Meeting_Body
EXECUTIVE MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE
JANUARY 15, 2026
Subject
SUBJECT: BOARD ADMINISTRATION 5-YEAR STRATEGIC PLAN ANNUAL UPDATE
Action
ACTION: RECEIVE AND FILE
Heading
RECOMMENDATION
Title
RECEIVE AND FILE the Board Administration 5-Year Strategic Plan annual update (Attachment A).
Issue
ISSUE
Motion 43 by Directors Garcetti, Solis, and Najarian (Attachment B) was approved at the May 27, 2021, Regular Board Meeting. This Motion directs the Board Clerk to prepare a strategic plan, including but not limited to:
1. Delivering continuous improvement to encourage meaningful public engagement and improve the accessibility of Board meetings, materials, and public comments; and
2. Continuation of effective public engagement options developed as Metro and L.A. County jurisdictions responded to the pandemic and its recovery process.
The strategic plan was presented in January 2022. The Board Clerk committed to providing yearly updates on the progress of the goals laid out in the Strategic Plan.
Background
BACKGROUND
Led by the Board Clerk, the Office of Board Administration (Board Administration) is currently a 30-member team. Board Administration is comprised of the Board Clerk’s Office, Legal Services, the Dorothy Peyton Gray Research Library and Archive, and the Records Management Center. As the agency’s record keeper, the Board Clerk is responsible for keeping accurate Board meeting minutes and producing Committee and Board meetings. The department handles public records requests, claims for damages, electronic records management, and manages the research library and archive. The need for innovation has increased exponentially as the department has moved away from a paper process and embraced technology in multiple facets of business operations. Board Administration no longer solely plays an administrative role at Metro but is an important strategic partner for the agency. This team is comprised of future-thinking, highly skilled individuals who strive to keep Metro transparent, responsive, equitable, and accountable. Transparency and public engagement are crucial to the democratic process and quality decision-making by our Board of Directors. As the conduit between the public and the Board of Directors, the Board Administration aims to remove barriers to access of public information.
The Board Administration 5-Year Strategic Plan (Attachment C) was first presented to the Board of Directors in January 2022 and has four goals, each with subgoals and yearly milestones. The Strategic Plan is a roadmap for Board Administration and gives the public a clear picture of where the department plans to be and how it will get there in five years. The four goals are: 1. ongoing workforce development; 2. responsive, accountable, and trustworthy governance within the Metro organization; 3. enhanced public engagement with Metro’s Board of Directors; and 4. improved agencywide Strategic Knowledge Management, utilizing innovations in the preservation, access, and curation of Metro’s information.
Discussion
DISCUSSION
Progress on the goals is detailed in Attachment C, with highlights shown below:
1. Ongoing workforce development.
• Subgoal 1.4: Succession Planning
o The Senior Director and the Senior Manager in the Library & Archive are both planning to retire by July 2026. In anticipation of these departures, four new FTE librarians have joined Metro beginning in 2023. The Office of Board Administration is now in a stronger position to transition to new leadership for the Library & Archive. Staff members have worked together across their own job functions to create a stronger team: developing marketing and outreach best practices, participating in various aspects of integrated library system preparation, and planning for upcoming high-profile mega events in the coming years.
2. Responsive, accountable, and trustworthy governance within the Metro organization.
• Subgoal 2.5: Records Retention Schedule
o A full Records Retention Schedule (RRS) review with professional services was initiated in August of 2025. Due to changes in the RRS management system vendor’s professional services, the full-scale legislative review will take place every 3-4 years, rather than annually, yet staff will continue to monitor legislative changes through the citation mapping function available within the system. Additionally, staff continue to have access to professional services for review of individual items as needed.
3. Enhanced public engagement with Metro’s Board of Directors.
• Subgoal 3.3: Public Access to Archived Board Meeting Documents
o Staff continues evaluating systems and processes for migrating all Board documents into a single repository accessible to the public. In the meantime, a federated search tool is available for the public to search multiple Board archives (pre-2015 documents) in one place through <https://boardagendas.metro.net>.
4. Improve agencywide Strategic Knowledge Management, utilizing innovations in preserving, accessing, and curating Metro’s information.
• Subgoal 4.4: Archival Management
o Archive staff have begun loading digital assets into Preservica, our digital asset management (DAM) platform. This powerful tool finally provides a comprehensive storage and retrieval solution for the Library & Archive’s extensive digital holdings. Preservica facilitates file format migration by transitioning obsolete or proprietary formats into stable open formats for long-term preservation and access, ensuring their continued readability and usability over time.
o Staff have developed several working relationships with the Customer Experience department team members to facilitate the ingestion of physical and digital marketing material, Metro Art assets, and contemporaneous photographs, which allows us to archive resources “in real time.”
o Staff continue to identify stakeholders across the agency who hold mutual or complimentary interests and responsibilities to strengthen and raise consciousness about our work and why it is important to the organization.
o Library & Archive staff will continue to plan for future oral history projects to develop a diverse collection of first-hand accounts of regional transit and transportation planning, construction, and operation. Staff endeavors to surface underrepresented voices from across Metro, as well as beyond executives and decision-makers. Staff will continue to build out the Preservica digital asset management repository, identifying new access options, exploring how to market and promote its availability. Staff will explore the best way to replace hyperlinks found throughout the Primary Resources website which point to online Flickr photos and galleries and instead point to more robust Preservica galleries that feature not just images, but digital/digitized documents and other audiovisual assets.
Equity_Platform
EQUITY PLATFORM
The Strategic Plan supports equitable access to information for internal staff and the public. Additionally, the Strategic Plan increases access to information by offering multiple means of communication with the Board, including options for communication in different languages. Further efforts include optimizing search capabilities in the Board archive database, integrating an online translating service for forms, such as the forms for public records requests and claims for damages. As part of continuing efforts, traffic to the boardagendas.metro.net website has increased, and Public Records Requests have also grown. Board Administration also continues to provide multiple opportunities for public participation at Committee and Board meetings by accepting public comment both in-person, via telephone during meetings, and via email and U.S. Mail in advance of meetings.
All of this is in pursuit of making Metro more transparent, accessible, and responsive to our community.
Vehicle_Miles_Traveled _Outcome
VEHICLE MILES TRAVELED OUTCOME
VMT and VMT per capita in Los Angeles County are lower than national averages, the lowest in the SCAG region, and on the lower end of VMT per capita statewide, with these declining VMT trends due in part to Metro’s significant investment in rail and bus transit.* Metro’s Board-adopted VMT reduction targets align with California’s statewide climate goals, including achieving carbon neutrality by 2045. To ensure continued progress, all Board items are assessed for their potential impact on VMT.
While this item does not directly encourage taking transit, sharing a ride, or using active transportation, it is a vital part of Metro operations, as it provides an update on the Office of Board Administration’s 5-year Strategic Plan. The plan aims to provide increased transparency and accountability to the public for the Board’s actions and meetings. Because the Metro Board has adopted an agency-wide VMT Reduction Target, and this item supports the overall function of the agency, this item is consistent with the goals of reducing VMT.
*Based on population estimates from the United States Census and VMT estimates from Caltrans’ Highway Performance Monitoring System (HPMS) data between 2001-2019.
Implementation_of_Strategic_Plan_Goals
IMPLEMENTATION OF STRATEGIC PLAN GOALS
This recommendation supports Metro’s Vision 2028 goal 5 to provide responsive, accountable, and trustworthy governance within the Metro organization. Further, the goals contained within the Board Administration 5-Year Strategic Plan are connected to the following Metro subgoals under goal 5:
• Subgoal 5.3: Metro will develop a transparent data management policy that addresses open data, data storage, and data protections.
• Subgoal 5.4: Metro will apply prudent commercial and business practices to create a more effective agency.
• Subgoal 5.7: Metro will build and nurture a diverse, inspired, and high-performing workforce.
Next_Steps
NEXT STEPS
Staff will return annually with an update on milestones achieved and will return in FY2027 with an updated 5-Year Strategic Plan. Additionally, staff has brought an action to the Board in January 2026 as required by new legislation (SB 707, Durazo) for the Board to find that Metro’s eligible subsidiary bodies can meet virtually under the requirements stipulated under this new bill.
Attachments
ATTACHMENTS
Attachment A - Detailed Strategic Plan Updates
Attachment B - Motion 43
Attachment C - Board Administration 5-Year Strategic Plan
Prepared_by
Prepared by:
Matthew Barrett, Senior Director, Library Services & Records Management, (213) 922-7444
Omar Camacho, Director, Systems Projects, Research & Records Information Management, (213) 922-2335
Margarita Lencioni, Manager, Legal Services, (213) 922-2333
David Lor, Senior Manager, Information Governance, Research & Records Information Management, (213) 922-2883
Deanna Phillips, Deputy Board Clerk, Board Administration, (213) 922-2566
Shelly Ray, Manager, Information Governance, Research & Records Information Management (213) 418-3040
Reviewed_By
Reviewed by: Collette Langston, Board Clerk, Board Administration (213) 922-2837
