Good morning, everyone. It is now officially 9.03, I think, 9.35, 9.35. And the meeting is officially a call to order. I wanna thank all of those in the audience for attending this morning. And I just wanna thank those that are participating virtually as well. To the board members, I ask that you speak directly into your microphones for the recorder. And so we can make sure we get verbatim minutes. If you are not speaking directly into the microphone, I will have to ask you to repeat yourself and that will only delay our meeting. So mics on, please. I wanted to start by just inviting anyone from the general public, if you are interested in making comments, please. Do we have anyone signed up to speak? All right, you're welcome to join us at the podium. Great day, and thank you for this opportunity. I am Aretha Wimberly. I am the founder and CEO of Save Broward Incorporated, which is a nonprofit organization working alongside neighbors and stakeholders to elevate concerns related to the quality of life for vulnerable and other marginalized persons in our community. One of our current initiatives includes engaging community members and focused on the quality of service provided by Broward County Transit Tops paratransit contractors and the opportunity to utilize the disincentives agreed upon in the contracts to improve performance of services and generate cost savings related from applied contract management processes that more accurately reflect the interactions between the drivers and dispatchers and the riders. In our talks with Tops customers slash riders who are older adults and also visually impaired, we believe that we discovered considerable opportunities to improve the contract management processes and improve safety. Was that my ding? Okay, I thought it was my ding. I was out of time. Sorry. Our hope today is to gain access to guidance and how to access reports or other relevant information, including compliance to contract performance standards. Because as I said before, our interactions, with our engagements with some of the users, particularly older, visually impaired riders, there are some definitely deficits in the customer experience. And we believe that if the contracts were actually managed in a way that those disincentives were applied, that that would influence better customer service, as well as generate cost savings by not paying first in full when they don't deliver the service, according to the performance standards in the contract. So our hope today is to gain wisdom, guidance, insight, and direction from you all on how we can verify our findings to make sure that we are referring to the current contracts, as well as the processes that are already in place to respond to customer and rider experiences. Thank you. All right. Thank you. I have a question. Yes. Could you be a little more specific in what issues you're trying to, I think it's on, right? Oh, closer. Could you be a little more specific on what issues you're trying to get improved? Because I'm, I hear what your words are saying, but tell me what passengers, what you really need in common language to me, okay? I just don't understand what you're saying needs improvement. Thank you for asking. We have some visually impaired, again, older riders, and some not as old. They're experiencing situations where they have safety concerns. There are instances when- Okay, stop right there. When you say they have safety concerns, is they can't, because they can't see, they're not given enough time or- I'm gonna get there. As for example, as they're getting onto some of the vehicles, the railings are not secure and being blind. That causes them to question their stability, if they're stepping up right in the next step, the confidence in moving forward. There are instances where they've had to actually encounter the vehicle with a hole in the bottom of the floor as they're getting on. They've had instances where the seat belts are not working. So imagine being blind and you're being tossed around and the seat belt does not work. So there are vehicle maintenance standards in the last contract that I saw that for each instance, I believe that would be a $25 disincentive to be deducted from the contractor. So because if these things are not happening, the disincentives are not being enforced, then the contractor has no influence or no reason to provide the quality of care to our riders that they should. There are other instances, such as false reporting, where we've had blind persons be picked up and not be taken directly to their preferred or requested destination and essentially taken on a ride to wherever the driver has in their personal schedule without telling them where they're going. We have, for instance, one gentleman was leaving someplace. It was 1130 PM and his ride, he realized he was riding much longer than he should have been riding to reach home. He asked the driver, you know, you've been driving quite a while. Where are we going? To which he got no response. He heard the dispatch reaching out to the driver, no response. Turns out the driver needed to pick up a relative from a hospital and just decided he would force the customer to ride along without saying anything. The customer reaches home at approximately 1.30 AM. Well, doesn't reach home. He reached what he's told is home. Gets out to realize he's been left in the wrong place in the middle of the night. It is 1.30 AM. He's blind and is not home and the driver drove off. He finally manages to get a dispatcher online. That dispatcher says the driver says he knows you. And he replies, well, if he knows me, he knows he just dropped me off at the wrong place at 1.30 in the morning. I should have been home a long time ago. Instances like that, I would consider to be a falsification of records for which there is a $250 disincentive in the contract and would possibly motivate the contractor to be better, to take, again, better care of our customers and our riders. Because these this paratransit services is due to the penny for transportation surtax. It is fully funded to my understanding, which means that every person who is in Broward County spending money is entitled to know that their monies are actually being applied in a system of care for transportation for our vulnerable and visually impaired neighbors. So, again, my hope here is to get some insight on where I can verify the information we researched in our contracts. And there are many more, but I know you all have other things on your agenda of instances where we engage with our community members and we took out their audio testimonials. Well, we can directly tie those instance of dissatisfied service to a disincentive in the contract. So even if they complain, for instance, there is a five day requirement for the contractor to satisfactory get back with the customer or the rider. We have instances where there's something happened at the beginning of the year and they're saying they've never heard back that I believe, if I'm not mistaken, that is a $25 disincentives. Who's making sure this is happening for our monies that we're putting into this particular program for vulnerable persons in our community? Is this the paratransit? Yes. Buses, basically, is what you're talking about? The TOPS program, basically, the paratransit. Have you raised this issue with anyone until today? I have. I've reached out to Mr. Strobus and, unfortunately, Mr. Strobus is not responding to my emails or I'm not given the correct email email. We have gone through multiple persons to try to get someone who would be willing to actually sit down and go over our research and our data to make sure that we don't want to give community the wrong expectations about what's in the contracts, the current contracts. We don't want to give them the wrong expectations about what those performance standards should be and how to actually put in a complaint. We've also gone to the LCB where we've listened to how that process works and I was kind of surprised to hear that with their grievance committee that they said that they have never met. They have never actually followed through with one customer complaint and hearing these things that have been going on for years and actually going through the Board of Broward County Commissioners commission meetings and even seeing where back in 2023 we had a mayor, I believe from Coconut Creek, so concerned about a letter he received from a constituent. It ended up on the agenda and yet the LCB's grievance board says committee says they've never responded to one grievance or complaint from the community and I was just floored by that. Can you say your name again please? Aretha Wimberly. I want to thank you for your courage and your advocacy in coming to us to let us know about this. But I am I'm present. I don't know if you know anything Gretchen about this issue. Have you heard anything about this before? I have not heard anything about the issue under our current contracts. This has been a long standing concern. There was a lot there were a period of time when the paratransit program was undergoing significant review and restructuring and there were many agenda items that came in front of the Broward County Board of County Commissioners with respect to service and meeting the contractual requirements. I had not heard that under our existing contracts with our with our new providers that there were these types of issues when we received Miss Wimberly's public comment form. I did reach out to BCT, of course, and let them know. I'm going to at if at your direction, I will share the comments, obviously, with Broward County Transit. I know that there is someone with the county auditor's office that's in the room, and it's my understanding and I don't know, Laura, if you're willing to say, but it's my understanding that the paratransit program is currently undergoing an audit by the performance audit by the county auditor's office. So I believe that some of these issues may already be be being evaluated. I don't know. Would you? Madam Chair, would you? Yes, we certainly need to hear more about this. Laura Rogers with the county auditor's office. I wasn't prepared to speak on the issue. So I am not I don't want to confirm if it is already underway, but I do know it is on our audit plan for this year. Again, I can get back to you on that, and I can let the county auditor and the team know that you have some concerns. And if you have a business card, I'm happy to take that from you. I have another question for you, Gretchen, or for counsel. I can I presume our preview, because these are dollars being spent on surtax that aren't being spent efficiently. We have the ability to request in this case, I would like to hear from the transit people come in here and tell me how many complaints I've had, what they've done, because to me, this is absolutely uncalled for. Now, I don't know if we have the ability to do that, Mr. Counsel. But if so, this would be at least a request I would like the board to consider. And let's get to the bottom of this. Let's not. It's been going on for years, apparently. So do we have the ability to request that? Again, you can certainly request that staff communicate with BCT, the appropriate folks there that are responsible for paratransit to potentially come back to December to give you answers. I would make that a motion, and I'd see if we can get a second. There's no need for a motion since there's nothing on the agenda. But if that's the general consensus from the board to request somebody from BCT to come and communicate regarding these issues at the next meeting, you certainly can do so. Yes. We absolutely want to stay on top of this. We want to be informed continuously, actually, to make sure that this is not an ongoing situation. Thank you. And I just want to say one of the reasons that we are so aggressively pursuing advocacy is because every time this incident recurs, it is truly a life-threatening situation. We've had multiple, in one sitting, we had at least 15, 15 visually impaired people telling us experiences that they've had. And our best hope was, well, the complaint system has not produced the fruit that we wanted it to as regarding effective and sufficient change. So what's next, let's look at the contract, because all of these things that you're concerned about are identified as disincentives. So why aren't the county staff persons ensuring that we're not only getting the services that we're paying for, but we're also saving money by not paying people for services that they're not delivering at the standard they agreed to deliver them. And like I said, every time one of them step on one of these buses and encounter a driver who just, I know I'm sensationalizing it, but in my mind, he was kidnapped in the middle of the night, forced to go on a ride for a personal errand without any information. And only when he gets, reaches the hospital and hears the driver speaking with the family member, does he realize what's actually in play. And he's just helpless on, in this transportation. Now put yourself in that position and you're an adult, you're not a child. And they treat you as if you don't have any right to express your concerns or demand that they continue your ride the way that you requested it. So there is, I mean, we have so many, so many, it's a litany of concerns that, again, they correlate with the disincentives of the contract. And we're hopeful that by taking that step, that we can actually get to the root of what's causing these negative experiences. Because I know that Broward County really is not the service provider. However, it's reflected on Broward County when they do not enforce those contracts the way that they should. So help us make these experiences safer. And also, I'm a part of a larger community advocacy group. And this came up in our conversations with them. And I have to say that they serve a large population of disabled youth who are expressing the same things, of very similar concerns. And what's the name of that organization? Well, they didn't give me permission to speak on their behalf. And your organization, what's the name of it? We're called Save Broward. I will share the two groups that we're advocating for. One is Blind Faith. And I believe the other group is Unity for the Blind. We've been joining them for their monthly meetings. And they've just simply exhausted all avenues. And some of them are on the LCB board. They're very familiar with the processes. They understand how the system works and who the points of contacts are. They've been trying to advocate for themselves. And they've exhausted those avenues and reached out for additional support. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you. I assure you. We will stay in touch. Madam Chair, I have another comment. I don't particularly want to wait three months to resolve this issue. So, did we do our schedule last meeting? No, we're doing it today. Well, we're going to meet in December. Huh? We're meeting in December. That's December. You'll have an update in December. December 12th. No, I know we're having a meeting in December. My comment is, I don't think we should wait until December. So, when we go through our calendar, I'm going to call, intend to call a special meeting and get this resolved prior to December. There's no reason for this to continue like this. So, sir, the contract administrator and the contract is being administrated by Broward County Transportation Department. And I would encourage in between now and whenever it is that the board is meeting and is going to bring up and discuss this issue, that the speaker communicate further with them regarding whatever the concerns are and make any requests that are necessary. Can we do this, Chair? Sorry. Yes. The auditor representative mentioned an audit. But I don't want to get that confused with the audit that we've got underway, the performance audit for the overall program of MAP, and that there's a separate audit, if I understand, dealing just with this discussion here. Hi. Yes. I can confirm that's two separate audits. Yes. All right. Raymond? Raymond? I would like to say, based on that, I think we may be preliminary or too early to do a special meeting now, but allow the audit to go its track, and then we've got the input of the auditor's office relative to your concerns. My question would be, when will the audit be done that would address this issue, or when will this meeting happen internally? I mean, is this going to take six months, or is this going to take two months? My comment is simply, we need an update. I just can't, I can just see this thing falling down the road again. So the question is, when will the audit be complete so that it would address this issue? My apologies. I do not actually have that information, but I can check back with the office and convey information back to Gretchen, to get back to everyone. If the audit is in progress, I don't know if they have been already looking at these issues or not. My apologies. I'm not doing that work, so I'm not directly involved in that scope. What it sounds like, it's going to be December before we have information on audit, or the other, or the county has meetings with its provider to come back to us and give us a report. Is that what I'm hearing? Can we do this? Can I offer a suggestion? Gretchen, can we have you list, not to put work on your plate, but list your questions and concerns out, and then you send it to Gretchen, and then Gretchen can send it to staff and ask them to address it via an email format, and then have it emailed to us as soon as possible, hopefully before December 4th. Excuse me, Raymond, I wasn't finished, but number one, let's let the staff do their job. We've heard from our attorney that there's processes they have to go through. All I'm trying to do is expedite it. It looks like we need your audit. We need staff to do their thing. And to be realistic, it's going to be December before someone comes back here and either gives us the recommendation or the status of it, I'm guessing. And I'm happy with that as opposed to calling a special meeting, but at least it's urgent enough that we should have an answer by our December meeting. Gretchen, I'm sure you can work with our Department of Transportation, get some idea of what's going on, what have they uncovered based on what's been said today, and share that with us even in an interim through email before our December meeting, just to give us an update on what's going on. No problem there, Chair, and these concerns will also be shared with the audit team that is leading the audit of the paratransit contracts so that this, you know, to make sure that these specific issues are being looked at by that team. Go ahead. All right, thank you very much. I want to thank you all so much for understanding the urgency in this situation, because, again, every time one of these incidents happen, it is a life-threatening situation for our customers, our neighbors, the most vulnerable persons in our community. And if it would help the audit, we do have those audio testimonials that we would be willing to share with them. If it would help them to understand more specifically what these experiences are and how they relate to those contracts. All right, very good. All right, thank you so much, Arita. All right, thank you. Do we have any other public comments? No? All right. Roy, can you go ahead and lead us? Sure. With roll call? Thank you. Good morning, everybody. Debbie Madden. Thank you. Anthea Pennant-Wallace. Here. Alan Hooper. Here. Thank you. Douglas Kuhlman. Here. Ardell Donas. Here. Phil Allen. Here. Raymond McOvery. Here. Thank you. Ronald Frazier. Here. And Shay Smith. Here. Thank you. Shay, we have a quorum. Thank you. All right. Thank you. We have a quorum for sure. At any rate, today, I think we have a number of programmatic updates and progress reports, items that were previously requested by the board. So we'll start with an overview of the public engagement effort from Ms. Wilson, our outreach, public outreach manager. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning, board members. So to start with most recent news, this past Monday, excuse my hoarseness, the county hosted what they posed as a double feature, grand opening ceremony slash ribbon cutting, not only for the convention center and its new facility improvements, as well as the port bypass road, which is now referred to as you see on the title slide, the convention center connector to better illustrate and story tell how this roadway is connecting folks from the U.S. one entry and cutting down their time nearly in half to the southeast 17th causeway, if I'm writing that right. So we have a video here to illustrate the happenings. New road is opening and it's more than asphalt. It's a story of innovation, resilience, and community, led by Broward County Highway Construction and Engineering Division. Under the Public Works Department, the convention center connector project tackled complex engineering challenges to improve traffic flow near one of the region's busiest gateways. Finding the right location meant working around tight spaces, high security zones, and active port operations without disrupting daily commerce. The route had to remain outside secure port areas, ensuring safety while keeping freight and passenger movement uninterrupted. Crews navigated underground fuel, water, and sewer lines with precision. Contractors installed over 100 auger cast piles, some more than 100 feet deep, to support the 1,300-foot bridge in South Florida's tough soil. Contaminated soil was remediated to protect the environment while Port Everglades stayed fully operational. The result? A two-lane road with security fencing, a bridge with barrier walls, a roundabout to streamline traffic, checkpoints, modern lighting, signals, intelligent transportation systems, and clear signage. This new route eases congestion, boosts safety, and lets vehicles bypass the port's core. The project, initiated by Broward County Highway Construction and Engineering Division, designed by WSP Incorporated, built by lead engineering contractors, and inspected by Broward County Certified Business Enterprises, was supported by prime consultant F&J Engineering Group and sub-consultant Solid Consulting. Over 90% of inspections were performed by CBEs, proving local talent builds world-class infrastructure. Completed ahead of schedule and within budget, The project was funded by the gas tax, penny for transportation surtax, and a state of Florida Department of Transportation county incentive grant. This project is a smart investment in Broward County's future. The Convention Center Connector isn't just open, it's paving the way forward. Yes, we really want to give a huge shout-out to Public Works and the Highway Construction and Engineering Division for their diligence and hard work. New road is opening. Delivering the project on budget and not only on time, but a little early. So we are very excited to hear about that. This video is just a ride over of the bypass road. So if you're in that area, if any of you live in that area, I encourage you to see the great work that's been done with the help of the surtax and other funders. So as you see, it is a bridge-like overpass that connects from the Port Everglades entryway security point and rounds about a few miles out to Eisenhower Boulevard. Yes, you can drop off at the Convention Center on your right and go straight forward through to Southeast 17. So we're really excited that this is done. I've been tracking and monitoring feedback on social media platforms from the public, and it's already receiving a lot of good sentiment for this new project. It has been long awaited by the residents in that area, and especially now that all the dust is cleared, they're even more pleased. So we are happy to show this work, and we are absolutely proud that we had the chance, as you all have seen in previous videos, to interview and speak with the CBEs on the ground of preparing and getting this project done the right way. So we're really excited, and I will just cut that here because I think you all get the picture. But I, once again, encourage you all to ride along for yourselves. Just a quick comment. I was there this week for the Florida International Trade and Culture Expo. We had over 3,200 Broward residents, I think, on that very first day, and over 76 or 72 countries participating, and the space is really beautiful. So excellent job on that. I'll send your regards, and I'm sure Visit Lauderdale will be very pleased with your comments. So, as you may recall, we have our ongoing five-year public outreach plan for our activities to engage and inform the public. I'm here to provide an update for the last fiscal year, and happy to forward the original plan presentation, as I understand some of you weren't there for my original presentation at a later time. It's available on our website, which I will also share with you soon, shortly. All right, so I want to kick off with our public outreach accomplishments. So, in efforts of delivering educational content, we use a hybrid of both traditional and emerging platforms to ensure that the program's messaging meets the public wherever they are. Whether it's in our traditional print, even websites are deemed as more traditional nowadays as more emerging new platforms are created each and every year, as well as our social media tools, augmented reality, virtual reality, immersive experiences, which you all have had the opportunity to demo out for us. Thank you for that. And plenty more. So, first win in that regards is the launching of our new program website, mattbrower.org, is now live. I will demo that for you all shortly, but I know that we have been teasing it for a little bit, and I'm glad to say that it is here now. You all received the completed and distributed FY24 annual report in print. I showcased the annual report video at the end of the last meeting in August, and it is our first annual report video, and we hope for it to be the first of many, as we want to continue to provide information in a way that engages the public on platforms they're already using, whether it be social media, whether it be in the metaverse space, and so on. So, other digital platform wins this year. We have, I'm skipping down to our social media, we have continued to raise our following year over year. A huge bump. I deeply credit that to our public information specialist who's working behind the scenes, Katia Aborty. She is really taking charge of getting our content to a stellar quality, where we're producing reels and videos, as video is way more received than static photos these days, capturing with our drone footage, different project sites throughout the county as they're being done. We have over 350 municipal project signs out to date and counting with the plenty more projects that are coming down with FY26, R&M projects specifically. We are also proud to say that we've been all around Barrett County presenting and participating in different events within the community, with the county commission, without advisory boards, and community organizations, and our program partners of other agencies like BCT, Public Works, OESBD, FITSA. We had the great opportunity of attending that this week. So, shout out to Office of Economic and Small Business Division as well. And we continue to plan to do that in the years to come. So, as the overview of our outreach plan goals, I break them out into three keys, as you see here. We aim to reach annually. Building upon these year over year helps to move the needle in raising public awareness of transportation investments in the resident communities. So, first and foremost, with the innovative aspect, I shared with you all the ARVR experiences and equipment that we've purchased and we tout currently now to an event series that we have currently going. Our next event taking place October 28th, next Tuesday, at Government Center East. You are all welcome to attend, and we will consider it as a pop-up event of sorts to highlight to staff and residents alike the transportation investments and how to get a hold of the transit experience in real time. We also, as you all know, the public dashboard and our other digital platforms, which I'm teeing up my colleagues at a later date, will provide an update to you all on the improvements made on the public dashboard. For youth education and engagement. So, we specifically tried to focus in the original outreach plan on different target audiences to message them where they are. And we derived it to, we broke it down to youth and to older active adults. And first being youth as they are what is deemed as the earliest of adapters to new emerging platforms and methods of communication. And given that this is a 30-year plan and program, what that speaks to me is a generational impact. So, it is to be who of us to ensure that we're speaking to each generation and showing them the different improvements being made in their backyards. So, we stand by our foundational elements in that way of transparency, accountability, and resilience. And we see that it's necessary, that much more necessary, to cater specific outreach materials like our coloring activity books. We've taken them out to cities for back-to-school events. We've also partnered with other agencies like Resilience and Air Quality Control to get them out to schools and get them incorporated in STEM programming as well with Broward County Public Schools. And third, interagency and municipal cross-functional collaboration. This is always a goal of ours to continue breaking down the so-called silos within the county to ensure that we're a great support for surtax-funded projects as they cross over and impact other agencies internally. So, next, as promised, I'm going to demo our website. So, I'm going to jump out of this presentation really quickly to show you a few pages. So, this is the homepage of mattbroward.org. As you see, a reel of various projects under our various project types is the first thing you see, and about us, our goals, and then quick links here about frequently asked questions, our public project dashboard, and oversight board meetings. And these were chosen as the top three because they are the top three most visited pages on our website. So, we want to make sure that they're always the most accessible pages on the front page of our website. And we have our newsletter sign-up. So, as residents come in and want to receive more information, they will get queued in by submitting their email forms to us. We receive it and add them to our subscriber list for our regular newsletters. So, I'll just hover over quickly to not take up too much time. Our about section includes a lot of our history and our background, our legal framework, our historical framework, like ballot language, how we align with the county commission strategic plan, our goals and foundational elements, as well as reporting. So, everybody wants to know about the reporting, wants to know how we can track back our work. So, we break it down here by our budgets as they're updated, audits, annual reports, and, of course, the economic impact reports that come from OESBD. Hovering over to project information, so, again, our dashboard being first and foremost, we break it out, call-out pages for public works projects, transit projects, our municipal surtax program, which I'll hop over to, and our other projects. So, these are projects like our Briar County Aviation Department, related projects, innovations, our multimodal mobility master plan, as well as regional projects like Pat Salerno Interchange, for example. So, as you can see on our municipal surtax program page, it has a button here to the latest update of the five-year plan, and it has workshop materials, as those that have just recently taken place, and we live update bid solicitation opportunities here, so that those who are interested can come find it on our website on a regular basis, and we always divert them back to the procurement pages of the individual cities that they take interest in. Program oversight, oh, apologies. No, I love that you're doing that. Oh. Procurement opportunities. Yes. Yes. Thank you. So, program oversight, as you may recognize, these beautiful people before you. We wanted to be transparent in who our oversight board is, and drop down of bios, as well. And our oversight board meeting information here is accessible, as it is, as shown on the quick link on the homepage. So, as you'll see here, we have newly entered into fiscal year 2026, and it is archived here from the upcoming meetings, so people can see what's ahead, as well as what's been archived back from all of our meetings, FY26, all the way back to meeting number one in these collapsible formats. It is easier, more mobile-friendly for the scrolling, as we have a lot of information, and we'll continue to have a lot of information year over year up till sunset of this program. And it's super accessible, it links out, and we update this all the time up to this very event. As you see, the materials and live link for the meeting as it stands right now is in place. Same for our appointing authority members in meetings, and we have a link here for our audit as well. And last but not least, as you see, our social media handles are available here to direct people to see program updates and initiatives in other ways on social media, and to connect with us via contact form, whether it's just a general inquiry of more information on this program, or public requests, whether it's a records request, anything and everything, it is here as a catch net that we receive directly. So, we're really proud to have accomplished that. I want to give a special shout-out to Carol Munamera, to the County ETS team, and our CBE partners, all who were very beneficial and very helpful in getting this project over the line. So, thank you, and I appreciate you a lot for your assistance in getting this done. Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you. So, I will move right along. So, as we spoke on the augmented reality and virtual reality educational components, these devices, not only do we have them here at the office and utilize the Surtex Plaza space to showcase the equipment, we have also uploaded the software in Broward County Libraries. So, now, those who show up to the library can access the same software and equipment and use it to gain more knowledge about our program in a different way and have these right experiences. And we plan to expand it to more libraries. It's right now in beta and at the Broward Main Library downtown, as well as the Dan Pearl Branch. And we intend to expand it to more, hopefully all, one day soon. And as I already told you, we are in a current pop-up event series. We completed one event last month, September 30th, here at the Surtex Plaza. Next Tuesday at GC East and November 13th, we are doing a library pop-up event visit at the Northwest Regional Branch Library in Coral Springs, Florida. So, we also have established a library of our completed projects. That's another Easter egg ahead of the Innovations team when they come and present to you the completed project photo viewer at another meeting, at a later meeting. We have been taking out our drone. We've been taking out our video and photo capturing devices to get a log of the project. We've been taking out our projects to show and enhance our public project dashboard as it stands, with a gallery of photos and videos that showcase the timeline from planning, design, construction, to completion of each project. It is a hefty task, mind you. But we're already, well, once I put the 51% to goal as a timestamp on fiscal year 2025, but we have kicked it into high gear this month to get it nearer and nearer to the 100% goal of completed projects so we can move forward and be ready and prepared for the FY26 projects to come. But we are always going out to make sure that we can capture the status, and it also helps us and informs us to see in real time what's going on on the ground of each and every one of our projects. So, moving right along, to break down the youth education and engagement goal, we recently produced a school zone safety video last month in collaboration with Broward County Public Works, and it highlighted the school zone improvement projects happening near Broward Estates Elementary, 10, 15 minutes down the street on Broward Boulevard. And the cool part about those projects, that Public Works partnered with the Waze app, if you all are familiar with that navigation app, to ensure that school zone improvement projects show up on the app as users ride along. So, it's very cool to know that surtext-funded projects are showing up on Waze app now. We've distributed, like I stated, over 1,000 activity books to date since creating them last year, once again, in-house. We worked collaboratively with libraries, parks, to disseminate these materials, have these drop-off stations, if you will, at different well-visited parks and libraries. And we also hosted our very own Take Your Child to Work Day internal event last year, showcasing the ARVR experiences. And as always, we are always going out to city-county-sponsored events with our partners to engage each quarter with the public and inform them of projects coming to them or projects recently completed, including public informational meetings. So, moving right along, last but not least, our interagency and municipal cost-functional collaborations. So, the outreach efforts that we have, as you see listed before, Port Bypass Road slash the Convention Center Connector Project. We had that video series ongoing that has been reviewed and well-received by county leadership and external stakeholders. We are continuing our project site visits to expand upon our photo gallery for our dashboard, to feed into our presentations, as well as our social media. We will always, always participate with our OASBD agency partners for events like the Brown and Beyond Business conference, the Florida International Trade and Commerce Expo, as well as the smaller-scale events like the contract opportunities workshops each fiscal year. And we will continue to increase our construction and memorialized signage. So, as we commonly and nickname these as our mini billboards for the program, we've assessed and recently realized that as more and more projects will come to be, as you have seen on our dashboard before, up to nearly 800 projects from 2019 to 2048. We know that there's a potential for saturation, oversaturation, if it's only in the format of that photo to the bottom right of those type of road signs. So, we're assessing and evaluating new ways to memorialize the project so that folks, as they pass by, ride by, walk by, drive by, they can still see, and it still communicates to them in a new way with compliance to sustainable options for memorialized signage. So, looking ahead, we are working on connecting more and more visuals to our dashboard. We plan to engage with Broward County Public Schools for STEM engagements for our AR, VR devices to be highlighted, as well as hosting school assemblies to continue to educate the youth. We are assessing our signage options for more sustainable options and working with our other county agencies in the near future for new and innovative program projects and events. So, what can you all do? How am I going to land this plane? So, first, as you all know, you are the ambassadors for this program. As a call to action, I encourage you all, let us know. I am always ready and open for feedback, as well as Gretchen. Follow us on social media. Share our content. When you receive our newsletters, forward them along to your circles of influence. And join us. You are always invited to attend our community events, public information meetings, ribbon cuttings and ceremonies, and different things like that. So, now I will open the floor to ask you all, what would you like to see more of, less for, less of, and any additional ideas you may have? Well, I am going to go ahead and dive in right away. First of all, love, love this presentation and love your enthusiasm. It is really great when somebody loves the work that they are doing. And it shows every single time you come before us. So, thank you for loving your job and for doing such an extraordinary, extraordinary, such extraordinary work. I just had, I had a few comments regarding the municipal partners. Are they co-branding? I mean, I know, are they co-branding? Yes. Yes, they are. Many of these projects. And then the other thing I wanted to find out was on the, there's a section for public comments. Yes. Will you share those with us over time? I mean, it doesn't have to be every month or every time we meet, but it would be good for us to kind of get a sense, because I don't know if we could go on and see the public comments. Is that something that if we were interested? No, they're not posted live on the website, but we receive them through our CatchNet email, mapsocialatbroward.org or mapatbroward.org. And we can provide you with a log. Just so we can get a sense of what's being said, what questions, what concerns our residents have. Certainly. And that was it. And I will open to other members. Alan? Just one thing, you know, and great job, by the way. Thank you. On that billboard, the mini billboards and oversaturation, I honestly, I don't think you can oversaturate. But one thing I would do, and if you go back and look at the sign, it says something like it has a lot of words on it that speak to the location, a commercial boulevard improvement project. You know what? I would just put Broward, map Broward. And below, I would always have a catchphrase that says, another surtax investment. You don't have to get into the minutiae or spend the money on doing unique signs for every project. Just have one. It's like my construction company. If I had 150 jobs going on all over the county and I just put Hooper Construction, people would be like, hey, I saw another one of your signs. I saw another one of your signs. So I think the message should be another surtax investment or something that says that the county is investing and that this is another one of those smart investments. That's what I would do. Just an opinion. Thank you. Thank you. A good one. No. Anybody else go ahead? Yeah, just a simple question. Regarding the bypass road, that's just a game changer in our traffic problems and everything else. Indeed. But as a reminder, how much was the cost? How much was surtax? How much was other? I think we should. I'd like to have an answer to that, whether it comes from you or Ms. Wilson. In other words, how much was the cost of the project? How much was surtax? How much was someone else? Or is it all surtax? It's been all over our website and our socials, but I would be unable to give you the exact breakdown at the moment. It's gas tax, surtax, FDOT. Okay, because I think we pride ourselves in matching funds and everything else. And that's the first big project that's going to make a difference to a lot of people. I assume it's going to help people get in and out of the new hotel easier, besides the convention center, et cetera. And I think we should applaud that. And it's wonderful that got done. It's another project that goes in the county line, but it's being built in Fort Lauderdale. So even though Fort Lauderdale doesn't always rank high on how much money is being spent, it's being spent in Fort Lauderdale, which is really, it helps. We've got a commission that was complaining about they weren't getting enough of the surtax money. Well, this is a big, big chunk of it right there that didn't come into the Fort Lauderdale number, but it came into Fort Lauderdale. So I think those numbers are- They're there in your binder. I just confirmed with Roy. They're in the back. So it's in your leverage report at the back of your binder. Okay. Thank you. All right. Anyone else? Ms. Wilson? Excellent job. Thank you all. Thank you. All right. Okay. So next up, completed surtax projects by commission district overview and program updates. I think, Gretchen, you're up. I'm up. I'm going to try to bring the same level of enthusiasm and love for my job that Tishana does. I'm going to do it from here, if that's okay with you all. I do love my job. And I am enthusiastic about these initiatives because from the very, very beginning, for those of you that have been here since day one, I've heard consistently from the oversight board membership that you want us to be able to tell a good story. And that story has to be accurate. We have to be accountable. And clearly, we are more under the microscope now than we were then. So we've heard you talk about ways that we can tell a story of what have we done. The public dashboard is an incredibly popular area of our website, but it's a plan. You know, the public dashboard is a point in time. It's the amount of money that was awarded for a particular project phase. And it doesn't tell a dynamic story. And we understand that as the program evolves and matures, we have to be able to tell a more dynamic story. So this is just a taste of what you're going to see in far more detail in December. We're starting at the commission district level. I'd like to give a shout out to our planning and data visualization team. The innovation that they've had to use to try to tell a better story using iconography. So I'm just going to go through and kind of give you a sense of these are a series of completed projects that Tashana and her team have gone out and captured these images or the city contractors have, you know, given us these images. And then we are going to start putting them together at first at the commission district level. And then we will start drilling down to the municipal level. And eventually, as you'll see with the photo viewer application, you'll actually be able to see a, for some of our projects that we have the images for, a project moved through from, you know, what was the existing condition before construction started through construction to completion. So that's our goal is to tell a more comprehensive dynamic story about the impact of the investments of the surtax. The next step is, as I mentioned, revamping the public project dashboard. So it's obviously had to evolve just like we are from what we told the voters we were going to do. We're using a ESRI GIS, so a geographic information system software. So it's very much location specific. It's very heavy on geospatial data. What that means is that it's difficult for us to tell a story that all of the audiences and all of the stakeholders want to see on a GIS dashboard. It's not nimble enough to provide financial data and program performance data. But it does tell a compelling story of the level of investment in a specific geographic area, if you can geographically quantify that investment. And there are so many investments that you all are reviewing and approving and overseeing that are not geographically quantifiable. So we continually look at ways to use innovative technology and new tools and new software, including artificial intelligence, to try to bring geographic data and financial data together so that we can address the audience needs, including audits, including the state of Florida reporting. So for the public dashboard, we've heard loud and clear, not just from you all, but through all of our public survey, that the iconography that was on our public dashboard was not really telling a very compelling story. So we spent a lot of time working with internal stakeholders to look at ways to try to visually depict what it is that we are investing in. And this goes to a question that one of the oversight board members posed to me just this morning. How are we actually moving these things into categories? So we have project types, but those project types are then rolled into project categories. How do we visually cue someone who is looking at our dashboard that they're looking at a transit project? Well, it will be orange. How do we know, how do they know that it's multimodal? It'll be green. How do we know it's a congestion management strategy? It'll be blue. So these are the types of ways that we are trying to better connect visually what we're doing to the public. We have a lot of different communication tools. Many of them are utilized by the county commission. We get asked at least monthly, sometimes many, many times in a single month for surtext summaries, program fact sheets, briefing sheets that have both visual data and text data and financial data. And we're trying to find ways to have those things automated because it's very time intensive for our staff to try to go through and quality control and format all of that. So that another thing that we're working on is a kind of automated surtext summary. And again, we'll show you more of this in December, I'm kind of teasing it for you right now. As you can see over on the lower right, that's the completed projects photo viewer application that the team is working on right now. And that'll be a place that people can leave the public dashboard, move into that application and see pictures of completed projects. Get a lot of questions about program performance and financial data. I just wanted on the record to, um, to put out there that we have been talking about this since 2019 metrics performance tracking every single thing that the oversight board approves, knowing which projects are moving forward that were in the original plan versus which projects are new to the plan. Um, all of that is being tracked in an internal dashboard. The last time we spent a really, uh, I would say detailed long amount of time talking about that. We were at Nova Southeastern university for a retreat. So it's time for you all to see that again and have an opportunity to weigh in. We have new oversight board members that have joined us since then. And I want to make sure that what we're building, because it is intensive, it is a very difficult job to put financial and programmatic and actions that the oversight board takes and budget versus actuals and audited versus unaudited financials all in one place and make it tell a compelling story. And I have to say that my team has done an amazing job of trying to pull that together. They've rebuilt the whole thing on a new tool. Um, they're using an Oracle database and power BI to build this for you all. It will be incredibly helpful if we get audited. Um, but I, you know, I do want you to have an opportunity to weigh in, to look at it, to spend time with it and see if it's meeting the needs that you set out because you kind of challenged us to create something that can do a lot of different things, including drilling down and rolling up like big picture, high level, and then detail. So we'll be looking at that again on December 12th. I wanted to highlight some of the amazing, um, impacts that are occurring as a result of the third amendment to the transportation surtax interlocal agreement with our municipalities. We've had another municipality join, um, that fully executed agreement has been shared with all of our municipal partners. Thank you, Nathaniel and your team for pulling that together. And we now have 30 participating municipalities. Lazy Lake has joined and yeah, and we also, we also have new components of the program that we've talked about with you, uh, just briefly, but I wanted to highlight the fact that the grant match program for the municipalities that opened in August that we just briefly touched on during your August 22nd meeting was extremely popular and much more so than we had anticipated. We did receive $16.9 million worth of, um, requests for the grant match program. The county had actually made only $13 million available, but we were able to award nine cities. Uh, eight of those already have a grant agreement or an appropriations agreement. Uh, one of those is pursuing one in this current, uh, upcoming legislative session. That's the city of plantation. But as you can see, this is very valuable to our overall goal of leveraging $2.5 billion. Um, that $13 million is bringing in $21.6 million of other people's money. So again, this is both state and local, and the cities do have skin in the game. I know that that's been a question that you all have had previously. They are bringing money to this program and the formula based and micro transit. So every city received notification of their allocations for FY 26 in this particular fiscal year. Um, they were able to access $30 million and that was distributed through a formula that the cities proposed that was based on centerline miles of roads in each municipal jurisdiction. They then, uh, received an application from us that Nathaniel and his team and county administration, we all had, um, input on the goal was to streamline it. So the cities had one application that they would submit to us that had any rehabilitation and maintenance projects, um, microtransit requests. If they wanted to defer their allocation to a future year, they had the option under the third amendment to do that. Um, several of them have chosen to do that and you can see there just kind of visually there's clearly a need for, um, rehabilitation and maintenance funding. Uh, but there's also some desire for several of our cities to either expand or add, um, on demand transportation at this point, unless you all have any questions on anything that I just went through, I know I went quickly. Um, but if you don't have any questions, I'd like very much to introduce you to your new finance manager, Madam Chair. I love that iconography that's being done to showcase, um, the priorities, um, for each of the items that it's being worked on. I think it's awesome. It really helps to make it clear for everyone. So I just want to comment on that. And you certainly bring the same level of enthusiasm. All right. Did you have a comment? I have one comment. Raymond? Um, it's funny. I was, I was actually emailing Gretchen and Nathaniel and Roy before this about understanding how we can track metrics better. And then I suggested some, and so I'm glad to see this user interface. It seems better and more easily to use better UX UI. Um, I would like to ask you chair, if maybe we can talk about in the December meeting, since I'm new to this board, if we can talk about the metrics we would like to see. There's some metrics that aren't there and that I would like to see. I don't know. Roy, did you print any of those out? I can check my email. I had sent them. I'm sorry. Um, do you want to share? Yeah. So some of these that I would like to see just, just like a, we don't have to pass them out. I can just go it off. Okay. Yeah. This is something I've been, yeah, for like a year. I kind of wanted to see if more granular detail. Can you give us an idea of some of what you're. Yeah. So some of them are total inventory of sidewalks. We have that we're missing a deeper classification of the bike lanes we're building using all the different categories from the traffic engineer's perspective. So we have more granular data there. Um, I would like to look at, although this is outside our scope, but I believe it's a big macro goal is pedestrian and bicycle fatalities year over year. I think these are going to be important to understand when this program comes get sunsetted or when state level people push on the program, we have heart, hard data that we can go to the public with, um, to defend the program. So these are kind of the things I would like to see and talk about. I think that was a request, um, that we had before. Yeah. We had a safety presentation back in December. Yeah. Um, so there's, there's quite a bit of metrics, but I just believe the more metrics we're following, I think we can have these meetings quicker. I think they can be more efficient and then we can figure out where we're lapsing and where we're succeeding and just focusing on the lapses instead of just kind of just doing general information. So I would just like to bring that up if with the chair's permission, if you want to talk about that in December. Um, certainly we can have it on the agenda. I'm not sure all that is involved in making sure that we can, um, address some of these, but I'm open to it. Did you have a comment, Gretchen? No, I just wanted to make sure on the record, since people that are watching this or looking at this, aren't seeing it. Um, I just want to make sure that, you know, that, uh, we will make it available as additional material. We'll add it to the website. So people know what's being proposed. Uh, it, madam chair, if I could just mention that many of the metrics that are being proposed are things that we're already measuring, um, that, you know, at any time you all can ask us and we can provide you many of these things. If, um, if we don't measure them or track them, public works does or Broward County transit does. Um, and with respect to some of the metrics, and I will weigh in more in more detail in December, uh, if we're going to have a discussion item about this, I would just, um, caution the oversight board, uh, to measure things over which we have direct control as a person who spent a former part of her life building logic models and performance measures for grants and programs. I will tell you that what you don't want to do is to measure things over which you do not have direct control. Um, and there are several things on this list that I would recommend against us owning, uh, because they are not things over which we have direct control. We are a funding source, um, and we are building projects. Yes. With that funding source. But there are a lot of things about the design of our transportation network that, um, even in 30 years, we're not going to be able to control or influence to the extent that I would necessarily encourage you or suggest that you own the measurement of perhaps fatalities. That would be one. Right. There's also limited resources, right? We know that for a fact. So I know that the penny tax budget will never be able to satisfy all of the need, but it's, it's, it's certainly, it's a good opportunity for us to see if there are some gaps that, uh, the funding can address and get a sense of what the budget implications would be. And if so, you know, maybe have it on our wish list of things to do. Um, did you comment? I think. Go ahead. Um, yeah, I, I, I, I hear, I hear you, Gretchen. Yeah. There are things that you can't own for sure. And, and I, I looked at the fatality thing, the first thing I looked at, and then I thought, okay, should we be measuring it or shouldn't we be measuring it? I'm not, I'm not sure what the right answer is because one of the things I think was one of the charges in the ordinance was safety. So, but I got to hand it to you. The fact that you put this much work into it and that you, that you came up with a list like this, I think it's great. I think, I think that, uh, to have a board member that, that wants to get into the, into the, the details of what we do is good. And, and yeah, we do audit all these things or a lot of them, if not all of them. And, and, and it's good open discussion in December. I think we should figure out which ones we own and which ones maybe we don't, but I really think it's, it's great that a board member is putting this much time into it. Right. So Alan, the safety concern, this is something it's not part of our charge, but I know it was something that we, yes, it's something that we talked about. We had a presenter some time ago that came in and demonstrated, uh, some safety concerns, issues that, and we, we, it was requested by the board. That is something that we monitored. Um, and even if we cannot own it, it's good for us to have an understanding of, um, what's happening on that front. So, uh, if, if, if there's any way that we could address it or at least encourage some funding support, um, to reduce fatalities, I certainly would be for that. And then, or Adele, you had a comment. Thank you. Um, I just wanted to really comment on this, uh, new program. Uh, we, you know, started the, uh, 2026 grant match program, uh, making 13 million dollars available, you know, for municipal, you know, partners and almost doubling that amount and giving everybody an opportunity, but not having more than, you know, one project qualify for it and making it competitive. And this is so awesome. And this is not guaranteed money. This is, you know, if you have creative projects, creative funding, and you, you need some extra money and we will definitely, you know, listen to you. And I think this is open to everybody and making the partners becoming part of it throughout the year, not just one or two times, you know, with something, you know, our deadlines, you know, there, right. I think this is, you know, truly the, uh, outcome of, you know, what you negotiated with the, uh, municipalities, a third amendment, and, uh, we're already seeing, you know, uh, great results. And I just wanted to, you know, thank you all for it. All right. If I, if I can, so again, all credit to, uh, county administration, map administration, our partners with the cities, um, the goal throughout the entirety of the process was to, again, as I've mentioned before, uh, simplify the manner by which cities can get money, provided, uh, an ability for more cities to get more money more often and eliminate, um, the, the competition of city against city, um, for every single dollar. Um, obviously the grant match program to some extent is on a first come first serve basis. We have a number of cities who had these grants that were sort of in pipeline already and the ability of the county to gap fill what they have the ability to come out of pocket from their general revenue, um, you know, just allows more projects more often and to some extent, as you, as you indicated, more creative projects because they're able to get those funds for more innovative projects from, uh, from state and other sources. So, um, you know, all, all the lawyers do at the end of the day is, is draft the words that the clients want to include in there and, you know, give advice and suggestions. Um, and we were very, very lucky to have a lot of very dedicated people on map administration, county administration, and from the cities to really find a way to expand, uh, the pie here. And, uh, I think that so far it's, it's been fantastic. I've been reviewing, uh, applications for both the RNM projects, as well as the grant match program, uh, projects. I don't think there's been a single one that has been even close to the line in terms of whether or not it would be eligible. And I think it's going to speed up our process and still maintain the transparency and accountability, which is so key to the program. So I thank you all for your support and comments regarding, uh, the third amendment, as it was developed as well, many of those ideas were included in it. So thank you. Yeah, real quickly, I just want to get back to page 35 and I want to thank the staff because I think we went over it too quickly. We put 13 million of our money in and got over 22 million of somebody else's money and our match. That's, that's wonderful. That's just the match program for 2026. We've done a lot more. And I think we need to, people need to understand that their penny is doing a lot more than a penny. In this sense, we got 40 more cents for our 60 cents or 60, 60%. So thank you staff. And I want to, I want to ditto Alan's comments about Raymond. I think that's why the board's here. That's why we're diverse. And the more of that, that we can get out here is the better. And, uh, I just want to thank the staff, this match thing that needs to be sold more of, and, and I don't know how we do it. Uh, I think one of the things Alan made a comment about his signage, that's a good idea. Just another, just another surtax project gets that ball rolling. But anyway, thank you, everything. Madam Chair, I have just. Go ahead. Is it on? Mr. Fraser. One question. Uh, has any of the federal funding been affected with the, uh, shutdown of the government or with the Trump administration recalled in certain grants? I know that Miami-Dade was affected for a very large project. They pulled back around $60 million for a federal transit project. What is happening? Um, we have just recently had a conversation and it's my understanding that we have not been affected in the transit environment. We've been affected in other areas, uh, lines of business that the county manages, but to date, I'm not aware of it coming to the transportation program. And just to, to add on to that, uh, as well, there has actually been some, uh, broadened flexibility on certain grants that, uh, the FTA, uh, provided to Broward County. Uh, for example, at the, in the fall of 24, uh, there was a, a competitive $25 million grant that was awarded from the federal government to Broward County for the purchase of electric buses. Uh, given the challenges that exist in that industry right now, um, the, the feds allowed, uh, for, uh, grant recipients to, uh, be more flexible in terms of propulsion method, hybrid, uh, natural gas, other, other ways of doing it. So it wasn't a scenario where they're like taking it back. Um, but in fact allowed it to be used for other propulsion methods. And I know that, uh, Broward County Transportation Department was very proactive in terms of communications with the FTA as soon as there was any, uh, you know, inkling that that was going to happen. And my understanding most recently was that they had approved the change. So those funds, once the federal government is governmenting again, uh, will, will be on their way to Broward County in the near future. All right. And I was remiss in, in not mentioning a, uh, uh, Ms. Lonergan, uh, general manager for Broward County Transit just reported to the county commission last week that, um, BCT had submitted the largest grant application in their history to FTA to support, uh, Primo. And I'm sure she'll be bringing you an update on that when she comes in December. Awesome. Gretchen, I think you were in the process of, um, introducing, uh, Mr. Harvey. So I want to make sure we don't miss that. Thank you, Madam chair. Kelton, would you come forward? So Kelton is joining our team. He's coming to us from Parks and he will be acting as the finance manager and kind of leading, um, many of the efforts on behalf of you all with respect to financial reporting, uh, responding to the newly required state, uh, reports they're due on January 15th. We'll be talking more about that in December as well. So just welcome, would love to have you a welcome, Mr. Harvey. Yes. Good morning, everyone. It's nice to meet you all. I'm excited to be here and start working together. Awesome. I've basically been with the county for almost 12 years. I spent the last 11 years with Parks and Recreation, um, in their business section. So I'm excited to tackle a new task here and learn the program and work with everyone, but that's about it. Yeah. My entire career has basically been in local government. So I'm excited to, you know, make an impact on the transportation side rather than the park side for once. Welcome. I can't believe you've been at the county for 12 years. It doesn't look it. It doesn't look it. All right. Okay. Awesome. I, uh, next on the agenda, welcome, Mr. Harvey. Uh, next on the agenda is, um, uh, the oversight board calendar. Uh, you gonna lead us on that? Well, actually right, right before that, if, if you wouldn't mind, Madam Chair, the, um, Broward County Commission, uh, just of course passed their FY26 budget. And, um, many of you may have been hearing the conversations about property tax and some of the, uh, property tax bills that have been filed in the Florida legislature. And while this program is not affected necessarily, uh, by property tax and, you know, people think, well, you know, you're your own surtax and you're in your own trust fund. There are significant impacts on the county, uh, and there are general fund, uh, programs that the surtax leverages. Again, going back to the conversation about leverage. Um, so I just want to make sure that since you all are ambassadors for this program and there are folks that do tune in, uh, to watch the oversight board meetings, we've been asked to share this with all of the advisory boards, uh, related to the, uh, Broward County commission. When you pay property taxes, uh, a quarter of each dollar is coming back to Broward County and Broward County general services. And the Broward County general services that are highlighted here on the subsequent slide bulleted on the upper right are the areas of Broward County's lines of business that are supported by that quarter. And so, you know, I just think it's important that everyone understands that Broward County is very large. Yes, it's a, you know, $8 billion entity, but a great deal of that $8 billion is utilized for very specific purposes, no different than the transportation sales surtax can only be used for the eligible purposes under the statute. So if we're looking at how we're going to be able to provide parks and libraries and human services and address issues related to, uh, persons experiencing homeless and E911 and, you know, many law enforcement functions that's coming out of, um, the general fund. So I just wanted to share that with you. Uh, I know there's a lot of discussion happening, so perhaps you can help educate folks in the community when, uh, these conversations come up. Um, you know, I, this whole idea that property taxes is going to go away to me is just, uh, it's a, it's a way to discuss efficiency. It's a way to politically discuss efficiency. Right. And, um, and I, you know, and, and that's been the mantra in the last couple of years is, you know, cutting back on budgets and saving money. And Lord knows the federal government spends so much money to no matter who's in charge that it starts to weigh heavily on the taxpayer. So, uh, when the governor, the governor's office and the state want to talk about these kinds of things, it's easy to say it. And I think it shines a light on efficiency. And this response is actually kind of enlightening and it kind of helps. So even though it might be politically, uh, uh, charged, it's still does make people start looking at efficiencies or, Hey, where are we spending our money? And, and now the public is getting to know those things because it's forcing the conversation. So I don't think property tax, I don't think there's a replacement for property taxes. So I don't ever think that that's going to go away, but I also don't think it's terrible that we now are seeing this. I don't think a lot. I knew that the school board eats up probably the majority of the, of the property tax and that the hospitals collect a bunch, uh, and that the municipalities collect their share from the property tax, that it's not just the county. I knew that, but probably not many people in the county do know that they probably think they're paying property tax and it's all going to the county. So I think it's pretty healthy conversation. Uh, and, um, and, and the mayor has been uh, responding, uh, to, to the efficiencies of Broward County. And so I think it's, it's brought up, it's kind of bubbled up a lot of conversation. I think it's probably a good thing because people do get wary of, of, of where their taxes are being spent. But like I said, I can you imagine where they would get, how they would pay for bills if you got rid of property taxes, it would just not going to happen. Okay. Uh, Phil and then, uh, Doug. The question I would have for our council is if this goes to eventually to something on the ballot relative to, uh, the elimination or options for property taxes, is, are there any restrictions on us as board members as it relates to educational matters, uh, of how the money is being spent or being faced for, uh, outcomes of the overall program? So, I mean, you're utilizing resources of this board and in two terms of educating the public, or I just want to know if there's any kind of limits. Um, yes, uh, on, uh, Mr. Allen, there are a number of limitations by statute that have recently been imposed on local governments associated with both advocacy and education on ballot questions. Um, the state has no such restrictions, uh, regarding those issues and can elect to spend money, uh, with regards to ballot amendments. Uh, prior to any, uh, bill having been passed or a question having been finalized for the ballot, um, you as individual board members, the county commission, local governments have the ability to talk about the ramifications and, and to some extent expend some resources, uh, talking about the potential ramifications of the various, uh, proposals that are out there. But when there is in fact a ballot question that has been finalized and is going on the ballot, uh, local governments, uh, are prohibited from expending any public resources on advocacy or educational materials. They are permitted to have a quest. They are permitted to respond to inquiries from the public and to some extent have a website that has an FAQ kind of, uh, component to it. Individuals who are elected officials or serving on boards always have a first amendment right to speak about those particular items, but there is a statutory prohibition on local governments, uh, using public resources regarding these things. So, um, there is no ballot question that has been finalized. Uh, we don't know what or how many of them are going on the ballot. The governor has recently stated that the property tax elimination is going on the ballot. Um, that is one of the seven proposals that the, the, the legislative committee did discuss and, uh, the speaker published last week along with a number of others that range from, um, you know, expansions of homestead, uh, on the bottom end to straight up elimination of ad valorem taxes on the top end, uh, with certain carve outs. Does the federal hatch act apply to our activity? We have, we have the little hatch act in Florida, um, which tracks very similarly, uh, uh, the federal hatch act and I'm more than happy to discuss that with the board members individually, uh, offline. Uh, but again, you do retain a first amendment right to speak with regards to, uh, issues as long as they are, including political issues, as long as it is not, uh, utilizing public resources. So, Ms. Jerry. Go ahead. Oh, just to follow, follow up on Alan. This is an excellent chart. I don't know whether it should go in our Ms. Wilson's sales pitch or it should go on the side of our buses. Uh, I wish I, yeah, I want to put this, but my real question is, uh, we have, we have obviously have the surtax dollars besides this money, correct? Yes. And is it 1% or is it 3% or is it what? I'm just curious. In other words. So, so property taxes are based on the millage rate and they're completely separate and distinct. No, no, I understand. But my point was, here's, here's all the money that you're paying in your taxes, but only this much of it is really going to Broward County to pay for these other things. You know, the surtax is over and above this, correct? Is it, is it 1% of the county's budget or is it, I was just trying to get a handle on the surtax itself? The money that's coming in for surtax is X. The county's budget is Y. What is, if, if you'd have to look in the county's budget going to hospitals is, are we getting an extra one or two or three or four percent? I see what you're asking, but that's a, we would have to run that analysis because the way that our budget is actually built, we have two separate budgets. So there's an operating budget and a capital budget. All of the transportation surtax, all of it is in the capital adopted budget. The property taxes and the lines of business that are supported by property taxes are in the operating budget. So they're, they're not even mixed together. It's a difficult analysis, but we can do it for you. And we'll save time. I'll meet with you later on that. Okay. Thank you. Gretchen, I had one question. Is this going to be talked about or we just put in here as auxiliary information? I put it in there as, as just for your information. I was not planning to have a discussion about it unless you wanted to. We don't need to discuss. I just had one thing I wanted to note about it. The importance of getting these metrics in that dashboard is so, I mean, you're doing it at the right time because if the Sun Sentinel was willing to publish a piece criticizing the effectiveness and the efficiency of the surtax, I think it's a good time to be showing metric backs. I mean, he, he literally quotes seven years later, where's that light rail? Do you feel the roads are better and less congested? So there's obviously a public sentiment enough that the Sun Sentinel decided to run this piece. I think it's good that we do what we do. I just like to remind you that the Sun Sentinel ran a lot of pieces and op-eds opposing the surtax before we got it passed. So I'm not particularly surprised. I'm not. Yeah, I'm not. The Sun Sentinel opinion department is not, but. All right. So Gretchen, did you want to get into the calendar? I would love to. Let's do that. So it's that time of year again, everyone. I hope you brought your calendars. For those of you that went, that chose to have briefings, we did let you know that this was going to be something that we were going to do today so that we can get a sense of the cadence for our meetings in 2026. And we are following the same methodology that we did last year. It seemed to work well. We'll pick a meeting date, but we'll have a backup meeting date. Roy will put both dates on your calendar to hold them and then release them. Once we have clarity that we are going to have a quorum for those meetings. So since we are meeting in December, Madam Chair and oversight board members, we are proposing that our first meeting in 2026 be in February, but early February, we will be in the middle of the legislative session. So there will likely be quite a bit to talk about legislative session at state level begins in January and it will end in March. So we're proposing to meet on Friday, February 6th as our main meeting date with a backup date of the 13th. No problems there for me. Does anyone on the oversight board foresee an issue with meeting on February 6th? Madam Chair, may I move on? Yes. Okay. The 13th as a backup date is not looking good for one member. Anyone else having issues with the 13th? I'm good. I'm good. I think nobody else. And as long as we, I'll just remind everyone, as long as we have a physical quorum based on your current administrative code bylaws, we can allow for virtual participation. So that would make it easier for you, Mr. Hooker. So we'll move on to April. We are proposing the main meeting date of April 24th. Good for me. Does anyone have any concerns with April 24th? Travel, other obligations? Okay. Our alternative date. Alan, Alan, are you? I hear it moaning over here. Well, does everyone find the process of us sending Outlook invitations to try to block your calendar and remind you that there is an oversight board meeting helpful? Okay. Good. Okay. So we'll do that. And we'll do that for April 24th. And we'll have a backup tentative date of May 1st. Okay. And then, as is typical, unless we need to, we will not meet again until August. That will allow us to, from the county and city standpoint, do our budgets, get our recommended budgets together for you. Again, just a reminder, the county releases their recommended capital budget on July 15th. And then we put together your oversight board materials for August after that time. That's why you see the date a little bit later in August. So we're proposing a single meeting. This is the one part that might be controversial. So we're proposing a single meeting that would have both the workshop and the regular action items in a single day. It's a long day. For a couple years, we broke it up because folks were saying, you know, six, seven hour days, too much. But it seemed to work well. And we got some good feedback from the majority of the members that they would prefer to do one meeting in August rather than two. So that's what we're proposing. Does anyone have a concern with going to a single meeting, workshop in the morning, action items in the afternoon? No. Five year plan as well in the afternoon. Okay. So we'll right now, we don't have a backup. Well, we could come up with a backup. But the backup would probably be in order for us to meet the county commission deadlines, the backup would probably not be a Friday. It would probably be the 17th or 18th or 19th. 17th would be the backup, Roy is telling me. Are we good with that? Okay. So you got the 17th. And then our next meeting that we're proposing would be November 6th. Backup would be Friday the 13th. Yes. Hearing no issues. All right. So we're through. Now we do have some proposed holds. The reason that we are proposing some additional holds is again because of legislative session ending in March. We're proposing a hold at the end of March in the event that there are legislative issues that need to be discussed or addressed immediately with the board. Also at the end of September, after the county commission acts on their budget, back to the issue of property taxes potentially being on the ballot in November, this would be an opportunity for us to discuss if there and I, I'm not going to get into it a lot because I don't have enough data. But the impacts of last year's legislation on surtax revenues may be something that we need to talk about as we have more data because last year's legislation went into effect on July 1st and that eliminates sales tax on certain commercial real estate transactions rent. So that is expected to have a pretty significant impact on sales tax revenues. So as we see trends in our own revenue projections, we may very well want to come back and have a conversation with you about that as well. And then if we decide that we'd like to have a retreat, as we often have in the past in December, I will just have the December 11th as an option of this year or next next year. This is all 2026. Okay, good. We have a meeting right now. It looks like our meeting is early November, so November 6th. So if there was the need for a retreat or a desired retreat or even a workshop, I know I've heard from several of the members that don't need to have a quorum. Maybe we just want to have a discussion about some specific issues. Maybe we want to get more in depth on some metrics. We could do that in December. Okay. All right. Okay. So we're at this point where we could take a break. And so just by show of hands, let me know if you want to take a quick break or we could just power through. We just have about, I don't know, four agenda items that we could just go through and be done. Have lunch and call it a day. So good. All right. All right. Let's move it then. We need a motion to approve the minutes. Can I get a motion? I make a motion to second. All in favor. Awesome. Let the record reflect. No, we have a second. Doug. Doug. All right. Thank you. All right. So our next motion. I apologize, manager. If everyone could please make their votes audible for the record, just so that we have that. All right. We'll do this again. May I have a motion to approve the minutes? So moved. Second. All in favor. So it's moved by Mr. Hooper and it's seconded by Mr. Coleman for the recorder. All in favor. Aye. Aye. Keep putting it on. It seemed to have been doing something. Oh, okay. Well, for those who are here. All right. So our next motion item is to approve the city of Pembroke Pines request to convert design phase funding in the amount of $664,000 plus to construction phase funding awarded in a maximum not to exceed the amount of $3,000,000 plus for fiscal programming year 2026 for a municipal capital project. Do we have need for any discussion on this project? This is something I believe that came before us before. So go ahead, Alan. I just like to make a motion to approve this. I think that, uh, uh, shifting from, uh, design to construction phase is okay with, in my opinion. So I'd like to make a motion to approve it. I'll second that motion. All right. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. All mics are all noted. Um, okay. Now, um, next item, uh, is to, uh, Broward County Transportation Department's decision to deliver the city of Sunrise's municipal capital project and potentially reallocating, uh, 1.1 million plus in design phase funding to 8 million in construction phase funding to the Oakland Park Boulevard bus rapid transit project, uh, subject to additional negotiations and legal review. Uh, do we have any discussion on this? Any comments? And this is just a notation for the record. There's no motion that's required for either of the two remaining items. Oh, that was my question because it said, it says that it's subject to additional negotiations. Yes. The, the city has not, uh, entered into, uh, a final contract with regards to these projects, the county's decision to, uh, deliver them. There will be additional discussions with the city, uh, and, and appropriate agreements executed in connection with, uh, combining what they were going to be doing with the BRT project along Oakland Park Boulevard. Um, I'll be certainly happy to give an update at the next meeting, uh, as to where that stands. Uh, I don't, I have not spoken with BCT regarding this project. Uh, and I don't think that they're at the stage where they're ready to begin those negotiations, but I'll be happy to give an update at the next meeting. Okay. I'm not sure what we're supposed to do if we don't make a motion, but I'm glad to see the cycle one funding taken care of. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Um, so we're, we're not making any real decision on this. So, and I think this is same for the other item, motion of note for the record, adding cert tax funding from existing county public works project cost savings in the amount of, uh, 314,000, um, plus to act as leverage to a shared use path project along Riverland wood parks park and the, um, and over the new river canal. So this is for a shared use path project. Um, I don't know, Nathaniel Gretchen, any comments on that? There's again, there's no motion required on this. If, um, Gretchen has, uh, further information that you would like, I'm sure she'll be able to give that to you. So it's really just, if there's some thought about transferring some of the surtax funding from a project. Yes. Madam chair and oversight board members. Um, this is an opportunity for us to use a small amount of surtax funding, uh, to leverage existing constitutional gas tax. That's in a project. That's actually, um, being delivered by FDOT as part of a larger project along state road, seven us four 41, uh, south of 595. So the county asked FDOT, if they could add scope to a project that was in their five-year plan, they agreed to do so. The bids came in a little high, uh, but there is cost savings in another project that you already approved that surtax funded. So this will add some leverage again to your, to your leverage report and, um, allow us to get the shared use path, uh, constructed. We absolutely love it when we are, um, leveraging cost savings in some way, um, for greater efficiency. So that is a good thing. And believe it or not, we are at that non-agenda section of our, um, our work today. Um, chair members, uh, Nathaniel Gretchen, anyone, uh, with any comments, I would like to take a moment of personal privilege to say that if you have not driven the new convention center connector, find a way to get down there. Um, having, when I left the event, uh, on Monday, uh, I used it. I even took a video of it. It was fantastic. And, but for its existence, I probably still would not be here today. Um, but it, it really is fantastic. And, uh, you know, again, I would just give shout outs to public works and everybody that was involved in that project for having it come in, uh, faster than expected and under budget. So. All right. Oh, and go ahead. I would just like to say some transit news. Um, South day bus rapid transit opened up in, in South day to Miami date. Um, you guys can Google the project. They already had the right away, so it wasn't as big of a task, but it has air conditioned stations and the stations are really nice. It opened up on Monday. They had a press event and they're using the, um, the new flyer electric buses, 60 foot lengths articulated. So it's going to be interesting to see how these electric buses perform and, uh, Miami-Dade decided to go that route. Um, a little bit of other transit news, Sunrunner, which is another BRT project, which is in St. Pete is actually getting the, um, bus rapid to getting their lanes removed, uh, from FDOT at the governor's discretion because the transit project wasn't meeting the minimum requirements of, uh, throughput. So I think this is something we need to be aware of that the state is actively trying to remove BRT projects because we're actually trying to expand BRT projects. Um, do we know the reason? Um, yeah. So the ridership wasn't necessarily high enough. There's reasons why the ridership wasn't high enough, particularly probably land use reasons is that St. Pete, the County of St. Pete wasn't correctly building the land use to encourage more ridership. I don't know exactly why, but ultimately the state deemed it that they didn't get a lane anymore. Are there guidelines that the state is using to determine? So this is another thing I was going to say yesterday. I was at the five year work program for FDOT district four, and I'm not going to repeat names or say anyone was officially on the record, but as I was talking to FDOT staff last night about some of the BRT lanes, um, it's going to be interesting. Our BRTs like an Oakland park and stuff meet the criteria to not have their own lane, but to be qualified and looked at by central office in Tallahassee. But it seems like Tallahassee hasn't given the exact direction yet regarding what will and what not. So it puts a lot in the flimsy. And I would like you chair and I like the board to see if it's you guys. I would personally prefer to start seeing quarterly reports. It doesn't have to be from Mrs. Lonegan herself, but I would like a representative from BCT to be here to tell us the status of all the primo projects at every single meeting going forward. It's a huge amount of money going to these projects and we're working in a state with a very political sensitive environment to these kinds of projects. And the reason I say this is this kind of brings me to my second point is that recently there had some changes with Broward bus service. So I'm part of a riders network and we communicate on groups. And so the breeze buses were cut back. So we had service cuts on the breezes, which are the express routes on 441 and US-1. And then recently we shift the scheduling of Route 72, which is our future Oakland Park BRT, which carries 6,000 riders a day. And we moved that from a 20 minute frequency to a 28 minute frequency. This would just happen. I think the changes go into Sunday. So I don't understand why BCT is doing that. They're probably having some type of bus or labor constraints, but I would like them to be here to talk to us so we understand as a board why, in my mind, that route should be getting more frequency so we can keep juicing that number. So when we do our application, it looks good to the state. And they're like, hey, you know what? You guys keep growing this route. So I'm not understanding some of their operational decisions. And again, this is surtax money. So I would like I would like them to come quarterly if you guys would like that. All right. Can we make that happen? We can make the request. So I just want to make sure that I mentioned that we did meet with Ms. Lonergan and you did bring those issues up to her. So she is aware of your concerns, right? Like you and I. Yeah. So I did want to, yes, just so you guys know, because of some things I was talking about with the bus service route and stuff, Ms. Lonergan asked me to meet with Gretchen and Roy, and it was a very productive meeting where she kind of hashed out. We kind of opened up and explored some things that I was having. I wasn't really understanding what was happening at BCT's level, but big project and operational. I really would like to see them coming to us quarterly. I would like to see how many revenue hours they're doing quarterly. And I'd also like to see year over year improvements on every single one of their routes. I think we're the ones as an oversight, because so much money is flowing to them, we should be looking into that. Well, she does come in and provide frequent reports. I'm not sure what the cadence is exactly, but I know we see her with some frequency. So, Madam Chair, as part of my report to you all, I was just going to mention what the agenda is currently set at for December and make sure that there wasn't anything that I was missing based on the discussion. One of the items for December is an update on the comprehensive operational analysis from BCT. Another is an update on the PRIMO plan from BCT. When they have updates to provide, similar to the situation with Mr. Gale, you know, they will come and provide them if there is something to provide. With respect to the comprehensive operational analysis, I know that, you know, we also had a conversation about that when we met with General Manager Lonergan and some of the ridership information that's being requested is very much reliant on the comprehensive operational analysis being completed and implemented. If it is the will of the board and the consensus of the board that BCT provide more frequent updates, then, you know, I would just be looking for some direction on that before I share that with Ms. Lonergan. Well, I'm trying to remember how frequently she comes. I know, just like when Sandy was here, he was coming with some frequency. I believe she comes at the same level. Maybe every other meeting or probably even more than that. But it depends on how many meetings we have in a year. But they have tended, BCT has tended to be here for at least, I'd say 75% of the meetings and making presentations. Right. Yeah. From my perspective, it's not just so you understand, chair. It's not that I would like an in-depth presentation from BCT. I would like them kind of how they do it for the equivalent of our group in Miami, the CITT, the Citizens Independent Transportation Trust. Maybe like just a grid format of all the different things they're working on, comprehensive operational analysis, BRT, LRT, bus facilities like Copen's, and just a quick update. This is what's holding us up. This is what's not holding us up. We're pushing forward here. We see troubleshooting there just so we start bringing these really large expenditures out into the public. We're getting a lot of info, a lot of metrics tracked on them. It's just going to help us make a better case when this comes and goes. This is just a lesson from Miami-Dade County and how they ran their program. And nobody could understand why nothing came out of it. And it was a huge thing. And the Miami-Dade County voters do not like, I don't know the polling, but they do not like their surtax because it didn't deliver results. So I want to make sure we can keep it on track to deliver results or at least deliver transparency. So that's it. Sure. So I know our program is definitely delivering results. We heard quite a bit of that today. So I want to celebrate that. And I also don't want to create bottleneck work environment for the team at BCT having to do a lot of redundant work because they are coming here and making reports. I think what might be critical is for us to be more specific in terms of what we are looking for in these reports. I don't know. Sometimes trying to measure impact in very short timelines don't always give you the kind of substantive information that you need. And so I don't necessarily think every three months, I know it creates a lot of work for team members, but to have a report every three months because the data may not be always so timely in whatever you're trying to measure in terms of impact or the lack of impact in terms in whichever area. I think the focus is, and maybe give some thought to this, and we all can think about it. What exactly or what more do we want BCT to report on? What more? If it's about safety concerns? If it's about fiscal efficiencies? Let's see. Because I know that they're here with some frequency already. So I don't want to add, you know, another layer of obligation because it means that either we are having to meet every three months to hear this report. And if it's an emailed document, who's going to decipher that for some of us who may not be as, you know, transit savvy as you are in terms of assessing that information. So I want us to be careful or be mindful that we're not creating inefficiencies by just overburdening the system with additional requests. Well, since Madam Chair, Oversight Board members, she will be here in December, perhaps you can think about the types of things that you would like to have reported and the cadence of that and have a discussion with General Manager Lonergan at that time. So, I mean, it's a good cautionary tale, you know, whatever is happening in Dade County or in other counties for us to pay attention to it. But I don't necessarily want to do a knee jerk reaction on it. Let's just cautiously move forward. I think her reports have always been very detailed. And anyway, we look forward to that meeting in December. Anyone else? So in any. Go ahead. No, did any of our oversight board members have a report? Have what report? Did anyone else want to speak before I get my report? I wanted to find a change. Well, anybody else? I'd like to see. Go ahead. You know, the reason this board is here is to oversee. So I think it's not a big ask to ask BCT to come. We were charged with being the oversight board. There's a ton of money being flowed into transportation. And at the very least, BCT can come to our meetings, somebody, a representative and answer questions on where the big buckets of money are being spent. I don't think it takes a lot of time. And certainly I'd rather do that than just go over four motions or just marketing. I think the most important thing is our oversight and where the money is being spent. So I don't disagree. I don't know how much into the minutia we need to get into, but certainly the big buckets of money would matter to me. And I believe, and Gretchen, I don't know, I think, can we get an idea of how frequently Ms. Lonegan has been here? She's been here a lot. And so I don't want to discredit that. She has been here to a lot of our board meetings sharing detailed information about the work that's being done. So I don't want to take that away. It's being done. So if there is additional information that we think we need her to add to her report, then let's ask for that. I think really what's being talked about here a lot is ridership, right, usage. So there is a risk. It's kind of, we've said this before, it's like, if you build it, they will come type of mentality. I think this is something for us to really keep an eye on, right? Because there's a huge investment going into bus, right, and rapid transit. So I think that's the area that's being kind of called out. I mean, and the fact that the state is going to be hawkish on that. So that brings in a different dynamic. And I think it's smart that we get ahead of that and potentially challenge these ideas about resources matching with ridership. Because at the end of the day, if you don't get there, then maybe things do have to shift. And it was also brought up that there seems to be the reverse, at least question out there, where you have the ridership and that seems to be being cut. And maybe there's, or changed, and maybe there's an explanation for that. But that, I think, you know, tying in ridership with expense, right? And at some point, those projections have to start coming out. I mean, we've been doing this for years, so it can't always be in the future. So I think it's smart for us to think about this. Absolutely. And so, I mean, more specifically, I would want to know what metric is the state using to determine how are they evaluating the level of ridership, right? I mean, that would be something I would want Ms. Lonergan to provide for us. It's not to discredit. I think your suggestions are totally on point in looking at what's happening across the state and for us to pay attention to it. But as we're doing that, I'm just saying, let's not create additional work to the point where our staff at the county can't move forward with projects because we're just, we want to report every month, right? And it doesn't really measure anything. So give them the space to do the work that they need to do and the timeline of a monthly report or a quarterly report won't necessarily reveal anything is what I'm saying, right? But let's be very specific and intentional about what we're asking. So anyone else? No. You're going to go ahead and then close out. So for the December 12th meeting, we have updates and presentations scheduled from Public Works and Environmental Services, the Sheridan Street Expansion Project, as well as Public Comment. We will also be introducing you to the new assistant county administrator that's overseeing Public Works and Environmental Services. As I mentioned, transportation will be here. And I did want to also invite those of you that might not have seen it to look at the BCT annual report that's in your binder. It does have some writership and financial information in there. We will then be bringing you the internal dashboards and the metrics, and we'll add a discussion item related specifically to additional performance metrics or outputs that you would like to see us tracking. Did I miss anything? Did I miss anything? Okay. No. All right. And so just before we close, I just wanted to say thank you again to all of our board members. It's time out of your busy days, extra effort being made to research information that is important to our residents here in Broward County. All of that is appreciated. So I just, at every meeting, want to take the time to just thank you for your service and the sacrifice. And, of course, to our staff at Broward County. I know there's a lot of work that goes behind preparing for these meetings. I know. And coming in and making reports and so on and so forth. And I want to thank you for that. And then, of course, you know, residents who come in to make public comments. It takes a lot of courage to make those statements. And, you know, Doug, I appreciate you asking Aretha this morning to just talk to us because it can be a nerve-wracking affair for the individual who's doing it. And we want our residents in Broward County to know that we are here. And we are all advocates in our own rights for different things. We are appointed to this board because of our special interest in certain areas. And we want to be your advocate. And I want you to know that we welcome those public comments every single time we meet. And we will continue to fight the good fight for you. But we also want to recognize that we have a county that is supportive of this work. We were all appointed because the county saw fit to create this oversight board because they also wanted to be intentional about making sure that there was good stewardship in the way the dollars were being spent. And so I just wanted to underscore that and to just thank everybody for their participation in wanting to make Broward County the best place to live. Thank you. All right. And I'd like to take a motion, get a motion for us to adjourn. So moved. Second. All in favor. All right. Lunchtime. Thank you.