Okay, I'd like to call the meeting of the executive committee to order and
As for a safety briefing from Frank Castellan our chief executive officer for safety security and compliance
right
Morning, Chair McAllen committee members. So as a reminder in the event of a fire alarm activation
We're all going to exit the building calmly and uniformly
We're going to stage just outside the Metro customer service area away from the building and wait for further instructions
The event of an earthquake we're going to drop, take cover, wait for the shaking to
stop and then do an assessment of whether or not an evacuation is necessary.
In the event of a situation requiring first aid, I will be your initial first aid provider.
I will ask Ms. Peña to contact Metro Security Front Desk where the AD is located and they
will contact DMS if necessary.
And always in the event of an active attacker situation, I advise you to run, hide, fight.
In concluding my safety briefing, whatever your team is this Sunday, insert that team
name and best of luck to them.
That concludes this morning's safety briefing.
Thank you very much.
I'm going to ask our CEO to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance if he can remember the
31 words.
Thank you.
Roll call please.
Vice Chair Chafee.
Second Vice Chair Bergson.
Director Tremblay.
Here.
Director Najarian.
Here.
Adriane chair McCallan do you have a quorum present thank you very much now
is public comment time do we have any public comments we've not received any
written public comments or any requests to speak we'll go on to our regular
calendar first item is approval of the minute minutes of October 13th I just
wanted to make a comment there's a Scrivener's error on the agenda it is
for the minutes of January 12th when creating the agenda it just had the
wrong date from the previous set of minutes but the correct minutes were
uploaded for your review. Thank you very much. As amended. We have a second.
We'll call it please. Vice Chair Chaffee. Seconded by Chair
Bergson. Director Tremblay. Yes. Director Najarian. Yes. Chair McCallin. Yes. That
motion carried unanimously now we have a action item low carbon transit operating
program resolution represented by Jennifer faras arenas excuse me our
manager of grants Jennifer good morning chair McCallion and members of the
committee this action item requests that the committee recommend that the board
approved resolution 24-143 authorizing the transfer of 3.5 million from the
mobility for all program to the student adventure pass program. The mobility for
all program was launched in September 2022 and received a total of 5.7 million
in low-carbon transit operations program or LC top funds. The program offers as
50% discount to eligible EBT card holders and to date approximately
175,000 in funding has been utilized.
Next slide, please.
In October, 2023, the Student Adventure Pass pilot program
was launched using 4 million in LC Top Funds.
The program provides free passes to students
riding anywhere, anytime.
In the first three months of the program,
2.5 million has been utilized.
Next slide, please.
Given the popularity of the Student Adventure Pass,
LC top funds would have been depleted early this year.
Therefore, staff requested that the transfer of 3.5 million
from the Mobility for All program
to the Student Adventure Pass program
occur in December, 2023.
Next slide, please.
Staff anticipates that the transfer of funds
will allow the Student Adventure Pass
to continue through the end of the academic year.
The Mobility for All program is anticipated
to have enough funds to continue until June 30th, 2025.
This transfer also allows LC Top Funds
to be utilized promptly before funding expires.
Next slide, please.
The resolution is a procedural action
acknowledging the transfer of funds
between the two programs.
We are requesting that the committee recommend
that the board approve this resolution.
Next slide, please.
This concludes my report,
and I'm happy to answer any questions.
Thank you very much, Jennifer.
As we heard at last meeting, the popularity
of the student program using these funds
is exceeding more than our expectation.
Comments?
We have a motion and a second.
This is an action item, so roll call, please.
Vice Chair Chafee?
Second, Vice Chair Bergson?
Yes.
Director Tremblay?
Yes.
Director Najarian?
Yes.
Yes, that motion carried unanimously. Thank you. Next we have our February legislative update
Which is a receiving file and this time it's presented by and
Then a key I see your manager of government relations
Not Jeff this time. Yes, Jeff is out, but thank you for having me. Good morning. Sure. McCallin and members of the committee
First slide, please
Great. I will start with local the increased service to the AVL line has triggered a title 6 requirement
Meaning we must notify all stakeholders of the AVL line
On the AVL line of the change in service
So at the next executive committee meeting we will be sharing the finalized date for the public meeting as well as our outreach plans
public comment due date and other details we are targeting an April 18th date and
planning on a virtual meeting both in Spanish and English and
Then safety education on February 2nd. We sent out a new school safety email with virtual programming
We made some refinements to our recipient lists to focus on school principals and faculty as opposed to
and attendance to try to improve the open and response rate.
The email went out to about 4,700 schools
and included information on our school safety online program,
which emphasizes the dangers of crossing the railroad tracks.
We also took this opportunity
to advertise the student adventure pass
and ask for the opportunity to place banners on campuses,
advertising the availability of the pass to students.
I'm happy to report in the week that the email went out,
we've received 15 responses and one banner request.
This should bring in even more students into the program
as we've talked about the next generation of riders
to our system.
Next slide please.
On the state side, as you may recall,
Jeff presented last month on the governor's proposed budget
which was released on January 10th.
As part of last year's budget,
the governor and the legislature provided funding for about $5.1 billion for transit
and rail operations over two years. This year, in an effort to address the almost 38 billion
estimated funding gap, Governor Newsom has proposed a delay of about $1 billion in TIRCP
funding for one fiscal year. To discuss this and other issues, our CEO, Darren Kettle,
will be up in Sacramento on Monday and Tuesday
as part of the Mobility 21 delegation.
The group will emphasize the importance of retaining
the 5.1 billion for transit and rail operations
even amidst the difficult fiscal winds.
He will also be talking about the 2028 Olympics
and the need for a regional approach to goods movement.
Metrolink contributed substantially
to the promulgation of the talking points
and the priorities for the Mobility 21 Delegation Trip.
We specifically urged a more honed focus on investing
in shared freight and passenger rail corridors
where singular investments bring multiple benefits.
And then finally on the federal side,
we are beginning the process of requesting earmarks
for the fiscal year 25 federal appropriations process.
Typically these requests are due in early to mid-March.
We know things are a little crazy over in Washington
right now, so we will see, but we have identified
about 10 priority projects across our system,
including four repeat projects that were not funded
from our process last year and six to eight new requests,
including a few that focus on our Olympic priorities.
We will be strategizing with our federal advocates next week
and we'll begin submitting projects later this month.
And then I'd like to end my remarks by noting that
Earlier this week, Chair McAllen was in DC on other business.
He took time out of his busy schedule to walk the halls of Congress and meet with Representative
Pete Aguilar to advocate for Metrolink on our Reconnecting Communities application.
As a reminder, we submitted a $44 million grant request for eight tier four locomotives.
Chair McAllen's advocacy was effective and Representative Aguilar indicated he take the
the urgency of our message straight to secretary Buttigieg.
I want to express my sincere gratitude
and Jeff Dunn wishes he could be here as well.
We're grateful and we will try not to look over our shoulder
in case you decide to make a career change
and want to take over government relations at Metrolink.
Thank you and I'm happy to take any questions.
Any questions?
We got that Henry Fonda-esque look to you, you know?
No, no, no, no, no.
Going to Washington and-
I think his next career might be in Congress.
No way.
I'm not stupid enough.
No, I'm sorry.
I do have, I guess, a comment or a question.
So the new committee chairs have been named in Sacramento.
The Transportation Committee for the House or for the Assembly
is, I think, a gentleman from San Jose.
It used to be Laura Friedman from this area.
So perhaps we can spend some time.
We'll send our ambassador maybe to Sacramento
and work the magic with them.
But no, are we reaching out to sort of acclimate
that new chairman with us
and make sure that they understand our needs and...
Yes, that will be one of the meetings
that is taking place early next week.
we will be doing subsequent outreach with our partners
up in Sacramento to make sure that the new chair
is familiar with Metro League's policies, priorities,
plans for the next fiscal year and more.
Yeah, he's probably a Caltrain guy being from San Jose,
so I think our interests are pretty much aligned
in that sort of thing.
So tell him we're with him in all that stuff.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Any other comments or questions?
Very good. This is a receive and file, and without objection, that's what the committee will do.
Thank you very much, and next we go to Chief Executive Officer's report.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. So briefly, we had, we all know about the weather that occurred over the course of the last week and a half.
And generally, our system weathered it well, thanks to the operations team, our contractors,
communications team of getting the word out about how our system was being
impacted generally speaking again we we did handle the storm fairly well we had
some delayed trains but for the most part system ran well we continue to have
to just deal with this challenges in San Clemente and the current landslides
slope failure at Mariposa Point we continue not to run trains through that
location at this point. There are BNSF freight trains that do run through a
couple times in the in the middle of the night. I have executed an emergency
contract for a design build that will need to be ratified by the full
board at our February board meeting to commence the construction of a
barrier wall very similar to what we built back over the summer at Casa
of Romonica also in San Clemente.
So we are actually hoping though to get a bit ahead
of these issues in the San Clemente Bluffs area.
We'll be working very closely with OCTA
on some work to be a bit more proactive.
OCTA has done a short-term study
that has identified hotspots
in the San Clemente data point area.
We're hoping to take that hotspot analysis
and actually translate that into actual projects
to potentially get ahead of landslides
instead of having to be reactive.
So stay tuned for that.
We had transit equity day on that rainy Sunday,
this last week.
We normally have about 5,000 riders on a Sunday
on our system, we doubled that.
For transit equity day, it was again a day
where people could ride our trains anywhere
in the system for free.
So it was a success.
And then lastly, next week on Valentine's Day,
February 14th we have customer appreciation day. The board secretary has
sent out an invitation to all board members requesting your
availability if you have availability to join us at a station throughout the
system to greet our our riders and show our our gratitude for them riding our
trains. So if you can do that we would love to have you out there joining our
staff who will be in full force at these various stations so please if you can
and get back to Michelle, if you're able to join us.
And then that concludes my report, Mr. Chair.
Thank you very much.
Any questions of our CEO?
Any committee member comments?
Mr. Chair.
Okay, go ahead.
Go ahead, extremely.
Oh, thank you.
I just wanted to compliment and thank our chair
between his advocacy on the congressional levels
and with AQMD and other places.
I don't know when the chair gets to sleep,
so I'm just very grateful for all of our chair's efforts.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Yes, and I echo those remarks.
A really good job up there in Washington, so,
but I would like to, I guess, emphasize my appreciation
or the operations and maintenance team, Scott Johnson,
as well as our partners at OCTA for handling that slide.
I'm sure it's just a pain.
You don't know what's happening from one minute to the next.
Everybody wants to know budgets are almost non-existent
because how do you know what to budget for?
But it seems like there's a lot of good teamwork,
a lot of good communication in a very difficult time.
So I'd like to thank, thank everyone involved in that,
as well as our MetroLink representative from OCTA.
Very good, any other member comments?
Well, I thank you very much for the kind remarks.
I was back there in DC for AQMD business
And if you've ever had the opportunity
to go from the Cannon House building over to the Capitol
and then back, you know it's a long walk.
And Pete Aguilar, being the third highest ranking Democrat
in the Democratic Party, he's very busy.
So I had a one-on-one schedule with him since I've known him for a long time, and I had
to go from the Cannon Building, walk all the way over to the Capitol because they were
having a vote on the Mallorca's thing, and waited there for him to get out of voting
for that.
And as we were walking back from the Capitol to his office in the Cannon Building, I had
an opportunity to lobby him on our request, and he was very appreciative and grateful
and said he would do what he could for us. And then we went into his office where we
had the AQMD meeting with him. So it was a long walk for me, but one of the reasons
I was in Washington with AQMD was the fact that we had, along with us, labor, we had
the environmental community, we had the ports, both port directors, plus AQMD there, lobbying
as a group with one goal to get money for the ports, because the ports are one of the
the highest polluting entities, if you will, in this basin,
in terms of ships and trucks and rail,
and 80% of the air pollution now in the basin
is caused by mobile sources,
and mobile sources are not being regulated
by the federal government who has the responsibility.
We were back there lobbying for funds for the port, but also at the same time the environmental
protection agency has disapproved AQMD's 1997 ozone contingency plan, and by disapproving
it, they start the clock on sanctions for this area, sanctions meaning it will be harder
to get permits, if you can get a permit, it will cost you double, but the most significant
thing is that we will at some point not receive any federal transportation dollars at all,
which will effect jobs, will effect our way of moving around,
just effect the economy tremendously.
So we were, in addition to seeking funds,
we were also there letting Congress know the impact
that this disapproval will have on Southern California
and to solicit their support in getting EPA
to change their ruling.
We'll see what happens in that,
but it's going to affect all of our transportation agencies,
SCAG, OCTCA, VCTC, SBCTA, et cetera.
So I encourage all of these entities to get on board and provide comments back to EPA on the ruling,
because it will have a detrimental impact on this entire area.
That's all I have.
So with that we are adjourned. Thank you very much