City Council - Regular Meeting

Hello. you so so so so you Thank you. you you

Doing well and back to our regular schedule in terms of our council meetings. Today is Wednesday, August 5th, and we will start our study session. For the record, Councilman Lee will be participating electronically through Microsoft Teams, and we have items one and three being executive sessions. Ms. Clerk?

Item 1 is a notice as executive session, Jankey v. Thalia-Tucson et al., Pima County Superior Court, case number C20257439. Item 3 is notice as an executive session discussion, water resources developments and infrastructure funding opportunities with the United States Bureau of Reclamation to mitigate drought in the Lower Colorado River Basin.

I have a motion to go into executive, please.

So moved. Second.

There is a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. And for the audience and those in attendance, I believe this executive session is going to be about an hour. So we'll see you in an hour. Thank you.

Bye. ¶¶ Thank you. you Thank you. Bye. Bye. so so you you Thank you. you you

Thank you.

Thank you. ¶¶ Thank you. Thank you. you you you so you

you

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you.

¶¶ so Thanks for watching! you you Bye. you so so Thank you.

Only because it's going to take the same effort.

okay everyone we need a motion to return to our regular setting seconds there's a motion and a second any further discussion hearing none all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye aye any against motion carries all righty what is the council's pleasure for item two

Your Honor, an appropriate motion would be to move that the Mayor and Council authorize and direct the City Attorney to proceed as discussed in the Executive Session to include the settlement of this tort lawsuit in the amount of $115,000.

So moved.

Second. So there's a motion and a second. Any further discussion on this item? Hearing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Any against? Motion carries. What is the council's pleasure for item four?

Your Honor, an appropriate motion would be to proceed as discussed in Executive Session 2.1, authorize the city attorney and the city manager to negotiate and the mayor to execute a system conservation implementation agreement and any associated storage or exchange agreements with the United States Bureau of Reclamation, Requiring the bureau to pay the city to complete the savs ARP expansion before 2032 in exchange for storage and exchange rights within the state for the benefit of tribal nations and others and to Authorize the city attorney to approve as to form and the mayor to execute an IGA with the Arizona State Land Trust to authorize reassignment and reallocation of Central Arizona water project water to facilitate economic development of state land trust land Your honor I'd like to make this motion and also acknowledge all the great work staff has done to make this happen I

There is a motion there's a motion a second any further discussion. You know all those in favor please signify by saying aye aye aye against. Motion carries thank you so much item 5 time has been set aside for mayor and Council consideration of the fiscal year 2027 economic and workforce development selection committee Mister manager.

Thank you, honorable mayor and members of the council. Joining me here is chief economic development officer Mike Jakowski. For the study session, it's essentially an overview of the process and the recommendations from the committee that was assigned by you all to review the proposals and recommend awards. And then, subject to your discussion today, there is an item on consent tonight for you to take action with regard to those recommendations so for now it's an update I turn it to Mister Chikowsky.

Thank you again Mister Tamir good afternoon mayor Romero members of the council thank you for time today as we discuss the economic and workforce grant committee funding recommendations As a reminder, this is a process that occurs every two years with $600,000 budgeted for the categories of small business support and development, job training for at-risk adults, job training for at-risk youths, long-term job training, and special events. We do have this, as Mr. Manager mentioned, on tonight's agenda for final recommendation approval. Upon a budget approval for FY28, we would continue a second year of funding for each one of the awardees, the amount allocated. This year, we did receive 76 proposals, so we had quite a lift for our committee members to review those in a compressed amount of time. The breakdowns of small business had eight proposals requesting $414,000 and change. At-risk adults, 13 proposals requesting $1,097,000. At-risk youths, 13 proposals requesting $567,000 and change. Long-term job training, six proposals requesting $456,000 and change. And 36 special events applications requesting $507,596. The committee chose to fund four small business organizations with an amount of $95,000, five in the at-risk youth category, totaling $90,000, five in the at-risk adult programs, totaling $145,000, three long-term training organizations, totaling $165,000, and 16 special events, totaling $105,000. So a significant impact for COSA. Committee did focus on applications that had strong community benefits, but also budgets that indicated they could support sustainable activities. The city funding really acting as a gap for those not the primary source of funding for these events or programs. The applications that were not funded were lacking in one or both of these criteria. Organizations, programs, and events recommended scored the highest and did have a gap between those scoring. So we did choose to score the highest level and then where the break was. And at that point, it just becomes an accounting problem to divvy up the $600,000 to the respective awardees. I would also like to thank very much Jackie Vega For her, she is actually the one that did really all of the hard work on this. I'm just the shiny face for this. And I would also like to thank committee members. And we have two committee members here today, if you'd like to acknowledge them for their outstanding work. We did have a significant amount of meetings reviewing these applications, some of them several hundred pages long, reviewing budgets, documents, everything, and then the effort to get them down to the $600,000 from the $3 million in total asks. So thank you all very much for your time. Really appreciate the opportunity to present this today and happy to answer any questions if you have any.

Thank you so much. Really appreciate the presentation. Thoroughly reviewed both all of the need, right, all of the applicants and their needs, as well as the work that was done by the committee members. I want to thank especially the committee members for the incredible work that you've done. and being the community voice to bring the different perspectives to the table that ended up with a really incredible group of organizations that are being funded. This is an important investment in my view. I was here at this table when we created this economic development investment in both workforce development and nonprofit groups as well as event investment. uh it means a lot to me that we were able to keep it um as part of our budgeting process this year this particular funds uh were at on the chopping block and because of american council and community we were able to keep it um and continue to grant funds for for these groups so appreciate it again the committee members our staff that has done incredible work receiving and organizing and putting us all together. I appreciate it. The intent of these funds are to have a strong economic impact as possible and then to help promote not only events that we've seen in our community for 30 plus years, but new events. that are attracting a diversity of our residents in the city of tucson so appreciate all the incredible work and i did have a couple of questions because we have on the events piece we have events that the city of tucson has traditionally funded for example the mlk march and rally We also funded changing name, the Cesar Chavez March and Rally. And I know that there's a group of people changing that particular name, but are those still at the table or are they, because I know that we just had funding that these groups didn't have to apply for. Are those still at the table?

Yeah, Mayor Romero, those were not applicants in this particular program. We fund those through other sources of revenues. And on that topic, there were some other programs that if the city already participates in, we chose not to fund them through this. The committee chose not to fund them through these dollars because it was almost considered double dipping. We're already participating in those types of programs. We provide in-kind dollars or programs FUNDING THROUGH POLICE, THROUGH BARRICADES, THROUGH TRANSPORTATION, ALL DIFFERENT SOURCES THROUGHOUT THE CITY OF TUESAN.

THANK YOU. ANY OTHERS? VICE MAYOR AND THEN COUNCILMEMBER DALL.

I ALSO WANT TO RETIRE THE GRATITUDE TO OUR COMMITTEE MEMBERS FOR SPENDING SO MUCH TIME GOING THROUGH ALL THESE MATERIALS. And you, Mike, for kind of helping lead that effort. My question is, there's a number of organizations that are prior applicants who have received funding. When you're looking at their grant proposals, are they also seeing like the outcomes The previous year of how they use you know the city funds to do their work so that we know we're continuing to find programs that are having an impact rather than just.

Seeing it at face value for the ground yes the vice mayor Santa Cruz excellent question that is actually a significant conversation that the committee has. that Jackie actually puts a lot of work together collecting the data and the information from our current grantees that we have awarded previous funding to. The number one thing that we want to ensure is that they are doing what they said they're going to be doing. And we are constantly updating the requests for the data that we can collect to provide good feedback not only to our committee members but to the council as well. For example, we had questions from Ward 5 about what type of activities happen in the specific boards. We weren't collecting that type of data before. We are now working on collecting that type of data. But it is something that the committee really looks closely on for existing awardees that they've done what they said they were going to do. And if there are any questions about them not performing or anything, we have those conversations, and that's considered in the scoring.

Council Member Dahl and then Council Member Barajas.

Thank you, Mayor. Mike, great report. I don't have any questions because we had a great session where I was able to do a deep dive. And the one thought I have that I want to express in public is that these were great proposals. And it's a shame that we couldn't fund almost all of them. There was a line we had to, I see the committee members shaking their heads yes. And it's a shame that we don't. But hopefully these groups will continue their great work and look for funding in other sources. Thank you, Mike.

Councilmember I has and then councilmember Schubert. Thank you, ma'am. Well, I just want to thank you all. Thank you to the members of the economic and workforce development selection committee for your thoughtful work that went into reviewing these proposals and developing these funding recommendations. I know it wasn't an easy decision with 3 million in requests and only 600,000 available. I do want to thank our Ward 5 Commissioner, Lovely Gantner, who's here in the room for sharing each each step of the process with our Ward 5 community and partners that applied for the first time. I just have a question in regards to accountability measures. What's in place to ensure that the funding organizations meet their performance goals over the next two year grant cycle? And how can we encourage collaboration amongst the grantees and also the recipients that did not receive an award?

Thank you, Councilmember Barajas. Jackie now has the pleasure of writing all of the contracts for each one of these awardees, and into each one of those contracts, we have them write their metrics on what they tell us they plan to achieve that aligns, obviously, with their application and what they hope to achieve. We want it to be as achievable and as easily done as possible. We're not asking for criteria that's going to be not measurable. So we are looking for those metrics and that data and to ensure that they are doing that. If for whatever reason they do not achieve those metrics, we do request information that states what happened, why didn't you achieve it. And if it's reasonable conversations, obviously we're going to do everything we can to fund them and keep them doing what they want to do. If it's something where we're just not getting any response, we have not funded organizations in the past because of either a lack of response or lack of performance. And as far as collaboration, as you know, we have more nonprofits here in Tucson than just about anywhere else. And that is one thing that we obviously try to work on with everybody, to work as much as possible. They all have great relationships with each other already. And in fact, you see that in the applications when you review them, that they all do work together on all of these programs. So we've already got some great collaboration, and we just continue to work on that.

Thank you.

Just adding my voice to the chorus of thanks to the EWDSC committee members and specifically our appointee, Gene, who's our Ward 6 appointee. He was particularly complimentary of Mike and Jackie. I want to take this opportunity to lift up Gene himself as our commissioner. He's one of our first-time appointees. And he brings a background of C-suite level positions with Birkenstock, Epson, and the Diabetes Hands Foundation, as well as positions at UC Berkeley and San Jose State. So we were really excited that he was willing to offer his experience, his expertise, and his perspective to this process and how the city is investing our resources. As the committee worked through the applications, Gene kept us updated about the process and we met with him once the recommendations were finalized in order to get more context about what informs this final list. He had a great understanding of the values of our office, but also brought a lot of his own questions and thoughtful approach to the entire review. we are really grateful for commissioners like him who can offer an informed citizen layer of input to our public processes it sounds like he and the other committee members are interested in staying engaged beyond this recommendation list to potentially refine the application evaluation also the grant monitoring process so we hope that they are able to do that it would be wonderful to keep utilizing their expertise as we continue to refine and improve our processes. And then just two quick questions. Thanks for sharing the rubric. We were wondering if it's ever planned to share the rubric publicly as far as how the applications were evaluated and scored. And then my second question, are there any plans to align future grant review rubrics with our prosperity initiative or PCHIP frameworks? in order to improve consistency in our assessment and how we're investing in key areas.

Thank you, Councilmember Schubert, on those nice comments. I will say it was nice having Gene sitting on some luxurious port wherever he was working on this, so to be joining remotely was phenomenal, but he did provide some great input. As far as the rubric, we can absolutely share that, and we have shared those in the past. we we it's a great scoring criteria not only for our staff to be able to provide metrics for us in the committee's to put these together but we also again jackie as luxury of sending letters to the folks that we are not funding and we use those that scoring in that rubric as criteria to let them know here's things that you can work on here's where. the committee felt that your application may have been lacking. So we can absolutely share that. As far as the prosperity and all of the other things, absolutely. That is something that Lane Mandel and I are strongly working together in. We're really excited to have the opportunity to bring all of these together so that we can have true reflection of Tucson in all of these applications and all of the plans and ideas and everything that Mayor and Council proposes over the years to come.

And then is this a one year to year.

Allocation it may remember oh yes this is a one-year allocation to be renewed the next fiscal year upon budget approval if this is continued in the next budget okay it's a two-year. Sizable allocation your cycle that the grant and the application I'm sorry the contract will be absolutely the same renewed next fiscal year, all the same metrics, all the same dollar amounts. Okay. In two years, we will renew the process all over again.

Okay, all righty. So two year with the renewal pending budget. Excellent. All righty, any other questions or comments? Thank you all so much. Thank you to the committee members for your incredible work. Really appreciate it. All righty, so we move on. to item six. Item six is an update. Let me make sure that I'm reading correct. Time has been set aside to discuss the second annual report on the implementation progress of Tucson Resilient Together, the city's climate action and adaptation plan. Mr. Manager.

Thank you, honorable mayor and members of the council. Joining me here for this item are our chief resilience officer, Fatima Luna, our lead for the Office of Community and Economic Impact, Lane Mandel. And we are also presenting to you an update on all things trees. So I want to give also a quick acknowledgement to Nicole Gillette, our urban forestry program manager. And there's a whole team of folks that work across the city on climate action. But Fatima has the honor and privilege of representing all of those efforts here in this report and at this table. So with that, I'll turn it over to the team to begin the update.

Thank you, manager, honorable mayor, members of the council. So it has been three years since you all adopted the city's climate action plan, Tucson Resilient Together. And in your materials, there is a 40-page detailed report on everything that city departments and divisions have done during the fiscal year of 2026. Rather than walking you through the entire report, Leigh Nicole and I will provide very targeted and key updates on some very cool initiatives. But if you do want some more to dive deeper in any of the actions or reporting sections, we're happy to meet with your offices. And of course, we're happy to answer any questions after our presentation. So during the reporting period, 87% of the 122 actions were advanced. That's up from 85% from our last report. And so much of that progress, like the manager mentioned, it is really the result of the many city departments and divisions that are dedicated through implementing climate-related projects, not only through their ongoing operational budgets, but also some of the of the capital improvement projects. So these are existing and not new investments. So in total they have invested during the reporting period about $220 million. And again, existing investments, not new ones. And so these investments really support essential services that our community needs on a daily basis, from safer streets to reliable water infrastructure to affordable housing, improvements in parks, waste reduction, and many other strategies. So I want to highlight the climate action. It's not happening in one office or in one team, but it's happening across our city departments. And so I really want to, you know, make sure that you or council know that, but also our community. And so one key update that I want to share with you is the draft implementation strategy for the Energy Collaboration Agreement, or the ECA for short. And so, as you know, voters will have the opportunity or, you know, if approved by voters, if voters approve the franchise agreement in November, then the ECA will become effective. And so, to be prepared for that, we developed an implementation strategy that is a draft. And so, essentially, it is a framework to prioritize how those $2 million could be used initially, and so this strategy is built around three primary objectives. The first one is to ensure that investments reflect the community's priorities that were identified in the adopted ECA. Second, that prioritize projects, reduce energy burden, and also lower heat-trapping emissions as well as community resilience. And then lastly, that we maximize community benefits by investing in projects that not only create multiple benefits to our community, but also that help us build the city's long-term capacity to implement the agreement. So what we're proposing, at least for the first two years, is to focus on the investments in five main categories. The first one is household investments. So these are investments that will go directly into people's homes from weatherization, retrofits, energy efficiency and electrification, as well as rough rooftop solar, and so we are proposing that 60 to 65% of these investments or of the ECA allocation goes to that. The second is community resilience infrastructure. So these are things that will improve our community-wide resilience to extreme heat such as cooling centers, urban forestry, resilient hubs, emergency preparedness, and other cooling infrastructure. The third one is workforce and implementation capacity. We know that successfully implementing the ACA will require dedicated staff and trained workforce. So including energy auditors and weatherization specialists. And then the fourth one is municipal and public facilities. So these includes investments in building retrofits, energy efficiency improvements, EV charging infrastructure, as well as other investments that will help us reduce operating costs. and improve performance across city facilities. And then lastly is innovation. So this is where we get to pilot emerging technologies as well as explore potentially like innovative financial tools such as an energy revolving fund. So the idea is that if there's savings generated through retrofits and efficiency projects in facilities, those could be reinvested in community, you know, projects. You do have an attachment B in your materials. It is, again, a 40-page implementation strategy. So I am really looking for your feedback. If we don't have enough time today, I'm happy to schedule one-on-one meetings with your offices to get more detailed feedback on this implementation strategy. The idea is that I obtain your feedback before the strategy is finalized. And so my final update before turning it to Lane, is the Youth Climate Action Fund. So the city recently received funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies to provide micro-grants to youth climate, youth-led projects. So we are one in 300 cities across the world that received the funding, and I believe we're only We're one in only two cities in the whole state that have ever received this funding. Mesa was another one that received the funding last year. So I want to thank our mayor for her leadership in establishing the relationship with Bloomberg Philanthropies. Participation in this program requires formal commitment from the mayor, and so your formal letter really allows to participate in the program. So thank you. I also want to recognize Council Member Dole and Council Member Barajas for your support in helping brainstorm, plan, and potentially implement some of the project. And then finally, just want to share some flyers with you. I would love for you to help me spread the word. We do want a large pool of applicants so that we can select some of the projects and really help our youth lead the way as they have been in climate action. So with that, I'll pass it on to Lane.

Honorable Mayor, Vice Mayor, members of the Council, I just want to take a quick minute to highlight some pretty incredible work that city staff has been doing over the last year. Fatima has been working with a nonprofit research group, the Urban Institute out of Washington, DC, as they examine how investments in climate resiliency and infrastructure could possibly lead to a viable economic development strategy. So working alongside staff from the mayor's office, the city manager's office, and local First Arizona, Urban Institute has interviewed dozens of stakeholders across different sectors of our community. They convened a focus group of 11 local businesses here in our community. And all in an attempt to better understand how we could possibly build pathways to economic development through our sustainability work. And this last month, Fatima and I were invited to Washington DC to speak on a panel for the Urban Institute entitled Mobilizing Community and Economic Development to Address Climate Change in Front of More Than 800 People. And the panel highlighted the incredible potential Tucson has in creating a sustainable and resilient economy. It also recognized your foresight to combine the five focus groups that now live in the Office of Community and Economic Impact. It was through your leadership that we combined economic development, equity, small business, and climate resilience strategies to create a shared vision for long-term prosperity in our community. And I don't want to create any spoilers because the research has not yet been released, but the Urban Institute concurs that by combining these different focus areas, these different work areas, we can not only respond better to climate and resource pressures, but we can shape a more inclusive, adaptable, and durable economy for our community's future. From our incredible legacy in our community for conservation to our capacity for research and training, Tucson has a really strong foundation, is what the research found, to build in this sector. So using this research from the Urban Institute combined with the work staff just recently wrapped up with the Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Program, this work can all help us substantially define a green economic strategy for our future that benefits both our residents and our local businesses. So an incredible bit of timing, some great timing. Just this morning, Fatima got the green light to send you all a sneak preview of the Urban Institute report. So you have that in your emails today before it rolls out to the world later this month. And we really look forward to diving into that report with you and talking about this important work more in the future. And I am going to turn my chair over to Nicole Gillette to talk about the urban forestry program.

Good afternoon, everyone. For those of you I haven't formally met yet, my name is Nicole Gillette. I'm the urban forestry manager for the city of Tucson. I do come bearing tiny gifts, especially for folks who have not yet received one. These are our little tree pins that we received from the Arbor Day Foundation for being a tree city. Some of you already have one, but feel free to take one on and pass it along. Yeah, this is it. It's only here.

Full disclosure, she had given me one before the event. So I have mine.

They're tiny, but they're very cute. I'm here today just to provide a very brief update on the urban forestry program and Tucson Million Trees. A more comprehensive update was included as an attachment to the TRT memo. And as Fatima said, I'm happy to have any follow-up conversations with any of you at a later date as well. I wanted to start by mentioning that spring brought us two records One was the earliest hundred degree day in the city's history on March 19th So not super exciting the other was our record tree planting season so this season alone We planted over 20,000 trees which is thousands more than we planted last year which was thousands more than we planted the year before and And so while we are incredibly proud of these 200,000 trees that have been planted towards Tucson Million Trees, we continue to feel this demand outstripping supply. Every year the urgency sort of just seems to increase as we get the earlier 100 degree days and also our later 100 degree days too. The season just seems to be going on and on and the nights especially are not cooling off. So the need for this work only seems to be getting more important. and more urgent every year. And I remember sitting down when I started this role in 2020 with Tim and many of you talking about what the urban forestry program should look like and what it should be. And we all recognized that the mayor and council had a lot of foresight in creating an urban forestry program because While planting trees is incredibly important, it's just one component of this work. Planting, of course, is essential. It's what's going to get us our next urban forest. But we also need to think about the urban forest of today. So we need to be making sure that the plants and trees that we are putting in the ground are making it to maturity. I often talk about the economic impacts of our urban forest and the long-term impacts of what we're doing. We only get those if our trees make it to maturity. while I spend a lot of my fun time planting trees, actually most of my time goes into thinking about how can I get those young trees to survive. And that's really been my focus for this last year. We actually received a new grant to advance young tree work. I see it as our most important intervention point. It's the lowest cost time to get in when that tree is small and young and malleable. And we have a lot of cutting-edge research that that is also just the best time for the tree's health to get in and make those changes to make sure that that tree can grow up with minimal maintenance interventions into a mature tree that will give us all the shade and benefits. So that was one of my top priorities for the year. And the second was protecting and caring for our urban forest that is mature, that does exist. We've had a lot of pieces fall into place just this year with implementing our tree inventory, our plan standards and practices, and wrapping up a new training program that's available to all of our staff and contractors. So we're getting everyone on the same page. It, of course, will take time. And like the rest of the industry, we face basically constant turnover in staff. But we're going to keep making this a part of onboarding. And eventually, we'll touch every hand that also touches trees one day. So at the same time, we've continued to lose trees to extreme heat. Record numbers of trees we lost just to heat this year. And also some of the things that come along with heat stress, trees become a lot more vulnerable to pests and other things when they're already stressed. So we've unfortunately lost a lot of trees to that. Prolonged drought impacts and just changes to our water cycle in general. And then also a lot of preventable human impacts and those we still try to tackle head on. Much of the federal funding and technical support that helped launch this work is all but gone at this point. And many of our sort of low-hanging fruit, for lack of a better way of saying that, is either underway or completed. So we're kind of at this pivot point. And so what I'm here to sort of announce to all of you and also ask for your input is, We're looking at updating our community forest action plan. We are five years in, which seems a little bit unimaginable, but here we are. And we're looking at pivoting some of our approaches to reflect sort of realistically the lessons we've learned through these five years and where we are now, which is a very different place than when we launched this program. and what changes do we need to make internally and maybe what new partnerships do we need to bring in to really launch us into this next phase. And I'm saying that not to be discouraging, just realistically frame what is the next phase of this program. As we bring these updates, we're also launching into a lot of exciting new ventures which are gonna sort of really get those high tree numbers in the ground, just as one example. We've worked in a lot of neighborhoods. Our approach has always been working directly with residents to get trees in the ground. Tree giveaways are great. They do help our numbers get up. Just counting numbers works great, and we have a lot of new tools to advance that data. But we also know that getting that tree in the ground on that first day is the really important first step to make sure that that tree survives. But also, when you show up in a neighborhood for the first time, you're a new face. You're not trusted yet. People don't know who you are. And it really takes a couple of cycles of that work before neighbors start being like, That person got a cool tree a couple years ago. Maybe I'll do it this year. And so we're seeing record uptake on these programs. And we're going to be able to hit basically all of our priority neighborhoods this and next planting season again and again, sometimes for the third time. And that's when you start seeing like 300 trees go in the ground at a time, right? So that's just one example. We're also looking at some really exciting high density planting locations. That's where you can sort of ignore all the rules and just get a lot of trees in the ground in an area on a more of a reforestation approach, which is fun for me, but of course will require innovative funding approaches. And so on that note, we're looking at not only scaling up planting, but also improving how we count trees, which sounds a little bit nuanced. But we now have the tree inventory and that allows us to automate some of this data tracking in a way that I haven't been able to before and lets me bring in a lot of data sources that I didn't necessarily have access to before. And so we're looking at partnering to sort of think about from seed to the end, all of our nursery locations, you know, where are these trees going? We also have new planning tools as we implement both middle housing and updates to the landscaping code. to think about how we're pulling in numbers whenever a tree goes in the ground, not just one that I have direct access and eyes on the ground. And then this update to the plan will also prioritize strengthening the urban forest we already have. As I said, one important piece of that is actually activating a piece of the charter that's already in place that allows mayor and council to manage public trees. It's just not something that's explicitly in code yet. And so we are... tentatively calling that our tree protection ordinance and it will recognize that trees are a valuable piece of city infrastructure and also gives us just a little bit more backing to say that these are public assets and trees and we will treat them accordingly lots of input to from all of you on that much still needed but that will be I think a critical piece to sort of protect all of our current assets from things that may be happening in the field that either I am or not aware of But I can't do this alone. Beyond my position, Tucson Million Trees receives no ongoing general fund support. So we've relied on partnerships, grants, fundraising, one-time funding, and then also leveraging our existing budgets within departments to make all this work happen. So just putting that out there, we're running on the ends of the shoestrings here. So I very much welcome all your feedback, ideas, and partnership with all your offices as we move forward into this next phase. And more to come next quarter.

Thank you so much. Appreciate the presentation. It was a pretty chunky presentation, everything from the ECA to Some Million Trees to our new Office of Community and Economic Impact and Bloomberg Harvard work that we are doing. And then, of course, the funds that we received from Bloomberg Philanthropies for our youth impact grant. So it's all very super exciting news. I want to thank you, Fatima, our Chief Resilience Officer, for leading such an incredible team and staff members. Nicole, thank you for your incredible work. Dr. Karina Martinez, she just got her PhD, I saw in the report, and had a little baby girl. And on top of all of the incredible work that you're doing, you all, the mighty team, was able to put together more than 39 events. engaging almost 1,000 community members in all of the work that you're doing. Heat resiliency, I mean, this office and the work that you're doing is invaluable. And all of it, we have been working on, what is it, the past six years? But the Tucson Resilient Together Climate Action Plan, we're celebrating three years of it. fast, furious, impactful work that make a difference in the lives of our community. And so I just wanted to thank you, congratulate you for the incredible work, many times just going on grants and fundraising that we've done together and our work with the community, all volunteers, and of course I want to thank Tucson Clean and Beautiful, Trees for Tucson, because they help us lead, especially in our Tucson Million Trees Initiative. 200,000 trees is an incredible feat. Sometimes, you know, I represent Tucson all over the world, and I'm a part of Climate Mayors, and so when mayors are like, since I got elected four years ago, we've planted 5,000 trees, and I'm like, ha! Okay. So I know I'm a competitive mayor, what can I say? But the work that we're doing is very, very important. Some people call this work as a... Choice that we choose to invest in and focus on You know they call it Things that are not important that it's politically leaning Kind of fun work I'll say this year we hit a hundred degrees in March before we even started spring and and i know all of us watch tv and we know what's happening in in washington and in europe and in all parts of canada in terms of forest fires that are happening really precipitated by climate change And so we know what's happening with the drought in our state and the lack of water in the Colorado River that will impact each and every one of us that receive Colorado River water. And so some cities and towns in Arizona more than Tucson because we as a city have prepared for decades for this drought. And so the work that you're all doing is incredibly important and does affect especially those hit first and worst are the most vulnerable communities amongst us. The work that we're doing in heat resiliency is really leading in the state and around the country. Those residents hit by climate change and heat are the most vulnerable. Children, seniors, low-income communities, our unsheltered residents, those are the ones, people that work outside, those are the ones that are hit first and worst. And I'm proud of the work that we've done. I'm proud as the mayor of our city that I ran on this agenda, that we continue to work on this agenda, that the city of Tucson was the first city in Arizona that passed a climate emergency. And from that climate emergency, we worked with our community to put together our climate action plan. So very important work. I'm very proud of what we've done together. For me, I think it's important to talk about our Office of Community and Economic Impact and the work. You're so kind, Lane Mandel, that you're saying we've led in putting together this office that is so innovative. I think all of us have added to that. you know, the thought of putting this together, right? Putting the equity work, the environmental work that we're doing, climate resiliency work, the small business program that didn't exist, all of this at the table. So we've done transformational work, but I do have to credit you and the innovation team of Bloomberg Harvard, our team that really envisioned like, why don't we create an office? You all have led in this and it has been because of all of our work together that you all came up with such an incredible office. I know that the Bloomberg Harvard team, innovation team, also worked with the Urban Institute and really kind of said, let's separate the work here. Urban Institute focused on working with labor and other environmental groups. on putting together the thoughts and their surveying and their work for economic development opportunities for our community as what as bloomberg harvard did so all in all you can tell how excited i get about this work it's incredibly important and the strides that we've been hitting are equally important My one question that I have in terms of the energy collaboration agreement is the draft of where to allocate the funds. Was that put together with community input?

Honorable Mayor, members of the council, so the draft was put together through a diverse approach. First, we did a desk research looking at best practices of what other cities have done when they when they have dedicated funding for climate work and how they kind of manage that. Second, we had a meeting with the city's climate action team where we presented like initial thoughts Councilmember Dahl was part of that meeting. And so providing some feedback on the strategy. And then third, we also met initially with the Commission on Climate, Energy and Sustainability, talked through like initial ideas and they provided feedback on what they would like to see. And then we also requested feedback from some key community experts. on what they would think the best prioritization framework would be. But most importantly, we wanted to stay true to what we heard throughout the energy future town halls on what the community wanted to see and how they wanted to prioritize. So reducing energy burden or increasing affordability was kind of like the main concept. And doing that at the resident or household level was also what they share. That is the first line of defense when people where community members have a safe, healthy home where they can stay cool during extreme heat, save as their homes are weatherized, save in energy bills. That's their first line of defense that even before going to cooling centers. So that was the thought process of how that priority framework was put together. But again, it is completely, you know, We're looking for your feedback and we can adjust it as you see fit.

So being one that has followed the community town halls that have been put together to talk about the energy collaboration agreement and the TEP franchise extension, that's the biggest part that I saw that people wanted to see investment in. And so I'm glad that it has the biggest chunk of investment in the initial investment framework. I want to make sure that I open it up. Questions, comments, observations from any Council Member Schubert? And then Council Member, Councilwoman Lee.

Thank you so much. Well, I want to be mindful of time, so just ditto to everything Mayor Romero said. 100% agree about the praise, about the great work that you all have been doing. Really excited to meet you in person, Nicole. Your name has come up a lot in conversations with our engaged constituents in Ward 6 around trees in our parks, and really appreciate all of your support through those conversations. And I'm just so proud to be a part of a city that has a climate mayor that passed a climate emergency. I'm really excited about terms like a green economic strategy and a sustainable resilient economy. I think those are things that our constituents are super excited about. Just a couple of things. We met with members of the Arizona Youth Climate Coalition earlier this week. They're very excited about the new fund, by the way. I'm really encouraged with their commitment to hold us to the Tucson Resilient Together plan. They've also been doing some incredibly creative work in conjunction with our Commission for Climate, Energy, and Sustainability, the CCES, to explore how to make Tucson more resilient more quickly. And they're really focusing on that sort of strategy around urgently responding to our climate reality. So I just wanted to say that if my colleagues haven't had a chance to meet with the Arizona Youth Climate Coalition, particularly to discuss their latest distributed capacity procurement report, the DCP report, so exciting. I encourage you to consider it. All of that said, it's clear that we can't slow down the urgency with which we address the priorities in this plan, and great points have been made already about that urgency. Just uplifting the recent article from Arizona Luminaria about efforts with our unhoused population that cited U of A research that links being unsheltered to a 200 to 300 times increased risk of heat-related death in Pima and Maricopa counties. So that's at the top of my mind. as we move through these conversations and fatima we would love to sit down with you and talk more about the eca um thank you for for this for the um for the offer these issues of climate justice from our trees to our energy use to our water to our housing they're not just aspirations to protect our future we also need to recognize that these issues are already affecting tucsonans right now particularly the most vulnerable so thank you so much councilman lee and then councilman

thank you mayor fine question for nicole because i didn't catch what you said nicole on a percentage of young trees that don't make it so that's one question nicole and then i would be particularly interested if you could share with our office as well as our colleagues what you've learned about the root cause without any pun intended there of why that's happening is it specific species of trees like what are the contributing factors to why these younger trees are not making it just because you know we focus a lot of our efforts as well on tree planting events since we have a lot of land out here i think that would be really helpful to understand and if you could just confirm quickly what percentage you say don't make it um i would really appreciate that thank you

Yeah, that's a really great question. I wish I had a really simple answer, council member, because it does kind of depend what kind of planting situation is happening. So if it's a city project, which is handled mostly by professionals, I'm seeing pretty low attrition rates, mostly around 6%. We go upwards from there, depending on the kind of project it is, upwards of 40%, depending on the conditions. Every single factor goes into that, right, because a tree is alive. And so anything that happens when it's young continues on to when it's old. One thing I'll highlight here that it is great to plant with volunteers, and I think it's critical to building stewardship and a sense of place with folks. We also do need to recognize that arboriculture is a professional career path, and planting trees and learning those skill sets is something that we've worked really hard to develop a trained workforce on. And so it is great to have everyone involved. And I think it's a very critical component of it. It's also important to recognize that the work that continues on after that does happen by professionals. And that requires investment, training, and a recognition that that early care is a critical component of that tree care. And so I have sort of working with mostly our capital improvement programs Included that into our contracts to help improve the survivability of tree rates. It's not just about the warranty It's not just about you know the day of planting but the actual care that goes into that early tree and that is a trained profession and that I think is important to uplift and to continue to invest into workforce development. Again, it's great to work with volunteers, but it is a knowledgeable skill that you do need to get good at over the years. And so that's where I see a lot of the mortality coming from. It can come from defects, of course, coming from the nursery all the way up to much later issues, but that's just one element.

Thanks, Nicole. And if you have any tips or tricks or guidance for our offices as we, you know,

want to improve that survival rate please let us know for sure yeah and i'll just point everyone to all of our planting standards are on our website so i would share those widely with community members they're pretty straightforward and easy to understand and and all of our partners also have great and easy tools that are free to distribute at any time but always reach out to me for those kinds of questions thank you council member doll any others council member barajas after him

Thank you, Mayor. Great presentations, fabulous work that's happening. I have a couple of specifics, but they're very specific. And I want to appreciate that we're doing incredible work, Mayor and colleagues, in this area. Of course, we have to do more. But on the ECA draft part, and I think we need to have a version that doesn't have draft on it to present to the public pretty soon, because draft brings up too much questions. I was talking about the implementation plan, but I think also the ECA. When I went to find a copy of the ECA quickly, I have some. that I can't find quickly in our agendas and stuff. The TEP version of it shows up real readily, but it has draft on it. And I think that will be confusing. And do we have a signed version, Roy? Yeah, that's the one that we should be presenting to the public, so there's no questions about that. And again, the implementation plan, it's so fabulous. The graphic you have towards the end It has so much richness in it. You have to take a long time looking at it. And no one will. But if you're real concerned, the youth climate kids will look at it. And they'll understand it. And in fact, they've influenced it over the years. Trees, thank you for this. Trees are always on my mind. I'm so appreciative of you and all of our partners planting trees. And I'm glad that Director Sancredio is in the audience. Not accusing anybody, and I'm not mad, but there's been a couple of situations where we've gotten complaints. Mostly miscommunication, where midlife or mature trees that were planted by the city were taken out by contractors who are being paid by the city. Because they're misunderstanding that a 311 complaint about something shouldn't give them the authority to cut down the tree. We need to trim it or deal with it properly. And I'm passing on this problem to you, Nicole, because I think there's some solutions. What we've thought of. I gave her the example. I visit Carmel-by-the-Sea. I'm fortunate to do that fairly often. I haven't been there in seven years. And I got there this summer. Their forester and their budget, as you pointed out, so much. Every tree in Carmel is not only inventory. It has a number. And there are huge penalties if you accidentally damage a tree. If you have a car crash or you're doing construction on your house, there are huge penalties. So when you see construction going on in the car malls all the time, they wrap the trees with bubble wrap and tape and stuff so that you don't damage a tree. And the property in my family, a tree died due to disease. We had to come up with a tree replacement plan OK it by the forester and mayor and council of the town of Carmel had to approve it. Not proposing that we do that, but someday maybe when our ship comes in. But maybe there's things we can do. Our brainstorm was, if it's not too expensive, maybe people could sponsor this. Trees that we put in when our storm to shade, let's have a tag so that inadvertently people won't take it into their own hands or have DTM come deal with it improperly. And I do want to appreciate that you've noticed this problem four years ago and that you've done training manuals and worked to do that. And we need to keep completing the loop. When something happens, we need to make sure that people get trained. Unfortunately, in the landscape industry, there's a lot of turnover. I apply for a job. Can you trim trees? Yeah, I can trim trees.

No.

There's a skill. And there's an art. So I'm just rambling at this point. Fatima, Nicole, and Lane, great work. Thank you.

That's a really good point. And when we receive emails from neighbors that trees have been cut, I mean, I can read it. they're shouting, they're so upset. And we haven't been able to train enough people to understand about chopping down trees is not the answer to their concerns, whether it be unsheltered concerns or others otherwise, right? Chopping down trees, we've had neighborhoods chop down more than 70 trees in Ward 3. uh we've had tusd and other school districts chop down trees and it is just maybe an opportunity for us to continue this education piece about chopping trees is not the answer um to the concerns that they might bring let's try and find other uh solutions so council member barajas if there's no others then we move on to the next item

Thank you, Mayor. Well, just thank you all to our Climate Action Team and everyone involved in developing and advancing this Tucson Resilient together. I've been a fan for the six years that you all are talking about, so I'm really proud to now represent and be here alongside you all. And congratulations to Dr. Karina Martinez for all the work she's put into this. I just wanted to share that yesterday I had the honor of speaking alongside our Congresswoman, Congresswoman Grijalva, at an event with a room full of young people. And one message came through loud and clear. Climate issues are a top priority for our youth and their families. And they're looking to us for leadership and meaningful action. And I'm proud just to hear all the work that has been done and will continue to be done. And I wanted to share, Mayor, you know, with this Bloomberg Philanthropies. Thank you for bringing this to Tucson. We shared this opportunity, the Tucson Youth Climate Action Fund with the room full of youth. And all of them were so excited. They all met afterwards and We're talking amongst themselves of what project that they're going to apply for. So I'm really excited to see this being executed. And as we all know, our summers are not getting any cooler. We continue to experience extreme heat, especially in Ward 5 on our south side. And that reality affects all of our neighborhoods, our public health, and our quality of life. So it reminds us that these decisions we make today will shape the Tucson, our children, and our future generations will inherit. So I look forward to continuing this work together. Thank you.

Thank you all. Thank you so much, Fatima and Nicole Lane. Really appreciate your incredible work. all righty so we move on to the next item item seven time has been set aside to discuss the proposed adoption of the safe city action plan and track traffic safety deterrence as requested by me um i just wanted to uh open up with a thanking uh first and most importantly liz morales our incredible Safe City Task Force made up of volunteers, community members, Tucson Police Department, our chiefs, Chief Beto, Shaner, everyone working together to make sure that we have a safe city with a good quality of life for all. This work started with my open letter to Tucsonans in October of 2025, but the transformational programs and services have been created since 2020, starting with our Housing First program, which completely transformed the way we deliver unsheltered services for our community to our community safety health and wellness program that was put together by our police department our city manager myself and others we've created our viva program that started as a pilot at the tucson police department with place network investigation And then to including our Office of Violence Prevention and Intervention. And I'm excited to have the Safe City Action Plan in front of us. I know this is a living document where our council colleagues should feel comfortable owning it, adding to it, changing it, subtracting and adding is important. Thank you to everyone, especially the Safe City Task Force members that put so much time on this. The purpose of the action plan is to address, put together a strategic plan, right? Just like the city of Tucson did not have a housing affordability strategy for Tucson when I became mayor, we all put our heads into creating a strategy, creating goals, and metrics for affordable housing. The safe city action plan is very similar in my mind to having a strategic plan where we have goals and metrics that we want to accomplish in all of this. And so we don't want to duplicate services. We're bringing jurisdictions to the table, nonprofit leaders to the table, business leaders to the table to create. a strategy and action plan to move forward. So I'm happy for the collaboration, the accountability that the action plan brings to the table, and the targeted and strategic investments that we've all put together as a team to get this done. i you know i i i hope that we continue improving on this work and i'm hoping that our council colleagues uh feel comfortable in in adding their voice to to all of this uh safe city task force meetings um are open to the public so the media neighbors residents and council offices are invited to attend and um yeah i'm i'm excited to hear what you all have to I HAVE TO REPORT TODAY MR. MANAGER.

THANK YOU HONORABLE MAYOR MEMBERS OF THE COUNCIL. JOINING US TODAY OUR ASSISTANT CITY MANAGER LIZ MORALES WHO'S OVERSEEING THIS EFFORT AND TO START AT THE TABLE WE HAVE ASSISTANT CHIEF SHANER WHO WILL COVER A PORTION OF THE MATERIALS AND THEN THEY WILL DO A QUICK TAG OUT FOR LAURA SHARP WHO WILL LEAD YOU THROUGH SOME OF THE KPIS AND DASHBOARD ELEMENTS OF THE SAFE CITY ACTION PLAN. And it is presented to you for discussion. It is also presented in a form that could be adopted, but we also understand we need your input in order to make sure it's the action plan that's right for the City of Tucson. So if you're not prepared for an adoption of it at this meeting, that's okay. We don't have a regulatory deadline. The work will continue, and we're happy to bring it back to you at a future date for adoption, depending on how you feel about today's presentation. Before I hand it over to Assistant Manager Morales, I want to thank two new members of the Safe City Task Force. We've had recommendations and self-nominations for augmenting the Safe City Task Force. So we've recruited Krista Baker from Banner Health to expand the public health aspect of our dialogue, and Alejandro Beltran, bringing more of a voice of the youth and thank you to board five for bringing that person forward so with that i thank them both they've accepted their invitations and they'll be joining us shortly with that i turn it over to ms morales thank you mr manager honorable mayor members of the council before we go into the action plan we are returning with an update on some of the work around

our traffic safety deterrents and also uh... street racing so i'm gonna turn it over to assistant chief shainer who will talk about that and then we will turn over to the action plan thank you very much good afternoon honorable mayor members of the council i'm here today to speak to you uh... to provide an update on our uh... illegal street racing enforcement strategy as part of the multimodal traffic safety initiatives that are housed within the overall safe city initiative. Illegal straight racing and intersection takeovers have evolved beyond isolated traffic events. Today they are organized events involving reckless driving, roadway blockages, property damage, violence, and significant disruption and risk to our neighborhoods, businesses, and our traveling public. In response to these emerging trends, the Tucson Police Department has begun developing a comprehensive intelligence-led enforcement strategy earlier this year. Our objective is not simply to respond to individual incidents, but to disrupt organized racing activity, improve long-term deterrence, and enhance roadway safety through coordinated enforcement and intelligence-driven policing. The strategy establishes a department-wide response led by our Threat Mitigation Unit, which serves as our primary investigative and intelligence coordination unit for legal straight racing and tico street takeover activity rather than relying on isolated enforcement operations strategy emphasizes long-term disruption through intelligence gathering proactive investigations regional collaboration and coordinated operational planning several operational components support this approach to begin it will be an intelligence led policing strategy to identify repeat offenders organized groups vehicles, hotspot locations, event organizers, and emerging trends through crime analysis and social media monitoring. We are strengthening coordination between patrol, traffic services section, the threat mitigation unit, criminal investigators, our analysis division, our technology units, as well as other regional partners to ensure a unified response. The strategy also includes directed enforcement operations at known gathering locations, including nuisance properties, business districts, industrial areas, and known historic corridors where street racing occurs. During periods of increased activity, such as holiday weekends or graduation events, our Traffic Zebras program are integrated in the traffic deployment to increase our visibility and our ability to engage with potential street racers. Technology also plays an important role in this strategy. License plate readers, traffic cameras, drone technology, and digital evidence recovery improve our ability to identify offenders while reducing the need for high-risk vehicle pursuits. In addition, we continue coordinating closely with prosecutors to pursue enhanced charging strategies, vehicle impoundments, forfeitures, and felony investigations whenever appropriate under existing law. Performance measures include intelligence reporting, operational metrics, collision trends, arrest data, and repeat offender tracking, which will allow us to continually evaluate the effectiveness of the strategy and make changes as necessary. In addition, anecdotally, we do see communications between participants in street racing events where they're urging other participants not to engage in the activity in Tucson due to an increased risk of enforcement activity and consequence. We know that that's not a final solution, but it is a trend that we appreciate. The strategy also recognizes enforcement alone is not enough. Community outreach, public messaging, business partnerships, and education are important components of reducing the dangerous behavior. A few months ago, led by Ward 5, TPD units, Ward 5 staff met with Tucson Dragway owners and staff, as well as other community stakeholders, to brainstorm strategies for providing opportunities to community members and car enthusiasts to allow them to demonstrate their driving capabilities in a legal fashion, as well as provide education opportunities at the same time. As we've developed this strategy, we also have identified several areas where state law may limit some enforcement tools available to law enforcement. Because of that, and as directed by Mayor and Council back in May's study session, we have begun internal discussions regarding potential legislative concepts that could strengthen investigations, improve accountability, and enhance public safety. Conversations with legal advisors, Laura Dent, external stakeholders, as well as unions who oftentimes support legislative efforts are helping us develop the proposed legislative legislation this legislation is very much a work in progress we will look forward to being able to engage with mayor and council in the safe city task force as those discussions continue These concepts and legislative considerations are currently under evaluation, and they include strengthening penalties for organized street takeover activity, examining whether vehicle forfeiture authority could be expanded for the most serious offenses, and exploring updates to Arizona's vehicle impoundment statutes to better reflect modern investigative techniques that rely on video evidence, license plate readers, and other digital evidence that exists. The intent is to ensure that any future legislative recommendations are thoughtful, balanced, legally sound, and aligned with community expectations while providing law enforcement with effective tools to address this growing public safety concern. Ultimately, this strategy aligns with the broader goals of the Safe City Action Plan. It emphasizes prevention, intelligence integration, data-informed deployments, deployment of resources, regional collaboration, accountability, and sustained crime reduction. We appreciate the Mayor and Council's continued support and look forward to receiving your feedback as we continue refining these strategies and legislative concepts moving forward. I am open to any questions you may have now or after ACM Morales' presentation.

How would you prefer? Mayor, I think if we can leave the questions to the end, I think we can consolidate them. Okay, absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. So I will turn over to discuss the draft action plan. As you know, this plan has been the result of months of collaboration with city departments, our community partners, the residents, and as mentioned, the Safe City Task Force. It also responds directly, as you mentioned, Mayor, to your open letter. which called for a comprehensive strategy to address some of Tucson's most pressing community challenges, including homelessness, substance use, behavioral health, violence, and public safety. As we worked through this process, it became clear that while the city has made significant investments over the past six years, much of this work has developed independently. And we needed the framework of this action plan to bring these efforts together, which identifies where the gaps remain, establishes clear priorities, and allows us to measure progress over time. Before I describe the action plan, I think it's important to recognize that the plan is not the beginning of the city's efforts, as you mentioned, Mayor. It is building on the foundation of this transformational work and how Tucson responds to these complex community challenges. The city has made transformational investments and programs, and again, I don't want to repeat, but I think it's worth reiterating, community safety, health, and wellness, our Housing First, and our Violence Interruption and Violization Action Program, which we call VIVA, and most recently, the creation of the Office of Violence Prevention and Intervention, we call OVPI. Each of these initiatives addressed an important need, and together they have expanded housing opportunities, strengthened behavioral health and crisis response, increased outreach to vulnerable populations, and invested in violence prevention and community well-being. The Safe City Action Plan builds upon that foundation. Rather than creating an entirely new program, it aligns these existing efforts into one coordinated strategy, that helps us better prioritize investments, strengthen partnerships, improve accountability, and identify where additional work is needed. At its core, the action plan does three things. First, it organizes the work that is already happening across city departments and regional partners. Second, it identifies gaps where additional coordination, investment, or policy changes are needed. And third, it establishes priorities, measurable actions, and performance indicators so we can track progress and continuously improve over time. The action plan is organized around six strategic priorities. The first, and I will go through these quickly, but I think it's important to highlight each priority. First one is improving resource access for people experiencing homelessness. This includes pathways to shelter, housing, and supportive services while improving coordination between outreach teams, housing providers, and service organizations so individuals can move more effectively towards stability. The second priority focuses on behavioral health and substance use coordination. The goal is to strengthen our crisis response, diversion, and treatment pathways so individuals are connected to the appropriate care rather than repeatedly cycling through emergency rooms, jail, or the justice system. The third priority is violence prevention and intervention. This represents a shift from simply responding to violence after it occurs to preventing it before it happens. Through the Office of Violence Prevention and Intervention, we will continue strengthening partnerships with schools, neighborhoods, public safety agencies, health care providers, and community organizations to identify youth and individuals at the highest risk of violence and connect them, whether it's mentoring, education, employment opportunities, behavioral health services, and family supports. The plan also continues investments in what we know works, our strategies such as VIVA, which has demonstrated meaningful reduction in violence within participating neighborhoods. The fourth priority is strengthening regional and community collaboration. Many of the issues identified in this plan cannot be solved by the city alone. Success depends on strong partnerships with local, state, and federal partners. We are currently working with our partners at Pima County, justice system partners, healthcare providers, and community organizations to find ways to better work together. Improving coordination across these systems allow us to better serve residents and maximize available resources. The fifth priority focuses on data, technology, and accountability. This includes establishing shared performance measures, improving data sharing and transparency, and using data to guide decisions, evaluate outcomes, and continuously improve programs over time. The sixth and final priority is the community outreach and engagement. Community safety requires ongoing collaboration with residents, neighborhoods, businesses, and community organizations. The plan emphasizes transparent communication, meaningful engagement, and shared problem solving to build trust and strengthen community partnerships. Finally, the action plan includes measurable performance indicators that will allow us to monitor implementation and evaluate outcomes, which Laura Sharpe with the Equity Office will share some details of what that looks like. I do want to take a few minutes to talk about our community and task force feedback. As we developed the plan, we heard from Mayor and Council that this needed to be something that we took out to the public, and so we, through our Safe City Connect, we held four community meetings, we had stakeholder engagement, and then I'll talk about the task force, where we received valuable feedback that helped strengthen this final draft document. Overall, just a very high-arching comment is that the residents and the task force members support the direction of the action plan. I do want to share that you've all been given a pretty in-depth summary of what we heard from the task force and through the analysis of the Safe City Connect. So what I'm going to share today is very much a reduced version of what they said, but it's Worthy worth reading because we had received very good comments and feedback What I'll say is the feedback is not about changing where we're headed instead. It's focused on strengthening Implementation three themes consistently emerged first was around accountability Second improved coordination and third continued investment in prevention treatment and housing while maintaining strong commitment to public safety The task force provided several recommendations related to implementation. They encouraged the city to develop a 90-day implementation plan, identify visible short-term accomplishments, and prioritize the highest impact initiatives rather than trying to do everything at once, and clearly identify future funding needs and resource requests. Several members also emphasized the importance of demonstrating early progress so residents can see tangible results during the first year. They recommended refinements to the plan itself, including clarifying the role of community violence intervention partners, acknowledging implementation limitations such as funding and staffing, strengthening implementation timelines, improving the performance measurement section, and expanding discussion of the long-term infrastructure needed to sustain the work. Many of those recommendations have already been incorporated into the final action plan and will continue to inform the implementation moving forward. In my summary here, before I turn it over to Laura, I just want to say the Safe City Action Plan is intended to align cities' work into one coordinated framework. It's a living document that will continue to evolve as we measure outcomes, learn from implementation, and respond to changing community needs. It emphasizes collaboration across systems, data informed decision making, transparency, and continuous improvement. Ultimately, the goal is to improve safety, increase access to services, strengthening partnerships, and ensure our investments produce measurable results for our community. With that, I will turn it over to Laura, who will walk us through our measurements.

Good afternoon, Mayor and members of the Council. The Safe City Dashboard are intended to be a transparency and accountability tool for both the city and the public. They take the six priorities of the action plan and translate those into eight measurable indicators. It's important to realize from the start that what the dashboards are not doing is keeping track of every single piece of data associated with Safe City. Instead, each dashboard takes a specific part of the work that we can measure on a monthly basis so that we can ask the question, are we moving that measure in the right direction? So my plan is to just take a few minutes to show you the dashboard. I know you've all seen it. It's now live on the City of Tucson website. And so I'm just going to walk you through where to find that and how to read it. So if you can see the screens, or you can look at the copy that was in your materials, I'm on the website. And I'm going to scroll down past our engagement announcement for next week's public engagement. And you'll see that there is a new section on the website called Safe City Priorities and Performance Indicators. There's a menu where you can jump immediately to the priority that you're most interested in, or you can just keep scrolling, which is what I'm going to do. And so the first one that I'm going to show to demonstrate how the dashboards are organized are positive housing exits from city-owned shelters. This is looking at the percent of people leaving city-owned shelters who exit to a positive housing destination, so either temporary or permanent housing. You can see in the header we've identified what priority this is associated with, what it is we're measuring, the positive housing exits, and identified the 2026 annual goal, which is to be at 65% positive exit rates for the year. When you move into the body of the dashboard, you see first is the highest level look of how the current data compares with the annual goal. So we have a line showing where the goal is. And right now you can see we are exceeding our goal. In this sort of middle section, we've separated recent performance from year to date performance. So while the most recent month is going to give us an idea of how we're doing now, the year to date gives us a more stable picture of how we're doing throughout the year. And finally at the bottom we have a trend over time chart and this really puts in perspective the numbers that you saw previously so we can understand is this recent month where we're slightly below the target is that an anomaly or is this a new pattern that we need to be paying attention to. The next dashboard I'll show is bus stop safety. And just to demonstrate this feature, I'll click on the back to priority list. And I'll click priority three, which is where the bus stop safety dashboard is. Here we're looking at non-traffic related police incidents that occur within 25 feet of a bus stop. What I want you to notice about this one is that in the previous example, higher numbers were better. So we had a goal that we were trying to achieve to be at or above. In the case of safety incidents, we want the number to be lower. So here we have a threshold that we're trying to stay at or below. other than that beside even though the topic is different the direction of the measure is different the layout is the same so you don't have to learn a new system and the last one i'm going to demonstrate is the data trust scorecard and i'm showing this one in part because it is the one exception to that layout pattern that i just described And here, the data trust scorecard is really about being transparent and accountable with how trustworthy the data is on which we're making our decisions. So this is organized by trust level. So you can really get an idea of the status of the overall portfolio. And then by individual data sets. So you can find out which ones really we should be giving attention to. You can see for the current year, the goal is to have all of the data sets at provisional or higher, which means provisional or trusted. And we're currently meeting that goal with 13 data sets at trusted and three at provisional. Looking ahead, this process is something that IT is going to be applying to many data sets across the city. So you can expect to see that. And as public safety data sets go through this process, you will start to see those added to this dashboard. um so that's all i have for the demonstration i do before i close quickly want to thank james mcginnis joe nearhouse andrew sutton and jessica braver at i.t who helped make these dashboards possible and just reiterate that even though these don't show everything about safe city they really are a consistent and publicly visible way to monitor progress identify where we need more attention, and help us ask better questions about what is and isn't working.

Thank you, Laura. And since you're thanking people, I also need to make sure I give some proper thanks, one to Laura, who's spent significant amount of time doing this stephanie zamora and jeff coon who really have helped lead not only the task force but getting this plan drafted so appreciate the city manager providing the resources so we could get this and all the directors

across the city and pima county has been a great partner so that concludes this presentation and thank you for your time thank you any questions comments um observations from my colleagues councilwoman lee and any others and then council member schubert and then vice mayor so councilman lee council member schubert and vice mayor

Thank you, Mayor. And I have so many chicken scratches. I'm going to try to keep track of all of my notes. But thank you to the team for all of this work. I really appreciate a lot of the elements of this. I appreciate the structure of the plan, the clear focus on execution of this plan with goals and KPIs and a very data-informed approach. So I just wanted to acknowledge that I really appreciate all of that. I also, in all of this work, I'm still in my mind connecting it and don't want to lose the thread to how we still understand, similar to the conversation we had about public drug use in our previous Safe City update, where the additional data lives that we need in order to tell the story. As we all know, the system as it relates to public safety is very complicated and we own one portion of that pie. And really understanding the other pieces of the system and where accountability may be falling out of the system is something that we still need to keep an eye on because public safety is not solely the responsibility of the city. And I think we're doing a better job year after year of honing in on exactly where our area is and figuring out how to execute well and measure and tell our story. So love that and just wanna do a plug again to make sure we're staying on top of the direction out of the last meeting with respect to data sources and pulling that together so that we can understand more about where there are opportunities for improvement. I also want to acknowledge for the city manager, I just, six and a half years ago when I came into my role, I met with then city manager Ortega and was really looking at better understanding what the organizational level goals are that we have and how all of the work that our teams are doing map to those goals. So I feel like you guys have been making such amazing progress across the departments to be able to do that and connect the work with the why and the things that we're trying to accomplish at the organizational level. And I just wanted to put a plug or maybe plant the seed that I would love for us to consider this fall or at the start of the first year to really have another retreat that focuses on those organizational level goals and then feed those into workday so that we're understanding of what our North Star is across all of these strategic plans and all of the work that we're doing is traceable and connected to that work. Did have just some shout outs and some comment on the dashboard. I love the dashboard. It sounded like, Laura, you said you all are going to review that dashboard monthly because I was just curious the cadence. for continuous improvement. So it sounds like that's gonna be reviewed monthly. There's gonna be opportunities for improvement that are recognized from that. Is that something to the city manager that you guys could maybe provide us just an off agenda, a little update, here's what we observed this month and here's where we're going to make some changes or when do you think we would become aware of those opportunities to improve?

Honorable Mayor, members of the Council, and Councilwoman Lee, we do have a standing Safe City update on a monthly basis with Mayor and Council. It's usually the first meeting of the month, so it is my expectation that we would be reporting on this monthly in that Safe City update. We'll come up with something that's pretty quick and efficient. Of course, the dashboards are available real-time at any time, but we will make a point of reporting in our monthly report on the data. And as we identify trends, opportunities, needs for improvement, we would highlight that in that monthly report as well.

Amazing. I think that's just important. We're aware of where the opportunities are and how we are correcting it and making modifications to be more effective. And last but not least, I will just remind everyone, and Laura Dent has done an amazing job of this, I sit on the League of Arizona Cities and Towns Committee for Public Safety, Military Affairs and Courts. So going back to the street racing and intersection takeover conversation to the TPD team, please feel free to arm me with information as well on what you're finding as capabilities that you need the legislature to provide you in order for me to take that to that group and help us get some advocacy there too. So that's all my comments, Mayor.

Thank you, Councilwoman. Council Member Schubert and then Vice Mayor.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, members of the council. I want to begin by thanking city staff, our county partners, and every member of the Safe City Task Force for the tremendous amount of work that has gone into developing this plan. Very excited about the dashboard. I love measurables. This plan has the foundation to become an important roadmap for improving community safety. However, based on the feedback provided by the task force members themselves, I do not believe it is ready for adoption today. I also have a set of questions I'd like to make sure staff takes back and works through. with the task force, so we'll follow up by email with those questions. While every survey respondent supported moving this work forward, the feedback was equally clear that the plan needs stronger accountability, clear ownership of implementation, measurable outcomes, baseline data, funding strategies, timelines, and regular public reporting before it is adopted. One of the biggest unanswered questions for me is whether we are aligning our resources with the strategies that this plan prioritizes. Much of the work described in this action plan, case management, resource navigation, relationship building, long-term engagement, this is work already being done by our amazing community safety, health and wellness, VIVA, and the homeless protocol efforts. My office has recently met with Chief Prieto and the city manager to better understand existing grant funding and where opportunities may exist to strengthen these long-term efforts. We all recognize that the state and federal funding options are constrained, which makes it even more important that we invest city dollars strategically and equitably. Before adopting this plan, I think council deserves a clearer understanding of whether these programs have the staffing and resources they need to accomplish what this plan asks of them. If we know these approaches are expanding and showing promise, are we structuring and funding them for long-term success? If additional resources become available, should they be invested in deeper collaboration between Tucson Fire's TC3 program, Community Safety, Health, and Wellness, VIVA, the Homeless Protocol, and our other safety hub partners? Those are conversations I believe should happen before and not after we decide to adopt. I also remain concerned about governance and accountability after adoption. For example, will the Safe City Task Force continue to meet? If so, what authority and role will it have in reviewing new initiatives, evaluating pilot programs, and recommending changes when strategies are not achieving the intended outcomes? We heard from task force members following last month's focus deterrence discussion that they did not have an opportunity to provide feedback on the pilot. If the task force will no longer serve in that advisory role, then what process will ensure that practitioners, directly impacted experts, advocates, and community partners continue to shape that implementation? These questions remain unanswered. Several task force members also cautioned that better coordination alone will not meaningfully improve conditions without a clear understanding of resource needs and a willingness to invest where the data demonstrates the greatest impact. Other emphasize the need for a central point of accountability, ongoing evaluation, as well as the flexibility to adjust programs when outcomes aren't being achieved. I also believe we need to be honest about what works. Cycling low-level offenders, particularly people experiencing homelessness through our jail, is neither fiscally responsible nor an effective long-term public safety strategy. If our goal is to reduce crime, improve neighborhood conditions, and help people stabilize, then our investments should follow that evidence. We should prioritize the programs demonstrating measurable success and be willing to redirect resources when the data evolves. Finally, our residents deserve more than assurances that a plan exists. They deserve to see measurable improvements in the places where they live, work, and recreate. Success should not be reflected only in reports, but in cleaner public spaces, safer neighborhoods, stronger public confidence, and visible improvements in everyday conditions. For those reasons, I can't support the adoption today. I would support bringing this plan back after it's been strengthened to incorporate the implementation, funding, governance, and accountability recommendations made by the task force itself. I believe taking the time to answer these questions now will result in a stronger plan, better stewardship of public resources, and a greater likelihood of delivering the results that our community deserves. Thank you. I have the questions. I also have comments about street racing, but I want to be mindful of time. Should I provide the comments about street racing?

Maybe give Liz an opportunity to respond to any of your concerns, because I know that she and the task force have been thinking about some of these concerns. So, Liz, I don't know if you wanted to have an opportunity to respond.

Thank you, Mayor. I appreciate, again, the list. And we will certainly follow up with the task force around how we can do those things where we strengthen those areas. And so everything you shared is very consistent with what I heard from the task force. So very much prepared to go back and do some additional work around this.

and i like the idea i really do like the idea of talking about funding because as we've all said around this table pima county is a jurisdiction that participates with us actually steve holmes sits at the task force and we should talk about their responsibility in terms of mental behavioral health or substance use disorders or even methods that they use in the Pima County Jail and how they connect to resources for people coming out of jail. So there's a lot of work that needs to happen and appreciate the feedback and input. I know that your staff member does attend the task force meetings and that's very, very important. So I want to make sure that you all feel comfortable with the action plan. Again, it's a living document. It's not going to stay there. The same, right? We will continue to improve it, but I love the idea of budgets. Like who's responsible for what? How much, what are the gaps, right? Because of course we don't have enough money to do everything we want to do. Who's responsible for what and what are the gaps in funding to provide the services that we need? Alrighty, who's next? Vice Mayor and then Council Member Cunningham. All right.

Thank you. I want to start off, Mayor, by thanking you for kind of bringing this forward to us at the end of last year and giving us an opportunity to also include the different components that create a safer city that go beyond just policing. So thank you for that. FOR THIS EXERCISE, IN MY TIME IN THE CITY, WE'VE NEVER HAD SUCH A ROBUST FRAMEWORK TO HELP GUIDE OUR WORK, AND AS YOU SAID, IT'S NOT GOING TO BE PERFECT. but it gets us moving in a positive direction and that we continue to adapt it as we go and we learn. I had a question also, Lisa, I really appreciate, Ms. Sharpe, the dashboard and all your work in doing that. Thank you for making it accessible for all of us to understand the data. I did have a question about the Suntran bus stop safety. For the data point that was shared that captures incidents within 25 feet of a bus stop, how did we arrive at that metric? Because I'm also just curious if there's issues unrelated to the bus stop happening, how do we not conflate crime with it being, like how do we not blame it on the bus stop if it had nothing to do with it?

Thank you for your question. The 25 foot buffer was determined in coordination between the TPD analysis division and Suntran. So they worked out that number as the sort of a large enough radius to capture the activity near the bus stop, but not so large that it would capture activity associated with nearby businesses. And to the second point, we did filter out traffic related incidents for that reason. But it there is still the possibility that we are capturing non bus stop related incidents. That's one of the limitations of this approach. but it's just it's a known limitation and as long as we're sort of we have a consistent methodology to capture it we kind of thought that you know it still is it it still helps us identify you know whether the trend is going up or down but we do hope to also use suntran data in the future OKAY.

THANK YOU. I THINK I MENTIONED THIS BEFORE, MAYOR, AND I'LL JUST REPEAT IT AGAIN. I KNOW THAT IN PRIORITY 3 WE'RE IMPROVING MULTIMODAL SAFETY, AND I WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT WE'RE NOT EMPHASIZING ENFORCEMENT ON PEOPLE WALKING OR BIKING. I'VE ALREADY BEEN RECEIVING REPORTS THAT THAT'S HAPPENED AGAIN. I KNOW THAT PREVIOUSLY WE HAD PUT A PAUSE TO THOSE KINDS OF ENFORCEMENTS. IF ANYTHING, IT WOULD BE MORE OF A WARNING. I believe that our enforcement resources should be directed toward the behaviors that pose the greatest risk to public safety. And so for me, that is vehicular traffic violations, the SO I KIND OF WANT TO PIVOT TO TAKEAWAYS FROM VISION ZERO, WHERE THEY HAVE A REPORT TITLED RIGHT SIZING THE ROLE OF TRAFFIC ENFORCEMENT, AND THAT'S THAT NOT ALL TRAFFIC STOPS ARE CREATED EQUAL. Safety stops target behaviors directly linked to serious and fatal crashes, including speeding, impaired driving and other reckless or dangerous behavior. So I want to make sure that we're keeping our focus on that rather than stopping or ticketing minor pedestrian and bicyclist offenses, because we know that. But in that interaction, those experiences, especially when it's unsheltered people, could lead to deadly consequences because these are already existing vulnerabilities in our community. IF THERE'S AN OPPORTUNITY TO THINK OF THIS PRIORITY THREE THROUGH THE LENS OF VISION ZERO, I THINK IT WOULD BETTER SUPPORT PEOPLE'S SAFETY OUT ON OUR STREETS. I JUST WANTED TO ADD THAT. AND AGAIN, THANK YOU FOR YOUR LEADERSHIP ON THIS.

COUNCILMEMBER CUNNINGHAM.

I started out in my career in public service where the medium for social service, and at the time law enforcement, was at a nexus, a juvenile court. And so the juvenile court, there's this line where your mission is the child, even if they're the offender. mission is to try to get that person to their best their best place and over the years and we've talked about different safe city initiatives I've looked at different ideas different plans we've had I've looked at that Nexus on how we find that place to get folks where they need to be I think Mr. Witwicky and Crystal Moore and Professor Volji former mayor Volji did a great job and kind of Pointing out what I wanted to point out today, which is we've done an incredible job aligning our systems. That is a like, incredibly complex tapestry for all the systems that you have when you think about the different social service agencies, the different type of social service agencies, the street outreach with social service, street outreach with law enforcement, street out with. Street outreach with environmental services. And then we have in-house, in custody. Then we have outpatient. And when you think about all these things we have, you get this mishmash. And you can run through all the buzzwords. And at about buzzword 47, you're frustrated and confused. To have a tool like the dashboard you've set up helps people organize their thoughts and refocus. So those are the good things. But it becomes very clear that we're under resources. to do all the things we really want to do. As I sat here during this meeting listening, I tried to do some rough math myself. I know that Tim Tomier is super happy to hear about that. And my best guess is there's probably about a $21 million funding gap, give or take, on the number of full-time employees we'd need to staff not only the things we want to do full-time, in other words, have daily core units, have track enforcement every day, have alternative to jail court daily, 12 hours a day, seven days a week, where folks could engage the system, get their warrants quashed, and help self-deflect. Whether we had more detox beds voluntary plus we had low barrier more low barrier beds every day up to twenty of them and so that would take about twenty million I mean is it twenty million dollars could be more could be less. It just depends on how you know what lens you're looking at and so as we go through this motion. I think part of it is there's three gaps I'd like to look at. One is I'd love for us to have 60 inpatient bed spaces that are 30 days long, that are post-detox. They can be in custody or out of custody, or maybe 30 of each. But I think that's a gap that has to be part of this framework. this framework that we're building the other piece i think is some type of shelter that we're at least five to ten beds i know desert cove is a good step toward that but we have 10 beds a day every day every morning we know that every single one of our street outreach people know we have 10 beds available low barrier We probably there'll be some barriers. We probably aren't going to allow it to be a safe injection site I don't know if that's ready for prime time, but we will not Remove you from that placement if you're under the influence unless you're acting so deliberately that it's necessary So I think that's a good a good piece to that The last one I think is the IS THAT ALTERNATIVE COURT SYSTEM, THAT ALTERNATIVE COURT SYSTEM WHERE WE HAVE SOME ENGAGEMENT NO MATTER WHAT. SO I THINK THOSE ARE THE THREE GAP SPACES, BUT I THINK TO ACHIEVE THAT WE HAVE TO HAVE ALL THE OTHER THINGS THAT ARE GOING ON. AND WE CAN'T CUT BACK. WE CAN'T CUT BACK ON WHAT WE'RE DOING AT KNIGHTS END OR CRAYCROFT. WE CAN'T CUT BACK ON WHAT WE'RE DOING AT WILDCAT. WE CAN'T CUT BACK ON WHAT WE'RE DOING AT SISTER JOSE OR AMAZON. Now I hear, based on when you guys briefed me about this item this week, that we've had multiple discussions at this table about GRC and Center for Opportunity not being a capacity. I'm under the impression that they're approaching that for the first time in their existence. So that's kind of some of the pieces to this, that whether we like it or not, they're a potential partner. So that's kind of where I'm at. I'll tell you this. What we've done is we've taken a kind of a very unorganized tapestry and made it into a framework. We've taken a foundation and made it into a framework. Now we've got to expand that framework and make it into a structure. And I think we can get there. And it is a tedious amount of work to put a team in a task force and do all this collaboration. That is what government's supposed to do, and I get impatient with it. So I'm proud of that part, and that's outstanding. But I think those gaps and those resources are things that we should probably be ambitious in going after. Thanks.

Liz, did you want to add any of your or respond to any of the commentary so far?

I don't have any response to the commentary. Very helpful. All taken to heart. So thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. I did want to open it up to Council Member Schubert in terms of, so just to make it clear, we're going to add the input, additional questions. You didn't ask them, but additional questions and feedback by the council offices. And I think that's exactly what we need to do. We do have to realize, and I think the Vice Mayor said it very eloquently, this cannot be all things to all people. And reading the letters by task force members, specifically Professor Bolger, former Mayor Bolger, He's like, we need more money, basically is something that I have been talking about, right? We need more money in order to make sure that we do transformational investments in the work that we had. With Crystal, she said this plan is really good, but we need to also invest in identify measurable outcomes and performance indicators that evaluate not only service delivery, but improvements to public spaces, economic vitality, and overall quality of life, which is something that really brings in the concept of our Office of Community and Economic Impact. That, what Crystal said, is directly associated with why we chose to create the Office of Community and Economic Impact. And so the... um safe city action plan does not go into that but it doesn't mean that we are not working on it or uh working on the economic vitality one thing that she does say is it would be wonderful to also measure uh public confidence And that is something that our chief says it all the time, right? Our crime is going down. Homicides are going down. Other major crimes are going down. But we need to also measure public perception. And there are ways, scientific ways of doing that through polling that could possibly be attached to the idea of measuring outcomes and how people are feeling. They're two different things. So I just wanted to add that because it's IT'S IMPORTANT POINTS, BUT THE SAFE CITY ACTION PLAN DOES NOT TALK ABOUT ECONOMIC VITALITY OR INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT NEEDS OR ALL OF THE OTHER PRIORITIES THAT WE HAVE AS MAYOR AND COUNCIL. I THINK MR. TAMIR, YOU WANTED TO ADD.

THANK YOU, MADAM MAYOR. AND ALL OF THOSE POINTS ARE ALSO WELL TAKEN. As the office of community and economic impact continues to mature and we actually stand up our work in the prosperity initiative space that is a that touches on a lot of what you talked about and what is more brought up that we need to make sure that there's a lot of interplay between those we're trying not to silo or trying to unsilo so that will be a big challenge for safe city working folks to be working with OC and I folks And then with regard to your measuring public confidence, in this month's round of briefings, one of the things I was bringing forward is our intention of having a community survey for Tucsonans. It is something we've not done, if ever, certainly in a long time. We are working with ICMA on an instrument that does measure public confidence among a number of other things across safety, across investment, and it is something that we have a tool we can use. It is intentional. It will be statistically valid. It does approach actively the demographics of our city. It also is an instrument used by other cities, so it makes it something that can be comparable to other cities.

definitely heard you there and we are already moving in that direction for something that would be happening this fall with that public engagement also a piece of that as well is surrounding right in terms of making sure that that we have clean safe parks people associate how things look and safety. And so mayor and council did pass a clean city fee that will add to making sure that we maintain our public spaces clean and safe for the community to be able to use those those spaces so I just wanted to add that as well and I did want to go back to councilmember Schubert's questions on the presentation regarding street racing and I wanted to open it up to councilmember but I has to see if you wanted to add more on that yourself councilmember.

Thank you so much, Madam Mayor, and thank you to Assistant Chief for the presentation. Just a few comments about the street racing item. I would like our goal to be stopping the harm from happening in the first place. So while the legislative proposal's a tool, my concern is that it addresses the harm after it's already happened. I think we can all agree that our goal is to prevent another tragedy from occurring, to prevent another young life or lives from being lost in a reckless and preventable act. We have options outside of legislation, including street engineering, civil citations, and community education that could be more effective in saving lives. So I do have a few questions, but I just feel like we're running out of time. But first, my first top question is, what opportunities do we have to use street design and infrastructure through traffic calming, roadway reconfiguration, and other proven safety measures to address street racing? This is really more for Director Credio, I think, maybe, since I'm talking about engineering. Sorry. Sorry, Assistant Chief. Speed humps, chicanes, roundabouts, narrow travel lanes, protected bike lanes. Other complete street treatments are all tools that reduce excessive speeds and make dangerous driving more difficult. I have other questions that I'll share by email, being mindful of time, but thank you.

Thanks to the voters of the City of Tucson, we have several different proposition initiatives that we're working through that are allowing us to not only invest in the pavement of our streets, but also invest in other safety elements. I'll start with Proposition 411. Most of that money has been allocated for the repaving of neighborhoods, but there's also a significant investment in safety elements. THE COMBINATION OF THOSE TWO ARE WORKING TOGETHER TO CREATE SAFER NEIGHBORHOOD STREETS FOR OUR COMMUNITY. THAT DOES INCLUDE INVESTING IN OUR BICYCLING INFRASTRUCTURE, OUR PEDESTRIAN INFRASTRUCTURE. WE ARE HAVING THE OPPORTUNITY THROUGH THE MINI GRANT PROGRAM TO INSTALL TRAFFIC MITIGATION ELEMENTS SUCH AS SPEED HUM, CHAKANES, TRAFFIC CIRCLES. WE'RE ACTUALLY SPECIFICALLY TARGETING NEIGHBORHOODS THAT HAVE EXPERIENCED HISTORIC DISINVESTMENT SO WE CAN MAKE SURE THAT THEY KNOW THAT THOSE OPPORTUNITIES OCCUR help them organize and advocate for themselves. And we've been successful in distributing that money and building those elements. Now, talking a little bit about some of the other work we're doing, the collector program, which is CONNECT IT TO PROPOSITION 411, WHICH IS AN INVESTMENT OF GENERAL FUND AND HIGHWAY USER REVENUE FUNDS, WE ARE REPAVING COLLECTOR STREETS, BUT WE'RE NOT JUST PUTTING FRESH PAVEMENT DOWN. WE'RE USING THAT AS AN OPPORTUNITY TO NARROW THE STREETS WITH STRIPING. WE ARE ADDING VERTICAL ELEMENTS, SUCH AS K-71s, WHICH ARE LITTLE PLASTIC RISERS ON THE STREET TO SEPARATE THE BIKE LANES, SO WE'RE CREATING MORE BUFFERED BIKE LANES. And so every time we touch the pavement, we're using those opportunities to improve safety. Lastly, I'll just talk a little bit about our RTA program, which that is where we have the greatest opportunity to rebuild roads, rebuild intersections. And we are using all of these things that we've learned to implement in our new road design ways that we can slow people down and make it safer for our most vulnerable users. Thank you.

Thank you so much. We'll follow up with the additional questions. Just really intrigued about DTM working with TPD on some of these other strategies. Appreciate it.

And the additional question I wanted to ask, the Safe City Task Force is not sun setting, right? We're still having them work on stuff.

Thank you, Mayor. That was one of the things I did want to say. No, the task force is here to stay, and we plan to, every policy, any idea of any pilots, ordinances, or efforts, we will be going through the task force, anything that would be related to Safe City. Even though we missed it completely. We did miss a couple and I will take accountability for that but we will ensure that going forward that they're hearing about these policies and pilots before and also with Mayor and Council regular briefings making sure you all hear these

well and also your questions comments suggestions and advice for the safe city action plan they have to go you have to present them so that they go to this the task force so when you provide your questions and advice commentary all of that your input will go to the safe city task force to be evaluated by the task force so our voices go to them as well and they give us advice and feedback on how to proceed. Also the street racing legislative ideas also are going to go to the Safe City Task Force and then hopefully we have the opportunity as mayor and council members individually to put our voices to continue those legislative priorities because Mayor and Council do have to approve them when we're getting ready for legislative sessions. Other than that, any questions or comments? Alrighty, thank you so much. Thank you, Liz, Laura, Chief, Assistant Chief Chainer. We really appreciate the incredible work. Sam. Thank you for your work thank you appreciate it already we thank you councilmember Schubert for keeping time we are running a little late out we move on to item eight and then all of the other items are pretty fast. So item eight, time has been set aside at the request of mayor and council for the human resources director to present a recommended timeline along with the documents that will be used for the evaluation project for the current city manager. Mr. Manager.

Thank you, honorable Mayor and members of the Council. Joining us is our HR Director, Dr. Terri Train. She has been interacting with you almost over the last year about your interest in a rubric and or methodology by which you would do performance reviews of your three charter positions, who are all cheerfully sitting here together. And based on when we all started, I would be the first one out of the gate for that, and the time has come. This would be your review and initiation of a process to review the city manager with the intention of bringing it back to you for September 9th, doing the actual review and executive session. With that, I will turn it over to Dr. Train. Thank you.

Honorable Mayor and members of the council, thank you for the opportunity to return this evening. And I don't need much of your time. I think you've had the opportunity to take a look at the documents. Just a reminder that what we have done in building the documents, we're supporting Plan Tucson, adopted city policy, et cetera, transparency, inclusivity, efficiency, equitable city governance. And the opportunity for feedback The goal with all of this, whether it is your internal feedback as the elected group or the external partners that have been identified, is to strengthen relationships And I think you've heard in your meeting agenda today the complex things that we are tackling as a city and as a community. All that goes forward through relationship development, improvement, recommitment, and the opportunity here is through these documents. We've given you the sample documents for use. They are ready to go. Timeline that we are recommending is August 6th, so before close of business tomorrow. You, in fact, would receive the link to be able to use the document that is returned. Same thing with external partners, random sampling of directors, ELT members, assistant city managers. in totality. And that will come back. All of the information gathered will be done in a confidential manner. We'll have an opportunity to, again, create general trending for you in a report. and then again that would be provided to you in a very confidential manner for use in that September executive session. So we believe we're ready to do this. We can support this for you and if there are any questions that I can answer this evening, I'm certainly

surely happy to do that for you thank you dr train yeah i think um first and foremost i want to thank vice mayor santa cruz for um really you know putting her thoughts into this process a 360 evaluation for the people that we hire which are the city manager the city clerk and the city attorney is clear transparent and useful And so appreciate the work that you've done in any comments vice mayor and colleagues Again, just wanted to you know, thank you.

Dr Tran and your team, you know for all the work and getting us here as we have Come gotten up to date on our own practices internally around evaluations and how important it is for us to give feedback and YES. TO OUR EMPLOYEES SO THAT WE CAN BETTER MEET THE NEEDS OF OUR COMMUNITY ALSO NEEDS TO BE REFLECTED, YOU KNOW, WITH OUR TOP LEADERSHIP. AND I SEE THIS AS AN OPPORTUNITY NOT ONLY FOR THE TRANSPARENCY AND ACCOUNTABILITY BUT TO How do we improve, you know, as an organization if we're not in this constant kind of dialogue? So I know it can seem scary, intimidating, but we appreciate our city attorney, our city manager, and our city clerk. And we also want to make sure we're a good place for you all to work and that it's a mutually beneficial relationship. So thank you for everything. You're very welcome.

Any others? Council Member Barajas.

Thank you, ma'am. Well, I just have a couple questions. How will the people be selected for the 360 review? And then are there opportunities for city manager's office staff, department directors to participate in this process?

What we did for this launch, for the first opportunity with this, certainly all of you, of course, will receive the link. Our assistant city managers will receive that also. There will be a random selection of members at the director level, so from our executive leadership team, approximately three directors, and then we also will have our labor union leaders have an opportunity, so that is a total of six. We also looked very closely at professional partners Meaning, again, as we've even heard on today's meeting agenda, so much of what is happening, everything from Southern Arizona Home Builders Association to our PAG and RTS group for rapid transit, Visit Tucson, and that, again, critical push for economic development. And then also a neighborhood association. And so those individuals, we've identified them. Again, they will have the partner opportunity. That's a little bit of a different set of questions. And all of that will be coming back. And again, sole source redirection in a confidential manner that will get that link or that completed document back again.

Do you need a motion to proceed with starting the process? All right, can I get a motion?

All right, yes. I move that we direct the Human Resources Director to conduct this evaluation effort as described. Second.

There's a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Any against? Thank you so much. Really appreciate motion passes. I really appreciate the incredible work put into this. Thank you.

We look forward to bringing the report to you. Thank you.

Thank you. Alrighty, so we move on to item nine. Time has been set aside for discussion and direction relating to matters pending in front of the Board of Supervisors. And we do have our team, Stephanie Zamora and Laura Dent, that will be reporting today. Mr. Manager.

Thank you, Honorable Mayor, members of the Council. You've done the introductions for me, so we start with the Pima County and local jurisdictions. Ms. Zamora.

Thank you, Mr. Manager. Good afternoon, honorable mayor and members of the council. The report that was submitted to the record highlights a few actions taken by the Pima County Board of Supervisors recently. The board received updates on the implementation of its own climate action plan. It also received updates around behavioral health and reentry initiatives for justice-involved people and also the prosperity initiative, including a new dashboard that's being developed in partnership with the city of Tucson. Lastly, the board approved approximately $3.9 million in community funding and accepted a $1.73 million intergovernmental agreement with the city to implement the Tucson Pima Pro Housing Initiative through 2030. And with that, honorable mayor, that concludes my report.

Thank you and I do want to remind the colleagues that we are having a joint meeting with the Board of Supervisors, August 14. I know that some of you will not be able to join us, but you can always leave like input statements and that will not be the last meeting with the Board of Supervisors. So, looking forward to that. August 13 or 14? August 13. August 13. Sorry about that. Ms. Dent.

Thank you honorable mayor members the council I'll start with our federal update today Congress is working to avoid a government shutdown before the October 1st start of the new fiscal year The Senate will likely take final action on a bipartisan continuing resolution that would fund the government through December before leaving for the August recess at the end of this week The Senate bill also extends surface transportation authorizations through December and temporarily delays implementation of the administration's proposed changes to the federal grants process which we've discussed with some of you if Approved by both chambers which would need to happen when the house returns from their recess The measure would avoid a government shutdown ahead of the upcoming midterm elections which is in about 90 days On the state front, I'll offer just some brief news and post-primary updates. The primary turnout this year was quite low. It was around 27%. Andy Biggs, as you know, is the Republican nominee for governor. He won his primary and recently named his lieutenant governor running mate, Sini Kerr. Kerr is a former Republican legislator, a dairy farmer, and a West Valley resident. It has been widely reported that Governor Hobbs will soon name her choice for lieutenant governor as John Giles. a former Republican, and the former mayor of Mesa. Alex Culloden won the Republican primary for Secretary of State over Gina Swoboda. Senate President Warren Peterson defeated Rodney Glassman in the Republican primary for AG. Kimberly Yee defeated incumbent Tom Horn in the Republican primary for Superintendent of Public Instruction. And Teresa Leyva Ruiz won her primary in the Democratic side. At the Corporation Commission, Republican incumbent Kevin Thompson and challenger Ralph Heap prevailed. Heap did defeat Nick Myers, a current commissioner of the Corporation Commission. He has since faced two campaign finance complaints, which are actually being heard today by the Clean Elections Commission. In local news, incumbent Stephanie Stahl Hamilton did lose her seat in the LD21 primary by a very narrow margin. I want to congratulate the winners of that contest and just take a moment to acknowledge the leadership of Representative Stahl Hamilton. She is one of the most tenured leaders of the Southern Arizona delegation. She was a ranking member of the Appropriations Committee and served on the Arizona Reconsultation Committee with our esteemed manager and she's been a staunch advocate for the city so she will be missed and just a final update from the litigation front on referrals that have been litigated in recent days a proposition 145 was rejected by a judge last week so that's been kicked off the ballot and this was the poison pill that essentially would have invalidated the outcome of the protect education act We are expecting an appeal on that by state lawmakers, so we'll see where that goes. A Superior Court judge in Maricopa County also knocked out Proposition 143 from the ballot. This is a proposal that would have banned collective bargaining for government workers and blocked school districts from supporting union activities. Lawmakers have committed to not appealing that, so those two referrals are no longer going to be on the November ballot as of now. And just a final plug the Arizona League of cities and towns conferences in two weeks the 17th through the 20th, I believe no the 18th or the 21st and I Appreciate that several of you will be there would love to make sure that if you are going that we are in communication we have several members of leadership uh both elected and department staff featured on panels discussing issues of import to tucson so we have a great agenda i want to make sure if you're going which i hope that you can that you're aware of all of that and can be there to support and that concludes my report thank you wonderful report thank you so much miss dent any questions comments concerns hearing none thank you so much mr manager

okay perfect thank you appreciate the reports.

Item eleven does anyone have any items to remove from the consent agenda on tonight's meeting council member don't not from the consent agenda but from the liquor licenses I would like to pull to be considered separately for discussion item five. The three.

Council only.

Thank you, Mayor. From consent, I would like to pull item G for separate consideration. It's a very straightforward item, but due to my husband's employment, I would like to abstain from that vote.

Any others? All right so item 12 does anyone have any items for future agendas. Seeing none study session is adjourned the next regularly scheduled meeting is on Tuesday August 18th and we will reconvene at 545 for the regular meeting right here. Thank you so much for everything really appreciate it we'll see you in a bit thank you.

All right. So,

Everyone, this is the Mayor and Council meeting of Wednesday, August 5th. We will stand with Roll call. And we will stand in session.

Council Member Cunningham.

Here.

Council Member Dahl.

Here.

Councilwoman Lee. Here. Council Member Barajas. Here. Council Member Schubert. Here. Vice Mayor Santa Cruz. Here. Mayor Romero.

Here. Before we go to Item 2, City Attorney will go over the rules of decorum for Mayor and Council meetings. Mr. Attorney.

Thank you, Honorable Mayor and Members of Council. Arizona's open meeting laws provide the members of the public may attend and listen to the proceedings during tonight's public meeting of the Mayor and Council. Arizona law also allows the Mayor and Council to enforce rules and procedures for public attendance of the meeting to ensure orderly behavior and to prevent unnecessary interference with the public meeting. Here are the rules that apply. The rules require decorum and orderly conduct by the members of the audience. No person attending the meeting shall engage in conduct that disrupts or otherwise impedes the orderly conduct of the meeting, including any statements or conduct that interrupts the persons who might be addressing the mayor and council or that disrupts the discussions of the mayor and council. The mayor has the authority to ensure compliance with the rules of orderly conduct. If disorderly or disruptive conduct continues after a warning, and this is that first warning, the mayor may direct the removal of persons from chambers and or recess the meeting itself. If disruptive behavior makes it necessary to clear the chambers, the persons who disrupted the meeting will not be allowed to return to the chambers for the remainder of tonight's meeting. As a final note, please be aware that interfering with or preventing this lawful public meeting from being carried out in an orderly manner not only violates the rules of participation, but also violates Title XIII of the Arizona Revised Statutes.

Thank you, Mr. Attorney. Item 2.

Invocation, Pledge of Allegiance, and Appointment to Boards, Committees, and Commissions.

We will start with the land acknowledgement. Let us begin by grounding ourselves and acknowledging these lands. The City of Tucson is on the lands that have been stewarded by the Tohono O'odham since time immemorial in the Pascua Yaqui tribe, who have lived in the Sonoran Desert for thousands of years. Let's rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you so much. We will now move to item 2C1. Presentations. We are actually skipping 2C1, the recognition of excellence for Samia Posadas. We want to make sure that she's here with us and she was not able to join us today. But we will be moving to item 2D. Appointments to boards, committees, and commissions. CITY MANAGERS COMMUNICATION NUMBER 213 DATED AUGUST 5TH IS RECEIVED INTO AND MADE PART OF THE RECORD. DO WE HAVE ANY APPOINTMENTS TODAY, MS. CLARK?

NO, YOUR HONOR.

ALL RIGHTY. IS THERE ANY PERSONAL APPOINTMENTS TO BE MADE AT THIS TIME? SEEING NONE, WE MOVE ON TO ITEM 3. MAYOR AND COUNCIL REPORT SUMMARY OF CURRENT EVENTS. CITY MANAGERS COMMUNICATION NUMBER 217 DATED AUGUST 5TH IS RECEIVED INTO AND MADE PART OF THE RECORD. THIS TIME HAS BEEN SCHEDULED TO ALLOW MEMBERS OF THE MAYOR AND COUNCIL TO REPORT ON CURRENT EVENTS. THESE ARE TO BE CURRENT EVENTS OF ACTIVITIES WITHIN THE COMMUNITY, NOT POSITION STATEMENTS ON POLICY ISSUES. DOES ANY COUNCIL MEMBER HAVE ANYTHING TO REPORT AT THIS TIME? YES, I SEE SOME HANDS UP. WE'LL START WITH VICE MAYOR AND WARD ONE AND THEN COME DOWN. THE ROW. THANK YOU, MAYOR.

SO THIS PAST FRIDAY, FUGA CELEBRATED ITS EIGHT-YEAR ANNIVERSARY WITH OUR CENTER ENDING UP AT AMERICAN EATS. AND SO JUST WANT TO THANK ALL THE FAMILIES AND COMMUNITY WHO KEPT THIS MOVEMENT ROLLING FOR EIGHT AMAZING YEARS. WE'LL ALSO BE HAVING OUR SECOND SUNDAY RIDE OUT OF THE WARD ONE OFFICE AT 8 A.M. this coming Sunday. Last, I guess the only other thing to report is that last Thursday, myself, Council Member Barajas, and other council staff had the chance to get an up-close look at everything happening at Tucson International Airport, from major safety improvements to investments coming to our region. It was great to see and experience a new runway that's being built, so appreciate everybody's Participation from the council colleagues. I'm getting to understand more of our airport system And thank you to staff for for coordinating that event.

That's it Councilmember Cunningham a Few things first of all I'm really not gonna get through this meeting without mentioning Harry Mitchell Harry Mitchell was the mayor of Tempe for 16 years and AND SERVED IN THE STATE SENATE WITH MY FATHER AND ALSO SERVED THE STATE OF ARIZONA IN CONGRESS. BUT HE WAS ALSO, LIKE ME, A TEACHER. HE TAUGHT SOCIAL STUDIES AT THE HIGH SCHOOL AND WAS A CONSUMMATE PUBLIC SERVANT. HIS SON BECAME MAYOR OF TEMPE, AS A MATTER OF FACT. AND THE FIRST TIME I EVER MET HIM WAS OBVIOUSLY THROUGH MY DAD WITH MY DAD AND He talked to me about how much teaching and being a teacher meant to him. And for that, I just wanted to express my condolences to his family and their loss. The other one is here in Tucson, we also lost another person this last week who had an incredible effect on Tucson, and that's Alex Garza. He actually helped start Los Artes, which is one of the programs that allowed multiple people to get their GEDs in Tucson over a period of like 30 years. He actually grew up as a migrant farm worker and became a renowned Chicano artist here in Tucson. He served Los Artes as a way to get youth involved in improving the community through public art. He started the program at a room at the Bernie Sedley House in South Tucson like had to be late 80s and he really just thought that there was this opportunity for young kids to engage in art and also in their GED and that's the type of things that we have in Tucson that are special. The program recognized them all over the place. They're students of Los Artists have painted murals in Tucson, Los Angeles, Seattle and even Washington. And a few years ago, the public tile snake at Wrightstown and Pantano, Las Artes did that project as well. So my condolences to his wife, Yoli, and his daughter, Adela.

Thank you, Councilmember. Councilmember Dahl.

I want everybody to be careful driving out there. Kids are back in school, and it's a dangerous time as people are trying to figure out where to go. I live near Sal Point, and we have young drivers in our neighborhood. They're usually not the problems. It's usually the parents who are dropping off kids and are in a hurry to get on to work. So all of us need to slow down. These signs are available through the city, and you can post them up like any of those stupid political signs at places to help remind people to slow down. Did I say stupid? Sorry.

I don't think political signs are stupid. I'm sorry.

Not many of them are smart. We'll agree to disagree. My final announcement is I want to give a shout out to a staff member at Ward 3, Arnie Bermudez, who is moving on to a better job or a different job. He has been our communications manager for a couple of years, three years maybe, and has done a great job with our newsletter and our social media and so many other duties. He's been stolen, Mayor, by the county. He will be serving in the office of Andres Cano. But good for him, good for Andres, and best of luck to both of them. Thank you, Mayor.

Yeah. Councilman Lee. Thank you, Mayor. It is with a lot of sadness that I want to take a moment to acknowledge the passing as well as the life of Rudy Lopez, who alongside his wife, Ann, dedicated nearly three decades of service to the Rita Ranch Neighborhood Association and to Southeast Tucson community. For almost 30 years, Rudy helped shape the future of our region through his leadership, advocacy, and unwavering commitment to smart growth and neighborhood improvement. In the six and a half years I've served on the city council, I can't remember attending with you, Mayor, a single groundbreaking or ribbon cutting where Rudy wasn't there proudly celebrating our city's progress. So my family and I and my team want to extend our heartfelt condolences to Ann, his two sons, and the entire Lopez family and everyone whose lives were touched by Rudy's service and leadership and friendship. And we're incredibly grateful for all he did to make Southeast Tucson a better place. And he will be deeply missed. Thank you, Mayor.

THANK YOU, COUNCILMAN. COUNCILMEMBER VARGAS. THANK YOU, MAYOR. IT'S OFFICIALLY BACK TO SCHOOL TIME, AND I WANT TO WISH ALL OF OUR STUDENTS, FAMILIES, AND EDUCATORS A SAFE, SUCCESSFUL, AND WONDERFUL SCHOOL YEAR. THIS WEEK, WE WILL CONTINUE TO SEE YOU ALL WILL CONTINUE TO SEE OUR WARD FIVE TEAM OUT IN THE COMMUNITY DELIVERING BACKPACKS AND SUPPORTING STUDENTS AND FAMILIES AS THEY PREPARE FOR THE YEAR AHEAD. I WOULD LIKE TO WISH OUR WARD FIVE SUMMER FELLOWS, WHO IS HERE SOMEWHERE, A STUDENT AT ASU, RISING SOPHOMORE AND A RISING SENIOR AT CLAREMONT COLLEGE AS THEY WILL BE LEAVING TUCSON SOON TO START THEIR NEW SCHOOL YEAR AND THEY ARE BOTH Members of our Ward 5 community grew up in Ward 5 and I wish them the best of luck. I also want to take a moment to recognize and congratulate Southside resident Sebastian Rivera for being selected to the Team USA Southwest 12 and under regional baseball team. Sebastian's hard work, dedication, and passion for the game are an inspiration and we wish him the best of luck. As we welcome students back, I also want to recognize the important role our community spaces play in supporting our families. Our parks are critical for Ward 5 and for our entire city. They are places where children play, learn, and build confidence, where families gather, and where neighbors create connections that strengthen our communities. I want to thank our Parks and Recreation Department and Tucson Police Department for taking the time to attend a Southwest Rams football and cheer practice a couple weeks ago. They met with A huge group of parents, coaches, community members to discuss the ongoing improvements at Rudy Garcia Park. The 4.7 million improvement project at Rudy Garcia Park was funded primarily through Tucson's voter-approved Proposition 407 bond program. This represents an important investment in Ward 5. Community engagement and open communication are essential as these projects move forward. And I appreciate our residents for staying involved, asking questions, and helping shape the future of this important community space. I also want to congratulate Fuga for celebrating their eight years. I wish them many, many more years to come. I WANT TO RECOGNIZE THE PARKS AND RECREATION DEPARTMENT GENERAL SERVICE FACILITIES MANAGEMENT TEAM FOR THE RECENT SNACK BAR IMPROVEMENTS BACK AT RUDY GARCIA PARK. THANK YOU TO LARRY, JAMES, ADRIAN FROM GENERAL SERVICES FOR YOUR HARD WORK AND A SPECIAL THANK YOU TO CARLOS FROM JESSICA'S APPLIANCES NEW AND USED STORE LOCATED ON SOUTH SIX AVENUE IN MICHIGAN FOR GENERALLY DONATING A NEW REFRIGERATOR FOR THE CONCESSION STAND. We wish you the best of luck, Southwest Rams, and I look forward to some yummy nachos and cold soda. This week, I also had the opportunity to join Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva for a back to school climate conversations with youth. Hearing directly from young people reminded us that climate change, extreme heat, and environmental justice remain important priorities for our youth and our families. Last week, I also participated in a Southern Arizona community town hall focused on building a more reliable, affordable, and resilient energy future. Thank you to all the organizers, all the Partners who participated and everyone that attended you made these conversations possible Now I encourage you all especially our youth in the room and the audience and our young adults to learn more about the Tucson Youth Climate Action Fund, an opportunity that provides resources and funding for youth led projects that help create a cooler, greener and healthier Tucson. This city of Tucson program backed by Bloomberg Philanthropies will help provide micro grants ranging from a thousand to five thousand dollars. Thank you to our mayor for making this opportunity possible. Please join us for the upcoming Safe City Connect transit meeting hosted by both Ward 1 and Ward 5 on Monday, August 10th from 5.30 to 7.30 p.m. at the El Pueblo Activity Center. If you cannot make this date, there will be both in-person and virtual opportunities Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Your feedback and participation are very important as we continue working on these issues that impact our community. I want to celebrate a special milestone in our Ward 5 office. Please join me in wishing Gabriel Holguin, our constituent communications advisor, a very happy 30th birthday. Gabe, thank you for your dedication and for helping keep our community connected and informed. Lastly, I too want to recognize the passing of Alex Garza, who was a resident of the Fairgrounds neighborhood, founding artist of Las Artes organization in South Tucson, and an icon in Tucson's Chicano art community. While I did not have the privilege of knowing Alex personally, I have had the opportunity to appreciate and witness the lasting impact of his work. Through his art, Alex celebrated our culture, inspired generations of artists and students, and helped bring communities together. His legacy will continue to live on through the many lives he touched and the artwork that continues to enrich our city. Thank you.

Council Member Schubert. Thank you, Madam Mayor, members of the council. Thanks to everybody for being here. I'm going to start my current event report with an update about traffic violence. I didn't provide this at the last meeting on July 21. So this starts on June 27. So on June 27th, there was a two-vehicle crash with one fatality. On June 29th, a 55-year-old pedestrian with serious injuries after a hit and run passed away on July 9th. So he was in the hospital. He was battling those injuries and then passed away a few days later. Also on that day, an SUV crashed into a semi that started a vehicle fire and left one person hospitalized. So that both happened on... June 29th on July 1st a motorcyclist had life-threatening injuries after a crash. On July 13th there was a multi-vehicle crash. One person was transported to the hospital with life-threatening injuries and a second person was transported with non-life-threatening injuries. On July 14th a 63-year-old pedestrian was hit by a car and pronounced dead at the scene. On July 15th A two-vehicle crash left one person hospitalized. On July 17th, one person was in critical condition after a crash. On July 18th, a 19-year-old motorcyclist was killed in a crash just after midnight, and then one hour later that same evening, but at a different location, a 44-year-old pedestrian was also hit and killed. On July 30th, a 59-year-old was hit by a car and later died from his injuries at the hospital. On August 1st, three people were taken to a Tucson area trauma center after a rollover crash. So continuing to provide these updates regularly is just a way to keep these incidents at the forefront of our mind as we continue to seek systemic solutions to prevent these types of things from happening in our communities. Ongoing current events, I want to start by providing an update about our chill space, our Ward 6 chill space, which is the cooling center that we're running out of the back of the Ward 6 office. The Chill Space has now logged over 1,000 visits since opening in late May and provided over 400 showers to the community. Last week, Chill Space staff were tasked with rehoming a puppy that was rescued by a guest and managed to find a home for him. Yesterday, a guest was transported to medical respite and is now looking at transitioning from the streets to an assisted living environment. We've seen that this third space also operates as a community meeting spot for people to check in on each other in the absence of phone communication. This recently resulted in a mother and daughter reuniting in our program. And then I brought a prop just like Kevin Dahl. I brought some comments. So the guests of the Cooling Center filled out a survey last month and I just wanted to read a few comments. What is your favorite part of the chill space? This person says, I like the shower. It's hot, has plenty of water pressure. Hygiene is a human right. Thank you for respecting us. What's your favorite part of the chill space? It's an easy way to cool off and get water and food. Great resources. How have you been helped by staff or one of our rotating services? This person says, ID, birth certificate, and treatment information. This person says their favorite part is that they get to shower and eat snacks and the resources help and they like to stay cool and clean. And then Yeah, have you been helped by the Chill Space staff? This person says, yes, I have. They showed nothing but respect and kindness toward me. So we're seeing amazing service acceptance by employing this approach of building relationships and trust and providing a dignified and welcoming space for attendance. We also want to acknowledge our amazing summer interns. We had two high schoolers this summer, Oliver and Jolina. They wrapped up their time with us last week since school's starting again. Jolina's a rising senior at UHS. Oliver's a rising sophomore. The team and I really enjoyed working with them this summer. These were our first ever interns. We greatly appreciate the essential support they provided on a variety of projects throughout the summer. And we miss them already. Thank you so much, Jolina and Oliver. Continuing with more gratitude, I wanted to share this sweet note that I received from a community member who wanted to highlight an unsung hero in Ward 6. It reads in part, a two-time AmeriCorps Public Allies National Service member, Zachary Owens spent two years working at the Armory Park Senior Center building up daily programming for seniors, planning events like Bark in the Park and the Senior Wellness Fair, and becoming a big part of the daily fabric of the center before leaving for grad school in California this past fall. The writer told me that he was also Zach's manager, so he just wanted to let me know that. But he said when he popped in recently to introduce a new senior neighbor to the Armory Park Senior Center, there was Zach. He was volunteering while he was home for the summer. Zach quickly provided the new guests with a calendar of events and enrollment info for the senior lunch program. So I want to thank Zach and I want to thank Bob for sending me this piece of good news. And then finally, just two upcoming events. This Saturday, April, August 8th, April. On Saturday, August 8th, in the morning is a yappy hour to celebrate the opening of the Armory Park Dog Park. That's going to be at 9 a.m. And we're excited to hear that acoustic music is going to be provided by no bigger dog lover than former Ward 6 Councilmember Steve Kozachek himself. I know, I know, hot news. So I'll definitely be there with my dog. And then that evening, also on Saturday, Gallery 3202 at our office here at Ward 6 is excited to announce our first ever curated exhibition. This is in partnership with Shannon Smith of the Etherton Gallery. She's the gallery manager and the head registrar over there. So protest is currently on view at our Ward 6 office. You can come by during walk-in hours, and we're also having an opening reception on Saturday night from 6.30 to 8.30. And then our Ward 3 and 6 Safe City Connect Transit session is happening on Wednesday, August 12th. So anybody who's interested in talking about the Transit Safety and Security Action Plan or giving feedback should definitely attend. I will be there. That's Wednesday, August 12th from 5.30 to 7.30 at the Randolph Recreation Center Auditorium. We'll include that reminder in our weekly newsletter and just a reminder to subscribe to our newsletter if you haven't already. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Councilmember. I, too, want to add my congratulations to the teachers, parents, and students that are starting school. I, too, want to wish the students, parents, and teachers a good school year. I hope the students learn a lot and make new friends and have wonderful adventures, including in reading. To the teachers, I hope you get the best students ever and that you continue enjoying the work of teaching our children and youth. And to the parents, I would like to suggest that, yes, you do slow down. Take your time in driving your children to school. so that we can all be safe. And as a parent, a TUSD parent, we will be starting school tomorrow, and I'm looking forward to a good school year for our family as well. And then I too want to add my voice inviting the community to attend a, the Safe City team will be hosting a series of informational forums. You heard about the transit safety and security action plan. This is an opportunity for community members to learn more. about the transit safety and security initiatives that Mayor and Council passed and it's an opportunity for you all to provide feedback to help shape our policies in the City of Tucson. Sessions will be August 10th, 11th, 12th, and 13th. Please go to tucsonaz.gov to register. I also had amazing interns this summer and I want to thank them. All our interns, our summer interns, are ready to start school and doing great things. So we had Jilly Rolnick, an intern from Harvard that came to do a Somos Uno and City of Gastronomy strategic plan. Sylvia Jimenez, Giselle Ladriere, and Nicole Camacho all served in the mayor's office this summer and are doing some incredible work going back to school. But if you called my office, if you emailed us, our interns took care of you. So they added an amazing voice to our mayor team. So with that, We are going to move on to Item 4. City Manager's Report, Summary of Current Events. City Manager's Communication Number 218, dated August 5th, is received into and made part of the record. This time has been scheduled to allow the City Manager to report on current events. Mr. Manager.

Thank you, Honorable Mayor. For tonight's comments from the city manager, I'm going to call upon my colleague, the city attorney, Roy Lusk. We had a recent loss of a staff member from the city attorney's office, and I think it appropriate to give Mr. Lusk an opportunity to talk about her at tonight's meeting.

Thank you, Honorable Mayor, members of council, and city manager for... THAT GENEROSITY. ON MONDAY MORNING, PIRI GLINSKY PASSED AWAY PEACEFULLY WITH HER HUSBAND AND DAUGHTER BY HER SIDE. SHE WAS A TREASURED MEMBER OF THE TUCSON CITY ATTORNEY FAMILY IN THE BROADER LEGAL COMMUNITY. SHE SERVED IN THIS OFFICE FOR OVER 27 YEARS, STARTING AS A LEGAL INTERN FROM THE CRIMINAL DIVISION AND MOVING ALL THE WAY UP TO A PRINCIPAL ASSISTANT CITY ATTORNEY FOR THE CIVIL DIVISION. She represented the Planning and Development Services Division, among other roles. She represented that department through various directors, zoning administrators, and zoning examiners, and helped guide that department through the transition to the Unified Development Code, working on the Impact Fee Program, advising the Board of Adjustment, the Tucson-Pima County Historic Commission and Planning Commission. Most importantly, though, she took a practical approach to the law because she never forgot who she was working for, the people of Tucson. More importantly than her work, Perry's kindness and generosity with her time, her energy, and her support made all who worked with her better. She saw the good in people and brought it out in them. She trained many attorneys and always treated them gently because she knew what it was like to struggle. She treated victims with respect because she knew it was hard to come forward and ask for accountability. And she treated her coworkers like family because she knew the importance of her family in her own life. And that was what they were to her, her family. Perry's commitment to what was right, her sense of humor, her heart, her adventurousness, and her belief in the magic of life made her so much more than a good attorney and a wonderful colleague. It made her a great mom, wife, sister, and friend. It made her the best person. I count myself lucky to have known her and will miss her terribly. If you knew Piri and are able, please reach out to the ones you love and to each other to share your thoughts and memories of her. Piri would have wanted it that way. Our thoughts are with Piri's family and her friends during this challenging time. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Attorney. I appreciate it. Item 5 liquor license applications city managers communication number 214 dated August 5th is received into and be part of the record madam clerk please read the liquor license agenda

Your Honor, on the evening's agenda, we have four applications for new licenses, one application for a personal transfer, two person and location transfers, one application for a special event, and one application for change and acquisition control. We have one item, B3, that upon no objection from mayor and council will be considered separately. We also have one item not in compliance, item B4, and all other applications are in compliance with city requirements. An appropriate motion would be to forward items 5B1-2, 5B5-7, 5C1, and 5D1 to the State Liquor Board with a recommendation of approval, and to forward item 5B4 to the State Liquor Board with a recommendation of denial.

What is the Council's pleasure?

I move. It's all moved, Mayor.

There's a motion to move the liquor licenses, a second. Any further discussion? All those in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Any against? Motion carries. And we have a couple that we're considering separately, correct? Item B3. Okay. Council Member Dahl.

Thank you, Mayor. I pulled this with the acceptance of my colleagues for a short discussion before I will move to recommend that we forward it to the Liquor License Board with a yes recommendation. We don't issue liquor licenses, but the city is part of the process. It's the state License Board that gives liquor licenses. The state asks us for police to look at the record of the people who are getting the liquor license. And our planning department makes sure that the plan for wherever liquor is being sold or served meets all the requirements. In this case, it meets all those requirements. In this case, we had some controversy, some legitimate concerns from neighbors. It's a Dodge and Grant. It's a neighborhood. It's changing, but it's well known for being a neighborhood where there's a lot of crime and a lot of violence. And there are active neighbors, some in the audience now, who are working to bring up the neighborhood. We got written excellent and well presented and well researched written objections, and I believe those will be forwarded to the Liquor License Board, which is another place for this decision to be made. But our role is to, one, is it an appropriate location? It is because it's where a liquor license and liquor has been sold for years. Is the person who's going to be holding the license, are they qualified? Are there any problems with them? Well, in this case, it's changing because there was a franchisee of 7-Eleven who's left. And if anybody's interested, they have other franchises where they're working elsewhere in Tucson. And unfortunately, just as an aside, that business was impacted by Grant Road. which was a shame. I mean, all the businesses where we're doing construction along these major roads are being impacted. And I hope that the city gets better and better at supporting the businesses impacted like that. So the corporate 7-Eleven is taking over running it. And they have a long history of having liquor licenses. There's no, they haven't violated any liquor license laws in the state of Arizona. So that's why I've come to the conclusion to move that we forward it to the state board with a recommendation of approval.

So there's a motion. I'll second. There's a motion and a second. Any further discussion on this item? Hearing none, all those in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye.

ANY AGAINST? MOTION CARRIES. ANY OTHER SEPARATE? OKAY. SO WE ARE DONE WITH ITEM 5. WE MOVE ON TO ITEM 6. CALL TO THE AUDIENCE. Madam Clerk, please read the announcement.

Thank you, Your Honor. At this time, any member of the public is allowed to address the Mayor and City Council on any issue except for items scheduled for public hearing at the meeting. Call to the audience will last for 30 minutes, and speakers are limited to three-minute presentations. The green light will turn on when you're called to speak. It will turn yellow when you have 30 seconds remaining, and will turn red and beep when your time is up. At that time, please conclude your comments.

All righty, our first speaker will be JP Salvatierra.

Madam Mayor, I have to say you look vivacious. Even under the strain of your position, something is genuinely showing. It looks nice and I compliment you. I'm gonna say things that I honestly, truthfully believe and I'm going to tell people exactly how I feel about the benefits that they do to our community and how they support us and uplift us whenever I can. Board members, City Attorney Lusk, I have some remarks to review for adoption or revision of current policy. We have a general and special election coming up. There are props 421 and 422. 421 is a new expanded and long-term franchise agreement with TEP Fortis, and Prop 422 is an extended long-term one-tenth cent sales tax to fund Reed Park and Zoo. I have to say I'm ambivalent about voting for either one of them at this point in time. Uncheck public. Inflationary cost will stop only when statewide commonwealth utility cooperative network exists. And it's important because we can't just work off credit or sales tax revenues. It has to be profit that we create and we recirculate within our community. And the Commonwealth utility focus is going to remove TEP Fortis forever and maintain this kind of a stature for the entire state so we can sustain ourselves well in the future. So once again, please vote no on Props 421 and 422. They have no merit for long-term public approval at this time. And I'd like to recommend that... Why not proffer an immediate council adopted proposition to urgently and totally replace Fortis TEP with an interdependent state and municipal public statewide commonwealth utility cooperative network? It's a big measure, but we can't afford not to do something about creating more revenue generation in Arizona.

I think those are the three minutes, Mr. Salvatierra. Thank you so much. Very much. I appreciate it. Kevin Nelson.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. My name is Kevin Nelson. Four years ago, I bought a historic home on 7th Avenue in the West University neighborhood. with the intention of retiring there. Since then, I've invested over $100,000 restoring and improving my property. Today, I'm here to share what a typical day looks like for those of us living immediately adjacent to Anza Park. My day starts every morning by picking up trash in front of my house. Most of it consists of commercial litter blown down the street from the Circle K at 6th and Speedway. Moving to the alley behind my house on Farrow Avenue, the situation turns entirely critical. Every single day, I witness open drug dealing in that alley. At least once a week, my morning routine involves clearing human feces, discarded drug paraphernalia, and piles of trash off Farrow Avenue just to keep my property sanitary. During the daytime, our civic resources are entirely unusable. Every day, a group of 10 to 20 individuals takes over the local dog park, preventing tax-paying dog owners from accessing it. Throughout the day and night, a group of as many as 10 people completely occupies the children's play structure. I call it the condo. Local children cannot play there. The security situation has completely deteriorated. Personally, I've called 911 at least 10 times to report attempted break-ins on my property, assaults, fights, open drug use, and active shootings. This past Saturday morning, I called to report a serious assault and received no emergency response at all. Just recently, three people died in this immediate area, including one this morning. And my neighbor, sitting right there, was forced to save an overdosing drug user's life by administering Narcan. We see the hardworking Tucson police and community service officers do what they can. Several of us surrounding the park have pooled our own money and hired off duty police officers to do extra patrols in and around the park. That helps for a few hours, but the problems always return. We actively report these encampments and safety issues, but neighborhood coordination tools alone cannot solve a crisis of this scale. I'm asking the council for three immediate actions. One, enforce existing laws. Consistently enforce existing ordinances that establish park hours and prohibit camping inside our city parks. Two, hold businesses accountable. Require Circle K to manage the commercial trash generated by their store and hire a security guard or police officer to proactively prevent large groups from loitering and using drugs near their store. Three, install infrastructure barriers. Support the West University Neighbor Association's request to install a functional security fence on Ferro Avenue at the back of the Circle K property. Without immediate decisive intervention from the city, residents like myself may be forced to sell our properties. This will inevitably further depress neighborhood home prices and directly erode the property tax revenue the city relies on. Please help us reclaim our amazing historic neighborhood that we all love. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Nelson.

Danza Park has been a parks that we've been working on these issues since I was a council member and I've been mayor for seven years So it's not a new thing that doesn't excuse what's happening and we want to make sure that we can connect with you So I'm gonna give your number because you did provide it to us to our city manager so that he can Have someone in his office work with you and the neighbors. I

I ALSO SENT A WRITTEN STATEMENT WITH PHOTOGRAPHIC EVIDENCE AND SOME LOGS TO THE CITY CLERK EARLIER.

YES, WE RECEIVED THAT. THANK YOU. MAYOR, I WOULD ALSO JUST ADD FOR THE CITY MANAGER FOR THE FOLLOW-UP TO INCLUDE MY OFFICE AND WARD SIX SINCE WE SHARE THIS AREA. THANK YOU.

OKAY. I'M DOING NOTES. THANK YOU ALL. ALL RIGHTY. OUR NEXT SPEAKER IS FRANK CHASE.

My name is Frankie Zills. I'm here to talk about the, my name is Frankie Zills. I'm here to talk about the rehabilitation acts that are going on within the prison systems and how they're letting people out. My First Amendment is protected in this building, correct? So I can say anything I wanna say as long as it's not threatening and my rights are not to be infringed upon. I'm here to talk to you, Regina. I have something for you to hear personally because I blame you and Hobbs. My grandma, Susan Marie Gerke, was tragically murdered on the 24th of July by a man named Ashir Edward Jefferson, a man that you guys failed to keep locked up because of your rehabilitation beliefs. In 2019, this man was found guilty of third-degree burglary. In 2021, he was found guilty of aggravated assault for binding somebody up and temporarily disfiguring them. This person was a 13-year-old child. He should have been charged with kidnapping, with aggravated assault, and attempted murder. Instead, you guys gave him a plea deal and took off the temporary disfigurement charge and didn't even charge him with kidnapping. Give him a break, right? He's a young black man. He just made a mistake.

I'm being sarcastic, just so you guys know.

I'm pretty sure there's not a lot of common sense in those seats right now.

He was sentenced to five years in prison in February 2021 and was released early in October 2024. While in prison, he was found guilty of disorderly conduct, weapon possession, tampering with a security or safety device, disobeying an order, possession of communication device, possession of drug paraphernalia, and possession or manufacture of an intoxicating substance. And you guys still let him out early and didn't charge him more time after what he did in there because of your rehabilitation beliefs, specifically for people of color because you're afraid of looking racist instead of realizing good from evil. Everything is about racism, you guys, and it's childish. and now my grandma's dead. He murdered my grandma a little bit more than a year after your systems let him out. It's your fault and Hobbs. The cops took an hour and a half to get to my grandma while she was bleeding out and the guy came back three times. The neighbor had to make sure he didn't get to my grandma while she was bleeding out, going in and out of consciousness. How many law-abiding citizens have to die? How many family members have to lose loved ones before you guys realize your rehabilitation ideas are jack shit? I don't think you guys are here for the people of Tucson. I think you guys are more worried about helping out the criminals and the people that come here undocumented and commit crimes because you guys are afraid of looking racist and it's pathetic. After what happened to my grandma, I'm definitely gonna use my Second Amendment right to carry my rifle and body armor when I go out in public just in case I have to protect myself, my family, or the citizens of Tucson from foreign and domestic terrorism at any point for it is my Second Amendment right. The fact that you guys are in those seats is a danger to the public and this is proof.

Thank you. Reyes Suarez. Reyes Suarez.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council. My name is Reyes. I am a citizen of Ward 5. I am representing D-Flock Tucson tonight, though I'm not a paid speaker. First, I want to thank the council members who reached out to have a dialogue with me. I apologize that I have it reciprocated. We've been collectively busy and do plan on reaching back out to everyone who has offered. Our online petition to remove AI mass surveillance in our community has reached over 2,000 signatures on July 24th and has already jumped by near 200 since that date. Over 20 cases now have come out of officer abuse of the ALPR systems in order to illegally stalk and track their romantic interests, ex-wives, and partners. Pinal County Sheriff just this morning announced he intends to cancel or discontinue their ALPR contract over Fourth Amendment conflicts. John Oliver just this Sunday did a dedicated show to this topic that was three years in the making. I highly suggest all council members and everyone in the audience to go check that out and watch it. Today I wanted to talk about the Odyssey. I know it's a bit random, but stick with me here. Odysseus, also known by his Latin name Ulysses, the title character, is actually referenced in modern day tech companies in what is known as the Ulysses Pact. For those unfamiliar with the story, Ulysses, in wanting to hear the sirens call, who dooms its listeners to jump to their deaths in the sea, made a plan with his men that he should be tied to the mast of the ship and ignore his orders during the duration of the fatal song in order to keep the ship and all of its members from deviating. An example of said PAC was when Apple prided itself with its nigh unbreakable encryption for its phones and other devices. The encryption was so obstructive that the FBI sought out court orders to force Apple to create a back door for it and force install it into other phones. Apple had in its design of the phone post the Snowden surveillance revelations, designed it so no entity, even the government, could create said back door and stood firm. in its original promise. The Ulysses Pact, no outside temptation, even the government sway, would deviate their original design and intention. I bring this up to say that no third party surveillance company currently contracted with the city has such a pact in their mission or designs. Not Axon, not Motorola, not Vercada, not Rekor or Liveview Technologies. All of these for-profit corporations have made no long-term plans to resist the federal government in allowing them backdoor access to their collective data, putting us all at risk of exposure. Time passes and values change and drift, short-term goals take precedence, and the alignments and long-term goals divert without any sort of guidelines. Do you really trust these corporations at their current word? Recco, for example, has only existed for less than a decade. Personally, I find it unlikely that they haven't already given back doors. I suggest you all to do your duty and have oversight of the collect data, but once they reach their servers on AWS cloud networks, you are barred from doing so. Our information exists within a black box that could be stored, copied, contorted, and shared in any number of ways, and you have no recourse to find out exactly how. Please do better.

Thank you, Mr. Suarez. Thank you. Jason Huaraque. Jason Huaraque.

Good evening, esteemed mayor and council. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak tonight. I'm here, it's a bit against the norm, but I'm here to give thanks tonight. On July 25th, Barrio Santa Cruz Neighborhood Association, along with Harvest Center Christian Church and Vice Mayor Santa Cruz's award-winning office, we had a back to school party. We were able to give away 160 stuffed backpacks to children that needed it. We gave away free haircuts for boys and girls. There was free food, free clothes, and it was done with a lot of help. So I'm just here to give thanks to the help. First of all, Mayor, thank you for always BEING THERE FOR US, THIS ISN'T THE FIRST TIME YOU SPONSORED THIS EVENT. AND BY DOING SO, YOU ALLOWED US TO OPEN UP FUNDS TO PROVIDE MORE FOR THE COMMUNITY. ALSO, THANK YOU TO PARKS AND REC. THEY'VE ALWAYS BEEN VERY SUPPORTIVE. ORANGE VIEW PARK HAS BEEN A PART OF OUR COMMUNITY SINCE IT WAS BUILT, NAMED AFTER ONE OF THE FAMILIES THAT STILL RESIDES THERE. Parks and Rec was just instrumental in providing services. Our rec center, due to budget restraints, has been closed since 2008. But every year, we're able to pull it off with the help of individuals in Parks and Rec, primarily Robert Norris, Aaron Sanchez, Marcy Aguilar, All came together. They did some great work urgently and quickly to help clear the area and make sure we had a cool, clean place to provide these resources to the children. We gave them free hot dogs. Gospel Rescue Mission was there with free clothes, free food. We had Jumping Castle, Face Pain. It was a beautiful event. TFD showed up, and it's probably the favorite part of the event. They did a great cool down and cooled us off at a point where we really needed it because it was very hot. So thank you all. Thank you for your continued support. It is your support that helps the neighborhood stay engaged, helps individuals want to step up and do more to improve our environment and address any concerns that come up. Unfortunately, I do have to transition to another concern. Our neighborhood is, we are the next door neighbor to the Pima County Jail. So everything that happens at the jail is something that we pay attention to. This week, there was another death. an inmate died in the jail, and there's been, I think, four in the last few months as that has happened. I know the Mayoral Council does not have any authority there, or the Supervisors doesn't have any authority there, but the Mayoral Council, you all have done such a great job addressing violence, addressing unhoused everything. If we can address the jail population because it is obviously too high for the jail staff to handle. Maybe in how we prosecute crimes like FTAs, fairs to appear, shoplifting, trespassing, and maybe we examine that so that we don't have so many people unnecessarily in jail. I know that goes against what the many people want, but the lives of the people that are in these cells, it's just as valuable as the lives of all of us here. So thank you for your attention tonight.

Thank you, Mr. Huaraque. I think it's Jackie Ritalis, I believe. Yes, come on up. I just couldn't read. I couldn't read the handwriting. It's just my eyes. They're tricking me. The tall one, please.

Please, I'm only five foot, girl. Maybe stretch out my neck. Hi there, Regina. Hi there, Paul. I told you I would be here. Okay. I'm representing today the Tucson Fire Department. And I'm not going to go around because I'm a... Ukrainian Mennonite that believes in love. I don't believe in anger or shouting or anything. So I'm gonna bring out the fireman's prayer. So you can understand that the firemen represent love, not only in Tucson, but through all United States and around the world, because they fight with love, those fires, okay? A fireman's prayer. When I'm called to duty, God, whatever flames may rage, give me the strength to save some life, whatever be its age. Help me embrace a little child before it's too late, or save an older person the horror of their fate. Enable me to be alert and hear the weakest shout, and quickly and effectively put that fire out I want to fill my calling to give the best in me, to guard my every neighbor and protect their property. And if according to your will, I have to lose my life, please bless your protecting hand, my children and my wife. Now I notice that you have been building some fire stations, but do you really know a fireman in person? I'm going to give you some little information here right now because I've had contact with the Tucson Fire Department giving guardian angels and helping with post-traumatic stress and with also relaxation techniques for seven years. And so do you know why a fireman has a mustache? Anybody know? Okay, they got handsome mustaches, but it's to filter the nose from the smoke. Now, do you know that a fireman wiggles? And why do they wiggle? Because they carry a pack on them that alerts the rest of the people that they either have fallen down or they're unconscious as an alarm. So they have to do a wiggle. And this is the fireman wiggle. wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, and they have to do this every single day and they gotta wiggle around. So if you see a fireman wiggling around, don't think he's dancing, okay? He's alerting them that he needs to keep in contact to save his life, okay? And the greatest fear of a fireman is not the fire, It is losing a life and not being there on time to save a person. And that's all I have to say. Thank you so much. Really appreciate it. And I left Mr. Paul Cunningham, a guardian angel. They kept it up in front. It's got the symbol of the sunflower and it has the symbol of the guardian angel of Ukraine on it.

Thank you so much.

Thank you. We really appreciate it. Thank you. APPRECIATE IT AND APPRECIATE YOU VERY MUCH.

THANK YOU, REGINA.

OUR NEXT SPEAKER IS JOE MILLER.

Hard Act to file. My name is Joe Miller. I'm the president of Midvale Parks Neighborhood Association. Have been for about 20, what, 21, 22 years. Thank you, Madam Mayor, Dr. Santa Cruz, and the council. I appreciate you very much. I appreciate the hard work that you're doing. I did kind of blindside you with a list last time I was here. I can tell I blindsided you because not much of the list was accomplished. In fact, none of it. We are gonna simplify this time. Grijalva Park is the heart of Midvale Park. We worked very hard on that to make that the heart. We used asset-based community development, as I learned, to put in there the things that would represent everybody. And we have a volleyball court. because one of the previous neighborhood presidents wanted a volleyball park and that's how it started. But we have not received, or we don't have a volleyball net. So if we could get a volleyball net, did I say volleyball net? because we still don't have a volleyball net. We work with Tucson Clean and Beautiful. Half of the park, as you may know, is on Grijalva Elementary. TUSD is having a very, very hard time taking care of their half of the park. Parks and Rec is having challenges themselves, along with a couple of the departments in the city. One of the things that they're having a problem with is Christopher Moon Field. That's in honor of a real hero of Tucson and of Midvale Park. Christopher Moon was awesome, and the field named after him should really represent him. I also know, a little aside, Grijalva Elementary is having a problem with attendance, and I know that it takes a village. They're doing everything they can, but if there's anything that the city can do to help with the attendance rate at Grijalva Elementary, that'd be great. Sarah Ann Miller Park's looking great. There's some things that we can do there. The streets in the neighborhood are doing good. Valencia Road and the bus stops, There's some problems there because there's going to be some renovations on Irvington. But I'll leave you with this. We really could use a volleyball net. Thank you.

Mr. Miller, thank you so much for coming. You still have your old cell phone number that I've had for 20 years, do you? Absolutely.

Okay, we'll call you. Your Honor, we actually purchased a volleyball net, and because I'm Paul Cunningham, I ended up purchasing three because we got a better deal on the P-card. So we'll get that to Ward 5 right away.

We'll make it Ward 1.

I'll get that to Ward 1 right away. Thank you.

Alrighty, and our last speaker is Jennifer McFerrin.

Hello, Madam Mayor and members of council. My name is Jennifer McFerrin and I represent Miracle Center. We're a nonprofit here in Tucson. And I just wanted to come and say thank you, Mayor and the council for all the work that you do and the support that you give the nonprofits here in Tucson. We really appreciate it and we need it. So thank you.

Thank you, ma'am. And that was our last speaker for call to the audience. Thank you all so much for coming to speak to mayor and council. Item seven. Consent agenda. Reports from the city manager on the consent agenda are received into and made part of the record. Madam Clerk, you are requested to read the consent agenda.

Upon no objection from mayor and council, item G will be removed from the consent agenda and addressed separately as discussed during today's study session. Item 7A, approval of minutes. Item 7B, intergovernmental agreement with the city of Tucson and the state of Arizona for supplemental construction funding for the 22nd Street Keno Parkway to Tucson Boulevard bridge replacement project. Item 7C. Economic Workforce Development Selection Committee recommendations for fiscal year 2027, allocations and sunset date extension. Item 7D, programmatic agreement between the City of Tucson and the Arizona State Historic Preservation Officer regarding U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development funded program activities. Item 7E, appointment of full-time magistrate pro tempore. Item 7F, reappointment, special magistrate David Diebel. ITEM H, INTERGOVERNMENTAL AGREEMENTS BETWEEN THE CITY OF TUCSON, PIMA COUNTY COMMUNITY COLLEGE DISTRICT FOR THE PROVISION OF MUTUALLY BENEFICIAL EDUCATIONAL AND TRAINING SERVICES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND FACILITIES.

MAY I HAVE A MOTION TO APPROVE THE ITEMS ON THE CONSENT? SO MOVED, MAYOR. SECOND. THERE'S A MOTION AND A SECOND. ANY FURTHER DISCUSSION ON THIS ITEM? HEARING NONE, WE DO NEED TO GO TO ROLL CALL.

VICE MAYOR SANTA CRUZ. AYE. COUNCIL MEMBER DALL.

AYE.

Councilwoman Lee?

Aye.

Councilmember Barajas?

Aye.

Councilmember Cunningham?

Aye.

Councilmember Schubert? Aye. Mayor Romero?

Aye. The items on the consent agenda are approved by a vote of 7-0. We are going to consider one of the items separately.

Item G, three months extension of fire medical and special hazard services at the Raytheon Company, United States Air Force Plant 44 manufacturing facility.

Alrighty, this item was requested by Councilwoman Lee to be considered separately for the need to abstain. Alrighty, is that correct? All right, we do need a motion to approve and a second, and then we will go to roll call. So moved.

I'd be happy to read the resolution number. Yes, please. Resolution number 24157 relating to the fire department emergency services approving a third agreement to fire service agreement between Raytheon Company and the city of Tucson acting through its fire department for emergency medical and fire response to extend the term of that fire service agreement from June 30th, 2026 to October 1, 2026 and declaring an emergency.

So moved. Second.

There's a motion and a second. Any further discussion on this item? Hearing none, we do need to go to roll call.

Council Member Dahl.

Aye.

Council Member Cunningham.

Aye.

Council Member Schubert.

Aye.

Council Member Barajas.

Aye.

Councilwoman Lee. Abstain. Sorry. Vice Mayor Santa Cruz.

Aye.

Mayor Romero.

Aye. The items on the consent agenda are approved by a vote of six. How do I count this one? One.

601.

601 abstention. All right. Any continued items on consent? No. Okay. So we move on to... All righty. What I am going to do... Since we have a public hearing that will I'm sure last for about an hour, we do have an item nine that is a rezoning that does not have a public hearing that needs just a vote of mayor and council. So if it is acceptable to my colleagues on the council, I'm going to move item nine, I'm sorry, so that we can consider it before item eight. Is that okay? No objection? ALL RIGHTY. SO LET'S MOVE TO ITEM NINE.

ITEM NINE, REZONING MAJOR CHANGE PRELIMINARY DEVELOPMENT PLAN AND CHANGE OF CONDITIONS, ORDINANCE ADOPTION TP MOD 0326000028 TOWN WEST FIRST AVENUE R2 TO C1.

City Manager's communication number 215 dated August 5th is received into and made part of the record. This is a request for ordinance adoption for a major change to the preliminary development plan and conditions for rezoning case C9-19-03. The applicant is requesting to modify the PDP and conditions to allow for the development of an Aldi grocery store. and a future restaurant. Is the applicant or representative of the applicant present?

Madam Mayor, Roy Juneman representing the property owner.

Mr. Juneman, is the applicant agreeable to the proposed requirements? Madam Mayor, we are. Okay. Thank you so much. Really appreciate you being here. Madam Clerk, you read the ordinance. Okay, you are requested to read the ordinance 1-2-2-6-5 by number and title only.

Ordinance number 1-2-2-6-5 relating to zoning amending ordinance number 1-2-0-8-6 in the area located at 4137 North 1st Avenue at the southwest corner of Limberlost Drive and 1st Avenue in case TPMOD 0-3-2-6-0-0-0-0-2-8 Town West 1st Avenue R-2-C-1 and setting an effective date.

councilmember doll this is in word three so thank thank you mayor of course i moved to adopt um ordinance number one two two six five and after a second i have a short statement second there is a motion in a second any further discussion thank you i'm real pleased to support this rose rezoning having a major new grocery store i've never been in an aldi but People who have been in an Aldi are very excited to have an Aldi. I think there's three more coming to Tucson, so Aldi fans will be well served. But on a major corridor surrounded by residential is a great match. It's a property that's been vacant for a long time. We have a lot of apartments and pedestrians in the neighborhood who will benefit from this development. I want to give a shout out to the Aldi, the property owners and the representatives for agreeing to use our Ward 3 specific native plant list that favors trees and shrubs not just native to the Sonoran Desert or to deserts in North America or deserts in Australia and North America, but ones that are native to the Tucson Basin. Those plants are much more helpful to our native bees, butterflies, birds, and other wildlife and provide great shade at very little expensive water. They didn't blink an eye at this request, and when we're asking to change this landscape palette. And I just point that out because we are talking about revising our landscape ordinance. And it's an example that going native is much easier than everybody thinks.

Thank you. Thank you. I do want to add my happiness when I heard that we were going to have an Aldi on 1st and Limberlost, which is an area that needs fresh groceries for the neighbors in the area. great for the area and good for Tucson that we're having an additional option for grocery shopping for the neighbors in the area. And by the way, I really hope that you thank me for moving you before item eight. I'm just saying. I'm just saying. Anyway, thank you so much. Any other comments, questions? We have a motion and a second on the floor. Anything else? Alrighty, I do believe we need to go to roll call. Council Member Dahl.

Aye.

Councilwoman Lee.

Aye.

Council Member Cunningham. Aye. Council Member Schubert. Aye. Council Member Barajas.

Aye.

Vice Mayor Santa Cruz.

Aye.

Mayor Romero.

Aye. Ordinance 12265 passes by a vote of 7-0. Thank you so much, really appreciate it.

Alrighty, we move on back to item eight. Public hearing regulations for large scale data centers, unified development code amendment C82504.

City managers communication number 222, dated August 5th, is received in turn made part of the record. This is the time and place legally advertised for a public hearing to establish development standards for large scale data centers and address associated land use infrastructure and community impacts. The public hearing is scheduled to last for no more than one hour. Speakers are limited to five-minute presentations. And I know that our staff has a presentation to do first.

Yes, thank you, Honorable Mayor. We have a brief presentation to give background on the item. Our Director of Planning and Development Services, Corin Manning, is going to lead us through that brief presentation.

Good evening, Mayor and Council Members. Corinne Manning, Director of Planning and Development Services. I just want to give a brief overview of how we arrived at these proposed regulations that are before you for consideration tonight and all of the community input and feedback that has gone into this process. So a little bit of background to start off. data centers are not really a defined use in our land use code currently they smaller data centers are treated as a commercial storage use with which with the emerging large-scale data centers that we're seeing we really saw that this does not match what's defined in our code does not match the uses that we're seeing emerging as we've seen these new large-scale data centers so that means there's no standards for their use where they're appropriate how they should be developed to reduce impact on neighborhoods and on our community So last August, Mayor and Council directed Planning and Development Services to develop regulations and standards for this use, including a process and a public review process for any proposed data center. And they also directed us to work with the community, with the Technical Advisory Committee to develop appropriate regulations and guardrails really for our community with this emerging land use. Additionally, last September, our zoning administrator issued a determination, because this was an emerging land use, we needed kind of an interim determination of how would we classify this land use before, until we have a full set of regulations. And they are currently classified as a utility generating system use. That is only allowed through a PAD or PCD, so it's a use that is only allowed through a site-specific rezoning. However, there are no standards in our code for that use. so over the past year based on the direction for mayor and council we have spent the year really listening to the community and working through a set of recommendations to arrive at the recommendations that are before mayor and council tonight so first we established a technical advisory committee composed of experts with various backgrounds in energy in environmental work and water use a range of expertise on that technical advisory committee, and they really worked with our staff to develop a set of recommendations that are the basis of the proposed regulations for large-scale data centers. We also really looked at what other communities are doing, how these are being regulated in other communities in Arizona and across the country, what's working, where there's areas to improve upon those regulations. We also held a series of community meetings to gather further input in February and March of this year and then came back to Mayor and Council in the spring once we had that community input to share that input with Mayor and Council and got further direction that really helped narrow and refine this amendment. And then we took this to Planning Commission for their thorough review of the proposal through a study session, public hearing, and then ultimately their recommendation, which is how we have arrived at this public hearing. So just a little bit more on that public engagement process. I mentioned before the Technical Advisory Committee that had experts with diverse backgrounds. We held four public meetings. We received over 1,100 comments from the public. all of which were categorized and analyzed to really understand the key priorities for our community that we could focus on in this proposed code amendment. All of those have been provided to Mayor and Council in your materials. So an overview of what is being proposed to regulate large-scale data centers. This proposal defines large-scale data centers first, which again is not currently defined in our code. So large-scale data centers would be defined as facilities over 25,000 square feet that have data center computing equipment and or a center, a data center that uses over 20 megawatts of energy. So those are either or. Either of those criteria would trigger this large scale data center definition and these land use regulations and standards. Now that 25,000 square foot standard, that could include multiple buildings on a property. So dividing up into smaller buildings on a property would not allow someone to evade these regulations. The approval process is very specific for data centers and would only be allowed through a planned area development or planned community development, which is a site-specific rezoning that goes through a full rezoning process, including a neighborhood meeting, zoning examiner, public hearing, and then ultimately a mayor and council decision. So these would only be permitted through a mayor and council decision. We're also proposing a expanded notification area for that proposal beyond our current public notification requirements. And then one of the key provisions of this is a separation distance for large scale data centers from residential uses and from other commercial uses and sensitive uses. So we're proposing a half mile separation from any residential zone for any large scale data center. and 1,000 feet from commercial or office zones. There could also be potentially setbacks or separation from natural areas depending on the results of an environmental resource report that would be required for any proposal. So in terms of the building and site standards, again, an environmental resource report would be required for any site. And then that is meant to dictate what areas on the site really should be protected or conserved and what areas are more appropriate for development. There is a 40% lot coverage maximum on any site with a large scale data center to make sure there is large kind of separation area even on the site and significant open space to mitigate things like the urban heat island impacts of data centers. Also a 50 foot maximum building height and an expanded landscape order of 40 feet around the site. Noise is one of the key issues we have heard about from our community and we see as an impact in other communities with large scale data centers. So there are regulations in these proposed regulations around noise, specifically of course meeting the city's noise ordinance, but also an independent noise study is required at the beginning of the process for any proposal. And that does need to include infrasound. That's one of the things that came out as we were doing research on these large-scale data centers, that some of the sound is not audible or perceptible to the human ear, but does have an impact. So that noise study will need to study the full range of sound emitted from any site. There's also screening requirements for generators and that equipment. and a noise complaint liaison on site that is accessible to the neighborhood. Energy and backup power is also another major topic. So any proposed data center would need to show an available energy supply, but also disclose their proposed energy mix. So including use of renewables. Additionally, generators are not permitted for regular operations, only for backup power, and this does require clean energy models for generators and for battery storage, that there is two hours of energy storage onsite through energy storage such as batteries. Testing also needs to be limited to business hours. Water use, of course, a huge topic for our community. So these regulations are meant to work in parallel with our large water user ordinance that has been adopted by mayor and council already. So any large scale data center would need to comply with the large water user ordinance, would need to show available water supply. And if they are under the threshold to comply with the large water user ordinance or be required to follow that, this would prohibit any use of potable water for cooling on site. SO THOSE ARE THE REGULATIONS. I WANT TO HIGHLIGHT A FEW OF THE KEY CHANGES THAT WERE MADE TO THESE REGULATIONS BASED ON THE COMMUNITY FEEDBACK THROUGHOUT THE PROCESS. SO AS I MENTIONED, AT EVERY STEP OF THE WAY, WE REALLY SOLICITED INPUT FROM THE COMMUNITY THROUGH COMMUNITY MEETINGS, ONLINE SURVEY, AND THEN OF COURSE THROUGH THE PLANNING COMMISSION. SO A FEW OF THE PROVISIONS THAT REALLY EVOLVED THROUGHOUT THIS PROCESS IS ONE, THE DEFINITION OF LARGE SCALE DATA CENTER. OUR INITIAL DEFINITION WAS ACTUALLY FOR 50,000 SQUARE FEET. and we didn't have a criteria for energy usage. And so that's one of the things that has really evolved is we now have a lower threshold of 25,000 square feet and the community and our technical advisory committee really felt it was important to include an energy usage criteria as well. So that is in the definition. Another major change was an expansion of the separation area from residential zones. Our initial proposal was actually a 400 foot separation distance, kind of looking at some of the examples that are out there. And what is before you tonight is a half mile separation from any residential zone. So quite a significant separation. And again, that's to really mitigate the noise impact, urban heat island impact of large scale data centers. We also really looked at the open space and protection of environmental resources. That's another aspect that really evolved throughout the process. One of the things that was added after we did more community input was that open space requirement on site and a restriction on the maximum lock coverage of 40%. We also got feedback about The landscape border and opportunities to also provide some mitigation options for that open space, if it could be provided off site to acquire more valuable open space. So those were some of the key changes was really around the noise, the separation from residential uses and environmental protections. This did go to the Planning Commission and they held four meetings reviewing the Lariskill Data Center proposal, two study sessions, a public hearing, and then a final meeting to consider and take action. So while the Planning Commission did vote in favor, a clear majority in favor, they voted 6-2 on a motion to recommend adoption of the proposed code amendment. The Planning Commission requires a favorable vote of seven or more votes to make a formal recommendation to Mayor and Council. Um, so this comes to mayor and council with a vote in the majority, but not a formal recommendation from the planning commission. And that is the proposal that, uh, the proposal that's before you tonight is the proposal that went to planning commission. There's been no changes or a vision since then. So our recommendation is that staff adopt the proposed regulations to establish regulation, the proposed code amendment to establish regulations for large scale data centers. And I'm happy to take any questions now or following the public hearing.

Would you like to ask questions now or wait until the public hearing is over? Council Member Dahl.

Thank you, Mayor. I have a quick one. The two who opposed it, were they opposing it because it wasn't strict enough or because they thought it was too strict or for some other reason?

Yes, great question, Councilmember Dahl, Mayor. So based on kind of the questions and discussion among the Planning Commission, yes, I would say the two opposing votes were concerned about over-regulating this use and really do we have enough information around things like noise impact, you know, is this separation of a half mile maybe too large of a separation? So it was really more on the side of erring on are we over-regulating this new use rather than too little regulation. Mm-hmm.

So thank you so much for your presentation, Ms. Manning. What we're going to do, I have my council colleagues pulling, tugging at my side right here, wanting a little bit of a five minute break. And so before we start the public hearing, we're gonna have a five minute break and then we have a full hour to listen to as many of you as possible. So give us a little bit of a break and we will return Yeah, in five minutes. Thank you.

so so Thank you. Thank you. you so so you you

SO MUCH, EVERYONE, FOR ALLOWING US TO HAVE A LITTLE BIT OF A BREAK. I APPRECIATE YOU ALL COMING AND BEING PATIENT WITH THIS ITEM. WE ARE BACK IN SESSION. AND WE HAVE THE ITEM 8 IS STILL OPEN, AND WE WILL START A PUBLIC HEARING PORTION OF THIS ITEM. So Ms.

Clerk, did we read all of it?

I think we did. Okay, so speakers are limited to five minute presentations. We are scheduled to last for no more than one hour. Please come forward when I call your name and make your presentation, state your name, whether you live in the city of Tucson or not, whom you are representing and whether or not you are a paid speaker. Please forgive me in advance if I cannot read your handwriting. Please announce your name, and if you live in the city of Tucson, if you're a retained speaker. With that, we are going to start, and it's an hour hearing. Nick, Maya?

Someone has to do it.

My name is Nick Maya. I live in unincorporated Pima County. I'm here on behalf of the Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection. Good evening, Mayor Romero and council members. My name is Nick Maya, and I'm the program manager for the Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection. Hope you all had a chance to read the letter we sent ahead of tonight's meeting. The Coalition supports the proposed data center amendment. Since November, we've served on the TAC and worked with the city staff throughout this process. We're pleased that the proposed code incorporates several of our recommendations, including requiring consideration of natural open space and riparian habitat, while citing future data centers and allowing development intensity to be guided by an environmental resource report, rather than relying on rigid lot coverage standards. We believe these changes will lead to a better site design while maintaining flexibility for development. We encourage you to adopt the proposed code amendment. Thank you.

Thank you, Nick. Margo Ituli.

Good afternoon, my name is Margo I. Tooley and I'm a resident of Tucson representing myself. Thank you, Mayor and Council for holding this public meeting and thank you for rejecting the Bill Boondog. I'm not confident these amendments to the unified development code protect our community against the glaring unquestionable harm inflicted by these water intensive industries. They operate in secrecy for a reason. What would be more appropriate would be to pause any future large scale data centers to determine if this AI bubble is not just a mad rush to cash in. Last week, Last week, Amazon announced it's scaling back its AI models and reorganizing. Do we really want our desert bulldozed and our watershed drained only to have the industry collapse and be left with the crumbling industrial wasteland of data temples? We're facing a collision between economic survival and environmental reality. It's high time we got our heads out of the sand and face the fact that the fictitious 200 promised jobs are the carrot the broligarcs used to disguise corporate colonialism as economic development. After the initial construction phase is over, the centers pretty much run themselves. So the 200 promised jobs turn into more like 14 jobs, which are mainly janitorial and security and at minimum wage. The only people who will be benefiting from this endeavor are the billionaire tech bros and their shareholders. The rest of us will be paying the price for the irrational cult of greed for a long time. The infrastructure necessary to support and sustain data centers is non-existent. Experts and industry leaders have warned that this technology is being foisted upon us prematurely. Across the country, we are confronted with horrors experienced by communities living under the data center curse. The damages caused by data centers, including noise pollution, water and energy guzzling, atmospheric heating, air and water pollution, wildlife and habitat destruction, and supportive mass surveillance, make it undeniable that the harms outweigh, far outweigh the benefits. During our time, this time, when our beloved Sonoran Desert is suffering a mega drought, when our share of a shrinking river just got cut by 40%, when our electric bills have increased by 14%, we must conclude that data centers absolutely do not belong in the desert. It is illogical and reckless to think otherwise. Now is the time to choose between the continuation of life on planet Earth or blindly follow lockstep behind the oligarchy. New York has passed a ban on data centers in 15 other states have introduced similar bills. This is the strategy we should adopt. In a recent article by the Three Senorns, they ask a question we should all be asking. Does our infinite societal demand for AI and digital storage mean we are quietly trading our physical life-sustaining resources for virtual confidence? I leave you with that question, thank you.

Thank you, our next speaker is Roma Lamore. Roma Lamore.

Hi, my name is Roma Lamore. I'm a resident of Tucson for about 40 years. I live in Ward 6. And I would like to ask you to ban all data centers. last year when i first heard about this first finding out that it had been a secret for two years it just made no sense no sense at all why we would do anything like this here and then when you hear there aren't really permanent jobs for this or any any type of income for, you know, we need things that bring in income. And I just couldn't believe it. And I can't believe we've spent a year, I've been to city council meetings, I've been to county supervisor meetings, I've been all over the place, and I just can't believe, I went to the high school where we gave input, like what she just talked about, based on, we gave the input, please don't do this. Please do not. It doesn't make any sense and I would just like you to ask you to ban them. I understand that there is a proposition, is it 207, where they're concerned about land values if someone wants to sell their land in order to build a data center and we can't devalue their land. But any land that's anywhere near a data center will have no value. And a half a mile away is not enough and the vibrations in the ground and no matter where you put, I know we're talking about the city right now and not outside the city limits, but if it's put in Vail or in Sahuarita, it's the same pool of water. It's from the same place. And I agree that we should not have TEP anymore. Please don't renew them because they agreed to this. all of these regulations i don't think the companies will follow them anyway they don't care they're already not following them from project blue and they keep being stopped and they keep getting around it and they just find ways to do that because they don't care about our desert and we care so please Please ban them, please. I just don't think this is gonna work. I know, I wanna thank you for trying, because I've been at these meetings. I know you voted against things, and I know you've been trying to understand how to, when we had nothing, and you're trying to have some type of regulations, but I just don't think it's gonna work, so please, thank you.

Thank you. Cresta Romero-Cardenas, Cresta Romero-Cardenas.

Hello, buenas tardes, mayors and members of the council. My name is Krista Romero-Cardenas. I'm a Tucson native and a doctoral candidate at the U of A studying environmental governance and data center development across the Colorado River Basins. It's hard. So I wanted to start by explaining that city planners and wildlife managers and county health directors and mayors all face a really difficult position right now. Not only with the challenges and funding that we're seeing from the feds that got cut coming down, but also limited time and capacity. So I just want to acknowledge the work that you guys have done. Thank you. So both my disciplines, I'm actually a master in public health policy and also doctoral student natural resources. So it's teaching me a lot of importance about systems-based approaches when we look at these big cumulative projects. Not only direct impacts, but also indirect impacts. If you hear me, I'm nervous, so just come with me, okay? So I commend the proposed safeguards that you guys have for water, energy, noise, and public review. It shows that Tucson does recognize that large-scale data centers are not ordinary land uses. So the legal distinction does matter, right? I would like to share some research to maybe help strengthen or just provide different ways of looking at this. So I'm gonna start by sharing just really quick what other state policies have done Two, I want to share a study that was done by John Hopkins and also our Pima County Health Department that looked at health environmental It was like a health impact assessment for data centers. And then I'm going to just close with just something I'm seeing at a large scale view, so bear with me. So other state policies, just to keep in mind, I'm looking at my phone because I don't want to get it wrong in case you like any of this stuff. So Oregon and Texas, completely different states, right, have more rigorous accountability laws that they accounted in 2025. So Texas is SB6 enacted in 2025, empowers the Electric Reliability Council, so their version, to cut power to large load users during grid emergencies. That's very important to have on paper. Also, they require $100,000 fee for an interconnection study that must be paid by that user. It's almost like a NEPA environmental impact statement, but they're having the user actually pay for that. Genius. In Oregon, HB3546, the Power Act, also enacted in 2025, ensures utilities assign infrastructure and transmission upgrade costs to those users. So they're trying to prevent households and small businesses from taking that financial burden. They also require regular study and reporting of the impact on large loads on retail rates. Iowa requires certain tax-exempt data centers to report actual electricity purchases and backup fuel to its own Department of Revenue. Minnesota permits collection of projected water information for large proposed users. These are things we can enact on paper now that will help us, I believe, if Tucson wants to be innovative, to help us find those industries that are gonna grow, improve their process. How do we reward that now instead of just saying yes to everything? now moving to the public health study it's really cool i think i sent it a while back but i'll resend it from john hawkins and our own local health department it's called environmental and public health impacts of data center development so just a few highlights from the study and you may know all this but it's a nice reminder diesel backup generators release pollutants near facility fence lines. Energy used by data centers can produce air pollution far from the actual facility itself, so I want you to think cumulative impacts here. Individual data centers can use two to five million gallons per day. I'll let other people talk about water. We know it's important. Noise from cooling equipment and power infrastructure is measurable at residential distances. A Phoenix-based study found that data centers on average increase neighborhood temperatures by one to four degrees Fahrenheit. So as we're thinking about only a half mile separation between residential, just keep that in mind. I was melting on my way here. I was like a delicious piece of chocolate, I like to say. So that makes me think about the minimum separation distances from what I saw in the report, the half mile from the residential zones in schools. I don't know if that's strong enough. Also half a mile from the natural areas and washes. I actually thought it was very interesting that one of the speakers before that works in the Sonoran Desert supported this because something that we're seeing at a federal level in NEPA is we're using actual spatial data sets like the USGS has a wildlife corridor team. that maps migration patterns. So we can even use that existing data that's used by the feds and certain states to be like, you wanna do something here, let's overlook this. And seeing that this is my last minute, I just wanna share, and it was mentioned, just the reminder that the Colorado River allocations are still being decided on. So since we all signed the Drought Contingency Plan in 2019, how we choose the industries that come play a major role. So I please ask that you strengthen the amendment and just also keep in mind that construction phases and data centers require different things, everything from construction to the e-waste that is produced afterwards that will eventually end up in our soils and our water system. Thank you for your time.

Vivek Barastan, I believe it is, Vivek.

Hi, everyone. Wow. My name is Vivek. I'm a member of the No Desert Data Center Coalition. Tomorrow marks one year. Tomorrow marks one year since you all voted down Project Blue. How about this community that learned so much and showed up and made that happen? And we continue to show up because we know this isn't enough. Our assignment to you then was clear. We don't want large scale data centers in Tucson, in the region, anywhere where the people don't want them. And Mayor Romero, I appreciate you saying at that study session a couple months ago that data centers are extractive. I couldn't agree more. And since then, since your vote, we've seen how private corporations like TEP and Beale Infrastructure can go behind our backs and violate the will of the people and bring these projects back with force. Now we're here to figure out whether the zoning regulations that are before you and that the city has worked on are enough to stop that from ever happening again. The planning department has done what they were directed to do, come up with zoning regulations specific to large scale data centers, and they were responsive to our community's input. But our question to the planning commission was this, is this the best that you can do? And by the way, one of those no votes on the commission was from a TEP employee who didn't feel that those regulations were strong enough. So, you know, take that as you will. Here's an example of why I believe the answer is no. This does not go as far as we need it to. During the initial public meetings this spring when we looked at the heavy industrial zoning maps for where large scale data centers could be placed in that time, we found that most of the eligible areas were in the south side with a smattering along the I-10 corridor and some on the east side. Now what we see on that new map, which is attachment G with the red lines, is that the I-10 corridor seems to be safe and there are fewer sites on the east side, but the sites on the south side remain. And for example, Summit, which is unrepresented in this council, is surrounded on three sides by Tucson, and there are potential sites for data centers, for large-scale data centers out there, according to this map. We're talking about round folks who live out there. We're talking about the border with the San Javier district of the Tohono O'odham Nation. this continues to be an example of environmental racism. These are the same communities that suffered from TCE poisoning. And I don't know, I don't need to tell some of you that. So we started looking into the possibility of total bans and came to understand that city attorneys are a little skittish when it comes to bans because of Prop 207. But Prop 207 has an exception in the statute for cities to protect the public health and safety. I am calling on you to amend the regulations before you to make them stronger with the suggestions you've already heard and will continue to hear this evening. I'm also calling on you to direct staff to bring a plan to ban large scale data centers. by framing them as a public health and safety issue. Because there's so much evidence from communities that have these monsters that residents around them suffer. So much continuing body of evidence over the last year, before that, since, where we can prove that these are bad for our community's health. Thank you for your time.

Reyes Suarez. Reyes Suarez. And the next speaker is going to be Kelly Lewis. And I'm going to try and move us fast through the speakers because we have a big chunk of people that want to speak. So the next speaker after Reyes is Kelly Lewis.

Hello.

Reyes again.

One correction. I got my district mixed up with my ward, so I'm actually Ward 1, District 5 of the county. Sorry. It's late at night. I had a full workday to start. My brain's a little frazzled, but... First thing I want to talk about is just my frustrations with this whole public information meetings that I had to attend at both Pueblo High School and Rincon, where I felt like we were treated as children. We don't need explanation of what a data center is when we come to these meetings. It just wastes our time and reduces our chance for public interaction and discourse, where the first meeting, there wasn't even a set time for that, if I recall. We kind of had to force that to happen. And then it just kind of seems that there's an active... agenda to reduce public agency within these meetings. It's like you don't want to hear from us, you just want to talk at us to get your point of view, and I find that just ridiculous. Equally ridiculous is that when I found out about the tech advisory group or tech or whatever it was, that none of the members in that group were explicitly against data centers in general. So that doesn't really represent the people in this room and the people of the city. You're not getting the experts in the field when you're picking and choosing ones who are for data centers. I also want to get into just the craziness of even discussing this. The El Nino is said to be a super El Nino, which leads back to an environment that created the Dust Bowl. I believe Arizona's population during that time was roughly around a million or so, and it's now almost eight times that. This is an emergency. This should be taking up all of our minds. We should be talking about not just canceling all data centers. We need to talk about agricultural issues, golf courses, livestock breeding. We can't survive this oncoming disaster, because that's what it is. And as far as the use of these data centers, I'm wearing this, one of the reasons why they wanna build this is for the surveillance state. Flock, for example, generates over four petabytes of data a month. That's more than NASA's entire orbital monitoring system. It's creating profiles on all of us through all of our data, all of our shopping data, all of our traveling data. They want to monitor how much we make and how much we're willing to spend and how much we're willing to take on our wages. It's big brother to even the Supreme, like we can't even contemplate what Oral was even like writing about. He would be blushing, to be honest. It's terrifying, it's scary. I know many people who are paying attention to what's happening right now, talking about moving from Arizona, because they don't see a future here with our current water shortages. Look at what happened at San Carlos Lake. All the fish died there because they kept draining water to support Douglas and Coolidge. And now they don't have a lake that the population can enjoy. The San Carlos Apache tribe depended on that for their tourism. And they're going to be infected at the same time that they're building this copper mine there on their sacred lands. We need to just... Stop this madness. We need to take an actual look of what's happening. There's no way the potential income is going to match the loss of our environment and our lives. So please, ban data centers. That's just the start. That's the bare minimum. Thank you.

Thank you. Kelly Lewis, and then after Kelly it's going to be Melinda Watson-Spina.

Hello, my name is Kylie Lewis and I am a resident of Ward 1. I'm here representing myself and I am not a paid speaker. I am here to call on the Mayor and Council to put the following zoning measures into place for all data centers moving forward. Ban all NDAs as a means for doing business within the city at all stages of the process. Banning the use of generators and putting tight restrictions on only using batteries as backup energy. Aggressively increasing the distance from residential areas a half a mile is unacceptable. Strictly enforcing the city's light pollution code and creating an equally strict noise pollution code including tight restrictions on low frequency noises. I want to be very perfectly clear about something. I am in support of a full ban on all data centers, no matter what their size is, large scale, hyperscale, and otherwise. I understand that there are some concerns from the legal team representing the city about Prop 207, but as Vivek said earlier, there are provisions within that proposition for the city to make bans based off of the health and safety of the residents within their community. And I really want you to look into that and heavily consider it. To this day, until this I say, I really want to encourage you to make this city uninhabitable for this extractive industry. They are not here for our benefit. They will take everything they can from us while lying to our faces, promising us the moon and barely giving us a scrap. It has been proven over and over again throughout our nation that they poison communities, they destroy wildland, they harm wildlife, they lower property values, they increase light and noise pollution, they increase the temperature of the surrounding area by one to four degrees Fahrenheit, and they extract every drop of water from area that they inhabit. On this last ground alone, you should put these restrictions and even more in place because we don't have the water. We will have even less after we lose our rights to the Colorado River Basin and when Project Blue sucks up the water from our water table. We have already seen them try to steal Tucson City water twice, and they're not going to stop there. They don't care. They will take whatever they can from us. And since I have two minutes left, I just want to add a personal note. I am from the Mojave Desert in Eastern California. I grew up in the Owens Valley. I grew up seeing what massive extractivism in terms of water looks like. I would ride my horse with my grandfather herding cattle and I would have dry river beds and dry lake beds pointed out to me and say, I used to go fishing here when I was a kid. There used to be fireflies here. There used to be swimming holes and an abundance of life. I grew up with the Paiute and Shoshone people and heard story after story of them talking about how Los Angeles destroyed their native lands. I come from an area that had a great benefit of snowpack and more water runoff than we have here in the Sonoran Desert. We are in a massive drought. So is Colorado, the entire West Coast, and it keeps getting worse and worse and worse. Please, protect our area. We have a wealth of so many beautiful and wonderful things here, but we don't have an abundance of water. We don't have the resources for this. Please ban all data centers, large, hyperscale, and otherwise, and protect our community for future generations. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Melinda, and then after Melinda, it's going to be Florence Johnson.

Melinda? My name is Melinda Mattson Spina. I live in Tucson. I spent most of my childhood stationed at Fort Huachuca. Thank you all for your work. I agree data centers come with many health and safety risks, and there are some that I'm asking you to take more seriously. The NAACP case in Louisiana proves large data centers are inherently dual use. Unless AI is incentivized differently, military strategists say data centers will soon be the highest value targets in modern warfare and terrorism. This spring on National Security Law Today, the director of the Joint AI Center for the Pentagon, Lieutenant General Jack Shanahan said, our leaders are not being transparent about how broadly AI will affect society, referring to both job loss and what he called human cognitive surrender. When the head of AI for our armed forces says our leaders have a transparency problem around service members' cognitive surrender to AI that's being deployed without guardrails into warfare and into everyday life, into every facet of everyday life, that technology's infrastructure is a health and safety issue. If you think this policy landscape is moving fast, AI founders predict that AI models may be able to autonomously update themselves in about 18 months. You cannot predict what the development landscape will look like in the near future. So please, find us a way to a moratorium or a ban.

Florence Johnson. And then after Florence will be Derek Espadas.

Florence Johnson, I'm a resident of Miranda's ward. And I thank you all for the opportunity to address you. I would be here to urge the city of Tucson, Pima County, and the state of Arizona to follow the example of the governor of New York, and to impose a one-year moratorium on construction of data centers in our Sonoran Desert region so that our regulations can catch up with the threats posed by data centers. In Pima County and around the country, wherever data centers are operating, residential electric rate payers have experienced exponential increases in residential electricity rates to pay for the massive expansion and energy generation capacity needed to run those data centers, and the increased water use to cool the electric generation plants that are needed to generate that power. So there's a lot of just water and electrical issues related to these. There's a substantial investment in the expansion of the electrical distribution infrastructure, substations, and transmission lines, and our corporation commission sees fit to pass those things along to our residential rate payers, and there's little that we can do about it. So it just doesn't make sense to have more data centers in the Sonoran Desert. Our city and county's current industrial and commercial wastewater treatment systems are not prepared to handle the volume of contaminated water that's created by open or closed loop systems to cool servers or electrical generating plants because the electrical generating needs to be cooled, not just the data center servers. Residents need to demand an end to the construction and permitting of large-scale data centers at a time when our cab water supply is being drastically reduced, and our regulations and treatment protocols are unprepared to handle the volumes of water lost to data center cooling systems, data center contaminated wastewater, or electrical generation to power data centers. put the common good ahead of individual property owner rights, it seems to me that the health concerns, the noise concerns, the property value concerns need to be put ahead of the rights of individual property owners to profit from an investment in their property. Because data centers are pushing regional physical limits and this becomes unsustainable, data centers are now adopting coordinated planning across power grids, cooling technologies, land use, and networks. Distributed computing architectures, including scale across models, are employed to link workloads across entirely separate regional data centers. Council members, Tucson and Pima County regulatory agencies need strategies capable of blocking these strategies from corporate overlords. Suggested strategies AI data centers and their investors are using include but are not limited to the Marvell Scaling AI Infrastructure Guide or the Keysight Scaling AI Data Centers Report has a lot of details on this. So when you think about what you need to regulate, maybe you should look closely at those reports and those guides. What staff at the City of Tucson Wastewater Treatment Department, the City of Tucson Building Inspection Department, or the Pima County Department of Environmental Protection have the experience and specialized knowledge required to craft regulations or evaluate and issue permits pertaining to the scalability of large-scale data centers? Because we really don't know what's next with AI and data centers. We need regulations crafted that govern fire prevention and building insulation to limit noise and heat pollution. So I don't see those in the regulations that have been proposed. We need the knowledge to oversee construction. I guess I've finished my five minutes.

Thank you, Ms. Johnson. I appreciate it. Thank you. Derek Espadas. Derek Espales. And then after Derek, we're going to have Elizabeth Kelly.

Hi, I'm Derek Espales. I live in unincorporated Pima County. I am not a paid speaker, although I am taking offers. And I just wanted to start off with making some comments on some things I heard today. I was at that public hearing at University High School where someone from the city went around to anyone wearing a no data data center shirt or wearing red or carrying a sign in opposition telling them to be silent. I was fortunate that it was kind of a reverse ableism where that person felt Intimidated to pick on the guy in the wheelchair and I got to be the voice for everyone But I will say the same thing that I said at that forum When will our aggressors and our violators accept that no means no? We have been saying that for so long and it still does not get heard it does not get accepted and So I lost my notes, that's okay. I do wanna say I'm an accountant. I run an accounting firm here in Tucson. I too am a doctoral candidate in business and sustainable systems at Case Western Reserve University, the Harvard of Ohio. But I am here in opposition to any data centers at all. The promise sounds impressive, jobs, growth, economic development, but these promises are misleading. Data centers are not that kind of development that built a stronger Tucson economy. They're capital intensive, low job facilities that consume enormous amounts of water, power, and public attention while sending the real financial benefits outside the community to the investors. This is not local prosperity. It is a subsidy pipeline given to corporations. There is a fallacy about importing economic development that we must rely on outside corporations to build up Tucson. We have no data throughout this nation that shows that these data centers are providing the fanciful promises that they provide to us. Remember when Project Blue promised they were going to create water for us? That quickly disappeared when we asked questions. So it has been decades since we rejected the concept of trickle-down economics in theory, but we continue to practice holding onto it as a lifeline. Growth at the city or regional level does not automatically trickle down to residents. When external monies invade, data shows the gains often go unevenly to firms, especially attorney firms representing data centers, higher income groups, and politically connected actors. And those not even from the colonized communities, but again, the outsiders from the financial origins. And if a project only rewards the company receiving incentives, again, it is a subsidy. It is corporate socialism. It is only when wages are raised, affordable housing, public services, and local ownership, that we can truly call a genuine development. Let us develop Tucson and what we have here. Let us not surrender our communities to data center exploitation. And Tucson residents are being asked to accept the cost and not the benefits, strained infrastructure, environmental burdens, long-term resource pressure, while outside interests collect the profit. This is not economic development for Tucson. I repeat, this is not economic development for Tucson. I repeat, get that man a volleyball net. All of this falls upon low-income residents, renters, displaced communities, indigenous communities, LGBTQ plus communities, any marginalized person, which is most of us. Most of us here are economically disadvantaged when it comes to the billionaires and their data center toys. That is why researchers argue economic development should be judged by equity, health, and community wellbeing, not just GDP or job growth. Also, the numbers are very misaligned in that. You have the opportunity to show you care because the county and the ACC have already told us they do not, and they will not protect us. You are serving as our community's parental figures, Will you show us here that you care and nurture us? Or will we suffer another generation of trauma as victims to the abandonment and neglect? Show that you care about us more than those who victimize us.

Thank you, Derek. And I am considering to retain you as a speaker. Elizabeth Kelly, and then after Elizabeth will be Nathaniel Nadu, I think it is, Nadu? Alrighty, Elizabeth.

Mayor and Council, my name is Elizabeth Kelly and I live in Ward 6. I've lived here since 2003. I didn't have much time, much notice of this meeting, so my thoughts are a little, I'm so impressed by the caliber and preparedness of the other speakers. I'd like to start by giving you some feedback on the ordinance. Just so you know, I read it. I read it even though I don't agree with it. I'm totally opposed to all data centers. But your ordinance neglected to include monitoring the hot water effluent, which will contaminate the environment and possibly enter our groundwater. That would be a toxic water. And so that should be in your ordinance. The other thing is there are no guardrails. There's no provisions for monitoring, for compliance, and enforcement if there's any problem. So it looks like that poll, either it's in another part of your UDC or somebody forgot to put that in, but I think it's essential that there be accountability, enforceability, and penalty for lack of compliance. So I run an organization based in Tucson that works internationally called the Electromagnetic Safety Alliance. And I've been before the City Council, the Board of Supervisors over the years testifying about cell tower permit applications and explaining what the health and safety risks are. i haven't done it in a few years here because lately i've been managing an international organization a project of esa called the international commission on biological and health effects of electromagnetic fields in five years we've positioned ourselves as a very strong counterweight to the industry who prefer to say that there's no harm from emf exposure and they control the knowledge base. They suppress the science. So we publish papers, we critique their work, and we work internationally. Scientists, engineers, and medical doctors working together. But I've been following the build out of wireless tech for 30 years. The Federal Telecom Act had a provision, Section 704, that I'm sure you're all aware of, which prevents people from talking about their health concerns. Towns get sued when they do that because the industry monitors very closely. This is impairing our understanding of the effects of electromagnetic fields, in fact. So there's plenty of opposition, but people have no way of expressing it, their knowledge. Anyway, until the advent of fifth generation wireless in 2019, we all enjoyed our phones. I have one, too, for voice communications and texting. And then 5G came, and that's when they introduced data collections. So our phones are served by a network of towers, and more and more towers have been installed in Tucson. A real densification, if you say, if you will, of cell towers, putting out signals night and day. And we voluntarily adopted that technology in our homes. But the 5G changed the game by introducing data collection. And with 6G, what's coming is a merging of man and machine. One of our earlier speakers spoke about that. I learned about all this from the IEEE. They gave a presentation a few months ago. and that's the Internet of Things data collection about everything we do. It's about us. It's not a service to us. It's about us. It's surveillance, and it's data collection, nominally for commercial reasons, but many more uses of that. So it's a command and control infrastructure that's being built around us. We love our phones, but there's a lot more going on underneath that. So why would I care about this cell tower issue given we have data centers that might be operating in our town? Because the data collected goes to the data centers. That means these cell towers, the power's gonna go up. They'll be operating much more than before. They have a lot of data to collect. They are now embedded in our neighborhoods, and that's going to cause not only the surveillance problem, but more threat to our health and safety from all these cell towers. Thank you. Thank you, ma'am.

Nathaniel and then Gabriela Laz, I believe it is, after Nathaniel.

Hello City Council. My name is Nathan Nadeau. I'm a resident of Marana, but I was born here in Tucson and I spend most of my free time here. I still consider it home. I represent myself. So here we are again to tell you all no, again. It's getting old having to come here and say no over and over again, but here we remain as resolute as ever. I'm not gonna take up too much time. as there are plenty of people with actual facts to present, but I just want to say with my entire chest that there's no amount of land that we will ever agree to give away to this large-scale Sonoran suicide cult. We will show up whenever this conversation comes back up to tell you no again and again and again each and every time.

Take a look around you.

Take what's no longer even a hint. You were elected to represent, so represent. You don't work for these tech companies that want to work to buy and sell all of your personal data. Yes, even yours. You work for us. So please do the bare minimum and protect our home. Stop Project Blue. Ban all data centers.

Gabriela Las. Gabriela Las. And then after Gabriela, it is Elena. And there's no last name. Gabriela. And then Elena. All right. I don't see either coming through. Elena. Gabriela. And I don't know if she's here. And then Elena. Elena. Okay, if you're one of them, please approach the mic.

Hi, good evening. Sorry, I left off my last name. My name is Elena Ortiz. I am a resident of Ward 5. I'm not paid to speak here. Just representing myself. Yeah, I just want to, how long do we have? Oh, goodness. Okay. Yeah, I just want to start off thanking the city, the mayor's office, the mayor, the planning commission for the commitment to developing and enforcing accountability and community protections from hyperscale or AI data center development. I'm a native Tucsonan and I'm deeply concerned about the impacts of AI data centers across the country and what their proliferation in Arizona particularly means for our communities and our water scarce region. As you can see here by everything that folks are speaking about tonight, that this issue is deeply connected to many, many other issues that we don't have time to get into. It's an economic issue, an environmental issue, It's related to the climate crisis, the water crisis in the arid southwest, related to our privacy, to democracy. And data centers are a really small piece, but I think this community rightfully understands that context matters and that many of these issues converge with AI data centers. So I look forward to continue to work with you all on this. And I look forward to continue to working on these many, many other issues to make the lives better for all Tucsonans and protect our future here in Tucson. So I recognize that in your jurisdiction as the city, you're limited into what you can do. And so I'll try to turn to the task at hand. and focus on the code amendments and the recent changes that you've made to reflect community feedback, which I think are an excellent step in the right direction. I really appreciate the setback requirements, set asides for vegetation and wildlife, and many other amendments that you all have made in response to community feedback. I do think that more can be done to hold developers and operators accountable after the permit is approved, if a permit is approved to develop, to continue to protect community members and our Sonoran Desert ecosystem. I raised some of these concerns and recommendations in my survey response to the co-development in the spring at the May Planning Commission. I think I wrote June in my email to you all, and I'm sorry, that is my brain right now. through public comments and then via email. I do want to clarify that I would be supportive of an outright AI data center ban in Tucson, which I think would offer the strongest protections. In the absence of a ban and recognizing concerns about preemption, I did want to make some recommendations about ways to strengthen the zoning code and yeah, strengthen the zoning code so that you've set forth. So in terms of items that are already there, I would be supportive of adding a section in the noise mitigation recommendations that actually requires ongoing monitoring and reporting to the city on behalf of the operator of noise impacts and any events when the noise exceeded the excessive noise code restrictions and that all those reporting materials are made available publicly online by the developer. I would also like to see that the city indicate that battery energy storage systems, or BES, should serve as the first line of backup power sourcing over diesel generators. For the water section, I think this should specify who is providing the water certification, I'm assuming it's Tucson Water, and specify the sufficient water for a determined number of years, so 20 years, for example. For notification, section nine of the code, I'd recommend increasing the resident notice boundary to five miles. Let you figure out the exact number there, but it should reflect the density of the area, which is in the southwest side and it seems a lot less dense. And so folks might be living more spread out. So recommend increasing increasing that. Oh my goodness, okay, that was five minutes? All right, I emailed you all about recommendations, but I think ultimately most of my recommendations are about ongoing accountability in the case that a permit application is approved to send a strong message around transparency, monitoring and enforcement, impact studies and impact mitigation, related to air quality, urban heat island effect, wastewater, traffic, roads infrastructure, light impacts, and more. So thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Ortiz. I'm going to call on Gabriela one more time. Gabriela Laz, I believe it is. And if she's not here, then Martha Lynn. Martha Lynn. And then after Martha, it's going to be Heather. Heather Ochoa, I believe it is. Can you use the tall mic? You can adjust it to your height.

Hi, my name is Marta Lynn. I live in Ward 1, and I'm not paid. I came here to call for a moratorium on data centers, but I like ban. That's a better word. Our seven states that are watered by contract from the Colorado River, none should be accepting high water use industry until all of these states should be required, as we were and did in the 1980s, account for the next 100 years use of water. How much do we have? I want more than nods and assurances that there's lots of water because we've saved it and we've done so well. I want to see figures. I'm grateful and proud that Tucson has replenished much of the watershed that we've drained from the aquifers. But I know that we don't have as much as we did in 1950s because the Santa Cruz isn't running. which it did back then. So how much water do we honestly have and how are we going to project it for our survival for the next 100 years? This is also a difficult question to ask because not only are we in an extreme drought, we're headed into we have no idea how much worse it will get drought. So how do we allot it to our population without drawing down the aquifers like we did before and ending up in the same boat without Colorado River water to replace? All of the states should be doing this again, including ours. The world needs to slow down the advancement of AI in society. There is now a pro-human AI declaration written by the Nobel laureates at a meeting conference called by the Pope in Rome. They went to retreat, they came to the conclusion that AI was developed in just very few countries of the world and by a few corporations, honestly. So the control over what it's used for is designed by those who developed it. Yet AI itself actually consists of the collective knowledge of humanity. This is all of us. This belongs to all of us. And this is the conclusion that these Nobel laureates came across. There is a website. You can sign on to it if you agree to it. It's at GlobalNobelAssembly.org slash Rome dash Declaration. Kind of clear. The declaration calls to slow it down so that more people can get in on the discussion, so that AI can be developed for the good of humankind and the good of the planet. These people are particularly worried about nuclear warfare and nuclear arms race. Who's got the finger on the button, a person or a robot? So these are all considerations in addition to our local considerations, why we don't want the data centers here. This whole movement needs to slow down. It's gonna be a kick in the pants for Wall Street and for everyone who invests there. but it's already going to be a kick in the pants for everybody on the bottom rung who's paying the most for it. So that concludes my thoughts on the matter.

Thank you, ma'am.

And I'd love to see a band.

Thank you so much. Appreciate you. Heather, and I'm not sure if I'm going to completely... slaughter the last name Dyke or? I'm sorry. It's Heather Dyke by the way.

Okay. I've lived in Tucson for about seven years and I am not paid to be a speaker. All right. So I want to start out saying that these data centers aren't for the people and they are destroying the trust between our cities and county councils. Tucson Council originally said no to Project Blue when the county sold us out, gave them land right on the border of Tucson and what a smack in the face. I assume this break in trust may affect other areas of discussion between Pima and Tucson Council. Hopefully not, but here we are now still fighting even if the first decisions were out of our hands. Now that these regulations are not enough at all, not even close. I believe these data centers will be fight back and beat around the bush constantly whenever possible. We already seen these issues around breaking regulations, excuse me, throughout our nation. Data centers say they do not need river water supply and later on now they're suing access for the Colorado River. There are many running around on generators full time for years fighting counties saying it's only temporary and tell when. How can we trust what data centers are building, saying no, now, saying what they're, excuse me, my heart is racing. saying that these data centers, how can we trust them now and believe what their actions will be what they say later? There are many data centers out there being reviewed or sued for not following original CO2 and other harmful gas regulations and running outside decibel sound parameters. There are many centers being read at over 60 decibels sound 24-7, which can cause severe to profound hearing loss. This is actually my field of current study and career. Many people will have hearing loss over time and need to aid because of this constant exposure to high dB, and many insurances do not cover hearing aids, and neither does Medicare at this time. So what will be done when the people's hearing is affected by mass corporations that will not care to fix what they broke? I've done lots of research over the years, not even sure if these data centers will pan out. It's a bubble waiting to burst. To even build these data centers, the world is lacking finite mineral resources in order to build computer chips for these data centers. Generators and all resources to build these facilities is already stretched too thin, and there isn't enough power available on the grid. Smaller crypto miners are already fighting to get any single megawatt of extra power, and somehow these centers expect to obtain mass amounts of megawatts in the hundreds to thousands. And add on top of it, so many data centers are trying to build multiples around each city. They will be fighting each other over resources to build and the energy to run, and there won't be enough for all. If it doesn't pan out, desert and wildlife will be affected for what? Just to have empty buildings? Wasting all of our finite resources. Let's say it does pan out. There is enough resources, but all this craziness. The jobs that are promised for it will be very short-lived. In the end, as anticipated, these data centers will be a tool for AI to take over human jobs. Obviously, we will welcome the plenty of water environmental issues this nation is already seeing and price energy increases in areas around data centers. Whether or not these data centers pan out or the bubble burst is not for the people, it is only harm. We need to end this nonsense of focusing on harm instead of growth for the people.

Thank you. Rebecca Andreacola. Rebecca Andreacola. Rebecca Andreacola. And then Myra did not include last name.

All right, hi, I'm Rebecca Andrea Colville. I actually just met you recently at my dad's retirement. I am born and raised in Tucson and Corona Day Tucson, and I am representing myself. This is my first time attending something like this, let alone coming up to speak. Honestly, I'm feeling pretty frustrated that I even have to be up here in the first place. I'm having to sit here and fight to protect our resources, our land, and the well-being of our community when you guys are the people who are supposed to be doing that for us. There's so much research out there. that shows the negative consequences of what these data centers will bring to our community, to the wildlife, and to the beautiful landscape that we call home. Are we forgetting that the water is already limited here, that our electric grid is outdated, that people die from heat stroke every year? Do you really not understand the risk that you are taking, the danger that you are putting our community in, or are you just willing to gamble our lives in order to let a rich guy make a billion dollars? These data centers disrupt the entire ecosystem around them, including the humans that live in that area. The low vibrational humming affects bees' ability to navigate, and without bees, we die. Without water, we die. Without electricity here in the heat, we die. And that's without mentioning the psychological and societal effects of AI and the dangers of allowing mass surveillance. This isn't just the stuff of countless books and movies, this is a reality that we're creating and paving a way to. My dream is to one day own a homestead, to live off the land and to be self sustainable, just like the settlers who made Tucson what it is today. It's disheartening to know that that may be impossible in a few years due to the environmental damage that we're about to cause if we allow these data centers to keep moving in. Arizona already is one of, for some reason, is one of the places that they're making the most data centers, which is insane. It doesn't make any sense, and I think we should be really concerned about why we are trying to do this, why these things are being pushed. why we are not caring about the fact that our animals are going to suffer, the wildlife is going to suffer, the water, all of our resources around the world are going to suffer from these choices that we're making. And we're putting money and capitalism above our world. Like we really, really, really need to care about our people and our world and get back to what we used to be. I am begging you to please look at the research and think about the long-term consequences that these data centers will bring to our community, to consider taking the hard route of standing up against these companies, and to save our earth, and to work towards banning all data centers. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Thank you. Myra and then Adria Brooks. Myra and then Adria Brooks.

Hello, my name is Myra Duran and this is my first time here. I would like to start by saying that everybody here is severely desensitized to liars. The gaslighting with the woman in the black suit giving the presentation on regulations was straight up lying to everybody. Just to let you guys know, they do not follow regulations and never have. I am here to ask for an utter and complete ban. No exceptions. I told my children that I would come and say, and quote the Lorax, I speak for the trees and the saguaros. In Phoenix, our saguaros are dying due to climate change, extreme heat. If this data center is built, the Saguaro National Park is nine miles away. They rely on cam photosynthesis. Okay, if it gets too hot, saguaro stop breathing. My grievance here is why do I need to hide behind a federally protected plant? Utah overturned a data center that broke ground because of a native protective plant. We have the saguaro, guys. But you know what I see? We have us. We are far more valuable than a damn saguaro. And I love saguaros. And I don't want to hide behind and have that be my disclaimer. I have nothing else to say. I don't want to laugh with the council. I don't want to barter. I'm here to say, remember that you represent the people and that's it.

Adria Brooks, Adria Brooks.

Hello, Adria, are we on? Okay, great. Adria Brooks, Ward 1, here representing myself, and I have not paid to be here. So thank you, Mayor and Council, and also all of the staff, Carver especially, and the staff who've been willing to reach out to me as a transmission planning expert to pick my brain about how the power grid works. I love this stuff. I was on the technical advisory committee, and I think that the regulations on energy have been strengthened over the last month. They are good. They could be stronger. I wasn't planning on speaking tonight, but a handful of folks that know I am a data wonk asked me to get up here and to talk about some data to help support strengthening the regulations. So I'll speak mostly just to the energy and the setback regulations, not going into everything because that's where my expertise is. Right now there is a suggested requirement for two hours of battery backup. Two hours is the average of power outages within Tucson Electric Power. So with a two hour energy storage backup, we would cover more than half of the outages that occur. At least I'm looking back from data from like 2019 and 2023 when I say this. If there was a requirement for four hours of battery storage, for example, then we would be covering 90% of all outages within TEP within the last four years. Why that's important is because the longer that we can stay on battery backup or any low-emitting generation technologies, that means that we can offset the need for data centers to switch to their high-emitting diesel generators. which are the things that create a lot of noise, create a lot of local air pollution, create a lot of heat island impacts. So that's one place where this could be strengthened. I would also note that it would be important to specify very clearly that battery storage and low-emitting generators need to be used first before high-emitting generators. It is most likely the data center operator would choose to do that just given fuel costs, but it's not a guarantee unless it is explicitly written in the codes. Similar things on the setback. So two big things that are really important for setbacks from data centers are the heat island impacts and of course the noise. On the decibels, which you can think of as just like the measure of loudness, assuming that the data centers are going to install like the highest quality sound barriers, I believe the regs say they must install sound barriers. I don't know if it says what quality, but if they install the highest quality, then that's going to immediately reduce the sound of what are essentially jet engines in a building by 30 decibels right away. And then with distance, when we get to the 1,000 feet for the commercial setback, that is gonna reduce the loudness of the data centers to about 50 decibels, which is the sound of a conversation or traffic on a residential road. That's, again, with this 30 decibel wall. If it was a 20 decibel wall, then you're going to add 10 decibels, right, whatever they don't do in the wall barrier. Going out to the half mile, is it quarter mile, half mile? I can't remember. Thank you. For residential setback, we're now getting down to the conversation level or like a hum of a refrigerator. So those are pretty good, but I do want to highlight that that is just the loudness. That doesn't necessarily mean the attenuation of that low frequency hum that you've heard folks talk about. However, it's a different story when we start thinking about heat island impacts. So for heat island impacts, this is relatively new data that's been coming out of Phoenix, which is going to be the most comparable place for us to compare heat island impacts than other places where these studies have been done. In Phoenix, they found that at the commercial setback distance at 1,000 feet, The normalized temperature increase for the surrounding area because the heat on impacts of hyperscalers is two degrees C, which is big, right? That's really significant. Even when we get out to that half mile for residential, we're still at about 1.8 degrees C. That's, of course, those that are like downwind from the data center. If you're upwind, you don't have the heat island, the heat's going to be pushed with weather. To get down to even one degree C, we'd be looking at about a three mile setback. So the heat island impacts do not attenuate nearly as quickly as sound does. So more setbacks are going to help a lot with heat island. There are other things that can be done for heat island impacts, which have to do with Obviously the landscaping being sure that if there is additional setback on their property Then they have to do a ton of good like native landscaping to help lower Which is not my expertise so hopefully someone behind me can give advice there I think those are the three things that I wanted to add that could help to strengthen these Yeah, thanks Thank You miss Brooks Steve Turner Steve Turner

And then after Steve is Sandra, Teddy. So Steve and then Sandra.

Well, I can't find my notes. My name is Steve Turner. It doesn't matter what ward I'm from. because the water's all the same. A few years ago, I spoke to you. You spoke, Mayor, at the Botanical Gardens, and we're talking about banking the water, and now we're up here discussing a project, again, that is going to drain any water that could be banked. on top of the fact that we are looking down the barrel of having most of the CAP water either shut off or rationed. It boils down to this, we're on the precipice of a watershed moment, pardon the pun. Now, which side of history are you gonna be on? Are you gonna be the one that set a precedent? Are you gonna be the one that helped bury us? Because that's all that's left. You guys are up here. You guys work for us, as it's been said before. Our votes put you where you are. And so why are you not representing? Why are we having to come and have this conversation when you guys are wanting to back these corporations that come in? They're going to give a few jobs for a little while. And then, yeah, it's true. I've spoken to people that have built data centers in the Phoenix area and stuff like that. And they're like, you guys don't even know. They've had to build substations just to power, like one substation just to power one data center. And some of the larger ones end up having two substations. Who's going to foot that bill? Us. You know, are you going to give them tax breaks? Where is the financial benefit that comes from this? I ask any of you to answer that. I mean, the jobs for a short period of time, you know, granted they're well-paying jobs, but when all that's done, it's a skeleton crew that runs it. And we're talking about something that is not even going to be that has to be replaced every so often, just like the windmills and stuff, okay? The other thing is, you know, and I'm glad other people have brought this up, you keep talking about wanting to do this climate resiliency and all these things that were laid out from the, God, I don't remember the name of the company that gave you guys the roadmap for it, that they're out of London, but... This isn't resiliency at all. We already have... Watch the news any day. Watch the weather, okay? We watch these storms go around Tucson. Why do they go around Tucson? Because Tucson's a heat sink. We already have because everybody wants to keep putting rocks in to make it so the homeless have difficulty laying down or whatever, and people want to use rock and gravel for their... their landscaping and stuff, all that is is a heat sink. If it was bare dirt, it would be better because the bare dirt releases it. The rock doesn't. We have all of the weather patterns that we need going around us already, and you want to add to that? Really? I mean, it boils down to this. What side of history are you going to be on? Thank you.

Sandra, Sandra Teddy, Sandra Toddy. Toddy, I'm sorry if I messed up the last name.

Hi, I'm Sandy Toddy, T-A-D-D-Y. And there's a long story I could give you, but I won't. I just got a phone call yesterday afternoon saying, I have to leave town. Can you go? So I haven't had a lot of time to plan this. But we need to remember these data centers are not coming for us. They are coming for them. When they have gotten what they want, they will leave. Now, the joy would be if they left the land and everything perfectly like they found it. But they won't. So we need to make sure that if they're going to leave, they're going to have to pay for it. Because if they leave those buildings full of all that electronics, we're going to be screwed because that's going to be big deal trouble to get rid of. Nobody wants it in their dump anymore. Yeah, and we need unbreakable contracts, agreements, signed by somebody much higher up the food chain than this guy from the shell company. It's got to be somebody up there that has money to sign it, that signs the thing and says, oh, yeah, yeah, we'll do that, we'll do that, we'll do that. So that when it comes time to get money to be paid for, in fact, actually, why wait for the money? They should be, we know there's going to be, Don't get to be 76. Your brain just... There's going to be environmental cleanups and everything when that building is done. And somebody just said, they have to change and update this equipment and everything. Well, so they have to update the equipment. Well, let's go someplace else and build a new building and put our new equipment in and not worry about this. Again, we're stuck. We need to get a bond. and they pay it now not when they open the building they pay it now and we'll give them interest they can have the interest back if it never gets needed plus the money if we never have to use it but we need a bond that's going to pay for that stuff so we're not stuck with it we shouldn't be giving tax breaks I've seen, I think, IBM got tax breaks twice. Now, IBM is still in Tucson, but parts of IBM left. And right as soon as the tax breaks were done, they're gone. SloanFast was building, I think it was a manufacturing plant. They never moved into it, and they were gone. I don't know if their tax abatements started when they started building or if they had to wait until they opened. But these guys can do the same darn thing and leave us stuck. And just as a question, they have acres of roofs. Why aren't they putting solar panels on their roofs? I've got solar panels on my roof. Anyhow, that's really all that I have.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Toddy. Thank you. That was the last speaker card. Is there anyone else in the audience wishing to be heard on this item? JP, oh, my God. I didn't know you would want to speak on this. JP.

No, I don't want to burden you with trying to be, you know, the scapegoats to, you know, put more challenge in your efforts. But... Chris Mays made a really strong effort to identify what she called the nuisance ordinance expansion. And if there ever was, you know, a self-evident hazard that these organizations, data centers will play for Tucson, we need to do a preemptive strike on a nuisance ordinance level. Okay, that's simple. It's nothing that's unusual. And the state's rights have the authority, we have the authority to increase our security and safety for the health and environmental needs of our public and our land. So that's something else that's very easy to access. We also have, well, I'd like to see a 10-year moratorium that dovetails with our Colorado water allocation. And if it doesn't come up, then they don't come up. And the moratorium continues. Because I don't see an end to this. It's really important that we protect our living culture and what we love in this country. And then we come back to, Chris Mays also mentioned the fact that TEP's regional aquifer access at Irvington Road plant, it's like a water permit. They can make a side deal with Project Blue outside of ACC purview and rob more water. It doesn't have to come directly from you. There's so many ways to attack this. Let's not be the first ones to jump in the fire and burn everything around us. Take some example from Phoenix. They're under tremendous strain. When we start getting 120 degree days, nothing's gonna cool that plant. So please, you know, you don't have to feel any guilt for this. That's what I'm saying. It's a no-brainer. It's our survival. It's our humanity that has to come first. And other entities and other domains and bureaucracies can do whatever they want, but if there's no one to represent you as constituency, then it's all over. That's all I have.

Thank you. Any other wishing to be heard on this item? Okay. Okay. And just come up, it's the same, introduce yourself, and if you live in the city of Tucson or not, and if you are a retained speaker.

Hello, Mayor and Council. My name is Joseph Avenetti. I'm a Marana resident, but I was born here and I work here. I'm not being paid to speak. I'm speaking for myself. It just feels kind of absurd that we're talking about Like we're talking about like how environmentally damaging are these data centers allowed to be before we allow them to be here? And yeah, I'm not even gonna like read what I wrote. It's like, like my problem with the data centers is yeah, it's water scarcity, the heat island impacts, the infrasound, the noise pollution, the electricity rates going up. Like all of those on their own would be like, I think are existential threats for living in this region. But that's not even the main issue with these data centers, because the main issue is what they're being used for. And they're being used to power these ALPR cameras that are like license plate readers, but they can do facial recognition. And they're putting them in places that don't see license plates. And it's powering this mass surveillance that is trying to control all our lives. powering this AI that has all these horrible effects on human cognition and jobs. And all this mass surveillance is being used to track people and help ICE and Border Patrol put people in concentration camps. They want to open a concentration camp in Marana. That's in our backyard. And we're asking, oh, do we give this homicidal maniac a gun? Well, I don't know. What are the pollution effects of the casings that it drops on the ground? I'm like, no. I don't want these data centers here, period. It doesn't matter if they ran on 100% solar and required no cooling and did no pollution. They're being used to hurt people. They're being used to hurt us. And so why can't we just ban them? And also... As far as the Project Blue data center goes, I realize that's outside of city limits, but annexing that land into city limits so that we could regulate it was on the table when we were gonna allow it to happen. Well, it's happening anyway. Can that not be explored? Can revisiting, bringing that area into the city's jurisdiction, is that a possibility? Maybe, I don't know. But I just think it's something to think about. Yeah, I guess I just wanna say, please ban data centers in the city, please remove all ALPR cameras from the city, because they're being used to hurt people, and it doesn't matter what they say. That's it, thank you.

Thank you, sir. All righty, if there's no others interested in being heard on this item, there is, okay, come on up, and then we're gonna have to close the public hearing after you.

Is it this one? I was not prepared to talk because I know and I've been here in many meetings and I know people come with better arguments that I could ever think of. But the more I come to these meetings, the more I learn. I was here a couple months ago and I showed you historical data of the temperature in Tucson and how we're reaching 80 degrees in December and we're reaching 100 degrees in March and how the heat in Tucson is just expanding and expanding. I already brought this data to you. But I have also been attending other meetings where I learned that TEP lobbied for these. and that other, the bill infrastructure lobbied for this, and there was this NDA agreement. And now I'm just hearing about Prop 207, which says property owners can sue cities and counties when they pass regulations. Maybe I'm curious, I don't know if they were also, the people selling the land or the property owners, were they also in the loop when there was this NDA? I'm curious because if that's the case, where is the democracy? Like we are, We are not aware, the citizens were not aware of what's going on, but then these people come with unlimited pockets, and then they bring their lawyers, and then they're like, well, I can sue you if you don't do what I want. So where's the democracy? So if they were in the loop and if this property owners knew everything that was going on and were in on all of this planning, maybe Prop 207 should also have a clause where if an NDA is existing, they cannot come and sue us. That's all I'm saying. Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am. May I have a motion to close the public hearing, please? So moved. There is a motion. Second. There's a motion and a second.

Any further discussion on closing the public hearing?

Just a question, Mayor, procedural question. When will our opportunity to discuss... The feedback we've heard exists once the public hearing is closed.

So we'll close the public hearing and we have two options. We can open up for questions and questions from the council alone. And then we will need a motion in a second so that we can enter discussion. So I can, we don't need a motion and a second to ask questions of the attorney or of Ms. Manning, but once we wanna start discussion, we need a motion and a second. Or we could just have a motion and a second and enter discussion and questions to whatever the preference of the council. Alrighty, so there's a motion and a second to close the public hearing. All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Any against? Motion carries. We've closed the public hearing. And Madam Clerk, I think you need to read the ordinance.

Ordinance number 12268 relating to planning and zoning amending the Tucson code chapter 23B unified development code sections 4.9.11 and 11.3.11 and setting an effective date.

Alrighty. So what is the council's pleasure in terms of preference with starting questions? I know that we all have a lot of questions on many of the items brought today by the public. We can do questions or we can enter into a motion. and a second and then enter discussion and questions. Questions? Okay. So I'm going to open up for questions and it's the preference of the clerk and her advice that we keep it to questions alone and then once we're ready to go into motion in a second, we can go into further discussion in terms of our opinion and where we want to go. So open it up for questions. Who wants to start? I know Councilwoman has some. You're jumping.

I have more discussion, honestly, and questions after that. So I'll hold for that opportunity.

Okay. Any other questions by the council colleagues? Okay. I DO. I HAVE SOME QUESTIONS. A LOT OF THE SPEAKERS TODAY SPOKE ABOUT THE NEW YORK AND MAYBE OTHER STATES HAVE DONE AN OUTRIGHT BAN ON DATA CENTERS. I THINK THERE WAS A ONE OF THE SPEAKERS TALKED ABOUT TEXAS, IOWA AND OTHER STATES HAVE LAWS THAT CAN, YOU KNOW, REGULATE MUCH MORE than what we're trying to do in the city of Tucson. What's the difference in our case in the city of Tucson? And why can New York ban?

Thank you, honorable mayor, members of council. I think the question is, the issue is that those are state laws. So in the city of Tucson, we're bound by state law as well as our local ordinances and the Arizona constitution. And that state law that the state of Arizona is free to do the same thing. But it has to be the state to do that. So until the state does that, we're bound by what the state law actually is. And that includes Prop 207-12-1134, which does have some requirements related to if we are entertaining banning use or wishing to do something like that, that gives property owners the right to engage in that process and request Excuse me are to sue if they feel that their property rights have been diminished in some way that was a Initiative passed by the state of Arizona not by the legislature, but by the actual voters of Arizona It was a constitutional amendment voted on So in order for us to proceed beyond that it would require removal by the state of Arizona including the voters of Arizona and WHETHER IT WOULD APPLY TO THIS PARTICULAR BAN WOULD BE WHETHER OR NOT A PROPERTY OWNER COULD DETERMINE WHETHER OR NOT OR PROVE IN COURT THAT THEIR PROPERTY HAS BEEN DIMINISHED BY THE ACTIONS OF THE MAYOR AND COUNCIL IN ENTERTAINING A BAN.

SO I THINK IT'S CHINO VALLEY. outright banned solar farms. Chino Valley is here in a town in Arizona.

So I hear, yes.

Okay, me too. I had not heard of it. But they banned solar farms, and I want to see what happened there. What's the difference? Why can they do this, and Tucson can't ban this?

Sure, so my understanding is that Chino Valley did that in... When they passed that ban, they did it against the advice of their attorneys and their staff. And it was the subject of what we call a 1487 complaint by the legislature. I don't know the outcome of that complaint. I believe it was withdrawn at some point. but it does present a risk in the same way that a ban of data centers or any use may present a risk if there's a currently allowed use and it's banned.

Can you explain what a 1487 complaint is?

Sure. Thank you, Honorable Mayor. So a 1487 complaint is another legislative, another state law that allows for a legislator to ask the attorney general to investigate a city or a town who they believe are violating the law. Arizona law. And I don't recall off the top of my head whether that was an initiative or a legislative, I think it was a legislative passing. So if that happens, then the AG has to investigate and they can determine whether or not the city or town has violated the law. If they believe that city or town has violated the law, then they can refer it to the Arizona courts. And the Arizona courts can't, if they determine that that is true as well, that city or town could lose their state shared revenue.

Okay. I know that some of my other colleagues have some questions, Vice Mayor.

Yes, Mayor, I just kind of wanted to follow up on your question. Could there be any version of a stricter threshold or use limitation that would functionally narrow the pathway without triggering the same legal exposure as an outright ban?

I think that's true, yes.

THE OTHER THING I KNOW I HEARD A LOT FROM THE PUBLIC AROUND MONITORING COMPLIANCE, ESPECIALLY AROUND NOISE AND WATER AND ENERGY. IS THAT SOMETHING THAT WE'RE EQUIPPED TO DO AS A CITY IN HELPING REGULATE AND MONITOR?

I DON'T KNOW IF THAT'S A LEGAL QUESTION, MORE OF A RESOURCE QUESTION. I MIGHT DEFER TO MY COLLEAGUE AND THE MANAGERS.

THANK YOU, HONORABLE VICE MAYOR, MEMBERS OF THE COUNCIL. Are we equipped to do the monitoring? I would say no, we're not equipped to do the monitoring. Could we become equipped to do the monitoring? Yes. We were chatting offline during the comments and there's a question of requiring the operator, if one was approved, to do monitoring and report on it. That is something we could do. I think similarly we could also require them to pay for such monitoring. That could be done by a third party or it could be done by the city. The ultimate answer to your question is we could certainly do that. Are we equipped at this moment? No.

Yeah, I'm also curious, like what would be the consequence, right, for if they were not found in compliance?

I think that if, sorry, Vice Mayor, thank you. If you're asking what the legal consequences, I think that could be kind of up to us. In many cases, we have requirements for ongoing businesses, ongoing uses. that lead to consequences, whether it's a violation of code, then we can issue notices of violation as well as civil infractions and other sort of violations. And those violations can run day by day depending on what the violation is. And then that would be up to a judge to decide what the penalty would be as well as the, or, depending on the code, how much of that penalty is imposed and how long it could be imposed and what the fines are and that sort of thing. Please.

Vice Mayor, if I may, I think it's also important to understand that there would be multiple different avenues for accountability if you went down this path. There's the code itself, which would require a planned area development or similar mechanism that would come to Mayor and Council. That would also, by itself, have a site-specific agreement that would have additional requirements and accountability measures in it to be determined by you in consultation with the developer. The code itself provides a framework for that if you adopt it, but there's also subsequent instruments that would put into contract terms things like penalties for noncompliance, things of that nature.

Thank you.

Council Member Schubert. Yes, thank you.

I am curious to go into the exception that was mentioned for Prop 207 around public harm.

Sure. Thank you, Council Member Schubert. So that exception is in the statute. This case law has interpreted that statute to require positive evidence by the city or town invoking that, or burden of proof is on the city or town invoking that exemption. So that would require the city or town, if they were challenged in a legal proceeding, they would have to go into court and prove by respondents or evidence that that exemption is the primary reason for passing that ban. Or it doesn't have to necessarily be a ban. It could be any sort of restriction or limit on subdivision.

Councilmember Cunningham and then Councilmember Barajas.

Am I allowed to ask this question? It's unrelated, or is it too unrelated? We're passing a, or we're considering a large water user ordinance in about a month that parallels this. Is that correct?

Honorable Mayor, members of the council, that is correct. We currently have a large water users ordinance on the books already. We do not yet have an ordinance related to data centers, but we are bringing at the second meeting in September is the current plan to bring revisions to the large water users ordinance that were developed in a similar process.

This data center ordinance that you want us to pass tonight, is there a reason why we have to pass it tonight? Is it the one year moratorium? Is running out or is there a reason that we have to pass it tonight?

Honorable Mayor, members of the council, you are not under any timeframe or regulatory requirement to pass these ordinances tonight. What I need to advise you of though is absent these ordinances, you have nothing on the books as form of protection for development of this other than our statement from our zoning administrator.

So, last question. Walk me through the process in the very synoptic, fast-paced move, couple minutes, on what they'd have to do to build one under the current ordinance proposed.

I'm going to also call up Corin Manning, our Planning and Development Services Director. So your question is, what would it look like today?

Yep. If we pass this thing tonight, what would it look like? And give me a ballpark likelihood on that one too. With this ordinance adopted. Yes.

Mayor, members of council, so I just want to reiterate that this would establish a framework for adoption as a city manager, reinforce this is not adopting or allowing data centers widespread throughout the community. In fact, this would make data centers one of the most highly regulated land uses in our development code. There would be no by-right.

One of the most or the most?

There's only one other land use that would be as highly regulated, which is power centers, power utility centers. Yes, thank you. Power generation. So power plants and large scale data centers would be the most highly regulated use in our development code. Power plants, as you know, very high community impact. That's why they are currently highly regulated per our development standards. So this would treat large-scale data centers very similarly, which is that this would be a defined use in our code, but there is no zone where it would be permitted by right or through a special exception. It would only be permitted through a planned area development or planned community development, which is site-specific zoning that would be proposed for that specific use and a specific site and go through a full rezoning process.

Which means they'd have to come to mayor and council?

Yes, so that would include a neighborhood meeting, a public hearing with the zoning examiner, and then ultimately mayor and council review.

So we could still nullify it at mayor and council?

Right, that means that this is a very discretionary process. A data center would only be allowed through discretionary public review that includes multiple opportunities for public input and comment, and then a decision by mayor and council.

And this would eliminate any by-right zone for any data center?

Yes, they would not be permitted by rights anywhere in the city by right or through a special exception.

Council Member Vargas. You can stay up just because I have a question for you actually. So I know a lot of folks in the audience spoke about setbacks. So I was wondering if you could share a little bit more about how this distance was determined and do you believe that it provides adequate protection against potential impacts such as noise, heat, quality of life concerns based on other communities' experiences?

Yes, thank you for that question, Council Member Braga. So Mayor, Members of Council, so we, as I mentioned, that is one of the aspects of the code that really did evolve throughout this process based on the community feedback and feedback from our planning commission. I do believe this provides very strong protection because this would mean data centers would not be permitted near any of our residential zones, residential neighborhoods. or many of our commercial areas as well. So really trying to locate them away from population centers, places where people live and congregate and go to school. There's also provisions for setbacks from schools as well. I mentioned that earlier we started with a more limited setback of 400 feet, so about a block distance, one block if you think of it that way, and that's because that's what we saw in a lot of other codes around the state and other ordinances we looked at that regulate large scale data centers. But as we were doing more research and hearing from our community, we realized we wanted a much larger separation distance, really based on just what we're seeing in other communities and what we've heard from Tucsonans. So this would provide, a half mile is quite a significant separation. If you think about it, that's about at least a 10 minute walk typically. So quite a significant separation. And this does limit, there is a map that was provided to mayor council, this really does limit data center development away from kind of the existing developed part of our community.

Any other questions council member? Any others? Okay, so we've come to, I mean we've asked questions and then now we move on to a possible motion second and then further discussion. What is the council's pleasure?

Just a motion.

So I move to approve the item with direction to staff to return to mayor and council within one year with the review of the ordinance and its implementation. Okay.

So there is the motion. Do I have a second for the motion?

Second.

There's a motion and a second, and now is the time for discussion. Alrighty, so I know Councilwoman Lee has a lot of thoughts. Go ahead, Councilwoman, and then we'll move from here, Ward 6, to down the line.

I do have a lot of thoughts, as you all know, and it's an hour and a half past my bedtime, so I will censor myself to just hit the high points. First of all, I want to thank Corinne and her team A year ago, we gave you direction to go do this work and you did exactly what we needed you to do. So I really appreciate you doing that. And I, as always, want to thank everyone who came out tonight to share your very well-informed feedback with us. It is incredibly value for this process and this dialogue to be able to occur. I have always been honest about how I feel and what I think about this topic. And I'm going to just be honest with you all tonight. So much of what I heard tonight, I absolutely agree with. And that's what makes this conversation particularly challenging. As I think about the past year, Project Blue gave us the ability to see a lot of vulnerabilities that existed. And because of that, I just want to highlight very briefly the steps that we did take to work on closing some of those vulnerabilities, bringing forward the large water users ordinance and getting that protection on the books, as well as NDA reform. making sure that anything that is coming up in front of the community has a 90-day sunrise period so that it's all visible before any action is taken even by our committees. And I know we can't take full credit for this, but because of our advocacy and advocacy of other jurisdictions, the state decided to put a three-year pause on the data center tax. handouts to corporations, which I think was just a race to drive to the bottom personally. What's come up consistently for me in the original conversations and tonight is just reinforcing the idea that we're here to represent the will of the people in these conversations. listen and protect our community. And after Project Blue, I know many of us really started to focus, Mayor, you said it a year ago, we can't say no to everything. What do we want to say yes to from an economic development standpoint? And we've been doing that work to try to find the right industries to come here that will actually create jobs, high wage, long term jobs for our community. So those have been my focus areas with partnerships of many of my colleagues since we sat here a year from now and had the Project Blue conversation. And Margo mentioned the changing industry. There are a lot of data center projects that are being canceled, that are being delayed because the industry is changing so incredibly rapidly. And in addition to the well-informed feedback that we received from our community tonight, there was a Gallup News article that came out May 13th of this year. that research was done and seven in 10 Americans oppose local construction of AI data centers. So while we have a small but mighty group of folks here tonight, you all represent what 70% of Americans feel about this particular industry and having these data centers in their neighborhoods. So that is a powerful data point to me. Last year I mentioned, and I still feel this is true, that we need a national strategy for where this infrastructure goes, and it should not be in drought-stricken areas across the world, including here in Tucson, in my humble opinion. And I think after listening to all the feedback tonight, what I'm thinking and feeling is that at a minimum, before I feel comfortable voting, and I may be... in a minority and that's fine. I feel like what we've heard tonight deserves a response so that we can respond and understand all of the feedback and questions that our community members have presented. We do have a stop gap ish in place with the zoning examiner. So I do have a couple of questions with the vulnerability lens on. What vulnerability does exist if we don't adopt tonight? We do have that zoning examiner, Opinion, but if we didn't adopt something because we've been able to hold the floodgates back the past year What happens what risk do we introduce to our community if we don't adopt something?

I? Assume that's for me honorable mayor members of council councilmember Lee The main concern is that one that zoning administrators determination currently allows someone to come in and apply for and get a PAD to build a data center and there are no safeguards. So none of the things that we talked about tonight around noise or heat islands or setbacks or anything like that are are there right now. The other concern is that the definition is still very vague as to what a large-scale data center is and how it would be applied. So the zoning examiner determine, or the zoning examiner determine, or administrator determination, excuse me, said that this use is allowed in this sort of zone, but it didn't really define a large scale data center in any kind of specificity. So the concern is that one, there's no safeguards, two, there's no definition, and three, it doesn't prohibit really much of anything at this point, because it's just a determination as to where that use is allowed.

So right now you're saying there is a vulnerability. We just haven't bumped into it because we haven't had anyone knocking on the door.

Correct.

Okay. With respect to a moratorium or the preferred word ban by one of our friends out here, I just think if that is something that we would ever consider, I do think there needs to be some studying of that because what I'm thinking is existing employers like the U of A, let's say they want to put a small data center up to train a model to do medical innovation. I don't want to do anything that would negatively impact any employers from doing something like that. That would be small-scale, very specific purpose. But that's just what I'm thinking of if we were to consider a moratorium policy. now or in the future just to make sure that we're not having any unintended consequences. So the way that my brain is looking at that is three paths. We strengthen based on the feedback we got or adopt or there's a moratorium or we don't do anything. And so that's kind of how I'm seeing the paths that are in front of us. And I think just for me in general, I would, personally prefer time to process the feedback we heard tonight, get some answers to the concerns before I feel comfortable voting on what's in front of us tonight, but obviously it's up to the group. Thank you.

Council Member Schubert, and then we can go down the line. And I just wanted to add, you know, this time last year, we're one day off from the Mayor and Council meeting. SAYING NO TO PROJECT BLUE. I THINK VIVEK BROUGHT THAT UP FOR ALL OF US. AND AT THAT MOMENT, WE GAVE DIRECTION TO THE CITY MANAGER TO CREATE the large water user ordinance to have our zoning examiner put a moratorium and then for us to work on a land use code change that would better define large hyperscale data centers as well as be able to put these land use code REQUIREMENTS ON. I DON'T FEEL COMFORTABLE JUST LEAVING US UP TO CHANCE. I'D MUCH RATHER WE ADOPT OUR LAND USE CODES, IT COULD BE TONIGHT, IT COULD BE THE NEXT COUNCIL MEETING, BUT I DO NOT LIKE TO LEAVE US WITHOUT ANY LAND USE CODE REGULATIONS. But saying that, I have other comments and discussion, but Council Member Schubert, and then we'll go down the data.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, members of the Council, and everybody who's still here tonight. I hear your calls for a total ban, and I want to acknowledge how strongly you feel about that. The work and the process to get to this point tonight has been intense, participatory, iterative, and guided by your feedback. And many of you who provided specific feedback are in the room tonight. I commit to moving forward and finding out how a ban could be possible, including researching the health impacts of data centers. If you want to be a part of that, reach out to our office. Reach out to us at Ward 6 if you want to be a part of that work. Tonight's decision is not the end of the story, but this ordinance does not mean that should a data center developer come around sniffing tomorrow that This ordinance does mean, excuse me, it does mean that if a data center developer comes sniffing around tomorrow, this mayor and council has the final say, which is not a protection we currently have. As your elected representative, you, the public, have made it clear tonight that approval for a change in zoning to allow a data center to get built would not happen. So I believe we need to pass the ordinance now and get something on the books. I would like to add an amendment for one and two year reviews to look at any potential changes, but keeping in mind that we can actually revisit the ordinance language at any time. I would also like to add back in a requirement that was in the June version of the ordinance that required that batteries be used before higher-emitting generators. We know that batteries are a cleaner source of backup power than generators. Generators have a detrimental health impact on surrounding communities. So I want to add to Section 3D the following language. Storage and low-emitting backup generators, if available, must be used prior to high-emitting generators to support data center operations when disconnected from the grid. The community has clearly expressed a desire for a ban, so I believe we as a mayor and council should not only pass the ordinance tonight, but continue working on strategies to overturn Prop 207 and also looking for a legal pathway or a loophole or a workaround or something to still be able to enact a ban. I don't think that we should give up and be scared of the risk. We also need to keep a close eye on emerging evidence and case studies. of the environmental and public health harm that hyperscale data centers cause, in addition to the drain on water and energy resources, keeping in mind that these impacts disproportionately hit more vulnerable and under-invested communities. Finally, let me be clear. I do not support hyperscale data centers here in Tucson. Thank you.

Alrighty, I think we're all find ourselves in the same position. Council members should work that we want to make sure that we protect our community as much as possible. And, you know, I remain with the same thought that data centers are extractive and it's very concerning in terms of water use and electricity use. is concerning that I'm just thinking about our work that we've done to get to this point. And it's been arduous and thoughtful engagement with the community, with local experts, with a technical advisory committee. And we've developed a set of robust protections. A lot of people, a lot of other mayors around, not just Arizona, but the country are really looking at Tucson. because we were one of the first cities in the country to say no Hyperscale Data Center because of you, because of the work that you all did with us. But they're also looking for some sort of clarity in how we develop our land use codes and how we protect our community. You said that you wanted to add an amendment to the motion, which I support. But is there any concerns by the council colleagues to add?

I think I would just ask our city attorney and city manager, are we good with those? We just want to- What Council Member Schubert just- Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Mayor, I think we just need a second. Is it a friendly amendment I guess you're asking for, Council Member? So we just need a second and-

original seconder, who is?

This is just a friendly amendment to the original motion done by Council Member Barajas.

So Council Member Barajas, are you okay with that? Council Member?

So it's now in possession of the body because you're discussing it. So you can, if there's no objection to the amendment, it can be adopted. If there is some concern about it, then it needs to be seconded and then voted on.

Can it be restated?

Can you restate it, Council Member?

So my amendment is to approve the ordinance and also continue to look for strategies to either overturn Prop 207 or find a workaround in order to still enact a ban. And then also adding back that 3D language to Section 3D about the battery.

I have no objection.

No objection. All righty. Council? Council?

That's fine, Your Honor, thank you.

Okay. Alrighty, so if there's no objection, we don't need a second or anything. It's just a friendly addition to the motion. Alrighty. Councilman Lee and then Councilman Rudolph.

Yeah, I just want to make a final comment. I hear everything you all are saying and I'm the first one to want to protect our community. I know that based on our conversations on who is or isn't knocking on our door, I feel like for me there is a little bit more time that we could take to integrate the feedback from tonight. So that's really the only reason I'm not going to be supporting just because I would like to have a little bit more time to integrate everything that you all have said tonight and take that into consideration. But I HEAR YOU, I UNDERSTAND THE NEED TO GET SOMETHING ON THE BOOKS, AND THIS WAS A TOUGH ONE FOR ME, Y'ALL, BECAUSE I'M FEELING VERY PULLED IN TWO DIFFERENT DIRECTIONS, BUT THANK YOU FOR LETTING ME KIND OF EXPLAIN THAT BEFORE WE GET TO A VOTE.

SO COUNCILMEMBER VARAJAS, I'M SORRY, I SKIPPED YOU. IT'S YOUR TURN, AND THEN COUNCILMEMBER DALL.

THANK YOU. THANK YOU, MAYOR. WELL, YOU KNOW, A YEAR AGO, I WASN'T SITTING HERE. I WAS WATCHING YOU ALL HERE, MAYOR, COUNCIL, TAKE THE STAND TO SAY NO TO PROJECT BLUE, AND I WAS VERY PROUD. I support emerging technologies and the economic development opportunities they can bring to our city. especially through partnerships with the University of Arizona and Pima Community College. At the same time, we do have a responsibility to ensure we're balancing innovation with environmental stewardship and protecting neighborhoods that are already disproportionately impacted by extreme heat and environmental burdens, areas that have a history of environmental injustice. The map showing eligible parcels is concentrated primarily in ward five with some parcels in ward four. Our Southside neighborhoods have already faced public health issues, some ranging from lifelong illnesses like cancer and death due to TCE contamination. Our neighbors are wary and concerned about additional strain on clean, safe water and affordable water and electric utility prices. We still do not fully understand the environmental impacts data centers can cause to our communities, like massive electricity and water consumption, increased air pollution, and disruptive noise pollution. We are already one of the fastest warming cities in the U.S. and Ward 5 is home to the city's zip codes with the highest temperatures. The heat island effects and waste of large-scale data centers are deeply concerning. Furthermore, the parcels shown in the map are largely part of what we are referring to as the Southlands area. This area is within city limits and we are going to kick off planning and visioning efforts for the Southlands in September. The Southlands provide exciting development opportunities in Tucson with environmental stewardship integrated into any new development we plan for. And we need to have a zoning code in place. Given that this is an evolving industry and that large-scale data centers of this scope and scale are relatively new, I believe it is appropriate for Mayor and Council to revisit this ordinance after it's been in place for a year to evaluate how it's working and to determine whether any adjustments are needed. Before waiting a year, though, I think there are additional considerations that I would like to see in this code amendment. Language requiring decommissioning plans and site reclaimation standards, given how quickly this industry is evolving, sites may also quickly become obsolete. Adding this language could provide some assurances that we will be able to mitigate any ground contamination address dust issues, and return the land to developable conditions. Additional language regarding accountability, monitoring, and enforcement reporting requirements to ensure site conditions are being met throughout operations and community benefits would also be helpful. And those are my discussions. Thank you.

All righty, and I just want to make sure that the concerns mentioned by Councilmember Barajas are part of the work that we're doing, Mr. Manager.

Honorable Mayor, that would be something we would commence immediately, and we would bring back any potential code amendments, certainly at maximum one year. But what I'm hearing is as soon as we identify an issue, we bring it to your attention for potential consideration and action. So that's the direction we would take.

Okay. Council Member Dahl.

I have a short comment, but I have a question following up on that. Since this will be a site-specific rezoning, could we bring that in at that point and require decommissioning as part of the conditions for the PADD?

Honorable Mayor, Members of Council, Council Member Dole, absolutely, yes.

Thank you. So as someone who opposed Project Blue from the beginning, absolutely no-brainer, I feel comfortable moving forward with this ordinance. I feel the process has been transparent. It's been huge with the involvement of many people. And we have some pretty stringent safeguards in regards to energy. the sort of stuff we can do with zoning, and we have that large water user ordinance as well. The key point, the key point is like all rezonings are planned area developments. They come to mayor and council, and we have discretion. We said no to Project Blue unanimously. I can guarantee, if we're up here, any hyperscale data center that comes to us through this process, and I think they would be crazy to try, We would say no again. That's my belief. That's the major reason I feel that we're comfortable in doing the right thing here. Thank you.

Thank you. Council Member Cunningham.

My dad grew up in Nashua, New Hampshire, which is a few, about 80 miles north of Boston. But his his mom was from Lowell It's one of the poor parts of Boston But it's also home to the one of the first data centers that was built the United States in the middle of a neighborhood It's absolutely crushed the quality of life there Between what's happened in Quincy, Illinois and Lowell, Massachusetts I I can tell you that from my perspective everything that was said tonight everybody on this side of the dais agrees with you We're trying to figure out a way to navigate what the will is, and that's fine. I'm more than okay making our ordinance more hardcore, but I don't want to leave the side door open right now. I'm more than happy to do that in 30 days. If we could do a moratorium for 30 days and bring it back when we do the large water Water user piece, that's fine too. But it's six one way app doesn't the other. It's easy to just modify the code. And if we want to modify the code more, we have all the safeguards we need. I can tell you right now, as long as I'm in office, you'd be a pretty tall order to convince me to vote for a pad on a data center. I mean, it's just be a pretty tall order. Never say never, but... All right, let's talk about a couple of other things. One of the cruxes of this discussion is not whether or not we want data centers. I think everybody agrees that nobody wants us to build a new data center. The question is do we want no one to build a new data center in the city limits? or outside, or the whole region? Do we really want to stop data centers from being built in the whole region? So is that more the goal? Because if that's more the goal, then we probably should be, and before you, let me finish the whole thing before you boo me, all right? We should probably be thinking about saying, making very stringent about building new data centers, but having the door open a little bit, a little bit, For an adaptive reuse, an existing structure, say, out by the airport, a large old hangar, the Lisa Frank building, something like that. Hold on. And the reason being is that that would preclude someone from trying to build outside the city limits. Otherwise, I don't have any control of that. That's all I'm saying. I'm not saying that we should do that right now. I'm saying that that's something to think about. I want to provoke some thought here. 100%. 100%. But I'm just telling you. I'm trying to provoke some thought there. I'd also say that... When we think about adaptive reuse, we have buildings that are already built. We're not building anything new. So if we can do that without compromising water, and we can do that without compromising quality of life, then I'm open to having that discussion. I don't want to have it tonight, but I'm just saying at least we get some say. Because otherwise, if we say no forever, at some point, someone's going to go out to Right? So we have to be able to say, well, we're going to be in control for ours. The other piece is that I think on that side, I think it's really important that we also understand that we don't want to limit ourselves in the evolution of this society. this industry as as Nikki was talking about there are there are scenarios and we're a micro data center which doesn't do all this stuff that we're talking about may be plausible so all that stuff I'm willing to have that conversation for now that's a conversation to have with public input in a public process for now I'm okay passing this safeguard if we want to add things I'd rather do it when we come back to the the water use ordinance in the next 45 days. I don't want to wait a year. If we've got more hardcore stuff that we can do that's within the parameters of 1487 or 207, let's go for it. So that's kind of where I'm at. But I wanted everybody to know where I was coming from. Because I think this is a pretty good process. I know everyone's like, man, hardcore and all this stuff, and I get it. But I'm also trying to thread the needle so that we're acting smartly and we have a little more control of our destiny. All right, that's my comments.

Thank you, Council Member, Vice Mayor. Hi, thank you, Mayor. I don't want to take too much time. I feel a lot of my colleagues made a lot of the points that were important other than to thank staff and thank all of the community and public who has been consistently showing up to all of these meetings and engaging with us. I share the concerns and our values align and we're trying to make sure how we can get, you know, we can get to that place because we know that our Sonoran Desert, the state of Arizona is not a place for data centers. But I know that part of our responsibility right now is to build the strongest, most protected standards allowed to protect our city residents, our water, our energy. So again, I just want to thank everybody for their time. I did want to ask for clarification though, on the amendment, because I think the first time I heard something about researching a ban and then the second time that it was read, I didn't hear that part. So just curious if that was part of the ask to staff.

Council Member Schover.

Yeah, thank you, Vice Mayor. I'll say it again. My amendment had to do with, it was twofold. It was continuing to explore a legal pathway for a ban, as well as strategies for overturning Prop 207.

Well, I think the 207 piece is, you know, much more of a political side because that was a voter approved initiative. But I mean, we should be able to at least request to the state legislature that they overturn it or they institute another voter initiative. That's a long piece unrelated to land use codes. But Mr. Tamir, I'm pretty sure that we could at least do report and research on what a ban would mean and what it would take as well as 207.

HONORABLE MAYOR, MEMBERS OF THE COUNCIL, THAT'S EXACTLY CORRECT. THE CITY ATTORNEY AND I ARE VERY CLEAR ON THE DIRECTION AND THE SPIRIT AND INTENT OF HAVING SOMETHING IN PLACE THAT GIVES US SOME SIDE BOARDS AND A STRATEGY AS SOON AS PRACTICABLE TO TRY TO GO DOWN THE OTHER PATH.

IS THAT GOOD, VICE MAYOR? I think that it's a, you know, this time last year, we talked about this. This time last year, we, I believe, and I've said this before, the mayor and council in the city was Tucson was severely unprepared to even deal with a hyperscale data center. Because of the research and work and dedication and commitment by our residents advocating for regulation of data centers we've come after a year of work and lots of engagement from the community local experts as i said city staff that has put so much time into this We have a large water user ordinance that we're already updating that will help protect us from large water users. We have this land use code regulations in front of us. that really many other cities and towns, not only in Arizona, but around the country are looking at us to be able to follow. And we also have, it also motivated me to, DO OUR OWN RESEARCH ON ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND THE PROSPERITY AND THE QUALITY OF LIFE AND THE SUSTAINABILITY OF WHAT TYPES OF JOBS WE WANT TO SAY YES TO. AND WE STARTED A HUGE PROCESS OF FINDING THE RIGHT ANSWERS WITH COMMUNITY INPUT, WITH THE URBAN INSTITUTE AS TO WHAT TYPE OF JOBS we could bring to the city of Tucson that would make our climate action plan the centerpiece of what we want to say yes to, that would make our water policies the centerpiece of economic development strategies. So one year later, thanks to you all, to my colleagues on the council, to our staff, we are much more prepared to say yes for this particular conversation. Thanks to the leadership of Councilwoman Lee, we restructured our NDA policies, et cetera, et cetera. And I am pretty sure that in the next year we will be able to continue moving and shaping our land use codes and our policies based on what we see and what the community wants. What I like about this land use code and what we have in front of us is that after community engagement, ANY DECISION REGARDING A HYPERSCALE DATA CENTER HAS TO COME TO MAYOR AND COUNCIL. AND AT THE END OF THE DAY, MAYOR AND COUNCIL HAVE A VOICE AND A VOTE TO STOP IT. SO WITH THAT, I BELIEVE WE NEED TO GO TO ROLL CALL. LET'S GO TO ROLL CALL, PLEASE.

COUNCILMEMBER VERRAJAS.

AYE.

COUNCILMEMBER CUNNINGHAM. AYE. COUNCILMEMBER SCHUBERT. AYE. Councilwoman Lee? No. Councilmember Dahl?

Aye.

Vice Mayor Santa Cruz?

Aye.

Mayor Romero?

Aye. Ordinance 12268 passes by a vote of 6-1. Thank you all so much for being here, being interested, and being part of the process. We thank you. And with that, that was our last item on the agenda. We will move on to item 10, which is adjournment. Council will stand adjourned. The next regularly scheduled meeting will be on Tuesday, August 18th, at or after 5.30 p.m. Thank you all so much. Appreciate it.