Public Works and Utilities Committee Mon, Feb 2, 2026 · Public Works and Utilities Committee https://santafeminutes.space/meeting/960 == Executive Summary == The Public Works and Utilities Committee held a meeting where they welcomed new committee member Councilor Bamonte. The main highlight was the recognition of Marcos Armijo from the Wastewater Management Division as the Employee of the Month for December 2025, praising his dedication and professionalism, especially in handling difficult situations. Mr. Armijo will receive a day of administrative leave for his achievement. The committee also approved the meeting agenda and a consent agenda unanimously. No public comments were made during the meeting. Committee members were asked to submit requests for policy-influencing presentations to the Chair, and staff were tasked with preparing these presentations. == Key Decisions == - Approved the meeting agenda unanimously. - Approved the consent agenda unanimously via roll call vote. == Motions & Votes == - Approval of Agenda — Passed unanimously - Approval of Consent Agenda — Passed unanimously via roll call vote == Public Comment == No public comment period. == Topics == - Employee of the Month Recognition - Wastewater Management Operations - Committee Member Welcome - Approval of Agenda - Approval of Consent Agenda - Public Comment - Future Meeting Presentations - Meeting Logistics and Schedule - Matters from Staff - Matters from Committee - Matters from Chair == Full Transcript == We are live. Thank you so much. I call to order the Public Works and Utilities Committee. It is Monday, February 2nd, and it is now 5:01. Could I get a roll call, please? Yes. Councilor Chavez, Here. Councilor Barrett, Here. Councilor Bamonte, Here. Councilor Fagali, Here. And Councilor Faulkner, Here. All right, you have a quorum. Thank you, sir. And welcome to Councilor Bamonte, who's joining our committee. Welcome. Next is approval of the agenda. Are there any changes from staff? No changes from staff. Could I get a motion, please? I'll make it happen. Motion to approve the agenda. Second. I have a motion and I have a second. All those in favor signify by saying, "Aye." Any opposed? See none. Motion passes. Next is approval of the consent agenda. There were no items pulled. Can I just confirm that with staff? Correct. Are there any items that need to be pulled by committee members? There will be no staff, but any items pulled? All right. Can I get a motion, please? Motion approved. Second. I have a motion and I have a second. Could I get a roll call vote, please? Yes. Councilor Chavez, Yes. Councilor Barrett, Yes. Councilor Bamonte, Yes. Councilor Fagali, Yes. And Councilor Faulkner, Yes. Motion passes. Thank you. We have public comment next. Is there anyone in chambers that would like to come up and speak with us today? All right, I see nobody. We're going to move forward to presentation. And it's a good one. We have Public Utilities Department Employee of the Month for December 2025. Marcos Armijo, Wastewater Management Division, and Michael Doer, Wastewater Management Division Director, will be here to present this award. All yours, sir. Good evening, Public Works and Utilities Committee. I would like to introduce the Employee of the Month for the Public Utilities Department, Marcos Armijo. Marcos has been with the city, well, with Wastewater Management for about seven years now. He started in 2019, and he keeps the collection system flowing. They're basically, they are the ones that keep us receiving all of the septage at the wastewater plant. Marcos leads a crew of staff through day-to-day operations, and he is also on the 24-hour on-call rotations, which means he does have to show up anytime there are overflows at 3:00 in the morning at someone's house. So the first sight and the first thing going on in these really difficult situations is that face showing up at your door, seeing what the real issue is and what's going on. So you can imagine, it's really stressful for them also, just showing up to the homes, and everybody is already in a pretty stressful situation with an overflow. So it's really great to have operators that can show up to the homes and talk through and explain. It's not something that anybody wanted, but they're going to be there to hear the problem and take care of it. And it takes a lot. They're very, they're very good people that go out and take care of that. It's very hard to walk into that situation or even be dealing with that situation. But his supervisors, they nominated him because of his can-do attitude and his attention to detail. You can already tell right now, just from saying this, of talking about sewer overflows. I've actually personally had customers call in and say that they were very thankful that he is such a professional person and that he has taken every, every one of their questions into account and had answers for them. So, I would like to, at least for me personally, say, "Congratulations." This is, I'm very proud that you were nominated for this. Time for any questions or anything if anybody has any. Right. We'll go to comments from the committee. Are there any comments from the committee? Yes. Congratulations. Thank you for, you know, coming down and letting us recognize your work. Thank you. Anyone else? Yes. Councilor Bamonte. Congratulations and thank you very much for your service. Anyone else? Councilor Faulkner. Congratulations and thank you for your service. Real original. Just kidding. I aim to please, Chair. Any others? Just thanks. It sounds like you have a really tough job and you're doing a great job, and your bosses recognize that. So, thanks so much. Good job. Just kidding. Yeah, Marcos, thank you for your job. I think that, well, all of our city staff, I don't think people realize that the city stops functioning if we don't have you. And so you showing up at all hours of the day when the community needs you is a larger effort than people probably realize. So I just want to thank you for your effort. And anytime we have staff here to celebrate, we ask that you come through, shake our hands. Don't shake mine, I'm getting a cold, but I would love to shake your hand eventually to thank you. But please know I'm very appreciative of your work. We see you. We know that Santa Fe is nothing without you. So please come and we could get a handshake of thanks. And Chair, if I might add, Marcos gets a day of administrative leave in recognition for his hard work and his being awarded Employee of the Month for the Public Utilities Department as a whole for November of 2025. It's amazing. Good job. So he can take care of all of his honeydews. Yeah. Thank you so much, and thank you, Director, for presenting this to us today. Thank you. All right. We always like that they're really good at celebrating staff. Okay. Next is matters from staff. No matters from staff, Chair. Mr. Roach. No matters from staff. All right. No matters all around. Okay. And matters from committee. No matters from committee. Matters from Chair are, oh, matters from Chair. Actually, I did send an email to each of you. I didn't, I will get one to you, Councilor Bamonte. Just requesting presentations that you would like to come in front of you that has been communicated to staff. They're working with their teams to make that happen. Again, we really want presentations. You want that drive policy. Okay? We want to make sure that we're valuing staff time. We're not asking them to come present on things we could simply ask them, because their time is valuable, but we want something that'll influence the committee, influence policy, and push things forward. So, anything like that that you have in mind, please let me know so I could work with staff to make sure that happens. And other than that, our next meeting is Monday, February 16th, 2026 at 5:00. I think.