Governing Board - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the MCIG meeting of May 21st. Can we have invocation, please?

If you would stand and bow your heads please. Our dear and gracious and holy Father in heaven, we humbly bow our heads and we give you thanks for, first of all, for this beautiful day, for the gift of life, for this beautiful county, this beautiful city, and for everybody who's in charge of these important decisions. We know that everything is in your timing and we ask that you would give everyone here wisdom to make the right decisions for our children and grandchildren in the future. And thank you, Lord, for the opportunity. In Jesus' name, amen. To the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Clerk, may I have a roll call, please?

Director Nielsen? Director Reed?

Present.

Director Ford? Director Serrato?

Present.

Director Amabile? Director Pacheco? Director Pedrozo?

Present.

Director Pereira?

Present.

Vice Chair Samra?

Present.

Thank you.

Okay, at this time, approve of the agenda, please.

I'll move to approve.

Second. I have a motion and a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed? Thank you. Public comment. At this time, public is available to make any comments they wish to come forward to what's on the agenda. Does anybody wish to make a comment from public? Seeing no one coming forward, Caltrans?

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair. Oh, the microphone's better. That's a surprise. Good afternoon. Hope everybody's having a good end of May. One funding reminder and a few announcements. One is the California Transportation Commission's Active Transportation ATP Cycle 8 applications are due June 22nd. And then a few announcements. I know several of you kind of reach out to me or through Ms. Guzman for issues, which I'm happy to do that. But Caltrans does have a tool that you can pass along to your constituents as well that they can use to directly communicate with Caltrans. And the website is csr.dot.ca.gov. And that's our customer service request. CSR.dot.ca.gov. And so when they submit it, they get an automatic email indicating that their inquiry is received, and then they'll also get a follow-up email once the issue is resolved. And we get, each district gets a monthly, well, they send it statewide, has each district's how many inquiries and how many were addressed, and we take great pride in ensuring that our SUCCESS RATE REMAINS HIGH, SO PASS ALONG THAT TOOL TO YOUR CONSTITUENTS. LAST MONTH, ON APRIL 24TH, WE HAD OUR 36TH ANNUAL FALLEN HIGHWAY WORKERS MEMORIAL TRIBUTE CEREMONY, WHICH WAS WELL ATTENDED. THE WEATHER WAS BEAUTIFUL IN WEST SACRAMENTO. YOU'RE FREE TO WATCH THIS PAST YEAR OR PREVIOUS ONES ON THE CALTRANS WEBSITE, AND THEN WE'LL BE DOING IT AGAIN NEXT APRIL AS WELL. District 10 is celebrating May's Bike Month. We have our annual event on Wednesday, May 27th next week on the Virginia Corridor Trail in Modesto. We'll meet at the Roseburg Square next to the trail. The event will start at approximately 10 o'clock. We'll have some visiting and information sessions and then go on right on the bike trail from 1120 to about one o'clock. So all are welcome to join us on that. Next month. I was planning to bring the project management Engineers to do our quarterly a project update. I do know that we're you guys are starting early and you have some other stuff on the agenda So if you don't want to add, you know the Caltrans, I mean I'll be here but then if we don't want to do that we can I could bring the engineers on July when there's a little less on the agenda perfect and And then a follow-up item on the 152 project. So in Los Banos, we're continuing to progress with the temporary construction easements necessary for the work. And we still have a few property owners that we're waiting to sign. But we're planning another outreach event in the next month and a half or so, inviting those property owners involved, as well as some of the folks, local partners in the city as well. And then lastly, there's going to be a lot of folks traveling this upcoming weekend. So I encourage you and wishing you and your constituents a very happy and safe Memorial Day weekend. So that concludes my report. Happy to take any questions.

Anybody has questions for Caltrans? Dr. Nelson?

Yes, I do, actually. So in regard to campaign signage, as I recall that when we, you know, fill out our paperwork, we get a package that says you're not supposed to put signs on Caltrans facilities. And I noticed between Atwater and Livingston, there are several places along the freeway where the signs have been put right on the fence between the freeway and the frontage road. And I thought, well, maybe they're trying to catch the cross traffic on the connecting streets like Crest Sea and Sultana and whatnot. Maybe they were just double-sided signs. No, they're not. They're facing the freeway. So who is responsible for noticing it, one, and taking care of it? Or should I send a message to CSR here and fill out a request?

Yeah, I mean... we obviously have our construction crews and our maintenance folks you know driving up and down but we don't always you know driving on the freeway we're not always knowing you know where's the right away and whatnot so that's something that you know we rely on the locals to identify issues or things that are not in compliance within the right-of-way and then let us know well if you're heading back to sacramento on your way home today

Atwater Livingston right along there yeah there are some actually on the on the Caltrans fence itself yeah exactly they're on the fence that's exactly what I'm talking about yeah thank you for clarifying your poem I appreciate that okay that's all I had thank you okay director McDaniel yeah thank you thanks for the update today um I noticed that we have some uh barriers there at Bear Creek on 140. I was wondering, when are we going to get those guardrails in place? It's been a while, and I think we've brought it up before. But, yeah, there's temporary, I guess, I don't know what you call them, orange barriers, but they wouldn't stop anything from going off the edge there into Bear Creek. Okay. So I'd just like to get an idea when that's going to get taken care of. Okay.

Yeah, we'll check into that and follow up. Thank you. Uh-huh.

Director Pereira?

Thank you Mr. Chair. So at the intersection of North Highway 59 and Bellevue Road, that with the UC traffic, that intersection is now generally 4 to 5.30 and 7.30 to 8.30 in the morning, it's pretty backed up, but there's an electric pole on the northeast corner that is like two foot off of the pavement. So anyways, just wanna get that intersection on the list of projects that may need, or sites that may need to be upgraded.

Okay. You said 59 in Bellevue?

Correct. And then also just in the interim, I think it's on that same corner, there's a pothole. Okay.

Director Reed, do you have any questions? Director Serrato?

Nothing for me, thank you.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate it.

Okay, items 5A through 5C, this is informational items. Does any board member, directors have any questions? Staff, any questions? This is informational items and no questions and we'll move on to the consent calendar. Consent calendar items are acted by one vote on a specific item or for separate incentives by the member of the board, member of the staff, or the member of the public. Does any board member wish to pull any item for discussion? Staff? Anybody in the public that wish to pull this item for discussion? Seeing no one coming forward, I'll entertain a motion at this time.

I'll motion to approve.

I have a motion by Director McDaniel. Do I have a second? Second by Director Reid. All in favor sing by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Motion carried.

So we're at seven?

Yeah, seven, yeah.

Yeah, there we go.

Okay, item number seven, this is a discussion item, federal requirements for regional quality conformity. Stacy?

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is a fairly complex topic, but we felt it prudent to provide the update to the board as it relates to actions taken at the regional level that impact us locally. So the San Joaquin Valley is designated as a federal non-attainment area under the Clean Air Act. And that requires the eight Valley MPOs, so MCAG being one of them, to demonstrate that our RTPs comply with federal air quality standards before we can adopt them, and that the regionally significant transportation projects can proceed. So those are typical things we do, but before we can do our RTP and move forward on these projects, we have to demonstrate that our plans comply with the Clean Air Act. OR I'M SORRY, THE FEDERAL AIR QUALITY STANDARDS. SO TYPICALLY WHAT HAPPENS IS THAT EACH NPO IS ABLE TO DEMONSTRATE THAT CONFORMITY INDIVIDUALLY. SO WE GET WHAT'S CALLED A SUBREGIONAL BUDGET AND WE'RE ABLE TO SHOW THAT THIS RTP AND THIS PLAN OF INVESTMENTS THAT THE GROWTH AND INVESTMENTS THAT ARE INCLUDED THOUGH THAT IT WILL NOT PRODUCE EMISSIONS THAT EXCEED THE BUDGET GIVEN TO US FOR OZONE. AND SO THAT'S KIND OF THE VERY SIMPLE EXPLANATION. AND WE TYPICALLY DO THIS EACH OF EIGHT OF US IN THE VALLEY EVEN THOUGH WE'RE ONE AIR BASIN WE DO THIS INDIVIDUALLY. Where we're at, though, in this instance with the 2026 RTP that we're preparing to bring a draft in the next couple of months, as we're working through our RTP development individually and as a region, we have several MPOs, two or three at this point, we're still working down on the final detail, that are not able to individually demonstrate conformity. So they're not able to demonstrate that their RTPs ARE NOT WORSENING THE REGIONAL AIR QUALITY. SO IF WE CONTINUED AS WE NORMALLY WOULD WITH THESE INDIVIDUAL BUDGETS, THERE WOULD BE AT LEAST ONE OF US, IF ONLY ONE OF US OF THE EIGHT WERE TO FAIL CONFORMITY, IT WOULD TRIGGER A CONFORMITY LAPSE technically a grace period that could lead to a full conformity lapse for the entire San Joaquin Valley so in other words if one of us fails we all fail so with that it's of great interest to all of us to try to find a path forward to not let that happen so we have oh and I should say when there is a lapse and a freeze consequences are you know freezing on the approval of new REGIONALLY SIGNIFICANT TRANSPORTATION PROJECTS, THE INABILITY TO AMEND, ADD, OR ADVANCE OUR PROJECTS IN OUR F-TIP, LOSS OR DELAY OF FEDERAL AND STATE TRANSPORTATION FUNDING, DELAYS TO CONSTRUCTION, ALL THE THINGS WE WANT TO AVOID. SO WHAT HAS BEEN USED IN THE PAST AND IS WHAT THE VALLEY COG DIRECTORS ELECTED TO DO FOR THE 2026 RTP WAS TO DO A REGIONAL BUDGET. SO WE REQUESTED INSTEAD OF US GETTING EIGHT INDIVIDUAL SUBREGIONAL TARGETS OR SUBREGIONAL BUDGETS WE ASKED FOR ONE SINGLE REGIONAL BUDGET FOR THE SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY AND THAT ALLOWS US TO basically pull our results together and as long as collectively we don't exceed that regional budget we will conform as a region so that has been um that's the direction that the eight valley cog directors decided to do it was a way to recognize and to ensure that air quality in the region you know we're still saying we're still staying within what is the allowed emissions budget but it's not jeopardizing us individually to be able to move forward with our projects so um we're going to be following this you'll see your draft rtp uh here soon because we do have to adopt by the end of summer to get those to the feds so that they're all in place before they expire in December and it may look a little different so you might hear us bring this up in the future as we ultimately work our way back to sub-regional budgets But here for the near future, if we start talking about FTIP amendments or things, you may see new processes or discussions, but it's because we're going to be operating under one regional budget for federal air quality conformity for the 2026 RTP. And I'm going to now look at Elizabeth and say, do you need to clean up any of that? Did I get that wrong? I've learned more. Hey! LET THE RECORD NOTE. I HAD NO CLARIFICATIONS ON MY FEDERAL AIR QUALITY. I'VE LEARNED A LOT ABOUT FEDERAL AIR QUALITY CONFORMITY AND STATE REGULATIONS, TOO. SO THIS IS JUST AN INFORMATION ITEM. IT'S A SIGNIFICANT DEPARTURE FROM WHAT WE WOULD TYPICALLY DO, BUT IT'S NOT UNPRECEDENTED. THE VALLEY HAS DONE THIS BEFORE, BUT IT DOES NOTE JUST A MOMENT OF TIME TO EXPLAIN IT. I'M HAPPY TO ANSWER ANY QUESTIONS OR ASK ELIZABETH TO ANSWER THEM.

BOARD, ANY QUESTIONS?

That was my biggest one.

Elizabeth, did you wish to add anything? I know you guys gave your thumbs up, but anything beyond that?

Thank you.

Wow.

Reviews must be coming up. Is that what it is?

I know it's not.

I earned it, Mr. Chair.

Okay, thank you. Okay, if not, then we'll go on to the Draft Transportation Network Vulnerability Assessment. Ms. Prince?

Mr. Chair, good afternoon. MCAG was awarded a Caltrans Adaptation Planning Grant to develop a transportation network vulnerability assessment. This plan assesses the risks that extreme weather pose to transportation assets in the region. We have drafted the assessment and circulated it to the working group last month, and now it's available for public review through the 29th of this month. The final plan will come back next month for the board to consider adoption. We contracted with WSP, who specializes in transportation resiliency planning, to develop the assessment. And we have Tim Gross, the project manager with the WSP team here. He's going to give a brief five-minute presentation just giving a few highlights of the plan and the cost-benefit analysis of three projects. That are included and then afterwards we'd be happy to to answer any questions or take any comments.

So I'll hand it over to Tim Go ahead, sir Yeah, we can see it fine, thank you Here's here's what we've done we identify

to climate-related hazards, so things like flooding, wildfire, extreme heat. We developed a set of guidance on adaptation strategies, so strategies to mitigate some of those issues. And then we focused on three specific projects, like Meg mentioned.

Adaptation options there, evaluated those, and did benefit cost analysis on those to determine whether they might be cost-effective and can

for funding. And then we wrapped that up in the draft transportation network vulnerability assessment plan. We had engagement throughout, public engagement, and then also a stakeholder working group. So jumping into those three projects I mentioned, the first is on State Route 59. It's just north of the landfill between City of Merced and Snelling. This is an area at Henderson Lateral, the Henderson Canal crossing where there's regular flooding and that causes a lot of delay to travelers there who have to detour quite a ways around there. And so the idea here was to, the concept was to to mitigate that flooding. We evaluated a few different options. One was expanding the culverts there. Another one was raising the profile of the road. Another one was installing a detention basin to help hold some of that water and prevent the flooding from happening. So we developed concepts, performed flood analysis, developed cost estimates for the different options. And then we did an economic analysis just of benefits, and our benefits here are avoided disruption costs compared to kind of a do-nothing base case. And so you'll see for all three of these projects, we list the benefit-cost ratio, so that's benefits divided by costs, so a benefit-cost ratio over one is good. and then net present value. So that's our benefits minus our costs of the project. And a positive NPV or net present value is a good thing. So for these options, all four of them show to be cost effective. The culvert expansion options were shown to be the most economically viable, suggesting that they'd be a worthwhile investment. The next one we looked at was a new operations and maintenance facility for an electrified fleet for TJPA on the western side of the county. We compared this to a base case future in which there'd be one O&M facility in the eastern part of the county that served all the routes in the county. And under that base case, it was assumed that buses would need to drive across county um every day to charge and and so that staff out takes obviously staff time and energy costs as well our concept was to uh we so as a concept we developed this facility with 16 um this this conceptual design for this facility with 16 charging stations washing service areas we came up with a cost estimate um layouts and square footage allocations for different parts of the facility um this one uh also had a net present valid positive net present value of around 12 million under the assumptions used in the analysis we looked at over about a 50-year window for benefits and a benefit cost ratio above one and and the keys there the big benefits were just reducing that those energy costs and that operator time to drive the buses across county And then the final one is the Bear Creek Erosion Control Project. This is to stabilize some severely eroded stream channel banks along Bear Creek and near the city of Merced that have experienced a lot of issues in the past, including during the recent winter storms. And so under a do-nothing case, you see continued erosion there, sediment cleanup issues that need to be dealt with, levee subsidence, and threatening adjacent properties and transportation infrastructure. The concept here was based on an existing City of Merced project, and Dokken Engineering has done some design work on that. And so we looked at the highest priority areas just to do the benefit cost analysis. So highest priority rock slope protection areas between McKee Road and West 16th Street in Merced. And they, again, for this one as well, the avoided embankment repair costs, the reduced sediment removal costs, those far easily outweigh the capital cost of the project of protecting those slopes. And some of the other benefits are protecting the bikeway that runs along there and the roads and properties as well. So just to wrap up, so for all three of these projects, they all were under the assumptions in this analysis shown to be cost-effective and would be good candidates for resilience-focused funding. And the hope is that the concepts developed for this project as well as the narrative and the reports and the economic analysis could be used to help pursue resilience-focused funding for these projects and similar projects in the future. So thank you for your time and I'll open it up for questions.

Board, any questions? No?

Real quick.

Director Serrato? Thank you, sir.

With respect to the City of Merced project on Bear Creek, what sort of information did you review? You mentioned you talked to Doken about the project they're working on. I know currently they're pretty far down the line in terms of design. Yeah. What facts do you know in your evaluation of them?

yeah yeah so we we don't can engineering share that information with us and we use that um to inform the benefit cost analysis and we um you know we did some additional flood modeling just to show the benefits of some of those designs um so if there was a need to get more funding for that project you could use that but yeah we included their information that are helpful and collaborative on that thank you yeah I think we've got together about nine million so far you know the rough estimates about

13 14 for the full build so hopefully yeah this could certainly yeah help make us more competitive for other pots of money to to get there yeah the primary thing is just sort of that rock that like we have i think we during after the flooding we dumped something like 10 million pounds of rock in there but you know just kind of adding on to that in certain key areas is the yeah yeah i mean we just evaluated the existing design so i think the design as is would be good for protecting a lot of those areas and it's going to prevent

I mean, the analysis we did basically just shows that you're going to, I mean, by investing that money now, you'll save that over the long term and what you're going to have to clean up on future flood events. Okay. Thank you, sir.

Mr. Chair, thank you. I just make please clarify me or correct me if I'm wrong. But the purpose of of the analysis we did was to prepare projects with this vulnerability assessment that thereby makes them eligible to go after certain new pots of funding that are really intended for I don't know. I mean, they're either climate resiliency grants or whatever those may be. So just to clarify, it's not to initiate a project or to, you know, do double work over what the city's doing or what we're already doing with the transit. It's doing this level of assessment means that when these new funding opportunities come in, they'll say, do you have a, what is it, a

CLIMATE RESILIENT, WHAT IS THIS CALLED, VULNERABILITY? VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT.

DO YOU HAVE A VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT AND YOU SAY YES BECAUSE HERE IT IS, THEN YOU CAN GO AFTER THOSE NEW TYPES. IS THAT A FAIR SUMMARY?

YEAH, THERE ARE A COUPLE NEW PROGRAMS FOR, AND TIM MAY WANT TO TALK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THIS TOO, BUT THERE ARE A COUPLE RELATIVELY NEW PROGRAMS FOR THIS TYPE OF CLIMATE RESILIENCY FUNDING FOR TRANSPORTATION PROGRAMS. ONE IS THE CALIFORNIA LTCAP PROGRAM. And then also under IIJA, the PROTECT program, which it sounds like is included in the new proposed transportation bill too. So yeah, the information in this plan would help jurisdictions be more competitive for those funding pots.

Yeah, I think you covered it well, Meg. Yeah, and just to clarify, too, on another point you made, so that Bear Creek one, we just basically used that existing design and did more analysis on it. The other two were more doing conceptual designs from scratch, so that O&M facility and the SR-59 crossing were more creating those concepts from scratch, so hopefully those could be then used to create a

a full design at some point real quick go ahead in terms of the timeline and pretty much we're ready to if if there's funding pots available we can we can move using this or what's the uh um tim do you know the timeline for the the next calls

Yeah, so, I mean, it depends what the source is. Like, FEMA BRIC is out now. I'm not, like, you know, that's a traditionally more flood mitigation-type project, but it is resilience-focused pre-disaster mitigation funding. PROTECT, unclear on, but there's discretionary funds that we, you know, for the current surface transportation bill, the IJA, that we'd expect will be released at some point here. Not sure on timing. But it looks like, like Meg mentioned, in the first draft of the new surface transportation reauthorization bill, PROTECT is in there, and funding was actually increased for resilience projects. So not sure on timing, but signs are promising there. And I do think just generally, if you've got projects that are helping reduce flood risk, erosion risk, or wildfire risk, there's going to be funding streams for those and so just being set up to to be ready to go after that or if you've got an existing project that has one of those elements um there could be some good opportunities to help help fund things and in terms of timing of this plan it'll be on next month's agenda to adopt correct okay that's good thank you very much board any other questions well thank you sir thank you thank you thank you

Item 17, this is a disclosure of the Measure V compliance. Ms. Guzman.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. MCEG is publicly disclosing that we were informed by the city of Dos Palos that approximately 2.2 million in Measure V local projects funding that was allocated to the city was used for non-transportation purposes over multiple fiscal years. So MCAG revenues are voter approved restricted transportation funds and are required to be used solely for eligible transportation purposes consistent with the Measure V expenditure plan and associated funding agreement. On notification of this issue, MCAG immediately implemented safeguards to protect the remaining Measure V revenues and prevent further unauthorized use of funds, including the withholding of future local projects funding distributions to the city pending corrective action and compliance measures. MCAG is also developing a comprehensive correction action plan intended to ensure full restoration of the misspent funds and associated interest earnings, to strengthen financial oversight and accountability measures, and to establish additional protections to prevent similar issues from occurring in the future. As the local transportation authority responsible for administering Measure V, MCAG has an obligation to ensure transparency, accountability, and stewardship of the voter approved transportation revenues. We stand committed to addressing the matter publicly and responsibly in order to protect the integrity of Measure V and maintain public trust in the program and its long-term administration. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. We'll go on to Item 8. THIS IS TO ACCEPT THE MEASURE V AUDIT FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR YOUR ENDING. MR. BOGGEDY.

THANK YOU. GOOD AFTERNOON, DIRECTORS. FOR YOUR ACCEPTANCE TODAY IS THE MEASURE V AUDITS ENDING IN JUNE 30TH OF 2025. NEXT SLIDE, MICHAEL. SO THE PURPOSE OF THE FINANCIAL.

SORRY. ONE THING WE NEED TO ASK FOR PUBLIC COMMENT ON THE DISCLOSURE ITEM.

Okay, we'll go back, I should have asked if we were going to.

That was my fault, sorry. No problem.

Okay, we're gonna circle back to item 7C. Does anybody in the public wish to ask any questions on that item? Seeing nobody come forward, we will.

Anyone online? Nope, okay.

Anybody online? Any board members? THANK YOU. THE 7C IS NOW CLOSED. WE'LL MOVE ON TO ITEM 8A. MR. BROGENY.

THANK YOU. AGAIN, THIS ITEM IS FOR ACCEPTANCE OF THE MEASURE V AUDITS ENDING JUNE 30, 2025. THIS IS THE PURPOSE OF THE FINANCIAL AUDITS IS FOR A REFRESHER FOR DIRECTORS AND FOR NEW INSURANCE FUNDINGS ARE USED INSURANCE FUNDINGS ARE USED INSURANCE FUNDINGS ARE USED CORRECTLY, CONFIRM FINANCIAL CORRECTLY, CONFIRM FINANCIAL CORRECTLY, CONFIRM FINANCIAL ACCURACIES, EVALUATE COMPLIANCE ACCURACIES, EVALUATE COMPLIANCE ACCURACIES, EVALUATE COMPLIANCE WITH THE RULES. WITH THE RULES. WITH THE RULES. ASSESS INTERNAL CONTROLS AND ASSESS INTERNAL CONTROLS AND ASSESS INTERNAL CONTROLS AND RISK AND IDENTIFY ISSUES THAT RISK AND IDENTIFY ISSUES THAT RISK AND IDENTIFY ISSUES THAT REQUIRE CORRECTIVE ACTIONS AND REQUIRE CORRECTIVE So the first line represents the beginning balance of cash held by the jurisdictions. And the transit fund, regional east and west side, along with the administrative fund, the total cash held in the beginning of the year was $94 million. Measure V generated for fiscal year ending in June 30th of 2025 generated $26.7 million. In that same fiscal year, about $14.9 million has been spent. and 2.8 million dollars of interest earned on the money that's shown above and the ending balance of total measure refunds is 108 million dollars. Any questions on this? Well, before I ask, the biggest pot of money is the regional pots for the east and west side along with the transit and the county and the city's money. Does anybody have any questions on this slide?

Board, any questions?

You do? Oh, OK. Next slide. OK, SO THIS SLIDE REPRESENTS THE EAST SIDE REGIONAL PROJECTS WHICH ARE COMPLETED OR OPENED. AS YOU CAN SEE, AS I MENTIONED, AME, HIGHWAY 59 PHASE 1 WIDENING ALONG WITH THE BLACK RASCAL CREEK ARE THE TWO BIG PROJECTS ON THE EAST SIDE THAT HOLD THE BIG POT OF MONEY. THESE PROJECTS ARE MOVING ALONG. ANY QUESTIONS ON THIS SLIDE RIGHT HERE? NEXT SLIDE. On the west side, you have Henry Miller along with Pioneer Winding. I know that the Blossom Avenue project has been completed, but that was completed in this fiscal year. So as you can see, there's no expenditure as of June 30th, 2025. So any questions on the west side project's balance and expenditures?

NOT AT THIS TIME.

ALL RIGHT. NEXT SLIDE, MICHAEL. SO THIS REPRESENTS THE RIDERSHIP, RIGHT? HOW MANY RIDES WERE PROVIDED WITH THE MEASURE V TRANSIT FUND. AS YOU CAN SEE, YEAR OVER YEAR WE'VE BEEN INCREASING THE NUMBER OF RIDES PROVIDED TO MERCED COUNTY RESIDENTS. THIS RIDE IS FOR ELIGIBLE FOR SENIORS, VETERANS, AND ELIGIBLE ADA AND ELIGIBLE ADA RIDERS. ONE THING I DO WANT TO HIGHLIGHT. We provide over a million rides in the last fiscal year, a million rides to seniors, veterans, paratransit, and ADA. This is not what we get to. You guys don't get calls. You don't see this. These are not roads that are paved. These are not physical things, but these people right here. Next slide. It matters for. This is Tammy. She's visually impaired. So before she used to spend $120 a month taking the paratransit bus with, I will give Stacy the credit on this, it was her idea to provide know subsidize fares for paratransit as well since we do subsidize those fares on fixed route she won't do it on paratransit so she saves 120 a month almost close to 2 000 a year now she gets to do activities like go to doctors on her own or go to the gym or whatever it is on our bus service so this is why it's it's important to us for these people right here next slide BUT THERE WERE SOME FINDINGS, RIGHT? SOME JURISDICTIONS DON'T CONSTANTLY REPORT INTEREST EARNED ON THE MEASURE V FUND. THIS IS A LITTLE INTERESTING BECAUSE I'LL USE THE COUNTY AS AN EXAMPLE. THEY HAVE A TRANSPORTATION FUND, RIGHT? THAT MONEY GOES TO THE ROADS REGARDLESS. IF IT'S MEASURE V FUNDED OR TRANSPORTATION FUNDED, IT STILL GOES TO THE ROADS. SO WE'RE WORKING WITH THE COUNTY TO KIND OF JUST DEMONSTRATE IF THAT POT OF MONEY HOW MUCH INTEREST WOULD HAVE OCCURRED BUT YOU KNOW AT THE END OF THE DAY I DO AGREE IT IS MONEY STILL GOING TO ROADS REGARDLESS IF IT'S MEASURED INTEREST OR IT STILL GOES TO ROADS THE SECOND ONE IS THE INCONSISTENCY AND DELAYS IN THE QUARTERLY EXPENDITURE REPORTS LET THIS This year, I could say 98% of reports have been on time. And the ones that are not on time, they let us know ahead of time, hey, we're waiting on this, or something happened with our system that we're going to submit them on time. So this action for this year has been corrected. But last year, there were still some jurisdictions that were getting caught up. And last year, we talked to this board about copying the jurisdictions, the board members on them. THAT ACTUALLY HELPED REALLY MUCH. SO THIS YEAR WE'VE SEEN 98% ACCURACY IN REPORTING. THE LAST ONE, SAFEGUARDING OF MEASURE V CASH HELD BY PARTICIPATING JURISDICTIONS. THAT'S BASICALLY WHAT STACEY REFERENCED IN THE ITEM BEFORE. SO ANY QUESTIONS ABOUT THE MEASURE V AUDITS?

BOARD, ANY QUESTIONS? CONTINUE, PLEASE.

THAT'S IT.

THAT'S IT. BOARD, ANY QUESTIONS AT THIS TIME? If not, this item is open to the public. Does anybody from the public wish to comment on this item? Seeing nobody come forward, I'll entertain a motion at this time. I have a motion by Director McDowell. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Director Pereira. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed? Okay, measure passed. Item 8 B. This is to adopt the measure be a limitation plan Thank you, mr.

Chair Sorry, I'm give me one second.

No problem. I kind of got there fast I

Got it, okay. Anyway, my things are out of order. Okay, this item is finally the day that the board gets to hopefully adopt the 2025 Measure V implementation plan. This document went out for public review with the board's instruction. A few months, oh gosh now, it was, March gosh yes it was March no changes were made between the review and presentation of the draft and the draft that is available to you today for adoption this will allow the board and our jurisdictions or the jurisdictions and the transit agency recipients all of the measure fund to move forward on the projects as programmed in the programming documents that are found on page... What was that? 177 starting there and there are no changes we did get two comments submitted from the public so I just want to clarify we have we're required to hold a public hearing and to do a public review period we actually held four public hearings instead we did two virtual two in person and one on the east side one on the west side and also two of them are at the noon time hour and two of them were after hours. So we tried to cover all of our bases. We received two comments that are included in your packet starting on page 202. And it was an email from Strong Towns Merced. That, as you can see, emphasized wanting some set aside for rail grade separation and quiet zone designations and some more safety, you know, focusing on improving safety outcomes. So there's a way here to kind of, I think this is good feedback for the types of projects that jurisdictions are considering, and then some transit related and other improvements suggested under page 203 so this document is just open for public review it's not necessarily it's more of kind of an awareness and education here's what's being in included I would just always encourage folks to be in communication with the jurisdictions during the call for projects and to be sharing those local project ideas with our member agencies when we go through that process So unless anyone has any questions or would like me to review any segments or drafts of the plan, it is available. And I should have noted that we did already have one funding agreement for the projects here that was on consent pending the adoption of this, and that's the Santa Fe Rehabilitation Project for the County of Merced. So as soon as this gets adopted, funds will be spent.

Board, any questions? Okay, this item is now open to the public. Does anybody from the public wish to comment on this item? Okay, item is now closed to the public. Board, any further discussion? If not, I will entertain a motion at this time. A motion by Director, I'm sorry. Okay, for the next one. I have a motion by Director Pereira. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Director Reed. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed? Motion carried. Okay, item number 8C, this is the approve the amendment for to the Measure V transportation. Mary Malcolm.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The action item before you today to approve Amendment 4 to the measure of the expenditure plan. The expenditure plan has a provision that once every calendar year, there may be language amendments proposed and adopted by the board. The one for this year pertains to the language about what it means to have a quorum of the Measure V Citizens Oversight Committee. First of all, I should say thank you on your consent calendar today. You reappointed three of those at-large members. There will be a few more coming back to you next month. But as you know, we've had a consistent issue keeping those seats filled. There are 14 seats on the COC. Currently, only nine of them are filled, and the language as it is written now in the expenditure plan states that a quorum will be no less than eight members. As you can imagine, getting eight out of nine people in a room together, even though it is only twice a year, can be challenging. JUST THIS YEAR, JUST THIS MONTH, I SHOULD SAY, WE HAD TO RESCHEDULE A COC MEETING WHEN WE SHOWED UP TO THE MEETING AND ONLY THREE MEMBERS CAME. SO IN ORDER TO PASS THOSE AUDITS, WE HAD TO CALL A SPECIAL MEETING. So in consultation with legal counsel, we're proposing to change the language that a quorum will now be no less than 50% of the appointed committee membership. So however many seats are filled, a majority of those appointees will constitute a quorum. And as I mentioned, that language is highlighted in appendix B on page 15 of the plan. And I'm happy to take any questions if anyone has any.

Board, any questions? This item is now open to the public. Does anybody from the public wish to comment? Seeing nobody coming forward, the item is now closed to the public. Directors, any questions further? Okay, at this time, I will entertain a motion.

So moved.

I have a motion by Director McGinn. Do I have a second?

I'll second.

Second by Director Serrato. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carried. Item 10A, this is a discussion item. This is the draft operating capital budget fiscal year.

And we have, okay, go ahead. We have a tag team. Tag team. I'll be kicking us off and then handing it over.

I think Director Perez was right, it is evaluation time, so. I see Mr. Barger saying Stacy's great and all that, so I see something going on here.

We're trying to spread the joy here. So yes, we are looking at the 26-27 budget for TJPA. And first off, we'll do just a quick recap of our ridership to date. As you can see, we did see a little bit of a dip starting in October, November. However, we are seeing an increase in ridership with current fuel prices. And going into the summer, the hotter months, we normally do see that. If we look at the average for the year and if we meet those numbers and get about 59,000 for the remainder of the year, we will be just slightly over our numbers for last year. So we're hoping to see those increase and making some good initiatives to get our writership up as well. Next slide, Michael. So some accomplishments that we have seen over the past year is we did procure a hydrogen fueling trailer for our pilot that's coming up. The trailer was actually just inspected and we should be seeing it on site soon. There's still permitting and things that need to happen before we can actually put hydrogen in it. But we're excited about that. We also have the implementation of the Fairbox tap-to-pay system. This project has been ongoing for longer than we anticipated. We have a few bumps in the road, but we will be launching it. We're ready to flip the switch. It is, again, the tap-to-pay system. You can either use a credit card or your phone or any payment system, digital payment system. It also includes the app that you can use and purchase passes through. We'll be kicking this off right after our free fairs in July. We'll kind of be doing a quiet launch for that. And then the head signs and automatic voice announcer upgrades. This, again, the biggest benefit of this upgrade was not only the visibility of our head signs, but the bilingual announcements that this provides as well, so both English and Spanish announcements. We've purchased two battery electric cutaways. These are for anticipated microtransit expansions. We should be seeing those shortly. As well as our on-bus security cameras, we've had a very outdated system. We have upgraded the hardware and we'll be going to a cloud-based system as well. So it'll be a big time saver and efficiency saver for pulling any camera footage if and when needed. And then we've also been doing the ongoing development of our zero emissions bus facility. We are currently trying to wrap up the environmental for this. And one other big project that is not on here has been our operations maintenance RFP that is THANKS TO OUR AMAZING PROCUREMENT DEPARTMENT KEEPING US ON TRACK. IT IS NOW IN REVIEW WITH CALTRANS. SO JUST A FEW THINGS THAT WE'VE BEEN WORKING ON THIS YEAR. AND I WILL PASS IT OVER TO NAV.

She wants to take all the credit for all the good stuff and then bring me in for the tough conversation about increased cost and all the good stuff. So the budget for 26-27, our budget is increasing by 4.6%, which is $765,000. uh the primary cost uh primary driver for the cost increase is our annual contract escalation for the operation maintenance and also the rising fuel cost and insurance cost we are always striving to look to make our service better make more efficient we're also looking at more innovative ways to be more reliant more IN THE COMMUNITY SO I WILL SAY WE DO ARE OFFERING FEW FAIRS TO THE FAIR SO BE ON THE LOOK OUT FOR A FLYER. NEXT SLIDE PLEASE. SO AS I MENTIONED WE DO HAVE A DECREASE IN PROFESSIONAL SERVICES BUT OUR OPERATION MAINTENANCE CONTRACT WENT UP BY $340,000 BUT THE BIGGEST INCREASE IS THE MAINTENANCE AND FUEL NOT ACTUALLY THE FUEL BY $753,000 RIGHT. AS WE KNOW THERE'S SOME IN THE WORLD AND ESPECIALLY IN THE MIDDLE EAST SO WE'RE IN THE WORLD AND ESPECIALLY IN THE MIDDLE EAST SO WE'RE IN THE WORLD AND ESPECIALLY IN THE MIDDLE EAST SO WE'RE ASSUMING THE DIESEL PRICE TO ASSUMING THE DIESEL PRICE TO ASSUMING THE DIESEL PRICE TO STAY AT $7 A GALLON AND THEN STAY AT $7 A GALLON AND THEN STAY AT $7 A GALLON AND THEN GASOLINE AT $6 A GALLON. GASOLINE AT $6 A GALLON. GASOLINE AT $6 A GALLON. BUT WE DO HAVE A DECREASE IN BUT WE DO HAVE A DECREASE IN BUT WE DO HAVE A DECREASE IN OUR MAINTENANCE EXPENSE WHICH AS OUR MAINTENANCE EXPENSE WHICH AS OUR MAINTENANCE CHEAPER TO MAINTAIN THESE BUSES. BUT OVERALL OUR INCREASE, THE BIGGEST INCREASE IS OUR FUEL AND OPERATION AMENDMENT CONTRACT. THE TOTAL INCREASE IS $765,000. ANY QUESTION ON OUR EXPENDITURES?

Thank you for, I was going to ask the question, but I think you already answered it. How is maintenance equipment cost coming down? It normally doesn't happen, but you explained the newer fleet.

Yeah.

Thank you.

What are we?

Average age of our fleet?

No, when did we transition so far?

Oh, we've transitioned about 85% of our fleet.

85%. Yeah, that's why, yeah. Our operation revenues, we do see a decrease in our 5307 funds, a little increase in 5311 funds, that's our roll funding, but then we do have TGPA does see a decrease in state funding, SDA funds, so we are going to be looking at using some of our carryover funds of $932,000, and then we are going to be utilizing the state of good repairs of $159,000 a share, and then the rest of our funding does stay STABLE OUR AGREEMENT WITH UC MERCED AND MERCED COLLEGE. MERCED COLLEGE AS THE COST INCREASES WE DO INCREASE OUR COST A LITTLE BIT AND THEN UC MERCED WE WERE IN A PILOT PROGRAM WHAT WE DID WAS NOW IT'S BASED ON ENROLLMENT SO THEY'RE GIVING US UP TO DATE ENROLLMENTS AND THAT'S HOW WE CHARGE THEM SO WE'LL SEE $80,000 increase in our local fair so that's how we were able to balance our budget for rent operations for fiscal year 2627 any questions okay moving on to our capital projects these are our capital projects that are came in over for 2526 what one of them I would like to highlight is as we do have 40 foot hydrogen bus in here ELIZABETH WAS ABLE TO GET US SOME ADDITIONAL FUNDING WHERE WE'LL BE BRINGING BACK A REVISED BUDGET FOR NEXT MONTH WHERE IT WILL BE TWO HYDROGEN BUSES INSTEAD OF ONE. WE'LL BE USING SOME CMAQ FUNDING WHICH IS CONGESTION MITIGATION AIR QUALITY FUNDS TO HELP PURCHASE TWO HYDROGEN BUSES. SO AND THEN THE SEVEN TRANSFER VEHICLES ONE OF THE THINGS I WANT TO HIGHLIGHT LAST YEAR I REMEMBER BRINGING BACK A HYBRID ELECTRIC WELL BY THE TIME THE STATE APPROVED OUR APPLICATION THOSE VEHICLES WERE NO LONGER AVAILABLE SO WE WERE ABLE TO GO FROM HYBRID HYBRID ELECTRIC JUST TO HYBRID VEHICLES SO WE DON'T HAVE TO PUT CHARGES IN OR NOTHING JUST HYBRID VEHICLES WITH THE SAME DOLLAR AMOUNT ACTUALLY THEY CAME IN PROBABLY TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS CHEAPER SO WE'RE AT $197,000 or $199,000 or so. Any questions regarding this matter on our carryover? Next slide. So we are looking to purchase a property and use some rehab money in an amount of $1.7 million. We're also looking, we did secure a 5310 grant to purchase four cutaway gasoline buses. And then we're looking to purchase a service truck with a Tommy lift gate. There was some cost savings from another capital project, so we just took the savings and applied it to this. So there isn't any additional funding that we were requesting for that truck. For this 26 the new project new capital project for 26 27 is about 2.8 million dollars So any questions and just to clarify that's not 2.8 in new money as you mentioned some right? And right the the property purchase will be coming from a reserve and then that eight hundred sixty six thousand dollars Will I should have that broken down on this one? We will be using fifty three ten money some state of good repairs and a small amount of our LTF money about a hundred fifty thousand dollars of only So any questions on the TGA budget?

Oh, Dr. Pereira?

Yeah, what's the, I missed the, which property are we wanting to buy? Transpo. Oh.

Yes, sorry. I do apologize. Yes, we're looking to purchase the Transpo. I know the city of Merced has agreed to us to start negotiating on the property. So we're looking at options and see where we can get creative on it. So we will be looking at property on the west side as well. All right. Any questions?

Board, any questions?

Thank you.

Thank you. Okay, going to item number 11A, Mr. Moore.

We're here today with this item requesting an amendment to our fiscal year 25-26 budget. We've had a few unexpected changes. One, our mechanics truck out at the Highway 59 site has had an engine failure. It's a 2008 Freightliner. Due to emissions controls and the age of the truck, we are not able to locate another engine for it that can be installed here in California. so we have some funds that were encumbered in our 24 25 budget that we deferred spending so the first part of this request is to reallocate those funds towards the new mechanics truck the second change is a shift of some cost savings from items that we purchased in 2526 WE HAD 35,000 IN THE BUDGET ORIGINALLY FOR TWO UTILITY VEHICLES AGAIN DUE TO EMISSIONS CONTROL AND TARIFFS EARLIER THIS YEAR. THE FIRST ONE WE PURCHASED WAS ABOUT 21,000 SO WE HAD A SHORTFALL THERE BUT IN THE SAVINGS FROM A COUPLE OF OTHER ITEMS WE'RE ABLE TO SHIFT THAT OVER AND ACQUIRE THE SECOND UTILITY VEHICLE UPON APPROVAL OF THIS AMENDMENT. And other than that, if there are any questions, I can answer those. Board, any questions?

Seeing nobody come forward, anybody in the public, in the comment? Seeing nobody, coming back to the board, any further questions, or any questions? If not, this is a action item. Would anybody like to make a motion? I have a motion by Director Nelson. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Director Reed. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed? Okay.

Thank you all.

And item number 12.

You're throwing me back up.

I'll give you a second.

All right, so I guess we're going to do the same thing on the RWA budget, yeah. I was wondering why you took off, and I'm like, well, maybe you're not getting evaluated. Yeah, well, maybe I am, because you think, I didn't do this yesterday, somebody else did it. But let's go ahead. I didn't do it either. ALL RIGHT, WELL, GOOD EVENING. ALL RIGHT, WELL, GOOD EVENING. ALL RIGHT, WELL, GOOD EVENING. WE'RE HERE TO DISCUSS OUR DRAFT WE'RE HERE TO DISCUSS OUR DRAFT WE'RE HERE TO DISCUSS OUR DRAFT BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 26-27. BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 26-27. BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 26-27. SO FIRST HERE THIS SLIDE SHOWS SO FIRST HERE THIS SLIDE SHOWS SO FIRST HERE THIS SLIDE SHOWS OUR TONNAGES OVER THE LAST OUR TONNAGES OVER THE LAST OUR TONNAGES OVER THE LAST FIVE OR SIX YEARS. FIVE OR SIX YEARS. FIVE OR SIX YEARS. THE LINE IN GREEN ON THE FAR THE LINE IN GREEN ON THE FAR THE LINE IN GREEN ON THE FAR RIGHT REPRESENTS there's a few reasons for that the primary one is that our billy wright landfill we did have a large amount of waste that was being imported from out of the county some of that waste has been redirected due to the fuel increase costs the haulers are able to go to a different location pay a higher per ton fee but because of the reduced transportation distance they're saving money so we've seen some back and forth on those issues again also this year luckily we did not have any major disaster type waste streams such as avian flu or fire debris each of the previous three years we've had a large amount of material from those waste streams so our tonnages are down a little bit we can go ahead and go to the next slide Okay, so here's some of the accomplishments that we've done this past year. HIGHWAY 59, RESOURCE RECOVERY AND HOUSEHOLD HAZARDOUS WASTE AREA. THAT WAS PART OF OUR INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECT WE STARTED TWO YEARS AGO. ALLOWS FOR SELF-HAULERS TO DROP OFF A NUMBER OF DIVERTED MATERIAL STREAMS IN A CENTRALIZED LOCATION THAT'S ALL ON PAVEMENT OR A ROCK SURFACE. WE DON'T HAVE PEOPLE DRIVING THROUGH THE MUD AND THE DIRT ANYMORE, WHICH HELPS QUITE A BIT. OUR LANDFILL GAS COLLECTION CONTROL SYSTEM ON PHASE 6, WE ADDED 13 NEW VERTICAL GAS WELLS LAST WINTER. BILLY WRIGHT, WE COMPLETED OUR PHASE THREE SALE AND SURFACE EMPOWERMENT LATE LAST WINTER. WE STARTED PUTTING TRASH IN THAT NEW SALE LAST WEEK. SO WE STARTED PUTTING IN THE FIRST LAYER. OUR LANDFILL GAS COLLECTION CONTROL SYSTEM AT BILLY WRIGHT LANDFILL, THE DESIGN PLAN HAS BEEN APPROVED BY THE LOCAL AIR DISTRICT. WE'VE JUST MOVED FORWARD WITH OUR PERMIT APPLICATION AND OUR APPLICATION TO CONSTRUCT. uh we also last year we told you we received a grant from the department of energy to establish a battery collection program since the inception of that program about 17 months ago we've collected over 1400 pounds of lithium alkaline and rechargeable batteries in my mind every one of those batteries is a mitigated fire that we've avoided And lastly, our master plan, we've been working on since last summer. We expect to come back to the master plan subcommittee in June or July. We're receiving reports right now from the consultant about rate structure. They're finalizing scenarios for expansion capacity at each landfill, and we hope to wrap that up by this fall.

Michael, could you go back two slides real quick? So this is our projection revenue. We're projected to be at $23.2 million. We budgeted about $24 million, so we'll see a little shortfall in our revenues. So that will impact what we put towards our CIP for this fiscal year. Also, one of the other attributions that did contribute to a lower OUT OF COUNTY WASTE IS WE DID RAISE THE RATES ON THOSE OUT OF COUNTY HALLS AS WELL. SO THEY GOT TO PLAY THEY GOT TO PAY TO PLAY FOR HER. SO WE'RE IN GOOD STANDINGS RIGHT NOW. INSTEAD OF PUTTING SIX POINT FIVE MILLION DOLLARS TO CAPITAL PIPEL FIVE POINT FIVE MILLION DOLLARS TO CAPITAL. NEXT SLIDE. SO 2627 DRAFT OVERVIEW BUDGET 87% OF OUR REVENUES ARE FOR TIPPING FEES. THE REMAINING 12% IS OUR ORGANIC TIPPING FEE WHICH IS A PASS THROUGH COST TO THE JURISDICTION ON THE EAST SIDE AND THE REMAINING 1% ARE GRANTS INTEREST AND OTHER SALES OF LIKE IF WE SELL COMPOST OR ROCK OR WHATEVER. SO THAT'S HOW OUR REVENUE IS MADE UP FOR RWA. NEXT SLIDE PLEASE. SO OUR 26-27 BUDGET, WE ARE PROJECTING A DECREASE IN REVENUE, ABOUT $4.6 MILLION. THAT'S 70% DECREASE IN OUR REVENUES. WE WENT FROM 24, PROJECTED $24 MILLION TO $18 MILLION. THE DECLINE IS DRIVEN BY REDUCTION OF OUT OF COUNTY WASTE AND RAISED FUEL COSTS, ALSO THE ECONOMIC CHALLENGES THAT ARE IN THE VALLEY. The organic waste of the $2.7 million is a pass-through cost, as I mentioned, to the jurisdictions. And then we do have other grants and interest that we do record. So we are seeing a 17% decrease in our revenues for RWA. Any questions on the revenues? Next slide. OUR OPERATIONAL EXPENSE INCREASED BY $898,000 AS A 5% INCREASE. BUT OF THE $898,000, $513,000 IS ASSOCIATED WITH THE ORGANIC WASTE WHICH IS THE PASS THROUGH COST AND THE REMAINING COST, 83% IS MADE UP OF OPERATIONAL EXPENSE. NEXT SLIDE. THESE ARE THE ATTRIBUTES WHAT IS THESE ARE THE ATTRIBUTES WHAT IS THESE ARE THE ATTRIBUTES WHAT IS DRIVING THE ADDITIONAL INCREASE DRIVING THE ADDITIONAL INCREASE DRIVING THE ADDITIONAL INCREASE GENERAL LIABILITY INSURANCE GENERAL LIABILITY INSURANCE GENERAL LIABILITY INSURANCE OUR EQUIPMENT MAINTENANCE OUR EQUIPMENT MAINTENANCE OUR EQUIPMENT MAINTENANCE REPAIRS ALONG WITH AS I MENTIONED the passive cost for organics, the DBO, and then environmental fees and also our electric utility services. One of the two factors is one is our current flare is operating at a higher efficiency, which pulls a lot more energy. And then we're also taking into consideration installing a flare system at our Billy Wright Landfill next year as well. So this is what makes up the $898,000 increase in our expenditures for RWA. Next slide. So we'll take, so to recap our revenues is $21 million revenues, $17 million of operating expense. That leaves us a gain or loss of operational income of $4 million. Next year will be our last year that we paid off our debt, our bond debt. So in 2027, we'll be paying off that $2.2 million bond debt. And any additional revenues that's left over will go into our reserve fund for capital and our CIPs, which we estimate about $1.7 million. And we will have a balanced budget for 26, 27 budget. Next slide. So we are, RWA is looking to purchase and rebuild some equipment. Two equipment to rebuild is the motor grader and the dozer. And we're also looking to purchase a D6 track dozer along with a cart machine and cart machine spools. Total expenditures for our fleet is about $1.5 million. Any questions on our fleet budget. Next slide. So RW has several capital improvement projects underway, including initiatives that serve as the seed funding for future development. There are no new CIP projects in this fiscal year. Historically, they used to put the cart before the horse or count the chickens before the eggs are hatched. So long story short, what we do is once the revenues are recognized and we have the revenue, then we allocate those to CIP projects before You know, we want to make sure we have the revenue before we can allocate those to the projects. Next slide. So this board has authorized $4.2 million of projects. We've spent about $22 million of the $4.2 million, which leaves about $20 million in encumbered funds for RWA as of March 31, 2026. So any questions about the RWA budget? Oh, last slide. Sorry. JUST TO RECAP, OUR OPERATIONAL BUDGET, WE'RE PROJECTING $21 MILLION, $21.9 MILLION IN REVENUES, $17.9 MILLION IN OPERATIONAL EXPENSES, AND THEN $4 MILLION FOR DEBT AND CAPITAL TRANSFERS. OUR FLEET BUDGET, WE'RE LOOKING AT $1.5 MILLION OF PURCHASE, WHICH LEAVES A BALANCE OF $5,700. And then in capital improvement projects, we have $42 million of authorized. We expended $22 million of it. It leaves us an encumbered balance of $20 million. So any questions regarding the RWA's capital, fleet, and operational budget?

Board, any questions?

Could you go back a couple slides? There you go. HOW MUCH IS OUR BOND PAYMENT? HOW MUCH IS OUR BOND PAYMENT? THE REMAINING BOND PAYMENT THE REMAINING BOND PAYMENT THE REMAINING BOND PAYMENT IS ABOUT $2.2 MILLION.

IS ABOUT $2.2 MILLION. IS ABOUT $2.2 MILLION.

AND THEN WHAT'S THE 4.7 AND THEN WHAT'S THE 4.7 AND THEN WHAT'S THE 4.7 MILLION? MILLION? MILLION?

YEAH, SO WE TAKE THE 4 MILLION YEAH, SO WE TAKE THE 4 MILLION YEAH, SO WE TAKE THE 4 MILLION MINUS THE 2.2 AND THEN THE 15 FOR MINUS THE 2.2 AND THEN THE 15 FOR MINUS THE 2.2 AND THEN THE 15 FOR FIXED ASSET PURCHASES.

FIXED ASSET PURCHASES. So we're going to transfer $1.791 million into reserves?

Reserves, which basically is our CIP or our capital projects. $5 million for equipment. And if our revenues come in less, then that number will be less. So that's the number that we... make adjustments accordingly if the revenues come higher or lower.

No, we're good, I just, I missed that.

Okay, so any other questions?

Board, any questions? Not?

All right, thank you.

I think that's, we'll go to other reports. Director's report.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm happy to report last week Elizabeth and I attended the California Transportation Commission meeting in San Jose, and the commission approved an allocation of $2,393,000 in local partnership program funds to the Santa Fe Rehabilitation Project, which is a match to the Allocation of measure funds that was just approved and the funding agreement was approved today. So that project is funded as of today and Also just wanted to confirm that I had a meeting with the executive director of Cal Vans following last month's meeting and he is confirmed to present to the board at the June board meeting so He'll be here. So I appreciated Caltrans offer to do their presentation in July because we'll have budgets and that presentation next month just as an early reminder that we host the next city county dinner, which is July 16th, and it'll be at Hilmar cheese and so mark your calendars and Also, I believe it's official official that we were able to find one more date in 2026 where all board members are available for the board retreat So it will not be June 23rd. It will be October 13th October

I didn't say it that way, did I?

It'll be October 13th. So Stephanie, I believe, has already sent out an updated agenda. Just please, please, please carve that into your calendar. Cement it. If you have executive assistants or anyone that helps with your calendar, there is no turning back. October 13th. I'm set. All right. And then lastly, next week is kind of a chaotic week. What? Oh, yeah. Oh, no. Okay, but you will be here on the 13th?

Yes. Okay, good.

OK. The last thing I want to mention is I will be in and out next week, largely out next week. But I'm not going anywhere. I just have a lot going on. And the week culminates with my firstborn promoting into junior high. So it is, I know, I'm much too young for a 13-year-old. I'm sorry. And then Nav has something that he wants to say.

I WANT TO I WANT TO HIGHLIGHT OUR STAFF YEAH I WANT TO HIGHLIGHT OUR STAFF AT RWA AS YOU KNOW THERE WAS A FIRE OUT THERE ON TUESDAY monday and we had our staff very resilient you know from our supervisors to james i would say they're out there you know putting the fire out with their feet but safety and i were out there not putting off her was just over there looking um but i want to say i want i want the board to know that our staff did a phenomenal job in handling that fire it was one of the biggest fires that rwa had PROBABLY BURNED ABOUT 46, ABOUT 40 ACRES. HAD SOME DAMAGE, BUT I WANT TO SAY THIS FOR THIS BOARD AND I HOPE OUR STAFF IS WATCHING THAT, I WANT TO GIVE CREDIT TO OUR STAFF THAT DID A PHENOMENAL JOB IN HANDLING THAT SITUATION. IT COULD HAVE GONE REALLY BAD AND I'M PRETTY SURE DIRECTOR PEREIRA YOU PROBABLY SAW THE SMOKE FROM YOUR HOUSE.

I DROVE PAST IT WHILE REALIZING ALL THE WORK THAT HAD BEEN DONE TO STOP THE FIRE.

AND THE STAFF THE LAST COUPLE OF DAYS JUST STAYING OUT THERE LATE JUST TO MAKE SURE THERE'S NOTHING. Ironically enough, there was a fire today at Billy Wright at one of our, but it was out real quick. So just wanted to give you a highlight to our staff that did a phenomenal job. I do have a question.

Yeah, so the gas lines in several spots burnt? And so is that just the gas is under such low pressure it didn't cause big issues?

Well, yeah, the typical gas quality that's in that pipeline is flammable, but it's not explosive. So it will start burning, and that was what a lot of our staff on the ground was doing Monday afternoon, was trying to extinguish the fire inside the pipe. A lot of times the fire was actually hot enough that that pipe actually melts. There were several spots where you can go out and look down, and it looks almost like it was melted oil that has now reformed into plastic. And that was part of the challenge. I mean, for the last three days, we've had our water trucks circling the site continuously wetting down those areas i definitely appreciate nav's comments i also want to pass on my thanks to cal fire and i believe we even had a city merced engine one was out there and uh you know again uh complimentary both their staff our staff uh cal fire was very complimentary of the efforts our staff put in uh it was one of those instances where the wind was gusty we had low humidity And once the fire started in the grass, even though we've cut that grass three times this year, it was only about six inches high, but the wind whipped it up and over the hillside and jumped across the road into phase one through four. So as Nav said, it was about 40 acres of damage. you know preliminary estimates a little over two hundred thousand dollars in materials and labor to rebuild the gas system we submitted our deviation report and variance request to the air district today because clearly we're going to be offline for longer than five days materials should arrive tomorrow with the holiday monday we expect to start repairs on tuesday and it'll probably be a several week process to get the gas system replaced but thank you

directors any reports I Just say I'm very excited about the SB 1 LPP funding for Santa Fe that was a project that we were looking at having maybe a couple years out and Able to put that together with the recent range that and Caltrans has left because of the rerouting of traffic going on to Santa Fe I was just glad that they moved it over to the consent calendar so it was unanimously approved which is very exciting and just happy to move forward on this project the project director Nelson anything to report

I know he was. I didn't have the heart to. Director Reed? Director Pereira?

Director Serra?

So the J59 project that I've been working on did not pass the Appropriations Committee. And to be honest with you, staff, I don't think they're, well, so I didn't feel like their report was very accurate. They did worst case scenario on every cost. made it seem like a hundred and fifty million dollar deal Which is fine. We weren't I think we weren't prepared for that Yeah, so I talked to the senator today and she said it's you know But not dead yet that they're gonna do some work and hopefully we can revive it if not soon at least in the next session good Dr. Serrano

Everybody has a good rest of the week, a good weekend. A lot of things going on in downtown Merced. We've had a lot of great events lately, and tonight there's a concert at Ballpark Square, and then this weekend there's also the Merced Art Festival as well. So they're doing, I think, five live murals downtown, doing a lot of other good things to help unify downtown. So continued good momentum, I think, for us downtown in particular.

Thank you. And as far as for me, we had a Cal Vans meeting last week, I think it was last week, with the new director taking full control, Sid. He did a great job. First time in a long time that I've seen our budget where I could actually understand it. well laid out yeah there are some shortfalls and it'll be worked through so he's doing a great job and also the board approved a technical advisory uh committee uh then they'll be reaching out to each jurisdiction if they wish to participate i highly recommend that we participate we told them we would yeah and i actually i'm the avini decided who you're gonna put into it you

Those women right there?

Those women?

At least two of them.

Oh, that's two of them? Oh, great, great, okay. Well, great. Yeah, because we do need to participate, I think. It's on his way, you know? Yeah. And then also, I was in our last council meeting, but I believe, Mr. Moore, you went to our, I'm sorry I wasn't able to see, but it was nice to see you come into our meeting, considering what you went through just earlier than that with all the fire and everything. So I really, really appreciate you coming out and making yourself available. And for me, that's it. Any other further business? If not, we're in adjournment.