Your life.
Well, good afternoon everyone. Welcome
to the TID board meeting. Today is
Monday, April 27th, 2026. It's
approximately 1:00 p.m.
I am chair Eric Enriquez. We will start
with a moment of silence for the brave
men and women of the United States Armed
Forces as they protect our interests
around the globe, as well as our
courageous men and women of the Las
Cruces Police and Fire Department that
protect our city and keep it safe 24/7
365.
If you join me in the pledge.
I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America
and to the republic for which it stands,
one nation under God, indivisible, with
liberty and justice for all.
The first
item is 2.1, approval of the minutes
from January 12th, 2026.
Move to approve. Second.
This is on the motion to approve the
minutes from January 12th, 2026.
Board member Macler? Yes. Board member
Matice? Yes. Board member Harris? Yes.
Board member Bencomo? Yes. Board member
Crain? Yes. Board member Munoz? Yes. And
chair? Yes.
Now for the discussion items, 3.1,
a financial update by Chris Faivre.
Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, members of
the TID board. Chris Faivre, community
development director, for the record.
So, a quick run-through of where we
stand year-to-date with the TID.
Um,
collections are going along quite well.
Um, you can see the monthly totals are
averaging, give or take, you know, five,
six hundred thousand dollars a month.
And year-to-date, the totals are
actually trending above where we were
last year. Uh, this time last year, we
were just a little bit over 4.7 million
in collections. So, I'm anticipating
coming in with numbers maybe closer to
2000 FY FY23 FY24 time range. So, right
now we're sitting at about 5.3 million
dollars in year-to-date through March.
And you can see through March, the
ending account balances for each of
them, with the bulk of the funds being
at 4270,
the TID sits at about 29 million dollars
and change right now.
And then a quick update on some of the
projects going on in the TID. So, um,
construction has actually begun on the
Main Street casitas in each of those
areas between, um, down, you know,
between on Main Street between the
roundabout and, um, Bowman Avenue. I
think there's about four of them in
there, three or four of them.
Construction has started, the fences are
up, and, uh, that's expecting to take
between nine and 12 months. And economic
development has been working with the
business owners in the area to let them
know about the project and keep them
posted.
Campo Street, still moving through the
design, hoping to wrap that up, uh, this
summer.
Bid the project out in the fall and have
construction start late this year or
early 2027. And that should take
approximately 14 months as well.
The downtown master plan, so we are
wrapping up a draft to have to the board
to review. Um hopefully, we're thinking
the end of June. Typically, we have a
meeting in July, but the consultants are
going to be out of the country, so we're
thinking about moving that up to the end
of June.
Present that to the board, get your
comments. Between now and then, we'll be
doing um we'll make it available for the
public to comment on, combine all that,
bring it to the TID meeting at the end
of June, have a work session discussion,
and then bring that back to council for
adoption in August would be the timeline
there.
And and and during that work session, we
can sort of have a broader discussion on
the projects and catalyst projects that
they propose as well as any other
conversations the TID board wants to
have with uh potential projects or or
things that they would like to see
funding dedicated to.
Um another one that we've been working
with PD on is to purchase a modular
vehicle barrier system for downtown that
could be set up whenever these events um
uh close streets downtown like we did
this past weekend with Meow
Uh PD has provided some information on a
few different options for these mobile
barriers that can be set up and taken
down pretty quickly.
Uh and typically, they're crash rated
for you know, large trucks up to 30 mph.
So, that should should definitely help
um with any safety concerns in the
district. So, if that's something that
council would like us to move or the TID
board would like us to move forward
with, we can appropriate funds from the
TID to make that purchase. They're
probably somewhere around $200,000 if
not a little bit more.
And then sort of the big one that uh
we're really excited about um the
housing section uh has put out an RFP
for mixed-use development in downtown.
Uh we are targeting uh parking lot 8,
which is the parking lot directly next
to the um re uh renovated El Paso
Electric Building. If you haven't seen
it, it looks really really nice. Um this
is intended to be a catalyst
redevelopment opportunity uh to
strengthen downtown and really kind of
be the first attempt to get people
living in downtown proper. So, I think
this would be the really key first step
project. Uh maybe have some residential
um combined with maybe some retail on
the lower level or or some combination
of of professional space or something
like that.
Uh right now, the RFP is out. It does
close the end of this month. Um and it's
sort of a two-phased approach. One would
be working with the developer on the
feasibility, and then once that's been
determined uh if it sort of
um aligns itself with that direction,
moving forward with a proposal for
development. So, really excited.
Hopefully, we get some good
um submissions on that and can move
forward with that project.
And that concludes my presentation. I'll
stand for questions, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Chris.
Are there any questions? Uh
Councilor Harris. Thank you, Mayor, and
thank you, Chris, for the presentation.
Um
I I think as I mentioned at a previous
council meeting, big fan of the vehicle
barriers. So, that'll be
exciting to uh to see put in um
cuz that's that's a concern, too, and I
I know it's been Well, they're not here,
but I know it's been brought up uh by
the chiefs before as a big concern.
Um and then also on the next slide,
I was uh I was talking with somebody who
lives near us downtown last week, and um
if we could
I don't know. Is is a grocery store or a
little bodega or something part of this
part of the thoughts here cuz
if we want to get people living
downtown, um something like that would
be really cool amenity to have, I think.
Certainly, Mr. Chair, uh board member
Harris. Yes, that could definitely be
part of the retail component of that. Um
and so, you know, hopefully feasibility
would bear out that that could be part
of that project. Or maybe if it's not
part of that one, that project and and
that population that's moving in could
sort of like, you know, a future phase
of development, it could sort of lead to
something like that. But yeah, that's
definitely something that we are hoping
we can see come in with some of this
redevelopment, for sure, downtown. Cool.
Um that's all all I got. Thanks.
Councilor Bencomo. Thanks. Just on this
uh page, Chris,
I'm
curious about the advertisement for the
RFP. I know that there I just had heard
some concerns from the community when
there was an RFP out for Amador about
like folks not hearing about it enough.
I'm just I just want to make sure that
we get as many good applicants as
possible. Can you talk about what that
has looked like? Mr. Chair,
um board member Bencomo, I'm going to
turn that over to Natalie because that's
through her section, and she'll know
specifically how she put that out.
Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor members
council. Natalie Green for the record.
So, this one is a request for
qualifications. So, we actually outreach
directly to developers. Um we we did
advertise in the newspaper, and then
it's posted on our website, but then we
sent uh emails to
um
developers we've previously worked with,
and then I posted it um on the our
LinkedIn page. Uh so, we could target
some of the developers that we know
through that. And then, we had some of
our consultant partners like Project
Moxy also distribute that um
more widely.
Um again, and it's we're looking for a
qualified developer who has already done
this mixed-income, mixed-use project. Um
and so, it's more of a qualifications
uh
we're looking at qualifications versus
uh an actual proposal. Like, show us
what we can build.
Oh, interesting, Natalie. Can you talk a
little bit more through that? So, then
once So, then once people submit their
qualifications, like then how do how do
you move forward with that process?
Um so, after we receive the the
qualifications, there's some preliminary
information we're asking both on their
skill set and then what some preliminary
concept ideas. Uh we have an internal uh
subject matter expert committee that
will review all of those, and then uh
we'll likely bring either that through a
presentation to council, or we can make
a formal recommendation through uh a
resolution. Um but we'll have a staff
committee, and then Project Moxy is also
working with us to do some of the early
uh review of that. Oh, this is really
interesting and really exciting. And
then, the reason we did it this way is
because we're really looking at the
skill set of the developer who knows how
to both build commercial and housing,
and then um solicit businesses like the
grocery store. Um we'll work through
feasibility to figure out what we can
build, how much it's going to cost, and
then we'll move forward um to what that
capital stack looks like, and then the
actual development. So, we need to do
some
a lot of
um
pre-development work first, and then
we'll move forward. And it is
non-committal, so should we not like the
initial developer or feel like their
concept doesn't align with what the city
wants to see there, then we can um
sort of
let them go, and then choose to work
with another developer. Hopefully,
that's not the case, but it's you know,
you never know. Sometimes we don't match
up with certain
um development teams.
Thank you, Natalie. That's really
exciting update. I appreciate it.
Mayor Pro Tem.
Uh Mr. Chair, Chris, on the barriers,
I'm I'm glad you're you're doing that
for safety of our residents.
One of the things I would just want to
make sure I don't know if that's going
to be internal or external
um
group managing that, but I just want to
make sure that on a timely basis, it's
put up and and removed. Didn't want to
impact the uh
traffic into the the merchants and
nonprofits and museums that we have
downtown. So. Certainly. Thank you.
All right. Well, thank you, Chris. Um
looking forward to the master plan and
when it comes uh again in June, and then
we can vote on it in August, so we can
see all the things to enhance and grow
and develop our downtown.
Um
I'm glad that we're seeing the barriers
for safety, and you mentioned the the
event that took place this weekend, the
Meow. So, I'll take advantage of that
and say I see Albert back there. I just
want to give a shout-out. They did put
on a tremendous event this weekend. Meow
Las Cruces was awesome, and I got to say
that drone show at the end was
spectacular. It was really a crowd
pleaser. So,
uh congratulations to you, Albert, uh
Visit Las Cruces, and everyone that took
part in that. So, thank you. And that
that's what we want to continue to see
in our downtown area, the gathering, the
economic development, and the safety.
So,
[snorts]
looking forward to the master plan.
Thank you, Chris. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'll take a motion to adjourn. Move to
adjourn.
Second.
This is on the motion to adjourn the TID
board meeting. Board member McClare?
Yes. Board member Matice?
Yes. Board member Harris?
Yes. Board member Bencomo?
Yes. Board member Curran? Yes. Board
member Munoz? Yes. And chair? Yes.
Yes, so give us a couple minutes, and
we'll start our work session.
We'll go live in 3 minutes, Council.