Thank you for joining us. We're going to give it
about a minute for folks to just settle down. We
are going to get started. Thank you.
I'm hearing in parents, so I wanted to see if
we might be able to get the volume turned up
a little bit. Please. Thank you for making that request,
Dr. Audi. Is that possible? I can hear it. Can
you hear now. Yeah. OK, perfect. Thank you. And it
is a reminder that we should, when we speak, try
to speak a little bit slowly for if we have
any translators or folks that are hearing impaired. Thank you.
Ok, let's get started. Happy Friday to everyone and thank
you for joining us for this important task force, meaning
of the South County Higher Education planning task force. This
is our second meeting, and we have quite an agenda
this morning. Just to kind of orient everyone before we
do roll call. The task force discussion today is pretty
substantive. Today, we turn to one of the most consequential
questions before this task force. The governance choices that will
shape how the university district at Trulvista moves from planning
toward formation and operation. And as the materials themselves recognize
today is a starting point rather than a final word
on governance. Unless there is strong consensus among the task
force that we are ready to move forward with a
recommendation or recommendations. But our goal is to understand the
choices before us, identify the principles that should guide our
evaluation, provide direction on the approaches that warrant further development,
and distinguish between areas of emerging agreement and questions that
may require additional analysis before the task force makes recommendations
to the legislature. I will try to manage this discussion,
but I want members to feel open and with curiosity
with a sense of purpose of this meeting. And so
looking forward to all of everyone's perspectives in this meeting
today. And so with that, I'm going to request, roll
call to be called, thank you. Yes, member Aguirre. Present.
Member Allen. Present. Member on Guyano. Member Aronsed Bia.
I'm sorry. President. Member in Carnesian. Present. Member Falcon. Present.
Remember grave. Member Jones. Present.
Memberedesma. Present. Member Malcolm.
Remember more? Present. I understand member Sanchez's absent. And member
tongue. Present.
Okay. Thank you very much. Before we get to public
comment, let's move forward with an approval of the May
1st minutes, which is found in our consent calendar. May
I actually, do we have public comment first on that
item. None? Okay. If there are any questions or comments
from the dais or a motion, I'll take that now.
Motion to approve. Okay. Motion made by member, Allen, second
bye. Membered on CBA. All in favor. Aye. Aye. Any
opposed? Aye. Thank you. Any abstentions. Okay. The minutes from
May 1. Meeting are approved. Before we move forward, we
have one speaker slip for public comment. And I'd like
to invite Orlando, he sent it to come up to
the podium. To make your comment. Thanks for being here.
Good morning task force members. My name is Orlando. I'm
the student trustee at Southwestern College. And I'm here in
full support. And on behalf of all the students that
I represent, thank you. I've been volunteering alongside Marlene since
May. So I've seen firsthand just how much work you
guys are putting in to get this university bill. But
to ensure that this is an absolute success. We have
to talk about who actually runs it. When these multi
agency districts are built, the board seats are naturally go
to city council members, mayors and university administrators. And if
a student is included at all, it almost always defaults
to a non - voting advisory vote. And as you
draft your final recommendations, my strongest request today is that
you include a permanent voting student trustee on the UDCV
governing board. I see the value of a student vote
firsthand at Southwestern College. And a board of officials is
powerful. A board with a student vote is tied to
the reality of the students. We are the ones who
will actually live with the decisions that you guys make.
And we know exactly what resources and support systems our
classmates need to graduate. And while you're designing this university
to keep the local talential Avista, guarantee a permanent student
vote in your governance structure and let us help you
build the university that truly serves South County. Thank you.
Thank you for your perspective and for being here. All
right, next item update on the task force activities. Do
we ever speaker? Yes. Ms. Garcia. Thank you. Good morning
task force members chair Falcon. This is indeed an important
discussion. It's our second meeting of four meetings. And so
we, you have noted that the agenda is chock full
of information. And there is a lot you'll be considering.
Governance, as mentioned by the chair is in fact probably
one of the more complex and significant issues you'll be
addressing because it really sets the foundation for the long
- term planning. Well, also thinking about where we are
today and how we take that first step. So it's
really important, the deliberations and the materials that you have
been absorbing in preparation for this discussion. I want to
recognize that the staff have scanned national models and looked
at California models. And there is no other entity that
is attempting to do what we're trying to do. So
we are doing something truly exceptional, unique. And certainly important
for this community. So thank you. Since our last meeting
though, we have been working very hard on other activities
related to the three task force pillars of land use
governance and finance. And I'm just want to kind of
give you a quick update on where we're having conversations
and where we're making inroads. Um, the first one is
binational roundtable. We are privileged to have been able to
meet with binational higher education experts, have lots of conversations
of trying to understand the question of what does it
really mean to have a university with a binational dimension
by design. And that really is the key, that it's
actually envisioned as part of the structure in the system.
So you'll be hearing today from representatives from that group.
And there were 20 plus individuals who met with us
and gave their thoughts and really gave a lot of
thought to how we designed something together. The second update
is of community forum we held on July 25th. This,
we had no idea how the community was going to
respond, but we were just so pleased that 60 plus
people showed up for the community meeting. And they were
genuine community people who are excited. And enthusiastic about this
university. And as I was reading through their comments, many
of them left comments, um, they were all saying things
like we're so excited about this happening in our community.
How can I help? How can I be more engaged?
I want to know more about this. So we've really
are trying to build a community outreach effort that can
engage community their thoughts, their ideas, because they had a
lot of great ideas that they surfaced at the, uh,
at the forum. But the highlight of the form was
the students. We had a student panel. And the students
really brought it all home. They talked about what it's
like in the South Bay and in the Baja Gali,
the Calibaja area trying to get a degree and education.
They said things like, I spent hours on the bus
just to get to class. I crossed the border every
day so I can earn my degree. I need to
stay close to home because my family needs me. These
are real heartfelt feelings that the students bring with them.
And they are so excited about having a university that
is within close proximity to their families and to their
homes and to their work. Because of the importance of
community engagement, it is established, it is actually a provision
within AB 662 to engage the community. We're trying to
define what that looks like. And I'm really pleased to
announce that, uh, we've been talking to a lot of
philanthropic entities, but we recently received a pledge from the
James Irvine Foundation that they're going to give us 50,
000 dollars to engage in some community outreach now as
soon as possible to build on the work of a
task force. Because the number one issue we're hearing is
awareness. We need to get the word out. So more
people understand the incredible work that's being done here in
Chula Vista. So the more to come on that. And
I really want to thank you to the Irvine Foundation
and to college futures. The other philanthropic organization that has
contributed and is continuing to contribute to, um, consultant support
to help us with these very challenging and important issues.
The last thing is that I'd like to mention is
we are also reaching out to the business community because
after all this institution is going to be designing academic
programs that are career - lined, that there produced jobs
at the end for our students. So we have to
be communicating closely with the business community. So working with
the city's economic development, director and others were scheduling a
couple of business meetings to come in the next month.
One is going to be a luncheon here in Chula
Vista with co - hosting it with the Chula Vista
City, the Chula Vista Chamber of Commerce. And we'll be
giving an update on the task force and also the
vision behind the university district at Chula Vista. You'll all
be invited if you're available and interested. And it'll be
an important discussion to hear from local business entities. Um,
we are also planning another business roundtable discussion with San
Diego business leaders at large economic development leaders at large.
We are still firming up the last details, but you'll
be hearing more about that. But I think that most
important thing is that we hear these perspectives that we
get out beyond and understand how this, what we're creating
is bigger than just a university. It is an economic
development opportunity that helps people connect people to jobs, but
also increases, um, local prosperity and opens access to higher
education. We are doing everything we can to hear those
comments, to bring it to you and to certainly to
reflect that in the final report. The business community will
have two representatives that it sends to your November meeting
when you are talking about finance and to talk about
their perspective and their suggestions for what you might want
to consider to intentionally build a connection with workforce, um,
from the beginning. So that's my report. And we're really
excited about, uh, what you're all going to discuss today
and the commitment you've all, um, demonstrated and being part
of this effort. So thank you very much. I'm happy
to answer questions. Thank you, Marlene. And first of all,
before I open it up to questions and comments, I
just want to thank you, um, and the city staff
and your fellow consultant team, um, for all the substantive
preparation and all the work that you've done in the
interim between the first and second meeting and really reframing
the work that that's been done and the vision work
as well as, um, the very successful community form that
took place very recently. So thank you. Any questions or
comments from the dais on, Marlene's presentation. Okay. Thank you.
I'd like to now call up Marty Alvarado of Sova.
And Marty will be providing us an update on the
vision framework. So and then following that will be Adriana
Rolf. Good morning. Uh, good morning. Uh, thank you for
letting me join you this morning. I am here to
provide a very brief update on the vision mission defining
characteristics document. Uh, as you may recall at our last
meeting, we introduced a draft, uh, prototype of the vision,
mission, defining framework document. Uh, the intent was to introduce
the content, solicit feedback, provide time for reflection. There was
a feedback form that was provided where we gathered all
of your, um, perspective and recommended edits and acknowledgments of
the content. Thank you to everyone who participated and to
the really robust feedback. Really appreciate it. Um, as a
result of that feedback, we have gone through and made
refinements of the document, uh, and the content. Some of
it was minor, minor word changes, language changes, but we
wanted to bring back to, uh, the group four, if
you will, four distinct highlights. Just to call your attention
to some of the more substantive changes. First, we really
went through and tried to, um, sure that we were
explicit about the nature of expectation for collaboration. This was
a key point of feedback from members that they wanted
it to be clear that this is not just, uh,
every man for himself, uh, at the site, but very
much, uh, coalition of the willing who want to engage
in joint partnership and really have a vested interest in
the endeavor. We also clarified the adaptive, excuse me, additive,
not competing. And so really trying to make explicit that
this was intended to be something that was added to
California's higher education ecosystem, not designed to compete with our
existing institutions across the region. We also made sure that
we were here making explicit the adaptive and accountable, that
the expectation for the endeavor was that it was going
to continue to evolve, uh, be adaptive, uh, make explicit
the use of technology AI and different resources so that
the enterprise was responsive to the changing landscape impacting higher
education. And then lastly, we tried to clarify some language,
really holding onto the concept of a learning society and
a learning sector that is rooted in the research. But
really, uh, bringing back language that is much more familiar
in terms of lifelong learning infrastructure. Because what we are
talking about is an enterprise that is serving the community,
uh, at any stage of their educational journey. And so
really, uh, really leaning into lifelong learning infrastructure language and
the ecosystem of partnership language. Uh, so those were the
four big substantive changes, if you will. Again, very minor,
uh, really grateful for all of the thoughtful feedback, uh,
that really, um, reinforced the members'commitment to the transformative and
sort of future forward orientation of the vision mission and
defining characteristics document. Any questions. Do you have a question
from Dr. Enkartasian? Thank you, Chair. I have one question
that doesn't have to be answered today because I think
we are short on time. But something to think about
moving forward, um, the additive by design is very familiar
to us at the University Center as we embark on
partnerships and collaborations with our university partners. And it's, it's
truly, um, important when you're collaborating, um, I think it
would be really good to go back. And I'd be
curious what the city thinks about additive by design in
this location city land. I know that there has been
really a focus on being able to recruit universities and
not being boxed into what universities you recruit over the
decades, additive by design. We have a community college. We
have adult schools. We have private and public universities all
in this region. If we are going to add to
it and not duplicate, that means we can't recruit any
universities. Um, because we have all of the programs we
have certificate. We have community - based learning. We have
credit for prior learning. We have research institutions. So more
maybe diving in with the city too and what it
means to them and their recruitment efforts because of economic
development. So again, doesn't have to be answered today, but
maybe like really looking at that additive by design and
non - duplication and non - competing. What does that
mean in terms of economic development, business recruitment, business development
and really integrating a robust ecosystem of higher education that
also integrates with economic development? Right. Love it. Um, no,
no answer to that, if you will. But I think
it's valuable to note that when we're thinking about additive
by design and really valuable for the conversation to come
around governance is non - competition is also not the
same as non - additive, right? And so I think
it's really thinking about the population that needs to be
served in the region and how does this endeavor create
an additive environment for the individuals in the region who
are currently underserved, right? As a population. And so I
think that that'll be an important sort of framing to
wrestle with as you all get into the governance content.
But thank you for that feedback. Definitely making a note
of it. Great. Thank you. Um, any other comments or
questions from members. Okay. Thank you for your comments and
for your response. Yes. Dr. out on sevia. I want
to circle back to Ms. Garcia's points. Yeah. I think
your mic is not on. Is it out now? There
you go. Okay. I want to circle back to the
points that, uh, Marlene gave me about awareness. I think
that needs to be somewhat circled back here. Cause I
think this is one of the things that within division
framework, I think needs to be kind of put out
there. It seems to me that, um. Again, it's like,
this is one of the things about nuts and bolts
and putting the cart before the horse. I think the
awareness part of this and being able to have that
as part of the vision to make sure that the
students know that we're exploring options for this kind of,
uh, access for the folks that aren't used to having
access. Does that make sense? I mean, I hope that
the awareness component needs to be also engaged, I think,
if that makes sense. That's not just even the clarifying
question on that one. By awareness, are we thinking communication
outreach marketing, all of those pieces? Yeah, it's also a
self - fulfilling prophecy, right? In the sense that the.
One of the things I keep hearing is the cost.
The cost, the cost, the locale affects cost. And then,
I mean, I have kid in college. Cost is expensive,
you know, so it's kind of like, how are we
communicating and providing awareness that this will reduce the cost.
For students? And how involve access. I think that's, that's
one of the things I think might be just an
important thing to kind of consider. This is so good.
And let me test a little bit. I started to
take up a little bit more time, but I think
this is such a important point. These two points together
because what we're, what it sounds like we're talking about
is making sure that we're being clear that this is
going to be a different kind of benefit to individuals
who come to this by reducing costs, by creating different
opportunities by making sure that this is something additive, uh,
and, uh, sort of a different experience that creates a
different access point. Is that a fair? That's absolutely what
I want. This is so good. We will definitely go
back. And this I think is a really good, uh,
example or illustration of the desired process that we're taking
in the feedback, trying to wrestle through it and, uh,
we'll keep bringing it back to you as we continue
to refine it. But thank you. Great. Yes. Dr. Encarnacion.
Only fix I want to add to that. You just
made me want to add to that. Sorry. I also
think that additive is not, um, just saying duplication. Additive
could be, and this will segue us into this governance,
I promise. Additive could be, um, not necessarily creating a
ceiling of just workforce development, just lifelong learning in terms
of creating opportunities for, um, working adults. It's still absolutely
could be what the city also has talked about is
high research universities, but creating that additive value, which is
access and affordability and ensuring the governance structure, um, requires,
um, for this entity, whatever it ends up being, um,
requires for the universities they recruit to work in some
policies that require access and affordability for our local students.
Love it. Thank you. Great discussion. Um, any other comments.
Um, yeah, so when I'm, what I'm hearing from the
both of you, uh, from member on CBN and member
in Carnacion is ensuring that, you know, that we continue
to iterate this work on vision, um, and ensuring that,
you know, we're grounded in common priorities, which I'm hearing
is access particularly to folks in our binational region as
well as, you know, ensuring that we are open to
inviting potential, um, institutions, um, have a conversation about potentially
locating, um, or having a presence in this site is
what I'm hearing. Correct. Okay. Great. Well, thank you. Um.
Next, I think is Adriana. This item before you is
a quick overview of the presentation you heard at your
last meeting. Regarding the site regarding the university district site
and infrastructure requirements, particularly as it relates to the initial
phase of development. Um, you've already heard that in 2018,
the city successfully entitled the University District site and completed
all the environmental clearances for approximately four million square feet
of academic space. 1. 6 million square feet of student
faculty and staff housing, two million square feet of market
rate residential and tumuling square feet of innovation uses. That
lays a foundation, that means the foundation has already been
laid allowing us to focus on attracting the educational institutions
and innovation partners that will bring this project this vision
to life. You also heard from Carrier Johnson, the firm
retained by the city to prepare master plan for the
first 35 acres of the university district site. As the
initial phase of development. The first phase envisions of vibrant
mixed use campus anchored by a student union approximately one
million square feet of academic research and innovation space. Uh,
2, 700 parking spaces, 10 acres of open space and
a central services facility. This slide illustrates the phasing strategy
that was discussed, which is designed to provide flexibility as
development progresses and institutional and industry partners begin to establish
a presence on site. As part of the master planning
effort, consultants developed a rough order of magnitude, construction, costs,
estimate as well. Including the necessary infrastructure. The estimated cost
to complete all phases of the initial project is approximately
2. 17 billion. And that is just a wrap up
an overview of what you heard at your last meeting,
but I wanted to refresh that, um, for new members.
And without that, we'll transition to the next agenda item.
But I'm available for any questions. Thank you, Andre. Any
questions or comments from members. Yes, member Malcolm. Welcome, by
the way. Send us, uh, digitally all those of that
information that was sent. To each of the members, please.
Yes, absolutely. Thank you. All right. Thank you. And the
other questions or comments from members. Okay. Thank you very
much. Okay. Moving on to the meat of today's meeting
is the background on governance structural considerations. And I'd like
to invite, is it Marty Alvarado again. Yeah, okay, great.
I'm going to be very quick. And we're going to
dig into this more in a future item. But as
we have been preparing, the governance recommendations for the members
to review. What we wanted to make sure we were
doing is introducing an organizational maturity framework in a way
that can help us locate some of the things that
maybe top of mind for members, uh, and where it
might be most appropriate for us to think about when
those questions or items may come up over the course
of the evolution of the organization. And so you have
in your materials and organizational framework that really places our
endeavor right now at the concept stage. And really then
beginning to transition into the formation stage. Again, we're going
to get into this more, uh, in just a moment,
uh, in a next item. But we wanted to introduce
as you go into hearing the conversation and the presentations
around the different governance vehicles, keeping in mind that currently
this endeavor is at the concept stage. And we will
be moving into a formation stage. And so we are
thinking about governance relative to what sort of emerging governance
structures are necessary as we move from an idea into
an actual formation. We are not at the mature. We
are not at the fully operational, et cetera. We are
really just trying to stand it up. And so just
wanted to, um, make sure that we are continually reinforcing
that as we think about the different structures and recommendations
needed. Thank you. Any questions or comments just on the
process that was laid out by Ms. Albrado. I do
have a question. When you're, when you say you're going
to concept to formation, can you kind of dig a
little bit deeper on that? What is the lens by
which you're evaluating each of these recommendations? So, uh, what
we were trying to do was, um, make sure that
the recommendations moving forward were appropriate for the stage at
which the entity is. So for example, um, some of
the feedback and some of the comments that have surfaced
were oriented around things like credit for prior learning. Like
we want to make sure we have credit for prior
learning infrastructure, you know, opportunities for students. That feels more
at the operating stage as opposed to we need a
board to actually figure out what this, uh, enterprise is
going to do. And then it's the responsibility of let's
say a board or some sort of governance vehicle to
be able to make those decisions and structures, if you
will. And so just trying to make sure that this
framework will help us locate where those conversations might be
most appropriate to happen as we start, um, start, uh,
very often digging into or defaulting to the operational implementation.
Okay. Thank you. We do have a speaker in the
room, Mario Lopez. Chair Falcon. Yes. And I did have
a question. Oh, yes. Of course. Dr. Moyes says. And
the framework. I appreciate the, the framework gives us a
roadmap. My question was, it's anticipated that it's going to
be a multi - institutional campus. And as such, is
it contemplated that it would be possible for different entities
or institutions to be at different stages of formation? Or
is this how rigid is it and how fluid is
it in regards to different institutions and where they're coming
in? And I want to make sure we give ourselves
flexibility. So for example, the university A who's here earlier
and they're further down the construction process. And then we
will kind of, we'll forge these academic ties as well.
But a latter point, institution B or university being that
wants to come in. Obviously they're going to have to
be at an earlier stage of this framework. I just
wanted to get an idea for the thought process. Yeah.
For the fluidity. Yeah. So I should have started by
saying, um, as we were trained by all of our
researcher colleagues, every framework is wrong. Some can be helpful.
Right. And so, uh, this is not meant to be
like rigid and now you've had it and it's going
to be compartmentalized when we moved a formation. Now we're
done. You've missed your opportunity. It is really intended to
help us have a conversation together around what this evolution
looks like. And I think what you're calling out, which
is the different places and stages that wear different entities
enter into the partnership. I think the goal, as you'll
hear from some of the binational partners and some of
the work that's happening is to be clear about where
we want to start and then really then creating the
space for the onboarding, understanding that as this enterprise matures,
there is going to be new partners, new business partners,
new education partners. And so how do we create a
structure that actually facilitates that? A governance structure that actually
facilitates that. Absolutely. Great. Any other clarifying questions before we
go to public comment. Okay. Um, Mario Lopez.
Good afternoon. Muy buenas tardes. I'm very excited to be
here. My name is Mario Lopez. I'm a private consultant.
I do cross border public affairs. And they've been in
the region for the last 25 years in different positions.
Born in Chula Vista race in Tijuana. I'm here to
say that this is very exciting. I'm very supportive. Everything
that has been common, especially on this last line item.
And this work is not only important for the cross
- border region. It's essential. It's essential because it will
unlock the future and the real potential of her cross
- border community, something that South Bay has always lived
with, I think, but it never actually has embraced as
far as action. So it really commend all the work
done. And there's about 75, 000 daily commuters. Who I
think are not necessarily aware that this great work is
being taken place. Uh, huge number of those are students.
A lot of them go to private schools that I
think should be part of this conversation. A lot of
them go to private public schools as well in different
capacities. And also it's very important to mention there are
over 30, 000 American children in the Tijuana public school
system that eventually going to make their way up north.
30, 000 because of different migration. Issues housing deportations COVID.
This is a phenomenon that we did not have in
other years backed. So this work is essential to the
future. And again, this is part of a great workforce.
It makes us unique along the U. S.- Mexico border.
It makes us, um, really harness what we can do
from both sides. So really, I'm excited about this. I'm
very supportive. A lot of people from it came to
Tijuana to support this. And I think having these conversations,
they've already had south of the border will be been
important for the project and long - term. And I
appreciate all the work and all the time, especially the
work, the great staff of the city of Chulapesa has
been doing. Thank you for your time. You got to
ask you. Thank you for being here. And I did
realize that I went out of order by opening up
to public comment, but appreciate your comments. Um, I will
now request, um, Adriana Ochoa with Snell and Wilmer to
provide the legal frame room work for consideration. Thank you.
And good morning to the task force. I'm Adriano Ochoa,
partner at Snell and Wilmer. I'm legal counsel for the
task force. And I am here to talk about the
legal frameworks and structures for governance. Just waiting for my
PowerPoint to pop up.
Thank you. Okay. So we are going to talk about,
as you know, the legal structures for the potential future
entity. The bill asks this task force to identify and
recommend government structures for the mixed use intersegmental educational facility
in Julevista. That's part of the report that has to
be transmitted next year. Uh, an overview of the legal
structure is considered the consortium model specifically addressed in the
legislation itself. A joint powers authority. MOU based coordination, new
statutory entity and a nonprofit organization are among the legal
structures that we considered when coming to the recommendation. So
first, the consortium model. An educational consortium is a partnership
where multiple schools, universities or libraries pull their resources to
expend student opportunities and reduce operational costs. Generally, this looks
like shared services agreements for facilities, library books. Um, maybe
transportation. Cross registration, meaning students enrolled at one institution can
take classes at any other member school or joint purchasing
for things like books or other technologies. Um, key features
of the consortium. It is a fundamentally a contractual arrangement
rather than the creation of a new legal entity. Uh,
this approach is flexible. It preserves each segment's existing administrative
structure while fostering collaboration. And it does not require new
enabling legislation. However, because it is contractual rather than statutory
or otherwise protected by law. This also means that a
consortium would lack the independent legal personality of a JPA
or a newly created entity or district. The consortium could
not hold property in its own name issue debt or
employee staff unless the party's designated one member as the
fiscal and administrative agent. And that puts a disproportionate amount
of risk on that entity. Also, you know, as part
of the discussion, even though it's at a future meeting,
we did talk about financing options and a consortium would
luck. The financing capacity for major capital projects. And when
you look at stuff like bonds, um, the bond markets
typically prefer a single legal entity over a web of
contractual obligations among separate institutions. The next model we considered
was a joint powers authority. Under the joint exercise of
powers act, which is in the government code, uh, participating
public agencies may create through the creation of a joint
powers agreement. A JPA or a joint powers authority to
jointly exercise powers that are common to the contracting parties.
The JPA would be a separate legal entity. That can
hold property, enter into contracts, issue debt, employee staff. And
importantly, act as a liability shield. The principal advantage of
a JPA is the institutional permanence and the unified authority
or the buy - in, as we like to say.
As a separate legal entity, uh, the JPA can, as
I said, hold title to facilities and perform a number
of tasks that no consortium or MOU would be able
to replicate without designating one member to bear disproportionate fiscal
and administrative responsibility, as well as inherent additional risk. This
independent legal disposition also positions the JPA as a single
applicant for stuff like federal and state grants. Um, and
it would capture intersegmental funding opportunities that might otherwise require
fragmented institution by institution applications. The JPA's ability to issue
revenue bonds, lease revenue bonds, cops certificates of participation and
access to Marx Roos pooled financing gives a capital market
access that consortiums or MOUs would lack entirely. JPAs are
public agencies because they're formed by public bodies. So they
would be subject to open meeting laws, public records, SEQA
and prevailing wage in the construction process. Um, we considered
the drawbacks of a JPA with your minimal loss of
an independent control among the participating agencies, but there is
a mechanism for control, which is the appointment of your
respective members on the JPA's governing board. Uh, there are
some binational considerations, which we will go over sort of
in the recommendation phase. But note that under a JPA
model, a Mexican public university would not be able to
participate as a member. Uh, and that's because they are
governed by a different set of laws of different countries
that have loss. Um, and the other federal kind of
contracting issues with states or public agencies contracting with foreign
governments. Um, but we do have a proposed solution, which
is the JPA could contract with a 501c3 nonprofit that
is operated with affiliated by our controlled by a Mexican
university. Contracts can be 50 years, right? They can be
very long. And so you could have a more permanent
partner with a Mexican university or a nonprofit that is
affiliated with the Mexican university through something like a contract.
MOU - based coordination. So MOUs or memorandums of understanding
is another model that we explored. It's less formal. Um,
it's basically a series of contracts that could govern specific
aspects of the university district. Um, space allocations scheduling, cost
sharing, program coordination and student services. No separate legal entity
would be created, which provides max flexibility for each party.
However, there are a number of limitations to this model.
Again, it lacks the institutional permanence needed for a major
capital project here. If you're talking about hundreds of millions
of dollars, um, MOUs are generally a little too loose
for that. Um, every significant decision would require each of
the parties to the MOU to go back to their
respective boards for coordination or decisions, which can slow things
down. Uh, there's no independent borrowing capacity each institution would
have to finance its own share. Um, parties can withdraw
or let agreements lapse under, for example, the JPA model
withdrawal is possible, but it's a lot harder and more
complicated. Um, things like pensions and retirement, um, uh, funds
are considered statutorily. We're us in something like an MOU
or even a consortium. They're not. Um, and there are
potentially increased aggregate costs of capital versus a consolidated entity.
The staff, when we came out on this, we thought
that an MOU would be best suited for the early
phases of collaboration as we start gathering and soliciting partners
for the university districts. Probably not appropriate for the large
- scale capital development. We also considered the new statutory
entity as a model for the task force. Um. We
could recommend new legislation, uh, for a new statutory entity.
And that could define the entities powers, membership, fiscal authority
and relationship to each participating segment. Something it could do
that a JP could not is authorized capabilities that are
not common to the constituent members. A new statutory entity
could be tailor - made for the unique university district.
And it could be granted its own express powers. So
that's a pretty rigid form of creation that you would
be recommending. Um, but this approach carries drawbacks that warrant
careful consideration. Establishing a holy new statutory entity would require
separate follow - on legislation, adding time and political certainty
beyond both the reporting deadline and the existing statute's sunset.
A new entity could impose duties on the city or
other local agencies that could generate unanticipated costs or unanticipated
outcomes. Beyond the legislative process itself, the new statutory entity
would be comparatively rigid once created. A new entity would
be harder to amend or dissolve than a consortium or
a JPA whose terms could be renegotiated directly by in
between the parties. Um, the authorizing legislation, depending on how
specific it would be, could risk duplicating or conflicting with
existing statewide governance structures or the academic. Unless the authority
is precisely carved out relative to each segment's existing governance.
Thank you. Okay. Next, uh, next we'll go to the
nonprofit. Let me see if I covered everything here. Yes,
pretty much. And the last model discussed was a nonprofit
or a 501c3 nonprofit public benefit corporation. Another, you know,
one of the, besides the JPA, the only other model
that's got a corresponding principle act in the corporations code.
It's covered by statute. Um, so this is a practical
vehicle for the binational participation where the other, um, options
are, it gets a little bit more complicated. A 501c3
could be affiliated with the Mexican university, which would enable
cross - border collaboration without triggering statutory or constitutional constraints.
Key features. So a nonprofit could be modeled on the
friends of organization structure, which is a very popular organization
structure across the country for cross - border collaboration. Um,
there's no IRC, which is the internal revenue code. There's
no federal prohibition on foreign entities creating a 501c3. There's
no residency requirements for directors. So our friends on the
Mexican University side could participate despite being Mexican national citizens
on a 501c3's board, um, to create representation. And have
their voices heard. Uh, the board would be independent and
could take on any number of different personalities, right? In
terms of how large or small it can be and
in terms of what the participation would look like. And
of course, the US board would be required to maintain
discretion and control over funds. The advantages, so this would
eliminate the public agency limitation under the joint exercise of
powers act if the 501c3 executes a contract with a
JPA. And the nonprofit would be able to receive and
hold funds in U. S. dollars and accept tax deductible
donations, which is something, for example, a JPA couldn't offer.
Um, it would insulate the JPA from foreign sovereign immunity
issues. And again, there's no need for special legislation, congressional
consent, um, or, or treaty or other considerations. Um, so
again, this is an overview of the five models that
were considered. And I think Marty is going to go
over the recommended model moving forward, but I'm happy to
answer any questions about the legal structures of the governance.
Thank you, Ms. Ochoi. And thank you for clearly laying
things out very clearly for us. Any clarifying questions before
we go to the next speaker. Yes. Dr. Jones. Dr.
Moore. As a point of clarification, um, I think I
heard that you can use both models or two or
more models or are we looking for just one. Yes.
We, uh, absolutely. And part of the recommendation is actually
almost three. It's kind of early stage MOU to recruit
and solicit partners. Then the establishment of a JPA, which
I don't want to spoiler alert, but, um, establishment of
a JPA once we have some partners that are willing
to participate in that. And then maybe or around the
same time the formation of a nonprofit so that we
can start developing the operational and by national component, um,
and longer term, you know, now we're getting into the
later parts of that maturity arc because longer term would
the JPA have perpetual life. It depends, right? Because it
depends on what we need from it. Um, there's a,
there's a situation where maybe that could happen. There's a
situation where maybe it wouldn't be necessary anymore depending on
the nonprofits. Depending on the structure of the whole university
district, um, and what happens with the land and potentially
leases. But, um, but no, you can definitely, and those
two models kind of go nicely together. The JPA with
the 501c3, both for fundraising opportunities for the Binance national
component and a number of other reasons that Marty will
articulate when we get to the recommendation. Thank you. Sure.
Dr. Moore. Yes, I have a comment on slide two.
So the bullet that you didn't read here, um, under
drawbacks, which is Compax negotiations among divergent institutional cultures, governance
traditions, legal authorities. University's often have joint governance as part
of their governance, their internal governance structure, which includes the
academic Senate. And they have greater or less authority depending
on the institution. However, I think we should go into
this very clear eye because I can anticipate that we
could set something recommends something here. And then once it
goes into the internal conversations within the participating partnerships, um,
there could be quite a bit of, of back and
forth. And there needs to be flexibility in order to
be able to, um, accommodate that. Thank you. Yes. And
that's an excellent point. So, you know, I would say
each of these options, all five contemplate complex negotiations among
divergent institutional cultures, um, and the legal authorities are something
that a joint powers authority agreement in particular would have
to navigate carefully. Um, but education is a matter of
statewide concern. And so the legislature has created the UC
system, the CSU system, the community college system to serve
their various functions. And we would need to carefully, uh,
respect the different, uh, governance structures and legal frameworks in
drafting the joint powers agreement. Um, but really any of
the models are going to require whoever the partners are
to come in and start negotiating and figure out what
their places are, how they want the structure to look,
um, but yeah, those are excellent points. Thank you. Any
other clarifying questions. Dr. Gueda and then member Malcolm. Thank
you. Thank you, Chair Falcon. I have a number of
clarifying questions. And I don't know if the necessary an
answer at this point, but when, um, when, uh, considering
our contemplating a JPA were exoficio members part of the
consideration in terms of Mexican university representation. So I understand
the rules in place about participation of foreign nationals. Um,
but I was wondering if that was part of the
contemplation is exoficial members. The other question that I had
was, um, I understand that sometimes not profits are able
to have less than a majority of interested members from
another entity, i. e. a JPA. So that also a
contemplation in terms of would there be a possibility to
have an individual number of individuals who do not constitute
a majority that are still able to be members of
both the JPA and the 501c3. So the question of
overlap institutional overlap would be kind of a question. That
they're one that given some of the universities involved, I
think is an important matter to also contemplate his geography.
I believe we're really focused on our by national region.
And so I do think that there's something to be
said for universities that are located within the Binational Region.
Again, I understand there's, there's others, whether it be Unam
or whether it be others in LA that are interested.
But for me, I think it's important that we maintain
the Binational Aspect of what we're trying to establish. And
then I have a number of funding questions about what
would happen. And what are the methods to resolve disputes?
It's really kind of starting to get into the weeed.
But what would happen if interinstitutional disputes were to arise?
So, um, no, we did not contemplate an exoficio position
on the JPA board for a Mexican national. We could.
I think it would get complicated because the point of
a California joint powers authority is to have California public
agencies participating and keep the sort of, um, personality of
a state public agency. And it might, you know, I
haven't frankly looked into exoficio seats, uh, into a JPA,
but we're happy to do that. And I'm happy to
explore that. Um, we thought it would be sort of
more meaningful to the Mexican partners or Binational Partners to
have something like a nonprofit that they could actually run
and control. Um, instead of having, because of course JPAs
would require either Bagley keen or brown X compliance, public
meetings. They could have a spot, a standing item on
the agenda for reports. It'd probably be appropriate for that.
And that might seem a little bit more meaningful than
a nonvoting position. Um, we did not explore having a
JPA minority on the nonprofit board. We did talk about
what that board could look like. And the reason that
happens often when a public agency forms a nonprofit for
various charitable purposes, they staff it with a number of
their own directors or staff persons. Um, that's a little
bit farther than where we're at now in terms of
the, you know, that's something that would be discussed by
between the partners to see if that's something that's important.
Um, and so it's certainly something that could happen. Um,
there's nothing that precludes it. It's just a matter of
what appetite the partners that are involved have. Um, and
then with respect to the binational participation, you know, hugely,
hugely important, uh, and really central to all the conversations
that staff has been having and what makes us different,
what would make this UDCV different, um, is the Binational
participation, which is why we tried to give special consideration
to the nonprofit option as either the entity that would
operate the site or at least a partner entity that
would participate in the site to allow, um, Mexican and
to draw more participation from Mexican public universities, private universities
partners. You know, that's something that the nonprofit could do
that, for example, the JPA couldn't do is involve private
institutions, not just public institutions. So all of that was
given significant weight as we came to the recommendations. Great.
I remember Malcolm. Yes, I have a question really to
the city manager, City Chilvesta. On this issue. And I'll
do respect to this great committee. The city owns the
land. The city needs to, um, and has other authorities.
As a charter city that you talked about bonding that
general law cities doesn't have. So JPA. On some things
aren't necessary. But I'm, I'm worried about as long as
the city's happy, I'm okay. But we're really creating, or
discussing entities. To go out and discuss what we're going
to do and how we're going to do it. And
yet the biggest benefactor has one vote out of. How
many. And, um, should there be some type of, it's
handag, we can call different cities, can call weighted vote
or something. Are you happy or satisfied with the direction
we're going for the protection of your constituents. Well, I
think what we've discussed so far is really the structure
and laying out the different options. Um, with the recommendation
that they're going to be presenting with the JPA and
the potential 501c3, I think that that properly protects the
city's interest as the property owner. That is our role
here. We are the, we are the owner. We are
the advocate. Um, but we also are not in the
business of running a university. And we recognize that that
is not, um, our strength. And so it is important
to us to bring in the academic partners as the
organization does mature. And so I think that's a lot
of why you're hearing this concept of an organizational maturity
model and having the right structure at the right time
for what's in front of us. And so, um, right
now we're very comfortable with what's being proposed. Um, but
it's also, um, you know, really, that's part of the
discussion here for the task force and to get that
feedback. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the question
and jumping in, remember Alan as city manager for the
city. Um, yes, member incarnation. So I'm going to build
off of task member Malcolm's question because it sparked one
that I wrote down as well. Um, earlier we talked
about in the land use presentation, the university innovation district
versus the first phase, which is the university district, the
35 acres. And so I keep having, and it could
be, you know, my problem. Um, ambiguity on this task
force scope is a task force planning a governance or
making a recommendation on a governance entity. For the first
phase, which is the 35 acres, where we being asked
to create a recommendation on the governance entity for the
UID, which you made me think of, um, member Malcolm
because that is seems like an encroachment on cities purview.
Um, so I'm just going to put that out there.
No answer needed. But I do, um, I'm hearing, um,
if the legal entity of the, um, governance structure, I'm
not hearing, I'm hearing questions and comments and are wonderful
student trustee made of public comment. Um, if membership was
contemplated, because I'm not seeing that in here. And the
questions about, you know, majority membership on a JPA for
a landowner or exofficio membership. And I think also about
what member Moore said and the different institutions having different
shared governance and institutional cultures. And also centralized institutions and
meeting their central body to even approve the participation on
a governance structure. And so in the contemplation of all
of the recommendations, membership, um, was that contemplated. I didn't
see that in the recommendations or the discussion. And then
I think about voting structures. We've talked about who votes.
What would that voting structure look like? And what is
the authority of the voting structure? Would certain people have
different. We talked about weighted votes. Um, so I'm just
curious if that was contemplated. And if it was, maybe
you can share with the task force more about what
was contemplated and what was thought about. Sure. I mean,
part of the beauty of the JPA model is that
all of that is discussed and decided when you draft
the joint powers agreement. So would that be included though?
And that's what we're tasked with is providing a recommendation
to the legislator. So if we go with a joint
task force with a nonprofit so that we want to
include my national, would this task force include any of
those levels of details? Would we be tasked with having
that discussion here in an open meeting and being able
to have that background so that we can contemplate whether
we would include that in our recommendation. What level of
detail we would include, would we consider including it. I
think that's a determination for the task force, but I,
my initial answer is no. The mission of the bill
is to recommend a governance structure that government structure could
be a joint powers authority with the nonprofit partner to
complement the Binational component with those details to be sorted
out, A, once we have partners. I mean, because what
you don't want is to recommend something as a task
force. That scares folks away or precludes folks from even
having a discussion about whether or not they want to
participate. So you have to really find that balance between
over prescribing and under prescribing. So my gut, and I
know Marlene and Marty are probably itching the talk too,
is to say, you know, you, you, the recommendation is
for the structure. And then depending on how the legislature
responds, how's this task force response? You would then find
your partners and have those discussions. Is a JPA something
you'd entertain. Um, and if so, what are the voting?
Are we talking about five member board? We talked about
a 10 member board. Are we talking about weighted voting?
Are we talking about one vote for each person talking
about exofficeo members? Those discussions happen once you have partners.
And once you have buy - in, go ahead, Marlene.
I know you want to chime in too. Because we're
getting into the next one. If I may chair Falcons.
Yes. Thanks for judgment. So these are all great questions.
And yes, we are in getting into the recommendations where
the some of the detail. But I think it's really
important to reinforce that you're asking really good questions. And
the complexity of governance is that the layers. And layers
of the degree to details like the questions about, we
awaited votes and all of that. There's a time and
place for those discussions. Right now we're at the very
beginning. And we're looking at broader frameworks. And that's why
legal frameworks knowing what they can and can't do is
important. So if I may, I think that a lot
of those questions can be answered. And if they can't
be answered today, at least it'll be noted where in
the process they will be appropriately answered. Thank you for
the reminder. So, um, if, if we can reserve our
questions right now. Uh, for clarification, the discussion questions are
really, really juicy. And I think we need to, um,
resurface those during discussions so we can get to the
next presentation. But I do want to pin that one
question from, from, uh, Dr. Carnesun about the scope, um,
on the UID versus UDCV. I don't want to say
verses. But defining what it is at this task force
really needs to hone home in on, um, and understanding,
you know, how big or how, how constrained that we
need to. Yes, exactly. So I don't know if that
we can table that for the discussion, but if you
can return to the podium and address that, that would
be great. Absolutely. Happy to. And again, the short answer
is depending on the structure you choose. If you choose
a joint powers agreement as a recommended structure, the JPA
contract can do it all. Like it can tell you
who's the principal act, what law are you following? What
powers are you going to have or not have? Um,
who are going to be the parties? How are you
going to vote? How are you going to make decisions?
All of that is laid out in the contract itself.
Um, but I'll, um, I'll hand it over to Marty
so she can get it. Thank you, Mr. Cho. Appreciate
your presentation. Um, we do have our next, uh, presenter
brimner, uh, from policy solutions. All right. Good morning task
force members. I'm Jake Bremer. I'm one of the consultants
helping support this project. Um, and what I'll be doing
is providing an overview of some of the research that
was in your background materials as it related to other
models that we've seen across the country. We've been trying
to research what we can learn from instances where, um,
institutions have already come together around shared facilities or other
ways of, um, expanding or extending resources through collaboration.
And I'll just pull my slides first. Okay. Um, and
actually I'm very appreciative that you just started this conversation
because what we'll do here is actually now show through
some of these case studies what shared decision making has
looked like in these instances where you're bringing partners together,
um, today I'm going to just have time to touch
on three of the models that we researched. But what
I thought I would do first is just give you
a sense of the breath of the different models that
exist across the country. There are models that differ in
terms of their programmatic or their ultimate objectives, the kinds
of students that they're serving, the types of institutional partners
that they're bringing together, whether a city is one of
the active participants in that. And of course, that then
suggests different legal structures. So you just heard from Adriana
about what those look like. We have almost all of
those, um, represented here in terms of the examples that
we found nationally, um, and then what that means for
their shared decision making structures, their board compositions, those all
really very widely as well. One thing I will note
as a disclaimer, there wasn't a JPA example that we
found nationally. But with that being said, there are certainly
examples of where local city has been a catalyst and
has been a really active partner in making these kind
of projects happen and staying involved as the project matures.
Um, so with that for the sake of time, I'll
just dive into one of those examples, um, of where
cities been really active in driving a project. In Denver,
Colorado. So in Denver, Colorado, you have an example of
where really for years, um, as I'm sure folks from
the city of Chulivistic can relate to, locally about the
benefits of bringing institutions together at a shared campus. There
were strategic proactive zoning and a neighborhood that had been
identified as really suitable for that kind of facility. And
ultimately through a combination of policy action at the local,
the state, and in this case, even the federal level,
um, they brought that, um, chip fruition in the 60s
and 70s. Um, ultimately after receiving those funds and local
bond measure that was approved, um, the state of Colorado
defined a statutory entity, which is the Aurora higher education
center that exists today. It brings together three different public
institutions, three different, um, campuses from various statewide higher education
systems. And this statutory, um, language also defined objectives for
what that collaboration would look like. So it required that
those institutions agree to aligning their calendars agreed to coordinating
on scheduling things that really have a material impact on
the student experience, particularly when you have a community college
and students that are working to transfer from the two
gear to the four years that have space there. Colorado
state law also defined the governing board. Um, that governing
board's composed of the three CEOs for each of those
institutions. And then each of the gut statewide governing boards
has one appointee that serves on the board for the
Aurora Higher Education Center. Students and faculty each have one
representative. So the committee that includes faculty and students from
across the three institutions, each of those committees name one
representative for their constituency that serves on the governing board.
There is actually ledge to the earlier comment. There was
legislation that gave them a vote that didn't, um, they
didn't have one at first. Um, and then the governor
of Colorado has three appointees that serve on the board
as well. They have to be Denver area residents. Um,
to an earlier question that came up from Dr. Guede.
There is actually language in Colorado state law that addresses
how to resolve disputes with institutions and instances when the
same system, so the governing board appointee in the CEO
both have not voted in the majority on a decision
on the board. If there's this instance where you have
one institution that is really holding out from an action,
the majority of the gubernatorial appointees have to be an
agreement with that action for it to move forward. So,
um, some example here of what that can look like
when you have public institutions and this statutory entity defined
in Colorado law that's helping coordinate their efforts. Okay. So
now to the other side of the spectrum, this is
a nonprofit consortium - based model just up the road
in Claremont. The Claremont College's consortium brings together seven separate
standalone institutions. They're all independent, but they allow for students
to cross register across the institutions. Um, this is not
only a consortium, but they've actually created their own nonprofit
entity that holds land and provides services back to the
member institutions. They charge institutions based on a cost sharing
formula that the board of the nonprofit itself develops. That
board does have three independent representatives that serve on the
board. They are not affiliated with any of the institutions.
But then each of the member institutions have two representatives
that serve on the board along with the CEO of
the nonprofit itself, which is called the Claremont College Services.
Interestingly, the Claremont Colleges also have a constitution. Uh, this
constitution defines the scope of what the board can handle
versus what a council of presidents can handle. So a
large majority of issues are actually resolved amongst the institutional
partners themselves, but there are reserved matters that are higher
stakes. So issues around debt issues around land issues around
enrollment caps that are reserved for action by the full
board of directors, the constitution for the colleges also defines
vote thresholds, um, it requires majority vote for some issues.
And then on some of those more sensitive matters, it
requires a super majority, two - thirds vote of all
of the board members. And in some cases, even ratification
by the governing boards of each of the member institutions
themselves. So again, something like enrollment caps really sensitive for
each of those member institutions when they're sharing space. So
now I'll go to my third and my last example
here before I get to some conclusions from across this
research medical center of the Americas is a project out
in El Paso that the city was really active and
responsible for driving. In fact, the city had identified an
area that already had some post - secondary educational institutions
or extension facilities, um, and healthcare facilities. And what it
wanted to do was really grow that into something that
could serve the broader border community, but also could become
an industry cluster. So not just, uh, access to hospitals
and to care, but biotech research, medical device design and
manufacturing, things where there's already a lot of cross -
border, um, trade that's involved. So the city, not only
zoned accordingly and identified this, um, part of its community
to facilitate this kind of development. But it found an
external partner, um, what's now the MCA holding company and
its nonprofit, the Enscape Foundation. It sold a fraction of
the land. So not all of the land that's part
of this broader district, but a small portion of it
sold the land to the holding company. It also, um,
committed to providing an annual appropriation through the city budget.
It's about 2. 8 or 3 million dollars depending on
the year. In exchange for this holding company structure, and
I'll talk more about that in a moment, um, to
commit to reaching certain deliverables, um, things like construction of
this incubator space that's on the slide. This is called
the Cardwell collaborative. It was one of the things that
this entity had to commit to constructing in order to
not only hold the land on which it's built, but
to receive this funding. The holding companies also responsible for
facilitating the development of the broader district and really through
a coordination role with partners. It doesn't own that land
doesn't do the construction itself directly. But through these various
subsidiaries underneath the holding company, it's able to bring partners
together and find out what they need in terms of
space and facilities. So one really interesting example, uh, one
of the subsidiaries is focused on facilitating biotech research. It
actually has revenue generating capability that then can be reinvested
back into the project more broadly. Um, this governing board,
very different from the others that we, um, just highlighted.
This governing boards really composed of real estate development finance
and healthcare industry professionals. There are non - voting institutional
representatives from the city, from healthcare facilities, um, from educational
institutions, including their Mexican university counterpart on the other side
of the border and even a New Mexico state university
that does a lot of research partnerships with the center.
So now, um, just to conclude and let you get
back to your discussion about what this means for our
work here, um, shoe libista. Of course, as we heard
earlier, there isn't a single model that you can just
copy and paste into the unique context and the unique
opportunity that you have in true livista today. But I
think from these three examples, but certainly from the others
that we didn't have time to cover today, we can
learn a lot about the elements that we should be
considering for how we leverage this project to align with
community needs and to support students in the workforce in
South County and the cross - border community more broadly.
So at Aurorea and Claremont, we see that they really
have clarity of scope for the kinds of decisions that
are within the board's prerogative or other vehicles that might
allow the academic, institutional partners to work on those more
quickly or more nimbly or within existing governance structures, as
we heard earlier. So Claremont Colleges, think of those really
clear boundaries for issues that are for the board versus
issues that the council of presidents can take on. The
medical centers of the Americas, this interesting structure, this holding
company with nonprofit, programmatically focused subsidiaries really creates opportunities that
might not be available to other structures based on identifying
revenue and trying to help facilitate, bringing that into the
project, uh, Aurorea and MCA. What I wanted to note
here as well. And both of these instances, you had
policy action, not only investment, but statutory action in some
cases or defining terms of a contract agreement that really
allowed those local communities to define the goals for the
projects. And then finally, um, what you see across all
of these examples is the need to ensure there's a
balance in centering, independent, um, voice and focus on the
good of the project and for what the project's doing
for the local community with that institutional input. And there
are different ways of doing that, whether that's through looking
at board composition, looking at other vehicles. We'll talk more
about in the recommendation section where you can facilitate that
conversation amongst the academic partners, um, while also still allowing
abort to have that prerogative oversight governance issues. Um, so
I'll leave it there for now so you can move
forward with your agenda, but certainly welcome any questions. Thank
you. Thank you. Any clarifying questions, Only. For Mr. Brimner.
Okay. Thank you very much. Next set of, uh, presentations
on the Binance Roundtable report, Dr. Joel Pilco, director of
Binance and International Programs for Southwestern College, as well as
Dr. Carlos Garcia, whose vice president of institutional relations at
Cetis University. Good morning. Buenos días. Thank you for the
opportunity to speak before this task force. Before we get
into our recommendations from the Binance National Roundtime tables, I
want to show something with you. Between 96 and 97.
Of non - time ago, our student, as I was
from college. And to continue my education, I have to
move. Out of this area. At the time I lived
in parabox actually. And my parents lived at the end
of Palmar Street. I didn't have the opportunity to continue
my education here. And today I serve as students who
are making the same decisions. So the work that you're
doing in creating this opportunities is applaudable. And thank you
for doing that for our thousands of students who need
to make those decisions. My coagulacia were asked to share
the recommendations from the Binance tables. And before I do
that, I want to share with you what's happening in
the binational region already. And I can tell you that
we've been very busy. Universities on both sides of the
border, we've been working on three very specific pillars. Access,
mobility, and belonging. Access through programs such as AB 91,
which we're going to discuss later. We've been working on
MOUs. We've been working on different options to give the
students the opportunity to study in both sides of the
border. Typically, it's through an exchange program. Typically, those type
of activities. As that's being working great. And I think
we've been doing a lot more than that, such as
conferences like the reboarder conference by San Diego State University.
The other element that we are really concentrating on is
mobility. What does it mean for the student who lives
across the border to cross every single day. And have
to come to school. Likely that is working. Since April
this year, through our collaboration that includes US customs and
border protection, cells in college, San Diego is the university.
And you see San Diego, lane for students at the
San Isidro and Otay Border for entries. That lane saves
students hundreds of hours every year. They're crossing the border
in 10 to 15 minutes instead of two, three, four
hours every day. But I want you to think about
that. We did a math. Student is saving 380 plus
hours in two semesters by using that lane. That is
16 days of life giving back to the student. What
will you do with that time. Our students are studying
more, spending time with family. Sleeping a little more, probably.
That comes to write. So that's what we're doing in
terms of mobility. Southwestern college has been partnered with settings
to teach our courses in Tijuana. So the students don't
have to cross the border. We're doing a lot of
creative stuff to make sure that we meet the students
where they are. And lastly, belonging. In the last few
years, we have been very careful in giving the students
a sense of identity. By national students are bilingual, by
cultural. They have skills that are resilient, flexible. And they
truly understand what it means to cross the border, change
your mind completely. And behave the way we do things
in the US. And then at night, they go back
to Mexico to do so. But we've been doing this
in silence in a way. For instance, Southwestern had an
MMOU with cities. SDU has an MOU with who I
would say. And so on and so forth. And that's
been great. But we needed to come together to do
something even more meaningful for those students. And that is
the creation of the Kalibaha Higher Education Consortium, which since
December, 2025 is helping us have a space to have
this conversations altogether. And you asked why we're doing that.
Because we have data and some of it is on
the screen. Data that says that we need to produce
professionals in very specific areas right away. And that's what's
happening in the Binational region. And with the partnerships that
we have in right now. I'm going to invite my
partner here, Dr. Garcia, to speak about the first recommendation.
Thank you, Dr. Pilko. Morning, everyone. Um. Chair five com
members of the task force, higher education colleagues, committee partners
and members of the public. Thank you for being here
and for being part of this important conversation. The question
before us today is the one that was stated in
the invitation for this meeting. How should the universities show
the base to be governed as it develops from vision
to reality? That question matters because UDC beam is intended
to expand educational opportunities strengthening economic mobility, prepare talent for
the careers of tomorrow. And build new by national education
research and workforce partnerships. I'm going to have some slides
on the screen. We're not necessarily going to delve into
them. Those are going to be left behind for you.
But I'm going to reference them as we move forward
with this presentation. Our governance recommendations do not begin with
a legal structure. They begin with a guiding document that
UDCB addition and design principles. That distinction is important. These
principles are not academic. They are not abstract aspirations. They
were written to define the conditions that feature decisions on
land use, governance, financing, partnership and operations should make possible.
In other words, these principles give us a test. In
that test is as we move towards implementation, are we
actually building the institution that we set where we're going
to build. This is how we approach the recommendations. If
EDCB is indeed to be a friction - free by
national by design adaptive and accountable financially sustainable and become
an ecosystem of partners, then its governance must create the
capacity to deliver on those outcomes. The recommendations are therefore
not a separate technical exercise. They are the implementation pathway
for the principles of this operating institution. One recommendation, it's
specifically important to UDCBs by national identity. The creation of
a nonprofit organization that complements the joint powered authority. The
JPA provides the public vehicle for land capital infrastructure and
public accountability. The nonprofit creates a durable place for partner
participation, including meaningful participation by Mexican higher education institutions. The
reason for using both structures, its practical. One structure does
not do both jobs equally well. At California JPA is
well suited to public stewardship and financing. But it's not
designed to sit Mexican public universities as full governance partners.
A US nonprofit can provide that form of boys while
also supporting philanthropy industry engagement and continuity across changing administrations.
Last. So the nonprofit should not be considered as an
atom. It should be looked at as one of the
mechanisms that allows you to see being to become what
its own principles describe, binational by design built as an
ecosystem of partners and capable of reducing barriers rather than
creating new ones. We are still in the information and
learning stages. We do not need or to address nor
do we have the answers for every single governance question
or detailed today. But we can start to move forward
in creating the architecture that allows the mission to become
real. And that preserves the distinction by national character. From
the beginning. Thank you very much. The second recommendation from
the Binational Roundtable has to do with, if I can
go back to the other slides, please. Recommend from this
group is to establish our national hub or center. Within
the University District of Visa Institutional Framework. Thank you.
Our recommendation is that the governance entity identifies our national
hub or center as an infrastructure requirement for the university
district. It should serve as a non - profit operational
home. And the one - stop shop through which a
students can access coordinated services. These entities, this space, this
building, whatever it will be, it will have the task
to coordinate activities to develop policy. To develop partnerships not
only between the are participating in institutions, but also outside
workforce development, philanthropy, community, all of them, but also to
share solutions, you know, between the estructure. Some of the
core cognitive functions that we found would be very important
for this space. Collaboration. Coordinated work between US and Mexican
institutions. Partnerships reach out to workforce development entities, preach out
to the industry and philanthropy. How they understand what we're
trying to do. Remote barriers that can be legal policy
administrative or administrative institutional obstacles. Also to continue working on
access for these students. And finally, to define a priorities
that the whole organization is going to have. But I
won't speak a little bit about how we look like
for the students. I think we're trying to do something
different here. How would it look like if a binational
student truly goes to a place where all these services
will be available. Think about it this way. You have
many universities there. With representatives. The information in one place.
You have by national partners, you have research institutes. You
have workforce partners in the same building. And the student
has the opportunity to get information from each one of
them. Including translation services. For an credential evaluations, financial assistance,
based on immigration support, a clinical advising and so on
and so forth, you can see on the screen. This
concept has never been implemented before from a Binance. And
we truly believe that if we're going to do something
different with this project, we've got to take into consideration
that these students need clear information from the get -
go. And as I mentioned in my opening, I think
they by natural round table clearly understands that we need
to meet students where they are. And that is our
second recommendation. Our last recommendation has to do with. The
establishment of a limited AV91 pilot for the eligible public
hiring institutions that are part of the UDCV. If you're
not familiar with AD91, it is California legislation that allows
students who live in the border region. To enroll in
community colleges in San Diego and Peter Counties, pain in
- state traditional rates. Earlier today through a comment, it
was mentioned that there are about 30, 000 US citizens
living in Tijuana and attending public primary and secularing schools
in Tijuana. That number can be higher than that. It
could be 45, 065, 000. Those students before 891 didn't
have the opportunity to enroll in community colleges and pay
in - state tuition fees. Therefore, there didn't go to
school. Twin implementation of A - 1991 in the last
three years at Southwestern College. We have been able to
really change that. Sorry, that's my time on the first
one. We have been able to really change that. And
in the last three years, as you can see on
the screen, we have been able to enroll over 300
students. These semester, we just started this week. We have
358 students in the AB 91 program. And guess what?
So the order 30, 045, 000 who are in the
public system in Tijuana. Guess what they're going to do?
They're going to come to us. And we need to
be ready for that. This is students are very well
connected. With their workforce needs of the region. You can
see snapshot here as a full 2025 of the mergers
these students are pursuing. And the top stem. One of
the intents of the legislation was to promote STEM education.
And there you go. That's what they want. And that's
what they're going to go to working. But more interestingly,
this student's academic performance. It's outstanding. The persistence rate from
fall to spring. Was over 94 percent, which is much
higher. Than the general student population at Southwest and College.
The course completional rates were also. Well, we don't know.
But we know that these students are truly commuted and
resilient. What's happening today is that at some point, there's
an enrollment cliff. You have these hundreds of students about
400 servers in college. Maybe 80, 100 at mesa college.
Another 50 200 at Imperial Valley College who are going
to continue their education with us. But they're going to
point that they're going to be able to go to
a state university because they do not feed the requirements
for in - state tuition. That's why it's so important
for these task force to consider to please consider something
similar to AB 91 from the get - go. We
as the task force to establish the decision - making
process. So whoever sits on these non - profit JPA
is able to push forward legislation that is going to
help by national students attend colleges and universities in the
US. And now we conclude the recommendations from the round
tables. Thank you. Thank you, doctors Buchl and Garcia. Are
there any clarifying questions from members. Okay. Seeing none, thank
you. Um, I do not see any additional requests to
speak from the public. So we are going to move
on to the action items overview of state governance recommendations
and calling back up Marty Alvarado. Okay. Let's get into
it. Um. Excited to jump into the recommendations. You've heard
a lot of content today that provides some framing for
the recommendations and the different governance vehicles. I also want
to thank our Binational Partners for making that connection between,
um, the, uh, vision mission and defining characteristics. I could
not have done it better myself. Uh, in terms of
really trying to make sure that our governance recommendations land
and finance recommendations down the road really are bringing that
vision to life and or setting the path for bringing
that vision to light, uh, to life, excuse me. And
really, uh, centering students, uh, and the community as we
as this body is making recommendations going forward. So I'm
going to jump right into and try to move quickly
here, uh, so question to make room for questions. So
as we were developing the recommendations, the draft, very draft,
something for you to engage with, uh, push back, provide
feedback, uh, on this is that we, we really wanted
to make sure that we're operating from a common framework
or a common place of reference. And so there are
three elements that we wanted to walk through, uh, the
governance baseline, the maturity arc and two parallel tracks. So
first, um, the governance baseline, again, I'm going to move
quickly. These are three reference concepts. Let me back up
three reference concepts. First, when we are talking about governance,
what are we talking about? What does that mean? Because
we hear a lot around decision making, but decision making
is very nuanced at very specific to the decisions that
need to be made. And those are many and complex
given some of the earlier conversation around who gets to
decide what is this going to look like. Right. So
as this body is thinking about the recommendations in a
report that is really at this early stage, we have
to be thinking about what is it that we are
trying to construct and in service of what. And it
is in service of entities, organizations, bodies and vehicles that
will facilitate policy, procedure and direct practice. That's the goal
here. When we are thinking about governance, we are thinking
about vehicles, entities, organizations that will facilitate the creation of
policy, procedure, and practice. Think local policy. Little P, big
P, all of the P's in between policy procedure practice.
Okay. Uh, then we also wanted to get into the
organizational maturity framework. Since I mentioned it earlier, I'm going
to touch on it lightly here, but the goal of
this is to really help us situate where UDCV is
right now. Right. They are not at a mature operating
stage. They are very much at the concept stage trying
to move into formation. And so it's really about being
able to understand the sequencing of decisions and how this
group, uh, this task force is setting up the conditions
for those future decisions down the road. And so, uh,
what you see here are the, uh, this framework, this
stages of framework. So we are at the concept stage
really trying to position governance that moves the entity into
the formation stage where the actual legal governance structure, uh,
that policy, uh, procedure and practice decisions can begin to
be formulated. It will move into an emerging stage where
you actually begin to offer services for students and start
testing this with active participants in a more comprehensive, deliberate
way. Uh, sustainable, uh, where it is operationally stable and
financially, uh, diversified. And then we get into a mature
stage, really self - sustaining and focusing on evolution, uh,
and maintaining relevancy. I think it's valuable to note for
this body that as we were researching organizational maturity frameworks
in order to bring you something today, um, we found
a lot for startups, for businesses, even for nonprofits, a
lot of research around organizational maturity within these types of
entities, companies, et cetera. There were almost none for higher
education. Right. We don't think about higher education as an
evolving, maturing organization and having this type of maturity arc.
We think of them as established. Right. Because they've been
around typically for so long. And so I think it's
really, really important for this body to be thinking about
that as you are creating something new. You are in
startup mode. Right. Honoring all the realities of the partner
organizations that are going to be coming to the table,
but really thinking about what does it look like for
us to create a governance structure for something that is
new that is going to be engaging these partners and
is going to go through this maturity arc, Organizational Maturity
Arc over its lifetime. Which again is not something that
we typically see and or is talked about within the
higher education realm, at least public higher education, maybe for
the for - profits. Um, so hence the maturity framework.
Uh, and then lastly, uh, the last concept that we
want you to hold as we dig into the recommendations
is really acknowledging and honoring that there are two parallel
tracks for governance. There is the land use and operations
and fund development capital building construction. All of those components.
And then the academic programming. And those are two separate
governance tracks because we wanted to deliberately account for what
was surfaced earlier that each of the academic programs and
institutions that will come to the table have their own
existing government structures have accreditation requirements. There's a whole different
layer to that that will need to be wrestled through,
which is distinct from capital development, uh, land development, all
of those pieces. So we just, we wanted to acknowledge
that and make sure that the government structure recommendations accounted
for those two parallel tracks operating simultaneously while also leaving
space for the maturity of the framework for those to
come together as needed going forward. Okay. Uh, so the
last thing we wanted to note is that what the
task force has to do today, uh, and going forward
is really think about what does it mean for your
governance structure to deliver what you need to date while
also being set up for what needs to come as
the enterprise matures. So what comes next. Okay. Uh, so
to get into the recommendations, you've heard a lot of
the reference points earlier. I'm not, I want to leave
time for comments and question. And so just very quickly
walking through these, uh, the recommendations, not in any particular
order, but certainly modestly sequenced, uh, the draft is that
we start with a JPA, as you heard earlier that
really sets the legal infrastructure for the enterprise, uh, provide
some grounding, uh, and brings preliminary partners to the table,
uh, the development of or the selection of a nonprofit
site organization as a recommendation really meant to, uh, at
least at this stage conceptually manage the day to day,
uh, allow for additional structures that facilitate, um, acquisition of,
let's say philanthropic dollars and other, uh, financing efforts, um,
we also included a recommendation around an academic advisory body.
So again, accounting for those parallel tracks, well, the first
two enterprises are really organized around the establishment of the
infrastructure. The academic advisory board is really about, uh, creating
the time and space for those decision points that need
to happen around the academic enterprise. Going back to the
vision document, really thinking about what are the conditions environments
and expectations if we were to, uh, lean into this
just - in - time lifelong learning infrastructure that we
are envisioning for our chill ofista residents. Uh, and then
fourth down the list, you see state authorizing legislation. We've
noted this as a potential future complementary track because at
this initial formation stage, it really is about setting up
the infrastructure and then figuring out if and where policy
state policy could actually be beneficial. Is it going to
secure additional dollars for the enterprise commitment from the state
for the enterprise that brings resources? Is it necessary for
the education partners to have flexibility for the types of,
uh, instruction that they might want to deliver or programming
that they might want to deliver at the site? So
what we're saying here and this recommendation is that that
is on the table for future consideration, not a bygone
conclusion at the initial stage. And that it really should
be benefiting the enterprise and the students intended to be
served through the enterprise, not just legislation for legislation's sake.
And then lastly, as we've talked about a lot today,
this recommendation around ensuring that there is equitable and meaningful
participation by national partners in the governance infrastructure that is
produced at the end or developed at the end. Decided
at the end. So what you see here is a,
um, I won't say a timeline, but sort of a
signaling of how we would envision this moving across that
organizational maturity framework arc. You'll see we've mentioned a few
times that we're at the conception stage that we're really
at the concept stage of this effort. And so you'll
see examples of items that are actively in progress during
this conception stage under state authorizing legislation, for example. We
have this task force that was comprised or pulled together
from legislation. Similarly under the academic advisory board, you'll see
examples of things like partner MOUs that we are anticipating
and have begun to move forward and different types of
efforts under the concept stage. What you see as we
transition into the formation stage. And again, know that these
are not hard and fast cutoffs. That this will be
evolving. It'll be fluid batooks in between. But we really
see that development of the joint powers authority, uh, the
establishment of the academic advisory board sort of happening early
on. And then the development of that nonprofit organization maturing
over the timeline of the enterprise, the full enterprise. You'll
see the gray areas we want to note. There continue
as needed. We don't know yet. Right. We don't know
when and how and if they will continue to be
needed and valuable for the enterprise. And so we have
flagged those as continuing as needed, uh, and then ongoing
across all stages is the Binational Partnership. So this gives
you an idea of how we sort of have been
conceptualizing how these recommendations would roll out as well as
interplay Bitchs in between. One last visual for those who
are visual learners or to make sense of the complexity
of these recommendations is really seeing these JPA nonprofits working
together at this initial stage, this advisory board, really feeding
into those enterprises. And, uh, the other two supporting and
caring through as we go. All right. I am going
to stop talking and invite questions, comments or concerns. Thank
you. Um, before we go to questions, are these presentations
going to be available to all of us? Okay. Thank
you. Okay. We have a question or comment from Dr.
Tong. I was reading, uh, the information we received before
the meeting. And this presentation is a little better. Uh,
I think, uh, then the languages that were there in
the PDF files, uh, on the academic advising board, languages,
were a little too broad and ambiguous. Right in terms
of partner institutions independence. And so, so as you know,
some of these will definitely conflict with, uh, our standards
and our, uh, faculty academic, uh, governance and sheer governance
and accreditation requirements, right? Right. So we have to make
sure that they're all, uh, pretty clear about that. You
know, he's each institution obviously have exclusive. Authority and everything
for research accreditation intellectual property, et cetera, et cetera. Right.
So, so I just want to make sure that in
the final language, we're pretty clear about those. Right. Absolutely.
Absolutely. And we recognize it was a lot of information
to hold. Right. What did the parallel tracks mean? What
is this maturity framework mean? And how do these things
come together? So through the slides, we were trying to
really visualize, create a visualization of how all of this
works together, uh, to create that vision for the future.
But thank you absolutely. We have a question or comment
from Dr. Moore. Thank you. And just to echo these
comments. And following up. And that's, I think the next
slide and also the previous slide, there was something about
the academic advisory board not having authority. I'm not sure
what that meant because it almost seems like the, um,
nonprofit could veto the recommendations of the academic advising board.
Yeah. So this is a great call out because technically
legally. Let me say it that way. Legally. The advisory
board does not have legal standing to make decisions. In
these recommendations, and I'm not a lawyer, I do not
play one on TV. So I am only referencing here
that the JPA and the nonprofit are what carried legal
authority for the enterprise. And so this is why in
this next visual, what you see is the academic advisory
board providing recommendations to those entities. Uh, I want you
to keep in mind that, uh, we have the structure
for those two have not been set. And so the
extent to which, uh, institutions of higher education would be
represented on the JPA and others that some of the
safeguard that we are anticipating with the, uh, advisory board
providing recommendations. But it does not carry legal authority. Any
other questions? Yes. Clarification. It kind of builds on that
question as far as I'm aware the precludes us from
having overlapping membership amongst the different bodies so long as
they don't constitute a majority unless I'm mistaken. So that
might be a way for us to be able to
have some type of voice and safeguard across the different
bodies. Right. Correct. Okay. Got an affirm. Um, yes, member
anguillano. Thank you again for this framework. Um, I also
had to clarifying question on that academic advisory board. It's
in the write - up. It talks about the partnerships
with workforce development partners, corporate training. I think these are
really important components of the educational ecosystem. People need a
lot of different type of education, not one institution can
meet the criteria over a lifetime of learning that we
are envisioning seeing, you know, as a future unfold, AI
is quicker. People need to be upskilled, reskilled moving up
in their careers, um, and so I'm just curious. When
we say academic advisory board, how much flexibility is that?
And then how does that, I'm just having trouble also
figuring out how that matches with the nonprofit and the
JPEs. This is a great question and goes back to,
uh, I'll start with the vision mission defining characteristic document.
As we were putting together the recommendations, we're also thinking
about what are some of the structures and, uh, the
signaling of the composition that is going to, um, uh,
invite and or meet that vision for the future of
this UDCV enterprise. Um, I think one of the things
that we wrestled with is terminology being accessible. So hence
the earlier conversation around adjusting learning sector to, uh, lifelong
learning infrastructure because it's accessible. So when we're talking academic
advisory board, we're really trying to signal through the language
that it is around the governance of the instruction or
the academic enterprise of the, um, UDCV. Um, however, an
alignment with the vision mission defining characteristics, part of that
is really inviting in this more comprehensive concept of, uh,
academic and instruction and academic enterprise, I should say. Given
that we are leaning towards lifelong learning. So ensuring that
there's be a access for the region while also inviting
enterprises and activities and structures that will actually facilitate, um,
this lifelong learning available resource. I think there's also, um,
this interplay with the land use component as well, because
you're creating a, um, trying to create an experience that
is equivalent and or as meaningful as a residential experience
without necessarily requiring the residential aspect of that. And so
how do you leverage that, uh, the utilization of space
that will look fundamentally different here on this enterprise than
we might see on a traditional campus. And so trying
to create space for in this advisory board, that thinking,
um, across these various elements, not just how do we
pick up instruction that we've been doing elsewhere and replanted
here. Yeah, I'll just note that most of the research
is moving towards lifelong learning infrastructure. You have the research
from Stanford on the learning society. You have, um, the
UCs moving to UCLA for life, ASUs, learning enterprise. There
are a lot, a lot of research showing that institutions
need to be ensuring that they're serving the students, not
just at the beginning of their careers, but throughout their
career. So I really think that that's an important element
here. Great. Thank you. Any other clarifying questions? Yes. Dr.
Grove. So I wonder if there is the possibility in
the model of a nonprofit, which I think is really
the direction we're going to, that, that some kind of
shared governance model can be implemented there. One would be
the academic side and the other one would be the
administrative side. That's certainly how the University of California and
the CSU is functions. And it would be very easy
to then say, uh, well, this is how we function.
Let's, we're, we're implementing the same model of shared governance.
I understand nonprofits and the fact that you have a
board. I don't think there's anything in nonprofit
legislating. Maybe I'm wrong. Two boards. Although I think
one board precedes the other. I don't remember all the
rules regarding the two board model with one above the
other. Or are they equals? But that really is how
shared governance functions in the UC system, for example. And
I think that instead of an academic advice, so did
you consider this. That's really the question and the clarification
that I wanted. Yeah. Uh, we did not. We did
not consider implementing a shared governance infrastructure under the nonprofit.
In large part because, uh, the nonprofit are starting assumption.
Let me say this. We are starting assumption is that
the UDCV is not accredited. It's not an accredited entity
on its own that we would be pulling and leveraging
the accrediting, uh, the accreditation from the partner institutions that
will join. And so the shared governance enterprise really happens
at the institutions that are participating, not necessarily within the
UDCV infrastructure. And so that's, that was the starting assumption
for this. But this is also bringing up a really
important point that I want to make sure to highlight
here, which is that feedback form similar to the one
you receive for the vision mission, defining characteristics, uh, document
will be going out to all of you. So that
way you can continue to provide these types of feedback.
These are drafts. So this type of a request should
definitely continue to come in and we will continue to
look at those. Thank you. Any other questions? Yes. Dr.
I don't see Bye. And Dr. and Sivia, I don't
think your mic is on. Um, the nonprofit boards that
I've been a part of that are functional have been
very, very small. The larger that you get on profit
board, the less functional it gets. So I just, I'm
popping board. You should probably have five to seven people,
not more than that because it's just cumbersome in terms
of decision making. And when you go any further than
that, um, and I just, that's my, my, my two
sides. Regardless. The, the other thing I want to highlight
also is that again, going back to the maturity framework,
we're really at that formation stage and thinking about what
are those legal vehicles and entities that are going to
be needed to position the institution. I'm going to point
to the really valuable and important example of the, um,
the hub, the binational hub as an illustration of this.
Zero opinion on when we or another. But as an
example, part of the, um, part of the rationale for
the hub is that it doesn't currently exist, right? If
you decide to put together a nonprofit organization as this
entity, it may be that that's part of their charter.
And so is it a hub or is it a
branch of, uh, the responsibilities of the nonprofit organization? Right.
So again, this is why we're trying to manage expectations
in the recommendations. We're, we're not so defined of you
have to build this thing, but you really have to
build the conditions in the legal structures that will actually
facilitate being able to get those things done in whatever
form they take as this matures. So just as an
illustration, no expectations, uh, opinion. Yes. Dr. Rakita. Thank you,
Chair Falcon. More of a comment. I really want to
say thank you to staff for having put together these
frameworks because I think it definitely helps move the conversation
forward and give this a real focused way of thinking
about the questions before us. I also just want to
invite all of us to be reminded that we all
have our, our own perspectives and experiences, but we truly
are building something that has not been built. Um, it's,
it's new. It's, it's innovative. And to a degree, I
think we all bring our experiences to build a better
experience, a better institution for all of us in our
community. But I think I would invite us to think
that a little bit differently because we all have our
experiences yet. We're building something different. A multi - institutional
university campus, uh, as we saw is fairly unique. It's,
it's not, uh, usually you have an established institution builds
a satellite and then the satellite dang becomes, and I'm
discussing the CSU San Marcos experience and other experiences. This
is not that. We're really building something different. And so
I would hope that we can think of a little
bit of a different, be open to different concepts as
we look at how we organize and structure this institution
that will truly be one location with multiple institutions. And
how do we build the right balance between central versus
university specific? So we have quite a task. I think
we're up to the question, but I do want to
say thank you. Yes. Thank you. Um, so we are
at the noon hour, um, just doing a time check
here. And we started getting into the discussions, um, this
is an action item, but I want to ask the
task force members if we have enough to make some
sort of action, um, I certainly want to open this
up to discussion. And so I guess that, you know,
as you are formulating your comments and questions, and I'm
not sure what, until what time we have, can staff
address how much time we have today. Um, I would
defer to the task force members, um, but I will
say that you will be receiving a Google doc, um,
after this meeting, like the last one. So you can
just online make your comments and send it directly to
Marty, um, for, for consideration. And, uh, we know that
we gave you a lot of to think about in
this meeting. So we didn't really anticipate that you're all
going to say, okay, let's march in the same direction
that you might need some time to process. And that's
totally acceptable. Um, you know, feel free to make any
comments about, you know, where you have questions now if
you'd like, but you can certainly do that on the
Google comment form. And that'll all be taken in consideration.
And then at our next meeting, similar to how we
did a recap for this meeting to join the meetings,
we will do a recap on the feedback and we'll
take that feedback and integrate it as best we can
and reserve a small portion of the next meeting to
really try to see if we're getting closer to consensus
on the direction that we want to take. Okay. Thank
you. I appreciate the opportunity to provide feedback. I think
there's, it seems like there's benefit to us, um, having
an open conversation, um, before we do that. And so
if, if I could ask for the indulgence of the
task force members to have a few more minutes for
discussion, have to make it to the airport. Okay. All
right. Well then Dr. Grava, thank you. And if you
have any comments before you leave, no. Okay. Thank you.
All right. Let's open it up for, for discussion. If
anybody has any comments. Or maybe you don't, maybe you
have recommendation. Yes. Dr. Encarnacion. Um, well, I want to
echo what Dr. Gary said that this is a lot
of work. And I want to thank staff because it's
layered upon layered. And trying to make sense of something
new that you're building as you're going is very difficult,
but you did it very well. Um, I do want
to go back to the question of whether our task
is to plan a recommendation around the governance entity for
phase one or the entire. Cause I think that changes
a lot of how we think about this. Um, the
consideration around an academic, I think the JPA and the
nonprofit is I'm here and I feel like it's kind
of where we're leaning to for what we're looking at.
But that changes a lot if we're doing phase one
versus the whole entity. And we've also talked about the
need for academic advisory board, but also how we really
see this as integrating for lifelong learning, whether you're skilling
up or whether you're recently graduated high school student or
you're a transfer for community college person who is community
invested. We were on a webinar and someone said it's
not placebound. It's somebody whose community invested. They're invested in
their community, right? They need to be in their community.
So your community invested student, but you want the same
opportunities. You deserve the same opportunities. Um, so do we
need to have just an academics on that advisory board?
Or should we have some industry partners that we would
want to be integrated with our academias so that we
know that we have paid internships that our students could
go, you know, seamlessly into maybe as they are also
learning and getting their degrees. So just something to consider
as well when we're thinking about all the different roles
that folks play who will be in this space. Because
in the end, we're here for our students, right? And
our community members and our lifelong learners, whatever and whoever
they are. Um, but again, going back to that, you
know, phase one or the entire, because over the decades,
I know I've been involved. And I know the city
has a vision. And I want to be very respectful
of the city's vision and their role. So yeah, I
think if, if I can help explain that a little
bit. So, um, we brought in the information about the
first phase of development because it gave us an idea
on the cost. And so that will help us when
we start having the conversation on financing, right? Um, because
we have a lot of unknowns and we don't really
have the partners at the table. We don't, the only
thing we know right now is what an initial phase
can look like and how much that would cost, including
the infrastructure. When you talk about governance first phase or
the university district, my answer is more of it's still
in this early phase of development. And that's what we
are planning for and recommending for. It's early phase. In
the future, it's really hard to plan for something where
we don't even have anything stood up. The partners aren't
at the table negotiating. I think what the government instruction
looks like in the beginning has to be flexible enough
for it to grow and evolve as well. But as
a task force, we should be thinking just that phase
one right now. Perfect. And with flexibility, obviously. Yeah. I
mean, it's, it's, I'm sorry. But it is early development,
right? I think we are planning for governance on the
university innovation district. The university district in general, again, I
think the first phase of development is just to give
us an idea on cost of, of what it would
be to develop a first site. But we are looking
at governance throughout. It's, it's one place at the end
of the day, um, but we are in this early
concept going into formation stage. Perfect. And chair Falcon circle
back to the item you put a pin in, which
kind of corresponds with this. I'm going to just read
straight from the, in terms of scope and what the
role of this task force is with respect to governance,
it's to identify and recommend potential governance structures for the
mixed use intersegmental educational facility, including but not limited to
consortia and other collaborative models. So really the role with
respect to the deliverable for next year is identify and
recommend potential government structures, not flesh them out, not identity,
you know, and then the next stages will be identified
potential funding mechanisms, potential partnerships. So it is again, at
the very early stage and the discussions about how it
would work functionally are for a later. And the sentence
above that was for the facility or the whole district.
Cause that's what I was asking is about the space.
So what did you said something about the space in
the first part of that? Well, part of the recommendations
are distinct, but the task force is established to do.
It does say at least all of the following. So
potentially you could go further, but Identify and recommend potential
governance structures for the mixed use intersegmental educational facility. Okay.
That was the part that I was asking about. Yeah.
Thank you. For the facility. Thank you. Member on Guiana
has a question. More of a comment. I think it
is really important that we understand the full scope. It's
like building a house. You can't. How do you build
a foundation if you don't know the size of the
house? Like you're going to build things that are not
appropriate for the size and scope. So I do think
we need to consider the overall vision and site as
we develop, you know, the first phase. Thank you for
that. Any other comments, questions. The only other request I
would have is as we get the feedback from the
surveys, it would be really helpful. I think not just
for, I'm going to speak for myself, but also the
public to see, not just to see how, um, it's
interpreted and brought through. But I would love to see
the comments from the community forum. There were comment cards
I heard that were submitted. Or the comments of my
fellow task members who put in their community comments through
the survey. Because I think this generation of dialogue on
the dais is super helpful because someone will say something
and then it'll generate an iterative like comment. Like that's
the wonderful part of public meetings. Um, but if we
don't get to see the actual comments and we just
see how staff kind of interpreted to them and incorporated
them, we miss out on that richness. And I think
that's really the heart of community engagement and public meetings.
So that would be just a request, not necessarily a
question. Thank you for that. Um, if I may just
add to some of the comments, you know, when I'm
hearing about that we're looking at governance and phases as
we are continuing to develop, um, the, well, develop the
university concept. And then we talk about finance mechanisms on
the next meeting. It seems to me, and I understand
that, you know, we need to be kind of flexible
here is if we start building momentum for the finance
mechanism. It seems to me that you need a structure
of where that lands. And we can't be flexible when
it comes to public financing. That has to be crystal
clear. Are we going to trouble, right? So I don't
know if there's, if staff hasn't, uh, can provide me
some, some clarity on that. And, cause I'm trying to
get to where. We can get to a recommendation. I
don't know if we're there yet. But I like that
if we're getting into the finance mechanism next meeting, we've,
we've got to be clear on, on what, what we
can do on governance right now. Yeah. And I will
speak for myself, not for the city. Well, I will
say is that as we have been pulling together the
recommendation sort of taking in all of the, the legal,
uh, context, et cetera, we have fully recognized the interplay
between all three of these areas, these domains, governance, land
use, and financing. There's a lot of interplay and a
lot of, uh, codependencies. And so what we are bringing
to you today is a draft that should also inform
the discussions that happen when the finance recommendations come forward
and or the land use recommendations come forward. And they
all have to work together. And we'll have implications for
one another. We've begun to do some of that work
of taking that into consideration. And I'm sure more surprises
will be in store for us as we dig into
in more granularity. I would also say that we are
also trying to hold the discipline of keeping the maturity
arc in mind and being able to, um, produce recommendations
that get to the, uh, what we would like to
see going forward. Because it is, it is recommendations that
are going to be in the report, not prescription. And
so that's, I think what we're trying to hold across
both. But so you will see these come back to
you as those conversations, uh, come forward. And you should
anticipate sort of wrestling through those with us as we
go forward. Thank you for that. And, you know, as
we're thinking about governance. I'm also hearing a little bit
of, um, some themes about composition of what, um, each
of these options would look like. And so I think
even before we come up with a recommendation, I feel
like that needs to be fleshed out as well. Um,
so that we know where to sort, you know, or
we sort folks and stakeholders. Just to be clear, the
composition for the governance enterprises. Is that what we're. Any
other comments? Yes. Dr. Gade. So just kind of trying
to synthesize the conversation. I think, um, as a body,
I'm sensing a lot of questions, whether it be about
the city, kind of city role, whether it be about
the composition of the board, whether it be the, some
of the technical pieces. And well, this is not prescriptive.
I think we want to be really thorough in our
exploration and robust in our investigation. So perhaps we might
want to consider creating an ad hoc working group or
a sub body of a smaller group of us so
that we can delve deeply come back to the next
meeting with a really vetted set of questions. It's a
suggestion. Again, just giving that I'm noting the hour and
noting the dialogue, uh, that's what I'm sensing. So I
like to, to have that be part of our consideration
is perhaps we establish a NATO. Maybe we just meet
in between meetings to delve deeply with staff so we
can really kind of bring that back. I know that,
you know, I think that would help me and my
determination. These recommendations make theoretical sense. But some of the
exploration about the practical impacts I think need to be
explored a little bit more deeply. Yeah. That's an interesting
suggestion. I want to be also mindful of the scope
of staff and the consultants. But, um, I'd like to,
if there is an agreement with a group to explore
that, obviously what the parameters that would look like, um,
given baggly keen. Right. I was just going to say,
um, particularly considering that there are a few members missing,
um, from the task force today. My recommendation would be
to add a future meeting agendized, the creation of an
ad hoc so that folks can know going in that
that's a decision point that's going to be made. Um,
as opposed to sort of impromptu creation, just to avoid
any potential bag leaky issues since it would be an
action of the board. And then a reminder ad hocs
are a minority of the, it could be less than
a minority, right? It could be two of you. It
could be four of you. Um, but, and the quick
rules on the ad hoc is it has to be
limited jurisdiction, something that's finite, uh, where the clear ending
point, a regular meetings and ad hocs are not subject
to public meetings, public notice. But my recommendation just to
keep it really above board legally would be to have
that as an action item on, on a future agenda
would be appointment of an ad hoc if you're so
inclined to go in that direction. And that way you
can ensure at least the folks that aren't here, you
know, would come to the next meeting knowing that they're
missing the meeting or the appointment of the ad hoc
is coming. And maybe they can pass along their thoughts
to one of their friends on the board. Okay. Thank
you for that guidance. Um. Is there a desire to
create an ad hoc? I mean, obviously we don't want
to create more work, but, um, there are some really
substantive questions. In my mind, I obviously the city should
be part of, um, ad hoc. And I misunderstand what
you said. We can't even discuss that until the next
meeting. Or am I misunderstanding what you said for a
creation, right? Correct. We have to be an action item
for the next meeting, correct? Correct. And from what I
understand, Chair, um, Falcon is trying to glean whether the
appetite to have that as an action item on the
next meeting. You can discuss it at this point, but
you can't take the action. That's what I want to
make sure to make sure you're cool. Okay. Okay. Do
we need to have a consensus? You know, go ahead.
To the point of creating an ad hoc committee, it
would end falling within the rules that the brown act
and allows us to do. We aren't prohibited from having
a vote notifying everybody, giving the chairperson the right to
a point. A ad hoc committee. Because if we want
to have that recommendation for next meeting. And we, and
we wait till appointing ad hoc tour, next regular schedule
meeting, you know, there might be a shortcut for us
to have a vote. Or I think we aren't prohibited
from sending out a vote to all the members to
see if they would authorize the chairwoman to form an
ad hoc committee to come back with a recommendation at
our next meeting versus putting this off for six months
or whenever our next second meeting is. Because if we
appoint them. Do you have a they could, they could
authorize the chair. And nothing precludes a minority of this
body from discussing these items outside of a meeting. As
long as you don't get into a majority, right? Because
then you have an issue with Bagley keen. But if
you're inclined to empower the chair, which is not unusual
and very typical on formation about hawks, um, to create
an ad hoc or a small set, I wouldn't call
it a subcommittee because then you have other rules. But
yeah, an ad hoc group committee. You can, you could
do that. Okay. I'm hearing a consensus that there might
be interest. Okay. Yes. Remember, Alan. And then we'll have
a member in Karnassian. Thank you, Chair Falcon. I would
just offer that while, um, in ad hoc committee composed
of minority a number of members is not required to
be a public meeting. I would encourage that any meeting
that happens would be open to the public so that
this conversation continues to be open and transparent. Okay. Just
to throw that out there. Yeah. No, thank you for
that. Dr. Encarmasion and then member on Guyana. Um, I
was also totally fine. Even with an ad hoc committee.
I'm just thinking we technically only have two meetings left,
right? We have a finance and then a final report
to review. And I'm just wondering if there is an
ad hoc to think about governance. And then we have
another very robust meeting about finance that might activate more
thoughts and conversations that then might bring us back to
like wanting a tweak something that we thought about around
governance. I'm feeling like that ad hoc might need a
meet again. And then maybe. There. I mean, I don't
know how it'll turn out because we can't foresee the
future, but I also just want to throw out if
this task force wants to also just think about how,
is this an ongoing task scores? Just to be realistic
for anyone who decides they want to be on it
and do we also want to consider just the idea
that this task force might need an additional meeting. If
I may answer that. So in reading the legislation and
you raise some really important questions, uh, it's probably what
keeps me up at night, how we're going to get
through all this material before the requirement, uh, for submitting
the final report honor before July 1st, 2027. So the
number of meetings was not prescribed in the legislation. So
we could have another meeting. We specifically focused on the
four meetings, uh, land use today's governance November's finance. And
then the last meeting was to start, have a discussion
about the first draft of the report. We can add
another meeting, but we also want to be mindful that
there's a lot of work that goes on in between
the meetings. And so that's why we didn't have six
meetings versus four meetings. But we certainly can have a
subgroup or advisory group to work on some of these
issues, a minority of the task force. We can do
it publicly. Um, and then we can just be fluid
because that's part of the issue. Finance might not be
as complicated as governance actually, because you have a set
number of mechanisms and then it's the public will whether
or not we can implement those mechanisms. That was my,
that's my thinking as well. And I don't know how
everybody thinks about this, but when we go buy a
house or we go buy a car, we kind of
come in with a budget. You know what I mean?
And we understand what budget we are. I mean, we
have an expense and we know what we have and
what we don't have when we build that way instead
of, and this is the frustrating thing for me because
I don't, I don't understand like the difficulty with creating,
we're, we're kind of creating a cathedral when we really,
really right now, we need to have like, Hey, what's
the price that we need. And how are we going
to be able to finance that or reverse? I have
this amount of money that I can finance. And then
I'd like to be able to be able to have
this at least in the first phase of what we're
doing. Instead, I think we're doing like backward designs. So
it's just like we're trying to cram all these ideas
into one small thing. And I think that we have
to be very careful with that because if we're trying
to cram everything back into a smaller spot, but we
don't have the money or we don't have the, uh,
you know, the capacity to build whenever we want, then
it's kind of difficult for us to sit here and
say, Hey, we were actually doing what we were supposed
to do. So I think financing for me, and I
said this first meeting, that's the nuts and bolts. Because
that tells us what money we have, what monies we
have and what needs we don't. And we're actually able
to say, okay, then we have this space and then
we build the governance structure out that way. That's just
practical me. And I'm sorry. I just don't understand. I
mean, the concept of binationalism is great. But I mean,
we're getting into talking about how many board members on
a possible nonprofit would be from a binational committee to
have them included. And we just don't even know where,
you know, if we have the money for it, you
know, and that's to me is I might, I hope
I'm not the only one that feels that this is
a little bit, we're convoluting the process. We didn't find
out how much money we have. We don't need to
find out how much it costs. Today was the first
time I've seen a cost associated with, thank you, Adriana.
I really appreciate it. But I think that this is.
I feel like the Mandalorian. This is the way, you
know, no, thank you for your, you know, your, your,
your, your passion. I want to also get to membranguiano.
Did you want to comment on something? I just wanted
to underscore that. The finance discussion, we will be dedicating
a whole meeting to that. So we're not overlooking it.
We're not, the, the, the interplay between governance and finances
pretty significant. And so yes, just want to reassure you
that we actually have a consultant in the audience who's
working with us along with his team to really dig
into those finances and to bring you a set of
options to look at. And there are, all of them
are, you know, what's available. The question is how do
you activate them? But, um, I just want you to
know that we are certainly considering that. Member Aguiano. Well,
I was going to suggest that if we were going
to have a public meeting anyway, it might make sense
to make it a task force meeting versus an ad
hoc. So everyone can attend. And if they can't attend,
then that's fine. But it seems like a lot of
people have questions in a minority might not be enough
people that want to participate. If we can get, um,
if we can get a quorum of folks, um, for
another meeting just on governance and just to dedicate, um,
to governance, if we still cannot come up with a
recommendation, then we maybe we might need to entertain, um,
a subset group to really dig in. So we, we,
we could do that if it is, um, you know,
if the capacity for us to do that in between
now and, um, our next meeting. So we could shoot
for something in October. To give us a chance to
give you a chance to think about it, absorb, get
to comments in to Marty. And we can certainly have
a meeting. It might be an hour. Can we do
a Zoom meeting? Is that possible? No, we have to
do in person. Correct. It has to be an in
- person meeting. And then just a reminder. So the
way, as Marlene was mentioning, the interplay between governance and
financing, some financing mechanisms might not be available depending on
the governance model you choose, right? And then some governance
models make certain sorts of funding mechanisms available. Um, and
so I would just caution you from, I mean, certainly
if the task force feels strongly about a governance recommendation,
please voice that. Um, but I think the intention of
our, of our, our, of our, of the group is
to present the recommendations as options. And then present the
funding recommendations as options so that you can see how
they interplay with each other. If you choose this, you
have this funding mechanism available. If you feel very strongly
about this funding mechanism, this is no longer an option.
And so that's sort of one of the reasons why
the, you know, they're being handled sort of together governance
first. A replay of governance next along with the funding
conversation. Dr. Moore. Uh, thank you, Chair. Um, given the
last few comments, I'm wondering if it would be better
to defer the discussion of governance till after the finance
meeting. In other words, schedule another meeting after the next
meeting. That way we'll know what the finance options are.
We'll know the interplay between the governance options and the
finance options. It will give us an opportunity then to
expore in more depth. Because I agree that we, the
governance questions there are a significant number of questions that
I think we need to have an in - depth
discussion. And the meeting, frankly, just don't leave us enough
time for discussion. It's just, and it's no one's fault.
It's just the format in the complexity of the issues.
So I think rather than having something in October, it
might be better to have our next meeting about finance,
then schedule and at another, um, task force meeting. Appreciate
the sequence. Do you have a conversation? From a staff
perspective, that makes sense. I think that makes a lot
of sense. And then it gives you time to think
and then understand the relationship. And again, we have a
February meeting. We could schedule January meeting or December, but
I think January might be more effective. So we can,
if you want to, I don't know if this would
be appropriate to, you have an action item for this
item. You could, um, someone can make a motion to
have the chair work with staff to work out. The
details of establishing another, uh, task force meetings specifically to
focus on governance. Or if you just show a consensus
that that's what you'd like to do. I can entertain
a motion, if any, I move to do what, uh,
what Marlene just put in. I can't repeat it word
for word, but yeah, so there you go. I'll second.
Okay. So we have a motion by, uh, member out
on CBS seconded by a member Allen. Do we want
to repeat the motion of staff wants to, what I'm
hearing is that, um, the motion is, is to, um,
empower the chair to work with staff on sequencing an
additional meeting, uh, for governance. Um, and yeah, and then
we'll schedule that meeting. And that we may want to
identify January for your calendaring so that you have some
time to plan for this. Okay. So we have a
motion and a second all in favor. Aye. Any note
suppose. Okay. The action passes. Thank you so much. I
really appreciate this discussion was very substantive and rightly so.
Um, you know, we do have to get this right,
even though there will be, you know, potential flexibility as
the university continues to develop, um, especially if we're starting
to put meat on the bones, we do need a
structure to, you know, to house, um, these future decisions
and continuing to organize and plan for this university. So
I appreciate each and every one of your comments and
questions and, um, I hear the passion also from, from
members, um, as he speaks. So thank you. Um, any
additional comments from members before we adjourn. And thank you
so much for spending a few more minutes of your
precious time, um, in this discussion. I have a comment.
Yes. Um, I want to make sure we can legally
do this on a non agendaised item. Um. The city
of Chilevista certified the EIR for this property in 2018.
However, we have seen in California numerous times. Those certifications
challenged because of change circumstances. Um, like it or not,
us people that have grown up in the South Bay
feel somewhat of a chip on our shoulder. That we
have the only prison. We have the only toll road
in the county. You know, some of us think La
Hoya could afford that better than the people in the
South Bay. We have a sewage problem that's gone on
for five or six decades that would never happen in
La Joya incinitas. Delmar were up and down the coast.
And we have to deal with it regularly. So maybe
our chip is misplaced. But this task force has a
very, very difficult task in front of it of completing
university. And one of the things that as we get
people, if we can build on what Southwestern college has
done and bringing in USC to a South Bay campus,
one of the things that concerns me is a challenge
to the EIR that was done in 2018 when we
complete our task. We get all this done. And then
somebody doesn't like traffic. Somebody doesn't like the lighting from
the ball field. Somebody doesn't like the noise. It'll come
from the vent. And all of a sudden we find
ourselves in a lawsuit. For years. And people all over
the country, and I do business all over the country,
are afraid to come to California. Because of CEQA. The
legislature has made very clear that if proper things have
gone into place as Chulavisa did. And they certified the
EIR that you can request that that area, that 380
plus acres be exempt from CEQA. What I want to
do is cut off any future challenges that might come.
And so the question is, and I've talked to the
assembly men about this. I've talked to elected officials and
chill vised about this. And everyone supports. But the assemblyman
would like to see if this committee would recommend to
him. That we ask him to carry legislation that would
exempt. This site from future CEQA challenges. So the question
is, can we make that recommendation or do we have
to agendize that. For next meeting? Um, uh, yes, this
task force can make that recommendation. No, not today because
of today's agenda. It does go hand in hand with
governance. Um, because part of the governance task is to
identify statutory barriers and one can interpret the environmental laws
as a potential statutory barrier or future barrier for success.
So that's something that has been the case in many
times. So that's something that we can consider a staff
with respect to the final report as a recommendation on
the statutory barrier front. Um, so that would be an
item for a future meeting. Um, and we can discuss
offline. Yeah. The problem is not too future because assume
in Alvarez would have to introduce at the beginning of
the year. And so that means we have to act
this year to have, uh, the implement to act to
carry the legislation. I've talked to the speaker's office about
this and the assembly men and again to elect officials
here. Everyone seems very supportive of us completing our work.
And then finding ourselves in a lawsuit. For years and
maybe losing the project. So. If we could agendize that,
be appreciative. I think it'd be fine to have that
as part of the next discussion at the October meeting
on the front end, um, whether that's something that this
task force wants to do as part of its recommendations.
Okay. Thank you. Okay. Sure. Thank you member for bringing
that up. And we'll leave it to staff to determine
what the most appropriate way to incorporate because of the
time sensitivity with, um, the upcoming legislative, new legislative session
starting in January where that, where that conversation should be
housed, um, you know, the timeframe in our scope of
meetings. So. Thank you. Any other comments from members. All
right. With that, thank you so much everyone for, uh,
your time today on a Friday and for the rich
discussion and with that, this meeting is a meeting is
adjourned.