No, she doesn't.
Good afternoon. Welcome to the work
session. Today is Monday, December 8th,
2025.
It's approximately 1 p.m. I'm Mayor Eric
Enriquez. We will start with a moment of
silence for the brave men and women of
the United States Armed Forces that
protect our interests across the globe
and our courageous men and women of the
Los Cruus Police and Fire Department
that protect our city
and keep it safe 24/7 365.
Please join me in the pledge. I pledge
allegiance to the flag of the United
States of America and to the republic
for it stands one nation under God
indivisible with liberty and justice for
all
we
all right I think we have pets of the
week first
Good afternoon. I'm Carol Nelson,
digital content specialist with the
Animal Services Center of the Messia
Valley. This week, our dog of the week
is Bandit 91663.
I'm a big goofy boy full of love and
fun. At just over a year and a half old,
I still have some playful spirit to
share, but I'm also a master at settling
down for affection. I'm also all about
the treats. Seriously, I really love
them. Um, my love for treats is helping
me learn new things. I've made great
strides with commands and have even
mastered sitting. I am also known for
having a calm and sweet demeanor after
some playtime. I'm great with my kennel
mates and other dogs. If you're looking
for a sweet companion who adors pets and
overall a friendly guy, I'm your dog.
Cat of the week is Panta 1000563.
I'm a sweet and gentle cat who is on the
hunt for a loving family. I love
lounging in cozy spots and just soaking
up affection. When I first arrived at
the shelter, I started out shy, but now
I purr and enjoy being petted,
especially when I can curl up next to
someone. My journey has taught me the
value of patience. I may flinch at some
sounds, but if you go gentle and slow,
I'll come seeking all the pets and
scratches. and my previous owner says
that I'm completely litter box trained
and housebroken. If you're looking for a
mellow and affectionate companion, I
could be the perfect fit for you.
Um, and as always, we like to highlight
a few of our long-term residents as
well. Um, so we're happy to share that
after 313 days, Dexter was rescued. So,
we're super happy for Dexter. Um, but
Finn has been with us 311 days, Hulu
309, and Blackberry Pi, uh, 271 days.
So, all really good options if our pets
of the week are adopted. These are good
backups.
Uh, and for our upcoming weekend event,
it is going to be our on-site event, uh,
Santa
photo day with Santa Claus, um, from 1
to 3. So, we just ask that you bring an
item to donate for our community of hope
donation drive. Um, and come get a
picture with your dogs and Santa. It's
going to be a great time. We ask no
cats, please, as they are harder to
restrain. So, only dogs, please. And as
always, for more information, please
visit our website or you can follow us
on social media. Thank you.
All right. Thank you, Carol.
Next on the agenda is item 2.1, office
of emergency management.
Amanda,
good afternoon.
Alrighty. Uh, my name is Amanda Bowen.
I'm your emergency manager and I'm here
today for two reasons. I would like to
give you a brief operational update on
the office of emergency management and
also to talk with you about our
allhazards emergency operations plan.
That is the framework that governs how
the city, the county and our partners uh
manage disasters. Uh the plan is coming
to you as policy and governance document
not as a tactics manual. So, if you keep
that in mind, uh my goal here today is
to make sure that you're fully aware of
uh what it does, what your role is in
it, and why adoption matters, and uh
both for legal and financial reasons.
Uh I'll start with the AllHazards
Emergency Operations Plan. I'm going to
refer to it as the AH EOP just to
condense that down a little bit. So,
when you see it on the slides, um that's
what I'm referring to. Um, the AHOP is a
multi-jurisdictional
coordination framework that we use for
large-scale emergencies. It defines
who's in charge of what, how agencies
work together, and how decisions are
made when incidents exceed routine
response. It applies to natural
disasters like wildfire and flooding,
technological incidents, uh, like
hazardous materials or cyber events, and
human-caused incidents, including active
threats.
It's fully aligned with FEMA, the
National Incident Management System or
NIMS as it's on your slides, uh the
Americans with Disabilities Act, and the
New Mexico State Law. Uh again, not a
tactics manual. We're not telling
firefighters uh how to fight a fire.
We're not telling law enforcement how to
work a scene. Uh we're telling the
entire government system how it
coordinates uh to support those
operations at a scale.
Our prior emergency operations plan
dated back to 2011 with some minor
updates in 2019.
Uh the federal and state standards uh
require a major revision every 3 to 5
years. So that means quite frankly we
were very overdue for an update. Um the
previous plan lacked many of the annexes
that are now considered standard
nationwide. It also no longer reflects
how our emergency operations center
actually functions today and failed to
meet current federal preparedness,
accessibility, and reporting standards.
Updating the plan wasn't optional.
Without it, we risked non-compliance,
uh delayed disaster funding, fragmented
response, etc.
The update process began in May of 2024
and extended out through June of 25. It
produced the base plan, 10 functional
annexes, 10 hazard annexes, and multiple
operational support tools. This was not
a desk exercise by any means. It
involved uh multi- agency planning
meetings, operational uh reviews,
including uh many of the city of Los
Cus's departments, including public
works, our first responders, and
citizens contributing to a uh the
repeated drafts that were developed. Uh
we now approach the final steps and uh
for adoption that is the stakeholder
adjudication um not just your
jurisdiction but all the jurisdictions
within Donana County. Um next we do a uh
state level final review uh making this
a fully crosswalked FEMA aligned state
compliant emergency operations plan.
The plan was evaluated against FEMA's
comprehensive preparedness guide 101
version three. Uh, it complies with NIMS
and the National Response Framework,
meets ADA requirements for accessibility
and functional needs populations, was
reviewed using New Mexico Department of
Homeland Security and Emergency
Management's crosswalk tool. It matters
because disaster funding and mutual aid
are tied directly to the compliance with
these standards.
The plan focuses on the hazards that are
realistically going to affect our
community. wildfire, flooding, extreme
heat and drought, hazardous materials
along our major interstate corridors,
pandemics, cyber security incidents, and
high wind events.
Every one of these has either occurred
already or is statistically expected to
occur again.
None of these are hypothetical.
Do I need to pause? I apologize.
Yeah, it's just that our screens are
going on and off. So,
got it. You let [snorts] me know when
you'd like me to restart.
Is that like you're simulating an
emergency? Just kidding.
Uh, we do that.
Oh, it's a communication black.
Just wanted to make sure everyone was
able to work through the emergency at
the same speed as emergency management
is. [laughter]
It looks like they're back online. Go
ahead.
Cool. Okay. Um, again, so these are the
hazards that we expect to focus on. Um,
and those should be on your screen at
this point. Um, none of these are
hypothetical. These are things that are
realistically could occur in our
jurisdiction.
The plan outlines the expectation that
all incidents start and end locally. Uh
field responders use the incident
command system to manage tactical
operations. When incidents become
complex or exceed routine capacity, the
emergency operations center is
activated. The EOC does not replace
field command. It provides coordination,
resource management, emergency
purchasing, policy support, public
information, and state and federal
liaison functions. State and federal
support only engages when local
government requests it and demonstrates
that local capability has been exceeded.
One of the most important functions of
the emergency operations plan is
continuity of government. Even if
officials are injured, facilities are
damaged or systems go down, those
essential government functions must
continue. We do that through orders of
succession, making sure those are in
place for key leadership. Uh vital
records are protected and backed up,
alternate facilities are identified, and
in short, the plan ensures that
government does not st stop functioning
during disasters.
Now, for council authority, a local
emergency declaration activates
emergency powers. It allows expedited
purchasing, regulatory flexibility, and
access to mutual aid.
Most importantly, it is legally required
to request state and federal disaster
assistance. If a declaration is not
issued, disaster funding is delayed or
denied.
This is one of the most direct decision
points that council controls during a
disaster.
Now, council's role does not begin and
end with declarations. You have an
ongoing role. things like approving
preparedness funding, setting policy
that shapes community readiness, uh
supporting volunteer and nonprofit
disaster organizations, ensuring
outreach to vulnerable populations,
providing visible executive leadership
during emergencies. Your policy
decisions directly affect how well the
community performs under stress.
[clears throat] Excuse me. Um, as
previously stated, uh, the update
includes 10 new functional annexes and
10 updated hazard annexes. This covers
everything from mass sheltering and
debris management to joint public
information and radio interoperability
and lots of things in between there. Uh,
we also added EOCC job aids and
community lifeline reporting tools to
make information flow faster and more
consistent with the way that the FEMA
system works. Accessibility compliance
has also been made stronger throughout
the plan.
Next steps uh include formal plan
adoption and promugation, state
submission, multi- agency training on
the new plan, public facing education,
and ongoing maintenance. Emergency
planning is not a oneanddone. It's a
continuous program. So, we will focus on
that.
And next, because it's been some time
since uh OEM has stood before council,
we would like to share with you a quick
little quick review of some of our key
accomplishments from the last year.
Um this past year, we broke ground on
our new emergency operations center. If
you've been by NMSU, you've likely seen
the building. It's up on the hill on a
mountain. Um we're planning to move
facilities in May. So, we would love for
all of you to come out and join us when
we do that. Our team responded to four
federally declared disasters across the
state. We supported multiple significant
events including those that happened
here in our own community uh with Vado,
Burino, Delto, and uh Ringone. Uh we
also activated the and uh the family
assistance and resource center following
the Young Park mass shooting uh
providing coordinated victim, family,
and survivor support.
Uh we delivered advanced incident
command training to regional responder
responders, expanded CPR and AED
training with Spanish language outreach.
Uh hosted a railc car hazmat response
training and advanced staff through
wildfire debris and severe weather
programs. Training [clears throat] is
one of the strongest predictors of
operational success during real
disasters. And it's become one of our
strongest focus areas.
And next to that is exercises. We
conducted multiple exercises this year
from full scale to tabletops including
hazmat, mass casualty, election
security, cyber security, energy sector,
wildfire, agriculture, and flood
response. Exercises expose weaknesses in
a safe environment. So those weaknesses
don't affect us when we face an actual
disaster. That's why those are so
important to us.
Um, we've deployed 45 new interoperable
radios regionally, placed a large animal
rescue trailer into service, and
advanced the county's transition in the
statewide radio system. Of course,
there's the finalization of the AHOP,
which I just spoke about. Um, we've also
started and are almost completed with uh
what we call the AHMP, not to be
confused. Uh, we love our acronyms in
the emergency management world. That is
the all hazards mitigation plan. Um, so
that will be coming before you to to
view uh soon. We managed $16 million in
grant funding, updated the city county
emergency operations uh cooperative
agreement plan, um, and completed a
countywide hazardous materials commodity
flow survey to better understand
transportation risks.
Um OEM maintains continuous coordination
with first responders, health care,
utilities, volunteer organizations, and
state partners. We serve on statewide
emergency management boards, planning
committees, and have advanced automated
alerting between dispatch, the EOC, and
partner agencies. One of the big steps
forward uh was hosting a countywide
water summit focused on shared utility
risk. Uh the team developed disaster
donations education to reduce post
disaster fraud and waste and
strengthened philanthropic partnerships
for disaster recovery funding. Uh
preparedness only works when the
community understands it. So we keep at
the forefront that disasters are not
managed by one agency but rather by a
system and coordination and engagement
have been really key to our successes
this year.
Um we have had some changes in staffing.
Uh Steven has moved into county
management, county administration. I was
selected as the emergency manager to
take his place. Joy Chavez, who's here
with me, um is was selected as the
deputy emergency manager and Manel
Pianka continues with our office as the
volunteer coordinator. We have added two
new emergency management coordinators
that is uh Tim Hydrickch and Matt Comms
uh both who bring a wealth of responder
knowledge to our team.
Um lastly, I would like to say thank you
to all of you. Um the support and
collaboration that we've had with the
city of Los Cusus this last year has
been really amazing. Uh from an
emergency management perspective, uh we
view preparedness as a policy decision
and your support in areas like flood
prevention, utility infrastructure,
target hardening, and things like that
have resulted in better protection of
life and property, faster response, and
stronger recovery. Um, so I really
appreciate the opportunity to talk to
you and would be happy to take any
questions if you have any.
All right. Thank you, Amanda. Does
anyone have uh Councelor Graham?
Oh, thank you so much. Um, just wanted
to um appreciate the presentation and
all of you do all that you guys do. I
know that you hope to never be seen in
in the community because it's like
rarely I'm glad that we can come in
under non-c catastrophic circumstances.
Um I'm so glad that you mentioned the
coordination of the family assistance
center after the Young Park tragedy
because if you didn't I was going to
bring it up because I feel like that is
that's such a good example of what you
do in the community. like you said, you
do a very technical job with a lot of
acronyms and a lot of people, you're
just kind of like, okay. But seeing
seeing you in action, um doing
coordinating everything from uh payments
to victims to just bringing out dogs and
trying to heal hearts was huge. And I'm
on the record here saying if you need me
for future interview panels, um I'm
going to have a lot more free time
coming up soon. So, I hope you'll keep
me in mind and it's great to see you
here.
That on record. [laughter] Thank you.
Thank you so much. Thanks, Mayor.
Thank you, uh, Councelor Kin.
Thank you. Thank you. I just also wanted
to really give you all an enormous
appreciation for all of your work with
the family resource center. The um I
think you also work behind the scenes
with the animal services center and gave
a lot of support with them and thinking
about their emergency plan and the
collaborative
emergency response plan for animals. So,
I I I want to thank you very much. I did
want to follow up on one specific thing
that isn't actually for you. Thank you.
I like that's mostly what I have for
you, but when we first came on board as
city councilors, we did went through a
little bit of a an orientation with
Office of Emergency Management and that
was great. I think I highly recommend
new counselors um also or new elected
folks also go through that. One thing
came up in that conversation that I
never followed up on and I don't know
that any of us ever followed up on and
that was increasing the city manager's
ability to spend money in an emergency.
And historically the council had set
that at $100,000 which may have been
real money in the past but isn't
actually real money in today's
emergencies I think. And so
that was like 3 years ago and I had it
apparently on a hidden post-it note in
my brain that had been lost until you
came here today, Amanda. So, thank you
for bringing it back because I don't
think we've ever considered that. I
don't think we've made that move to
increase the authority of the city
manager in the in the case of an
emergency to spend more money on behalf
of the city of Los Cusus. But I would
like us to I don't think it would be a
very big um policy lift, but I would ask
us to actually maybe consider following
up on that if we can. Um, just seeing
you reminded me that that's a thing that
we should do to make sure that we're
contributing meaningfully to this. So,
and maybe I'm misremembering. I don't
know. It was years ago. Again, forgive
me, but thanks for being here, Amanda.
Thanks, Council Troy.
Thank you, Mayor.
Thank you so much for your presentation.
Do you remember the last time you were
here or your organization was here?
I believe it was about a year and a half
ago when Stephen presented. Um it's it's
been a bit of time and I apologize for
that. We've been shuffling people and
things, but we do hope if you will allow
us to come back yearly to provide you
with some u more consistent updates.
Okay. I was just wondering because there
was a date uh that came up 2011
uh in the beginning and what was that
for?
So the ah EOP that the plan that I was
discussing um the last really
substantial rewrite of that plan was
done in 2011. We have done some minor
tweaks to it to keep it uh to keep our
office compliant so we could get grants
and things like that. Um there was a uh
signature revision in 2019. So that's
the official date of the plan that is on
file currently, but we knew that it
needed more significant updates and it
needed some uh for things like adopting
ADA compliance issues. Um those are
really important and we didn't want to
gloss over that by doing um
non-substantive updates to it. And so
that's why we went with a full rewrite
this time. That's what that date is
referring to.
Well, that's really good because then
your funding isn't at all jeopardized.
Yes, ma'am.
Enhancements.
Thank you very much for your work. Thank
you.
Thank you,
Mayor Pro.
Thank you. Thank you so much, Amanda.
It's good to see you again. Um
I It's just really quick. I thought it
was funny that you said the acronym was
to condense the name, but even the
acronym is kind of long. So,
I just thought that was funny. Um, you
know, I I just continue to be really
impressed by yourself and Joy and um,
especially in the aftermath of the Young
Park shooting. And so I just really
wanted to thank you both for that and
how quickly you moved. I am curious if
um, you know, something you said during
that day when we visited you at the
resource center, you said, you know, you
can plan and plan and plan and it the
only way to know if the plan work is if
something happens and you never want
something to happen, right? But that's
just the way it goes. I'm curious if you
know in the last few months you've had
time to debrief and if you have any
lessons learned certainly for yourself
but anything that the city could have
done differently or better I think that
that's really important to and maybe
you've already sh shared that with you
know like our our chiefs. Um but if
there's anything you could share with us
today I think that would be important
and if not because I'm putting you on
the spot then if you can follow up I
think it's just really important.
Debriefs are just so important for for
learning and for you know doing things
differently. Hopefully not a next time
but certainly if if a next time should
occur.
Absolutely. So we did conduct an
afteraction um of the actual family
assistance and resource center process.
I believe that your team did a
afteraction report of other parts of um
the incident. Um ours was specific to
that as as that was our scope. Um and we
had a lot of entities show up, a lot of
participants show up and I think the
biggest uh takeaway that I heard from
the room was really uh the
amazing way in which people stepped
forward with a very little ask and how
the plan pre-planning made such a big
difference to executing. Um there are
always little tweaks and things that we
feel feel could be done better. I think
there's some improvements to the plan
that have already taken place. Um Joy
could probably speak better to that, but
um the the big takeaway was really in
collaboration and really continuing to
exercise that moving forward um with our
law enforcement and fire partners.
Thank you so much. Again, I really
appreciate you both. And I think it is
also important that we will have two new
colleagues on the council in January
that they um that they meet you all and
go through some sort of introductory
presentation.
We would love to provide that.
Absolutely. Thank you.
Thank you.
Yeah. Thank you, Amanda. Is there anyone
else?
Um, again, thanks again with the Young
Bark incident, but also for Reoso. You
know, when Rioso was hurting in the
flooding, you all also were there and
providing assistance and knowledge and
experience, but those kind of
emergencies also create education. So,
thanks. I'm sure it helped with the plan
and and putting things together for our
community in case something happens. So,
thank you for your efforts. And I just
want to say thank you for the update on
the new facility. You said it'll be in
May.
Yes, sir.
Okay. So, uh, as already been mentioned,
we'll have two new counselors coming on.
You can do the introduction and show
them. But I would hope that sometime in
June, uh, give it about 6 months, get
established, and then invite us over,
uh, so we could get a tour of the new
facility and how it works and another
tutorial on on, uh, the expectations and
the role of counselors is is is always
important. So,
absolutely, if you give us a minute to
talk, we'll fill your ears as we have
previously. So, we would love to
collaborate to the fullest extent you
invite us in. So, appreciate it.
Okay. Thanks. And as far as the funding
and things, I do recall something like
that um that took place back then,
council correct, but I think that's
something that our city manager could
get with the county manager and yourself
and see how we can work through that as
it's a shared entity.
I believe we've worked that out. We do
have a new cooperative agreement that's
been signed and so that's all in place.
Uh we really appreciate the the
willingness to work on that. our team uh
was working really hard to provide your
team with a lot of backup data and a a
standard reimbursement amount really
made more sense um and and your team
accommodated that. So, thank you very
much. We that should be in place now.
Okay. Thank you, Amanda.
All right. Thanks.
Next is item 2.2, to the NIH light
program update. We got Matt Hiles, Wes
Smith,
and a group of others.
Good afternoon, Council, Mayor Pro Tim,
Mr. Mayor, Matthew Hiles, O Cru's Fire
Department, Division Chief. Uh we're
here to present an update on the light
program and what it's doing now, what
it's been going through, what it's
experiencing, and Wes has done an
amazing job with uh putting together a
lot of data and fine points to show
council today um on where things are
going and where we're trending and what
we would like to see. Um, also an update
on the mobile integrated health program
and everything that it's going through
and the changes and and what we're
seeing out in the community uh whenever
we uh go and do visits with with those
individuals and the underserved. So, at
this time, I'm just going to go ahead
and bring up Wes Smith. He's our case
manager for the fire department.
Can I start with the mobile integrated
health program?
Where's that? Because it's on.
Here we go. All right.
Okay.
Mr. Mayor, Council, uh, Wes Smith, Los
Cruises Fire Department, case manager.
Super excited to be here. Um, I get
really excited when I start when I talk
about my programs and I get really
excited when I talk about statistics.
So, if I start talking really fast, I
apologize.
Um, but I do want to start with a brief
comment on policy. Um the rural health
transformation program was authorized
recently
um and empower states to strengthen
rural communities across America by
improving health care access, quality
and outcomes by transforming the
healthcare delivery ecosystem.
This model has a heavy focus on EMS and
community parame medicine. That's about
as scripted as I'm going to try and get.
So, um,
the Las Cruises Fire Department, um,
community risk reduction program has
been in incorporating this since 2017.
Council's been backing this. This is
just a change in policy affecting the
federal government that the city has
already been established for the last
eight years. So, it's super exciting to
see that we're kind of on the forefront
and kind of the model um of this
administration of programs.
I want to take a moment and talk about
who we are. So, we're led by our
battalion chief, division chief, uh,
Matt Hiles. We have a licensed clinical
social worker supervisor, Allison
Stoner, who says she's watching on
television. And then we have our MIH
coordinator, the Paul Ford.
And then we have Dan Howard and Chris
Olison is our MIH team. So Dan is a
firefighter paramedic and Chris is a
licensed clinical social worker and down
here at the bottom is a case manager.
That's me.
Um
so I kind of want to paint a picture of
an MIH patient. So the the youngest MI
patient we've ever had was two. The
oldest was 108.
Um the average MIH patient is about 70
70 years old. Um but given a standard
deviation, we're looking that a patient
is anywhere between 60 to 80 years old.
Uh when we break it down by race and
ethnicity, we see that a white
identifying patients far exceed all
other race and ethnicities. A rigorous
kaiquare analysis was done in the winter
of 2025. It confirmed this disparity and
exceeds the population that we serve. So
the population that MIH serves does not
reflect the population of our community.
Um what that further shows is that um an
active uh pursuit of cultural competency
is required for this program.
Um when we look at by gender uh there
are no remarkable findings by gender.
We did a cross-section analysis of
patients by chronic illness and mental
health diagnosis.
Less than 5% exclusively had a
psychiatric diagnosis. About 10%
exclusively had a chronic health
condition. However, 85% or almost all
had a chronic health condition and a
psychiatric diagnosis.
This finding confirms that we take on
the most complicated cases facing very
difficult conditions.
That was a really fun study.
Um, so any organization, whether it's a
small business or a Fortune 500 company
or an NIH program, it needs to know what
its referral sources come where the
referral sources come from. Um so fire
kind of comprises the majority of our
referrals um shown in red they're
considered internal referrals. These are
often n uh repeat 911 utilizers with an
established relationship with the fire
department and are experiencing some
unmet need. Their primary access to
health care is through the 911 system.
So what you see is somebody has a
stomach ache. They call 911 instead of
going to their primary care provider.
They go to the emergency department.
They get that acute need met acute need
met and then they go home, they don't
follow up with the primary care
provider, they have another flare up and
they go to the back to the emergency
department. So kind of what we do is we
go we try to mitigate those um excessive
911 calls and find out what that unmet
need is and get them the proper care
that they need. Referrals from LCPD
include patrol and CIT officers, but
also animal control and codes. These
referrals often accompany uh with like a
mental health component.
Government agencies include courts, Los
Cusus Utilities, the library, and
Roadrunner Transit. It's important to
point out that the transit system
doesn't have a social services program.
However, their drivers and staff really
know their their riders and so they can
like see like a change in their
activities of daily living and they'll,
you know, they'll call their supervisor
like, "Hey, I was going to pick up Mrs.
Adams and she had difficulty getting,
you know, from her wheelchair to the to
her rollolator or walker and the
supervisor will give us a call and we'll
try and find out like, well, was there a
change in her medication? Was there some
like some sort of change in condition?
You know, what do we do to maximize her
independence so that she can stay home
and uh stay home successfully?
Referrals from families and friends. Um,
these are exclusively word of mouth. Um,
so these folks are referred by previous
patients and family members. The fact
that so much of this total is found in
this category makes me proud to work for
MIH. This is a true satisfaction survey.
So you want to know like how well you're
doing? Well, your friends like the
family and friends of the patients that
we've worked with, refer to other
families and friends. And this is and
the fact that it's like such a large
portion of the the of the referrals like
that that gives me confidence in the
work that we're doing. And then
referrals from health and human
services. Um, these include hospitals,
skilled nursing facilities, physicians,
adult protective services, and our dear
friends and senior programs. Um, so
these are our million-dollar referrals.
Um, they're incredibly complex. They
take a significant amount of time,
resources, and collaboration. Um, it's
also where the healthare system truly uh
unites. We talk about how how siloed the
health care system is. That's one of the
things that we mitigate through our
program because we have those
established relationships and we can
work with folks um across the uh
healthcare continuum. It's pretty wild.
All right. Um so an MH referral can be
found ineligible typically for three
reasons. Uh there's no MIH need, we are
unable to locate the patient or they're
out of our jurisdiction. Out of our
jurisdiction so folks will have their
emergency in city of Los Cusus. So, we
get the referral from within the
community, but it turns out they live
outside of our uh jurisdiction. So,
we'll try to case manage them either
like over the phone or try and access
resources in the county to get them
linked up with um as best we can.
Um a referral may be revoked due to
safety concerns. Um so, sometimes we
don't have the scene security necessary
to continue with that patient. Um so
we'll try to um deliver services via
phone and email and things like that. Uh
deceased patients are those we've lost
while under our care including hospice.
Um refusals are those patients who
agreed to a needs assessment. The
treatment plan was started but for
various reasons the patient chose not to
continue with the treatment plan.
Graduated patients include those that
were enrolled, followed the treatment
plan that have included resources
provided by MIH referrals to outside
agencies. Then the team agreeing that
the team agreed that all reasonable
interventions had been navigated. And
then to really MIH graduates as a
performance measure, imagine MIH as a
business where 80% of all referrals
result in a sale.
That's unheard of, but it's an excellent
conversion rate. Sorry,
should have stuck to stuck to the
script, but that's a good conversion,
right? Um, all right. Um, so some of the
things that we do measure, um, the
number of community health visits was
890 separate visits with 1,739
interventions where we either provided
the resource or referred to some outside
agency.
That's so typically any patient that we
work with gets one to five uh referrals
or resources.
Um 86.8%
of the patients we worked with had a
reduced 911 usage.
53%
as of November 15th, all the patients
that we worked with in FY25,
half did not have a subsequent 911 call.
And then the average time, so whenever
folks do have another 911 call, it's 82
days after the fact. So if you think of
like the 30-day rehospization rate,
we're beating it. Super like I'm sorry,
these are super awesome to me.
Um, so future plans and growth. Um, we
did hire an LCSW supervisor position.
Um, Allison Stoner says she is watching
online. So
hi Allison. Um we do have the uh light
MIH headquarters fully funded through
HUD um HUD funding and state legislative
funds and then community partnerships
and education. Paul Ford has more
education programs to provide to our
community. So we're talking to um we're
talking to seniors about fall risk.
We're talking about medications. We're
talking um a whole slew of education
that Paul Ford's able to provide. Um
yeah, and we'll be continuing to do
that. Super exciting.
And with that, I'll stand for questions
about the mobile integrated healthcare
program.
Thanks, Wes. Uh, Council Pro.
Yes. Uh, thank you. Thank you for your
presentation. Um,
on page nine, um, there was an 80%
success rate measured or reported on
page nine.
But um there you no there thank you. Um
so
what does it take to graduate and then
um the recidivism is also a factor here.
Okay.
So
so there's a
20%
20% of those measured uh come back. The
other 80% don't. over a period of how
much time was this data collected?
Mr. Mayor, um, councelor Flores, the 80%
graduated are folks who were referred,
enrolled, and we administered at least
one resource or one referral, maybe up
to five. It really depends on the
severity or the the acuity of the
patient. Um, so sometimes it's a very
simple fix. Sometimes it's just
navigating somebody to have their own
wheelchair that they can't afford.
Sometimes it's getting adult protective
services involved. Sometimes it's
navigating somebody through a skilled
nursing facility and getting them
inpatient rehabilitation. Sometimes it's
um really pulling like multiple agencies
to um get somebody engaged and be
successful independently. Um and so that
80% is C captures those folks that
require some sort of interaction. the
the other 20% are typically refue like
they refuse services um they're deceased
revoked or ineligible. Well, I I can
understand the deceased and the reu the
refusals, but um the revocation and the
ineligible, what happens to them and
what are the actual numbers of those
percentage points?
I have the percentage points. I don't
have the actual
so um I mean terms [clears throat] of
the percentages it looks like it's very
successful but you have no idea what
happens to that 2.6%. I'm just wondering
and is it just ineligible
what what what's the eligibility
requirement?
Mr. Mayor, madam counselor. Um so if
there's no MIH need this is a situation
where um perhaps by the time we do our
needs assessment that need is no longer
um applicable
because they've reached they've they've
gone to a higher level of care.
That might be an option. um or um family
came into town and they took over um and
they're able to meet the patients needs.
And what about the revoked? Are they
referred to another entity?
Mr. Mayor, madam uh madam counselor. Um
revoked is often for like safety
concerns if um if uh
someone's violent or
Yes, ma'am. If we're not able to um
successfully intervene in a way that
doesn't put our staff in danger.
Okay. And then well and then you have
3.8 who have died so that's explainable
and um I I I had another question but um
maybe it you know it drifted away lucky
you but no but thank you very much for
the reporting and thank you all for your
work. It's crucial. Thank you.
Anyone else
again? West. Thank you and everyone, the
whole team, but a special shout out to
Paul. Paul was there from day one, from
the beginning, and your continued
efforts and work. Thank you, Paul.
All right, now you're going into the
next.
I'm gonna interrupt Wes really quick
[laughter]
because I have a two o'clock meeting
and I'm going to try to get through
this.
[snorts]
So, you all know me and you know that I
don't cry and I'm usually super
vivacious.
Um, but I'm here to share my story.
So, good afternoon, Mayor, mayor prom
counselors, and this entire team.
I'm not here
I'm not here in my community
nonforprofit role, [snorts] but as a
citizen of this city.
Over the last eight years, I've been
caregiving for my parents. As an only
child and living close by, [snorts]
I knew this would be my role. But I was
not ready this early in my life while
balancing children, work, general life,
and just overall schedules. My mother My
mother has dealt with knee sorry
my mother has dealt with a dozen falls,
a car [snorts] accident, two knee
surgeries, and has been in a wheelchair
for four years. As caregiving took a
toll on my father, it was apparent that
his health, his mental capacity, and
PTSD as a Vietnam veteran was turning a
corner I could not assist with on a
daily basis.
As an active member of the nonfor-profit
community, I feel really connected. I'm
so well connected that I know the
resources and services that you provide
here in the city of Los Cusus. [snorts]
It was through these resources and
connections and outreach that my family
[snorts] was truly impacted by this team
and so many others at the city and
continue to be served. The medically
integrated health team began helping my
parents roughly four years ago after a
physical altercation with my father and
I. Several fall assist calls to 911 and
many visits from station two. So, Chief
Daniels, thank you to your department at
station two. I've gotten to know them
very very well [snorts] and needed
support to keep them out of the ER on a
regular basis and stop calling 911.
Paul, Wes, and Mindy and all of this
team behind me, assisted my parents and
placed them on a regular MIH rotation.
this. They assisted with check-ins on my
dad, discussing of getting firearms out
of the home, fall protocol, assisted
with trying to get my dad onto VA
services, setting my parents up on meals
on wheels, discussing setup of vomos to
assist in transportation, and if you
ever need me to talk about Vamos, I
probably won't cry as much, but [snorts]
it's an amazing service and thank you
for doing it for free for our community.
But most importantly, it was another set
of eyes so I could keep my parents safe
in their home. This has been invaluable
for them and for me.
Unfortunately, my father decided to take
his own life in June.
MIH, Vamos, and LCPD
were all there to assist me in a
situation that I was not prepared for,
but unfortunately knew may come.
Even with discussions on getting
firearms out, alerting fire and PD of
the pro of the potential danger, and
seeking additional mental health
services, the act still came to
fruition. I want to thankly personally
thank LCPD and especially officer Monise
for his care during that difficult day.
I'll tell you a funny story. Dr. Mo
officer Monise is not very tall
and he met me at the door and said I
don't want you to have to see what is
happening so I'm going to walk with you
[snorts] and I thought that's so sweet
cuz I can see over the top of you
[laughter]
but he held my hand and he helped me get
through that situation and thank you to
him. [snorts]
Days later, MIH was there to help my mom
get a Knox box on her door, complete VA
paperwork for survivor benefits, and
talk about how to keep her at home. Paul
and I talked for hours, Mindy and Wes,
in support of possibilities of assisted
living facilities or keeping her safe at
home. [snorts] It is with their help
that I've been able to do so for do so
for the past five months. I could not
have done it without their guidance. I
want every citizen, every single one of
you and every family member in Los Cusus
to know about these vital services
provided by the city of Los Cusus.
[snorts] From MIH to the free ride
services of Vomos to meals on wheels and
the support that PD and fire give to our
community even on our blue sky days. I
want the council and the chief of fire
to understand the importance of MIH and
its staff. These are amazing people that
take on situations to reduce 911 calls,
unneeded transports, ER visits for our
residents, and connecting family
families with resources they need.
[snorts]
With support from their team, including
the importance of a social worker,
families can get through issues and
reduce their needs for 911. I am full
support of this team and hope that in
today's work session, you feel the same
way. Thank you all so much and thanks
for listening.
Tara, thank you. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you for your testimony of MIH and
how it's valued in this community and we
all share that. So, thank you.
Mr. Mayor, council
West Smith, case manager, Los Chris's
fire department. In this presentation,
I'd like to provide a brief history of
how the light program was established,
reintroduce the framework of the staff
and their roles, what they do and don't
do, provide a review of what was seen in
fiscal year 25, and what we see on the
horizon.
In the summer 2016, Battalion Chief Cody
Haver conducted a study on fire
department based mobile CR uh mobile
integrated healthcare programs. In the
fall of 2016, the NIH pilot program
started.
February 2017. Oh, nope. In February
2017, the pilot program report was
submitted to city council. In 2018, MMC
resident physicians started a ride
along. And in 2018, NMSU School of
Social Work started an internship
program.
By March 2019, the NIH program was
formally established.
In 2021, the overdose outreach program
was established, pairing a firefighter
paramedic with a master level social
work intern to do Narcan leave behind
with patients who had previously
experienced an overdose. However, the
team chose to also link patients to
recovery resources. So, the idea of the
grant was just to do like a Narcan leave
behind after they had um after somebody
had experienced a an an overdose. These
folks went above and beyond to take the
next step to actually lead them to
recovery resources and treatment.
In July 2022, Operation Bluebird, which
includes the NIH team, partnered with an
LCPD CIT officer, uh were set together
to visit um with to visit patients with
a significant mental health concern that
required scene security.
So, the mobile crisis response um is
within the 911 system in the city of Los
Cusus and Los Cusus public schools
dispatching a team composed of a social
worker and a firefighter paramedic to
mental health and behavioral health
crisis. The structure of the light
program includes our battalion chief
Matt Hiles, Allison Stoner, who assures
me she is watching from home or from
wherever she is. I think she's on a
plane somewhere. Um and then two light
teams. So, I want to point out Karina
who is our firefighter paramedic in
hiding and Mindy our licensed clinical
social worker. Those two make up light
one. And then case manager, it's me,
Wes.
Uh hours of operation are Monday through
Saturday. We're in service from 8:00 to
7:00. We have two teams working
alternating shifts on a 40hour schedule.
Um so we have an LMS LMSW is required.
It just turns out that all of our social
workers are LCSWS, which is a little
higher credential. And then um the
firefighter paramedic, the firefighter
paramedic is trained in trauma-informed
care, crisis intervention, law
enforcement training. It's a 40hour law
enforcement training program, um
deescalation, motivation, motivational
interviewing one and two, and then
non-violent crisis intervention.
The roles of the firefighter paramedic
include the uh medical assessment, so
they can check blood alcohol content,
vitals, uh blood sugars, and then
collect a past medical history. and they
should review current medications and
see if there's any interactions that may
be affecting the the situation on the
scene. The role of the social worker
includes a comprehensive assessment um
such as uh prior psychiatric history,
the event leading to the trigger um
assess for suicide risk using various
modalities and then identify healthy
coping strategies. They can treat in
place using brief um behavioral health
interventions. The roles of the team
include being present and offer a calm
demeanor. uh that recommend possible
follow-up care, transport to definitive
care, connect to resources for food,
shelter, transportation, and healthcare.
White does not sign certificates of
evaluation, does not accept referrals.
We do not provide long-term counseling
or case management services, and we do
not respond to 988 calls. Now, there are
caveats to each of these, so we don't
sign certificates of evaluation.
However, we do respond with PD who is
still capable of um taking somebody into
protective custody if necessary or
appropriate. We don't accept referrals.
However, when you do call 911, you can
uh kind of explain what's going on to
dispatch and request a light team to be
added on. We don't provide long-term
counseling or case management services,
but there is a case manager as part of
the team um to do follow-up after the
incident. And we don't respond to 988
calls. However, a 988 call can be
escalated to the 911 system and then
light would then be dispatched. However,
that is very few. There's only been like
six cases in two years where that's
actually happened.
The last time I talked to 988
call types include behavioral issues,
suicidal subject, suicide attempt,
overdose, CPRs, and deaths. There's 15%
on this screen that talks about other.
These are situations where either PD is
on their way to like a welfare check and
they've requested a light team to be
added onto that call or a fire crew is
out and they're uh they're assessing the
situation. They think light would be an
appropriate um response to add on to
this call. So, it's kind of like the
ghost category of folks who are um like
know that the light program is
appropriate for uh what needs to happen.
Let's talk about behavioral issues.
A significant amount of behavior calls
include restless and agitated patients.
We find a significant amount of patients
are combative, violent, angry,
homicidal, or experiencing strange or
bizarre behavior.
But many patients are anxious, stressed,
and irritable.
Behind hallucinations, depression
related behaviors are also common.
This chart shows half of the patients
are adults between the ages of 19 and
55. However, it also shows half of our
patients are underserved populations.
The growing gerosych population is
evidenced in the prior presentation on
NIH.
The revelation of the youth population
resulted in a two-year retro study and
analysis by myself and Mandy Fowler. Um,
we reached out to many community
stakeholders, identified gaps, and used
that information to improve our
responses to adolescence. Imagine that.
Using data to change policy to make the
program more effective. crazy
um dispositions.
Okay, so we we pulled it down by quarter
um for what we um what we were working
with with our patients. So this just
really shows that more than half the
time we treat in place, which is the
goal and the objective of the program to
deescalate and get people to um like the
yeah deescalate them and get them the
care they need. Now when we do transport
um the blue bars shows transportation to
the emergency department and then the
orange is uh transport to defive level
of care. Um so of course we want to we
want to pull away from the revolving
door of the emergency department and we
want to continue to provide
transportation to a definitive level of
care. This could be like um peak
behavioral health. This could be um MC
Valley Hospital. This could be the
crisis triage center. or this might be a
family member that's supportive and
capable of meeting their needs at that
time.
So we looked at police um Los Cusus
Police Department, Los Cusus Fire
Department and AMR when that was going
on. So again FY26 the first quarter is
the last um time that we looked at this
um and these are the times the
percentage of times that we have
canceled PD um which is typically
anywhere between 30 to 50% of the time.
Um there's been times where we have
asked uh you know we've kind of talked
with PD about like you know it was
appropriate for them to like to move on
and they're like no we're going to keep
an eye on you for a little bit longer.
Um and so um that's kind of the
relationship that we have on scene.
Likewise with fire. Um but we kind of
see like the last two quarters it was
pretty much like I think they were
getting a lot more comfortable with um
um that disposing
um in those situations.
Um this is kind of like my workload. So
any I get anywhere between like 10 to 30
um referrals a month by a quarter.
It's manageable.
Um relevant data. So time on task is 1
hour and 18 minutes per call in FY25. Uh
this is a decrease of 40 minutes
year-over-year.
Um the mean emergency department or
detention diversion was 72.9%.
Uh these are folks who would have
otherwise been transported to an
emergency department or detention center
had there not been a light unit on
scene.
Um recidivism 89.9% did not have a
subsequent 99 911 call.
Um and then response to mental health
crisis was 58.2%.
This was 9 percentage points higher than
the previous year. Um
and so super excited about that
increase.
Okay. So, I also want to briefly talk
about the contribution to the national
discussion. In March 2022, um we um sat
on a panel discussion with mobile
integrated health, the opioid overdose
outreach program and the assisted
outpatient treatment program through
Donana County. Um that was done in
Albuquerque.
Um we did two presentations in Spokane,
Washington. Um Allison Stoner um did a
presentation on battling the blues and
Mike Torres did a presentation on the
evolution of a social medic. So this is
the idea that a paramedic can
pivot and become have that social worker
mindset in the field. Super super
exciting. Um
presented n that was a panel discussion
navigating the crisis continue of 988.
He was the only one from 911 at that
that at that conference. Um and then the
presentation at FRRI that I think Chief
Smith was on that one. Um I did a poster
presentation in Tampa and then this
summer we did you're grounded. At least
we hope you are. It was a it was a first
responder. Come on. This was a joke. And
then we got approved for we got accepted
to present in Dallas uh next summer.
We're using data to drive partnerships
and improve child and teen mental health
insights from Los Chris's fire
department mobile crisis team. This is a
paper Mindy and I were working on um
from the work that we did with that
two-year uh retro study. And then Mindy
has a presentation for NASW pending for
Washington DC
future growth. Um we have the clinical
supervisor position that started in
October 2025.
um the light social worker the light
social worker overtime that was approved
for FY2026.
This is going to allow us to expand our
um times and service. Um so this is
going to really increase the amount of
calls that were able to go on. So thank
you for that. Um light MIH headquarters
fully funded through HUD and legislative
funds. Um community partnerships and
data sharing is in process. So, we're
continuing to um take the data that
we've um done over the last few years,
share with the community and get more
feedback so we can improve our programs
and it's really exciting.
Cool. And I'll stand for questions.
All right. Thanks, Wes. Appreciate it.
Uh Councelor Grant,
thank you, Mayor. Thank you so much. Um
I feel like any slide in this
presentation is just clear justification
for you know both celebrating this
program and expanding it. But can you
jump back to slide 18 for me please?
Perfect. Um so I think this is this is
just such a great overview of
how well this program is doing but also
how much more we could use it. So,
you're responding to 58.2% of all mental
health crisis calls in the 911 system
with a goal of 90%. But when we look at
bullet point one, average time on task
of 1 hour and 18 minutes per call, and
that's that's amazing because that's the
time it takes to successfully engage
with these patients. But it also shows
even when a light unit is available, if
they are with they're with a patient,
they're going to be there for a while.
And if we're going to get that fourth
bullet point up, and I really appreciate
you pointing out the progress that's
being made, um, we just we just need
more of you. And, um, I just pointing
out since my time here is fast fast. I
know every time I say this, everyone's
like, "Oh, you make it sound like you're
terminal or something." But no, just
because my my council term is about to
be over, so I'm it's not anything deeper
than that. Um, you know, and I again, I
don't think I have to convince anyone on
this DAS or the folks who will be
joining us in the future about how
important this program is, but I just
wanted to call out this one in
particular. And again, thank you all so
much for all that you do. Thank you,
Mayor.
Councelor Car.
Thank you. Yes, I echo um
the fading councelor Grahams. No, you're
not fading. I'm just kidding. Uh
gratitude and appreciation for this both
the way that you've analyzed it. I
appreciate the nerding out. So, I see
you using your data. Um, so I appreciate
you all for for that and for the
essential work that you do in the
community, which is actually um
important to talk about, but but the
data is the least important part of what
you all do, I think, in terms of
contributing to things. I'm curious, I'm
actually sort of asking for you to
speculate a little bit, which I know no
one ever likes to do when they're doing
these presentations, or talk a little
bit about the horizon. You sort of
alluded to some of the horizon, but I'm
curious if you have a sense of two
different variables that I think really
relate to your work. One is the
frequency with which you're have these
calls are coming in, if that's trending
in any direction. Um and then
secondarily the
providers or lack thereof that exists to
um do follow up on almost any version of
of both MIH's and lights work requires a
very robust network of of people to to
be sort of handing people off to and
understanding how that works. And I'm
curious if you can talk about, again,
this is speculative. This is not, you
know, I'm not asking you to give a full
epidemiological study, although I would
love that and support it. Just just
what's your sense of both of those
things in terms of how it relates to
this work and the future of of both NIH
and light.
Mr. Mayor, councelor Karan. Uh, thank
you. Um,
so we work with a lot of other agencies
including Haida. um DEA and PD obviously
um and we were in a a lot of
conversations with a lot of community
stakeholders um like the LC3 Behavioral
Collaborative um like and so we're
constantly being educated on trends not
just in um numbers of like frequency of
calls but like what what are
contributing factors that are going to
lead to more calls. Um so this may be a
change in policy, this could be change
in um administration, could be change in
um
there's a lot of things. Um
[clears throat] so we we is we we're
there's nothing that we're really able
to like track and trend outside of like
uh like basic like um volume statistics.
I I guess part of the reason I asked
this is because sometimes when people
become more aware of something they end
up calling more, right? like so if the
trend is to increasing numbers whatever
the origin of that is or if fewer people
are calling right so I guess those are
the kinds of things that I I would be
curious to know um and you might not be
able to say that but but I think what
you're getting at is it's too
complicated to make any uh speculative
pronouncements about what I'm asking
yes ma'am yeah maybe more um
I have some ideas. Let let me talk to my
chief and I'll have him get back with
you.
Um but as far as a lack of providers, um
I do appreciate that you do that you do
appreciate that um there is a positive
of providers in our community. Um but a
lot of what we do it's not what you
know, it's who you know. Um, and that's
why this community engagement and
reaching out to folks and like kind of
like sharing our experience with like
mental health crises and um, getting
feedback from providers. You're learn
we're learning all kinds of different
other programs that may be appropriate
for especially like youth. Um, when
Mandy and I were going through this
research, we were able to identify all
different kinds of like avenues and like
um,
strategies to uh, get uh, children
connected with resources. So it's it's
what you know or who you know rather
than what you know.
Awesome. Thank you. I guess the the
danger of knowing a lot of people is
that you get better at your job and then
more people call you and then there's
more demand. So just to just to
speculate myself, I think you all are in
danger of becoming both really ever
better at your jobs and ever more demand
in demand. So I I sense that that's on
the horizon of of the the future of
these programs. though which you have
contributed to today for better or
worse. So, thank you again for for
chatting. But I do hope that you'll
consider, you know, when it comes to
things like collaborations, if there are
any ways that we can support those or if
there are trends that are happening in
the community. Um because we've heard
distally of things
ending, right? Um things in the
community resources that have existed
that that are becoming fewer and fewer,
right, in in number. Um and even as like
these are all very downstream things
even like the professionalization of
social work right and ability to get
your loans reimburseed those things
affect every aspect of your job right
and so as you sense trends that we can
help offset or contribute to
overcoming those humps or or addressing
things that that you all are affecting I
hope you'll you'll let us know what you
need as ever Please. Thank you,
Mayor Pro.
Thank you. Um, thank you so much, Wes,
for your presentation. You know, you're
a wonderful presenter. I know we were on
a panel a few months ago and you're very
nervous. I don't know why you would be.
You're you're very great. So, just have
to say that. Um,
I couple of
notes, just a couple of thoughts and
then a couple of questions for you. You
know, I wanted to circle back to
something you said in the MH
presentation about um transportation not
having a social services department yet
our bus drivers being incredibly attuned
to their customers. I thought um that
was really beautiful and I'm I'm really
glad you put that into your presentation
because again the data and then that's
very important like that is how we
should be creating policy and
programming and funding and there are
some things that the data doesn't
capture and so I just really want wanted
to express my gratitude for that because
I think there are you know little
miracles and magic happening all over
the city all of the time and we keep
hearing that from our bus drivers. So
pre thank you for noting that. Um I you
know these two presentations for me just
continue to um affirm
um just the belief that we should always
be pairing the right first responder to
the right emergency and you know these
two programs are the epito epitome of
that right and you know for a long time
I also um have heard that we should not
have a co-response model for light uh
through the 911 system right like that
that is some of the models across the
country, right? And um I used to believe
that too until I went on a ride along
and got to sit and talk with the folks
that are doing the actual work and who
have said I don't know that that's
necessarily something we needed. We've
seen like a lot of really positive
things come out being out of the 911 uh
program. Like for example, we've you
know the social workers on the light
team have seen a police officer like
regulate themselves in the middle of a
scene and again things that the data
doesn't capture, right? And so I just um
I think it's so important for all of us
for us up here to just continue to be in
conversation with all of you
here for sure, but like just directly
come to you all for um for information
about how we we can support the
programming and not make demands that
perhaps um isn't what you want to see.
And so I just I just want to note that
because I think it's incredibly
important. Um just a couple of questions
I have. Um when you talked about 988
I'm I am curious what kind of and maybe
this is in the future or you're already
working on it like what kind of data are
you getting from MVDA and from 988 to
because I'm so curious about what you
said in terms of you know the escalation
988 calls can get escalated to 911. I am
curious you said that's only happened
six times in the last year. That's
that's really interesting to me right
like I maybe that's a good thing. I'm
hoping I am just I would be more curious
to learn about that. Um, and that might
not be from you. I guess that might be
from Merva next time we see them as
well. But I I do think that's really
important. And then well, I'll stop
there. I don't know if there's anything
you wanted to add to that, Wes.
Mr. Mayor, councelor V, Mayor Prom, I
can get you in contact with the 988
folks that we work with and they're a
great resource.
Yeah, that'd be great. Thank you so
much. And then on page 16, I think just
so that I'm clear, you talked about the
cancelled that is. So, for example,
um LCPD can that's you arrived to the
scene at with LCPD
100% of the time. So, and you're saying
that these are the times where you said,
"Okay, LCPD, you can go." And LCPD was
like, "Yep, that's okay." Same thing
with fire. I imagine like ambulance or
the entire apparatus has shown up and
then you said nope everything's good.
Same thing with AMR or ambulance service
that they showed up and then you canled
it or am I getting that right
Mr. Mayor Madam Protown?
So um I want to say that sometimes even
AMR will be canceled on route.
Okay.
Um
like fire can be canceled on route. Um
but typically um PD is always establish
security.
Okay. I was just curious. Thank you so
much. Yep. No, that makes sense. Thank
you. And then my last question was I
think for Kyle. Um I am curious about or
public works. I am Kyle interested about
the update to the building and where we
are. Um in terms of I know we have full
funding and I am I would love an update
on what's next.
I'm so sorry.
Jimmy, I'm so sorry. Not Kyle.
[laughter]
Jimmy Moreno, public works for the
record.
Um, mayor uh mayor Tim Beno uh we are
approximately 90% on the design for the
building. Uh also the plans are
currently in review with Shipo which is
a state historic preservation office. uh
since the old fire station 3 is greater
than 50 years and because we have a HUD
uh grant we have to go through that
process. So um we're hoping to get some
resolution on that by the first quarter
in uh in 26. So uh but the design is
going well. We're almost completed with
that and then we'll move forward
accordingly.
That's a that's great to hear. And then
Jimmy um just to make sure we're you're
connecting with the light and MIH team
for like you know their needs and you
know making this
that is correct the sorry mayor mayor
partic that is correct we uh our team
coordinates with them with our user
departments make sure that all their
needs are met in the design and
construction.
Awesome. Thank you so much. I appreciate
it. Um those are all my questions.
Thanks again, uh, Wes, and to to all of
you for all you do.
All right. Well, thank you for that,
Wes. Thanks. Uh, as you said, uh, super
exciting. I think you said it several
times. So, a lot of exciting news, a lot
of growth, and and I share that with
councelor Karan that, um, you know, as
as you become more known and the great
work that you do, you become more in
demand. And it is true. But the beauty
of all this is that this started with
911 calls. So people can always call 911
and still get the fire department and
police department out there for their
for their needs. But thank you for all
your work. We really appreciate the
presentation and the update.
So, next on the agenda, 2.3, legislative
policies,
and I believe uh Larry Haran, is he on?
I'm sorry, mayor. I forgot to mention
that he had a family emergency, so he
wasn't able to jump on.
Okay, no problem.
Mayor, city council, Christina Rivera,
your city clerk. So today we have
legislative p policies that we're
advocating for in the upcoming
legislative session. This presentation
will be in multiple parts given by
multiple departments with their policies
and then we'll open it up at the end for
questions. And so first up today is the
airport and we'll bring up Andy Hume.
Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor and
counselors. Good to see you all today.
My name is Andy Hume, and I have the
privilege of serving as director for our
airport.
Uh the policy that I want to just touch
on a little bit this afternoon is the
rural air service enhancement grant
program. Uh this was a program that was
passed by the legislature in 2022.
Uh, and it's modeled very much after the
essential air service program that is
run by the FAA. It [snorts] provides
financial support for passenger air
service and in our case just for the
state of New Mexico.
Right now, we have our passenger air
service uh between Los Cusus and
Albuquerque. Uh, and very soon we're
looking to transition uh our service uh
from Albuquerque to Phoenix. So, we'll
be looking forward to that in the very
near future. Um um uh over the course of
the past uh three four years uh we have
received financial support through this
grant program. Uh in our first two-year
cycle, we received $3.5 million total uh
with a 10% match that you see there. uh
over the past two years. And there'll be
a a uh a grant uh application, a grant
award coming to you all uh the first
part of next month. Uh we received $1
million
uh in 2025 and again in 2026.
I'll come back to the reason why the
difference in funding in just a little
bit.
um in the as I noted uh certainly the
there is financial support from the New
Mexico Department of Transportation
through the state legislature. Um but
there's also a match that is required.
Uh up to this point we have had an
ongoing uh agreement with New Mexico DOT
that has been amended and that original
uh contract has been with a match of
10%. for future contracts, we may see
that match go up to 20% uh should we
continue to participate in this program.
So, what benefits have we been seeing in
this uh program? Well, uh I've had a
chance to talk with some various folks
and and also uh [snorts] we've done some
surveys and uh really there's a wide
variety of individuals who participate
in this service and so um I just have a
a quick list of of individuals who have
participated. I've actually had a chance
to talk with some folks. Uh I myself
have taken the flight a number of times
uh and uh particularly when I'm going
north to um advocate on behalf of this
program to our legislators and uh
actually had a chance to talk with folks
who use it uh to see their family more
often for instance uh when they uh with
their family members that live in
Albuquerque uh and they live here. So, a
wide variety of reasons why. And this
provides just an additional method of
transportation. And let me tell you, it
really beats a 3 and a half hour drive
uh from here to Albuquerque.
So, from the policy perspective, the
requests and recommendations that we're
looking for, uh number one is to
continue to provide the program in the
first place. um between the financial
support that's provided and the ticket
price really we see that this without
the program the the uh or without the
financial support the program is not
sustainable and I'll provide you with
just a really quick example right now
ticket prices uh one way from here to
Albuquerque are $95
without the financial support one-way
ticket prices are about $750
So that's really not sustainable given
the size of the aircraft that we use. If
we had a larger aircraft flying, we
could probably get sustainable service,
but for right now, without that
financial support, the the air service
is not sustainable right now.
Second, we are looking for a multi-year
stable funding source. As [snorts] you
can see, the first uh the first source
was a two-year source. Uh remember uh
there was a two-year funding stream, 3.5
million. Uh that allowed us to get the
program, pun intended, off the ground,
and really allowed us to uh find have
some stability uh and see how our
metrics were doing for the first couple
of years.
Since then, it's been a year-over-year
program, and air service really needs
planning from one year to the next and
scheduling. So, making sure that the
pilot schedules are appropriate and
especially if we're looking to change
the routes. Um, that requires looking at
the the entire routing uh not just in
New Mexico, but through connecting
through Phoenix and their other uh
routing systems. So, a year-over-year
program really hampers that scheduling
and planning. So, we would like the
state to consider a multi-year stable uh
funding stream so that that type of
planning and scheduling can be done.
The other request that we have is to
establish a methodology for fund
distribution. You'll also notice from
the previous slide that we had $3.5
million
uh for our first two years, but then
that went down to only $1 million for
the last two years. Um there really is
no rhyme or reason to this point.
There's no clear methodology as to how
the funding is being distributed.
uh some some cities get more funding
than others, but it's not really clear
how that methodology is put forward. So,
uh we're asking that there's a much
clearer methodology that that is
presented through this through the
policy. Um u with that, Mr. Chair,
that's my presentation and I'm going to
turn over to uh Natalie uh for her
presentation on housing.
Thank you, Andy. Natalie Green for the
record, your housing administrator. Um
so we are tracking a number of policy
bills. Uh some of them are a little
ambitious. We're uncertain if they'll
actually make the call. Um the first is
a source of income. So the city of Los
Cusus already has a source of income
discrimination within our code. So we're
supporting the statewide um bill.
There's also eviction ceiling which will
come um we anticipate that also coming
this section. There's also a consumer
protection bill for mobile home parks.
So, um, and that helps with some of the
corporations buying out mobile home
parks, raising prices, evicting tenants,
and not um giving them the opportunity
to to potentially co-op and purchase
their own. Uh, the executive is also
pushing uh residential uses in
commercial zones. So, I I anticipate
that this one will be successful in
making the call sheet since it's um
being run by the office of the governor.
Um this doesn't impact the city of Los
Cusus since Realize already allows that.
Um but this would impact the rest of the
state. Um the biggest things that we're
supporting and following is
appropriation bills. So Housing New
Mexico has two uh bills that are moving
forward. The first is to fund the New
Mexico Housing Trust Fund. That is gap
financing for low-income housing tax
credit projects. And so [snorts] uh with
the increase at the federal level, they
anticipate needing an increase at the
state level to have that gap funding.
They're also asking for 500,000 for
implementation of the affordable housing
act. Um that helps local governments uh
create their plans and implement their
affordable housing plans. And then the
biggest ask is through the office of
housing. They are pushing a multi-year
stable funding for both affordable
housing and homelessness. So they're
looking for a three to fiveyear fund
anywhere from four to 500 million. Some
would be for affordable housing and then
a small set aside would be for
homelessness programs. Um this is
particularly particularly important
because of the continuum care no which
hot off the presses I just found out an
hour ago that it's been rescended by the
federal government. So that's um some
good news for now. Um, but we'll
continue to monitor this and uh we'll
still be advocating for that flexible
funding source for homelessness in the
event um additional um problematic nos
come out around continuum of care
funding. In terms of benefits, it
increases our resources to both build
and preserve affordable housing. It'll
meet some critical funding gaps for
affordable housing projects. It'll
provide a more flexible, sustainable
funding source for homelessness
response, which in turn reduces some of
the needs for emergency response.
Um, it'll increase our statewide
capacity um especially as federal
housing programs and homelessness uh
funding becomes uncertain and then it
advances our priorities around
neighborhood revitalization. Um, so with
that, I'll pass the presentation on to
Chief Story.
Good afternoon, Mayor Council. Jeremy
Story, police chief.
I'm going to talk about three issues.
The first two probably are are nothing
new. These are things I've been talking
about really since I was interim chief.
The third one is probably something
that's new. The first is juvenile crime.
And unfortunately, we've seen this uh
throughout my time as chief, but
especially this year with Young Park and
then the most recent homicide. Kind of
highlight the importance of this. We've
seen just the level of violence go up in
the last few years and if you look at
class three citations you actually see
it kind of trending down but you see the
severity of the crimes that are
committed actually going up. There are
far too many repeat offenders who are
juveniles and this is a snapshot from
earlier in the year I believe around
midyear but we have six juveniles in Los
Cusus who have 11 or more arrests and we
have 37 between six and 10. And the
average person when you ask them either
hasn't been arrested or maybe they
forgot to pay a ticket and got a warrant
or a DWI. But to have six or more
arrests as a juvenile should be a red
flag. It's been really challenging to
address these because of the current
mechanisms that we have. We don't have a
really good way to intervene and stop,
especially as it escalates until that
child commits first-degree murder and
then they're charged as an adult and
it's kind of intervention, but the goal
of course is to do that intervene before
it gets to that point. This year we've
had four juveniles who have been charged
with first-degree murder.
kind of along the same vein, which is
repeat offenders or frequent offenders
in general.
And when you look at evidence-based
policing, there's kind of two main
umbrellas. You have kind of placebased
or hotspot policing, and then you have
the fact that there's a certain group of
people, which tends to be a very small
percentage that commit a
disproportionate amount of crime. And we
can call them repeat offenders, frequent
offenders, familiar faces, but that is
something that we've struggled with here
as well as really everywhere. Our
failure to prevent or probably better
said to mitigate recidivism has resulted
in a lot of damage to our community. our
our businesses, our citizens, and
especially our victims. And just one
area is pre-trial detention. Now,
pre-trial, even if we changed it, it
would not fix this because there's a
number of issues at play that are
resulting in these numbers that I'm
going to show you here, just as an
example. If you look at Donena County,
we have three or more or three people
who have over 100 arrests, 101 or more
arrests. We have eight people who have
76 to 100 arrests, 19 people who have 60
to 75, and 46 people who have 50 to 59
arrests. Now, if you go 40 to 49 or 30
to 39, that number continues to swell
drastically. And again, going back to
what I said earlier, most people either
haven't been arrested or maybe made a
mistake or two in their life, but to
have this many people with 50 or more
arrest should be a red flag.
And then the final issue I want to
highlight, this one is probably new, is
um to modernize law enforcement train.
There's several bills that are kind of
flown around that are draft bills.
Senator Messes who's vice chair of
Senate Judiciary kind of took this task
on but there's other people who have
drafted proposed bills or model bills
and what they're trying to do is take
the system that we have which is built
up over decades and decades. So what's
happened is the legislature there's a an
issue that's come up and they've kind of
mandated training let's say in the 60s
or 70s and then in the 80s they've done
that in the 90s all the way until a
couple years ago and so you have all
these different requirements that are in
different places in statute or the New
Mexico administrative code that have
stacked on each other and to the point
now where I believe it's 51 hours of
mandatory training in the 2-year cycle
and at the same time law enforcement is
required to do 40 hours of in service.
So now the mandates are are higher and
I'm not even advocating to lower that.
actually think we need to do more
training than that. But what's happened
is it's made it very difficult for the
law enforcement standards and training
council which the legislature enacted a
few years ago to actually do their job.
So what the bill does different versions
do different things. Essentially they're
trying to put the power in the hands of
the council to create both uh
requirements and curriculum to be more
flexible. So if something comes up,
we're not dealing with something that
was important 30 years ago but may not
be relevant now, but they can address AI
and ethics and law enforcement. That's
something that's coming up. We need to
do a training on that. They can develop
the curriculum and make the mandate now,
which they don't really have the power
to do that.
That is all I have at this time. I'll
call up the quality of life director,
Carol Bray.
Thank you, Chief Story. Good afternoon,
mayor and council. Carol Bray, director
of the quality of life department, and
I'm here to uh request your support for
uh something that actually happens every
two years uh through the legislature,
but you may or may not be aware of this,
and this is the uh New Mexico library
geo bond. Uh there will be another one
in 2026. This is something that uh
happens uh as part of the general
obligation bonds bill and that is
developed by the legislative finance
committee every two years. that includes
um all types of libraries including
public libraries, academic institutions,
senior centers as well. So our senior
center process through which we get
funding for projects like the uh Mson
Center edition and the Sage Cafe
edition, our meals on wheels vehicles,
those also come out of this bill for
another fun fact. So uh this bill uh for
the library geo bond is supported by the
New Mexico library association. every
year they work closely with with
legislators to uh formulate this bill
and uh it has been approved by the
voters for the last 22 years. So we hope
it will continue to have that great
record. Uh and uh this for this coming
session the New Mexico Library
Association has requested an increase
from 19 million to $24 million for
libraries which would also uh benefit
our uh libraries here in Los Cusus. And
here's uh what the local impact is.
Basically, uh, public libraries received
supplemental funding based on our
population. Uh, Las Cusus public
libraries received about 466,000 in
2022. We're expected to receive about
500,000 in 2024. And then if this $24
million increase were approved, we would
receive uh $554,800
roughly uh from that increase. funds
have been used to enhance many of our
popular resources, our e resources, our
digital books like Hoopla and Libby
which I know some of you are familiar
with uh to purchase uh traditional
books, print materials, upgrade library
furnishings and equipment. We cannot use
these funds for construction or staffing
but we do use them to leverage our
construction projects. So for example,
Brandan Library would be able to
purchase furnishings and equipment with
this funding for an expanded uh for an
expanded facility. Uh basically what
NMLA told me is that since this bill is
already under development, we're
requesting your support. Uh and I want
to let our legislators know how much we
appreciate these funds uh because this
will go out of the legislature to the
voters for approval. So I want to make
that clear that this is a bond issue
that goes next to the voters, but it it
originates with the legislature and also
how essential these funds are to library
service in Los Cusus. And uh I will now
uh move to questions and we all will
stand for questions. I'll turn things
back over to Christine. Thank you.
All right. Thank you, Christine. Um
Council Grant,
thank you. Uh yeah, not delving into the
any of the individual items yet, but
just for people listening and perhaps
like me, you're like, "Wait, didn't we
just do this last week?" So, um I feel
like some explanation is would be
helpful. Um, and Natalie actually, not
to Christine, you're always you're
always amazing and anyone can feel this,
but Natalie actually used some
vocabulary when you said the governor is
putting it on the call. So, I don't know
if anyone would like to explain. Yes,
this is a 30-day budget only session.
However, the governor has powers.
Go for it.
Correct. Mayor Councelor Graham, you are
correct. the governor can bring certain
policies forward. I know the public
safety ones are big on her list. Um,
again, of course, there's no guarantee
that they'll be passed, but she does
have that prerogative to bring certain
ones forward, and public safety is one
of her big ones. So,
okay, great. But, yeah, just kind of
pointing out that this is an evolving
situation. Um, you know, as Natalie also
mentioned, things are changing as we
speak. And we're also starting to see,
you know, the hints are the hints are
out there. There's, you know, additional
um, you know, I've been made aware of
some potential gun safety legislation
emerging from some legislators in
Albuquerque looking at uh, gun
dealerships. Um, I'm going to share that
with you, Christine, so you can share
with the larger council. But yeah, just
to say this was not um this was not like
a ball drop from last week, just that
this is constantly emerging and is
largely tied to powers vested in the
governor
themselves.
Correct. And mayor and councelor Graham
just want to mention too that we won't
see a lot of these policies until
January when they first drop. So we
don't even know what they're really
going to look like at this point.
Right. Yeah. No, we're in speculation
mode. that. Thank you.
Thank you, uh, Mayor Pro.
Thanks, Mayor. Thank you, Christine. And
thanks to the staff for, um, coming back
a week after we had this this
conversation about legislative
priorities
um, at last week's regular meeting where
we voted on this. I think, you know, I
think it's important we have this
conversation because even though we
really are trying to move away from
endorsing any one particular piece of
legislation given the feedback and
advice we've gotten from Larry who
literally does this for a living, right,
in terms of how one piece of legislation
can look a certain way the first day of
session and completely different by the
30 days. So, we're, you know, trying to
do more umbrella type of um sort of
advocacy or support, if you will, like
housing, public safety, and especially
because the 30-day is even more, I don't
say volatile, but certainly volatile
than the 60-day. So, um I do think that
it's important we're having this
conversation. I think for me what felt
really concerning last week was that we
voted on this big sort of um
uh item on legislative priorities. And
what I saw on social media after was
that Chief Story had uh meeting with the
citizen group specifically about his own
legislative priorities. And to me that
felt and I've expressed my concern to
both chief and econ about this but
wanted to name it publicly because
that's the work we do. And I think it's
important that we are aligned as a city
that we are on the same page and even
when we're not that we're able to have
public conversations about some of these
things. I think for me what it
perhaps it wasn't intentional but it the
impact it had of that decision was that
the city council does not support chief
story and public safety policies and to
me that feels in this moment in time
detrimental to the kind of trust that
we're trying to build with our community
to the kind of important work that we're
trying to move forward in our community
and you know I think especially when it
comes to public safy safety. I feel like
there continues to be a rift between
council and LCPD and I hope that that's
not true. I hope that that's just what
I'm sort of looking from the inside out
and you know as we see collaboration
with um the Trump administration even
though the majority of this council is
really trying to push back on that even
if it's immigration quite frankly I feel
like it's a lot of things because the
you know Trump administration has really
set a tone that has said we're going to
be high on cruelty and low on competence
when it comes to navigating issues of
immigration iss issues of homelessness
and
I I just want us
to better navigate these public
conversations together um because
that's how we're going to get important
work done and I just was I just felt
very discouraged by that last week and
certainly hope that um in the future we
can just n plan be better especially
because I think for Larry Larry doesn't
work for one particular staff member,
right? Larry works for the city and I
want to understand when someone asks me
about some of these priorities, I want
to be able to feel like I know what I'm
talking about and because I should.
That's my job. And so I just I want to
note that I you can respond if you wish.
You don't have to. You can if you want
to. I just think it's important that um
you know there's going to be criticism
no matter what. Whether we as electeds
or as members of the city are fueling to
that or not really is the question here
and I would prefer for us not to be and
to show a better more united front
especially when it comes to the issues
that are most challenging and um facing
our city. So thanks Christine. Um I
um whether staff go through you
Christina would like to just request as
soon as we know what is on the
governor's call um for staff to be able
to tell you and then you tell us um just
so that we're you know updated as as we
head into our advocacy day.
Thank you.
Mayor Counselor Beno I will be working
very closely with Larry. I he's already
on it. He'll be starting to review the
bills as they drop in January and then
reporting back to me on which ones will
um fit into our priorities and then I
will be reporting that out to everybody.
City manager, you wanted to go ahead
respond.
Thank you, Mayor Enriquez, Mayor Prom.
Thank you so much. Uh city council, uh
city manager for those listening in. Uh,
thank you so much, Mayor Prom, for
speaking to it. I I I definitely want to
be transparent. This isn't on any of the
the staff as as you and Councelor Graham
and all city council uh are very aware
this came before you as legislative
priorities and policies and this wasn't
on there. Typically what we do is when
this comes before council, we do our
best to get them collectively um to get
the policies and uh our ICIP together on
the same agenda item and it did not
happen. Um and I'll I'll I'll take that
as a city manager. This is not anything
that any of the staff today planned or
intentionally. Uh but this is something
that we typically do historically and
that one is on me. It wasn't intentional
by um any of the staff here today. Uh
but I appreciate you um bringing this
forward and this is something moving
forward that we will um bring together
and as a as one agenda item and as you
mentioned to show a unit a united front
on this. It's very important uh as you
mentioned. So this is not something uh
that I uh that I did on purpose. Um, but
I I appreciate you bringing this forward
because I know you you want to make sure
that it's transparent for everyone
watching as well. Uh, and we appreciate
uh the grace that you and council has uh
has has had on this topic uh on these
various policies and we appreciate you
bringing forward to the public. Thank
you, Mayor Bon and Mayor. That's all.
Okay. Thank you, Connie. Anyone else?
[clears throat]
Yeah. I just I just want to say that we
understand that it's a 30-day session
and it's mostly financial and these are
some of the things that the governor
could call. So, we want to make sure
that we are aligned with that. We just
uh witnessed a presentation earlier on
the mobile integrated health program and
the success and that all started with uh
repeated uh individuals, repeat
offenders of utilizing the 911 system.
So, we had to be proactive in order to
make a difference in our community. And
I believe that what Chief Story is
presenting with the repeat offenders is
in line with being proactive instead of
reactive. And we have to be ready when
the governor calls to be able to discuss
this and to say as a mayor and council
from Los Cruus, we support this because
we want to see a difference made just
like we saw with the MIH and with
housing the same way. And Carol, thank
you for bringing that up. With the geo
bond, it is important that we we we are
uh in the forefront of it and and being
able to take advantage of those. Uh the
question I had for Andy was um you know
I totally agree with it creating
services for uh our residents and
opportunities for our businesses but do
you do you have any numbers since 2023
or what is the demand for for these type
of flights?
Uh Mr. Mayor uh we have been tracking
our wrership uh and what are called load
factors. I don't have the numbers with
me, but I can I have them available and
I can send them to you this afternoon.
Okay. Thank you, Andy. Appreciate it.
All right. Thank you. I think that was
it.
Thank you.
Look for a motion to adjourn.
So moved by Florus.
Second.
This is on a motion to adjourn the
meeting. Councelor McClair. Yes.
Councelor Matise.
Yes.
Councelor Graham.
Yes.
Councelor Karan.
Yes.
Councelor Flores.
Yes.
Councelor Beno.
Yes.
Mayor.
Yes.
Thank you.