are in design or for future use, right? The first project we wanted to highlight is our plans for a new pavement management project that we have in design currently. This project will be utilizing both SB1 and Measure D funding as well as our TIP funding through the RTC. We're currently reviewing the streets that are going to be addressed with this and we'll hopefully have a nice project coming out in the near future. And next slide, please. This is a pretty exciting project that I'm happy that we're getting underway with. So this is the 31st Avenue Adaptive System. I'm sorry the slides turned sideways. I wanted to be able to show you the extent of the whole project. So what we're planning to move forward with this year is the blue section, which is signalizing all the signals on the intersections from 41st and Bromer up to Clare Street. Those are all the city controlled intersections that we have funding through Monterey Bay Air Resource District to complete. The green sections on the right or the north are actually what the county is going forward with. The county is actually out to bid on that project right now and we'll be going out to bid on the blue intersections in the next month or two. And then the gap that we're really helping to get completed are the three Caltrans controlled intersections. We've had a little bit of a challenge getting approval with the Caltrans encroachment permit to install the infrastructure on their signals. We've made some good progress, but we're hopeful that in the next handful of months we can get buy-in from Caltrans and then that would ultimately allow both our adaptive system and the county's adaptive system to meet together and create much more efficiency for ridership and decreased wait times on 41st Avenue that many of you know is our largest street, widest street in the county and gets fairly congested in both morning and afternoon peak travel times. And we can move to the next slide. Here we have the Bay Avenue, Bay and Capital Avenue under grounding and roundabout project. Currently we're working with PG&E to utilize our Rule 20A funding to underground all the utilities in that intersection. And then after completion of that under grounding effort which we're currently out to bid now, we will then move into designing and finalizing a roundabout for this intersection that would then kind of start to enhance our upper village area of Capitola. And we can go to the next slide. Another project that we've had on the books for a little while that we're looking forward to moving forward with right now is the Clair Street traffic calming project. We're currently developing our public workshops so that we can form similar to what we're doing here today with RTC to reach out to our community and seek input. We've already had a cursory involvement with RTC with the ND attack weighing in on some of the components that we're looking at for enhanced pedestrian safety and are reviewing the different options that we may have that could help us kind of decrease traffic speeds but also increase the opportunity for pedestrians to cross Clairs because right now there are only places to cross Clair Street at the intersection of 41st and Worf and with the completion of our new library at the corner of Worf and Clairs, we envision seeing a lot more use of this area by the pedestrians and so we're really trying to enhance this area to make it safer and easier for everybody to utilize. Next slide please. And this is the last project I wanted to highlight. This is part of the Monterey Bay Scenic Trail Network where the city of Capitola is planning to do a pedestrian trail that feeds to our upper village parking lot which is one of the fairly large parking lot that then would allow visitors to both access the village and the coastline here in Capitola but also then also be able to tie into Monterey Bay Trail that runs east and west here along Park Avenue and so that's our last project that I wanted to show to you guys and with that we can move to the next slide. And I just want to take this opportunity to thank the RTC again being a small jurisdiction here in Capitola it's very helpful for us to have the opportunity to work with the staff at the RTC as kind of an extension of staff it makes us feel like we have more resources available to us and we can seek a lot of input by working with RTC and our partner jurisdictions to hear about just approaches that they're taking on projects or learning about different grant funding opportunities and things of that nature that they really do contribute to our ability to provide more infrastructure to our community so I wanted to thank the RTC for that. Without that, that concludes my report today. Thank you for that report. Is there any questions or comments? Who's the commissioners? I see Commissioner Jock's hand was up. And then I'll go with Patrick Malhern and then Commissioner Kristin Peterson. Yeah, thank you, Chair. I don't know. Oh, okay, Kristin is back. She was offline for a bit and I was going to make some comments for her so she'll make her own comments. I do want to thank our Public Works Department for a particular aspect of how they do the programs with our citizens in Capitola. So two projects in particular, Park Avenue and the 38th Avenue Reconstruction and also the Bromer Street Reconstruction. So our Public Works Director in concert with his staff has worked extensively with the citizens to get their input. And also there was a mention of the bike committee especially on Bromer. And I know from the bike community that that was a particular problem. If any of you bike and went on that street, you know that it was absolutely horrible. But we had a lot of input from that committee and also from the residents there. In particular on Park Avenue at night, which a lot of people walked that street, it was very unsafe at night. The speeds are rather high and most people try to avoid that street. Now when you walk there at night, you see a lot of pedestrians actually walking because the sidewalk is great. And also the bike trail is four feet wide which is really good. It's part of the bicentennial bike route. So a lot of people still have those old maps. I did a cross-country bike trip using those old maps too. So they may still have them and still use them. The 38th Avenue Reconstruction was particularly important because there's a lot of mobile home parks there, a lot of people using bikes, a lot of mothers and parents in particular using their strollers. Very unsafe. Now it's much safer. So really appreciate that. Another project that is important and thanks for the RTC for the funding is the Claire Street. You know, for the longest time we've been worrying about that because there was no crossings unless you get the 41st and this was explained in Warfamilio. So imagine a lot of people on either side not being able to cross many emails about how that was so unsafe. I haven't heard of any accidents but this should address that. So thanks again for the funding and thanks again for the public work staff capital working with residents and other interested groups to make sure these projects turn out even better. Thank you. Thank you new commissioner, Jacques. I hope we didn't take too many words from your commissioner, Christian Peterson, but you have the floor. Christian Peterson. Thank you. Yeah, I lost it for a second there and Jacques was going to step in for me but I'm glad that I'm back and thank you Jacques for your willingness to do so if it had been needed. I just wanted to take a moment also to thank Kailash and all of our public works staff for all the hard work that they do. As mentioned, we're a small city but the projects are no less critical to our residents and to the region and so I just want to again take a moment to thank him and all of our staff for all the hard work that they do. Thank you. Thank you, commissioner Peterson. Commissioner alternate Patrick Melvin. Thank you chair. I have a I guess it's more of a process question. For the second time this morning we've heard that some of our projects are held up in Caltrans for encroachment permits. The the fence over highway one at Rio del Mar and now we hear that the the adaptive the 41st Avenue adaptive signal project is held up in Caltrans encroachment permitting. Can Mr. Eads that and explain why our projects aren't clearing encroachment? If I can respond to that Mr. Chair, be happy to. So unfortunately our our permit staff are just completely stretched right now. We're we're understaffed and they're a little bit overwhelmed. They're doing what they can. They have been working in the previous example working closely with Sarah Christiansen on the over crossing structure and doing what they can to get those permits out. I'm not super familiar with this particular location but I'm sure it's a similar issue in terms of there's a lot of internal processing when we're looking at adaptive signal control and making sure that our system will continue to function. We're not going to back vehicles up onto the main line which is a primary concern for us of course because of the safety implications but I'm sure that our permitting staff will continue to work with the city on this and I'll touch base after the meeting just to see how they're doing. But I'm you know that's the right place for the for the process to occur. Unfortunately we're a bit over understaffed right now. Thank you very much. Thank you. Commissioner is that all Commissioner? Commissioner Manu? Thank you chair and thank you Mr. Muzumdar for the report. It's really exciting projects to hear about whether it's the bike improvements on Bromer or the roundabout on Bay and Capitol Avenue. I'm really excited to hear about the traffic calming on Clare Street. I have a lot of constituents in the area as well who've pointed out how dangerous Clare Street is today and so it'll be great to have that as a more biking and walking friendly environment. And I just want to point out you know a lot of people don't know where the city of Capitola ends and where the unincorporated county begins so I'm particularly excited to work with you on you know whether it's roads like Bromer or Capitola Road or even Forty First Avenue that you know these major major thoroughfares that go between the city and the county and working on the bike and pedestrian connections between both our jurisdictions. I just had a couple questions for you. You know you mentioned the Forty First Avenue intersection improvements. Have you considered doing any roundabouts on any of those major intersections? So with that project really the focus was on the adaptive system deployment and so we didn't look at any geometry changes to any of those intersections. Yeah I would say no that that hasn't been that hasn't been looked into. Okay I mean is that something that you will ever look into or have you in the past for one reason or another will doze out? I guess I wouldn't say that as far as my knowledge goes I don't think we've looked into roundabouts on the Forty First Avenue corridor. I think more recently there have been some studies that the RTC has been looking at to evaluate better throughput at the intersection with gross and Forty First because of the frontage roads that intersect there that are causing a lot of challenge. There's you know there are a few long-term designs that have been I think are on the book somewhere for what may improve that intersection but it's a challenge there mainly because the on-ramps don't have the length to have signal metering on them and so effectively metering happens on the city streets and so the it's kind of trying to find a good compromise to find you know better throughput for the street but then not flooding the freeway with too many cars all in volumes of big chunks that kind of create more of a challenge for them. So I think that's the main reason why we've had a little bit of a challenge with getting our encroachment permit figured out with Caltrans but as far as the addressing your question about different orientation for those intersections I don't believe we have anything right now that we're looking into other than that intersection at gross with the RTC that has been looking into that a little bit more heavily and I think that's more looking at you know opening up or closing down different entrances and exits rather than you know creating a large roundabout in that intersection. Got it yeah because one of the things we're looking at in the county of course is with the future plans for the mall how to improve throughput on Capitola Road you know one suggestion has been to widen into two lanes in both direction I'm not particularly sure that's the best plan since in the past we reduced it and put it on a road diet and so in an alternative we're looking at is putting in roundabouts that at some of the major intersections along Capitola Road and interesting to see if we can continue that into the city and then the other question I had is if with those signal improvements you're planning any pavement management on 41st Avenue I know particularly at that Capitola Road 41st Avenue intersection of pavements in pretty bad shape and can be a little bit dicey for especially for bikers. Yes no that's definitely an intersection that we know needs addressing it's you know being one of our largest arterial streets in the county and for sure the largest street in Capitola it is in need of some additional pavement management but right now that you know to bite off a section of 41st costs quite a bit because it's such a wide road and so oftentimes our funding limits don't know you know we're happy to get a million dollar project out usually and that you know addressing all of 41st would be a multi-million dollar project so at this point I don't think we've got the funding to do a full to look at that that would be more of a long-term plan that we would need to stockpile some money over over the years and have a plan for that in the future. Okay thank you very much. Commissioner Mike Ratkin. I just wanted to quickly point out that it's not just citizens of Capitola that are served by these projects and somebody who rides a bike around the county it's really those they really made a difference on a couple of these projects to the improvements for bike bikeways thank you. Thank you. Thank you commissioner. Is there any other fellow commissioners they have any questions or comments on the capitol report? Seeing none I want to go and take this out to the public now for public comments again if you have any questions you can email them to the city of Capitola and I'm pretty sure they could respond back to you. Is that correct? Yes. All right we have Jessica Evans. Hi commissioners um thank you so much I just want to express some appreciation for the work that you guys are doing in Capitola to make it more bike and pedestrian friendly um like Mr. Ratkin I spend a lot of time riding my bike around town and I do live on the west side of Santa Cruz but my family and I regularly ride our bikes into Capitola and through Capitola and I just want to um one one item I would like to share with you is there's an organization called the National Association of City Transportation Officials that produces design guidelines that are complete streets design guidelines they're nationally recognized as the producer of the sort of best practices for design guidelines for um complete streets with bicycle pedestrian and automobile infrastructure combined into one um you know design that really serves everyone um there's a specific document called uh don't give up at the intersection that has great very clear guidance for designing intersections and um I just you know maybe you already know about this but you know you probably do because you're professionals but I want to you know urge you to maybe target intersections on 41st avenue and and use this document to make those intersections better because intersections is where people get run over you know we see it again and again um and all the intersections in Santa Cruz county and especially those big busy streets in Capitola could really use some intersection specific some spot treatment um to make those intersections safer thank you so much thank you Mrs. Owens James Wheeler Chair for recognizing Mr. Wheeler are you unmuted okay okay I'm on I want to say as a longtime resident of Capitola um thank you very much for uh finally fixing Bromer between 31st 38th and 41st I'm a a senior citizen who rides a recumbent tricycle with no suspension and uh that sucker uh was just terrible so I'm very appreciative I didn't like it uh Mr. Ben Varnasa yes uh talking about intersections I want to remind everybody that between the old depot at Monterey and Park Drive all the way to La Selva beach uh there are only six streets to cross on the coastal trail Marvista State Park Drive two in Aptos village which are controlled now with signals one at the clubhouse drive and one going into seascape tremendous tremendous and I just want to remind you that to get to the hillside of Aptos and Soquel we have the Marvista overpass is being built so that's that for mid-county it's a wonderful transportation system when you put that all together thank you thank you Mr. Ben Varnasa is there anybody else in the public would you like to come in I do not see any other hands up commissioner okay well well thank you uh thank you the city of Kepitola for that report thank you for your time I'd like to go ahead and move on uh item 25 which is the report regarding grant requirements compliance in the context of the tie vote for the commission related to the transit corridor alternative analysis in rail network integrated study business plan for electric passenger rail and the Santa Cruz branch rail line ginger morning chair commissioners and members of the public i'm ginger die car i'm senior transportation planner on the rtc staff the item before you today is regarding the caltrans grant require compliance requirements in relation to the business plan for electric passenger rail on the Santa Cruz branch rail line just the final component of the transit corridor alternatives analysis and rail network integration study as you know at the rtc meeting in February and 2021 rtc accepted the transit corridor alternatives analysis and the rail network integration study which selects electric passenger rail as the locally preferred alternative the project team then developed a business plan for rail transit as the locally preferred alternative at the rtc meeting on April 4th 2021 rtc staff presented the draft tcaa rail network integration study business plan and recommended that the rtc adopt a resolution accepting the business plan for electric passenger rail on the Santa Cruz branch rail line as a guide for implementation and to direct staff to seek federal and or state funding to complete the preliminary engineering and environmental documentation for electric passenger rail in motion to accept the staff recommendation failed with the tie vote of six to six staff expressed concern at that time that the caltrans grant requirements for the rail network integration study section of the project may not be met if components of the draft business plan were not accepted rtc the commission requested staff to come back to this meeting to provide information on options for meeting the caltrans grant requirements rtc staff has since discussed the grant requirements with caltrans staff and caltrans has determined that the grant requirements have been met with rtc acceptance of the alternatives analysis and rail network integration study report at the February 4th rtc meeting thus no action is necessary to assure grant requirements have been met with that that's the end of my presentation we'll have you to answer any questions thank you ginger i i would like to make some additional comments regarding this item um a business plan is not a requirement by any agency including rtc moving forward with drafting a business plan was a staff recommendation in order to provide commissioners with information on potential funding for transit on the corridor acceptance would not have meant that passenger rail is definitely coming to santa craze county staff acknowledges the six six the commissioners and plans to continue researching funding for delivering all projects that have been identified in our various programs and planning documents including measure d the unified corridor investment study and the regional transportation plan which is in the process of being updated the rtp that's the regional transportation plan has both a constrained and an unconstrained list of projects for the county the commission recently approved those project lists which include passenger rail on the unconstrained list it was not placed on the constrained list because we could not identify enough funding for the project without a local new revenue source at this time passenger rail will continue to be included in the rtp unconstrained list for santa craze county the project will also continue to be identified in the state rail plan which is an ambitious plan consisting of both projects to enhance existing rail service and various projects for new service both now and into the future in developing the business plan our biggest challenge was identifying a potential funding source for the next step which would have been preliminary engineering and an environmental document historically state and federal funding has not been made available to fund this component of the work and certainly not without a significant local match staff met with caltrans division of mass rail and discussed how hard it is for local jurisdictions to fund this early stage of such a large project to fund this early stage of the project locals often need to direct several years of regional discretionary funding or this component of work unless they have a dedicated funding source since it is not advisable to ask citizens to tax themselves without having the knowledge of the project impact and cost it is almost impossible to move forward with a project of this magnitude without the help of the state caltrans staff explained that the state understood this problem and was seeking a way to make more money available to local jurisdictions for this work caltrans staff identified one possible funding source the emerging corridor fund within the state rail assistance program this is a small account and RTC project would be eligible there would be no guarantee of funding and in fact a subsequent meeting with caltrans staff indicated that the fund would not be able to fully fund RTC's project with the state rail assistance money even though a local match is not necessarily required caltrans staff thought that over time some caltrans planning money may be able to be diverted to rail projects to help close the gap in summary RTC has not turned down any funding that has been made available for a rail transit project in Santa Cruz county in summary RTC staff is responsible for seeking funding RTC projects I plan to continue to investigate the likelihood of any funding for any of our projects and advising the commission and seeking direction moving forward thank you thank you there any questions from the commissioners commissioner latkin it's not a question it's a just brief comment I'm like not making an argument I just want to highlight that what our executive director just told us is that the information that we got many of it all of us got and I myself believe for some time was that there is not 17 million dollars from the state that's available for us if we just ask for it with no local match a lot of the emails that I got in phone calls from people had that assumption I had that assumption when I frankly when I thought we had 17 million dollars for free from the state it's not free it's our tax money but money from the state that we'd be crazy to stop you know moving ahead to the if we're going to stop we'd stop after we made the next step that it was misinformation that we had and that's really important to understand that that's not to I'm not trying to suggest what anybody's position should be after that but you'd have to have that information and thinking about where we go next thank you thank you any other comments commission Eduardo yeah so like I said thank you thank you Mr. Preston for for that report but you know I still encourage the I want to make a motion to agendize the item for the business planning our art and direct staff to seek federal and state funding to complete the preliminary engineering and environmental document for passing the rail point of order commission what's your point of order I believe that this is essentially a motion to reconsider since this is not a motion to reconsider it's a motion to put a place on the agenda future agenda item that that said is not the exact same text of the motion that was already considered we didn't we didn't know he's asking for it to be brought back as an agenda item well I would just say that in general you know one of the purposes of parliamentary procedure and Rosenberg's rules of order which we follow is is finality and to prevent a body like ours from continually looking at the same question over and over and over again I mean I'll just point out these meetings are very expensive our staff time alone not to mention the commissioners time but our RTC staff time is about $150 that's before an hour before you consider the building and the electricity and other utilities $250 an hour I believe once you take all that into consideration so it would be extremely wasteful for our for our commission to continue to consider the same question over and over again and that's why whether or not technically or not this is a motion to reconsider Rosenberg's rules which we follow make it very clear that really only someone who voted against the motion in the first place should be able to put it out for consideration again and if that it occurs that you know again if it there needs to be a two-thirds vote by the body to reconsider it so I just think that this is really out of order if not technically then practically because we don't have the time to consider this question over and over again Council would you want to address that or could I comment on that so they there is a process for a motion to reconsider that's a motion that's been made by somebody who's in the majority there was no majority at the last meeting that the commission split six six on the substantive vote so this is the the motion that is being proposed and which I would note hasn't been seconded yet is effectively a new motion commissioner conic's point about the fact that the commission would be talking about an issue that you talked about before is correct that's true but the commission isn't prevented from considering an issue that you are not at some point in the future when you are not able to reach majority position in your prior actions and so I do think that the motion that's proposed by commissioner Montesino is is is a proper motion it is not a motion for reconsideration thank you is there a second to commissioner could I think commissioner Hernandez is trying to speak commissioner Hernandez well given council's opinion I'll second the motion we have a motion we have a second do we have any commissioners comments commissioner McPherson yeah I'm going to vote against the motion at times you know the misinformation regarding the business business plan has only served to further to really divide our community at this term the volume up on some really posted online stuff this commission does not need to formally accept the business plan for the train to remain an option for the future although I would like to point out that I voted on April 1st to accept the business plan a motion that failed the commission accepted the transit corridor alternative analysis study in February which I voted for the recommended preferred alternative of the train remains an option as part of that study in terms of the next step which is a 17 million dollar EIR is the executive director's job to seek funding for projects that are well positioned to qualify and complete and compete for that money if really if a realistic funding source came across this desk he could bring that opportunity forward to the commission for a discussion he doesn't need to be directed by us to do that we do not need to take any further action to comply with the Caltrans grant that funded the TCA study so I think it's now the time for the head to take a rest I hope it calms down the unproductive campaigns with much at times disinformation going on our community I can see we can talk about this now this motion for the next two hours and there's probably people lined up to do it we've got we all have received hundreds of emails to foreign against this from people on both sides who I have a tremendous amount of respect for their their thoughts but I think that the call I would just assume call for the motion now I always want public discussion but I can tell you we're going to end up with a six to six vote on this motion I well I don't want to get it unless you want to prove me wrong I think we have a call for the motion and move on Commissioner Christensen Peterson thank you yeah I would like to echo what Supervisor McPherson just said I think it's he makes some really important points I'd also like to to thank Guy for clarifying some of the misinformation and misconceptions specifically surrounding the idea that the state will will fully fund any kind of EIR moving forward I have also spoken with many people on both sides of this issue people who I greatly respect and appreciate their opinions and and insight and input on this and with that in mind I also want to encourage those on both sides to consider toning down some of the incendiary rhetoric that is on both sides right now that really goes to attack those whose opinions we don't agree with or who is not on our side it's not productive it's damaging to this conversation and to the ability for for us as a body to make decisions in a way that that we can do so without the concern that there will be either personal attacks or attacks of a nature that aren't related to sticking to facts and and information that can be proven and so with that I'd like to just also share that I will also not be supporting this motion to return this business plan for future consideration as already mentioned this can come back you know at another time if additional funding is is identified I had someone call me yesterday indicating that they received information that this could never come back to us again my understanding is that is not the case but I don't see the point in moving forward with it right now when we're already as as previously mentioned at a six six tie it would be unproductive and so I will also not be supporting the motion to return this to us at a future meeting at this time thank you commissioner commissioner andy shifrin yes it is unfortunate how contentious this issue has has been for the commission I do appreciate the clarification that guy gave that in fact the business to accept the business plan or not accept the business plan is not a particularly meaningful action the commission I think the thing to focus on is that the commission did accept the tcaa recommendation that rail is the preferred alternative that to my mind is the last action that a majority of the commission supported but what I understand the executive director to say and what was echoed by uh commissioners macpherson and peterson is that what that means is that if there is funding available for moving forward with the next step there is no need to direct the staff to look for it they will be looking for it and if it is available they will bring it back to us and then we can have hopefully a productive discussion of whether it's worth pursuing or not but at that at this point when there isn't a full funding available I'm not sure really is productive to end up with a split that has symbolic value of pro and con but doesn't really help move the process forward so I don't want to vote against the motion I don't think it will be productive to have a 6-6 vote and then have the opponents of rail say yeah we killed rail again I would ask the maker and the seconder to consider that in fact what they want to happen has happened it doesn't need a vote of the commission to accept the business plan the business plan is not the determinative document the determinative document was a tcaa and that was uh you know the accepted that document with rail as the locally preferred alternative I want to say something I want to thank all the people who contacted me and I know what the commission is as well on both sides and particularly those who wrote long explanations of their point of view many of those people talked about the community agreeing with their point with their perspective I think it's it really made me realize that we're not really talking about a community when we talk about transportation we're talking about a bunch of communities and those communities have different priorities there's the rail priority there's the highway priorities there's a trail priority there's a bus priority there's local roads priority and all those priorities led to the passage of measure d because they all agreed that the deal that provided for all of them is was worth supporting measure d didn't pass by much it needed all of those communities to support it and the commission I think has been moving forward with the various uh various components of measure d we've gotten a lot of highway money we've gotten a lot of outside trail money where you know there millions of dollars have gone to local roads and a great deal of money has gone to the transit district and I think we've been you know trying to move forward with rail as well because that was what was part of the deal with measure d and I think what staff is saying is it's still part of measure d but we don't know what the funding is going to be we don't know when or whether it's going to be available but should it be available the commitment that measure d made is going to be carried out so I really feel that this sort of contentiousness and having people be angry on both sides um and feeling that this is the knockdown drag out decision on whether we're going to deal with rail or not is really not what's going on so I would request um the maker and the and the maker of the motion and the commissioners seconded it to accept what the uh executive director said that we're going to move forward with rail if funding be if and when funding becomes available and we don't need to have this vote today thank you commissioner commissioner sandy brown and then commissioner rockins and then uh commissioner john yeah I'll just add that I um I agree with uh commissioner shifrin's comments and others that have been made about the uh concerns around the contentiousness and the the real purpose of uh accepting a business plan it you know I'm I'm confounded that this has become uh this pivot point that you know people are so upset about and being the city Santa Cruz city council representative to this body I'm quite used to um contentious emotional input and in large scale input from the public and I appreciate that people have their you know they have these feelings about it people do feel strongly and you know if that people want to share that is is not so much my concern it's it seems to be the the perception or the understanding of what we're actually doing accepting a business plan means that we are accepting that uh some uh that we had people who studied this who um you know use the best information available at the time who uh you know came to some estimate of what the potential cost might be and tried to evaluate funding sources so to reject it does not mean that we're rejecting rail to accept it does not mean that we're accepting rail and this is going to happen right um right away this is about steps in a process that um you know will get us the information we need I I just reject the idea that um you know we're wasting money studying this I you know I I read this is this is something that um you know we we should be taking very seriously and the voters did in measure D so I just want to say um you know I I'm not um with respect to the motion I I would like to see this resolved um I unfortunately don't see that it will get resolved in any meeting coming up soon and that continuing to have uh tie votes won't be productive I appreciate uh uh Mr Preston's uh comments that um a lot of these things that we're concerned about not happening as a result of this vote um that's not the case that that staff will continue to do what they do and um and do that in uh you know in accordance with the preview with prior direction um so I I don't want to vote no on this because I do support moving forward and I do support having uh the continuing to have the conversation I I would like to see that conversation happen when um you know we've when folks have have really um you know dug deep and feel prepared to um you know figure out how we're going to move forward uh with uh um some you know with a with a majority of the of the commission so I um you know I don't want to not support this um and I also agree with a commissioner Schifrin that um where it's I'm not sure it's going to get us anywhere um by doing it right now Commissioner Hopkins so um I really can be brief here I I want to associate myself with Andy Schifrin's comments I want to first appreciate Guy Preston's clarification of what's going to happen if we don't take this back up again and I want to definitely appreciate the fact that people on both sides of this question are urging the makers of the motion not to put this in front of us because uh this is not a the decision not to put it on the ballot on the uh meeting agenda for the next meeting does not mean that either one side of the other has somehow won this battle or that we have a something new or definitive happening so beyond that I'll simply associate my myself with Andy's comments thank you thank you Commissioner Commissioner Jack you're muted thank you chair so I'd like to um associate with Bruce's comments and as expanded by Kristen and you know there is a lot of acrimony in this community and this is not going to get us anywhere at all to some extent um expanding on what Guy said you know we are going to be uh approaching um the effort to get more funding for the incremental steps forward but the reality is these are incremental steps the larger question is because we don't really understand the perspectives of the various user groups as Andy started talking about the various groups that are either supporting or not supporting we're never going to come to a consensus and a countywide vote which is actually going to be what's necessary to me to actually pay for the final project whatever it may be so this to me is a timeout this gives us some time to think about what this whole project really means for the various elements in the Santa Cruz County community and what are their needs that may be or may not be met and as Patrick mentioned the other day and I've expanded on in the past what needs are we being asked to meet in reference to other needs of this of the county of Santa Cruz so from a policy standpoint where do we want to spend our money to better the lives of the residents of Santa Cruz County within all the different groups of Santa Cruz County and this is something I think we have a timeout now to try to understand try to understand what's the efficiency of a rail system as opposed to expanding bar excuse me not bar but the metro you know what is the efficiency of looking at bikes and getting our signals you know in sync and stuff like that and having you know so many other ways that we can improve traffic flow at a much less cost so we need to understand these things but first off let's take advantage of this time to actually have some we're the commissioners we it's our responsibility to try to I have to understand what's going on in Watsonville I have to understand what's going on in Santa Cruz you know we're in the middle of the county I take that on freely as an obligation and so getting back to Andy and others this vote and I asked Eduardo and I asked Felipe to withdraw your motion and the reason why is because I think this continues the contention if you take this action I think you're recognizing that we don't want that to continue we want to have a conversation to continue to start listening to each other and with that I'd also like to say I appreciate all the people who have given their emails a lot of the comments are great I appreciate the I mean I realize that there's a lot more to this than you know then I think most of us realize and so this is a time out for me and I hope it's a time out for the rest of the board and you know hopefully we do it as possible as commissioners to realize what would be a possible consensus moving forward for the county of Santa Cruz and all the needs of its population and yes I'm definitely not going to vote for this thank you very much thank you commissioners uh thank you very quickly your voice is muted or something wrong with your audio I wanted to thank CalTrans for flexible and requirements for their grant funding it's pretty big I mean they're a huge partner to us in this county so it's nice it's nice to work with them so thank you okay before I go on to anybody else I'm gonna make a comment here I'd like to thank staff for their clarification but you know I'm a little confused here at the same time you know staff came before us asking that we approved the business plan so they can have a guidance some of the guidance to the future it wasn't an immediate action thing also they asked us to give staff direction to be able to go seek grant funding again this is seek grant funding it's not immediately but look for it if it's there go after it and I think that's what was the purpose of the business plan and directing staff to go that way and again it wasn't an immediately let's do it tomorrow it's it's a how they're going to work their process but at least staff had direction fund us as commissioners and giving them guidance on that but you know now that the the executive director has clarified that he really doesn't need our vote on this to seek forward funding or procedures it was kind of I'm kind of throwing back because it's kind of like a you know supervisor a criminal that I'll waste money and funding and resources because you know staff brought us this to us so we could help them so they could move forward into the future and now they're taking steps back and saying well you know we really don't need your vote we can move forward and so I'm kind of thrown back at that prospect and this is an important subject for a community overall it's important not to close out the community I know you guys don't want to have this brought back but I think it's important that the community have their voice you know we heard just there's over 500 people they want to get in on this meeting shows a significance of importance to our community and then we put this back on the agenda so we just give the community an opportunity to continue to voice their opinions and really start learning more of what's going on and so I'll support the motion still because I think it's important to allow the community to continue to voice themselves and that we don't shut that door on them and because they are they are they are the taxpayers they are the ones that we're using their fundings and as far as funding goes in resources as a supervisor man who said you know they are spending money actually me it's costing me money because the little that I get compensated for this does not compensate me for the amount of time that I spent on this I'm not compensated that they equal as a county supervisor is it's way way much less and so I understand that you know energy and time is important but I think it's important that the community have the opportunity to feel a continue to voice themselves and by not allowing them the next meeting to continue to voice I think we're just going to shut the door on them so and that's the reason I'll support this to bring it back to the agenda to give the community an opportunity to continue to speak thank you and so with that Andy I know you who spoke already once commissioner alternate but commissioner Eduardo motocino would you like to step in yeah please thank you thank you for giving me the time to recognize you know seeing all of you all of your comments and I'm you know and especially you know commissioner serfence um uh point of everything you know you you swayed me to uh uh put that uh put my uh put my motion out of consideration um the second one is is willing to consider polina sir chair i suggest you call in the second next commissioner alternate Hernandez I'll wait for a second okay motion has been withdrawn um i'm going to go ahead now and take it back to out to the public mr chair commissioner uh randy johnson also had his hand up oh I didn't see him he's not on my screen sorry I apologize right commissioner randy johnson that's okay uh chair I the motion has been withdrawn and I what i'm looking for is I think everybody on this commission is looking for alternatives kind of a consensus that's best for our community and so being open I think I saw felt at least a sense of that and you know I I don't always agree with commissioner rotkin but um I've always respected him and I think initially his very first comments were you know unless people are going to change their minds it's kind of redundant and I do believe that people have had a chance to speak on this uh they did in April so um thank you uh chair thank you commissioner johnson commissioner rotkin um I'm not going to do this as a motion I just would like to make a suggestion to the really or the our chair that we not uh unless our legal staff over rules me that this is a procedural motion and I don't know that we need under the brown act to take comments from the public on it if you just either he'd suggest that we do or that you decide that we should all leave that to your judgment um I would suggest that you give people one minute each because I do not believe hearing these comments will in any way advance our conversations people still have many opportunities to reach all of us with their views to try and persuade us to change our minds about variety of things and so forth but I don't think it's productive for us to sit and listen to two two minutes each or three minutes each let's say two is what you were going to do uh from everybody so please either you know find out whether we don't we have to actually take these comments at this point and if we do please limit them to one minute each that's just I'm not a motion but a plea to you as the chair commissioner just just for clarification before this motion can be for us to allow the community to speak on the business plan on this item on the agenda on 25 and so I'm going to go ahead and proceed with that and respect them it's not going to be on the procedural motion that was made um okay just going to be on item 25 thank you sir judge I would just be comments and uh so they can keep them as brief as possible we greatly appreciate it because there's a lot of folks that do want to make those comments and uh engage and so it's important that we allow the community to continue to engage with us is that all from the commissioners commissioner Andy Schifrin you still have your hand up yes I just want to thank uh commissioners Montesino and Hernandez for withdrawing the motion I think it is helpful and I did want to respond to you as the chair regarding your concern about public comment I think um I certainly agree and I I I think probably all the commissioners would agree that public comment is critical I don't remember I've been on this commission for as an alternate for many many years and I don't remember any item that has induced more public comment than this than this issue has and on both sides and you know to the extent that this isn't the end of the discussion this is just a pause in the discussion while staff and the state and federal government decide what they're going to do there will be many other opportunities for the public to let us know what they think and hopefully we'll be around something when we're actually taking uh making a decision that is meaningful unfortunately at this point there isn't I don't think the decision that was before isn't meaningful I wish the two groups could work it out so that it wasn't as contentious but given how strongly people feel about the issue on both sides I don't think this is really possible but I did want to just thank the um the maker and the seconder for their for withdrawing it and to you know you know appreciate your desire for public comment um it makes a lot of sense we need to hear it we've heard a lot of it and I'm sure as we move forward we're going to hear a lot more of it thank you with that I'm going to take it out to the public now giving them the opportunity okay Mr. Lowell Hearst Mr. Hearst you're recognized by the chair you have two minutes is that me you're talking to yes yeah we've lost a minute oh thank you thank you I'm in the doctor's office trying to copy on his email his wi-fi you know I hate to see Watson they'll get left behind I hate to see South County and all the commuters and all the elderly and the disabled folks be left behind and so you know moving forward is something that we've been trying to do for 30 or 40 years here and so why can't we find some way to move forward instead of getting boxed out all the time and so I would just urge the commission if they can't do anything today let's do something tomorrow or the next day or a week from today we need some relief we need action we need real solutions not just stone rolling and passing the buck and saying we can't do it we all agree that there's many many problems and that's what we need to work on is solutions to many problems and it's never easy and it's not cheap but if we if we have a little more compassion and a little more understanding of what the real needs are I would hope that we could move forward that's the job of the RTC is to move forward so hey can't we all get moving that's it for me thank you city councilman little hers back to the doctor's office at Trina Kaufman Gomez yes thank you my again this is Trina Kaufman Gomez I've been involved with the TCA process here prior to my finishing up of the the council and I continue to support the RTC looking at all avenues of moving Santa Cruz County around and making sure that it is an equitable choice I was prepared to say something in support of this plan which I would still continue to do because it is a pathway in which to achieve many goals and accomplishments and we do need this this fraction of the two size and the decisiveness has been very very difficult and this isn't a win or lose situation this is a situation where we need to come together and there will be things that we don't agree that we agree that that need to move forward but we need to work with this Watsonville's paid dearly for many things at the north end and we need to be able to reciprocate this when we do move forward with planning getting funding and getting projects that this county needs completely for the entire community and the divisiveness needs to stop and if it means taking things slowly and incrementally we need to do it but this needs to also happen in our lifetime and we we don't have the public here because they don't have the ability to wait five hours to get through a meeting and that's unfortunate as well and having two sides we need to figure out what we could do what we can we have to take the steps on what we have the ability to agree on and move forward with those steps and so that way we're coming to the point of consensus to the middle ground here because we do need to make sure that we're acknowledging and recognizing all of the community not just a segment of the community and not for recreational purposes but we we need this corridor and these plans to recognize all of us that are moving that are getting to work that are providing services for the north end of the county as well and needed the quality of life so again I'm sorry that this is paused out but I believe that there are still components of this RTC can use to still move forward on things that can be gained consensus with it thank you thank you Mrs. Kaufman no miss we have Sophia Sophia Hague and then Matt Ferrell Sophia Chair recognizes you can you unmute yourself hello sorry my name is Sophia Hague I'm a Cabrera college student I'm urging the RTC to end the delay in implementing passenger rail service in Santa Cruz county as an environmentalist I'm deeply concerned with the prospect of catastrophic climate change affecting our beautiful community our car dependency contributes significantly to greenhouse gas emissions and as much as I want to use green methods of transportation that is just simply not possible with my heavy work and school schedule yesterday it took me over an hour to get from Aptos to my home in Ben Lomond and if I could take a bus that has that had pulse transfers to light rail I would most definitely utilize that for my commute considering the large segment of Santa Cruz county that will be impacted by rising sea levels the county owes future generations investment and clean public transportation thank you that's all thank you Miss Hay Mr. Matt Ferrell and then Michael Wohl Mr. Matt Ferrell chair recognizes you good afternoon commissioners I just wanted to thank executive director Preston for clarifying the intention of staff to move forward with seeking funding for continuing work on rail and the preferred local transportation alternative and I also believe that that is what the majority people in our county support thank you thank you Mr. Ferrell for those comments Michael Wohl and then Mark my city miller sir chair recognizes Mark Wohl we have two minutes hi my name is Michael Wohl I'm a UCSC student and I'm urging the RTC to stop delaying progress with passenger rail as our climate and economy cannot wait the people I've met from around California and around the world at UCSC are shocked at how disconnected our public transportation system is and since the majority of first and second year students do not have a car we rely on our transit system to get anywhere off campus for at least two years a common trip for UCSC students is from campus to 41st avenue to get essential supplies for college life at Target and other big box stores near the Capitola Mall right now a trip from Quarry Plaza to Target takes over an hour if you make your transfer on time that travel time should be an embarrassment to the county as one could literally drive over the hill to San Jose in the same time it would take a student to take the bus a few miles across town I could go on with more horror stories about how disconnected our current system is and how it affects students who significantly contribute to our economy instead I urge the RTC to end the bureaucracy and move forward with passenger rail delaying rail is against the will of the voter against smart economic growth against an equitable county-wide transportation system and against environmental sustainability thank you for your time thank you mr. wool mark miss city miller and then jessica evans chair recognizes mark missy miller mark you unmuted that's a phone number 3660 no we're going to move on to the next one okay okay I can I think I just unmuted can you hear me now yes okay greetings chair gondolas and commissioners I guess you know my name is mark you city miller I've been a resident of santa cruz for 38 years I know you have been inundated with an avalanche of support for accepting the business plan and moving forward with a long range planning of rail service I hope you paid special attention to the resolutions of support unanimously adopted by both the city councils of Watsonville and santa cruz the two largest cities in our county in case you missed it both resolutions have the following language in common quote whereas according to the US Census Bureau the population of Watsonville of which many commute to santa cruz for work and school is over 80% majority latinx and the per capita income of Watsonville is less than half per capita income of the majority white population of the three north county cities of santa cruz capitol and scott valley whereas developing operating and maintaining passenger rail service between north and south santa cruz county and connecting to Monterey county and the rest of the state and national rail network will facilitate a decrease in the long standing and substantial per capita income gap between the majority latinx Watsonville residents and the majority white north county cities of santa cruz capitol and scott valley end quote recognizing that many folks seem focused on the almighty dollar at the end of the day your vote on this matter is also and perhaps most importantly about equity equity and equity I trust that your position reflects where your conscience has led you thank you thank you mr miller Jessica Evans and then Faulkner Jessica hi commission thank you for the opportunity to speak I'm speaking now as a representative of the santa cruz county friends of the rail and trail so this is the official rail and trail statement first I'd like to say that our policy is to always stay positive and courteous to the commissioners and to the members of the public with that said I'd like to point out to the commission that there has been a huge outpouring of public support for rail transit in santa cruz county since your six six vote last month including many people in organizations who have not voiced an opinion in the past here are some of the new organizations who sent letters after last month's vote to ask you to move forward with the long-term plan for rail transit the santa cruz county democratic central committee the power of valley says our shaves democratic committee the sandlands of valley women's club the monterey and santa cruz counties building and constructions trade council the ucsc lobby core and ucsc college democrats youth for climate action in addition to the agencies and organizations who have expressed support for rail transit six hundred and seventy nine unique individual members of the community have sent email to the rc rtc using the friends of the rail and trail email links or forms this does not include other members of the community who have used their personal email to send comments we roughly estimate around a thousand individual members of the community have expressed support for rail transit we have made a rough estimate of two hundred to three hundred individual members of the community who have expressed opposition to planning for rail on average public comments have been seventy percent in favor of rail throughout the public process in april alone there were one hundred and twenty three letters in support of rail transit and only twelve opposed momentum has been is now and will continue to build for adding rail transit to our public transportation system public transportation supporters are not going to give up and disappear the community wants the rtc to move forward with long range planning and implementation of rail transit in consideration of this public mandate the friends of the rail and trail request that all of the commissioners give their full support to expanding the public transportation system in santa criss county by planning for rail public transportation implementation in santa criss county you'll also find a slightly longer version of these comments in your packet thank you so much good day thank you Mrs. Evans a minute you're saying just you know I see Veronica else's hand she's on them she's on the list okay just wanted to know what's great um if I have Faulkner and then Emily trexel and then Veronica chair recognizes mr. Faulkner I uh thanks for taking my statement can you hear me yes great my name is Lonnie Faulkner and I've lived in santa criss for decades in live oak since 2005 and I support the business plan for clean quiet electric rail that runs through Watsonville from Watsonville to Davenport and a trail in 1990 with prop 116 the voting majority entrusted our representatives to move forward with investing in rail along the north south corridor and the unified corridor study completed in 2019 best use of this rail corridor was to implement both rail and trail not trail alone high speed e-bike lanes serve more affluent sectors of our community a rail system serves our elderly disabled students working commuters health care professionals day laborers many locals who cannot or do not drive or bike trail only serves a smaller primarily physically active sector California is now investing billions to connect our cities within the state by rail and biden and us transport secretary Buddha just recognize America is decades behind other countries like Europe Japan China and India and they are continuing to plan and commit 165 billion in this country to support rail and in city transit rail is the answer to a greener future our neighbor Monterey is building a rail system that connects them to Watsonville our rail system would allow us to take rail from Davenport to Monterey as well as rail to San Francisco Reno Denver and cities across California and the country rail is our future not providing rail to members of this community cuts us off from being able to connect by rail with the rest of the state and the country we do not need more cars on the roads or self-driving Teslas or polluting gas vehicles young people today are moving to cities which offer high quality light rail light rail in Santa Cruz County would serve people well into the future and community members would use rail the most who cannot attend this meeting today to speak for themselves due to work and school Emily Trexel and then Veronica Elsie Emily Chair recognizes Emily Trexel Hi there Can you hear me? Yes Are you able to hear me? Okay Yes Hi Okay so the first thing you know it's been stated that I know the chair originally said well nothing happened at the last meeting but it did the reality was the 6-6-0 was a tie that means it wasn't it was decided that it wasn't feasible and it didn't you didn't approve the the business plan and I think that was the correct decision I think I support you and I think that it would be not another revote for the same result determined to not be financially feasible I don't think that the people who don't support this project at the moment say that we don't want greener options of course we do absolutely 100% but I always have to wonder when we hear the commentary about the wave of the future greener reducing gas emissions the reality is I have to wonder if they read any of the 200 page agendas and information and business plans that appear the reality is it was estimated that this would reduce about 3% of the cars on highway 1 that is not a greener option the connections I have plenty of people that I know who are my friends family that work in Watson or that live in Watsonville and commute but the reality is this is not set to be a commute train as in New York or San Francisco so I think it's the correct decision that we also don't have the funding to move forward this isn't going to come from nowhere it's not governmentally funded there was a whole host of unidentified income I think that Commissioner Randy Johnson framed it well at the last meeting by saying that this really sucks out the oxygen of all other projects or things we could do we need to enhance our bus system if we ever have a rail we need to have infrastructure in place to get places enhance roads and I think that this was an ironic foreshadowing what just happened today the RTC is inability to forecast the level of public participation to open that Zoom meeting to more than 100 people makes me question the ability to forecast what really the cost of this train would be when compared to ridership given that the metro ridership is down 80 to 85 percent I just don't Veronica Elsie and then Bud Colligan greetings in in light of the comments from this morning I would just like to call to your attention the letter that is in your packet from your elderly and disabled advisory committee so that you understand how important this issue is and how important following measure D and actually really studying rail should be because some of us do need transportation and it does mention commuter rail options my concern is that using words like timeout means we don't have to address it for a while and it's going to be left to members of the public to continue to push you to follow through with what we thought we voted for in measure D so please do not drop this please do not be afraid of getting information which is what these next steps are I encourage you please don't stop thank you thank you this is Elsie Mr. Butt Colligan and then phone number 1884 last four digits can I recognize Mr. Butt Colligan thank you can you hear me yes thank you Chair Gonzalez and commissioners I just want to step back a little bit in history to 2018 and at that time we had a vote on the Progressive Rail contract and there was ample information provided to the commissioners about the unwise choice of going forward with Progressive Rail and a number of the folks that did not want to that voted to reject the business plan voted against that it was an eight to four vote but for those votes were from commissioners who did not go for the business plan and since that there have been two elections actually a lot of people talk about support but there have been two elections measure L in Capitola and the first district supervisors election where the train was a central issue I think that those folks who voted against it and then two more commissioners were added that joined that six person group that voted against the business plan so I think that history tells us something Winston Churchill said if you don't learn from history you're condemned to repeat it that they were right and that we wasted a lot of time and money on something that we shouldn't have after Progressive Rail canceled after two years and all the same people that are talking on this call today in favor of passenger rail were the same ones that said we should vote for Progressive Rail so let's learn from history Greenway has been signed by 10,000 people the Fort Petition has been signed by 1,475 there's a large difference of support between the three petitions okay last four digits of the phone number 1884 and then Tina A Chair recognizes 1884 you're on there you go Chair Gonzales and commissioners my name is Tina Cole I'm with bike Santa Cruz County I'm also a resident of Watsonville bike Santa Cruz County appreciates everyone's advocacy throughout the years for the rail trail to continue and I I really took to heart all of the comments that the commissioners made today I feel like with new information that we can continue to move forward we will do so with more purpose to quote my friend Nancy Falstich from Rihanna Racion in Watsonville now it's the time to be both brave and bold and I encourage you all to be brave and bold time equals money time also we can't take back as far as climate change is concerned I know that many folks have concerns about the future of rail in the county and I'm sure that many many other folks have offered you the facts and figures that support the multiple facets of this complex project just dismissing the business plan as folly however is not going to result in a win for anyone it was a well thought out plan I know it's off the table but I feel like we can still abide by some of its guidelines we all understand that reaching the goal of completing the rail coastal rail trail is not going to be quick easy or cheap we understand that funding for the entire cost will not fall from the sky will not be available in one grant opportunity will instead be pieced together from different buckets from multiple funding streams over several years we also understand that times and trends change the county residents of 2031 or 2041 may not have the luxury of living in a house with a yard away from the density of our city's downtown centers they may not have space to park more than one car they may intentionally choose not to drive but rather take public transportation across the county we have Tina A and then David Van Brink chair recognizes Tina A two minutes hi this is Tina thank you for taking my call firstly I want to address the measure L there were paid staff can you hear me yes okay so I think the delay is a tactic by a small group of very influential and wealthy people when the entire community supports really rail and trail Watsonville 86 percent look at the support from during April the city council of Watsonville unanimously backs five years of coastal rail of supporting the coastal rail trail and I think we should support them also I think metro if we link that with the rail it will be very beneficial it will be a great partnership it will effortlessly produce a greater good if they're both linked together I definitely feel that we need to support like I said Watsonville so I'm a little nervous and the delay tactic of the anti rail this has been going on for a long time a number of years ago Greenway actually sued as part of the section south of Aptos and fortunately the federal the judge ruled in favor of the RTC so their tactic is let's do more delays let's cost more money their delay is let's not move this forward then they bring to the public look it's more delays and more cost when they're not really telling the general public the full truth they're the ones that are delaying it they represent the folks that aren't driving every day to Watson from Watsonville to work they have the privilege of sitting at home in their beautiful homes and they're not exposed to the horrific traffic jams your comments we have David Van Brink and then Joseph Haleen Mr. Van Brink Joe recognizes you have two minutes hello can you hear me okay yes hi I'm David Van Brink thank you for the clarification from director Preston I'm very pleased to hear that we've sort of you know officially acknowledged that indeed it is worth staff hourly time to continue to pursue funding sources I do hope that under this light all future planning continues to respect the future of mass transit within the corridor aligning with the TCA a locally preferred alternative outcome and all other processes up to now to be clear despite the minority obstruction most citizens are in favor of the RTC's stated official long-term direction please keep moving forward thank you thank you Mr. Van Joseph Haleen and then Brian Peoples chair recognizes is it Joseph Joseph hi yes thank you for the opportunity to speak I just want to share some of the organizations who have asked you move forward with rail transportation on the Santa Cruz branch line the transportation agency of Monterey County the Democratic Women's Club of Santa Cruz County the Santa Cruz group of the Sierra Club bike Santa Cruz County Regeneracion Bajaro Valley Climate Action Ecology Action their campaign for sustainable transportation bike friendly Watsonville the California Coastal Commission the Caltrans Division of Rail and Mass Transportation the City Council of Watsonville the City Council of Santa Cruz the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission Elderling Disabled Transportation Advisory Committee the RTC Interagency Technical Advisory Committee the RTC Bicycle Advisory Committee in the Santa Cruz Area Chamber of Commerce there's a clear mandate from the public to plan for rail transit in Santa Cruz County I ask that you place the rail business plan back on the RTC agenda please take a new vote accept the business plan and move forward with planning rail transit for the future of Santa Cruz County thank you for your consideration thank you Joseph see your comments Brian Peoples and then Jack Brown chair recognizes Brian Peoples hi this is Brian from Trail Now the debate really isn't between a train or trail actually the debate is over when are we going to open up the coastal corridor that corridor has sat there for 10 years under our taxpayer owned property and it's a valuable transportation resource we now know that we can rail bank it and we also know that those old railroad tracks have to come out we also know that it's those tracks are actually worth a lot of money they actually recycle value will pay for the interim coastal trail so we've studied a lot but now we need to realize that the key here is we need to start using that property so we need staff to start looking at how can we use that coastal corridor now what can we do to move forward and we know what we need to do we don't have to reinvent the wheel it's well known so we need to rail bank that property now and we need to start building the interim coastal trail and I'm hopeful that there is no more delay of this because when construction of highway one begins and when Murray bridge retrofitting begins you think traffic is bad now you wait till those contract construction begins so it's very very important for our community to open up the coastal corridor now thank you for your time thank you mr. people's Jack brown then Barry Scott Mr. Jack Brown I'll mute yourself you have two minutes yeah thank you first I'd like to say I'm just really impressed by the commission and how you guys acted before this I think you've recognized a lot of key issues here of the contention not only in the public but within your own commission here and so I really appreciate that but I think we have to take a look at you know this the public comment here and really on both sides there's claims of special interests being involved on the other and you know we kind of see it especially with Fort where you know they put petitions out where you know there's signers on there from Nebraska and Maine and across the country and they're they're filling the inboxes with non-durifiable email accounts stating that they've got the majority and there's people on the trail side that say they have the majority but the big elephant in the room really is that there's never really been a vote by the public for rail or trail and how to get through with this and I think that was a big misconception that Schifrin and Brown made earlier measure D did not account for rail it made for lots of things it allowed for a study and maintenance of the corridor but it wasn't a vote on rail so I really would like to have the board of supervisor members of the commission or their alternates are here to really go back and say you know you really need to take this to the public because it's always going to be a stalemate in the commission and it's always going to be a lot of misinformation going back and forth until we really have that vote so I look forward to a good positive action here and that the commission can start moving forward on some real transportation issues here in the county thank you thank you Mr. Brown Barry Scott and then Maria Solis Kennedy chair recognizes Mr. Barry Scott oh thank you thank you chair Gonzalez and thank you RTC and Mr. Preston for the clarifying comments the division concerns me too and I see a lot of misstatements on all sides it's not just two sides and I see a lot of logical fallacies use these these binary arguments like it's rail or it's trail you can't have both or it's rail versus metro and you can't have both and I'm of the I'm of the opinion that you can have it all we really in fact when you put things together you get a remarkable network but more than anything else I'd like to speak to the development of these the train technologies the rail vehicle technologies that are possible here in 2015 we looked at exclusively diesel fossil fuel trains the unified corridors then came together and looked at rail and trail and found the trail only wasn't wasn't a useful option but rail with trail was the best use of corridor but still we're looking at diesel technologies the TCAA looked at 18 different options including a hyper loop underground and came back again and said rail transit it's the best return on investment but the prices were still based on large and expensive commuter rail systems only this year fortunately the business plan identifies electric power as a requirement not fossil fuels and for the first time ever small light street cars are included as possibilities but the costs still apply to the larger systems clean quiet street cars like the Tig M shown on page 13 of the business plan are right-sized and far more affordable than the larger systems that cost so much and that have been the subject of the disagreement so I hope staff will clarify the potential savings of a street car option and that and share this with with commissioners because I think we might all agree that geez something like a small light electric street car could really make a lot of people happy not for your comments Maria Solis Kennedy and then Brett Garrett Chair recognizes Maria Solis Kennedy hi can you hear me great thank you so my name is Maria Solis Kennedy I live here in Santa Cruz and I wanted to urge you all to move forward on a public transportation option and specifically the commuter rail I wanted to share a little bit about what this commuter rail would have meant to me or would mean to me up until a month ago I was a nanny to a wonderful two-year-old boy but when his family moved to Watsonville I had to quit the job that I really loved because I could no longer make the commute work I have problems with my eyesight so I'm not able to do the drive especially in inclement weather and with all the traffic and then the bus timetable just didn't allow me enough wiggle room to get to my second job as a barista on the west side on time so when I heard about the coast connect vision I was like wow this would have been exactly what I needed to be able to stay at my nanny job the electric light rail would open up so many possibilities for Santa Cruz residents like myself and is also an important step in the right direction in combating climate change I want to urge you all to end the delay and bureaucracy and support rail and then I also just wanted to quickly speak to the importance of making these meetings accessible to the public I mean this is obviously in the middle of a work day and it's now been like five hours and so I think that if you want to hear from working people and not just people who are able to be on a meeting like this long then it's important to make these meetings at times that are more accessible and also to not have any sort of cap on the number of people allowed in as you all said you've been getting tons of feedback from the community you know this is a really hot issue so I just encourage future meetings on this subject to be planned to be a little bit more accessible for the community thanks so much thank you Mrs. Kennedy Brett Garrett and then Sally Arnold Gary recognizes Brett Garrett two minutes hi can you hear me yes hi there is a technical difficulty on this meeting I did not hear the comments from Mark Mercedes Miller nor from the phone number 1884 the zoom was completely silent when those two people spoke which is very odd because I got the impression that you were hearing them anyway back on topic I keep hearing a wish that the two sides might find a compromise so I'm here with a possible way I urge both sides everyone to look very deeply into personal rapid transit PRT is a paradigm shift better transit without a train it's the possible consensus option currently not well understood by many people even some consultants don't understand it but I've researched it deeply and PRT will provide better transit on the rail corridor and beyond the glideways project in the east bay will prove viability just please look at the city council meeting just from a few days ago in Pittsburgh, California it shows a feasibility study and there's a wonderful presentation about how glideways will work in the east bay and by extension it could work here and there's other providers I'm not saying that's the only company but it's the one that is showing viability right now thank you thank you Mr. Garrett Kelly Arnold and then Peter Scott Chair recognizes Mr. Kelly Arnold hi this is Sally Arnold can you hear me all right yes okay great thank you well you know as many people have mentioned this is yet another marathon meeting I'm so ambivalent about that because like so many of us I have things to do too and on the other hand it's wonderful that we have such an engaged community to care so deeply that they are willing to spend their time you know expressing their concerns and their interests and their ideas about how to make this community better and I appreciate all of your patients I want to just speak for friends of the rail and trail for a moment we are really pleased to hear from the executive director Preston that the staff can continue to seek funding for the locally preferred alternative rail without the commission approval of the business plan just because the commission is deadlocked doesn't mean that they cannot continue doing the work needed and that and given that and the fact that now once the commissioners understood that I thought I wanted to commend commissioners Montecino and Hernandez for withdrawing their motion I appreciate their flexibility in the light of new information and I just really want to encourage the staff to continue their excellent work to bring clean light rail to our county as you can see it's a very popular thing you know people have listed all the organizations that are in favor and the hundreds of people that write and attend these meetings that are in favor I know there's a desire for a hundred percent consensus we're not going to get that but we are pretty darn close here in terms of the number of organizations and individuals who support clean light rail for our county there will always be a small minority of people who will object we can't stop that but really we're darn close to consensus right now thank you thank you Mrs. Erlund Mr. Peter Scott Peter Scott then Keith Otto yeah Mr. Peter Scott chair recognizes you you have two minutes you okay can you hear me yes yeah I would just like to point out that FM3 apparently has done polling in Santa Cruz County and has found outstanding favorable opinions from each of the five Santa Cruz County Supervisorial districts over 70 percent in favor of rail I'm not sure where Mr. Colligan gets his statistics from but I would urge you to do your own polling and see whether those polls that you do agree with the previous polling done by FM3 so I would urge you support for either commuter rail or other options on the rail tracks in the rail corridor we are very fortunate to have that rail corridor available to us and fortunate to have it owned by our local RTC and thank you so much commissioners for all your hard work thanks bye thank you Mr. Peter Scott and then Jeremiah Daniels here Mr. Otto you have two minutes yeah can the commissioners hear me okay yes excellent last month there was a vote on the TCAA business plan the outcome was to not move forward with passenger rail that was a decision one of the components of that vote was direct staff to seek federal and state funding that was voted down today one commissioner said something like staff will do what they will do in reference to continuing to seek rail funding and then said that staff actions will align with direction from the commission so my ask of the commission is to do just that and provide clear direction to staff do you really want staff and the director to pursue funding for rail I hope not if we're serious about evaluating public support let's have a county-wide vote this month just like last month the underlying facts remain a train north of Watsonville does not make sense for Santa Cruz County let's move on from this train idea and focus on real plans that move Santa Cruz County forward thank you thank you Mr. Otto Jeremiah Daniels and then Ryan chair recognizes Jeremiah Daniels you have two minutes hello this is Jeremiah Daniels I'm red as an of Santa Cruz I am I wanted to correct one of the incorrect statements made by Mr. Colligan earlier about hearing the same voices over and over again I was not part of this debate I became part of this I became very distraught with the situation when I saw how much outside money was being put into the anti rail campaign and it seemed very dubious and devious to see that this is a new voice and I plan to stay in Santa Cruz County for a long time and I want to urge you to accept the business plan and and to move forward with light rail using our rail corridor for the people is clearly the most equitable and most environmental solution and it'll help strengthen all of our other public transportation options it'll help improve everyone's electric bicycle movements and their personal rapid transport solutions that they choose but none of those are actually public transportation options whereas a rail is a public transportation option for everybody accessible to everybody and yeah please supervisors make the right decision and and move forward with the the the rail thank you Jeremiah you have Ryan and then Doug chair recognizes Ryan yeah two minutes Ryan you there you can unmute yourself or you're unmuted Ryan okay thank you sorry about that I want to follow Mike Rockins lead and saying you got to come up with something that's going to move one out of six commissioners or you know somebody and I think that probably the way to do that is public opinion and because the commissioners seem to be pretty well set on their in their opinions and the way to do that is to have a common set of facts and I think the place from which a common set of facts could emerge that would be useful to everybody would be the RTC staff and the way to do it would be to boil down some of the key issues to basically a one page document that could explain in simple terms what the alternatives are and the fact of the matter is that there's all the support for the rail but it's based on misconceptions it's based on the misconception that you can have it all and I think that it's really important for the RTC to be able to put out in the public what are the what's the cost of a rail versus a trail what's the timeline of a rail versus a trail what's the effect on freeway traffic of a rail versus a trail what's what's the environmental impact what about the vulnerability of a train to sea level rise versus the vulnerability of a trail the environmental damage as I talked about earlier in terms of what's happening in section seven phase two and then of course the big monster about well if there's not enough money where's that money going to come from and whether that whether the sources of that money is equitable or not equitable I think there's a really a lot to be laid out here and if it was really clear what is going on a lot of people who say oh yeah I'm for the train I want the train you know whether it's the Sierra Clover Bike Santa Cruz County their members are going to wait a minute that doesn't add up so please let's get some objective information out in the front of the public in an easily digestible form thank you Mr. Ryan Doug Doug chair this is Doug and Ryan's comments are a great segue to my comments in 2012 UC Berkeley prepared a transportation study that says the most successful light rail projects are 50 times more successful than the worst so we talk about not being divisive and not being emotional but I think this is a very divisive and a very emotional decision to be made also in that study it said that heavy rail works better than light rail heavy rail works because there's higher transit numbers light rail with low transit numbers is not cost effective and that's exactly what we're discussing now is light rail low transit numbers very unsuccessful 50 times more unsuccessful than the best the business plan that was published by the staff underestimates the operating expenses per year by a factor of two to three based upon my analysis of existing light rail operating expenses per mile shows that that's that's grossly underestimated so if we're going to create a fact sheet let's make sure the facts are right we do not want to agree on facts that are wrong please stop this I congratulate you on not approving the business plan and I look forward to a nice beautiful path through Santa Cruz County thank you Mr. Bernasso Sharon is Mr. Ben Bernasso give me a minute okay I've got you now I think this suggestion do you need anything else of being compromised in each other for a while makes a lot of sense actually even the trail are the rail people the trail and rail rail or trail whatever I call it they know that that's not going to be done until the mid 30s that's 14 years from now so my compromise suggestion is rail bank do a basic coastal trail so we've got this transportation system and then keep studying to see how you can put a trail and rail together but in the meantime let's use what we have and let's not forget metro metro is a great asset in fact it can use part of the trail part of the time especially from 41st avenue to the boardwalk and then up to the UCSC or to bringing people from Watsonville and Mid County that are government employees working in Santa Cruz or they're jurors trying to get to a jury duty special bus starts with Watsonville 20 minutes it leaves the Cabrillo college and then 20 minutes later it's at UCSC or the other bus in 20 minutes is at the center the government center there's all kinds of flexibility that a bus system a metro system has and I really like the efficiency studies that are going on that we heard today and not only metro but in the other areas so that's my suggestion rail bank plan for what you want to do and then unbank it if you need to bye bye thank you Mr. Ben I do not see any other hands commissioner Gonzalez see no other hands I'm going to go ahead and close this item now and move on I just had somebody jump on I don't know what you want to do but he will take the last person Stefan Wells is that correct correct this will be the last individual Stephanie thank you so much I thought I had raised my hand earlier my name is Stephanie Wells I am a resident of Santa Cruz and I just wanted to to say like Jeremiah who spoke earlier I'm also a new voice I was not in this conversation in the last meeting but I've been encouraged as so many in our community have to join this conversation because it means a lot to me I encourage you to keep moving forward to seek funding for passenger rail we need an interconnected public transportation option for our whole county our population is growing and highway congestion as I've seen between here between Santa Cruz and Watsonville is terrible even with the pandemic keeping people home and relying on Highway 1 is for the commuting needs of our residents between north and south county just isn't feasible and nor is the trail only I am an avid bicyclist myself and I've been enjoying the open trail on the west side so thank you but post pandemic I'll need to commute across the county and biking from one side of the county to the other is just not a real a realistic option for me and certainly it's not a realistic option for our community members who are trying to get to different parts of the county for second or third jobs as one of our community members Maria spoke about I'm trying to get her to her nanny job in Watsonville and having to to leave that so that's reality for so many of us and for the more facing a climate emergency we just can't keep delaying the Biden administration's committed to expanding passenger rail and dramatically increasing funding for passenger rail so just seems like now is the time to to be forward thinking and to to seek some of that funding to bring passenger rail to Santa Cruz County so thank you for letting me speak again I apologize I didn't have my hand raised earlier thank you for your time okay thank you we're gonna go ahead and I'll officially close that we're gonna go ahead and move on now to item 28 closed sessions Mr. Chair we do have one closed session items today regarding real property negotiations we're not anticipating a report out of closed session okay I guess my question here is to the commissioners do you guys want to continue on or would you like to make a special meeting next week just for closed session let's do it now and get it done that's my view just do it now and get it done okay is that a forward move forward move forward okay we're gonna move forward I think you have some comments for closed session from the public okay so we're gonna go ahead and get back to the public for the closed session comments any anyone that wants to comment on the closed session item only motion I apologize if I'm mispronouncing your name motion and Brian yes can you hear me yes yes just regarding the rail trail I live in live oak and my wife works at live this is on the conference of the real the closed session on real property I don't have anything for that I raised my hand for the previous I've just been on for the rail trail I need to apologize that we had closed that already that's up to you guys that's fine I mean I raised my hand but whatever you guys decided to do yeah we had only moved on so I apologize for that okay Brian people's hi this is Brian from trail now not sure of the closed session negotiations however rumor has it that roaring camp is going to take over the freight operations in Watsonville and I want to say we support that I think it's great with some conditions we want to make sure that roaring camp will not have we'll have no legal rights to prevent rail banking from Watsonville to Davenport or the construction of the Santa Cruz coastal trail no public funds will be used to subsidize roaring camp freight operations in Watsonville roaring camp will financially be responsible for the infrastructure of the railroad tracks including part route river trestle and they shall not operate excursion trains outside of their current private operations and we hope you support the rail banking and construction of the interim trail by 2023 now as a side note we want to suggest that you think outside the box the UP yard is about a half a mile or so from the customers in Watsonville and an alternative could be the loading offloading could exist in the UP yard right next to it and then the trucking could service the local customers and what the opportunity here is now Watsonville could have the Pajaro River trestle converted into a trail and open up the neighborhoods so we want to encourage you to think outside the box there and look how that could benefit the local Watsonville community so please keep in mind that look at space x you don't have to think that you need the big big trains running through the Watsonville neighborhoods thank you thank you there are no other hands up commissioner okay so everybody got the link for the closed session it was sent this morning and I just find it so with that going to close the meeting and we're going to adjourn into the closed session did I get that right I don't think I've ever gotten this correct okay sorry I apologize for that so I guess we'll see each other in the closed session okay bye thank you thank you is this or comments or everybody's going to closed session hi Ian so our legal counsel noted there will be no report out so we can go ahead and close this meeting


Hello, Columbia, and welcome to This Week in the City. Highlights brought to you from the Public Relations, Media, and Marketing Department for the City of Columbia. I'm your host, Alicia Utsi. On Monday, November 1st, the Office of Business Opportunities will host a free webinar. The Office of Business Opportunities will host Columbia Disadvantaged Business Enterprise, CDBE Program Virtual Workshop. This workshop will be hosted on Monday, November 1st at 10 a.m. Please visit our website at columbiasc.gov for more details. On Monday, November 1st, the Planning Commission will meet at 5.15 p.m. at the Busbee Street Community Center, located at 1735 Busbee Street. This meeting will be a hybrid meeting, which will be held in person, but it will also be live streamed on our city's website and our YouTube channel. For agenda items, please visit our website at columbiasc.gov. On Tuesday, November 2nd, municipal elections will be held for the City of Columbia. Four open seats are available. Mayor, at-large council member, and council members for districts one and district four. For information regarding voting, please contact the Richland County Elections and Voter Registration Office by calling<PHONE_NUMBER>. Make sure you exercise your right to vote. Also, please note that there are precinct changes regarding the upcoming election on November 2nd. For details regarding these changes, please visit the City of Columbia's website at columbiasc.gov and follow us on social media platforms by checking Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And again, you may also call the Richland County Elections and Voter Registration Office at<PHONE_NUMBER>. On Wednesday, November 3rd, City Council will hold an Economic and Community Development Committee meeting. The committee meeting will begin at 2 p.m. and will be held in person at the Busbee Street Community Center located at 1735 Busbee Street. For agenda items, please visit our website at columbiasc.gov. A free COVID-19 vaccine clinic will be held on Wednesday, November 3rd from 1 p.m. until 5 p.m. at Drew Wellness Center located at 2101 Walker-Solomon Way. Please come out and get your free COVID-19 vaccine to ensure your safety, your family, and the safety of our community. For more information regarding our free COVID-19 vaccine clinics, please visit our award-winning microsite at resilient.columbiasc.gov. The Board of Zoning Appeals will meet on Thursday, November 4th at 4 p.m. The meeting will be held in person at the Busbee Street Community Center located at 1735 Busbee Street. For those who do not want to attend in person, the meeting will also be live streamed on our website at columbiasc.gov and on our YouTube channel. For agenda items, please visit our website at columbiasc.gov. Thank you, Columbia, for watching this week in the city. We'll be bringing you highlights from the Public Relations Media and Marketing Department. Please stay connected by visiting our website at columbiasc.gov, by following us on our social media platforms, on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. And of course, by staying tuned in and connected, you may call us at<PHONE_NUMBER> or you may email us at pio.columbiasc.gov. And remember, we are Colombia.