Hello everyone, thank you for coming. It's great to be here. My name is Peter Gubin, this is Anton Sirvachev, and today we'd like to talk with you about Blender and GIF development. But first, let me tell you a little bit about us. We work at Trace Studio, where we create game content for golden titles, and then as an expert in 3D and 2D, we collaborate with studios like Infinity Ward for games, Wargaming, and Gaging Entertainment to create awesome games. So, I'd like to share with you some artwork by our artists at Trace. We create environment art, character art, as well as vehicles, weapons, and other surface stuff. But today we'd like to talk mainly about environment art. We won't be talking about animation, rigging, stuff like that. So, as you can see here, we make a lot of environment art. And today, we'll be talking about current states for Blender with a rival of 2.8, and Anton will be talking about intro to environment art. I will show you tips and tricks that will hopefully help you with your own game-ready art creation. Also, we'll be talking about how we use Blender and why we use it in our pipelines. And finally, we'll be talking about how Blender could be improved to make it even better in the future. So, let's... Anton will be talking about Curricidal Blender in game dev. Thank you. Thank you. So, you have already seen the slide after that. This is how I felt about the arrival of Blender 2.8. So, when Blender 2.8 arrived in an experimental branch, I was beginning to learn Blender with the intention of switching over to it completely. At that time, I was using other industry-standard software, both at home and at work, but I was really missing some software that would allow me to model with the same speed that Blender offers. So, what I really liked about Blender was its clean UI and powerful modifiers. So, those two things alone were already a big improvement over what I had to deal with on a daily basis. But what really sold me on to Blender was the new real-time rendering engine called Eevee. And this is a work by Daniel Baistat, if I remember it correctly. So, what Eevee allowed me to do was to preview my vertex normals, my surfaces, how they look in the viewport, how my textures look, how my material layers work, without actually exporting the asset into your game engine. So, in that sense, Blender gives you freedom because it removes that extra step and you save time by doing that. So, let me talk a little bit about Blender game development now. So, Blender is being used on big game projects right now, but I have to say that in terms of becoming a part of pipeline outside of simply modeling stuff, there are still some challenges. So, in-house tools remain oriented to industry standard software. And it is used for organizing scenes and also for animation and rigging. And that's all good. But there are also such third-party plugins like Havoc, which are not supporting Blender at the moment. And I think with how Blender 2.8 is progressing, this is going to change in the future. So, at the same time, I have to say that people new to Blender do not have to fear that they will not be able to use Blender at their workplace because Blender fits any modeling pipeline. So, why do we use, why our company uses Blender in AAA projects? Because Blender is efficient because it supports our modeling workflows. And from Boolean to Bevel Modifiers, it allows us to do our job in a very fast, very efficient, non-destructive, and very procedural way. And we very much like that. So, a little bit into, I'll talk about an introduction to creation of environment assets for video games.  So, current generation video game consoles have a fairly limited amount of texture memory. But at the same time, they can handle a lot of polygons on the screen at the same time. So, for you as an artist, this means that you have to get very creative with how you handle your UV mapping and texturing. And this is how getting creative with UV mapping actually feels like. What kind of texture size you should use, what kind of type of texture you should use. This is mainly decided by the size of your asset and also its importance and proximity to the player's point of view. So, in this graph, you'll see that small assets are uniquely textured. Medium assets are textured using trims and decals, while big assets use tellable textures and material layering. In reality, of course, this is not so clear-cut. And most of these techniques are used together in conjunction also with such supporting techniques as custom vertex normals, vertex color painting, material layering, and stuff like that. There are many, many, many techniques with which you can achieve a visually rich look for your real-time assets. So, unique texturing. Unique texturing is easy, very easy to implement, very easy to understand for newcomers. But at the same time, it allows for a lot of visual richness. But due to its unique nature and the fact that current generation systems have limited texture memory, they become pretty expensive. They can become pretty expensive. So, how do you mitigate some of this issue? How do you offset the cost of the unique textures? You can overlap or mirror some of its elements, but that's about it in how to fix that issue. So, next up, you need to make something medium-sized like, let's say, a fireplace. For this one, you will need to use trims. Also, unique texture. Yeah, so very unique, very rich. But for medium-sized assets, you need to use trims because you cannot use unique texturing on small assets. That would be very expensive. So, trims are basically, sorry, trims are basically textures that are tileable only in one direction, horizontal or vertical. And you can move these trims around just like that, sorry, yeah, just like that to give your asset a more interesting and exciting look. At the same time, it would be beneficial for you if you could include other elements into your trim texture into the same texture space, I should say, like unique elements, uniquely baked, uniquely textured. And also, elements like decals that you can mix using a second UV channel. So, as you can see, I'm mapping decals into the other material, into the material. And with that, I can achieve visual richness. So, okay, a third type of texture, tileable textures. For instance, you need to make a big asset like a building. For this one, you cannot use unique texturing, you cannot use trims. Well, you could, but that would be more trouble than it's worth. And since you are using tileable textures and you have to build something huge, you need to probably use several of those tileable materials. And you can, sorry, and you can mix these materials together using such techniques as bitmap masks, or as it is shown in the next screen, vertex color painting. So, as you can see, we mix the materials with red, green, blue, and other colors. And you can also take colors in between for smoother transitions. So, this gif is made by Peter. He's very good at this technique. He's very clever. He also mixed in masks for height maps so that, you know, the grout is shown below the actual paint. So, yeah, some more vertex color painting. And yet more vertex color painting. I hope you're not bored with that. Okay. So, why do I talk, speak so much about all of this texturing and UV mapping stuff? Simply because I want to stress how important UV mapping is. And, naturally, the tools that allow you to do that have to be very robust. I have to say that tools for UV mapping in Blender are lacking at the moment. And objectively speaking, other industry-standard software does this job so much better. So, how do we progress from here? How do we improve Blender? I think the best way would be to get inspired by example of father industry-standard software. And it has a lot of neat features. They, several software packages. First of all, signing and checking textual density by clicking the button. So, this one is really important because you do not want your textual density values across all of your assets to be random. You need to get them more or less uniform. And this would lead to a smoother player experience. Otherwise, some of your assets will have a very pixelated, very blurry look. And some others yet will have a very crisp and very texture-rich look. So, another second thing that I want to point out, what would be good to have in Blender is straightening UV shells. So, basically, you would use that a lot in environment assets for games because you will work a lot with trim textures. And you will need to have a very easy way to map your UV shells onto trim elements. And third thing I think would be good to have is an unfolding algorithm. So, other industry-standard software has good unfolding algorithms.  Blender has something like that, I know, but it doesn't work as well. And I think this algorithm has to improve. And I know what you will say, that all of this stuff can be mitigated by using third-party plugins, paid plugins, free plugins. But we really want Blender to be an ultimate 3D package. And we want it to, we want Vanilla Blender, Vanilla Blender to work out of the box the best way it could possibly do. And now, thank you. I'm done with that. Now, Peter is going to tell you more about modeling tips and tricks that we use at our work on a daily basis. Thanks. Thank you. I would like to show you some tips and tricks. And they are, I would like to point out that they are using core-blank functionality, so they don't require any third-party add-ons and stuff like that. First one is when I use decimation, I often use a bunch of vertex groups to mask the several decimation modifiers. And it's a great way to control different areas of decimation and it's procedural, so you have control over the result. So, as you can see here, I remove a lot of geometry from the edges by painting and then removing the unnecessary geometry there. Next one is a technique I use for organic modeling. And it's several modifiers such as solidify and subsurface. And it's a great way to model organic shapes. I try to work with simplest geometry as possible when I model stuff like this. And it allows me to make this stuff in a quick way. And you can use Boolean to do that. And, yeah, it's really powerful. So, now I would like to talk a little bit about new modifier features in 2.8. The first one is UV offset. It's important because when you use array and you get the overlapping UVs, you get the baking errors. And it's a great way to avoid that because you don't need to collapse modifier and move your UVs outside of zero to one space. So, the way it works is that you offset it by a margin of one and you get a goal. Mirror UV offset is the same feature for mirror. And, again, it's a great way to get cleaner bakes when working with mirror geometry. Data transfer modifier is really useful in specific cases. And it's rarely in a spotlight, but it can be really helpful and most useful data to transfer customers normal CVs and their color. And here, as you can see, I have issues due to the fact that I cut the cylinder in non-uniform and messy way resulting in better apology. And this happens a lot when you cut your geometry for secondary channel or stuff like that. And you can easily fix that by transferring normals from in this example, clean cylinder and you get correct shading. The triangulate modifier is great in 2.8 because it allows you now to triangulate on the end guns, which is great and which is even better because it preserves normals now. Why is preservation so important? Well, because you want to have your geometry shaded correctly when you triangulate it because if you rely on FBX exporter or stuff like that, basically standard exporters, you don't have a control over triangulation and you can get errors due to different triangulations and stuff like that. So as you can see here, I have triangulate modifier on the end of the stack and I get correct shading and I can be sure that I will get correct shading across different applications. Next one is Boolean modifier and it's great. It's being great but now it's even greater because it can work with bevel modifier which have custom works normals now and it's great because it's procedural and there is simply no other to do dynamic Booleans in such powerful and efficient way and it's very flexible. And stuff you may not know is that you can transfer the data from Boolean objects, any data such as vertex colors giving mapping stuff like that which will be handy later as you will see. Next one is custom works normals. Custom works normals is a way to affect your shading and it's been used in game dev for a while now but now we have a bunch of modifiers that do this procedurally and we don't need tools like Yavna and other tools and as you can see here we have average normals on the left and custom works normals on the right. So here's the first way to get custom works normals out of the box and bevel modifier now have option to harden normals it's basically a way to get procedural custom works normals with bevel. And second one is weighted normals modifier which is awesome because you have on top of having procedural custom works normals you have an option to preserve hard edges and also you can affect custom works normals shading by using weights. So here's an example of using custom works normals for making stuff here I have a rock which will have a lot of gradients on normal map where if I use it with average normals but I can use custom works normals and get flat surfaces and avoid a lot of shading on normal map and it's a great way to get cleaner bakes and one thing you should note is that your baker and your game engine should support the custom works normal. Here's an example of using a bunch of stuff I discussed before so here's a couple of booleans and bevel modifier with custom works normals and this subject is procedural it's great to have procedural bevels, real time bevels. So here's another example you have a bunch of booleans and you can see the only symbol here is it's mapped to second degree channel used by a source subject so it's a great way to transfer different UV maps like that and here's another example how you could achieve wall damage like that using that technique here I use one plane with solidify modifier and a bunch of UV channels. The wall damage is mapped to second channel and I even transfer vertex colors here from the boolean object so it's a great way to get such wall damage with ease of editing and you can copy this stuff over and you will get wall damage really easily. Next one is paneling which I use for one of my personal scenes it's basically again this plane and I can cut geometry easily and use solidify on the top and bevel to achieve these hard surfaces and this is a result. This map doesn't use any unique textures so here's another technique it's a variation of previous technique and here I basically curve the panels along the curve object and I use two instances one without curve modifier and one with and it's a great way to edit stuff like this. You can edit the object on the plane and preview the result right there so here's the result another useful technique is to use asset linking and it's a great way to mitigate the complexity of the scenes by separating objects into their own scenes and it helps a lot with dealing with such objects like windows or stuff like that because you have simple objects on the top in their separate scenes and you will propagate any update to the object here as you can see I use two blender scenes one is assembled from collections so no unique geometry there but I can easily edit separate objects and I will get the updates right there so great thing here is that I can use any modifiers objects and stuff like that in separate scenes and ignore them in main scene because I just link objects and later on you can return to your scene and bake stuff and it will update everywhere so in conclusion I would like to I would like to say that you should it's a great thing to invest your time into learning about modifiers and incorporate them into your daily routine because it saves a lot of time and it's procedural and it's great so thanks so let me briefly conclude it I would like to highlight what is great in Blender and what is not so great about Blender right now and how it could improve and how we could all benefit from that so first not so great UV mapping has to seriously improve to make a big statement in game development and current implementation of UV mapping module is probably 10 years old so it should change or at least be overhauled so second one is subdivision modelling we understand that the algorithm for subdivision has been improved and now it's of high quality you get higher quality results but at the same time we have lost in speed and what we have to do now is we switch on sub-diff modifier see what we are working with then we switch it off and then we model push polys, polygons, vertices, whatever and then we switch it back on to just to see what we have done to see the results this is sub-optimal I think this should also be improved you would like to have this kind of quality that we have now but with the same speed that we had before that would be pretty awesome third one, undo of course it really holds us back not always but sometimes in some scenes that are very complex it can hold us back we can mitigate this issue by separating the asset into several elements and then link them from different blend files but we would like to avoid that but that's about it for the shortcomings from our side now I have to say that despite all the shortcomings that I have discussed Blender is an excellent modelling tool we need to highlight some of its more awesome features so modifiers Blender Extra Special Subdiff, solidify, bevel boolean it's all the special sauce that makes Blender with this and I cannot imagine going back to what I had before I like this non-destructive very procedural way of working up until the very end when we export the asset to a game engine it's called Ivy, it has given us freedom missing that extra step as I have said before just to see what the hell you are doing very important and speed speed in terms of how fast the Blender starts up it takes seconds while industry standard software can take a minute or more to start and add up during the day especially if you load that standard industry software with a lot of plugins with a lot of in-house build tools and this makes your software unstable and then it crashes all the time you probably all know that so Blender starts in minutes and this really saves time and by saving time it saves money in the end we would like to share some resources they happen to be made by artists from our studio but that's a simple coincidence it's because we are the best, I'm joking and some of our contact details you can get in touch with us, tell us how awful and boring the presentation was or on the other hand maybe you liked it please, we would be very excited to hear your input and we very much appreciate your attention we hope that you all think that it has been somewhat useful for you maybe you would use some of the approaches that we have discussed here at your work, thank you


Years before I'd been in a film called Man of La Mancha and at the Dino Rente Studios they filmed it, Pietro Tull as Don Quixote, and I was a villain in the film. And Dino had, at the Dino Rente Studios, a great big lawn and he wouldn't allow people to sit on it. And I sat on it with two or three other actors because this dreadful, dirty set we were in all the time, Man of La Mancha. Certainly a rain was in it.  And I stayed on the lawn. And I remember Pietro Tull after I said, we took votes. I did it with Dino and we did, took votes. He said that when he made this order they'd all clear off. I said, except one. It'll be blessed. He won't.  So that was my relationship with Dino. He won't. He threatened him but he's the only one. He's not fighting with me.  Dino ran, shoot her, leave this lawn. No, I'm relaxing.  He got carried, he got carried. So that was my relationship with Dino. So I met Dino at Sheperton with my daughter. I'm one shot.    You look great for it.  I make your beard black and black hair. So you don't seem blonde. No, no, no, no. And darkened skin. And this with gold on it and this and that. And I think you should have a sword. I said, what, a sword? I said, a sword? I don't think you know. No. I said, this guy is the most powerful man physically in the film. And he beats people up. He beats monsters up on this. And I said, he uses his bare hands like John. If you want to show strength, if you want to carry ray guns, that makes you weak. But if I just move them on monsters and just hit them, bash, bump, like the comic strip, he just flattens them without a weapon. Okay, kid, okay. Maybe you have... It's like a pirate thing. You have a club, maybe. We'll all use that. Okay, kid. You should get the bird, though. I think you're right for the bird, I think. He hates this.


Here we go, Lake of the Woods boys hockey taking on Duluth Denfeld. Denfeld up one to nothing in the first, trying to make it two. But Aiden Tom able to make the save and sprawl for the cover up. Bears on attack still in the first. Blake Ferris has an opening in front of the net, ties things up at one for Lake of the Woods. But in the second, Cade Shea behind the net. He passes out to Logan Jasper for the low five hole goal. And Denfeld will take back the lead and they would go on the rest of the way to win five to one. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland news, please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.


Good afternoon. Welcome to the October 12th Santa Rosa City Council meeting Madame city clerk. Could you please call the roll? Yes, thank you mayor councilmember Tibbets Councilmember Schwedhelm here Councilmember Sawyer here Councilmember Fleming here Councilmember Alvarez present vice mayor Rogers present mayor Rogers here Councilmember Tibbets. Have you joined us? Okay, let the record show that all council members are present with the exception of councilmember Tibbets Thank You madam clerk. We'll start the day in closed session with Adam 2.1 Madame deputy city clerk. Can you please check to see if there are any hands on zoom for public comment on that item? There are no hands raised in zoom and we receive no written public comment on this item All right, and I don't see anybody in the chamber who is here to give comment as well So we'll go ahead and recess into closed session, and we'll be back when we start our study session Councilmember Sawyer, please be sure to join the closed session credentials. I thought I had just done that Mike test for closed captioner test test test Hi Pablo and Alejandro. I'm gonna go ahead and start the Spanish Channel and get you into place Alejandro, I'm gonna put you into the Spanish Channel first Can we first of all do a quick Mike check with Alejandro and Pablo? Well, this is Pablo Ruelas Thank you both Alejandro, can you please make a brief statement from the Spanish Channel to confirm the audio was working from that station? Perfect. Thank you Alejandro For those of you just joining the meeting via zoom live translation is available in Members of the public wishing to listen in Spanish can join the Spanish Channel by clicking on the zoom Toolbar icon that looks like a globe Once you join the Spanish Channel, we recommend you shut off the main audio so you only hear the Spanish translation Pablo, can you please restate this in Spanish? of course para los recien unidos a la reunión Interpretación en vivo al español está disponible y los miembros que desean escuchar en español pueden unirse al canal Para unirse haga click en el icono de interpretación en la barra de herramientas de zoom parece un globo terrarium Una vez que un al canal de español se recomienda que apague el audio primario para que solo escuche la interpretación al español Thank you Pablo Do you know you available for a sound check? Hi councilmember you sit came in loud and clear Excellent got through this time. Yeah, I realized I believe that I did not leave But last time and that's why I couldn't get into the closed session I think that need to be more aware of the necessary necessity to leave the prior zoom meeting and that's I'll watch that Perfect Thank you. All right, Madame city clerk. Let's resume the council meeting. Would you please call the roll? Yes councilmember tidbits here Councilmember Schwedhelm here councilmember Sawyer here councilmember Fleming here Councilmember Alvarez present vice mayor Rogers Mayor Rogers here let the record show that all council members are present with the exception of vice mayor Rogers Great. We'll go on to item 3.1. Oh We're missing our city attorney Well, I can start the item in her absence. Yep, if you please would okay Good afternoon mayor and city council members today's study session is on the redistricting process for the decennial review of councilmember district boundaries by state law Cities with district-based elections are required to review the boundaries of the council districts every 10 years upon receipt of the federal census data to ensure compliance with the U.S. Constitution federal and state laws and although Santa Rosa Just transition to district elections in 2018. Those districts were based on the 2010 census data The city clerk with the help of the city attorney's office conducted a solicitation for proposals for demographers and the city is contracted with redistricting partners to help center Rosa through the redistricting process Today we have Elizabeth Stitt from the redistricting managers with redistricting partners Who will outline the procedural steps required for the review of existing district boundaries? The standards applicable to the review and to set forth the timeline for completion of that process I'm at today's study session the council may receive the information ask questions discuss and provide a direction to staff However, no formal action will be taken and with that I'd like to introduce Elizabeth Stitt redistricting manager with redistricting partners who will provide the presentation Excellent well, thank you so much for having me here today. This is obviously an incredibly important aspect of our democracy And like she said even though you went through the process only in 2018 We're now basing all of this all of our districts off of the 2020 data So let's go ahead and go to the next slide So a little bit about redistricting partners We're a firm that has been around for over 10 years now We focus on redistricting Demographics voting rights act analysis And our services to the city of Santa Rosa includes educating the public on redistricting at outreach meetings Generating draft maps based off of this public input and we'll be getting you at least three draft maps for you to examine and base districts off of those We'll also be training staff on the redistricting Process and best practices will analyze qualitative and quantitative data including drawing up memos for you all on the The current census data and then finally we'll be submitting the district map to the county on your behalf Let's go to the next slide, please So redistricting What is it? So put it simply it's basically just rebalancing the districts So that each District has equal population so at its core it's an act of equalizing population among districts This is particularly important in order to meet two requirements one Unconstitutional and one that is supreme court precedent. So you have equal representation It's the 14th amendment. How effective any resident can be at advocating for themselves And in practical terms this speaks to how effective any resident can be Advocating for themselves or being represented within the city So the act of the balancing the population among the census allows for every resident To be able to advocate equally for their needs So anything like the need for a new stop sign or road repairs This allows everyone to have the same equal voice In one extreme that we've worked with I think this was about ten years ago We redistricted an agency that hadn't redrawn their lines since 1950 So one district had about 12,000 people and then the other district had a hundred thousand people so Needless to say the folks in the hundred thousand population Had a little bit more difficulty reaching their elected officials So that's why we redraw and rebalance districts to ensure that everyone has Equal voice and equal access to their elected officials and then of course one person one vote This is supreme court precedent This is equal ability to elect a candidate of choice So this is the one person one vote principle and effectively measures the equal ability to elect a candidate in the same And in that same example of the hundred thousand people versus twelve thousand people You probably don't have a hundred thousand registered voters in that district, but We could probably guess there might be seventy thousand registered voters In one big district and then ten thousand registered in a small one. So then you would have Seven to one Equal to people's voting power So again, we're just rebalancing power of voice and Election abilities, so let's go ahead go to the next slide So Another way redistricting has been transformed over the last ten years Has really happened in the public eye So we've had changes in the federal and state laws with the addition of the fair maps act in California and the California voting rights act We've had The establishment of best practices And public opinion like I said has transformed So the public is becoming more and more involved in redistricting Understandably so and here we have a we have a Study that said 97% of voters agree that local government should be required to have transparent and open redistricting And on top of the public interest we also have an increase in media interest So more and more newspapers more television Are covering these outreach efforts and hearings and next slide, please So let's talk a little bit about the voting rights act Because this is a very critical Part of redistricting So the federal voting rights law Seeks to remedy racial disenfranchisement and has two sections that impact Redistricting so the first one is section two. This is a majority minority district. So essentially How we can help? Tell if there is need for a majority district or a majority minority district is if the citizen voting age Population is about 50% Of one racial subset or more That's just the first step in finding it out And then there's section five which essentially has been Deemed inactive by the Supreme Court over the last ten years So previously there were certain counties and states that had to get pre-clearance from the federal government to Enact their maps. This is no longer the case But I don't believe Santa Rosa was ever under that pre-clearance anyway and then of course There is the California Voting Rights Act This prohibits the use of at-large election systems in local government if there is proof of racially polarized voting however Senate this does not apply to Santa Rosa We've already Districted in 2018 so No longer applies to the city Next slide, please So then there are traditional redistricting principles. This is what we use To help guide us draw the line. So these are here to prevent gerrymanders It's here to keep everything above board and transparent And so these have been established And used throughout the country and have been upheld in Supreme Court cases as well So this list here is a ranked list of criteria according to the Fair Maps Act The very first one is each district has to be equal in population So we're talking about the US Census data That includes everyone. So it's not just citizens. It's not just voters But it is the US Census data that we're basing it off of Next each district has to be contiguous. So What that basically means is you can draw the district with one line. It's one whole piece Next we want to maintain communities of interest And communities of interest can be a little difficult to grasp at times. A definition of it is it's a group of It's a group of people, a neighborhood, a community with similar policy Concerns and would benefit from being maintained in a in one single district And we'll be doing outreach hearings to gather information from the public On their communities of interest Next we want to follow city and census designated place boundaries when practicable And then finally keep districts compact in appearance and function So we don't want to bypass a nearby population for one that's distant Next slide please And then of course There's the new Fair Maps Act. So this is the first time agencies in the state are using Or are following the Fair Maps Act. It was passed and enacted in 2019 So there are some additional transparency measures here that the city will have to follow This includes We can't consider incumbents or candidates When drawing the maps Not draw districts to advantage or disadvantage political parties So again, these are here to prevent gerrymanders incumbent and partisan gerrymandering We have to hold a minimum set of hearings and encourage public participation So there needs to be at least four hearings on the maps or excuse me There needs to be four hearings on the process two need to be included Regarding the maps themselves And the next posting all redistricting commission information on a website that's maintained for the next 10 years. So Theoretically this video will be on that website so we can all Wave hello to our future selves in 10 years Um, but also it's going to have things like the agenda for people to follow. Um It'll have maps for people to view when the maps are available And it'll allow people to submit their own testimony as well So the Fair Maps Act is really a tool to get people more involved in the process Next slide please And so real quickly here is the timeline for the next Well few months till april so april 17th is the deadline for the city to get their map in Today obviously is october 12th. It is the first study session Um, and then the first public hearing official public hearing will be december 7th And then you'll get a couple months break from us and then we'll have a community outreach Meeting specifically so we can gather data and information from the public Which will help uh drive our maps And then the next meeting will be january 25th. This is going to be a map meeting So you'll have draft maps by then and be able to Assess the maps give us feedback Um, and then the next meeting march 1st will be a revision of those maps And then march 29th final passage If there is additional need to Edit those maps we have given you all some wiggle room So april 12th would be the last day to pass those maps before the deadline So next slide So let's just talk real quickly about the current census data Next slide So this information is based off of the Census data that we will be using to draw the line. So As you all know the census data was very late this year due to covet 19 so We got the final final version from the statewide database Only a few weeks ago So this includes the prisoner Reallocation data This is the data that we have to use under the fair maps act And as you can see The there has been some pretty substantial changes over the last well 10 years and just a reminder the 2018 Districting was based off of the 2010 data Um, so that's why we're comparing those two Um, if you look at district 1 it grew by almost 5 percent district 2 grew by 5.3 percent district 3 grew by 3.6 percent District 4 was the only district to lose population and it lost 10.2 percent um District 5 grew by 1.5 percent 6 grew by 1 percent And district 7 grew by 7.2 percent So let's go on to the next slide So here, um, this shows you the well the demographics But I particularly want to show you The deviations and this is important because by law We have to have a deviation of under 10 percent And if you see um, let me just I'm gonna stare at my screen. It's 7.7 percent is the largest deviation And then it's about 12.9 percent is this um lowest one. Thank you Um So Taking the absolute value of that. It's about 20 percent So we are going to have to see some changes In the lines, um, even if you know all things equal So we're looking at growing district 4 And shrinking district 2 Um So go ahead and go to the next slide So let's go through each district. Um, as you can see here uh district 1 This has a um a latino cvap Of about 36 percent Um, I believe this is the highest latino cvap um, which, uh Doesn't ring any vra section 2 alarms. It's under 50 50 percent But it is something that we should be paying attention to. Um, go ahead. Oh, and it looks like the deviation is just under the ideal population So this one would not necessarily have to change very much, but it also depends on the community input So go ahead and go to the next slide And then here, uh, this one I believe is the largest one so the deviation is 7.2 We'll likely have to shrink district 2 as well Go to the next slide Here is district 3 This deviation is also rather large. It's 4.9 Go to the next slide And then this one is district 4. This is the, uh, deviation or this is the, uh, Most underpopulated district. So this will likely have to Grow in some fashion, uh, to pick up population And go to the next slide And then this one's also slightly underpopulated. Um And next slide And this one is about equal in population. So, um, Yeah, it has a deviation of 0.1 percent And go ahead and go to the next slide And then finally here's the last district Uh, deviation is about 3 percent. Uh, so might have to shrink But again because under the fair maps act, um, it places such an emphasis on community outreach and community input. Um, we, um, Might see some changes to the lines that go beyond equalization of the population Um, and next slide. I think that's the last one. Great. I'm happy to take any questions. Um, if anybody has any input Or feedback All right council members. I'll start with john Thank you, mayor Thank you. Um I'm I'm curious if you've mentioned that there would be three maps Submitted to the to the council. Will there will those maps Be accompanied by a base basic recommendation? and with with with explanation or are we um Is is is that as far as you will be going as far as presenting three maps after getting all the community input, etc Will there be any recommendation included in that? That's a good question. We, um We try not to tell you what to do. Um, we base all of our maps off of um Like objective data, so we base it off of the census. We base it off of community input Um, and we try not to put Our spin on it. Um, we obviously follow all the r. A. F. M. A. Law requirements. Um, but we We will draw maps based on your direction So, um, if you tell us to draw maps, um, where we You know Focus on including all of the community inputs and Don't even look at the current district lines. Um, we'll do that or you can usually what we'll do is we'll draw a map that essentially rebalances the lines. Um, so that's One direction you can give us to. Um, but really, uh, we Work off of the direction that you tell us to go into Thank you member Fleming Yeah, my question is around the deviations and if it has to do with The overall population of a given district or the voting age population of the given district It's overall Okay Um, the one of the things that's interesting about santa rosa is um You know, I think probably particularly with um, our probably our youngest district district one and but we have a very Elderly district, so we're going to have districts that have a much higher proportion of voting age persons And um, just curious if the law takes that into account in any way No, um, so the supreme court has basically cemented that we um, just look at the us census data And um That's what we base the equal population off of Um, it would be interesting. I think it's worth debating Um, how you want to consider the overall deviation Um Because you do have a 10 buffer Um, so if you want to make one district a little bit larger Um, because you're accounting for younger people That might be doable Um, you know under the age of 18 but um It uh is up to you guys and what you uh direct us on what to do Thank you. That's helpful One of the uh comments that i'll make one of the questions that I sort of have I think part of the deviation that you see for district four and we've talked about this a number of times Is that that was an area that was particularly heavy hit by the 2017 wildfires And when we drew the maps in 2018 Coffee park and fountain grove We're still using data that was based on Who was there in 2010 when the census happened? Now as I understand it this census data If somebody has not yet rebuilt their home, they are not reflected in the population here. Is that correct? That's right. And that's a really good point. Um, essentially This is just a snapshot of the population on april 1st 2020 um, so if there um was not If the district did not um repopulate since um the fire then that's right It would it would be smaller because of that It it might just be worth council keeping that in the back of their mind as we draw the districts that perhaps It's okay for that district to be a little bit on the smaller side via deviation Because we know that it's likely to grow as people rebuild their homes And if I may may or to that point, you know on april 1 of 2020 There's going to be a significant a fewer amount of repopulation Then we'll have at this point in time or even at the point in time when we dot draw the districts But unfortunately, we won't have that data At hand and certainly I'd like to think with the council's commitment on rebuild It'll also be substantially more people who will have repopulated by 2030 Which these maps go to as well um, I'm just thinking of you know with the county talking about the the equity and workload conversation As well around their districting that it's something for us to keep in mind that there's a going to be at least one council member Who represents an area that we know for sure is going to grow? Substantially, I would think from the the rebuild There any questions or comments councilmember alfarez Yes, thank you, mayor You made the comment of district one for seeing minimal changes Could you elaborate on what you envision or the group has envisioned as well as scenarios that have been contemplated? Um, well nothing's been contemplated yet. I think we definitely need to have outreach hearings first get community input I would basically If all things equal It had a deviation. I believe of of about negative point one Um, so that I think was the closest to the ideal population um, so If the community outreach Comes back to us saying, you know district one Includes all of the communities and doesn't need to change much then That seems to be an ideal size for a district Thank you I think the the last comment that I'll make and then we'll open it up for public comment um Last time we had Public maps that were submitted and we were able to go through those and my understanding is we'll be able to do that again Uh, and at the last minute one of the determinants that the council really used Was the idea that we thought three districts should touch downtown So if I remember correctly, we took a map Uh, and then amended it in a couple of ways I know ridgeway was taken away from district four and put in district five And I think district two was brought over to touch Downtown and I don't think that it did originally it'd be nice To hear from the public if they still consider that to be A guiding factor and whether council still sees that as needed Now that we've experienced it for a couple of years and whether that should be one of the criteria that we ask for From apps as they're being developed With that I'll go ahead and open it up to public comment If you have a comment on this study session go ahead and hit the raise hand feature on your zoom I'm not seeing anybody head towards the microphone here in the chamber I don't see any hands on zooms. So let's go ahead go to our prerecorded voicemail item 3.1 redistricting Dwayne DeWitt from roseland There are many who live in the roseland district who are Concerned that there's not that open Transparent and accountable approach to this redistricting effort that's the beginning And it's probably already halfway through The outreach here in our community has been very sparse You spend millions of dollars on a community engagement department. You started up and yet they don't talk to a lot of people It's very problematic to many long-term roseland residents who feel That they're not going to get the representation they thought would come with districts And now redistricting Please we need in-person outreach Authentic community engagement to the residents of roseland many of whom Are disadvantaged and underserved may not be on the internet like you folks It would be really nice to see some city staff over here helping on this effort perhaps you could use the Community center that's still owned by the taxpayers with the county operating it for a covet vaccination site There's plenty of space And there's opportunities now for people to be meeting and greeting each other in person please Help us in roseland get better representation With a better redistricting effort. Thank you All right. I'll bring it back. Are there any last comments from council? You know, I do have one last comment mayor, which is around the workload and just keeping in mind the suburban versus urban districts, I do think that it's can I'm not sure from your perspective, but that it creates a A higher level of work when you have multiple cultural heritage board Districts clustered together and that that may be a consideration to look into as well Great. Thank you. Okay Well, thank you so much elizabeth. We'll be seeing you I think you said that our next our second meeting. I believe is in december And so we look forward to having that conversation at that point Great. Thank you everyone All right, mr. City manager. Let's go on to our next study session 3.2 Mayor rogers and members of the city council item 3.2 is our second study session item of the afternoon The matter before the council is the sinoma county transit integration and efficiency Study the future of transit process Rachel eed our deputy director of transit urie colson our transit planner Matt wilcox another transit planner Suzanne smith and dana turry from scta brian albie from sinoma county transit And jurid hall from pedal luma transit will be someone will be today's days as as presenters All right. Thank you so much I'm I'm getting a bit of an echo here. I hope but you're but you're hearing okay on your end I'll just go forward and we don't resolve So good afternoon mayor rogers and members of the council We're pleased to be here today to present the study session on the transit integration and efficiency study and the future of transit process As befits a collaborative effort. We have as the city manager indicated several people on the panel here today Urie coslin and matt wilcox city of san erosa transit planners will be giving most of this presentation as they are the lead city staff on this initiative We're also joined by susanne smith and dana turry of scta SCTA has a really key role in this effort I vote the board and staff levels as will be discussed And finally, I'm very interested in my counterparts of economic transit and pedal luma transit are joining us today Brian albie is transit manager for the county of sinoma and jaren jara hall is transit manager for the city of pedal luma next We take a brief moment Getting some feedback. I'm not sure what is happening here in council chamber, but it's quite distracting It's very distracting for me. So that's fine. Well, we'll take it two minutes two minutes. We'll come back Rachel, are you are you and urie in the same room or near each other? No, we're all in different rooms Okay, okay. Thank you. Thank you All right. Well, all right team team team looks into it. We're gonna go ahead and take a full recess Mic check mic check mic check Any echo? Mic check mic check Everything sounds okay there Rachel, can we have you do a brief sound check? Sure check check Check how does this sound now? It sounds okay on my end That sounds okay so far on r and urie. Can you please do a mic check? Mic check mic check urie here Thank you Matt, can you do a mic check? Here as well. Any echo? Thank you Suzanne, can you do a mic check with us, please? Mic check test test. Thank you And dana, can you also do a mic check? Mic check Testing Thank you And brian, how about you? Can you do a quick mic check with us? Sure testing one two. Okay. Thank you All right, madame clerk. Let's resume the meeting then Let's go ahead take the roll councilmember tidbits councilmember schwethelm here councilmember soyer here councilmember fleming here councilmember alvarez Vice mayor rogers Mayor rogers councilmember tidbits. Have you joined us? Okay, let the record show that all councilmembers are present with the exception of vice mayor rogers and councilmember tidbits Have at it rachel Okay, take two that sounds much better. I was afraid I was going to have to do that the whole time and that was going to be rough So, uh, thank you guys for resolving that. Um, so I just want to just reiterate quick introductions Just because I'm not sure they were actually audible at all the last time We're pleased to be here for this study session And we do have a number of people with us on the panel today because this is a very collaborative effort. We're working on Introducing yuri coslyn and matt wilcox our transit planners who are lead staff on the future of transit process from the city Suzanne smith and dana terre are here from scta scta has a very key role in this process or both at the board and staff levels so we're Happy to have them join us today And then brian albie is the transit manager for the county of sonoma Jared hall is the transit manager for the city of petaluma and we're all working together very closely on this process So i'm grateful to all of them for joining us today Next slide please In terms of the agenda for this study session we'll begin by providing some background and context for the current transit integration effort A lot of what we're working on has been discussed for a number of years And we've gotten some real traction and acceleration around it in the next in the last year a year and a half Well, next going to some detail on our Current and planned future integration activities under the auspices of the scta future of transit ad hoc Mayor rogers is chair of that ad hoc of the scta board We'll also provide some regional context and discuss how our efforts here in sonoma county relate to The mtc's blue ribbon transit recovery task force process and the recently published transit transformation action plan that was And we're response to the pandemic looking at how we can build back a more integrated regional transit network And finally we'll discuss some of the next steps Including some items that we'll be bringing to council in the next few months for action to continue to forward our work on this process And of course, we'll be happy to answer any questions at that time And what we're looking forward to council's feedback on this overall initiative Your priorities, etc. Next slide please So to begin with some really high level context as you know There are five primary transit operators making up the local inner city and regional transit network in sonoma county The three local bus transit systems city bus sonoma county transit and petaluma transit as well as smart and golden gate To provide the regional connections So it's become very clear that to achieve our shared city and county goals around climate action transit oriented development Housing and affordability We really need to do everything we can to strengthen and rebuild our transit network and make it as user friendly convenient and accessible as possible While also ensuring that we're providing the highest quality transit services we can to the public within our limited resources So the future of transit effort is about Working on building integration in several functional areas among the three different transit operators the local bus systems Initially so we can present a more customer focused convenient understandable and ultimately unified countywide transit system For our current riders and future riders And i'll just know we're at a really unique moment now. I'm building back after the pandemic. There's a lot of energy around this in the region About building back a more integrated transit network And sonoma's sonoma county is really seen as leading on this We're ahead of the rest of the region and really tackling some of these challenging issues To to create a better local transit network And as I mentioned, I do want to be clear What we're talking about today is focused on the local bus transit system sonoma county transit city bus petaluma transit as a starting point But a lot of what we're working on will ultimately relate to how we integrate with the regional services and In addition, we'll all be working together on these regional integration initiatives coming out of mtc over the next few years Next slide, please And here i'll pass it off to matt wilcox to continue with some background in terms of how we got here and uh And he and urie will continue on with further detail in the process Hello everyone, um I'm going to turn this subject as you know as a planner. This is a very exciting exciting process for us In our line of work um to give you some background of how we got to the point that we are today As we present to you um in 2012 mtc Before the transit sustainability project and this Was in response to the o8 through 2010 recession um The intent of the project was to improve the financial situation for the transit agencies improve customer service and attract new riders To the transit systems throughout the bay area The actual study was actually mentioned in a transit cooperative research program Optimant which is a national institution that looks through different aspects of how transit operates and Does case studies on different transit agencies and also provides advice on how to Go about the transit planning process um, so it's kind of a big deal in the regards to how Integration has been a hot topic in the bay area um specifically in the document called for integration of the sedama county operators In working together to either integrate service and great fairs and also Just a general sense of coordination between the agencies that operate within sedama county And then moving forward to 2019 That transit integration efficiency study was completed by scta Is a very major lift by the staff that is on this call to get that going hiring consultants and working between the agencies To better understand What can be done to coordinate services in sedama county? um Because you also may remember council. Um, actually provide general fund money to complete this study um, and the results Helped the transit agency kind of figure out. Where do we head to increase coordination integration? um, and in this acts the foundation for What we're about to talk about here today and also just how that we move forward through Integration coordination between the agencies so some of the main goals were to improve rider experience in sedama county and increase the efficiency In delivering high-quality public transit service and reducing operating capital across um to improve the service further um, and now you know the present day, um, so to speak 2020 2021 we're still in the pandemic One of the responses to the pandemic um from NTC standpoint was to creatively ribbon task force and the intent was to rethink transit service and create a set of goals that would result in Making simple and consistent equitable affairs integrating customer information and enabling a unified and efficient transit network and this was all kind of rolled into With a also a planning ad hoc who's working separately, but also on different coordination pieces going to the next slide. We do a little more detail about the blue ribbon task force so the Blue ribbon task force created a problem statement that they wish to address They're being managed. I know there's 27 unique agencies in the bay area that provide public transit Whose procedures and practices are not necessarily consistent nor do they align And they also serve many local priorities as opposed to regional priorities It is not organized to support Customers in a very friendly way, although obviously there's information available but it does make it more difficult as the People move to the bay area. It is not Sometimes easy to understand So there's on this slide. There's individual pieces. They ought to keep clicking. Unfortunately Got too fancy so one of the Things that came out of this was transformational outcomes and one of those Concentration comes with spare payments Essentially making them simpler consistent and equitable as someone travels across the bay area And the hope is that it would attract more riders if this part of the transit experience was simplified Next Customer information is also A big part of what the task force set out to achieve improving that with integrated mapping and signage Real-time schedule information whether that's at stops or through mobile devices And just making it convenient and easy to access for new and existing riders The transit network is also obviously a key part of the process In providing public transit. It's where the rubber meets the road So making sure that services are coordinated whether that's transfers or making sure that Services and duplicative and if it is a major corridor that those routes run in a way that can Actually increase the frequency for buses going down those corridors Obviously accessibility is also a major part of what public transit hopes provide Ensuring that all people of ages and abilities can easily access transit whether that's through the fixed route or through Parapan 80 a pair of transit and then also ensuring that this doesn't exclude none of so people basic ability But also income as they hope to access transit and are often some of the people that use transit the most and finally part of what This out to you was provide funding or allocate funding to help the bay area transit agencies Do what they need to do to increase their ability to coordinate and consolidate Where it was possible an scta Went to bat good agencies so to speak At the leader of task force in work to get funds allocated specifically to our immigration efforts I should also note that supervisor rabbit is Sonoma county representative for the blue ribbon task force next please and so Kind of in tandem with the blue ribbon task force that began earlier in 2020 scta convened its own Transit ad hoc group This is an october 2020 the current membership is made out of made up of local representatives From the jurisdictions in the county including our own mayor Chris rogers who is the chair Susan goren from Sonoma county david rabbit from Sonoma county Sarah gurney from the state of sabbatical and delinda fisher from the city of petaluma so This group actually meets monthly to discuss the process of moving forward with the integration Priorities came out of the ties study, which I spoke about a few slides ago and coordinating Based off of what the blue ribbon task force is actually put forth to so as you can see there's a lot of interplay between Local efforts in regional efforts and a lot of similar goals that each of those have set out and one of the Ad hoc specific goals is to increase transit ridership as a mechanism to reduce greenhouse gas emissions improve access to low cost transportation and reduce congestion So that's very much in line with council's goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions And ultimately want to simplify the transit customer experience And we also obviously maximize our Resources and be efficient as possible as we do expand service and change our frequencies next slide please this is just to provide some background on The level of service that the three operators in Sonoma county three fixed route operators that operate solely in Sonoma county, I should say Provide in regards to the level of service and the number of trips that they provide So this information is from the last fiscal year that we have That wasn't affected by the pandemic These numbers are from the national transit database Cumulatively the three agencies serve about 3.1 million Headed towards 3.2 million riders. This is fixed route and 88 pair transit In the combined revenue hours about 260,000 Give signage perspective golden gate transit, which serves Sonoma county, marin san francisco Oakland and I believe all the way to richmond three of large Service area with a very high densities They have a similar level of ridership As we do as a collective agencies So we're we're pulling Pretty heavy loads for a suburban rural county Next slide please So this is how we plan to proceed with this integration process We have it chunked up into three different parts What first is to strategize which is where we are now headed into the planning phase And finally the implementation phase. So this is about a three to four year process It'll take a little time for us to work through these things depending on How you know where we are on the pandemic and how we can be able to interact with the public Interacting with the public is a big component of the planning phase And understanding that between the three agencies, what does the public hope to see what makes life easier for them? As that's the ultimate goal for this process is to provide a better customer experience on public transit and then implementation It won't probably be like you flip a switch and overnight and there's new transit in Sonoma county It will be also be a process once we get decided and determine what the public wants us to do and what we can do financially Um and parts of those things will include integration with NTC transit regional and way of planning implementing a shared branding process with you know Look and feel of our buses And the information that we put out there so We are Like I said, we're currently in strategizing and we're kind of moving hopefully moving into the direction of planning very shortly next slide So before I hand it off to Yuri to kind of give you a sense of how we've chunked up This planning process and the goals that we have to achieve in the line item tasks um, we've we've siloed things into you for integration objectives one being service planning so um short answer or a short definition of that is You know the buses on the road and how we integrate customer service Making sure that when people will contact the agencies they get the same information fares making those equal And then finally public information and marketing Making sure that we're bringing people onto the buses letting them know what's changing and when So there's everyone's expectations are aligned and with that I'll hand it over to Yuri And he'll go into some of the details in regards to each of these integration objectives Thank you matt mayor council great to be with you today We go ahead one more slide Okay, I am uh Going to go through at a detailed level the actions we are taking within each objective as part of this future transit in Sonoma county so Developing and adopting shared planning models This has already started with the reviewing policies definitions performance data and existing benchmarks Ultimately service will be better with an integrated service planning model These steps will help us get there Starting with the deep dive into analyzing the three systems line by line and ensuring that our data is harmonized This uh data harmonize harmonization will be achieved through further analysis and familiarity with ridership data which is collected using our Automatic passenger counters or APCs which are electronic devices on transit vehicles Which record each passenger using invisible light beams each and it's recording time a passenger boards or lights at a stop collecting the time and location of the day reporting our lighting Additionally understanding the data will allow staff and or consultant to analyze the overlapping service area and investigate how to better approach transfers and connections All of the above service planning focuses on fixed route But we also want to improve paratransit coordination. So paratransit is critical for transit serving people living with disabilities And is also required by the federal civil rights act in americans disabilities act in 1990 So paratransit service covers a minimum of three quarters of a mile of area from the fixed route line So we feel that the next Needed improvement in paratransit and standardize the paratransit eligibility process in the county At this time each of the three agencies has its own process and forms Each is very similar by trying to identify a procedure That we all share will benefit those living with disabilities in terms of accessing paratransit services next slide So this is an example of service planning that were that were that were that were contemplating or at the line by line area Mendocino corridor as we all know is one of the busiest quarters in the county In 2017 the city is reimagining took multiple city bus routes on mendocino combined them into one Route the city bus route one that you see there, which is operates on 15 minute frequency Additionally Sonoma county transit Has most of its routes also operate on Mendocino avenue Sonoma county is working to meet the needs of riders traveling from the county. We're trying to reach the city center Let me sorry county center For the county's route 60 that serves cloverdale heels burden windsor the county center is on its way downtown But the other routes would serve the other routes could serve the transit mall All the other routes serve the transit mall and then they travel north to county center So just to pose the question that we've all thought about which is does the fact that some of the county admin will be moving downtown Or that the city the county center site will be redeveloped have any impact On the transit service on mendocino avenue and we think it does and that's what part of what we hope to look at in greater detail We know that mendocino avenue demands significant transit services It's important that the services are coordinated from the public perception standpoint And and I will say in the city's phase two of reimagining. I mean we The city imagined even an increase in frequency on mendocino avenue up to 10 minutes So again, these are the line by line analysis that we hope to address through the service planning objectives within the future of transit discussion next slide So here we're looking at uh, the subjectives around looking at fares around how to harmonize the fares We look to develop uniform fair policy media structures and universal and develop the universal paths universal transit paths so policy being things like who qualifies for what at what age and media types being You know month pass or ride book Or for that matter universal pass it would allow riders to ride any system in the county without with the only thing once And the structure being you know, what what is what are the different options? What are the different? Media type options and then what other incentives kind of that we're pushing riders Where we save save money on certain number of uses that's the structure So then there's also clipper And and adding, you know, if you do a universal passport of adding that on the clipper We may also include, you know, some reprogramming of other clipper Media types as well as developing an online store and printing paper passes So clipper as many of you may know is the bay area system payment For all bay area transit operators Now it is not only available on a card, but it's also available on your phone Um, there are unique cards under clipper for adults youth seniors and people living with disabilities Fair changes that that we may contemplate at the county level have a lead time in terms of getting them programmed in the clipper And in the future we foresee incentives Creating incentives to use clipper as part of the fair structure as this media enable this type of media enables Passengers to have access throughout the bay area to transit Also in coordination with decisions made related to fair media and structure That the three the three agencies are interested in is what will be reprinting prior passes with whatever new branding or We develop make try to make it possible to buy more than one Pass type at the transit mall to try and offer all system Each agency's passes at the transit mall and then online purchasing from like a single website So right now you go to each individual website to buy a pass or call each individual agency So a one one stop solution for something you don't have but Next slide So here's kind of a picture of our fairs and some of the differences Those in red are where there are differences Um, I'll just like to highlight a few of them. You know, we have the adult 31 day pass You can see the difference In costs on that adult 31 day pass there Um We have ticket booklets Towards the bottom there you can see the county offers a 20 pass ticket booklet Whereas the city offers a 10 pass and 40 pass So you can see some of the confusion for the public where they're coming in You know, they may not know what to ask for and they might not they may be familiar with the county And they come to the city and their their avenue adjust their expectations Also for veterans, you know, the the city currently offers as followed the county in terms of Allowing veterans to ride for free, but we haven't yet taken a step to Enable active duty military to ride free and then again with college students Santa Rosa really only has the jc as a major, you know college In within our city. So we offer to jc whereas the county has Sonoma State as well as the jc and they offer it to all college students. That's that's another piece that we look to You know these these these fairs we would bring back to council to to to adjust as Once we all are in agreement Next slide please So next objective here As primarily is to simplify and enhance the transit customer experience This can further enhance can be further enhanced By all using a single phone number to call in for county wide transit services other than having to know three numbers You just would need to know one And then further ensuring that staff on the other end of the phone or for that matter at the transit mall Have the tools to provide the public accurate information on all the transit operators in the county including smart and golden gate And and there's also men to see no operates north We look to have consistent integrated bus stop signage, which we at this point we have some regional some some Some of that going on. We have multiple agencies on the same side with our new branding. We would look to update that transit center signage Real-time information stops. So no matter which agency you went to you would see a similar type Signage display telling you when the bus is going to arrive And consistent policies and procedures for public information interactions So the public is expecting to get the information to a certain source and expecting to get that information for all three agencies And then Lastly the website redesign creates some uniforming uniformity and integration. I'll go into that a little bit at the end So yeah across the board our goal will be to improve access to information for the public Next slide please So this is kind of one highlight of where you know the Information to the public can be can be made consistent And this is you see here all the different holidays and all the different levels of service that just within three agencies We provide and in red again You see those are those are inconsistencies between our agencies And and we've worked at a regional level with smart and golden gate to kind of map this out And as rachel mentioned earlier, we're looking to kind of at the county level get ourselves all onto the same schedule In terms of what holidays we offer and what level of service on those holidays. So we have Everybody at the table that needs to be making this decision. So we're working through those discussions and and and we'll be bringing something To council the later date on that matter next slide please so Another objective here is clear communication with riders requiring that requires two-way communication along with analyzing ridership data Engaging and surveying the public is critical to charting a county-wide integrated transit network historically the agencies have Individually conducted surveys city bus did one in 2018. I believe the other agencies were in that similar time frame But these were often focused. These were mostly focused internally to each system A survey that covers county-wide transit connections This would be a first in Sonoma County This information is expected to provide insights into many of the objectives identified back in the service planning focus areas Like overlapping service area time transfers and connections and line-by-line evaluation just to mean a few This bullet point regarding marketing and communication and unify branding across three agencies I will be discussing greater detail by matt wilcox later in the presentation But as part of uh, this As part of a project that mcc is hiring consultants to do in which that consultant will be designing And brand designing a brand and wayfinding specifically for Sonoma County in coordination with the regional effort But our three transit Our three system partnership will need to do the heavy lifting of Producing all this collateral like the maps the signage of the transit mall bus stops Uh fair media and vehicle appearance, whether it's a wrap or how the vehicles You know or or you know what with the image on the vehicles that is presented that creates some uniformity while possibly Um identifying uniqueness between the three agencies as well Finally working to to market and and and highlight the tools Um And finally we're working in marketing. We want to highlight tools like the clipper mobile app This works for all three agencies and is another this is another objective of the future of transit mission It is to highlight these tools that work for all three agencies Next slide please So, uh, here's a another example of public information just to highlight These are the three agencies and our three website splash pages if you want You can see how different they are how varied Um, you know, if you're want to if you want to go and plan a trip and you're used to working on Sonoma County Um, but you live you you want to take a trip in Petaluma, you know Your plan your trip is at a different location on their website and for city bus You got to go one level deeper into that left hand bar to get to your plan the trip Or for transit alerts, for instance, you can see there's a little triangle there on Sonoma County for the transit So it has similar Similar logo as Petaluma is there, but then the city city buses isn't read You know, and they they can stand out, but we feel like we can do a better job. Um, here's an example. Uh, next slide please Um, here's an example of what was done in the Raleigh Durham in the triangle area in north Carolina Where they they worked to, uh, have a public facing Branding and and Integration where you have three agencies separate operational areas. Um, the triangle is more the regional and the Raleigh Durham are more of This citywide service, but they all have a very similar look and feel while individually being identified You go to the websites. You're going to find the information in a similar location. Um, you as a member of the public You don't have to adjust how you're reading things or where you're going so much as to Uh, to find information. It's it's it's more intuitive and and and built built for the public to be able to navigate three different systems Next slide, please so You know, we have a lot of work to do but we've also uh part of our the first phase the mat identified earlier Uh was we yielded some, um, some some good successes Um First we instituted a one seat ride pilot that reduces transfers on paratransit And i'll go into that a little bit in a little bit more detail here in a minute. Uh, we synchronized schedule change dates so, um recently in august All three systems and a number throughout the bay area also scheduled our system Changes our schedule changes all the same day in august Um, so riders can expect, you know to know when a schedule is going to change, uh and and not be kind of You used to riding one system and then all of a sudden try to transfer and realize okay, wait I'm operating on old information Um, so we were able to synchronize that those those that was the wind coming out of the endemic um Historically, you know for a long time we've had a universal day spare of a dollar fifty, uh, which is which is a which has been a win and kind of Has shown some of the historic, uh A nature of our agencies working together, but um, but that we that we want to replicate um, we during the pandemic we jointly, uh In reinstated fairs so on february 1st 2021 coming out of the pandemic We handed a lot of a lot of the kind of the social distancing and fairs and reinstated fairs similarly across agencies And that was that was a that was a that was a big win um during the pandemic we install all operators in some kind of instituted a clipper start, which is a Allows eligible low income adults age 19 to 64 Whose household income is no more than twice the federal poverty level So for example 52 000 for a family of four. So these riders receive 20 off Uh county-wide when using clipper on a single ride once they're eligible Um, there's a new phone system for direct transfer. So we basically told our staff rather than just giving some You know a caller the phone number for snow the county. Let's just go ahead and transfer them directly to the county Maybe give them the phone number just in case they just get disconnected But even before that try to answer their questions as much as we can and then transfer them And then we've also, uh, cross-trained our staff at all the agencies So that you know, so that our staff that are down at the transit mall or staff are answering the phones Uh, make know that they have the update most dated information on the county system or pedaluma No, you know have some confidence why not answering questions and don't kind of Have that trepidation and they don't want to give wrong information so they're transferring and we're trying to give them the information So that they can just help that person You know Next slide, please so here's um The information about the one C ride prior to the pandemic region wide Um, the act of transferring a paratransit client between paratransit systems was normal. We would transfer You know And so despite the fact that many of these transfers resulted in a lot of Agency staff time as well as long waits for clients Um, so for instance in santa rosa the transfer point was the ymca and sometimes that's rjc um And so these clients would wait at that location until the other Vehicle arrived and picked them up sometimes You know A paratransit there's even larger delays because you're dealing with people who are in wheelchairs and so So it just it just was clunky and you end up with more complaints Um compared to the number of trips, which were not that many I mean we do we would do I think prior to the pandemic like 20 20 trips a month that way You know nothing major, but we just had a lot of complaints So when the pandemic hit and social distancing directives were put into play city bus in the county Um, so in the county started working through what the logistics were for having Paratransit clients is driven to their final destination. So effectively eliminating transfers So now as part of the increased coordination through the future transit the county and city paratransit operations Have worked to continue this pilot of the one seat ride This is an issue other bay area agencies are trying to solve as well And we are happy to report that our agencies Have figured out a way that it's worked well so far It's a it effectively doesn't increase our workload Of either the paratransit operation teams, but it also improves the customer experience So today Santa Rosa paratransit riders are provided direct trips From within santa rosa to as far north as the airport as far west as sabasca road as far east as oakmaw area and as far south as wilford avenue You know the casino into the south So i'm going to hand it back off to matt for the next slide and he's going to talk about The further regional collaboration with mtc for the next steps Thank you So as i'm you know alluded to earlier um a lot of what we're working on locally is also A regional effort as well across the 27 agencies in the bay area um one of those pieces of that um collaboration and coordination is The regional wayfinding program, which is essentially used to create um consistent user focused material at major hubs throughout the bay area as well as just some small stops in between the major hubs as well um the intent is to kind of rebrand how Information is displayed in a way that if you are You're coming from say san jose and you come to the north bay to isanoma county and you're looking for transit information out of hub um, you're looking at the same exact thing other than the Very specific information on those pieces of material. So the Where you know the the map is always the left hand corner of the kiosk and schedules are on that always on the bottom right It's that kind of thing as well um In san jose county, we're hoping to take that one step further Between three agencies and having you know common graphic identity not just with the region but also Within the county. So maybe we'll look at that. They can identify. This is san jose county public transit as opposed to oh that city bus. That's okay. That's pedaluma And maybe getting confused where they they know that it's just it's just transit And that's what people are looking for when they want to get from one place to another um, so the intent is to Work with mtc over the next few years. Um, as you can see in the timeline where we're kind of in the beginning of the phase and we're moving towards the 2020 24 25 fiscal year is when hopefully things really start going in this project This is also an mtc Funded efforts in regards to the way finding there will be some of the stuff that we need to support locally but for most part in regards to How things will be laid out All that is being done through mtc. And they're actually currently in the process of hiring on a consultant to go through this Process to create the the consistent looking field throughout out the bay area You can go to the next slide, please So the next steps, um, this is You know the staff work. This is what we hope to achieve with between the staff of the three agencies That are hoping to integrate Um, we actually meet weekly as staff to kind of go over the pieces that Yuri talked about earlier Without planning effort and I think those those meetings will become More engaging and more prevalent even maybe weekly as we get deeper into some of those major tasks um, moving to service planning where you plan to start sharing our data more Regional service scenario planning will be a part of that as we look at our services and how they work with each other um, and then also Defining our routes and their purposes and seeing if there are any Cross purposes between the service that each agency is putting out there and maybe that those things can be consolidated or improved for the public We'll be going moving into defining a consistent fair policy and then integrating that Fair policy into clipper to further ease customer access to the transit systems And then finally As we go through this messaging to the public will be critical So we will be developing a community engagement strategy How will we engage with santa rosa riders and no accounting riders and how can we get maybe All those groups collaborating together and at a single time to see you know What what is the public look looking for and how we deliver service? To the residences And then one of the things that's very near in the future is actually santa rosa. We'll be working to update its website through the same vendor that sinoa county and probably my transit use that hopefully that's the intent of that and The intent is there is to create a similar looking field across the three websites and then hopefully down the line that Easily integrate those maybe you choose the website or go the way that Go triangle did and in your example earlier where there's three sites, but How you navigate them is is exactly the same Go the next slide So obviously whenever anything's done it takes money And so here's kind of where the direction we're headed right now. We actually have 750 thousand dollars from NTC for planning and implementation A lot of that most that will go to the tasks that you already laid out scta Was able to secure this funding and for us to have it as a huge boom to our ability to move this process forward There is you know, we we don't want to say that that's a retiree. We'll think this process go forward There's additional regional resources expected mostly Or specifically so with the regional wayfinding And how we display our information to the public out out in the field and then finally Are the operators operate operation maintenance budgets. It's not that these will be New align items, but this will be activities that fit within the baseline budget that we already have in place um It just me more so Redefining how we're using resources Um in regards to planning maybe not specifically for ourselves Ourselves being standard of the city of us I'd say that a city of us planner, but also doing those planning efforts that we normally do Alone more collaboratively with our other operators and You know the next slide I'll hand it off to you rachel I'm going to swoop in for the last slide after urion matt have done all the heavy lifting Just to give you a preview of some of the upcoming council items. We anticipate related to this effort First of all, we will need to enter into a memorandum of understanding with mtc scta and the other transit operators Specifically around the mtc award of the 750 thousand dollars. There's a detailed scope for how that money will be used we all need to Reach an understanding how we'll work through the process of delivering that scope and reflected in mo u We also want to come back to council to move the paratransit one-seat rides from a pandemic era pilot To a permanent part of our program for delivering paratransit services in sonoma county And finally, uh, we have a little bit more work to do here and there certainly will need to be some public engagement but we need to um to come back hopefully sooner than rather than later with uh, Proposal for fair harmonization among the three operators in some of the areas that uria pointed out earlier There will be additional actions, of course, but those are some of the ones that are on the front burner at this time Next slide please So with that we'll wrap up take any questions council may have and certainly we'd love to have any overall feedback from the council on this initiative As well as any priorities anything you your your curious about that you think is missing from this effort And so i'll turn it back to the mayor at this time. Thank you All right, thank you so much to the team And I know it's been a an incredible amount of work to get to this point particularly with a pandemic layered on top But I do think uh, we all agree that it's the right time that as we Have to make some changes that we look at this and implement the ties study I'll turn it over to council members to see if they have any questions council member fleming Yeah on that note, um Can we uh, we have an acronym in here the ties. Can we get clarification on what that stands for? Yes ties stands for the transit integration and efficiency study Excellent. Thank you. And then on slide I don't see my slides numbered here But on the one where it says background operational scope and then it has the trips on top and green and below revenue hours I'm just curious to know is it is it considered beneficial to have um, Are you know a particular type of ratio? Here is there a way that you can help me analyze what i'm looking at Yeah, I would say it's going to be highly variable depending on the type of service, you know, for example, uh, and Sonoma county transit They're serving uh all areas of the county including some very low density areas So they're going to put out more revenue hours for those long intercity trips Based on the density of the areas they're going through they may not have the same ridership return As you might have in the heart of santa rosa, for example So so it's really highly dependent on on the service area and the type of service being provided So there's not necessarily an ideal to work for there are each of us does have service standards For productivity on our system. They're specifically tailored to our Service type and operating environment. Um, so those are what we tend to measure our performance against on an individual basis Excellent. Thank you. And I would just like to echo what the mayor said you and this is really impressive and a whole lot of work and Is going to bring a better quality of service to our riders and hopefully at better value to the to taxpayers and and the fair The fair payers. So thank you so much for all that you've done Any additional questions from council members? Seeing then we'll go to public comment on the study session If you're interested in providing comment, go ahead hit the raise hand feature on zoom And I see no hands. Madam deputy city clerk. Did we have any pre-recorded voicemails? We did not Okay, I'll bring it back to council to see if there are any comments or direction for the team I'll look on zoom first with councilmember soya and tibets Just thanks It amazingly comprehensive and uh like Um Councilmember flaming said it is it's all good. This is a this is a win-win and it's been a long time coming I think there has been uh an intention to improve this system And you have nailed it and uh, I believe there will be a lot of happy travelers in the future When this is instituted We're implemented. Thank you Councilmember sweater Thank you, mr. Mayor. I would also like to echo my comments or compliments This is exactly what we need taking this regional approach getting away from the silos So, um, I really appreciate this presentation And I think this is what all of us are needing. You're starting to model those behaviors. So thank you so much And I will say it's it's particularly nice for me to be able to watch Some of the mtc meetings now with our own commissioner From santa rosa on as well representing sonoma county And hearing a lot of the conversations about where The group would like to see transit agencies go and then be able to sit back and really see the work that Rachel and brian and jared and matthew and so many others have been doing I think it's positioned sonoma county very well to be able to be a leader in that regard as well as to Potentially get funding for a number of these initiatives So I just wanted to continue to say thank you On behalf of both the council and the ad hoc That's been looking at this We're really are we're really impressed with the work that the agencies have been doing in the collaboration that's taking place Suzanne i'll give it back to you to see if there's any last comments Thank you, mr. Mayor Suzanne smith and the executive director of sonoma county transportation authority and the regional climate protection authority um your comments just now about sort of The leadership that our transit operators have shown in this work is definitely Acknowledged at the regional level and pointed too frequently So I really want to commend the work of the general managers of our local bus systems For their openness to this collaborative approach and it's a pleasure to work with them and we look forward to Advancing into phase two with the funding we've secured so far and Delivering better and improved service for transit riders. Thank you for having us today All right with that we'll go ahead and thank thank folks for the presentation. We'll move on with our meeting We do have Our next portion starts at four o'clock So we'll go ahead and recess until that point