2025-10-21 All Hands

[joecastiglione]

Agenda

• Admin
  • Phase 11 agreements & contributions
    • 3 agencies have not provided signed agreements
    • 7 agencies have not provided contribution
  • Invoice review / approval process
  • Cancel Nov 11 Meeting (Veterans Day)?
  • Outreach strategy update
• Phase 11B progress updates
  • Clean up command prompt logging
  • Other tasks? Were new issues created? Don't see any updates
• Phase 11C prioritization
  • Training / documentation materials prioritization
  • Draft telecommute scope received
  • Scoping of 2nd tier tasks (agency vs consultant)

Meeting Notes

Date: Not specified (Late October 2025)
Meeting Type: Partner/Engineering Team Meeting
Attendees: Joe (Zephyr Foundation), Lisa Zorn (PMC Chair), Guy Rousseau (Atlanta Regional Commission), Alex Bettinardi, Bhargava Sana, Sijia Wang (WSP), David Hensle, Bo Wen, Mark Moran (MWCOG/NCRTPB), and others

Administrative Items

Phase 11 Agreements and Contributions - URGENT

Status: Significant delays in both agreements and payments

• Outstanding agreements: 3 out of 14 contributing agencies still haven't signed
• Outstanding contributions: 7 out of 14 contributing agencies (50%) have not submitted payments yet
• Various reasons for delays: awaiting bank letters, needing invoices with PO references, checks in mail, staffing changes
• Concern: Cannot issue Phase 11C task orders without adequate funding
• Action: Joe will reach out again to all outstanding agencies despite recent contact

Invoice Review Process

Discussion: How to handle invoice review going forward

Prior process (with AMPO):

• AMPO receives invoices
• Review tracking in Trello board
• Joe reviewed content/substance and financials
• Approved invoices go to AMPO bookkeeper, then accountant for payment
• 30-day payment timeline required by contracts

Key considerations:

• Invoices need both substantive review (work completed as specified) and administrative review (formatting, accounting consistency)
• Deliverables exist in mixed locations: some are PRs, some are documents, some tasks have no explicit deliverables
• Financial documents previously maintained by AMP), not on project Google Drive

Proposed new workflow:

• Lisa and Joe to draft initial workflow in Zephyr environment
• Product and Community Team to take lead role on invoice review
• Distribute review responsibilities among team members
• Consider assigning leads per consulting firm
• Possibly assign based on who ranked tasks as 1s and 2s (agencies with highest priority interest)
• Maintain invoice transparency with linkage between scopes and deliverables
• Use GitHub for tracking where possible

Action Items:

• Lisa and Joe to meet separately on finance matters and draft workflow
• Product and Community Team to sort out distribution of review responsibilities
• Set up invoice assignment process in GitHub for future monthly invoices

Calendar

• November 11 meeting CANCELLED (Veterans Day)

Outreach Strategy

Goal: Grow partnership to sustain increased activity level and engagement

• Need to bring in agencies using ActivitySim but not contributing as partners
• Potentially reach beyond current users
• Motivation: Higher expectations for participation, fourth consulting firm, need to "grow the pie"
• Action: Joe, Bhargava, and Sumit meeting this afternoon to brainstorm concepts
• Will report back with ideas

Phase 11B Progress Update

Concern: Limited progress updates provided asynchronously as requested

Status check on 10-12 assigned tasks:

• Only Joe Flood's updates were clearly visible in original issues
• Some work may be happening but not documented in expected locations
• Possible duplicate issues created, making updates hard to find

Updates provided during meeting:

• RSG (David Hensle): Opened draft pull request just before meeting for main task; some additional UV work completed
• WSP (Sijia Wang):
  • SANDAG example model update task nearly complete
  • Pull request ready for review (tagged Jeff and Bhargava)
  • Located in separate SANDAG sample repo, not main issue tracker
  • Will update issue to link to pull request
  • Started fixing some tests but leaving final touches to Jeff

Action Items:

• Consultants to update progress in GitHub issues, even with minor notes
• Get updates in before Thursday engineering team meeting
• Don't wait until last minute to add information

Phase 11C Prioritization

Three High-Priority Tasks (Already Identified)

1. Telecommute Design (WSP leading)
2. Training Materials (needs sub-prioritization)
3. EET Next Steps (RSG scoping)

1. Documentation and Training Materials Sub-Prioritization

Process:

• Separate ranking matrix created with ~13 training/documentation items
• Partners to rank items 1-13 (only top 10 receive points)
• One week timeline for completion (sent out recently, due ~1 week from send date)

Early leaders:

• Getting Started documentation
• Input and Output documentation
• Model Component documentation

Considerations:

• Some tasks well-defined (Input/Output), others ambiguous (Getting Started scope unclear)
• Model Component documentation could be massive or targeted depending on scope
• Need to determine what's already documented vs. gaps
• Can distribute work across consulting firms

Action: Partners to complete rankings within one week

2. Telecommute Scope (WSP/Sijia Wang)

Status: Draft scope submitted for first two steps

Content:

• Details software infrastructure additions for two new components
• Specifies data source: SANDAG 2022 Household Travel Survey
• Outlines estimation steps for both models

Next steps:

• Internal review by Joe, Lisa, and Bhargava before presenting to full group

3. Scoping Second-Tier Tasks

Budget context:

• Total remaining Phase 11 budget: ~$220,000
• Top 3 tasks unlikely to consume entire budget
• Could have Phase 11D if needed

Discussion points:

• Balance between careful planning and maintaining momentum
• Don't want scoping to extend through all of November
• Some tasks vary widely in potential scope (e.g., telecommute frequency considering commute cost could be modest or extensive)
• Partially automated calibration scope unclear - could be huge or discrete proof of concept

Two approaches considered:

1. Wait to see costs of top 3 tasks before scoping next tier
2. Start parallel scoping for near-certain tasks to maintain momentum

Scoping responsibility:

• Historically: mix of consultant-led and agency-led scoping
• Consultants have been leading recent efforts
• Agencies could draft scopes for less complex tasks (as clients would)
• Need to identify who takes first crack at each scope

Bhargava's suggestion:

• Add budget allocation step now, not just ranking
• Partners should estimate dollar amounts for highlighted tasks
• This will influence scope decisions
• Process designed well, not huge lift to add budget column

Agreed approach:

• Partners to complete documentation sub-prioritization WITH budget estimates
• Partners to add budget estimates to main prioritization spreadsheet for top ~8 highlighted items
• Timeline: Complete within one week
• Continue discussion at next Tuesday's meeting

Action Items:

• Joe to send reminder email requesting:
  • Complete documentation rankings with budget
  • Budget additions to main spreadsheet for highlighted items
• All partners to respond within one week
• Reconvene discussion next Tuesday

Technical Updates

Explicit Chunking Fix (WSP/Sijia Wang)

Issue: Explicit chunk issue reported by TransLink and encountered by Transport for New South Wales

Status:

• Pull request opened to main ActivitySim
• Tested and working for Transport for New South Wales
• Needs testing by TransLink (Bo Wen agreed)
• Needs engineering review (suggest Jeff as original author of explicit chunking)

Action Items:

• Bo to test the fix for TransLink
• Sijia to tag Jeff for review when ready

Next Meetings

• Thursday: Engineering team meeting
• Next Tuesday: Continue Phase 11C prioritization discussion
• TBD: Lisa and Joe finance meeting, possible follow-up

Key Themes

• Urgency around funding: Need agreements and contributions to proceed with Phase 11C
• Process improvements: Distributing workload for invoice review, clearer progress tracking
• Balancing planning with action: Want thoughtful scoping but can't let it drag out
• Growing the partnership: Outreach efforts to sustain expanded activities
• Transparency and communication: Need better asynchronous updates on progress