County Council - Session - Regular Meeting

okay i want to welcome everyone to the county council july 7th regular session so we're going to be doing the meeting in hybrid format so we'll have some counselors and some presenters in person and some remote so we'll be taking public comment at the beginning of the meeting for items that are not on tonight's agenda and then when we ask for public comments uh ms mass will look on zoom to see if there's any people with their hands raised on Zoom. And if you're on the phone line, you use star 9. We request that you keep your comments to three minutes unless otherwise directed. We also ask that virtual commenters include their full name on Zoom so they can be properly addressed. We also ask that comments be addressed to the chair and be on the topic. Okay, and so we're hoping to meet in the meeting tonight and we'll be there in 10pm. If we're still meeting at nine, we'll check our progress at that point. So now we'll have the roll call. So since we have a councillor on zoom, so please call the roll.

Councillor Agor?

Here.

Councillor Cole?

Here.

Councillor Haveman?

Here.

Councillor Herman? Here. Councillor Reidy?

I'm here.

Councillor Neil Clinton? Here. Councillor Hand. Here. We have six present in chambers and one remote.

Okay, let the record show that all seven councillors are present. Councillor Neill-Clinton is remote. And if you are willing and able, please join us in the Pledge of Allegiance. So now we're on to item number three, which is public comments. As I mentioned, this section, public comment, is for items that are not on tonight's agenda. Is there anyone present in chambers that would like to make a public comment? I'm not seeing anyone. Ms. Masson, can you check online?

I can, Chair. If you'd like to make a public comment, please raise your hand. Chair, I'm not seeing any hands raised.

Okay, thank you. So now we're on item number four, which is approval of the agenda. Is there a councillor interested in making a motion regarding the agenda? I move that we approve the agenda.

Second.

Okay, so we have a motion by councillor Cole, second by councillor Havman. Okay, not seeing any discussion. There is a green sheet coming up later, but that doesn't affect the agenda. So can please call the roll.

Councillor Neill Clinton?

Yes.

Councillor Hand? Yes. Councillor Herman? Yes. Councillor Wrighty?

Yes.

Councillor Rigor?

Yes.

Councillor Happerman? Yes.

Councillor Cole?

Yes.

Motion passes 7-0. Okay. Let the record show the motion passes unanimously. So now we're on to item 5, which is presentations, proclamations, and recognitions. 5A is 21581-26. It's a presentation by Dr. Stanley Priam, manager of the Environmental Management Los Alamos Field Office. And we'll also have Mr. Smith, too, president of N3B. So whenever you're ready, just get the slides up. and you can start your presentation.

Hey, good evening, county council. I'm Dr. Stanley Peele. I go by Stan. Just want to say thank you for the council for giving us the opportunity to present to you today in the LANL cleanup mission. I've been in this position as the acting manager for EMLA since March. You know, having a great time here. You know, the weather is amazing. Getting to go outside. Over the weekend, I did the Bandalia National Park, National Monument. And I did the Tent Rock. So beautiful weather here. It's almost like it's amazing. And getting to enjoy some of the... I don't want to call them challenges, but the opportunities to excel in moving the EMLA mission forward, things like that. So a little bit about me. I've been a civil servant pretty much my whole career. You know, after college I did work on the private sector for five years, but after that I joined the government. So between DOE and DOE I have worked for environmental management NSA close to, 20 years, 18 years than before that I was with the Army Corps of Engineers as a civilian. Also, I'm in the Army Reserve where I'm still serving. I enjoy being in the Army Reserve. I think it keeps me young because you're interacting with a bunch of 18, 19-year-olds, so that's a great feeling. It's just the next day after you run with them, it's not good on your knees and your joints, so it's a little bit different conversation. So before I came here, I was at Savannah Riverside, again, supporting the EM mission. I was the chief engineer of the site, working on the nuclear waste they have over there. So we're working on the vitrification of the high-level waste and the grounding of the low-level, you know, And we do have some low-level and mixed-level waste there we share, you know, but it's a little bit at a lower level. So I've been part of the EM mission for a little bit different site, but understand the EM mission as a whole, what's our purpose. And this is one of those missions I really take pride in because at the end of the day, this is about protecting the environment, the public, And the people, because one thing I always said, we are part of that public, we are part of that environment. Most of my staff live in the area between White Rock, Los Alamos, Santa Fe. Myself, I'm in Santa Fe for now temporarily. So it's a great thing, part of the EM mission to be part of that community, to get engaging at the multiple level. I'm glad to be here. I'm excited. I was just telling one of my staff, one of the things I want to do coming in October is the Balloon Festival, but I heard it's extremely hard to get tickets, so I'm going to bring my daughter, try to work the process to get some tickets. So we'll work it from here. So that's, again, I'm looking forward to know everyone, have conversation on the side. Like I said, we are part of the community. I think engagement, that's how we move the mission forward. Next slide. The coulmium interim measure. So this is what we've been doing to remove the X-available coulmium plume in accordance with the 2016 compliance order. So we've been going at it Executing the mission but one other thing I love to highlight and when we talk about the IM system is the fact It's an interim measure. So what we're saying it's it's a it's a it's not the final remediation But that's a path to get us there. So one of the key thing of that system you allow us to Revise adapt the system to when we collect new data to improve it get more efficient more efficacy So one other thing we want to highlight, because there's a conversation, you know, you do the extraction, you send it to the iron beam to clean up, and then you do the injection back. The injection is really more of a... secondary uh process and removing the the chromium it's more the the main reason for the injection back is to create a hydraulic wall that's critical to managing the chromium in that process so more conversation in the next few slides but we'll highlight some of the key things and why the im has been effective when it's working and some of the way we'll continue to work to revise it to make it more efficient to move the mission forward Next slide. So this is, chronological date of the system. So since the system being operating, we have been ordered by NMED to stop it three times. One of the key things for this system, we have data that show when the system is operating, it is efficient. It does the job. And one of the things I highlight, part of the system is to revise when it's operating with collecting data and we're able to tweak it to make it more efficient. But we have enough data that show once it's operating, it is efficient, it does work. So these are the list of the date. We came online in 2018. We had the first shutdown in 2020. 2022, we didn't call it official shutdown, but that was directed by NMED what, where we could not use. So it was a partial shutdown to a certain extent because that was not the way we designed it and that was not a decision made using data to support that process. In April 2023 we had a second shutdown officially and the last shutdown was in November 2025. Next slide. So one of the main push we're doing right now working with NABD and the state of engineer is to get the system restarted. And part of it is they have some concern on how the system is operating. And we're working to get some, we call it partial, but it's really adjusting the system because the system allow us to use different injection well, which one we're using as an extraction. There's a certain level of flexibility that's associated to the system. So we had an expert technical review team that went in the analysis that did some deep review for us. And one of the key things they highlighted was the IM system is the most important process in dealing with the exovalent chromium plume. So we had a team and those experts, we're still leveraging them to support any data we're collecting and to make us continue to improve our process. One of the key aspects of that system is we've got to continue drilling well so we could collect data, so we could use decision to help support our decision-making process. So we've got a couple where when we go to the update slide that we're moving forward in terms of they've been successfully executing that mission. So although we had a shutdown directed by NMED in 2025, November, so one of the key things we did, it was like, we're not just going to stop the work. You know, there was some recommendation from the expert technical review team and part of it is drilling somewhere. So we didn't just stop. We continue drilling our well based on the location we have identified. For example, we completed December 3. And we have some new data that we're working the process to release those data and enter this. Those data probably will be out in the system and the website probably around September. There's a process for that. We have worked with the Pueblo. We're working it. The drilling is complete, but there's a whole process in developing the well, things like that. So there's multiple additional steps that need to happen before we could say the well is complete and start collecting data. And right now, our next well we plan to do is R-79. A couple of things we continue to do is looking at alternative injection. One of the major concerns NMED have is our injection. We're injecting into the plume. So part of the conversation is like, okay, so let's go ahead and try to target injection outside the plume. However, once we drill, we might realize something. But part of the initial decision is like, let's try to target outside the plume so we could still have an injection and have a net zero in the process. So from the extraction, cleanup, injection, we'll have a net zero. Because one of the key things we don't want to – we think it's problematic is if we do an application at 100% at the configuration the state is asking us to do. Because at the end of the day, being around here, water is an extremely natural resource that's not abundant. So at the end of the day, it should not be we just doing an application. That would be a substantial amount of water we just not properly utilizing and that probably could create other problems with other, the state of engineers or just, it's just not the right thing to do because our system could, uh, correct me if I'm wrong, process about 60 gallons per minute. So I will let, Everybody just do the math. If you do 60 gallon per minute, let's say, assume our system is fully operational. We operate it for 365 days. You could do the math how much of water that will be spread out there and how much that will be impacting the environment. So I think that's important that we continue to work with the state to find an alternative position where we could find a different injection area. We could do a partial in application, but it cannot be in the full configuration the state is asking us to do. The next thing I want to highlight here is evaluating the mod flow. So we will have an RFP coming out sometime this summer. And the commitment the government is making will be transitioning to mod flow by the end of calendar 2027. So that's calendar year 2027. That will be a better system that help us, one, communicate to the different stakeholders, and two, managing our process. You know, in the last point I want to make to that slide before I go to the next one is one of the key aspect on us managing that IM system is that what we call the adaptive site management. So part of the system allow us as we collect more data, we're able to use data to help support our decision-making process and bring the different stakeholders to the table so we could have a conversation and how we selecting those where, what's the process, what's the monitoring world is giving us the data and support our decision. But one of the things you hear me preaching and the whole team is preaching about that is in order to move the mission forward, is part of those conversations need to be candid, professional, and in good faith. Because at the end of the day, any group working when you put a group together to execute a mission, there will be disagreement. But it has to be done in a professional manner where we could all get together to pull in the same direction with the same goal, which is, to me, I believe everybody should be aligned with that, is to protect the environment, the public, and the people. So we'll continue to work in the Good fate, collaboration, consulting with the multiple stakeholders in the Pueblos. Next slide. So a couple of the key takeaways I want to leave you all with is right now the plume is a slow-moving plume. So there's no pause to immediate threat to the public and the private drinking well. So we have sampling those. there's no immediate threat to that. We continue to sample some of all the well and monitoring continue to happen on a regular basis. Some of them are monthly, quarterly, biannually, things like that. So continue to use those data we're collecting from the result of those well to support our decision making. But one of the things I want to highlight on the adaptive sap management, what I love about it is We're not saying our system is a magic pill that will fix everything. So when we get more data, we're using that data to refine it. So having more data will help make the system more effective. Already said it, when the IM system is operating, it does have a positive effect on the plume. It is efficient. during both of the shutdown that was directed by NMED, we have seen a spike because we're still collecting, we're still monitoring. We have seen a spike on the exterior lacromium that, and when the IEMs start back again, it's working. So we had an external technical review team. We continue to engage them in the process. We have... This is what they do. They expert in the process. And although they talk about the land application, if we execute it into the configuration the state is asking us to do, it's not sustainable, just with the amount of water that would be wasting. So a couple of things I want to highlight, because one of the things with the IM system we talk about is we're in a shutdown phase. And right now, Brad, correct me if I'm wrong, it probably cost me about $400,000 every month when the system is operating?

That's correct.

That's correct. So if you do the math, how long you have been operating, that's less money available for cleanup. You know, my budget doesn't go up because I have a stoppage. So any money I don't have to either effectively utilize the IAM system because even if the system is not operating, they're still required maintenance. It's like if you have a car at your home. If you're not driving it, you just leave it in the driveway, it goes bad pretty fast. So part of the process, we still have to do some maintenance and maintaining it. So it costs us roughly 400K. So one of the things I always highlight is those group conversation with different stakeholders is important because if I'm not operating the IAM, it's costing us money that's not available for the for the cleanup mission, reducing the cleanup mission fund available. Plus, if I'm spending money on legal side, it's delayed the cleanup process plus reducing the available funding available. So I have a fixed amount of resources. We all have finite resources. So anything that's not being targeted to support the cleanup is not being spent effectively. Next slide. So responsible to restore the chromium plume. A couple of things we continue to engage. The state, we have got support at a headquarter level where we get EM1, Mr. Tim Walsh, has engaged with the state at multiple level, whether it's with the governor of New Mexico, Secretary Kennedy, try to work some of those process, you know, so we're getting top coverage between EM1 and part of the NNSA team. It is a top priority for the EMLA office to get this. I always tell people one of my top priority is the good thing with this EM office, our mission is a little bit more straightforward. I really have two top priorities is IM and Legacy Waste. Some other side got multiple priorities they have to balance, but from our case, we got really two top mission to execute and those are the things we're pushing forward to get them done. So we have engaged at multiple level and part of the understanding is we'll be able to come to a resolution soon so we could restart the IM. We did get a couple administrative compliance orders that we're working to the legal side. And like I mentioned, anything we spend on the legal side is less money available for the cleanup. Those I cannot comment on them because there's a whole legal process that tell you what you're allowed to do and what you cannot do. and that's not supporting moving the mission forward. That collaboration, I'm hoping we could move, get the mission executed. Key expert in there, we got Dr. Anastria. She's the executive director of the Applied Research Center at FIU. She's expert in that field that's supporting this mission. And also we got Matthew Tomkin that have worked with different regulators in the process in supporting getting the mission executed. So we got the right team. One thing we're pushing is to have, all the key stakeholders coming to the table in good faith to move the mission forward, pulling in the same direction. Next slide. Iron Beam, it's one of those facilities we're working out there right now. It's a line item to, it was built in 1951. It's about 60,000 square feet. We have an amazing team out there, APTEN, that's executing that mission. I'm already predicting we're going to win DOE project of the year. So I told them as long we stay safe, we execute within our budget or standard, I believe we got a great project to win project of the year. So we're documenting that. So we make sure we, when it comes down to submit for that, we definitely will move, put that forward. It supports the land modernization process, you know, because once we remove that building, NSA will be able to put new facilities on top of it to support their mission, things like that. And we all know up here, square footage is limited. So any additional space you get is critical to execute the mission. So. So these are some couple recent activity pictures. You could see they have couple large equipment removal. They have the roof abatement because it had a bestest to it. The building back then, everything had a bestest, so we're dealing with that in the process to make sure we remedy all these things before we remove them from the building and dispose of them. We have the accelerator, so they're working on the package so they'll be able to cut it. huge piece of equipment. To get it out of the building, they will have to cut it. I think right now they're working in two pieces so they could get it out of the building. One of the things during construction, they bought it in, they had a whole wall they didn't have in when they bought it in. In our case, the wall is still there, so we have to cut it in half to be able to get it out. Next slide. I'll just leave Mr. Smith to give us a quick update on what our mission is.

Thanks, Dan, and thanks for having me back. It's been a couple years, so we've got some good updates for you. Waste shipments, this is always one of those topics of how are we doing, and thus far, we have 64 true waste shipments that have gone in FY26 to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, and it The big thing to note is it's a 49% increase so far over last year. So we're making really good progress. It's 289 cubic meters of true waste, which is a 50% increase. But an easy way out of that 64 waste shipments we had 154 waste containers that were in, so each one of those TruPaks can add up to three containers in it. So we're making really good progress. A couple years ago I was talking about the corrugated metal pipe campaign that we went through, and we have actually been able to increase the amount of standard waste boxes we've been able to ship, and two things that I want to really thank is one triad has really helped us with the ramp facility, which is where they stage the true packs. The other one is central characterization program out of whip. They are with us every day and they have, even on holidays, if we need to do characterization there, they're with us. So I would call it mission centric. Everybody in New Mexico wants to ship this stuff. It's ready. The things that, We have characterized, we have a surplus right now. So WIP is in an outage and we continue to characterize and stage so that when they open back up, we expect some time in either late July, early August to recommence shipments. So anything we can do to accelerate that we're doing. The other thing that I want to talk about that is on the next slide, but it's probably fair to say here, is that one of the other challenges that Jessica Kunkel and now Stan has given to N3B is not just standard waste boxes. We have other waste that is throughout, that's above ground. So we have a thing called drill and drain. And if you will, if you looked at this room and you put literally say a table there, but it's enclosed in a glove box, Our folks go in and they will take a drum, they will empty it, they will sort it, and it's very manual, but it works really well. And the reason is they have to look for liquids. So once they separate these out, one of the things we talked about before is at the end of September 2025, we had 2,539 above ground waste containers of true waste. We are sitting at 2,341 now, which is like, oh, that doesn't sound like a lot of, you know, a big change. Well, every parent drum creates daughter drums. And you might have one, you might have two, you might have five. But that drill and drain exercise is going really well. The crews have picked up speed. We are supposed to do 100 containers this year. It was a pilot project, so you never start out really quick. And not only are we doing it that way, we've hit all-time lows. And my ESH&Q project manager, who is my senior technical advisor, if Robert Edwards is listening, sorry, Robert, I have to say this. It's the safest we've been since the beginning of the contract while still getting this stuff done. So that's a testament to the workforce. As we know, a lot of my workforce comes from northern New Mexico. They share everything that's going on. Last year, I moved from Santa Fe into Nambe. So when you start looking at the impact you have to the local communities, Los Alamos is an obvious one because here we are. But everybody that's downstream, downwind, our folks take the responsibility of knowing that If they don't do something right, they can have a massive impact on the area. So I want to give everybody that, that we're meeting and beating our safety goals. For low-level waste, we've done 977 cubic meters this year. Our two facilities are waste control specialists in Texas or Clive, Utah Energy Solutions. That's about 67 standard-sized dump trucks that if you see go down the road, that's us. But it's not just a nuclear piece. Our aggregate areas, what we're doing right now to support Aptum and the Ion Beam project, we have large bags that are of low-level waste, mixed low-level waste, of PCBs that we have collected, we've characterized, and those have been shipped as well largely to Utah. Next slide, please. We always like photos, so for those that have been on the tours, this should look a little bit familiar. On the left side, Area G dome. And on the right are what they'll call a four pack that you've seen out there. That's where a lot of our waste is stored. So the next two years, we're gonna continue doing the above ground inventory of legacy waste. The other one that's really interesting, we've talked about, we have a safety document that looks at nuclear safety accidents, but also it is all of the safety management programs that not only protect our workforce, but also the Los Alamos area proper, which then by extension protects the environment. We are implementing a new documented safety analysis and the technical safety requirements are like your driver's manual for your car. You know, basically if you go and read, you're going into one of those waste storage areas, then it would tell you, you see the number of items stacked on the left or on the right. That is by design. Each of those are, If you look carefully, our metal pallets that are there so that they are fire resistant, they're not wood. We had to change those out. But each of those accidents that could be involved with that waste is analyzed and that's in our new DSA, the colloquial term. The other thing that's happening is that our workforce has been involved in the development of these controls. So all of our nuclear operations staff, our health and safety professionals or radiation control technologists, even our procurement folks because some of these require higher levels of quality assurance to make sure that you're meeting if you look at those standard waste boxes on the left they have procurement specifications for the type of nuts and bolts that we'll use the gaskets it uses so next time we if we have you out We'll take you through, those that have seen this, we have the little show and tell stations that you can see those. But bottom line is that we're trying to optimize the extent we can. We want to stand as challenged. We want to be as efficient as we can because every dollar saved is another dollar spent toward mission accelerations. And that is a challenge that the workforce has taken on. Last year, we had a really good year from the standpoint of cost and schedule performance. And it was the first time that we had actually for every dollar spent, we got more than a dollar in return. So that was really good news. Next slide, please. And then we have environmental remediation. So through the rest of the contract period, We have completed drilling of two groundwater monitoring wells, summer three, that is part of what is going on right now in R80. We have another one, R-79, that we have the drawing work plan, working with Office of State Engineer on that. And also, if we can, we are planning for additional potential well locations, but that'll be part of the workshops as we go forward, as Stan said, in the collegial way with Office of State Engineer, NMED, and the Pueblo, the San Ildefonso. Advanced cleanup goals, we have performance-based incentives for these, but bottom line is that just as a reminder, aggregate areas or watersheds or canyons that contain soil or debris contaminated from legacy operations at LANL, we still go out and do sampling for those areas, even if we're not doing any excavations or remediation. Another thing that is not written here, but I've got a huge thank you to our partner in EMLA because we have now a new system that will be telemetrics for all of our sampling locations out in the aggregate areas. And it used to be a huge source of slips, trips, and falls for our folks because anybody that's been out hiking around here knows it's a very uneven surface, but you add a 40, 50, 60-pound backpack on, and you're tired at the end of the day, even with walking sticks or proper PPE, it is still very challenging, shall we say. So this will be huge. And again, we will save approximately $2 million a year, which will go back into the mission for other things. But Stan and his staff, Kara Hetrick and their IT folks, along with our IT folks, have done a phenomenal job of getting that across the finish line. And Stan's already talked about continuing to implement the expert technical review for the hexavalent chromium campaign. I think, next slide. And the conclusion, safety. Again, I am so proud of the workforce. They are very committed to what we do. A reminder that we have approximately 50% of our workforce comes from the Albuquerque area. So, you know, you think of the weather and everything else that goes on and the commitment they had to come up and do get in for six in the morning pre-job briefings. They leave at 4.35 o'clock, depending on their work regime. And they have put in large amount of overtime to continue doing what we're doing. And what I mean that is for that document safety analysis. They really want to get that in place. And once that's done, it will make their lives easier. They're going through training right now, which is the reason for the overtime. But once they're done, then they go and rewalk the procedures to make sure that what we said we're going to do, we're going to be able to do. And last bullet, which is being here right now, transparency, accountability, and respect for the communities and environments where we live and serve. All of us are part of these communities. So it's a great honor to do this mission. I think everybody can agree that environmental remediation is paramount for us because it does protect not only ourselves, but our future and our future generations are going to be here. So I think that's my last slide.

Yeah, just want to reemphasize safety is key for us in executing the mission because if you are not safe, that mission cannot be executed. And I just want to say thank you to M3B for being an excellent partner in executing that mission safely and efficiently. We talk about committed to transparency and accountability. It's interesting looking at the quote up there, every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle by Thomas Jefferson. So this is an excellent quote to me looking at what we're talking about, having different stakeholders in a room pushing the mission in the same direction. So we could have difference of opinion, technical decision, but we need to have a consensus to move the mission in the same direction, to me, which is the principle. So I think it's amazing just looking at that quote the council have on the board. I think it's a great quote and appropriate for what EMLA and N3B is talking about moving that mission forward to get it successful. Thank you. We're open to questions. Yes, we are. I'll take the easy one, and Brad will cover all the hard ones. So you got it. OK.

So thank you for the presentation and the comments that went with all the slides. So I see Councilor Neil Clinton's cut wants to ask a question. So we'll take questions or comments, and then we'll have public comment if there's any on the presentation. And then so, Councilor New Clinton, did you want to get started?

Thank you, Chair. Yes, I have two questions. Dr. Stan, I believe that I heard you say that the state suggested a fix that you state is not sustainable. How is the state as a stakeholder responding to that comment?

We're still working with the state to have that conversation. But one of the key things to understanding with the state, you have two key groups. You got NMED and you got the Office of the State Engineer. So the permit for the water side is on the state engineer side. NMED is more the other side. So working with them to understand that conversation full LEN application is not sustainable so that's why we try to tell them we'll do a partial of the IM system which means we're going to revise the process use a different extraction we're still working on that extraction injection well and we still could do LEN application but it have to be to more of a reasonable number not to that full number I'm talking about because it's one of those things if we Let's say we could even do what they're asking us to do. Let's say we go execute it. From the NMED side, we might be compliant. But from the OSC side, we'll be violating our permit. So it's a cash 22 to a certain extent. So part of that conversation require, first of all, we work with them to have a conversation in one voice. We cannot be executing one side and violating the other side.

Anything you want to add? Well, I think also the Groundwater Bureau, back to the discussion. We were in workshops and then circumstances changed, but I still believe we'll end up in workshops. And Office of State Engineer and the Groundwater Waste Bureau are both, or the Groundwater Bureau are both, and Hazardous Waste Bureau, I don't want to exclude anybody. I think everybody's looking for a solution. It's just how to get there. So dialogue is important. You can have differences of opinion technically, and I think it is coming up with the why and then the how. And right now, when it comes to something that You need to have that kind of direction. The leadership will agree and get together. I believe that, as Stan was saying, the highest levels of DOE are in discussions with the state, and I do believe it will bear fruit. Other sites I have been at, you end up in similar conundrums. You have technical differences of opinion. How do you settle those? And you have to do it in a way that is professional because you still have to work together once this is all done. And we want to make sure that it remains that way. So I'm hopeful. I think people know what they want. It's just getting to that point.

And then what does the state then consider reasonable?

I didn't hear that question. I think we had trouble hearing you that time.

What does the state consider reasonable?

We're still working, trying to understand that. But the state position is extraction, full-length application. And we're coming back, said, it's not a sustainable approach. So we open to extraction, cleanup with the iron beams, the cleanup with the iron beam, and then injection to a certain extent in a small portion of land application. But one of the key things for all these things to support the mission moving forward is that collaboration that's needed. And one of the key thing is to resume a workshop. But one of the problem resuming those workshop is the last workshop we had that open discussion conversation we had during that workshop was used to administer some ACOs against the department. And so that's why I keep talking about operating in good faith because it is important when we have those workshops, it's an open, honest environment where we could exchange technical ideas to execute the mission. It should not be used in the back end to weaponize those to an extent to issue ACOs against the department because then he erode that trust to move the mission forward. So all this conversation we're having, it would need to come back to the workshop where we could make those decision. But since we're in legal space, there's a whole legal requirement in what we're allowed to do and what we cannot discuss. So we're still working with the legal side to establish some of clear boundaries to resume those workshop.

Okay, thank you for that.

Okay, thank you, Councillor Neill. If we have any other... Councillor Hannon.

Thank you, Chair. So, I appreciate your continued interest in safety. I heard rumors that there's a lot of relaxed requirements for safety. you know, at the federal level that has come down to our local level. And I was just wondering, you know, based on some of your comments that safety is better than ever, how were you able to accomplish that if we have relaxed requirements?

So I definitely want to take that one. So there was some looking at how the federal government is executing the mission. So we have a lot of other standards. The question was, how do we get more efficient? especially if you have orders that contradict itself. So part of it, there was a revision. Let's go look at the orders of standard, how we execute the mission and do it in an efficient way. But safety is still the primary part of executing the mission. Because at the end of the day, once you have one injury, it's going to stop the process. And in DOE, we still have what we call type A and type B investigation. If it's you know, people lose part of their body, things like that. These things will shut down your site real quick. So in order to execute our mission, we have to continue to be safe. Part of the federal government was to, let's review our orders, make sure we're not putting so many layers on it that's making it impossible to execute the work. let's apply it at the site level because each site is different to a certain extent, each site have different risks associated to it. And I'm still learning about those adjusting at 7,400 elevation feet, you know, because coming from Georgia and I grew up in the Caribbean, I'm at sea level. And Georgia is like 120 feet. When you come at 7,400, it's a whole different environment. So even bringing the workforce, some of the risk we have in this area is different than what I will have in South Carolina. So that's really what the federal government did was like, how do we execute the mission in a more efficient way? But safety is always still in our top priority in executing the mission. I don't think we could execute a mission. I know we cannot execute our mission without being safe.

Another thing is we have management observations and employee observations. Management observations, I have tasked my workforce, I'll say my senior managers, to be out in the field a certain amount. the amount of time I'm out in the field spending and talking to people on the floor to see what's going on and what I'm being told is actually what's happening. I grew up on the floor. I told you that before. When you start out there, you have a different way to look at things and I don't want them to ever think I'm spying on them, and they don't. We have a really good working relationship with the unions. We meet with union leadership in Albuquerque as well as Santa Fe. We now alternate every three months. We go on walks together so that that way it helps. But the other piece to this is that the employee observations are purely voluntary, and we continue to average 350 to 400 employee observations a month. and what they find, they log, we have an issues management system, they put it in there, and then we track things, and if something isn't happening, I have a Tuesday staff meeting, and we have an Office of the President where we go through our contractor assurances, it's called, the issues, and if they're not being done, the union leadership, our key people on the floor, the supervision, will let us know, Then if we need help, we go to EMLA or DOE headquarters. We have a lot of engagement also to DOE headquarters and what we're doing with all of our new things. But if you're a project velocity or the relaxation of certain standards, my contract is largely the same as it was in 2018. And my procedure set is set on that. The training coincides with that. And we also track what we call pause versus stop works. And if I'd rather have a pause all the time as opposed to a stop, those will remember in 2022 the heat stress event. We never want to have another one of those, ever. So we have increased the amount of pauses. And if we celebrate, those are all hands meetings. Because, again, that is thank you very much. Because if it's a two-hour pause versus a two-day, two-week, two-month pause, not only is it good for the taxpayer, for me it's more important that my workforce is going home safe.

Okay. Thank you.

Council Rieger. Do you have a short answer as to why the state objects to the interim measures on the chromium plume? What is their exact objection? There's some data they have that I've seen part of, but I don't really understand it.

I don't want to speak in the state position, you know, so our statement of position is the data we're collecting is supporting making our decision. You know, we have enough data that show how the IM work, you know, it's positive when it's working, it works, it's efficient. They did have some administrative compliance that kind of laid out that we're working to the legal side, but I think that's a really good question for the state. I don't want to be Just saying.

You can't speak for them is what you're saying.

I can't speak for them and I cannot, I don't know where they're getting their data to support some of their decision making, you know, how they make about it.

Oh, they don't share the data with you or they share it with you in a limited way?

I know we have the data we're collecting for the sampling, the monitoring, where they're at. We still try to understand part of their decision making process.

So it's their data interpretation that perhaps differs from yours? Yes. Okay, thank you. Okay, thank you.

Councillor Rieger, do we have any other? Councillor Berman?

Thank you, Chair. And thank you for your presentation and your hard work here. I was wondering, are there or could there be long-term implications for the land application of water?

So again, back to we have the rules and the permits in place now. If we want to change them, that's where the consultation with the state, whether it's NMED or the Office of State Engineer comes into play, and then you have the discussions. And then off consensus, you end up with a new permit if we are And in fact, that's one of the points that is coming up right now is that depending upon the configuration for the interim measure, we may have to change anybody that goes out into Morton Dad, you'll see the large water cannons that will operate at certain times of the day or the year. And so we want to avoid having water runoff, having aberrant places that you wouldn't normally see water. And the other thing, we definitely don't want to have that water running off because you've seen the road that goes around into Pueblo de San Ildefonso. So again, trying to keep the land as it is without creating another problem. So it really is just the consultation to get there.

Okay. Thank you. I am happy to see the drilling of two groundwater monitoring wells and permit for the additional well. I think obviously getting more data is key and data interpretation on both sides needs to come together. I'm wondering, you talked in your report about the, or your presentation about the two technical experts. Are those, were they on the original team? They were?

Yes. They were part of the original team that supported that review that gave the report.

Okay. And I'm wondering, so did both DOE and NMED agree to follow the advice of that report from that initial? Okay. Yes. But it's not really being followed now by NMED, right?

they're pulling back from the agreement of the report. But I think one of the key things I want to highlight is we got the report, but also that adaptive site management. So part of that conversation is when we're getting some more data, we're able to adjust to make it work. And that's one of the things the report support is being able to make those adjustments as we move forward with the mission.

Right. Okay. I'm happy to hear about the highest levels of DOE, having conversations with the state. That makes me feel a little bit better. But, you know, as a counselor for the county and as a resident of northern New Mexico, it's incredibly worrisome that we just can't get together at the table and figure out how we're going to move forward with this. You know, and I just... Path forward seems... difficult to come to. And it just it seems like we should be working together better. And it seems like you all are committed to that, but not everybody is. And it's just incredibly worrisome as a citizen here.

That's correct, counselor. We are 100% alignment, having every stakeholders coming to the table to move the mission forward. And we are even humble. We're saying we don't have all the answers, but that's part of the data collection to help us make better decision, but we need everybody at the table moving that mission forward. So we advocate, we will get support from anybody that could listen what we want to get that mission moving forward in a positive direction. So my headquarter hear about it all the time from me, be like, hey, I need all the help to a certain extent I could get to get this going.

Well, we appreciate, again, all of your hard work. your efforts. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor Herman. You're welcome. Okay, we have a couple questions. So thanks for being here again and appreciate the presentations. So I think the 60 gallons per minute is about 10 acre feet. Does that sound about right or less? Maybe a little less, but yeah. Yeah, just a little bit less. Yeah, pretty close. Yeah, yeah, we're using ballpark, so. So, yeah, because if I think about how big the footprint is down there, it's more than 10 acres, right? So just spatially. Right. I mean, so theoretically, I mean, you could drop a foot of water on there over the course of the year, but you can't, there's part of the year where you can't do it, right? So there's logistical issues about like that, and there's cultural sites, there's a number of things. So, And I think that the county's water right is in the thousands, I think. I believe you're right. Yeah. Okay. But still, we don't want to be... If there's another solution for that, that was the nice thing about the interim measure was that it was putting it back. We didn't have any loss of any water right. Because I'm not sure everyone up here did the math. So I remembered that from when we had the technical work discussions. So... Something that had come up, the county has our water supply well PM3. Is that being evaluated in any active way for an alternate point of injection at this point?

Yes, we had the conversation internally. So this is one of those things we definitely get more people engaged. One of the things we're committed to the Pueblo yesterday, we had a consultation with them was how do we get more people in the process? Because we don't want it after we go to the state engineer getting a permit. But how do we get people up front? At the same time, getting all the stakeholders, we're not trying to delay the process, but it's how do we stay transparent to everybody, not slowing down the process, but getting people engaged in the whole process. So that was one of them that mentioned. There was two, I think, three. Yeah, three, that's another one. So the team is working on multiple, but we are committed to transparency. So we'll have that conversation when the time comes. Okay, that's good to hear.

So I think by you not mentioning anything about SIMR3 specifically, there are no new data that you can disclose at this point. Do you know roughly how long before those data might be available?

Should be about September 1st. That's what my team told me. And the NTELIS of New Mexico, that database, they'll be available from there.

Okay. So the well is having, was developed, and so there were samples collected as screening samples, and those were released. So now we're talking about the well sample and just the regular well samples are being collected. And how many events have you collected of water data?

I think we had well one, screen one and screen two. But one of the things we caution people in terms of those first sample that was collected, we use the sampling eventually to establish a trend. I got educated in well drilling coming here. One of the process is the well had to settle down. It's almost like you afflicted pain to the underground. So you have to settle to a certain extent. So collecting data, those sample over time will give you a better picture of where your numbers are. So although it's a first sample, you will show us something, but we always caution people, don't just take that first sample. That doesn't mean we're ignoring that first sample, but this is part of that collecting, starting that trend to see where we're at. The expectation is as we, as the Earth, the well settle down because we just afflicted pain to the earth, it will get the data lower to a certain extent, the data that come out of it. So we caution people not to just use the first sample to move to make decision.

And some parties have seen the data. Yes. You can tell us that as well, right? Yes. Okay. Has the state seen the data?

The state had their own data. They had their own data, they published, but we do have a process how we release our data. And one of the key thing that's important to us is when we make commitment to different stakeholders, we stick to them. So we follow those processes in how we releasing our data, because I think it creates that trust to move the mission forward. If you make a commitment, this is part of our process, how we release our data. We wanna stick to those process and not bypass them because then erode that trust between different stakeholders or the Pueblo.

So that's part of your access agreement for collecting the samples. Okay, so I heard the number 400,000 to not operate the IEM. Over what period of time is that? That's a month. Okay, that's a month.

And that's an issue number. It could be a little more. You've got preventive maintenance. You have other things you have to do to it that you just have to maintain. We have the ion exchange beds and other things that are there. So again, it's timing of... when something needs to be changed out or whatever else.

So if you imagine we got the shutdown in November and now we're in July, we're looking what, seven, eight months? So I have spent already a few million not being available to execute the mission, the cleanup mission.

Okay. So I was trying to track verbally all the numbers that were stated because I think there are more, there's no more drums. of true waste, but there's less volume. Is that right? Because you were talking about the daughter drums and you have to go through things. There's more drums.

It's been. Yeah, you start with a volume and then as you split it, it's just like pouring cups of coffee, right? You have one craft, but if you have eight cups, it's smaller amounts. And by doing that, we have a couple of advantages. One is characterizing is easier to knowing exactly what the contents of the daughter drum are. And it's always still in the waste program that is the computerized system to tell us what's there because we have to demonstrate to WIPP exactly what we have. And that's why we use the central characterization program to help us with that. But there's still waste being shipped.

Yes. So you are decreasing waste. So I think that was one of the things we did see. Maybe it's in your reporting. You do give numbers on, like, the actual volume of waste.

It's gone down. It's gone down, yeah. Even with the increases because of the parent-daughter drum thing, we are still net down on the first eight months of the year.

Okay, a couple more issues. So thanks for letting us know about... the safety is so important, and also the logistics where some people live.

Chairman, one thing I wanted to highlight since we're talking about waste, because that's one of the conversation we had at the Stigwick and talking to headquarter, is we want to make it clear that the mission from a DOE perspective has been extremely successful. And one of the conversation we have is we have removed 90% of the waste, true waste above ground, 90% of the waste, true waste above ground since the mission started. It was part of 2000. And the last 10% that's left is the most difficult waste to characterize to move the mission forward. So because I hear conversation at multiple level, that DOE is not pushing, is not prioritizing that mission, but when you capture the number, 90% of the waste have been removed and we're focusing on getting rid of the last 10%, which is usually the hardest one to get rid, but we're pushing that mission forward. Okay, thank you for that clarification. And that's the above ground, so. Yeah, the above ground, right.

Okay. Let's see, so getting back to workforce, So it sounds like, because this was a topic we had a conversation about, just retaining workers, you know, the field workers, other workers that you have. So it sounds like in terms of N3B, you have a full complement of workforce, though some people are driving a long way to get here. They've been doing that forever.

Yeah, forever.

But what about the federal workforce? What's the federal workforce like? now compared to what it was, you know, a couple of years ago?

We did lose some employees, but we still have the workforce to provide adequate oversight, you know, proper oversight. And what I mean by that, we, for example, we have leveraging course training and in terms of a technical qualification, making sure employees of course train and we prioritize our resources. You know, you could try to go target everything or you could use train to see where you need to focus your attention based on the resources we have. So we have the workforce to execute the mission safely and we're getting support as well when we need either from different offices or a headquarter. We got our safety bases from the headquarter working with us in some of those evaluation. But we do have the workforce at the field office to provide. efficient oversight to ensure the contractor is doing effective work. And one of the great thing is having an excellent contractor like N3B make my life a little bit easier in the process and providing that oversight because when they're executing the work in a safe manner, this is make life easy and how much of additional assessment you have to do. So appreciate executing the work safely.

Okay, thank you. So I think the last thing I want to talk about or ask about is Technical Area 21. So that didn't come up tonight. So we've asked before about different sites out there. So one of the more high profile ones probably for the whole program is Technical Area 21 MDAT. And I think that there was a revised work facility investigation, maybe phase three is what it was termed, came out the end of last fiscal year. So I am kind of curious about... know the end state being planned for that and this may be something you can go back and take a look at in particular so i know you probably won't stay around for the next presentation but we're doing economic development in different parts of the county including down dp road so there are plans for having some more you know businesses and not necessarily more people living but more activity down dp road which i think brings it probably to within a half mile of MDAT. And I just wanted to maybe point that out, that that's something that's been in the works for a while. That was land that was transferred by DOE Starting many years ago. So it was a cleanup of MDAB, I think was most of it MDAB, Bravo and Victor, MDAV. Those are the two out there. So I know there's some restrictions on V, but there's, you know, V is available for development. And I just wanted to point that out, that that's there and that there's going to be more people doing things down DP Road. So just in terms of considering what the options should be considered for MDAT.

We didn't get no additional funding for TA-21. But one of the key things you hear us keep talking about is how can we execute the mission more effectively and efficiently. Because I think if we could do that, you know, in the process we have additional funding to get more work done. But TA-21 is one of those once we get the additional funding we'll tackle the above ground work out there.

Okay. So any other questions? Is there any public comment? Okay, I'm not seeing anyone present. Is there anyone online? Ms. Meza?

I can check. If you'd like to make a public comment, please raise your hand. Okay, I'm not seeing any hands raised.

Okay. Well, thank you very much for being here again and the presentations and answering all the questions. Thank you to the Council. Thank you for having us. So now we're on to item 5B, 21301-26, presentation on council strategic focus area economic vitality and quarterly economic development update. So we have Mr. Isaacson to probably start us off.

Do you guys want to sit there?

Hello, Chair Reidy, members of the council. Good evening. I'd like to introduce some of the folks from our community development team here behind me. I have Max Kudiakoff, Anita Barella, and Ellen Felden. They'll be presenting this evening on providing an update on our economic vitality strategic priority. And then we will stand for questions. Myself, Ms. Laurent. We're all here to hopefully answer any questions you may have. Thanks.

Perfect. Thank you so much. So good evening, everybody. So this is the update on the council goal of economic vitality. Next slide, please. So here the economic vitality is defined as the community's ability to diversify, develop, grow, and sustain many elements a local economy needs to flourish. Next slide, please. So under this goal, we track six elements, which include housing, local business, downtown revitalization, educational, arts, cultural, historical elements, tourism and special events, and community broadband. Next slide, please. So you guys have received a very comprehensive presentation on the housing development efforts just a few weeks ago. So I'm going to go over this really briefly. So the 2024 affordable housing plan calls for roughly 1,300 additional units to hold affordability steady and about 2,400 to make real progress. Next slide, please. So on delivery, now we have slightly over 500 completed units within the county and another almost 2,400 in the active pipeline, which are split between both county supported and private development projects. Next slide, please. So the key projects for housing development include the 20th Street development, Coyote Mesa, ninth street apartments in the North Mesa improvements, as well as some regional coordination projects with our local and regional partners. The next slide, please. So on the market outlook, national mortgage rates remain headwind, but Los Alamos has a key advantage here. So essentially we have a pretty rapid review time really great departments that work together and the committee development partners. So one of the key elements we would like to point out is that there is a new interactive housing dashboard available on the website. So that showcases all of the current projects. Next slide, please. And I will pass it along to Ms. Borrella to talk about our business development efforts.

Good evening. I just wanted to point out some of the goals that we're going over. So our local business has one core goal, and go directly to the business owners and connect with their needs. And the achievements that we've made so far have been each quarter I meet with probably about 20 businesses. And we are now offering pre-application meetings, meaning that we would like people to come talk to us before they sign a lease so that they can find out if that use is allowed in that particular space that they want to do a business with. That way they can you know, be assured that there won't be any hiccups. And then we have all of us, including me, have attended a lot of local meetings to get business input. And next slide. And digging into the numbers, we have 225 new registered businesses over the past year, year-to-date, and 682 renewed business registrations. And we have a monthly newsletter. It says 695 up there. I just checked today. It's 709. growing that little newsletter. So we engage with local businesses by we've created new topical rack cards which with information that everybody can use so they can take them with them and as I stated before we have the pre-application meetings with businesses and we've had some workshops over the past year Recently, we created a business directory so that people can get a little bit of a advertising by signing on to our website. And it'll show up in the Visit Los Alamos website and our website. And the expanded marketing that we allow is the activity guide directory. And we regularly update the walk, shop, and dine map probably every quarter. Next slide. And our retention and expansion, we check with the, we have a topical checklist to gather data and we consult with business owners on the signage programs, which we are updating now in Chapter 16. And we have been outreaching to site selectors statewide and we have been doing a lot of regional collaborations. We present recently with Creative Industries. I've attended their Creative Cons. Leadership Los Alamos did a presentation there. And we did a resource fair for New Mexico LEAP and LANL, Entrepreneurial Scientists and Innovators. and we have some workshops planned for coming up fy27 we're going to go over the business regulations and requirements for businesses which is useful for to refresh every time that every probably every year and we continually give special event permits and home-based businesses and navigating use regulations for commercial buildings which is different than residential so we do need to go over that with people who are concern considering renting a commercial space. Next slide. And the downtown revitalization, we have some goals that support businesses with LIDA, LIDA Retail, MRA, MRA and LIDA Grant and Loan Awards. We would like to reduce the amount of empty storefronts. That's one of our goals for the year and increase the commercial space by working with landlords to see what we can do to help them we have several applications in process six retail two mri and combined mra and lita applications and one mra alone and two regularly to standalone applications and right now we have an 11 downtown commercial vacancy rate which means there's 24 empty storefronts and um but right now we have some commercial opportunities with county-owned property which are four in Los Alamos and two in White Rock. Next please. And so we're also focusing on the softer side of downtown revitalization, which means we will increase the health of downtown by increased visibility of commercial development opportunities. So we would like to track the status of redevelopment and increase positive perception among commercial areas among the residents. So we're going to maintain and update an inventory of commercial vacant properties. We went around town and did a GPS of the actual buildings we stood in front and did a little point of data and we collected them. We need to do that on a regular basis to see what is actually empty. Then we will track the vacancy rate. with probably a map that we could show. And also show what are occupied. And then we also track the business openings and closures. And we do that on a regular basis. The development strategy and messaging is to increase downtown favorability in the National Community Survey, which I'm not sure where it is in the process right now. It's done annually, but we would like to raise the rating to good or excellent. And I will turn it over to Ellen.

So the last time I gave an update to council about tourism was in March. So we do have some additional data to what is listed in front of you that I will kind of be going over throughout this presentation because we got some numbers in today from the Bradbury. So we can look at what the first quarter data is. truly looks like for the regular year. So obviously last time I spoke to you we were talking about aiming for stable visitation following the government shutdown that happened. I think we've kind of found the course of that, but at the same time there's a lot going on with the price of gas right now that I think is trickling down to the numbers we're seeing so far this year. But some of the big things on the docket for this year is collaborating with New Mexico Singletrack on their September mountain biking race here in town, which is set to bring in 200 participants and their families, and there will be a large event at Ashley Pond for that with live music and vendors and all sorts of things like that. So even if you're not attending the race, it's a great opportunity to bring people to Los Alamos in downtown. In addition, we're collaborating with neighboring communities, so the Jemez Mountain Trail Run, working with trail guides throughout the Santa Fe area that do come up here for various groups that they have, and then also working with the HMIS writers. In addition to that, right now we have the estimate on there of about 510,000 visitors by the end of the fiscal year. The data that I have right now for July through March on visitation is 349,003. I believe with the fact that we still have three months of data that we haven't received all the information for, it's very probable that we will get to that number of about 510,000. Next slide, please. So a lot of you have probably noticed there's a lot of wayfinding signs that have gone up around town. First we saw the larger ones. I think that's what we kind of spoke on the last time I presented, but now there are a lot more pedestrian signs that have gone up. So definitely improvement. I think at this point I would estimate there's probably more than 66 out there, but I haven't gone and counted them myself. I think the people in the back of the room might have better data on that. We updated the adventure guide. It took us a while just because the way that things were ordered last year in anticipation for Balloon Fiesta and then what happened at the event, usually the state is able to pass out our guides all week. And after we had placed our order, we found out they were not going to allow that last year. So we just worked through the extras that we had printed to get through those. In addition, we started doing some online advertising through Meta, so Facebook and Instagram, to get people to go to the website and request a free guide. What we've been finding, though, is that people instead are opting to download it now to their computer. But we are still getting some people requesting the guide. with knowing that information and kind of running this right now as an ad, we decided to scale back on how many we ordered because we can always order more, um, instead of purchasing more than expected and then having them at the end of the year and people saying it has 2025 on the front. I don't want to touch that. Right. Um, so as you notice with, um, on the right side there, what the front cover looks like, we purposely put, um, the addition on the backside, That way it's more evergreen when it comes to other visitor centers and having those out in that space. We've been focusing more. We had a couple more influencers come in and on social media, and that's through the New Mexico True funding that we received. And then working on that shoulder season messaging, again, just massaging that and trying to get some people when it's not as busy up here. Obviously, history and science are a big part. And when we get kind of down to that, connecting regionally and across the state, That's been a big conversation topic. So the state reinstated their travel trade program in the last couple of years. And what they're finding going to these events with places like Albuquerque and Las Cruces and Santa Fe, a lot of people are actually asking about Los Alamos. And that's because the focus in travel trade is the people from the UK and the German markets. And those people are very interested in our history and everything that's happened here along with outdoor recreation. So we've been working directly with the state to kind of work on that partnership and some of the opportunities that they have to be able to present them to people who are interested in bringing large tours here. Um, and it, in addition to that, um, I went to the New Mexico hospitality association governor's conference this last year and this last month, excuse me. And I also went to the public relations society of America travel and trade event. It was held in Albuquerque this year, which was really easy to get to. Um, and with that, New Mexico true was the one who hosted it. So there was extra time to speak and kind of promote Los Alamos as a location for people who are writing articles in magazines. and that sort of thing to help get us on the map. Next slide, please. And then for lodger's tax, I apologize, it says January through May on that amount for this year. It should be June of 2025 through May at $398,187 for 2026. I do anticipate that we should end up around 435,000. Obviously that number has not come out yet for the month of June, but looking at past years, we kind of range around 40,000 or so. So I think that's definitely something in terms of estimation that we're probably gonna get to. So we will likely see an increase compared to FY25. Next slide. This is some older data, but I kind of wanted to highlight it. I don't believe in the past, since I've started, that we've really kind of showcased this data in front of you that comes from the state. So with this state, they offer every year, and it'll come out in June or July, the tourism economic impact through tourism economics, which is a system that they use to collect data. And it looks really small on the big screen, so I hope your screens in front of you are a little easier to read. But it kind of highlights the direct spend and how that happens to impact Los Alamos County directly. So they're looking about 41.5 million total dollars. And then it kind of highlights in there the employment as well as what is the direct spending by category. So obviously for us, lodging is the highest and then food and beverage comes behind that along with retail. Next slide. So now I'm going to kind of cover some things for some people who are in the back of the room. Obviously a lot of this is done by the Community Services Department, but we work closely with them in all of our efforts. So they have a lot of different contracts regarding educational arts, culture, and historical amenities. The first one obviously being kind of related to tourism as well with the Historical Society. They had a lecture in April and May of this year and they opened A new exhibit on March 10th, The Secrets of Shangri-La, which was about the enlisted women at Project Y. If you have not made it over there, I highly recommend it. When they opened, they had standing room only at Fuller Lodge for the lecture, so it was very interesting to be there for. Next slide. And then the other contract that they have is with the Los Alamos Arts Council and Fuller Lodge Arts Center. So they have held a variety of shows through the past few months since January. Next slide. Thank you. And then the Los Alamos Nature Center. So they have their full-dome planetarium films that happen weekly. Earth Day Festival, again, was a large event. And then they have wildflower walks as well as they extended their Nature at Night series. So originally this was something they just offered in the summer. But they found that there were a lot of parents that appreciated having Wednesday nights being open just a little bit later. And they kind of call it like a dad and kid night is kind of the way that they've really seen the impact in it. And they all come and bring their kids. So they extended it to be more kind of year round this past spring. But with that, they kind of rebranded their summer series to be nature at night as well. And that's kind of the one where you get to see things like robotic dogs and things like that come in. So they've kind of expanded that program based upon what they were seeing a want and need for in our community and from visitors. And then they had Bear Fest in August of 2025, and they're planning to host it again this year. In addition, we also have the Los Alamos Public Library system. So the Seed Library had their anniversary and then a relaunch. There's been a variety of adult and youth programs that you can find online on the county website or the visit website if you're looking for things to do. So that goes anywhere from chess tournaments to a writer's group to puzzle competitions, which is kind of cool. And then they are planning on Atomicon again this year. The New Mexico State Cooperative Extension Office has also offered a variety of programs. So they offered some horticulture and landscaping ones, as well as a fire smart landscaping presentation in April to the community, and a container garden workshop in April as well, so just in time for anyone who was looking to plant anything. And then they had a family and consumer education event in March as well. And then we have the community services department itself. So the summer concert series has a total of 15 concerts they're going to have this year. They started in May on the 22nd and they go until August 28th. Their average attendance rate was about 4,600 people last year. So kind of looking and hoping to see about that again this year. In addition, We've really found that there's a connection that people don't just go to the concerts, they also eat downtown or shop in the area if the locations are open. And then the 4th of July event that was this past weekend. This past weekend it was in White Rock at Overlook Park, but last year it was held at Ashley Pond with 10,400 people in attendance. Last year there was an extended drone show due to no fireworks. The same thing happened again this year down in White Rock instead. And then on the parks and recreations events and happenings, they continue to offer their Gymkhana event. And then they had the Northern New Mexico Royalty Court with seven competitors back in May. And then the rodeo was hosted August 2nd and 3rd of last year with rentable bleachers. And they're planning to be renting bleachers again this year for the event, August 7th through 9th. But this year, Saturday night, we'll have a night rodeo starting at 6 p.m. So that'll be something different and new. And now I'm going to pass it back to Max.

Thank you, Ellen. So community broadband. So this is a $35 million project, plus almost $16 million over 20 years for operations and maintenance. So essentially, this project is designed to bring reliable high-speed internet throughout the county. We broke ground in May of 2026, and we are targeting construction completion by the end of 2029. So it's worth highlighting that customers won't have to wait for the project completion to use the service. So essentially, they will be able to connect as construction progresses through the parts of the county. Next slide, please. So on the middle mile part of this project, San Ildefonso Pueblo is installing 11 miles of fiber to connect to the county's community broadband network, with the county contributing about $2 million towards that effort. So all of the parts installation began along New Mexico 502 in May of 2025. And now we're finalizing the long-term operations agreement with the Pueblo. Next slide, please. And now a really brief status update on some of the economic development projects that have taken place. So the New Mexico Ford crossing and multi-use trail is expected to go out to bid in August of this year. Denver Steel's phase two is targeting completion that same month. Wayfinding signs remain an ongoing project. The Manhattan Project Area Dormitory has an approved plan on completed design, and we are now working with the Archaeological Studies with the State Historic Preservation Office before it goes out to bid. The Hemis Mountain Fire Protection Project is in phase three. The C-PACE ordinance is now in effect, and we've held a local training on that program. And the White Rock Visitor Center Phase 2 food truck pads are currently out for bid. Next slide, please. And so essentially that covers the whole update. And we're happy to take any questions.

Well, thanks for all the presentations and all the collaboration there. So this is just a discussion item. So if there's questions or comments from counselors, we can take those.

Thank you, Chair. Thanks for this great presentation. I actually had a few citizens reach out to me today with some questions. The first one is on page five with the housing and special projects, you have a spreadsheet on there with potential versus completed housing units. And it lists 2,395 housing units as in the active pipeline. And one of the people that reached out to me today took kind of offense with the phrase in the active pipeline. And I guess their point was that some of these are actually potential units, not necessarily active. For instance, North Mesa, um i know that when we saw this same uh spreadsheet a couple of weeks ago it didn't use the wording of in the active pipeline and i guess their point was that this matters to the anti-housing people because they're saying that they we should stop trying to build housing anywhere because there are 2300 units on the verge of being built and some of this um you know might be hopeful and not necessarily active, and they just don't want us to take our eye off the ball. I get their point. It's kind of just a technicality, but I wanted to put that out there that there are people out there that didn't like that phrasing.

Um, chair, council Herman, I would just say, um, thank you for the feedback. We're happy to use different words for us. All it meant was we're actively working on it. And the North Mesa project is something we are actively working on. And as a County, we are investing in design and feasibility. So, um, we can just use it as active projects, but then you're right. The nuances then explaining what kind of phase it is. And that is in a very early phase. And, And it is correct that there's a lot of approvals and development before that one is, I guess, a shovel-ready project or fully funded with a developer partner lined up project.

Okay, great. I appreciate that. Thank you. On page seven, I love the new interactive housing dashboard. It's very cool. I would love to see more data when you click on the little developments, like how many units there are going in and that particular one, but it's huge progress. I appreciate it. Thank you. On page nine, the business, I'm not sure if you would call that licenses, business licenses. The renewed number is great. 225 new businesses registered. That's a lot. Who is that? I mean, there's a lot of home-based businesses, I guess.

Chair Righty, Council Member Herman. Yes, so it's a mix. It's not all what you would maybe traditionally think of as brick and mortar businesses. So it is a number of home-based businesses. It's also a number of contractors that are working. And so Um, you're a roofing contractor based out of, you know, Albuquerque Metro up here to do a job. Uh, we require a business registration, but prior to issuing a permit. And so a lot of these are, uh, sort of trades related construction related, uh, business registrations, also folks working at the lab and things like that. Uh, sometimes the business registrations, uh, depending on the nature of the work. Uh, so a lot of that is, is sort of general contracting and things like that.

Okay, great. Good numbers. Page 11, the downtown revitalization with the 11% vacancy or 24 empty storefronts. So quite a few of those would possibly be occupied with the projects that are on deck coming up. So I'd like to see that somebody reached out to me. and asked the question about that, are those that are slated for development and not necessarily move-in ready or able to accept tenants, and that they thought that was an important distinction. I don't know any.

So there's, you know, this number here sort of lacks a certain level of granularity that i think you're suggesting counselor um you know there's any number of reasons why a storefront may be vacant um it may be vacant for a long time it may be vacant temporarily as they're sort of uh Sort of relocating or or new tenants are moving in and need certain improvements made to that space prior to occupancy. This is an interesting 1 in terms of our strategic priorities in that this is 1 of those things where the county doesn't necessarily have a direct span of control over some of these things. Right? So these are. A lease is between a business and a private property owner. And so what we do is through our BRE efforts, really try to assist businesses that may be looking to relocate or things like that. But we are very much in a support role in terms of addressing that. That vacancy rate not really in a position to directly impact what's going on, but you know we're excited some of the projects we talked about. You know, as part of the housing section of this presentation also do contain a retail component, for instance, the 20th street mixed use project so we're excited to see some new. You know, high end, you know, class a retail space coming online in the Community as well, so good things to come there that's great.

Thank you. Page 16, the state tourism economic impact from 2024. Do they provide a breakdown by county?

Thank you. This breakdown specifically is for Los Alamos County, not the overarching entire state, based upon the data and information that the state has and the company that they utilize. Wow. Okay.

That's great. Thank you. It's impressive. And then page 22, the fireworks show in White Rock. I have heard early estimates that about a third of the people were in attendance this year compared to last. I know that's early estimates. I assume some people may have gone elsewhere to see actual fireworks and shame on them. But a number of people told me today that they didn't go because it's so difficult to get in and out of White Rock. And I was just wondering, would we ever consider doing that possibly at Ashley Pond? I know we did it last year because there was some work happening. down in White Rock, but people seemed interested to maybe do it up here again, maybe rotate it, I don't know.

Yes. So, Chair Righty, Councillor Herman, at this point, no. I mean, historically, we haven't even contemplated that because historically it's been a White Rock event. White Rock is very proud of the event and it is the only location where we can do actual fireworks safely. If we are able to do fireworks, we cannot do those at Ashley Pond. We can only do a drone show at Ashley Pond. So that would have to be, I think, a discussion with the public and get input into whether there's... I mean, that would have to be some direction we get. But right now, the staff is not initiating that kind of change. That would be something we'd have to socialize and...

Just wondering, a couple of people asked me about it. I did hear the, I was unfortunately not able to be there and I heard it was fabulous. So I was just wondering. So thank you. Sorry for so many questions.

Chair Reddy, Councillor Herman, your second question, I wanted to mention something, but now I'm not recalling what it was.

It was about the dashboard.

Oh, Yes, thank you. So I just wanted to make sure that as you click on each site and a little window pops up, there is also a link where you can connect to a website which has all the unit numbers. If it's not a county parcel, there's a link or information about who owns the property and what their leasing contact is. So it might be that...

you're missing that little link to the, for some reason I wasn't able to connect to any of those links today. Maybe it was on my end. I don't know. Okay. So we're happy to look at that and, you know, try to address that. Thank you.

But I, the tool is kind of what it is. Like the tool is limited to how it works and how we link, but we did try to include, I just wanted to mention, we did try to include all that information on our website about the different projects, about unit prices and types and things.

It's a great dashboard. Thank you.

Okay, any other questions?

Thank you, Chair. Yeah, so I had a few questions about this graph or this data on page 16 from 2024, that view graph data. What's with the years being so old, or how about some comparison of different years? That's pretty impressive. Do we get this all the time? I don't remember this type of information. Did we have this before, or is this a new thing?

We've had it before, but we just haven't utilized it in a presentation because it is usually pretty out of date as to when they get us the new data. But this is something that is available on the state's tourism website, and you can go back a couple of years. I'm happy to share a link with you guys tomorrow morning with that information if you're interested in seeing more of that data.

Oh, I would like to see more of that, and they don't have 2025 up yet?

They do not. It usually is released in June or July, so I would anticipate in the next couple of weeks it will be available.

Okay, so the 2025 data will be up shortly?

Correct.

And this is just the last year you have? It's in the presentation because it's the last year you have.

Correct, yep. It's the most recent information we have.

Well, that's pretty impressive stuff. And then how do you think, how does it compare year over year to other years? Do you have a rough idea?

I believe we have seen a bit of an increase since Oppenheimer, as we've kind of seen that across the board in a variety of different ways. As far as specifics, when it goes into those different categories, that's something obviously I'd really have to dig into the data and compare a bit more.

So when they say direct visitor spending, they do have a few years of data.

Yeah. So as you can see, there's kind of been an increase since Oppenheimer, which kind of aligns with everything else we've seen in our tourism. So they kind of would create a domino effect.

But are those numbers comparable to what it was before COVID or something?

So it looks like 2020, I believe that's the first year they started utilizing this company. And before that, they utilized a different resource.

And how do you tell someone who's doing tourism from somebody who's in town to visit as work, like at the lab, visitors to the lab, they fill up the hotels?

Again, that goes back to the way that Symphony, the program they use, tracks that data and kind of determines a visitor from a local in the same way we've talked about with different programs that the county utilizes. Everybody kind of has a different mechanism as to what that threshold is. Again, that's something I can definitely look into if you're curious about how they break that down

So it's like geofencing of where cell phones are, that kind of thing? Correct, yes.

They're utilizing geofencing.

They know the difference between a tourist and a lab worker. Some of that, yeah.

It can be seen through kind of how those transactions are when they're seeing, you know, where a credit card zip code is from, that sort of thing.

Okay. And then there was another really interesting graph that you already talked about. It was like number seven. No, page... Page nine, which is amazing number of new businesses. Is this related to like a farmer's market where they require business licenses for

Yeah, every time somebody is chapter 12 requires everybody who does business in the county of Los Alamos have a business license. So the contractors with the lab, hospitals, just anybody who farmers market, craft fairs, All of those things require business licenses. And they may be only here once a year, but some of them are repeat. They come for every craft fair or they're doing business as a contractor on a regular basis.

Are they paying a full business license fee?

Exactly.

To do farmers market like a few weeks?

Yeah, it's a from May until October. So they can continually do it. And then there's a farmers market in the winter as well that they can participate in. But it's an annual fee. It's $35.

Did they used to have that lumped together into one fee through the Chamber of Commerce or something?

No.

They've always been each one has their own fee.

Yes.

And that's paid annually, then?

Correct.

Okay. And then they pay some other fee to the...

Yes, they have to pay like a booth fee. Like the farmers market, I think they require, you know, you register with the Cindy Talamantes, who's the manager. And I don't know what the booth fee is right now, but you pay the booth fee and then your business license is good for a year.

Okay. So can we get a list of this? I'm amazed. Or how many new, I guess when it says 225, is that this year?

It's year to date.

Excuse me?

Year to date.

This year to date, 225 new businesses? Can we get a list of that?

Sure. With the names and where they're located, we can pull that for you.

Is this related to, okay, so I was guessing the farmer market, and you're saying no. We've always had business licenses. Yes. What about food trucks? We have a lot of new food trucks.

Yes, they have to have business licenses.

Is that where these kind of numbers are coming from? Yeah. We're having waves of new food trucks or something. How many are there? How many of those are food trucks? Yeah. I mean, I'm just trying to get a picture of such a big numbers. Sure.

Sure. Ready. Counselor, we're going to jump in a minute. One of the things we wanted to do is report these by business type. So you can see what category. I mean, it could be a contractor who's doing jobs, you know, jobs here. remember the business license is really a business registration and the purpose of it is for tax purposes. We need to know that the services provided here are being reported in those taxes. Our portion comes back to Los Alamos. So that's why. So it could be a business that does not have brick and mortar, but it's doing some sort of business or service here. So there's a lot of variety of different categories. And I think what we're trying to strive towards is reporting those by the different categories so you can see if they're vendors. And then To your other point about like temporary vendors that are doing farmers market, we have been asked to consider revising and bringing back to council a different fee structure. The fees will have to be approved by council. Right now we just have a one rate. We can consider a different rate and that is something that staff is considering and we'll work through the process.

If I could just add to Ms. Lauren's comments. So there's also with the business license, not all of the businesses that are getting a business registration, excuse me, not a license, but business registration aren't necessarily based in Los Alamos. So we have quite a few businesses that are based elsewhere, but are doing business in Los Alamos, you know, tow truck companies contractors painter you know folks like that um so those are why the numbers may seem a little bit higher than people that don't even have an address in the county correct correct and so that's why the numbers are what they are is because we do have a lot of businesses coming up here to do A single project, or work on a single contract, things like that. And so we do require them to get a business registration for the reasons Mr. mentioned. And then, as far as the revisiting the fee for things like farmers market registration fee for that, we are in the process of updating our business registration. Uh, fees, uh, to accommodate some of the new, uh, childcare facility rules, uh, uh, that came down from the state through, I believe it was Senate bill 96. I could have the number wrong. Uh, pardon if I, if I'm incorrect there, but, um, so we're going to re. Revisiting those, and that would be an opportunity to revise the ordinance, uh, uh, regulating the fees, um, for vendors at the farmers market craft market thing like that. Okay.

I'm not sure what the state laws you're talking about, but it's a state law governing child care facilities.

And so as part of that, child care facilities are required to obtain a business registration, but we're not allowed to charge a fee for that registration. So we have to make some amendments to our ordinance to accommodate that change. And that would be an opportunity then to revisit some of the other business registration fees as well. Yeah.

Okay. And then can we really get a list of who these businesses are?

We absolutely can provide that.

Yeah. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor Ricker. We have Councilor Neal Klinsman waiting to ask a question.

Thank you, Chair. Actually, it's not a question. It's more of a comment. One of the things that I find myself saying a lot to county managers as well as staff is to celebrate the wins. Even though it's hard for me to sometimes see because the print is so small, that just says there's a lot of work going on. So I just wanted to commend you guys for actually taking credit for what you're doing because you do have a heavy lift. Economic development is not for the faint of heart because we do have a lot of work to do. So I just wanted to thank you for actually culling together, pulling together all of the work that you're doing. and to continue to do that.

Okay. Thank you, Councillor Ingram.

Thank you, Chair. I wanted to make sure I understand the difference between a business license and a business registration. Because I thought at one point somebody said they're kind of the same, interchangeable. Then I thought you said, oh, the rate is different if it's a license or a registration.

apologies uh counselor haverman they are synonymous business registration is is actually the more accurate term and we have a we have a single fee for a business registration in the county we are being asked by the state to waive that fee for child care facilities and as such we could revisit if we wanted to establish a different fee amount for other types of specific business activities like Vending at the farmer's market or crafts market.

Sure. And then so currently the fee for a business registration, AKA business license is $35 per year. That is correct. And it's due and payable on the anniversary date of when the applicant makes their first. license application receives it I guess not their application okay so speaking of that when someone walks in to your office and says hi I think they make an appointment first from what I understand or that's advised that they walk in or make an appointment to register their business let's say they're new how long how many pages is the application is it Two pages. Okay. And then do they, and then they give it to you. And then how long until they receive this quote unquote official registration and or license?

Thank you. Between three and five days. So there is a review process. So if it's in town, we do review it because sometimes they're just working at home. Majority of them are home businesses. So we do review those with planning, sometimes fire, and it depends on maybe building might have to weigh in. So we make that determination, but we try to get it done within three to five business days.

Okay. Thank you. And then you said home businesses, that's a common one. Does that include like mobile businesses? Like if you're a car detailing business? Yes. Okay. And so do you think that all people who have these kinds of businesses, like a car detailing business out of his car or a person who comes up from Albuquerque to wash people's windows, do you think they know just instinctively or inherently that they have to have a business registration filed with the county?

I think so. I mean, I do know of a couple of them that are doing it. They have come to us and asked me generally people do ask, I want to do the right thing. Um, what, what do I need to do? And I'm doing it out of my car and visiting people's homes and they, you know, we hear from them. Otherwise we, we wouldn't know if they were doing it. Okay. I do think people do check with us first.

Okay. Okay. And then you had said, you mentioned you've got some workshops coming up, like one of OB for home-based business. Would that include like these mobile businesses or? People who don't have bricks and mortar, for example.

Yeah. And like the one that we had last year, it was like, are you thinking of starting a business? This is what you need to know. I mean, it was aimed for people who are just considering it.

Yeah.

So just, you know, and we're hoping to get somebody from the state because people had a lot of questions about taxes last time and we couldn't answer those. So this time I hope to get somebody from the state. to come answer those questions.

Yeah, good idea. Wonderful. And how do you think people are finding out about these workshops or how will they find out about them?

We have Ellen, who's so wonderful with our marketing. She will let us use meta, whatever it means that we have. So we didn't have great turnouts, but this year we hope we have more, you know, between six to ten people is usually what we're who are showing up. okay and then like is um lacdc or the chamber of commerce a good partner for getting the word out absolutely and they are really um asking us often like what are you guys doing next we would love to partner with you so and there is a home-based expo that's going to happen in september so we're going to partner with um the chamber so they would like to do a just home-based businesses we're going to reach out to all the ones who have a business license and then we're going to hold it over at the airport Oh, really? Okay, wonderful. They hit they had an open house last year, which was really successful.

Yeah.

And we would like to do something in conjunction with them because they had such people had such a good time over there at the airport. So we'll kind of repeat it. But we'll invite home businesses to have little booths.

Outstanding. All right. Thank you very much. Thanks. Thank you, Council. That's cool.

So does the local business coalition still exist?

That is an excellent question. Chair Reidy, Councilor Cole. I'm not quite sure. I've not received any communication from representatives of that group recently. So I can't speak with, you know, 100% certainty whether or not they're still active or not.

Okay, that was going to be my next question is have we received any feedback from them on any of the changes that we've made and whether they're improving

their situations. Okay. No, I have not received any recent communication from any of the members of that group.

Thank you.

Okay. I think I've communicated with some of the folks and I'm not sure they're all entirely pleased, but we can, we can talk about that too. So I think maybe starting with this whole thing about visitation versus tourists, So aren't the numbers the number of people, but for certain things, we want to know how many people are tourists that we're attracting based on events, right? So isn't there the numbers that are total are people including people doing business travel. We're not segregating out business because there would be more then. We'd be understating it because there's obviously all kinds of lodging Monday through Thursday from everything we've heard about hotel rooms, for example.

So if the question's in reference, Chair Reidy, to slide 22 that had the Symphony data from the state, companies like Symphony have an algorithm they use to try to sort out and differentiate between the types of folks that are visiting the community.

I'm talking about visitation. We had numbers of visitors that went down during COVID to under 300,000. over like 550 or something now, that's everybody, right? That the visitors, because it says visitors, not tourists. I'm just trying to be clear also about the language we're using in presenting the data, just so people understand how many people are visitors and what that includes, because there's also the tourism initiatives we have. We want to know how successful we are with those. So can we clarify?

Thank you.

Whether or not the visitors includes everybody.

Slide 13, with this specific data that we have, this is actual physical counts from our main attractions. So as it notes here, the Valle Caldera was not included in 2019 through 2022, and then we started adding their data in. But when we consider this tourism, we consider this anyone who's visiting one of those attractions. So, yes, it very much could be a local in that sense that is walking into, say, the Nature Center on Tuesday night.

Or somebody that's here on business travel. It's like we're not distinguishing between... Correct.

Either of those would be counted the way that these numbers are because they are visiting a location. Does that make sense? Okay.

So then the other number is then what might be tourists, but... Correct. From what I understand looking at their data, is that they may be, but it's unclear that they're actually segregating out business travelers from people coming for non-business reasons.

Yes. So I can speak to that kind of like we talked about on 16 and we've talked about when we used to have Datify and then we had Placer AI as different ones that the county has been utilizing. The difference with that is, as we've kind of talked about, there's different data and there's different thresholds for every single company. and how they're taking that data. So to kind of give an example, like I said, I'm not certain what that algorithm is for Symphony, but for Placer AI, which is the data and software that we are currently using, you have to be working specifically between nine to five, at least three times a week when we see you coming up for that, that's how they pull it out. We've been working with them directly on a solution, obviously, because lab schedules don't always have that in their system. There are people who work night shift. We know that. And so that kind of makes a difference as to how crystal clear that image can look. When we were utilizing DataFi, for example, their algorithm and their system had to do with just how many days a week someone was coming up to Los Alamos. And that then would trigger them to become a visitor if it was so many times within a month that they were coming. Does that make sense? So everyone is kind of using a different methodology for how they consider.

Trying to subsetting the total.

Correct.

Okay. But let's just take it another way looking at this simpler way maybe. So we have a lodgers tax revenue, right? Correct. And am I misremembering the number is something like 600,000, 500,000. It's not over a million dollars, right?

Correct.

It's something like that. And that's 5%, right? if you multiply that by 20 i get the number you were showing there yeah basically right i mean so it's not like we have because that's the total that's everybody paying lodgers tax including the professional so the numbers on 16 are not just related to lodgers tax it's lodging in general so like the full amount they pay each night

not just a percentage like lodgers taxes.

I guess I'm just trying to wonder, you know, I'm just trying to ground truth the data. Does it make sense or not? Cause it sounds good. But on the other hand, yeah, but it's the lodgers. So what would be the big chunk that would be missing? Cause you're saying that there's lots more because if it's only like an average of one fifth or something, because there's only so many nights available, right? The rooms are booked up four nights a week. This is what we've heard. I mean, so you only have so many nights a week that you can rent. How are you going to generate that much revenue, even if you're adding in other stuff besides what's applicable to lodging, lodger's tax?

I think lodging specifically, the way they look at it, it's anyone filling a room. I would have to, again, double check how the state takes it, but that's why the number is so vastly different. And obviously that's someone who could be staying more than the 30 days, which is the only part that lodgers tax takes account for. Okay.

I just, cause it's like, I think the housing thing. So the other part of the 500, there's like an N, like how many years, right? So there's a rate. It's like, we didn't just build them in one day. So I think it's important communicating. Yeah. It's like a decade basically. I'm not exaggerating. I don't think because it's like the, the whole apartment started before I got on council by like years. And that's part of, that's like a good chunk of the 370 units. So I think I can understand why people it's like, so if somebody wants to paint a picture, it's like, Oh, you, you're at 500 and like you're billing another 2,400. Cause I think that they're in different States. And I think that the map does indicate a little bit. So that might be helpful just to understand, yeah, this is a rate that might happen, but it's going to take, what, whatever number of years, because there's a process for building these.

Well, and especially with lodgers tax, there is a cap out amount based on how many hotel rooms you have.

Yeah, we only have some hotel rooms. They're projects that are trying to build more. So that would help with some of that capacity issue. And then we would have more rooms available for tourism. Correct. So let's see. So, yeah, the business license is an interesting one. And I think the checks is, so we would, when we get the report on GRT from the state, it's by business area, right? By the CIC code categories? Isn't that correct? It's like the general categories, like 541 is technical and scientific. So it's those categories that We could tell, like, and so some of those are related more to this, like tourism, right? You can't tell for certain what any dollar is spent on, but you could use those data and it seems like if there was one new business license that had generated $20 million in GRT, that's different than, you know, 500 licenses where people are not really billing much, they just have it. they're doing a project like you said so um the business license does not seem like a very sensitive measure um i mean it's a gross measure it's easy to report but so is there some stumbling point point block to reporting taxes so the the the

Information we get from tax and rev is generalized to the point of being anonymized so that you can't trace any GRT to one business. That's one of the goals of the way they report that. You know, I think your point about our business license, I think that is a, I think you're absolutely correct. It's not necessarily the best line of sight into any one particular business or groups of activities happening in the community. I think it's a, it's a, A general indicator of sort of economic activity of how much is going if we were to see that number take a precipitous dive year to year, that would be something that we would really want to dig into and understand why we're seeing. whether it's a lack of contracting activity or construction activity whatever it might be here but I think we sort of the goal is to take some data like a data point like business license activity whether it's renewals or new licenses combining that with other information we have to sort of then cobble together a better picture of what's going on economically here in the county

But you understand they're anonymized, but they're by category.

Correct.

So they're by the six codes and they're like that, the three number code that would tell you basically what kind of business it is.

Correct. So we could tell if it's food and beverage businesses that are sort of driving a lot of GRT or professional services, things like that. We have a general sense of where.

If we were trying to encourage more food, obviously we would see with our eyes what's happening. Um, So that's what people are, when you say you want a 10% increase in people's perception, it's like, well, are there any, there's only like 11% vacancy rate, but we've lost like space. And then there's some space like, you know, the old Smith's market, you know, business businesses is not vacant, but it's no longer, you know, a customer facing business. So I think that's what people see. Because if you look at the building, there's a fruit stand now that has people at it, right? And when the fruit stand is not there, it's like people don't think there's anything going on at that anywhere. Obviously, there's businesses open still there. But I just think that you need to have metrics that correlate to what you see. And you see properties that are just like vacant, right? There's nothing on them anymore. And that doesn't count as a vacant property, vacant building, because it's just torn down, right?

So, Chair Reidy, I just want to help a little bit on this topic, because we are going to be hearing an update on our dashboard, and all of these metrics are planned ones as we build out the dashboard. I will say that from a business license perspective, that is an industry standard to keep an eye on. We all hear the devastation. that people feel when their one particular business closes. The reality is we are looking at a broader level of are there bigger changes? Businesses, especially small ones, do open and close all the time. That's not unique to Los Alamos. We're trying to keep track of bigger shifts. So I think all of the metrics you mentioned, including one of them we're just still working on, getting the history from the assessor, and then the other one is collected by finance and Those are both, all three of those in terms of tracking the commercial space and those changes, total square footage, occupancy, vacancy, business licenses, and the assessors, anything else we get from the assessors, that is all planned to kind of be numerous metrics that maybe holistically give a better sense than anyone on their own. So I just want to note that we've heard that from you and we are working on it.

If I may, Mr. Chair, I wanted to just kind of give you a summary of the GRT by industry that we last reported in September. We do track it by type, and we look at the trends. So for fiscal year 25 compared to 24, we did see growth in retail trade from 3.9% up to 5.7%. We saw growth in construction from 3.7% to 5.7%. We also saw growth in professional scientific and tech services, about a percent. And then we actually saw a decrease in some of the accommodation and food services. But we saw an increase in other services category. So unfortunately, we aren't able to give that guide. We try to educate the public out there. It's a self-reporting mechanism on how they report what type of entity they are. So if they are reporting in other, they could be any one of those categories. but we are looking at those trends. So we'll continue to look at that and help report on that.

Okay, thank you. So let's see. So I think, so there was a question that came up about, I guess the local business coalition and also even though our local and small business council work group has been disbanded for like nine months, we still occasionally get requests to meet with people. about things and just wondered what the status is. And so I think one of the questions that we got late and recently was about LIDA, and in particular retail LIDA, which I know we have a very, it's not really an eye chart, right? It's meant to be on like probably 11 by 17 piece of paper. But there's a lot of those projects, right, that are listed. And that process started a while ago, right? It started a little less than a year ago. Yeah.

Okay. About nine months. I think it launched memory serves late August, September of 25. Okay.

So, um, and we had some discussion about, and I think it's just maybe complicated the process, right. For doing lead because the retail leader maybe isn't really much different than leader in general, what the requirements are. Right. So is that a fair thing? But it's like we haven't we haven't gotten we haven't gotten there. There's a spreadsheet or a list of lots of projects.

So very, if I may, very few A small subset of the overall number of businesses showing interest in that program have gone on to actually complete the application process. So I'm going to use general numbers here. I want to say between 25 and 30 businesses reached out overall through the inquiry process. About six of those have completed the application process. So what is that? Maybe a fifth, quarter to a fifth. And then a number of those that actually completed the application process have withdrawn, have asked to withdraw their application for any number of reasons. Some of them have to do with just the business itself and where they are and are they ready. to proceed. Some of it has to do with just concerns about the larger business climate and are they ready to commit to, you know, providing growth in their receipts or their staffing over the next number of years. But we do have one that has continued to move forward. That's Nambe Drugs. They would like to proceed with their application through the Rita Retail Program. And I believe we have a meeting scheduled with them even next week to kind of continue that conversation. But I think what we're finding is a lot of small businesses are sort of, we intentionally create a very low barrier of entry to kind of come into the county to start talking about the possibilities. I think as they are sort of learning more and more about the program, requirements for security, the commitments to growth and things like that, a lot of our small businesses are sort of, seeing that maybe that's not the best option for them and are deciding to either pause or just withdraw altogether. It's not, you know, I think, you know, LIDA really is set up for, you know, the types of projects that we're seeing being successful, whether it was the ubiquity LIDA agreement we did earlier this year or some of the other things that we're talking about, you know, that we brought forward to council a couple weeks ago, CB FOX, the rock down in White Rock and some others that are sort of we're queuing up to bring forward soon. It's those larger projects I think are better enabled to take advantage of the program and are, you know, are projects that would possibly move forward regardless of the funding, but that funding makes it a much more, you know, financially feasible project reduces risk to a point where people are ready to proceed and things like that. So, um, I think we're seeing lead up play out in some of the ways that we may be anticipated. Um, but, um, you know, we are excited to keep that project, that program open and encourage people to continue to consider it as they're moving forward with their business plans.

And chair, if I may, I just, um, just to summarize the reason for that is it's the same law. It's the same state law. that has the same requirements. So no matter how we package it, it all comes down to our meeting the requirements of the law worthwhile for the benefit I would get for asking for this money. And the lower the amount of money, what we're finding is it's not really becomes worth the effort. And then again, we anticipated this like Mr. Isaac has mentioned, and that is collateral is still a barrier to wanting to accept and engage in a participation agreement with the county. And it may not be an unwillingness. It may even be ability in their circumstance to provide that collateral.

Okay. So it's great to keep it open, but I guess do you judge it to be a success?

You know, I do in the sense that, you know, we have one applicant that's coming forward. And I think as the program continues to be available, I think more and more businesses will really understand how to leverage that program to really get them to where they need to be. And so, you know, I think. it's very much a work in progress, but, um, you know, I think if we're finding us a local businesses to support and help through the program, I think it's a success. Um, we'll continue to see, you know, if it, you know, gains additional traction with our local business community. Um, but I think for the right business and the right sort of part of their cycle, um, it's a wonderful tool to leverage to kind of get to where they want to be.

Okay. And I think that one of the things that we had discussed was, property owners would be more apt to have collateral security. Right. So they have the building.

Because that is what I, Chair Reidy, I think that's, you know, that's correct. You know, one of the sort of one form of security is using equity in a property, whether it's land or a building. So in some ways, folks that own the property do have some uh, collateral that they can draw from some security that can draw from to move forward. I think, you know, folks that are tenants, um, do run into some challenges around where they're getting the collateral that maybe a property owner wouldn't have. Um, but you know, the one leader retail pro project that is moving forward, non-made drugs is a tenant, uh, over at central park square. So, um, you know, it really depends on business to business.

Okay. Um, It just seems like that is something that if Ms. Burrell is up talking to businesses, maybe emphasize that in working with your landlord, I guess.

And we are. And so the way the program is set up, we have a quick questionnaire that you submit, which then puts a business on our radar. We then reach out within a couple days, schedule a meeting, and it's in that meeting where we work through some of these finer details of what the requirements are and, you know, letting people know what they need to be thinking about if they want to move forward completing the application.

Okay. And then maybe last thing that's maybe two last things. So recently was looking at an announcement for a book signing that the county was doing and it was going to be in collaboration with one of our local businesses. they were going to be selling the books. So this was actually a comment I've gotten from a couple of people about like, is that something that you could do more routinely? If there's businesses that are already offering something like they're selling books, obviously our libraries are much beloved, right? They love people, love the libraries. But we also want to help our work with our local businesses. So just thought that was interesting, because I was actually specifically the comment we got from some of these, why aren't you doing that? And then it was a few weeks later that there was one that we were doing that. I think of all the things you might be tracking, I mean, just conceptually is like, how many times are we leveraging, you know, county events with local businesses? I know, you've mentioned all the vendors and food trucks. That's great. That's an obvious thing. But other opportunities where we have, you know, businesses that are, you know, services or retail, and it's like this is an opportunity to kind of collaborate, you know, on a project. So that's maybe more of a comment. And I think that was great to see that. It just was the other day when that was announced.

Chair Ryder, I could offer a little bit of information. Our contract for those book signings are with the publisher. We don't have any contract with any various business, but if the publisher has a relationship and sells with that vendor, that's where the partnership opens up. And certainly we are always open, especially with our partners, LACDC, Chamber, Main Street. I think we do it probably more often than people even realize, but I think getting the word out that You know, we just need to know from the business. Usually the idea comes from the businesses and we respond accordingly, but we're always, our ears are open.

Okay. Well, I'm not, the DOE couldn't speak for the state. I can't speak for businesses here, especially, but I do hear from some businesses that they would like to collaborate more. So I'll just leave that at that. And then the other thing I think was maybe just something that I brought up and I've asked about before, So there's the land that Los Alamos County owns in Santa Fe County, which there's like a couple of different locations. One location is directly east of Eastgate. And I know that's kind of on the list. It didn't come up tonight because maybe it's still preliminary. But I think it's something that, you know, it's like we just talked, we just heard about. We all know we have very limited land, right? So it seems like it's an ideal place for something to happen there. So I just wanted to mention that again and hope that we can see, you know, some progress on that at some point.

So thank you, Chair. That property at Eastgate is still very much on our radar. In fact, I'm actually meeting with representatives of Santa Fe County later this week to talk about how we might proceed with annexation or some of the options there. So hopefully more information to come on that very soon.

Okay, thank you. Okay, let's see if there's any public comment. Not seeing anyone present in chambers. Ms. Nelson, can you take on the line?

I can, Chair. If you'd like to make public comment, please use the raise hand function. Chair, I'm not seeing any hands raised.

Okay, thank you. Thank you for all you for the presentations and answering questions. Appreciate everything you do. Okay, so I think given what time it is, let's take a try to take a 10 minute break. Okay, so we're back in session, and we're on item six, which is public comment for items on the consent agenda. Do we have anyone present that wants to make a public comment? Ms. Madison, can you check online to see if anyone wants to make a public comment?

I can. If you'd like to make a public comment, please raise your hand. Chair, I'm not seeing any hands raised.

Thank you. So the next is item 7, the consent agenda. So there are no changes. So it would be for the items as reports as concluded in that motion.

So is there a councillor interested in making a motion? A councillor call? I move that council approve the items on the consent agenda as presented and that the motions and the staff reports be included for the record. Is there a second?

Second. Okay, so we have motion by Councilor Cole, second by Councilor Herman. Do we have any discussion? Okay, not seeing any. Can you please call the roll?

Councilor Rowdy?

Yes.

Councilor Regor?

Yes.

Councilor Hand? Yes. Councilor Cole? Yes. Councilor Haveman? Yes. Councilor Neal-Clinton?

Yes.

Councilor Herman? Yes. Motion passes 7-0.

Let the record show the motion passes unanimously. So now we're on to introduction of ordinances. I think we have one ordinance to introduce tonight. So 8A is OR 1150-26. It's going to be induction, introduction of Incorporated County of, almost code ordinance number 02371. It's into Code Ordinance Amending Chapter 16, Development Code, Article 5, Administration Enforcement, Division 1, Review and Decision, Making Bodies, a number of other sections. So is there a councillor willing to read this item into the record? Councillor Pavan.

Thank you chair, I introduce without prejudice incorporated County of Los Alamos code ordinance number 0, 2, dash, 3, 7, 1, a code ordinance amending chapter 16 development code, article five administration and enforcement division one review and decision making decision making bodies sections 16 dash 68, 16 dash 69, 16 dash 70. Division 2, procedures, sections 16-71, 16-72, Division 3, specific development procedures, sections 16-73, 16-74, 16-75, Division 4, nonconformities, sections 16-79, 16-81, 16-83, Division 5, construction improvements, sections 16-84, 16-91, 16-92, 16-93, and Division VI, Violations, Enforcement, and Penalties, Section 16-98.

Okay, thank you very much for reading all that. I just was going to see if I could see the date. A public hearing is scheduled for the end of the month on this one. So now we're on to the public hearings. We have five public hearings tonight. So line A is OR1133-26B, Incorporated County of Los Alamos, ordinance number 756. So it's an ordinance authorizing the issuance of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos, the Mexico gross receipts tax improvement revenue bond series 2026A, the bonds, and a principal amount not to exceed $35 million for the purpose of acquiring, extending, enlarging, bettering, repairing, and otherwise improving fire station number four. And I think that's adequate for introducing the item. So we have Mrs. Datsy here.

Yes. Good evening, uh, charity and members of council. So I will be presenting an overview of the proposed series 2026, a gross receipts, tax revenue bonds, and also online tonight is our bond bond council, uh, Peter Franklin, a module Sperling. Um, so he'll be able to answer any questions at the end as well. Uh, next slide. So begin with a brief explanation of the ordinance before you or not 756 authorizes the county to issue up to 35 million dollars in gross receipts tax revenue bonds. These bonds these funds will support the construction of fire station for as well as several other public facility and and infrastructure needs throughout the county adoption of this ordinance also prepares us for the 2026 a bond sale ensures we can meet the disclosure requirements. expected from our investors next slide so a common question is that we receive is why grt revenue bonds well these bonds are repaid through the county's gross receipts tax revenues and this is important because the county has a relatively small property tax base which means traditional general obligation bonds are less practical By using GRT-backed bonds, we do maintain affordability and financial stability for our property owners while still addressing capital needs. Next slide. These bonds rely on the county's existing pledged GRT revenues, which are already in place and currently pledged for bond repayments. So no new taxes are being proposed or pledged as part of this issuance. Next slide. The potential bond projects are listed here. Of course the largest is the construction of Fire Station 4, estimated at approximately $20 million. Next slide. I did want to give an overview of the Fire Station 4 project. A construction contract was awarded in April of 2026 and physical construction did start in May. The project is currently underway and is expected to be completed by November of 2028 with an estimated 18-month construction period. Next slide. So regarding the bond structure and debt service, these bonds are expected to use level annual debt service payments, which smooths the county's repayment obligations over time. Our existing 2013 bonds will mature in June of 2028, and our 2026 broadband bond extends 25 years. And the proposed 2026A issuance is also expected to have a 25-year final maturity. The county does also maintain high credit ratings for favorable interest costs from S&P and Moody's. Next slide. And finally, the timeline and next steps. Tonight, of course, we're holding the required public hearing and presenting the ordinance for potential adoption. If approved, we anticipate conducting the bond sale in September, with funds being delivered in October. And these proceeds will reimburse the county for construction costs on Fire Station 4 that has incurred since May, and will also continue to support the construction moving forward. And with that, I'm happy to stand for any questions.

Okay, so this is an action item, so we're just taking technical or clarifying questions at this point. Okay, I'm not seeing any questions. So you mentioned that there's no new taxes, but we did increase, so it includes what we've increased. increase just a couple days ago.

So charity, this actually are we're pledging the same revenue that we've already had in place.

So it's not regarding the new increments, right? Okay, thank you for the clarification. I'm not seeing any other questions. So is there any public comment on this item? Not seeing anyone in chambers as best condition check online.

I can. If you'd like to make a public comment, please raise your hand.

Chair, I'm not seeing any hands raised. OK. Thank you. So was there a councillor interested in making a motion? Councillor Cole?

I move that council adopt Incorporated County of Los Alamos ordinance number 756, an ordinance authorizing the issuance of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos New Mexico grocery seats tax improvement revenue bonds series 2026A, otherwise known as the bonds, in the principal amount not to exceed $35 million for the purpose of acquiring, extending, enlarging, bettering, repairing, and otherwise improving fire station number four, firefighting and safety facilities and equipment, and other public buildings, facilities, and infrastructure. providing that the bonds will be payable and collectible from certain gross receipts tax revenues distributed to the county, providing for the disposition of the receipts derived from certain gross receipts tax revenues, delegating authority to the county council chair and county manager to approve certain terms and details of the bonds at the time the bonds are priced, prescribing other details concerning the bonds and gross receipts tax revenues including but not limited to covenants and agreements in connection with the bonds and the form and manner of execution of the bonds, authorizing the preparation of a preliminary official statement and the form of a final official statement for the marketing of the bonds, authorizing the execution and delivery of a bond purchase agreement if the bonds are sold in a negotiated sale, and other agreements and certificates in connection with the bonds, ratifying action previously taken in connection with the bonds, and repealing all ordinances in conflict herewith, approving the form of the preliminary official statement as amended and included in the agenda packet, and asking staff to assure that it is published as provided in the county charter.

Okay. Thank you very much for reading all that. Is there a second?

Second.

So we have a motion by Councilor Cull, second by Councilor Neal-Clinton. Do we have any discussion? Okay. Not seeing any, can the clerk please call the roll? Councilor Rigor?

Yes.

Councilor Cull? Yes. Councilor Haffeman? Yes. Councilor Herman? Yes. Councilor Reidy? Yes. Councilor Neal-Clinton?

Yes.

Counselor Hand. Yes. Motion passes 7-0.

Let the record show the motion passes unanimously. So thank you for being here for the item. So now we're on to 9B, OR 1139-26B. So this is Incorporated County Los Alamos, Ordinance Number 757, an ordinance proposing amendment to Article 3, Section 305, subsection 305.3 of the Charter of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos to be submitted to electorate for adoption or rejection at a general election November 3, 2026. This one's pertaining to standing boards and commissions and ad hoc advisory committees. So Ms. Madison, did you want to make a couple comments?

Yes, Chair. Chair, Council, this now is the second item as a result of the Council Working Group that reviewed the Charter and recommended changes. So this particular change, Ordinance 757, is to revise the charter to read, no more than a simple majority of voting members of Planning and Zoning Commission, Board of Public Utilities, or Personnel Board shall be members of the same political party. So in essence, that would remove the political affiliation Restriction for all other boards other than planning and zoning personnel board and board of public utilities. If this ordinance passes today. It would be effective in 30 days. And there would be one more step that would need to be before it is put on the ballot. That would be a resolution that you would hear August 18. And that resolution contains the ballot language that would be utilized to put the ballot question on the general election ballot. So with that, I would stand for any questions.

Okay. Do councillors have any technical or clarifying questions on any of that? I'm not seeing any. Is there any public comment? I'm not seeing any in the chambers. Ms. Madison, can you check online?

Chair, I'm not seeing any hands raised online.

Okay. Can the clerk please call the roll? We didn't have a comment, right? Oh, yeah. Do you want to make a comment? Yeah.

So I think this is a very poor modification of the charter. The committee that we put together to do this really didn't come up with this. This came up at a later meeting of the council. And I think that this is the kind of thing that will run away with itself to the point where you'll have single parties filling out the entire board. And that'll be in every single area. And it's only now because there's a requirement that we even get county staff to go out and look for Republicans or independents to fill out these spots. And so I think what's going to happen, you're going to run away and you'll end up with, as we had with this task force that did sustainability, they end up with a carbon action plan that doesn't No one in the whole room who's on that committee ever asked a tough question about how are you gonna really do this? How will that come out for the county? How will that come out for the rate payers? So I think that was, they ended up with a carbon action plan that really doesn't even represent a concept of, a real concept that is not even in touch with reality. It's just things that we can't do with such a small county. And now we're gonna have every board in this county or not every board, but most of them will have no requirements that you find even an independent or a single conservative to go even be on the board and asking hard questions about the policies of the board. So I think this is a very harmful amendment, and hopefully we can vote it down now before it gets too far to the public. But maybe the public will vote it down as well, because I think you're going down a very destructive path that we will see will be quite a burden on the public. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor Rieger. And that did remind me of one question. So the Board of Registration is different. So it's covered by state law. Aren't there other, I mean, so isn't that correct? Because there can be no more than two members of a political party and that's in state law.

Yes, that is correct.

Is that the only board that is like that?

Um, chair, uh, righty, uh, and council, uh, the only other board that I can think of is the property valuation board, but that is very specific in. Qualifications. Qualifications on what's right. So party affiliation does not come into that. Party affiliation is not part of that anyway. And they're not in Chapter...

They're not one of these boards. Right. Correct. And maybe that's the same thing with the Board of Registration is they're not in this chapter. Exactly. It's not in that chapter. Right. Exactly. Okay. Okay. Any other Councilor comments about this ordinance? Councilor Nguyen?

I guess all I'd like to say is, I understand what Councillor Rager is saying. But let's put it out and see what the public says. You know, you know, there's a reason why we came together to try to make a modification based on what the boards and commissions had explained to the council. And so I think there was an effort to try to do something different than what we have now, which seems to be a problem. So let's put it out there and see, you know, how people vote.

Okay. Any other comments from councillors?

Okay. I'm not seeing, so prematurely, sorry. You can call the roll now. Okay.

There's been no motion.

Okay. We were supposed to have a motion before we had to comment. I wasn't confused. So it isn't even that late. Okay. So is there a councilor interested in making a motion? Councilor Herman.

Thank you, Chair. I move that council adopt Incorporated County of Los Alamos Ordinance Number 757, an ordinance proposing amendment to Article 3, Section 305, subsection 305.3 of the Charter of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos to be submitted to the electorate for adoption or rejection at a general election on November 3rd, 2026, pertaining to standing boards and commissions and ad hoc advisory committees, and ask the staff to assure that it is published as provided in the county charter.

Okay, do we have a second? Second. Okay, so now I'm supposed to ask if there's any comments. I think we already had a couple comments. So are there any more comments? Okay, not seeing any more. Now we can call the roll because we have a motion on the floor.

Councilor Hand? Yes. Councilor Reidy?

Yes.

Councilor Cole? Yes. Councilor Neal-Clinton? No. Councilor Ray Gord?

No.

Councilor Haberman? Yes. Councilor Herman? Yes. Motion passes 5-2 with Councilors Neal Clinton and Rigor against.

Okay, I'll let the record show motion passes with Councilors Neal Clinton and Rigor opposed. So now we're on to 9C, which is OR 1141-26B. So this is Incorporated County of Los Alamos Ordinance Number 758, an ordinance proposing amendment to Article 5, Section 509 of the Charter of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos to be submitted to the electorate for adoption or rejection at general election on November 3rd, 2026. This one is pertaining to the priority of budgeted expenses for utilities. So did you want... A couple more remarks on this one too.

Sure, Chair. Chair and Council, so this is the third item that Council took action to bring forward to the electorate. And this ordinance number 758 proposes a change to section 509 to delete the following quote 6.6 all remaining operating profits shall be transferred to the county general fund. And again, if this ordinance passes today, it would be effective 30 days from its publication date. And then the last step needed before it would be put on the ballot would be a resolution that will be considered on August 18th with the ballot language. And with that, I would stand for questions.

Okay. Do we have any technical clarifying questions on this one? Okay. Not seeing any. So now I should ask if there's any public comment. Not seeing anyone present in chambers. Ms. Nissen, can you check online?

Chair, we have someone online. Mr. Gibson, you should be able to unmute. Please state your full name and limit your comments to three minutes.

Thank you. Robert Gibson, Chair of the Board of Public Utilities. Mr. Chairman, just for the record, on the 17th of June at a regular meeting, the Board of Public Utilities did vote 4-0 to support moving this item forward. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Gibson. Okay. So now I think I'll remember to see if there's a motion. Is there a councilor wanting to make a motion on this ordinance?

Councilor Cole? I move that council adopt Incorporated County of Los Alamos ordinance number 758, an ordinance proposing amendment to Article 5, Section 509 of the Charter of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos to be submitted to the electorate for adoption or rejection. at a general election on November 3rd, 2026, pertaining to priority of budgeted expenditures and ask the staff to assure that it is published as provided in the county charter.

Is there a second? Second. Second. So I think I heard Councilor Herman first. Okay, so we have motion by Councilor Call, second by Councilor Herman. Do we have any Councilor comments? Seeing any, I mean, I just mentioned all, so we'll see what the vote is, but all three would be at the same meeting. That was the idea. So for the ballot language on the 18th.

Chair, correct. The three resolutions would all be considered on August 18th.

At the same time. So, okay. So can the clerk please call the roll?

Councillor Haveman.

Yes.

Councilor Righty.

Yes.

Councilor Hand. Yes. Councilor Cole. Yes. Councilor Rigor.

Yes.

Councilor Herman. Yes. And Councilor Neal-Clinton. Yes. Motion passes 7-0.

I'll let the record show the motion passes unanimously. So we have two more public hearings that are on resolutions relating to transit. So We have 9DRE0685-26. It's Incorporated County of Los Alamos, Resolution Number 26-12, a resolution of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos Council authorizing application to the New Mexico Department of Transportation for Federal Transit Administration Section 5311 Rural Area Transportation Program funding for federal fiscal year 2028. and that would fund administrative operating capital needs of Atomic State Transit in the amount of $7,271,004. So we have Mr. Barilla.

Thank you, Chair, and good evening, Council. Before I get started, Chair, I do have two items. Would you like me to present them, both items or one at a time? I think let's for efficiency to do both. Okay, sounds good. So for the 5311, application, the Federal Transit Administration Section 53 land program provides capital, planning, and operating assistance to subrecipients that support public transportation in rural areas where many residents rely on transit to access employment, healthcare, education, shopping, and other essential services. Funding is awarded through a competitive allocation process administered by the state and is used to replace, rehabilitate, and purchase buses and related equipment construction-based facilities and support LGBT operating and administrative expenses. Los Alamos County has utilized some of this FTA section funding to support the capital administrative and operating costs and the needs of Atomic City Transit since 2007. Annual funding allocations are administered by the New Mexico Department of Transportation transit brew and following the submission and approval of the county's annual grant application. For the proposed FY27 allocation to North Regional Transit District, NCRTD, as you see, it's just over $2 million. That's the budgeted amount that NCRTD reached out and gave me. The county has submitted a service plan that exceeds the allocated funding amount to demonstrate the growing need for future transit funding and to ensure the county can maximize reimbursement. By presenting all eligible operating and administrative and capital expenses, the county's position itself to receive the full reimbursement. Estimated FY27 funding shortfall, any eligible costs exceeding that allocated amount are anticipated to be covered through the general fund and the FTA 53 funding as applicable. And with that, I'll stand for any questions.

Okay. Thank you, Mr. Borrella. We'll take questions on either 9D or 9E. We have any council technical or clarifying questions?

Council Rieger? Just excuse me, I don't see a number. Where is, how much is 9E or what is that? Is that a portion of the 9D grant that gets redirected to the regional transit?

So I'm Chair and Councilor Rieger. Are you saying 90?

In 9E. Okay. I don't quite understand what that budget item is. Is that an amount of money or we're just endorsing some other plan?

Okay. I understand. So GRT will receive GRT from the NCRTD for $2,031,000. in reimbursement from the 350,000 MOU that we give back in the beginning of the year. So every year, annually, we have an agreement with NCRTD. We give them $350,000 to be part of the umbrella of the NCRTD. And in return, we get an allocated amount that they budget for GRT that comes back to Atomic City Transit Los Alamos County as a revenue. And they've budgeted $2,031,000.

2,031,000 would be the revenue for ACT as part of the whole regional plan.

Yes. And it covers any route that we run in Los Alamos County that meets regional service. So it meets NCRDD and it meets Park and Ride.

Yeah. And do we get this money previous years? We always get it, yeah.

Yes, we have received it in previous years.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Rieger. Any other technical or clarifying questions on either resolution? Okay, so I think we'll see if there's any public comment on either resolution. I'm not seeing anyone present. Ms. Bass, you can check online to see if there's anyone that wants to make a comment on 9D, Delta, or E, Echo.

I will. If you'd like to make a public comment, please raise your hand. Chair, I'm not seeing any hands raised.

Okay, thank you. Is there a councillor? Willing to make a motion on 9D. This one's in the package. So, Councillor Ann.

Thank you, Chair. I move that Council approve Incorporated County of Los Alamos Resolution Number 26-12, a resolution of the Incorporated County of Los Alamos Council authorizing application to the New Mexico Department of Transportation for Federal Transit Administration, Section 5311, rural area transportation program funding for federal fiscal year 2028 to fund the administrative, operating, and capital needs of Atomic City Transit in the amount of $7,271,004. Is there a second? Second.

So I have a motion by Councillor Haynes, seconded by Councillor Neill-Clinton. Is there any discussion?

Thank you, Chair. I just want to use this opportunity to say how I repeatedly hear feedback about the outstanding customer service from your department, especially in regard to the ADA paratransit and the on-demand transportation, just accolades from start to finish, from the first phone call to the interaction to the service itself. So I think this is really a great service we provide our community. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Abbott.

Thank you, Chair and Councillor Abbott. I'll definitely share those kind comments with my staff.

Yeah, and there was a question about the people getting to the, you know, extravaganza. I think that's what it was actually called on Saturday, and you could take the bus, so... traffic is too bad for you. And we used to get a lot of people that would, you know, try transit for taking special event, you know, coverage. So I really appreciate also, your staff, you know, you did the Saturday service, as you know, mentioned, and that was a special event, you know, holiday for people, but they came in and work. So yeah, just appreciate everything that they do. So can the clerk please call the roll? Councillor Cole?

Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Yes. Okay, let the record show the motion passes unanimously. So now we'll go just to the

motion for 9e and so that's what we have the green sheet for so there's a change on the uh resolution text so sir counselor uh willing to uh make a motion counselor hand thank you chair i move that council approve resolution number 26-13 as revised

Do you want me to say the rest of the, um, I believe resolution.

So, um, we don't need, so it's just as revised in the package. We don't need to state anything else. Is that correct? Ms. Really part. So I think that there was some confusion with the recommended action as they just, you just have to approve the resolution as revised. Is that correct? That's what the resolution has amended as in the green sheet.

Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. So I think that's what we've done.

So second.

Okay. So we have a motion by Councilman second by Councillor Cole. Any discussion? Okay. Please call the roll.

Councillor Herman?

Yes. Councillor Haveman? Yes. Councilor Cull? Yes. Councilor Rigor?

Yes.

Councilor Neal-Clinton? Yes. Councilor Reidy?

Yes.

Councilor Hand? Yes.

Motion passes 7-0. Okay. Let the record show the motion passes unanimously. So thank you, Mr. Perl, for being here. So now we're on to council business item 10. 10A is general council business. 10A1, item 21880-26, New Mexico County State of New Mexico statutory amendment discussion. So this is just to make council aware of an effort. So I think some councillors have been to either through New Mexico counties or meetings of the affiliates have heard about the statutory changes that are being planned, but I don't know that the entire council was aware. So we just wanted to bring what we had available last Thursday. So put it in the package. So since last Thursday, there's actually a different section that is also being proposed for amendment. It's like Article 38. So that relates to more specifically to county commissions. So I think the only thing I wanted to state now, there could be questions asked, I guess, since it's on the agenda, but we'll send out a PDF that has the revised language. It got revised on Monday morning after a commissioner affiliate meeting, and I have not gotten the revised text after that. I think Councilor Rieger was also attending that for a while. I don't know that any other counselors attended the Zoom. I don't think so. So yeah, there's a number of changes. And I think just what I understand is that it could cause some inconsistencies between what would be in the statute and what's in our charter. I think that's the best way to put it. And so we may want to look for an exemption for probably an incorporated county. And I think since that isn't in the package, I think we probably can't go a lot further than that. Mr. Leapheart, at this point, we'd have some discussion about what's in there. What's in the package, I think, what's in the package today is not that helpful because it doesn't include some of the stuff. But there's a lot of other sections that are being proposed for amendment. And it does mention Class H counties, which, of course, we're one, but we're also an incorporated county, which we're the only one. And we were just talking about three different or two different changes to the charter. So our charter tends to be more definitive for some things. So I don't know if there's anything else that you wanted to add, Ms. Leapheart, from what you've reviewed so far.

No, Chair and Council, but there are some. issues with us being an incorporated county because we not only have all the powers of the county, we have all the powers of the municipality. So, and we do not have the same, um, as you see, this was written as an incorporated county. We don't necessarily have the same elected offices as other counties by the provision in the constitution that established us to be an incorporated county. It allows us to assign duties to county staff or other people that would perform in the offices of the county official. For example, our charter assigns the role of a county treasurer to the county manager. And this statute talks about the treasurer as being this free-standing elected official that's going to participate in all these groups and decision-making processes. And because we've exercised our authority, or the citizens have, really, this is how the citizens consider to be governed. We don't have the same elected officials. This is going to be hard to try to make an incorporated county fit into. And there are other issues with this too. I haven't reviewed all of it, but this is something we need to pay attention to.

That's it. So I will also, I guess, add that I approached the question about some sort of exemption for our situation, but It was not a very receptive group on Monday morning for that kind of thing. So I think we'll have to see how things go. I think so it was yesterday when this meeting was of the commissioner's affiliate. Tomorrow the Mexico County has a legislative committee in their meeting, and then that group will make recommendations to the Mexico County's board, which I sit on. So at the beginning of next month, we'll have a Mexico County's board meeting to prioritize legislative items for next year, of which this might be one. It might not be.

And chair, I just wanted to mention it might, it would probably be a good topic for the state and regional committee as we go into legislative session. If we have opinions about this, depending on what moves forward, it's probably something we should put on our state legislative discussion topics.

Yeah. So we'll definitely know more, you know, what the Mexico County's board decides to do. And there could be some opportunities for, I think it just has to have a couple of words in there added. if there's anyone interested in doing that. And then it won't cause any conflict for us. So that was what I just wanted to make sure everyone was aware of. And we'll get the document that was revised after the meeting yesterday to council so you can all see it. So are there any other questions or comments on that? Not sure. Okay.

I guess there could be. Yeah, there are major sections of this that don't, aren't relevant to us and don't even make any sense. So you're voting against it when it comes to the New Mexico County's board? You want a sense of our agreement?

If it doesn't, yeah, if we don't get an exemption, then I'll most likely be voting against it. But we have a little bit of time to see what the legislative committee does. So do you want a sense of the board or do you want an actual vote? I think we'll probably take a vote. And that, so I think we can get it in the last meeting of July, I think. And actually we could do it even the first, I have to check the calendar again. But it was definitely the last meeting of July would work, the 25th, if I'm remembering right. So we'll have it for action 28th. Okay, we'll have it for action, depending upon what we hear. But I think we probably want to make sure that, you know, the language and, I think this is one where you probably want me to vote a particular way on this item. So this particular item. OK. So we'll put it back on the council agenda, I think, for action. Does that make sense? OK. For making a, yeah. There was something else you would like me to do?

Well, if we're having a debate of this, we're not having that now. So we can't do it now. I can add a lot of chronic criticisms to that. Yeah.

We can't attorney's criticisms. You know, there's not, unfortunately council hasn't seen the document that came out or the weekend came out on Sunday. Yeah. So it was too late to publish in the agenda. We can send it out to, uh, council, especially once we get the document that's not password protected. So they sent out a link to a document, a Word document, that you cannot open up. So anyway, we'll get that figured out, and we'll get the document, and then we can put it on the agenda. Okay. Okay. Is there any public comment? Ms. Messing, can you look online for public comment?

Chair, I'm not seeing any hands raised.

Okay. Thank you. Okay, so this is really about the only other real business item we have tonight. To 10A2, 21913-26, it's discussion and possible request of the Environmental Sustainability Board to evaluate expanding recycling services. So, yeah, Councillor Hand had reached out to me, I think, in April about this conceptually, And so I thought it would be good timing to have some discussion of it tonight, just to see what interest there is of Council, because I think we understand what recycling options we have currently with our current contract. And yeah, I think that the presentation includes the current contract and some other information attached. So did you want to go through your slides, Councilor Hinn?

Yes, Chair. I appreciate the opportunity. So I'm not going to read all the slides like bullets. I actually have some other expanded things that I'm going to say related to each slide. So basically, thank Thank you all for allowing me an opportunity to present tonight on this subject. I really appreciate the Council's consideration of a potential expansion of single-use plastic recycling here in Los Alamos County. The idea is simple. Recycle more of what we already use and waste far less of it. As you might have noticed, those lightweight plastic grocery bags that many of you consider a nuisance are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to single-use plastics that we use every day. Plastic encases most of our food, packaging, and shipping containers for almost every product we buy. Even our clothes have plastic in them. If you buy a cardboard box of cereal or crackers, there is most likely a plastic bag inside where the food is stored to keep it fresher. Many packages are truly single-use, even more than the lightweight grocery bags that many citizens claim they reuse. If the plastic grocery bags are banned, then many citizens claim they will end up buying single-use plastic bags to replace the ones that were banned. It could be difficult to rid ourselves of even the plastic grocery bag without introducing additional plastic bags to take the place of them, as recently disclosed by citizens. Some citizens have gone to great lengths to justify why we shouldn't ban plastic grocery bags because they have less impact on the environment than some of their replacements. The timing couldn't have happened more perfectly to find out about some new plastic recycling services becoming available in Los Alamos for residents. An expanded program for recycling could increase the scope of our current recycling program to include many more single-use plastics than we currently recycle, and even potentially include yard and political signs, styrofoam, large bulk plastic wrapping that is currently thrown away. I hope the Council will consider expanding recycling to a larger segment of the population, including large bulk single-use plastics disposed of on a daily basis by local businesses. An expanded community-wide recycling program delivers added convenience, could lower individual resident costs for single-use plastic recycling, and divert significantly more plastic from the landfill. One unified system makes it easy for residents to recycle far more materials directly advancing our climate action plan and environmental sustainability goals. Over the next few minutes, I'll walk you through why this matters for our community, what I'm specifically asking of you tonight, and the practical strategies we explore to get there. Can you advance the slide, please? Thank you. So why expand recycling now? A single, community-wide program delivers value on three fronts. First, convenience. When one shared program makes it easy to recycle a much wider range of single-use plastics, residents naturally recycle more because the barrier to doing the right thing drops. Second, we anticipate lower costs per household. A shared service spreads the cost across the whole community and creates enough demand to invite companies to launch local recycling here, which is far cheaper than every household trying to solve this on its own. And third, a healthier planet. Every ton of plastic we divert into new uses is waste we keep out of the landfill. Convenience, cost, and climate all pulling in the same direction. Next slide. Here's what I'm actually asking of Council tonight. I'm not asking you to approve a budget or sign a contract today. I'm asking you to direct the Environmental Sustainability Board to lead three pieces of work and report their findings back to Council. First, study what an expansion of plastic recycling would actually involve, its scope, its costs, the alternatives available, and realistic timelines. Second, align with our contracts. Review our current recycling agreements to see whether expansion fits as added scope with our existing vendor or whether it needs to go out for competitive bid. And third, engage residents. Hold a town meeting or run a survey to gauge community interest, understand acceptable cost thresholds, and compare a community-wide approach against individual household costs. Let the residents get more involved. Residents can help motivate an expanded plastic recycling program by participating in county surveys, attending town hall meetings, and sharing input with the Environmental Sustainability Board and County Council. Citizen feedback on acceptable costs, preferred collection methods, and desired service levels directly shapes program design and helps the county prioritize expanded recycling in future contracts and planning efforts. These three steps give us the facts we need before committing a single dollar. Okay, next slide. Finally, let's talk about how this could actually work on the ground. I'd ask the sustainability board to weigh three expansion models and report back on which fits us best after seeking public input. The first is integrated pickup, adding additional types of plastics into our existing curbside collection routes so residents don't change their habits at all, or only slightly by separating the new types of plastic or types of waste in their existing recycle bin. The second is periodic drop-off drives, scheduled community events for the harder to recycle plastics that don't fit neatly into our curbside collection. We could have drop-off drives that could include styrofoam recycle, fabric recycling, and other large bulk items. And third is a hybrid or new model combining these approaches or exploring emerging recycling options as they become available. One key question threads through all of this, contractor capacity. We'll need to confirm whether a single vendor can handle all of our current and new plastics or whether we'd need multiple contractors to make it work. Or maybe there is a possibility to have our current contractor partner with a subcontractor who specializes in the added plastic waste streams for the new contract scope. The Sustainability Board's research will help provide those answers. Thank you, and I'm happy to take your questions.

Okay, thank you, Councillor Hann. So we have any councillor technical, so this is an action, technical action item, so are there technical or clarifying questions from council?

I guess are we going to hear from the Environmental Sustainability Board? There was a, The attachment were in the package on the work plan.

So they could quite whether or not they could, I think, do what is being requested. Yeah, they can probably talk about their capacity for doing the work.

Good evening, Chair, Council. So I don't think that the Environmental Sustainability Board would be able to do this by itself, would be able to do the research that's required. So this is probably a situation that if we really want to do it, we'll need to acquire a consultant to help out. And I mean, it's a great idea. I'd like to get, I mean, I was looking at the stats, getting ready for our bag ban hearing, and 45% of all plastic waste is wrapping. So this is significant. And so I would support doing it. I just, I think we need to think about, well, One of the options I might recommend is have staff continue to keep an eye on what's going on with this and maybe have discussions with a recycling contractor and just see what materializes from then. But if you really want us to pursue it, I think we're going to require help.

good evening county council um thanks for letting us weigh in on this topic i think it's something that we are interested in exploring um however right now our focus is strongly heavily weighted in the climate action plan and trying to accomplish a lot of the items that are in there we have 13 items for year one and two so we want to make sure we stay focused on implementing those items obviously if this is a priority to you all we We just need some direction on what should be reprioritized.

Okay. So does that help? So do we have any technical or clarifying questions from council about what Councillor Hand is requesting?

Councillor Rieger? What plastic are we not including now? We recycle all plastics that aren't dirty?

No, there is a tremendous amount of plastic that is not recyclable now with our current contract. So all the wrappers, like on energy bars, these little energy bars right here.

Yeah.

That plastic wrapping is recyclable with other types of contractors, but not the one that we currently. So all the bags, you know, like Ziploc bags, like all the bags where you get your chips, the bags you put your produce in, the bags that, you know, basically case a lot of your food. All the plastic wrapping, you know, it's kind of like saran wrap, but it's, I don't know, they just call it plastic wrap. But those types of things are not currently recyclable now in our current program. But it can be quite a bit of plastic. So, you know, I think it could, you know, if we are looking at the nuisance of plastic plastic grocery bags, just the ones to carry your groceries out to the car. That is just the tip of the iceberg. That is just nothing compared to all the plastic that we use in our daily lives. It's everywhere. And I think if, you know, we're really serious about sustainability and you know, the plastic problem that I don't think that, you know, like just banning those grocery bags, which, you know, there are a lot of people in the community even debating about, you know, whether we should do that. You know, some people use those bags again and they say they're going to use other bags if they don't. And they're going to use plastic bags. So we have all this plastic. And it's not easily going to go away, even if we do something like a ban, you know? So, um, how do we really deal with the bigger problem? I think we're, we're just, we're trying to take baby steps and I think, you know, we should put a proposal out there as well. That's like, well, let's tackle the real problem. Let's let's go for the big issue, not. you know, just the baby steps here.

Oh, thank you. Okay. Do we have any other technical or clarifying questions? Council.

So our current contract for recycling ends in 2031. Is that correct, Ms. Laurent?

My intelligence out in the audience here says 2032.

2032. So, um, FY 32 probably is what, um, so is it possible to, to that reevaluate, um, with that current contractor, what it is that they're willing to recycle, um, before that contract is completed?

Uh, chair ready. Counselor Cole, to my knowledge, this, um, the, the, semi-rigid like the flexible plastics or the completely um the semi-rigid and then the flexible plastics are not accepted so um to my best of knowledge that's not something a business that they would be bidding on so that i don't believe that's an option at this time but that could change in the future um I guess I'll add that any contract, if there is a desire from an efficiency to only have one recycling contractor, we usually have in our contracts the ability to cancel a contract with certain periods of notice. In this particular circumstance, we would not want to do that until we knew we had a contractor in place and we would have to look at the terms of the notice. But almost all of our contracts have some sort of out before the time. So I should clarify that too.

So this isn't really a question. Can I make a comment? Sure. Let's try to. So my concern with making recycling of plastic easy is that it doesn't end plastic. Plastic will not go away. It will just proliferate because people can now feel better about being able to get rid of it in some environmentally friendly way, supposedly. It's still going to be in the environment. It'll be in a different form. It might be in something that lasts a little bit longer, a yard chair or something, or a bag that is manufactured by one of these companies, but it doesn't get rid of the plastic. And the only way to get rid of the plastic is to send the message to the people that provide plastic that we don't want it anymore. And so, I mean, while I think that will take a long time to happen, I think having the ability to recycle what is currently being generated is not a bad thing. There is a lot of plastic that does not get recycled that goes to the landfill. And I know we supposedly monitor what our current recycler does with the plastics that we send them. hopefully it's they're not ending up in the, in the landfill as well currently, but we don't, I don't know if there's any way to guarantee that we have some things in our, in our little contract that say they have to tell us what they're doing with it. Um, so I, I mean, if we don't have, if environmental sustainability board doesn't have the capacity and I, and I agree that they don't, um, and, Our current staff don't necessarily have the time we be basically asking our county manager to reprioritize. What what that staff is doing in order to accommodate this so i'm not sure the timing is right, necessarily, I think it's a good idea, I think it was offered as a for individuals to opt into regarding the presentation. um, from the other company whose name escapes me at the moment, Ridwell. Um, I don't know why that escaped me. Ridwell. Um, anyway, um, maybe we get a grassroots movement, um, happening and we, we get people to, to prove what a great thing it is and, um, and then come back and propose it to the ESB or to the County at some future date. I just don't think right now that, um,

willing to support a motion if any if one was made and i'm not sure what that motion would be so thank you okay thank you counselor call so um counselor and neil clinton you had you wanted to say something ask a question so it's a question of ignorance so the plastics that are not recyclable i ease it off bags and etc where do they go

Chair, they go into the landfill and Councilor Neal-Clinton. They go into our, they get hauled to the landfill.

Okay, so they are disposed in the landfill. Correct? Yes. Okay, so then I'm slightly confused. because I was under the impression that they're not recyclable. So are they or are they not?

Chair Ruddy, Councilor Neal-Clinton, so right now, the current vendor for our recycling services that we haul things from our transfer center there, they do not collect the flexible or... Wrapping type plastics is as counselor handics described, there is a new vendor who has is trying to branch out who by mail. What they do is they provide bags to individuals and for a fee per bag and you have to separate it per their rules of what goes in what bag and you mail it. and then they use it to put back into like a decking product or something like that. They recycle it into another use. We also, at least I'll ask Ms. Hurley to talk about Smith's and what they do with those plastics they collect.

Good evening.

I'm sorry.

So we're paying another fee to another vendor to have them separate out this plastic that we don't take.

That would be the program that's being proposed tonight. If we hired a separate vendor to collect like the flex wraps and your food packaging containers. So they offer that service to take the plastics that are not accepted through our current recycling company. Does that make sense?

It's okay.

So everything that's in your blue bin, we have a company called, um, Barco and they're out of Albuquerque and they take plastics one through seven. They take bottles. aluminum cans, paper, cardboard, paperboard, all the things that can go into your blue recycle bin. They do not accept the plastic bags because there's not a market. There's not a global market for plastic bags. That's basically the lowest type of plastic that you can get to, a plastic bag or a plastic wrap. So there's other companies that are offering a service to collect the films and the wraps.

but then we still would have to provide the resource to separate those out.

We would have to hire them and pay an additional fee for that service.

And Chair Wrighty, Councilor Neal-Clinton, the important of the fee piece of it is that the environmental services is an enterprise fund. So it is fee-based, and so it would affect what we charge our customers, similar to like a utility type of. So that would be part of the cost analysis that I think was described was needed to evaluate the program.

Okay. And Ms. Gurley, just because of your area of expertise, what would you estimate or how many FTEs would you estimate we would have to bring on if we decided to pursue this.

So I believe that the company offers like a full service from what I've heard where they send you a bag a little like a Amazon plastic bag is kind of what I imagine and then you stuff that full of the plastics you collect in your home and you mail it in so everything is done by the third party separately but that there would be the additional fee on top of on top of your, you know, we'd have to include that new fee into our rate.

So, potentially, Los Alamos residents would receive a bag, which they would have to then fill, and then return back? Correct. And then also be charged a fee for that as well, because this new alternative that we're bringing on, is that, am I following you?

Yes, that's correct.

Okay. Counselor Henn wanted to I think provide some other information. Thank you, Jeremy. I want to try to answer your question. Yeah, Councillor Hinton wanted to try to answer your question.

I want to try to answer your question, Councillor Neal-Clinton. So basically, right now, there has been a company that approached Los Alamos County and said that they can provide this service on an individual household basis. And so any individual household can sign up for this program. And, you know, you can modify the way, you know, like the frequency of how often you get the bags, you can do it on an as needed basis. But basically, it's like $10 a month per bag, and that pays for the shipping. as well it's already labeled ready to go you just close the bag and give it to the post office or you can have the post office pick it up and and then they have it you know you can have a debit card that's already set up to where um you know they just debit your debit card you know the ten dollars every time they receive your bag of plastic

And so what I'm hearing you say is that theoretically it wouldn't have to go through our recycling. Well, the reason come through the individual.

Okay. So the reason why I made this proposal tonight is because I think if we, if we provided it on a, on a larger scale community wide, that we could probably reduce the costs per individual household and It's economies of scale, right? Economies of scale. The more that you're able to provide, the cheaper you can get it. Okay? So it could potentially create more interest in the public to start recycling they might be able to get a lower price to do this recycling by incorporating it into a county program versus just doing this individually on their own that was the um the suggestion is that can we look into this and see if you know we could encourage more plastic recycling by offering it through the county and and uh basically a contract even if it a contract says it's 2032 when it expires you can always amend a contract i've amended contracts before you can amend a contract you can change the scope you can add scope you can do all that stuff to contracts so have we don't have to wait until 2032 our constituents whether or not this is

something of interest to them, or is this something that you're asking that our recycle people propose to them just so that we can get a feel?

So I was hoping, based on how I gauge the overall public response to sustainability, that this would be something I thought people would be all over this kind of a proposal. that this would be something people would really want to do. I mean, we're talking about grocery bags here, banning those because they're such a nuisance. And, you know, that's nothing compared to all the plastic that we're already throwing away. We're throwing away so much plastic. If people really care about sustainability, I think that You know, they need to look a little bit beyond the grocery bags and look at all the other things they're throwing away. And we're not going to get rid of this plastic. Us creating a ban, in my opinion, is not really going to send a message to anybody. We're just a little county.

I'm sorry. Council again, can we stay on the topic of this item because we'll be talking.

So that's why I'm asking.

We'll be asking, we'll be talking about that other ordinance later, so.

So what I'd like to know is again, is this, is the question whether or not to have our recycling facility propose this to Los Alamos County residents or not?

that's where i'm slightly confused i think the motion could be to you know investigate this further we heard from the environmental sustainability board they didn't seem like they had a lot of capacity so it could be you know investigating it with the consultant it's one of the things we get in trouble doing right hiring consultants to do stuff but there's no necessarily capacity for staff or the board to work on this per what they had told us.

I understand that either, I understand that the ESB is saying they don't have the bandwidth. I get that. I understand that Councilor Hand is proposing maybe a third party come in. So is that what the proposition is? Is We propose this to Los Alamos County residents. That's one. Two, we propose to a third party. Two, Marie, we have a consultant come in. Are those the choices?

I think it would be all part of that. So we do have a service currently, and we know how much it's utilized by the residents. And so everyone pays the same amount for a resident to have the roll carts. So one roll cart is the blue bin. And then you can actually, I think, still get more than one blue bin. If you have another brown bin or black bin, that will cost you more money for your house. And then the yard waste is also provided. So all that's on that basically recovered through the enterprise fund for environmental services. So if we have a different model, if we're collecting different stuff or we have other vendors, that would likely cost a different amount of money So that would be the money part of it. If we hired a consultant, hypothetically, they could also be looking at would people be wanting to do more recycling of different kinds of products, materials, than they currently can. And they can do that through the county. And there's also basically there are vendors that do this, that basically send you the packaging that you send back to them And you do the sorting on your end as opposed to they don't sort it. It's supposed to be 100% whatever it is that is in that pouch. And they have a number of different pouches that they offer. And some of the materials are very difficult to recycle because they're these multi-layer things. They're not as easy to recycle. So what was attached to this was our current contract with... It's the waste connections of Albuquerque, ESB Friedman. So it's basically the same Friedman plant. And we had heard before about that they didn't want plastic bags in particular because those actually jammed up their machinery. So they didn't function. They'd actually cause problems. So they would prefer having zero plastic bags come in at all. I think then the question came up about what's Smith's doing, which I think is different than what it was at one point. So is that, I don't want to get into the whole plastic bag discussion tonight because we're talking about other kinds of plastics that are not bags that we get at the store, including the multi-layer ones that are probably the most difficult to recycle. So did you want to say anything, Ms. Gurley, about the Smiths, information from Smiths about?

Just all we know is that Smiths is accepting the plastic wrap the bags the anything that you can poke your hole through your finger through that type of bag they'll accept that the front of their store and they are shipping those back to their headquarters and turning them into the decking material yeah so that's there's lots of overlaps between different things that's an overlap between what we could pay somebody else money to take them right but they take them

at smiths and theoretically do the same thing that this other company does for that one item or type item um so um so i think that's so we've been having questions in some discussion so i think um i will since we've had a lot of council discussion and we're getting close to the time we're supposed to be done i'll see if there's any public comment

Hi, Jody Benson, 3547 Pueblo Drive. I want to second everything that Councillor Cull said. What the problem would be if we started telling people that they could recycle whatever they wanted to recycle in single-use plastic is that it would make people, as Councilor Cole said, forget about reducing. First of all, reducing and reusing plastic. Recycling really doesn't happen with plastic. You can put them in treks, but we've already got that. That's the construction planks. And I think what this is coming down to is that, Maybe the council doesn't want to deal with the fact that we really need to eliminate the single use plastic shopping bag. Reduce that first. And this is the issue we're looking at. If we want to subscribe to RIDD well, like I do, and it's $30 a month, or you can do as I do, just wait until you fill a bag, and then you send it back, and they'll send you a new package to fill. But the most important thing is to reduce. Let's reduce. It's cheap. It doesn't cost a thing to ban the single-use plastic shopping bag. So what Councillor Cole said, I absolutely agree with. And what Councillor Hand is proposing is a personal thing. We can subscribe to RID well personally. And then we can reduce our plastic. So right now, let's focus on eliminating the single-use plastic shopping bag as so many other towns and countries are doing. Thanks.

Okay. Thank you, Ms. Benson. Do we have any other public comment? Is there anyone online who would like to make a public comment?

If you'd like to make a public comment, please raise your hand. Ms. Shin, you should be able to unmute. Please state your full name and limit your comments to three minutes.

We can't hear you yet, Dr. Shin.

You should be able to unmute or you should be unmuted.

Can you try to talk now?

Ms. Shin, I can promote you to a panelist if you accept, and then you should be able to unmute yourself.

Yeah. Can you test your microphone?

Are you able to hear me now?

Yes, we can hear you now. Thank you.

All right. So I'm Lisa Shin, and I'm at 637 47th Street. And I completely agree with Counselor Hand. I think it's a really great idea. I think it supports the citizens as well as the small businesses. I feel that if we... The alternative is the plastic bag ban. I think it's a terrible idea for the residents. I think it raises costs because people will simply buy plastic in other ways off the shelf, which is more expensive. And if you force people to buy a recycled bag, it's an enormous cost on top of groceries. So again, I think it's really... harmful to our middle class to be raising costs. And I think that Counselor Hand's proposal is actually an excellent use of public resources and I fully support it. I think it's great. I think it definitely addresses the bigger problem of plastics. And, you know, you go to these summer concerts and you have the county or you have the county with their plastic bags and plastic things that they're giving away. So I just kind of feel like it's very hypocritical for the County to be talking about a plastic bag ban when they're the worst offenders at the summer concert. I do think that counselor hands proposal really addresses the deeper issue of all the plastics that we are throwing away. And you know, you really can't change people's behavior. People, want to use their plastics for their trash cans, for their pets. It's impossible to get rid of plastic in this town. So anyway, thank you, Counselor Hand. I think it's great. Thank you.

Thank you, Dr. Shin. Do we have anybody else online that wanted to make a comment? We don't have many people left.

Chair, I'm not seeing any. Okay.

So the See if there's a council that wants to make a motion. Yes, and did you want to make a motion?

I'll make a motion. I know you guys will probably all vote it down anyway, but I move to direct the Environmental Sustainability Board to leave three pieces of work and report their findings back to council. as outlined in the presentation given tonight and report back to council by the end of the calendar year as to incorporate this in the next year's work plan.

Okay, is there a second? I'll second. Okay, so we have a motion by Councillor Hand and a second by Councillor Rieger. Do we have any discussion?

Councillor Hapman. Thank you, Chair. First, I'd like to commend Councillor Hand for bringing this. I think your presentation was really well done, especially for an introductory presentation. And I think that it I think that the motive behind it seems to be in line with our sustainability goals. And I think it's, I think it's a really interesting concept. I know people who have done it and people in our community who've done it like Ms. Benson. So that said, I also feel like at the same time, I think a higher priority, at least for this fiscal year, is to stay focused on the climate action plan priorities that are in process and really make progress on our composting efforts because that is something that without a comprehensive composting plan, the waste that goes to the landfill is very heavy. It weighs a lot and then that drives our costs up to our community members. I don't think that we could explore this right now without the retention of a third party consultant to do the due diligence on the cost benefit of such a program. I think there are a lot of good questions um, raised tonight and by the ESB prior to this. And then I, I had other, you know, kind of questions about it too, just the practicality of it, um, how it'd be implemented. And I, I think that would take the help of a consultant to explore it. And, and it's not something that we really talked about thoroughly in our budget process. That said, I think it's kind of what you're coming for tonight. Well, like, Hey, we can have new ideas. Um, as you know, not everything has to be at the budget hearing, so we can have new ideas. So let's consider it. So I'm a little bit torn because in an ideal world, I would love to see this. But at the same time, what I really would love to see maybe our resources go to besides the composting program is an education and outreach program where we really focus on the reduce, and reuse aspects of sustainability and reducing our carbon footprint and energy consumption. Because to me, that's one of the root problems of plastics is the petroleum that's needed to produce it and manufacture and distribute it. And then the waste that's provided. I also worry that if... I don't worry about this. One reason I was tempted to really wanna be gung-ho on this is the contamination rates of our current recycling program. You know, what people put in the blue bins, and I think some percentage of what gets put in blue bins is the kind of stuff that this program could help reduce and eliminate, and I think that would be a great benefit. But again, that would all need to be kind of studied and sorted out. There's a lot of unorganized thoughts. I apologize, but in I guess at this point in time, I personally would like to see us focus on the climate action plan points that are already in progress and composting program and an education program to reduce and reuse.

Any other comments?

Council Cole? Yeah, I mean, my concern is that we're asking the Environmental Sustainability Board to do this, and we heard from them that they really don't have the bandwidth to to deal with this. I mean, I'd rather see the Riddwell product or what they do better advertised within the community and see how many people actually sign up by the end of the calendar year. If we've got significant interest in that, I think then expanding it to a community-wide program might be worthwhile. assuming that this is not going to cost anything, I think is wrong based on, you know, some of the comments that we heard that, you know, banning plastics is going to cost people more. Well, recycling plastics, more plastics than we currently do is going to cost people more. So there are some cost considerations that need to be evaluated through the whole thing. But I think if people are willing right now to pay, whatever it costs to recycle additional plastics, it would be nice to know by maybe the end of the calendar year how many people have actually signed up for this program. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor Cole. Any other comments?

I have something to share. So is it possible for our recycling facility to just send out a flyer with a barcode that people could scan and then get a feel for who would be open to paying for whatever the site is, or if they have any additional questions. In other words, get a pulse from the community as to what they're willing to do. And that doesn't cost anything. I think that could just be a flyer or a mailer.

So that would probably be some additional work for somebody. But yeah, that conceptually could be done.

It is certainly more economical than the consultant. And it is something that you can get immediate returns on.

Yeah. So that is one of the three items was to get the feedback. But I think you're not asking for all three parts of the motion. You're asking for one part of the motion. Is that correct? Yes. Okay. So that's a different motion than what's on the table. What's on the table is for, I believe, the ESB to take the lead on this. Is that correct, Councilor Hand?

I need to explain one aspect of this whole proposal. This is not about a particular company, Redwell. It is used as an example because we heard this when they came to town, we heard that they can do this, which I didn't know that this was available. So we know that kind of recycling is out there. As far as I knew before that, we could only recycle the things that our county said that we could recycle. But now there's another company that comes into town and says that they can do this, but we can't recommend Ridwell. this has to be part of the procurement process. I don't want us to focus in on Redwell specifically. It's gotta be, can we look at our contracting processes can the contractor possibly even subcontract to another contractor who does that if they don't wanna do it or whatever. Those were all within the presentation. I talked about the public input and how we could do that. But the bottom line is we set the priorities for the Environmental Sustainability Board. If this is important to the council, then we say it's important and the priorities can be modified. And one of the things that I was told when our climate action plan was approved is that it was a living document and it could be changed. And that's what I believed when I approved, when I voted yes, I believe that it was not set in concrete. And I do believe that this is part of the climate action plan. And, you know, I'm just, I'm really surprised that the pro sustainability attitude that I've seen with council is not showing through tonight.

Okay. So I think the motion is though to ask this environmental sustainability board to do these things. Is that correct? Yes. Okay. So I think it might be different if it was a different scope where we were contracting it. So I guess, did you, Councilor Nguyen, have comments on this? Councilor Herman? Okay. So, yeah, obviously we would like to have more avenues for, you know, our waste and more, all we would like to reduce first. So that's the big question. That's a whole different discussion we're going to have about plastic bags. So with the information that people can take their plastic bags, which is one of the things that's difficult to recycle, back to Smith's, if that's where they got them from, then that kind of makes an impact on this particular service. And I do know that we had At the co-op, they used to have TerraCycle because they had a bin that they collected chip bags in, because those are one of those multi-layer bags that's very difficult to recycle. But they stopped collecting them because I think it was the cost. And it's also then people just dump their chip bags there from wherever they bought them into the roll cart. So, yeah, conceptually, this would be great. in the interim, when we're not getting rid of plastics, to have more options for recycling. I won't get into the debate, is it actually being recycled? If it's being turned into a board, it's debatable, right? It's not being turned back into a plastic bag or a chip bag. It's being turned into something else. So that isn't really closing the loop if we do that. So they're interesting services. Yeah, they could have unintended consequences of what basically tells people, yeah, you can not feel guilty about plastics by having this option. That certainly does help with it, the issue that we have. But I don't see how the Environmental Sustainability Board would have the ability to do this particular activity. They could probably pull people. We could find out, you know, six months from now or a year from now, will there be more data on people using this kind of service? I don't think it's out the window. We have five more years left on the existing contract. With this information being relatively new to a lot of people in town, like you said, I think that giving it another year makes some sense. We'll have the discussion about the plastic bag ordinance in about a month, four weeks from now, right? So that's a related, unrelated topic tonight. So, yeah, with the way the motion is stated, I'm not going to support it. I do appreciate all the work that Lincoln went into this and appreciate you bringing it to this option. And it isn't about a particular contract, but it's a kind of thing that we might be able to do. And hopefully we'll people take advantage of the options we have. We now have more information out to the public about this. So I think if there's no other comments, I'll at least call the roll.

Councilor Neal-Clinton? Councilor Neal-Clinton?

And the motion is whether or not this is going to be an action item for ESP, correct? Yes.

Did you say yes?

Do you want me to repeat the motion?

Please restate the motion so the councilors know what they're voting on.

Okay. I move to direct the Environmental Sustainability Board to leave three pieces of work and report their findings back to council as outlined in this presentation tonight and report back to Council by the end of this calendar year.

Okay, is that clear? Yes.

Yes. So, yeah.

Councillor Hand.

Yes. Councilor Herman? No. Councilor Wrighty?

No.

Councilor Raycor?

Yes.

Councilor Haveman?

No.

Councilor Cole?

No.

Motion fails four to three with Councilors Herman, Wrighty, Haveman and Cole voting against.

Okay, the motion failed three to four with councillors Havenman, Coleride, and Herman voting against. Okay, so thank you for bringing that to us, Councillor Hand. Appreciate all the discussion. Okay, so we're on to 10b, appointments. We don't have any tonight. 10c, the board and commission vacancy report, 21182-26, that's attached. Are there any 10 D as board and commission reports? Do we have any reports tonight?

Thank you, chair. On June 17th, the board of public utilities meeting was a full agenda with the following highlights. BPU supported a revised ordinance that limited the gas rate increase to the 2027 rate increase and removed the additional 2028 rate rate increase. Council will see a revised ordinance on an upcoming agenda. Deputy Utility Manager of Electric Distribution Dennis Astley gave a presentation on his research and cost estimates to underground electrical distribution lines. White Rock has almost 26 miles of overhead power line, and the town site has 45 miles. The cost estimate was very high, over a million dollars per mile, and has some downsides. The presentation was just information at this point. Deputy Utility Manager of Finance and Administration Joanne Gentry provided an overview of the reserves policy and modeled what would change in the 10-year budget projections of these policies if these policies were revised. It appears that it may make sense to have different amounts of reserves for each utility to address their unique circumstances if that is possible. Staff will assess the issue more. BPU supported Council placing the recommended charter changes on the November ballot, eliminating the profit transfer language. And BPU Chair Robert Gibson will be presenting the Board's annual update to Council next week on the 14th.

Okay, thank you. Councilor Herman, do we have any other? Sure.

Councilor Herman? Thanks. At the last Planning and Zoning Commission meeting a couple weeks ago, the only item on the agenda was the item that we had tonight regarding the amendments for the Chapter 16 Development Code. Thank you.

Thank you. Okay, not seeing any other reports. Let's see. There's no report attached to this Cam, Andrew, have any items you'd like to inform council of? No, not tonight? OK. So 10 AFIS Council Chair Report. So there was a request to change the appointments to the North Center New Mexico Economic Development District. So we'll have Councillor Hand Mr. Kudiak-Cove, and alternate will be Mr. Isaacson. So that was a letter I signed tonight to make that change. Then just a couple of meetings since last week. Had a constituent meeting last Tuesday about low-income apartment, some issues they were having. There was a meeting that I believe three of us attended that NMED is putting on as basically kind of their technical work group on hexavalent chromium. As we heard, I think tonight the Department of Energy is not attending these meetings, nor their contractor. So I went to the Overlook Park for the events there on the 4th, and they were quite nice, and the turnout might have been a little bit less than some other years, but hopefully people will get accustomed to those years when we don't have fireworks. I know that there's a lot of pet owners and other animal owners that don't really like the fireworks. And I think that there were some major issues one time when they were on North Mesa. So they were out there one year at least, and some the last 20, I think. And then where you talked about the commissioner affiliate meeting, that was all that I had. 10G is approval of councilor expenses. Do we have any expenses for going anywhere? OK. Not seeing any. So 10H is preview of upcoming agenda items. We have 10H121096, TS26, tickler. So we're going to be having the gas rates, I think, not on the tickler, but we'll have Currently, the schedule is that the LIDA projects that we heard about last month are still, I think, scheduled maybe for introduction on the 14th. Is that correct or are they slipping?

Chair, the two that you heard the initial introductory presentations are back in our hands. We're reviewing to see how many changes were requested so that we can figure out if we can make it. We'll try to still make the soonest meeting we can, but we're assessing, we just got those back like I think yesterday.

Okay. So those may be coming and we certainly want to make sure everyone's aware when we have the introductions and then the hearings. Um, and then just was informed earlier today that, uh, There was a problem with the water rate ordinance that was the version that we had in the package had basically a typo in it. So that has to be reintroduced. Or I guess it has to go back through BPU and then the council. We don't have a specific date as to when that's going to happen. Do we miss sleep art?

That's correct, Chair. The version that was introduced at the Board of Public Utilities initial introduction was the correct version of the ordinance. At the public hearing for the Board of Public Utilities, that wasn't the version that was approved by the Board. So the Board approved an ordinance that wasn't introduced and that the ordinance that the The incorrect ordinance that was approved at the public hearing by BPU was the incorrect ordinance approved by council. So we need to go back. BPU can have a public hearing because they've introduced the correct ordinance, have a hearing on that correct ordinance, and then it will then be come to council again.

Okay. So that's going to be coming maybe relatively soon. Okay, so that's it for that. Counselor comments, any counselor comments tonight? Okay, and I guess if there are no objections, we are adjourned.