Speaker 1: Good evening.

Thank you for joining us for via a conversation to keep essay moving.

My name is Tuesday night for more than 40 years via metropolitan transit has kept our economy and our community moving by providing reliable and affordable public transportation services to San Antonio and bear County.

Public transportation provides critical connections to jobs, workforce training, and education, recreation, healthcare, and so much more.

And the pandemic has really put the spotlight on just how important via services are.

Whether you ride the bus or drive your own car tonight, we'll talk to via business and community leaders to go more in depth about the importance of our public transportation system and how via plans to keep moving.

Let's start with via president and CEO, Jeff Arndt and via board chair.

Hope Andrati.

Thank you both for joining me today, Jeff.

Yes, Hirono virus has upended many aspects of our daily lives for months now, but there have been parts of our economy that have had to adapt quickly and keep going via is one of those, how is via fared through this pandemic?

Well, you know, topsy turvy, right?

It was quite a, quite a change, but we had to keep rolling.

We had to keep San Antonio moving.

Uh, we are not in a position where many of our people can work remotely.

You can't drive a bus from home.

Uh, and so we had to quickly develop protocols and systems to help make sure that the operator was safe and you can't have a safe trip if the operator is not safe themselves and to keep the passengers safe.

And so we put in a number of processes, all passengers wear masks.

We do do social distancing on the buses.

So we only allow 16 people on the buses.

If you go by and say, there's not many people in that bus, I'd say, yeah, that's by design because we want to provide that opportunity.

All our operators have their temperatures taken before they go into work.

Uh, they all have mass.

They all have PPE.

We put in a shower curtain.

I know there's a fancy name for it, but I think everybody knows that it's a shower curtain, a clear shower curtain between the farebox and the operator to provide them protection.

As people board the bus, we stopped collecting fares for a period of time, but we, we had to keep rolling.

Right?

And the reason we had to keep rolling is because the people who ride via still had to keep rolling.

It became very clear.

Someone recently said that out of chaos comes clarity.

That's very true.

And the clarity we have is that our passengers were out there, essential workers getting to work every day to and fro on via.

So what have you learned with that?

I mean, your safety is really important for the public and for the ridership.

So what is via learned over the last few months?

First of all, I think we've seen, we I'd say, first of all, we have not seen any cases of COVID that had been traced back through the, you know, the process to having been on a bus.

So I believe that that certainly reflects on the efficacy of our, of our efforts.

And, and obviously we draw on other agencies.

I, I have regular calls with the CEOs in Dallas, Houston, and Austin.

So the four of us get together.

Initially it was every day we would call, what are you doing about this?

What are you doing about that?

So I think we've all worked together to keep the system very safe, but we also have seen how essential we are to people getting to work, right?

Uh, people who ride via buses, almost three quarters of them work full time and are taking the bus five to six to seven days a week.

Obviously commuting, if you're going to that often, uh, most of them don't have a car in their family, so we are essential to getting the work.

But the other side of that coin is there are also people out there that have to make essential non-work trips, right?

What was essential workers that are riding the bus every day that didn't no one paid attention to them before.

Right.

So now Jeff, this population here in San Antonio is expected to grow in 20 years.

How is via going to address that transportation growth?

Well, we call that keep essay moving.

Although we do keep essay moving today, but to keep essay moving, which diva evolved out of our long range plan, uh, has, uh, first of all, the themes are frequent fast and flexible.

So everything I say about the plan, if you'll in your head think, Oh, well that, that would be frequent.

That would be fast.

That would be flexible.

That's that's the framework.

Yeah.

And so we put together a plan that will meet we'll improve the service for the people who currently use it, make it more attractive that people that don't currently use it.

And then of course, as more people arrive, we need to be at the top of the game as all transportation pieces need to be.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Well, that is a perfect segue into the next question.

So, because many people think via is just a bus service, but, uh, the two of you have described so much more than that.

And so hope Andretti is here with us today.

And again, thank you so much for being here, but what is the expanse of via services and products?

And now I know both of you can answer them, so I, you might want to tag team them, but sure.

Well, you know, and thank you so much for doing this because we always want to make sure that our writers understand that we do practice every safety measure for them to feel safe.

As, as Jeff mentioned, we take people to work.

I mean, this is what we do.

And during these times, you know, I always say pass by a bus stop and look at the people that are waiting for the bus.

They're already essential workers.

They're the ones that can not work at home.

They're the ones that do not have an automobile.

65% of our riders do not have automobiles.

Okay.

So the most important service that we provide is that we take people to work and we take people to school.

We take people to their medical appointments.

We take people to buy their groceries and we've taken people just to visit each other, which is so important.

And you know, when Jeff mentioned that our ridership has, um, has been affected also, but everyone's ridership has been affected.

In fact, in San Antonio, we've been affected the least, which means that our workers still have to get to work.

And those are the essential workers that we talked about before, right before they weren't so essential, but now they were important to driving our economy.

So I think that they always were essential, but out of chaos comes clear clarity.

Thank you for that.

That's exactly right.

So I want to go back to hope.

Um, and so hope I know from just knowing you that you have a public transportation story that as a young woman, because you had, um, you know, written transportation publicly, do you want to talk a little bit about that?

Sure.

I mean, you know, as a teenager, I took the bus to school.

Um, I took the bus after school to go to work.

I had to work, you know, I had to help my family.

And so, and I took the bus back home, but when I finished my shift at nine o'clock at night and it took me a couple of hours to get home, my mother would go wait for me at the bus stop so that I wouldn't have to walk back home in the dark by myself.

Um, then I got married and we only had one car and my husband had the car.

My job was closer to a bus stop.

And so that's a decision.

We made that because there was a bus stop right in front of the office that I was reporting to work every day.

It was best for me to take the bus.

And that's the agreement that you can't do as a family?

Well, we compromise that's what marriage is do we compromise?

So we come, we compromise that he took the car and I took the bus, but it gave me an opportunity to still get to work.

And there's this a story of a student?

Her name is Maria Garcia.

Garcia.

Can you tell me a little bit about my goodness?

That reminded me so much of, um, uh, certainly my beginnings of, of taking the bus to school, but, uh, Maria today is I'm a student at MIT.

Okay.

Pursuing a deal, a degree in engineering and I believe science or technology or whatever, but it's very impressive.

And, and, uh, and when we learned about her and heard her story about, since she was a freshman, all the way to graduation, she took the bus to a young women leaders Academy wow.

Every day, every day.

But then we find out that 35% of those students that attend the Academy, take the bus, the school graduating from the young woman's leadership Academy is amazing and kind of relieving and also very scary.

You've been waiting for this day for so long, but at the same time, it's finally here and you're like, I don't know if I really want to leave because everyone here is just so amazing.

And you know, this place like it's your second home in the fall, I will be attending the Massachusetts Institute of technology.

Most commonly known as MIT and I plan to major in electrical engineering and computer science, a dual degree program.

I would not have gone to school at the Academy if it weren't for via, because my situation, that was the only way I could get to school without it I'd be at a different school, not here at all.

Well, Maria, I know when she was in the sixth grade was, um, taking via to get here, but DHEA was the conduit that got her to the school that gave her the education to get to MIT.

So if you take away via, and you take away that access to transportation, then in essence, you would be taken away her opportunity to come to a college prep Academy.

And that would have negative impacts.

You know, she's very bright, but the opportunities that she was provided here are very, very different without it.

I don't know if any of us could do it since YW lays the school that takes students from all over San Antonio and even farther out.

And to have that just cut away would be, I think horrible because that's the way you get to and from places.

So just like taking that away would be just destroying a whole lot of students' dreams.

Because for me, like without the bus, I couldn't have stayed at clubs.

I couldn't have done sports.

I couldn't have gotten here early in the morning for testing.

So about 35% of our students use via to come to school.

So via is an equalizer when it comes to getting our girls here, what it will mean to those students is that there are challenges to come to school, be greater right now they have the facility, the ease of being able to go to a bus stop and find their way to a school like ours.

If they are having to look for a closer bus stop, or if routes are cut, students might have to decide which schools they're going to go to.

Students might have to decide what activities they participate in.

Students might have to decide, you know, um, what their priorities are in their life.

Students really appreciate this a lot.

They may not say it, and you may not know about it, but like if you ride the bus and you just know that it makes a difference in their lives because you're one of those people.

So not only are essential workers, needing transportation, students, families, parents, wives, and husbands, possibly.

So thank you so much both of you for being here.

Um, this has been really important discussion about transportation importance in San Antonio.

So thank you both for your work.

Thank you for your representation and thank you for joining us tonight.

Thank you.

Thank you, Eric Cooper.

Thank you so much for being here with us today.

We are so excited to talk to you about the San Antonio food bank and your partnership with via metropolitan transit and how you are getting the necessary services to the people that need it the most here in San Antonio.

So thank you for being, Oh, it's such a privilege to be on.

And it really is a privilege to talk about this partnership with via, I mean, what an amazing job they do to move people, um, taking people to work, to get groceries, uh, really, you know, a form of transportation that we all value and appreciate, but I think it's those that lack access that appreciate them the most.

And in this COVID-19 crisis, there's been a lot of people where transportation has been a barrier to get them food and VA has been a great partner to help us overcome that.

That's wonderful.

So with that type of relationship, was this something new that happened during the pandemic or was it built?

Yeah, so I mean, vias always been a great partner of the San Antonio food bank, really to help in lots of ways, whether it's educating their writers about the programs, the food bank offers or some of our strategies during the summer, but it was really in this COVID-19 crisis that as we were serving families, uh, we serve families through our emergency food pantries.

These are individual nonprofits all throughout South Texas that the food bank supplies food to, but then we also feed families through our programs.

And those programs were highlighted in a lot of the media over this crisis with our pop-up distributions, where families could pull in, um, and in a touchless way, have groceries loaded into their vehicle.

Now these are great for families that have vehicles, but via was concerned about those, that lack transportation.

They don't have a trunk to be loaded, right?

Um, we have distributions where rideshare or via, or, you know, friends could bring families, you know, sometimes people even ride their bike.

But, um, the opportunity that via suggested was how could we leverage our fleet and getting families food.

And so we targeted seniors and people with disabilities, and literally thousands of people have been delivered food boxes from the food bank because of via.

Wow.

And you told me a number that was really crazy in the beginning when we were talking, you said 60,000 people a week, how many people are being fed?

Okay.

Yeah.

So we went from feeding 60,000 a week, pre COVID to 120,000 people a week.

And that demand has stayed consistent.

And so if it wasn't for great food companies and obviously great grocery retailers like HEB, we wouldn't have the food supply that we desperately need to feed those families.

But our city's amazing, right?

They've been coming together, whether it's a church or school or nonprofit or, you know, foundation corporation, everybody's pitching in to try to make sure that families are taken care of.

And at the end of the day, it's food is basic, right?

It's, it's essential.

We have to have it right.

And it's been incredible to partner with via to make sure people get access to good nutrition and that transportation.

Tell me how that eases the burden for someone.

Well, when you think about nutrition, right?

There's four big barriers.

Uh, income is the biggest driver.

Um, but geography is the second big driver, um, education, how it'd be knowing how to prepare food and then, you know, competition in advertising.

But it's that geography that I think is the biggest barrier.

And when families don't have transportation, um, they don't have a car.

And, um, you know, they don't have access maybe to a, uh, a local grocery store.

They end up eating right in their community, what's available.

And that might be groceries at a convenience store.

It might be fast food.

What VA has done is they've, they've bridged that gap.

They've been able to get good, healthy, nutritious food.

That's been provided by the food bank to residents that didn't have a way to get it.

And it's been incredible.

So wonderful.

And I know specifically, right now, people are hurting in so many different ways.

So if they come to you and they need more than say a box of food, what other services do you do?

I'm so glad you asked that, right?

So we have a three tiered approach.

It's what we call food for today, food for tomorrow and food for a lifetime.

So anyone that's in need of food immediately, right?

They, their cupboards are bare frigerators empty.

They can call us, they can come to the food bank or they can go online.

For those that need access, you can visit our website at essay food, bank.org, or call our hotline at (210) 431-8326.

Now we're going to direct you to the closest food pantry, um, or to one of our pop-up distributions, or get you on the list we're via would deliver your food box.

Um, but it's meeting your need today, but we want to make sure that you're nourished tomorrow.

And so we'll ask you about applying for public benefits.

These are programs like the supplemental nutrition assistance program snap, which was formerly food stamps.

If it's a mom with kids, maybe the women, infants and children, um, they might need healthcare.

So Medicaid or the children's health insurance program.

So we work to stabilize households in our food for tomorrow strategies.

And those are more longterm, actually bigger benefits that families can get.

And then it's that third tier of food for a lifetime.

As we get to know families, we learn who's working and who's not.

And we have workforce development programs.

We partner with workforce solutions, Alamo, um, project quest to really get people access to, to education and training.

Ultimately we know we're not going to solve hunger with a canned good right hunger helping it.

Absolutely.

And that transportation to get to the products and the programs that you have, and the products with Alamo colleges and workforce development, workforce solutions, that's all important too, right?

Critical.

If we're going to move families to self-sufficiency, they need to be independent.

And transportation is a form of independence.

And that's again, where via helps to bridge that gap right there, helping us get food to families, but it gets them in that track of that today, tomorrow in a lifetime.

And ultimately that's the goal that we have.

We want a community where everyone thrives, where everyone has access, where there's not barriers to any community or individual and together we're nourished.

I love that.

And that's a San Antonio thing, isn't it, it's a together.

We can do this.

Well, you know, that, that coined phrase, we are San Antonio strong has been ringing true in our ears throughout this crisis, seeing so many people stepping up, right.

And a lot of ways people run away from crisises.

But I think people in San Antonio, we run towards it.

We embrace it.

And, um, it doesn't matter where we're from or who we are.

I think there's a place at the table for everyone there is.

And it's just incredible to see that in this crisis.

So many good people, so many good companies vias, one of them in really helping us solve this transportation gap, this logistical challenge, they move people every day and just feed them.

Yeah.

And the combination is amazing.

Eric, thank you so much for being here with us this morning.

I think it's really important to talk about that juxtaposition of food and transportation.

So thank you so much for being here and I'm excited to see what else you do.

Thank you so much.

We've heard a lot about how via and public transportation in general help make connections to the important things in our lives, but in a car centric, city, convincing people of the benefits of public transit can be difficult.

Our next guest has long been a champion of via and the value it provides to our community as president and CEO of Brooks, Leo Gomez has worked with via to develop a new transit center that opened on Burke's campus last year.

Leo, thank you for joining me.

We'll thank you Tuesday.

We've, we've heard from via CEO and board chair women about their plans to keep San Antonio moving, but I wanted to talk to you about the importance of public transit to economic and workforce development.

So if I'm a business owner and I don't ride public transportation, why should I care?

Well, you know, Tuesday, two points there, economic development and workforce to go on to keep things in the creation of jobs period.

And so if you're a business owner, you might not use public transit, but depending on what kind of businesses you're in your employees might, and if your employees don't one of your vendors or suppliers, might your customers might, there are many other people who might, and in the world of economic, it's important for business owners in particular, small business owners to know that in the art of recruiting large employers to San Antonio, among the factors that they're concerned about is the availability of public transit, the investment by a community and public transit.

And so they want to make sure that once they hire people in San Antonio, that folks are going to have a reliable way to get to their job.

And at the end of the day, any business, the business owner wants San Antonio to be doing well.

And if people in San Antonio are fortunate enough to find a job, but have a challenge getting to that job, that's not good for the economy of San Antonio, right.

And you've been really, really supportive of via and making sure that via had a center on Brook's campus.

Tell me a little bit about why that was so important to you.

It became real obvious to me early in my years at Brooks, that the companies that we were recruiting mainly from the East coast or from international sources, were very interested on in terms of where we were with public transit and reliability of transit.

Uh, they came from communities where there was a large investment in public transit.

So the car centric was alien to them, and yes, they're coming to Texas, but it adds a level of comfort to them to know that a community is doing what he needs to do to make sure its workforce can get to their place of employment is important.

Tell me a little bit more about your campus and why transportation is so important.

Well, if you take a look at Brooks, we're not pre, you know, we're not dominated by any one industry.

It's really a mixed use development of residential, commercial, industrial health care, high schools, et cetera.

And so there's many forms of employment and different levels of employment, so to speak, but it's not just doctors at the hospital, there's technicians and support staff that need to get to the hospital and not all technicians and support staff have a car.

And so to get to the hospital, they have to have reliable transportation from the region, from their household onto the campus.

And then it's not just the campus, it's the surrounding region.

And so making sure that employers in South East San Antonio are going to be able to benefit from public transit and that their workforces will is critically important.

So Brooks is an innovation zone and vias keep essay moving plan is designed to leverage technology to make life easier.

So what do you see for Brooks their role in that, especially now?

Well, we're thrilled to have this phenomenal transit center that be, has invested in right smack in the middle of Brooks.

That's great.

But at the end of the day, they still have to get from that point to their place of employment.

And at Brooks it second be as far as half a mile, three quarters of a mile away, maybe even a mile right at the outskirts.

And so the challenge that we still have is folks from chord, their bus, the bus drops them off at the via transit center to their place of employment.

And through the innovation zone, we hope to be able to leverage or pilot, uh, various opportunities that might help us solve that problem.

And we went from e-bikes to scooters, to, to shuttles, uh, and maybe even driverless shuttles someday, but all of that is going to involve new technology.

And we have the opportunity as an innovation zone, the pilot different programs that might work.

And if we can solve that last mile challenge for transit at Brooks, then we have figured out how we can solve it for all other parts of San Antonio.

Well, we need that type of innovation.

So thank you Leo for providing that now, um, coronavirus has brought a whole lot of different things.

And so I know you've had to change up the way that you do things.

So tell me real quickly about what you've done and any final thoughts you may have for the viewers.

Absolutely.

Let me tell you, uh, this crisis has been incredible, uh, but it's amazing how we all have been able to pivot from our responsibilities from having, from having a belief that we had to be in the office.

At least I did, uh, to understanding that the organization can still function, even when working remotely, what technology has allowed us to do today.

I'm very proud of the team at Brooks that has been working remotely since March, April timeframe.

We go into the office as need be, but, uh, we've been working remotely.

The companies on Brooks have folks who are essential that need to be there day in, day out and have folks that can work remotely.

And so everybody is really trying to adhere to the principles that are advocated by our mayor and our County judge that has kept San Antonio really at the forefront of managing this crisis to the extent it can be.

Great.

Well, Leo, thank you so much for joining us.

I think that your thoughts and your vision really is important, especially with the juxtaposition of via and Brooks Tuesday.

It's a pleasure to be here.

Thank you to our guests tonight for helping us understand just how important public transportation is to our community and our economy.

Jeff, do you have any parting words for the community?

Sure.

I'd like to talk a little bit about what, what actually is in the plan itself.

So there are three big elements.

One is increased frequency, which we've been doing in our core bus service.

The more innovative is what we call mobility on demand or via link.

And it's where we take the fixed route buses out of that area.

We replacing that with vans that operate on demand so much like a ride share type program, you book it, it arrives, it comes within eight minutes rather than one hour.

And we proposed a spread that all around about 15 mod zones compared to the one today and increases our service area by 300 square miles and gives those people.

For example, people disabilities access for the first time to transit.

And then the last part, the advanced rapid transit, the dedicated lanes.

We started that in some way with the HOV lanes, it just opened two weeks ago, VI as part of that.

So we have a very broad, innovative program.

So there's a lot that is transportation, but keeping that same movie, absolutely keeping us moving hope.

Do you have any parting words Tuesday?

There's no question that we take people.

We connect people to opportunities, but having a robust, innovative public transit system is good for the future of our community.

Great.

Final words.

Hope thank you so much.

And thank you to our viewers for joining the conversation with your questions and comments online, you can learn more about vias plans for our public transit future by visiting www dot dot com.

And you can watch this full show on demand at dot org.

Have a great evening.