Board of Commissioners - Regular Meeting

Testing. Testing. Alright. Good morning, everyone. This is the second second regular meeting of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners.

Today is 05/20/2026. It is 10:01AM. Madam clerk, please call the roll.

Chairman Rob Pitts. Present. Commissioner Bridget Thorne. Present. Commissioner Bob Ellis.

Present.

Commissioner Dana Barrett. Present. Commissioner Marvin Arrington Junior. Vice chair Khadija Abdul Rahman. Present. Mister chairman, you have a quorum.

Thank you, madam clerk. Please rise for the invocation followed by the pledge of allegiance.

Let us pray. Almighty god, we give you thanks for this day, for your continued grace and mercy upon our lives. We pray now your peace and your power upon our commissioners. Give them wisdom and your strength. It is in your name that we humbly pray. Amen. Amen.

Alright. Continue madam clerk.

On page two, consent agenda twenty six zero two seven zero, adoption of the consent agenda. All matters listed on the consent agenda are considered routine by the county commission and will be enacted by one motion. No separate discussion will take place on these items. If discussion of any consent agenda item is desired, the item will be moved to the second regular meeting agenda for separate consideration.

All right, anything Madam Clerk?

I don't have anything.

All right, Commissioner Ellis.

I would like to remove item two on page four, item 260,279, accounting manager 05/26/2026 Justice System Update for further discussion. It can even be held till we get to the commissioner's discussion items. Just have a few things I wanted to ask about within it.

No objections. Alright. The motion on the floor is to approve as amended. Motion to approve by commissioner Thorne, seconded by commissioner Barrett.

And the vote is open. And motion passes, four yeas, zero nays. On page five, second regular meeting agenda, 20 six-two 81, adoption of the second regular meeting agenda. Mister chairman, members of the board, I have one amendment to today's agenda. Also on page five, removing a proclamation on twenty six zero two eight three. The proclamation recognizing Atlanta Voice Newspaper Appreciation Day. That proclamation will be brought back at a later meeting.

Okay.

And that's all I have.

Alright. We have a motion to adopt as amended by commissioner by commissioner Ellis, seconded by commissioner Thorne.

Regent Thorne is in there.

Commissioner Thorne. Do have a question?

I would like to move up item 260,298 on page nine, community development. The Fulton Youth Commission initiative is to come right after '26 dash two zero two five eight, the MARTA quarterly briefing because we have a lot of young people in the audience that probably need to get back to school. Two six dash zero two nine eight on page nine to come right after two six dash zero two five eight MARTA quarterly briefing.

Alright. No objections. Motion to adopt as amended by commissioner Ellis, seconded by commissioner Thorne.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes. Five yays, zero nays. Twenty six zero two eight two ratification of minutes. Second, regular meeting minutes, April 15. First regular meeting postagenda minutes, May 6, and special call meeting postagenda minutes, 05/12/2026.

You have a motion to ratify by commissioner Barrett, seconded by commissioner Ellis.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes. Five yeas, zero nays. Twenty six zero two eight three, presentation of proclamations and certificates. The first proclamation is recognizing National Preservation Month sponsored by Chairman Pitts with full board support.

We're ending all individuals with the Atlanta History Center and all its supporters, join us. Whereas National Preservation Month serves as an opportunity to honor the people, organizations, and institutions dedicated to safeguarding our shared heritage and promoting historic education and civic engagement throughout our communities, and whereas the Atlanta History Center, through its community collaborations initiative, has demonstrated an unwavering commitment to preserving and amplifying the stories, milestones, and experiences that define the history of Fulton County and the greater Atlanta community. And whereas under the leadership of doctor Lanise Littleton, the Atlanta History Center successfully partnered with Fulton County government in the historic opening of the 2,000 Fulton County time capsule, providing residents and visitors with a meaningful reflect reflection on the county's history, growth, and progress over the past twenty five years. And whereas this collaborative effort also included the creation and resetting of the Fulton County twenty fifty time capsule, ensuring that the voices, aspirations, and accomplishments of today's residents will be preserved for generations yet to come. And whereas the Atlanta History Center's Community Collaborations Initiative and Kenan Research Center further commemorated this milestone through its twenty twenty five county history exhibit and timeline, which highlights significant events, leaders, and transformative moments that have shaped Fulton County and Fulton County's enduring legacy.

Now, therefore, be it be it proclaimed that the Fulton County Board of Commissioners hereby recognizes and celebrates National Preservation Month and honors the Atlanta History Center's commitment of community cell collaborations initiative and does hereby proclaim Wednesday, 05/20/2026 as National Preservation Month in Fulton County. Would you join me in celebrating that?

Good morning. I'm doctor Lanise Littleton, director of community collaborations at Atlanta History Center and a historian. I just wanna say thank you so much. We are delighted at the Atlanta History Center to be able to partner with, judge Johnson in Fulton County to continue to, document and preserve the stories of the county, right, that are also the stories of the city and the state. We are celebrating our centennial celebration at Atlanta History Center where we, are very excited about having, been collecting and documenting the history of the city of Atlanta for one hundred years now.

So we thank you so much. We're so grateful, and, we're honored at the recognition and at the opportunity to continue to collaborate. Thank you all so much.

The last proclamation is recognizing National Public Works Week sponsored by Vice Vice Chair Abdul Rahman with full board support.

Can all of our Public Works employees, the great men and women that keep us going, please come forward. This is for you. I take great pride in presenting this on behalf of Fulton County with my colleagues. Everybody in place? Whereas National Public Works Week is a reminder of the many ways Fulton County Department of Public Works provides foundation of our day to day comfort.

Remember that, you all. Day to day comfort, including roadways, traffic control, sidewalks, airport, water, sanitary sewer, and storm water management. And whereas this year's theme, rooted in service powered by community, acknowledges the roots of a service run that runs deep in the public works and the efforts of all employees form the foundation of thriving communities, reminding us that every project, seen or unseen, powers the connection between service and the people it supports. And whereas Fulton County's Department of Public Works maintains sanitary sewer and water distribution systems, provides water and pollution prevention education to residents, businesses, schools, and communities, maintains roads and traffic signals in the unincorporated areas, and performs the maintenance of all access roads, runways, ramps, and parking lots at the Fulton County Executive Airport at Brownfield, and whereas the Fulton County Department Of Public Works is considered one of the premier, I'll say that again, premier agencies in the state of Georgia with dedicated staff and award winning facilities that provide critical response and a support for twenty four hours a day, three hundred and sixty five days a year, and they do not complain. I know that's not a part of the proclamation.

I just wanted to put it in there. And it's and it's committed to delivering great services to our community. I am so proud to announce that now therefore be it resolved that the board of commissioners of Fulton County recognizes and commends the department of public works for their continued dedication and public service to the county and hereby proclaims the week of May 17 through the twenty third as National Public's Work Week in Fulton County, Georgia. Please put your hands together for these heroes and sheroes that make sure it gets done for us.

Thank you, commissioner. Thank you commissioner Abdul Rahman and the board of commissioners. I'm deputy director Adriana Bustigios, and on behalf of our director, David Clark, and the more than 250 public work employees, we thank you for this proclamation. The 2026 theme, root in service, acknowledge the roots of service run deep in public works. Communities may not take much notice of the dedication of public works professionals because some work, like maintaining roads and traffic signals is highly visible while other public works contribution like maintaining water and sewer systems are sometimes hidden from the view.

However, for twenty four hours a day and despite the weather, public work employees quietly do their jobs without fanfare, working behind the the scenes to respond to emergencies and to deliver great services. Together, these efforts form the foundation of thriving communities in Fulton County, reminding us that every project seen or unseen powers the connection between service and the people it supports. Thanks to the men and women of public works and the outstanding work they do every day to advance the quality of life for all. Thank you.

Alright. Continue, madam clerk.

Continuing on page five, public hearings. Twenty six zero two eight four, public comment. Citizens wishing to participate in public comment will be allowed to appear in person or may choose to participate virtually via Zoom video conferencing by registering on the county website www.fultoncountyga.gov. Priority for public comment will be given to Fulton County citizens and those individuals representing businesses or organizations located within Fulton County. Speakers will be granted up to two minutes each.

The public will not be allowed to yield or donate time to other speakers. The public comment portion of the meeting will not exceed sixty minutes. In the event the sixty minute time limit is reached prior to public comments being completed, public comment will be suspended and the business portion of the BOC meeting will commence. Public comment will resume at the end of the meeting. Mr. Chairman and members of the Board, we have received 38 speaker cards. Will the first six speakers please come forward? Michael Collins, Tanisha Doerr, James Joan, Joyce Farmer, Tanisha White, and LA Pink.

Alright speakers, when you have fifteen seconds, as you know, I will say fifteen seconds and that's your clue to begin to terminate your or conclude your remarks.

Hey, everybody. Michael Collins. I hope everybody got a good night's sleep after all the partying and celebrating and election stuff last night. I wanted to talk about two things that we are here a lot of us are here to talk about today. One is calling on the commission to get involved and fix issues around the diversion center as it relates to pad.

There has been a foolish dispute between the City of Atlanta and contract issues around PAD is causing the diversion center, which you guys heavily supported to be put in jeopardy at a time when the World Cup is approaching and we need the diversion center to be as robust as ever. And PADD is an agency that has been at the forefront of diversion in this city, but for some reason is being pushed out, played with whatever we would put it when it comes to contract issues with the diversion center. PAD is a key part of the diversion center and always has been. And it's up to the commission now to step in and show their support with PAD. The second thing I wanted to see is there's a resolution before you all today to encourage the sheriff to use his power to decline certain misdemeanor offenses when they are brought to the jail.

I know Commissioner Thorne and Commissioner Pitts have worked closely on this together. It's something that Playfair ATL spoke about in connection with the World Cup and the need to take all measures possible to reduce the jail population. It would mean that when somebody on a minor offense is brought to the jail, they can simply be given a ticker or taken to another and we're not adding to overcrowding. So in the name of using all options available to reduce the jail population, we call on you to support this and support PADD. Thank you.

Good morning. My name is Jeanine Shador and I am a community advocate participant with PAD. And right now, our city is having major conversations about public safety, homelessness, behavioral health, jail conditions and neighborhood stabilization. And the truth is, these are not separate issues. We see it in our motor stations, we see it in our parks, outside our libraries, in our emergency rooms, in our neighborhoods. We see people in crisis and too often the only systems available to respond are already overwhelmed. That is why PAD matters. PAD because PAD sits directly in the middle of what Atlanta says it's trying to solve. This meeting may be framed around structure, oversight, contracts, metrics, and operational control, and yes, accountability matters. Transparency matters.

Efficiency matters. But while those conversations are happening on paper, real people are living the impact of every every delay, every service gap, and every failure to respond before crisis gets worse. Atlanta cannot arrest its way out of homelessness. We cannot displace our way out of poverty. We cannot emergency response our way out of untreated mental health needs.

If we are serious about public safety, we need to be serious about prevention. If we are PAD does not replace public safety, it strengthens it. It helps create another pathway before something ends up in hand someone ends up in handcuffs, in a jail cell, in emergency rooms, or in a system completely or completely lost to a system that has never been built to heal them. So, if the concern is oversight, then strengthen oversight. If the concern is metrics, then improve metrics.

If the concern is coordination, then build better coordination. But do not tighten the process so hard that we choke off the very service helping people avoid deeper system involvement in the first place. Support PAD I mean, supporting PAD is not about politics. It's about whether Atlanta is willing to invest in in intervention before collapse. Support PAD, stabilize the system, and stop making prevention beg. Thank you.

Good morning, everyone. My name is James Jones and I wanted to briefly share my experience with and what this process has meant for me personally. Before working with PAD, a large portion of my life was focused on survival and instability. When you are constantly worried about where you are going to sleep, safety, transportation or basic needs, it becomes very difficult to regulate yourself mentally, emotionally and physically. One thing I've learned through this experience is that regulation starts with stabilization.

PAD helped provide structure, guidance, and consistency during a time when my life lacked those things. That support gave me the ability to begin rebuilding not only my stability but also my confidence, discipline, and long term vision for my future. I especially want to acknowledge my care navigator, Denise. One thing that stood out to me throughout this process is that she genuinely listens, assesses my concerns and situations, and then works towards navigating me towards beneficial solutions. That matters because when someone is trying to rebuild their life, being heard and having practical guidance can make a major difference.

I'm a certified trauma informed yoga instructor. And over the last year, I continued developing a movement and wellness practice rooted in yoga, cycling, mobility, breath work, and intentional movement throughout Atlanta. The work I've done with regulation through yoga became much more effective once I had a support system, helping me stabilize the environment in my daily life. Because of that support I've received from PAD

Fifteen seconds. Able

to build on my Facebook page with teachers regulation through the Internet and hopefully one day in person. And that's that's what I'm currently working on. Thank you all for your time. Thank you.

Good morning, chair and commissioners. My name is Joyce Farmer and I stand here before before you because the people of this county deserve answers in regards to the condition of our jail. For too long, too many families have watched their loved ones suffer behind those walls from death, lawsuits, allegation of neglect. The jail shouldn't be a place that is secured, constitution and humane. Inmates shouldn't have to worry about being injured or not receiving medical attention.

Leadership means taking the responsibility when the system fails. Leadership means facing the public and not hiding. Leadership means coming up with solutions and not excuses. We need a stronger mental health and medical system. We need oversight. We need to build culture from the top down on accountability. This is not just this this this is not just headlines. These are people's lives. These are mothers, daughters, sons, and fathers. So, this is not political.

It's accountability, transparency, and people lives. The people have spoken, the family has spoken, and the commissioner has spoken. The question is, who will have the courage to change this? Thank you.

The World Cup is about to have a lot of people in handcuffs because corruption, as we continue to tell y'all, done got too comfortable. But it doesn't really care about who it keeps around as long as it can have control and power. But as we watched last night, so many different things take place. We watched no one speak about, what just took place over at Waccamaw Park with election ballots and the event that was taking place right 110 feet away that's supposed to be in 150. Now we all know that Mayor Gumbs and Helen Willis are real good friends, so we're asking for an investigation because there's some type of ties off in there.

This is the reason why no one believes in the integrity of the election because there is too much corruption being pushed up under the rug, being ignored. So while everybody is out here tallying, rallying about the redistricting, y'all better worry about the redistricting of y'all's pockets that they about to do. The of your bank accounts that you're about to have to be extra because they're taking your property. See this redistricting of these seats that they're trying to place up amongst us. There's no way that Dana isn't up with with Penny.

No way. That right there is questionable. Like, you have not done one thing, but neither here nor there. Then Marvin, we're praying that you don't get behind mo mess because we know how the corruption goes. It's a domino effect. When one loses, they gotta keep the

other loose. Fifteen seconds.

But however, community, y'all better wake up because the devil's on the loose.

Hello. My name is Tanisha White, and I'm here to inform you on how your jails are being And from the day that I walked in and I received my blankets and my sheets to the day I walked out, it's the same blanket and sheet that I had when I came in there. They put up they posted up on the doors that they were going to weekly wash the sheets and the blankets, but never did. We were barely able to get clean uniforms every week as we were supposed to. On top of that, you get one sports bar and one underwear.

Well, you know, women, we get the time of the month. So we struggle to have to have to keep our hygiene up with one sports bra and one underwear. And, also, when I walked in, I noticed that for the women, we don't have nothing that shows us anything of bonding companies, lawyers, no type of information like that. When I when I asked an officer about it, the answer to me was that I had to ask another inmate for that information. And it and and it wasn't put up or given or none of that.

You have people in there that have mental disabilities that don't even need to be in there, but they're in there. The officers are rude, disrespectful, talk to you any kind of way.

And I

knew they took oaths.

I knew they took oaths. So, for them to act like that is crazy. Ledbetter, she should not be where she is right now. The simple fact that they neglected her and left her there. When you say you're on suicidal watch, you you are not supposed to be in

Thank you, ma'am.

Next speakers, please come forward. Sean Stilo, Hillary Phillips, Helen Williams, Devin Franklin, Denise White, Eric Montero.

Good morning. My name is Sean Stilo. I'm a medical student, a master of public health candidate and a fellow with Stop Criminalization of Our Patients better known as SCOOP. At SCOOP we provide education and research on the ways in which the criminal legal system impacts health. I'm here today to speak in support of evidence based alternatives to policing and incarceration, specifically in support of PAD.

Based on nine one one analysis, we know that the vast majority of community responses do not require police. When individuals, especially those already vulnerable, are forced into the criminal legal system, most experience further traumatization and marginalization. And a system rooted in coercion rarely fosters lasting recovery and stability. I know this not only academically and professionally, but personally as a nephew. My uncle struggled with a substance use disorder for much of his life.

He cycled through systems that only perpetuated his trauma rather than addressing it. My uncle overdosed and died shortly after being released from prison. My mother and her siblings never got the chance to see what might have happened if their baby brother had been given the opportunity to take a different path. That fear of receiving the call, the one that no family should ever have to get, eventually became her reality. Right now there are families all across Fulton County terrified of receiving that same phone call.

Programs like PADD matter because they create opportunities for intervention before tragedies like this occur. They recognize that people experiencing mental illness, substance use disorders, homelessness, and poverty are still members of our community. When we create opportunities for all to heal, everyone in Fulton County benefits. I'm asking the board to resolve PADD's contract with the Center for Diversion and Services. This is not just a policy decision. This is a decision to support the 126 people currently connected to care navigation services all the future ones that Pat will no doubt help. As a future physician I believe we should always choose care and compassion over punishment. This is not only the ethical choice it is the most effective one. Thank you.

Hi, my name is Hilary Phillips and I volunteer at Fulton County Animal Services, primarily spending my time with the court case animals. The dogs are held at the shelter as evidence pending the trial. Fulton County Animal Services currently has 63 court case dogs with some having been in the shelter for over six hundred days. These dogs can't be adopted and they can't even be seen by public. Many people are currently working towards shortening the wait times for these dogs however the truth is there are far too many dogs that are spending far too long waiting.

There's an obvious and relatively simple solution that already exists within Georgia law that's called the cost of care petitions. These petitions require the owner to pay for the cost of care for the animal every thirty days while the case is pending or forfeit the animal. While this wouldn't bring the number of court case dogs down to zero it would likely significantly reduce the numbers. So you might be wondering this seems like a logical solution why isn't it happening? It's because the county attorney's office simply is not filing these petitions.

Myself and many others cannot comprehend this. When abused dogs are forced to remain imprisoned by a legal process that already has a path to resolution simply because the agency won't utilize that resolution that system is actually prolonging cruelty and not fighting to end it. Furthermore the strain of housing these court case dogs impacts every single dog in the shelter because the court case dogs go into the shelter capacity count that sets the number of dogs placed on the euthanasia list each week. This week there are 26 dogs with a deadline of tomorrow because we are 26 dogs over capacity with 63 of these spots being taken by court case dogs, with the high number of court case without the high number of court case dogs, there would be no capacity driven euthanasia list. So my ask is this, I implore you to ask the county attorney's office to immediately begin filing the cost of care of petitions for the court case dogs.

My second ask is that you come visit the court case dogs in person.

Fifteen seconds.

I believe when you see them you will agree that the effort it takes to file a petition is well worth the outcome it could have. Thank you so much.

Good morning. My name is Helen Delilah Williams. I live in Vine City. I live at 06:42 Lester Street. I am a retired member of MARTA. I've worked thirty, thirty plus years. I also worked for Home Depot for six years. I am here to, for one, speak up for PAD because it's well needed within the community. They have a great great service. I was detained by the officers in reference of a tag.

I really should have been sent to Pat to help me, but they sent me to jail. I got the bra and all that wonderful stuff and the bedding. I should not have been sent there. I would also like to speak about the schooling. There is a way that we need to find a way that we can sponsor or support not closing 16 schools within the district.

It is so prevalent that our kids get a better opportunity. You have more charter schools popping up like one, two, three, but the only reason you can get in charter schools is because sometimes people can afford more. Low income people really need public schooling so would you consider using those schools for a better reason? Also, we have more gambling in the stores. Use that money and send it directly to the schools.

Selling weed. San Diego, dispensaries, use it for the schools. Marta, mister, I can't call his name right now. Marta, would you please allow the low income families to ride doing the FIFA until they leave? Allow us to ride free. Had several, several leave with money, jump on trains, this, that, and the other, allow the public to move around, gain an opportunity to get jobs while this is going on through our city?

Good morning commissioners. My name is Devin Franklin. I am senior movement policy council at the Southern Center for Human Rights. Today I am here to ask that you protect PADS critical role in the diversion center by directly funding PADS care navigation services using the funds that have already been approved for this purpose. To be clear, what I'm advocating for today is for Fulton County to solve a problem that has been created by the city of Atlanta's willingness to honor its contractual agreement as it pertains to the Diversion Center.

Right now PADD Care Navigators have not been able to accept referrals since March because of the City of Atlanta blocking PADD's contract renewal. In the April Diversion Center report, 34% of people diverted to the center left without connection to services. That means more than one out of every three people walked out with nowhere to go and no real support. The Diversion Center was created to reduce unnecessary arrests and keep people out of jail by connecting them to meaningful support, but diversion only works if people are actually connected to care. We cannot allow the diversion center to become a door to nowhere.

As a former veteran public defender of more than twelve years here in Fulton County, I have helped literally hundreds of people be connected to services once they've been brought to the grass with the criminal legal system. That includes wraparound, navigated services like those provided by PADD, as well as self-service voluntary engagement services such as those provided by Grady at Tim Park Place. While there is a need for of tactic and level of care, one thing that my experience and expertise have shown me, and provided me with first hand knowledge of, is that by far our greatest tool in providing care to persons in need and fighting recidivism is care navigation. Recovery and stability do not happen in a few hours. They require trust, consistency, and sustained report.

That is exactly what PADD provides. Fifteen seconds. I urge you to act now. Please ensure PADD's care navigation services are funded with the already appropriated Divergent Center money. And in my closing moments, I would also ask that you all support the resolution calling for the sheriff to be able to refuse misdemeanor arrest. There's adequate research and legislate and law behind that supporting that. Thank you.

Deputy director at PADD. Today, you're gonna hear from our care navigation team, the people on the ground leading this work every single day. Our care navigators support individuals navigating housing instability, mental health challenges, substance use, trauma, and repeated involvement with the criminal legal system. The work they do every day directly contributes to reducing the jail population in Fulton County. When people are connected to services and long term stabilization, they are less likely to cycle in and out of jail.

When people have trusted relationships and consistent support, crises can often be addressed before they escalate into arrest or incarceration. I've had the privilege of watching this team closely. I see them celebrate the successes of our participants when someone reunites with family, secures stable housing, enters recovery, or reaches a milestone they once believed was impossible. And I also hear their frustrations when systems create barriers, when resources are limited, or when someone struggles to stabilize despite trying incredibly hard. But even in those moments, this team continues to show up with grace, compassion, compassion, and commitment.

You will hear stories of triumph, resilience, and transformation today. But what you will not hear are stories about factory style social services where people are expected to heal within unrealistic timelines or move through systems as quickly as possible. Healing takes time. Trust takes time. Stabilization takes time. Our care navigators have the knowledge, expertise, and patience to walk alongside people for however long it takes to help support lasting change. We are proud of the work our CareNavigation team does every day

to pull away

from incarceration and toward healing, stability, and community connection. Thank you.

Good morning. My name is Eris Montero, and I'm a licensed master social worker working directly with individuals experiencing homelessness, mental health, substance use challenges. As a legal navigation manager with PADD, I often support people during deeply challenging moments in their lives. Many of the individuals we serve have gone years without consistent support or access to the services that they need. I initially joined PADD as a care navigator.

That role is more than just a title. We help people navigate systems that otherwise feel impossible to access alone. For many people we work with, we become their emergency contact, their support system, and sometimes the only safe space they feel they have. Through care navigation support, I've witnessed participants who were released from the jail to pad with nothing but the clothes on their back, obtained permanent supportive housing, secure employment, and given back to This year we've enrolled 26 individuals who were referred to us while incarcerated for quality of life related offenses and needed support instead of punishment. We recently housed a participant who was living on the street for years, struggled with substance use for over a decade and and has over 50 arrest cycles in the city of Atlanta.

He now has his own place to call home and recently celebrated a year of sobriety. I can share countless stories like his. That outcome didn't happen overnight and they didn't happen through arrest alone. They happened because someone stopped long enough to ask what support does this person actually need. The work we do benefits not only the participants we serve but the entire community. When people are connected to appropriate services, we reduce the strain on law enforcement, emergency rooms, jails, and other public systems while helping people move toward long term stability. This is why I'm asking you to continue supporting PAD as a critical part of Atlanta's public safety response. Thank you.

Hi, my name is Anjira Harge. I'm an Atlanta native, Fulton County resident, and a graduate of the Whitney M Young School of Social Work at Clark Atlanta University. What I want my legacy to be is that I'm an optimist and humanitarian, choosing to acknowledge the kindness and beauty in everyone I encounter. Throughout my life living in Atlanta, I have seen many unhoused individuals, and I have always wondered what their story is. About five years ago, I came across a care navigator position on Work For Good, and I was struck by Pat's unique approach, offering ongoing support and resources without discharging participants from the program.

Currently, I am one of the Care Navigation Supervisors, and I love how I get to show up for the Care Navigators. What many people do not see see beyond our titles and responsibilities are simply people who decide to give the best of themselves through compassionate service to our neighbors, often beyond work hours. What many people do not see is how our care navigators are humans navigating their own lives while advocating for the best outcomes and providing ongoing support to people who have been wrote off by society for having quality of life concerns. One participant I worked with struggled with his recovery from alcohol. When I met with him, I did not see his struggles.

I saw a man trying to do better for himself, for his family, adding value to his community, and become closer to God. The man I worked with loved going to support groups. He loved community. While collaborating with collaborating with the participant, he became a peer housing manager. Through time collaborating with the participant, I observed highs and lows. I realized even more, healing is not linear and there is no timeline to healing.

Fifteen seconds.

Everyone has tests and testimonies. My ask is that Fulton County continue to support the excellent work of PADD Care navigation. Thank you for you all's time.

Good morning, Board of Commissioners. My name is Darius Hardy, and I'm a care navigator with PADD. I've been working with children, families, and social services for the past twelve years. And with working with PADD Care Navigation Team, we're on the front lines daily to provide provide additional support to individuals who experience quality of life concerns. Oftentimes, I am reminded of how we're able to serve these individuals effectively and efficiently.

As a PAD care navigator, working with those working with those who possess mental health challenges, homelessness, or even repeated incarceration. It is important to have programs like PAC care navigation for it is critical to have safety net programs that provide individuals with peer support networks and basic human provisions food and emergency services. So I stand before you today asking for your continued support for PADD Care Navigation Team. Thank you.

Good morning, board. My name is Eugene Walls. I'm a housing manager at PADD. I've dedicated my life to social services for over eighteen years. I'm asking for your commitment to continue supporting PADD. As the housing manager, I'm responsible for oversight and development of all housing partnerships, service coordination within the agency. I I actively work to increase the accessibility of housing opportunities to in alignment with PADD's mission using a housing first approach. What made me choose PADD? PADD values align with the passion I have for service as a person with lived experience. Service is not a choice for me.

It is commitment I made a long time ago when I changed my life. I do this work because I know what it feels like to be unhoused and the need for support. PAD gives the participants hope and opportunity to change their lives when they are ready. As the housing manager, I'm honored to be a part of their journey. Last year, our team was able to provide short term housing placements for 384 participants to work towards their long term housing goals. The continued support is needed from you. Let's let's continue to, support our community on their journey. Thank you.

Good after good morning, board of commissioners. My name is Ashley Hybull, and I am the legal coordinator overseeing the post booking process with Pat. I started at Pat about four years ago as a care navigator and working directly with people experiencing mental health challenges, substance abuse, homelessness, and poverty. Through that work, I began to understand how often people are criminalized for unmet needs and survival behaviors rather than being connected to the support they actually need. As I continued this work, I found my passion in the legal field, in the legal side of PAD.

I saw so many individuals being arrested and placed into the Fulton County Jail, sometimes sitting there for months because of unmet needs and quality of life concerns and lack of resources. The experience that experience eventually led me into my current role as the legal coordinator, overseeing the post booking process. This work is also very personal for me. I have struggled with depression myself, and that experience has deeply shaped the way I approach both my life and this work. It has taught me how important support systems, compassion, and human connection truly are.

PAD has not only shown up for our participants, but it has shown up for me too. Today, we currently have 26 participants from our post booking program this year who have been released from jail and remain actively engaged with their PAD care navigators while working toward housing, mental health treatment, sobriety, stability, and rebuilding their lives. To me, those are not just numbers. Those are people being given the opportunity to move forward with support instead of continuing to cycle through the jail system. I'm asking for your continued support of diversion and care based responses in Fulton County because these programs truly change lives. We need the right response for the right situation. Thank you for your time.

Good morning, everyone. My name is Terri Thompson, and I am a Care Navigator Supervisor. I've worked in social services for the past twelve years and in the legal field for the past eighteen years. I've been employed at PADD for the last three years. We need your support to continue our work and service to the community and the diversion diversion center.

Your support would allow us to continue participant advocacy and incarceration, housing support, disability and mental health services, wellness, and many other health related services. One example is participant David Lee. He is an example of a life that was changed with the help of PADD. David was at his lowest when he was diverted to PADD in 2021. After many incarcerations, alcohol, and substance uses, he was ready for change, and we were there to help him. David was placed at many women of human excellence in nonprofit in alcohol and drug rehab treatment for a variety of substance system. Is a a of of

He

is volunteers with WWJD to feed the unsheltered. Derek recently purchased a house, and he is getting married. We are so proud of him. Why does PADD work? We meet the participants where they are and thrive to make a difference in their lives. We don't give up on the participants. We work step by step and work with each participant at their own pace. We motivate, we encourage, we cry, we celebrate, and most importantly, we do this work together. Thank you for your support.

Hey, good morning and good day. My name is Marcus Harper, and I'm a PAD Navigator with over ten years' experience. I'm also a native of Atlanta. So, this work is personal to me because these are my people, my community, and our neighbors. One thing that makes PAD different is that we we don't just do case management. We build relationships. We walk with people through some of the hardest moments of their lives. We stay connected even when progress takes time. I've seen the impact firsthand. I've sat with people in courtrooms while they was facing life changing situations.

Just making sure they didn't feel alone. I've helped small things like getting medication, rides, or helping somebody with important phone calls. And sometime biggest thing we do is just simply show up, listen, when somebody feels down. Right now, supporting a participant who's incarcerated. We're already working together on the plan for when they are released, making sure support, resource, and the programs in place so they have real chance to move forward. Just the other day, the person's mother called me thanking me over and over just for being there and not giving up on a loved one. That's what PAD does. This work is beyond paperwork, beyond checking boxes. These relationship change lives. They help people believe and change believe change is possible.

I ask that you continue to support PAD and the work we do in helping people in Fulton County, Atlanta, period. Maybe even some people that you know personally. Thank you for your time.

Good afternoon. My name is Victoria. I'm a master's level social worker with ten years experience serving individuals and families in social services right here in Atlanta. I'm also an Atlanta native. Growing up in Southwest Atlanta, I saw both the strength of our communities and the challenges that too many families and individuals face every day. Raised by a single mother, I witnessed firsthand how life changing it could be when families have access to real support, real opportunities, and people who genuinely care. I also saw what happens when those resources are missing. That experience is what led me into social work and feels my passion for advocacy today. At PADD, we are unique in both what we do and how we do it. I often call PADD the unicorn agency because we offer services that not everyone has access to or that everyone is able to receive.

We understand that people are more than their circumstances. Our approach to care is rooted in dignity, compassion, consistency, and meeting people where they are. We don't believe in temporary fixes. We believe in long term transformation. Every day, we work with individuals who are facing different barriers that people often are unhoused, mental health challenges, substance use, unemployment, trauma, domestic violence, and poverty.

But with the right support system in place, lives can and do change. A success story I wanted to share with you all today is about a participant that was diverted for criminal trespassing. I was able to work with that individual, was able to work with her on getting her basic documents, got her into emergency shelter, and she was able to regain custody of her daughter. Three months later, we were able to get her into rapid rehousing, and she successfully is employed and thriving. The reality of this work cannot continue at the level our community deserves without increased funding and investment. The need in Atlanta is growing and organizations like PAD are on the front lines responding

to this need every day.

When you invest in PAD, you're not just funding the program, you're investing in safer communities, stronger families, and a better outcome for people who deserve the opportunity to thrive. You are helping create pathways to stability, hope, and independence. As someone who grew up here, works here, and deeply believes in the city, I know Atlanta is strongest when we take care of each other.

Good morning, Board of Commissioners. I'm Cameron Johnson. I've worked as a care navigator with PADD for almost three years now. Every day at the Diversion Center, I met people carrying trauma, behavioral health challenges, housing instability, survival stress that cannot be resolved through one interaction or one night of support. What makes PAD effective is not just crisis response, it's long term case management that allows trust and stability to develop over time.

I want to share one example. I worked with someone who had already come a long way. He had achieved stable housing, a place where many programs would have ended case management, but tragedy struck for him. Afterward, we temporarily moved him into our respite hotel so he could regain a sense of safety. When I went to check on him one day, for what was supposed to be a brief visit became several hours.

The trauma, paranoia, and everything combined with existing behavioral health challenges had pushed him into crisis. In that moment, he told me he needed me to stay with him that night, and that afternoon, I remained with him well past work hours, helping facilitate calls with Georgia crisis and law enforcement so he can get the support that he needed. That experience reminded me that recovery isn't always linear. Stability can often disappear overnight. Without ongoing relationships and support, people can quickly end up back in crisis.

So today, my request is simple: please keep supporting PAD at the Diversion Center, especially the long term case management that lets us help people, not just during a crisis, but as they work toward recovery and stability. Sometimes, what really makes a difference isn't just responding in the moment, it's having someone who stays after the crisis has passed. Thank you.

Good morning, Board of Commissioners. My name is Mark Bean Peters. I began a commitment of being of service to others in September 1999 through a fellowship dedicated to supporting individuals in strengthening communities. Over the years, this passion for advocacy, recovery support, and empowerment has grown into a professional career. Senate on hope, resilience, and peer support.

In 2012, I earned a certified peer specialist certification, followed by a forensic peer specialist certification in 2014 and a cares addictive disease certification in 2016. These credentials reflect extensive experience working with individuals navigating mental health challenges in substance abuse driven by the belief that diversity is one of our greatest strengths. And I'm dedicated to creating safe spaces, supporting spaces with it where individuals can rebuild their lives with dignity and purpose. Nothing is more rewarding than witnessing someone move from hopelessness to hope and ultimately lead into a home of their own. Thank you very much.

Good morning board. Nice to be here. My name is Darcy Jarrett. I'm the training coordinator with PAD and I'm also a person who served for two years as a care navigator with PAD. And so not only do I have ten years experience working in social services, but I'm also a person in long term recovery. I'm a person who access services and experience homelessness here in Atlanta. I stand before you today because I know personally what it means to need more than just a referral. It means we need someone who stays with us. We need to build relationships. When I was struggling, recovery did not happen because somebody gave me a phone number or handed me a deadline.

Recovery happened because people built relationships with me rooted in trust, dignity, patience, and consistency. It happened because someone believed the life that I was living could be different and they saw that in me. This is why PADS role inside the Diversion Center is essential. It matters. The recent SAMHSA homeless housing resource that you've just been handed says clearly that people experiencing homelessness and substance use disorder need relationship centered care, warm handoffs, persistent engagement, and long term care navigation support.

Especially it warns against transitions and disconnections in care which create an elevated risk of overdose. PAD is the agency that does this in the diversion center. We don't want to have a diversion center that expects change in one referral or one phone number. PAD is the reason the diversion center is effective. This Please support ask comes not just from lived experience of myself, but from what we know and what we've heard from all of these care navigators. Thank you very much for your time.

My name is Bobby Green, and thank you for having me to speak. I'm part I'm in the pad program or whatever, And my request is for you to strengthen PAD or whatever. Ronald Reagan said it best, peace throughout strength. PAD is a program that you can get a lot of many different things from it, but you've got to want to change and want to do the program or whatever. PAD is just what can I say?

PAD is a great program. PAD helps you. PAD you can call 311, and PAD will come wherever you at, give you food, clothing, hygiene products. PAD is hands on with the community. And I love to be in the program with PAD, and I wish I'll keep strengthening PAD.

My cat navigator Victoria once told me, it's not how you start out in life, but it's how you end. Thank you.

Good morning. My name is Eric Miller. I can remember when I became homeless back in 2017 and I ended up coming here to Atlanta in 2017 or beginning of twenty eighteen. I ended up going to jail. I let them know I was homeless while I was in there and I got picked up by PADD after a two year stay.

PAD did it for me for what I couldn't do for myself. I didn't know where to look. I didn't know where to have these things provided for me. But I see PADD getting bigger. I see it being nationwide because it helps a lot. It helps a lot of people. Being entwined with the mental health system, because that's a big part of homelessness right now, I think the power will elevate. And thank you for your time.

Good morning. My name is Quacia Sanders, and I am a resident of Fulton County. As someone who worked at PADD as a care navigator, I have seen firsthand that Divergent only works when people are connected to real, ongoing support. The care navigators at PADD do far more than hand someone a referral and hope for the best. They walk alongside people through some of the hardest moments in their lives.

They build trust with people who have often been felt repeatedly by institutions and systems. They help people secure identification documents, apply for benefits, access health care, enter treatment programs, find housing, attend court dates, reconnect with family, and develop plans for long term stability and recovery. Care navigators coordinate across agencies and providers so people do not fall through the cracks. They meet people where they are, whether that's at a jail or an encampment without judging without judgment and continue showing up even when progress is slow. Care navigation is not an extra service attached to diversion.

It is the reason diversion succeeds. One thing I know for sure is Atlanta needs PAD, the unhoused population needs diversion services, and the care navigators need to be paid. I no longer work for PAD, but I will always stand behind them and the work they do for this community. So I am requesting and asking you all to provide PAD with the necessary funds they need so they can continue offering diversion services to the people that need it the most. Thank you.

Hello. My name is Talia Cooper Smith and I'm a medical student and fellow at Stop Criminalization of Our Patients. We research the ways in which the legal system impacts health and what we might do differently to support health and safety. Many people today will have articulated the need for evidence based alternative response programs such as PAD as a humanitarian and economic solution for a city tackling immense quality of life disparities. And with the release of nine one one and three one one data over the past year, PAD's diversion tells a story of strong foundations with potential for incredible development.

Over the past year PAD has responded to over 1,900 community requests through 311 leading to 1,800 community response and seven eighty five newly enrolled participants utilizing PAD's care navigation services. Beyond this PAD has the infrastructure for growth. For every 311 call that goes to PAD in 2025 there were approximately 19 calls to 911 for similar quality of life concerns. Meanwhile PAD's average response time remains over ten minutes faster than that of 911 and with the diversion center's potential to divert over 10,000 jail bookings from ACDC and Fulton County jail, the story of PADD as one of underutilization above ineffectuality becomes clear. However, it cannot be understated that the success of alternative response programs in Atlanta are contingent upon investment in growth not regression.

If PADD's contract with the center of diversion services remains unaddressed up to six staff members will lose their job snowballing to a cumulative a 126 individuals who would lose long term support from care navigators. This would mean cutting from the lifeline of connecting them with housing assistance, transportation, legal assistance, access to their own documentation, the rights and resources that protect livelihood and decrease recidivism. PAD is not just a pit stop in the cycle of incarceration. It is a way out. The infrastructure is present, the community support has

The been

room for expansion is wide. I am asking this board to resolve PAD's contract and ensure the work of diversion does not become a road to nowhere.

Hello. My name is Akhil Brooks. As a young black professional who's worked in tech as well as academia, I'm often struck by the disparity I encounter on the streets as I travel between class meetings or to and from offices or co working locations. As a professional, I know I must stay focused on my duties. As a young black person, I realize that many of the people I see could be could have been like me once.

The data overwhelmingly overwhelmingly shows that black folk are most affected by homelessness. I began volunteering with PAD when one of my employers offered volunteer hours to workers. I was happy to find others who were making the world a better place rather than increasing poverty and misery. Instead of merely throwing people back on the street after they've recovered, PAD provides long term support to folks by actively addressing the issues that led to their law violations in the first place. The diversion center needs PAD in order to handle case management and care navigation.

This is how they help folks find housing, health care, and income after being diverted from arrest or from jail. The city of Atlanta could alleviate the pressure of the jail population and reduce the number of people living on the street by renewing PADS contract. Please ensure this aspect of the diversion center continues as an institute as an institution.

Thank you.

How y'all doing? My name is Kathy Edwards. I'm a recovering addict who works for PAD, this fantastic organization behind me on both sides. Let me tell you why they're needed in the Diversion Center, the care navigation team. From my experience, we go in there, we got no help, direction, no case management, no suggestions, no nothing. We come out, we'd be repeat offenders again. Today I pay taxes. I'm tired of people going to jail for not having no help. I continue to keep paying for that. The care navigation team does everything they need to do.

They need to be back in the diversion center. They need to have control of it because they give people directions. They make suggestions, not demands, which works out better. They give case management. They give them information. They lead them today, not tomorrow or later on. They are fantastic. They are awesome. Another reason why PADD is so awesome. They're the only organization in the state of Georgia that reduces jail time and can get people out of jail for nonviolent crime.

So that's why we need PAD, the Care and Navigation team, which is a heart of PAD, back in the Diversion Center. The people that booted us out, that said they was going to do this and do that, they ain't doing nothing. While we stand on the sidelines still busting our tails to help, not them people or those people, our village. We're all a village. We need help. This is why I'm with this organization. They are awesome. They do everything they said they're gonna do and more, even with less funding. That's why they need

to continue Whatever being

they ask for, give it to them because they know what to do with it. They do what they say. Thank you.

Good morning. Larry Arnold. That's my name. I thank God, number one, for pay. They had helped me from Rice Street. That's when I found that about PAD. They come and visit you. They get you a store. They uplift you when you're in a place like that. Everybody ain't fortunate enough to give stuff. They do do that. Make me feel good. Know, buy them a $50 store, then they turn around to get their store. They sell it for strips. What is I don't know because I don't do it no more.

I used to smoke crack. I don't smoke crack no more. And I definitely don't do that strip whatever they do over there in the 4th County. Y'all know what's going on over there. It's sad. But PADD, you get with PADD, they uplift you. I got my own place now. I'm not living in the street. I was sleeping in U Haul, truck, sleeping on the info calls. I don't do that no more. I got my own faith. Thank you, God. Let me speak to her. She helped me. She talked to me. She like, mister Arnold, you could you got to do this. Mister Arnold, you got to do that. And she right. You know, she a young lady. And look at me.

I'm 67 years old. The young lady helping me how to live my life in which I should be telling her. She telling me. So I thank God for paying. Oh, yes, I do. And that's all I got to say.

I'm emotional. I would like to say god is good all the time. Everybody's not in a situation, born into a situation, you get into a situation. But people drift off and fall off. When you're strong person, sometimes you need help as well. So you become the weak. Nobody's there for you. So you're like, where do I go to run for help? You know what I'm saying? And everything you done or you possibly can do for anybody, they ain't nowhere around.

I've been here for ten years, and I've been up and down. But I woke up in a bed, though, with the police taking me to jail for me being asleep in a in a in a bed apartment building. But instead of the police taking me to jail, he asked me, did I need any help? Nobody asked me that. And I don't wanna ask nobody for any help because everybody help ain't good. I've been in this program for the last four or five years, and you work the program. It helps work you. You understand? Some people want it, some people don't. But at the same time, I am very blessed because I'm not from here.

You know what I'm saying? My family's not here, and I don't wanna go back at home. You know what I'm saying? But I still wanna continue to build myself and be a better person. You know? And I'm grateful for the bad place. So, yes, you guys need the bad place. But you need people. You need us. You know what I'm saying? We need people. We need help. You know what I'm saying? And I appreciate y'all. Y'all have a blessed day.

Good morning, y'all. My name is Jana Batra. Thank you for having me today. I am no expert. I'm just here as a community member because I love PAD. I know that they do incredible work and you've heard from so many people who are doing that work and who've been impacted by that work today. I've learned so much from them and I'm asking you to listen to them and learn from them too. And what I've learned is that the diversion center exists because we, this community rightfully decided that for people who are struggling arrest and jail aren't the answer. They aren't the solution to the problem. And PADS pre arrest diversion model is actually offering real support.

It's offering real dignity instead of punitive measures, especially for members of our community that are homeless or struggling with addiction or mental health. It's such an important resource. And as an aside, you know, as a young woman myself, like I feel much more protected with Pat around. I've called the 311 hotline before and I've been so grateful for the amazing folks who just de escalated, made everyone feel safe in that interaction. And that model works best after somebody walks through the door of the diversion center because like you've heard, these folks are building real relationships and they're doing the work to create long term recovery and stability for people.

Putting people in jail just does nothing to change the underlying conditions that are and it's creating a revolving door. It's punishing people for systemic issues. And it does more to overspend taxpayer dollars than it does to make our communities safer. Through the diversion center, our community members can actually find help to navigate the complexities of housing and substance use treatment and healthcare and legal assistance. But since March, POD hasn't been able to accept referrals. Even despite that, you've heard like these books have continued to show up for hundreds of people without a contract

Fifteen seconds.

Past their working hours because they're committed to the people they serve. The resources to fund this care navigation is already there. You guys already put it in the approved 2026 and 2027 budget. You named PADD as a core partner in the agreement governing the center. So I'm asking you to follow through on that commitment and fund PADD's contract directly. Thank you so much.

Good afternoon. Good morning. I'm Tiffany Roberts, deputy I'm sorry, policy director at the Southern Center for Human Rights. You've already heard from mister Franklin, and I just wanted to share that Southern Center has been doing work for the last two years. We launched a campaign called PADD, Not Politics, when we saw that the Dickens administration was working really hard not only to defund PADD's mobile diversion services, but also to impair their ability to provide care navigation at the diversions at the Center for Diversion and Services.

So we were able to kind of process some of the data that we received, and we're happy that we shared some of it with you all, but I'm happy to share more as other results come in. Some of the things that we see is one, you know that the Fulton members, first I just want to say thank you to those of you who serve on the Justice Policy Board and remain in contact with the members of the Justice Policy Board for actually flanking PAD and the need for them to provide care navigation through the Center for Diversion and Services, and also pushing back against the notion that somehow contractors for Center for Diversions and Services are authorized to act outside of the scope of the IGA. What I want for you to be mindful of is in addition to sort of this direct attack on PADD, what we're also seeing is the degradation of other infrastructure that would be needed to provide services to people who are experiencing homelessness. So, that looks like increasing funding for APD, increasing criminalization of unhoused people, even working with the folks who were supposed to be supporting them through erecting hostile architecture, asking APD for cover for the World Cup, and so on.

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Much too much to share

in my public comment, but Southern Center stands 100% behind PAD and also adamant about naming the attacks coming from the city of Atlanta, and we want to be thankful to you all for supporting PAD despite that attack. Thank you so much.

Good morning commissioners, Devin Barrington Ward. Congratulations chairman Pitts and commissioner Barrett for advancing to you all's runoffs. My hope is that the commissioners will serve as the adults in the room when it comes to what is taking place with the crisis at the Fulton County Jail. It is a crisis due to mismanagement. It is a crisis due to a lack of vision, and it is a crisis because we are not using the resources that Fulton County taxpayers have already paid for.

We've invested so much money into the diversion center and so to cut out PAD out of this process is abhorrent. The fact of the matter is is that they deal with some of the people in this city that many of us don't have the courage to deal with, many of us don't have the character to deal with, many of us don't have the heart to deal with. So when PADD comes here and asks you as the county to step in and stop the city of Atlanta's shortsightedness around these contract negotiations, it's a simple change. It doesn't require an act of congress, it just requires an act of this body right here, and I believe that there are members here who are willing to act because we see what is happening at Wright Street is no longer sustainable. The world knows that we are home to the jail where people get eaten alive by lice and bedbugs, where people lose life and limb because of the mismanagement of our sheriff.

We are also here in support today of the resolution that is going to urge, demand, request, require the sheriff to turn away these low level offenses that will be taking place, particularly as we are on the cups of the World Cup where we could see mass arrests in the ways that we saw in the nineteen ninety six Olympics. The city of Atlanta is willing to put Fulton County in a very precarious situation by not utilizing the diversion services to its full extent, and so that's why it's important that you all put pressure on the sheriff to ensure that he's using his authority to turn away these low level offenses so that the jail does not continue.

Mr. Chairman and members of the board, I still have speaker cards. Not sure if everyone had a chance to speak. Nicholas Burroughs, Matthew Nursery, Eva Mobley, Gio Lindsay, Melanie Rosier, and Trindolyn Browning.

Good morning. I'm Nicholas Burrows, and I am respectfully addressing your offices and tenure and appreciate your time in advance. I'm here on behalf of a group of homeowners who have had their homes stolen in the wake of the financial crisis of two thousand and eight. As we all know, homelessness is cyclical. This group proves it and I'm sure either their parents or other loved ones have also lost their homes.

And I'm here to advocate that we have our titles to our homes recognized by the state of Georgia. Our group has gone through process of having our warranty deeds authenticated by the governor, Kemp, and his office. For some reason, there has been no movement on behalf of the counties where this has happened even though judges have been removed from the magistrate court who have unlawfully divested us. And to note, these were not courts that had jurisdiction to take our homes, but they did nonetheless. So I'm asking that our warranty deeds are enforced and that a commission is set forth to ensure that this theft does not continue.

I understand Governor Kemp wishes to have Atlanta continue to bring in real estate investment corporations. That is taking away from our young and future homeowners to be able to get into the homeowners market. And it's costing unknown amounts of money for individuals to enter the market because they're competing with individuals who have billions of dollars. So I'm just asking that we think about this and we think about how we wish to shape the future of Atlanta. And I thank you for your time and consideration. Good day.

Good morning. Good morning, Board of Commissioners. My name is Jill Lindsay. I live in District 5 in the city of South Fulton. I adopted Old National Highway and other neighboring streets.

I'm going be short because I only got two minutes. We are requesting that the commissioners and the Board of Elections remove Park as a polling location for the citizens in our city. We found out that they are using that facility and that it's less than 110 and it's supposed to be 150 where you're feeding over, they're saying, 400 seniors. And that is serious because the FBI is already investigating Fulton County and we don't wanna be a part of that. So we're asking and requesting that the election board in Fulton County look at the fact of removing Waccamaw Park as a polling location.

Thank you.

Good morning commissioners. My name is Melody Rosser and I am the campaign and membership supervisor of Women on the Rise. I'm here because I'm concerned about how Atlanta continues responding to low level issues tied to mental health, substance use, poverty, and unmet needs. Right now, police are still being dispatched to calls that could and should be handled by PAD. These are situations that often do not require an armed response, but instead require care, support, trained professionals who know how to deescalate without pushing people deeper into the system.

And, this is before the World Cup. As Atlanta prepares for the increased pressure that will come with the World Cup, we should already be planning differently. Our emergency systems are going to be overwhelmed, the three one one not operating during that time. So we are still defaulting to police for low level calls instead of dispatching PAD during PAD operating hours. Why are officers still being sent when there are other options available?

And I also want to ask, do you know how many people in your districts are being arrested for low level offenses right now? Because the public still has not received the data from APD on citation and arrest outcomes tied to city ordinance violations and misdemeanors, like substance use, trespassing, open container shoplifting, and public indecency, data that was supposed to be released under legislation that many of you supported. The public deserves transparency, and you deserve transparency. We cannot police our way through the World Cup. Atlanta needs real care response

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Infrastructure, and PADS should already be the central part of that plan, not treated like the afterthought. People deserve support, not unnecessary arrests. Thank you.

Good morning, Board of Commissioners. My name is Trenda Lynn Browning, and I am the reentry and office supervisor Women on the Rise. And today, I'm here to speak to you as someone directly impacted by the criminal justice system, and now I do the work every day to help people that are coming out of incarceration. What I have learned is that too many people are still entering the system over low level issues connected to poverty, mental health, substance use, homelessness, and just being able to survive. These situations often do not require police intervention, yet police remain the primary response even when PAD is operating and alternative services exist.

As we prepare for the World Cup, I am asking you all to think differently, to think bigger, to think more than just policing as an option. We are about to embark on thousands of people coming here to Atlanta for the World Cup, where visitors will come to Atlanta and our emergency systems will become overwhelmed. What is the plan to reduce the unnecessary police calls, police dispatches, and to connect people to care instead of jail. We know that we do not need to dispatch low level 911 calls when we have PAD. Instead of calling the police whenever appropriate, especially during times when 311 is unavailable, let's allow our trained community responders to handle the situation that do not require police.

So what I am asking is that you all would utilize PAD, that you would fund PAD, and that you would cut down on unnecessary jailing. Cannot continue to criminalize poverty crisis while claiming that we want safer communities. Real public safety means reducing unnecessary arrests, reducing jail involvement, and investing in responses rooted in care, stability, and dignity. Thank you for your time.

Are we twelve minutes over the hour? Yes,

mister chairman. We have six speakers on Zoom.

Alright. Okay. Quickly.

The first person to speak is Dominic Huff.

Good morning, commissioners. My name is Dominic Huff. Thank you all for listening to me today. I know you have a proposal for BARDA coming up. They're gonna discuss a few things, But I do want you to ask them about what are we going to do to improve services for night and weekend riders? Because I see all the people prepared at the meeting. Part of the reason why we have the PAD problems, we have people who can't get to work. We have people who want to work with this no reliable bus service. So I come to you all today. I sent you all the email. Wanna see more solutions in regards to improving our rail service and our bus service. And as you all have the contract with MARTA, I want you all to definitely ask some questions. Thank you.

The next person to speak is Robbie Caban.

Hello. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Great. I'm a Fulton County advocate and real estate broker. I'm here today because public trust in Fulton County government continues to erode, particularly the county handling of animal control, animal services, and oversight of taxpayer funded contractors or NGOs, agencies operating under your authority. Recent ethics complaints alleging the community manager improperly use animal control resources for personal interest deeply raises deeply troubling questions for taxpayers. Animal control is not simply a nonprofit service.

These are sworn deputized enforcement officers operating under law enforcement authority. There are official reports, official investigations and taxpayer funded safety operations. Many taxpayers are asking how can residents trust the integrity of the system if enforcement resources can allegedly be redirected to our personal disputes while communities continue to struggle with dangerous dog complaints, loose animals, attack, neglect places, and lack of response. What makes this even more concerning is the parallel pattern many residents, whistleblower, staff, volunteers, and advocates have already described for years involving the county animal shelter contractor Lifeline Animal Project. Residents who responsibly reported concerns, deficiencies, dangerous conditions, neglect, and transparency issues, and operational failures describe retaliation, targeting exclusion, intimidation, and dismissal instead of accountability.

There are parallel patterns under your oversight as the Fulton County Board of Commissioners. This is why taxpayers have repeatedly demanded a full forensic audit of the entire county service operations, including shelter operations, animal controlled, field enforcement, contract expenditures, policies, leadership structures, and contractor influence. Without transparency and accountability

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Collapses. Lastly, I want to address PAD. We cannot contra continue treating systems. The root, the root, the lack of divestment in the South Side, jobs. Money for businesses is ridiculous after generations of divestment. As a real estate broker

The next person to speak is Jen Simmons. Jen Simmons. Alright. The next person to speak is Linda Nash. Linda Nash.

The next person to speak is Megan Harris. Megan Harris. And, this concludes our Zoom public comment.

Thank you. Continue, madam clerk.

On page six, presentations to the board. Twenty six-two eighty five, MARTA Quarterly Briefing.

Hello? Better? Sorry. Didn't mean to turn it off. I'd like to recognize my Fulton board members, Freda Hartidge, Elizabeth Bolton Harris, and with me today, Al Pond in the in the audience.

I'm gonna move this a little bit. Can we go to the next slide? For our agenda today, you'll we'll go through the items as noted on the slide. For item number two, the proposed f y twenty twenty seven budget, I'm gonna bring up my deputy CFO, Greg Patterson, to speak on those items. Also with me today's staff is our chief of staff, Steven Parker, additional government affairs support, Carolina Ramos, and head of planning, Ryan Van Sickle.

The the company's leadership And car and rail ridership estimates are now derived from manual counts. And as you can see, the rail ridership has spiked into an estimated 4,000,000, riders. We believe the jump in ridership in January is due to the fact that we changed this methodology where we are doing manual counts as well as looking at video and doing counts in that way and taking statistically significant samples. Prior to that point, a lot of those lost rides were due to fare evasion and malfunctioning gait, which we are addressing through our Better Breeze program, which I'll jump to later in the presentation. I'll also, later in the presentation, go into greater depth around our next gen launch and MARTA REACH.

With that, next slide, we have our proposed FY 2027 budget. Mr. Patterson, if you join me.

Thank you, Mr. Hunt. Think it's a good morning still. Chair Pitts, Vice Chair Abdul Rahman and members of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners. The proposed budget was shaped by Marta's four strategic priorities, enhancing safety, improving cleanliness, increasing reliability and what we added this year was improving our customer experience.

Each decision to fund a cost center budget or a capital project went through the filter of these four items. If it was contributing to this, it stayed. If it did not contribute to this, it did not stay. And so by grounding our fiscal plan in these pillars, we ensure that our resources are directed towards the actions with the greatest impact on rider confidence and daily operational performance. Next slide please.

Here we present the operating revenues forecasted for fiscal year twenty twenty seven. They total $679,900,000 Sales tax remains our largest revenue source with federal assistance expected to increase due to grant awards connected with World Cup and enhanced preventative maintenance reimbursements as well. Passenger revenues are projected to strengthen as regular service levels stabilize and completion of the Better Breeze system will help us reduce our fare revenue loss. Modest growth is also expected in advertising and parking revenues. Together, these revenue streams create a stable foundation for Marda's operations in fiscal year twenty twenty seven.

Next slide please. For our proposed operating expenses, they total $663,100,000 Labor costs inclusive of salaries, wages, fringe benefits and over time represent the largest part of our expenditure budget and operations. That's nearly two thirds of all expenditures. That's also pretty normal for a transit organization. Contractual services make up the next largest category at 13.9%.

That includes targeted cleaning of our stations and vehicles, IT staffing support and contracted paratransit services. Materials and supplies represent 10.9% when you add our fuel and propulsion together with the other supplies to deliver service. Next slide please. All right, this shows our overall financial structure for the capital budget for fiscal year twenty twenty seven. Across the state of good repair, Mormonta City Of Atlanta program and Mormonta Clayton County expansion, total sources amount to approximately $1,500,000,000 with planned uses totaling $919,800,000 State of Good Repair accounts for the majority of expenditures and includes both capital project investment and debt service costs.

I do want to call a note on that. Debt issue is a pretty large piece of that, but that is because Marta is also going through a generational improvement of the infrastructure that's in place with the new trains, new buses. We are tackling traction power substations. They're not exactly glorious part of the organization, but they're very important to keep the third rail power to keep the train going. So all of that is being invested in for renewal and replacement. The alignment of these sources and uses supports Marta's highest priorities, renewing our aging assets, advancing key expansion commitments and maintaining fiscal flexibility for future capital needs. Next slide please.

Thank you, Mr. Patterson. Now in the presentation, I'll turn to the capital program. Our airport station, we continue to see progress at airport station. I'm happy to report that the Ride store is open and operating and accepting customers, as you can see in the photo to the right. And the second elevator has been installed and we are on track to have all of this work completed prior to World Cup. Next slide. We are now move on to the Rapid A Line project. The soft opening occurred on April 18 and was very well received by the public. All 14 stations are in use.

The yellow or gold colored circles on the screen are temporary stops being utilized at those four locations that are still under construction. We are in the process of installing the red MMA or red paint on the Hank Aaron. It is installed all around this facility in downtown. We can move to the next slide. The next picture the next slide, this picture on the left is the I'm sorry.

I apologize. One back is City Hall. It's just showing you how bright the rapid a line stations are, and the one on the right is the installation of the red paint or MMA at Georgia State Station. We can move to the next slide. This slide is also a view of the Rapid A line at the capital and the transit signal priority.

This is a section where the queue jump or the bus gets to jump in front of the regular traffic. That project is coming to a close by GDOT, and we expect that to be done prior to World Cup as well. It is in place now and operating, but they're making certain software and other improvements to that program. As part of rapid next slide our rapid response public engagement has extremely active in the community. Given the soft launch, our engagement now is serving focus on educating the public of the temporary stops and where to stand and how to utilize them at those four stops.

Also, generally, how to use the fare because this service service uses an off board payment and validation methodology where you pay for your fare and tap before you get on the vehicle. Since rides have been complementary on the soft launch, we encourage and invite everybody to go down to Terminal South, which is at our terminus down by the BeltLine connection, because they're offering local government employees a 15% discount on Mondays for their lunch. Myself and Deputy General Manager Alan enjoyed that this Monday, in fact. Next slide. I'll turn to another very large scale project in the county, Five Points Transformation.

This is two projects in one as a reminder. First is the transformation project pictured in the images above, and then the station rehabilitation project, which I'll get to in a moment. Briefly, we've relocated our MARTA Police Precinct in this area to Ashby Station and our MARTA Hope Office and Lost and Found. Those have been relocated to Lindbergh, but all of those services are still available. We're also partnering with Mercedes Benz, State Farm, the So to Group or the South Downtown Group, Centennial Yards, and doing beautification around 5 Points.

That project is going to launch at the beginning of June, where we'll be installing beautification around the construction barrier, which will remain in place post World Cup. Next slide. Downstairs at 5 Points, we have continued to make progress on all platforms. We've installed new seating, lighting. The work is going on feverishly.

Prior to the commissioners meeting today, I was walking through 5 Points, inspecting the work. And this too will be completed prior to World Cup. Our next slide, the Cleveland Metropolitan Arterial Rapid Transit, or ART, project is pictured on your slide. The construction start is later this month, and we are very, very excited about that. We're going to start this work in East Point outside of the construction clean zone, which will allow us to get a jump on the project without interfering any World Cup operations or disturbing any visitors to the region.

We anticipate construction will begin in the city of Atlanta around September 2026. Next slide. I'm going to move on to the Marder Rapid Sea Line or the Campbellton Greenbrier Transit Hub project. Our final design consultant is on board and is already working with the planning consultant doing a handoff so we can get deep into design. We are going to continue our public engagement and outreach.

We're taking a couple of month pause because of World Cup, and everybody's going to be very distracted to make sure that we get enough public engagement back. We're going to reignite that in August, and we'll continue public engagement throughout the life of the design. In conjunction with that, at present, less glorious, we're going to be working on right of way impacts and utility impacts and trying to minimize those throughout World Cup with those working teams. Next slide. The Bankhead Station platform extension project, we're extremely excited about this.

The current design is at 60%. We had a land swap, which was approved by our board in February, which allowed us to swap land that we had north of Bankhead Station, not pictured on the image, for land where you have in the image where it says bus loop and everything south of existing station. MARTA received that land. It allowed us to take the bus loop from underneath the station in that sort of purple magenta color and move it away from there because it was a lot of cross pedestrian bus intersection. So it's a much safer station.

It'll improve the flow and circulation of the station in addition to extending the platform to receive the new railcars. Can we move to the next slide? Now I'm going to move on to our partially funded, no less important, but partially funded projects. Next slide, thank you. Martyrs continued to advance the Georgia four hundred BRT project by working toward our 30% design on our proposed three in line stations for this very important BRT project.

While we have a $100,000,000 state bond and a $26,000,000 commitment from the SR four hundred Peach Partners Group, the group that's developing and building the Peach Pass lanes on Georgia 400. We still have a small funding gap to match. I'm going to get into some of the legislative actions we've been getting into to try to advance that later in the presentation. We have worked with the True North CID to update the cities and keep them well informed about what we're doing, as well as the perimeter CID have on the progress of this project. You're on the correct slide.

The automated transit network pilot As a reminder, we are partnered with the ATL Airport Community Improvement Districts or the AACIDs in studying the feasibility of deploying ATN in the South Metro Region. This study, in addition to the work that's ongoing, is going to determine the benefits, the costs, the impacts, the operations, the total cost of ownership number on where it might be able to be deployed. The second project governance committee meeting was held on January 26. Thank you, Chair Pitts, for participating and attending that meeting. And at that meeting, phase three of this project and construction activities was unanimously approved.

And we have another program governance committee meeting coming up in the coming weeks very soon. Next slide. I mentioned the feasibility study. On the feasibility study, in conjunction with the actual pilot and the construction, as you can see on the right hand side of the slide, we are studying where this could fit in the Southern Crescent. A stakeholder meeting was held on 04/23/2026 to update on the current project status.

The route evaluation methodology includes a couple of tiers focused on network connectivity, the population, employment access now and in the future, and then second tier focused on to our customers.

To to value

And

we're

the As I noted in the beginning, we're going going to dive deeper into NextGen our and MARTA customers. REACH. The launch of NextGen bus network came after a five year comprehensive process. So we included this slide just to remind everybody and remind the public where we began and how we got here. We're already looking at the next gen's momentum, which I'm going to get into on the next slide. We launched on April 18. It was a wonderful weekend. Thankfully, weather held out. There were three fifteen buses and have three fifteen buses operating across 81 routes. That weekend was historic for MARTA.

It was the largest change to our bus service in our history. And we now have triple the number of routes with headways of fifteen minutes or better. And a third of our bus routes have headways or wait times of twenty minutes or better, which we are extremely excited about for our patrons. Next slide. Some of the statistics from that weekend show how Team Marta stepped up to help customers weather this change.

We had over 900 ambassadors out system every day from the start of our service to the wee hours at the close of our service. Our customer service team fielded over three times as many calls as they normally do during this weekend launch. And just for some figures, the first three days of the NextGen rollout delivered 15,000 bus trips that carried approximately 250,000 passengers. The first week of NextGen delivered just over a million bus trips that carried nearly 700,000 passengers, both of which are increases over our normal numbers. The NextGen bus network had its successes opportunities for improvement.

On the next slide, I'm going to talk about those. Over the launch weekend, some of our successes and things we're most proud of in addition to our patrons are our transit ambassadors, our frontline workers who made conversions, some of which had to happen overnight just to get the buses out and operating properly, and our support center in fielding all of those calls and questions. The same weekend that we rolled out the NextGen bus network, we also rolled out Georgia's first BRT line. I also want to speak about customers who may have lost service or customers who don't appreciate the increased frequency maybe near their home, apartment, townhouse. I'm sure some of you have heard from your constituents.

And I know these conversations are not easy. We've heard from some of our patrons as well. We know the change isn't going positive for everyone, but this did come after five years of study, public outreach, engagement, and planning. But what brings us some hope is that, on balance, the benefits to the majority of our patrons accessing triple the number of routes of fifteen minute headways or better has been beneficial. Next slide.

Let's talk about next steps with the NextGen network. From the moment, excuse me, that NextGen rolled out, evaluating the performance of the network has been paramount. It's very early days, but our evaluation falls on three pillars. The first being data, focusing on ridership, on time performance and service delivery, and taking feedback directly from our patrons. The next is customers or our patrons reviewing their concerns and comments coming through our customer service lines, or whether they give those comments to our operators or to our transit ambassadors on the system.

And finally, operations. Our operators, operation staff, and mechanics are all critical sources of feedback. And may share robustly with us about the safety, cleanliness, and reliability of the system. One of our main goals is to increase bus ridership throughout the county and throughout MARTA service area. And we expect this to take about six to twelve months to level out.

The initial feedback and the initial ridership has been positive. It will take existing customers a little time to learn the new network. We'll increase that we have shorter dwell times and better connectivity, but we do expect ridership on our bus network to improve. I mentioned NextGen. On the next slide, I'm going to talk about reach and go a little bit deeper there.

Within the county, there are seven reach zones, which are West Atlanta County Line, Lakewood, Oakland excuse me, Oakley Industrial, Industrial, East Point, and in North Fulton. The first week of Reach, all zones, that was March '14. We launched Reach early because it was also an additionally new service, and we really wanted to spend some time getting our patron base and others used to using our MARTA REACH service, which is a shared ride Uber like service within those 12 zones. So we launched it. It was complementary.

In the first week, we had two thirty four trips with two seventy three passengers, not numbers you want to write home about. But since the launch of our NextGen network on April 18, our average daily ridership on reach is now eight seventy three passengers. And to put it in perspective, that's been a tenfold increase over the average trips at the beginning of the launch. Let's move on to a Better Breeze because Better Breeze is coming on the next slide, and it is here. Construction and installation of the new fare gates and fare equipment consist continues system wide.

We ask that our patrons and the public do bear with us, do show us some patience. This is a very transformative change system. We're not only changing the fare gates, we're changing all of the tap and validation on all of our rolling stock, as well as the fare gates, all of the ticket vending machines, and the software and backup and systems that support all of this network. The new fare gates closed on May 2, and fare is now required. At station where construction is ongoing and old fare gates may remain, you may see an open gate or you may see an open emergency entrance door.

That does not mean the ride is free. We're still asking folks to tap and pay. At the end of the month, we will be closing all of the new fare gates. So you may not be asked to pay a fare at a construction station under construction when you come in. But when you leave, you'll tap to exit, and that's when we can collect the fare. The good news is that the Better Breeze system is open payment. So in Google Wallet, Samsung Wallet, those Android devices, you can already add your electronic Breeze card to your mobile device. You do not need a Breeze card to access our system. Just tap and go. IPhone will be following shortly.

They had a system wide app update to their App Store the same time we were launching, which is the only reason why they're lagging behind. Riders who are unable to pay down their fares on May 2 can continue to transfer their balance from their current Breeze account to a new registered Better Breeze account through October 30. I do want to take a moment to address the story about our reduced fare cards that came out now two weeks ago. When we came out on May 2, we did a lot of outreach, a lot of marketing, a lot of public engagement about this transformation. We mailed out we have approximately 47,000 reduced fare customers on our rolls.

We mailed out 38,000 reduced fare cards through the Wednesday prior to May 2. Why did we stop? We stopped because we didn't want a bunch of cards caught in the mail, and we encouraged people to come in. This is where we outdid ourselves with outreach and engagement because people came in, and they hit us hard on that Saturday and that Monday. Our wait times, on average, were about two to two and a half hours. That's unacceptable, and we apologize to our patrons. It should not have been that long. And thus, the news stories that some of you may have seen, I know we know the public has seen. We took action on that immediately. That Monday evening, the leadership leadership team got together.

We had a two and a half meeting half hour meeting after hours. We kept the reduced fare office open to extended hours. The thing that we are proud about over those two days is no matter what time the person showed up, as long as they stayed in line, they left with a reduced fare card. Nobody was turned away, and nobody will be turned away going forward. We changed the process.

We segued because the reduced fare office also was customer service, also handles lost and found, and some other issues. About 10% to 15% of the people who came in to the reduced fare office because of our engagement were brand new to MARTA. They were seeking new reduced fare cards, or their reduced fare card, which lasts for three years, expired, and they needed to renew it. So that group, we segregated out. We segregated out folks who needed lost and found and put those in different lines.

We hired external resources and got some contracted staff to come in, and then we pulled in all of those wonderful transit ambassadors back into headquarters to service these folks. So we went from a two and a half hour wait time on Saturday and Monday, and by Tuesday at noon, that wait time was between twenty to thirty minutes, and it has remained at that length since then. So for those who may be waiting for their card or really want their card now and are nervous about coming down, the wait times are twenty to thirty minutes. Please do come in. You're allowed to wait inside of our headquarters.

There is water, you. Dignity. Can we go to the next slide, please? Thank Thank you. You.

I'm going to shift to public safety for a moment. As of April 15, our overall year over year crime is down 27%. There's upticks I am aware of between April 15 and today, because it's about a month lag. So those that number is going to come down a little bit, maybe into the 15% to 17% reduction area, but still a reduction over the over 20% reduction in crime crime we had last year. BARDA continues to be one of the safest transit systems in the country, and that's largely also due to the strong partnerships that we have due with our jurisdictional partners like Fulton.

For example, next Friday and thank you to Fulton and to this commission as well as to the the police force. Force. Marta's going to graduate our largest police cadet academy in our probably last twenty years. We have 18 cadets graduating next week. So we are very, very excited.

They're all coming out of Fulton County's academy. I did want to address, we did have a recent shooting. It was the first homicide to occur on martyr property in over fourteen excuse me, fifteen months. On Monday, April 27, MPD responded to the Oakland City bus loop following reports of a shots fired, where we came upon a victim who had unfortunately been shot and passed away at the scene. Our hearts go out to the family of this victim, and any incident, any tragedy like this is too much.

And I wanna emphasize that Rolarda remains committed to the safety of our system, but also to ensuring that our patrons are safe. The Rolarda police conducted has currently has three suspects in custody. They were able to arrest the first suspect the day of. The other two wisely turned themselves in in the morning. And this one incident represents the first part one crime or excuse me, our part one crime rate is 1.4 per million passengers, to put it in perspective regarding statistics.

But statistics don't make people safe. Can we go to the next slide? As we continue to hear about nondestination riders on our system, we are tackling the problem. We'll take a moment to highlight the amazing, amazing work of our MARTA HOPE program, our case workers or case managers. You can see one in orange here, many of which have lived experience.

This is an outgrowth of the Atlanta HOPE program, where they seek to find folks who may be unhoused, may be experiencing chemical dependency issues, or maybe experience other issues, and partner those folks up and do a warm handoff to social services. Martyr ourselves, we pay for 10 shelter beds every night, five men, five women here in the city, which those beds remain full every night. But this group does amazing, amazing amazing work to address some of the non criminal activity. But we do have a very large service area. I'd like to move to the next slide.

I want to shift to our legislative advocacy. During this session under the Gold Dome, we worked to provide ability

ability government's

to thousand and sixty seven, and we've already placed bonds a where that action has yielded substantial savings for the authority. I've asked our legal team to begin drafting and streamlining an implemented document regarding the sixteenth Amendment. The passage of this penny triggers a review of the rapid transit contract and assistance agreement or the contract between MARTA and all of our jurisdictional partners. So our legal team's already working on that. And we'll be coming back to this group regarding a methodology and a framework for us to go through the negotiation project process quickly.

We also pursued legislation regarding bus camera enforcement around Rapid A line and forcing those red bus only lanes. Unfortunately, that did not pass. We are working closely with state legislative council as well as the city of Atlanta about the possibility of enforcing those lanes in the local locally controlled streets, and we're making great advances there. There's nothing I can report on at this time regarding the enforcement there. But I will say that on launch weekend, MARTA Police, APD, and others were in the lane giving people warnings.

And periodically, we go back to the lane because this is a brand new service for the entire state. We need to give folks some time to adjust to what a bus only lane is and what it means to them in their home state. Additionally, in early April, a picture on the left is myself, Chief of Staff Parker, AGM Arrington, along with a few board members pictured up there is board member Pond where we went to DC. And in DC, we were at the APTA legislative conference where we, as an authority, were called to share some of our best practices with the nationwide, with the industry, and some of the innovative things that we're doing. And we also took the time to get on the hill and visit our legislative delegation, where we advocated for project funds for projects like the Georgia 400 BRT project, additional support for newer and greater fleet of mobility vans while we were on the hill.

Next slide. Now I'm going to turn to the little games we have coming, the beautiful game, the FIFA World Cup. It continues to be a high focal point for MARTA, and we will be in our Mar FIFA World Cup ready. Our focus will be on ensuring that fans, local and international, can focus their attentions on the matches, events, and celebrations and let Marta drive. We'll handle that. To meet the unprecedented demand of the global tournament, Marta's implementing several things in our high capacity demand service plan. Be little of of

see

of more

a

fleet in place for those days as well, a minimum of a 30 buses located at specific stations around our system. We will also be implementing wayfinding and additional multilingual support. We'll be using iconography, as you can see in the picture in the lower left, where you see the MARTA. That's the iconography, which will make it easier for non English speaking passengers to navigate our system. We'll have custom World Cup branding, which is currently being installed right now.

We started this week, so you're going to start to see MARTA transform into putting its World Cup outfit on. The multilingual content doesn't stop there. We're also embedding that within our map, and our transit ambassadors will have multilingual cards at their disposal. We'll also have health relief stations and family reunification spots available around our system. In case kids get lost, they'll have a point in which they can get to health services, police, and find their parents quickly.

We're focusing on a world class customer experience. And for that, our frontline workers and our transit ambassadors are going to be on their front foot. We have over 6,400 transit ambassador slots that we are going to fill so that for twelve hours a day during match days and fan fest days, we will have transit ambassadors out, as well as transit ambassadors during non match and non fan fest days. On the security front, we will be working closely with several different jurisdictions across the region who've committed committed to have police officers help support MARTA so we can focus in on the transit policing aspect. We've got lots of local jurisdictions, as well as RTD, or Denver's transit.

They're going to send officers over to help us as well. We've been awarded 3,400,000 from the Department of Homeland Security to help with the costs offsetting the costs of overtime. And the FTA has allocated $9,400,000 under a grant that MARTA led to the region for transit to help offset transit costs. I'll now take a next slide take a moment to highlight our community engagement activities over the last quarter. Next slide.

We were pleased to host a MARTA one hundred one event at our headquarters on March 13 for newly elected officials across all jurisdictions. It was very well received. We were invited by Councilwoman Doctor. Latoya Rogers to attend East Point's City Council meeting, which was excellent on April 6. We also presented at the city Of Palmetto at the behest of Mayor Thomas Smith and council members on April 7.

On April 18, we participated in Wellstar's Know Your Numbers Be Well Health Initiative, which is pictured in the lower right. And on April 24, we partnered with the Atlanta Regional Commission to discuss partnership opportunities at East Point City Hall focused in on the Southern Crescent. On May 5, we were honored to join Vice Chair Abdulrahman at her annual Senior Tech Summit. The two pictures on the right show attendees and staff enjoying that event. Thank you, vice chair.

We look forward to even larger event next year and partnering with you throughout the year. With that, I think you've heard enough from me, and I wanna go to the next slide and merely say thank you, and do you have any questions for me or for any I

that's that's

certainly was time for of this next gen service, organization. Right? So glad to see that that is up and running and that you guys are moving forward with that. I do have one comment from the seniors at the Darnell Center. Apparently, there was a bus stop right in front of the center and it's been moved half a block or a block up. And so for the seniors with mobility issues, that is a challenge. And so I don't know if that is an issue that you can look at as you're looking

We will definitely look at it.

Yeah, doing your analysis. Just trying to work with our seniors and the mobility issues that they may have. But looks like you guys are doing a great job of implementing and rolling out this next gen service. And hopefully, as you continue to do your analysis on it, the data, and receive feedback, it will only get better and better, not only for you but for the customers. Thank you, I'll stop there.

Vice Chair, I'll do Rockwine.

Thank you Chairman. First of all, I am highly offended that you would even put the senior summit on a slide as a successful event. Mr. Parker, thank you for being present here. Mr.

Hunt, I've always been one of the greatest allies of martyr. Today, it's in the other direction. I'm getting ready to be a great big old adversarial, and I'm going to tell you why. The Fulton County Seniors Summit has arguably become one of the most anticipated annual events in this county for our seniors and for hundreds of stakeholders and vendors who serve this community. What started just five years ago under my leadership and has gained with the collaboration and help of my colleagues, 1,200 seniors coming out is a major attraction in Fulton County.

Our seniors anticipate it every year, in fact, it pulls adults from all over the state of Georgia who want to be present, engaged, and collect critical life changing information. This summit provides up to date education on how government works, how to avoid scams that specifically target our elderly population, and critical details on essential services that are often left out or overlooked elsewhere. Beyond the social aspect, the entertainment, the exercises, the yoga, the line dancing, and bingo are some of the most critical components of this event, given our seniors direct face to face access to essential vendors and stakeholders from health and insurance companies to public transit. Up until our most recent summit on 05/05/2026, MADA was a regular expected partner in that network. Now, want to be very transparent, and Chairman, please oblige me.

I went back and forth on whether to say anything publicly about your limited because in my opinion, it was an absence. I thank Erica Pines for bringing a herself at the twenty fourth hour after I called her. Otherwise, you all would not have been there. I am so disappointed in the lack of respect for our seniors. I am so disappointed that something that has been built up and is a premier event Monica care less about.

It was a slap in my face, and it was a slap in the face to the seniors. The seniors had become to lean on the fact that they could get good information yearly, they could get half fair, and a whole slew of other information model was considered a partner. This year, you all went went silent on me. You all were disrespectful to me, and I don't appreciate it how hard I speak up for Mada daily. That was a slap in my face.

Also, I want to say this to you. I asked you, standing here in front of me, what you all had done, because anything that could possibly happen can, as far as the transition. You assured me that you had the customer service end covered, you all were going to make sure you had people in place. If, in fact, I had to give you a grade on what happened with our disabled and our seniors, you would have an F. You should have prepared better.

There is no excuse for any senior or any disabled person to be in a line wrapped around a building. You have too many resources here? Fulton County could have been a resource. We have several centers that we would have been willing to stand to the task of helping that situation. Here again, I'm speaking on behalf of the less of these.

Our seniors and our disabled must rely on MADA after FIFA leaves. And we want you to understand that right now, what we're seeing is a disrespect of the community. I find it deeply troubling when I consider how Model positions itself overall. Model likes to brand itself as a staple of Atlanta and Fulton County. Your leadership regularly comes here before this very board to present, to make your case, and to remind us why you are supposedly a very integral part of Fulton County families and employers.

Yet, when it came to showing up for seniors, when it came to looking out for the disabled, when it came to doing what you needed to do, you wrote them off, you wrote off the senior summit, and you did it without in as much as a courtesy text message or phone call with one of your biggest, biggest allies. Mister Parker, you and I go back a long way, that was a slap in my face. Just like I can stand here and fight for MATA, and in the six years that I've been here, I have fought for MATA. That was a slap in my face, and that was a slap in the community's face. I hope that me being very transparent with what I felt like was intentional, maybe it wasn't, but let me tell you why I felt like it was intentional.

There was a commission er on this board that spent fourteen months here, and you all had no problem doing a community event with her, with somebody who's been here six years, who has been the host and founder of an event for our seniors, nobody engaged me but Erica Pines. That is unacceptable, and it must not happen again. And that's after me reaching out. Now, our seniors and our disabled have been calling my office and I have, in the earnest of trying to look at the past relationship we have, have been assuring them we just need to give MARTA a chance to get it together. But I'm telling you today, I am disappointed.

I received several, several calls of people who were given incorrect information, information that people were given and told what to do, then when they did what they were told what to do, model told them, my bad, you can't do that now. You're not going to get it in mail now. You have to come here. We're so sorry. No, y'all gotta do better than that.

Also, model mobility. I have been increasingly getting calls about it, even to the point our Commission on Disability Affairs has voiced concerns to us about modern mobility. I'm going to need to see in these reports an effort to make sure that modern mobility is treating our community with respect, and they are doing what they need to do. I'm not concerned with any excuses today. I'm not interested in hearing why you walked away from this event that was a big event that had grew with the help of what I want to hear today is what you intend to do to fix one, it takes a long time to get a reputable image in the community of what Marta had.

It take overnight to ruin it. And so I'm giving you all fair warning that I would rather be a strong ally. This conversation I'm having open today, we had a call in today from, Dominique Huff. He has emailed all the commission ers here. He's concerned, commissioner Arrington, I think he may have said something to you about it, about the lack of services on the South or the overlooking of the South.

So please, I want to be a partner with the model. I want us to have the relationship that we've had for six years. CEO, you got to change how you do some things. Mister Parker, you must, must let this organization know that community engagement is important. And sometimes, sometimes, it's not what you do, it's how you do it.

And so in closing, I hope you have a plan to restore the trust of our seniors. I hope you have even a bigger plan that when I come back to the next meeting, I'll be able to say something good about MATA, which I can't do today. Thank you, Chairman.

Mr. Ellis?

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I've got two or three areas I want to explore. If you could go back to that ridership slide. I just want to understand why she's pulling it up. So if I look at this, and I just want to make sure I'm not misinterpreting this, is there a suggestion here that the ridership that was being recorded of about 2,000,000 is understated by 2,000,000 and you're running new estimated methodology to determine real ridership?

So our ridership is thank you for the question. The ridership is up until we started doing the construction on Better Breeze was by taps. Our old traditional of we've progress lot of of the past. The FTA, among others, regarding our ridership. We're doing that now by doing manual counts from our data group as well as reviewing video on the riders.

It's capturing. So when somebody taps and pays, we capture that. If somebody walks through, we capture that. We take a statistically valid sample. Are we watching every single bus, every single rail station? No.

We

take a sample and extrapolate that that for for the the system. System.

Okay. So we're suggesting this graph would suggest that things were being underestimated by two Correct.

Not underestimated, people using the system without paying.

So 2,000,000 people were using it without paying. That's what that graph says?

Correct.

Okay. I just want to make sure I was reading it correctly and understanding Okay. This thing is going to be fully implemented when? Better breeze? Right.

The end of the summer, early fall will be completely done every fair bit.

So we should expect that number then a real then we're going go back to reporting real numbers after?

Yes, 100%. And as we collect taps, those are in there as well.

Okay, okay.

Alright, that was number one. Number two, on the and I think we may have talked

about this last time,

but I can't recall. On the next gen stuff, what is the does MARTA have a stated goal for increased bus ridership as a result of the next gen program?

We do have estimated numbers. Our budget is off of the prior numbers, not the jump up you see in rail, but off of last year to be as prudent as possible. But we do expect an increase in ridership from the conversion on next gen.

What's that stated goal?

I do not have the number off the top of my head, but I will get it to you.

Okay. I think we asked for that last time. I think that that would be kind of important to see. And then on the financial slide, just wanted to just appreciate you walking through that. Can you verify and maybe see if I can verify this. If I did the math right, I think roughly kind of overall sales tax receipts from for operating in capital is about $780,000,000 annually. Is that about right, if I did my math right?

Just about right, dollars $7.79.

Dollars $779,000,000. Dollars $7.07 $7,079,000,000.

Yeah, okay. And I just sort of raise that and note that as like, I mean, I appreciate you face in the music with some of the stuff that Commissioner Vice Chair Abder Rockman had shared. But in relative terms, $7.79 whatever, that's what MARTA receives in sales tax revenue. This governmental body which I realize serves a slightly smaller footprint than what you serve receives $35,000,000 just for relative sort of scale. It's a lot of money.

It's a lot of taxpayer money. People have views in terms of sales tax being a regressive thing too, right? So there's a lot of funds that you're entrusted with and that in turn should breed a lot of accountability back. Citizens expect a lot, right? And I think that there are definitely gaps that people feel.

And I appreciate you acknowledging some of that stuff, but it's something I just think we're all necessarily all of you and everybody in service to MARTA needs to be aware of. And this slide to me is about kind of the ROI on a lot of this stuff. I know it's not the only thing but I think in particular whether it's the NextGen or whether it's the Breeze piece, when we started having the full implementation of that, if these numbers aren't moving then that's a huge, huge, huge problem for this system. And I know there are other things that are going on along with that that would also be additive to it. But I've talked about this since I've been on this board and I know there have been changes and different trends with ridership around the country and all of that stuff.

But the fact of the matter is we've got a limited amount of funding to fund all of the stuff that we do within local government between schools, county government, city, and transportation related stuff. And this is not cutting it. And I think everybody knows that and I think in terms of the stuff that you're annotating in here, but that's gotta change.

We completely agree which is why we're launching all of these initiatives.

Yeah. Yeah. And so what is the measurements on it that they're actually coming through and they're working. So again, thank thanks for facing the music on it. Thanks for being transparent parent. It is appreciated. Alright. Commissioner Thorne?

No? Alright. Any other questions?

Thank you. See you next quarter. Thank you. And may I, Chair Pitts? Yes. I know Commissioner Abdul Rahman is not here, but I want to put it on the record that will not happen again next year.

Alright, madam clerk.

Next item that brought up on the agenda at the beginning of the meeting on page nine, twenty six zero two nine eight. Presentation, the Fulton County Youth Commission Initiatives for the program term 2025 through 2026. Alright.

Come on up.

Good day, commissioners, executive leadership and guests. My name is Reginald Crossley and I have the honor of leading an amazing group of young leaders called the Fulton County Youth Commission. For those who are unaware, the youth commission was founded in 1999 through board resolution to give youth a voice in government and an outlet for young people to have a means of communication with our county officials. Youth Commission helps create laws, policies and solutions to youth issues and today we'll share some initiatives that are helping move the needle for areas in need throughout Fulton County. I'll start by next slide please.

This slide. The Youth Commission is broken into four committees, the legislative committee, social progress, environmental and health. Youth Commission will share briefly on some high level details on how we're helping move the needle in areas of need throughout the county. First up will be Nathaniel D'Silva. He's the chair of our legislative committee and he'll take it from here.

Hello everyone. My name is Nathaniel D'Silva. As Mr. Crossley said, I'm the chair of the legislative committee. What we do is turn youth ideas and their voices into policy action specifically. We specify in the area of children and families but we've gone really broad in the way of several different clusters to help children, youth, and families across the state of Georgia and in Fulton County. Next slide. So just in the last three years we've done a ton of amazing policy change. Specifically this is our social media initiative that you see up here. And we did this with a lot of the help from state representatives.

I'm sure a lot of you actually remember voting for Senate Bill three fifty one and approving it two years ago. But this is our social media initiative. And what we did was we noticed a problem in our schools and we pointed the finger at ourselves and said social media is something that is detrimenting the quality of learning in classrooms. It's hurting us outside of schools and phones and things like these are becoming distractions and it's time for us to take action. Using that we passed four separate bills, senate bill three fifty one, house bill three forty, house bill one thousand two ninety six, and house bill 1,009.

What these do is they put age limits limits across the state of Georgia to make sure that those on social media are there with their parents' consent and are at the correct age, and they take phones out of schools from k through 12. This has been an incredible experience as a youth, and this is such an amazing program because what we've been able to do is use our voice. We we spoke in the halls of the Georgia General Assembly. We worked with representatives to draft, to write these bills, to defend it on the floor session, and it's been a truly incredible experience to see our voices actually conveyed into policy. We do this through several initiatives all throughout the year.

On the next slide, you'll a picture of all of us at the day of the capital. So we met with various state representatives. We looked into the halls of congress. We learned more because not just an advocacy program this is also a built in growth program. And what we do is look into because many of us want to be politicians. We want to be commissioners serving our community as you all are right now. So what we want to do is see how internally all of these processes take place. So an example of this was the day at the capital we met with state representatives. This helped understand our legislative process understanding and this was an entire Fulton County Youth Commission event. Next slide.

And if you see here this was House Resolution fourteen fifty two where we worked with other youth commissions from across the state and we were recognized with the House Resolution in the House. That an incredible experience. Next slide. Along with the vein of this being a growth we also do regional debates because speech and discussion are critical to making policy change and to making an impact in our community. So we hosted a regional debate.

We called youth commissions from all across the state. We brought them into this very hall today, and we had the debate. And we used these to guide the policy decisions and the policy advocacy that we would later do at the capital. So what we do at the legislative committee is a very simple process. We research, we debate, we speak, and then we advocate for these policies.

And through that we make sure that every youth, every family, and every children has their voice represented, is being cared for, and is being helped by the government that's there to serve them. Next slide. Like these are some of the photos. If you see like we've debated we were in this hall it's just an incredible experience. We all really appreciate the Fulton County Commission's support as well for our program especially for our legislative initiatives. It's been really really helpful. Next slide. So now I just want to introduce the chair of the Social Progress Committee and the chair of the Fulton County Youth Commission, Sona Scipio.

Good afternoon. So this is the social progress committee and so this year we decided to focus on three major points. Homelessness, family support, and school literacy rates. All three of the things all three of these things are things that our commissioners have personal experience with, whether it be all three, just one of the three, but we decided that this year was the year that we were going to focus on just three things and make sure we really lock down on how we can help youth and families and children in Fulton County with these issues. So for homelessness, Fulton County Youth Commissioners, there's a day every year where we do a hope box initiative.

And what that looks like is giving out hygiene packs full of toiletries, shampoo, washcloths, all the things to people who are homeless around this area. We literally maybe walk one block down the street and we can give out these hygiene packs to to hundreds of people. Moving on to family support. This is one of my favorite initiatives this year. We got the chance to give Christmas toys to kids who can't afford them and to families who can't afford them.

I've been the commission for two years and I think one of my favorite memories was this year was being able to give a boy a Spider Man bicycle. He was definitely a little too small for the bicycle, so he probably needed to get some training wheels. But to see the joy in his face, to be able to know that I am contributing to my community and contributing to just one smile is what really makes the difference and I think that's one of the special things that FCYC gets to contribute to Fulton County. And then moving on to school literacy rates, around three percent of all children in the state of Georgia are illiterate. We see that as a major problem.

Reading, writing, learning how to spell are all key things that are trackers for your success. That are trackers as to how you become an adult, as to how you function in Atlanta, in our city. And so we thought that this was really important. So we have developed multiple school literacy rate programs to make sure that children all across Fulton County can read, can write, and know how to do so well. We can move to the next slide.

And so these are some pictures from again two of my favorite initiatives. One of these is Hosea Feeds the Hungry. That's the pictures on the left. And so that is full of that we go on Thanksgiving Day morning. We give out turkeys, collard greens, all the things that you could want that come in a Thanksgiving meal to people who really need it.

We can make sure that we do it with a smile on our face. We put our gloves coats on, and we get to really help and serve our community in that way. And then on the right, those are images of our Christmas drives and our hope initiative where we give, like I said, hygiene care packages to the local community and where we give Christmas toys to kids who can't afford them. So we can move on to our next slide, which is the environmental committee as well. When I was first in the Fulton County Commission, I got placed in the environmental committee, even though I wanted to be in the legislative committee.

I was like, I have nothing to do with the environment. I think we should save the trees. I think we should stop using plastic. I know nothing else. But the environmental committee was a great learning point for all of our students who are in the program.

So we do multiple things like tree planting, environmental stewardship, and murals. So tree planting, we've done two tree planting initiatives this year. We planted over 100 trees in Fulton County with the help of the organization Trees Atlanta. So our youth commissioners in flesh and blood, we take our pick axes and shovels and we dig through the ground to plant trees. I've been there for both events and they're definitely difficult, so shout out to the people who plant trees and do that kind of stuff for a living, but it's such a rewarding it's such a rewarding experience to see the communities who now get fresh greenery, who now get trees in their environment.

And so moving on to environmental stewardship, we've done multiple PSAs this year that on the Fulton County network that are about how we can conserve energy, how we can conserve water, how can we make Fulton County greener. And so those are some really important programs that we think are especially important to children who really have no access to how they can be environmentally stewards, how they can protect our environment. And so to be able to do that is a really refreshing experience. And then lastly, we also do murals. So we did one on the belt line, we've done one in local high schools.

It's really about not only the environment, how do we protect that, but how does it look like to steward the environment that we're in. What does it look like to make sure that our schools are a place where we want to be, where my schools looks like someone where I can see my face on the wall and not people that I can't connect with. And so our murals are another great way that we kind of reach out to the community around us and the way that we steward that environment that we have to be in every single day. So we can move on to the next slide. And so this actually is a picture of me.

We got to build a greenhouse at Banneker High School. And so Banneker has now now has a greenhouse that is full of fresh produce, that is full of fresh fruit, especially because it is in a food desert. A food desert is an area that really has no fresh produce or no healthy produce for the people that live in that area. If we have to go to school, we should have fresh greenery. And so that's kind of what that green greenhouse is. And so me, Mr. Crossley, and multiple other commissioners worked for multiple days on this greenhouse. We built it with our own power tools. And it was really an exciting experience because I'd never built a greenhouse. I don't know if you have.

But it was amazing experience to make sure to be to give back to our community. And then on the right, we have more pictures from our our tree planting initiatives. That is me with a pickaxe, throwing my back out, doing all the things. And so it's a really fun experience, but that is one of the joys that we get to do. We get to serve and we get to help our community in all sorts of ways.

We can move to the next slide. And so these are our PSAs and our murals that we paint throughout our Fulton County Schools and murals that we, and PSAs that we recorded right in that back room with scripts that we wrote, things that we produced, and so another way to make sure that we reach our communities. We can move to the next slide. And so now we're gonna move on to the health committee. I'm gonna introduce Rishab, who is one of our new youth commissioners but has made such an impact in our committee.

Hi, everyone. My name is Rishabanand, and I'm a sophomore at the Westminster Schools. And like Sanath said, I'm a first year member of the Fulton County Youth Commission. And specifically, I'm a part of the health committee in the Fulton County Youth Commission. So our three main focuses this year were a, drug prevention, and also prom safety in the mental health health crises that we see in our own high schools.

But we got these main struggles not from predetermined categories that we set for ourselves at the beginning of the year, but we saw these own problems in our own community, our schools, our homes, and just in the Fulton County area as a whole, we were able to observe these three problems and see the true impact that they had on not just us, but families as a whole. Next slide please. So to start, in order to tackle this problem of overuse of drugs and drugs in our own school communities, we attempted NEOTORS, which stand for not even once. And these NEOTORS went to different schools in these areas as a way of spreading the impacts and the harms that drugs had on these individuals, and as a way of just reminding these people at their own areas that of the dangers of drug use and attempts to stop the spread. Next slide please.

Then at the same time, another one of our main focuses this year has been on prom safety. Onethree of teen driver accidents throughout the entire year occurred during the two months of prom season. And this is largely because of, first of all, driving at night because in the prom season, these individuals are let out of prom at such a late time that it poses serious detriment to their sleep quality, which in turn causes even more accidents than at the same time because of the use of drugs and other alcohol and alcohol and other substances, which can cause loss of focus and other distractions in the car. And as a result of this, we were committed this year to helping to spread we were committed this year to spreading the potential dangers of prom driving, and we did this through the help of our sponsors such as AAA as well as

the

governor's office of highway safety. And this allowed us to give a $1,200 bonus to the school who produced the best creative work that demonstrated the impact that prom safety that prom driving could have on someone's health. Next slide, please. Then at the same time, a personal mission of mine was creating an app that could help promote teen driving safety in Fulton County specifically. And this app that I created was named DriveQuest and was recently released two to three months ago on the App Store, and again, is a free and downloadable app.

But I just want you guys to imagine this. Your phone rings. It's your teen, but it's not their voice. There's been an accident, screeching tires, shattered glass, flashing lights. Your child was in that car. At that moment, nothing else matters. But this isn't just a nightmare, it's reality. Every day, eight young lives are lost in car crashes. The leading cause of teen deaths isn't illness, it's a road. But teen driving deaths often come down to one thing, unsafe driving habits.

This is where DriveQuest comes in. DriveQuest is a sensor powered app that helps build safer teen drivers from the start. We take the sensors that are already present in your own phones, for example, speeding, acceleration, rotational data, and combine this, providing a seamless experience for teens to know exactly how they're driving. These screenshots up here are taken directly from the app. And our main way of communicating our messages to the users is through through active feedback directly after they're driving.

This allows them to directly absorb the knowledge that they've gained from their drive and at the same time know exactly where they need to work on. In future updates, we're also adding courses, and these courses can include things like quizzes as well as reading sections and videos. And these courses will allow these users to be will allow these users to have direct impact on their own driving skills. And at the same time, to ensure that all data is accurate and up to date, we're taking everything from the Georgia DDS driver's manual just to make sure that we can have a true impact on these teens and their education. Thank you so much. Now I would like to bring

presentation, but as a final conclusion, we would like to thank you one for listening, for giving us your time, for hearing what we're passionate about and what we care about. But I think we would also like to emphasize that all of these are projects that we start. All these are projects that we are passionate about, that we see a need for, that we think need to help make a change in Fulton County. We're not doing this because we need service hours, but it's because we here, we signed up for this program, and we see a way that we can make an impact. We're so excited to make all of these changes, and it is truly one of the joys of my high school career, and I think the rest of us as well. So thank you so much.

Thank you very much. Commissioner Barrett, Vice Chair Abdul Rahman and Commissioner Ellis.

Thank you Mr. Chairman. I just want to say thank you Mr. Crossley for running such a great program and you guys are I mean I don't know about clearly future politicians, more professional than a lot of people that come in front of us and maybe a tech entrepreneur too, I don't know but very very impressed with the projects you've chosen, the work you've done. It seems like it's both written, it's hands on, your presentation skills are amazing, the legislative work is amazing. Just super impressed and congratulations to all of you for a great, great body of work.

Vice Chair.

Thank you, Chairman. I just want to say how impressed I am. I feel as though I see the future VP, the President, and the AG standing in front of me. And so all I would implore for you all, please let Georgia keep your talents here. Please. Please come back once you've done everything from an educational point of view. We need you. Fulton County needs you. You are the reason that the chairman says Fulton County is a big deal. You all were just amazing.

And I am so proud of not only the subject matter experts that you are today, but how articulate you all were. Thank you. Keep up the good work and keep making us proud.

All right. Commissioner Ellis.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Chair. All right. Well, these two have been mom. I'm going to be a little bit of dad. So I will echo their comments. Would be great work definitely for sure, but don't be going and getting a big hit, okay? You got a lot more work to do and a lot of stuff ahead of you. And I do want to just make a comment though on just one of the things that you touched on and I hope that maybe something can be a continued focus for some of the folks that are continuing.

The literacy piece, we not only have a youth literacy issue, we also have an adult literacy issue. We've got a sort of a literacy problem nationwide and certainly it's been more pronounced in youth particularly post pandemic and we've not even we've not got back to those rates that we needed to be. Fortunately, they're probably not as severe as those ridership trends we saw at MARTA, but but they're a problem. Right? And so I appreciate you calling that out.

And and and I think that's something this initiative on the phone stuff is I think is a great one that you went down the path of. And I think those two things could have some correlation. They likely do. They may not, but I think we'll probably find that they likely do. Right?

So So I would encourage all to continue to sort of lean into those things and figure out ways to sort of build upon particularly that literacy component because I also think that there are opportunities for resources within Fulton County library system, etc. Obviously you all many are functioning and living in environments that are literacy rich in many of the great schools that you go to. But there's great opportunity to build upon that. So thanks again for all the great work, but keep on plugging ahead. There's a lot more work to do.

All right, Commissioner Thorne.

I'll go back to echo the mom comments, post the dad comments. Thank you for all the work you've done and I appreciate you guys coming to all my town halls and showing everybody the work that you're doing and making the public more aware of it and get the interest going in other youth because you are role models in your schools to the other youth as well. So well done with that. I hope you'll continue to come to my town halls. You're always a highlight whenever you speak.

I always get the comments like, I can't believe the youth that we have in Fulton County and the work they're doing. When a lot of other youth could be doing a lot of bad things, you guys are on the right track. Nate, just wanna call out you, wanna thank you for the continued work that you do, not only on the youth commission but as an intern with my office. And we are gonna be working with homelessness this summer as a summer youth project and Nate will be heading that up. I just wanted to put a plug into that for any interns.

We usually have the youth commissioners come and intern. Mr. Crossley, I know the application process, is that over with for next year? I didn't know if you could highlight that as well.

Everything can be submitted online. You must be a Fulton County resident and attend a school within Fulton County lines.

And it doesn't have to be, it could be a private school as well as a public school, correct?

Correct, public, or charter school within Fulton County.

Okay, great. Thank you.

Commissioner Arrington.

Thank you, mister Crosley for the great work you do in leading the youth commission and certainly thank you to our youth commissioners for your outstanding presentation today.

Thank you very much. Alright. 12:53. Yes, no. Yes.

Lunch.

Recession.

Recess.

Yes. Alright.

We will I'll entertain a motion to recess for lunch and we may take up some items in the executive session of real estate litigation and personnel.

And the vote is open. And motion passes. Six yays, zero nays.

We got there? We got Alright. Without objection, we will resume the regular order of business. Madam, madam county attorney.

Thank you, mister chairman. From executive session, is there a motion to approve the requests for representation in items one and two of the executive session agenda?

Motion to approve by commissioner Thorne, seconded by commissioner Barrett.

And the vote is open.

And the motion passes five yeas zero nays. Is there a motion to approve the request for representation in item six of the executive session agenda?

We have a motion to approve by Commissioner Arrington. Is there a second? Is there a second? Alright. Fails for lack of a second. Anything else?

No further action items.

Alright, madam clerk.

Back on page six, county manager's items under open and responsible government twenty six zero two eight six purchasing and contract compliance, ratification of emergency procurements.

Madam CFO, where is she?

These are purchasing.

I'm sorry, yeah.

Purchasing, sir.

These are, these were three items that were done because the first two, the emergency services for the janitorial services, we received 13 proposals. The evaluation committee is trying to complete. We did do a ninety day extension but that extension was set to expire before we could bring it to the board for an action. So we had to act to continue that essential governmental service to keep those buildings operating and clean. And so we had to exercise the county manager's authority under 01/2020 for extraordinary circumstances to keep the services so they would not expire.

Okay entertain a motion to approve. Motion to approve by commissioner Thorne seconded by commissioner Barrett. Please vote.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes. Five yays, zero nays. Under health and human services, twenty six zero two eight seven, community development. Request approval of the twenty twenty six community service program evaluation committee's recommendation in the amount of $5,363,958.

Motion to approve by Vice Chair Abdul Rahman, seconded by Commissioner Thorne.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes. Six yays, zero nays. Twenty six zero two eight eight public works. Request approval of contract item agreement between Fulton County and the Georgia Department of Transportation for the relocation of sewer facilities. Estimated cost of the project is $54,350.

Motion to approve by vice chair of Durock Vaughn, seconded by mister Thorne.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes. Six yays, zero nays. Twenty six zero two eight nine senior services Request approval to amend existing contracts in a total amount not to exceed $90,000 for contracts providing agent services for Fulton County seniors aged 60 and above.

Motion to approve by Vice Chair of Durbanca, seconded by Commissioner Thorne.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes, six yeas, zero nays. On page seven, Justice and Safety on twenty six zero two nine zero police request approval for the lowest responsible bidder for alcohol and drug substance abuse testing services in an amount not exceed $160,000.

Motion to approve by commissioner Thorne, seconded by vice chair Abdul Rahman. And the vote is open.

And the motion passes five yeas, zero nays. Commissioner's action items twenty six zero two nine one request approval resolution to support the growth and long term sustainability of local independent small businesses as they expand and create jobs in South Downtown to ensure the local small businesses are included in the economic opportunities provided by the twenty twenty six World Cup and for other purposes sponsored by Commissioner Barrett.

Motion to approve by Commissioner Barrett, seconded by Commissioner Arrington. Commissioner Barrett.

Thank you Mr. Chairman. Colleagues this is very similar to the resolution that we brought several meetings back to support some small businesses within blocks of the Mercedes Benz Stadium. There are three small minority owned businesses that are getting this opportunity through the Westside TAD small business improvement grant and our portion comes up to a total of $37,500 So I'm asking for your approval on this and I do Commissioner Ellis that I did remove that similar language from this as the others that you had requested. Thank you.

Motion to approve by Commissioner Barrett, seconded by Commissioner Arrington. Please vote.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes six yeas zero nays. Twenty six zero two nine two request approval of a resolution directing the county manager and chief financial officer to redirect funds for the fiscal year 2026 budget of the superior court to the magistrate court in the amount of the unobligated portion of the $7,780,000 previously transferred to the superior court's budget and for other purposes sponsored by chairman Pitts.

Motion to approve by vice chair Abdul Rahman, seconded by commissioner Thorne. Commissioner Ellis?

I just had a question about what's changed with this. We had set this procedure up at the request of Superior Court and just sort of curious about why this is coming before us.

We'll both answer. We met with Judge McBurney yesterday. He confirmed that this is the desire of the Superior Court, that their working relationship has improved and expectations are being met so there was no longer a need from their perspective to have this convention in place. Sharon, anything else?

I think you covered it all. Other than that it was a board resolution which established it so we would need the board resolution to reverse it and if approved we'll bring it back in the next budget soundings.

Okay.

Alright, the motion on the floor is to approve. Let's vote.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes. Five yeas, zero nays. Twenty six zero two nine three request approval of resolution to request the Fulton County Sheriff to utilize existing authority to decline certain misdemeanor bookings in order to address jail overcrowding, improve safety, and prioritize detention space for serious offenses and for other purposes.

Motion to approve by vice chair of the rock man seconded by commissioner Barrett.

And the vote is open. And motion passes. Five yeas, zero nays. Twenty six zero two nine four request approval resolution. Challenging the constitutionality of the Georgia House Bill three six nine which provides for the nonpartisan election of county of fit officers and district attorneys in Clayton Cobb, DeKalb, Fulton, Gwinnett Counties beginning in 2028 and for other purposes sponsored by commissioner Arrington.

Alright. Motion to approve by commission excuse me. Commissioner Arrington, seconded by commissioner Barrett, vice chair of New Rockland.

Thank you, chairman. Commissioner Arrington, thank you for bringing this forth. I would like to be a cosponsor on it, please.

No objection. Happy to have you as a cosponsor.

Thank you.

Commissioner Barrett, you wanna be heard?

I do. Thank you, Chairman. Thank you, Commissioner Errington. I also would like to be added as a cosponsor and thank you for bringing this.

No objection, happy to have you as a cosponsor.

Alright motion is to Commissioner Thorne.

Yeah, there's a typo on line 12 that should be corrected. I don't know if that really matters.

We can correct that when we add the co sponsors. Okay, Thank you.

Alright, let's vote.

And vote is open. And motion passes. Four yays, zero nays. On page eight, commissioners full board appointments. 260295, region three emergency medical services council. Chairman Pitts has nominated Roderick M Smith for a full board reappointment to a term ending June thirtieth twenty twenty eight.

Motion to approve by vice chair of Durack Mann, seconded by commissioner Barrett.

And the vote is open. And motion passes. Six yeas, zero nays. Twenty six zero two nine six regional three. Chairman Pitts has nominated Alex Robles for a full board of reappointment to a term commencing 07/01/2026.

I have a motion to approve by vice chair of Durack Mann, seconded by commissioner Thorne.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes six yeas zero nays. Twenty six zero two nine seven Regional Three Emergency Medical Services Council. Chairman Pitts has nominated Steven Morris for a full board reappointment to term ending 06/30/2028.

Alright. Motion to approve by vice chair of Durack Mann, seconded by commissioner Thorne.

And the vote is open. And the motion passes. Six yays, zero nays. On page nine, commissioners presentation and discussion items. Twenty six zero two nine nine discussion. Utilization of funds committed for improving jail detention staffing and the detention staffing hiring process sponsored by Commissioner Ellis.

Alright, Commissioner Ellis.

Yeah, could we also just, I think just tie this in with item coming off the consent agenda, justice system update since they're related.

Okay, back on page four. Follow on page four, twenty six-two 79, May 2026 justice system update.

Yeah, thank you. And I'm certainly not looking for you to go through this presentation. Just really just had, I wanted for this particular component, the utilization of some sort of graphical representation of that to be sort of in the continual adjustment system updates. Mr. Ehrman, know you provided some detail at the last meeting and I'll just ask to confirm this again.

And I just want to reiterate again the importance of this. And I said this before, what gets measured gets focused. And the lack of this happening is costing us material amounts of money and also creating material amounts of risk. I think at the last meeting one of the things that I'm not sure came out in the floor session or not but one of the things that was shared of us related to facilities themselves was that we have this fixing of doors that goes on which doesn't have anything to do with the age of the facility. These are doors that get repaired and Mr.

County Manager, I think this information was shared back for us from Mr. Davis, I believe, who's not here but that information was shared. It was that 35 of the 80 doors that they had repaired within three weeks were damaged again. And that sort of speaks to things not being supervised and monitored. And if you run that out, we're on pace to spend $3,000,000 $3,000,000 again, 3,000,000 on door repairs due to vandalism and we know kind of like all of the stuff that's come before this that we've had to turn down or find out, find unique ways of things to do whether it's, you know, youth job programs or whether they're senior related things but you know things that we would like to do, input priority, but we're not able to do them because we're having to incur sunk costs like this that could be avoided if we have proper supervision which ties to this initiative of getting this 200 net new people in there.

And so I do want to kind of continue to keep this front and center. At the last meeting, again sort of the target on this with this additional just under $20,000,000 footprint that was set aside for this was to get to a net new 200. And at the last meeting we had a net new of 27. And where are we at today in terms of the net new hires?

Good afternoon commissioners, Kenneth Herman, Chief HR Officer. As of today the number has dropped slightly. We're projecting net new of 25. We had some additional Okay.

So we're closing out on five months and we're at 25 on a target of 200. So just want us to all kind of keep that in focus and keep this in these reports so that we can kind of continue to understand what's going on with that and the impact that has by not meeting it on our overall system implications for the entire county. Thanks.

All right. I'm sorry, Commissioner Thorne.

Do we know why, like how long it takes if a candidate is interviewed by the sheriff, length of the hiring process? Like when are some of these candidates presented and then how long is it taking for them to go through the process?

Commissioner I don't have that information but I can go back and look at 11 folks that have been hired, sorry of the 19, of the 44 individuals that have been hired I can see when they started process to when they actually became on board and provide you that information on average that it's sixty days or ninety days. I know in a conversation with the sheriff's office I think they were trying to be no more than thirty days outside of the county's normal sixty day hiring process, but we acknowledge that their process is protracted because they do have to do a number of different validation steps than that we have to do for normal hiring of a clerk for example.

Okay, thank you.

Okay, anything else? Madam Clerk?

20 six-three-one, discussion, update, implementation of the five point plan sponsored by Chairman Pitts.

Yes sir. Hi good afternoon. Benjamin McCarty from the strategy office. I think we have a PowerPoint if we can wait for that to be pulled up. Alright. Thank you. As I said, name is Benjamin McCarty. I'm here from the strategy office. I recently started with the county. Excited to Excited to be here and be doing this work.

And so we wanted to, we're of course gonna provide an update on the five points. But wanted to start with this slide to give us a little bit of additional language to show that we are continuing to think through what a broader and more structured jail reduction plan could look like, because of course we're going to need to continue doing jail reduction work probably in the future. So one of the things that I wanted to note here, and you'll probably be seeing this in future updates, is this focus areas on the bottom left of the slide. So we have the pre arrest, pre booking and post booking. So pre arrest would be things like the diversion center and the work that Pat is doing.

And then we have pre booking which would be one of the five points which is the diversion hub. And then we also have strategies that would be focused on post booking. And I bring this up just to show that there are, we can do things to reduce the jail population that is currently in jail, but also the inflow as well. So that just helps us think about additional measures that we can do to help reduce the number of people that are coming into the jail. I also wanted to point out here, although it is not one of the five points, we have the data working group.

This group is almost all of the justice partners who have met, I believe three times now and we're meeting every Thursday. And we are going through the justice data to identify an inventory of data points, key data points that we can use to effectively measure our progress toward jail reduction initiative. So I've heard over the years that there's a need to have the partners align on the justice data so that there's standardized definitions so that we can use them effectively when we're communicating with one another so that we're pulling the same numbers. And so in the future you can expect that we will hopefully be able to show you a prototype of what a new dashboard could look like which would have some of those aligned data points focused on our gel reduction initiatives. And we can go to the next slide.

All right, so moving to our five points, we've got one slide here for each of the five points. So the first one being reducing our pretrial population through increased utilization of our ankle monitors. We know that we have capacity to place people, additional folks on ankle monitors and so we've had some conversations with the district attorney and public defenders offices and we've reached out to provide support because they'll be the ones who would primarily be leading that effort. After those conversations we have, we believe that a reasonable or realistic number of placements that we could achieve on a monthly basis would be a net of 20 to 25. And so if we are able to do that through the end of the year, we think that we could reach a point where we have a net increase of up to 150 additional monitors.

And so we'll continue to support that work. As I say we've reached out to provide support to those offices and so we'll continue to do that. So next slide please. Wait a minute before you leave

this. So when we originally talked about this, there were some five or 600 that were eligible to be put on ankle monitors immediately. The district attorney sent a memo email which I saw a copy of. What's happened with that?

Yeah. I believe they did have some initial meetings where the district attorney and the public defender did meet and they believe that district attorney identified about 200 people and that those people were shared with the public defender and they met and they did review them. I believe that they were able to coordinate release through ankle monitors of about 15 people and I know that they are continuing to have conversations to establish a mechanism by which they can coordinate review of those people. I will say that as we may pull 200 people, but as we go through that list it may not always be that simple because there's gonna be other reasons why if someone's eligible or appropriate for an ankle monitor release it may not be realistic to do so because they have other reasons to be held in jail. And so that may be that they're not able to post their bond.

So a judge would have to reconsider or lower that bond or they may have to be seek some other assistance to be able to pay that bond. Okay.

I mean no disrespect here but this is a simple matter that will help us to immediately decrease the jail population. And I was encouraged when I saw the original initial memo that was, sent by the district attorney. But I don't see any progress. We started this, what, two two months ago, three months ago?

Yeah. I believe so.

And this will be in July or not. It's I wanna do like commissioner, Ellis here. I'm gonna have this on the on our agenda at every meeting and I like actual numbers. I appreciate the, you know, the the words on your, PowerPoint here but I mean, we have a problem and we're just all trying to reduce the jail population and we can do this quickly. Now, I don't want to talk about why I'm hearing there's a problem or not a problem but reluctance to, to do so. But this will be back on the agenda. If you want to go through, you want to be heard? Yeah, go ahead.

Well, could I also say we, we would benefit from some encouragement from this group to the two principals that are responsible for this, the DA and the public defender being here to explain what's the disconnect between the memo and the practice.

I thought we had asked for that before.

Well we did and we were turned down so we need some encouragement from this group to make that happen.

Mr. Barrett.

I just had a question about the application, the people that qualify for this because Commissioner Thorne and I were on the same sheriff's update this week and the numbers that they went through I believe there were some number over 500 of probation violations or parole violations currently at Rice Street and like another 100 that were failure to appear. And those just not being a lawyer or a DA or any of those things seem like logical places where ankle monitors could be applied. They were clearly out and are only back in because they didn't show up for a court date. I know we have the text strategy that we're working on but it does seem like those would be a really good fit for ankle monitors again without going case by case and really understanding that. But is there a reason why that is not correlating nearly as well as it seems like it should?

Yeah, I'm not entirely sure to be honest and I don't want to speculate on the different policies or reasons why those folks may not have been selected in that initial list of 200 or additional conversations. I'm just not privy to those conversations or to that at this point. But as I say we have reached out and I think we will continue trying to support and trying to get to the bottom of why we can't move a little faster on this.

Do you know anything further on that Mr. County Manager?

No, was going to ask Benjamin is that part of the jail population review exercise that Judgement Berney talked about yesterday or not?

Yes, there is so the jail population review committee meets every two weeks and they've been doing so I think for many months now. And so they have a list of folks that is referred to them and so they work with Georgia Justice Project, PADD, and Superior Court. They have partners there as well. So they come together and they go line by line in a list of people and say, know, can this person be is this person a candidate a good candidate to have some sort of expedited release process? So ankle monitors may be part of that but with the DA not being there and part of the jail population review committee, I don't know how to what level they be able to address ankle monitors directly as part of that effort.

But this conversation is a great example why getting to a single set of numbers that everybody agrees to that you've talked about much previous to today is so critical because you get a memo about 200, you went to a meeting about 500, the committee may or may not have looked at either and everybody's it's the tyranny of the anecdote. Somebody comes up with something and says it and then we run that direction and then we run back another direction. Meanwhile, Mr. Chairman, we're not really making substantive progress. So those, what Benjamin was talking about upfront, I am encouraged by, even though it seems amorphous, but getting a data group that is representative of all different entities and getting everybody to agree is fundamentally a step one.

And then getting the principals to assume ownership and then lastly to help at least report out to this group on monthly or whatever timeframe you think most helpful. Yep.

Vice Chair? Thank you, Chairman. I formally ask that a letter comes from this body requesting their presence because at the end of the day, Mr. McCarty can't answer that question, the county manager can't answer, And it does a disservice, Chairman, for us to sit up and have these presentations and then questions, legitimate questions like the one Commissioner Barrett asked. And we don't have anybody here that can answer it.

And so if we're really seriously talking about working together to make sure that this five point plan, I think a letter needs to go out respectfully. I don't imagine it would go out any other way, but I just let me just say what's on my mind, and I'm gonna say it again, and I'm gonna keep saying it over and over again, before I got here six years ago. Commissioners asking you to come and speak before the board is not a bad thing. It is an opportunity for you to say yay or nay, this is the reason for, this is the reason against, I do not run your department, so I need some input from your department. And this Fulton County as a whole, we have to get out of this thing of, oh, they asked me to come down.

I remember when we had a I had another situation where I asked for a person to come down just for clarification, and they talked to everybody but me, and they never came here because they automatically got in their feelings by it was something bad, chairman. And I just wanna talk about the elephant in the room, as commissioners and as being the mentee of commissioner Darnell, she would call anybody down here at a moment's notice to just answer a question. And so, us to be a governmental entity that wants to work together collectively for the best of Fulton County, we need you to come and answer these questions. So, I'm humbly asking Chairman that a letter be sent, and it be sent to say, hey, this question was asked and there's other things that we need to ask you in reference to this and would you please come before the board? End of discussion.

Thank you.

Alright. I'll work with the county attorney to draft something that will capture the sense of what board is talking about today. Alright. Commissioner Thorne?

The sheriff's in his meetings has always talked about the inmate advocacy unit. Are you familiar with that unit? And who comprises that unit?

I'm not super familiar with the details of who comprises it but I am generally familiar with it. It is part of, so the sheriff is part of the data working group and we have been putting together some metrics for that so I think we could get back to you with some clear information on that. But I don't know personally. I'm not super familiar with the MDCACUS Okay.

Yeah, just another question to get answered. Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Alright, Madam Clerk. Yeah,

I've updates on the remainder of the four if you'd like to hear them. If you want to move to the next slide. Okay so on the court date text reminders I think a little bit of a more substantive update there. We did meet with some folks from Superior Court yesterday and got some information that they are in the final stages of implementation of those text reminders. So they've come across some technical glitches that they're working through with Tyler and the Odyssey system and then they also have some process questions related to who should be receiving text, what makes sense for the different types of cases.

And so they are nearing again nearing implementation full implementation of that and the expected timeline was by the end of this summer. So I think we can expect those text notifications to start going out to folks in early fall. So we can move to the next slide. So the next two initiatives releasing people held on low bonds and then people with specific conditions that are preventing their release. Those two kind of go hand in hand.

One of the approaches that seems to be have the most legs at this point or be the most potentially effective is the weekly or twice weekly bond review calendar. And so that would be a senior judge who would be empowered individuals probably 15 to 20 per calendar who have low bonds under 10,000 and who have few or no conditions probably that would prevent their release. And so the judge would be able to look through that and coordinate the release of those folks as they go through those cases. I will just note that we've kind of touched on the jail population review committee a little bit but they do similar work so I think this is something that we want to make sure works hand in hand with that and does not overlap or kind of work against it. So that's what going to be some of the next steps.

I know that we're kind of tossing around different numbers and also talking about the data working group but I will just note that one of the things that we're doing here in this regard is just getting more familiar with the data that we're pulling and I'm relatively new still so I think we're just getting comfortable as we pull, know let's say we pull a report that says there's 900 people with low bonds. If we actually go through that list and look at them there may be you know fewer people who are actually eligible to be released because they may have some other condition. Maybe it's another charge for which they've been denied bond, maybe it is another hearing that they have coming up and a whole host of other things that may prevent that. So that is just you know something we're gonna continue trying to get more familiar with the data and understanding what the true potential impact could be. So we can go to the next slide please.

And so as I said this would be a similar approach here with this. It would be a senior judge or some sort of situation we're going through and having a mechanism that is a recurring process for a judge to look at those folks with whole conditions that may be able to be removed, things like an FDA or a probation violation. And then we can move to the last slide. And so this is the one I think we probably have the most potential. The one that I'm most excited about at this point is the arrest and warrant review hub.

And so this has also been called the trailer. And so this is an idea that came out of a trip that a number of folks took back to Pima County, Arizona in 2020. I believe it was late twenty twenty two, early twenty twenty three. And so we're trying to bring this idea back to life and building out a proposal now that it is part of the five point plan and so that would include an operational model, a cost proposal and then thinking about what staffing and oversight reporting could look like for the diversion hub. This is essentially an additional intercept that would be pre booking so when an officer brings someone to the jail they would go through this hub and they would have the opportunity to offer that individual diversion and transportation to the diversion center if they consent to it and if the charge is eligible for diversion.

So I think in a future update you can expect to have a full proposal from us on that. With that, that's all the updates that I have.

Okay, well I'm gonna have this on our hour. Again, no disrespect to you but it's like, what's that expression we're doing, what's that, Rome is burning? What is that? Anyway.

Cart before the wheel?

No, there's not, anyway. Commissioner Ellis, we have live leisure. There are human beings in this deal who should not be in there or could be released. So we take them. All of this will come into few fruition in November or December. That's six or seven months. You have live people, live, individuals sitting in that jail who are fathers, uncles, brothers just waiting while we're fiddling. Fiddling, that's what it was. Fiddling while Rome is burning. That's it. Mr. Ellis?