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thank you
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city council today is Monday April 10
2023. it's approximately 1 p.m if you
please join me in the Pledge of
Allegiance please
one nation under God indivisible with
liberty
us
okay so we're going to start off with
our pets of the week and Amy De Felix
from the Animal Services is on Zoom
good afternoon Amy
hello good afternoon I hope you all are
doing well let me start sharing my
screen for the patents of the week
alrighty and as always we start with our
cat of the week
um and our catalogy this week his name
is Bert his number is 60678 and he says
I'm a bit quiet and reserved but after a
few minutes of interaction I'm purring
and giving your headbutts and cheek rubs
I love pets even if I appear a little
bit shy and I don't have any bone in my
body I just need my family to let me
adjust to a new home environment and
it'll be a great low-key companion
and then for our dog of the week our dog
of the week is named Rachel her number
is 51164 and she says I'm reserved in a
little skittish but you'll see that I'm
truly a very sweet girl I get a little
anxious during new experiences or new
environments but I will eventually
settle in and maybe even enjoy some play
time I think if my future family helped
me feel safe and let me get comfortable
in my own time I'd be the most loyal
furry family member
and we do actually have an event this
Saturday April 15th at the icebox
Brewery Taphouse on Picacho we have a
benefit concert where a local musician I
believe his name is Neil MC Cohen is
headlining it is a free concert in
Beyond accepting donations and I'll even
have some dogs available for adoption so
we encourage everyone to stop on by
we'll be there from 12 P.M to 3 P.M
and to go along with this month's theme
of TNR
um I would like to share a little bit
about what uh has been
referred to as the vacuum effect in TNR
and so what is the vacuum effect well
it's
sort of like a social effect that has
been observed when people from the
community or organizations resort to
doing the I guess catch and remove or
catch and kill solution to having a
federal population and what the vacuum
effect is in the long run is that these
cats that are removed from the feral cat
territory and are permanently displaced
in whatever way that is cats from the an
outside territory will come in and fill
in those spots that those previous cats
were removed from and then keep
reproducing and in the end the
population problem is not solved in the
long run so that's why a lot of
organizations encourage DNR as a
solution because when you take these
cats you spay and neuter them vaccinate
them keep them healthy put them back in
their
uh their territory
the outside cats don't have the they
don't feel like they can assimilate
because cats are very hierarchical
hierarchical and very territorial They
Don't Really allow strangers when they
are themselves are full their population
and because the territory themselves is
sterilized they will no longer keep
producing future litters and
perpetuating future generations of
federal capitals eventually the goal for
TNR is for eventually the territories to
slowly uh pass away naturally and they
can't reproduce so it dies out in the
long run
so the vacuum effect definitely is
something that I thought a lot of people
from the community maybe know about they
don't realize this is a
studied and recorded effect that happens
quite often and ever in all kind of
parallel Community communities so
because of this effect and how it
doesn't necessarily really help we're
all got the ultimate goal of reducing
their own pets we encourage highly
encouraged understand orange and
suggesting it
thank you
okay thank you
all right next is going to be our jobs
of the week and with that we have Irene
para from our Economic Development
Department who's going to go over those
jobs
thanks Irene
okay
am I able to get control to move through
the slides
yeah there it is okay
okay so we begin with the oh by the way
my name is Irene Parra Economic
Development Department
we began with the city of Las Cruces who
is hiring for a grant development and
compliance specialist this position pays
between 49 000 and 70 000 a year and is
open until filled white Sun's Missile
Range is hiring for a firefighter this
position pays 42 000 a year and closes
on April 11th Conquest machine is hiring
for a CNC machinist this position pays
between 18 an hour and 22 dollars an
hour depending on experience and closes
on April 28th Messiah Valley Community
of Hope is hiring for a data manager
this position pays between 81 000 and
135 000 a year and closes on April 28th
CD General Contractors is hiring for
roofers this position pays between
twenty seven thousand and forty one
thousand a year depending on experience
and closes on April 27th and banega's
Mobile Home Services is hiring for a CDL
truck driver this position pays between
twenty thousand and forty nine thousand
a year depending on experience and
closes on April 27th
the city of Las Cruces is once again
partnering with the New Mexico Workforce
Connection office to host our quarterly
job fair this event will be held on May
3rd at the Las Cruces convention center
from 11 A.M to 4 P.M this
industry-specific career fair will host
employers And Trades engineering and
health care they are looking for
employers now and registration is closes
on April 30th
and for additional information about
employment opportunities you can contact
our local Workforce Connection office at
575-524-6250 at their office at 226
South Alameda and for employers
interested in participating in the
career fair they can find information at
employ nm.com thank you
okay thanks Irene and before we get
started on the agenda I guess you can
see that little picture of that young
lady up there top right corner counselor
Becky Quran so we're going to need a
vote a motion a second allow her to vote
and participate telephonically
motion made by councilor Florida second
by councilor beta to allow councilor
Becky Quran to participate in our work
session via telephone telephonically
Christine
this is under motion to allow councilor
Koran to participate telephonically
counselor beta yes councilor Graham yes
councilor Ben Comal yes councilor cran
yes counselor Flores yes councilor
gandada yes mayor yes
okay we have three of them three items
on the agenda first one being the casa
de peregrino's food security program
evaluation
and it has Lorenzo Alba from Casa de
peregrinos is going to looks like
they're going to start it off
okay great
save a few dollars having a city staff
doing it
I did
hello mayor and City Council Members as
well as Administration members my name
is Lorenzo Alva I'm the executive
director of Casa peregrinos and I have
with me Nancy Ryan she's my deputy
director we're going to be
tag teaming on this presentation because
she was more involved in the actual
evaluation process with the team that
took that took place over the last six
months when we completed this so I
wanted her to be here and in case you
have questions about how we went through
this process
we've been wanting to do this for a
while because you know if you've had me
come up here or I present in front of
people all the time and I say things out
loud and people are like how did you get
that information Well normally we know
we and it's an uncomfortable situation
we can't actually
have any data to back up what we're
saying so we wanted to make sure that we
had that data to back up some of the
things we say out loud like how what we
do at the food pantry actually has a
great effect on the families financially
and nutritionally among other things
really try to improve quality of life
for these families and for our community
it's easy to say it out loud when you're
hearing the people say it to you because
you go over there and talk to them you
spend a little time with them our staff
relays information back as we meet
together but to have the data to back it
up as what we really wanted to do the
other thing too is that I know that your
legal department struggles in trying to
figure out ways to evaluate our
programming and through some of the
grants that we do
I think this is a way for us to maybe
set up a matrix at some point that
really makes sense for what the city
funds us through the grant process
whether it's cdbg or through the housing
Human Services or other funding that
comes across instead of just being a big
data bank for you which is easy to do
anybody can do that we can take numbers
we can take pounds and equate into that
I mean but the value of what we actually
do I think should really be more based
on how it actually affects the families
so we took time to do this and it was a
process we put a team together
um I think I just hit interact
the evaluation team consisted of myself
Nancy Ryan Dan Alvarez who's our
programs manager Leticia Garcia and
James Stewart and MSU intern
all this was made possible through a
class that we went to at UNM it's called
the UNM evaluation lab we spent about a
week there our team spent about a week
there basically getting about a
semester's worth of information rolled
into one week and that time they were
able to
decide that hey we want to start with
this program
all that
was a difficult process to see I came
back after the second day I'm like okay
I'm gonna come home and take care of the
pantry while they do this and while they
were there they came up with an idea of
what they wanted to do and as soon as
they got back they immediately got to
work
a little background a little more
background on that is that of course you
know the creation of of doing this is
it's a process we got to come up with
logic models theories of change rubrics
trying to Define everything that we're
actually doing here and this is
something that's way out of balance for
some of our staff so we wanted them to
get trained on this make sure that they
understood how we were going to be able
to get this done
New Mexico state was absolutely
instrumental in helping us through this
process of course the folks over at the
University of New Mexico as well and all
of this was made possible through
scholarships from the Anderson
charitable foundation in Austin
they paid for us to go up there they
paid for some of the scholarships for
the hotels we had a partner help us with
the travel and it ended up being a
really good situation for all of us what
we wanted to do again is come up with
something that is understandable for all
of you
and for the community and at large that
what we do actually does make a big
impact on the families that we serve
the purpose of the evaluation was to
learn to measure the outcomes rather
than just outputs which outputs is what
you normally get from me when I come
report to you also to understand what
impact our programs have on clients
lives
to improve our reporting to funders
Partners and the public
to improve our services to clients so
tell us what we're doing right and what
we're doing wrong
to create a model for CDP that for the
future evaluation efforts so we're not
done there we're going to evaluate all
our programs even our fundraising
processes everything that we do we're
going to evaluate this to see that we're
doing the best that we can and of course
we like to tout that we're very good
stores of the funding that we get this
is another way to do that it's another
way to say that out loud and say hey
we're actually doing this for you for
the community this isn't just about Casa
peregrinos but it's about what we're
doing for the community I'm going to
pass it on to Nancy now and she's going
to go into a little more detail about
what what process we took but I'll chime
in here in a little bit on some other
things that have come up as well okay
all you're going to do is hit the enter
Nancy Ryan deputy director of Casa de
peregrinos
um
the way we the way we
how do I go back I'm sorry I think I
went too fast
I think you'd moved ahead for me I did
there we go thank you sorry what we
decided to do with this evaluation
process was to begin with a focus group
a series of focus groups that would
enable us to better Define what
questions we wanted to ask on a full
client survey so we started this process
in December which carried carried on a
little bit through the end of the month
and then we began
our Anonymous survey
what we've we just there were almost
1800 clients that were served during the
30-day time frame that we ran the survey
and
714 surveys that were returned
um
which was uh 40 return on surveys
um which we thought was very good and
the general response that we've received
from clients is that they were delighted
to be asked
um it was it was a very very positive
response the numbers that we're going to
be seeing are
um not necessarily consistent because
some clients didn't answer all the
questions
um because if they got through the line
before they were done they put the
survey down and took their food
and also some of the questions had
multiple answers
um
we started with
demographics I'm not going to go through
all of this but I think there are a
couple of things that are
important to point out
um
the clients by household size
37 percent of the people reporting on
this survey reported a household size of
larger of six people or larger
um
and
as our carts are designed
with nutrients that are sufficient for
two children and two adults for six days
I think you can see that the food
services that we have are
only a small portion of what families
really need to subsist on the second
thing I wanted to point out is
this is showing
um
62 percent female response 31
male response I think that that can be
explained by the fact that it's more
frequent that the woman in the household
actually comes to the pantry to pick up
the food and from my experience handing
out the surveys in the line more women
were interested in participating in the
survey than men are statistical
client breakdown by gender is about 48
men 52 percent women so this is kind of
an anomaly but it was interesting to
capture
the next slide client history with Casa
de peregrinos
I think that it's interesting to point
out here that more than half of our
client of our respondents have been
coming here for at least a year
um
so what we're what we're seeing is
um from clients is and not a one-time
need but an ongoing need
um
on the next chart
um
we asked about nutrition services
because we're
moving towards
providing more nutrition services
recipes nutrition classes we've put in a
couple of Grants to help fund this kind
of a program and we've been extremely
fortunate to have hired a master's level
nutrition
specialist
um
and I was I was very interested to see
on this that almost two-thirds of of the
clients responding said yes they would
use some sort of nutrition services
whether it be
recipes or content information or
cooking classes
um
which I think was
um
I think is very positive in terms of the
direction that we're heading on this
um
the next slide
um
this really
Harkens back to the slide that talked
about family size
um
for almost half of our clients this food
is gone in less than a week
um and I think tying that information
into the fact that according to
New Mexico families
New Mexico families for children is that
okay
um
when they're when they're judging how
long SNAP benefits last
they have found that 80 percent of SNAP
benefits are gone within two weeks
and 21
are gone on the day they're received so
I think when you
tie this in
what snap is able to do and what
constant peregrinos is able to do it
really points out in a very loud voice
how much the
how much food insecurity remains even
with
the existing programs
now
before we started this process we got
our team sat down and did some
brainstorming about what we wanted to
get out of this
and part of that discussion was about
what what do we believe that we do for
families and we've really honed in on
three things
we believe we improve their financial
situation we believe that we improve
their health and we believe that they we
improve their emotional well-being and
these next few series of charts
um are the feedback on those specific
questions
um
we're seeing here that
about 60 percent of our families
responding
are saying they're missing fewer meals
71 percent are saying they're eating
more produce
60 percent are saying they have the food
that they need to prepare complete meals
and 66 percent are saying they're buying
less junk food
these four charts together speak to the
impact on the health of our clients and
that the food that they are receiving
doesn't does impact
their health
the
next chart
um
is really in response to our question of
Are We affecting their emotional health
more than 99 percent of the clients
responding said that yes they worried
about food
and
responding to the second part of that
question as coming to CDP helped you
worry less about food 89 responded
positively to that so this chart to me
addresses
the fact that we are in fact making a
difference on people's emotional
well-being
and
the next
the next chart
um
was trying to address whether we do or
don't make a difference in their
financial situations
asked
flat out
are we making a difference in your
financial situation 60 about 60 said yes
42 percent said no
however once we drilled down with more
specific questions like
does getting a cart of food from CDP
make it easier to cover medical expenses
save money purchase other necessities
almost 80 percent of the people
responded that yes one of those
questions was true for them in that
situation
and then
we also wanted to ascertain whether
we were providing
um
a supportive and nurturing environment
for clients when they came to the
building and
um
we had between 83 87 percent of the
people responding that yes they were
treated with respect yes that the staff
and volunteers that served them were
kind to them
and on this one the numbers may have
been the numbers may actually be higher
than that because I think that um
clients may have misunderstood the
rating scale
and then finally
um
we asked whether
if put their opinion about why client
why other people are not coming to
concert peregrinos
the biggest one on here by far
that was reported is that no
Transportation was available but there
are a number of things in here that are
also
really interesting because they speak to
the need for increased Outreach on our
part into the community 19 of the people
responded that
their friends and neighbors might not
know about it
um
that they are too proud that there's a
fear of government involvement all of
those are issues that increase now reach
on our part can help to address
um with that I'm going to turn it back
over to Lorenzo for the conclusions and
I just wanted to take the opportunity to
thank you all very much for your time
and for all the support that we've
received from the city of Las Cruces
throughout programs
thank you Miss Ryan we appreciate that
the outcomes are interesting because I
think
some of the things that
even now in the presentation I
I really wanted to kind of note was one
of them was the ability to save money
the fact that that actually came up
uh is pretty incredible and that
actually makes me very proud to sit up
here and be able to say that out loud
but um
some of the rent comments uh were kind
of fun to see what was coming back and a
lot of them were just happy to be able
to participate they were happy with the
services that we were giving them and
that what they're doing it was actually
going to make an impact on how we do
things moving forward obviously
um
see what the next one does uh the first
conclusion was that the client staff
interactions are outstanding
overwhelmingly clients felt that the
staff and volunteers that served them
treated them with respect and with
kindness our staff and volunteers are to
be commended for their compassion
that's kind of one of my little things
when I'm hiring people
I look at that really closely because I
think
to do what we do you got to have some
compassion in your heart all the time
not just part of the time not just once
in a while but all the time
second CDP now has statistical evidence
that we are impacting our clients lives
with specific and positive ways we are
impacting them financially
we are impacting them nutritionally
we are impacting them and making better
decisions for their families
it does make a big difference when
they're able to come to us and then even
maybe set their budget up around what we
do for them
I don't have to get this because I got
it at Costco now I can use my SNAP
benefits to better budget my food and
how I purchase it
obviously the third we're adding
nutritional nutrition to our what we do
at Casa peregrinos as Nancy alluded to
we did hire somebody beginning July 1 to
provide nutrition services for our
clients another reason why we put that
demonstration Kitchen in our new
facility that's almost finished by the
way
we wanted to make sure that those
classes were available to our clients we
were able to show them spot on on the
spot how to cook with the food that we
give them and how to really build a menu
around the food that we give them we're
excited to have this young lady on our
staff and she's been working already
diligently to plan ahead
fourth
that the food at CDP provides only a
fraction of what what we're able to do
for them
um
go back to 2011 when Lorenzo Alva first
arrived at Casa peregrinos in my
excitement I kept thinking man we're
going to do this we're going to rock
this place like nobody's business
it took me less than a year to figure
out that there's no way
peregrinos could ever do this alone
and the collaboration started happening
then building the relationships with
other agencies with partners and making
sure that our major stakeholders like
the city of Las Cruces and doniana
County were well aware that we needed
them to be able to do this and that we
could only do this together and not
because alone
so that is one of the things that now we
can say out loud for sure because it's
absolutely impossible
it'll be more difficult for us to do
this as
we deal with inflation we deal with the
cost of food we deal with indecision by
our federal government on some of the
some of the programs that really assist
some of our clients so that was that was
a big thing
and finally
there remain numerous obstacles to for
us to you know get to get where we are
one of them has always been
infrastructure
one of them has been
consistent funding
one of them has been consistent
Partnerships
we knew that
we knew that coming ahead but now we
actually see it in front of us
we we hear that back from the clients
themselves and some of the things they
go through on a daily basis and
everything that we assumed
were felt was true is absolutely true
but we're trying to make sure that when
we plan forward at Casa peregrinos
that we're looking at everything that
we've concluded that we're listening to
our leaders that we're listening to the
community to what the real needs are in
our community
it's
to our best interest to add the
infrastructure so we could better serve
people
it's our best interest to make sure that
we nurture the relationships that we
currently have to make sure that we
continue this Mission moving forward I
don't think this is ever going to go
away anytime soon
I love to be able to sit up here and say
hey guess what we're done with this but
we're not going to be done with this
you know I first got here I used to meet
with the mayor every once in a while at
his office and talk about these things
and it was always an eye-opener for both
of us to think about how long
these things have been going on in our
community and how long Casa peregrinos
had been around
he reminded me of when it was over on
Spruce Street
growing up here
I was not around for that
but some of the stories that we're
hearing now about the impact that this
organization has made over the decades
is just amazing
I'm going to document it all and we're
going to put it on video so that
everybody can know what the real history
of us it really is
other than that the only other thing I
want to add is I know that adding the
infrastructure to Community of Hope has
made has has some other questions arise
especially with our lease and some other
things
but just to share a little bit of
information with you
our budget for this program and in Las
Cruces is currently 630
746 dollars a year
for this fiscal year
we've already overspent on it and mostly
because of the cost of food
out of that 83
000 dollars
has come from the city of Las Cruces so
the rest of it has been funded through
other grants
through individual donors through
Foundation money including emergency
food and shelter
Molina
Blue Cross and Blue Shield
Albertsons Walmart to stalker fund the
Anderson foundation so there's other
ways that we fund this program but most
of it is through individual donors so
whatever we get from the city and
whatever help we get from the city even
through the lease of being there it's
well spent money trust me when I tell
you that
trying to figure out how we're going to
set these things up in the future is
really a collaborative effort on us
trying to find out what you need from us
and how we can do this better to report
to you because I'm glad to come here
every month and report to you if that's
what you would require me to do
or at least send all the leaders a
quarterly report whatever it may be
whatever you may want from us we are
absolutely willing to work with you
because you've always worked with us
I look back at some of the history of
how the city has supported Casa
peregrinos and there's been hrps funding
and cdbg for instance like the early 80s
wow right
but that's the kind of relationship that
God said you know says always held with
the city of Las Cruces in this community
I'm not telling you anything different
by telling you that we live in a very
generous community
one of the most generous communities in
in the United States
how they can sustain nonprofits and
continue to do the minister the missions
that they support is unbelievable if you
think about it
another program that you guys fund is a
food rescue program and so far this year
on the food rescue program
we brought in almost 850
000 pounds of food through the food
rescue program that's valued at close to
about 1.5 million dollars
so the funding that we received through
cdbg funding for the food rescue program
is again the best bang for your buck you
could get because it also helps us
offset some of our budget because we
pick up this food from Walmart from
Albertson's area of farmers and other
grocery stores in the area
it's a huge help to us
huge help to us
Gotta Love what these Partnerships bring
and I am just very pleased with the
partnership we've had with the city of
Las Cruces and really attribute it not
only to the leaders up here some from
the past
but the staffs the administration
working with us through these difficult
times and for you guys to believe in us
enough to trust us to go after Capital
outlay Money
to go to try to build something for this
community to trust us with funding from
cdbg to help us try to follow suit to
what you're doing even with your
strategic plan and some of your mission
we want to be a part of it and we hope
that we can be a part of it for a long
time and at this point I'll open it up
to any questions
comments or concerns you may have
councilor Flores thank you Mr Marin
thank you so much for your present
respective presentations
um I have a question about Albertsons
during the holidays I think starting in
November let me see Albertsons over on
Lowman and talshore they asked for a
contribution you know from every one
checking out so do they match that or is
that the contribution Albertsons makes
you know I
you know corporate
thinking that a lot of that goes to us
and some other agencies but they also
have through their Foundation some
matching dollars that go to it they try
to do it according to what each store is
doing in the area this is a district
and one of the things that has changed
in the last couple years is that United
bought out Albertsons a couple years ago
they're way more philanthropic
and above and beyond what they're doing
at the store they've given us gift cards
that we're able to share with other
agencies as well as with our clients
when we're talking
what 45 50 000 worth of gift cards fifty
dollar gift cards that we're able to
share we use that also for our
Partnerships with like the fire
department
Paul Ford and his team whenever they go
to some of these homes and are stuck
between a rock and a hard place instead
of trying to find a pantry open in the
middle of the night
here you go man go to Albertsons buy
them some groceries get the food to them
it's way more important to take care of
the family now Albertsons is a great
partner above and beyond the donations
they give us financially and through
grants but they also are part of the
food rescue process as well and donate a
lot of food to us but yes
yes um yes they had two they add to it
that's quite a bit I'm very happy to
hear that whenever you should always
give to that okay because we we we'll
see we'll read the benefits of it I mean
you know when you give you're hoping
that it goes directly to you
um so um
the
I was wondering if
um do you collaborate with LA semia in
any way in terms of
um teaching people how to have their own
Gardens or do you have that uh
that capacity in any way I mean it would
be a matter of either them coming in or
you sending them out that be a
transportation issue it's a it's a
we don't currently have a relationship
with LA semia we have in the past tried
to start a relationship with them it's a
little difficult when the office side of
Anthony and their Farmers over there and
they sell their food instead of giving
it to us
they should be donating it to us
I know that they have to they have to
make ends meet but they also help us
Foundation backing them we don't
um but it would be great to teach people
to Garden if they wanted to actually put
the work into it it would be too small
of a percentage on our on our part to
really spend additional funding on that
we've we've started a garden in the past
before and couldn't get anybody to work
it
nobody wanted to come work it even
though they would get some of the food
it's not it hasn't been successful for
us is it out of the question for us no
as a matter of fact in a partnership
that we currently have with the village
of hatch and hatch Valley Public Schools
they want us to be involved in a
vertical garden that they're going to do
at one of the schools where we're
actually going to put a pantry right
next to the school
so it's not out of the question it's
things that we like to get involved when
we like sustainable programs like that
councilor Flores and it's something that
we're always interested in doing great
and what about can you go back to page
five or slide five or whatever they're
called
oh yeah actually the the chart so
that'll probably be page four
you know the one that shows uh obstacles
to getting to the one that has a
transport wheel that shows
transportation is an obstacle
no the next one there you go yeah so in
looking at
Transportation being a big issue
I mean that's probably the biggest I
mean that is the biggest but then
coupled with uh inconvenient Pantry
hours I'm wondering is there a
correlation between bus schedules and
your hours and or can we can we maybe
ask the city to have more routes out
that way absolutely looking at that and
that's one thing we noticed right away
we've always been kind of told back and
forth with what our hours are and what
would be convenient we've even tried
opening on Saturdays and stayed open
until six or seven and the impact was
very little which was amazing even
though we marketed it really well it was
difficult to try to get people to come
in at those hours so I think it's one of
those situations where we'll continue to
play with that piece now in the
transportation piece I think it's gotten
better especially now that you guys have
a free bus service it's really gotten
better for us we see a few people that
still come on the bus who pick up food
from us the problem is that they can't
take a lot of stuff on the us
so I think there's also kind of some
rules and regulations on how many things
they can actually have on the bus so
it's something to look into
but it's also difficult for them to
carry that much stuff in the bus we give
a lot of food out most pantries give out
an average of about 40 50 pounds of food
ours gives out an average of about 85
pounds of food so it would be a lot for
them to be able to just carry on a
couple of bags so it is a difficult
thing now
we've addressed that as well by
developing a delivery service
and the delivery service will begin to
really kind of put into place even
better once we get to the new building
and this will be mostly for families
that really qualify for it that really
can't get there also the homebound
seniors especially we want to make sure
that that's available to them
so and those are things that we've been
kind of researching and putting together
over the years but yes that's one way to
address that part of it thank you so
much Mr Mr Lorenzo Mr Lorenzo Alva and
miss Nancy Ryan thank you very much for
your work and what you do for our
community it's it's really inspiring
thank you thank you councilor Flores
thank you Mr chair let me ask councilor
Koran if she has any questions and then
I'll go to councilman Como Council Koran
do you have any questions
nope I'm good thank you so much for the
presentation
you're welcome thank you councilman Como
thanks mayor
um and thank you both very much for
being here for everything you do I don't
really have any questions I think
um this
presentation is really insightful and
and helpful for us for sure and I
imagine as I imagine it has been for you
and and how to do programming
evaluations can take a lot of work but
they're you know they're really valuable
and
um just want to say thank you for giving
me a tour of the new building a few
weeks ago I'm sure it looks totally
different now than when I was there and
Sydney was there a few weeks ago I I
can't wait to to come see the final
product Lord and so which if you you're
thinking it's June July
yeah but right now it looks like July um
I actually this past week
you should see me at one of these OAC
meetings you guys would be proud of me
I try to keep them to and and
probably Tom Gallagher our project
manager here at the city because he's a
stickler about scheduling and about
making sure that we're staying on course
and he supports everything especially he
knows that he's getting that support
from Casa peregrinos with it so it's
been great right now it looks like uh
they got a pretty solid date of uh July
12th as as a date
and actually July 8th as a date and then
we can after that begin to start the
punchless process so ifo I'm going to
need you for that more than anything
else okay
but we just we just want to get through
that so that we can open up sometime in
July for you
we are excited about this community
project because that's exactly what it
is
if you're going to look at the building
and I invite you if you want to come
take a tour of it give me a call text me
I'll make time for you I'll show you
what we've come up with
and it's really about what the community
really needed it's not about what Casa
peregrinos needed
it's really about what the needs are in
our community even adding offices to
have other agencies hold office hours in
there I mean
we're trying to have a little forward
thinking on it so that that's what we're
trying to accomplish so thank you so
much for stopping by and checking out
what we do thank you Lauren so I that's
all I really wanted to say
Institute for you and your team
um clearly it's it's one of the like
biggest shining pieces of information
here right how wonderful your team is
and how people perceive them so I just
really wanted to thank you all for all
of the work that you do and certainly
continue having conversations with uh
with our city manager and you all on the
campus around what it would look like to
um
to support you in a more sustainable
manner from the city I think what you
provide I don't know where we would be
without it and so I I look forward to
continue having those conversations with
you all thank you thank you councilman
Como
okay so I have just a couple of
questions and I think you answered one
of them so I was going to ask you about
the Vol about the um the drop off food
service and so I I was wondering if you
had volunteers but it sounds like you
have another what we did we have what we
did actually on on doing the delivery
program with some Partnerships with
other agencies but the other piece of it
is that we actually uh have our own
delivery van and our own staff to do
some of these deliveries we've been kind
of toying with it for about six months
already beginning to do some of the
deliveries and just trying to see what
we're really looking for and the
recommendations are coming from either
social workers from other agencies from
the fire department from the police
department to really try to figure out
who these people are that we need to try
to help out immediately we schedule that
we make sure that we call them make sure
they're going to be available when we're
doing the delivery and then begin that
process we're going to fine-tune that
whole idea when we move into the new
building because we'll have more
capacity to be able to to address that
and at some point I'll probably come
over to you guys and say hey I need 30
grand so I could hire driver
just kidding
not really but that's kind of the thing
about it the biggest thing is Staffing
it I think infrastructure wise were
solid but I think Staffing is going to
be the big one especially as it begins
to kind of take its own little form
there and get bigger and bigger and more
need for it absolutely well that was my
next question so your your total budget
is 630 000 for this for this program
oh just for this program just for the
one here in Las Cruces oh okay we have
our budget uh
is
1.65 million
I think
I was amazed that you could do
everything for 630 000 but okay
that was so uh you're going retro on me
now you're going back to like 2015 or
2016. so what I was going to ask was
this delivery service isn't that gonna
cost you something it'll cost us a
little bit but I think we've taken those
things into account as we move forward
our new budget is going to be pretty
astronomical and more more than anything
else it's going to be we got to add some
staff as we move into the other building
but the other piece of it is really the
cost of food right now the our cost of
food year over year has gone up about 21
22 percent and that's just insane I mean
it's just really really crazy and then
the availability of food right now is
not great our Reliance on the food bank
is important but they're also struggling
with that funding to try to bring more
food in and as what we do is changing a
little bit of a model you know
throughout the country feed into America
the food bank some of these folks are
beginning to re-look at how they model
the buildings itself a lot of it has
been that there were food sourcers as
well as funding sourcers now they're
becoming more of funding sources and
they are food sourcers I think that's
going to be a predicament for a lot of
us but it also gives us a little bit of
leeway on who we can go after food from
which if they're providing some of that
funding for us we can try to do it more
locally which really makes sense for us
or with the partners that are really
going to rebate money back and give us
those discounts that we really need and
then we can actually get the foods that
the families really need and not be so
reliant on what's available from the
food bank
and Lorenzo and I don't mean to put
other governmental entities on the spot
but did I hear you that really were the
only ones that contribute to no oh okay
doniana county is uh
finds a huge percentage of our rural
outreach program uh it's they've been a
partner since since I arrived here in
2011. just wanted to make sure about
that and oh so
do you have some type of a campaign that
like for example in probably not a day
goes by that I don't get a text from
someone who's wanting money for
something right and I was wondering if
you had something similar whether you
use venmo or or I don't think you use
act act blue but PayPal something like
that that people to make it a little bit
easier that may want to
safely contribute or donate to to Casa
de peregrinos and have you do you have
something like that or is that on the on
the horizon it is an horizon actually in
about two weeks we will have that online
and it would be available to where you
could just send it via text and then
also on email and then we'll have QR
codes that are available just to do that
if you look at the back of my business
card I know you have one in your back
pocket
just use a QR code and you can make a
quick donation if you want to do that
before you leave
we have QR codes for everything oh yeah
that's what we have them up here so we
do have those those for everything but
that's that's a good suggestion there
thank you yeah because you know I just
think that there that is additional way
to you know people who want to help out
and contribute something so thank you
okay well good and I just Echo a lot of
the comments that were made here we
appreciate we appreciate all that you do
for the community and and for those that
are in need uh it's it's an incredible
important uh you're an extremely
important uh and integral part of our of
our city of our County and we couldn't
get by without you all so just thank you
for for all the work that you do and um
I don't I I think this is uh automatic
that I mean it will never be able to
reduce it to zero so I think this is
something here that we're just gonna you
as as well as our partners there at the
community of hope it's probably going to
be an ongoing every year you know
funding because it will never
will never line items line item there
you go that's fine mayor Pro tem has a
question or comment thank you mayor
thank
you it's very insightful survey I know
we talk a lot and I knew this was coming
and really very informative about it
just what's what's available my question
is
um did this go out to it it appears like
these are just clients of yours or did
this go out to others maybe that could
potentially be clients and and or it's
just this specific to the folks that
came to your facility
Nancy I think could answer that better
than I could
survey was targeted to the people who
use our services okay
um and while we discussed the idea of
trying to do a broader survey to the
people who might be using our services
we decided to put that into the ongoing
other things that we need to evaluate
and to get this one picture of who we
were serving right now and how they were
reacting so Nancy does this also include
the community schools that you're in
because you do numerous right
events there at each of those schools I
know and does this include that no it
doesn't what we wanted to get was
the food security program data isolated
so that we could look at this evaluation
in a program specific way we will
evaluate the sax program in the
community schools we will evaluate the
rural pantries
we will evaluate the senior pantries and
the student pantries but we wanted to
pull that data specific to the program
so that we're able to not mush it all
together that's a technical term I love
that I love that machine together yes
um but so that we were able to say in
our food security program here is what's
being reported in terms of how many
clients are worrying about food however
in the rural programs it's different yes
yes but you're just not doing snap
programs at the community in the schools
you're also also doing several tonnage
of I mean you're giving boxes to no
that's road runners who said that's
roadruns who's doing that okay thank you
for clearing that up for me I appreciate
that okay
um and then
um I'll invite you to continue to
participate in the Dona Ana County
resilience leaders ludenso and Diana our
sector leaders for
for that for the food sector
we will be looking down the year
to
a sector you know the 10 sector survey
it's something that we need to update so
it might be where you want to maybe pull
some of the data or I'd be delighted
questions and others that would be great
thank you and then I want to talk a
little more about the transportation
component and and I knew that's a big
issue and something that our
transportation sector is looking at very
specifically how we address food
insecurity and what folks because it
seems like it's a general complaint
consistently that we hear often is
not able to carry you can only carry
just so much so ipuan hoping that
is we have these conversations that we
involve Roadrunner in the discussion
because I'm not sure that you know
they're not allowed to bring
you know the boxes just whatever they
can carry and and we might need to look
at that in a different way especially
because
as we know 269 folks are have no
transportation and that's
because even with zero fare they're
unable to take only but a bag or two I'm
not I'm not sure and that is something
that consistently I hear over time
that's a huge barrier for folks so if we
can have those conversations and maybe
come up with a different way to address
the Gap in barrier that would be very
helpful because then we can track like
this and see if it if we have we can
mitigate this percentage because it's
huge it's a huge any way we can help on
that just let us know okay the other
thing is
I'm really interested Lorenzo if you
could speak to the food prescription
that we had been talking about as a
experiment for the sector and I'm
thinking you're waiting for the larger
facility to open so that we could start
really pushing that can you talk a
little bit about that because at other
entities across the Nation are using
that sort of principle to help with
better nutrition and whatnot absolutely
and this is something that Our intention
fully on this is to partner with
Roadrunner Food Bank on this on this
program as well as with some of the
health insurance agencies like United
Healthcare some of those folks Molina
the idea behind this is really going to
be for us to serve very specific food
boxes for diabetics cancer patients
folks that have hypertension and heart
conditions and those would be
basically referrals or actually
prescriptions sent out by a medical
provider
and then we would custom make these
boxes that would really benefit them I
think it more than not what's happening
is that they're running into situations
that the ER hospitals where some of
these folks are food insecure
and
I had the opportunity last year to go do
a research project with UNM for cancer
patients in collaboration with New
Mexico state and
it was eye-opening for me I I I took on
it it was a lot of work I took on it
just because I you know
it seems like every other week I'm
getting a call from a friend or a family
member that's going through cancer
so I thought I need to probably learn a
little bit more about what's going on
with this and
it was an eye-opener for me but it's
amazing the cost of medical bills when
it comes to these things so some of the
things that they lack are going to be
the right nutrition
and we were able to really kind of
pinpoint where the lag was and figure
out some of the things we need to do so
it's always been one of our one of our
strategies to open up a food Pharmacy
which was uh which will be will still be
Our intention there we're just not going
to do it alone we're going to do it with
Partners to make this uh really happen
properly and be able to help out I
always think of our friends over at care
and and Yoli and her team I mean they
always struggle to just get those little
things for for their clients well this
is one way that we can address that and
continue our fight against hunger even
even through these medical conditions
that would really benefit our community
so it is Our intention to do that
absolutely thank you Lorenzo for just
a little bit too
too fascinated by this food Pharmacy and
what it would entail and I thought for
the public to hear that firsthand from
you is exciting so thank you so much
again for the work that you do I really
appreciate it and I am for a line item
for you absolutely thank you thank you
mayor Pro 10. I didn't have one other
question do banks contribute to
financial institutions yes okay good all
right Bank of America man 30 grand a
year
okay yeah there may be another one
moving into the city here and um so I'll
be sure to
I'm sure they they're going to ask who
put in a good word for us absolutely all
right good good enough I think that
concludes
so thank you very much yeah I just want
to again
um mayor and Council thank all of you
for the opportunity to present this to
you and of course all of you that are
here Administration
efo thank you for everything and I would
be remiss by leaving out the folks over
in Community Development Natalie and her
team they are just a huge asset to send
out the community hope and to Las Cruces
we have questions often and we get
answers quickly and that's always a
really good thing for us so thank you
Las Cruces for all the support you
because thank you Lorenzo and thank you
Nancy we appreciate you all very much
okay
okay so next item is 3.2 source of
income discrimination ordinance Natalie
Greene
sorry let me get organized I have a lot
of paperwork today
good afternoon Mr Mayor members of
council Natalie Greene housing and
neighborhood services manager for the
record today's discussion is around
possible amendments to our fair housing
ordinance to include tenant protections
for lawful sources of income
just a little bit of background the
federal Fair Housing Act was signed into
law April 11 1968 so tomorrow is the
55th anniversary of the Fair Housing Act
the city similarly passed in 1969
legislation that declared for the sake
of the protection of Public Safety and
Welfare that we were going to ensure
residents equal opportunity and
treatment regardless of their race color
religion national origin or ancestry and
prohibited discrimination around housing
since then the ordinance has been
amended a number of times the first was
in 1991 it added protections for
families with children and persons with
disabilities and that that was also
amended at the federal level
in 1999 it was amended again to update
the accessibility requirements and some
of the building codes around Ada
building requirements
it was amended again in 2005 and it
added some of the state protections or
the new state protections around
ethnicity gender identity and sexual
orientation the city further amended it
in 2013 to add protections for victims
of domestic violence and then it was
again amended in 2016 to add spousal
affiliation so that's protection for
people who are who are unmarried
and then in 2021 we had some
administrative changes around
the responsible department or enforcing
department and it was just identified as
a administrating department so as this
ordinance
moves it could be assigned by the city
manager's office
so what this ordinance change would do
it would maintain all the existing
protections so it would prohibit
landlords from rejecting tenants based
on their gender their race their
religion all of the other protections
and then it adds another protection for
lawful sources of income so it prohibit
landlords from rejecting a tenant solely
based on their lawful source of income
it continues to allow landlords to price
their units as they see fit so it
doesn't affect the price and it allows
landlords to charge any reasonable fees
or deposits so this is not impacting
those type of of rules
what it doesn't do is it doesn't prevent
landlords from vetting their tenants so
it absolutely allows landlords to
establish those tenancy requirements so
they can do credit checks background
checks they can have various tenancy
policies staff just recommends that
those be established Fair neutral
screening policies and that they apply
to all applicants
uniformly to all applicants so any
tenant that's coming into that apartment
complex would be treated equally it
doesn't prevent landlords from evicting
tenants who aren't paying their rent it
doesn't prevent landlords from again
interviewing clients or having those
tenancy requirements it doesn't require
them to set the rent at any particular
price so we're not requiring them to
keep it at a fair market value or fair
market rent they would set their rents
as they see fit to to their various
market conditions it doesn't prevent
landlord from raising the rent at the
end of the lease agreement and it
doesn't prevent any landlords from
evicting any tenants
the definition is a lengthy one but it's
basically any any lawful source of
income it could be child support alimony
payments received from annuity or life
insurance policies any payments provided
on behalf of the federal state or local
government so those disability SSI and
then housing Choice vouchers would be
treated like income or those rental
cents subsidies would be treated like
income
we did do a housing survey it was for
the general public and the question was
have you or someone you know struggle to
find housing because of a Housing
Voucher so most of our homeowners
obviously said that it did not apply to
them but some of them did say that they
knew people who were struggling to find
housing with the voucher and then we did
have a much larger percentage of renters
who did report back that their they
either know someone or they themselves
are struggling to find housing for a
voucher
or with the voucher
just some implementation around the
state both Albuquerque and the county of
Bernalillo have passed similar
ordinances Albuquerque approved theirs
in June 2002 and then it had a 90-day
sort of stay before it came into effect
their ordinance included funding for
education and a risk mitigation fund and
it's enforced by their office of civil
rights and so we did reach out to them
just to see how their experience is
going and they're not doing active
enforcement so as they get complaints
they're investigating and looking into
those situations and and they're
primarily focusing on educating
landlords during this time
to get voluntary compliance with the
ordinance
Bernalillo also adopted theirs in 2002
they did it shortly after Albuquerque's
went into effect in October and then it
was effective 30 days after that and
they also included a landlord incentive
program so their Board of Commissioners
wanted to make sure that we were
incentivizing landlords rather than
penalizing them
with this ordinance
just some data we did reach out to the
largest Housing Voucher provider in the
city and they have an approximately 1800
person wait list and these numbers vary
from month to month this is last month's
they've changed a little bit since since
I created the PowerPoint
they had approximately uh 1173 vouchers
leased up and then they had at least 169
vouchers out searching I reached out to
some of the smaller voucher holders and
they reported back that there's about 25
percent of the various vouchers from
month to month that are looking for
units so we have 80 Vash vouchers so
that's a veterans assistant supportive
housing vouchers we have some family
unification vouchers and then we have
some that are special needs populations
so those could be for for victims of
domestic violence or people who are
chronically homeless or some other type
of special needs population
I did want to address housing quality
standards I know often that this is
um
an argument that is used against voucher
holders and I just did want to note that
the requirements for hqs are are fairly
modest they're required to have a
flushing toilet
um hot water at least one working Outlet
in each of the rooms smoke detectors the
ability for attendance to egress
particularly in the bedrooms for
security we just ask that the window
either open or close and that the doors
lock if they have a refrigerator it
needs to be working if it has a Stover
oven it also needs to be working they're
required to provide heat they're not
required to provide an air conditioner
but if it is
provided needs to be working and then
there's an expectation of ventilation
and then if it's a unit that was built
before 1978 we inspect for lead-based
paint to make sure the windows aren't
chipping especially in units that have
families with children and then there's
just a visual assessment of of any
conditions right nothing that's there's
no leak under the sink when we open the
cabinet there's not evidence of
severe deterioration or bug infestations
things like that
for questions and discussions
thanks Natalie I'm impressed with the
presentation and the clarity of what you
listed what this ordinance would do and
doesn't do so counselor Graham and Cuomo
Flores
thank you mayor uh thank you so much
Natalie
um uh just have a couple of comments and
questions I took a very wandering Google
Journey on this one when I was reading
um so I hope you're ready to walk that
path with me
I appreciate this slide early in the
presentation where you point out how
many times the Fair Housing Act has in
fact evolved over time so the idea yes
thank you the idea that this is you know
a Monumental change or something brand
new that this Housing Act has never been
touched I appreciate the timeline for
this and also I wanted to point out that
as of last month
22 States District of Columbia and at
least you know way more than 100
municipalities have put ordinances like
this in place or state laws at the state
level so nothing to nothing too
extraordinary here so I just kind of
wanted to to point that out and get it
on the record
um
one of the things that you brought up
and I guess maybe the best slide would
be the
hsq the
yes thank you hqs these inspections uh
they would be conducted by
representatives of the city or public
housing authority
Mr mayor council Graham it depends on
the issuing agency of the voucher so the
Messiah Valley public housing authority
is the largest voucher holder so if it's
a voucher issued by them it's done by
either their staff or the third party
that they use to do those
if it's a voucher that's being issued
through La Casa or Mesilla Valley
Community hope then their staff would do
the the checklist and then for any
grants that are awarded through the city
that have vouchers we go out as an invis
I don't want to call it an investigatory
but as a monitoring agency when we do
our annual monitoring we depending on
the program we either use the hqs
assessment or we have the uh
upsc no
upcs and it's the uniform something or
other standard
and so our staff will will use that
checklist for the home programs okay
great
um one of the one of the other kind of
pushbacks that I saw when looking into
this because I did try to I looked from
the municipal side I looked from the
potential landlord side and one of the
concerns was delays on inspections
but it sounds like
it sounds like that is not
something so much on the city side but
on the partners side
Mr Mayor councilor Graham many of for
example the City of Albuquerque they do
have a delay in inspections because they
have their own Housing Authority that's
embedded within the City of Albuquerque
in our case our Housing Authority is
their own quasi government organization
so we don't get any direct vouchers from
the U.S Department of Housing and Urban
Development
there are ways to sort of mitigate I
know that Albuquerque put within their
ordinance of an hqs inspection doesn't
occur with within five days the landlord
does not have to hold the unit
in our case it's it's not really
applicable because it's just a tenancy
we're just asking that landlords not
discriminate based on someone having a
voucher
staff did do sort of a general calling
of different apartment complexes and
looking in and asking folks if they take
vouchers and and it was sort of a mixed
bag some of them said yes some of them
said no or just refused to answer any
questions so it's uh it is a need within
the city okay that's I'm that was a
question that you anticipated I was
wondering if we had some on the ground
information about that and we do and I
really appreciate that and again just
pointing out I'm glad this slide is
still up
these are not luxury kind of Standards
um so these are the things that I would
hope that any landlord would in good
conscience
you know want to provide to any tenant
regardless regardless of source of
income so just wanting to point that out
um you mentioned that Albuquerque
definitely I'm not sure if Bernalillo
had that under their bullet points
um the education program or kind of the
the the runway program to this
um can you talk a bit more about that
because I think that's definitely
I am I am supportive of this program I'm
supportive of an ordinance coming
forward
um so I I'd like to know how are we how
would we I should say plan to work with
real estate with property owners with
landlords to help them transition into
the situation
mayor council
to the housing prcn that was one of the
discussions on whether we should include
funding for education or some sort of
landlord incentive so we depending on
the recommendations we hear from you
today we would include those components
as part of the overall adoption staff
already does an excellent job of doing
Outreach on Fair Housing so in fact
today shortly we have fair housing
awareness training with all new
employees anytime landlords reach out
especially we try and do a lot more
Outreach in in April depending on the
workload but we've done fair housing
trainings at private apartment complexes
we do some just for General members of
the public we also on an annual basis
purchase the books which have housing
discrimination and so we make sure that
these are readily available to any
tenants
that we get calls from and so we do have
a dedicated phone line for housing
issues
575-528-3022 and so we're able to answer
questions sort of assess the needs of of
the callers many instances we do do
referrals to the U.S Department of
Housing and Urban Development
there are some referrals that we would
do to the state of New Mexico Human
Rights Commission because not all of the
city's protections or New Mexico
protections are at the federal level so
the federal level does not protect
gender identity and sexual orientation
but the state of New Mexico does
or or spousal affiliation that's also
specific to New Mexico and so staff
really tries to do that Outreach and
engagement around fair housing because
we are an entitlement City we are
mandated by law as part of our signing
of our HUD agreements every year to
further affirm fair housing all across
the city we wouldn't receive much of our
funding if we didn't so we do have an
analysis to fair fair housing Choice
analysis of impediment stiff bear
housing choice and it has an action plan
that staff works on ongoing in that
five-year period and it gets done every
five years
okay wonderful well thank you so much
and again any way that we can ship away
at the affordable housing crisis that's
affecting our community
I'm just so happy to see it so thank you
so much thank you mayor
thank you councilman Coleman thanks
mayor thanks so much Natalie I'm so
excited we're we're here talking about
source of income discrimination since
we've been talking about it for quite
some time I just wanted to say thank you
to your staff and to legal for for
working on this and getting us here
um I continue to believe that we
will need a
dedicated funding source for
what this will look like to include
training for codes I imagine Natalie
that I was kind of hoping someone from
coats would be here today but I imagine
that codes will be the vehicle for which
enforcement is done correct
at the advice of legal we made the
enforcement piece really flexible
so it allows enforcement to occur by the
administrating Department director as
assigned by the city manager when it was
first adopted it was the community
development director that would do the
or or designees that could do the
investigation and the enforcement but we
would anticipate that this would be a
joint effort between housing staff and
code staff
and similar to Albuquerque and
Bernalillo their initial rollout really
focused on
first the complaints that they received
from residents and then they've done
some where they were they were
researching ads from uh like apartment
ads and so doing some education with
landlords that says you know your ad
cannot say no vouchers or or
you know some of the other protected
classes we do on occasion we'll see you
know no no children allowed or no
females only overt
discrimination so we make sure that
we're catching those and forwarding
those to either HUD or to the other
enforcement agencies
I know that Natalie you asked for
increased capacity for
as we're in the budget cycle
did you have this in mind when you were
asking for
for that additional capacity or do you
believe that this will create additional
needs in your office
a number of needs that we explored it
was primary primarily around affordable
housing development we are filling a
Housing Development specialist position
it didn't make the jobs of the week this
week but maybe it will next week and so
that's a on the Las Cruces website
um but uh I I know there's some
additional ordinances around housing
like nuisance abatement or uniform
housing codes that may be coming forward
where this would eventually transition
and live as part of that enforcement
agency we did check with the City of
Albuquerque and they used their civil
rights office which is embedded within
their legal department
so that could make more sense as the
legal department builds their capacity
but we'll continue to explore those
various options and I couldn't get with
Bernalillo County I'm not sure where
their ordinance currently lives within
the enforcement
Natalie I
would hope that maybe
um either six months or a year from now
preferably six months I guess that you
would come back with additional data on
how this is going I I understand that
um and I think that perhaps at that
point we can make determinations on you
know what we do need to have a landlord
mitigation fund that would be really
great thing to have and partner with
Missy Valley Community of Hope and and
the housing authority on
um
and additionally in terms of
consequences right for folks who can for
landlords who continue to to break this
policy
um I know that for now it's gonna it's
going to be really more compliance based
right like really just educating folks
and bringing folks along to to make sure
that you know they're getting the
information as to why they should be
doing this and you know at one point if
that can if this continues to happen
then what is the shift right what is the
consequence
um have you thought about that
uh Mr Mayor councilor bencom uh
off the top of my head I'm going to say
no uh enforcement has been a challenge
that's one of the reasons we reached out
to Albuquerque and Bernalillo they are
having trouble with how that enforcement
looks like more so the capacity to
investigate so we'll have to see how
that how this sort of rolls out and what
the needs will be across the the various
departments ultimately the enforcement
is still capped at what the municipal
code allows which I may have to have
Jocelyn remind me but I believe it is a
500 fee or up to 90 days in jail but I I
don't think our Municipal Court
typically recommends jail
but it's it would still be kept within
what the what is allowed by municipal
code in chapter 1-13 or Dash 10.
Natalie and Council correct in section
13-7f it is listed as 500 dollars or
imposed imprisonment for not more than
90 days or both and then also remember
there are fines and penalties available
under civil remedies of violations of
state or federal law so if somebody
discriminated under a Federal Regulation
and that was Jocelyn Garrison for the
record
just kidding Christine you heard her
um thank you Justin I appreciate that
additional context yeah I think for me
it would be important Natalie to come
back in six months I you know none of
those things should deter us from moving
forward with something like this I think
this policy is just a piece of a piece
of the puzzle for
um you know tackling housing and
security and this housing crisis and so
for me it doesn't deter me but I would
like to come back in six months and see
how it's going and see what the needs
are especially for your office in terms
of capacity and legal as well and um you
know and perhaps that's when we talk
around codes and if codes is is
um I'm assuming they're going to be an
important player in this right and if
they need additional training as well
those are all my questions for now
although Natalie why is there no
requirement for an AC that sounds wild
in the Southwest
Minister mayor councilor Ben Como that's
a good question I'd have to refer to our
building official I don't know if that's
a building code or
I think in typically where these laws
sort of start it's it's colder versus
hotter okay well let's whoever is
listening up there Larry Larry's here I
would love maybe additional research on
this Larry and if this is something we
can do tackle locally because that's
just not okay so I appreciate that
Natalie and thank you so much I'm
excited
the AC AC unit should be required yes
thank you yeah that's what we yeah I was
like ACM for some reason
councilor Flores thank you Mr Mayor
um so thank you for your presentation
and and thank you and your staff uh who
do excellent work
um so my question is this for
clarification purposes uh this is a an
ordinance which has a criminal
implications if it's not um adhered to
correct
Mr Mayor councilor Flores it I'm going
to defer to legal on that yes it is let
me tell you it is
ask Mr Nichols if he'll tell you
um so um an ordinance has severe
consequences my question is does this
apply only to government funded housing
or does it apply to anyone who is uh
anyone who might be seeking
non-federal
funded housing is that stated in the
ordinance Mr Mayor councilor Flores this
would apply to all housing in the city
of Las Cruces that is being sold or
rented within okay so it's not but
you're but it's are there there are some
is there anything in the fair housing
act for federal purposes that isn't
encompassed or is it
um Incorporated by reference in our
ordinance
so there are some exceptions those are
exceptions that are already outlined by
the federal fair housing ordinance so if
it's housing that uh if if it's your
only piece of property like you're the
uh the single owner
and don't own other property and are
selling without the use of a broker or
realtor you're able to set those
requirements if you are in some sort of
duplex or quad Plex and live in one of
the units but own less four units or
less then that's also an exception if
you are
in what's called a housing for older
persons so a hopwa community something
similar to Trails West or or the Pueblos
and Sonoma Ranch you can limit based on
uh limit families with children so if
it's a senior community you you would
not rent to families with children but
you couldn't discriminate on any of the
other Provisions there's also some
exceptions for
religious organizations and membership
organizations when they're operating in
a non-commercial manner so similar to
the Elks club like their RV park they
limit it to their membership and so they
can have that limitation but they
couldn't limit it based on the other
protected classes so those are some
limited exceptions that are within this
ordinance and within the federal
ordinance so if someone in our community
calls you and they're not a recipient of
a federally subsidized
housing do you help them out or do you
refer them to whatever Mr American
councilor Flores we would advise them
within the bounds of our ability
if we determine that it is something
that meets the the standard of uh of the
federal fair housing ordinance we can
assist with filling out the complaint
forms that is within the ordinance we
would help them fill out their
complaints too HUD but at that point HUD
becomes the investigatory Authority on
the federal for housing there are some
instances would we would defer those to
the Human Rights Commission at the state
level and that's just because both the
state and the federal government have
what I would call the bigger stick right
they can they can punish more than what
we would typically do but that would
apply my question and maybe my mind
drifted but my question is
if there's a complaint
say
um
say I was trying to sell my house and
I'm and it's it's not there's no
government subsidy it's just my private
my home
I cannot discriminate or excuse me
renting renting it out I cannot
personally
prevent someone from applying or
qualifying if they have well if they
have the Inc if they I can't come I
can't
deny
um
my renting out that house or leasing out
that house to someone whose sole source
of income is government subsidies Mr
Mayor councilor Flores if it was your
personal home and you own no other
property and you weren't using a realtor
broker to rent that house then you could
you could do as you wished
um now again really you I I can
discriminate I can say I'm not going to
rent to you because you're depending on
social security or some uh Vietnam
veteran or whatever as long as you
aren't advertising and
we're again not using a realtor or
broker or some sort of website to rent
then and it's a private transaction you
can set your tenancy requirements even
as as a whole again the ordinance does
not prohibit people from having those
tenancy requirements and and setting
things like background checks or
criminal background checks or
I mean criminal background checks or
credit checks so you can have those
tenancy requirements you just want to
make sure they're neutral and apply to
any applicant so what if someone owns
says that they only own one one property
they're the house they live in
um but then
okay it's a little complicated I better
not go there but um
so I just want to make sure that I know
that the the draft that uh
our former City Attorney Jennifer Vega
uh Brown uh drafted was all encompassing
I hope uh when are when is this coming
up for a vote
Council Flores that was a different
ordinance it was not related to the fair
housing ordinance it was an amendment to
the nuisance ordinance to incorporate a
uniform housing code ordinance and so um
and when is that one coming up
Mr mayor council for Lawrence I'll have
to get back to you I believe that is
still under review with the city
manager's office and legal and they're
working on that and then we'll get back
to you we've been waiting for that our
committee has been waiting for that for
about five years four years five years
why is it taking so long this didn't
take that long
Mr Mayor councilor Flores I'll defer to
City Manager on that okay and we don't
need to answer that right now Mr peely
but I would like to bring that to your
attention and to the attention of the
public and thank you very much
so I'm gonna before I get the mayor Pro
tem Council Corrine had her hand up so
so councilman
counselor cran did you have a question
I'm just kidding tonight did I have my
hand left but no I'm just I'm just
messing I'm just messing around because
you use a little tiny picture this
presentation and thank you for checking
in with me there okay mayor proton
yeah
mayor's giving me a hard time I think
thank you Natalie and your staff for the
presentation really appreciate the
research that our colleague counselor
Graham did thank you that's all very
helpful
um no really I think it's it's good we
don't normally get that
um Natalie can you
move to the slide that spoke to the
landlorded
um
fund and the risk mitigation fund and
can you refresh my memory via sliding
the risk mitigation fund what will you
talk to us specifically about what those
funds consist of what they do and I
refresh my memory did we
at the housing author housing PRC
move in any of these directions to have
as part of our res our ordinance uh
Mr Mayor councilor mayor Pro tem that's
one of the things we would be looking
for guidance on today whether an
education and either risk mitigation or
incentive program should be included in
this as well as if you want to the
rollout of the effective date to be a
little bit further but the landlord
incentive and risk mitigation fund has
been piloted
pretty much Across the Nation but it did
start about a year ago MFA and CYFD did
a small pilot program in some
communities and then now they are
rolling this out Statewide so we would
look to model some of their programming
and Albuquerque is also rolling theirs
out so it does either as part of the
incentive side it would do either like a
sign-on bonus or cover there's sometimes
a delay between when someone signs up
for the voucher program and when they
get their first rent from the voucher
holder
so it could cover some of those costs
we've also seen where maybe a unit isn't
up to the hqs standard and needs a small
repair to be eligible and so that
incentive program could fix you know the
toilet or the sink or or provide a new
door or window that would make the unit
qualify and then the risk mitigation
fund
is more like a Insurance Fund so if a
landlord takes on a voucher holder and
they cause some sort of substantial
damage where they have to evict the
tenant and need to repair their unit
they could apply to this risk
modification fund to cover a portion of
those costs and we so we've seen this
cut also piloted this as part of the
increased vouchers that they awarded to
the housing authority and so they've
been rolling out similar pilots and then
I believe that there is plans within the
arpa funding one of the non-profits
received an allocation to do a similar
program so we'd like to see those roll
out and then do their best practices
before we would roll out our own yeah do
you know if Across the Nation if these
are ones that we use
it feels like it's an either or is that
is that true or can we have both of them
and be able to
um roll it out without feeling like
we're taking away from either one of
those programs and the ordinance per se
because I think these would be really
helpful staff would recommend that it
would be a landlord incentive and risk
mitigation fund okay um so we could we
could explore and have both options in
the risk mitigation funds we actually
saw
um on under utilization so a lot of
times it's a mess right that voucher
holders may be more destructive and so
we actually saw
where this was piloted in other states
that they didn't need the risk
mitigation fund after the program sort
of launched and so that would be our
hope is that we would utilize the
incentive program first and then you
would need less risk mitigation funds
yeah I would like to see both of them
and with a really robust education I'm
looking over at John I can barely see
her because of the computer but a really
robust education component I think would
be really helpful with this and and
Natalie you talked about looking at when
this would come into we have effect are
we looking at
so
Mr Mayor mayor Pro tem Gandara so
typically our ordinances and I might
have to defer to Christine after they're
adopted they take anywhere from two
weeks to 30 days to to go into effect we
could do a longer rollout where maybe we
started and let folks anticipate that
this change is coming
it will take a couple of weeks for it
for us to get it into the Ordnance cycle
so we don't anticipate it coming back to
either late May or early June and then
um
an effective date council could advise
at that time if they want 30 90 or
immediately it's really up to you yeah
I'd like for you guys to really
um
usually is 30 days when an ornance I
know you're shaking your head no
Christine can you
give us some mayor mayor Pro tem it's
about two weeks after the ordinance is
adopted it's posted in the paper and it
becomes effective five days after
posting in the paper okay so it's about
two weeks but if you wanted a different
effective date you could write that into
the ordinance instead
so I'm asking because I think I want you
all to be as a as a neighborhood to be
programmed to be ready right and all the
various things that it's going to
require so I'm asking what is your
recommendation Natalie and Company is it
90 days do you think you'll be ready to
be able to push this out because you
need to have the staff and if we have
education component right and be
prepared to fund these two programs the
risk mitigation fund and landlord
incentive program so what what are your
thoughts about that Natalie
[Music]
I'll take that back to staff and then
we'll also want to meet with codes to
ensure that they're absolutely ready so
we'll come back with the recommendation
okay okay add adoption time with that
effective date Natalie and then lastly
my last question have you heard from you
know I don't know the Realtors or
anybody related to this work session and
what their concerns might be on this Mr
mayor council uh mayor protem gandera we
did reach out to the Las Cruces realtors
association and the Las Cruces
homebuilders Association for commenting
and we didn't get any direct comment
from them on this particular issue
um
what about the Housing Authority which
is our largest
voucher Mr Mayor mayor Pro tem gandetta
we did reach out to them and they did
provide some of the data and they were
supportive of the action
okay good good to know thank you Mary
those are all my questions
thank you councilor beta
thank you mayor and thank you Natalie
for the presentation
during the process and information that
we got from the mras it showed that my
district has a really high percentage of
renters and as we've talked about
Communications
moving forward I think I just want to
know I think it'll be really important
to educate
those those types of communities to make
sure that they're they're well aware of
their rights and I was curious
that during your conversations with
Albuquerque
the issues of subletting happen often
too if there was any sort of
guidance or
suggestions about
um that Mr Mayor councilor beta we have
not crossed that where there's been any
issues with subletting okay thank you
very much and thank you mayor
okay so as I mentioned earlier Natalie I
appreciate the information and how
concise you were I just wanted to kind
of let counselor Flores know that there
is a a landlord tenant Hotline in New
Mexico the phone number is
505-930-566 that's in Santa Fe and it's
a non-profit and they help landlords and
tenants both understand the the state
laws so when you have someone who feels
that they've been wronged they'll
actually help direct them to maybe the
various City where they're at and maybe
get with legal aid to help them
represent them so it's actually pretty
good and then they help both landlords
and tenants as to what the what the
rules are for the state so
so
505-930-5666 and they've been around for
like 20 or 30 years so it's it's worked
out pretty good
I I don't think that this is something
here that's going to be really hinder a
lot of landlords I mean I think for the
most part
nowadays when you can get you know
especially when covert was hitting the
ones who were being who couldn't
sometimes make the rent were those who
were on a job that were laid off when
you get automatic substance from the
government that's that's pretty good so
more secure
okay well thank you very much
you know if there's no other further
comments we'll go on to the next
item which is 3.3 the city branding
update Mandy Gus
it's been a long time since I've seen
Dominic in a tie
all right good afternoon mayor council
I'm Mandy guest the director of
communications I did bring my tag team
partner here Dominic Aragon he is our
digital media manager and so we're gonna
share some information with you
and
where's the
button
there we go
um so today I'm here to talk to you
about introducing our new city logo but
really I want to talk to you about uh
from a bigger perspective I want to talk
about branding strategy and and where
we're going to go in the future and so
one of the first questions is probably
why would we make any changes so I'll
tell you I came into this role about two
and a half years ago
and one of the things that I really
wanted to see for our organization was
consistency how do we see consistency in
our voice consistency in our look
consistency in the level of quality that
we expect
across the organization all departments
and one of the things that we want to do
is bring all of the city departments
under one logo so you will see that
consistency and when you see something
that's out there in the community you
will know it's from us second I want to
talk about modernizing our logo I don't
know when the current one was adopted
we've gone back we can see it as far
back as some information in the 90s but
not in the late 80s so we're going to
assume it's about 30 years old very few
companies have had the exact same logo
for 30 years and we'll talk about that a
little bit so giving doing some updates
that give us some Modern and fresh look
will give us some more opportunities for
versatility with that design
at the same time we do want to honor our
history we do know that the logo and
things about the city do resonate with
people in our community and so we want
to make sure that we stay true to that
and and we don't lose that connection
with our community
and lastly I want to talk about best
practices when I first came into this
role it was 2020 our our city was doing
a lot of things in the middle of a
pandemic we had to take care of our
community which was good it gave my team
a chance to do some research find some
best practices in other cities other
brands and figure out how we can do this
successfully and come to council with a
plan and tell you how we're going to
roll this out so one of the first things
that we did and I'll talk about this is
the modernization how do logos evolve so
we've got some examples up there for you
where you can see logos start and and
where they are today
almost across the board you can see they
they Trend towards being more simple and
less complicated and so it also allows
logos to age gracefully you can you can
see
um
that first Apple logo I can't even see
what it's saying or what the what the
font is and then as you use it over time
as we continue to make it a focal point
use it in different ways it can be very
Dynamic and it it grasps recognition and
so you can see even the Pepsi logo still
has the font on it but if you just saw
the red white and blue ball you would
know that it was Pepsi and that is where
we would like to go with the city of Las
Cruces how do we get to the point where
that icon stands for who we are and we
don't need all the text and so that is
where we are headed and with that I'm
going to tag in Dominic Aragon and he's
going to talk to you about some
additional research that we did
good afternoon mayor City Council
I'm going to share with you a bit of the
research that we did to uh
find the design that we worked that
we're going to work with
so going back to what Mandy was saying
there was many discussions two two and a
half years ago when she started about
what a logo
update or adjustment would look like and
how it would work for our organization
and within this community
so some research was starting to delve
in that needed to kind of match what our
goals were
and again aligning with the consistency
of the logo being used throughout the
organization we wanted to make sure that
we had a simple and easily identifiable
logo and we also wanted to make sure
that we were working with the the unique
icon that the city of Las Cruces has
established across 30 years so
taking those factors into the research
we did find some some Brands out there
that were that were aligned with that
and one specific one that worked really
well was the city of Melbourne and
Australia
they faced a growing organization that
was being disconnected due to a large
number of logos and brands that were
being created
covering facilities events
departments programs Etc this is just a
sample of in front of you of kind of
some of the things that were going on
and it started to create that
disconnection of the organization
um
also too it started to become a
management and financial hardship for
the city of Melbourne if you could
imagine what it takes to make sure that
that things are being done correctly
when it comes to branding and marketing
and colors and fonts and etc etc you
start to grow a large quantity of of
Brands it starts to become kind of
difficult to manage it
so moving forward the city of Melbourne
designed what you see before you it's a
very simple design they use a grid
system
to help kind of with what could it what
the logo could evolve into it's just a
letter M obviously but uh but they they
simplified the icon but it allowed them
to be somewhat creative with some of the
design elements inside of this icon
and through the Simplicity they were
going to be able to maintain their
identity across the organization but
also allow departments programs events
Etc to have some creative freedoms
okay so here's a little bit of an
example where you take those design
assets color palettes patterns and you
can start to use those things to help
you with your marketing campaigns
banners posters you can also see there
in the middle they can take some of the
design elements and colors to
incorporate into their print materials
the Strategic plans a budget book things
of that nature that are commonly
developed by the organization but they
maintain their their unification their
brand by using that same icon that same
silhouette
and so this is just to highlight how
even though you might simplify or unify
with an icon you're not necessarily
limiting creativity or style or anything
of that nature you actually are allowing
that freedom to continue
so
city of Las Cruces this example here
that you're seeing in front of you is is
that the Dilemma that we're also facing
very similar to the city of Melbourne
and my 16 years with the city and the
Communications office I think we've
we've worked with somewhat north of 40
different logos
um
and you're kind of seeing a little bit
of an example of what we have right now
covering departments programs events etc
etc and we have taken some actions
towards starting to reduce those with at
the very top row you can see
some of the internal Department logos
that have already been addressed but we
have a ways to go and that's part of
what we're trying to accomplish here
um
lastly
we also are aware of the community's
connection to the local
we understand the long history of the
logo Mandy referred to the 30 years
estimate and we we know that in many
ways the community identifies with it
themselves
we've reached out to the community to
ask them about ways that they're using
it body art art whatever it might be how
what it means to them we've seen tattoos
we've seen our work and then what you
see here is a photograph of the New
Mexico State Aggies football team
running out on the field for the bowl
game recently
um the video was quick so we took a
snapshot
um so you can see that they're carrying
the New Mexico flag the New Mexico state
flag and then the city of Las Cruces
flag I believe the mayor gave them that
flag
um but I would say that they're probably
not running out on the field waving a
flag that represents the government
they're I'm sure that they're waving
that flag because it represents their
Hometown so it's something that we
recognize that we didn't we think it's
somewhat unique I'm not sure that
there's many municipalities or agencies
around the region that have an icon that
is relatable like that for a lot of
people in the community
so knowing that it's fairly unique
and that it does mean something to
people we wanted to feed that we want to
really capture that and and strengthen
that connection and make it more than
just a government but make it represent
a community in the city
um
make sure
all right so with that I'm going to
introduce you to the new design
foreign
[Music]
yes
[Applause]
I I encourage Applause
um
oh
they did do it during that time um so
let's talk about our new brand strategy
up there in front of you is is the
slightly updated logo which will
hopefully give us easier recognition and
we're moving in a direction that will be
clear messaging as we change all um the
Departments Under This One logo you will
know if something is coming from the
city if it's the cities Parks and Recs
Department or the city's Economic
Development Department it will still be
the city and that really is ultimately a
goal of unification that all of these
Brands will fall under one umbrella and
we will identify as the city first we're
excited to move to a more professional
image if you're looking at this logo
right now I'm hopeful I know we've shown
some people who said I don't even see
what changes you made so I will Point
those out to you
some of the things that we did to the
logo to update it is we fixed some of
the flares again we talked about the
logo being 30 years old and I think they
were each individually drawn and so
we've made them all the same and
symmetrical
uh we pulled the the crosses up that
gives the logo some some more Symmetry
and a little bit
um
opportunity for us to use it as a as a
palette and we also made the circle
thicker and again thinking of ways that
we're going to use this
um more flexibility and design it gives
us a a thicker canvas to do that the
other thing is scalability the way with
that
um the thicker Circle the the cleaner
images we can go from not just a big
sign on the side of the building but
down to the logo on someone's shirt we
it will reproduce well also if I'm
looking at the big screen here in
Council it reproduces well but a lot of
our stuff when we're working with
digital and web design needs to be
mobile friendly as all the way again
it's scalable to the size of your cell
phone
one of the changes that we made was the
font we updated to a more current font
and we also went with just the black
font or the white font the reason for
that is a lot of the things that we do
today are now in the digital world and
so black on or white font is easier to
read than if it's part of an image if
you're looking at ADA compliance from a
digital standpoint also like we talked
about some of those other logos
ultimately we want to get to a place
where we don't always need to have city
of Las Cruces we recognize it that's who
we are
um
and so lastly what we're going to do and
what I'm going to talk to you about now
is if we are all moving in that
direction hopefully this logo will have
greater impact and engagement across the
board however we choose to use it we
talked a little bit about creative
freedom
so just because all of our departments
are using the same logo I don't think I
want to be clear that we're not taking
away their identities so I started with
Parks and Rec they had a lot of
buy-in to Ziggy and we all know and love
Ziggy and I do not in any way want to
get rid of Ziggy and so we'll find ways
for him to interact with the city logo
our airport is doing a lot of things
thanks to council direction we we have
we now have flights out of our airport
passenger flights and so how do we
continue to incorporate like that
Aviation
aspect into the design elements we will
we will do that and then Roadrunner
Transit going to all electric buses I am
stealing their Thunder here a little bit
because we've been working on how those
buses will look you can see this new
engaging really modern and exciting
Roadrunner again how do we make a city
low go that ties in those elements
at this point these are these are like
our first set of drafts for some of the
Departments that we're working with we
will continue to work with all of the
Departments to develop colors design
elements that um that would work for
them in the different goals that they
have but again using that same logo
across the board but still being able to
do some really fun engaging things with
it
so next up is implementation
um
a couple of things that we have to get
done this is a very big project
we're going to move forward with getting
a logo inventory we'll have to meet with
all the Departments and find out where
all the logos are we know some of those
places are very obvious to us there's a
sign on the side of the building that we
know where that is but sometimes we then
get surprised when we find documents a
couple years later so we're going to try
and get ahead of that now we are going
to work through a transition year
what are some things that can be changed
right away all of our marketing
materials will start to be updated now
things that get updated in the normal
course of doing business like new
business cards we can update update
those right away
um
there are some bigger ticket budget
items which we know will have to address
and assess like the signage on the
building and most likely we will come to
you not in the fiscal year budget you're
being presented in two weeks but the one
a year from now
um we also have some fleet I've already
spoken with Luis about how are we best
going to update our our vehicles
um I want to talk about Swag a little
bit and just anecdotally before my time
in Communications they had a Christmas
tree lighting and the Communications
office had beanies with just the city
logo and it was one of the most popular
giveaway items
um we still get asked about them and so
we'll be trying to figure out ways that
we can roll out updated swag shirts
beanies not just to our employees though
we want to see this across our community
so people can be proud of where they
come from I think ifo told me when he
moved here he was surprised he couldn't
find any shirts that said Las Cruces and
so we're going to change that
um
we also realize long term there are some
things that we may not update
um and so I will tell you what those
will be
um I consider these sort of like Legacy
items where it wouldn't make Financial
sense to do that on some of our
overpasses on the interstate we're going
to leave those Alone
um and the in those cases those logos
are close enough to what we have now
that we again it's that transition it
makes sense at the Brannigan Cultural
Center they have these beautiful wrought
iron gates with their current museums
logo and we will we will probably leave
those in place
for the utilities logo they have manhole
covers and I'm not sure that everyone is
looking at the manholes to be updated so
we will probably leave leave those alone
as well so again as we take this
inventory of all of our logos we will
figure out all the places where people
are seeing it identifying and engaging
with it and somewhere it's not not
fiscally responsible to make that change
and instead just make the change moving
forward
and then where could we be in the future
and so besides
the signage all matching on our
buildings and the floor at mirchite and
the banners that are up on downtown and
on Hadley and on Lowman if you really
think big pictures some things that
could be really fun we have a big blank
wall on outside of City Hall in our
parking garage how could we
engage with artists and do some public
art pieces that had different fun logos
how could we potentially in a park have
a giant sign where people go and take
selfies when they come to visit Las
Cruces so those are potentially the
places that we could go in the future as
we continue to build on this brand and
so it's more recognizable it's stronger
we know there's a little bit of spark
right now and we really want to feed
that so when people see this this logo
and this icon they think this looks like
home
and with that I'll stand for questions
thank you mayor and thank you for this
presentation and for the new logos I
particularly like the one that shows off
our Oregon mountains
um I am curious as we talked about
rolling things out how we're going to
chat with our partners
um like mavita that goes out and um kind
of markets with us because I know we
want to make sure that they have all
that updated information if they're
going to be kind of on that first end of
individuals we'll work with
um thank you mayor councilor beta as
we're working with each of the
Departments we'll be working with each
of their Partners
um and so we'll we'll work through that
process I know with mavita we've been
doing some advertising for the
industrial park that's one of the logos
that we'll also have to update because
we we did come up with a brand or an
icon and we'll have to change that over
to the city icon okay great
um and I guess you know when we talk
about branding and marketing it I think
it's really important I feel like one of
our roles as counselors is to kind of
help Market the city when we go out
places I Want To Be A Champion for it
because I love it here and so it's
really great to have like identifiable
items things that we can go out when
I've started to engage with other places
you know whether it's a pin that
somebody gives you that has that logo on
it and it's just easy to remember so I
know that can be really important with
identification and we can call the old
logos collector items and
who said the last thing I will say
you've probably already thought of but I
guess for Ziggy he has a shell pattern
and if the shell pattern was the logo
that might be
I don't know that's one way he can
interact instead of just like holding
the miracle and um thank you mayor
councilor beta actually the color for
the um the parks and rec one was taken
from Ziggy's show yep that's great great
well thank you so much um for your work
on that and also recognizing that some
items you know are just not you know
physically responsible to change at this
point
um but acknowledging that history and
Heritage which I think a lot of our
community wants to do but also
recognizing that we need to
move forward in some ways and just
update which is never a bad thing so
thank you thank you
thank you counselor Flores
thank you Mr Mayor and thank you Mandy
and and Dominic for this beautiful work
so um
following up on what
a counselor beta just said about finding
stuff that that really brand you know a
brand
um so I've shared this before with the
New Mexico true
um and with ifo and a couple of other
people when I travel I mean I had I
bought T-shirts from
and then I've received as gifts teachers
from Oregon Mountain Outfitters
and so I wear them when I travel so I
was in Belgrade in Serbia at a pharmacy
and the pharmacist said oh I've always
wanted to go to New Mexico because you
know they you know New Mexico true and I
said no this is not Mexico it's New
Mexico I know I know I said how do you
know about it I mean here you are and
serve it she said I studied in
Massachusetts
um and I and I and then again
Outfitters
the T-shirt Place had one that says Las
Cruces so
um I I wore that when I was in England
and and people would just look at it you
know England they probably thought
before they were the best but the point
though is that um I I the only thing I
would add to the logo
maybe the t-shirts is maybe just a
little Las Cruces New Mexico and then um
and you know and it's just but I I think
it's wonderful and uh and I know that we
worked really hard on the logo for the
airport and I thought it was so
beautiful so I'm really happy to see
that uh your incorporate is it going to
stay the way pretty much the way it was
shown with a an airplane coming out and
the logo yeah so
um
I just wanted to make sure so because it
Andy worked really hard on that we met
and thought you know voted on it and
everything so
um I want to thank you for this I think
it's going to be dynamite and um also
you know we have our sister city coming
up
visiting us and then there's a
delegation going in August
um so can we provide our delegation
people our near our Germans from
Nuremberg with something like the pin
because I I love the our city council
pin and then the one that we give to
guests is almost the same
so can we do that Mr peely
oh great
I'm asking Mandy Mandy can you do this
please thank you Mr peely thank you so
much again
Mandy and and Dominic thank you thank
you Mr Mayor
anybody else
councilman Como thank you thanks so much
y'all for the presentation the video is
Amazing by the way
um can you go back to the slide with the
current
um departmental
yes
logos
yeah I
you know I think Mandy what you said at
the very beginning was you know your
desire to have some consistency and how
important that is and so given that
they're and I you're probably been
missing some right like given that
there's all of these different
departments have you started engaging
with them already and what's been the
feedback uh mayor and councilor Ben
Cuomo yes we have started meeting with
the Departments
um as councilor Flores mentioned the
airport we did speak with Andy and
understanding the things that are
important for them to hold on to
um and Andy specifically said he wanted
that thing that kept that Aviation and
so we're working through some
departments don't have their own logo
and so it's not as as much of a pull one
department is the Las Cruces utilities
and so they're very well branded and so
looking at all the places that they are
that's how we made the determination on
the manhole covers
um and also the Las Cruces utilities
their current logo was a adopted by
their board and so we realized one of an
additional step we'll have to take is
take some new options to them as well so
yes to answer your question we've been
talking with many of the Departments and
figuring out how we're going to move
this forward okay great that's that's
helpful
um to know to be honest with you I was
like super nervous before you unveiled
it because I think I was nervous for an
incredible change in the logo and not
only like the physical
impact of that but I think I some I
think that was very smart and strategic
what you all did so I just wanted to
appreciate that and and and just lift
this slide up again because I think it
does speak to the need for cohesion and
um you know looking like we all work for
the same place so thank you all very
much great work thank you
do you have any questions or comments
nope I'm great it's exciting I look
forward to the t-shirts too
anybody else
I just want to add that I I like it I
was like councilman Como was a little
concerned when uh you're going to unveil
it because I can recall back in the 70s
what the logo looked like and it wasn't
quite as as many uh you know flames you
know for the Sun Burst but but it was
pretty consistent so I think what what
you all are proposing is good so and
congratulations did a lot of work on it
it's a good good job
so again
Maze Runner
incredible that's really beautiful so
perhaps to them thank you
sorry yeah thank you guys did you rock I
mean I got chills when I saw the videos
so thank you for that
um I just trusted y'all that you were
gonna just keep write our identity and
evolve and you all know because you'd
work with it all the time that it looked
differently and I get that piece but
mayor you brought up an interesting
point last week about our the the logo
and trademark and copyright did you I
didn't know if it was a concern right
people pulling it without our permission
those kinds of things and I just wanted
to bring that up Mandy is something that
you're thinking about I'm not sure if
that has been if we found that out yet
um do you have any information about
that yes so uh mayor and mayor Pro tem
um our current logo is trademarked we
will move forward with trademarking the
new one part and we'll work with our
legal team to get that done part of a
requirement for trademarking is you have
to show that you've used it and so in
this transition year as we start to use
it in different places we'll be able to
use those as examples to re-trade Market
I know the mayor brought up last week we
had asked how people were using part of
that was to get that Community feedback
and and like the mayor mentioned we we
don't want anyone using our logo
freely we want to have some control over
what context that's used in but we would
definitely be open to potentially
licensing it if people wanted to make
t-shirts or swag and we would work with
legal for the best way to move forward
because again our goal is not just for
this to be the logo of city government
but it is the city the city's logo in it
and it is something that will will
hopefully resonate with our community
yeah no I really think that that's the
right move to to make and then you know
[Music]
um
I'm thinking about
city manager well councils sort of
identity if you will and the work that
was happening with
Jamie Rickman and then Carla and how
we've established our newsletters and
such
um so that's probably another way as a
side to for you to look into I think is
an important we we've sort of
um pick colors and those things and we
want to make sure that that is
stands true to what you're trying to
roll out in terms of consistency and
such mentee I also thought that this
would be a good time to talk about
the consistency part right how we
communicate with the public and I've
often feel sort of disconnected from as
Council in terms of how we communicate
with the public and so maybe that's just
something for you as you're embarking in
this large project that you keep in mind
I think that's an important aspect in
terms of how we communicate with our
public
and I would love to see
um
some a process by which we are just
clear in terms of how we communicate
with our public in a variety of ways and
and so I I hope I'm clear about what I'm
asking is how city council per se right
there's times when I would like to say
something so I tell if I ifo can we use
Mandy and it feels sort of odd and he's
always been yes let's do that but I
don't think all of us know that and so
if you could come up with some sort of
process by which we can and the times
that you're like no that's what I'm here
for and you've been always very helpful
and whatnot but I just wanted to be
clear
that that probably needs to be more
established if you will thank you mayor
Pro tem I I we've had ongoing
conversations also with the community
engagement group you mentioned Jamie and
Carla and I know Katrina is doing it now
we met with Katrina just last week so I
think we're we can do that to help make
that clear for you how we can help
communicate with the public using both
of our offices effectively I really
appreciate that thank you thank you
mayor
and uh Mandy I'm not sure how my
colleagues feel but regarding the
licensing I wasn't looking for the city
to necessarily capitalize or charge for
that but more so to have someone fill
out what they're going to use it for so
that the city knows who's using it and
they have that authority to use it
because you know that way there we have
some control over it and it was
mentioned earlier I mean if someone
wants to use it to make sure it's in
they'll promote the city and we'll
eventually get a little bit back from
the grocery seats tax that they use so
it was just really more of a of a
opportunity to know who's using that and
make sure that we have that
we have that on file because there could
be someone who's a business that's using
it without permission and then
unfortunately
maybe uh
doing something that they shouldn't be
doing and that would allow us if we were
to put an ordinance through to use that
as a means of not only stopping them but
finding them as well yeah
counselor beta and counselor Flores
sorry thank you real quick I don't
normally speak twice but I just I had a
thought about our license plates and
that's usually done by this state via a
change a law change so I don't know if
we're going to have to look into that as
well a mayor councilor beta Dominic
actually already did that research so we
will we will fix that as well thank you
what I have a question what did you on
regarding the license plates
what did you find out right because I I
tried to get one the other day and uh
they said we have to get it from Santa
Fe they used to have them at the DMVs
but someone moved it so that you have to
literally order it and before you you
could go to the local DMVs and get it
that's why you don't see them anymore
around so obviously someone and um
the Department of Motor Vehicles did
that you tried to get a Las Cruces one
well I have one plate but I was going to
get a maybe get I was hoping you were
trying to get a vanity plate and I
wanted to know what it was going to say
no no
believe it or not I I was allowed to
have a particular number and the number
I chose was my favorite engine number of
a Chevrolet so that's what you know
that's what that 427 stands for yes I
just wanna not on my car either so my
wife's yes I just want to comment uh
don't do what Obama did he used a Pepsi
logo remember that I wonder if Pepsi
sued him but anyway yeah I don't think
ours looks like a Pepsi logo I hope it
doesn't look like anybody else's logo
it's so unique it's really beautiful
thank you
okay I think that's it if nothing
further and entertain a motion to
adjourners
is that going to beat up most debated by
counselor Flores second by councilor
beta Christine this is on the motion
chair during the work session councilor
beta yes councilor Graham yes councilor
Ben Cuomo yes councilor kram
ER Flores yes councilor Gandara yes
mayor yes
okay we are adjourned it's 3 22 pm
foreign
thank you
about this last week
thank you
foreign
[Music]
oh there they go
okay this is the agenda setting meeting
for our April April 17
2023 city council meeting number one on
consent one non-consensed two
non-consent two non-consent three
non-consent three non-consums