progress. But to Dana Williams point the we thought it might be more cost effective and efficient and useful rather than having a large RV essentially mom have smaller mobile units right because like where we store that is a issue maintenance on it is an issue and drivers are an issue so it might be a parking right so having smaller vans might be more helpful. Get us to more locations might actually be more cost effective to and also allow us to potentially, you know, do something else with those vehicles once they retire like I don't know what we do with this RV
is huge. It's huge because we're watching it back into our events. And we couldn't believe it but and we always wondered the effectiveness of them anyway because we will have them out and I'm not sure how many people actually went on them and apply for jobs and you know, but they were good to have
it was and it was great branding blue. I mean it was wrapped, you know with Detroit at work, I think it I think it was helpful. It was useful. And it probably could be you know still Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
So if we can just at least add it to Executive Session, even if we put it in our closing resolution to support you said you want to have the federal funds to cure
it. It's actually not determined yet. So right now, the budget that we've built is so tight on what we believe are the core services that I'm not sure we'd be able to fit it in. That's going to be continued conversations for us internally. If not that we'd have to go out and get corporate or philanthropy philanthropic dollars to
support it. I feel Callaway was just going to donate them
we will add this portion to our executive session and see how we can further support you guys. Is there a motion to do so motion? Okay, chair. All right, Hearing no objections and we could put that under me and Callaway member Galloway's name, Hearing no objections that action will be taken. Alright, thank you, ladies. We appreciate the work that you all do. Thank you so much, I'm sure yes, before they
leave, we found money for golf carts, and I'm sure we can find money for your best. Okay, so I need to say that. Thank you.
Thank you so much. Y'all. Have a great day. Thank you for being here. Great. All right. We're gonna go straight to our next hearing. The WSD director Brown is with us
right now,
yeah, we never had a we didn't want to say that Councilmember. That's what happened when you know you guys would like a five minute break or to move forward. Or if we can keep a quorum. We can continue. This is our last two we have this one.
Drive Thank you. Yeah, Brian was off today, but he probably would remind us to do that.
No,
it's okay. We'll be back right
yes, everybody promoted on Zoom. Deborah posh Okay.
Thank you
you need another layer
is hearing someone's on sharing the screen? Okay. You're going to promote whoever needs to be promoted to share the screen. Oh
okay, so we don't have a PowerPoint for this morning. Okay. No worries. Okay. Thank you. All right. We will proceed now with our budget hearing for the Detroit water and sewage Department Director Brown. The floor is yours. Yes.
And thank you for having us. Good afternoon, Gary Brown, Director of the Detroit water and sewage department. I'll let my finance team introduce themselves, please.
Yeah, good morning. councilmembers. My name is Tucker Rama and I'm the Chief Financial Officer of DWSD.
I'm Michelle Williams. DWSD budget manager.
Okay. All right. We're gonna we're gonna get right in and I'm going to ask Mr. Ray Amman to get into the presentation. We should be able to go through it pretty quickly. We've done it for maybe five times with our with with the DWSD board of directors and so he's very familiar with it
already Yep. All right. Good morning. Again. This is DWSD is operating budget for fiscal year 2025. I'll go through a few slides here. Just in background of how the budget was developed and how we arrived at the rates that we have from fiscal year 2025. On the first slide, unfortunately, there is nothing on the show on this screen, but you all have copies. When we develop our budget for DWSD. There are a few considerations that we take into account that are guiding principles for coming up with the budget. At the top of the list is affordability. We want to keep rates affordable for our citizens for our residents. generally try to keep the rate below 4%. And we also keep in mind the support we need to provide residents for water conservation initiatives. The second important consideration for the budget is customer service. We value customer service tremendously. What are our guideline is to provide compassionate and responsive customer service to our citizens. Operations obviously is key for sustaining our DWSD operations. We want to ensure that we preserve public health, meet or exceed all state, federal or local regulations. Another key consideration is employee and safety. As well as safety for our assets, our infrastructure. Water and Sewer upgrades plays a very critical role in keeping our systems up to date and in compliance with laws and regulations, including lead service line initiatives that we have within the organization. Another key consideration is employee focus. Our goal is to hire competent and qualified individuals in them and retain them within DWSD. On the next slide, I just like to go through a few highlights within the current budget environment. The proposed FY 2025 budget was prepared in a very inflationary environment. The annual inflation rate for the United States of America was 3.4% for the 12 month period that ended on December 31 2023. According to the US Department, Department statistics, even in this environment, our goal which is DWSD is goal was to get keep the rate affordable. And at the same time we did not want to compromise on our service level initiatives. So the budget incorporates expenditures that are required to operate the system as a whole and the budget requirement or the expense requirement is collectively termed as revenue requirement. As I go through the slides, you'll see the total system wide revenue requirement increased by 2.9% over 2024 that amounted to approximately $14 million. So the there are three components to the cost structure and I'll go through them later quickly. Departmental or direct expense is one of them. That category of expense increased 3.2% or roughly $3.3 million and non departmental or indirect expenses. increased by 2.5%, roughly about $9.5 million. Revenue finance capital which is a very small component of the cost structure is projected to increase at $1.1 million. The increase is primarily due to increase in contractual services professional services for about $3.8 million GL ws Great Lakes weather authorities wholesale charges, which increased by $10.9 million. The BNC notes which are debt service, at 3.5 million and bad debt at $2.1 million. All of these increases upset by a decrease in legacy pension cost of $7.5 million. And I'll explain that a little bit later. In our 2025 budget, we added 33 new positions for the operating budget. Although there are 33 new people added to the budget, you will not see that much of an increase in salaries and wages or fringe benefits because two of the cost centers we have one for lead service line and one for engineering are transferred to our ISP which is the improvement and extension fund which deals with capital expenditures and therefore not part of our operating budget starting this fiscal year. At the end of it, the total revenue requirement was four $495.4 million for both the water and sewer fund. Combined, which was offset by non revenue of $22.9 million at the end resulting in a net increase of $472.5 million in revenue requirement. This represents a 3.9% rate revenue increase over fy 24. The 3.9% increase is offset by a moderate increase in our volume as well as meter counts averaging in about 0.6 to 0.77% over fy 24. So the increase in volume and usage kind of reduced the overall rate requirement from 3.9 to 3.2. The budget proposes a three to 3.2% increase in rates across the system, which means for water services sewer services as well as drainage except for private airline. We can go through some of the numbers here. As I mentioned before, there are three components that make up our expenditure budget, also called the revenue requirement. The Departmental expenses non department and revenue finance capital and the top first part of the slide. This the second part below shows the distribution by our waterfront and our sewer fund. Again, the water fund requirement increased by 2.4% Were the sewer fund requirement increased by 3.1 person with an overall increase of 2.9%. Departmental expenses, as I mentioned before, is an increase of 3.2 in non departmental and 2.5%. The next slide is just a graphical presentation of how these three components stack up against each other. You'll see here departmental expenses, which is these are expenses that overweights DWSD has control over and amounts to 21% $106 million non departmental expenses, which we also call indirect expenses are expenses over which we have very little or no control. And that amounts to 78% of our budget, or roughly $386 million. And I'll explain later, what are these expenses over which we have little or no control? This slide here summarizes our departmental expenses breaks down by natural click categorization of expenses. As you can see, salaries, wages, employee benefits, professional services and so forth. The biggest increase here is the professional and contractual services. Majority of the increases and this is mainly to help improve our service levels, as well as to clear up our backlog of service deliverables and give you an example of some of the new initiatives that we are taking into consideration for the next year's budget for example, we have a new fire flow test expense category for half a million dollars, permitted service line connection and disconnection for another half a million traffic control for another half million. We have expanded our caspase and cleaning initiative, aligning another million dollars to that project hydrant lasting for $0.75 million on South restoration for another million dollars. So all of these new initiatives kind of lead to an increase in professional and contraction services of $3.8 million. Next slide is a graphical presentation. Here you can see personnel costs, which is salaries and wages and employee benefits make up 53% of our cost structure. And headcount as I mentioned before, is projected to increase by 33 FTEs. Here's the non departmental expenses. These are expenses over which we have little or no control. Leading the pack is wholesale charges. These are charges that are determined by Great Lakes Water Authority, and they have their own they have their calculation method using peak volumes and as well as peak periods and a new calculation method which was introduced in FY 20. For FY 25 budget, all of that led to an increase of $10.9 million sewer cost but that is increasing at 2.1 million again based on our revenue projection. BNC notes which our debt service has a $3.5 million increase and is based on payment structure as we pay a little bit more as we go along.
All of this is offset by a decreasing legacy pension cost by $7.5 million. So legacy pension costs is the cost that when we bifurcated there was an agreement with the city of Detroit retirement system between us DWSD the city of Detroit Retirement System and the Great Lakes Water Authority to contribute a fixed amount of money to our retirement system. So there was no actual valuation but it was a fixed amount that we had to contribute every year, that agreement and then last year so going forward, we are not subject to that requirement. Now our contribution will be based on actuarial valuation of our pension obligation. So there was a saving of 7.5 Millions because we ended up contributing more than what was necessary. The next slide again, just a graphical presentation to show you that wholesale charges which is the most big the biggest part of our non departmental expenses accounting for 60% of the non department cost structure. Pre and Post bifurcation that is second, accounting for 20% and bad debt is the third coming up with 16% of the cost base. Now all of this is expenditures and revenue requirement. How do we find our revenue requirement? is a question that comes to mind. So our revenue requirement which is our expenditure budget is financed out of two main categories one is the retail revenue in one way or the other one is non retail revenue. Within within the retail revenue category you have rate revenue as well as non rate revenue. Rate revenue are those revenues that we charge our customers for providing water as well as sewer services and drainage services. Non rate revenues are things like fines penalties permit fees, which are miscellaneous in nature. Within non retail revenue, we have said services with Gia Great Lakes Water Authority some services are common, which are shared and they reimburse us for those costs. GL wa also participates in our pension and BNC notes they have their own share. Those are included in cost but are eventually reimbursed by DWSD to us and IWC is the industrial waste charges which remains constant compared to 2024. So, all in all total revenue requirement of $495.4 million. As I mentioned before, it's offset by some non rate revenue and the breakdown is below. We take the total revenue requirement then we reduce it by non rate revenue such as shared services, your level of a share of notes, the non read revenue, miscellaneous revenue and IWC charges. So our revenue requirement comes down is reduced by those categories, resulting in a rate revenue requirement of $472.5 million which translates to 3.9%. Here is this slide on the components of rates revenue what really makes up our rate revenue there are four categories one is the commodity charges. These are charges that we actually charge residents. service charges come along is for our meters and related charges. We have fire private violent charges and drainage charges. All of these make up our rate revenue requirements. And the second part of the slides is breaks it down by the two funds, how much of it is water fun and how much is in the sewer fund? On the right column you'll see across the board it's a 3.9% rate revenue increase. Again, a slide here just to show you that commodity charges make up the bulk of our revenue base, accounting for 49% of our total revenue required in rent chairs this comes second with 42% of the revenue generated after taking into account all the revenue requirements, our volume increases and our increases in our meters, we determine the rates for FY 2025. As I mentioned before, the overall revenue requirement was greatly reduced by all these increases in volume and usage, resulting in a basis that we could translate data that into a rate increase of 3.2%. So in our volumetric rate, both for tier one as well as tier two, as well as for service fees and service fees. It's a 3.2% rate increase compared to fy 24. Same thing with sewer fun. We were able to keep 3.2% Whether it's the volume or service rate, as well as the drainage be constant 3.2% across the board. The next two slides are just details of the breaking down of what I just went through and summary form. And these are just breaking down by what the what are the components of expenditures by appropriations and both for water fund and sewer fund. And then the slide here the last slide, but this one, but last is our distribution of our FTE is by cost centers. As I mentioned before, 33 headcount increase for the operating fund. We also have eight increase FTEs for our ind funding stands for improvement and extension one, which is the capital puppies of our budget structure and does not relate to any calculation for rate increases. Of all these you'll see the maximum increases in operating is for operational cost centers, which is our which is our key cost center. That one increased by six to 3.7%. Again, the focus is on to increase service level quality as well as clearing up backlogs from previous years. Increasing FTE for ayeni which is the improvement Excellence Fund is mainly for boosting our lead service line program. And that increased by five individuals what does it all relate amount to at the end of the day? We spent all this money we raise revenues, what does it translate to? What value does it add to ours to us and to our residents and our citizens. So all of this will relate to cleaning up a 500 miles of sewer to provide capacity to the current design standards clean entire system and a five year cycle. That's our goal. inspect and clean 6000 catch basins annually to reduce street flooding. Replace 8000 lead service lines with a goal to remove all lines within 10 years. More than 5000 have been replaced since 20 2018. We also have a project painting 5000 fire hydrants which reduces corrosion 1000s were 1000 hydrants were painted in fall of 2023 alone. We our goal is to complete the far west project stormwater management initiative that cost about 100 million 100 million gallons of water on an annual basis. We are initiating the East Side resiliency study and further pursue at least two other West Side green infrastructure projects. So all of these are important things that are necessary and the budget reflects the expenditures reflect those things. So that's a presentation we'll be happy to answer any questions you may have met Madam
Chair, can I just highlight just a couple of points that may have got missed over? One is I know that LPD asked us to produce a list of the last five years of rate increases just to be able to compare and what we'll put that together but I can tell you I do have a chart of 20 years prior to 2015 when I took over at DWSD and there were double digit rate increases sometimes as high as 17%. A year. And that is completely unsustainable. That's that's more than a 200% increase. We've been able to keep the rates down at around 3% And this year, we're at 3.2 and that's below inflation. And believe me, you saw the $10 million was a $10 million increase from our wholesaler the Great Lakes Water Authority. And that was basically due to the chemical costs that has gone through the roof, as well as utility costs electricity to run these large pumps and the equipment that we run. So I wanted to highlight that issue and then secondly, nowhere in the country certainly nowhere in Michigan, are you seeing increases in volume, which means our city is growing. We were putting 20 new meters a week installing and we've been doing that for for the last two years, almost so our volume almost increased by 1%. We're all over the country. Certainly every city in Michigan. Volumes are going down mainly because appliances like washing machines and dishwashers are more energy efficient. They don't use as much water so water volumes are going down all over the country but in Detroit, they're going up even though we're using modern equipment they're going up because we're we're putting more housing in place where people are showering and flushing and and using more water. So that's a good thing and it's helping to keep our costs down. The more the more volume that we sell the lower cost for everybody. So I just want to make those two points and then we can answer any questions. All right,
thank you so much director brown for the presentation. We have several questions from our office will submit in writing but I wanted to raise just two one is the drainage fees. I know that that is still an issue of contention among not only just residents but businesses and churches. Particularly churches lately. I've been receiving a lot of calls from churches and I want to thank Brian Peck and Paul on your team who is amazing. I love Brian. He does such a phenomenal job and he has facilitated several meetings with some of the clergy that have reached out regarding the issues with drainage fees from my understanding there was a credit that was given 25 50% and 100% for drainage fees for churches that has recently expired or is expiring. And so they're starting to see a huge increase in the amount that they're paying in drainage fees. So wanted to know if you can speak to us where we are with the clergy community, the outreach, and not just the businesses as well, but particularly if there was a credit that was given to clergy, if that is expiring and how we are assisting them transition.
Yes, and let me just just just for a minute just remind the public how we got to the drainage charge, because there's always been a drain discharge that was was buried into the sewer charges. And we got sued. And it was a class action lawsuit. And the churches were a part of that. And they basically say it you're not charging parking lots like the ones downtown because at the time we would only charge drainage charges if you had a water account. And so there was so many properties vacant parking lots that are in the city of downtown that didn't have water counts because they didn't have they weren't using water so they weren't being charged for drainage. And so we got sued by our commercial industrial and our nonprofits. The churches in a class action suit and we settled that suit for 10s of millions of dollars and we were forced to charge change the way that we charged for drainage to an impervious surface, meaning a hard surface is now being charged that wasn't being charged before. And the church is not only had large parking lots, I know several churches that that pay as much as $10,000 a month in drainage charges because the size of their their lot that drainage charges is more than $680 An acre Okay, so we did have a program some years ago, in which we put $5 million into a pot and we were able to set up a program where churches what helped DWSD with getting our message out with residential customers about our rap program at the time, and we were able to offset their bills through a credit program. And that had that that did pretty much expire. That money ran out. But I'm happy to say for now director brown it's that money has been gone for the last two maybe three years now. It's been gone. It was also used to help churches to reduce the amount of impervious surface but the fact of the matter is, is most churches couldn't afford to participate in the program even when we would offset their costs. They still it still was very expensive, and the return on investment just took too long for them to get their money back meaning they'd invest more money in redoing a parking lot putting in putting in pavers that would allow the water to go down would cost so much they would not recoup that investment in 10 or 15 years so it was just not affordable for them to do it. I am in the next few weeks going to announce a new program that will allow churches to apply for credits. I haven't got it approved through my board yet I intend at the next meeting to do that. It's also going to help residential customers. This new program and we're gonna use the churches to help us roll it out to the residential customers and therefore be able to give them a substantial credit that will help pay down some of their past due bills as well as their current bills. There are more than 6000 churches that are in the arrears on their on their bill. So we we've been working on a a new program. I can't publicly roll it out today because I haven't had it approved through my board. I will get that done at the next board meeting and we'd be more than glad to come back and publicly do a press conference and roll it out, you know, at this table.
Okay perfectly so we can expect something in 2024 to be out to support both churches, residents in businesses with credits on their drainage. Yeah,
my goal is to have it start on May 1 Okay, and but to we need to educate people definitely and get the word get the word out to do it. But that's my goal to roll the program out May 1.
Okay. Looking forward to the details of that and I'm glad to hear that there is going to be an additional program to assist our churches because again, I have gotten a lot of calls
about so I then saw by
you guys have been very helpful. Lastly, I just wanted to ask, of course about the basement backup protection program and the ability to expand this program particularly in district five. I know that we worked with Peckinpah for phase two to incorporate Jefferson village, which is the far east side of the district closer to the water. That's the only area I know in district five that is eligible. And so I'm just curious about expanding from the 11 target neighborhoods and I know we can't service everyone because the last time I think you sent something to us you'd mentioned that 30,000 basements are eligible in Detroit and about 40% of those are expected to apply. So that's roughly 12,000 basements totaling $72 million. So I know we can't reach everyone. But my question is about expansion and including more areas particularly in district five into the program.
Your district five district, six district 722 Different there were 11 neighborhoods in those districts that is going to be expanded to 22. Currently I have I'm working off of $4 million of Arper money that's that plumbers are you know, out doing homes right now, seven different Detroit based companies are doing basement backup program. We we've been approved for I believe another $7 million through FEMA for flood mitigation and we intend to use that to augment the basement backup program. More importantly, I believe this body approved $43 million of CDBG money and you know, you know phase one, we learned a lot in the basement backup program. We're in phase two now and we've changed the scope of work. And you're right. We've sent out letters to 32,000 homes where we put a camera in the sewer and we can see that the lateral sewer line that line that runs from the house to the city main has fallen off and those houses are flooding in, even in dry weather when it's not not raining. And so we're the next the next contract that goes out as well as phase two that's in place now allows us to reconnect the lateral sewer line that so the scope of work was changed from phase one. When we put the camera in in phase, one 1/3 of the homes, the linesets had fallen off and we couldn't fix we couldn't fix it because it wasn't in the scope of work that we put out. So when we put phase two out which is in place right now, we added we changed the scope and added that feature. And then when you moved $43 million, I think from HRD to DWSD. We'll be able to get some larger plumbing companies to also do basement backup as well as address some of the issues of a lot of the issues of the lateral sewer lines that have fallen off.
Okay. All right. Thank you. And just to be clear, you said 22 neighborhoods now are a part of a
district. Originally we had 2000 homes in Jefferson Chalmers and in areas that had flooded during the August 21 storm that had signed up for the basement backup program. Well, the $4 million is only going to do about 233 homes. And so the 43 million now as we expanded the program and you know, it's it's somewhat complicated because depending on the pot of money that we're using, like for instance when we're using FEMA dollars, I can't go into a floodplain area unless the customer has purchased flood insurance and you know that's unaffordable. So we decided to take the FEMA money and go into other areas of the city that weren't in the floodplain that didn't need to flood insurance and then use the CDBG money to go back and do the laterals in the flood plains and expand the area so it's it's really about capacity. I mean, we've we've got a lot of work. A lot of work going on out there now with lead service lines and basement backup. Plus are almost $100 million in our capital program to replace sewers and water mains. And so I'm assured the mayor that we will find the the capacity if we even if we have to go we've gone as far away as Minnesota to bring companies in because these lead service lines we got to get them out i My goal is to get 10,000 out a year. It will take eight years to complete the project. And we can't get it done soon enough, but we're going to get the capacity and as you saw in the budget we added 33 people we're adding DWSD employees that are doing lead service line replacement now and I just got a cost analysis they cost me about $6,300 A line when I do it in house. It cost me $9,300 When I contract it out. And so our goal is to bring on more and more employees that will not only build capacity, but it will push the price point down for contractors. And so we're buying new equipment, but you know, please understand it. This is going on all over the country and everybody's trying to buy the same equipment. And there's a backlog. So we're headed we're ahead of the rest of the country. There's nobody doing the number of lines that we're doing currently right now.
Okay. All right. Thank you, Director Brown for that. We will move now to questions from my colleagues and I will go to council member Johnson.
Thank you, Madam President. And good afternoon. Let me start by saying thank you for always availing yourself I know I'm always reaching out to you to come to the district to talk about updates and progress has been made as well as to address any challenges that residents are having. I know it's always difficult conversation but I appreciate you coming out as well as Brian Peckinpah because we email him all the time as well. Awesome. And so I have to be honest with you. So when you talk about an increase in volume, that makes me nervous. It makes me nervous because I understand the limitations of the capacity that the system has now. I also see that there's a far west stormwater management project. There are two other West Side green stormwater infrastructure projects, and there is an East Side study. Can you talk to me about why not an East Side GSI project that we're implementing to help manage
because you're so you're you're below the river level in a lot of points. The river is the GIS project where we're trying to slow the water down and get it into the river. And so you wouldn't you wouldn't put a pond below the river level
but there in the city of Mexico interrupt you. District Four goes all the way up to grassroots.
I know and that's the point I was gonna make. Because when we when we came out to the community meeting, we rolled out a half billion dollars a half billion dollars worth of programs that are going to help mitigate flooding in District Four, the project I'm doing on the far west side is 500 is 50 million. It's 50 million. So I understand the need in your district. And we've got the Army Corps of engineering. We've got gli wa we've got MDOT the state we've got everybody working on District Four and mitigating flooding. And and I think I have a green infrastructure project at at a county park Chandler park a pretty significant project there but we're gonna look for every opportunity in the city to do these these projects. But when you put in a pond in your on the northern part of the city, the high part that's that's where they're, they're more successful when you put a pond close to the river. And those a lot of homes are already below the river level. You're just going to cause more more flooding what what what you need are is either a, a tunnel or large tanks that will capture that water that storm water and slow it down during the event so that when the event is over, you can slowly release it to the plant that's what's needed. And that's a half billion dollar project is being engineered and designed by with the help of the Army Corps of engineering and Great Lakes Water Authority and several other federal agencies. Okay, we haven't we haven't forgotten.
I appreciate that. And you know, sometimes I am the last person to learn about all of these things. So it would be nice to know even if it's, you know, kind of off the record for me for me to be aware that these things are happening. So I just learned that the Great Lakes Water Authority has 10 projects going on. I only know of one. Well now potentially two. So it would be very good to hear about them beforehand. So that I understand the full scope of what's taking place that will largely benefit and most of the construction work is happening in District Four so that that will be greatly appreciated. And so you talked about some of the work that's taking place relative to the floodplain. You I believe, along with the Great Lakes Water Authority and others are really working on a plan to help remove the community from the floodplain. I know that some of the conversations that are being had now around the Great Lakes Water Authority and the work that they're doing as it relates to the pumping stations that doesn't necessarily impact the floodplain directly.
Yeah, we you know, Great Lakes Water Authority DWSD we manage rain. We don't we don't manage the river. We don't manage the water that comes over flood walls that that's not what the system was designed to do. And so there are others in in city government that are tasked with that. Detroit building authority and and others were were tasked with managing rain and storm water when it when it rains and that's what we're we're trying to mitigate flooding during those events.
But are you involved in those conversations at
all? Because that's the table Yes.
Okay. Okay, because I do know that when the designation was given to the Jefferson Chalmers community, it was shortly after right around the 2021 backups and you know, a lot of residents are feeling as though you know, a backup is different from a flood. Right. So we, the community just wants to ensure that the designation number one is appropriate is due to the community because as you indicated, it is costly to get flood insurance and we have a lot of legacy Detroiters that live in that community that are trying to hold on considering the numerous times they've had backups in their basements.
Understanding we are at the table with the rest of the city agencies trying to address the issue. All right.
I appreciate it again. What would love to be aware of the projects just to have an understanding of the full scope of work that's happening? Yeah,
I had this conversation with Great Lakes Water Authority CEO today that you have to do a better job. There's no way that the community should be finding out about a pump station is being built in the community. And it it comes to this body so you got to think planning and development. And you haven't even socialized it with the community yet with regards to how it's going to disrupt the community. Everybody will want this pump station. It's going to mitigate flooding, but it's going to cause a major amount of disruption for those neighbors and quite frankly, I told you, I treat it as if I live there. And you know, we have a family reunion. We have kids graduating from school and we want to have something our backyard you can't disrupt their neighborhood for three or four years and not communicate and that's gone on on the east side specifically, how to drive and van de there's work there that's been going on for three or four years and they you know, I'm as a board member, I'm going to every week be asking about the communication plan to the community. In the city of Detroit because quite frankly, I I see a different level of communication sometimes in Oakland County, when major projects are going on than I do in my neighborhood or in my community. So we're aware of that and we've got to make sure that they do better. Thank
you. I appreciate you elevating that with him. I did also have that conversation and just let them know that if I need to slow it down, when it comes to this body in order for the community engagement to happen that I will I that's not the ideal situation, because we know the impact of the work that they're planning to do. But thank you for that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President.
Thank you. Members Santiago mirror.
Thank you, Mr. President. Good afternoon, everyone. Similar to the questions around our infrastructure, lack of infrastructure, aging infrastructure, is what's leading our basements to be backed up during heavy rains. Wondering what we are doing if you wouldn't mind sharing with us in the public what we're doing to address our aging infrastructure. I believe a few weeks back now, there was an announcement from the federal government's announcing either five or $8.2 billion for municipalities to address their infrastructure. Have you heard of this? Are we going to go after some of these resources or what are our plans to address our infrastructure? We're
absolutely going after every dollar from every federal agency from FEMA to EPA from Health and Human Services at every direction that we can. The thing that DWSD is doing in neighborhoods is and I think it's in on the last page of the report. The more sewer lines that we can clean and build capacity in them when they are filled with routes and they won't help very much flow is going to surcharge into the basement. So it's our job to identify out of the 3000 miles of sewer lines that we have the ones that need to be cleaned, to build capacity and more importantly, the ones that we've cambered and we see need to be either replaced or realigned. That's the first line of defense is at least having the old system have as much capacity as it does and when when lines have collapsed or they're filled with debris and tree roots. They don't hold very much flow and they're going to be easy to for so that's the first thing. The next thing is to work with all the other agencies in in concert with the Gordie Howe bridge was a perfect example that when that was first designed, they were going to put all of the stormwater that came off of the bridge and the plazas into the sewer system and send it to the wastewater treatment plant and we said no, no, we need you put in ponds you do secondary treatment and you push it right out to the river. You you lessen the amount of flow in the system building capacity for when you have large rains. And you know without a doubt our city when it was built was it started at the river and built its way out north to eight mile so the oldest parts of the system are closest to the river, the East Side, Southwest Detroit, which is what I'm telling my team in terms of replacing lead service lines we should be we should not start at eight miles and work our way in we should start at the river and work our way out which you know some of your neighborhoods will want one of the first ones that we started at to do that. And so there's not a there's not going to be there's not an easy, easy fix. I think people do understand that but they want to know that they're there. There's planning going and
that there will be some relief at some point. And we have to keep communicating what what it is that we're doing in that regard. Through the Chair. I agree. I think we it would be good to see that plan. What is the 510 year plan, understanding that things take time to do those replacements and see it see it in the map see it and steps and in phases that we it's it's not a are we doing anything? It's Yes. Where are we in the process? How much more do we have to go How much more do we need? And then that way we can also our questions are then much more focused. So it's I know we're hearing this phase replaced all these lines already. It I'm assuming you have a plan like this already. Do you and would you be able to share a plan like this with the public?
Yes, and I on the Great Lakes Water Authority I chair the capital improvement plan and there is absolutely a 10 year capital plan. I chaired a meeting this morning on on that plan. I can certainly either make the plan available to you in in a hardcopy I can point it to you where it's where it is on the website. But you or your staff will need you will you will need our engineers to come in and walk you through the plan so that just reading it doesn't really tell the picture of how it's going to mitigate flooding in your neighborhood. But I certainly can. We're making a note to get you a copy of the 10 year plan and understand it and and I was I was suggesting it because you know I sat on I sat on city council that someone from your staffs we'd never we never hear from the city council at our board meetings at public comment I listen in to the meetings be a part of the we had Highland Park in yesterday we just signed a contract with Highland Park and I I told him the same thing you This is how you you get involved. You have two representatives me and Freeman Hendricks that should be pounding on the Great Lakes Water Authority. If you if you see the plan you'll see that the great majority of money being spent in Great Lakes Water Authority is being spent in the city of Detroit. That's not by accident. Number one, that's where the majority of the assets are. But number two, we're making sure that issues are being addressed in Detroit. So I will there's a 10 year plan. It's in writing, I'll make sure that you get a hard copy and we will also point you to on the website where you can find it but it is a voluminous document that without some walking through it. It's difficult to understand through
the Chair. Thank you. I know we're over time so I will save my last question for later was about the 10 3050 plan. There was a resident that came during public comments during one of our evening meetings. I wanted to hear an update on the plan. But we can follow up with that information on the memo. Member Johnson mentioned the ugly wall project it's actually in PHS right now. Part of at least a part of that request is is is in PHS right now. And we did have to hold it back because residents were coming in saying about the lack of engagements. So some more accountability on that would be good. And I am going to invite you to present your plan to public health and safety once we were done with budgets to share with the public what that is and we can share that together. Because it's just to your point. We're understanding we just need to know what's going on and we'll we're gonna get there. I get it. Thank you so much. That is it from me, Mr. Chair. Thank you
and there were there were two meetings on the public on the on the pump station this week. It is late but there were two and there are more that are planned. And the plan that I'm going to roll out in in May is going to it's going to fix problems in 10 3050.
Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Chair.
Thank you member Dorado
Thank you Mr. Chair and good afternoon to you stepped away for a moment but I don't know if this question has been asked obviously one of the most popular questions about the basement backup protection plan. I don't know if that's been asked already. But if it has not resonance and my district are very antsy as they see the rollout and they want to know when is it going to be expanded? even further. I know we've had the opportunity to talk about the aviation subdivision which is one of the hardest hit areas particularly in district seven spend a lot of time with you, obviously in Far West for the ruse plan that was rolling out but the question comes from a lot of residents, when is that going to come into my neighborhood? Is it possible it's going to come into my neighborhood and so I wanted to ask a question. Yeah,
we've been approved regarding some dollars from FEMA, and we can't use it in Jefferson Chalmers and so where we've picked aviation that's and several neighborhoods around aviation to roll it out in I'm reasonably assured we're going to have that money within the next 30 days. We have plumbers that are already under contract it would just be a matter of amending the contracts to add though that those list of homes on it so there is there is more work to be done on the west side of the city with regards to basement backup.
Thank you Anna and we do know as you know when it started obviously it's like a pilot. So as this has continued to move forward, you know, even farther west, you know, there are folks like in Franklin Park and other areas that say hey, we were hit hard as well. When is this coming to us and so I appreciate you you know answering that and as those dollars come in love to have conversations even about going forward how that footprint is expanded. Well, my second question just goes to a lot of commercial businesses, obviously, in a lot of districts that talk about water runoff. I don't know if that question has been asked as well. But relative to water runoff or storm water, a lot of folks don't understand how or why their bills are what they are. Can we just touch on that a little bit for clarity of the public about water runoff, stormwater runoff and why they may see some of those bills based on their infrastructure? Yeah,
it for residential customer if you have point 02 or less impervious surface, concrete hard area, we don't charge you anything. But if you have more than that you're charged and depending on the amount of impervious surface and it's on the bill, the acreage that they're being charged times the rate explains exactly why. What the cost is for that. Most residential customers are not don't have large drain use charges. Certainly the churches are have very large drains because of the size of their parking lots. And it's if they have a problem, we can take a look at it to make sure that the acreage is is accurate. That we're that we're charging them for and that the rates accurate and if you've got someone that has an A bill that doesn't look right, we'd be more than happy to take a look at it.
Thank you through you, Mr. President. And I appreciate that we have reached out to you guys have worked hand in hand with us for a few businesses within our district. Without asking another question, I'd say it in this manner. Hopefully we can find some just some ways that we can tell them how they can mitigate that maybe even lower costs for those churches in those buildings. There may be resources that are available to them whether federally or otherwise I can help them lower those bills. I think some folks don't know that. I know you guys do a pretty good job. We have you on our I think our virtual call every month and you go into the breakout rooms and talk to residents and all that so I appreciate that.
I mean I have a I do have a plan just may 1, we're going to roll it out. And as soon as I get it approved by my board at the next board meeting, I'm going to come back to council and it's going to be a way that churches can get some relief. All
right, thank you. I'm sorry for trying to get you to give the sneak preview of it but but we're looking forward to that and we love to bring that to our district and commercial businesses particularly not being commercial with churches in our district when that is rolled out on May 1. So thank you. Okay, thank you, Mr. President.
Thank you, Benson.
Thank you. And thank you all for being here today and DWSD thank you for your response in which he was always very responsive, helping in the third district. We had the challenges. These past couple of years with Libra you convened a meeting to educate the residents. I don't know if those door hangers have gone out to let people know about the future status of those but that was a commitment. I'm hoping that has happened. If it as a hope that it does happen soon. And I know that we continue to work on a solution for those who just cannot afford water and just becomes too expensive. I also see bad debt expenses increasing 3.6% that I see revenue requirements increasing 2.9% What are we doing? Yeah, how how are we managing our bad debt expenses and then when are we going to get that federal support which the energy industry gets why can't we get that for water? Yeah,
the good. The good news is President Biden just this week put $500 million into or made a recommendation to put $500 million into lie heaps budget specifically for water. We would have rather had Ed seen that go into a separate program called lie walk so that we didn't have to depend on the energy sector to share our portion of the money but without Congress acting on that recommendation, it will just die a recommendation. So three or four of my staff members will be in Washington for Water Week lobbying Congress, you know for dollars specifically. I'm going to Louisville and Austin, Texas next week to do the same thing and get some other utilities to to lobby for these dollars. But, you know, we have 28,000 households into into the Lifeline program 28,000. And we're going to get to a point where the number is not going to continue to grow. It's going to and it's it's getting there already, but it's the 80,000 customers that should be in the 10/35 the program and we only have 4000. And so how do I get people that can afford to pay to pay? And I'm going to roll out this this new new program that's going to have some consequences to it. But right now when we look at the data it's not people that can't afford the program because we have enough money to run the Lifeline program into next year. We don't have permanent funding or we don't have long term funding, but we have enough. But right now the problem is 80,000 residential customers that can't afford to pay. And if they need to get into a payment plan, we have one for you and we're going to even offer one that's even more generous than the 10 3050 but the people that can afford to pay half they have to pay or there has to be a consequence for that. And that's where the that's where the problem is.
It sounds like a management issue. That sounds like you're going to address
I'm going to address it is that the main ones Oh, I have the support of this body when I do it because there's going to be a consequence where people that can afford to pay but don't and they don't ask for help. We have how 10 3050s a program right now that if you need help, every single customer in the city of Detroit has an opportunity not to see a service interruption if they simply ask for help. Whether you're low income in lifeline or whether you're into 1030 or the new program that we set up, but we can't allow people that can afford to pay not to pay because the bad debt just gets rolled into rates next year.
So what is that kind of consequence?
A surface interest interruption okay.
For those who can pay will refuse. Yes, or those who cannot pay. There is a life lifeline.
This life and we have 28,000 households in it. And we're charging 1.8% of their household income which is for a family of 430 $6,000 $18.80 86% of the 28,000 households, not people out so there's 3.5 people per household that are benefiting from the Lifeline program. And so people that can afford to pay have to pay or there has to be a consequence. And that's all over the country. Now. We don't put anyone on the tax rolls, because we don't want to exasperate the we don't put residential customers. We certainly put industrial and commercials but we don't put residential customers. So what tools do we have? We I say we have the most generous, robust affordability programs in America. Nobody has an $18 all in water sewer drainage, all the end. But it this won't be sustainable. If people that can afford to pay don't pay
how do you determine who can afford to pay?
Well, if you can, if you can afford to pay and you don't and you need help. Then you need to add to ask and get into one of the programs we will help you and you'll see that this this new program will even be more generous than 10 3050 ever worth. But you got to pay something you got to work with us to to get back on track. You can't just
do we have a number word sustainable? Is it 30,000 households is it 50,000 households it's gonna
depend on the funding that's available. And right now. You know, I have 1% of our operating budget you saw our operating budget was 495 half million dollars, so just under $5 million. That's what I have. I depend on another 14 million from Wayne Metro and that's coming from the state.
Okay, so I'm just hoping that we will continue to go back to our federal office.
Yeah,
I just without a list. Whap or ally whap, low income water sewers Assistance Program. I just don't see how these programs are going to be sustainable until long term. I understand we're looking at a solution at the state. I'm very hopeful. But I really believe that the solution belongs at the federal level and I'm sure other others agree with me and they would love to have that solution as well. I think we really have to push on our federal partners, our US Senate, our state our US representatives as well. If the energy industry can have that type of support for families, why can't the water is so, so critical to our mature cities and to our financially challenged cities with large financially challenged populations. We have to have it we have to have the federal support.
Thank you for saying it's we believe and we're going to work really hard. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. Hello Tim. Tate. And good afternoon, everyone. And thank you, Mr. Brown for being so responsive when we call in district two. For some of the issues that we have over there. You've always been amazingly responsive. You and your team Of course Mr. Brian Peck and Paul's always, always available as well. So thank you for that. Certainly to tell you that. And this is not a question. This is just a statement on behalf of the churches in district two. We believe that the drainage charges are unconscionable on behalf of the churches in district two, not all of them but the pastor's that I've been in touch with is killing them $10,000 on average per month. That's that's a lot SERPs. So that's not a question that's just a statement on their behalf. And then another statement is you know, you know, the fire hydrants and in district two, not all of them are painted all kinds of colors. I have one. Her house is well their house is purple in the fire hydrant is the same purple. We have fire hydrants with polka dots, stripes, messages, green, white, I don't know what the penalty is. I don't know what the so this is not a question but I'm just trying to phrase it so I don't lose out on an opportunity to ask you two questions that I have. But hopefully there's something in place there that will address that because you know, what,
have you seen the new newly painted fire hydrants around the city? I have. I told my staff just today. I said I'm not going to be able to do lead service lines in district and a lot of parts of district two in my neighborhood in district two. I'm not going to be able to do it for several years. Go paint the fire hydrants, give them something we get, you know, we're going to be in disadvantaged communities. A lot of communities in district two are not disadvantaged. I'm not going to do basement backup. I'm not going to do lead service lines. Let's go pay to fire hydrants so that they get so that they get something because believe me they knock on my door about why can't you do something in our neighborhood. And so you're gonna see some pretty red fire hydrants?
Yeah, no, that's not a major. No. No,
it's not about it's not but it's a big it's a big deal to people in it really have one in front of the house. Yes,
it really is. So that wasn't a question. That was just an observation. So my question is, and I have a list of them will make sure you get them sir. But what is the reason for the disparity between the water departments increase in salaries and wages and the nearly 4 million decrease in Employee Benefits noting no change in the number of FTEs. Similarly, that switch departments employee benefits decreased by $5.7 million, but the salaries and wages and the number of FTEs remained the same. And I'm referring to B Dash 48 Dash five in your budget report and page B Dash 49 Dash four in your budget report.
Is it from the Yeah, we think it's from the BIM let
me let me let me let me say this about salaries for DWSD employees because I, my team negotiates that. We're at market rate, we, we have increased salaries in some categories by 100%. Because we quite frankly, we can't keep the employees that we can't hire them at $16 now, so we're closer to 22. And if you get a you get a CDL. And we'll we'll train you to drive a truck. We could give you an increase for that if you improve your skills in any way. We give you an increase for that. So salaries have drastically increased. I am not quite sure where benefits have decreased. Certainly healthcare and pension have not decreased. So we'll have to look at that part of the budget. There's an explanation but I don't have it off the top of my head. Unless director
Brown is you know, you can get the answer back. You can get it back to me but it is a $4 million dollar from our calculations, a $4 million decrease in employee benefits, but no change in the number of FTE so just just for just explanation. If you don't have it now,
we'll get it but we're going to tell you to put it in writing.
Are you sorry, you're not referring to the 2524 budget.
We're looking at page B Dash 48 Dash five It's okay.
Yeah, that's what we'll get an answer to you. Yeah. It's an it's an old one of the it's one of our older budgets. It's not this year's budget, this year's budget. We've increased those salaries. So
where am I getting that number from?
I'm getting I know LPD when they put copies together for us to compare, they also give us
that's it's here because that was gonna be my question as well. We're
looking at I mean, I think we all have the same documents from the 2425 budget.
Yeah, that's what I see. Section 5720. Right at the top salary, wages and employee benefits. You know, on page B, it's
an LPD 48.
Okay, well, we'll put something in writing. Okay.
All right. Thank you, sir. And then my last question is, what is the reason for the 11th? You might have to get this answer back to me as well. What is the reason for the $11.5 million decrease in fixed charges and the $6.3 million increase in other expenses? And I'll I'll give you the page is B Dash 48 Dash five. And then the 6.8 is coming from the source department. You want to get that answer back to me too. Yeah,
well, we'll get you the answer. We see it in the documents that you have, but
Okay, okay. Thank you. I'm Pro Tem. Thank you, sir.
I'm not gonna belabor the point. It's I had some of those same questions that members have asked already but ask a question. germane to D one. We've got the storm water infrastructure projects that are going on I'm excited about a number of residents are as well. And some of them indicated that they will be watching today. So we wanted to give you an opportunity to talk about how that project is going to benefit them. Potentially their bills and also how it will also affect the potential flooding that they have inside of their house because they said that haven't heard it from you. They've heard from your team who did again, they did a great job. This Patel is always awesome. But want to hear from the director. Yeah,
we're talking about Brian with the bride more proud to serve the bride more well. We are putting it in ponds to slow the flow of water down. Certainly it's going to mitigate basement flooding in that area. But it's going to go as far down as aviation. It's it's going to take storm water out of the system completely. And so it's going to actually add capacity to five other neighborhoods other than just bright more. So we're going to where we were in the process of as you know, of trying to negotiate buying some homes in the area that people are actually living in we've got a very good response. I told my team to go when they negotiate at least you know, get started two and a half times the rate of market rate. So let's let's be generous and if people want to stay in the area, let's find them a home, pay them out and then also help them find a home to stay in the area if that's what they want. But these ponds are designed to take stormwater that would normally go into the sewer system and take up capacity and go into a pond, get a secondary treatment and then be pushed right out into the Root River so that it never sees the sewer system. And again, it's going to not only mitigate flooding in bright more in the area that that the pylons are in. But it's going to help homeowners as far away as aviation district in the city of Detroit it's going to help five different neighborhoods by building this capacity and those pipes because remember that the flow is is is trying to get from from all the way up north telegraph and eight mile is trying to get all the way to the river where the wastewater treatment plan is to be treated and the more flow that you can take out of the system, the more capacity you build. So that when you have a large rain, you're not going to surcharge into basements. So I never say that it's going to eliminate the flooding but it certainly will mitigate most large floods.
So no, it's from my understanding 13 homes that are in the area and quite a number of parcels. Yeah, if the yourself
yeah, we've had a hold on hundreds of land bank properties. Not understanding exactly with the footprint and we've changed the footprint depending on we you know, we're not we're not trying to use eminent domain where we take somebody's house so if we couldn't if we can't buy it, then we got to shift our footprint and go around them. But we're going to be returning those properties. Now. We now know the ones that we need from the land bank, and we're going to be releasing the ones that we've had on hold so that they can be sold to other individuals is sometime in the near future. And
I know you've indicated and similar to what I've said if we're going to provide an opportunity for folks to move and paying that expense, the goal would be for them to stay in the city of Detroit. Absolutely. How are you all working to do your best to ensure that happen? Yeah, we
had a good model to work from with bridging neighborhoods. And we're using Rico and his team to do the same thing that they did with bridging neighborhoods in order to find people homes in the city of Detroit, hopefully, if they want to stay and bright more and bright more and help them relocate with dollars to be able to do that. And
then lastly, if in fact we get to the point where there's 11 of those occupied homes that said yes, I'm willing to put the two of them all in their key locations, what happens to the project
we have to have a conversation with with the community. I'm confident that we're going to be able to work it out with all 13 of the homes and if not, we'd have to shift the pond. And I the reason I mean I don't like that idea is I don't want to I don't want to I don't want to put upon that close to someone's house just you know it may not be aesthetically what they want. And so we'll have a conversation. I've always said that if the community doesn't want this project, I'll take it. I have a I have a second and third location. I'll take it. We're not going to force it on anybody if we can't buy all the homes and we can't read design the project. We've read it, we've redesigned it twice already because of of that issue, then we'd have to take the dollars somewhere else and do another project.
So I know again, a number of folks say that we're going to be watching today and I've got to fill in there. We're going to hear some of them in public comment if they're still hanging on. And I know I'll hear from him later on after that. So Thank you always for your assistance in the district and really appreciate that. Mr. Corley before we go to member young. Oh,
I'm sorry. The council member for some time. Okay.
You guys us on the same Mr. Carlin? Sure. All right. I mean, yeah. I want to be the guy to cut off Mr. Corley. It's quite like Raymond. Everybody loves Mr. Corley. All right, sir. How you doing? It's good to see you. I just wanted to ask you just really quickly. I mean, I understand what you're doing with detention and retention basis, but generally, that's not what you will use when you have a fully integrated master plan sewer system. So do we have a master plan for their sewer system? And what is the permanent fix for that increase in flows?
Whether the, the permanent fix is retention or detention to slow the water down whether that's in this particular area because you're so close to the Rouge River. Upon make sense. You just pipe it right into the river not to
expand the capacity. I don't mean to cut you up, but I just want to say not to expand the capacity of the pipe at all, or is that just too cost prohibitive? To do that, that's what I feel like everything I feel like we should do separate. You know the CSO to separate and to call for him to expand the pipe is to cause me to have 100 Prepare for 100 year flood is that true? I mean, I kind of feel like it's the same kind of thing. I just want to make sure I'm right. Those
are those are billion dollar those are billion dollar projects. Okay.
Yeah, that's like way outside. Which Okay, yeah, I just wanna make sure. Okay, and then I'm not to cut you off. I just want to make sure I got that clear, because that's what I'm going on. When I thought people
area they're actually streams that that are going to be on earth that are that are there already in place. And so that makes it cost efficient to be able to put the pawns in because the streams are already there. And
it really kind of steal and take away from member Benson. If we had more federal investment and state investment for the infrastructure, would that make that more realistic and the cost wise or would that still be so incredibly orbited that because that's what I'm thinking these solutions are going to be long term that permanent fix was what I'm really about, you know,
you know, when when in August of 21, you had 20% of less or less of the city that actually flooded 20% or less 80% I'm not saying that 80% You didn't have some homes that had some sporadic flooding, but there was 20% of the there were 22 Major neighborhoods that flooded. It wasn't the whole city
right that flooded was you know as well that do all it takes one time. Yeah. Why is that you don't trust there's nobody
in this room whose house hasn't flipped right and we all everybody understands that
all it takes one time and then we got to bear the brunt for that one time. You know that more anyway. My final question I just want to ask you was about part of the reason for my understanding, and correct me if I'm wrong, is why the floods took place was because the power went out. And so I just want to know, has there been any partnerships with DTE a terms of all your hand in terms of making sure that we have we've upgraded our backup generator system? Or that we have micro grids to be able to make sure that that doesn't happen? I know that's more a question with DTE partnering up with them. Make sure that that aspect doesn't happen again. So we have a situation where the power does go out. We have the necessary infrastructure in place. Yeah, to be able to prevent that. From taking place.
Yeah, we do have a report that we spent a million dollars having having analyzed what took place with with the flood. And the report basically said even if the system had been working at 100% capacity, the rain came down so quickly and so fast, didn't ever get had a chance to even get to the pump station to be pumped and yes, some of the there was some delays in getting those started but there have been 10s if not hundreds of millions of dollars that have been invested in putting in new substations, transformers, repairing pumps, to make sure that there may end that people are there during the event to be able to turn them on if they don't come on automatically. And those those problems are being resolved and we're tracking those repairs on a monthly basis. The
second part of that is I really liked the first it was kind of dreary, but other than I appreciate it. Thank you Madam President. I Okay.
All right. Thank you, Councilmember young and that will conclude all of our questions. I see Mr. Corley has his hands raised. Yes,
ma'am. prisoners. So. Okay.
He told me that was the last one. Oh my God, give me this give you Okay, sorry about that. Mr. Corley.
So as you all know, the Board of Water commissioners approve the budget and the increase in rates after the mayor presents his budget to you. So the water water commissioners approved the budget this well yesterday. And so what happens is that the numbers that's in the budget book that you are referred to earlier, are placeholder numbers, which means that they're going to have to be adjusted to reconcile with the budget that's been approved. And so I'm suggesting that that the budget department either in their Rata letter, put in those reconciling numbers, hopefully in a Rata letter, so hopefully the water sewage department can work. post haste with the budget. Department to reconcile those numbers. Otherwise, the administration had to come back with a budget amendment to reconcile those numbers. Now, my only suggestion also is that I do know that the water sewer department present is proposed budget to the Finance Committee. Under Water Water commissioners, usually in February. So those February numbers are usually pretty close to what the marijuana commissioners approved in March. If they could share those February numbers to the budget department as the mayor is developing the budget. I think that will flow better. I think the numbers that you will see in the proposed budget would what would more closely be in line with what they're proposing. So that's something hopefully they can work out with the budget department. I just want to alert you that there's going to be an A read a letter that's going to reconcile the numbers. And so just to let you know about it, thank you,
Director brown.
It's just it's always a pleasure working with both Mr. Whittaker Mr. Corley on these issues. They really help us by pointing out things such as this and I just wanted to publicly acknowledge the amount of support that they give us in getting this done.
All right, thank you. All right. So we will make sure you will make sure that information is given to the ledger department you're aware through a will see the updated Rata letter at that time. So all right, thank you, Director brown to the DWSD Department. Thank you for the work you all do. That will conclude the hearing. All right. And we will move to our last budget hearing for this afternoon and that will be the Department of Transportation.
Hey, dude, thanks for watching.
Right, Director Staley whenever you are ready to bring begin we do we did promote the individual that's going to be sharing this screen. So whenever you are ready, the floor is yours. Excellent. Okay.
Thank you, Madam President. Can I start out by introducing myself? I am Michael Staley. I'm the Interim Executive Director, Detroit Department of Transportation and I'll let the team introduce themselves starting with the Deputy Director.
You'd have to know Melvin Barkley, Deputy Director of operation and maintenance for the day.
Afternoon Stephanie Davis, government affairs liaison and trade partner transportation.
Good afternoon, Michael Hooda, Chief of Staff for DDOT
I am working on my car. I'm the Capital Projects Manager at dita. Good afternoon to join Maintenance Manager. The presentation was a change on the side and Tony Jr from the Office of mobility innovation test for support.
Okay, if we can begin with the slide presentations. Next slide, please.
So, we wanted to start by talking about some of the accomplishments that took place during calendar year 2023. So obviously, first and foremost, incentives for the bus operators. So the city of Detroit and DDOT signed a memorandum of understanding with the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 26 that increase the base wage rate by $3 an hour across the board and the performance incentive bonus from 1000 per quarter to $1,500 per quarter, so $6,000 in base wage, and an additional $2,000 in the incentive bonus. Next slide. A DDOT badge 240 new bus operators in 2023 And we'll talk a little bit more about how those numbers are progressing in 2024. Next, one of the biggest things that happened at DDOT in 2023, was that we brought paratransit in house on January 1 2023. As councils well aware, prior to that DDOT had contracted out the service entirely to trans Dev, a private company. And there were obviously quite a number of issues with performance under trans Dev. So we developed the model by which DDOT brought in house the critical operational functions of reservation scheduling, dispatching, eligibility certification and customer complaint process. From January of 23 to the end of June of 23. Under an emergency procurement arrangement, we operated service with five service providers. And then beginning on July 1 2023, we were able to complete new contracts with five service providers to continue to provide the paratransit service so that would be big star transit, Del Rey, Checker Cab, Mo and people's Express, you can see some of the results that are quite dramatic. When you look at 22 versus 23 In terms of ridership. So you can see during the first quarter, we actually underperformed the previous the previous year period of time from January through March. And then you can see that based on improved performance, ridership began to increase by about 2000 riders in the second quarter. And you can see it went up by about 7000 riders in the third quarter and then there was an explosion in the fourth quarter. It went up from 58,859 riders to 73,417 riders. And we're still seeing that growth continue as 2024 begins. Next slide please. Oh, one of the things that we recognize at DDOT is the service needs to be safer. So we need to reduce the number of accidents we need to reduce. Can you go back to Yeah, that's fine right there to reduce the number of accidents and reduce the number of injuries. So the national standard for preventable accident frequency rate is 0.98 per 100,000 Miles covered. DDOT is currently just below three. So we're about three times what the national standard is. We launched in January of 2024. What we're calling the SOS campaign, it's the sentinels of safety and it has two components. The first one is effective monitoring to observe and prevent unsafe behavior. So we've first of all, what we did is we identified drivers that we call drivers at risk. And these were individuals that fell into three categories, probationary employees, and that that is people that were in service for the first six months of their employment, people that had Accident history, or people that had a motor vehicle record where the points were added at a spot where we felt that they were at risk. So we identified those drivers drivers at risk. We increase the number of trail checks that we do on the street. So literally we have a service inspector trailing behind the bus operator to observe their behavior out on the street. And then the other thing that we did is we increase the number of video reviews that we've done historically in the past. What's been done on the video review is we've done it as a result of report of an accident report of an injury, customer complaint, or an observation that came in through other means. Now we're doing more randomly selected video reviews to see if we can detect unsafe behaviors. And then the second part of the SOS campaign is a targeted messaging campaign. It's our marketing campaign. So we're trying to sell safety. And the way that we're doing that is we have a monthly campaign. So this month, it's fixed objects, and then we we send out their auto generated every morning at 12:01am to DDOT all daily safety messages. So safety messages also are at the terminals there at the transit centers. And they're also when the transit equipment operators checks in for the day to get their assignment for that day. They're also given the daily safety message should point out that this past Monday, while we were celebrating National Transit driver appreciation day, we also conducted our first safety blitzes at both the Gilbert and the shoemaker terminal, where not only did we pass out some some DDOT gear but we also shared safety messages that day from pull out in the morning from about four o'clock in the morning to about 7:30am and then midday as we got a combination returns and more pullout and then finally, the last pull out during the day which occurred between about 3pm and about 5:30pm. Next slide please. So some related and concerted safety efforts. We have reached out to the aid to engage them in a partnership because it's everybody's job not only to be safe, but most importantly to make sure that our transit Equipment Operators The passengers, they carry the general public Get home safely, safely every day. We stood up the preventability review committee, the PRC on they meet on a regular recurring basis. They look at the accidents that occurred in the prior week to try to determine number one, was it a preventable accident? Meaning did the driver do everything within their power to make sure that the accident did not occur? Or was it in a non preventable accident? And then more importantly, to determine the root cause? why did why did the accident happen? And what steps what can we do differently or better to make sure that that type of accident doesn't happen? Again, we have a working joint safety committee across all the functional areas within DDOT. They'll continue to meet every month to to address more universal concerns over and above those that are handled by the PRC committee. And then SOS working group right now it's meeting every week. Eventually it'll meet more on an ad hoc basis. weekly meetings, develop monthly campaigns and refine marketing messaging efforts. So right now we're working on the April safety campaign. By looking at the preventable accidents that we had during the month of during the month of March. And should should be noted that the SOS program is designed to eliminate minimize unsafe behaviors. It's not a gotchu exercise. And we believe that coaching and counseling is the first step in this process, paid retraining will be utilized as well. And then if progressive discipline needs to be applied, that will be applied where indicated and in accordance, obviously with the collective bargaining agreement, and update on capital projects. Jason Hargrove transit center I know some of you joined us last Friday out there. Councilmember do roll it was good to see you. I know councilmember young and Councilmember Cole Callaway were out there. It was really a special event. It really was. The weather cooperated. We had a good turnout there. Were a lot of people from DDOT that had had the the honor of of actually working with Jason Hargrove, many more people that knew his story. It was a really, it was really fine event. A lot of his family members were there. His wife was very touched by the gesture and I can't tell you how many people how many employees at DDOT came up and were simply astounded by the decision by the mayor to sit down with the A to do the right thing. And more importantly for Council to approve of the naming of the Jason Hargrove transit center. So thank you very much for that. Over 24,000 passenger trips per week. We'll begin around at the adjacent Hargrove Transit Center and our target date for the Jason Hargrove transit center to go live is Saturday. May 11. So it's right around the corner. Next, please. Just to give you a sense of the routes that routinely circulate through the Jason Hargrove Transit Center, obviously. Number four Woodward number 12 Connett number 17. Eight Mile 30 liver noise and 54 Wyoming next fleet procurement plan status report. fy 19. Using section 5339 see a low and no emission vehicle program. The award amount was just under $2 million $1.8 million. And with that we purchased four battery buses, one plug in charger and one on Route charger. In 22. There was an FTA bus low and no emission award that was sizable $8.1 million. With that will purchase an additional four battery buses, one plug in charger, one out on Route charger and we expect to take delivery of those four electric buses in quarter four of 2025 and 22 using 5307 funding $16.7 million with that will purchase 18 hybrid buses and we expect those to be delivered in quarter three of 2025. And then in fiscal year 23. Again using 5307 funding award of $14 million and additional 15 hybrid buses with on the street projected to happen quarter three of 2025. Update on the bus shelters. We're currently in process of installing the first 60 shelters beginning in July 2024 with plans to implement 100 More within the next two calendar years. Coolidge terminal replacement, the Coolidge project set for completion in early 2026. It's designed to significantly improve the transit experience for Detroit riders on not only will this initiative offer more reliable and eco friendly transportation support facility to serve the city residents, but also focuses on creating a comfortable and supportive home away from home for our transit equipment operators. These advancements aimed to elevate the overall quality of our transit system and the working conditions for those who keep Detroit moving and with the restoration of the Coolidge terminal and 2026. The Gilbert terminal will be this commission or I'm sorry decommission, for those of you that have been around the Gilbert terminal anytime recently, it cannot happen too soon. There's a rendition of the Coolidge terminal restoration.
Next please. Just kind of an overview of the FY 2025 budget so DDOT by the numbers 907 employees currently 440 operators, revenue and expenses of just under 160 million revenue of 7.6 almost $7.7 million 11 plus million is the number of annual riders and 265,000 having trouble reading that paratransit riders I should know better than that. Our technology you can see it's a combination of cast this which is our rostering when our drivers pick their assignments, then those assignments are entered into hazardous. We use a clever device for actually monitoring service out on the street. 292 buses currently in the fleet 74 paratransit buses plus that number fluctuates and just remember that those are those buses are currently owned and operated by the service providers. Our routes 5106 bus stops and 101 one transit center we did not include the Jason Hargrove transit center in there as well. And then you read those other ones. Go ahead
144 million revenue miles of 37 fixed routes and not arrived at around 24 hours.
And then our service goals for the current calendar year. We want to reduce preventable accident frequency rate by 66%. As I said, right now it's just under three we want to get it down to the national standard of 0.98. Want to increase system on time performance to 85% which is our public service standard. Decrease customer complaints to 15 less than 15 per 100,000 boardings and then cut our overtime by about 25%. Of the service restoration plan so as you may be aware, the operators pick their work, per the collective bargaining agreement four times a year, but it happens in January. It happens in April. It happens in June and it happens in September. So when we were given the directive by the mayor to restore service to pre COVID levels, we peg that to those same four times of the year. So phase one, we're currently in phase one right now. I'm started with the January pick which went into effect on the 22nd of January, and that will run through the 21st of April and the numbers are 150 1am pullouts and then a peak vehicle requirements of 162 Peak vehicles every day. We're looking at the requirement for somewhere between 352 and 420 to transit equipment operators and you'll see on the notation there in parentheses. The 422 is if we were able to build the extra board out that is standby drivers, drivers that don't have an assignment every day, but standby in the event that somebody doesn't report to work. That would take that number up. To 422. A vehicle requirement minimum is 162 maximum. Again, if we had a 20% Spare ratio would take it up to about 194 At the end of April, phase two of the service restoration plan will see us go up to 160 8am pullouts with a peak vehicle requirement of 175. That'll require a minimum of 391 transit equipment operators at a maximum of 469. Again, if we're able to have a 20% Extra board protection and then the vehicle requirement minimum of 168 a maximum of 175 with a 20% Spare ratio. As we get in the summertime, Phase Three goes into effect on the 24th of June and will run right before through Labor Day. So the aim pull out will be 175 the peak vehicle requirement will go up to 188. The to requirement at a minimum 429 at a maximum 515 Again, for able to build out the extra board to 20%. And then the requirement on the vehicle side is 188 and 214. And then finally, phase four, which will take place right around Labor Day has this with a am peak of 200 200 pull outs and then a maximum peak vehicle requirement of 214 vehicles will need between 506 100 tios and then the vehicle requirement will be a minimum of 214 up to a maximum of 256 If we have a 20% Spare ratio so what are we going to do in paratransit year two, we've got some really interesting things happening most significantly we want to introduce same day service. It's it's entirely funded through an RTA grant. We hope to have it on the street by the third quarter of calendar year 24. It will operate Monday through Saturday, the hours will be 5am to 7pm. We estimate annual ridership in that first year about 32,000 annual rides. And we do have a budget request in the fiscal year 25 budget for some additional DDOT paratransit employees, most notably for full time equivalent dispatchers to operate the same day service IVR technology. It's again RTA grant funded, we hope to make it operational in the second quarter of calendar year 24. And what it'll do is it'll send out two text messages. It'll send out an advanced a text message saying Michael Staley remember you have a ride scheduled for Saturday, the 23rd at 9am. Please be ready. And then more importantly, it'll send out a second alert on a same day basis, typically about 15 to 20 minutes in advance of when the vehicle is going to arrive. Again reminding Michael Staley that the vehicle is on its way it should be there in the next 15 or 20 minutes. We hope to do a couple of things with the IVR technology number one with the advanced day notice is be able to cut down on the number of cancellations and with the same day notice not only be able to reduce the number of no shows that is that people that we show up at the at the curb, but they don't take the ride but also to speed up the system. So we've got a five minute dwell time requirement. Once a vehicle pulls up. Typically the dwell time is a little bit longer than that because the drivers required to contact dispatch who then tries to contact the passenger to let them know the vehicles arrived. So more times, not that dwell time can be seven minutes, maybe in some cases 10 minutes. So we'd like to be able to speed up the system through the use of the IVR technology. And then most notably and right now we don't really have a good idea on the positive impact that IVR technology will have on this front. But we hope to reduce the call volume and the wait time as people are calling into the call center. Not only to book a reservation, but also to to get an answer to where's my ride calls. So right now, customers can call in to book a reservation 14 days in advance. They can choose a different prompt and and talk to a dispatcher to find out where's my ride if indeed the ride hasn't arrived within the designated pickup window. And then the final piece of paratransit year two is we want to offer supplemental training and there is a budget request in the 2025 budget. We hope to make this operational in the third quarter of calendar year 24 approximately 100 drivers getting eight hours of additional instruction in four critical areas disability awareness, sensitivity training, passenger assistance techniques. As you recall when DDOT took over the service from trans Dev, one of the things that we were going to be responsible for then was making sure that training was done in accordance with the requirements of the request for proposal. So not only did the five service providers have to indicate to us what their training program would be we went one step further. We purchased our own in house paratransit operator training program. We hired for trainers, and our trainers train the trainer's of the service providers and we want to take it to one more level and that is provide that additional supplemental training that it'll be open to qualified individuals, qualified companies and we certainly have heard already from any number of disability groups, advocacy groups, that they're interested in participating in this program. Next slide, please. And that's thank you and that's our picture from the from the Jason Hargrove transit center dedication ceremony. Thank you,
President Vice Director. We appreciate that presentation. And for all the work that you all have done, we definitely could concede the progress that has been made. I hear it from the transit riders that they are pleased with the progress however, we know that there's a lot of room for improvement. One of the things for sure, I know is that the $3 bonus or increase in salaries was great, but I still hear how it is still bit behind as it relates to other communities that what they're paying DDOT bus drivers so if you could just speak to I know you said the MOU was just passed when we when will we be able to revisit or reopen the discussions around still raising our DDOT bus drivers to a higher salary? Outside of the $3 that we've recently
approved? Thank you for that, Madam President. It did have a great impact. And it took our it took our base wage from 1615 an hour up to 1915 an hour and then our top rate from 2261 to 2561. Most notably, close the gap was smart. Still a gap, but it closed the gap was smart. The bad news is smarts in the final phase of its labor negotiations, and we expect them to to have a proposal on the table. I would think within the next 3060 90 days, the collective bargaining agreement one of the things that we did not require which was which was unprecedented. As part of the wage increase we did not require any changes to the work rules in the current collective bargaining agreement, nor did we ask for an extension of the current collective bargaining agreement. So the bargaining agreement with the ITU is scheduled to expire on June 30 of 2025. We'll be sitting down the table probably in the next six to eight months to start the negotiation process. Knowing that is President call your indicated that the $3 increase was just the first step or step. So first, yes, we recognize that and I would I would refer everybody. I I would I hope everybody would understand that I my preference is not to negotiate in public, but I would refer all the council members to some of the recent articles on there have been two labor agreements that have already been have already been approved by smart one with your paratransit drivers and one with ASMI for non driver position so you can get a sense of, of where those where those numbers came in at.
All right, thank you so much. And then just can you provide an update on the low income Fair, where we are with implementation? I know this is a conversation that has been going on for probably about five, six years. When I was my last term. We talked about it and I know there's been analysis done on how much it will cost but not really seeing the department figuring out a way to fund it and implement it so I'm not sure if you can provide an update on where we are today is is still roughly around $10 million to implement or
the last number. The last number I saw was low fair was $4 million, and no fair was about $9 million. So quite honestly, since I walked in the door on August 23. I've heard this topic mention innumerable times. Not only in council hearings in the charter mandated meetings in our community input meetings and our local advisory council meetings. So under understand that and also in watching the Peoplemover presentation yesterday. I certainly understood the pressure is going to mount on DDOT with Peoplemover moving to no fair on their system. Quite honestly, our focus has been twofold and will remain so this year. Number one is on the service restoration plan and all the expenses that are associated with that and number two is on improving the quality of service as you rightfully pointed out, as we are acutely aware, we have to be safer. We have to be more on time we have to be more customer oriented. We have to be more cost effective. What I do think we have an opportunity to do in the near term is a couple of things. One is look at the lessons learned from the people mover as they implement their no fare policy. That that's that's one opportunity. And then I think the other thing is as we finalize the DDOT reimagined plan, since that was part of the analysis that you referred to. We can we can revisit the issue as as we're doing the cost analysis for the final version of DDOT reimagined one thing I would I would I would note is since the issue was it has been so front and center I made a point of going back and looking at the literature and have to be have to take note of the fact that the literature as it relates to no fair policy and safety issues is pretty inconclusive. So there have been some systems that have implemented a no fair policy. And incidents have gone down because as you can imagine there's no more fair disputes. But on some systems, they've seen a rise in the number of incidents. So one of the things that we'd want to look at very closely and take advantage of of whatever lessons we can learn from implementation by the people mover is what impact did that no fair have on the people mover?
All right, thank you so much, Director. We will submit our additional questions in writing for you. Thank you.
Thank you, Madam President.
All right. Thank you. We will move to questions from colleagues. We'll start with you member Doha.
Thank you Madam President. And good afternoon to you all touched on a lot obviously of my questions relative to paratransit. Obviously that is a concern. Of a lot of members sitting at this table. How we move forward to improve the experience for our riders. I know you gave a brief update about how things are going. But can you touch and go a little bit deeper and specificity about the call center I know you know, the prior director and now you're our director as well, you were still around and obviously to help push us forward. But how has that turned out relative to complaints? And then resolutions? How far are we moving forward with resolutions for those complaints? And then even just thoughts of how we're going to move paratransit forward for the future.
Thank you for that for that question. Because it's it's one of the it's one of the good news stories that DDOT has to tell and and I will tell it every time I get the opportunity to tell it so I would point to a couple of metrics as it relates to the complimentary paratransit service. When we took over the service in January, trans debit ended the year at about 86% on time, meaning about 8.6 trips out of every 10 trips had been picked up within a 30 minute window. We made some modest increases in the first quarter of 2023 up to 93%. By the second quarter we were at 97% by the end of the year. paratransit is operating at 99% on time, so 9.9 Out of every 10 trips, we're picking up within a 10 minutes are within a 30 minute pickup window. Second thing is the number of complaints. When you look at the complaints that Transdev was sharing with DDOT at the end of their tenure, I believe that they were artificially low because people had given up on the system so we were getting about three complaints a week, which was which didn't square with 86% on time performance. And so the good news is for the complimentary paratransit system now operated by DDOT is our complaints are less than 1/10 of 1%. And the reason is obvious. If you're running 99% on time, there's very little to complain about. We set up a very robust customer complaint process that we perform in house where we do the intake. We have a five day turnaround that all the service providers are required to meet to respond to the complaint. And then we we make a determination based on the information at hand of the validity or whether the complaint was invalid or not. And then the final piece to your point about where we going forward with this on the next calendar year, is the final piece that we want to complete is the closing the loop. So now we want to begin to do outreach back out to the customer talking about what we heard back from the service provider and most importantly what correct what corrective action was taken. The only thing that I would point to with paratransit the biggest thing that's on the horizon is is going to be same day service. It literally will be a game changer. Because right now, and it's the requirement of the Americans with Disabilities Act. It's an advanced day service. So you can book up to 14 days in advance. You can book the day before. We don't deny any trips. But now you're going to have the ability to wake up tomorrow and decide that you want to take a trip or you get a call from your doctor's office or dentist's office, changing your appointment time. And on the advanced day service that can only take place if if space is available. Same Day Service, you'll have the ability to do that. Our commitment will be on the same day side is within an hour of the time that you make the request service will be delivered. That's going to be huge and it's gonna have it's gonna open up all kinds of mobility opportunities to people that are elderly in the city of Detroit, and people with disabilities in the city of Detroit to have many more transportation options they currently have right now.
And I will say I mean I'm glad to hear that they are running all the time particularly particularly to paratransit I applaud that at the same time not too loudly, because in some sense, that's what it's supposed to do. And so when for me, I understand the challenges and the barriers that go to that. I know we made significant progress and I'm going to continue to push though we're supposed to be all the time folks who pay their tax dollars who are sitting there in the coal and the rain, sleet, hail snow, waiting to get there. We got to get there. But my question more so was even just about the experience and I'm very tough on this because I get a lot of text messages about ridership and experience. And it's not, you know, I haven't gotten any lately. But one of the most disturbing ones was when a young lady was dropped off who was visually impaired at a casino and then left there to wander around. One was a young lady riding in her wheelchair and the driver was driving so viciously okay her chair came out of the little secure thing and flipped over and so when I hear stories like that, that's very concerning. And I know you were saying that complaints have gone down, but even to your previous point. I'm hoping they're not going down just relative to apathy. Because apathy will push someone for not to make the complaints because they feel like no one's going to do anything anyway. But you know, I have seen a significant change I know we talked about it, I want to continue to push hard and I will say just to your credit, I appreciate you guys participating with the disability Task Force. You always got to open here as well to brother Cunningham and a lot of other individual folks that come and give suggestions and I know it's not all your fault. I mean, we're talking about a problem that is long standing. But I think in order for us to turn the corner particularly and show members of our disabled community that we're serious, particularly about paratransit and their experience, we got to prove that quality of that ride. I think that's, that's where it is. And so my second question goes just into the regular bus that are driving every day, you know, I had an opportunity to hop on one or two of the buses. Sometimes I think one of the rides we let you know that we're coming and when someone arrives I don't let you know I'm coming. Because I want to see what it's going to be like if I just hop on there and what's going on and you don't know the council members gonna be on there. And a couple of the buses were late, ran a little bit behind. I do understand though, that's due to driver shortage. So we're hoping we're going to see that significant change. So thank you for your leadership as well as the unions for pushing forward for our drivers will want to continue to increase their pay and change that here. But I want to talk just more so about just route changes. How we review you know, where our master plan is going. We know things here in the city of Detroit are changing badly. We've got new developments. We got events coming down here such as the NFL Draft. Have we looked at different route changes for when we have larger sporting events to ensure that our daily riders can still be able to get to work, noting that we may have an influx of folks coming into our city.
So if I can, if I can answer the question a little bit differently than you posed it. One of the things that I do want to emphasize is DDOT reimagined is the master plan. It's in its we held a public hearing on the 15th of February, on the final draft. We took public comments for another 30 days after that. And so we're in really kind of the the last mile of the planning process for DDOT reimagined. So the next steps beyond finalizing or incorporating the public comments were indicated will be to do a cost analysis and then do an implementation plan. But what I do want to emphasize is with those four service enhancements, the first one in January, the second one scheduled for April, the next one for June, and the fourth one for September. Those all come with enhancements that are consistent with DDOT reimagined, and by that I mean one of two things, which are the two core components of DDOT reimagined, one is more frequent service and the other one is a greater span of service. So for instance, in the January service changes that we implemented on the 22nd we added additional service on the 16th Dexter where we increased frequency to 20 minutes on the weekdays. On the 18th Finkel we began 45 minute frequency start a weekday service and still instead of after eight o'clock, we added peak periods supplemental trips to Grand River Connor, Chicago Davis in Fort Seven Mile Joy evergreen Cadillac Harper, and then I will let Mr. Barkley who has been our point person on the planning for the NFL Draft. Talk a little bit about the impact of 250,000 At a minimum, individuals coming in to Detroit and 75,000 people being in the venue on any given time at any given
day. Um, yes, um, with the NFL Draft coming we know it's going to shut down time. So well we've looked at as nine of our routes will be rerouted. It will be significant impact for four of our routes to six grand shit, denial Jefferson and 52 Shane and the 67 Cadillac Harper. What we're going to do, Ben is going from east to west. We're going to have those buses actually stop at the Peoplemover Bricktown station. So we'll be using the people mover to connect from east to west for certain routes. So we'll be making sure that we'll still be able to get our citizens really gonna be impacted the last three the three days that a draft when this area right here will be shut down. So we're gonna be using the people mover and also people working with the NFL to help try to work on getting us some bustling. So that's something that we've really been pushing for.
And I know I don't have any other questions because we only are allowed to but I would just say I hope that is for the Grand Prix as well, because that significantly changes routes and how our residents move as well. I have tons of other questions as many of I know my colleagues are gonna have some too. But I am going to make a motion to put the entire DDOT budget into Executive Session.
All right, Hearing no objections that action will be taken.
And thank you, Madam President. And I have some specific ask just so our budget team and Mr. Corley, could know, I would like to make a motion to include the $30,000 for one time funding for assessable paratransit line haul coach and stop shoulder feedback tools.
Any objections to adding that to our Executive Session? Hearing none that action will be taken.
Thank you Madam President. I also have a motion to add $205,000 for driver training sensitivity for disabled riders sensitivity,
Hearing no objections that action will be taken.
Thank you, Madam President. And I believe that includes most of what I have, and we can revisit the funding amounts for the additional during deliberations. But I do want to thank you just again for participating with the disability Task Force. And just as a reminder, we joined you at the Jason Hargrove transit center you and I had that conversation just about reminding the public to that our drivers are instrumental and on the front line every single day. That was a reminder as I spoke to his wife, that was a reminder that sometimes our public servants don't get to do that they need so we must continue to push for their pay to be raised but also to make sure that they're safe and their experience while they're doing their job is a nice experience where they can come home to their families every single day. Other than that, that concludes my questioning. Thank you, Madam President.
Thank you for that. Councilmember. Darrell. Much appreciated.
Thank you, Mr. Director. Thank you, Councilmember Johnson.
Thank you, Madam President. And good afternoon. Thank you for the presentation. I kind of want to focus my first question on the bus shelters. I know you all have identified where the first 60 are going. Can you talk about how how you plan to identify the next 100 that will be installed in the community? I'm asking because I have a couple of residents in the community that have been asking and asking and asking for bus shelters. In particular areas where businesses are willing to help to just kind of monitor keep it clean. And they just recognize you know the number of riders that are standing outside of their business and wanting to provide some type of shelter for them. One I will say has put her her own bitch outside of her business just to accommodate riders, but just wanted to find out how you plan to identify where the next 100 will go.
Thank you, Councilmember Johnson, if I could turn it over. To Ricky Yama, Cora, capital project manager.
Through the Chair, thank you, Council Member for the question. We are looking to not only with the partnership of the groups that we have within our organization, so planning and scheduling as well as our maintenance team, but we will be enlisting outside agencies within the city such as DPW and we will be looking through a contractor to help us partner not only with council members, districts, as well as outreach the local community but we will be also working with our advocacy groups in partnership to determine where those shelters are best we will be definitely reaching out to your office as well as the other offices on the council and make sure that we're addressing the needs that I am sure that you're hearing many things about as members of council from that point.
Thank you for that and are you all I guess I should ask how you all are going to be involved in the development or the process going with the the master plan of policies.
Mr. homecourt, can you speak to that?
I apologize. I'm not familiar in terms of the master plan. That was something that I'll have to get back to you. That's not something I'm familiar with in our office. But if it's from the overall transportation Master Plan perspective, that is something that we are informed by. So if that's what we're referring to, the the transportation plan that we have or the overall awareness of the master plan, if that's what we're looking for, that is part of our overall strategy.
So just to be clear, the planning and development department is working on community engagement around updating the master plan, and we've been making sure that community is involved in the process. But I do firmly believe that everything should be included in that one document and that the community should really help to identify how we are planning to move the city forward in the next decade or two. And so bus shelters, bus routes, how frequent they are picking up all of those things, and others should certainly be included within the master plan. And I know that last year during the budget discussion in District Four a lot of questions were related to transportation and the frequency of bus bus rides.
Definitely through the chair, Councilmember would definitely make sure that we're addressing that.
Okay, excellent.
Thank you. And it should be noted that there was extensive community outreach over an extended period of time for the DDOT reimagined. So we will, we will figure out how best to engage as it relates to the master plan and to see to what extent there's some overlap with DDOT reimagine.
Great, great. So my other question was really about the increase in wages and the incentive increase, but I know that has already really been talked about but can you because we know that smart is looking to do the increases that they're looking to do Can you talk about, like additional benefits that operators or DDOT employees receive? Can you talk about any investments in just protecting operators when they are driving on the coach? I think, you know, it's extremely important to make sure that their wages are increased. I think it's difficult though, for somebody who's been on the job for 15 years, who has, you know, invested in the pension in the city and
looking forward to getting something back? It may be difficult for them to shift to another agency. And so as we look to continue to increase wages, what are some of the benefits that operators can look forward to to make sure that they're safe? But that their well being is taken care of as well? Um, two things that I that I would point out. Number one is we've we've increased the number of employee engagement sessions through the city's HR department. Where we literally have had the employee engagement teams come out to the Gilbert terminal and the shoemaker terminal. And the last one actually took place about two weeks ago at Gilbert, where we make sure that all of our employees are aware of all the services that are available to them, many of them at no cost as the city employees so that we may not be as competitive as some of the other transit agencies in the neighborhood as it relates to wages and benefits, but there's a tremendous amount of benefit to be had to be derived by being a city of Detroit. Employees. So we want to make sure first and foremost, everybody's aware of that. I'm not sure if anybody saw the story about the to the transit Equipment Operator DDOT was able to purchase her first house through a city program, I mean, life changing experience. We've had people that have been able to take advantage of the scholarship program offered by offered by the city. So those are just two examples of what we're trying to do to increase the level of engagement between city services and our employees On the safety front. It's been in the works now for a period of time. We hoped to do a public presentation probably next month on a passenger code of conduct. We've been involved in conversations started with employees obviously, engaged the APU in the discussion. I'm talking to the legal department about it. And again, a want to eventually sooner rather than later we'll probably take place in April is to roll out the draft of a passenger Code of Conduct Policy that we think will go a long way in in curbing bad behavior and offering a level of protection to to our transit equipment operators. Okay, thank you. And I know in iOS, we've talked about cameras and I believe, transit police as well. So that operators feel a little bit more secure. And not that they're out there by themselves. But thank you for that. Thank you, Madam President. Thank you, member Johnson Member Santiago Romero. Thank you, Madam President. Good afternoon. Good to see you. Thank you for the work that you've been doing. It's It is exciting to hear the updates that you have for us, especially during public health and safety. Regarding service improvements. You mentioned DDOT reimagine, wonder if you can give us an update on where we are with those plans and if we have the resources needed to implement the plans. So as I mentioned earlier, we're in the kind of the homestretch of DDOT reimagined. So we did do the public hearing on the 15th of February, we just concluded the public comment period that's required by the FTA for service changes along those lines. And we'll be incorporating the the public comments that we received in the last 30 day period of time into final version of the plan. Next steps beyond that will be a cost analysis, as well as an implementation plan. What I do want to re emphasize is all of the service enhancements that are associated with the increased level of service to bring the system back to pre COVID levels are all consistent with DDOT reimagined in terms of frequency of service, and span of service. So as you can imagine, in January going from 150 pull outs per day to a peak vehicle requirement of 159 vehicles up to 200. By September, on the am pull out in 214 on the peak vehicle requirement, there are going to be a ton of of service enhancements that go hand in hand in January and April in June and in September to get to those levels. So while we may not be able to move full speed ahead on DT on all the aspects of DDOT reimagine we're going to make tremendous progress on the service enhancement features of DDOT reimagined the other things that are in DDOT reimagine, obviously, are the infrastructures though the hard projects so bus stops, how streets are laid out some of the other amenities connection corners and the like. So those are going to take some time. Those are going to take some planning those are going to take some money. But again, I think the good news to take to take away from today is the fact that the service enhancements that are at the core of DDOT reimagine art going to in large measure be realized by next September. Through the Chair, thank you. I appreciate that and we'll stay in communication about those plans. I had a group of questions that really have been addressed by member Dirk Hall. We always gets requests to make sure that we have ADA compliant shelters, that we're making sure that our paratransit service is is is enhanced. Residents are asking us for same day requests which we have now, which is exciting. So I'm glad that we want to move some of those resources to Executive Session for us to discuss to make sure that we are providing those resources to our disabled community. So those have been addressed. I think the focus that I'll stay in now is our app. So I too took the bus last year I plan on taking minutes with my bike this year when it gets warmer outs but did not have the greatest time ordering a bus ticket. So actually, it was another writer that gave me his ticket because I was sweating. I was running there from from from the office to the center. Dripping someone gave me their ticket. Thank God thank you very much. But it it made me realize how difficult it was for me to just give a ticket on my phone. Where are we in making it easier to access tickets? Because I was imagining opening the app, getting a ticket scan, get in the bus? Where are we in making sure that the app is allowing for easy access to tickets. And on top of that, because we're discussing apps, I've also heard concerns of information not being in real time. I have staff that had that takes the bus that has seen the little bus go to their home or to line them and disappear in the bus don't show up. So if you can talk about to order tickets, the how how difficult or easier we're going to make it to order tickets. And then regarding real time information on the app as well. As anybody will testify to that sitting here at the table with with me I am the least technical guy in the room. But if there's somebody wants to talk to the app, and then I'll talk to the tracker, okay, okay, well in turn through the chair, Council Member, the question is valid when it comes to the app and making a purchase. In the last 13 months we've switched vendors. We had a previous vendor that maybe it was experienced that you had the new vendors called Lock in transit, large organization, they've done a great job for us. We found that the number of customer service issues has decreased from the time that we had before. But as a program goes, we are only selling the regional paths, the dark paths right now. It is under consideration when it comes to the different types of tickets. So currently, we do sell through the app the dark paths, hopefully the experience is better. We invite you to try it through token transit through the Dart app. That's what we are selling right now. From that point, okay. So as it as it relates to the tracker, obviously, what I do know being the least technical guy in the room is we put the schedule, we load the schedule into the system. And then the tracker works off off the off the scheduled service. Anytime we have to cut a block. It's going to it's going to have an impact on the tracker and on how how close to the schedule, the service is actually operating in real time. So a couple of things that we've that we've been working on, obviously, you don't have to cut blocks, if you have enough drivers and if you have enough vehicles. And so with
that 150 Pull out every morning and 159 Peak vehicle requirement. Recently it's taken us a while but recently, in fact last week, we experience no cuts, which meant that everything that was scheduled went out went out the door some cases it may have been delayed, but it at least they weren't cut entirely so as you can imagine, if the if the system is scheduled to operate according to a certain design, and then we're not able to put all the buses out on the street at the time that they're supposed to be there. We're going to have disruptions. So the majority of the disruptions I think it's safe to say with the tracker have had hit have been the result of either vehicle availability or to availability. When we've identified what I would call glitch in the system. Then we've worked with our vendor clever to try to isolate what the circumstances were and what the root cause may have been. But where our where our emphasis is right now and I think rightfully so, is making sure that vehicle driver in service at the time that they're supposed to be in service and at the beginning of the line at the time that they're supposed to be at the beginning of the line. There's a Chair thank you for both of that when it comes to the tracker the real time information. I'm not sure if it's possible for us to get to a point where I mean if you're waiting for Lyft driver, you know exactly where the car is. We should be able to have technology where you can track the bus and have the bus be online, sort of it just being just pre this this pre baked plan that can change. I think we should go we should lean towards utilizing technology that tracks real time information so that we know what's going on. When it comes to the tickets. Thank you. I will try again. I want to use our bus I do not like to drive it it is not fun. It's an actually really enjoyed being on the bus so you get to see your city and it's a nice enjoy. I was reading a book while I was looking at the city it was it was it was nice. But we want to make sure that we can access tickets easily and that the buses there are on time because we know what happens if they're not. So just some flags for us to continue to work on that I will make a motion to include free ridership into the closing resolution. We are continuing to work on this. Thank you so much director for always meeting with me and my staff is CB Ron Kay, who are pushing for this as we see through the people mover there is success in free ridership and we're going to push for a pilot program however we can so just want to pull it out who that into the closing resolution for continued conversation. And thank you for your partnership. Thank you Madam President. All right. Thank you Hearing no objections, we will add that to our closing resolution. All right. Thank you, Councilmember Young. Thank you, Madam President. And good to see you as always good to see everybody. I just want to ask you really quickly. I'm looking right here at the your revenues and it's about your expenses is huge for 2023 is about $159 million a little bit. And then your revenue for that same year. 2023 is a little over 7 million. That is want to know that's about $151 million, gap give or take. I just want to know where the rest of that money coming from I'm not certain what you're referring to right here. Your proposal. Oh, I'm sorry, where it talks about 159 $159.5 million in expenses. Craig up $7.6 million in revenue. I just want to know, where's the rest of that? Money in terms of revenue coming from grants or other types of funding? Just because where's it coming from? Just out of curiosity, if I could, if I could refer that to Mr. Watson. Excellent. If that's okay. So through the chair to member young, so the way DDOT is funded is through a combination of general fund support general fund contributions, the fair revenue that I believe is what you're referencing, as well as local bus operating assistance from the state of Michigan, which is pretty much a 29% reimbursement of operating expenses, the reason why the expenses have gotten as large as they have and thus, you know, the general fund subsidy now totals about $114 million is a combination of an unprecedented level of general fund support for operations in addition to about $27 million that goes towards deedat share of the legacy pension contribution. So again, the biggest area of making up that difference is general fund support, but also about I want to say 30 to $40 million of state operating assistance as well. Oh, yeah. So that's basically you talk about your farebox revenue, your grant funds from the state and other such things I'm assuming, as well as the general fund dollars that support that. So that's basically where all those revenues are coming from that make up that difference. I just want to make sure because no for the person average citizens looking at that, that's like a real big gap. And so the reason I understand that, but the reason why I'm saying that because I want to make sure people understand when they see that where that difference is coming from I also want to ask a question primarily about a bus is getting on on a bus showing up on time. I think it's about maybe 60% rate somewhere somewhere on that number. I just want to ask, is that going to be fixed primarily because we have more bus drivers. Now is that a preventative maintenance problem? Do we need to invest more in terms of preventative maintenance problem? Is that a safety concern? In terms of bus drivers and I know you talked about you know, earlier terms of, you know, police or transplants, you know, falling bus drivers and I know what's required for formance to be able to follow buses, or is it just a morale problems, people not showing up for work? I just want to know, what is that? And do you have which one of those issues are the greater ones we have to deal with? And does this budget deal with that at all? Or is there going to be more money sufficient in order to address that?
So thank you for that question. It's a combination of all of the above but primarily it it has to do or has had to do most recently with the to headcount and vehicle availability. So we've been able, obviously, if, if you've got the drivers to be able to operate the schedule every day and you've got the vehicles to be able to operate the schedule every day. The likelihood of you being more on time than less on time is greater. Good news is in the last probably three months we're a long way to go again. We've ticked up from about 66% on time to about 70% on time, we still have about 15% 15 percentage points to get up to our service standard of 85%. Obviously there's other complicating factors in there as well, traffic weather construction and the like. But the primary two issues are to headcount and vehicle availability. This budget does address both of those. We've had tremendous success, thanks to HR in the recruiting group, at being able to fill up our to training classes currently have 150 students in training. As you saw from the presentation, we're going from about 400 T O's in January to 600 Come September. We're on track to do that. There's money in the budget for that. The most significant increase in the budget, as I as I mentioned earlier, was in wages and benefits largely driven by the increase in the to headcount, and then there's additional money in the budget as well to the tune of about $4 million for maintenance. So those two things in the in the budget proposal will help us get to where we need to be in September. And with that increased headcount, and with a greater availability of vehicles, and by improving our processes for how we pull out of the terminals every day, how we monitor service on the street. It's our it's our goal, it's our intention to get to 85% by the end of the year.
I just want to ask really quickly is my final question just want to ask, is there also going to include I know you have like 37 fixed routes, are you also going to be adding more routes because you have more drivers now? We'll be adding more routes to that or is it just sort of the restraints in terms of you know, population areas, or in terms of, you know, first mile last mile problem, or those type of things that come into effect of you having more routes available, in terms of the utilities, your budget restraints, as well. So are you going to be adding more routes to also address the issue in terms of people being able to get picked up from certain places as well? Or do you think that what you have now with the budget that you have is sufficient enough for you not only be to reach your goals of buses showing up on time, but people being able to have access to transportation when they need it?
I think one of the one of the features of DDOT reimagined was what is what is the system of the future look like? So again, as we're finalizing that plan, that will certainly be a key consideration. But our approach right now, and I think it's the right one, is to make sure that as we're increasing the service levels, from January to April to June to September, that we're increasing the frequency of the service, so that if people know that, instead of it been a 30 minute headway, it's now a 20 minute headway or a 15 minute headway that improves their experience and improves the overall quality of the service and makes for a better writing experience. So the approach in the near term will be with the service enhancements to make sure that we're operating service with greater frequencies and in some cases, the span of service when service begins and when service ends is enlarged.
Thank you. All right. Thank you member young president pro tem tait.
Thank you, Madam President. And thank you all for being here. Appreciate it. I want to talk about the app the tracker may have her what the fix is because again, if we're I understand we have challenges with the way the system is set up now for the tracker to catch up with the estimated time but what's the fix because I did have an opportunity to go out with Mr. Cunningham, the biggest advocate you can think of shout out to Him always had an opportunity to go out with them and overwhelmingly I've got I got two issues that came about from the rioters. One was the accuracy accuracy of the tracker. They would say that literally it would be off sometime in an hour or so and they would call someone and they would get a better expectation of what what the real true estimate is but they had to call someone. And again to your point, customer service is working better because they got a better response. But the tracker is what most folks utilize. So what is that fix?
We really believe that it that's not a hardware issue and it's not a software issue. What it is, is having having gaps in the schedule. So the inability to put out every block every day with a driver with a vehicle wreaks havoc on that schedule. And so most of the issues we believe related to the tracker has to do with the schedule changes that we have to make on the fly if we're not able to pull out all the service every day. So what we would hope is that and we will continue to monitor it and we will certainly stay in touch not only with our customers because they make us aware of it loud and clear but also with counsel is are you seeing improvements in the performance of the tracker as we're adding TEOs as we have more vehicles available, as we're pulling all the blocks out every day, as we're pulling out on time. So we expect the performance of the tracker, no pun intended to track very closely to our ability to put all the service out on the street that scheduled but
if but if we still have a challenge I mean, challenges occur. How do we get similar to what number Santiago Ramiro indicated if you'd have a ride sharing app it can tell you when that that that vehicle is heading your way is tells you where that vehicle actually is how do we get to the point where even if there is some kind of gap, it recalibrates and gets caught back on track?
Well, as I said earlier, when we when we have seen instances that aren't related to what I just talked about, we go back to the vendor cleverer and look at isolate the incident and then try to discover what the root cause is. So it's going to continue to be we will continue to utilize that process. But it's my hope and expectation as we begin to adhere more closely to the public schedule, to the schedule that's built into the system on that there'll be less and less of those quote unquote glitches with the tracker. When
is a fair time in your opinion for us to kind of read look at this to determine if it's working or not.
I would like everybody to keep looking as we get to each one of these next tiers. So the next one that goes into effect so we've, as I mentioned last week, we were able to we were able to cover all the work last week with 150 average weekday pull outs in the morning and 159 Peak vehicle requirement. The next tier will be in effect on the 22nd of April, where we'll go up to 168 pull outs in the morning and 175 Peak vehicle requirements. So our objective is continue to move up as it relates to increasing the number of pull outs and the number of vehicles that are available for the service. Take the opportunity as we're bringing more T O's on board to build out our extra board. This is our standby capability. So that in the event of a planned absence, somebody's going to take vacation, we can cover that piece of work and not have to rely solely on overtime signups and then more importantly, not be victim to unplanned absences when somebody calls off, doesn't show up for work tomorrow or arrives 3040 an hour late. So part of what we're trying to do as we increase the to is not only fill the assignments, but continue to build out our extra board. We've been working with probably about a five to 8% Extra board capability. We'd like to get up to we'd like to get up to 20% the way I liken it imagine you're on the high wire in a circus and you're operating with a safety net. You take a misstep, what happens so we want to build out the extra board, get it up to about 20% We've had a conversation as recently as last week with the ATO about some of the ways that we want to. We want to do things differently with the extra board making sure that they had no objections. The extent to which we'll be able to protect the system from both planned and unplanned absences will be critical in in how we adhere to the schedule.
Thank you for that. We'll keep monitoring. The other question I had was regarding the seats sent a memo over asking about the seats and what I sat on was more of a fiber. It was a it was a fiber certainly, I'm sure more comfortable than some of those seats in the past that we've had. But it was indicated to me that that was described as vinyl. Is that how was that described as vinyl the seats that we have now vinyl? What's mentioned here is that we move from cloth to vinyl in 2019. But what I sat on was not a vinyl seat and I raised that because one of the complaints that I continue to hear is for the riders, it's almost impossible to know if that seat has liquid on. Hopefully that liquid is water. But there have been riders who there were writers who came up to me and said I've sat in something I wasn't sure was water Imagine having to sit in that and go on about your day if you're trying to go to work with school or wherever you going. So my question is, how are we determining that to be vinyl seats and to what's being done to address that concern that I just heard on one bus ride and but I hear it from bus riders since I've talked to folks asking the question,
if I could President take if I can turn it over to Joe joy or maintenance manager who can talk about the covering on the seats as well as what our cleaning regimen is for the buses.
I just want to make it clear it's not so much just about the cleaning. It's about again when cuz you can't control what happens at that moment. The issue is for that person who sits in that seat afterwards right immediately after and again, that's has nothing to necessarily necessarily do to Kleenex. I don't want us to go down that road. It's about the type of seating itself
okay. Thank you, Mr. Joy.
Good afternoon. Thank you for the question. President potente so the it's a mica Yeah,
we couldn't we know where you were. So,
we are currently using the 2019 and the further model years we are using thermoplastic seating. Those are more antibacterial resistance, and the one that we were using on the 2018 and the prior model years. We were using more on cloth related materials which pretty much you refer like if there is any any, you know, look was contained and that that impact the passengers. So as a improvement, the department is actually doing immediately on those floats seating currently on a every 30 day window time and we do the deep deep cleaning and we're also using the you know, going in going into stone looking into the next bus build to get a more stain resistant and all we are looking into other transit agencies especially on on the transportation side we are finding like the seats are commonly used and we have more passengers coming and going and we're just using the heavy duty thermoplastic materials on the upcoming built as well
being described thermal plastic for those of us who are not familiar with
thermoplastic material which it can be formed into a certain certain temperature and which will which will not allow the anti bacteria to sit on surface. So it's any look liquid or anything sits on at ages get evaporated. So it it's more of like a toilet seat. So it's the similar material that they're using. So it's on the on the nervous
side non pervious. Yes. Okay, so it's almost like the vinyl Correct.
Okay, but it's, it's, it's a composite material.
Okay. So, you will be able to see if it is in fact wet, correct. Okay, and when is that transition happening?
So since 2019 model year buses we were converting into the thermal plastic model. So the upcoming builds, we have more concentration on the thermoplastic and we are looking into other products on the our upcoming builds as well.
Okay. Like to dig more deeper into that not sure what that situation how many of those older seats, buses with those seats that I just mentioned, do we still have in the in the fleet as far as we know.
Approximately 150 buses might have it.
It's not easy fix.
So we did we did receive your questions and they were in great detail and we'll respond accordingly. With more information.
Not necessarily questions just for clarity. You indicated that you have a look. You've now identified where the first bus shelters are going
we have we've identified where the first 60 are going that will be installed in this calendar year. The maps available we'll be happy to share it with you. I know we've had conversations with any number of your offices and your staff members and have provided it but we'll make sure that we provide that that map of the first 60
I have not seen a map myself personally if my staff has received it, but I know your predecessors certainly had promised that at lot at Laaser and Grande River. That bus shelter that has been unfortunately smashed twice. And we're working on the issue with DDOT and excuse me MDOT as well as Wayne County to address the traffic signal situation but I was promised that we would have that as one of the first bus shelters to be taken care of I'm hopeful that it's on the list. And if not, then maybe there's a opportunity for me put something in closing resolution.
Understood. All right. Thank
you so much. I'll take a look. Thank you, Madam President.
All right. Thank you pro tem take member waters
All right. Thank you, Madam President. So I've heard some really great things today about paratransit and the sensitivity training that you're doing for disabled and our seniors. I am so thrilled we're thrilled to hear about those things. And as you reimagine DDOT, please and maybe you are all up on the bus drivers for their thoughts. They go through it every single day. So they should have a pretty good idea in terms of what's needed. In fact, I'm, I'm hoping that in a few months that they'll be able to come before the public health and safety committee just to talk about what they believe should be some of the changes some of the things that that we should be looking at. I don't think other than the passengers. I believe that the bus drivers in a real good position to share that with us. But I look at the riders um those that are not getting to work on time and losing their jobs as a result of it. I wonder is there a way for us to say survey, the riders to find out when they're going to work? What time they have to be there those kinds of questions and and getting their route from them so that we can do a better job in making sure that the drivers are there timely. So that people don't continue to lose their jobs. They have has to be something that we can do to assist riders and getting to work on time.
Man I do know is again the there was a tremendous level of involvement and public outreach conducted in in conjunction with with DDOT reimagined, has there been a specific survey in the seven months that I've been here on determining ride times. Now I mean, typically that data is acquired through the software system just by looking at ridership levels by day of the week by time of the day. So
you are you do have access to certain information.
Oh, absolutely. And that and that informs when we do make when we make conscious decisions on increasing frequencies on routes. It's based on the on the ridership data by day of the week by time of the day. Okay, well, that's
good to hear. You know, I I used to be a professional bus rider from one side of town to the other side. of town. So I know all about riding the buses. And I feel very strong about bus drivers because they became like my best friend. They used to watch out for me, made sure that I was safe. So I want to make sure that they're safe. And I want to make sure that they're getting paid what they deserve. And we all know that is not enough right now. But we're trying to get there. And I'm with you 100% there. We're going to try to get there because we need to treat our bus drivers better. So there's one thing I want to put in Executive Session. I want to I want to make sure and I've identified some of these bus stops bus shelters, near senior buildings some senior citizens have to walk a little ways they are some Donnelly's Jefferson have to walk a little ways to a bus stop. So I want to see and I can I can, you know bring pictures of that to you the various names of the buildings, because we want to make sure that they're safe too. And also some traffic lights. I sometimes see seniors walking from their building in the middle of the street crossing over to a store. I want to I want to change that to there's some there's some areas where we need to fix that and so Mr. Chairman, with that, I'd like to put these those things two things. Bus bus stops slash shelters and traffic lights in executive session.
Thank you blue, more specificity. You mean where so so it's about locations or? Yeah,
it's about bus steps. So there are some seniors sometimes walk out of a building. They have to walk a few blocks
to a bus stop and look for additional bus. The bus additional bus stops.
I am Yes. For certain certain areas. shelters. Well, yeah, that was Yeah, stop, stop slash shelters, along with some traffic lights too. And I'll help you to pinpoint some of those because I know where they are. And we'll we'll get that to you. Just
no worries. Just wanted to make sure Mr. Corley that the direction that
I make with Mr. Cohen. He's not Oh, he's okay. But
Mr. Whitaker's copy.
Okay.
All right motion colleagues for this to go into Executive Session. Seeing no objections that action shall be taken.
All right. All right, then. Thank you. And so I believe that's that's it for me. You guys did do a pretty detailed report. I'm glad that we're doing much better with prayer transit. And so kudos to you all. And thank you for all of your hard work. And I know there's some additional things that you need to do that you want to do and, and we're here for you. Consider us your partner.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, member Conaway. Thank you. I'm on Pro Tem and good afternoon, everyone. And I just want to thank you all for accommodating my request to bring your team to District Two a few months ago, and we did a drive through of district two. And we ended up at nine Marlin woodware, which is in Ferndale. And I just want you to see the possibilities of how our bus shelters could look. And I'm looking at what you are presenting and I'm hoping this is not yet. Age 13 of your report. Because I'm not I see the solar panels and I gave you my list of questions so these are not a part of my questions. But we also I showed you guys how they had that emergency apparatus unit or device on the side of that bus shelter right there on the corner of what were Do you remember that nine mile and Woodward do I'm hoping we can have those. They don't have to be at every bus shelter. But they should be at some throughout the city, especially in the high crime areas. And that is charged by solar and people can call 911 If they don't have a phone and it lights up it's a bright blue color. And you all saw that. So I'm hoping we can install those, again in the high crime areas. And we can talk about that in detail, but you saw it. You saw it and what's exhausting is the every Wednesday the number of lawsuits against DD DDOT is exhausting. And we look at each other like who's going to make the motion to approve. And sometimes I just turned like this instance daily and sometimes she turns the other way. And then you know, it's difficult, and some of these accidents are avoidable. And some of them are not. And so they're exhausting. And I've gotten two different responses in terms of whether or not we have cameras on every bus. I asked two weeks ago and someone said and I wrote it down. There are buses, I mean cameras on every bus. And then I heard from someone in your department they said they're not cameras on every bus. So I don't know what the correct answer is. But if we don't have cameras on every bus, I'm hoping we can get cameras on every bus, sir. Looking forward to the opening of the transit center, that Jason Hargrove transit center on May the 11th that transit center center and that whole area is currently in district two but as of January 2026, it will be in district three. So loving the bus shelters but would like to see what we what we saw during our field trip with you and your team with some of that emergency apparatus attached to some of those shelters. I'd like to see and I'm asking I'm going to put this in executive session and closing resolution. I live in the Green Acres area and our streets have been reduced. In terms of width. Our sidewalks are just as wide as our streets. We can accommodate we cannot accommodate those large passenger buses. I'm asking you to look at the the possibility of having smaller passenger buses going down six mile because six mile has also been reduced and some in terms of width and and live annoy a smaller passenger bus went during my observation sir. The buses are never failed. You might have one or two passengers on that little boy bus from six mile to eight mile and one was speeding about a month or so ago and pass back he was I guess he was late. He passed but he passed up a passenger. I tried to get him to stop but he wouldn't. He was speeding so fast. He made a bomb right turned on from West McNichols University Detroit Mercy onto live annoy heading toward eight mile. So I don't know whose route that was. That was about 30 days ago. And I don't know if I called you about or texted you. But I really felt bad for that young man. That that bus driver, I hope saw him. Well. I hope he didn't see him and pass him on pass him back because it was really late at night. So again, I'm going to ask that we put into Executive Session, a feasibility study regarding the avenue, I'm sorry, liver noi, and six mile using smaller passenger buses, again, because the ones that are there now can no longer accommodate on those large buses. I see it every day. We can't accommodate those large buses. So if I make a motion to put an executive session a feasibility study for a new bus line to connect the avenue of fashion lift six University Detroit Mercy and Palmer Park using a smaller size bus and so you have all of this because we provided this in writing to you and we've given you a couple of proposals. So that being said, Madam Chair, that is one of my motions. And then my second motion would be to look at improving before we start installing those bushes to MIT. Madam Chair, you should finish the first motion first. All right. Thank
you Dr. Powers. Yes, ma'am. All right, Hearing no objections for the first motion that action will be taken member Callaway, thank
you so much. And you have all this in writing, sir. And then we also talked about using those federal dollars that the Biden administrative Biden administration awarded City's $7.5 billion for local bus local municipalities to purchase electric buses. I know we have six in our fleet, I think and we're looking to expand that is that correct? Using some of those dollars?
Yes, as we showed in the presentation. Yes, yes. Yes, that is correct.
Okay. And we know how, okay, I see it, but I'm hoping that we will do that because I know that that money has been around since around 2021. And now we're in 2024. And they've just made another available 1 billion in 2022. So I'm hoping we won't let that opportunity pass us by but again, I appreciate all that you're doing. I appreciate you joining me in my district going on the on the field trip and my last thing is, this is not a question. I'm hoping that we will make a decision in terms of what bus stop signs we're going to use because they're very confusing. And I showed you guys that. The ones that look like when I used to ride the bus, the green and the yellow, and then we have the multicolored ones. And then I also showed you guys the smart bus signs block our bus signs in our city. And I showed you guys that as well. We took pictures and also follow up with sending you the pictures. So I'm hoping we can make a decision so it can be a bit more uniform in terms of how our bus stop signs are looking because it's very confusing the green and the yellow, and then you have the multicolored one. And then we have some in my district that are blocked by smart signs. Thank you Madam Chair.
All right, thank you member Callaway. All right, that will conclude all of our questions. So thank you to deedat for the presentation. And for the work that you all are doing. And if there's nothing else from you all that will conclude our deedat budget hearing. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you very much for your medical and public comment. I'm not gonna leave you hanging Mr. Cunningham. Now we're gonna go into public comments and how many callers do we have online? Do aisle 21 Okay. We'll start with in person and Megan Owens and Mr. Cunningham can join us here at the table. Yes, ma'am, ma'am. Right here at the right here. Yes, ma'am. And you will have two minutes for public comment. Just press the bottom of the microphone. So it turns green. There you go.
All right. Hi, I'm Megan Owens. I'm the Director of Transportation writers united as many of you guys know I'm also a resident of district two. I wanted to comment that I'm very pleased that the mayor proposed an increase in detox budget. That is absolutely essential. It's a great step in the right direction. It's not really enough to get us fully where we need to go. But it's a great step in the right direction. We also really applaud the laser focus on on reliability and hiring. Because yes, so many of the problems that we've been facing as writers have stemmed from there not being enough drivers, and so bosses not arriving when we need them to so I did want to I did share two handouts. I hope they got around to you or they will. One just a reminder that when we talk about the DDOT budget and we talk about public transit, it's about so much more than just moving people, people getting to jobs, it transit has such a huge impact on so many different aspects of our lives. Economic Development, equity, injustice. Health and safety, climate talent. So there's some some some facts and stats just as a reminder, I know each one of you know how important transit is but a reminder of when we ask for more money for data. It's because there are all of these different benefits. And then lastly, the files are shared, something that I put together a hierarchy of needs. There's 1000 things we would like to see DDOT do we know they can't do everything and they can't do it all at once. I believe some of my disability colleagues will spotlight the importance of accessibility on absolute must. As I said, we also applauded reliability and then frequency as being the important parts of the DDOT reimagined. So thank you so much. Thank
you. Thank you. We appreciate you miss Owens, and Mr. Cunningham.
Greetings. Just want to thank councilmember pro Tampa shout me out. He's a he's a good guy. We just like most of the council people we've gotten on the coaches, and it was a good experience and folks that do it again. When the weather breaks the class seating issue that the member Pro Tem talked about this that's real that people do comment about that and sometimes it can be very grimy and nasty and for some reason they text me and like I can't do anything. I'll give you this counterparts number what district are you in? And I have regular customers that are in my taxi cab to take the grassroot bus, they work at MGM, and one of the big coaches was very filthy. And she took pictures of it. I hear there's an app for fixing things in the city and I don't know if DDoS included with that app. But if someone anybody can acclimate me or get me how to use that app so I can forward it on to constituents, your constituents on how they can complain about filthy buses, which is often all I can do is forward them on to the powers that be show them how to use them. Tell them about the meetings. That's all I can do. I appreciate all the questions that you guys posed, but 70% 70% 70% on time is not good. But it is an improvement. Like I said the last time when I was at the nightly City Council movement, meeting, the Jefferson and the Woodward especially I've noticed some some improvement on those lines. Um, anyone at home want to just do a ride along you don't have to be a powers to be get on the coaches. Give me a call 313444914313 Fo fo fo 911 phone that number was made so you can remember it. And on Facebook retroactive figure in this two words on Facebook retroactive fairness. I give out bus tickets. There's a huge need for low income assistance of some kind. And I'm here to counsel people are fighting for just that. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Cunningham. Thank you for coming down. We appreciate you. Thank you. We will go online to our online
callers. Our first caller is ADOS Detroit. All right, good afternoon.
Good afternoon. ADOS Detroit.
ADOS Detroit. Alright, let's come back to this caller please.
Next we have Betty a Varner, Ms. Barner. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon. Good afternoon, Madam President and to all within the sound of my voice. This is Betty a burner president of sold elsewhere black Association. I want to say that I'm in support of the budget for both services. I'm hoping that the budget will improve the services for all and it will make it where people can get to work on time because I know that it is needed. Everybody don't dry. So kudos it sounds like things will should get better. But the bus bus service asking that the council members please consider allocating more money to seeing you accessibility home repair fund. That's another program and service that is needed. We have seniors and people with disabilities who need to have their homes handicap accessible so that they can continue to stay in their homes and my aunt oboe councilmember Darren hall experience yesterday he helped me he saw how hard it was for me to get in and out of a deal go and there are a lot of people who are dealing with the same situation that I'm dealing with now and some are worse. So it is very much needed. Please consider, consider and continue to support my think recorder and also Park diba community park we're in need of a contractor who can step up give us a good quote for a rat wall so that we can purchase our shipping container. Thank you. I appreciate the work that the council does. And God bless you all. Thank you.
All right. Thank you, Miss Varner. Councilmember Doha.
Thank you, Madam President, and just wanted to thank you. It was good saying yesterday. Ms. Bonner, I want to thank you for your courage and everything that you go through every single day we will continue to advocate for increased funding for that fun. And as we say yesterday, just don't tell my wife I touched two legs while I was trying to help you out the car. But I appreciate you so very much and everything that you do. You are such a warrior and you have so much courage and just seeing yesterday is a reminder that we need to do more. Love you. Thank you, Madam President.
Thank you member Doha. Our next caller, please.
The black legacy coalition. Right. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon. It's been a long day for me to employ this illusion. There is a dire need for customer service training because during the march Board of Review hearings, pro tems appointee Ms. Robinson was unnecessarily rude, unprofessional, insensitive, combative, and ignorant ignorant of the ramifications. of the issues that affect the cases. She was tasked with hearing. And she was apparently unaware of the current information of the University of Chicago study 2020 Poor analysis of property tax assessments of the city of Detroit, which stated Detroit over assessed 70% of all homes ranging from $3,500 to $34,000 in violation of the state law, if she knew this, she would probably be more sensitive with the people in that hearing. And also with the D di I love you, Councilwoman Callaway, but wouldn't it be cheaper if we just gone to leave the streets like they were instead of making them smaller? Here we have, we wouldn't have to buy more buses that make them make your boss buy smaller buses trying to hurry because you don't give us much time at the Miss and then five hours but the it would be cheaper and it's dangerous with those trees street made so small people getting out of their cars for pedestrian this dangerous and they need to stop making our streets so small and if it refers to DWSD they miss manage everything. I mean, you know the drainage feeds are illegal is illegal tax. If the church is organized to elect a mayor they can organize the stop this tax. We overtaxed a billion dollars increases this the city services have already been paid. The city owes us get any.
Thank you. Next is William M. Davis.
Good afternoon Mr.
Davis.
Good afternoon. Can I be heard? Yes sir. Okay, started off with human resource. I think the city Trenton need to go back to having a fully functional Civil Service Commission. You know, especially to help and assist the employees there are non union and exempt employees. Second, DWSD wsa DWSD rates wouldn't be so high if and the drainage fees wouldn't be so high. If the land bank got out. You know, if the city tried didn't you know, the city owns like 24% of the property in the state of Detroit. If that was to go into private hands, the drainage fee will be lower. Also, the word Detroit water and sewage need to negotiate the change the balance of how the rate is you know, for drainage. For the combined sewer overflow facilities we should not be paying the vast majority of the fees associated with that. The suburban community should be especially since Great Lakes Water Authority controls all of our assets and they treat our people bad they treat former DWSD people bad I get complaints from about Great Lakes Water Authority, our tech you know so also DWSD I worked for the DWSD for 34 years DWSD despite library retirees, you know, we our pensions was fully paid out with DWSD by the ratepayers, you know so somebody should be given us out some type of rebate and given rebates to 1000s of people to pay for our pension and just like the military to pay for the library, retirees pensions, you know, so somebody needs to be looking at some of this questionable stuff that's been going on. So, as always, a whole lot more can and should be done to help city charter retirees, especially as relates to the rate we receive from the Great Lakes Water Authority is too low. Back.
Thank you, Mr. Davis.
next caller is Steven hollering
as to how herring Good afternoon? Yes, you can't, sir. Okay,
thank you. So, yeah, very satisfied. You know, there's an increase in the DDOT budget this year, you know, I'm gonna echo what Megan said, you know, I wish it could be more but it's still progress. And it's still good to see you know, I really wish you know, DDOT could really get more capital projects on, you know, projects like BRT, you know, even doing studies of potential like rapid projects for the future because, you know, so many cities that are I mean, are probably about a quarter of the size of us are already building out their own BRT systems, I believe Omaha, Nebraska, just announced that they're building a huge 20 mile BRT system, completely dedicated lanes complete. The rapid stations. I just really wish you know, they could really think I know we have so much more work that needs to be done to the what we have now. But you know, I really, definitely wish I could see more plans for future capital projects. But you know, at least it's good to see we're somehow going in the right direction. But you know, there's still so much more than it needs to be done. And I do have to match and I know a few transit activists were not satisfied that the low income fare program was not in it. And you know, I want to say that I mean, a low income fare program. Yes. $2 is a lot of money for a lot of people. You can't make that up, but the birdie 10 million from the revenue of EDA, where the general would be devastating and there will be no return in investment, you know? Yes. I mean, if you want to do some bear assistance or extend on it, you should
wait, thank you. Next we have phone number ending in 124.
Caller 124. Good afternoon.
Yes. Yes. We
can. Yes.
Okay, great. Well, I kind of lost track of my thoughts when I heard about, you know, the transit center this historic state fairgrounds, I don't know how I'm gonna get to forgiveness about what I consider the rip off sale of that historic site. And then there's still not a proper facility there. Yes, we need to transit to the airport. Back to some of the things that member Johnson said in regards to transportation etc. In the master plan. I hope we also think about public health centers, because it doesn't appear we're implementing charter section seven days. 201 was caused for the city to provide adequate mental and physical health services. We could have done a lot of that with ARPA money instead of more demolitions and having libraries, rec centers and parks open. So I would also like to invite everyone to rethink including the mayor who will have control over the advisory group, people selected by the planning department down which is the mayor's office anywhere in the mayor's office about who's going to be on it should be open to the public. And if not, we should form a people's advisory committee. So it's not just selected by basically the mayors people and look into what the historic North End Alliance did and some of the lovely brainstorming sessions we had as we waited years and years and years for planning study, only to get North and landing, you know, shoved down our throats, but also when it comes to drainage fees can people should get credit for their trees and their plants and things that take up water which is why I'm very concerned about cutting down the trees that are over there to just your poor Park. People. The city cut down for gorgeous, very solid trees like descended Dara said they weren't viable when they were from what I can tell very much. And then they didn't replant the trees. So yeah, please pay the bus drivers more and they all
right. Thank you.
Robert Palacky. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon, Madam President, members of council staff and the members of the public. For those of you that do not know me, my name is Robert Palacky. I'm a longtime transit writer and advocate. First off I'd like to start with echoing the sentiments made by Miss Megan Owens and Mr. Cunningham, my fellow advocates we fight for public transit. And we know the importance here in the city is critical to the growth of this region. I'm very grateful for the mayor's budget and How come we've seen in recruitment of drivers and service with the mayor's proposal. For driver increases. But also I'm very grateful to see the DDOT budget having an increase this year. It just shows that we have the support from the mayor and council to be able to improve public transportation. Yes, 70% is not the greatest number, but it's a start. It's growth for DDOT my as a longtime South Gate resident, I've been born and raised in South Gate my whole life, but I use DDOT on the regular to get downtown to get around my own region but also the city. My main route is 19 fort. And as you all know, that route is almost an hour piece. With this increased budget. We can't just focus more on service. We'll be able to focus on the growth of service with DDOT reimagined. Matter of fact I'd like to actually point out some of the sentiments made by all council members especially Councilman Santiago Ramirez point with low income fair and free bus service having free bus fare Excuse me, are totally in support of that. Because it not just gross ridership. It gets people more out on bus service. Remember at the end of the day, more we invest in transit, we can attract businesses jobs, but it also reduces our carbon footprint. But everybody keeps on forgetting the fact that it's freedom. Transit is freedom transit is essential. And we are essential bus riders. So I would like to thank Councilman Santiago mail for making that point. And I would love to have more of a conversation offline with you in your office at any point in time but again, thank you so much for supporting us DDOT riders and transit riders and investing more into transit this year. Thank you so much for your time.
All right, thank you as well.
Next is Tracy. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon.
Okay, yes, my name is Tracy yesterday. I am with the volunteer of transit justice thing. And I'm asking for account So men who have 101 Pity me for the general fund to support the that. I was asking about the buses that the bus stops that just send your input. But Ying Yang said where you're gonna put the bus stops on Dexter. From Dexter to Davidson. There's no place for people to sit. Then your transport yard chain changed it from get from the Boston area to a building farther down from the house from our street. But I want to know is you're going to start when you're gonna start putting in bus the bus that we just said that the best is on the Dexter route from the Davidson all the way down to Grand River. And then in that y'all said the free thing for the free bus ride for the seniors. The volunteers, the veterans and amassing a line I want to know about when is the best service and then the best is on time. You're saying 70% I think it should get to 80 or 90% on time, right? Because there is like if a bus broke down, you lost that bus now you got to wait three more hours, but it makes us eat them.
Alright, thank you so much for calling in. And if you would like to contact our office, we can get you an update on the service line on Dexter Avenue. Between Davis and Grande River 3132244 or 505. If you want to contact our office, we'll make sure we get an update for you. All right, thank you so much. next
caller is Casey Peller.
May I be heard? Yes, you can. Good afternoon. Thank you. Good
afternoon to council. My name is Casey Peller. I'm a resident in District Four and Policy Manager at Detroit disability power. As others have said I want to thank the mayor and this council and to DDOT for the recent $3 raise for operators and excited to see the proposed 13% increase in funding this year to support those service improvements. Specifically hiring drivers and buying more buses for the fleet. Today I'm here with other local transit advocates to ask this honorable council to further increase DDOT budget to invest in retaining and sustaining our DDOT personnel, as many have noted here and emphasize that we need an increase compensation schedule for outriders, but also across the board for our mechanics and customer service representatives who are coming up for negotiations this summer, who are also need to be brought up to competitive compensation rates to meet market standards. We also would love to see an investment in disabled riders. We are so excited to hear the plans for DDOT to unveil or unroll paratransit same day service this fall. Please support the requested increase hire those for dispatchers to make that happen. And please also support the increase for new and seasoned drivers to have disability awareness and sensitivity training. We also would like to see an investment in making bus stop curb and landing pads accessible with benches and shelters at every stop that we can. There are several across the city hundreds across the city of stops that need those landing pads to be updated or adding them in the first place. And we'd also love to see some investments in things like QR codes specifically technology called Netherlands that would help our blind and low vision riders be able to access the service much more freely and easily. Thank you for the time.
Thank you. Next is Lisa Franklin.
All right, good afternoon, Miss Franklin.
The Detroit city council thank you to Director Staley and his team for always meeting with the transit advocates and have met with us for about the past six months. I am a paratransit user, and the Transportation provided by paratransit has significantly significantly improved since the new model and that's been across the board. Glad to hear that they are considering hiring new dispatchers because the wait time on the weekend is a little longer than someone should have to wait for someone to answer the phone or let them know when their ride is coming. So the new technology that they're also talking about expanding will also be a great addition. I mimic my colleagues on the bus stop shelters, the bus stops in the shelters putting those landing pads and making sure that the curbs are correct and all of them as many as possible. can have a concrete slab at the bottom. I love the idea of of Dr. Hoff bringing up the information about the oh shoot what you said there all did all what you said the training. We need that training to be across the board, not only for paratransit, but also for line haul and all of the dots, the dots personnel. I want to say and those QR codes. I think those QR codes can be used for more than just our visually impaired and blind residents. They can also be used to identify the buses that are having issues are doing good work with the driver. The shelter can let someone know what shelter they're at that there's an issue with and I heard someone talk about in the community meeting that those phone numbers on the back of those bus stops are not so QR code could replace all of that. Thank you.
Thank you. Next is Larry Donald verse. Mr verse Good afternoon
Good afternoon is diverse Larry Verse
All right, let's come right back to Mr. Verse.
Okay, next will be Jaime Junior
damy Jr. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon, Council. Thank you for allowing me this time to speak. I want to thank, again the council, the mayor and the data for their budget. I'm one save that I appreciate all the updates to para transit. I would like to see there be more accessible shelters. And I would like to add go. Miss Franklin Emma's pillars, column comments regarding the landing pads and QR codes. I think they will be a vast improvement to be able to help folks that are new to taking a bus know where they are. They're gonna have to search for a sign they can just scan that QR code on a bus shelter. That would be much easier. And I yield the rest of my time. Thank you.
All right, thank you so much. Next is phone number ending in 270.
Caller 270 Good afternoon.
Good afternoon. This is Manny Shelton, the city of Detroit. These a comprehensive study by LPD on the number of jobs and contracts that these large developments, the developers that are feeding off of our tax dollars like hungry hyenas are actually in real time providing to legacy majority betrayed residents. I personally spent freedom of information requests on this several times. And I could not get satisfactory answers back. And oftentimes I could not get any answers at all. Also the city has an obligation to ensure that the residents had clean have a clean, clean environment with clean air. You have to Detroit Health Department has indicated several times when I call that he does not take that alone investigate or rectify air pollution issues. Especially when the polluters are the mega corporate entities like marathon astronauts petroleum refinery, refinery in Detroit for the Ceylon is Plant one on the city's east side. The Duggan administration pursuant to the choice to HR is supposed to submit a comprehensive health report to be placed on the city's website every year by August 1. Neither the health department nor the city has admitted any comprehensive state of the city's health reports. And also the city has failed to establish an Advisory Commission.
Thank you, Mr. Shelton.
Next is Mr. Foster. Mr. Foster
Good afternoon.
Good afternoon. I'm wanting to just take some time out this afternoon to highlight a few things. I wanted to highlight the city council's decision last budget to invest in anti homeless programs and anti poverty programs. So paying off those decisions like the Maya Davis housing and Mr. Browder they're paying off and I'm very grateful for it today. I just wanted to let you guys know that the young couple that came in today pregnant was able to come down and get food, shelter, employment skills before the budget here is concluded today. And so it's only possible by the decisions that you guys made last budget to invest in our community. I'm very grateful for it. It was Miss Sheffield's team really showed up Mr. Ray Simpson the whole entire team even kind words from the Secretary and a police officers and that is the type of wraparound and nourishment that our community needs and deserves. So I did want to make it public. That I'm very grateful that the two youngsters are very grateful as well. It also highlighted today the need for the task force black male engagement, Mark, continue to advocate for it. It's very important in our community, and it shows that council can do two things at once. All right when it comes down to DDOT I want to just really advocate for that Dexter route is always been issues when it comes down to school time multiple schools along that route, very crowded may need two or three buses around school hours to to compensate that and the other thing is I want DDOT to be more proactive about the internal issues before they ever become external. And I miss yesterday to charge right and use them. I really enjoyed that large council evening meeting last year and I'd like to see that again. Maybe add another one that didn't use Zoom. I really appreciate you all keep up the good work and good decision making.
All right, thank you Mr. Foster.
Next is June nickel Berry. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon. My name is Joe Naka Berry. I am president of asked me to DLT as serve employees, clerical operations, clerical operations, and paratransit employees. So, I know you're talking about giving raises to bus drivers, and we're happy about that. But what about us so I'm here to say that I beseech you City Council, as we talk about the DDOT budget that you think about the other employees are the people that work at DLT. Our employees, our members, they do vital work such as our office assistants, that makes sure that we keep these bus drivers and keep track of the bus drivers that's coming in these new bus drivers. We have service sorry, customer service reps in paratransit and also in DDOT. Land haul that keep service on the road that take the complaints and monitor the service. We have a complaint Investigators then reach out to the customers and explain to the customers or resolve issues with the continents we have our senior service guards are to instructor it's our transportation services factors. They should masters facing workers, dispatchers, schedule makers schedule animus analyst, so many people that do vital jobs around DLT. So when we're talking about races for bus drivers, let's think about the people that supervise the bus drivers as well as the people that help the department run as a should. And we play vital parts. I was just told that our soup one of my supervisors only make a penny less than a bus driver. And that said that concludes my statement.
All right. Thank you so much for bringing that to our attention and we'll definitely follow up to see how we can look into that. So thank you so much for calling.
Next is Mr. Rue. Good afternoon.
Yeah, my CFO I'm gonna bring it to your attention. There is no way you about to be mayor of the city of Detroit. You're negligent actions and malfeasance actions rise now to level a complicity in the level in this corrupt entity which is the city of Detroit Detroit is being ran like a criminal enterprise. And now, the city clerk position. figures prominently that of the Director of the Department of Elections figures prominently. The whole city of Detroit is being ran like a criminal enterprise. Does Detroit voter fraud, the Detroit voter trap houses the absentee ballot fraud. You had a citizen call in and tell you that you got people voting from his house and you're still refuse to accept the fact that this is a very rare like a criminal enterprise and all roads lead to the Department of Elections that James II take. But you didn't see me Wait, and I'm trying to get social media hits when you got to Detroit voter trap house right here in district 1812842. Sussex street. There is no logical explanation for Mary Elaine Beckman voting from that house on 226 An absentee ballot to 2624 in the United States presidential primary election was counted on the 27th from that address I was at the door on the 28th at 10 in the morning. That man said he'd been living here for five months he'll know who Mary Elaine Beckman is. And UAE trying to find out fraud. Yeah, fraud yesterday, and today it appeared before the Board of police commissioners that matters about to get a dress and that tag needs to come up off Tanisha Coleman and he needs to get what she won't joke.
Our next caller please Renard mentioned ski that afternoon when art.
Get out afternoon, madam
president can be heard. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Madam President and members of council. My name is Renard was Trotsky. I'm a longtime resident and bus rider in the city of Detroit grew up here and now I'm a organizer with Detroit people's platform. I'm very encouraged to hear about the modest 13% increase for the DDOT budget and earlier to raise for the drivers initials that you all are listening. However, as we considered a budget for DDOT we need to make sure to do that is able to develop a capital plan for deedat reimagine and actually funded, invest in fully accessible bus stops and shelters echoing the sentiments of our disability advocates and organizers making sure there's a landing pad as accessible, and QR code information as well too so people can report invest in competitive and sustainable compensation and increased wages for all DDOT personnel echoing the sentiments of Joe nickel Barry, because dispatchers complaint takers all of the people are essential to DDOT smooth operation if you got some that are paid well and some underpaid you seen that in a faster restaurant, how well that works. It doesn't work well for any of us bus riders, and implement the local fare program. The city pays way more money and lawsuits due to the actions of the police department in the safety record of DDOT. And it's way more than 10 million and it's hyperbolic. To think that that's going to impact the general fund when it will create a reduced fare program for homeless individuals returning citizens and families experiencing really low incomes as well. And veterans as well who served our country. They should have a reduced fare program in addition to the federally funded one because it will increase ridership it will increase the budget for DDOT as well and it will get people to where they need to go. That's what's most important. Thank you so much.
All right. Thank you.
Next caller is s Solomon. Good
afternoon Solomon.
Hello, good afternoon. No. I one who really thinks that a big problem in the city of Detroit is litter litter everywhere. So I just wanted to suggest that I hope that the plan for the new shelters the bus shelters includes the addition of garbage receptacles. We have shelters now in place and there's no garbage receptacles there. And there's a lot of litter that is constantly at those bus shelters. So I just wanted to make that suggestion or maybe that's already a part of the plan but I just wanted to put that before you all and thank you.
All right, thank you.
Next is Rochelle is Stewart. Stewart. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon. My name is a good evening. President Sheffield Council. My name is Rochelle Hopkins Stewart and I'm with the Delta transit team of Detroit people's platform and district seven resident bones. They did up all the changes were made. We got a long way to go. And I thank you especially for naming that state fair transit center at the Jason Hargrove is well deserved. He was a great driver. And I really appreciate that. Thank you, council and the mayor. But getting to do that we need to develop that capital plan but DDOT reimagined and made sure that it's funded. Implement that low income fear. I mean, I know I keep going on and I know Jason Carter will always talk about we don't need it, but we do because 33% of Detroit is at the 200% poverty level and we need it. If we can do to people over the two line. Somebody should be able to sponsor D that low income pay at least a year. Let's try it out. See how it works. We need to invest in fully accessible bus stops. They said accessible to ADA with a special ramp so they can get up and down. You know and begin that installation in 2024. With regular updates to the public. We need to invest in competitive sustainable compensation for all DDOT employees or deedat employees. And we need to have 100 to 150 million investment from the city during the Fund for DDOT all this money is coming in from buying and putting in for transportation it should go to fix players fix transportation public transportation is sitting in our thank you for everything you need for paratransit I'm glad it went in our hands again because it is running very financially and keep on doing up the good work. And thank you, Interim Director Staley for the meetings with us transit advocates.
All right, thank you.
Next is Marguerite Maddox and Scarlett Good afternoon Miss Maddox. Yes, you know, number one
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We are going back to AD O. 's Detroit.
ADOS Detroit. Good afternoon.
Good afternoon, council president and through the chair. May I be here? Yes, ma'am.
You can.
Thank you, Carolyn. Has Thank you very much. Thank you for fixing the paratransit for the disabled people in the city that it's admirable. I like to hear their comments that they are satisfied. I like to to ask the council, do they do feasibility studies? Um, 70% of the people who work for the city don't live in the city. If you're going to offer tuition reimbursement, can it just be for city workers? Those people who live in the city of Detroit for both fire police and general employees. I don't think that it's sustainable for us to educate, pay and and do all that we do for people who actually just work for the city. I had a job all my life ever since I was 12. I've worked but what I want to say to you is I paid for my own childcare. Okay. No one paid for my childcare and I don't know why you think we ought to give you vouchers or pay for your childcare. You have to look at our budget and the amount of money that we bring in and the general fund is not sustainable for all that you want to do. We don't want to spend every penny we have on employees and employee perks. My other my other comment about the buses is that it's a crying shame that people are complaining that the buses are dirty. This is going to be reported to the CDC because you got our poor funds and we spent millions of dollars to keep those buses clean. And if you really understood the kind of danger that you put all Detroiters in when you don't maintain cleanliness on public transit. It affects everybody. You have money to do that. And if you don't do that, I am going to conduct the CDC. Thank you.
Right Thank you. Last caller is Larry Donald verse.
I think we are we came back to Mr. Burse Okay, Mr. Verse are you with this
Larry verse I'm showing that Mr. Verse is unmuted. Alright, Mr verse going once Larry verse. Very verse going twice.
All right, Mr. Verse. If you can just submit your public comment to the clerk's office, we will make sure it's a part of our public record. All right with that being said, that concludes our public comment in all of our budget hearings for today. Thank you colleagues for all of your patience in just holding on for a long day. And it was a long day. So thank you. Ah, thank you. Mr. Whittaker. Thank you, Steve Watson. Thank you to everyone for being here. Everyone Have a blessed weekend and if there's nothing else to come before us, this meeting will stand adjourned.