alex chair. thank you. members of the council. it is an honor and privilege to step in this role. pronounce he/him a visual description, i'm a middle aged little person. also hard of hearing. and today i'm wearing a suit, which i have to get used to. you know i want to say by way of introduction, what a privilege it is to serve in this position. by way of background i served as the director ceo of the marine center for inspect living for 17 years. i have been involved in disability rights for 21 years. almost half my life. i have been and -- embraced the complexity of -- the journey of disability. myself as has my family. and that come with joy, pride and -- when we talk about access barriers. sometimes frustration. whether this isarc seszing health care, physical space services. and so the privilege to -- serve as the director of the mayor's office on disability and really work in partnership with the council and community with other departments. with the city. at this very important time. in our city's history. is truly an honor. my report i want it say this is day 10 for me. so

i'm very pleased to ask alex sparkman to come to the mic. >> welcome. thank you. >> good morning chairl ga and commissioners again my name is alex sparkman and i'm the chief deputy executive director at mts and i'm pleased today to be joined by ruth bernstein who is the president and ceo of emc research. >> by way of background and i'm sure you all are familiar with this you know mts has really prioritized sized initiatives to sustain and improve the region's public transportation systems since the covid pandemic really upends the business model travel patterns as well as you know, in-person office work norms. mtc's efforts have involve advocacy and distribution of billions of dollars of federal and state relief funding and a commitment of hundreds of millions of regional dollars to extend the financial runway for the operators facing significant operating shortfalls. most recently this past summer mtc convened the transportation revenue select committee to forge consensus on a revenue measure that would avoid major service cuts. advanced transit transformation to attract new riders an

chair. let's bring in alex michelson and... thank you so much for coming in.ig bite that went viral today on -- he was asked about the whole males and female sports and he said the following. >> would you do something like that, would you say no men and female sports. >> it's an issue of fairness i agree with you on that. it's deeply unfair. i completely agree. that's easy to call out, the unfairness of that. there's also humility and grace. that these poor people are more likely to commit suicide and have anxiety and depression. the way that people talk down to vulnerable communities is an issue that i have a hard time with as well. >> trace: he does what he does a lot, he's like i agree with you but there's always this other side. he's got to get both sides in, what'd you think? >> he said he wanted to change the conversation. just a day or so ago we were talking about how every single democrat senator voted against protecting women sports. today here we are, the heir apparent for 2028 on the democrat side saying that actually he's acknowledging the reality

chair of advancing american freedom. welcome to all of you. aaron, you first here. so explain this tariff reversal, however temporary it is. >> so, alexhad to sort of make myself a cheat sheet here because things are changing so quickly. just this morning. things are changing so quickly here. so what we most recently heard through a truth social post from president trump is that he is going to pause the new 25% tariff on mexico after having spoken to the mexican president just in the last hour or so we believe, saying that this was a decision that would allow goods that are compliant with the usmca, that us, mexico, canada trade deal that president trump himself brokered in his first term. goods that are compliant with that trade deal would not be subject to this 25% tariff for a month. that, of course, follows what we heard, as you noted earlier today from the commerce secretary, howard lutnick, that perhaps something like this would be happening for both canada and mexico, though we haven't heard any more about canada at this point. and this comes after us automakers got an exemption just yesterday from president trump after these t