the citizens of Santa Cruz So I think there was five years in here. I'd like to have two to five years something like that You're asking on the form of a question. Can we do that? Can we do that? Right? I don't know how far this negotiation has gone. So this is an 8.5 liquidated damages Can you point us to the exact 8.5 Well, I think this section liquidated damages liquidated damages for the to the rtc If the railway Leaves so this is this is a payment to read to the rtc if the railroad decides to to abandon right and leave So I want to make sure they they've stayed here a reasonable period of time to try to make this contract work I don't want it to be a short period of time That's that's my point Yeah, yeah, I don't understand the logic there Um, we have other questions. I got wrong here. I know miss cough and gomas had. Oh, yeah Thank you, uh This is um really a complex and uh, none of us here have taken this lightly for our conversation today. So, um Um Right now we know we have some some freight issues Because we we've seen the letters. Um, we've witnessed the issue. We have repairs that are due In the event that this is not approved What are we going to do to make sure that the services are still being provided to the freight vendors that are using this line? currently both rtc and the federal government administration are Are working applying significant pressure to um hypo pacific uh to do a couple of things make make uh Some repairs on uh a small section of the track that needs uh some repairs and also have their locomotive inspected We have been told and that was uh Communicating in this morning that People are on the way to make sure that happens beginning early next week So that's you know, so that's good to hear. Uh, but also, um rtc staff has been working on the possibility of Contracting out for some for some of that work in case that hypo pacific is unable then to to do that And then there and there are a couple of ways of doing that in addition the If the rtc decides to go ahead and Approve this agreement and enter into the agreement with with progressive rail then progressive rail can Work with the stb to come on the on the rail line Much sooner rather than the way that the typical the typical 30 days that that happens so they can come in I'll you know, I don't know the exact number of days, but you know within days And then they can they can come in and do the work that is necessary and bring the the equipment in to move Of the cars that need to be moved progressive rail as already mentioned that you know, it'll take A few weeks to bring a locomotive in But there are other ways to do it. They've mentioned something that's called the a track A track mobile that can be that's lighter. They can come in here much sooner To take care of the the needs of the customers Now they do have of course One of the problems is hypo pacific doesn't have much motivation At this point because they're leaving progressive rail does have significant motivations They want to come in here improve Their metal in a sense to make sure that you know, the community sees that they're going to be responsible and do what's going to be needed For the customers and and for the community And they do have experience in in similar situations elsewhere where hypo pacific left operations And progressive rail took over and in reference checks on how that worked out Particularly with the north kialine for our transportation They expressed great satisfaction at how progressive rail came in And their customers already that were that were suffering as a result of what had been happening before with hypo pacific And as progressive rail came in they they did all the all the right things to then start You know serving the customers as they needed it and also Uh, you try to keep some of the Customers from leaving the area because that was part of what some some of the shippers were already Working on doing so So what i'm hearing here in summary is it's going to take over a week for the repair And even if the repair is done, um, that's part of it The other part is the locomotive and we won't even be seeing a locomotive for over three weeks If this contract were to be ratified Um, the the option to bring in the track mobile, which is the It's like a small truck that also has railroad wheels that can use be used for switching cars They can bring that in on short notice. So Um until they get the the regular locomotive on site So we don't have the exact about a time on that But it's a matter of days not weeks to get get that unit on site Yeah, because I I know we have vendors that are out thousands of dollars at this point So I know that that's important The the difference between the the contract from iowa pacific and this particular one Are there any expanded a number of services? Between the two contracts For us to vote on this progressive For example, this is freight. Um, this was some of the the passenger part of it. Um on the iowa pacific We're not asking to expand any services that were currently not Technically in contract with iowa pacific to perform If i'm understanding the question I I want to say yes, that's correct The clarity here is we're not going out and taking a vote on something that we're expanding any services Yes Now in the event that the corridor study Says no to rail and we have our our vendors for freight here That still needed or or it splits it says, you know, the the the vendors are fine But we're not doing anything with the passenger in this study Hypothetically comes to that conclusion. Do we have this vendor to still continue the freight service? Will they remain here? Will we have to pay them on an exit if they decide that they're not going to if the findings Find any truth to that matter? previous Analysis that was that was done for the rtc and from consultants at the rc hired Concluded that because of the there isn't a tremendous amount of freight service on this line That for the economics to work on this line a combination of freight service and then passenger excursion service Would make sense So that's that was the analysis If I can just answer the question from the the contractual standpoint The agreement provides that if freight service is maintained from mile post seven to zero We and terminate all other services terminated on the line including passenger Transportation as well as other freight. We would not owe the the operator anything We would not owe them that penalty. It's only if we remove it from the entire line including mile post zero to seven As louis indicates it would be up to the provider the operator to determine Whether they want to continue providing service in that circumstance But in order to do that we would not owe the operator any penalties So the the situation hypothetically if the corridor study came back to say that Passengers not going to be acceptable then we're at risk again in six months time With not having the continuity of services for freight Because they can leave as a result of not getting the phase two cleared with the corridor study So there's no obligation for the for the operator to leave. They don't it doesn't automatically terminate They may continue service. Um, but they do have the right to discontinue service So we still would then put our our businesses at at risk for the south county that use this corridor Potentially you could yes if they decide not to provide service I think that's all my questions for tonight I want to make sure that we have a lot of people standing up, uh, uh, mr. Caput I'll also just make an announcement. I think there's enough chairs for everybody here I think the people who are standing up are standing up to speak But they have turned on a screen in the other room and there's chairs in the conference room If you find that more comfortable to sit in you just head out the door and head to the left And there's a conference room with a screen that is airing this very, uh, meeting So mr. Caput, I'll make it quick because I want to hear from the public also, but We currently have some freight service going on Right now Yes, yes, we do. Okay. And and some actually comes from one not today Actually, there's no nothing moving on the rail line as of today Is that because of the uh, the one that crosses the power river? No, it's because the io pacifics locomotive has not been inspected Received its 92 day inspection from the fra Okay, so they are working to remedy that And uh, okay, that'll be I guess, uh They're all related. We're talking about short-term abandonment We're talking about how sturdy and how strong the contract, uh, if we go ahead with progressive is And whether or not they're gonna, you know, pull out in what six months or one year or five years or whatever they, uh Financially they're what they're reporting Uh is stronger than when we were promised before The before you mean economic, um, strength the strength of the company progressive They they appear to be very strong.  It's going to be shame on us So commissioner since we have a two phases to this Contract and we're just trying to get through phase one today If between now and the Star of phase two you want to see more detailed financial reports from the company You have the right to ask for those and i'm sure they'd be willing to Provide those they did provide some performance in their proposal That um that they made to the commission back in january, but if you want more detailed, uh financials from them I'm sure they can provide those Thank you, uh miss johnson Thank you, um I share uh commissioner kafan govmez is concerned about the reliability of freight service on the rail line And um, I know that the bahara bridge has been out and you and an rtc was notified 10 or 11 days ago And I am concerned and I heard louise speak to at least two options of potentially Repairing that bridge other than our pacific who's disincentivized to go repair it Or and or progressive going in and repairing it So I wonder about those two options and I wonder why there wasn't some kind of a backup plan in the beginning um That we had for repair when we knew we had a failing operator Indeed we've known that there are problems with our pacific for some time I mean, that's why we we came to the commission With uh recommendation for a notice of default To them and and for a process to select A new operator and we did indicate that it you know, it was possible that at some point in time There'd be a challenge and provided and providing the service So, uh, you know, uh, that's that's what happens when operations are are failing, I suppose and Indeed we have Since that time Did look at possible ways to to provide Service if that if that came to be However, it's not something that can be implemented in Immediately does take it does take Some days to get that in place and certain arrangements And one of the challenges for the rtc as well is that the rtc is not a common carrier operator And the rtc chose not to be a common carrier operator And for that purpose there's for that reason the rtc does not have Insurance as a as a common carrier operator and if the rtc does Take on certain responsibilities on the rail line Without that insurance then it could be you know an issue for the rtc So that so that that is one challenge that that needs to overcome and At least in one of those options I would also just like to point out that we have learned some lessons through our experience with iowa pacific That are reflected in the proposed agreement before each day and one of those Is that we have requested the operator provide? Financial security for their maintenance obligations So that in the event we end up in a situation where our operator is not providing maintenance. We have outside recourse And I appreciate that I think that's great. Um, I just I'm still stuck on the fact that we had as a commission and as a community no backup plan to prepare to repair Parts of this line when there was an emergency as we were under now With freight stuck on the other side of the bahara river Sorry for our bridge and we've got businesses who are suffering Financially because we can't get the freight over we knew we had a failing operator We knew there was a problem here and we should have had a backup repair plan and And the backup repair plan of saying oh the commission you need to Approve this contract and that's our backup plan. I just don't find that to be An acceptable backup plan, but thank you mr. Chair for the opportunity So now i'm gonna open it up for a public comment bob if you just wait one second if I don't know whether Councilmember billisic is still here. She told me that she might need to leave early And I told her I would try to get her up here if she's still here Then I I just call her to the front Then we will heard from our friends at big creek lumber Thank you. Thank you so much for your consideration You know iopis iowa pacific is out so we know that And progressive rail is here What are we going to do with our businesses that need help and need support? I really think that We need to do we need to go forward at least for Watsonville businesses. I mean we've talking about 400 people that may lose jobs We're talking about businesses that can't get their product moved We need to do something and progressive rail is here In talking about the big picture Of rail and I I uh, I think we need to do something about Rail between Watsonville and Santa Cruz. In fact, I'd like to see something go around the whole peninsula Go to Monterey, but you know, I think at one time. I said I think progressive rail is the answer But i'm not sure that it is now I think it is for this immediate thing Right now to move our freight But i'm looking at you know smart trains and things like that and and the future I think that we need to have Something that can get people from Watsonville To Santa Cruz you can tell our freeways a mess And maybe we need to look at other options like smart trail down the road But for right now the immediacy is a progressive rail then we talk about bikers and and um You know people want to walk and and we need that I I think we need that too And it would be great to have the whole corridor having bikes and having having uh walkers, but I think we need to also look at property owners Farmers I've heard from the farmers say You don't have any restroom facilities. You don't have any benches. You don't have anything along those lines So it's a big plan that needs to take place And it's but for today Progressive rail we need it at least to move our freight. Thank you. Thank you for your consideration. Yeah, thank you And we are going to have two minutes for every speaker And bob you've been waiting a long time. Thank you for your waiting and thank for everyone lining up in order to hear Thank you Chairman leopold members of the commission. I'm bob relage big creek lumber company big creek lumber company small family owned Business, it's been operating continuously in santa cruz county for 72 years Have two rail issues the first one has been alluded to and discussed already that has to do with Five rail cars that we have they're stalled on the other side of the power row river bridge and another one in route It's hardship for us. I don't have time to dwell on that Other than to thank staff and also some a number of members of the public We're trying to figure out a mechanism to solve that problem The bigger problem for us, of course is long-term Use of that rail our watsonville yard has been receiving Rail freight for almost 50 years and in fact we we bought that property where our watsonville yard is Specifically because it did have rail access. I think the people here Helpful for them to understand the distance from the county line To our retail facility in the industrial area of watsonville Is miniscule compared to the total length of the rail system in uh in santa cruz county Our employees and our company depend on that freight service. I want to quickly give you a little bit of economic Uh information about that we get six to eight rail cars a month The cost difference to our company To buy smaller lots of material and have it trucked here is in excess of $40,000 a year Potentially without that rail service That particular yard Could lose $500,000 a half a million dollars in a year With the loss of that With the loss of that service You know, we've got We don't have a lot of employees. Was that two minutes? It goes by fast. I apologize the mackerel Close out it's critical to us. We need dependable Maintenance and inspection Our company needs to have some sort of Reliable service we don't want to be Thrown into the bus for an issue that's much larger than we are. Thank you. I can answer any questions you have I appreciate it So I just want to just remind Remind everyone That we want to be respectful to everybody. So uh to the extent that We don't uh jeer Or or uh a hassle anybody for making any comments. I'd appreciate that James Eggleston from La Selva beach I'm stunned by the irregularity of this procedure over the last many months The staff's claim of due diligence is belied by a public record substantial public record Of progressive and its principles Fraudulent business practices and mistreatment of communities in which this is operated Your public bidding process issued an rfp Documents now reveal that was essentially predetermined in progressive's favor Before you issued the rfp That would make it fraudulent Your united corridor study Is to determine the intended use Of the rail line and here i'm talking about from watsonville north You are predetermining that By granting the progressive rail contact and incredibly you're about to issue a negative declaration under sequa Based on progressive rails claim That federal rail law preempts any and all environmental regulation locally and by the state Now you know it's a hotly disputed legal issue and may have to be determined By the courts But from a policy matter it is hard to believe That you as elected representatives of the people of santa cruz are willing to throw environmental protection on the rail Whether or not you have to Certainly as a policy matter you should do a study Because that would inform your decision You are negligent in your duties if you approve this contract now slow down Table the progressive rail contract for a few months Finish the united corridor study Do an environmental impact study You are the regional transportation commission Not the regional rail commission do your job Thank you Good morning Good evening or morning afternoon i guess at this point My name is Doug green and i am the current president of the la selva beach improvement association I'm not here representing the association because i know many of our members are on both sides of the spectrum As to what ought to be done particularly past our area But i have also worked for several government agencies and in Echoing my friend jim is there's always been a fiduciary responsibility to Follow a tract of how you do things And what i'm hearing here is again Contracts are being approved without the pertinent think studies being done ahead of time And just as an example our bluff in the selva beach a few years ago We had a major and spent a lot of money done on an impact or on an engineering study because we happen to know that our Bluff has a great deal of erosion And that erosion is affecting the railroad tracks below us And without an environmental study of the condition of the bluff area not only at la selva beach But anywhere else that those tracks come close to the edge Is derelicts in of duty in my opinion to approve a contract for a train service that could run up there And potentially completely destroy any bluff area along the coast I feel that if there's a way to get a contract done For watsonville so that this freight service can be continued whether that means pushing iowa pacific to do their job or Modifying your contract to get progressive just for that part of the spectrum The studies need to be done first To follow all of our elected fiduciary duties as i have to do as president of the selva beach You people have a fiduciary duty And should do it in the right order that it should be done the contract should not be signed today Take your time. Thank you. Thank you afternoon I'm brandon kett. I live here in watsonville been here most of my life I will be brief I took a lot of notes listening to your good questions of your staff and it kept shortening my speech so But anyway, our county seat as we all know is 20 miles away and it should only take 30 minutes to get there But with our gridlock problem, it can take an hour or more and it it makes uh, it makes it really tough for us watsonville folks to get to our county seat We need to improve our transportation options, especially in light of our growing population At the railroad corridor is one of the most scenic rail lines on the coast of california It would be a mistake to remove the rails It's a valuable asset that belongs to all of our citizens The united corridor study is due For a decision by you folks the end of the year. It sounds like and Hopefully it will shed some light on the importance And viability of keeping rail in our county I have read the proposed contract for progressive rail Progressive is offering to put money into our railroad corridor And our corridor needs to be operational and to generate income Uh, the the contract provides that progressive rail must cooperate With you folks for any future public projects Such as passenger service and trails Also, it requires that progressive must supply construction services at reasonable rates This proposed agreement provides the flexibility needed To accomplish our much needed goal of improving transportation In our county. Thank you. Thank you Good after Time to time in the audience. I really think you should be in the back of the it's fine to hold up signs But you're blocking other people's views. So please put it stand in the back with your signs if you need to hold them up Thank you Good afternoon My name is rick cleffel. The choice we face is very simple Will we employ an out-of-state company to use an obsolete technology To transport toxic and dangerous materials across our pristine Coastal environment Or will we use the same land to turn it into the world's First bicycle freeway This is would be a bad boon to both commuters and tours and businesses It's simple the past or the future you choose we vote This is my Hi, good afternoon. I'm I'm claire cleffel and I just wanted to say that I'm here to represent all the people who actually Live on the railroad tracks And I think the proposition that we need a freight train is highly exaggerated I've lived on the railroad tracks since 1992 and all I've ever seen going up down those railroad tracks is the coal is the Car full of rocks that was going to the cement plant I think we need to look to the future and we need to find a place for our bicycle riders to ride And we need to be able to move people but I think freight Is just really the wrong direction and I think that it's not actually supported by what goes up and down that railroad track Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon Good afternoon members of the commission My name is solid in sale I live on the west side within the city of santa cruz and have been a county resident for over 50 years Today's meeting is the latest installment in our family feud Over whether or not we should continue to include rail in our long range transit plans for santa cruz county I'm reminded of a time 40 years ago When a vocal opposition opposed plans to implement the first countywide paramedic system Opponents of upgrading ambulance services from basic scoop and run EMT level to paramedic advanced life support Raised one objection after another From rejecting the analysis of county health services staff and the emergency medical care commission To predicting system insolvency or the demise of one or more hospitals While opponents ultimately succeeded in delaying the upgrade to paramedics for eight years Until 1985 The system that was eventually implemented with great success Was exactly what had been proposed originally Our county's current sophisticated EMS system Is the outgrowth of the action of its early advocates who clearly envisioned a future that benefited the many As opposed to the few I support approval of the contract with progressive rail While I genuinely sympathize with those who just don't want any rail operations in their neighborhood ever I don't believe such opposition is in the best interests of the many Approval of the contract will assure continuity of freight service for long-standing county businesses like big creek lumber Meet our legal obligations to maintain services on the line And position us to begin restoration and improvements to the track If the the outcome of unified corridor study is decision to continue rail as a backbone of our regional transit system. Thank you Good afternoon Good afternoon. Um, my name is bonnie more and i've been a resident of this county for Almost 50 years and I just would like to shed some light on the issue of progressive rail Coming into our county here, which I think is a very bad idea If you take a look at the the projects that they've got around the country, you'll see that they're a propane Toxic material Transporter and a storage house This is santa cruz county and we're a coastal community the the level of Risk that you're taking and putting on the community is horrifying to me If you ever have an opportunity and I suggest that the public does this as well You need to google Kingman, arizona and take a look there and see what happened when a propane train Derailed and they had to evacuate an entire community of people It is hazardous. It is not okay. And this is santa cruz. You have to remember where you're living Take a look at winslow arizona. Look at litchfield park arizona Near the like air force base where they actually store things under old salt caves and caverns They don't have it out and exposed where you're going to have it here a freight line car that transports propane goes between 90 and Between 70 and 90 feet long And what you're asking is for a holding area for 30 of those tanks And if you think that you're going to get passenger rail on top of what they're going to do on their freight rail and their Propane transport you're mistaken. And if you think it's healthy and okay for bicyclists or pedestrians to walk along a rail line Go and walk on the rail line go to an active rail line and take a walk and see what it's like Try and put a bicycle next to a freight train that's coming through town Even when they are going at 10 miles an hour and put your children on that line Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon Hi, my name is celia more and I live on the west side and I literally live 10 feet from the railroad tracks And I live on seaside and rank in street. It's in your guys's report As it being somewhere through the quiet zone that it won't be able to be quiet So they will be blowing their horns 10 feet from my house Across from us is a preschool Three blocks is bayview elementary school One block is garfield park We don't even have sidewalks to our park I have to walk with the cars We don't have a safe way to get to the schools. We don't have safe ways to get to our to our parks But yet you want to put in a rail and activate a rail line that's been there and has not had any rail on it for I've since I've been here. I haven't seen anything That wants to carry propane which has been termed mega bombs because if one of those Propane tanks has a leak You're you're on metal on metal one little spark Boom there goes everything My life Is not worth your guys's decision to put in a rail line. That's going to transport something that can take my life away My life is more important than your guys's monetary Assumptions of what you may get through this rail line. It is a joke Right now people walk on that rail line and That that intersection right there has been deemed Unsafe through the city the city won't touch it. There's one stops. There's there's it's a four way There should be a four-way stop But it's a two-way stop because the rail line goes straight through the street So a car literally cannot stop there to let the rail go through it is completely an unsafe intersection Thank you. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is Shane white I'm speaking on behalf of Justin white my brother. He is the ceo of our company and this is our take on the situation Hello, I'm the ceo of knd landscaping in watsonville We have 68 employees and are very active in the community Do business from Santa Cruz to Monterey and I've taken a special interest in the rail corridor as a professional landscaper and a plant enthusiast I have walked miles of the rail corridor and counted all the heritage trees That will be cut by the current rail with trail plan We plant trees move earth and create landscapes for a living Including large commercial projects and walking the corridor. I've seen firsthand what the current plan of record will do Millions of cubic yards of dirt will need to be moved huge cuts to the hillside and larger tany walls will need to be built They will tremendously Caught be costly and upon visual inspection does not appear wide enough to support a rail and Train without doing immense environmental damage. As such, I am 100 opposed to signing the progressive rail contract We are starting the best use of the corridor according to measure D While we can train our options bringing a questionable operator and turn over public assets to an out of state profit making business And create a huge divisive issue when the ucis is six months away. I would never make a real business decision like this Kandy landscape has grown from 20 employees to 68 employees and Watson in the last five years We work with many watchable businesses supportive of greenway the trail advocated by greenway is a new economy Clean jobs economic development health safety and personal transportation The rail fantasy is the old economy belching diesel engines environmental damage Fixed schedules long lead times with economic conditions are changing rapidly and a huge upfront public investment With little known transportation value payback if you want to talk about business and jobs No ceo would make these types of decisions and it's not good for the jobs economy or the people Good afternoon. I will just say that remember we're talking about the progressive rail contract So keeping it to the progressive rail contract will help us address the issue There will be lots of time for we're going to talk about what we're going to do with the actual line when the unified corridor study is done Good morning, ladies and gentlemen and members of the santa cruz county transportation commission. My name is gary plump I'm a former 32 year resident of santa cruz county And as an advocate for preserving the santa cruz branch rail line and its potential as a viable transportation entity I do feel that the anti rail actions put forth by trail now and greenway are misinformed and short-sighted Why are they so vehemently opposed to trains? I hear people Misperceptions everywhere. I hear people talking about pollution and so forth today's modern diesel locomotive. It's clean burning diesel natural gas Battery powered. There's no electrical wires that somebody alluded to earlier. Look at europe. Okay Denying a contract with progressive rail will has has serious ramifications for the four companies in downtown Watsonville who depend on rail to receive and transport their products by imposing their self-serving agenda Trail now and greenway will cause hardships on those companies as we already alluded to Greenway on trail now Elitist attitude is self-serving and is from funded by nimby not in my backyard deep pocket individuals who want to remove The rail and replace it with the trail if this is allowed to happen Santa Cruz county will lose a valuable transportation asset to move people and freight now and in the future Also, it will lose the ability to connect with amtrak, which monterey county is moving and within two years You will have the capital a quarter extended with a stop in Watsonville junction. Have you folks ridden the smart train? I noticed that no member of trail now or or Trail now or greenway have Try it. You may like it the smart train is a great environmentally friendly train To connect with future amtrak service in paharo The santa cruz branch rail line has been in place for over 140 years No trains have fallen off the cliff and is part of santa cruz county history Let's keep it intact and say a resounding yes to progressive rail and to preserve the rail line, which i'm very passionate about Thank you I appreciate everyone's passion, but I uh, I want to I will stop future speakers if they start name calling the other side It's not it we let's talk about the policy issues and let's not ascribe characteristics to the other the other members Good afternoon. My name is joe martinis. I live in aptos. I'm here to tell you To say no to progressive rail There are 10,000 reasons to say no And greenway and trail now Are are have that support? So Again, please say no to progressive rail Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is kary pico Greg randy john as you will not find this in your packet, but this comes from documents $600,000 that's how much the rtc spends every year administering and maintaining the rail corridor Not counting the bridge repairs $364,000 is how much sierra northern lost one year on administering freight With the stb document by the way the first one the first document is with the rtc financial audits This one is from the stb Notification sierra northern spent 500,000 and they only earned 136,000 on freight. That's why freight's not working Um, what can we expect from the progressive contract if you use iowa's pacific's numbers of what the actual freight is By contract the rtc will get $6,000 back. Woohoo. You spend 600,000 bucks and you get 6,000 back If you use progressive's marketing plan and you actually believe their freight is going to go 10 times higher to 3,000 cars a year That will bring it up to $43,000 per year Well, let's include passenger service if you use iowa pacific's you'll get another 28,000 or a total of $70,000 coming in my point is we're not even close to the 600,000 you're spending lastly Well, it put it together if you add everything up The rtc will spend 600,000 a year they will get $50,000 back. Oh what I want to tell you also is in passenger service They're outsourcing so Progressive will probably get at best 30% of that revenue you put it in the contract. We'll get about 20,000 So when you add it all up The rtc will spend 5.5 million dollars To support progressive so 10 million dollars That's how much the rtc said that they took from the proposition 116 when they ignored the california Coastal conservancy money sitting on the table with no strings attached Good afternoon. Hi susanne healthman aptos I appreciate that you're trying to solve some real problems And I'd like to add my voice to those who have indicated that progressive rail is not the solution to those problems One of the underlying assumptions is that the time to Form an agreement even for phase one with progressive rail is because iowa pacific has become an unstable rail provider Iowa pacific has always been an unstable rail provider It missed every rail performance standard in its contract with the rtc starting in 2013 It stored rail cars earlier and in prohibited locations for years before it hit the newsstands in 2017 Thanks to an involved citizen The rtc never notified iowa pacific of non-payment of fees until november 2017 So why now is iowa pacific suddenly an unstable provider when it has been doing the same thing for five solid years? I urge you To wait until we have a unified study to make a change. I understand their problems We need solutions, but I don't think progressive rail is the solution. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon, uh, let me start by saying that I support the staff's Recommendation to approve the deal with progressive rail I've worked for the current operator here in lottsonville for about three years now and in that time Unfortunately, I've continuously seen them put the customer's needs As second and we need to be putting the customer first As a result of this we now have local businesses here in lottsonville that are suffering Um, so it's time to do the right thing and if iowa pacific won't do it Then you guys as commissioners have a responsibility to do the right thing and bring progressive in here. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is ted burk. I'm a businessperson from capitol And a member of the santa criss county business council board of directors And I want to remind you all that the greenway approach was endorsed unanimously by the 24 member board of directors And 86 percent of all business council members in a secret ballot This was an overwhelming endorsement by the leading county-wide business organization Which includes many south county business organizations such as KND landscaping who spoke just a moment ago par harrow dunes resort gruntski law firm watchenville hospital driscoll's lakeside organics And watchenville coast produce So commissioners with that said the business community and so many others are hoping that you won't vote this morning To tie up the 32 mile rail line for 10 plus years With oil tanker cars I think that the majority of you know that Transferring control to progressive rail is not the appropriate use of the rail line Nor is the focus of fossil fuel transportation and storage In sync with santa criss values and aesthetics So why then is it even being considered? Furthermore your so-called independent study has yet to come out and yet you now want to rush this through And if you do rush to jam this 10-year contract through today And by so doing Deprive the people of determining a better use you may get to where you are hell-bent to go initially But you're going to get there by yourselves and not by building a community along the way The people of our county from north to south look at you commissioners to be the essential filter of deliberating well-intentioned But flawed ideas and in fact that really is your job Many people see the rtc today as an agency run amuck in bias Without regard to better alternatives and a deaf ear to constructive objections Thus the citizens of santa criss county rely upon you to do your job Independent of the preference of the rtc staff and free of their frequent and obvious rail bias Good afternoon. Good afternoon. I'm jacquard martinez. I'm the resident here in watsonville I first want to just want to point out the concern I have a lot run a lack of voice in this room and that is the low-income Latino workforce we have here in watsonville As well as the high skilled young workforce that we have in this community I want to speak specifically about a concern I have about entering an agreement with a progressive rail And that is that I believe will be going down Setting things in motion that would be expensive or challenging To go back on This is a low-income community that relies on its cars This is a workforce that relies on its automobiles to get to their place of employment Or into the fields to do work in ag This is a young community that needs High paying jobs not in santa criss but here in watsonville I believe this decision to move forward with progressive will set these things in motion that will eventually lead to a passenger An attempt to bring a passenger trail trained to santa criss And instead of providing Equitable transportation to our residents. I think it'll in turn hurt this community by Increasing the amount of people from outside this community moving into watsonville And furthering the gentrification that we're already seeing in this community. Thank you Hi, my name is stanley socalo. I live in santa criss county near the city of santa criss Um, I think a lot of people here who are speaking Passionately haven't read the document. I read the contract last night. I have a few comments about it The first thing it concerns me is that it says that the Rail freight corridor the portion of the whole corridor that's dedicated to the freight operations Is 10 feet wide from the center of the track to each side? So that's 20 feet width of the track of the whole corridor A large significant portion Of the corridor is only 30 feet wide And so that leaves only 10 feet Uh leftover for the the trail Two feet of shoulders on each side Six inches for a fence it leaves a five and a half foot wide paved trail I don't know why you don't say That it's the minimum required which By law is eight feet six inches from the center of the track The passenger train feasibility study all illustrated eight feet six inches from the center of the track At least in the narrow sections make it eight feet six inches So that the the the uh The trail has enough width in those narrow areas Second it says um The progressive rail has the right to stockpile materials outside of that corridor on the rest of the Property it doesn't say that the stockpiling won't interfere with the trail I think it should make that clear the contract gives progressive rail the right to build maintenance storage facilities outside of that 20-foot wide corridor But it doesn't say that those won't interfere And it also doesn't say that whatever they build there At the end of the contract or if they're they abandon it that whatever was affixed to the Property becomes property of the rtc that they can't demolish buildings or whatever It should make that clear um Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. I'm pj mccosie. I'm with delmar foods We're a frozen fruit and vegetable processor We'll be celebrating our 60th year in business Next year. I've been president for an owner for about 33 of those For all the time that delmar has been in business We've utilized our spur to load rail cars of frozen fruits and vegetables to ship east We have many customers that are on the eastern seaboard and the products that we Are able to provide them come out of the region here There's a direct relationship between the price of gasoline and diesel And the demand for rail service And i'm sure that you folks are all aware of the Changes that are going on in the trucking industry right now the department of transportation Has a lot of new compliance Requirements that is causing the trucking industry a lot of woes There are shortages of truck drivers A lot of the equipment has to be taken out of service Prices on freight east i've never seen as high The trucking rates last week were just unbelievably high If you look at the I drove over from my plant. We have about 500 people working there right now You look at the at the track that goes from just the other side of highway one through town here Many of those properties may not be using rail today, but if you're thinking long term They very well may be Using rail in the future and that may determine the industrial activity that we have here in watsonville, which i think is an important part The status quo right now is completely unacceptable We have no rail service and we have this miserable line of tankers That are stored that are going all the way out to san andres road If we can get rid of those with progressive rail i'm all in favor of it. Thank you Good afternoon Good afternoon. My name is lilliania molas. I'm a lifelong resident of watsonville and i work for driscolls Of local berry company who's been in the community for 100 years In my role at driscolls i'm responsible for all of our transportation within the united states So that encompasses truck air and rail Within really what we wanted to speak to here was just understanding that for a highly perishable item like barry's Standard rail is just not an option to move this type of freight The main reason is the fact that this product has to be moved in a very time sensitive matter And rail is not traditionally known for being able to maintain schedules In the sense of if you were to go from here to chicago could take several weeks where Product that is this perishable just would not be able to sustain that Another thing to consider is that the thousands of shipments we do ship We have been able to ship about 47 shipments via intermodal rail Which is really the only viable option we've been able to find to utilize any type of rail service But that's only specific to expedited options which are only able to go from like say stockton or from southern california And in those types of opportunities you have to incorporate truck and rail The other component too to understand is that when it comes to perishable products We have to ship consistently all day long and so rail only really gives one option of loading And instead of being able to load consistently as product is coming in and able to ship In addition to that considering the amount of payload and the amount of Challenges on our receiving side all those factors allow it to where the rail does not provide an option for our transportation Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Okay. Good afternoon. Thank you My name is kent griffin. I am the supply chain director for rider affiliated companies One of the largest berry growers in the in the watsonville santa cruz area We have over 3700 local employees and farm on over 20 20 different ranches in the district And also support a number of local businesses Rider affiliate finds it troublesome that the decision a decision could be made now To move ahead with a progressive rail contract before the unified corridor study is complete We are also concerned that entering into a new 10-year contract with progressive Might jeopardize the implementation of other scenarios trade only scenarios or other transportation alternatives So rider affiliate companies opposes the approval of the progressive rail contract. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Thanks for the opportunity to speak before you chairman leopold My name is kurtis hill. I'm from san bonito county and I came over today because You have kind of the similar issues here going on today that we have in in the holister area. We have 11 mile Line that goes from holister to gilroy We're looking for cal train to come in to to extend down into to holister and also expand Freight due to the trucking costs and the growth going on in our community. I see a lot of parallels With that issue with what you have here You've got contractors that came before you that that need this rail service coming in and out of of watsonville It drives your economic engine to a certain extent the one thing that I you know, so I support your staff's recommendation to Towards approving the progressive Contract one of the things on the bigger term just for me sitting here from the outside looking in Don't do what la did back in the 50s when they ripped up their tracks in order to put Accommodate general motors with their buses You've got track laid down You know, I know that smart up in marine county is doing well Starting out great. You that looks like a good fit for this county moving commuters up and down getting them off highway one We're looking for that same thing in our county because our roads are choked so that's kind of the side issue, but the main thing is is is Your vendors here in in watsonville need progressive rail. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. I'm lauren cutter long-term resident of santa cruz county And I urge you to vote no on this contract with progressive rail I opposed the contract for the many reasons outlined today and in the public forums over the past few months Thank you to greenway and others for doing the investigative work to shed light on these very real and significant threats to our community if progressive wins this contract One concern I highlight is traffic gridlock I live near the intersection of 41st avenue and the corridor 41st avenue already suffers gridlock traffic and freight rail would greatly exacerbate the problem The costs both social and economic Of this contract would be pushed to us your constituents With significant impacts to our daily quality of life. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Hello. My name is dean cutter. I'm from santa cruz, california And I have to say mr. Leonard. I really appreciate your your attempts to try to keep people civil and nice And it's a really good forum um I am in favor of the greenway option And for that reason I do not support the progressive rail contract In my opinion, um There seems to be a trained at any cost mindset in the rtc It just seems that way to me And it seems there's been a strategy of kind of like a ratchet to promote the pro train agenda The first ratchet was the acceptance of the ten million two hundred thousand dollars to purchase the line Knowing there was a stipulation the money could only be kept if the line was used for recreational and freight train purposes And uh, this has been used as a tool against the huge public desire for a greenway in our county We should give the money back The acceptance of the ten million two hundred thousand dollars is being now used as an argument as a to contract with progressive rail Uh a contract with progressive rail will further prevent conversion of the line to a greenway Again, you are going counter to the desires of a large Constituency If you vote for progressive rail, we will all lose control over the use of the rail line Please don't take us down with the rail at any cost ship Please vote against the contract. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon chair commissioners My name is jillian greensight and i'm here speaking on behalf of the sierra club You received our letter of june 6th and i will summarize As a general statement the sierra club is in support of moving freight by rail And i think if you ratify this contract, it would be very important for you to track Whether more freight is removed from the roadways onto the rail line So in the future we could base our opinions on some data not just general statements As you know Santa Cruz sits in one of the world's relatively few biodiversity hotspots Therefore it is critical that for any of the human infrastructure we put in that we consider environmental issues And the sierra club's letter has detailed for you some areas where which we feel should be part of this contract We feel that there should be an environmental protocol with best management practices regarding pesticides if any are used Any tree trimming tree removal that adhere to local state and federal regulations To avoid bird nesting periods, etc needs to be spelled out Progressive rail is not responsible for fencing as per the contract But fencing will need to be built and we would encourage that you make sure that that is Cognizant of and designed to avoid preventing wildlife crossing We are opposed to the railcar storage on the north coast Although there seems to be some vagueness about whether that will actually take place That needs to be spelled out clearly section 6.3 regarding buildings again It's a bit vague where they might be or if they would be But that needs to be spelled out so we clearly know who has control over such land use issues And uh, finally that we would ask you that you consider Negotiating with progressive rail to undertake upgrading the line to class 4 continuously welded rail within the time span of the contract. Thank you Good afternoon. My name is Matthew J. I'm general manager for lineage logistics here in town We have three cold storage warehouses Two are on rail spurs What I'd like to say is that we need rail service here in town We are uh in the middle of the season right now And uh, we probably expect well over 100 million pounds of fruits and vegetables that come through If we don't have a rail option For our customers, it's just going to it's going to back up and it's going to be a problem for our economy So that's really what we want to say is that You know, we need to go forward with progressive rail just really to help keep our economy going This is the timing is that we are in the peak season right now. It's coming in heavy and we got to go forward Thanks for your comments My name is glenn salts I'm a resident of santa cruz county And I've written a letter to the rtc as a citizen and physician About grave concerns to public health if you hastily support a progressive rail before review of the ucis study You are not compelled to contract with progressive rail today, and I appreciate mr. Leopold Your choice of saying it's not fair to characterize people as rail haters I support greenway and progressive rail and voted for Train in portland where I had lived previously And rode the train to the airport as recently as 48 hours ago My habit suggests using medical language to frame your decision There are alternatives to surgical implantation of the midwestern freight carrier into our santa cruz public Body once implanted you will not be able to reduce the Progressive trail implant without sustaining Damage emergency do something today does not substitute for informed consent and risks and alternatives Uh We can view Terrible medicine as a not good way to inform public policy And we do not want to damage future public trust to support future clean transportation That includes hov electric bus and safe cycling Morph rate in a tourist train Of sipping lattes or a glass of wine is not a solution for transportation in south county Is not social justice and is more like anesthesia Because voting for progressive rail today will not reduce highway 1 commute by a single minute now or in the future Do not approve progressive rail contract today. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Hey everybody. I can speak fast. I'm going to go really quick First off everybody's really passionate in this room. That's great But I saw let's be patient tolerant and understanding of everybody. That's how we're going to get to consensus in this community I'm an entrepreneur. I co-founded and the CEO of inboard technology We make lightweight personal electric vehicles and we're totally agnostic trains buses planes anything it all works for us So I've got no stake in this. I'm not a nimby. I believe in data Data insights, and I think if you look at the age demographic in this room for the pro trainers It gives you an inclination of where the future is headed Lightweight personal mobility. We're 30 people in Santa Cruz We've raised 12 million dollars and brought that to this community over the last two years If you want to find out more watch shark tank season eight episode 10 We're undergoing the biggest transportation paradigm shift since the internal combustion engine in 1900 The amount of change we're about to see over the next 10 years is going to be massive We're engaged with the likes of Daimler tesla for gm shape for automotive group and bird the fastest growing company in the history of the world When looking at this, we've engaged with california assembly member christin olson the german ministry of transportation Karima deli who's the head of the french parliament who's chairing the eu commission on mobility and all of it is looking at decentralized ways Divorcing ourselves from traditional infrastructure and adopting new multimodal ways of transportation This is how my generation is going to look and to be totally honest We're going to look back at this commission here and we're going to say were they looking forward to the future Or were they looking backwards in antiquated technology? Um, you know, I think we're being very short-sighted. We're looking at sunk cost And we're getting in bed with non-community stakeholders I had a great conversation with jason collada who runs public affairs with progressive And he doesn't know why the agreement has to be even for the entire line He doesn't want it for the west side He said that he doesn't agree with the way the ceo and the legal counsel have negotiated the matter So why are we rushing into these things?  There's a drug dealer on the corner. You know, it's just for tonight It's not a big deal. We'll get another one later on. This is not the best way to move forward. Thanks everybody While a very highly entertaining speech It's totally not fair that I have to follow that guy Yeah, well, hold on for one moment. You know calling My concern about people calling each other names also has to do with calling out people's age So, uh, thank you Let's let's remember everybody in the room And we all have, you know, some might call that experience but some other might say that they look at things a different way But let's remember let's focus on the issues not on on the personalities of the individual speakers Wow, have you turned on the button yet? I still have two minutes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah So i'm john martinelli And I would like to thank all of you for The time that you spend doing this kind of stuff because it can't be fun And I've been watching you and you're really paying attention to the speakers and I really appreciate that Um, I'm a business guy and I'm a bike rider I understand and support the idea of continuing rail service for freight for watsonville watsonville needs that we get that But we need to break this thing into and leave the northern part of the of the of the rail Open for a bike trail and a and a and a walking lane It would be an amazing resource That would bring people that that would stay in our hotels pair hotel occupancy tax and all that good stuff that We could we'll never have it again The Via terse oh so bike lanes and and hiking trails connect communities. That's something that we're also missing So between watsonville and santa cruz. There are so many Crossings that if we have a train going up there, it's going to create gridlock That will impact our our roads a lot worse than they are now Because it has to stop at every one of those every one of those crossings And and and also as a as a And I wish we had more time to really talk about this, you know greg Our community is not engaged and we do need to spend more time Having conversations like this and i'm sorry that I wasn't prepared for this But I I do support freight rail for watsonville But let us do a a a bike trail and a hiking trail in the north end of the county and turn it into Just the the coolest thing that this county could have to bring people that that are going to spend money in our community watsonville needs Support it's we're very poor and and anyway, so Next time i'm going to come more prepared, but thank you for your for your support. Thank you Good afternoon Good afternoon commissioners. I'm william howe. I'm a long time multi-generational resident in santa cruz Working real estate and uh working job creation Dear commissioners Your decision today will Impact and affect the entire 32 miles of the central corridor for the next 10 years As you're all aware the ucis study is set to be available this fall It would be poor practice to accept a 10-year contract Just prior to receiving and evaluating this important report a yes today would severely restrict and remove all the corridor options If progressive rail group has any long lasting interest in santa cruz county, they will they'll reapply The contract is filled and i've read this thing multiple times the contract is filled with concerns of red flags To the disadvantage of the rtc and the citizens of santa cruz county the proponents who have assured everyone There is no likelihood that freight or rail storage will materialize north of watsonville yet progressive rail contract only refers to and references exhibits storing up to 100 cars on the north coast I've so rarely seen a contract that gives party terms and rights that they don't intend to use This group is here to make a profit who blames them no one We support even the last few companies that currently use commercial freight in watsonville This there is a current freight operator now voting no on this proposed contract gives rtc the ability to come back And draft a clear and clean agreement to ensure those freight users are protected Please don't let one mile affect the remaining 31 Also As you protect the interests of a few companies remember the vast number of local businesses That would be negatively impacted by poor and disruptive freight use Consider those impacts who adjacent properties to those who have made massive and lengthy efforts to attract and retain those businesses Those local businesses have spent hundreds of millions of dollars and employ many thousands of people Please thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is tad velletrop. I'm a resident of santa cruz um Very concerned about the rush to hand over the santa cruz county rail corridor To an out-of-state rail company one with questionable ethics and motives uh, and no real uh stake in our communities And while I recognize the the need to provide service for four shippers in watsonville, there are certainly Solutions that would allow us to work around this without locking us into a 10-year contract With progressive a contract that would greatly that could greatly restrict our ability To develop our choices regarding how we utilize this precious corridor Deeply concerned that no one seems to know or say what progressive has in mind for our corridor Why is it that the public doesn't know? What they want to ship through our communities or what they might store along the line What are the possible dangers the hazards? What are we not being told when it comes to progressive? And this corridor process Rail rail or a combination of the two These should be choices That the public gets to make unfettered by progressive's authority and their bottom line I urge our commissions to exercise prudence here To hold off on this corridor give away Give the public the benefit of the results of the feasibility study that is pending and allow us to make informed choices With clarity and options that currently are not afforded our constituents. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon I wanted to get in a little bit and share a little bit of my driving experience over this year Especially when it pertains to dealing with those big heavy freight trucks along our roads When we pass through when I have to pass along them on a Nero shoulderless highway like that of highway 17 It's stressful I love it I love as well as my friends experiencing anxiety that shouldn't need to be had while driving But here we are with portions of the highway known as big moody curve and redwood estates pick and pull Is accident rubbish pickups are poorly executed and tires get damaged talk about playing with my life Where's the fabricated outrage when it comes to this my item? There's a speed limit on highway 17 for trucks of 35 miles per hour for certain segments causing a huge bottleneck The highway 17 bus it was one time involved in a side swipe hit and run by a pickup Because of how dangerous this corridor is in tandem with poorly trained drivers Talking about the drivers on the road not our bus drivers. They're great Shout out to them Memorial Day weekend inbound departure 815 from san jose deriden actual departure 903. Thanks to traffic labor day 11 30 a.m Departure arrived into san jose 140 two hours trip time is a norm during holiday travel Um to wrap this all together We have traffic problems and to sit by and let freight traverse to corridors like 17 laurel street mission street and any other narrow corridor Especially those with only one lane per direction is to enable this problem The question today is do we accept progressive rail or do we let some mystery company picked by the surface transportation board? by force could the by the Become the fearful wicked operator of the west that we have less control of Because the feds pick it out instead of us when a natural disaster event happens A recession jacks up gas prices. Do we want to keep redundant keep the rail or do we just want to let it go to waste? Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon supervisor and board. My name is jonathan kolodinsky Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you on this issue. I'm a local small businessman and I observed the oil tankers in the watsonville area Fundamentally i'm in support of local business and don't want to do anything to impede the success of the existing businesses But that being said i'm opposed to the progressive rail deal north of watsonville I fully support freight train service here in watsonville and see that that's been a vital part of the community for decades Um and don't necessarily mind the tankers in the watsonville industrial area But don't know that the people of santa cruz who prefer storage of petroleum tankers to a well-maintained pedestrian corridor It just doesn't seem fitting for the santa cruz county community as a whole And I don't think that the trestles could support the train traffic Where would stations go and how many people would really use this? There is only room for one direction of rail traffic And I can't understand how there would ever be an efficient passenger rail system the cons just simply Outweigh the pros. Let's not rush a decision that has been Going to have such a significant impact on the county for years to come And please don't mortgage our environment and the financial future by approving this contract. Thank you After good afternoon. My name is glenn schaller. I'm the political coordinator at the monterey based central labor council afl cio We have 80 affiliated unions about 37 working Working-class families So, um, we have supported the idea of having light rail and bike trail in this county Since the hearings were held in sacramento to first get a hold of that 11 million dollars We strongly supported measure d here in santa cruz county and measure x in monterey county Because of the race class and geographic issues that are there in both counties The city of selenus and the city of watsonville are the two most union dense communities in our two counties And not surprisingly many people leave those communities in the early morning to work in agriculture in hospitality We need a way for folks to be able to get from one place to the other and we need a freight train Available to the mostly union companies that you've heard from today I'm a very proud member of teamsters 912 from right here in watsonville And most of the employers you've heard from today have 912 members who live here in watsonville or in surrounding areas I really urge you to vote for the progressive rail contract. This is a great way to move this forward You have ways to address issues as they come up and it moves us into the situation where we can use more information In the future to change things if we have to thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. I'm laura bezich and I came to say that I don't believe this is about transportation I believe this is about new industrial development from these companies that are Serving the petroleum and the chemical industries and they're using this to get their foot in the door So that they can come later on and and use these legal clauses and things in the contract To do more development in that direction, which is not good for the people of santa cruz You know, we're currently In of six mass extinction and it's caused by these very corporate entities that this company serves We don't want to be engaging with the company with that reputation Who say one thing now it's about lumber. It's about food It's not about that. Look at their track record Look at what they've done in their own hometown and the chemical spills and the pollution that they've cost They don't care about people. They're master manipulators and maybe you haven't seen through that yet Please don't sell us out We need you to take a stand here now in this time in this country To stand for the values that this country was founded on and keep this place beautiful Keep it for the people of america Good afternoon. Thank you I Commissioner leopold. I mean, excuse me commissioner. Coonerty's questions to staff at the outset were significant He asked If the contract would create any hurdles to removing the track staff said no Is the $300,000 liquidated damage clause a hurdle? Is a time limit for exercising the escape clause are hurdle I submit it is Commissioner Coonerty's alternate at the last meeting mr. Schifrin Said that staff was executing The policy of this commission He may be right You guys are gonna have to answer that I submit that a bad policy Has resulted in a bad contract And all you need to do Is look at the response to the public records act request Initially ignored by six weeks. Why? I submit it was ignored because they did not want the public to know That they had a deal in the works with um progressive before they did the rfp And excuse me before they did the rfp and before they issued a notice of default to iowa pacific If iowa pacific Was in default in december They were in default a year before I submit that staff is executing your policy In a way to create an appearance of fairness an rfp when they knew The game was up before they issued it And anyone who has read the public records responsive to the request about the transactions before the or before the arti arti What can read and see That this was a done deal. Thank you. I opposed the contract Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is greg becker. I live south of liselva for since 1980 I've written a couple of pieces for the sentinel and paharonian About these topics and in fact tomorrow in tomorrow's paharonian, you can pick up a commentary. It's called a What is called a rail Travelogue and commentary I am probably the only person in this building who has actually ridden the train from watsonville to santa cruz And you can read about that in tomorrow's paharonian But I want to talk about is hazardous material reporting This is a place that blindsides many Local governments including our friends in sonoma and marin counties And mr. Mansourian will be able to share with this commission his experience in discovering how hazardous materials are reported By rail They are not The santa cruz county environmental health service is our reporting agency for hazardous materials They have not received a report from iowa pacific And they do not expect to receive one from progressive rail When you hear about exemption Environmental hazards are exactly the place where exemption most comes to bear You will never Know nor do they know now what is in those cars? It says liquefied petroleum gas hazardous material 1075 and mr. Mendez has told people that the cars are empty If you talk to hazardous material people they'll tell you the cars are never empty And in fact are more dangerous half filled because of the presence of oxygen There is a great possibility. No, not a great possibility. It could happen So I would ask you to consider your loss Pardon my quivering voice I consider your loss of local control Beaman Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon Hi, I'm Roxby Hartley. I'm the operations director at agron I don't know if everybody knows where a biodiesel producer in the city of Watsonville We have a spur we can spark six cars for offloading material Biodiesel next year. We think we'll offset about 20,000 pound no 20,000 tons of carbon dioxide for the environment And also our fuel reducers particulates Now to get our business operation. We need to be able to have a reliable operation on the line When we order cars, we'll be getting 10 cars a week at least And those cars are 50 000 a piece So we're going to have half a million dollars of goods on the rail Every week and we need to be sure that can get delivered. So we need a low risk operator in place So we can get our business going. Thank you very much. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon commissioners. My name is Matt ferrell. I live in Santa Cruz From 1980 to 1982 I lived at cedar street in aptos, which is directly across from the rail line and there was freight service on the line at that time and I'm here to encourage you to support the agreement with progressive rail And move forward with re-establishing that service on the line. I think it's a benefit to the community. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon I'm paul shellhammer. I live here in south county We have south county businesses that use the freight services of the branch rail line And more will do so With the transload facility in watsonville that the proposed operating agreement provides for It would be greatly to the south county's disadvantage if this agreement were not approved today We understand that there are those elsewhere in the county Who can't wait until there actually is a transit rail proposal so they can have a fight about transit rail But there is no transit rail in this agreement None of the community's options regarding transit rail are foreclosed by this agreement None of the commission's options Regarding transit rail are foreclosed by this agreement This agreement has nothing to do with transit rail Orson wells used to promise on behalf of palmas on wines. We will sell no wine before its time I'd like to see our community Promise we will have no transit rail fight before its time I urge you to approve this operating agreement as recommended by your staff. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon chairman leopold commissioners bruce saw hill santa Cruz I encourage you to adopt the progressive agreement as advised and I said this is not about as mr. Schollhammer said this is not about the ultimate disposition of the rail line whether it's the fort vision or the greenway vision or something else with Electric skateboards or atomic hovercraft or whatever It's um, it's about taking care of our existing freight obligations Which seem to be just about entirely in Watsonville and avoiding being having a freight operator be assigned to us by the federal government Who might have no concern for the community rather than one that wants to become a good neighbor in a local business so it's almost It's almost like when you own a car you operate it on a network You drive it on streets that other people share and so you have to carry insurance And you have to wear your seatbelt. Well, we need to have a rail operator And that's like carrying insurance and wearing your seatbelt and even if you're only going to own the car for another year Um, the policeman isn't going to understand that when you say well The seatbelt broke and I figured I was going to sell it in a year. So I don't need one So I encourage you to To adopt the progressive rail agreement. Thank you. Thank you I'm ryan sanitaro santa cruz and We have a freight problem and we have a rail corridor that has a A big question about how it's going to be used the coast portion You got two separate issues here And uh, and john martinelli said uh break it in two. Well, why wasn't it in two to start? Why doesn't this contract just address the freight issue? Why does it conflate the uh, the rail corridor the The coastal portion. Well, I think it does because staff Refuses to And to engage with the community to engage with the the real wishes of people to have the possibility of a trail And they've put these things together. So they have you have all these people here saying approve the contract because I want freight Well, guess what we want freight. We don't want Progressive rail to get their teeth into the and their rights on the right of way up up and down the coast and It it's I think that the the simple fact that These negotiations were started way in advance and they were conflated. I mean progressive rail. What are they? They're all They're a freight company. They don't want an excursion train up. They're not going to make money that way so you need to to Refuse the contract today and get staff to put something together that actually addresses the needs of this community To have both freight and the options For the coast. Thank you Thank you Good afternoon Thank you commissioners. I'm sure you're thoroughly testing your patients and your bladders First off, I imagine how stressful this is for for you all The pressures and persuasion of such a big decision However, please don't fall victim to this persuasion Look deep inside yourselves And ask is this truly the best decision for not just us, but as the planet as a whole. Thank you Hi Brian people. It's trail now Um, I'm enjoying the the the awakening of the public and and so this is an enjoyment for all of us I think you know, I've been I said I've been coming here for 20 years um And so it's good to see the public voicing there and I'm hopeful that Not only the commissioners, but staff listens because I don't think staff listens I was actually our group was actually part of One of the five proposing companies Our proposal was to sub out freight North south of lee road We were going to do that and we were going to bring 2.5 million dollars to Work with the the the community on finding alternative uses of that rail line from lee road north Um, I was actually pretty offended that That staff was working behind the behind the scenes You know, I don't have a lot of time. I'm an engineer for a corporation.   Just try to keep it to the contra I got personally attacked I was personally attacked with my time I don't have a lot of time for this. This is games and that's the big problem with this agency To this community. So there's no trust Again, I've been dealing with this agency for 20 years All right active for 10 So i'm tired of the game playing It's getting old Thank you I want to just remind everybody that we're trying to talk about the progressive rail contract Not the individuals Whatever side you take or even the staff or the personal commissioners. So good afternoon. Good afternoon My name is Doug Erickson By day I work for a tech company. I've been in tech for 30 years By night and weekends. I run the Santa Cruz new tech meetup We're 4 000 plus members we meet on the first wednesday of every month We're the eighth largest in the u.s. Which says something about our community My wife and I moved here in 1974 and we raised our family here and We love the whole Monterey Bay here We've We were my wife and I are here to urge you to vote no today on the contract or at the very least Do not sign it until you have fixed some of the flaws that are currently in it. So Um As the sierra club and many other petitioners and voices here today have indicated The contracts flawed with emissions that would protect our coast our wildlife Our tourism and our community and as we've heard today, there's no clause in in phase two That uh that would allow us to extract ourselves from the from this relationship so But it shouldn't be a surprise because progressive is a freight company. They're not a transportation company And that's what we need in Santa Cruz is we need to address these issues. I'm neither pro train or pro trail I'm saying we need to address these issues. This contract is a mistake. Um, I can having been in this business The tech business. I've seen a lot of contracts in 30 years and This one smells like diesel and toxic waste. So I would urge you to to listen to the constituency majority And to your recent consultant Jared Walker who warned about the danger of one group rushing to claim a space before all concerns have been addressed That's it. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is trover park I am a supporter of rail and trail on the santa cruz branch rail line and I am an 18 year old supporter of that um I want to call out a couple things that people have mentioned about the progressive rail contract now. I um I have a little bit of inherent bias on bias on rail. I'm an employee of the santa cruz big trees in pacific railway and um, I want to point out though that people seem to have an inherent fear about uh pro pain And other toxic materials being shipped on the line um I know the santa cruz branch line well I operate on a very small portion of that line and there is purely no area Uh north of watsonville where any hazardous materials are going to be shipped. I think it's a uh ill-informed concern Because of the fact that there's just purely nowhere that that material is going to be shipped There's very little freight cut out past watsonville But hopefully that would be developed by a company like progressive rail um But at the at the present stage that that's just not there and there's a very uh small chance that Basically no chance that there would ever be toxic shipments past watsonville. The other thing um someone mentioned About the tank cars being stored on the line. I'm not in support of tank cars being stored on the line I think it's a waste of uh that branch rail line. It's a very Um a great opportunity we have here to use it, but um Someone mentioned that railroads do not have the right or don't have the uh Need to inform people what's in those cars I know people walk along those cars while they're stored out on the line And I'd like you to take a look when you next time you go out there on the triangular plaques on the side of those cars Those are called hazmat plaques if there are anything in those cars that are toxic that plaque will have something on it It's a requirement by the federal railroad administration to have a plaque on the side of the cars if they are shipping Toxic materials and I know this because I took a whole rules class on this And uh, so if there is toxic materials in the cars, there will be plaques there And if there aren't then there won't be anything on the plaque. Thank you Good afternoon everyone. Thank you for being here and thank you for all your work It's very clear to me that this is a very complicated county And I think it's absolutely essential that all the needs including freight needs And the needs of bikers and walkers be taken into account And this seems to me to be a rushed decision. So I would ask you to take a step back Listen to the various people more carefully and in more depth as some of you has said Vote no on this now and take some time to listen more carefully to the community. Thank you Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon commissioners monu konig. Uh, I work in polling and survey research I helped greenway to collect 10 000 signatures of support in favor of a greenway and not a train very specifically I'm currently working on with the public works departments in the county on a stormwater survey Um, I want to urge you to spend your remaining time today finding a third way A solution that helps the businesses in watsonville to deliver the freight they need to Without signing the progressive rail contract as it stands before you today There are issues with the contract as commissioner burtrant pointed out section 5.1 initial rehabilitation and repair Requires the tracks to be repaired to milepost seven not the miniscule amount used today Which staff said will cost 2.2 to 3 million dollars. Maybe the FEMA money will come through Maybe it won't but if you sign this contract today, we're on the hook for it Uh, furthermore, there's the 300 000 dollar termination clause, which if we do not do uh rail between milepost zero and seven We're liable for Um Commissioner cap it asked about what we get in return. Uh, what the payments are going to be I'd point him to section 7.4 license fees Which says the progressive rail is not required to pay a dime until uh a year and a quarter from the signing of this contract So we were not expect any money from progressive rail for uh more than a year Uh, as someone who works in public opinion, I can tell you that the prospects for funding passenger rail don't look good Right, both, uh, sonoma and marine passed a sales tax to support their smart train Uh, santa claire passed a sales tax to support bart Um, and the cal train if the temperature in this room doesn't show you, uh, we're not going to get a sales passed Passed for a passenger train in this community. So let's not commit ourselves to it Um, what's the solution? I think commissioner, uh, johnson hinted at it Uh, let's first move to implement plan b fix the pahero river bridge and implement an independent track mobile Or mobile if necessary Um, second conduct a full eir of the progressive contract so that we do get a true sense of the impacts of more intense great use And finally, uh, go back to progressive and renegotiate some of the problematic causes raised today. Any other work? Thanks Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is jasmine. It's great to see some familiar faces and some friends as well as some new faces But that's what a community is I suppose However, I'm not going to be speaking on my own behalf today I received a statement from the mayor of capitol a michael termini and I would like to read an email from him Verbatim for the rest of the room if that's acceptable Dear rtc members first. Let me apologize for this 11th hour email I was planning on speaking today, but had a last minute emergency My issues with the complete lack of cooperation by staff in the matter of a much needed inspection of the capitol attress Eight months ago. We met with george and louise in the capitol city manager's office and determined the trestle was due to Be inspected since the last inspection called for another to be performed in five years The last inspection was five years ago and since then the trestle has experienced significant damage after the Running of the polar express two years ago Let me be perfectly clear. I do not care if a trail only a rail and trail or just a rail happens on this right of way My only interest is the protection of the citizens of capitol I do not need to elaborate on the damage to life and property that would occur should the trestle fall I will close in saying the staff of the rtc has completely turned a deaf ear to our request for the last eight months And I find it has gone from simple negligence to criminal I assure you if this matter is not attended to immediately I will not be satisfied with merely bringing to our city council the steps necessary to through legal steps To prevent trains from crossing the trestle, but will expend all my energy in bringing criminal charges against staff and members of the rtc Should a disaster occur. Sincerely michael termini mayor city of capitol. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Um chair leopold commissioners. My name is sarah clark. I'm an attorney I represent santa cruz county greenway on this matter I urge you urge you caution in moving forward to approve this proposed contract today The california environmental quality act is the state's bedrock environmental law It is intended to inform agencies like yourself and the public of the environmental harm of proposed projects And to require mitigation and alternatives when the harm is significant as elected officials You all know about sequas requirements Yet the rtc has done absolutely no analysis of the potential environmental impacts of increased freight traffic on this line This is a problem both as a policy matter and as a legal matter We detailed the potential harms to air quality to traffic to public health to biological resources And noticeably although rtc responded to some of the legal issues Has provided no information about these potential environmental impacts nor has it rebutted our detailed letter Instead the rtc is choosing to rely on technical technicalities raising a real specter of community litigation In my experience courts are not inclined to defer to exemptions and preemption When it is such a significant project with high controversy and a likely increase of abuse In addition, I wanted to briefly address Staff's response that there are no hurdles created by this agreement to a choice on the unified corridor investment study This is this response was not true both as a legal matter and as a practical matter The commission may terminate the proposed agreement, but if it does it needs to go to the surface transportation board To pursue abandonment of the line If progressive comes in and builds up the freight service then the surface transportation board is not likely to grant an abandonment petition Even if the progressive goes with the commission to the stv And for that reason you've created a legal impediment. Thank you Good afternoon Good afternoon. I'm bill cook. I live in Santa Cruz I'm here today to urge the commission not to rush headlong into this proposed agreement with progressive rail We know the rtc has known about iowa pacifics need to get out of the agreement since december However, the commission has not yet undertaken any crucial studies to understand Whether this proposed course of action is the right one for this community We have no environmental review Even though increased freight operations would bring pollution noise traffic and construction throughout the county We have no economic review even though the past two operators have failed and conditions for freight transportation has worsened And we have no results from the unified corridor investment study Even though the commission promised the voters that it would study all potential uses of the corridor in an open transparent public process These studies are essential for making an informed decision about the future of this valuable asset. Thank you Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is Barbara Rettger. I'm just finishing The greenway attorney the rtc staff has presented you with only One possible path forward either sign the agreement with progressive rail or suffer the consequences Greenway is here today to present you with the viable alternative that Better meets all the rtc's stated goals do not Do not sign The contract with progressive rail today instead explore Other options for servicing existing freight customers in watsonville Greenway is not opposed to continued operation in this part of the line Negotiate with iowa pacific To help them get the trains back up and running In the interim period agree to forgive debt and how and help cover cost This short term cost would be much less than the repair costs for the rest of the line Enter into a short term contract with a new operator for Just this four a mile section of track Either have them work as a subcontractor to iowa pacific or agree to transfer only a portion of the freight easement Engage union pacific to serve watsonville shippers via short switch moves from watsonville junction yard One rtc consultants proposed this idea in 2004 or If none of these work out work for the four existing freight customers to use trucking services in the interim period Then undertake the necessary studies adequate environmental review and economic analysis and already underway a unified corridor investment study Then after all these studies are done if the results say that the freight is in the best interests of the county Consider entering a long-term contract with a new operator. Thank you Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon members of the commission My name is david eight from lasalva beach And I wanted to speak to the effects that this transportation crisis has had on me my family and my community Um became really apparent about three years ago And we took our daughter out of terra redwood school and now we home school because we just couldn't spend the Hour and a half every day to get her into the soak hill village Um, I work fewer hours. I'm home for fewer dinners. It has been really difficult and we've Felt real optimism with the passing of measure d that there would be near-term solutions to this crisis And I would like to inform you that I don't feel that optimism anymore I feel that greenway has provided the rtc with a simple focus solution to the issues presented by the failure of iowa pacific That this option would meet all of the rtc's stated goals Existing freight customers would have their needs met This would mitigate any risk associated with stopping freight service The rtc would stay in compliance with all requirements imposed by prop 116 funding and california transportation commission The rtc would be able to complete the unified corridor study Without a weight on the scale. I think if we just Hold our horses wait for Our unified corridor study to complete. We can make an informed decision about the future of transportation in this community. Thank you Thank you Hi commissioners. My name is carolin bridget flin. I've lived in Santa Cruz for about 30 years I really appreciate the amount of time it takes to serve on something like you're doing so I appreciate your service I'm urging you to I thought that the languaging of considering a third way Is a great way to think about this it does seem as if there is a way to address south county freight concerns and not address the entire rail In my letter to you when I said I was seriously concerned and urging you not to adopt the current contract as stated The two things that I pointed out there are lots of issues One is my reading of their proposal Is that progressive is an excellent organization and they want to they want to aggressively expand their freight service So i'm stating from their proposal the successful resurrection of an underlight underutilized railroad Is precisely where progressive excels haven't taken Several lines from the brink of abandonment which are now thriving conduits of commerce Just one example is progressives wisconsin northern railroad where they acquired 37 miles of coat hangers and rusty trail and today generate over 70 000 railcars a year Rolling over the most heavy-duty track in wisconsin So they have a lot of ideas about expanding freight and that's a concern to many of us And the contract is for the entire rail line. So again, I suggest For there are media problems to address with south county Create a contract that addresses south county The last thing I wanted to say is that it seems to me looking at the rfp That there was genuinely inadequate time for other people to bid I was really surprised to learn that progressive fate For progressive rail had formally pitched their service to the scc rtc In a 27 page in person presentation in october The rfp came out in december and it gave less than 30 days Over the christmas holidays For other people to respond. I think it was an adequate timing. I urge you a third option. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon monica maguire again I don't want to repeat items. You've already heard but I would love to underline them Let's just hold that thought please the pieces I haven't heard discussed is how many public questions have been asked By me and others in writing that have not had public answers Over many months. That's very concerning and brings up the Great idea of another principle to bring up here of the precautionary principle Because there hasn't been a good discussion of both sides of the passions on this We don't have the ability to say that there's enough known and precaution is what we want our elected officers to take Additionally, there seems like there's this Way that we've been promoted to fight about certain things while other items have not been answered And that's not necessarily your fault, but it would be great if you would step up and say Why don't we make a complete list of both sides and use this county's incredible resources of the santa cruz county mediation conflict resolution center and the nvc center These are incredible resources here that no one's brought up yet and that we really all desire Not to mention you have this much public input. You've feared complacency in the past. You haven't got it now Let's pull together and talk. It's a really wonderful time And lastly, I've seen firsthand in this county how phases work Another reason to bring in the precautionary principle because phases Mean that fewer people show up at the next phase or the next little piece or the next little piece And that's taken as complacency when really it's just too inconvenient for us Thank you so much for your attention and all your good work Good afternoon. Good afternoon commissioners. My name is robert singleton. I'm the executive director of the santa cruz county business council I'm going to keep my comments short so our organization back in July of last year voted 86 of our membership voted in favor of the trail only option However, that's not really what i'm here to talk to you about today We also don't have an official stance on this contract in particular We just have a lot of concerns and we've actually sent you guys official correspondence in the past Of which we didn't get an answer which was unfortunate, but we have asked some questions Our biggest concern is really about how the signing of this contract may perhaps undermine the results of the unified corridor study coming out Whether that is a preferred trail only option or perhaps bus rapid transit or any other means of transportation We feel that that study really the results of that study should come out before we jump into anything In particular commissioner mulhorn's a line of questioning earlier about the phase two and the legal remedies for being able to exit a contract after you're already entered into it I think is Really exemplifies where our concerns lie And there's plenty of others have been mentioned today, so I won't get into it But perhaps there is a third option in a way to balance these concerns in a way to still be able to fulfill our freight obligations For our south county businesses while making sure that we aren't putting the car before the horse and reacting before the results of the Unified corridor study come out. So thanks for that consideration Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Thank you all. My name is janey soido um on my drive-in this morning We came by past the rail yard and noticed big creeks lumber sitting there in the yard just waiting I you know, I think I think that here in watsonville we appreciate when county bureaucracy leaves us alone, but we don't appreciate when we've been neglected and regardless of your opinions On whether or not rail transit belongs on the santa cruz branch line You really need to take care of watsonville today I heard a speaker earlier say that express concern that pgr would come in and build up business And that that caused the stb to be unlikely to To approve abandonment gosh, that would be awful if we built up more rail business here in town And improved our economy. So anyway, um, I appreciate your concern. I appreciate staff's work I appreciate council working so hard on this. Thank you Thank you Buenas tardes. Mi nombre es aurelio gonzález y soy resident de aquí de la ciudad de watsonville Good afternoon. My name is aurelio gonzález and I'm a resident here of the city of watsonville I'm in support of the freight rail for progressive I hope you guys do you do diligence on this contract And if it does not work out, we are able to pull out. We we can't get rid of our rail We need to improve it. We need to progress with it And and look into the future Everybody speaks about saying doing something, but yet at the same time I've been hearing about a lot of let's delay this. Let's do another study. Let's do another six months Let's look into it again We have residents here in the city of watsonville 400 approximately they might lose their jobs because we're going to stop we're going to look and we're going to study it Well, there's so many people that might be able to sit down in sanik who's north of us on this couch and watch and go to work But there'll be some residents here. They might be in jeopardy of losing their jobs So there might just be 400, but those are significant 400 for the residents of the city of watsonville so please I support the rail and uh Make sure you do you do jail is on the contract for the progressives. Thanks. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. My name is denise leonberger. Chelle. I live in santa cruz for 30 years I'm 66 and 11 12th old I just wanted to throw that instance age was important apparently But what I want to say is if they if the commission has the ability to sit back and not vote today There's been enough opposition and enough good points on both sides to relook at this and not vote today I think we need to do something about the watsonville corridor. Keep that open get that moving It's obviously really important to all of us It's the east coast as well as the west coast and in between Keep working on this and make it the best decision for the environment and for the people. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon chair leopold commissioners My name is mark misciti miller. I'm a professional engineer with more than three decades of experience in public works infrastructure I'm the chair of the chamber of commerce in santa cruz. I'm the chair of the friends of the rail and trail You've received letters both from the chamber and fort. You've received my personal letter and I know today You've heard a lot of noise and hand ringing from all points of view As commissioners, you know that the goal today is to be responsible stewards of an asset the county owns To protect the individuals and businesses that rely on that asset today and in the future Prudentialed experienced transit professionals attorneys staff and commission members have evaluated all the proposals And the recommended operator thoroughly Regardless of who had been selected The no-track opponents would be making arguments against going forward just as they will argue every step of this process into the future This contract does no harm This contract puts in place a credible proven rail operator This contract prevents hardship and disruption of freight services for both south and north county customers It protects the county from fiduciary and legal risks And most importantly it leaves all options forward Open going forward I urge you to approve the progressive rail contract today. Thank you Thank you. Good afternoon Good afternoon. Thank you chair leopold members of the commission. My name is susie mariam I'm from santa cruz and i've worked for the city of watsonville for the last 17 years The freight corridor you are considering as you know is not an unused resource in the county It's been used by freight operators for over a hundred years Businesses in watsonville currently use the corridor and you know they will suffer greatly if the rtc Does not settle on a rail operator today You've heard from them. They're suffering Would you rather that they further clog our overburdened roads with truck traffic? As you've heard today that option is financially infeasible And I would rather have propane Hazardous materials flammable gases transported by train than on our roadways, especially highway 17 Currently as you might have noticed driving to watsonville this this morning There are rail cars stored on the line our businesses that use the line can't operate with Iowa pacific renting storage space to other carriers Impeding access and creating nuisances in our city As we in watsonville know Utilization of the rail line is not an option. It's a necessity for our local businesses to survive We have a thriving industrial sector Fronting on the rail line and it's heavily reliant on that rail line The time is up for negotiation. Please approve the contract with progressive rail today. Thank you Thank you. Well, good afternoon. Good afternoon Chair leopold and rtc commissioners My name is anna cammer and I am a resident of the city of watsonville um, I am also although i'm representing i'm just as a Resident of the city of watsonville. I'm also on the planning commission. I say right there use it um, so I know what a difficult job you have to um take in public opinion and to Measure what you you know all of the reading the packet because I read that packet I know what a chore that is but um, it's important to take in all of the information in order to make a really good decision and um, I'm before you today to support the Taking on a progressive rail as a contractor or an operator on the railroad on the rail line because Watsonville a couple steps statistics about watsonville 40 of the people in watsonville are under the age of 24 That's a young population young population coming up going to need jobs going to need um You know transportation A third of the people the residents of the county live in watsonville Most of them are not here today because they're out working So I feel like i'm taking on those People's opinions I live right on the clifford corridor where the bus goes And I see people and I've talked to them going up and down that corridor people want transportation The businesses in watsonville need this freight line and they need it soon So I urge you to vote for this real contract. Thank you Good afternoon afternoon green mcfarland sands cruise live oak um, I just want to say that I know when bills go through congress That the way they work is that there's all kinds of little side Conversations and deals and all things like that. I think that's what's happened with this contract So that freight in watsonville can't get taken care of unless you have this whole other thing lumped in So I have no idea how you do a third way at this juncture I don't know if there's a way to have friendly amendments and friendly riders go into that contract, but I urge you to Imagine if there's a third way today. Thank you. Thank you Before you start, I want to give you your time. Could I just see how many people still want to speak? If people could just line up that would be great to keep this moving as quickly as possible Thank you, uh, mike said I used to live in I was born raised on the peninsula and still am A bit annoyed that they tore out the tracks in monoray because If I didn't drive down here Yesterday, I would have been stuck on the traffic. I would have had to leave where I currently live in napa Like at 4 a.m. So traffic is tremendously horrendous and You really need to keep those tracks in place because you cannot foreclose future options Somebody talked about the precautionary principle while the precaution here is to keep the tracks intact You take them out you bring up all kinds of legal issues as Well, all of you got my email last week about that If you lose those tracks you're you know Why bother with anything actually? anyway I just wanted to address a couple of points first just To preserve the tracks this contract needs to be approved the issue about whether it goes beyond Beyond it through is the excuse me through the selva beach and the santa cruz Well, I don't think you're going to see any hazardous waste. You might see conceivably You know some lumber being hauled in or out that sort of thing as far as freight's concerned but just to just a pertinent fact would be That there's 10 to 12 million beach visitors a year in this town according to what I The survey of beaches that I did the length of the beach times areas. It's all the way from Davenport to Watsonville and Manrasa beach Uh I think a tourist train Is something you really need to look at and I hope the Unified quarter study considers that as part of the passenger rail service. The reason I say that is Well, the point is that the location of this line cannot could not be better to serve the tourists as well as locals Thank you. And thank you for waiting. I appreciate that Good afternoon German layer poles and RTC members. My name is Nancy Connolly. I'm a 29 year resident of santa cruz Westside I work in santa. I work in Watsonville I'm a founding member of greenway and I'm also a board director of save our shores So you kind of see where I'm going with my decision I urge you all to say no to the progressive rail contract today Um I work in agriculture in santa cruz in Watsonville and I understand the need for freight Um, I do find it interesting that we are one of the largest agricultural companies In the city and we were never contracted contacted By progressive rail to investigate our need for freight With that said The ucis is less than six months away and this is a study that's intended to Determine the best use of the rail um and Mr. Leopold you asked that we keep our comments today to progressive rail However, I think I feel that the decision that you will make today will affect the Whole rail the whole future of the rail And by saying yes to progressive rail you'll lock up our coastal corridor for the next 10 years in the name of running freight um But for reasons of public health transportation livability conservation environment economic revitalization possibly historic preservation and community identity um, I urge you to say no to progressive rail and to um Go with your conscience Look at what the best use is for our community And um, I thank you for your time today. Thank you So I'm going to this is the last call if you're not in line. I'm going to uh, uh, that this will be the last comment Uh, I see uh councilmember, uh, hernandez Good afternoon Good afternoon But my name is philippa hernandez. I'm from here watsonville city of watsonville born and raised here born in district one Which is the industrial area right here where the where the uh, the watsonville train station is at grew up playing around that area You know, it's funny that The rtc was being criticized today for not moving forward on projects and here we are today with people asking for more delays You know, I think we need to move forward. I urge you to vote yes for the progressive contract South county will face an economic disaster if we do not pass this now Voting no could be very expensive as big creek stated as much as 500 thousand a year To vote for more delays is a is a kiss of death to our local businesses to our local jobs Recently, we've already faced a huge job loss when dole left our community We need to keep those 500 jobs that del mar foods has Our community is already economically disadvantaged We don't want to exacerbate this anymore just to appease plain and simple nimbyism. Thank you Thank you Sorry to get off topic, but someone stated six p.m. Meetings in south county. That does sound like a great idea The board of supervisors will be here next monday, uh at seven o'clock. I hope we'll see you all there Hello gail mcnulty santa cruz county greenway um Contrary to the popular belief of many of the people in this room today Today's vote will not take up the tracks or build a greenway Or solve any of our gridlock problems This is we have a current need and that current need Is to make sure that the businesses in watsonville that need freight right now are able to get that freight And yes, this agency has some responsibility there And it's important that watsonville businesses are supported and the businesses throughout the county are supported The pahero bridge needs to be repaired That can be done that this agency can meet these needs Without signing an agreement with progressive rail today So i'm not a civil engineer. I'm not a transportation planner. I actually began my career as a research assistant for the washington post and moved to california as part of a journalism fellowship program And those skills have actually come in handy lately It seems that I and others working with me have done the due diligence on progressive rail that this agency should have done and unfortunately didn't Director dandero did write a rebuttal to our case against progressive rail Which is a very well documented well researched and linked Document that I hope all of you had had have had the opportunity to read Because if you have not you are naive And if you have not read that and if you have not read both director dandero's response to that And our response to his response You are naive I'm gonna ask you to stop stop with the name calling. That's what I apologize, but but I I'm trying to give a warning because watsonville's at risk santa cruz is at risk This operation coming to our county Could do harm in many ways and you need to move forward carefully and I have for you I will be handing out An op-ed that ran today in san francisco chronicle one from the sentinel And also a letter that you all received from our lawyer, which you may not have had time yet to read Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon And thank you for holding the meeting here in watsonville. My name is jenny sarmiento I'm a resident of watsonville. I'm also a planning commissioner And I am here to urge you to sign the contract with progressive rail We cannot afford to lose Not one single job in watsonville. We're talking about four or five hundred jobs that possibly could be lost Especially right now when housing is so expensive And families in watsonville have to pull together To pay the rent to three families per household It's unbelievable that the impact the negative impact that this would have in watsonville So I urge you to keep in mind those families that would if they're displaced They will have to seek jobs in santa cruz in the city of santa cruz There goes another negative impact on the transportation the traffic going up north. Thank you. Thank you Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Joe jordan resident of the monterey bay region, but in particular santa cruz Thanks to all of you for everything you're doing and also I just want to say thanks to everybody out here who's been listening and talking You know given what's going on at the federal government now I am I am a democracy junkie and I I could sit here for another five or six hours This is a great process and I'm learning a lot And uh, I'm a big fan of getting to know other people and what makes them tick what they're thinking and maybe where they got Some bogus information or whatever But uh, I mainly decided to come up here and talk everything I would say has been said But uh, I want to represent for a true Major a couple of environmental heroes in our community who could not be here today Namely, uh, you might even be able to guess who he is by looking at me. He looks somewhat like me Um, peter scott another physics guy at least half of you know him right and his wife cilia former mayor of santa cruz I I am involved in a group called the campaign for sustainable transportation And we decided not to take a stand on this issue because There's a bit of dissension in our ranks. I mean, I have really good friends and people whose views and information I greatly respect on both sides of this issue But peter um, said he had to leave the meeting yesterday early, so I didn't get to sound him out I should have called him last night, but he said he in no uncertain terms very forcefully that he Was very concerned if you don't vote now to go ahead with this progressive rail contract As framed I didn't get to ask I'm not enough of an expert on this to know What the rush is unless I mean, maybe it's just there's a gap that has to be filled by hooker by crook You know and it could be that progressive as one of my friends who's also not here He's a big fan of prt. Just like I am by the way I'm open to prt bus rapid transit trains You know as somebody else in planes and automobiles, whatever But as the other guy said progressive rail may well be a company that's mainly a fossil fuel entity That just happens to be dabbling in transportation. I don't know but thank you get her done. Thanks I I believe this is going to be our last speaker so Barry scott aptos, um, you know, I I follow this so closely and I thank everyone The folks that I've talked to on the commission that have been diggers like I am dig dig dig There's a lot of fluff out there and then there's the facts. There's a contract and there's the process Um, there are there you all voted eight eight votes I to to negotiate with the Progressive we have the rail line. We have a legal team. We have uh, director of uh, or or mr.  We've done a lot of due diligence. Yes, there's a lot of concerns and a lot of Frightening things that have been raised, but I think that we're in good shoes the you are the stewards of Of this this incredible asset and it's mr. Cooner deep said Last year at some time on the radio said this is our children's rail line The and and we have to take care of it and taking care of it means Living up to our obligations to our customers The last thing and it's so important. Watsonville is it loses so often and if we don't do transit You know for them eventually and we need the freight business to keep the the line alive So that we can have transit for south county people and really everyone else freight's great But to me it's a key to the future and i'm a friend a friend of smart and i'm a friend of the rail and trail. Thank you thank you thanks to everyone who Gave testimony and thanks to everybody who stuck around To find out what the commissioners have to say so i'll look to my colleague mr. Rockin First i want to thank everybody for the comments and for the tone of people's comments I mean with few exceptions People really were respectful of each other and that makes such a huge difference in making these difficult decisions The first thing i want to say is that a bunch of the testimony and the letters and emails we've received has been about the The character of um progressive rail that they're gonna they're gonna bring propane and Earlier stuff it wasn't didn't come out today, but fracking to santa cruz county and everything else that the I think the 18 year old and remember his name that got up and spoke not to talk about people's age again But that's what i'll remember about Identifying him that he was self-identified his His comment that Why would you be carrying massive amounts of you know petrochemicals or toxic waste or In santa cruz county, we're not on the roads of somewhere else We're the end of the line and with the end of the electrical line that comes here And the rest of the country's on a grid and we still have one power line that comes into our county um That's going to change but the um To me That is a kind of a fear tactic that's not realistic about what could happen here The fact that in the midwest where there is fracking and all kinds of toxic stuff that we would never allow happen in our county And that that's the business in the midwest means that's what they do there if they come here they're going to have to Ship vegetables and fruits and and you know stuff that people need for construction things in modern technology to make Probably electric motorcycles or whatever In large amounts, but the idea that somehow because it's they do something in the midwest They're going to bring that here and that's going to be what happens I think is very misleading about the business they were trying to develop here and The propane that they're going to move would otherwise be here Anyway, people use propane in this county and they come come on trucks if it doesn't come on the train And there's lots of evidence that it's a lot safer on trains than it is on trucks So that issue doesn't move me much about this issue Secondly, I do believe our legal advice from our legal counsel that We We don't have a choice of just kind of like Ignoring and most people were not saying that we should get rid of the freight service But we that we don't need to do the freight service that we're not under any compulsion to do so or that we don't have to spend And that the idea that we got to move ahead with at least showing that we're trying to Study and move ahead with the possibility of rail chances to keep the 10.2 million dollars that we got from prop 116 I believe that we have to do something in that direction and that the Lots of people have ideas about what we do it what our legal obligations are I'm going to take our legal counsel's advice on that matter and my own common sense about it that The the ctc would be very the state agency would be very unhappy if all of a sudden we just declare Well, thanks for the money, but we're not doing anything to do with rail We want nothing to do with it They're going to want their money back and there's going to be lots of other issues and people are pretty cavalier About how easy it would be to just raise that 10.2 million dollars to buy it, you know replace it with something else I don't think it's quite that easy So i'm very interested in trying to figure out how do we get to the place of eventually having rail service I think people have a myself as well It's difficult when you have to try and how do you get to a final goal when it's not a straight line I mean it's not like let's get started right now building rail if you believe in rail service Let's get that real passenger rail service going It might take us a while to do that It might be that we have to keep the rail we might have to do all kinds of additional study work and other kinds of issues And that's the reason why a number of speakers didn't quite get this idea that we have a two-part Proposal here that the first part of it is we're stuck with that if we vote yesterday But we could decide after the the quarter study comes out that we don't want to have rail here At which point I don't think we would be wise to start spending a lot of money at that point We might have to make a hard decision to pay back the money or do something else But we're not there yet. We don't know what that study is going to show Um and as a number of speakers pointed out until we get the information about that everybody has their ideas about You know what this is about, but i'm not persuaded that rail is the past and dead or something else on the other hand I'm not a real fanatic in that if the study shows us that rail is not really feasible or not likely feasible in the reasonable Planning horizon I'm not going to fight for a train that makes no sense on the other hand I honestly believe that the representation that somehow we could make us a transportation corridor with electric bikes or People bicycling and walking is not realistic So my view about keeping the rail is not because I believe we need to have a train or that that's where we're going But if we tear that I know enough from santa criss county politics And if you tear the rail out and make it into a park basically, which is something we need and that's part of the plan That you'll never get that back for a transportation corridor for bus rapid transit or for some of the other ideas people had So i'm not inclined to be pretty quick. That's the precautionary principle again I'm not quick to tear that rail out only because I think it protects a transportation corridor Not because I know we're going to ever have a train and also people have an idea that the train is going to be a diesel train We're talking about something a lot smaller some kind of a tram or something I imagine if we ever have a rail service, I don't know we'll find out Hopefully the corridor study will enlighten us on that matter I don't believe that Approving this and they're being stuck with the first phase of it means that we're stuck with the second phase I think we can get out. I don't think there's issues with that There's some costs and consequences to it, but that's a risk. I think we should take to protect what otherwise is going on Finally Because there's a lot of us here probably everybody has comments on this I I was surprised at the end of the comments from the public to hear that As some people said let's come up with a third way, which is always in the abstract a great idea Got two people to stick to groups two ideas. Let's have a third way that brings us all together But the proposal specifically that what we solve this is go back and negotiate some new agreement with iowa Iowa pacific that Pardon me that i'm not talking about the people but the idea john is insane I mean Because the same groups and the same people that made those comments were suggesting that we were In their election to not have gotten rid of them five years ago And we've we learned that we know that we're not going to make a deal with them It's over and so we need to have some other alternative here and we did go through I thought a very reasonable process I think it's misleading to suggest that we the fix was in or that we needed to have We were trying to make this agreement with progressive at the expense of others We were trying to move ahead as quickly as we could to get something done here Because we are in a railroad that's in default and it's causing real problems for freight shippers and so forth So I don't know the easy path that we're going to get from where we are now signing this contract To get to eventual what I'd like to see some kind of Transit service on this corridor. I don't know whether it's a train or something else But real transit service that allows people to go 14 miles to Santa Cruz and back Not on their bicycles. I'm a bicycle fanatic. I ride my bicycle up to school At the university. It's an 800 foot climb. So I consider myself a fanatic when I do that But I don't think that's a reasonable transportation alternative. It's a great Recreation alternative. I'm in favor of it. I'm glad we're not just talking about a rail and no Trail or something else that would be there, but to me I don't see in any way that voting for this contract Forecloses the difficult decision we have to make about what we're going to do with this corridor That's going to be coming up for us probably next january or december Starting in october, but probably take us two months to get there. So i'm in favor of supporting voting for this contract I've read it over very carefully. I have read every word and everything that's been sent to me email Pages everything else. It's a thousand pages worth of stuff at least And there's nothing in that that's persuaded me that we're putting ourselves at some huge risk to make this contract So that's why i'm going to support the staff recommendation Mr. Batur and then miss johnson Thank you for those comments, you know, I I want to bring us back and focus on why we're here The item on the agenda before us is whether we're going to review Sign a contract with progressive Railroad and and what's happened what's in this room what's been in this room for the past year is Train versus trail and that's not what we're talking about today, but that's the passion So that's what's overflowing and even though mr. Rockins comments are all over that I'm going to focus back on why we're here. This is about Providing rail service for an operator that is not meeting the needs which we've identified And because of that and because we learned from the last time with iowa pacific that they weren't fulfilling our needs The director initiated a visit where myself and him went back to meet with progressive We're going to say that this was our due diligence now Some people have asked me deep questions about that On the trip was just myself and the director dandero. We did not bring herald a revero with us We did not look into deep dark secrets We looked at some things with progressive But what I saw from progressive and it was an extensive trip. It was three days We went to iowa. We went to wisconsin. We went to minnesota Dead of winter I might point out and the dead of winter for california And it was pretty cold But th