Plan Commission - Regular Meeting

um impact someone that has the Sun Metro because it saves us from buying potentially 14 other vehicles for for other divisions. So, um, I really appreciate everything that's going on with this this grant and and I'm really proud of my team for getting it so we can move forward have any sales tax that we get on these type things because when we we do these grants, we can also get um extra discounts or um purchasing of vehicles because we're using loan grants. So the FTA gives us another 5% off the vehicles that provide tert secondary and tertiary effects that come from this grant that that we that we utilize and that we

Thank you for asking. Thank you, sir. I appreciate it. With that, I'll I'll move to approve. We've got a motion to approve. Second. All in favor say I. Any opposed? Motion passes. All right. Item number four, consider approval of amendments to the amended RMS 2050 MTP and the RMS 20252028 tip for the following Texas highway projects. A amend the PE phase pia drain shared use path nights to midway project CSJ 92406728 to update the project name, project description and project limits in fiscal year 2026. and B amend the ply drain use path nights to midweight CSJ092406728 to update the project name project description and project limits in fiscal year 28. Same thing we have a the backup is in information is in your backup and we have presentation or we can answer any questions that you may have.

Any questions? We have a motion approved. Second motion. We have a second. And all in favor say I. I. Any oppos? [clears throat] All right. Item five, consider authorizing the executive director to approve the statement of work between El Paso NO and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, TCQ for use of Texas writer 7 state and local air quality planning grant funding PM2.5 for work associated with air quality research and modeling at international border crossing. So again, this is uh continues the work and and it's an extension of the grant where we're receiving funding from TCEQ to do several things, but this one specifically is to continue the work uh specifically on PM2.5. So Mr. Chair, we do have a presentation on this one. We we'd like to to share it with you. So we have Claudia from NO staff.

Hey, good morning. So as mentioned, next slide. Okay. Okay. Rider 7 is a state funded program through the TCQ that provides money for local air quality planning with focus on ozone and also PM2.5. They start on 2023 and we received funds in that year and we already finished our first project that was in October that you are going to have is the item 11 will be presented by you a resource and it primary goal is to help the local areas develop plans to meet the air quality standard in particular in areas that are need or in unattainment zones. Next slide. So as we remember last month meeting we approved amendment and we are going to be receiving 320,000 for the new fiscal year that will be 2026 to 2027. The way we are going to split the funds is going to be 10% will be project management that will be for us to make that statement award to be in weekly meetings with them be sending quarterly project report to TCQ about advance of the projects then we're going to be sponsor two projects the first one will be the multi- pollutant exposure air quality assessment on the comprehensive environmental monitor at US Mexican border crossing This will have a cost of 253,000 and the other one that was already started we start sponsor with our funds then we are going to continue sponsor with TCQ funds so we can finish the project. This is the seasonal

characterization and statistical validation of PM2.5 exposure models at international border crossings and the cost is 34,000. The next one. So the first one will be as we know PM2.5 is not only a single pollutant. When we start making our assessment and monitor on the first project last two years was only P25 five. Now we want to extend it and include more contaminants as we know the environmental components can be find in the border are many and only having PM2.5 will limit our policy tools. So what we are proposing is that with a comprehensive and multipolar data we can have a complete emission inventories assessment compliance develop a target mitigation and support border environmental cooperation cooperation. Next one. The polloons that will be included now will be PM 2.5 the B borda a port of entry and we are going to be including the ultra fine particle matter also a particle matter at 10 micros and natural oxide. Uh as we know all these pollutants are linked with the card the respiratory effects on the human health and these are related to the talpine and vehicle emissions that we have in the border crossings and more with the long lines that the time that we wait there. H the deliveries for this project will be a complete environmental data uh provide improvement and target policy tools and help the enhancement of the

border crosser learn leadership. the project and next one. The project as we mentioned there was already um approved three months ago and they start making the assessment as we know in I mentioned in in the phase number one which is October we include all the seasons of spring, summer and fall at the Santa Teresa port of entry and the bridge of the Americas but we were missing the winter season. So they just start now and in in putting all our monitors again. So we are going to have now all the year like the four seasons and the goal of this project is that we're going to identify several factors of interest that can be potential concern when performing the assessment based on the activity of the B national region. So we are going to now have the temperature in inversion that we have on winter. We are going to have the holy travel patterns as we know as the times on crossing increase. So this the mission we hope that will increase and we want to see the trends also the spring transition condition when we have the temperatures are going to be high and then spring we are going to have sorry our temperatures on winter will be lower and the spring will start raising. So we want to see that transition on the missions for PM2.5 also we are going to have available PN 2.5 exposure in the geo productive model so our model that was performed in October now having more information will be uh a data complete and we can have a better models to forecast what will be the emissions. So this results in partial seasoning data

into complete a valid models as I already mentioned that stakeholders can confidentially use to inform policy and infrastructure decision general. We have any questions about these projects.

Actually we do have a question repres. Thank you chairman. Um my question is related to the grant. Um, will it be specifically for BOD or will there be different scenarios determined on air pollution quality in in different border crossings in different areas or will it be just specific to BOD?

Yes, for the moment we only have funds for BOA because of the price that the funds that we receive. But with these models we can predict in other bridges. And the idea is that with the next funds in the next two millennium probably we can send to another bridges. But with this model you also can predict in the other bridges will be the emissions and the because potentially [clears throat] border crossings will continue um to occur and pollutants will be just transferred basically from one area to another. Okay.

Um, so I think a study in the future would be useful. We have a comment from Dr. Ibara. He's the one. Hello everyone. I'm Dr. from And actually it is more than Americ if if I may. I know um in reports in item 10 um because the MO utilizes UT right

um uh as it relates to PM2. Um would it make sense to have that presentation along with this one right now? May may answer some questions. Absolutely. Um yes, thank you Mr. Chair. So item 10 which is a report that's how we had it uh under um you know later in in the in the agenda, but I think it would be a good idea if if it's okay with with you all to bring Dr. Vivara and provide that update and he can answer a lot of the the questions and including the the one from uh Representative Chavis.

Any objection to that? Second. Thank you. All right, sir. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Can I don't know if we can put up the the slideshow that we have prepared. [clears throat]

Um, no, that's not item 10. They're working on it. They're working on it. Okay. So, um, if anyone have if you have questions, I can answer meanwhile. Yes, that's it. All right. So, are you guys here for the

So, yes, good morning everyone. I'm Dr. Lear Mahia. I'm here from from UTIP and representing NCIS. So, I'm going to give you a brief uh overview of the results that we have on the previous uh study that that Claudia just mentioned about the monitoring uh pollutants specifically PM2.5 in both in these are two international border crossings. Was it it's uh bridge of diameticas and Santa Teresa. Next one please. [cough] [clears throat] So these are the five objectives that we had for our project. Uh we're going to go over them one by one. It is uh good to report that all the objectives were met and uh I'm going to just uh explain uh one by one uh very briefly. And next slide please. So our first objective was to uh determine uh what would be our reference values uh for traffic uh related pollution uh specifically to PM2.5 which is particulate matter uh the second most uh uh smallest particle of interest for health and human exposure and we did this at two ports of entry uh one was at uh uh bridge of the Americas the other was Santa Teresa. Uh for this we actually designed, developed and deployed five monitoring stations or standalone. Each one was capable of monitoring air pollutants and and uh um determined weather parameters at each microclimate at each station. Uh the purpose was then to establish a baseline of what is actually the level of emissions at those points. uh specific uh we also uh deployed uh something that we call people counters to assess how many people are using the bridge, how many cross back and forth going going northbound and southbound at the two ports of entry. Next slide please.

The other uh objective was to develop what is called a statistical uh modeling using an econometric model. And this econometric model will take into account all the things that we measure as such as uh traffic volume per hour and the types of vehicles that we're counting. uh we also measure the PM2.5 concentration and continuously during 24 hours and we uh determine the the weather parameters uh every time we counted the formula is there I I think I'm not going to go too deep into explaining that that mathematical model next slide please next slide please the other thing that we went is based on the exposures that the measurements of the uh particular matter that we did. We wanted to assess the potential exposure for all the CBP officers and the pedestrians that were using the bridge. And the another objective was actually to not only determine that we had PM2.5 or particulate matter pollutants, but where it actually comes from and this we did through uh using some filters and some chemical analysis. Next one please. And the objective of this was actually to see if there's any required uh actions that were to be taken both to protect uh the uh the the officers or the the pedestrians and to uh uh deliver some recommendations if anything was found before uh you know that was beyond what it was expected uh the standardized parameters. Next one please. So this [clears throat] is what you guys got for and thank you for uh uh approving this last year. So we u me measured uh duran 148 days from February 21 to September 26 of 2025. I'm going to say that this is still ongoing thanks

again for the extension that was granted uh a couple of months ago. We had 95 filters analyzed for the content of the PM2.5. As you know PM 2.5 is just the size of the particle but this analysis needed to see what the part particle is made of and this is why we conducted this analysis. So out of the 97 we were capable of analyzing 64 filters. We did not do this. We had to send it to an EPA uh approved laboratory which is localized in uh UC Davis in California. Next slide please. So this is what uh we gen what we find based on our our predictive uh uh models uh we were able to predict that the biggest uh the biggest predictor for the concentration of particulate matter is the number of vehicles per hour that we're crossing every day and this is also associated in BOA higher missions because it has more more vehicles but uh we also found out that the afternoons have the highest concentrations and that will be our main interest. So in in a sense uh the persons that every user at Bodha both workers and pedestrians we are considered a higher exposure than in Santa Teresa. In Santa Teresa we did find also that the vehicles were the biggest predictor and the wind uh the patterns are the ones that kind of the protective factor but it was not a greater exposure such as the bridge of the Americas. Next one please.

[clears throat] So the other thing that we found regarding exposure uh one thing that want we want I want to make very clear is that uh none of the measured parameters were went over the standard. However, there were peaks at uh at which there were some times in which there is greater exposure. So the standard is based on a 24-hour uh uh average but we found certain peaks that might be of concern and this might be irrelevant. So uh we consider some potential mitigations about that. So what we see is the afternoon shifts at BOD are the ones that are higher exposure. Uh but again everything is within federal standards but the night shifts of course are as expected have the lowest exposure in the uh in the Santa Teresa uh also the afternoons and mornings were high. We need to we don't know exactly why in the mornings there's a lot of other activities in in in Santa Teresa that we didn't account for but we need to know if this were uh were associated also the afternoon shift in Santa Teresa is the greater exposure than in the morning. Uh remember the Santa Teresa only has two shifts. Next slide please. This is a bit complicated but this is the digital or this is the print of the materials that are in PM2.5. It's uh it's a bit complicated to say but uh you see in that in that image this is this is uh it's called the XR XRF analysis. is basically to know what what that PM2.5 is made of, right? And what we found out is that you know the composition is uh is very relevant to our our city and our region. The more the thing that was more present everything was calcium which is typical for our desert environment. But we also found uh barium which is an indicative of the slowmoving traffic and the breaking patterns. This the you know slow movement and a lot of breaking. We

found some other minerals like antimony and cadmium. These uh can probably be uh come from contaminated salts which means that we don't only get at the bridge uh contaminants from the vehicle emissions but also is this probably the wind is bringing other contaminants into those those same those same points. We have other minerals like serium and indium. These are really rare to find but we detect them. We still need to find what would be the potential source of that. That is one other concern that still needs to be investigated. And one important thing is we didn't find as sink as much as we thought we were going to find which is typical to this to this region. Now what does this mean? This means that this is exactly what we need to protect our our uh officers and our pedestrians at those sites. This these are some of the chemicals that are of interest and for which we need to uh have greater concern. Next slide please.

[clears throat] Lastly, uh this is just what were recommendations for BA. Uh what we recommended is that you know take a little bit of uh uh into consideration the afternoon shifts. Maybe take some uh you know administrative actions like more shift uh uh shifting the the the workers around a little bit more. uh assess the booth ventilation systems and try to do uh exposure assessment when extreme conditions on we have windstorms. Uh we because that was one of the events that we found that when windstorms are are here especially in Santa Teresa the levels of PM2.5 and all the associated minerals that we found really uh go really up.

Next slide please. So what we found out is that not international boards of uh uh of entry are the same. So they have to be assessed. They have different characteristics. They have different particular patterns. The sources and the you know the and the composition of the PM2.5 is different in both uh sites. So that is something that we need to consider. Uh what we recommend is that not to take that one side fits all and every point of entry needs to be assessed individually. Next one please. So [clears throat] this is what your investment discovered right what we think is this is groundbreaking. Uh we did 33 samples going from spring, summer and fall. We still are ongoing with our with our winter um with our winter monitoring and now we understand what people exactly are breathing at both the bridge of Santa Teresa and and bridge of the Americas sorry uh port of central. Next one please. The next is uh we actually we consider that this project is has been a success. We now have high resolution air quality monitoring. We have data flow that still needs to be further analyzed. We also uh uh sorry we the most importantly for us whether we have where this pollution actually comes from right so it's not only from vehicle emissions although it's a greater part but it's also comes from other parts of the city and also uh it comes also with the uh dust in the air. Uh the bottom line is that we develop a system that works right and then our data is down and what we need to do is just continue completing one year to establish the effects of winter patterns and uh probably extended to other ports of entry. Next one please. [snorts] Lastly, I just want to acknowledge the

team and everyone that supported. I want to recognize my two graduate students there in the back. And uh next slide and thank you everyone and I'll be taking your questions if there are any. Any questions? Uh represent Thomas.

Thank you chairman. So just a follow-up question and thank you so much for this. I think it's a great presentation. Gives us a lot of information. Um I know that there are several factors that you've identified. Traffic volumes, landscapes, wind patterns. Yes. potentially if we were to uh switch commercial traffic from one bridge to another or divert it to several bridges, what impact would that create on contaminants in the other bridges potentially or what factors or what other factors would also play into those contaminants? We we believe and this is what we're proposing that uh you know there will be added factors like ultrafine particles that might lead to ozone formation and other things and this is what we're proposing for uh for the uh extending the project a little bit more to assess those type of exposures. Uh of course uh we must know that uh a single single contaminant is not not enough. We need to monitor all of them in order to really assess the potential exposure. And this is what we're proposing in the in the next project.

But the models will allow us to the models will allow us the models are there and we found validity uh in our models. They run consistently. Uh what we say is the uh the parameters that we measuring are the correct ones. That's what you know the uh the modeling says. We are right on track. we uh you know everything that we measure is uh let's say uh is something that should be included in this model.

Thank you. I have a question. Yes sir. So your presentation says that all shifts all current shifts are within federal guidelines. Sorry within federal limits. Does your models uh show uh a potential time frame as to when they will not be within

what it shows is that there's an an increase for every 100 vehicles. So that depends a lot right on two basic things. uh ones is uh how many vehicles are going to cross because if I'm not mistaken we estimated that around 1.1 for every 100 vehicles there's an increase of at least one point in PM 2.5 and the other thing that is going to affect it is the wind pattern right the wind pattern because when the wind comes it disperses so in in theory PM2.5 associated to vehicle emissions goes down but then other other types of dust and things like that come up.

So yes, but I think to to your to your question, yeah, I mean with the what are the the variables here is the number of vehicles. So if if we we can estimate, you know, with our forecast models, we can estimate the the increase in in number of vehicles that that are going to be crossing and and how the you know the the the split between border crossings, you know, will happen. And and based on that number of vehicles, yeah, we will be able to estimate

if those emissions the what you know that that are that are directly driven by vehicles, right? How you know how when or or to when to what level will we be beyond or above the federal standards?

Currently, we don't have say a timeline a time set say 10 years from now, 15 years from now, 20 years from now. We may be at elevated levels above. We can We don't have that right now. No, we can simulate it. Definitely. We can simulate it and have an estimate, but it'll be our our best estimation.

Thank you. Yes. I was going to ask you, did you look at any I know you're talking about doing an analysis. Sorry, George. I'm sorry. George public comment period right now. Any other questions, members? repres [snorts and clears throat] what was the rationale for the search I mean why was this what was the selection criteria for selecting bod if ultimately uh you know one of the reasons for shutting down the commercial traffic was that it was only 15% of of commercial traffic for the region so if ifa you know was already you know accommodating a higher rate of traffic I mean what how was that taken into consideration because if you're showing that volume is one of the biggest predictors I mean is is this model truly going to be transferable if if the volume and the traffic patterns and all are just completely different at at lea

the model is transferable the data is not uh and and we must recall that this project did not include commercial vehicles it's only passenger vehicles right so we didn't not take that into account our next phase will consider uh commercial vehicles right uh but the model itself you know the things that we measure and put in order to forecast the the the pollution it will work for you but the parameters you know is they don't they can't be the same because you know the landscape the geography of each site is different right and how much funding is it going to take for for us I guess to uh whether expand this or analyze additional ports so that way we get a comprehensive study I guess of people

well one of the things is I think this investment that you have made uh one of the biggest expense is the equipment and we already have that. So we have that capability. So uh for moving it you know to a different different uh ports of entry it will be just you know the cost of transporting it to the different sites and of course one of the biggest cost is uh the analytics of the of the filters sending him into a laboratory and getting them analyzed. That's one of the the biggest cost but it it shouldn't be a greater investment than it is right now. Right now we have invested a lot on equipment and I think that is already uh been taken care of. So it's just um you know a matter of uh you know I'm going to say salaries for whoever is going to conduct the uh the uh the the analysis.

Yes. and Sal Gonzalez El Paso MPO as of the the question of why Bodha and Santa Teresa uh we decided to of course because of limited budget we we had to select not we couldn't select all of the or include all of the ports of entry but Bodha and and Santaa since there are uh uh no toll tolling uh actually introduces an a level of comp additional level of complexity you have stop and go just for for uh for tooling. So uh that's why uh we decided to go with the uh less complex in this case BOD and and and Santa

wouldn't that result in more pollutants? Yeah, probably so. that we also needed additional equipment uh uh to to you know try and evaluate and and simulate the stop and go at the tolling that introduces uh different levels of of emission rates. And so we [snorts] wanted to go first to the what we thought was uh you know a simpler uh uh context. One of the things that might be introduced is the Q-le right and that is something that at this moment we don't have the capability of doing and going all the way into uh into what is to see what's the Q but but your your point or your question is very well taken because uh at this point you know the the the decision to do these two was just for simplicity I mean this is something new I mean the the monitors that you physically that we physically put at the booths. I mean, that's I don't think there's

no one has done it. No, nobody has done that, right? So, so we're we're in in in the you know, the cutting edge of of all this. Now, with more funding, of course, we would like to to expand extend this not to to other uh uh border crossings, but also to measure it throughout the queue, right? If we could put more of these these monitors along the queue and like Salvador said, yeah, the the stop and go is is that generates a lot of these a lot of these emissions of not just of PM2.5 but other pollutants as well. So it's a question of of funding perhaps. I mean perhaps we can just talk more about this offline. But I [clears throat] mean I think our goal should always be accuracy simplicity. I mean, it's it's I mean, what's the point of, you know, how can we rely on the accuracy of this if really the the primary goal was kind of just simplicity for data purposes. Well, then I mean, if I were looking at the data, well, then I wouldn't really be relying on it if if that was one of the overriding factors. But we can probably just talk more about this offline. [clears throat and cough] If you can find us about $5 million to do this, yeah, we can [laughter]

No, I hear you. Baby steps here. Yeah. But at the same time, I you know, even though I don't have a degree in chemistry, but and I, you know, the the what what UT is doing is is really high-tech, the way that they're breaking down the sources of a of a to identify, you know, what to do because at the end of the day, we we you know, we want to figure out how do we manage this or how do we protect against PM 2.5 specifically. But uh but you know, we're super excited that that we've been able to do this work and we're doing it with a grant from TCQ. So, it's not costing us any any money. If I just uh can say that the models are accurate for the the type of of uh of you know of crossing in this case a noll uh crossing and it is you can you can use the predictive models on other uh crossings that do not have uh you know the part that is not the tolling. Okay. So yeah, we we probably need to include that in in further models.

Any other questions? All right, Mr. Chair. So we can we take action then on item what is it? Item five. Item five. Sorry. Thank you. Um we have a motion to approve. Do we have a motion?

Motion to approve. We have a second. And all in favor say I. Any opposed? Motion passes. Right. All right. Item six. Uh consider authorizing the executive director to execute supplemental number one to task order number one with the El Paso NPO general planning consultant for on call general transportation planning support services to extend the termination date to December 31st, 2026. and to increase the maximum total compensation by $49,8858 for a total maximum compensation of $149,516.65. All right. So, um if you recall, uh this was the first task order that we executed with our general planning consultant back in in March of uh 2024, I believe. And and if the intent of of task order one was really to to provide us the the flexibility and the ability to do lowcost um you know pretty urgent uh assignments that that we needed to complete um you know before we could issue very specific task orders. So we were very successful in in doing that and that allowed us has allowed us to to accelerate the the the different tasks that that we have been uh doing recently like the the international border crossing before we executed the task order specifically for that. We were able to to get the the GPC to help us with the preliminary planning activities. the same with the task order where they are helping us with the development of our new uh uh metropolitan transportation plan. So part of that that that work to develop the the overall schedule for it was was great help. So um so task order number yeah task order number one expires at the end of this month. So, we want to extend it and uh we still have a balance

of about $20,000 that we are using precisely for the the the next step of the safety action plan. So, uh we are in the process of negotiating a a a bigger more detailed uh task order with the consultant. But in order to accelerate the implementation phase of the safety action plan, we asked the the consultant to help us organize the event that will follow this this uh board meeting. It's of the press conference where we're going to be announcing the vision zero uh committee and the next step for the for the safety action plan for the entire NO region. So uh with that uh happy to answer any any questions. Any

questions? Do we have a motion? So move. We have a motion to approve. We have a second. All in favor say I. Any opposed? Motion passes. Thank you. All right. Item seven is to consider authorizing the executive director to sign a partnership agreement for the use of the center for civic empowerment on the 17th floor of the blue flame building in order to hold NO transportation policy board meetings in the space in 2026 subject to final review and approval of the MO attorney. So again, this is a recurring item for to be able to use this room for TPB meetings in calendar 2026. Uh the draft agreement is in your in your uh backup. And of course, we recommend approval.

Base. We have a motion to approve. Second. Motion. We have a second. All in favor say I. Any opposed? Motion passes. All right. Item eight. Consider authorizing the executive director to sign a letter of support for the Camino Rail Regional Mobility Authority CRM grant application to the Texa 2025 offsystem rail great separation state fund program for the Union Pacific Railroad at Rick Francis Street Great Separation Project. [clears throat] So that uh draft letter is also in your in your backup. Um we have Mr. De is here from the RMA, the Camino RMA, in case you have any questions about the project or the letter itself.

Any questions? Have a motion. Motion to approve. Uh we have a motion to approve. Show abstaining from the vote. Do we have a second? Second. Uh we have a second. Uh all in favor say I. I. Opposed. Motion passes. Great. Thank you. All right. Item nine, we move on to to reports again. Item nine is to update on text statewide transportation alternative set aside TASA fiscal year 2026 project awards for the El Paso NPO planning area. And for that we have Mr. Jose from text for the El Paso. Morning everyone. Again, my name is Jose Boenega. I am with the Texas Department of Transportation. I am the El Paso District uh transportation alternative coordinator and we'll be discussing uh the transportation alternatives call for projects for 2025, the summary. Uh next slide. So, the uh 2025 TA call for projects officially began on January 3rd, 2025. uh within when it began received 13 preliminary applications from 10 different sponsors. This is totaling $91.7 million. Uh 12 of those projects were located within the boundaries of the El Paso MPO. From those 13 preliminary applications, nine made it into the detail phase. These nine applications totaled $77.8 million for the projects. And then finally, out of nine of the out of these nine applications, five were chosen during the uh Texas Transportation Commission meeting on November 13, 2025. Uh next slide. So the uh five projects chosen their little small saw read them here was the uh city of El Paso the McGoff and Pedros Pisano shared use path. This was a design and construction award totaling $13.39 million. Uh town of Horizon City this was for the Howard Low pedestrian mall also design and cond construction uh

totaling 2,270,000. City of Sakoro this is for the Rio Vista complete streets visibility study. This is a planning level non-construction award and this was for 2,813,000. El Paso County for the mission valley basela north trail phase 1. Uh this is for design and construction 17,625,000. Uh village of Vinton for their Vinton active transportation plan. This is a planning level award again and this is for 457,000. Next slide. to go over some of the analytics of our area. The El Paso District Region received 36,582,000, higher than the 2023 2023 awarded amount at uh 33,744,867. The El Paso district region received the second highest amount of funding among all the districts. This is reflected in that bar graph over there with uh Dallas being the highest recipient at 52,89,000 followed by El Paso. Uh the El Paso district region also research awarded among all the districts. That um on the left hand side is a breakdown of all the districts by alphabetical order. Um with El Paso receiving five, so we were uh six in that overall ranking. Uh next slide. So for our next steps here, uh textile will begin to create the CSJs for all the projects that were awarded and that is a deadline of January. Uh Texad is also requesting Nepal pass initiate the process to incorporate these projects under group CSJ and its transportation uh improvement plans as we move forward. The advanced funding agreement um this is a little bit dated. So advanced funding agreements will follow up and has a predicted completion of summer so June July. Uh upon the execution of those as a AFAS textile will reach out to local government for project kickoffs and assignment of project managers. As a friendly reminder, any project manager that is associated with these projects does have to complete our LGP local government procedures 101 class uh that's required every uh three years. So if you haven't, we are going to have one in February. So if you have any assigned project managers or projects that

haven't done it, uh please have them sign up for that class. Uh projects are also let within two to three years of award. So that's between fiscal year 27 and 28. And the next TA call for project will begin in 2007. Um this is my last slide. So um I just wanted to thank all the local governments that participated. Um it's your you know projects that help this region you know receive all that funding. So thank you all for participating and we hope to have you all participate also for 2027. Thank you.

Just want to say that um first of all thank you and the transportation commission for all the work that they've done. U this doesn't happen by accident. I think the fact that the delegation has brought every single transportation commissioner to our region to showcase and so they can learn about our infrastructure needs um uh was a key part of that. Uh the second part of that was uh the community effort. Um we demonstrated that we were aligned

[clears throat] um on our projects with with very little opposition and that was important for the TTC to make those um decisions. So, uh, great job to the MO staff and, uh, the transportation policy board for having that vision and that unity to move these projects forward. Um, so great job, uh, also to the NO staff for for that work. And then third, um, you know, we we are lucky to have a great district engineer and team uh for text here in El Paso who does, uh, wonderful work in and and demonstrating how we can all come together and and pull our resources and put this money both federal and state into into play. And, uh, this has been a a phenomenal district engineer. So, Tomas to you and your uh district. Great job, great collaboration. Uh and and I think the amount of funding that we're receiving demonstrates uh that type of collaboration. So, uh well done for everyone.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. That's I mean I was going to say uh something similar to that, but this is really a big deal. It's a really big deal for it's a big win even though it doesn't sound like a lot of money but but you know as you know TASA projects are are very competitive the pot of money at the state level is not big but the fact that we were able to get the second largest uh selection for our region and it was actually you know distributed you know the the county the city horizon uh etc and and you know we are really really happy and and uh and excited and proud of this effort because it was really like you Mr. Chair, it's a it's a group effort. So, thank you for for all. And now, let's get them done.

All right. So, that was item number nine. We already did 10. So, moving on to 11, which are the quarterly reports. Again, these are reports on administrative amendments that we've done, uh project completion, uh project readiness, and specifically the RMS 2020 strategic uh uh plan projects report. They're all in in your in your backup. Uh we really don't see um any major issues, but you know, happy to discuss them if you have any comments or or questions.

Comments, questions. All right. Okay. All right. So, item 12, um, as I mentioned before, uh, well, item 12, creation of the Border Plex Safe Mobility Plan Vision Zero Task Force, and we'll give you a brief, uh, presentation, but this is related to the event that we're going to have following the CPV meeting. So, [clears throat]

good morning, chair and board members. Um, so I'm going to talk to you a little bit about the next steps for the Border Plex safe mobility plan. You guys may remember that this plan was adopted at the last uh TPB meeting. Next slide, please. So, you guys have seen this slide lots and lots of times. The only thing I really want to highlight is that to see the plan itself, you can go to that QR code up on the top. Um, within the plan, there are lists uh from the analyzed data of priority segments for each of your jurisdictions. And also on that website, we have the high-risisk high injury network map where you can actually see uh not only the high-risisk and higher injury uh segments, but if you zoom in far enough, you can see the crash locations. You can see statistics compiled uh either for the entire region or you can narrow into like just your own street. You can look at your block and see what your crash stats are. So that all is up and live as of a couple minutes ago when I checked. Next slide, please. What we're going to see when it loads is the high-risk and high injury maps. So these are them. So we have this is within the body of the document with a lot of ex explaining about uh how we got here, why the segments that are included are included and uh and the crash characteristics for our region. This map is also available in interactive format on the website. That's the one that I was just talking about. Next slide, please. So, near the end of the plan is our implementation strategy. So, yes, we gathered a bunch of great data. We figured out where our problems are. We put together uh uh packages of counter measures that address each of the

prominent collision types within our region. So, that's great. But how do we get from there to the actual reductions that the plan seeks to create? And so this implementation strategy is included within the plan, but now we need to do something about it. So the rest of this presentation is going to focus on the main way we are proposing to go about doing this um in the five W's format. So we're going to go who, what, where, when, and why. Next slide, please.

[clears throat] So, we are creating our vision zero committee. This is why we got the cameras and why we're going to be talking to them next. Uh we have invited uh representatives from each of our jurisdictions. Also, law enforcement uh I believe and we've got other key important stakeholders in there as well from the community because we need to all work together. There's a lot of overlapping areas of interest, not only between just commuting patterns between jurisdictions, but there's also different spheres of influence and different spheres of control that all need to work together so that we can address this topic in a manner that actually moves the needle. So, who we got local government, we got law enforcement, we got different stakeholders. Uh many folks got uh emails this week inviting them to join this committee. If you have gotten one and uh haven't responded yet, we encourage you to do so. We we want [clears throat] as many people in on this conversation as as as practical and and we'd love to have you. So, what is it? It's a group that meets regularly, work together towards our regional goals of reducing and eliminating serious collisions. So, not only are we looking at just, okay, what's the data in the plan, but um and especially from our law enforcement partners, um what what are you seeing out there? You know, where where are we needing to focus? What sort of attention uh do we need to pay? Is the is what we observed that made its way into the crash data, is that still what rises to the top or, you know, do we do we need to address like a different emerging profile or something like that? Is there some sort of seasonal messaging that might be really really good to share amongst the group or is there something new and preventable that keeps happening that maybe we need to tell everybody to stop

it or how to stop it? All righty. So, next slide please. All right. So, where most likely the physical location for this hybrid meeting is going to be the no offices. But if we have the problem that we would love to have that we have too many people to fit, we'll find a different location probably downtown. Uh, and why? Because adopting a plan is not some sort of magical problem fixing device. We actually have to get in there and implement it. We have to have jurisdictions incorporate the safety uh recommendations contained within the countermeasures toolkit into uh uh maintenance and small construction projects. We need to work together as a region to go after transportation dollars when these competitive grants arise that get some of these larger solutions implemented. Uh and we're going we we hope to use uh this vision zero committee in part to help coordinate on how that piece happens through uh some form of technical assistance through some form of coordination about who's doing what and when. Um and uh yeah so yeah so there's so we need we need continuous action. All righty next slide please. All righty. So, we have this group. That's nice, but we then actually need to meet as a group and to do the work. So, we're going to have regular meetings. We're going to have technical assistance and collaboration on projects and grant applications, and we're going to coordinate on emerging conditions and

causes. Uh it's hoped that through getting everybody in the same room, we can work together on all on on a range of different solutions that helps us truly make a difference on this topic. and when uh we are uh anticipating our first meeting in January of 2026. And this is the end of my presentation. Again, we're really excited to to start this implementation phase. as Anne said, you know, yes, we have a plan which, by the way, we completed uh with a federal grant and and again, our thanks to the county of El Paso for providing the match for for that for that plan. So, but again, as as we want to emphasize, we have a plan. Well, that's great, but now we need to implement it because if not, you know, it's another plan that's going to get shelved and and uh without any any major [snorts] any major uh you know, solutions. So with that, any comments or questions on on this item?

Uh chair, uh um I do have a comment. Um can you bring back that this has really nothing to do with the the the vision and putting the committee together. Uh I just want to make sure that what is pushed out to the public is is um what we're clear in what we're looking to do. So on the original the regional safety vision, it states here that EPO commits to continually reduce and eliminate the number of fatalities. And it's just the way it's worded here. Um it says by half in 2035 and by zero in 2050. So if we could change that because it's the way it's read is we're not looking at changing any of that in 2050. So I guess my my comment would be could we possibly change that

like two instead of by zero. Exactly 200 by 2050. [laughter] Right. Because it pushing this out to the public. It looks like we're not trying to change anything. You're going to be in the vision zero committee, right? [laughter]

No, thank you for the comment. Just my only recommendation. No, absolutely. But but I mean you know these are the kind of things that that we need to to work on. I mean you know word smithing I mean we understand what the vision is right and I think we've talked a lot about the when it comes to safety right to to serious injuries or fatalities. We talk about uh you know what the target should be. And by the way you know we we're going to bring this next I think it's next month that that we have to do the safety again. But when it comes to fatalities what is a good target? Got to be zero. Right. So it's difficult and sounds uh you know very difficult to to achieve but anyway so that's that's where where we're at.

Thank you. All right. Thank you. Um so then finally the executive director's report just very briefly uh just to report that uh at uh earlier this month we well I attended uh the temple meeting which is the Texas Association of NPOS. These are really really good uh meetings that we have where we exchange a lot of information with not only within NPOS's but with the federal agencies with tax dot a lot of discussion on best practices and challenges that we have. Um and you know it's it's a these are really really good things that uh that are happening with with other NPOS's. And then the second thing is with the international border crossing strategic plan. Um, I'll give you a a more complete update in in January, but just to let you know that we had um last week, no, earlier this week, I'm sorry, we had a a meeting of the technical work group that is that is going to help us get into the details on what different uh scenarios we're going to be modeling for our uh strategic plan. Again, as a reminder, we're looking at the with our models, we're looking at at the six border crossings that we have in our region. uh see how we can make improvements when we look at them as a region and start looking at at different scenarios of what we can do instead of just looking at these individually or in addition to looking at them individually as as you know discrete single crossings. Um so we are planning to have another meeting with a work group on in January. uh we'll be able to provide some results just to give you a a sneak peek. Two of the basic scenarios that we're going to start and this is just the starting point is to have our baseline which is the the operations or what's what's going on today and then have a scenario where we uh eliminate trucks from the

bridge of the Americans right and start looking at at you know what happens what we can anticipate happening in terms of how the diversion or the changes in traffic patterns to other bridges including air quality um emissions analysis and so on. And then uh use those two as as like baseline scenarios and start looking at other scenarios that uh that may help us you know get some ideas on on what to do like maybe shifting further shifting you know one mode of of transportation to one bridge or building you know a new crossing expanding other crossings etc. So, it's really exciting stuff, but I but we we plan on on bringing you a more detailed update in the month of uh in January, next month.

So, happy to answer any questions or thoughts. Any questions? That's it. Business business. Do we have a motion? We have a second a second. All in favor say [clears throat] I. Thank you. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year.