Quality of Life Committee
Wed, Aug 5, 2026 · Quality of Life Committee
https://santafeminutes.space/meeting/993-quality-of-life-aug-5-2026

== Executive Summary ==
The Quality of Life Committee meeting on 08/05/2026 primarily focused on a comprehensive review of a domestic violence training program administered by Youth and Family Services, funded by ARPA. The program, designed to equip community organizations and individuals with the skills to address domestic violence, has trained 162 participants from over 20 organizations, showing significant positive outcomes in increased confidence and practical application of knowledge. Key discussions included the program's structure, lessons learned, and strategies for sustainability through alternative funding and partnerships, such as developing a domestic violence peer endorsement/certification.

The committee also discussed broader domestic violence initiatives, including a new county pilot diversion program for individuals who use violence and an upcoming Memorandum of Understanding between the city and county to delineate their respective roles in addressing domestic violence. There was a strong emphasis on supporting service providers through training and free Continuing Education Units (CEUs) to combat high burnout rates. Additionally, updates were provided on various city initiatives, including the placement of Connect Navigators in city facilities, the extension of Bicentennial Pool's operating season, lifeguard recruitment efforts, and progress on economic development programs like the SPUR Business Grant and the Economic Development Comprehensive Strategic Plan.

== Key Decisions ==
- Approved the agenda.
- Approved the consent agenda.

== Public Comment ==
Leila Kelly, the program director, expressed her passion for educating the community about domestic and interpersonal violence, emphasizing the goal of making knowledge useful for practical response. Councilor Cassett inquired about future RFQs, alternative funding, baseline data, and program impact follow-up. Councilor Barrett, a social worker, praised the provision of free CEUs and the focus on supporting service providers, highlighting the high cost of training and the need to retain professionals. Councilor Casa expressed gratitude for the work presented, emphasizing the importance of bringing the topic of domestic violence to the forefront. Councilor Castro thanked the directors for their work, particularly on summer programs and upcoming bond decisions.

== Topics ==
- Domestic Violence Training
- Community Capacity Building
- Workforce Development
- Pool Operations & Lifeguards
- Small Business Support
- Mental Health Services
- Connect Navigators
- Youth Engagement
- Senior Services
- Economic Development Plan

== Full Transcript ==
Are we live? Madam Chair, Councilor Castro, we are live. Oh, thank you so much. I would like to call to order this Quality of Life meeting at 5:05 PM. If we could get a roll call, please. Councilor Figalli. She's, excuse me. Okay. Councilor Barrett? Here. Councilor Travis? Here. Councilor Cassette? Here. And Madam Chair? You have a quorum, Madam Chair. Thank you so much. Do we have any changes to the agenda by staff? I have no changes, Madam Chair. I believe no one pulled anything. Move to approve? Second. All in favor? Aye. All opposed? That motion passes. How about anything off the consent agenda? Move to approve? Second. All in, all in favor? Aye. All opposed? That motion passes. We'll stick that backwards. Presentations. Very excited. We would like to invite, I believe, Director Emery, are you going to, yeah, do the presentation? Thank you so much. Thank you, Chair Castro. I am not presenting tonight, but I am introducing. So we have a really special presentation for the committee this evening. As the community knows, the city has been administering their share of ARPA funds for the last several years. This is one of the almost final projects of Youth and Family Services, and it really was born out of the real-time needs we were seeing from, in administering our ARPA funds. So, we have, and I have some additional things to add here. But, the presentation tonight with Leila Kelly is on domestic violence training that we administered for the whole community for free, from about this time last year to May. We wrap up in June. Well, it'll, it's in the presentation. But, for those of you who have not yet met or don't know, we have a new domestic violence response specialist here tonight, Dakota Hariden. Dakota, Dakota was hired in June. She hit the ground running. And her position is a partnership between Youth and Family Services and the Police Department. She is seated in the Police Department, and she responds to, to survivors of domestic and interpersonal violence within about 24 hours after PD is called to, to a site, to a site. And, she provides resources and is there as a really kind ear after, after an event has occurred. And, additionally, and officially, we have Sierra Vigil Trujillo, who is recently promoted as Program Manager for Youth and Family Services, who oversees this body of work. I'll let you ladies take it from here. Thank you so much. For folks who are online, that's Ms. Leila Kelly, who is the director of the program. Hey, T. Can we get a little help? He's going to do some stuff with the tech, so I might vamp up here for a minute. Oh, perfect. Okay. I was prepared to do a little song and dance. Good evening. I'm really honored and happy to be here tonight to, to talk about, not only a topic that I'm very passionate about, but a project that I feel very honored and privileged to be able to do. I was talking with Sierra earlier today, and I, I, I was saying that one of my favorite things about this work is having an opportunity to talk with the community and teach the community about domestic violence and about interpersonal violence. And so with this project, I got to be able to do that. So I'm very excited to be able to present what that was like. So, by way of introduction, my name is Leila Kelly, and I'm a consultant with the City of Santa Fe on their interpersonal violence work. This includes lots of different things like Dakota's role with Santa Fe PD. It also includes things like navigating the strangulation task force with our partners over at Esperanza, and, you know, many different projects in order to better equip and better respond to domestic violence here in Santa Fe. The presentation tonight, just where we're headed, I'm going to talk a little bit about the background and the community need that informed why Youth and Family Services felt like this was needed. I'll talk a little bit about the training series, how it was designed, what the trainings were, how, how they were facilitated, what was important about that. I'll talk about the folks who showed up to the trainings, give an overview of that. We did pre and post surveys with the training, so I'll give a little bit of feedback from them and what we noticed. Some of the lessons learned, I'll talk about how we leveraged this training opportunity to work with Opry in creating a domestic violence peer endorsement and what that could look like so far as professionalizing this work in a different field and what that could look like moving forward and then some recommendations and ideas. So that's where we're headed. So as Sandy foreshadowed, this idea or the, this project came from a recognized need when we went out to RFQ for domestic violence case management, and we didn't receive as many bids as we thought we could receive. And part of that we learned was, one, many organizations didn't feel like they were eligible because they weren't, quote, a domestic violence organization. And, also, on the other side of that, many organizations didn't feel like they had the expertise or the training to be able to provide this service all under the umbrella of their deep knowledge that they were seeing domestic violence in their work. And so what does it look like? You know, they were doing domestic violence work, not considering themselves a domestic violence organization, nor did they feel confident in the work they were doing. And so we really wanted to create a training series that could meet the needs of case managers, which really falls in a different sort of scope of work than is traditional domestic violence work. A lot of domestic violence work happens under advocacy, which is not necessarily in the realm of public health and a case management model. And so we wanted to take what is important about domestic violence and pull it into a public health model that really is equipped in that case management training. So the intended outcomes we were wanting from the training series was, one, to increase domestic violence knowledge and also the skills to back up that knowledge. We wanted to make sure that we were centering survivors' experiences in the training and how to operationalize those experiences. What does it mean to do case management in an interpersonal violence trauma-informed way? We also wanted to foster this idea of a community network and collaboration between providers because we have providers all across our community and our network that are experts in their field. Right? Like, LifeLink, expert in homelessness, you know, CSV, expert in emergency medical care. So how do we leverage those expertise in the service of domestic violence as a community network and to do that through this training series? And then overall, expand our community's capacity to respond to domestic violence. Okay. So my favorite part, the training design and the implementation. I'm going to start here in this middle column to talk about the core training topics. The first is we wanted to start our trainings with this foundational level understanding relational violence training. What was important about this training is that we wanted to bring it forward in, in the best practices and the newest information we have from multidisciplinary fields, including psychology and sociology, around what we know about domestic violence and what that looks like. But, again, how do we take that information, the, the knowledge, and make it useful into a practical response? So we can know this about domestic violence. How do we translate that into practice work? And we offered that training, the understanding relational violence training, for free once a month, every month. And then we did six deep dive trainings that took a component of that basic training and dived deeper into more information and more practical skills. So the first one really is risk assessment and safety planning. So what do you do after someone makes a disclosure of domestic violence no matter where you are in the field? Well, you're going to figure out how dangerous it is, and then you're going to create a safety plan. And so that training was really about what are the key indicators and key factors case managers are looking for, because we know that these cases can be quite complex. How do we zero in on the important information in order to know what we need to safety plan next? And so, you know, my big soapbox is that I believe that every person, every constituent in our community should know how to do a safety plan and risk assessment. Because if your neighbor knocks on your door, you should feel confident in knowing what to do next. Then we dived deeper into the stages of change and what it looks like for a case manager to do long-term support. So the stages of change model comes out of addictions work, and it looks at what process do folks go through when they're getting sober and what are the milestones on that process that we as case managers or supporters can link on to to meet them where they're at. Johns Hopkins adapted the stages of change model to domestic violence. And so in this training, we took a look at each of those stages as it relates to domestic violence, and we learned practical skills for how to meet someone in each one of those stages. I'll give a quick example, and that is, is the first stage of state change is precontemplation, which means folks aren't contemplating change. We, you know, one of the challenging things about working with domestic violence is meeting folks who, we are ready and there to support them, and they're not ready to be supported. And so what does it look like to meet someone who is not contemplating any kind of change? And we learned the practical skill of how to give empathic statements, how to roll with resistance, and those kinds of things. Then we dived into community navigation and non-traditional approaches. So when we build a safety plan, what does it look like to identify a need and then resource that need in our community both with a service of community providers that we have, but also leverage the community that is in their life as well. And how do we create a bridge between service providers and organizations who are often maxed out and burnt out with the people who are in those folks' lives? How do we do that? What does that look like? Then we talked about, we did a deep dive into client complexity. And so often when we think of domestic violence, there's a picture that comes to mind. And then we get in there and we're working with them, and we see that there's unmanaged mental health challenges. Maybe they're unhoused. Maybe they have severe substance use. So what does it look like to support a domestic violence response with some of this complexity? Then we talked about stabilization. So that stabilization, meaning how do we stabilize the nervous system and be that support for our client and how to lead psychoeducation groups, which is something that across our community, case managers in this level are asked to do. And our community members who are experiencing violence are really asking for it. They're asking for more groups. So what does it look like to facilitate a group? And then last, we dived into folks who used violence. What do we know about those folks? What does their stage of change look like? What does accountability look like? And then how do we support whether we're working with a person who's experienced violence or a person using violence? What does that support look like? How do we do that? And so we, we did those trainings, those deep dives. We did two, four sessions a month, two sessions, two of those sessions. So we did them on a Thursday and a Friday, and we had two sessions. And then the next month, we did another set of sessions. And then the next month, we did another set of sessions.

And part of that is because those sessions were longer. They were three hours and longer. So, overall, we did 18 free in-person trainings. Five of those were the foundational trainings. 13 of those were the deep dives. We did 48 total hours of trainings, and we were able to offer CEUs. I'm licensed with the state to offer CEUs. So all of the folks in the health system who are required to get a certain amount of CEUs were able to get CEUs.

Okay, so who came? We were very lucky. We had at least 10 diverse service roles. So what do I mean by that? We had advocates, we had peers, we had case managers, we had therapists, we had probation officers. All different kinds of roles came, which I think was really helpful. In total, we reached 162 participants, which was really amazing. I mean, it's not the most exciting training to sign up to, you know? It can be kind of hard to get people to come, so I was very happy with our 162 participants. And it was really exciting because we had more than 20 organizations represented. So we had folks from the Coalition to Stop Violence Against Native Women, we had folks from Consuelos, we had folks from LifeLink and the hospital and La Familia and Nambe Pueblo. And so there was a beautifully diverse representation of the organizations there.

So some of the outcomes that we noticed, 77% and, again, this is coming from our pre and post surveys that we did, 77% left feeling like they had a good grasp of the concepts that we were talking about and the ideas we were working with. So I feel really proud about that because that means that we didn't overshoot the information for the folks that were in the room. We also didn't undershoot the information. We really were able to kind of get it right where they needed it, that level of information. 84% of them felt more confident in responding to domestic violence, which was really the goal, is to build that confidence because they're already doing it. 88% identified a practical change they were going to make in their work, in their response. And many of them were like, "I know how to do a lethality assessment better. I know how to do a safety plan better," which was really great. A lot of them also left feeling like they felt inspired to work with the individual's community more than they had been before and to leverage community as much as we leverage service providers. And then 85% really felt like the content was relevant to their role, which was important because we knew that so many of the providers and the organizations didn't apply to the RFP because they didn't think they were an organization where that work would be relevant. And so when they got in and they were doing the trainings, they found, "Wow, this really was relevant to what I do. It really is useful."

Some of the lessons learned: One is that the cross-sector participation strengthened the learning. So having the folks from the different levels of service providers and from the different organizations, they were able to bring their own learned experience and taught others. We all learned from each other, and so that was really amazing to see. I will also say that word-of-mouth was the most effective marketing. We did flyers, we did ads, we did this, we did that, but nothing was more effective than someone saying, "Hey, you should go do this training." One of the things that stood out, the feedback that I got, is that many participants who had been brought in by someone had said, "I thought I already knew about this. I thought I already knew what I needed to know about this." And then my colleague came to the training and was like, "No, you've got to go," and came. And so that was the most effective way to pull in participants, which in Santa Fe makes sense to me. That makes sense to me. And then I got a lot of feedback that learning practical skills, learning how it's relevant. We did a lot of, "Here's a pretend case. Let's practice this tool we just used." That was the big takeaway and was highly valued from the participants. So really being able to work with the material rather than just having kind of a didactic rant or TED Talk lecture, I guess, is the word, was really effective in their learning.

Some of the challenges were that participants really felt like there wasn't enough time to really dive into all of the material, which for me was great because I could spend all day doing this, talking about this. And so there were a lot of requests to take a training that we had done a half day and make it a full day. There was also, and I think in that, they wanted more opportunities for role plays and skill building. And also, there were a lot of questions that came up. We couldn't cover all the content that there is, and so participants would ask questions. They'd be, "That's great. We don't have time to dive into that." So there was a request for more advanced-level trainings on some of those concepts.

So, Youth and Family Services, we really knew that this was under ARPA funding, and we wanted to make sure, what can we do for sustainability? How can we leverage this for future stuff? And so we partnered with OPRE, Office of Peer Recovery and Engagement, who leads the certification for all of the peers in the state of New Mexico, to work with them to take the foundational training and the six deep-dive trainings and turn them into a peer endorsement or a certification through OPRE so that if you are a peer and you've gone through that certification, you can do this continuing education and become a domestic violence peer. And so this was a really powerful opportunity to, one, really empower peers to specialize in something that a lot of peers are passionate about, that there wasn't that avenue for professionalization before. And also, it sets up organizations like domestic violence organizations that don't generally have an opportunity for diverse funding or diverse ways of income to start to do that because, as we know, peer services and peer work is Medicaid billable. So it helps create another funding avenue for those organizations. So that was really exciting, and we're still kind of rolling and working with that.

Just some recommendations or some ideas. Of course, almost all of the feedback is, "Is this going to keep going? I missed this one. Can I make it up?" So, to continue these training ideas, if I had a recommendation around, you know, we had seven trainings in total, if we were going to repeat them, I think doing the foundational one, the risk assessment, and the community navigation on repeat would be a good idea. There was also, and this was an interesting insight to learn, interesting feedback to get. A lot of the folks that we got were direct service level providers, and they learned all of this valuable information. And then they went back to their organization, and their supervisor didn't have this information. And so their supervisor couldn't supervise them as well with what they learned. And so what does it look like to expand or have a parallel something that equips supervisors to be able to supervise domestic violence cases? Again, this idea of deeper dives into some of those more interesting or more complicated topics was asked for. Also, what does it look like to create a space or an opportunity for the service providers who are doing this work to come together on a more regular basis and teach each other and learn from what each other are experiencing? Can we cultivate a space around that? And then all in this hope that the next time we can offer an RFP or an RFQ for these case management trainings that more organizations feel equipped to do so. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. It was fantastic.

Perfect. Thank you so much, Ms. Kelly. Extraordinary. I'll start with the committee. Any questions? Mr. Cassette.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you so much for being here and for the work. I guess this might actually be a question for Sandy. Given this, are we going to move forward with putting out another RFQ for this work, or is this, we spent out the money?

Thank you, Chair Castro. Councilor Cassett, the money is... We are actively seeking alternative funding sources for this type of work. And really, I would really like to have a very robust domestic violence response program. We are working with PD, as, obviously, you can see us. Dakota's here. But they help support some of Leila's work this past fiscal year. So we are working closely with PD to see how we can support this as a city and also looking at external funding to assist to ensure that we can continue these programs.

Okay. And I know that we have, we have DOH funds for the youth violence prevention. Do they have programs around DV for grants that we might be able to pull down a similar funding source?

Chair Castro, Councilor Cassett. Yes. Not, I haven't seen an RFP for DV come through DOH in a while, but we do in our state have the New Mexico Crime Victims Reparation Commission, which is the funding agency for Dakota's position. And they do annual notices of funding. CYFD, often their behavioral health wing, has RFPs for that, which we have applied for in the past. So we are actively resourcing the city with alternative funding sources.

Okay. Wonderful. Thank you. Appreciate that. And then I'm curious, did we do any work, I mean, was there any baseline data taken? I know you mentioned that this kind of came from the fact that nobody really applied, but around kind of what the work has looked like in the community at large, and then will there be an opportunity for follow-up on what it looks like now? I mean, I know it's a bit, it's kind of a nebulous question given that people were already engaging in this work, but not in a way that was potentially as evidence-based or as skills-based as, hopefully, it is now. So any, anything that we can really look at how this then manifests itself into services.

Thank you, Councilor Cassett. So I think what we see, so to answer your question, in the strangulation task force, we have an opportunity to come together. The different systems, the legal system and the health system, come together, and we do get a great opportunity to see how the work is looking sort of on the ground with these organizations. I think there's a lot of data that we're missing around this. There's a lot of opportunities for data capture across the board that I think we have an opportunity for. I think one of the challenges is, you know, the undertraining in this area is not unique to Santa Fe. It's across the board in the field because the history of this work really has been a justice approach. And so the health approach or behavioral health approach is sort of lagging behind at a county level, at a state level, at a federal level. And so I think, I so I think we have, we have an opportunity inside the strangulation task force to gather that kind of data and what it looks like. Right now, it's informal feedback and kind of gathering that and capturing that. I think one of the things that we could really leverage is for the Department of Health to put more effort into capturing the information around this. I, you know, I will say every time we go to the doctor, they ask us if we're safe at home. Where does that information go? Right? And so it's really hard to tell. It's hard to see. I will also say that the domestic violence specific funding that the Department of Health used to have was given to CYFD. So, again, like, the challenge around the unsupported work inside the Department of Health for this is not a city challenge.

It's evidence of a larger ripple. Well, and then, with the complications of CYFD right now, that's not, regardless of whether or not what's happened at CYFD, just the bureaucratic blockages there. It'd be great if they maybe didn't do that right now. It'd be helpful while they figure out all of that, which is, thank goodness, not a hard job. Doesn't sound fun.

But you bring up another thing I'm curious about, which is, to your point, this has really been justice-based. So I know there was one kind of small comment around looking at the perpetrators of violence, and it sounds like this work was more focused around the survivors. I believe that within some of the criminal justice system, there are conversations around, I know we do diversionary programs for a bunch of other things. What does that conversation start to look like within the criminal justice system? I mean, my partner is a prosecutor, and he talks a lot about the hard thing with these DV cases is sometimes he's sitting there prosecuting with a victim that doesn't want to cooperate because they've gone back to the partner, and suddenly we're running into this challenge. So is there any overlap there both for, hopefully, I am, you know, stages of change. I was a health coach, so I'm very familiar with the stages of change model. But, you know, how we both assist individuals. But I do wonder, if there is kind of almost a diversionary program that we're looking at with perpetrators of violence, do we also get the ripple effect that our survivors are getting the services and the support that they need because they're not terrified of sending the person that they love, despite everything, to jail?

Thank you. You could see us nodding because you're singing our song. So the first thing I'll say is that the city and the county are working on a domestic violence MOU. And inside that domestic violence MOU, there are clear, Sandy, stop me. But there are clear distinctions around where both the city's focus is going to be and where the county's focus is going to be so that we can leverage what we've got and also not be redundant about what we're doing. And so as part of that MOU, the county is really focused on folks who use violence and the response to folks who use violence. And so inside the county's response, they are going to be doing a pilot diversion program that captures folks prior to adjudication. Because one of the things that we noticed when the county did their domestic violence landscape analysis is that many cases are not reaching adjudication. And so we're missing an opportunity for early intervention. And so their pilot diversion program is going to be a violence education program that works with the person who's using violence in that education. And how do we weave this work together? What does that look like? And I'll say that when you look at folks who use violence from a public health perspective, many of the things that they're needing are quite similar. Quite similar.

And is the First Judicial, the District Attorney's office that? Luke. Luketon. LOPD, Magistrate, District Court. Awesome. I will just add with regards to the MOU, the city and county received funding in different ways. So the county's focus on those who have committed acts of violence is not because that's what they love to do. It has to do with funding resources and how we are actively working to affect change.

Wonderful. Yeah. Well, I'm, you know, that's, that is the prevention piece. I mean, there is, you know, the educational component for, you know, survivors of how do you recognize and get out. But, for some, that's risky as well, back to the safety plan. Sometimes leaving is just as risky as staying. And so the prevention piece is crucial there. So I'm happy to hear about that really holistic conversation. I think that's, I know a lot of people sometimes have a hard time, but that's kind of like, you know, the safe use spaces for people who are dealing with addiction issues. And people are like, "Oh, you're just condoning it." It's not. No. So I'm glad to hear that both sides are being addressed. I'm glad that we're working with the county. And thank you again so much for this work, and I hope that we're able to find ways to continue this. I think it's really important. And to your point, it's not been something that's been brought up. I think it's kept quiet a lot. And finally, I'm happy for things that help us bring it to the forefront. It's a hard topic. It's a scary topic for a lot of people, but really important. So thank you.

Thank you, Councilor Casa. And, yeah, it's a great point. One of the reasons that we continue to have presentations on these amazing programs is we are underfunding them, and they need support. And so it's our job now as Quality of Life members to advocate for those programs and make sure that they continue. And I did have just one quick follow-up question on some of those sort of upstream solutions. You mentioned some of the providers. 20 organizations is a lot, and they're currently doing a lot of this work. So I think I sent a text to Director Emery about La Familia because I know they had had a program that I don't know if the city helps fund. What are some of the programs that are currently available upstream solution?

La Familia is currently funded through the Human Services Committee, and I'm not 100% familiar with what their scope of work currently is, but there are programs. The city has funded through ARPA, which is what I can speak to, and through some of our violence prevention programming. We have funded Resolve, who is in school programming. Most of the work that's been done in youth and family services is around violence prevention at the youth level, but there are, and Leila can speak to better because of findings from the landscape analysis, what is going on in the larger community with adults.

Yeah. So, yeah, there's a lot of programs. There's a lot of ideas, a lot of programs. I will say La Familia specifically, many of their case managers came to the training and then made requests for this training to come into them. And so I think one of the, and that was a recommendation that was made by many service providers, is, you know, it was hard for them to leave where they are. What does it look like to bring the trainings into them? And so given the timeframe and, the funding cap, it's hard to go in everywhere that you'd want to go in, but there were some folks who rose to the top, and La Familia is one of them. So we remain in contact to see when I can come in and do the trainings for their staff because they do have programming. They don't, and they see it a lot. They don't have skills. Thank you. So one more thing that we can advocate for. Any other questions before Councilor Barrett?

As a social worker, I just want to shout you out and thank you for free CEUs because CEUs are very expensive. And I was going to say my first, actually, like, real social work job, I wasn't an official social worker. I was in social work school, was working at a domestic violence agency in Albuquerque that was bilingual and did a lot of prevention work, but there's no training. When you're in social work, you're just kind, I mean, from my perspective, they just throw you, you could be school, you could be medical, you could be, you could be homelessness. And it's like, "Boop, here you go." You know? Like, you have a degree, so figure it out. So, like, the training is so important, and we don't do enough of it. And it is really expensive to attend some of these trainings, like $500 to become, you know, whatever kind of training it may be. So that's really important because we have a lack of mental health providers. Just like we have a lack of medical providers, dental, we have a lack of mental health providers. So anything I feel like we can do to bolster that, to support that, and people staying in that career because it's very stressful, high levels of burnout. So I really appreciate that. And just, I don't know if we could do it anymore, even, like, around, I mean, you know, I'm going off here, but, like, addiction, substance abuse, you know, we just had our homelessness summit, and, you know, we need a lot of support, you know, but that's also underfunded, understaffed. We don't have enough programs. So I don't know whatever we can do to maybe support some of those trainings so that more folks will go into that. I think it's really important. And then I had another question. Was that at all for clients or people who had experienced domestic violence, or was it just for, like, professionals in that area?

Yeah. Thank you, Councilor Barrett. Fellow social worker. So first, I'll just name, yes, I think my real, I came up as a volunteer advocate and as an advocate and then a case manager, and it really is thrown into the frying pan. And so I was holding that in my mind. What did I need to know that I didn't know? And what would have been helpful at that time because that's where my heart space is, is how do we support those folks? So to answer your, I'm going to answer your question in two ways. One is, it was marketed specifically for case management providers, folks who provide case management, and anyone who wanted to come could come. And so especially at the foundational understanding relational violence trainings, we had whole swaths of people. Some people were just survivors themselves who came. And I, it was important to me to keep it open and accessible in that way. I will, the second part, and the way that I will answer the question is that very rarely do I meet a service provider who doesn't have this in their lived history if they're interested. So for me, where do we draw the line between a survivor and a service provider? In this field, it's a lot more gray. And so part of what was important to me about this work is how do I honor the truth that's often in the room that goes unspoken and give them tools and support to leverage their lived experience in a way that helps to bolster their sustainability and longevity in the field? Because often what's challenging is their stories get lit up. You know, they're here because they're powered by passion, their own lived experience. Their stories get lit up. They're not supported, and so then they get burnt out and have to go be a barista and make coffee. Right? And so what does it look like to take that lived experience because it's deep wisdom and leverage it in a way that is supportive, which is why having that peer component was such an important piece. And so were there survivors in the room? Yes.

That's awesome. I love that, like, full circle model. When I worked in Albuquerque, it was mostly Spanish-speaking women and children, and they had their whole program too where it was, like, lived experience, worked at, you know, worked through some trainings, and then, you know, you went out in the community and you did the work. So the peer, that's amazing. You know, with mental health, I know it's big peer support, all the things, substance abuse. So that's so cool that there's, like, there's steps up. Like, you can work your way up and then go into that work. So thanks. Thank you so very much. We appreciate you so much, Miss Kelly, and the whole team.

We are excited to work with you in the future. I don't see anyone in the room for public comment, and we have no action items. Matters from staff.

Thank you so much, Director Castro. I just have a few things today. First is that our Senior Scene, our monthly quarterly Senior Scene, was released today. For anyone who doesn't know, we have about a 4 to 5,000 distribution list, which I think is amazing. We print about 2,500 copies, and our seniors really rely on that and really like getting it. In fact, today's came a couple of hours late, and there were already seniors at the library saying, "Where's my magazine?" So, just a shout-out to our senior services. I think it's, I went to a seniors' event recently, and a lot of the seniors I spoke to said that that's really how they find their connection to events in the community. So, shout-out there.

Next, I have some exciting news. As many on council know, we do have a couple of Connect Navigators employed by the city. As of this week, we actually have a Connect Navigator placed in the main library. So, in addition to her caseload, she is there and available when the need for connection to services can arise within the main library. So, ideally, I'd like to have a Connect Navigator in every single city facility, but that's a whole other conversation for the future. But I'm really excited that we have Barbara there and really on scene for those who are in need.

Next, our pools. Just a little point of clarification for the community. Typically, Bicentennial Pool closes the first week of August. Our city staff have been working to extend the opening of Bicentennial Pool. We'll be open through September 6th, I believe. The hours are reduced from what they are in the peak of summer because a lot of our lifeguard staff goes back to school. And many of our lifeguard staff are young people in school with their own academic schedule, extracurriculars, etcetera. So it's not quite as easy as, "Oh, going back to school and they can work on nights and weekends." We do have a huge need for lifeguards in the city. We are hosting a rapid hire event this month at the Chavez Center. If you have youth or anyone in your network who is a strong swimmer, please send them our way for this event. We're doing screenings there so we can get lifeguards trained and by the pool as soon as possible. So just a little clarification around that. Our pool staff are really working hard to keep Bicentennial Pool, in particular, open as long as possible because we know that Salvador Perez is not in operation currently, and just really working hard on that. Please do reach out to me if you have any questions. I'm happy to speak with anyone in the community who has questions on what we're doing, how we're doing it, and what and how they can help. Because I really do appreciate community members who have reached out and offered to help and offered to really just problem-solve this. So thank you to the community for reaching out on that.

And my last little bit, which I know Councilor Barret will echo, we do still have applications open for our next Mayor's Youth Advisory Board members. We are having a meeting next week with our potential applicants. So if you have a young person in your life who has been thinking about joining the Mayor's Youth Advisory Board, this is the time to encourage them to get their applications in. The link for applications is on our city website under, I think, Mayor's Youth Advisory Board. So hop on in. We want youth from all of the districts in the city, all backgrounds. We want as many as possible engaging. So thank you.

Thank you so much, Director Emery. Doctor Nelson.

Thank you, Councilor Castro, and the CA where I started down the right path. And members of the council, thank you so much. I've got a few announcements and notes to highlight for you all and hopefully bring awareness to. So our award letters for our SPUR, our business grant, went out today. And, as a reminder, that $1,600,000 in requests that we received, such a significant amount, we were able to award $200,000 of that. So I'm curious. I'm going through emails to see responses and acceptances and also awareness perhaps of businesses not being eligible for this round. But, in those letters that are sent out to our community, we are also expressing the many other resources that are available and hopes for future funding rounds. So, again, thanks to the Small Business Navigator Program for helping us get these letters out. Thanks to the leadership of Councilor Cassid and the mayor as well as this committee to be supportive of this initiative. And, again, we're learning a lot about the need for the next round, what would we do differently, etcetera. So open to your ideas and feedback.

And I want to point out that we do have an open position right now, and that is an economic development specialist, but hopefully specializing in workforce coordination as well as financial literacy. We would prefer this candidate be bilingual and are hopeful that they can co-office at the Santa Fe Business Incubator, which is located on Airport Road. We had a very robust conversation today at EDAC, and a lot of the conversations around strategy end up going to economic opportunity and supporting workforce, whether that be internships, apprenticeships, creating opportunities for youth. This position is really key to see how we can leverage a position focused specifically on workforce. This is utilizing term funding that was allocated in the one-time funding last budget cycle. So please help spread the word.

And I will be giving an update on the economic development comprehensive strategic plan tomorrow at the Planning Commission, and we'll have our consultants there, engaging that board. This also came up in EDAC today too. We're really excited to get a draft finalized. I think we are hearing sometime end of August. And this will obviously be publicized, and you'll have the opportunity to review and give some feedback.

We will be putting out an RFQ to run and operate, help manage our Go Local program. I've mentioned a few times that this program has really grown in operation, in meeting needs, and in excitement from the community, so much so that we would benefit from having additional capacity help us run this program. And that should go live in the next couple of weeks. So please, if you're aware of organizations and or individuals that would be a good fit, please send them our way.

I'm also going to highlight that our Center for Responsible Entrepreneurship Accelerator program is still accepting applications. So if you are aware of business owners that are intrigued by the idea of beyond profit and addressing issues like climate change or other issues within a business, please have them reach out. They'd be a good fit for our accelerator.

And a few highlights for events that are coming up. We have the 505 Night Market that is a Go Local, Go Different, Fun recipient, and we're very excited to support this initiative. That'll be Saturday at the Railyard, supporting arts and culinary as well as community organizations will be there. I almost forgot. Canyon Road Walk is happening right now. I'm going to go head over there, but they're also a Go Local recipient. Really a great example of placemaking and community building, family event, and really a big supporter of our local businesses and artisans.

And last thing to mention is next week, we also have Pecha Kucha from Creative Santa Fe. That's really a fantastic event to hear some of our local celebrities and entrepreneurs and thought leaders presenting on interesting topics. The topic is America, and I believe that's Wednesday. Looking at Councilor Castro, but I think it's Wednesday. So that concludes my updates. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Director. Yes, Wednesday at the Lensic. I think doors open at 5:15. We will be in governing body. With that, we have matters from the committee. Does the committee have any matters? No? Okay. Matters from chair. I just want to thank everyone. Directors, you guys are doing an amazing job. There's so many things between the summer program, and I hear that we're going to potentially be doing some big decisions around bonds and whatnot. So very excited. You guys are really advocating well. Thank you. And with that, we are adjourned until August 19th.