City Council - Regular Meeting

I call this regular meeting of the San Marcos City Council to order. Today is Tuesday, August 18th of 2026. Time is 6.24. Apologies for the late start. Our three o'clock meeting ran all the way to 5.58. So, Ms. Trevino, would you call the roll, please?

Ms. Rodriguez. Mr. Baselk.

I need to see her somewhere.

Ms. Garza? Here. Mayor Hewson? Here. Mr. Scott? Here. Mr. Mendoza? Here. Mr. Gonzalez? Here. Ms. Laquan present.

OK. And I don't see the person doing our invocation this evening. Is Reverend Sheila Sidbury-Thomas in the lobby? If not, we will move on to our pledges of allegiance to the United States and Texas.

I pledge allegiance 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.

honor the Texas flag, and pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state, under God, one and indivisible. Thank you. We will now start with our citizen comment time frame. The city council will hear citizens' comments at regular meetings, work sessions, and workshops. There is a process to sign up. if you're online when it's almost your turn, there's going to be a pop-up question appear on your screen and and make sure that you respond to it so that you can get in when it's your turn. Speakers may speak once during the citizen comment time period and may not yield time to others. You speak now about a public hearing topic on tonight's agenda. I ask that you not repeat exactly the same comments during the public hearing on the same topic. When it is your turn to speak, state your name for the record. You will have three minutes. When you begin speaking, you're going to be in the green. The green will start to disappear as time goes by. When you have 20 seconds left, the timer shows only yellow and there is a little ping sound. When your time to speak is up, the timer will be red and a bell will ring. If you hear a popping sound, step back a little from the microphone. The mayor and council will endeavor to ensure that meetings are conducted in a courteous manner and in an atmosphere free of defamation, intimidation, personal insults, profanity, or threats of violence. If you do any of those, you will hear the gavel, and I will ask you to leave council chambers. This is your warning. So we have six people signed up this evening, and I will read all the names in order so everyone can be ready. We have an Aslan Hollier, Maxfield Baker, Randall Terrell, Lonnie Stern, who's here to answer questions about the scooter program, if there are any, John Artunio, and Lydia Bander. Is Aslan, that you?

Aslan, yeah.

Sorry, Aslan.

It's all good. Good evening, council. My name is Aslan. I live in Cottonwood Creek. I'm here about something simple, getting people to election polls free of charge. People have mentioned the bus, but this is what I found. My nearest polling location off Broadway is 3.1 miles from Cottonwood Creek, five minutes by car, over an hour on foot, 26-minute bike ride. That walk and bike isn't safe. Driving isn't even super safe. One bus stop is 2.6 miles away, but from there, only a half mile from the polling location. A different bus stop by Centro is five minute drive, hour long walk, 14 minute bike ride. We have to travel just to get to the bus stop. Another problem is both bus stops are blue line, Route 6. The red line, Route 5, is what actually reaches Broadway. So transit for us is covering 2.6 miles just to reach a stop then transferring or walking the last half mile. The elections office, the main early voting site, doesn't even have a bus stop. It's still another quarter mile from the stop. And where stops actually exist, buses run 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., 4.30 for Route 6. Monday through Friday only, polls stay open until 7. Early voting includes Saturday and Sunday when the bus doesn't run. 123 just isn't safe. It's crazy we don't have a closer stop. There's an elementary school and the high school is right by our neighborhood. People have been hit on this road by a car, on foot, and on their bike. Even a river road full of tubers all summer has no safe sidewalk, and that's what people enjoy doing here. This is bigger than elections, but right now it's costing people their votes. This falls hardest on people without a car, older neighbors, lower income households, young voters who don't drive or live off campus. I'm not alone in raising this. I've been told the city has already discussed this something before, so there's precedent. The Lions Club already runs a volunteer river shuttle out of City Park. If a nonprofit can do that with volunteers, the city can do it for democracy. So my ask is direct, a rideshare credit covering the ride there and back, a dedicated shuttle, special bus operations, or a combination of any of them, for early voting and on election day, including the weekends, reach neighborhoods like Cottonwood Creek where a transit option actually isn't an option. And I'm not sure what it's like for other neighborhoods, but I'm looking after my precinct. Voting is supposed to be accessible to everyone, and right now, for a lot of San Marcos residents, it's not. I'm asking you to change that before November 3rd. Thank you.

Our next speaker is Max Phil Baker, and I believe he's joining us online.

Hello. Can you see and hear me?

We can.

Hooray. Maxfield- Yes, I'm Maxfield-Baker. Today I'm here again on behalf of the San Marcos Civics Club. I wanted to, kind of similar to my comments at 3 p.m., make the community at large aware that for the third year in a row, the San Marcos Civics Club is conducting our city council candidate questionnaire for all the folks running for office. That would be the mayor's race, place three, four, and six. Before this, we sent this out today to all of the candidates. It will be due on October the 8th, which is one of the last or like right after voter registration ends. We will expect the candidates to answer each question starting with a yes or no. We will not allow them or be disappointed in them if they use artificial intelligence to answer these questions. And each question is also provided with about a paragraph explanation about why the Civics Club has elevated this question and, you know, give the context for some folks that might be newer to some of these issues. Our questions are, would you support publishing the draft agenda to the city's website? This has been a question of ours for several years in a row. We appreciate some council members that have brought this forward but have not had enough of you to support it, so we will continue to ask this question. We also are asking, would you advocate for the Hartman reforms to be fully adopted into the civil service contract? But the San Marcos police department today, you all had an executive session item talking about the civil service contract process. We are asking specifically as the Hartman reforms had to end the 180 day rule that creates unnecessary statutes of limitations. in the delay of interview rule that allows officers to wait and review video before filing their paperwork, adding public transparency for officers' discipline files, ending third-party arbitration, which costs taxpayers and allows bad cops to stay, and ending vacation forfeiture, which allows cops to use overtime to avoid discipline. We are also asking candidates, would you support requiring ethics commission decisions be posted in a public paper of record? Right now, if the Ethics Commission found city staff or city council members to be negligent in their duties or have done something that violates our ethics code, that decision is only disseminated to the filer and the person who is being accused instead of the public at large. We're also asking if you would consider bringing a lobbying ordinance to the agenda to create transparency for San Marcos residents about the influence of money, political action committees and paid lobbyists on our decision making process. Last year, we saw several candidates supported by a political action committee here in town, which seemed to have a big impact on our elections. Our own ethics commission has brought forward a lobbying ordinance that, again, the council did not see wise to vote in the majority to support. Our last question is, would you be willing to stand up for San Marcos against the state or federal government? And this is all too clear of an issue as it comes to data centers and the recent changes you all supported. Thank you very much. We look forward to hearing the answers from the candidates.

Our next speaker is Randall Terrell.

Good afternoon or good evening again council y'all heard from me earlier today. My name is Randall Terrell and I was bringing up the idea that San Marcos had the city of San Marcos has a public perception problem in terms of encouraging public participation in the city processes. I would like to take a moment to second what Mr. Maxwell Baker said about the Ethics Commission and I've had people come up to me recently and ask how to discover those files and look at the minutes and watch the video trying to figure out what's going on and it's not at all clear what's going on and they haven't met very much anyway. Following this afternoon's comments about the public perception problem is I wanted to suggest some solutions because I think there's some low hanging fruit that the city could encourage people to do and the city to do publicize hearings, meetings, agendas, and that type of thing. If you check on the city website, there's a communications division. You click on that, you get an email to contact and ask questions. You also find three or four policies about how public information and social media are going to be used. One of the stated processes or goals is to use the social media site to publicize hearings and other agenda items. And the good news is you have a website. Actually, you've got a social media site on Instagram that I was able to find. I believe it's y'all's at SanMarcusTexTX. And in that, I did not find any hearing or meeting notices. I found a lot of pretty pictures of the river, which I appreciate, but didn't go anywhere to encouraging public participation. I did not find a link to SanMarcusTexas on Facebook. I did not check any other social media sites. But I would encourage this council to look at publishing notice proactively of controversial, known controversial, suspect controversial, and in general, just the regular meetings of the various departments, chairs, steering committees, whatever, just to encourage people to participate more in this process. Thank you.

Our next speaker, Lonnie Stern, who I think is just here for answering questions. So next will be John Artunio.

Good evening. My name is John Antonio. I live at Adlerwood Homes on Third Plain. I come here for several things. One thing is the roads. We were recently informed that the roads fall under the city jurisdiction. But after talking to some of the people here prior to this meeting, They're looking into it, but they said it might not fall under the city. But anyways, that's one thing. Another thing is our street lights. We have numerous street lights that are out, and some of them in the backyards as well, which are for security lights, for security purposes. their previous director had called and tried to get these lights replaced. And I tried calling and one of the council members had tried calling and we were told that they will not replace the lights because they are property of the Sam Rocks housing authority. Okay. Well the director said, okay, well, then we'll rent a cherry picker and our maintenance department will go ahead and replace the bulbs that are burned out. They said no, because the pole belongs to the city of San Marcos, therefore your maintenance department cannot touch those lights. Meanwhile, more lights are burning out, so we're living in a dark community. No kind of security lights, no kind of street lighting, no nothing. So that's causing us to leave our porch lights on to have some kind of lighting, and our electric wheels are going up. The third thing I can speak about was the drainage ditch that runs along the south side of the apartments between the little strip mall Pac-Mill and Taziki's. It's overgrown with cat's tails and all kinds of other stuff. And it's a breeding ground for mosquitoes. And with recent West Nile mosquito that was found, we can't even sit in our backyards or in front yards in our sidewalks without doing this number because we're just being eaten up alive by mosquitoes. That was it for me.

Our next speaker is Lydia Banda.

Good evening, mayor and council members. My name is Lydia Banda and I'm also here tonight to bring attention to the condition of our roads at Allen woods because we were just recently told, you know, that it does belong to the city. So, I mean, I've lived in Allen Woods for many years and the roads are just getting worse and worse. So if it is, you know, the city's property or whatever, it would be great to, you know, to prioritize because I am a wheelchair user and the condition of the roads creates serious safety concerns for me and others with mobility challenges. The potholes and cracks make it very difficult sometimes and dangerous to travel safely. The problem is also affecting our sidewalks. The cracks from the damaged roads are extending all the way towards the sidewalks, making it very hard for me to safely get around with my wheelchair. I should not have to worry about getting the wheelchair caught in a crack or in a pothole or even unable to safely reach my destination. Many of the residents in these areas are low-income families, seniors, and individuals with disabilities. We may not have the financial resources to deal with injuries, wheelchair repairs, or other problems caused by the unsafe roads and sidewalks. I'm asking the city council to please prioritize repairing these potholes and road cracks and damaged sidewalks and to consider the needs of residents who use wheelchairs, walkers, and other mobility devices. We deserve a safe and accessible roads and sidewalks regardless of our income or where we live. Thank you so much for listening to my concerns.

Okay, Mr. Gonzales and Mr. Pantaleon, will y'all look into that and get back with these two people?

Mr. Portugno and Ms. Banda, I'm going to give you my business card with my cell phone on it. I'll hand it to you just now so that way we can talk about the situation. And Mayor and Council, we'll get together with appropriate staff and housing authority leadership so that way we can understand the concerns and then also then delineate whose responsibility belongs to which. and then we'll inform council.

All right, thank you very much.

Thank you.

Okay, so that concludes our citizen comment time period. Council, next is our consent agenda, and I'm looking to see who has anything to pull. I have number nine and number 14. Mm-hmm. Anybody have anything else? Okay. 9 and 14. So I am seeking a motion to approve 1 through 8, 10 through 13, and 15 through 18. And I'll give that to Ms. Rodriguez and seconded by Mr. Mendoza. Did you say? Yes, ma'am. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Ms. Trevino, are we push button voting tonight?

Yes, ma'am.

Hot dog.

Motion passes 7 to 0.

All right. So that takes us to our public hearings. We will return to items 9 and 14 after the public hearing. Ms. Trevino, item 19.

hold a public hearing to receive comments for or against Ordinance 2026-34, amending the project plan and reinvestment zone financing plan for the tax increment reinvestment zone number five, downtown Tours, to increase funding in support of an annual downtown operations and project plan. Authorizing city manager or her designee to execute the amendment on behalf of the city, including procedural provisions and declare an effective date, and consider approval of Ordinance 2026-34 on the first of two readings.

All righty. Presentation.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council. My name is Helen Ramirez. I'm the Director of Economic and Local Business Development, and I'm joined also here with our downtown manager, Josie Fayetta. Thank you. This is, first of all, I'd like to thank the TURS Board and the Main Street Board and City Departments for collaborating in this process. The TURS Board met on July 6th of 2020, 2026 and approve the revised project and financing plan which increased the budget by one time projects in the amount of $937,900 for a total estimated cost. I wanna make sure that the increase is only $937,900 but the estimated cost that is in the fund is approximately $8,281,998. The projects in the plan will implement recommendations from the adopted downtown area plan for consistency, including pedestrian amenities, beautification initiatives, and maintenance of downtown public spaces and right of way. It also includes traffic control measures and improves connectivity for pedestrians. Next slide. The one-time projects include Main Street projects as well as other projects that would be led within our downtown departments, such as, as you know, we have much gum removal, need of gum removal in our downtown sidewalks, planters, a work shed for our downtown crew that works out there seven days a week cleaning our sidewalks. We have landscaping projects, dog waste station replacements, tree lighting for the county courthouse to increase lighting in our downtown. Other departments would lead sidewalk reconstruction, intersection lighting improvements, sidewalk repairs, and a flexible festival street through a preliminary engineering report. So this is a report prior to any options with regard to creating a flexible festival street, as well as overall downtown lighting. Next slide. I know this is somewhat hard to read, so I'm just gonna, it just gives a quick, more of a description of what is included. The planters, there would be six flowering planters that would be included, one work shed for our current staff, The landscaping would be update on Hutchinson Irrigation Line. The downtown amenities would of course, the dogway station that has extreme wear and tear currently. The tree lighting on the square. And also hybrid lighting implementation plan, a sidewalk reconstruction from San Antonio Street from north to Guadalupe. Intersection lighting at $10,000 per intersection. intersection improvements on San Antonio, Comanche, and San Antonio and Feltner Alley intersection, sidewalk repair on North Guadalupe by Target, and the flexible street is on San Antonio Street. Next slide. The total increase for one-time projects is approximately 12.8% increase. And so on the table on the right is what would be the final change to the project and finance plan. For example, in item number one, multimodal transportation mobility, including sidewalks and shuttle service, would be 2,758,555. Item two, which is overall enhancement of downtown, including lighting, safety, and other aesthetic features, 3,523,443. And acquisition of property is not something, it remains unchanged, but because it is part of these three items, it was included. Next slide. There are also annual costs, but these annual costs do not present an increase in the total cap of the operating costs allowed. So while we are proposing to add a full-time temporary maintenance staff to the crew that already exists, it doesn't exceed the cap that is allowed to be used through the tourist financing. Also, in that operating cost, we'd also have the extension of the grant, which is our big grant. So that's always something that our businesses really appreciate, and it also helps us recruit more businesses that are family-friendly and retail-friendly that we like to diversify that type of retail. Next slide. I like this slide because it really talks about many of the projects that have been completed through the fund. I'm not gonna go through all of them, but as you can see from alley redevelopment to alley paving to security and safety, pedestrian connectivity, downtown shuttle pilot. So there's many programs that have been completed through this tax increment and reinvestment zone. I would also say that this is another tool in the toolbox that the city uses in addition to their capital improvement program. And as we heard tonight, we have limited funds for some of those capital improvements that are very costly. So having this fund going back to the zone that is about 244 acres allows a staff to do more with this money. Next slide. And that is, this has been reviewed by the TURS board, by the Main Street board. The county has also, which is also a contributor to the tax increment, has been notified. And we request that approval for this amended plan in the amount of $937,900. Thank you. And we're here to answer any questions you may have.

Okay. I will open the public hearing. We have no one signed up. But if there's anyone here who wishes to speak far against or about this item, now would be the time if you'll come on in and step up to the podium. And going once, twice, three times. Seeing no one, I'll close the public hearing. And I will... Motion to approve.

Second.

We have a motion from Ms. Rodriguez. Seconded by Mr. Peselk. And... Now we will discuss, I want to make it clear on that project. We're not spending $8 million this year. That's in the plan. It's always a cumulative. Yes, ma'am. Uh, the 2000 was spent several years ago. So I just say, you know, it's at the nine 37 nine. Um, and these are, this is money spent for what's hers was created for, which is to put some of the money that comes from downtown. directly back into downtown. Council, I have one amendment and one conversation to have. Does anybody have anything that they'd like to go first? Okay, one of my amendments is going to be, since it looked like maybe we thought we would get here in July, but it's actually August, my motion to amend is to change the header from July to August. And I would appreciate a second. Second. Thank you, Ms. Rodriguez. And I'm doing this just because when you're going back and researching, and you look at July, and then you start looking for other things with July, and it's not there. You don't find it on the July list. So that will be helpful. Ms. Trevino, let's vote on changing July to August.

Motion passes seven to zero.

All right. Thank you. The next item is an item that was on there, and it has to do with a tree and a sidewalk, in a sidewalk, not and a sidewalk, but in a sidewalk. If someone would like to explain to us, to the public, exactly what we're talking about there. Thank you, Mr. Condor.

Sean Condor, Director of Engineering and Capital Improvements. We've received complaints through SMTX Connect about a sidewalk that's basically between the Target and Texas State, Wood Street. It's on between Concho, on Guadalupe between Concho and Woods. There's a big tree that's growing into it. And the tree has gotten to the point where it's destroyed the sidewalk, pushed, heaved it up, if you will. And so people are tending to walk into the street or in the bike lane. and the sidewalk's not being used. And so the request was, could we repair the sidewalk? And so we looked into it, and there's definitely ways to repair it. We would have to coordinate with the property owners to make sure if they'd give us an easement or potentially sell us an easement. But the repair would basically repair that sidewalk so you can actually walk on the sidewalk between Conto Street and Wood Street.

And the estimated diameter of that tree is?

Very big.

I don't think I could get my arms around it. So this is a significant issue that has grown with time.

Yes. And the plan that we have in place would save the tree. Basically, we'd shift the sidewalk further away from the tree, create a tree well, if you will. And so the intention is not to remove the tree, which, of course, goes with the higher price tag of $300,000.

That's where I went, 300,000. I want people to be able to get around there. I want the tree to stay. It's the 300,000. Ms. Rodriguez is also on that board with me.

Yes, ma'am, I was actually gonna suggest or request of staff. I know, thank y'all for putting the presentations that you provided to TERS. Perhaps we can get a picture on the board. Again, I might have the wrong packet. It's page 1037, but there is a picture that staff put together of the specific tree. I just don't want to presume everybody knows which one we're talking about.

That is the right page.

Hayden, I'll see if he can pull it up for us.

There he goes. Mr. Meagle. That's it. At it again. As you can see. Yeah, that's the tree.

Large tree. As big as, wide as the sidewalk pretty much now. So, my concern is the $300,000, that's a lot of money to spend on a relatively small square footage. And... You have what you want to add, or shall I go ahead and say it?

I mean, you can go ahead and say it, and I'll provide any.

Yeah, I would hope that perhaps the university might help us kick in, because this is right kind of in the middle of their campus. Now, what the tree is in front of is, I believe it's private property, the McCarty Student Center. But still, I'm hoping that since they have quite an interest or should have an interest in this, that they could provide something. And I'm hoping this is one of those that we're thinking this is worst case scenario and ends up costing less.

That's the goal for sure.

Yeah.

Right. If I may, so I know the committee alongside county representatives shared similar concerns about the price tag and about a potential cost sharing agreement for this project. And so I guess to the mayor's point, it's one thing to appropriate the money and we know that whatever's not spent will return and I have assurance with that as well. But I guess in terms of where those conversations are in that process, maybe somebody could speak to that and see if those conversations have begun, is there any interest?

They have begun. However, the conversation was we really need to look at not only that street, the surrounding streets. So it actually opened up a bigger conversation about giving the new hotel coming in and other amenities, how we really need to work that whole possible block. So it actually opened up more conversation. So it started with that sidewalk conversation, then it increased. So what I would say, that was just the first initial conversation, but we're happy to go back and have more conversations. I know on August 31st, were to present to the tourist board that implementation plan and how we're gonna implement. So I hope to have more information prior. I would say if this becomes too costly or there is not that contribution, it is still a sidewalk repair project. So perhaps another area of a sidewalk repair could happen if this is too difficult to do. And it would still fit within the I guess priorities of our project and finance plan.

See the wheels turning.

That's for the tree removal and the sidewalk repair together? No, we would not remove the tree. I think it's very important.

For the record, we would not be removing the tree.

What's happening here?

Nobody said removal. No, we actually want to improve the pedestrian because they're walking on the street or in a parking area.

Yes, I definitely want to save a tree. I'm so happy to hear that. What kind of tree is it, by the way? I can't tell. Anybody know? Aren't you a tree guy? I'm just asking you guys.

Mr. Conroy, they asked about diameter and type. Oh. I'm just wondering if it's a hackberry or something.

No. I kid.

So I think my question, my request is, is that I'm not gonna suggest that we make a change in this, because when we make a change in the plan, then it's gotta come back, that's a whole new person and all that. I'm okay with leaving this 300,000 allocated, But before anything is done, I would like for this to come back to the tourist board. I think that was your plan anyway. So I just want to make that formal. And we see what we can do. Keep the tree. Keep it so that folks can go safely around the tree. And maybe not lose too many parking spaces. Yes.

And while that's not a motion, but as a member of the committee, second.

Thank you. So I believe that was their plan already. We're just formalizing that. Anything else from the council on this item? Okay, so you didn't have an amendment, you just had?

No. Okay.

I just want to make sure that we get to look at it again before that money is spent.

No, just thank you for starting that conversation with the university. I appreciate that.

I will say that we've made improvements this year and that we've got our Main Street Board, which is comprised of downtown folks and interest in downtown. The TURS Board is two council members, two commissioners, county commissioners, and a downtown business owner. And so we have the TERS. I've said the Main Street Board's got a lot of ideas. We hold the purse strings. So we have met with the two groups have met twice. Twice?

Three times?

Twice this year. And we will continue to do that as the Main Street Board identifies and has their plan for the next year. But I'll tell you, one of the things I'm really excited about on here is the gum removal. I think we'll all be excited. My mayor gum removal.

Yeah. I'd like to second that. Uh, this is actually one of my favorite committees, uh, to be a part of. And so, It is very rare for us to have access to capital to imagine. And so this is a different committee for that reason. But it was so nice to work with everybody, the mayor, the county, y'all, both committees. I've learned a lot. And in addition to the projects, one of my favorite is definitely what we're going to be doing for small businesses to expand that. I know that's part of your title. Yeah, I just look forward to seeing all these things as they move forward and appreciate the opportunity to be a part of it.

I will quickly mention how this is funded because I got an email from someone recently that thought there was an extra tax on downtown businesses and no. In 2011, the City Council decided to create this TERS. A snapshot was taken of the tax base. Ms. Folletti, you stop me at any time if I say something incorrect. That a snapshot was taken of the tax base and the taxes paid, and of the increase since 2011, 70% goes into the tourist fund, 30% goes into the general fund. That's for city and same for county. We did adjust that a little bit during COVID when we couldn't do projects anyway. So there has been a lot of improvements downtown. And so if you're shopping downtown or spending money downtown, then some of that is coming back into downtown improvement projects. So just a quick primer on the chairs. Number five, which is downtown. If everyone's ready, we can go ahead and vote on this item.

Motion passes seven to zero.

Thank you. Then we will go back to items nine and 14.

9 consider approval of resolution 2026-133r approving a license agreement with neutron holding inc doing business as lime authorizing a dockless electric scooter program within the city's right-of-way in coordination with Texas State University to offer students, visitors, and public environmentally friendly alternative to single occupancy vehicle trips for one year and up to five additional one-year renewals upon mutual agreement, authorize city manager or her designee to execute the agreement on behalf of the city and declare an effective date.

I have a motion by Mr. Scott, seconded by Ms. Rodriguez. The reason I pulled this was to call attention to this. On the consent agenda, it just kind of, flows through, and I just want the public to know, dockless scooters are back, or will be back. So anything else y'all would like to tell us? And then Ms. Rodriguez, would you like to cover what you asked and was answered on the message board?

Yes, ma'am. If you all want to talk about it first, I can pull up my question.

The start date? I'm Amy Finn. I'm the transit manager for the city. They have a proposed start date of September 1st. I also have a representative from Lime here, if you have any questions from them. Texas State already has an executed contract with them. We are obviously here to try to execute a contract on our side. So we're here for any questions or answers.

Basically, it's the same geographic area. And we did include new area or additional area on the east side of the interstate a year or two ago with the previous scooter folks. And so I understand that that's still going to be available because of improvements and sidewalks and being able to get from one side of the interstate to the other in that particular area.

Yes, ma'am. So it's going to be the same service zone as our previous provider with the newly expanded area that y'all approved in April 2025. Mm-hmm. And then we are offering a, by we, I mean Lime, is offering a Lime access program, which is going to be for our lower income neighbors. So anyone who receives any federal, state, or local assistance, as long as you can provide proof of that with Lime, there is an easy way to go about that, and you get 50% off your rides within the community. Okay.

Thank you, Mayor. Go ahead. Ms. Finn, you touched on most of it. I guess I just had a follow-up question on that. So to make sure we can maximize people's knowledge of these opportunities, have you all looked into getting in contact with Southside or other nonprofits that sort of have a lot of these communities coming through them already? Is that something that, I guess it might be our team more than Lime does, but in terms of outreach, what is that plan?

So we will be able to go to the areas who we know are going to be utilizing those services. So we can go to WIC, say, hey, this program's available. If they need any help, we can kind of help them on board. And Lonnie, stop me if I start Lime. So, yeah, we'll be able to go. Community action clients, et cetera. We'll be able to, like, go where they are and have an outreach. Hey, it's going to be a full outreach in general just to launch the program. Just say, hey, scooters are back.

And to let the students on campus know. And Ms. Grisel, Paris Carey would be able to help you with the list of people to contact.

Correct, yes. So we'll work with all of our stakeholders to make sure, just in general, the community knows that they're here and it's okay that they're here. And that there are some options available for our residents.

I do want to thank Lime for making that accommodation for those who need some help.

Yes, I want to second that. That's why when I saw that component in the agreement, I was excited about that. And so thank you. Yeah, no, I'm just really excited. When we lost the last company, the micromobility is a big thing to our communities. And so it's really nice to see this come back. And yeah, good job, everybody. Anything else from anybody?

Yes, ma'am.

Yes, Mr. Gonzalez.

So we have a representative from Lyme, right?

Yes.

So I had a question specifically for them.

OK, sir, if you can make your way to the podium with microphone. Thank you. Go ahead, Mr. Gonzalez.

So I know for the Lime Access program, one of the qualifications is participation in the free or reduced lunch program. Our local ISD has 100% participation. So I know in a different market, because every student had free lunch, their school district didn't provide individualized paperwork that shows that the student qualifies. So would a family just being able to prove that their child is going to a SMCISD school be enough to qualify them? Or how difficult would it be for them to prove that they participate in the free lunch program given that everyone in our ISD participates?

They participate, but they don't all qualify. There's a difference.

Being a Title I school, the entire school qualifies.

But for individual families, it's what, 75%? Yeah. No, I know they get it, but the qualification that we're talking about here may be different, but I'll let him answer the question.

Well, sure. Thank you very much for inviting me. My name is Lonnie Stern. I handle government relations for Lyme in Texas. So first, before we directly answer that, I think it's important to note that you need to be 18 to ride a scooter. It's very important. We see a lot of adults get an account and then they allow a child on the scooter. They're accepting responsibility when that happens. So this is meant to be for college students and older. And then to your point, when you're looking at an access program, you have two ways of doing it. You can either look at a geographic zone and say everybody here needs this service. I don't personally think that's as effective, because you're not targeting people who actually need it, you're making assumptions about where they live. And so our preferred way to do it would be to look at people who are receiving food stamps, people who are on Medicare or Medicaid, any sort of assistance of that kind, because there are national databases. And so we'll ask them to register and say that they want this service. When they do that, they give us an email that then becomes part of their account. Anytime their account uses the scooter, they get the discount. And we're able to qualify them immediately because they're in those federal databases. So I will say it would be helpful if the council members would spread the word about access, and we'd certainly work with some of your community support service teams that maybe have access to a utility bill when we get here.

So I guess that changes the root of my question. Because my understanding was as long as the household had a qualifying child. So I guess let me give you the actual real world example. So in San Antonio, several years ago, there was a family who lived relatively close to their school. So the father would walk the kids to school, but then use a scooter to get to work. But because the school district was a Title I school, the district was not providing them any sort of paperwork that they qualified. So they were having difficulty providing that to y'all. So the solution in that particular case is they actually qualify for food stamps. So I helped them, um, apply to get snap and then they use snap as a way to get onto us program. Um, but had y'all been able to just, they proved that their student went to a school district that had the free lunch program and just proving enrollment in the district would have been enough. I mean, I guess in the long run, they ended up benefiting from getting the SNAP, but it took like a two-month process for them to benefit from your program because they had to get through the whole process of getting SNAP to then qualify for the LIMACS.

Yeah, and we do need them to have qualified for themselves for one of these assistance programs. I will say that your utility rebate program would also be a qualifying event for somebody. So there may be people who are benefiting from that who perhaps are not enrolled in one of those other programs, and we'd be able to qualify that. Awesome.

Cool.

Thank you.

Yeah, I think getting more information with that would be helpful, because I don't even know what you mean by utility rebate program. But I'm looking at the website, and it lists like SNAP, Medicaid, reduced rate utility bill. Right. We don't. Yeah, we don't. We don't do that. I have that. Then it says free or reduced school lunch program. So I think that is, because that is a big conversation, and we know that every child qualifies for that, right? Yeah. For other programs, that is one of the checkboxes where it's like, oh, if you qualify for that, since your entire household qualifies for that, you therefore qualify for this other type of discount and stuff. I think that's kind of what my colleague is trying to get to. So if y'all could just look into that, that'd be great, just so that our neighbors can know if that is one of the kind of what would...

Certainly be an easier way to get in.

Yeah. And I'm honestly not sure how many of our neighbors who do qualify for, I mean, it's all of our, the households would wanna use this, but it'd be helpful to just have clarification.

I would like to add that the way that we do micro mobility in San Marcos kind of helps with a lot of this because we do a license agreement with one provider. It kind of funnels everything through staff. So it's a lot easier for us as staff to kind of help navigate residents who are having issues. So hopefully it's not a two month long process. there's like a point of contact, and we have a one provider, so it's a little bit easier for us.

Yeah, and for clarification, it didn't take two months for Lime to approve them. It took two months for the state of Texas to approve them to get SNAP to then qualify for Lime.

Okay. I do have one question, one more question, and that is please tell me that y'all pick up the scooters very regularly because we've had a problem previously where they didn't pick them up very quickly. They were falling over. They were blocking sidewalks. It was a mess, and certainly in some areas it was a bigger mess than others. Like folks who live near the river, they'd use the scooter to get to the river, jump in, and just leave them.

Well, some of the benefit that we have is the previous experience of other vendors that were here. So we're creating a very large no-go zone around the riverfront because we don't want to fish scooters out of the river anymore than you want to see them in there. Similarly, we have a local team that winds up rebalancing throughout the day. Our goal is to make sure that scooters move more than once a day, hopefully 1.5 times a day or more so that we don't have to rebalance for it. But when we first arrive, we assume that there will be some rider behavior work to do to make sure that people are parking in appropriate places. And to get ahead of that, we've been working with Texas State on instituting parking corrals so that there is street tape on the ground. And that way people know this is a place that you park versus any which way you want to do that. So we're going to test it out until we lock them in and then move towards making those mandatory. Yeah. Yeah, when they were leaving them, it was all over town.

Yeah, I was supposed to say to them, Mary, you're really excited about this program, but I remember when the other folks left, you were like, hallelujah, no more scooters, no fishing. So I'm glad that there's reassurance. I figured that y'all had a system, and that's why you're like, yes.

Well, I mean, it's not making you any money if it's laying there for three days. Exactly. It's causing problems.

Yeah, and Amy and Alex have been a pleasure to work with, and once this goes through, we'll start working on the parking corral situation for... downtown so that way we can get off the sidewalks. Parking corral, I like it.

Me too.

Thank you. I have one more question. Yeah, please.

Who draws your map on where you go and why? Say that again? Who draws the map on where you service?

You're asking about the pink spots like I did?

Well, I see one spot, and then maybe we could extend it just a little bit.

So we, as staff, determine that. So if there's a spot. I'm sure there's a good reason. A little more.

Right here, Wonder World over to.

Yeah, I asked that on the message board.

And it's like between 123 and Wonder World, you know, you get the school district over there, you get some houses. It's like right on this side of 35, we've got some houses that go from one world all the way down to 80. It might be a good idea to...

I can look at that. My map got cut off, so I don't know what we're talking about.

But to my colleague's question, so it is city staff that will be, I guess my question is, once we roll this out, and should there be areas that are less than desirable for people to be driving through, it is city staff who can alter these no-go zones?

Yes, that is correct. We'll do it with Lime, of course, to put it into their system. But yes, we as staff can determine no-go zones, slow zones. Zones in general.

Yeah, it's probably a sidewalk issue now that I think about it. Between Wonderworld and 123, the school over there and everything might be a really good spot to have them, but it's hard to...

Sometimes we make it a no-ride zone if we know that cars are driving at a fast rate of speed. There's no shared-use path. There's a big hill, big blind hill... those type of situations. Like I said, my map got cut off. You're talking about right here?

Yeah. Yeah, it's not any different than the other side of 35. So I'm just saying there's right there between Wonder World and 123. Maybe we'll take a look at that. We'll talk about it, whatever it is around there.

Yeah, I would like to explore that, too, because with the new housing there, there are sidewalks now.

Yeah, Wonder World's really starting to push that way. There's going to be a lot of feel going that way. There's a lot of housing out that way.

We're talking this side of 35?

Yeah, east side.

That'd be great because right now I am a faux Uber and I take my brother and all his friends to work because it's too dark and they don't have cars, so... Y'all could scooter it up there, you'd be doing me a solid. Thank you.

Yeah, it's good to, it gives me confidence to know that it's our team who sees traffic patterns, who sees those things, being able to determine the geographical boundaries. I guess just for clarification too, because the questions helped me think about this. So when it comes to processing the applicable paperwork needing to be determined to be eligible for the 50%, that is also our staff as well? Or is that in... That's going to be Lime. Okay.

It's actually... Because it's associated with their account. So we wouldn't be able to go into their account on the back end and do that. So they would have to apply through Lime. But if they needed help, myself and Alex are... 100% ready perfect.

That was my second question given some people have difficulty supplying certain documents And then last question so we went to a conference in Baltimore recently where lime is You'll have it there and so is an ability for me to see like the actual how the scooter stops in these no-go zones How it forces you to slow down that was really cool to see I guess in terms of So when we have people visit here, when we went over there for the purposes, I guess, of allowing people who are visiting to explore the city, they actually gave us a free all-day code. And so the purpose was that people can go from the hotel, go and explore it using Lime, and you end up paying money, and we did. And so is that something that y'all are looking at for the purposes of like economic development and tourism or? It was bad for my pocketbook because then I went much further than the hotel. I mean, I took it to go see a baseball game. It was a very enjoyable experience and I probably wouldn't have seen the city in the same way going through an Uber or, you know, because you can tailor it to what you want to go see.

We liked it so much. It was a bunch of council members. I imagine they're probably all hyping it up in there.

uh local governments too well i really appreciate that i've also been traveling in other cities where we'll have a conference and then having access to transit or having access to micromobility really makes a difference to the experience of being in that city. With that in mind, we do wind up having that kind of relationship, usually with nonprofits that are hosting significant events. At the same time, we host First Ride Academies all the time. And at a First Ride Academy, we'll give some basic information about road safety and behavior. We'll give out a free helmet. And we also take people on a free ride And you have access to that vehicle. It's usually time limited. It might be for like a two-hour time frame you have access to that vehicle. But first, I would happily recreate that for the council at any point. But also, you know, if you want to host a First Ride Academy outside of Texas State, we'd be very interested in hearing about that as well.

I think we would definitely be interested. Yeah. It was a really enjoyable experience.

I'm so glad.

Yeah. Thank you. We're glad that y'all are going to be in San Marcos.

I'm so glad to hear it. Thank you. We're excited to be here, too.

Okay. Counsel, anything else? Well, by golly, let's vote on this one.

But thank you for pulling this, Mayor, because it's a good conversation.

Motion passes 7-0.

All righty. On to item 14.

Consider approval of resolution 2026-138R, proving an interlocal agreement with the city of Shirts for allocation of emergency medical services and for mutual aid to the unincorporated areas of Guadalupe County. Authorize the city manager or her designee to execute the interlocal agreement on behalf of the city and declare an effective date.

Motion to approve. Well, I was going to make the motion to approve, but I'll give it to Ms. Rodriguez, and I'll take the second on that. On item 14, the reason I pulled it was simply for the amendment to the document, but if you would like to just in general explain what this means and why we're doing it, that would probably be helpful for us and to our viewers at home.

Absolutely. Mayor, City Council, thank you. Jill Rosales, EMS Chief. San Marcos Hays County EMS has historically provided coverage for this area of Guadalupe County. Without the coverage from the City of San Marcos EMS, these residents would face longer wait times for ambulances up to approximately 30 minutes if they were to come from Seguin. And I feel very, very strongly about keeping those residents protected. Some of the neighborhoods for the city of San Marcos edge into the edges of Guadalupe County. Also, the two best access points for Guadalupe County are Highway 123 and 621. So those are areas that we will be coming from as San Marcos EMS. And I think that continuing to take care of our neighbors in Guadalupe County is going to do them some good. and going to keep us in a spot to make sure that they're continuing to get the high-level care that we'll be providing.

And again, September 30th, October 1, seamless.

Change of shirt and keep on moving.

All right. Okay, then I do have a motion on that one, and it's simply because the map that was in there was just not making sense to me. is to replace the map that was in here with a much better map that is entitled Exhibit A, San Marcos EMS Service Area that Mr. Zalas provided for us today. That one is very clear what the intent is. Thank you. So that is my motion. And I hear a second from, for the amendment, a second from Mr. Scott. So thank you for that. And that map was available on the message board. Are there any questions about the map? All right, we'll vote on that. Motion passes seven to zero. All right, thank you. And so we will now vote on the resolution as amended. Are there any questions? We're voting.

Motion passes seven to zero.

All right, and thank you very much. That concludes our consent agenda. And we are on to item 20, Ms. Trevino. Mayor. Yes, ma'am.

Really quickly, before we go, I just wanted to say one thing really quickly. On your consent agenda, you approved tonight putting in Jonathan Henderson as interim fire chief. Yes, we did. So I just wanted to acknowledge that. Chief Henderson will be helping us as Chief Stevens. Thank you. Chief Stevens goes into retirement and just want to thank Chief Stevens for his amazing leadership over the years and all the things you've done to really accomplish in the fire service so just want to say thank you to you and welcome to Jonathan and we look forward to working with you so thank you thank you

Yeah, that's good. All right. Thank you. And you're saying welcome, but Jonathan has actually, she's been with us for a long time. Welcome to his new role. All right. Ms. Trevino, now we'll fire up with item 20.

Consider approval of ordinance 2026-35, amending section 82.003, the San Marcos City Code by increasing the time of all reduced speed limits for school zones within the city, providing a savings clause, providing for the repeal of any conflict in provisions, and declare an effective date and consider approval of ordinance 2026-35 on the first of two weeks.

Motion to approve. Motion by Ms. Rodriguez, seconded by Mr. Scott. Any questions on this item? All righty, then we'll vote. Motion passes seven to zero. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Avila, for being here for questions or whatnot. Item 21, please.

Consider approval of ordinance 2026-36, amending ordinance 2026-33, ordering a general and special election to be held on November 3rd, 2026, for the purpose of electing a mayor, city council member, place three, city council member, place four, and ordering a special election to fill a vacancy for the remainder of the term of office for city council, Member place six to be conducted concurrently with the general election by establishing early voting and election day polling in places for this election Making provisions for the conducting the election declaring an emergency creating the need to adopt this ordinance with only one reading and declare an effective date Are there any questions We're about motion passes seven is zero All right, moving on to item 22. Consider pool of resolution 2026-139R setting the dates of September 1, 2026 and September 15, 2026 as the dates to hold public hearings on the fiscal year 2026-2027 proposed budget and declare an effective date.

Motion to approve. Second.

I have a motion for Mr. Paselk, seconded by Ms. Rodriguez. Is this the one that the page was the old one or is that the next one?

That's the next one, Mayor. Okay, never mind.

Any questions on this one? None. We'll set the dates of those public hearings.

Motion passes seven to zero. Item 23. Consider approval of resolution 2026-140R, setting a maximum proposed tax rate of 65.15 cents per 100 of taxable value, setting the dates of September 1, 2026 and September 15, 2026 as the dates to hold public hearings on the tax rate and declare an effective date.

So moved. I heard a motion over here from Mr. Scott first. I'll give Ms. Rodriguez the second. uh, conversations on this one. Um, Mr Vino, I'm, I'm looking for an, Mr Locke, do you have the explanation? Because we've got a packet out there that, um, needs a little help.

It does. Um, there, We, the city has been experiencing some system issues with the system that is used to, that compiles the city council packets. And there have been workarounds that we've been doing to make the system work. And in this particular instance, their workaround did not work. So it pulled the last year's information, instead of the current year's information, as it should have. So the tax rate information, as you pointed out in the message board question, Mayor, was from last year and not from this current year that we're proposing.

Yeah, basically it's the executive summary was from last year.

Yes, ma'am.

Okay. So, but Mr. Vino, that's been fixed in the packet. So if somebody downloaded packets since what, yesterday afternoon or something to council, it would be. Yeah. But we know I'm looking for the public to make sure they've got what they need. Are there any questions about this one? I don't think I had anything. No, I did not. Okay. Questions. Nope. Nope.

Motion passes seven to zero.

Item 24.

Consider approval of resolution 2026-145R, approving a subrecipient funding agreement with Texas State University under which the city will pass through fiscal year 2025 section 5339C federal transit administration funds to Texas State University in the amount of $1,762,476.00 on a reimbursement basis for the purchase of vehicles for the Bobcat shuttle service. Authorize city manager her designee to execute the agreement on behalf of the city and declare an effective date.

Motion by Ms. Rodriguez, seconded by Mr. Purcell. You all have any questions? I see. No, thank you, Mr. Binion. Mr. Binion is here and ready to answer whatever we might ask. I tell you what, could you just make the statement about what I asked on the message board for those watching at home regarding the...

Mayor, this is P. Binion, Assistant Director of Public Works. This is going to be embarrassing, but I don't remember the question from the message board.

The fee. We love honesty.

The fee.

Yeah. Can anybody ride it?

Oh, yes.

And what does it cost?

The Bobcat shuttle and the local bus routes and paratransit service are free. They're free.

$3.99.

They're free.

It's been like that for a minute, right?

It's been that way for a while. But just making sure everyone still knows. So if the bus doesn't get you where you need to go, then maybe the Bobcat shuttle will, or maybe take a combination of the two, but they do have different hours. But still, I don't know that everybody in town knows that.

We'll do our best to make sure they do know. And it's to Council's credit, by the way, in the 2020 Transit Master Plan adoption, the DIAS made it fare-free for local service. Right. All right.

Thank you very much. Yes, ma'am. Any other questions? Let's vote.

Motion passes seven to zero. All right, I'm 25. Consider approval of resolution 2026-146R, approving a contract for election services with the Hays County Elections Administrator for the provision of election services for the city's general and special election to be held on November 3rd, 2026, and if necessary, runoff election to be held in accordance with state law authorized city manager or her designee to execute the contract on behalf of the city and declare an effective date. So moved.

I'll give Mr. Purcell that motion, seconded by Ms. Rodriguez. I do have a couple of amendments. There are a couple of, it was old information, was in the Contract, but this is the one they sent us, correct? Correct, both of them. So anyway, you can see them on the screen. It's basically correcting the address of the elections office from co.hays.tx.us to hayscountytx.gov. And then for the elections website is not co.hays.tx.us slash elections. It's hayscountytx.gov slash 172 slash elections.

Second.

Thank you very much. Are there any questions about these? If not, we'll vote on the amendment.

Sorry, Mayor. I cleared it. Sorry. Oh, we'll do it.

We can do it again. We're getting good at this.

Motion passes seven to zero.

All right. And any questions on the main motion as amended? We'll vote again.

Motion passes seven to zero.

All right. Mm-hmm.

Six. 26, sorry. Two numbers. Consider approval of Resolution 2026-147R, approving a joint election agreement between the City of San Marcos and Hays County for the holding of a joint election to be held on November 3rd, 2026. Authorize City Manager or her designee to execute the agreement on behalf of the City and declare an effective date. So moved.

I'll give that to the Rodriguez-Baselk team again. I do have a motion to amend. It will look quite familiar to you. Second. Thank you very much. And unless there's any questions, we'll vote on the amendment. Motion passes seven to zero. And then we'll roll back up to the agreement as amended. Motion passes 7-0. All right. We are to the executive session part of our program. Am I correct, Mr. Vigna? Yes.

That's 733. Hot dog.

All right. Item 27. The San Marcos City Council will convene an executive session persuading to Section 551.074 of the Texas Government Code of Personal Matters to discuss the duties of the city manager related to the meeting and confer process.

Motion.

Second.

I think that motion was made by Mr. Pesel, seconded by Ms. Rodriguez, and Ms. Trevino has already queued us up to vote.

Motion passes 7-0.

And we're going into executive. We have returned from our executive session, which we concluded at 10.07. And our next item is 28.

Consider action by motion to provide direction to staff regarding the executive session item under section 551.07 for the Texas Government Code Personal Matters to discuss the duties of the city manager related to the meet and confer process.

And we had that discussion. Next item is question and answer session with the press and public. No one signed up. No one is here. In that case, the next thing on our agenda is adjournment, and I will adjourn us at 10.09.