Board of Supervisors - Regular Meeting

30 seconds, so if you could complete your conversations, that would be greatly appreciated. Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors calls this meeting to order on August 5th, 2026 at 930 AM. In the Board of Supervisors meeting room 120, located at 2150 North Congress Drive, Nogales, Arizona 85621. At this time, Edgardo, would you please lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance?

Pledge of Allegiance, to the flag. When liberty has just arrived.

I will ask if you do have your cell phone on, if you could either turn it off or put it to vibrate, that would be greatly appreciated. At this time, Mr. Manager, I'd like to, is the agenda?

Mr. Chair, Mr. Chair, members of the board, there's a change to the agenda under department reports and activities. Under department, item two, department updates, it's deconciling. So GSA will not be presenting. What they did is they provided some slides for Mr. Young to present and project on the screen. The second thing that I just want to bring up to your attention is that we have a new sign. Whenever the meeting's live, it'll say on air. So many thanks to the IT department. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. With that being said, I'll entertain a motion to accept the agenda as presented with allowing the chair to deviate where necessary.

I move.

Second. It's been moved and seconded. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion carries unanimously. We will move to item C. We're going to be jumping around a little bit today with the agenda. There's a lot of different things happening today. The first jump is we have some folks here from our neighbors to the south. And after we move to call to the public, I only have one slip. Then we'll go immediately into department updates, and I'm going to ask at that point to vice chair to introduce Sobe and all of her team. With that, Ryan Quick and Luis Axiola. Good morning, everyone.

Morning. Good morning.

I'm the Health and Social Services Manager at Mariposa Community Health Center, and I also serve as the co-chair for the Santa Cruz County Overcoming Substance Addiction Consortium, otherwise known as SOSA.

Good morning. My name is Luis Aguilar. I'm the site coordinator for Hope Incorporated and also a proud member of SOSA.

Thank you. Okay. So we're here today because August is Overdose Awareness Month and substance addiction and overdose affects many people in our community, whether it's a close loved one, a friend, and SOSA is doing something different this year to honor those who have lost their lives and to support those who are struggling and bring hope for the future so what we're doing is we're hosting a car show on august 22nd from 10 to 3 at the oasis movie theater this is a fun way to bring our community together to bring some joy positivity while also having resource tables and information available to the public So we're inviting you all to attend. We're hoping that anyone in our community shows up. If you would like to show off your car, your motorcycle, your razor, or anything like that, you can sign up and be a part of that fun, or just come, look, listen to music, connect, and honor what's going on. So we just wanted to invite, and we thank you all for your time, and we gave you guys a flyer.

Thank you so very much.

Thank you.

Looking forward to it. Thank you.

Our county manager can trough as tundra.

Or not. Okay, we're going to move down to item E, and we are going to, like I said, jump around. We're going to have one department update right now so these fine folks can get back to where they need to get back to to work. And then we'll move back up to the current event. So I'm going to turn it over to Vice Chair. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Dr. Davis.

So I just want to say a few words before I move forward. So I want to introduce Solveig for Emergency Management, but she has a special guest, . So the county started this effort to do a drive, like a donation drive to take items to Nogales, Mexico, our neighbors. Like I said, our neighbors, our friends, business partners, our family. So having that said, I'm going to have Sophie explain a little bit more and bring her team and Protección Civil and everybody. Okay.

If you'd like to do it in English and Spanish, that would be acceptable.

Okay. Good morning, Chair and members of the board and the public. I would like to provide an update on our community donation drive to support families in Nogales, Sonora. who were impacted by the recent flood caused by heavy rainfall. The storm left many residents with excessive damage to their homes and they lost a lot of essential household items. In response, the Office of Emergency Management launched the community drive to collect much needed supplies for affected families. We shared this initiative with the public and the response from the community was very overwhelming. Local residents, community organizations, and nonprofit partners generously donated water, food, cleaning supplies, hygiene products, and other essential non-perishable items. Thanks to the incredible support we received during the first week, we were able to begin delivering donations two Fridays ago. Our office coordinated closely with the Nogales Sonora Protection Civil and the State Protection Civil of Sonora to ensure the supplies reached one of the neighborhoods that we identified as being among the hardest hit by the flooding. Our team, to include Luis Carlos David and Jesus Valdez, personally traveled to the neighborhood and distributed essential items directly to the families in need. It was a meaningful opportunity to meet the residents, witness the impact of the flooding firsthand, and provide immediate assistance during this difficult time. The community's generosity did not stop here. Throughout the following week, donations continued to arrive, allowing us to collect even more supplies. This continued support demonstrates the compassion and commitment our community is willing to have in case of our need. On behalf of the Office of Emergency Management, I would like to sincerely thank everyone who contributed to this effect and effort. And success to the donation drive would not have been possible without your generosity and your support. We remain committed to working with our local partners in Nogales, Sonora to ensure the donations continue to reach families who need them the most. And thank you for your continued support of this communication efforts. I would like to introduce Daniel Gámez-Martínez. He is the State of Sonora Coordinator of Civil Protection.

Thank you very much to everyone. I am a little bit rusty, but I will do my best to speak in English, okay? Okay, if I have a word that I can translate, I will ask help to Sobe. So I'm really, really thank you to all the county of Santa Cruz and all the state of Arizona, to all the people that is helping us to get into the houses with some items that they need because they lost a lot of things of their houses. I'm very thankful for all the efforts that everybody's doing in these days. This is the fruit of the effort with Solvera and the emergency management and the Sonora team that is behind me. I don't have any, I will tell you in Spanish, it's better for me. Well, I'm always very grateful to have these efforts that the community of Arizona, the community of Santa Cruz, is making. This is the effort that has been made after years of work with Sobeira. It's what we've been talking about for a few hours, that we've been working for many years, shoulder to shoulder. I don't like to say back to back because we'd be looking to the other side, right? sería viendo un mismo objetivo esta esta unión para echarnos la mano para ayudarnos mutuamente como como ciudades hermanas en este caso nogales arizona nogales sonora precisamente es eso es es demostrar a la población que estamos unidos como como ciudades hermanas que estamos unidos como estados que llevamos muchos años haciéndolo y esta no es la excepción y aquí es donde se demuestra el esfuerzo y el cariño que nos tenemos y pues muy agradecidos, muy agradecidos en todo sentido, créanlo vamos a llevar estos apoyos directamente a las personas que Thank you very much.

So on behalf of the Santa Cruz County, the board, the county management, emergency management,

Shannon? Shannon, you need to come. Get over here, Shannon. Shannon, hurry up. We need to get Shannon in here. Yes. Shannon was a trooper.

She went to Mexico herself.

Thank you very much. Thank you. I don't know which one is mine.

Is that how they go? Yeah. Thank you.

Can I say something? Yes please.

I personally want to thank Dr. Davis for rallying the troops and our county manager, Shannon, Sobe, her staff. It's amazing what they came up with. And it's really sad to see the tragedy that happened to our neighbors who lost one, maybe two lives, I think, in the wash, three lives. And a lot of devastation in the neighborhoods in our neighboring town of Mexico, of Nueva Sonora. Thank you again. And right now, Sobe has a room full of all kinds of donations. So I also want to thank our community for really stepping up.

Wonderful. Like I said, we're going to jump around a little bit. We do have a late call to the public. Mary Darling, if you'd like to come on up. You betcha.

I got distracted, so sorry. Good morning and thank you so much. My name is Mary Darling. I live on Crawford Street in downtown Nogales. And before I forget, I just want to say thank you to Hamid Chamberlain for speaking with our neighbors over the last few days about the GSA's plan for the DeConcini Port of Entry. The DeConcini plan as presented on July 29th is a very compelling vision. And I say that understanding that it will continue to change as we move forward. It's compelling for so many reasons, but the transformation coming to the neighborhoods that immediately surround the site and to the much larger community around them, frankly, is eye popping. A COMMUNITY THAT IS SIMULTANEOUSLY NAVIGATING AFFORDABILITY OF EVERYDAY LIVING, THE IMPACT LONG-TERM OF SOUTH 32 AND WHAT IT WILL DO FOR OUR COMMUNITY AND WITH OUR COMMUNITY, AND YES, EVEN THINGS THAT NOW FEEL ALMOST SIMPLE BY COMPARISON, LIKE HOW DO WE SAVE THE HUMANE SOCIETY IN GETTING OUR KIDS BACK TO SCHOOL? Over the last few days, I've heard from neighbors about property values, displacement of our other neighbors, the air quality during construction, during construction, post construction. And staffing issues keep coming up. What's the point of having more lanes if the staffing remains the same or something insignificant to handle increased traffic? the noise and these are real immediate concerns that are starting to happen even last night on my way home i turned the corner at crawford off of grant and i thought okay in the future i can't go straight up the hill i'll have to go right and around the port and come up the hill to go over to my house that's minor but at the end of the day it's going to significantly impact this community So I also wanted to say, and I will say it tonight at City Council, that if the Deconcini Port of Entry is looking into the future, that's great. But if the community around it, businesses and otherwise, aren't keeping pace with that, then our old and frankly outdated downtown area will not reflect that new and innovative thinking moving forward. And I say outdated because over the years that I've lived here, I have heard and seen so many reports on what we can do with Morley Avenue, which is great, but downtown is more than the crossing at Morley and Court Street. and for some reason we have not expanded that vision and we need to do that i feel moving forward so i have three requests for you all keep the pressure on the mayor and council to collaborate on so many things let alone the deconcini i would so grateful if you all can keep that pressure on and i'm happy to do whatever we can do or i can do to make that happen SECOND, I THINK YOU ALL HAVE AN OPPORTUNITY TO INTEGRATE WORK THAT'S ALREADY BEING DONE ON THE COUNTY PLAN TO HAVE SOMETHING THAT IS SPECIFICALLY FOCUSED ON THE DECONCINI PLAN. AND THE THIRD THING IS WE HAVE AN OPTION FOR MAYOR, AND WE HAVE ELECTIONS STILL IN NOVEMBER. IT MATTERS. THE STATE AGENCIES WILL INFLUENCE THE DECONCINI, LOCAL AGENCIES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT, AND IT'S NOT JUST THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. government and the citizens can play a part in changing what our future looks like. So thank you. Thank you, Mary.

At this time, is there anyone else who would like to come up to the call of the public? Okay. We will move forward with current events. To my left.

Mr. Chair, good morning. Good morning. We traveled to our national conference a week and a half ago in Louisiana and had the honor of electing a fellow Arizonan elected official by the name of Sarah Benatar. She's a Coconino treasurer and has been instrumental in our issues. at the treasurer's office and has helped Alejandro immensely, and us just in general. She obviously, was elected for a good reason she's a good leader and uh... uh... i'm super proud to have an arizona person representing us at the national level and i want to thank sarah and congratulate her uh... i also had the honor of hosting uh... southwest regional border counties for you include texas california new mexico arizona mister davis and i had to leave soccer world uh... championship halfway through but that that's why we're there for to to entertain meetings and host meetings and and and provide critical information to our colleagues Some of the critical issues talked about in that session were staffing. A lot of people have issues with not enough staffing, great facilities at the border, but always having staffing shortages. We spoke of our upcoming Deconcini project and some of our critical issues at the border, our wash. specifically, and CBP was there, U.S. Customs, all the big dogs from Washington were there. So it's good to have a voice at the national level. And I want to congratulate the winners of the election. maya donnelly congratulations and good luck i want to congratulate all our students are starting school today and wish them luck the school year i want to thank santa cruz valley's district 35 to for inviting uh our whole crew to their back to school It's always an incredible event, and the MC is yours truly here, our chairman, and does an amazing job. What a great event, and I want to congratulate Santa Cruz Valley and wish them a great school year. You know what? He does have some amazing moves. I saw a picture where he's got his knee all the way up here. I don't know how that happened. I want to see it here live. Can we see that? Dr. Davis and I want to see that move. Is that like a 30-year-old picture? Probably. And that's all I have to report.

Thank you. Thank you, sir. Bye, sir.

Good morning, everyone. Two weeks ago after the flood that affected Nogales Wash, I contacted the Arizona delegation to inform them about the situation. I shared photos and videos of the wash and explained the extent of the damage. I reached out to Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva, Senator Cabaldon, Representative Stephanie Stahl, and Consuelo Hernandez. And I was also able to speak with staff from Senator Mark Kelly's and Senator Ruben Gallego's office. Everybody was brought up to date on the damages of the Nogales Wash and the efforts made by Santa Cruz County and the city of Nogales to address the situation. And I got to thank Chris for leading that effort. As a result of this outreach, Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva visited Nogales to tour the Nogales Wash. She saw the current condition of the wash, including the three concrete panels repaired last year, and the four panels repaired earlier this year before the monsoon season began. We also stopped at the Effring Canyon area to discuss the proposal for a retention detention basin. Unfortunately, due to the estimated cost of $80 million, the project has not been feasible. However, we continue working to find a solution despite the significant increase in overall costs. Last week, I also met in Nogales with Carla Avalos and Robert Guerrero from Senator Mark Kelly's office and Jordan Toyos from Senator Gallego's office to provide further explanation regarding the situation of the Nogales Wash, also Canyon and other public health concerns. I want to thank county management for supporting the initiative to conduct a donation drive to help our neighbors, friends, and families in Nogales, Sonora. After the monsoon-related flooding, I want to express my gratitude to the community of Santa Cruz County for all their donations. That truly made a meaningful difference. I want to thank Emergency Management and Proteccion Civil de Sonora for coordinating this effort. I also want to thank Crossroad Mission, BFW, Public Safety, Global Alliance, and every other organization, nonprofit, and business that step up to support the Nogales, Sonora community. Your effort truly made an impact. I attended the book presentation for Voces de la Frontera. Voices of the Border, held at the Primeria Alta Museum. The author is Mexican Consul Marco Moreno Valles. The book highlights the stories of people born and raised on the border, narrated through words and a lot of images. It was an excellent event, and it was refreshing to hear stories from people from ambos Nogales, both Nogaleses. Stories that often get lost among large narratives, but that we must never forget. Yesterday, we had a very productive meeting with the City of Nogales, Sonora, Mr. Chris Young, and Mr. Colin, staff from Nogales, Sonora Public Work, and Mayor Heem to discuss the importance of communication and coordination for projects such as the Nogales Wash. This meeting led to an arrangement to hold a joint meeting between the county and the city of Nogales once a month. We will invite the city manager, the city mayor, and members of the city council who wish to attend. Our first meeting was very productive. I look forward to joining forces and building a strong working relationship, something that is truly needed. Those are my updates.

Thank you, sir. I also want to thank Dr. Davis here to my right for all of his efforts in Nogales, Sonora and all that he's doing. Thank you. I'm not going to go into detail about the NACO conference, but I also want to congratulate Sarah Benatar. She's been an incredible help. not only to Santa Cruz County and her county, Coconino, but throughout the state and throughout the nation. So we wish her the very best. She was elected as second vice president, so in three years? In three years, she'll be the president of NACO, which is the National Association of Counties. I had an opportunity to meet with Mark Sanders from ADOT. I'd like to thank our partners at ADOT for always being willing to sit down and listen. Thank you to Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva for coming down and seeing firsthand some of our concerns. It was great to have her here, and I'm hoping that This the concern with the wash and some of the other issues make it Make it to the federal level a lot quicker than than what than what has happened in the past Advisory committee I we had an advisory committee last week. I'd like to thank Celeste wisdom and wisdoms for hosting us at that meeting Thank you, Gary, for all of your input during the meeting. Took part in rural groundwater resilience workshop. Once again, the welcome back at SCVUSD 35, always a spirited event. And yes, it was taken about five years ago, and it was an electric slide. So we'll leave it at that. No pulled muscles yet. Community check-in. Yesterday, I'd like to thank those of you who accompanied me out to Sonoyta to meet with the folks in Sonoyta. finally the CPBA workshop that we had yesterday a four-hour meeting I want to reiterate what I've said in the past during these CPBA meetings we are focusing primarily on the protections and monitoring so that dispels any rumors that nothing's happening on behalf of the county the city and the town of Patagonia that is a major focus and that is what was discussed I would say for the better part of three out of the four hours yesterday, if I'm not mistaken. Thank you. And that's all I have at this point. Mr. Manager.

Mr. Chair, members of the board, just to add on to Supervisor Davis and regarding the Nogales Wash, we also, he met with USDA person and they have a program called Emergency Watershed Protection Program. So they think that we're eligible for funding through that program to fix some of the, to fix the banks of the wash. I just wanted to mention that. We received a letter from Border Patrol about the I-19 checkpoint. They're starting their EA, environmental assessment document, so they're going through the scoping process. They asked the county to comment, so we have 30 days, maybe a little less now, but we're gonna provide our comments. And lastly, something that Supervisor Davis had started is passenger train. I met with Supervisor Hines from Pima County and his staff just to briefly discuss the possibility of coordinating with Santa Cruz County and see if we could make that passenger rail come to Nogales and Santa Cruz County. That's all my updates. Thank you. Wonderful. Thank you, sir.

This time we'll move to Item E, Department Reports and Activities, Finance, Cash, and Investment, Expenditure and Revenue Reports.

Good morning, Mr. Chair, members of the board. For the cash and investment report in the general fund, we have an overall balance of $26,517,324 with an invested amount of $16,970,364. For the road fund, we have an overall balance of $6,626,388 with an invested amount of $5,250,032. For the flood control district, we have an overall balance of $2,720,089 with an invested amount of $316,414. In the jail district, we have an overall balance of $7,088,346 with an invested amount of $4,509,582. for a total overall balance of $67,040,598 with an invested amount of $29,220,773. The estimated end of month balance is $12,964,733. Thank you Maria. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Sir. Thank you very much. At this time we will move to E2.

Department updates. I think we already have someone in the back who had something to say. I don't think she agreed with you, Maria, in some of those figures.

Right now.

Good morning, board members, county management, and everybody here. First of all, I'm going to be reminding everybody that this Saturday we're going to have our 5K pause on the move. That's why we brought our two critters back there. They're up for adoption.

Bring them. Bring them.

We're going to have a whole lot more during that event. It's going to be at 6 in the morning on Morley Avenue. It'll start at Karen Park. So just want to invite everybody for that.

Can I interject real quickly? Dr. Davis, your other dog needs a friend, you know that?

I agree.

I'm still trying to train my dog. I'm going through that process right now.

He or she is training you.

Beautiful dogs though. Okay, for what I'm here for. I'm here to present a recognition we received last week from Best Friends Animal Society. A plaque for achieving and maintaining a 90% save rate or above. for the 2025 calendar year. A goal Best Friends has of achieving a no-kill nation, a goal that is closer than ever. I'll start by talking about how we were able to get to this point. Our department began to work with three people from within Santa Cruz County in placing animals. These persons are Sue Bergier, Barbara Oates, and Susan Anderson. They worked with us for quite some time in placing animals with other rescues or finding people to adopt our animals. They were instrumental in our beginning work with rescues. Then we began getting more help from other rescues. Stacy Van Dyke came along being a rescue coordinator for several rescues from southern Arizona. Many animals were being placed through her, but our release rate was still way under 70%. We worked so hard to place as many animals as we could, including cats. It's still not enough. It still was not enough. We started the process with Pinal County Animal Care and Control Director, Anna Audra Michael, leading the way with recommendations of how to achieve the no-kill status. We saw that it was a very hard road ahead, but we were determined to accomplish that task. We went from one stress level of having to sacrifice animals because we had no room for them to another stress level of finding homes for the animals through rescues and adoptions. We absolutely preferred the saving animals. Many things changed in this period and little by little we noticed that change. We noticed how animal control was being looked at in a different way by our community. My staff and me were very excited to be in this new era that it motivated us to work harder in the process. I would like to take this opportunity to thank my staff that have been through this process since the beginning. Officers Brian Gallardo, Officer Blanca Pina. Officer John Owais. And to our past employees that are no longer with us that helped in that process. They all have done an outstanding job in helping us to get there where we are today. Also, the new personnel that have continued to help our cause, Officer Liliana Alvarez. Officer Jose Rivas. And Officer Marco Rodriguez. Thank you for your hard work. The end of the agreement came on September of 24. We learned so much during that entire year that we were ready to take on that task of becoming a no kill shelter. Since then, we have made new friends, Hope Up Deliverance Rescue Organization in particular, as they have taken the task of only helping our shelter. Thank you, Bree and Taylor, and all of your volunteer staff. Also, Shiloh from Shula's Uber, who coordinates all the transports from all our animals that are rescued from our shelter, has now become our cat coordinator too. I would also like to thank our current board of supervisors for approving a resolution on January of 25 to become a no kill community to save all healthy and adoptable dogs and cats that enter our shelter. No doubt saving lives is expensive, but our furry friends are worth it. Life saving happens when we all work together. Let's continue to work together to maintain our no kill status for many years to come. In fact, so that we never have to go back to what we were before. I would like to recognize a few of our helpers from the past and now. Officer Weiss will be presenting that appreciation certificates to them.

Sorry if I'm a little emotional this morning.

Quite all right.

Good morning, members of the board and county management. Thank you for allowing us a few minutes today. My name is Joanna Weis-Leva, and before I begin, I would just like to add to what Manager Pena had to say. People often see a plaque like this and think it represents a percentage. But to us, it represents something much greater. It represents lives. A no kill shelter isn't measured by percentage. It is measured by the wagging tails that walked out the front doors. The purrs that found their way into loving homes and the lives that are still being written because someone cared enough to give them a second chance. It is truly an honor to present these certificates to our incredible rescue partners. I have had the privilege of working closely with each and every one of these organizations. And I can honestly say that none of what we've accomplished would have been possible without them. It is truly an honor to present these certificates to our incredible rescue partners. These are just a few of many rescue groups that have stepped up time and time again to help fulfill our mission of saving lives. Their compassion, dedication, and willingness to say yes when animals need them most have made all the difference. To those that may not be recognized by name this morning, please know that your efforts have never gone unnoticed. We are deeply grateful for everything you have done and continue to do. Let's begin with the veterans, the individuals that were there from the very beginning. First up, Susan Anderson. Sue Bergeer.

Can you all stay up, can you stay up here please?

Thank you dear for all your hard work.

Stacy Van Dyke. I'll take advantage that Stacey's already up here for the certificates of the individuals that weren't able to make it this morning. Harvey from Southern Arizona, correction, Southern Oasis Lab Rescue. Pauline, Pauline from Cherished Tales. Anita Osa from Sunshine Dog Rescue. And Amy Cubillas from the Sanctuary Project. Next up, Shiloh from Chula's Uber. Who will also be representing Alexandra from Southern Arizona Cat Rescue. And Susan from Hope Animal Filter. Shauna Lee from Arrows Landing. And Wanda Abeyta, my SCAR sister. And last but not least, Taylor from Hope of Deliverance. She will also be representing Bree Kishman. Behind every number is a heartbeat, a story, and a future that almost wasn't. This award belongs to all of us. Thank you.

I'm going to go back a bit because I think I missed one part here. It's very important. I'm a little bit nervous here, sorry. I'm going to be talking about the day we received an email from Jessica Goodman from Best Friends Animal Society. to see if we wanted to participate in this program. It was called the Shelter Collaborative Program. I read what it entailed and I decided it was worth a try so that we could save even more dogs and cats. At this point, I had a staff meeting to advise all my staff what I wanted to venture to and they all agreed that it was the right thing to do. I then began to set up Zoom meetings with best friends until September of 2023. We signed an agreement with best friends, which included a $100,000 funds and funds for use in our department for sterilizations, TNRs, vaccines, and any equipment needed for that one year agreement. That's when we started with Pinal County and that's where we are today. I am very proud in presenting our achievement plaque that will be displayed at our shelter for our community to see. to the Board of Supervisors and everybody here of our hard work that we have put into this incredible achievement of saving lives. So here's our plaque. We are now officially our no-kill shelter.

Congratulations.

If you could come on up here and let's get a picture of everyone involved.

Come on over. Thank you.

Can we bring it in?

Since there's so many, can you guys look this way? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you again for all of your hard work.

And as we're transitioning, As we're transitioning, we are going to have to have a hard stop at 10. Well, 10.25, we'll have a five-minute recess because we are going to move forward with the truth in taxation. So you'll have to be a little bit patient there, sir, because I know Chris is going to go next, and then we'll probably at that point. Got you. Chris.

Thank you, Mr. Pena. Thanks to your team. Congratulations. Thank you.

Got nine minutes, Chris.

Yeah?

Nine minutes?

I'll get it in five. Okay. Can we get those slides? Chairman Fanning, Supervisor Morales, Supervisor Davis, thank you for this opportunity to speak towards this. I just want to make sure, and Ms. Darling already, oh, there you are. I already gave an introduction to this and she did a great job. I just want to put it on everybody's map. We weren't able to get the virtual presentation from GSA for this meeting, but tonight at the City of Nogales meeting, I believe they will have an online presentation from GSA and it'll be a lot more detailed information than what I'm about to give you. I just want to make sure that this is on everybody's radar and the last slide is the one that is really important also and that's where you're going to be able to comment I just want to make sure everybody understands right now what's going on is what happened, the event that Ms. Darling was talking about with the community engagement was it's the starting of the NEPA timeline and this is what it looks like. As you can see, there won't be a final decision for about a year and a half. So it's a long process and there's a few different areas where the community is going to be able to comment. Okay. The next slide. And so when you look at this, this is what Mary was talking about, about the footprint. As you can see, it's pretty large. It's larger than what we thought it was going to be, and it has an impact on a lot of people. And so that's why it's so important that people do voice their opinions about this and give detail about what they'd like to see. As you can see, it goes pretty much all the way up to Elm Street. And it does touch half a side of Morley. So it will have a large footprint. impact obviously this is just the very beginning of the processes and if you want to go to the next slide the one where it shows the buildings so this is just a sketch and it needs to be it needs to be emphasized that this is just the beginning of the process this will be changed many many many times based on many many things including community engagement okay but right now this is for the NEPA process this is the information that they're taking Then the last slide. So this is the most important thing. Obviously, this is a federal project. They've identified that this is important for the country, for this region, and so it's very important that we as a community are speaking out and identifying the things that we want them to know. So this is the way that you can comment. I just want to say one thing real quick. Mary brought up – I'm sorry, Ms. Darling brought up the staffing issue, and that's a very important issue to talk about. Why are we going to make it bigger if we don't have enough staff? And it's important to mention that that's two separate issues, okay? Staffing is – I mean, there are two issues that we have to talk about, right? But this – the entity that is working towards this is not the entity that we need to talk to about the staffing. Does that make sense? So I just wanted to make that clear. These comments are specific and obviously you can mention the staffing in your comments and that's important. But this comment, this process is for the actual reconstruction itself. Okay, and I just wanted to put that in everybody's radar so that our community gets out and comments about what they'd like to see with the port. Do you guys have any questions?

Go ahead.

No, I just want to thank Mary for comments. I think you're on point. I think it's critical that we work with our partners, and it's good to see Councilwoman Parada here. Thank you for joining us today. Us working with the city is critical, and with Mexico. Because if we build this humongous project on this side and there's no adjustment on the other side, then there's gonna be issues. So I think communication all around is critical and teaming up, we look forward to teaming up with the city of Nogales to do something fun there, hopefully on Morley Avenue, maybe some project down there. And that's all I have.

Thank you.

Good morning, Ms. Parada. Welcome. Chris, when I attended the GSA meeting, if I recall correctly, they said they were going to have two more meetings after they get all the impact?

Yes. So if you notice, the process is about a year and a half. I believe it said winter 2027. So it's going to be a long process, and there's usually a couple different – engagement meetings with the community during the process. So yes, you're correct with the two more meetings. It's important that we voice what we would like to see down there.

Yeah, I think it's, I mean, I just think it's important to get people's feedback, right, and input, and that's vital.

Extremely important, and that's actually the main reason why we're doing this, because many people have already seen what I've just shown, but we want to make sure that everybody had the opportunity to see this slide and how they can participate.

It's estimated to be projected about $2 billion, right?

I'm not sure of the price tag, but to give you an idea, the largest projection would be 22 lanes. Okay, so we're talking about a pretty big investment.

Yes. I just want to say thank you. And for those of you who were able to attend the meeting, fantastic. If not, you can still make your voices heard here. A lot of discussion to be had. And I'd like to reiterate that the collaborative effort needs to be not only between the county and the city, but also with our neighbors to the south. Very important that this works out, that whatever happens is best for both countries, especially our men and women in blue.

That's correct.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

At this time, we are going to go ahead and move to recess. Do I have a motion to recess at this time? So moved. Second. I move to second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Motion carries unanimously. We'll recess until 1030, at which point, like I mentioned before, we had to have a hard stop so that we can move forward with the truth in taxation. Meeting hearing and that will start promptly at 1030