead and move on to number three, required trainings of the city plan commission from Mr. Kevin Smith.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh, good again, good afternoon, uh, commissioners. Again, Kevin Smith with plane inspections. On behalf of our department, we'd like to wish you, you know, a happy new year and hope you had a wonderful holiday season and we're looking forward to uh uh 2026 and the uh the possibilities that that is before us. It can you share the presentation, please?

Thank you. So, this is just a very quick quick presentation. Um, typically when you're appointed, um, Elsa Ramirez with our team or, uh, or Bernice will reach out and to make sure that the required trainings, you usually get an initial email from the city clerks, um, there about required trainings. And so, all members of a board or committee are required to take these trainings. So, this is not something unique to the city plan commission, but all board and committee members are required to. Um the first two um are to be taken every 3 years and that's the Texas public information act as well as the open meetings act that is within 90 days that is per state law as well that are u you're required to take that and the other three that are on the screen the ethics board and commission the code of conduct and the rules of order that's just a city requirement and that's only required to take once. So, um, Elsa and Bernice do a really good job keeping track of it. So, once you complete the training, I know Miss Reagan, you're you're fairly new, which I believe you already complete the training, so thank you for that. But she'll remind you and to make sure you you um complete these trainings. Um, they're available via the city of El Paso EP Learners, which um, if I'm not mistaken, I believe most of you, if not, are up to date, but Elsa will work with each of you individually. But just a reminder that um the trainings are required uh per state and per the city and um it's across the board. So just a very quick update and reminder and with that be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Any questions? Thank you. Okay. Appreciate it. Thank you. We'll go ahead and move on to number four. Presentation on climate, energy and sustainability programs from Bernando Berhano. Mr. Chair, we going to hear

you are correct. Annual legal training including city plan commission scope and duties from Russell Ablin Alyn. Thank you. Good afternoon everyone. How are you all doing? Um today I'm going to be doing my annual legal training um for for you all for city plan commission. So there's two types of boards um that we have in the city. We have advisory boards and we have decision-making boards. Um and advisory boards they provide advice um and decision-making boards have what is called um quasi judicial authority and you are you all are the second board. You are a decision makingaking board. So um there's two types of primary decisions you all make. Um, and the the areas you cover are are subdivisions um and zoning primarily. There's also a new um area that you'll be covering. I'll be discussing it a little bit and uh Mr. Bhano will be going more into detail after my presentation on that that new area. Um the reason we're having that new area is that um over this past year there was a uh review of boards and commissions that was done. Um and the when this new council came on in 2025 um they saw that there was you know 40some boards and commissions um within the city. So you know most the boards have nine members some of them had more. You can think about that they all had different bylaws. They had different term lengths. Um they had different coverage areas. So what um staff and um and staff did is they looked at all of these boards. Um some of them were um dissolved, some of them were consolidated. Um and this process happened over last year. Um as this one, this board is a statemandated board. The authority for this board comes out of

the Texas Local Government Code. um this board um really wasn't affected. It was left alone. Um and most of the advisory boards were kind of unified on on bylaws, things like that. Um but this this board was left alone because your your your um authority comes from the state. And so there's two things you you all do. um you make recommendations on zoning items and you're the final authority on subdivision items. And so um we have two sections of the code of the El Paso city code that you all look at. There's um there's title 19 which is subdivisions and title 20 which is zoning. Um so also along with your when you look at zoning items for resonings or different plat approvals under subdivisions um when there's changes to these code sections uh 19 and 20 they are brought to you for recommendation uh for city council. So I think last year we had um the legislative session which um the Texas legislature is on alternating years. Um so in 2025 they met and it was a he heavy land use year and so you all saw a lot of changes um that were made to the code um as part of that and there was a big push um for land use items and what you saw were different things to increase housing basically. Um so recommendations on zoning items when you we see a lot of uh reszonings that come to city plan commission. Um you all have a lot of discretion when you um approve reszonings, right? You're looking at um something that's currently zoned that that a property owner wants to change and your job is to say is that appropriate? Um and when you look at that, you weigh the different conditions

on on what you think is is appropriate appropriate. Um, is it how will it affect traffic? How it will it affect the neighborhood? Um, all of these things go into making that decision um on whether you believe it's appropriate. And on that one, you are making a recommendation who goes to city council who makes the final decision on that zoning item. and you have all been appointed by council members um and the mayor and they take your recommendation very seriously. Um I can tell you that when they um go to city council um they generally um approve it. Um well I wouldn't say they generally approve it but they take your recommendation very seriously. And then you have subdivision items. You all are the final authority on subdivision items. uh those items are um are tightly controlled by the state um as I as I've discussed for before for those of you um that have been on the board a while and generally your authority on those is unless the subdivision does not meet a um an aspect or a requirement of state law or our local city code. it must be approved. So, um there is that that difference between these two. The zoning items um you have a lot of discretion and you can weigh the different aspects. The subdivision items, those are those are tightly controlled with um what is called ministerial authority. And so ministerial authority again means that um if it meets those minimum requirements, you all are required to approve it. So this is the new section that is uh coming into um your purview and it's

climate and sustainability. So previously there was a board that uh dealt with climate and sustainability issues in the city of El Paso. That board was dissolved and city council um voted to move that purview uh to city plan commission. So that is something you all will be um having items coming forward on uh on a on a you know on a on a somewhat regular basis and that is a advisory portion of this board. So your two statemandated portions, your zoning and your subdivisions, those are quasi judicial. Um this will be advisory. And so um you will, you know, separately look at this um the the the things about this um you generally will not apply to the zoning and subdivision um aspect of your of your duties. And so the role of the city attorney's office and city manager's office or the planning department. Um what what are my roles? What is what is staff roles in this process? Um my role is to advise the board as a whole. Um I don't advise individual members. Uh monitor the board to minimize risk of liability for the city and monitor the board is in compliance with applicable laws. um staff, planning and inspection staff provide staff and resource for the board, coordinate communication between the board and council and in and ensure that the board receives and follows council's directives and assignments. So, where to start? Um I've talked about this a little bit. Uh we have the enabling ordinance for uh city plan commission. Um when you go when you go to our website, there's a uh a section on the city website that has all the

boards and commissions. Um it has a list of all of you on and your terms on there and it also has documents on there um such as the enabling ordinance, bylaws, um etc. Uh title two of the El Paso city code is where um city plan commission is located. um and information about um that board and and duties of the board. And then um Texas Local Government Code 211. 211 is where the zoning section is in the government code. Um and 212 is going to be subdivisions. And then again, as I mentioned earlier, you have uh title 19, which is subdivisions in the city code, and TW title 20, which is zoning. Texas Open Meetings Act. Um all boards and commissions in the city of El Paso are subject to the Texas Open Meetings Act. Uh as Kevin said, you all have to do trainings on that. Um it is especially important uh for compliance uh for this board because it is a quasi judicial board. Um you know that you have final authority decision making and every weekly city council meeting there are many items on there. uh your recommendations on on on that agenda. So um it is very important that we follow the Texas mo open meetings act and um provide that required transparency to the public. So the purpose of the Texas Open Meetings Act is to make decision uh government decision- making accessible to the public. That's why this meeting is open. Um that's why there was a notice public um published for this meeting um on the website in front of city hall

um and that those are the requirements and it's liberally construed in favor of open government. So wherever possible we try to ensure that if somebody wants to participate or comment um that is allowed that this information is also recorded. [clears throat] Again, it's being streamed on on YouTube right now in the city website so that the decisions going on in here that are so important that are affecting our community um are are visible to the public. Notice requirement. So, when that agenda goes out, it has to go out um it was 72 hours previously and it's now required three full days. And so, um, three full days prior to the meeting. So, that that's one thing that just changed this year. And I still have 72 hours on there, but it is now three full days. Um, and so what has to be on there is the time and date of the meeting, the place of the meeting, and the subject matter of the meeting. So, every item on there has to um that's discussed has to be on there and it has to be clear enough um that a person can reasonably understand what what's being discussed.

If I could just jump in real quick, Russell, it's three business days. Three business days. So, as there are holidays that come up too, sometimes I I believe for the city council that was held last week, it was posted two two and a half weeks before the meeting just to meet that that three business days because the city was shut down. So, um before it was used to be 72 hours for us typically for the city plan commission, we're posting roughly a week ahead of time. So, we're well within that requirement. So minutes are required um as um that's something that you all do every week. You um the minutes are are kept um and uh recorded by the the secretary of the board and then every week you all approve the previous minutes. Um minutes are required to be kept. Uh minutes must state the subject of the discussion, indicate each vote, order, decision or action taken. public comment. um public comment. So we have an open public comment for this board that happens at the beginning of each meeting if someone has general comments that they would like to make to the board and then there's public comment on um on every item um generally and um so if somebody has a comment on a specific item uh they will make that at the item and when the item comes up if they have a general comment that's not on the agenda that will happen at public comment um before the meeting. close meetings um in an executive session. Um I've been working with this board for eight years and in that time we've never had to go into um close session, but um it is technically possible. Um, again, we don't want to go into uh close session generally um because the Texas Open Meetings Act, as

um I said, is liberally construed towards um towards open open meetings and open governments. There are um are limited circumstances that you can go into executive session. We a close session and we would let you know if that was needed. um that it it it would primarily be for um legal advice. Um consultation with attorney um and so if that happens um the board is required to convene an open session first must identify an open session the legal provisions allowing for the closed meeting. Um notice requirements still apply and um you can't take action or vote in the closed meeting. So when city council does this, they come out of the closed session and they make the vote in public. Uh I'll talk a little bit about ethics um and our ethics ordinance in the city code. And again, as Kevin said, I believe this was part of your uh training when you're onboarded into the board and then um required to be updated every three years. So um city officials are city officers are fiduciaries. So as um board members on a board of city of El Paso, you are considered an officer of the city and um as an officer to of the city, you are um subject to our ethics codes and provisions. Um so you all have a fiduciary responsibility to manage and maintain taxpayer funds and Fiduciary is defined as a person who is required to act for the benefit of another person on all matters within the scope of their relationship. Uh this includes acting with the highest degree of honesty, loyalty, and good faith and managing

another's money or property with a high standard of care. And so um you know, I think this fiduciary responsibility, it really goes with all of the ethical provisions that are contained um in there. you know, being honest, being responsible, um you know, making sure to recuse yourself if you have a personal interest in an item. Um all of those things are part of being a fiduciary and having fiduciary responsibility. Um and again, this is from um our city code. Um all cities and offer officers and employees have a fiduciary duty to the citizens of the city to be ethical in fulfilling the responsibilities of their positions and at the very least um being ethical includes being disposed to comply with all laws that apply to one's position. Um so unethical conduct um it includes but not as much not limited to and there's different sections of the ethics code that cover all of these um seeking privileges or special treatment um accepting gifts theft breach of confidentiality uh using city resources to prop profit personally. Um, and so again, our ethics code is located in 2.92 of the of the city code, and it applies to officers, you all as board members, um, as commissioners of this board and employees of the city. Um, and you have the duty of the cities of duty to the citizens of the city of El Paso to be ethical in fulfilling the responsibilities of your position. Um and at the very least that means being ethical um includes being disposed to comply with all laws that apply to one's position. This this ethics code is

located in the city code. That is a law. So you are by law required to uh follow this ethics code. Um and you shall not recklessly disregard the established duties assigned to um to your position. personal liability. Um, this is one that has come up a little bit. Um, and you know, you all have asked um at different times in the past about, you know, am I liable for this decision? Well, you are executing your official duties. you are under the umbrella of um the city of El Paso and protected by that um on on those decisions and and that process when you when you can get in trouble is going outside of um of that responsibility or going outside of your duties and that's called an ultravirus action. Um and that's an act of the committee members without legal authority or beyond their granted authority. Um an ultravirus act, you know, the ones we've considered uh what the issue we've had come up is a subdivision item, right? It meets all of the minimum requirements. Therefore, under state law, it is required to be approved. You're required to approve it. Um if you know there's a subdivision application and you may have personal feelings against it and um you vote against it and it meets all those requirements that could be an ultravirus act. Um and you could be personally liable for that um that action. Um what would happen in that situation? Um there is some case law in it. Generally, the applicant would go down to the county

court and they would get a rid of me on Damus and order you to approve it. Um, could you be responsible for court costs and those things? Potentially. So, here is an example um in of a ethical situation. Um, Ann is a member of a city board. Let's say she's a member of the city plan commission. Um, she recently applied for a position with the company that has a business matter before the board. While an has not officially been given a job offer, she has been negotiating terms of an employment agreement. How should an handle this matter any? Yes. So according to the city's ethical ordinance, Anne must immediately notify the board for which she is a member that she is in employment negotiations. Further, she must refrain from discussing the matter at any time um at the meeting or with other board members and abstain from voting on the matter. And so that is my presentation so far. Well, so far for this year. I have more coming up. Any questions?

Can you explain the sustainability change, how like our role in that as far as advising council? Sure. So, I think uh Fernando will be talking a little more about that and um you'll be looking at those those climate issues that are affecting the city and making re those recommendations to council. Um similar to an advisory board in that capacity. Um, you want to make sure you know your your zoning and subdivision items are statemandated. Um, and so you kind of don't you want to make sure not to cross those. It's almost like um you know city council every meeting there's El Paso city council and then they go into the um Sun Metro meeting and they close the city council the council meeting pause that and go into sub sun metro and it's almost a different meeting. Um I don't think we'll be going to that extent here but I would say it's it's the same thing. saying, you know, you want to keep um those duties uh separate um from your from the statemandated duties. Um now I can imagine things coming up, you know, with a reasonzoning as we see, you know, a residential next to a heavy heavy commercial area. Um you know, there's when you look at that, you when you're making that decision, you're thinking of environmental concerns. So there's still not an issue with that. Um, and does that answer question a little bit? We should get more. We'll have more information though.

So, there's no um no power granted through that as far as um minimum standards for subdivision approvals. No, really. All it changes is that when we send a recommendation to council, there's a note on it saying the reason we denied this was because of sustainability concerns.

No. Okay. No, those are to be completely separate. So you'll be seeing items um about um environmental issues and sust sustainability and you will comment on those um to city council and make recommendations, but that is to be completely separate from subdivision and zoning items.

Okay. Yeah, if if I can maybe jump in a little bit too and and to be honest, we're we're still working through this uh to figure it out. But what what we do as well as your responsibility is looking at the code and see how this applies to a given situation. The sustainability items right now um are there's some plans identified. Um there may be items down the road where some code changes may be made. Then you could hold those developments to that standard. But until those changes are made, you have to adhere to the um code the minimum code standards um that Russell said. So again, some of it will be the the what the state gave you. The subdivision and zoning responsibility and um you already know your your purview for that. The state sustainability is strictly um how can you advise council on on these items. As I mentioned, it may lead to other things down the road, but at this point, there's nothing um for the city code on that.

Okay. Thank you. Does anybody else have questions? Thank you. Thank you. Was that the end of the presentation or you were going to That is the end. Okay. Thank you. We will go ahead and move to number four, presentation on climate, energy and sustainability programs from Fermentoto Perhan. Good afternoon, Commissioners. Fernando Vhano with climate and sustainability. Um, happy to be here and happy to introduce myself to you all. As Kevin was saying, this is obviously a work in progress and this is the first uh presentation today and I'll be very brief and short. I'm just trying to show today what we do with the team. We are under strategic and legislated affairs and at the city manager's office and I'll be presenting what we've been working on and what we're trying to do in in the coming future. So um before I start with the presentation um as Kevin was saying the the we've been working on um on a planning effort for the last two years a climate action plan for El Paso and that's um because that's on the strategic plan for the city. We were mandated to develop that climate action plan. we were um able to secure a grant to work on that climate action plan and I'm going to talk briefly about that and and those are the projects that we're actually implementing right now. So the plan itself covers El Paso and Haspet counties and um that's because of the of the grant that we received. We were mandated to focus on on the two counties and we've wor with the 10 municipalities, both counties, the MO and the Rio Grand Cog as partners to develop this plan. Can I just work?

It does work do well. Okay, so let me Okay, I'm I'm a little bit confused. Okay, this is the timeline. So, as I mentioned, sorry about that. As I mentioned, we've been working on the plan for the last two years, uh, starting January 2024. And the plan focuses on two main things. Um, air pollution, air quality. We we've developed a calculations to to see the emissions, the greenhouse gas emissions in the region. And the other component is an analysis of how climate is expected to change. And that's what we call vulnerability assessment. And we focus on flooding, heat, and drought. And see how those climate hazards may or may not change and how those may impact both city operations and the community. And I forgot to mention that we as a team we work both um servicing the city as an entity internally in all things sustainability and energy but also the community. So we have that two aspects to our work in 2025. Going back to the plan, we've been prioritizing actions and developing the final plan that it's right now and the under the final revision. We submitted the plan to the Environmental Protection Agency back in December and we are planning hopefully to bring the plan for approval to city council um probably in March. And this plan is being communitydriven. We've been doing a lot of engagement with the community, almost 140 engagements during these two years. That's almost seven engagements per month. Um,

and we've been meeting from doortodoor canvasing to um meetings with the private sector, with the community, nonprofits. We've met with everybody. what you see there as the leadership steering committee that's our uh governmental partners that I mentioned before and going back to the to the findings to the technical aspects of the plan that what I mentioned the air quality the pollution we looked at the emissions and we were able to to calculate the emissions per sector and you'll see that not surprisingly the Most of the emissions come from the transportation sector 48%. There is a typo on the buildings and facilities that should be 46% and then the rest up to 100 comes from land use and agriculture and waste management. So most air pollutions greenhouse gas emissions come from transportation and buildings and facilities. Sorry. The other component of the plan, as I mentioned, is stream heat, drought, and flooding. And we've looked both at the current picture for those climate hazards and what may happen up to 2030, 2050. And we'll see that both the community and the and the assets in El Paso and in in the whole region may be disrupted and we may have economic impact. So all that will be its detail rather in the in the climate plan. And when I was talking about the actions actions to either uh improve air quality and health outcomes and hopefully bring

uh new economic opportunities to the region and the actions to adapt to those to that changing climate. We've came we came up to up to 53 actions that will be in the plan. 39 of those focus on air quality. 14 focus on adapting to a changing climate. And this a little maybe a little bit small but these are the what we call measures. You can think um of those as buckets of actions. So those are the sectors or or um where we're going to be focusing on. We have a lot of things related to energy transportation. Um, and some of those, as Kevin was saying, down the road may come to you all on your on your um main role here at the commission. But at this point, the climate plan is an an strategic uh pathway for the city to work on these topics. And this is just a table of contents of the plan. Um, happy to share with you all the draft of the plan. Kevin, if if um obviously it's a it's a public plan, but happy to share any information with you about the plan itself. And ending that part of the presentation, I just very briefly want to talk about two three things that we're working on that align with what it's in the plan. Um so for that uh for those projects and for the implementation of the plan we look at all funding sources. So we have a couple of grants that we are leveraging um to implement but we we have private donations to that we so far are using for our tree planting program. [snorts] But as a summary we're looking at all

funding sources. So from philanthropy, uh, federal government, private sector, um, utility rebate programs to fund all these programs. And the idea, as you'll see, we're starting small pilot projects. Um, that's that has two reasons behind it. One, the limitation of funds that we have available. And two, we want to show uh business cases. We want to to make the case to scale up the projects and get into full implementation. And just highlighting three of the of the programs that we are working on or are about to start working on. We have our 915 treekeepers tree planting program that I'll talk a little bit more in the next slide. Um it's a tree planting program with the community. We are about to launch a cool roof program for lowincome households and that will be on next city council agenda next Tuesday. That it's a program to install cool roofs um meaning cool uh roofs that reflect heat um in a in a better way. So we are aiming at reducing the energy burden and the energy cost for those lowincome um qualified uh households. And then we also we're having a solar generation program coming for nonprofits and small businesses and that's through a department of energy grant and we're going to be able to install solar panels in qualified nonprofits and small businesses hoping to kick off that program as well in March. And just very briefly going back to the

tree planting program. This is a program we've been working on for three seasons now. Um our aim this year is to plant uh 300 trees. We are 150 trees uh already and the the program ends at the end of March. The main goal is to provide tree canopy for neighbors and neighborhoods. So this is a program in which neighbors can apply for it. um they just need uh five different residents households in the same street or the same neighborhood and we provide technical support. We provide the trees collaborate with parks for the pre-digging and with neighborhood services for any type of support that is needed by the neighbors and and it's it's been a very successful program so far. The only the commitment that we are requiring is that um the neighbors need to commit to to maintain those trees. So we are not able to provide irrigation or any other type of maintenance to the trees. Those trees are planted in the right ofways and and or in parks nearby. So we also collaborate with parks and their plans to increase tree canopy across the city in parks. So those are the two options that we have under 915 treekeepers. Um I want to extend an invitation if any of you um are interested in the program your neighbors your neighborhoods happy to help you out. We are happy here to um plant as many trees as we can. So and that's all I wanted to be brief today. I didn't want to overwhelm anyone. Um, and thank you so much for your time and and entertaining the presentation. Any questions?

With 915 Treekeepers, what is the limiting factor as far as how many trees you're planting? Is it community engagement so people know about the program or actually having the trees to plant? It's more the first um so the in many cases people are get interested they we go we visit the neighborhood we look at the at the technical options for planting and then um there are two main main obstacles that we find either utilities on the right of way in which we are very careful with that we don't want to interrupt any water uh um gas or or telecommunications utilities, but also the commitment to water the trees and maintain the trees is an obstacle in some um one of in in the lower income neighborhoods across the city. So the thankfully we have I mean we haven't reached any of the years that we've been doing the plan the the the the budget cup so we have money um 300 is something that the team is a small team we are a team of three so it's also a matter of being realistic what we can do in the four five months that the planting season lasts

and what kind of trees are they So the trees are either native trees or adapted trees. We use El Paso Waters and Texas A&M list of of approved trees um drought um resilient trees and we use the city's um uh size standard for those trees. So it's 2.5 to 3 in caliper.

Okay. Thank you. Yes, sir. Can you show your mic please? They have to designate the location where the trees can be planted and of course you already explained the size which is the same size that is required by developers to to put in in the streets or builders.

Mhm. And uh is there a limit per resident as how many how many trees they can ask for? Yes. Where can we find all these details? And I'm happy to provide the information via maybe the team Kevin. Sure. We have a website. We have flyers. We have a So you there is a limit per household of two trees.

Okay. Um that commitment of at least five neighbors. So that would be a minimum of 10 trees for those neighborhood plantings. So it's um time efficient for for the team and parks mostly to go and and dig those holes for the for the neighbors. So two trees per household minimum five neighbors per ne per neighborhood. There is not an upper limit. Um we just did a neighborhood planting last this past Saturday. We planted 14 trees. So, it's usually between 10, 12, and 20 trees in in those neighborhood plantings. We're going to be at Modesto Modesto Gomez Park this coming Saturday as um as an MLK celebration and we're going to plant 40 trees at the park. So, usually when we go into parks, we is more efficient to do more trees, but there is no upper limit to the number. If you are able to to get all your neighborhoods in your street and we do 20 trees, happy to do that.

Excellent. And then do you have a a requirement that they provide irrigation, automatic irrigation or timed irrigation because if you plant them and they don't water them, you know, we have harsh summers and we we the neighbors rather, they need to sign a an agreement. not I would say non legally binding is kind of a um an agreement in which they will water those trees. We don't require we don't require irrigation per se. So so it's usually hose or or any type of other watering system.

Thank you. Yeah. And very important we cannot plant trees in private property. So that's why we focus on right ofways. Yep. I got a few concerns. I like your program. I like that it's being started. Um especially your air quality. But we have a huge problem

and that is that we don't have no control over emissions of the refinery which is the largest largest poller. Uh they pollute with a name so big that I can't pronounce that are just totally poison and we can't do anything about it. And it's very sad that the state does not help. The TCQ does not help on that.

We don't have monitors around there. So, we don't have a really good gauge of where are these actual uh pollutants are coming from, but we know the source. Yeah. You know, so I mean, I'm not going to argue with your your comment. The

on the climate plan that again hopefully will be approved in a month or so. Um there are a couple of actions that actually that that focus on air quality monitors and the installation of monitors across the city. So we see the city providing those data making those data available. As you mentioned TCQ the state has the their regulatory um mandate and and they're ruling those emissions. So um another thing that I forgot to mention on those calculations about emissions we also focus on co-pollutants on so you'll see PMS 2.5 and 10 on on those reports. So happy to visit with you about air quality or any any other comments that you may have about that.

Thank you. And my other issue was on trees. Um, we've gotten to the point here in El Paso and I know the city allows their contractors to plant what they call the palo veres. They are not native to here. They're very invasive and once they start to grow, they grow babies and before you start having these little forest of palo veras everywhere and they're very dirty. They tried to put some on the pocket park at uh Chelsea and I told them, "Don't do that. Help us out. Don't do that. Let's use native trees from the Chihuahuan desert, not the Sonoran desert,

but uh you see a lot of these new uh um buildings and commercial buildings being built and uh uh the city requires them to put some trees around there something and they use those palo veres. I personally believe that those palo veras should be outlawed in the city of El Paso.

Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, we we use both native and adapted trees. So, we use those those lists that are already being used by El Paso water or parks department. Yeah, but uh I I I understand your concern. I'll pass that to the team.

Thank you. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. So now we have park fees special fund report from Carla Chavez.

Good afternoon everyone. I'm Carla Chavez. I'm the parks and uh parks planning and development manager for the parks and recreation department. And today I will present the park on education uh annual report and also I have included in my presentation some of the general requirements and minimal improvements uh that all parks uh shall have. So the parkland education projects align with the strategic goals number three and four. Uh just to give a brief overview of the parkland dedication ordinance. Uh this ordinance was adopted in in 1980 898 89 and it mandates that also divisions located with being the city limits and the extra territorial jurisdiction um are required to comply with this ordinance. Residential subdivisions are required to dedicate one acre of parkland per every uh 100 single family units or 200 multif family units. If the residential subdivision has less than 100 uh uh single family units, the the applicant is required to pay park fees instead of uh dedicating land. For one single family uh dwelling unit, the park fee is $1,370. For a multif family unit is 680. and non-residential subdivisions are required to pay a thousand uh dollars per acre. And all uh projects are are uh designed and construct and constructed uh following the parks and recreation design and construction standards.

So um the city implemented a dedicated fund to manage uh the collection of the park fees. The parks fees received are deposited to the account of the park zone which the subdivision is located. Each park zone has their own account. The city is divided in five main park zone which is northwest, mission valley, central, east, northeast and those main park zones are are subdivided in eight or 10 additional park zones. In total, the city has 48 park zones. So this um this table shows the breakdown of unallocated funds by park zone. Um in total for the northwest area uh an allocated funding um currently available is $1.3 million. For the central area is 20 $21,425 for Mission Valley is 5 58,842 for the east side park zones is $1.03 million and for the northeast areas we have $487,630. So the parkland education funding is used to provide new improvements or amenities on park facilities. I would like to point out the park facilities um the park facilities is not only parkland is also recreation centers, senior centers and aquatics facilities. Uh the parkland dedication funding is also used to complement underfunded

approved parks projects that are under design or construction. And these are some of the uh amenities that all parks should shall have like canopies, playgrounds, swing set, uh picnic tables, benches, trash receptacles, uh landscape and fencing and safety cameras. So some of the projects that we work on last year using parkland vacation funding is a new safety surface for one of the playgrounds on Notoya Heights. The other one is the new solar lighting for Modesto Gomez Park. Another one is the new concrete concrete stage at San Hasinto Plaza. And we are currently working on installing a new playground at Blackure Park. So in 2025 we add added 30 new parks to the park system with a total of 28.65 acres of parkland which is more than what we added in 2024. So the general requirements for parks um the minimum improvements for parks uh for land to be dedicated as parkland must meet the requirements listed on the municipal court and the parks um and recreation design and construction standards and they also need to follow the state and federal requirements. They also have to comply with the Texas accessibility standards. The landscape plan uh the lightscape plan needs to be designed and sealed by a landscape architect. The irrigation system also needs to be

designed and and the plant needs to be sealed by a licenses irrigator. We require a one-year warranty. Uh it is also require street trees in parkways and no overhead utilities are allowed. So the minimum improvements for parks is paving curving and gutter utility as water sewer and electricity grading automatic irrigation turf a playground structure that needs to be covered by by a ch canopy. um two accessible shaded pie tables and four benches per acre, one trash receptacle per acre and perimeter lighting in addition to one light um in the playground or focal point of the park. So these are the list of the new parks that we added to the park system from Parkland dedication in 25. Most of them are located in district 5. This these are just some pictures of those parks. This is uh Brian Park which is located in DJ North subdivision. This is linear park which is located in Est 81 and 83. And this is uh gate of the sun park located in Gateway states subdivision. And in 2026 we are expecting to add to the park system eight new parks from parklandation.

And this is the the list of those park. And this is all I have. Um any questions? How does irrigation work for such large areas of grass? I'm just wondering like how is that paid for out of the parkland funds that have been banked or

uh the the you mean how who pays the water bill? Yes. Yeah. That is paid by the city by the parks and recreation department once is transferred to to the city. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions?

Uh thank you Carla. That's very explanatory and and it's good that we're adding more parks and of course we're very familiar. We're working on park right now that's coming in 2026. I have a question. I have uh a neighborhood that came and asked us to help. They wanted to add something to an existing park. This is on the Mononttoya Park

and they were very interested in doing something different that city of El Paso doesn't have like they want to do a butterfly pavilion. What does it take for say a private group to be able to do work on a city park and how does that work after they say if they they get enough donations you know I'm trying to help them and get enough donation to do something you know along with the city

will the city take over the maintenance how does that work they they can reach out to us to to start conversation to see what is exactly that they are proposing how we can help and how Can we work together? We actually did a garden in Mononttoya Heights. So, I don't know if this is that is the one project that you're talking about.

That is we already Yeah, that is and they're they're actually hatching butterflies in that area, but they butterflies keep flying away. So, [laughter] that's something that we cannot control. So they want thinking of that they want to do a contained pavilion you know and we've been searching that and there's you know quite a good selection that is sort of affordable but not not expensive expensive but can be done and El Paso doesn't have one like that

at all. So anyway I'll approach them and see if they can come visit with you guys. Sure. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions? I do. Um, colors are very important. I've seen where in a park they did they painted some boulders black and and in the heat you go touch them and Oh my goodness.

Do you know which uh what is the name of the park? I don't know. Chelsea Park. Chelsea Pocket Park. Oh, those are not boulders are benches. Oh, that's even worse. [laughter] benches where you and they're right in the middle of the sun and we get 105 maybe 110. You go sit down there and you're going to get some heavy duty burns.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you for coming. We will keep it in there. Anything else? Thank you very much. Thank you. So we have number seven, planning division reports also by Kevin Smith. Okay. Thank you, Madam Chair. So this is the last presentation I believe on the agenda. Um, and uh, before I begin, I would just like to thank Fernando and Carla and Russell for their presentations um, to to come and take a few moments of their time to come and present to you some items um, very relevant obviously to the role of the city plan commission. Um, I also want to thank my team. Um, we're going to do a little bit of a relay race here where I I will have the baton. I will pass off to Luis and we'll go down the line as the various team members carry cover their various sections. But I'll I'll lead off here. So, um this is just an overview of the planning and inspections department uh as a whole and the major areas that we cover. We're broken up um into two large areas. Uh planning which um are the majority of items that come before you are from the planning team, but also we also have the building permit inspections which plays a humongous role in terms of development of El Paso. We actually have the assistant director um here, Tony De Cruz with us um this uh this afternoon. And um Tony is is very knowledgeable across all of development, not only on his side for building permits inspections, but he also actually previously had some experience in planning as well. Um primarily historic preservation and uh so he uh he is very very familiar and we're glad to have him. We're grateful also to as you're you're well aware uh the leadership of Philip Etwe and the leadership he provides and we're grateful for him. Um so as as this is viewed by you and maybe other members of the public there are a couple of items that we um we really

want to promote here is just some helpful resources. This is what we share. The biggest thing I will share, if anyone is interested doing anything with their property, come talk to us. It is a whole lot easier to come talk to us and do it right rather than having to correct some things down the road. There have been some items that come before the city plan commission that have been existing, whether it's subdivision items or zoning items where it's more of a cleanup because of someone doing things out of order. So, please come talk to us and I will go over the main team here in a moment who um is there to talk to. But, um we're we're available there and we're more than happy to talk and put people on the right path to uh see about achieving their their goals. So, as we look at 2025, and I I apologize, it's a little sickening to me that we're already in 2026, but you know, time flies. But 2025, the one of the main things and one of the main uh highlights we like to give is about our one-stop shop. It's located at 811 Texas. It's also known as City4 and it's where a lot of the land development, the licensing, permitting are in a single location. We have other partners there. Um on Tony's team, they coordinate heavily with the fire department who is there as well and which uh affects obviously a lot of commercial development and so they are also housed there too. We have health representatives um there as um sometimes it involves food handling um on a business or other things. So um a lot of that information is there on how to reach out to us and the hours of the one-stop shop. Um, you can come in. If it is very detailed, we ask that you make an appointment. It's a lot easier and you tell us what's going on. Then we can make sure we get the right people there to uh to talk with you. Um, there is some um information

there about our our metrics for the one-stop shop. So, we we track our in-person customers, our calls, as well as our pre-application meetings. The pre-application meetings is where you get to meet with us. It's customized approach where then we give you guidance about your proposal. um that's has been pretty consistent. We did see a little bit of a a dip there in the numbers for our calls, but we actually did see an increase in the in-person uh service as well, which is is rather interesting. And as we've talked about before, there are a number of factors that impact when um when customers want to come talk to us. Oops. Okay. So as we were talking and one of the things I asked the team is to think about goals. You know how how do we want to improve ever since Philillip um came on board we really had a a change in our department and trying to make improvements year after year and um a lot of it's about relationships. How can we have better relationships with those with whom we impact? The various staff members the various uh boards and commissions our elected officials city leadership uh but our customers as well in the neighborhoods. how can we speak better? And so that's really been one of the highlights is the change that we've had. But one of the things we like to do, obviously we're not content with where we're at. We want to do better is we want to have better training and and obviously for the plan commission. We want to have better training for you all. We want to educate you more on on what's happening in the planning world, not only here in El Paso, but nationwide as well, because often some of those trends end up hitting us here. We um are working with our IT team on updating our website to make it easier for information to make make it more customer friendly. So that's one of the largest initiatives that we really are focusing on as well as to create more information too uhformational material whether it's brochures, sheets, maybe

even some some graphics, some videos to um explain it not only on the planning side but also on the building permit side to make sure at the end of the day we want a a building, a structure, a site that is safe and where people can enjoy. And that is our main goal and we want to make sure that we give the right information and and we educate people. One of the things internally that we're actually in the testing phase on our end that's implemented in a couple of other um departments is blue beam software. So a lot of other uh professionals uh engineering firms, architectural firms use that software for their analysis and it gives a lot more functionality and and ability for us to um analyze subdivisions as they come in detail site plans um some of the items on Tony's team and our uh for building permits as well as our grading. So this is really a software that we're trying to implement and uh hopefully help in our review and get better service to our customers. One of the things that we often um want to do is as you're aware and you see the staff reports there. It is not just planning um that is providing comments. There are number of different agencies both within the city and some of our partner agencies that provide comments. We want to improve the communication with them and to make sure that they understand the requirements that that we all have in reviewing these applications. but then also as we provide comments and feedback to our our um our applicants to make sure that they're their communication as well. So, we want to make sure we're improving communication between all parties on on our applications. Communication is key um in in this and as as you're all aware, you know, time is money and we want to make sure we're moving these projects along as quickly as we possible, but they need to be make sure they uh meet our city requirements. And finally, update our applications and

checklists to make it very clear and easy for our customers uh to um to know what is expected of them as they submit these applications and to make sure that the process goes better with um with them. So those are overall for planning. I'm going to do a handoff right now to Luis Zamora who will cover some zoning items and we will continue passing it down the line. So I'll pass over Luis.

Madam Chair, if I may. Uh Kevin, do you want to introduce Mr. De Cruz, please? Tony, would you like to stand up please? So Tony, good afternoon commissioners. Uh I have worked with some of you in the past. Uh Mr. Rudbe served on the building standards commission for a number of years. Cell, I've been trying to get rid of him for quite some time, but he keeps showing back up. [laughter] But I oversee the building side of the house. So really, a lot you see a lot of the zoning subdivision cases, but a lot of what you don't see is all the construction do construction permits that we issue if they're allowed by right. Those go directly through our shop. I have a team of approximately 14 plans examiners that deal with nothing but reviewing plans for commercial, residential, uh, new constructions, additions, uh, alterations, demolitions, and approximately about 40 commercial and residential inspectors that deal with the new construction aspect as well as any existing construction. And finally, we are one of our shared teams is LA land development division that deals a lot with the grading and drainage components as new development is coming on board, but also really assist Kevin in the review of subdivision improvement plans once the commission has approved them and they're getting ready to actually develop all the construction documents. I've been with the city approximately 23 years. Uh, and I'm telling threatening the boss that I'm leaving in two if I can pull it off. Probably not, but hey, that's a goal. Uh, but we're here to assist the commissioners and the public in any of the needs. Like Kevin said, we want to be proactive and ensure that the community knows we're here to assist the community itself and of course the commissioners. Our main goal is reach out to us to begin before you begin a project. That way you don't get a visit from our code enforce enforcement department saying this is incorrect and then that really lengthens the process. But as I mentioned, we're here to assist the community, the commissions. Please

reach out to us whenever you need to. Thank you. Okay, I'll now pass over to Luis. And uh you see Luis and Ismael quite a bit. So theirs is a little briefer, but um the Armita Martinez and Javanni Francia for theirs go in a little bit more depth because it's just more than zoning and subdivisions with our team. So they'll go into a little bit more depth about their role here with with our department and how they assist the city. So Luis,

thank you Kevin. Thank you Tony. Uh so Luis Aurora for the record. Uh so I assisting in the zoning, right? stoning sections. Right now, we're going to go through the um kind of going through the number of cases we've seen. Uh right now, it's divided into two. So, right now, I'm going to focus on what the CPC has acted on. So, there there has been a total at least total 74 applications that need a decision by the CPC, the C plan commission. Uh all this technically require public hearings. So, again, the C plan commission is one of them. Uh we have another one with the Sony board of adjustment that we oversee as well. Uh 59 cases for the last year. Um and then administrative technically we have kind of what we keep 504. So about 10% of the cases are acted by the city plan commission. Uh most of them go to council as well and then about also 10% or less are acted by the Sony board of adjustment. as you can see here and unfortunately the logo kind of hides some of the text. So we have resonings which are typically uh we typically see up zonings. Um thank you it. Um this past year we saw probably like about five up down zonings either they were cleanups but at least you know the zoning got the intensity got diminished uh even though you typically see going higher uh special permits. So one thing about special premises typically uses are permitted but need the special uh or additional oversight by the city plan commission and the city council. So those ones you see also regularly uh 21 cases for the past year condition releases uh as you see sometimes on our zoning cases they're recommended conditions. The city plan commission may

uh also recommend conditions to council. Uh so previous uh property well not previous properties but existing properties that have previous been previously resone that may have some conditions sometimes they request to release those or amend them modify the text. So we've seen uh five as last year. Uh detail side development plans are the other ones. Those are technically mostly uh reviewed by by staff. They're administrative. Uh we have some requirements in the code that says if the the square footage well the property is two acres or more to more two or more buildings on that property, C plan commission needs to review and approve. And that's why you sometimes see those uh besides uh sometimes having conditions requiring the city plan commission and sometimes council to approve them but they're mostly administrative. So for site plans technically the CPC review 16 uh applications from last year. Comprehensive plan amendments those are amendments to the comprehensive plan which have been typically the future land use map being changed because of the not correlating with what's there now or the development for the city. So last year we only saw one uh and then again zoning board of adjustments. The zoning board of adjustments sees uh decides on variances or special exceptions as well as appeals uh to decisions. We typically don't see appeals. So last year there were none. Uh we saw about one variance last year only. Everything else is typically special exceptions. Uh so one thing to kind of call out on the Sony board of adjustment is that majority of those cases that go to public hearing to them are typically because code enforcement

uh cases there's some violations on some properties and the residents need to to kind of legalize those things and sometimes it it is necessary for them to go through a sunny board of adjustment. So they will um grant variances to to the setbacks uh lot sizes things like that. Uh going into the administrative side uh which again is a big of the stuff we do behind doors that you obviously you don't get to see. Uh we have the detail site plans again. uh we saw probably around 28 administrative uh those include uh admin what we call administrative modifications when the C plan either staff or a C plan commission or or sometimes council approves a DTO site plan as you know they're binding uh they had to develop that way sometimes there are small changes uh that an applicant needs to do or like to do uh maybe modify some of the parking layout the building uh so in some instance is uh this staff can approve modifications administratively as long as their the changes are deemed minor then we approve those. So we see a lot of those too. Um and then the other ones there's some again if it's a small property not many buildings uh mostly they're administratively approved. Uh building scale plan is kind of the same as a site plan. It's just that this is applicable to smart code. uh we don't have that many smart codes and technically typically the C plan commission doesn't look into smart code um but we do have that too and that kind of adds to those site plans. Uh city review committee that's an arena that's a committee city committee that we have that oversees the neighborhood conservancy overlay which is typically well the technically it's only on the rim neighborhood. Uh so we

do have those cases and last year we had 10 of those. Um regulating plan adjustment that's kind of master master plan for smart code. So we sometimes see those. Uh last year we had we see nothing. And then the big ones that we kind of get a lot of them is the legal non-conforming registration. We did a last year and a training rat overview on that one. Um so we see a lot of those nine for last year and the zoning verifications. So zoning verification is typically people uh the the residents want to know whether something's permitted, a use is permitted on the property. Some of those verifications they are required for them to get a license for a business. And some instances they are requesting a a classification or clarification in regards to a use. Is my use classified as this or is it this? And that goes to the Sonia administrator to to decide. Um so again a total of 637 applications were reviewed by the zoning section. Uh lastly to conclude at least on my site for goals. So we had identified some of them. Uh we want to update the website and the web I mean Kevin did mention updating the website for entire uh department for entire division. Uh in regards to zoning we want to have make sure that everything's online for people to see. We do get a lot of people obviously coming in in person asking question calls. Uh the code is technically online. Everyone has access to it. It's just hard to disseminate, right? So we want to try to assist in that disseminating putting that information online so everyone can actually understand it. So that's one of the goals we have. Uh another one is kind of going through the code. We've identified and I think in the past we've said it the code is it's outdated. Uh a lot of things have been peacemeal uh throughout the years and some things

are not relevant. Some things don't even match anymore because of the changes. Uh so we want to go ahead and clean. We have some uses that do not exist. There's no other regulations but there's something in somewhere in there that we would like to remove or modify the language. And that's one of the things we want to look at. The other uh another goal is to we have some waiverss in the code. Uh for example, the smart code uh developments are technically waved since probably like 2011 2012. They've been way because that was something the city was pushing for to continue having them develop those areas. Um and then other things or applications and we technically what we want to do is remove them from the code uh so we can capture those fees and technically transfer those waiverss to like through incentives like through economic development something like that. So then we can actually bet whether that's something we want to you know incentivize right is it is there a reason to incentivize or not and lastly uh again and I mentioned the s review committee the neighborhood conservancy overlay that oversees the rim area neighborhood I want to go ahead and try to update that plan that they have that limits kind of uh the way that the neighborhood looks and things like that there's some additional oversight for whenever they requesting permits And sometimes it's a a bit overkill. Uh one of the big things is for example when they typically want to do a re roof of their home, they have to go through this committee to get approval and sometimes is like they they just need a permit especially when there's a rain season. They just need a permit to move on and this kind of keeps them uh from getting there getting that permit. So that's something we want to clean up and fix some stuff some of those things. Uh, and this technique concludes my my part. So, right now I'm going to hand it over

over to Ismo Segoia. He's going to go over the subdivision parts. Good afternoon everybody. He's my Segoia. Uh, so yes, I'll be covering the subdivisions. So, in 2025, I took a look at how many cases uh came through and 661 cases came through. So that includes everything from platreat related which is your majors, your minors, your combinations. Um that's uh with the amending plat 5 days. So it kind of includes everything. It's almost in line with what you all saw with zoning. Uh for CPC out of all those 661, you saw approximately 78 cases. Uh that left about 583 left administratively. And what we mean by administratively on the subdivision side is taking a look at everything that comes in such as the minor applications, amending plats, five days, um planning determinations. So those are the ones that we do inhouse. Uh that keeps planners or at least the subdivision planners quite busy. Uh when we take a look at the breakdown uh from 24 to 25, you see the plat related cases actually kind of diminished uh from the 97 to the 82. Amending plats, same thing. The amending plat is kind of a good thing because that means that there were less scrivener errors. Amending plats are normally for scrier errors or moving a lot line here and there. Uh we take a look at the five days. The five-day reviews are initial uh completeness checks. Uh those remain high. Platting determinations and the address assignments are two of our highest. That's what our planners normally spend a lot of time on. So for the CPC cases when it came to the 78 uh 24 of those uh were on the consent agenda and then 45 of those were on the regular agenda.

As for subdivision goals, uh kind of being the new individual into the team, I've uh slated these as the top three. Uh first, revising the written operation operating procedures uh for the subdivision team. Reason I'd like to bring that in as a goal is so that way we have a little bit more standardized process throughout. So from when the application comes in to it comes to CPC, everybody has a procedure implementing uh subdivision uh case reviews. Kind of going back to what Kevin stated that face toface, that communication amongst team members instead of having the team members sit down in their individual workstations looking at plats. This is an idea as to where we're going to bring the subdivision team together, sit down, do it the oldfashioned way, print out a plat, and take a look at it amongst the team. So that way, one, we all know what's going on as uh as planners, but two, also get a little bit more training in. And then the last one, that one's definitely a big one for me, is encourage our team to get their CNUs or their AICPs, if not both. So that's that's a big goal for me. I'd like to see our subdivision planners get their CNU at least before the end of the year. I've already reached out to uh my team. I've gotten a couple of them that reached back saying that they're very interested. So hopefully I'll kick that off here pretty quickly. So that'll be the end of my presentation [clears throat] and I'll pass it on to Miss Army. [clears throat]

Okay. move the whole thing. Good afternoon. Um, Armida Martinez, the the ride ofway management section. Um, what is city ride ofway? Our city right ofway is land dedicated for public use such as streets, alleys, sidewalks, and parkways. And I know you're all familiar, but parkways is the area between the sidewalk and street. Our section oversees activities within the site within city rightway that include special privileges, small cells, special events, sidewalk vending, mobile billboards, shared mobility devices, better better known as scooters. Don't worry, I know some of these might not make sense. I'll elaborate a little bit further. To the right, you see uh the applications that were submitted uh last year and compared or versus uh the year 2024. So, first up are our special privileges. Uh special privileges in a nutshell is the rental of city right away for a small fee. a fee is paid uh for the privilege of using the city rightway whether it be a surface encroachment, an aerial encroachment or a subsurface encroachment. There are two different types of special privileges, permits and licenses. The permits are approved administratively and licenses require council approval. Here are some examples of the aerial encroachments. So, first uh on the bottom that's a skywalk. Uh it looks familiar that the skywalk that connects Las Palmas to the medical building across the street on

Oregon. And there's another skywalk that crosses over rim from the medical office buildings to the other medical office buildings and garage. The center U image there is an example of a perpendicular sign. As you can see, it is over the sidewalk. And the one to the left, those are banners. Those banners are primarily seen downtown. Um, you may also see banners um in December down airway uh when it's uh time for getting ready for the Sun Bowl uh football game or the parade. Then we have the surface encroachments. Um the top photo that uh that uh that is Kansas Street. Again, if it looks familiar, there is a tunnel that runs underneath the street and it connects the uh parking garage to the Wells Fargo building. The one to the left that you see that red line crossing the street that indicates a proposed conduit for fiber optic cable. Uh there it states conduit. Conduit being the the the casing for the fiber. And to the left or to the right, I'm sorry. To give you an idea, this uh is the roadway near the Marathon Refinery. That red line shows where a pipeline runs through that parkway.

I'm sorry, we skip I do apologize. We skipped surface encroachments. Those are the subsurface. So, here's some example of the surface encroachments. Uh the uh asion sign, that's a directional sign for a church. The top center uh image is of planters. Uh right underneath you have the same thing. You have planters but they are uh sitting on concrete pads. Here the encroachment would be the concrete pads and of course an outdoor patio. Uh you'll see uh s special privileges are usually or primarily required for outdoor patios within the downtown area. You see outdoor patios in uh uh commercial areas, restaurant bars or uh shopping centers, but those are private property. So you don't need a special privilege for that. Okay. And I went through the subsurface encroachments. Then we have the small cells. So a small cell is a low power wireless device that improves cellular coverage and capacity in specific areas. They're often mounted on poles or uh street lights and they're used to support 5G networks. The 5G network being the newer wireless network that provides faster speeds and more reliable connectivity. Uh small cells are mandated by the FCC and state code chapter 284. There are specific uh shot clocks and

other rules that govern these uh small wireless facilities. So these are images of some of these small cells. Uh the first one is a collocation on a light pole and that little canister that you see that is what we refer to as the network node. That's the equipment where all the connectivity occurs. And then the center photo and the one on the right are new poles that were installed for these small cells. And then we have the big one here, special events. We coordinate the permitting process and we issue the permits for events held on streets as well as on private property. So, some of the uh events that we do oversee are the parades uh parades such as homecoming parades, Veterans Day parade, uh Kelly Q Halloween parade, toy runs, Thanksgiving parade, uh the parade of lights during Winterfest. We also coordinate marathons. Uh we have an international run this weekend. We also uh well another marathon is the El Paso Marathon and I don't know if you know but uh the El Paso Marathon is a qualifier for the Boston Marathon. And then we have the Maid Moer Triathlon. Those also fall under our special events. We have uh church processions.

Uh most of these take place during the Easter holiday. Uh we also have some during the December holiday. And then of course our bigger set of events are usually take place downtown. So some of these downtown events are the sal lemon uh chalk the block, the diia de los muertos, the way out west festival, uh the lighting of the Christmas tree during winter fest and of course if you recall we used to also host neon desert and uh the uh old street fest which are no longer taking place here. But as you as you can imagine, these events are larger or bigger events. And just to give you an idea um of the coordination that it takes, as much as we support and want these events to take place, ultimately our priority is to ensure the safety of all participants. So some to give you some idea, the street closure, we require a traffic control plan. Uh we need to know uh where the barricades will be, what streets will be closed, uh the signs that will be placed to direct uh passerbys. Um we need the the designated route. It needs to be reviewed and approved. Um we also need to make sure that there's a designated route in case of an emergency. And of course all TCPs uh we look at them as well as streets but they're the ones who issue the permit for the traffic control plan. We have police they must review the site plans. Uh they review all the applications. They need to determine the number of officers and vehicles that will be required um also to ensure the safety of all the participants. and then uh they'll determine whether a

barricade will be placed at an intersection or a police vehicle. We have the fire department. They must also review these site plans. Um if there's tents being used, we need to look at the number of tents, their size, their sizes, how many flaps, the distance between the the tents in case of a fire. Is there propane tanks being utilized? And if so, uh, we need fire extinguishers. And of course, we need to know a point of ingress and egress. Then we have the building permitting. If there's a stage being proposed or stands, we need the specifications. We need to ensure proper anchoring. We need to make sure that they won't collapse. If there's an event downtown, we have the street car. So, if they propose to cross the track, we need some coordination with the street car folks at Sun Metro um to ensure that those tracks are turned off if they plan to cross. We also have to coordinate with text. Uh if you're if we're utilizing the state highway, we need their approval. If we plan to close a street down for more than four hours, then we also need council approval. It requires a resolution. The state highway is being utilized downtown or Mesa Street in Texas. And of course, we also coordinate a lot with parks. If an event is taking place at parks, then uh a park permit is required. But if they're planning to close the street, then we come into into play as well. They need a special event permit. And then last but not least, we have our sidewalk retail vending. And those are examples of some of the encroachments.

But the sidewalk vending is a selling of merchandise on the sidewalk adjacent to a commercial building with a zero lot line. So most of the buildings downtown are constructed right up to the property line, meaning they do not have the front yard. So, as a result, business owners are permitted uh to display their merchandise up to three feet in front of their store, provided that the sidewalk is wide enough to maintain clear pedestrian traffic. And so, with that, that concludes my presentation on rightway management. Up next is our closer, Mr. Francia. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is Joanni Francia. I am the archives and records manager for the archives and records management division of planning and inspections. Uh I will be going over a brief uh overview of our portion of the open records process, our annual numbers and some goals.

Oh, you already So what is our process? Well, first we receive the request. All requests must be received in writing and must be specific. Uh forms may be submitted in person. They may also be submitted through our government uh QA system which is found on our website. Um any written requests will be entered into the gov QA system as that helps to keep track of the requests and to um it acts as a file share since some of these files are too large to be emailed uh person to person. So once we get our request, we'll begin to do our research. We have items in our permitting software. We have items in microfilm, uh paper plans, and items in storage. So once we compile all our documents, we'll make copies. Uh some of these are already digitized, some need to be digitized. So once we make our copies, we will upload that to the GV QA system. We will transfer that request over to the city attorney's office for their uh review and approval of release of the documents. Once they have completed that portion, they will let the requester know that we have completed the request. And um just an exceptions uh not everything is available through the uh open records requests such as uh social security numbers and medical records. So this slide shows the number of open records uh requests that we received for the last four years. For 2025, we our office received 2,712

uh open record requests, which is 17 and a.5% increase from 2024 and overall a 42% increase since 2022. So this slide is our the number of paper plans that were scanned for the last four years. Um we received uh I can't see so yeah uh these are complete sets of plans that have been scanned and are digitized and are readily available if needed. But for 2025, we're able to scan 313 complete sets of plans at 5,523 pages scanned. Now, this set is for the microfilm plans. And again, these are complete sets of plans that are digitized and available at the at the quick if needed. And for 2025, we're able to scan 736 sets at 9,163 slides. So, our goals for 2026 is to continue digitizing these records that we have for open records. It reduces the response times as we have the items already digitized and the need to order boxes from storage to scan items is diminished. And it also helps to clean up the clutter around the office and at storage. And with that, uh, I conclude our

presentation and I'll open the floor to any questions you may have for staff. And I thank you for your time. Thank you. When you separate the plans versus the sheets, are you saying that the total number of plans you scanned added up to those sheets or you did full sets of plans and then additionally you have that many single sheets?

Those many sheets for those sets. Okay, that seems like a lot per per. Um they they range. I mean, I've had sets that are one page. I've had sets that are 200 pages. So, uh yeah. It varies.

Okay. Any questions? Not necessarily just for this final presenter. I'd just like to say thank you for presenting. There was a lot of things that I didn't know that I know now. I hope that next time I'm in this meeting, I remember what you all presented. Thank you.

Good. Thank you very much, everyone. With that, I will entertain one more motion. Anything else? Any discussion? Thank you very much everybody. Y'all have a good one.