 Interpreter Charles or interpreter Pablo. Are you able to interpret for us on the English Channel? Interpreter Pablo or interpreter Charles. Are you able to hear me? Yes, I can hear you. This is interpreter Pablo Thank you I'm gonna go ahead and read for this Spanish participants for those of you just joined in the meeting live translation in Spanish is Available and members wishing to listen in Spanish can join the Spanish Channel to do so click on the interpretation icon in the zoom toolbar It looks like a globe once you join the Spanish Channel We recommend you shut off the main audio so you only hear the Spanish translation Rousque reciens se une a la reunión Interpretation en vivo al español está disponible y los miembros que deseen escuchar en español pueden unirse al canal para unirse Agaclit en el icono de interpretación en la barra de herramientas de zoom Que ahora parece un globo terrarium una vez en un al canal de español se recomienda que apague el audio primario para que sólo escuche la interpretación en español Thank you All right, madam city clerk. Thank you so much. We'll go ahead and call our meeting to order Could you please call the role of the city council council member tibets? Here council member schwethelm here council member Sawyer council member alvarez vice mayor rogers Mayor rogers here let the record show that all council members are present with the exception of council member alvarez council member Fleming and council member Sawyer Okay, thank you so much Madam deputy city clerk if you could also promote me on zooms that I can see folks We are in a hybrid format today, we are both in our council chambers with council members as well as live via zoom See a couple of additional planning commissioners who are raising their hands as well as council member alvarez There'll be multiple opportunities for public engagement today Both be either here in the chamber or through our pre-recorded voicemail comments or our live zoom comments Madam city clerk. Can you walk folks through with how they would be able to participate in today's meeting? Thank you after each agenda item is presented The mayor will ask for council comments and then open it up for public comment The mayor will first take public comment from those participating in the chamber Then move on to members of the public participation via zoom The host and zoom will be lowering all hands until public comment is open for the agenda item Once the mayor has called for public comment He will announce for the public to raise their hand if they wish to speak on the specific agenda item If you are calling in to listen to the meeting audibly you can dial star 9 to raise your hand If you wish to provide a public comment and are attending the meeting in person Please sign up to speak with an eye with on an item with the administrator Julie at the top of the room This process is in lieu of speaker cards in order to reduce touch points due to covet 19 Julie will ask your name what item you wish to speak on and for a one sentence summary for your statement for the record The mayor will then call on those in person who have signed it to speak on the item Once all live comments Zoom and in person have been heard the meeting host will play voicemail public comments if you provide a live public comment on an agenda item, but also submitted an email e Comment or recorded a voice message public comment your email e comment or voice message public comment will not be Duplicated and read or played during the meeting Additionally, there are two public comment periods on today's agenda to speak on non agenda matters under item 17 and 8 13 and 17 This is the time when any person may address the council on matters not listed on this agenda But which are within the subject matter jurisdiction of the council Throughout today's agenda when the mayor calls for public comment An interpreter will be prepared to assist anyone needing Interpretation services those using interpreter support will be afforded additional time for your public comment as required by the brown act We asked that those listening on the spanish channel But wishing to make a public comment to turn off the interpretation channel entirely at the time you hear your name called So you can join the main channel to make your public comment heard and translated into english This icon may now look like a circle with an es in the middle and the word spanish underneath You can then rejoin the spanish channel at the conclusion of your comment to continuing listening in spanish. Thank you Thank you, madame city clerk We'll move on to item two announcement of closed session items Council did meet earlier today in a special city council meeting to hear two items in closed session I'll turn to our city attorney and see if she has any further information to add Yes, um the council met in closed session in the special meeting this morning. I understand that there was a report out earlier Um, I will repeat the report out Now for members of the public that were not present council did meet on two items. Um, the first concerned Existing litigation concerning cpu cpu c Proceedings regarding the Jennings crossing And gave direction to litigation our litigators And then the council met on item 2.2. Again, this was in the special session Regarding labor negotiations and gave direction to a labor negotiator. Thank you Thank you madame city attorney So we'll move on to our first study session of the day You might notice some additional zoom boxes up there in the in the corners here We do have a joint study session here with our planning commission Madam clerk, do we need to call the role of the planning commission to establish their quorum? Yes, we should call the um Role of the planning commission if the council would just give me one moment. I will um bring that up Okay, thank you for your patience Chair whole commissioner holton commissioner Here commissioner dugan here commissioner carter vice chair peterson And chair weeks here So let the record show that all commissioners are here with the exception of commissioner holton All right, mr. City manager. Do you want to introduce the item? Mayor and members of the city council item 3.1 this afternoon is our 2050 general plan vision statements Amy lile our supervising planner will be the staff presenter today on this item Good afternoon. Thank you so much. Um, nice to see you mayor rogers chair weeks members of the council and the planning commission My name is Amy lile and it's my pleasure to serve as the supervising planner for our advanced planning team And today we will also have a couple other presenters We will have andy gussison our senior planner and project manager for our general plan update And then also betrice garyl auna who is our equity and public health planner Her position is funded by our Kaiser permanente grant, which we'll talk about a little bit later as well And then also present our two representatives from our consultant team We have dan amson from mig and charlie nox from place works So we'll go ahead and get started. We do have a brief presentation today And this item really includes an overview of our general plan visioning process We're going to report out on what's occurred thus far What we've heard what worked what didn't and where we're going next I also just wanted to acknowledge that we do have a few cac members on the call today As well as present in council chambers And also just wanted to acknowledge an extreme thank you to the council and those planning commission members That helped us post various zoom meetings throughout the community And helped us gain more engagement through this process Next slide, please So the general plan process This includes more than just the physical components of our community And it really gives us the opportunity to rethink What's what's working and where we want to go? So the general plan provides a basis for all of our land use and planning decisions in our local jurisdiction And it really serves as an inspiration To communicate where we've been and what qualities we want to maintain And then how we want to evolve in the future. So for this item, we really want you to put on A new mindset and really forward thinking thinking about what we want our community to look like in 2050. Next slide, please So our general plan process is known as Santa Rosa Forward and it's really an opportunity for all members of our community We for this particular general plan update. We've been blessed to have the funding necessary to do And go beyond what we've traditionally done And for this we are focused on doing neighborhood engagement. We really do want to hear from everyone in the community We also have a focus of working with our vulnerable populations And infusing tools to combat a lot of those Unprecedented emergencies. That's the new word unprecedented that we've been experiencing. So we have a more resilient future in front of us Next slide, please So this is a graphic that shows the overview of the schedule for our general plan process And dina or Stephanie, you can just hit the mouse one more time. I think it'll highlight where we're at In this process So we are still somewhat at the beginning. So this is really a check-in and a review point And we will be rolling through the rest of the process concluding an early 2023 So it includes a full environmental impact report which will kick off in 2022 And this general plan is considered comprehensive. So it's not updating one or two different elements It's updating the whole entire general plan It does include an update to our housing element It also includes an update to our climate action plan We are also working on policy related to environmental justice to respond to community and also our new state legislation And also an update to our safety element And thanks to a grant from Kaiser Permanente. We were able to hire Beatrice To help us infuse health policy And then also collaborating with the latino service providers We have that additional focus on engagement with our vulnerable communities And really making sure that we have an equity lens in all of the aspects of our general plan So with that, I will pass it off to Andy to continue in with our presentation Thank you. Amy and next slide, please So I want to review with you quickly some important resources and some initial work that we did last winter One important resource I want the council and commissioners to be aware of is our project website It's a great place for getting up to date on our schedule getting access to documents and information And also for the public to know that that's a place they can go to And submit comments throughout the entire program And actually get access to surveys. Next slide The project team got busy in February or I should say even earlier last fall And wrote an existing conditions report. This is An encyclopedic document of many issues or a comprehensive set of issues That help describe where we are as a city. It really does perform a baseline that describes the Events the circumstances we find ourselves in today And this is a great document if you have a particular topic that you wish to Do a deep dive into you can learn about mobility or our infrastructure About community health and also Here see here what the key issues are That face us Next slide Next slide. Yeah, there we go The briefing book is an executive summary of the of the of the background report It's really meant to be accessible And it's really a great way to get a quick survey or scan of the issues facing the city And it's been published in both English and Spanish. Both of these documents are available on the website Next slide One of the things we did initially to reach out to the public was to issue a survey And we asked a number of questions But one of the most interesting ones was to ask our residents where they define the center of their neighborhood We were very pleased with our response. We had over 1300 Surveys completed and we learned some interesting things from from that response. Next slide. First We saw that we did a great job of getting city-wide Participation in this survey you can see on that map a scatter diagram showing where people identified their neighborhoods So you can see we really captured The full footprint of the city We also learned from the survey respondents a number of things how people define their neighborhoods It's not just the center of where they live But it's also a place where they shop where they get services Where they self identify as a neighborhood some place that is significant or representative of where they live Next slide And we also learned from many of the respondents who gave us information about their Some demographic data That we really do need to continue to work to Reach families who are not primary english speakers And we know that's something we will be working on throughout the product throughout the general plan project But we also see that we did a good job of reaching a broad spectrum of age groups in the in the city You can see on the upper right there that we do need to make more of an effort to get to the youth And we have some focus targeted outreach activities for that population group Next slide the general plan cannot be written by a technical team or consultants and Planning staff alone. We rely on our colleagues here in the city Who are technical experts in subject matters that are relevant and central to the general plan our technical advisory committee? Has representatives from all of our departments in the city and also they provide us connection with Their sub regional our neighbor our partners in in neighboring jurisdictions and in the region They are going to be engaged throughout the project to make sure we get The general plan right There's a lot about the general plan that involves technical materials That is important that is correctly Characterized and that we are being strategic in our Formulation of policies as we go forward next slide We also formed a technical advisory committee as many of you council members are aware. We've reached out to you to Help and encourage appointments to seven members of the 25 members cac They have become Really incredibly important part of our public outreach. You're very helpful during this initial outreach space They are not only our First line of feedback from the public But they're also our vanguard to reach out into the community As liaisons to get the word out about the general plan next slide so What's important to remember too is we're working From a plan a toolkit that we developed and presented to the council last fall in 2020 The community involvement strategy where we outlined Not just tools but principles that will guide how we reach out to the community throughout the general plan Project and we want to ensure that as we move forward through each of these steps We look at are we really providing, you know, authentic and equitable outreach? Are we getting people to the table? Are we being inclusive? Are we are we deploying the right technology? We were challenged by covid Having to shift from what is traditionally Face-to-face workshops and now having to go Into a virtual mode and I think with the support of our consultant team and and The encouragement we've had from council members and commissioners who participated in our workshops We've done a good job using technology and zoom to reach out to the community So we will continue to work with community groups organizations City boards and commissions. We will deploy workshops and surveys So that we get the kind of engagement that we need in order for this general plan to Reflect all the voices in our community So i'm going to conclude my presentation at this point and hand it off to Beatrice. Thank you Thanks Andy Good afternoon everyone in relationship to what and it was mentioned and if I can see the next slide please We want to talk about the community vision workshops that we have district-wide in the city. So We have 10 different workshops one per district and seven of them were english workshops and We had three additional ones for the districts that have more than 60 of the population who speak spanish So these were districts one five and seven Talking about the spanish speaking meetings one of the things that we want to communicate to us that it was challenging and more challenging to reach out to to Spanish speaking communities for different reasons first of all Internet access but also The demographics of of this population who are mostly essential workers for the city of santa rosa So basically during the pandemic time. It was very hard to to reach out to them and to find it a time that was Comfortable for them to be able to attend to a meeting. So that was the reason that we organized some weekend Workshops and we were very successful reaching out to this to this population but we wanted to just Take into account that it was more challenging and that we heard different necessities that the spanish speaking population has specifically talking about being rent burdened and very different concerns that that other areas of the city and we want to mention this because There are other immediate concerns not necessarily related to the general plan that should be addressed in in these groups and we want to We just wanted to to give the relevance to this topic before going to to what we heard from the general population in the city in terms of This is this is not here. I don't know if we can go to the next slide, please We besides the 10 different community vision workshops We had additionally 16 community organization workshops. These means that we met with different CAC members who helped us Connect with different organizations and we reach out to other different organizations besides those to Get a bit deeper And more equitable vision of the city From the community and what we can say from this is that this this Information was really useful. We got more than 160 participants in the in the district workshops and we got more than 200 participants in the additional meetings that we that we had so this is not to say that we pretend to have a larger number or or A higher number of people participated But just to say that we were very mindful to keep growing this With this number of of participants and to gather Comments from each of of these meetings if we can go to the next slide, please Yeah, besides these community workshops that we had We also created a Second community survey besides the one that Andy presented Which had the vision statements on on it And what we did was to prepare this this survey that mirror the contents of the workshops and the meetings So people who could not attend our workshops were provided an additional opportunity for Sharing their voice and providing their input on the vision statements that we can go to the next slide, please And this was a question that we had in in very different Meetings, so how are the community comments being used? First of all, we want to say that we have more than 3000 comments received during this process Of engagement To be accurate. I want to say that we have more than 4,662 Comments and this comments would be classified will be are being organized and classified into five Broad categories that we're showing on the right on the on the slide. First of all We are using it for including it into the vision statement second, we're Defining the assets of the city of cenarosa third. We're defining the opportunities and challenges and We are also identifying engagement methods that people prefer and last but not least we are creating another category for other comments and questions so we can Uh guide the comments that are not the directly related to the general plan update to the staff in the city that can respond to these questions and Classify what people need to know about the city. So if we can go to the next slide, please Just to show you what the vision statement process has been We want to tell you that the this aspirational statements are coming from the community Meets and desires and as my colleague and the good steps and mentioned We had a community a number one a community survey number one Then we went through the technical advisory committee meeting and then we had a community advisory Meeting and then we went to the workshops both district and community Focused and we had a second survey happening at this time And finally we're coming today to the planning commission and the city council to present what we heard from the community If we can go to the next slide, please Just to um be clear about the vision statement. It is organized around specific key topics and The initial statements were based on the ideas of of the community but also the the community advisory committee and the city staff And these statements were refined and confirmed by the community in the events that happened during May in June Throughout our workshops meetings and surveys And this is just a sample of the words that we heard during the the workshops if we can go to the next slide, please And um for you to approve in this meeting We have the general plan community vision and you have it in the staff report but basically we want to um Say that the our our general plan community vision is uh center rosé is a place with the following characteristics healthy just sustainable shelter connected educated cultural resilient successful safe prepared inclusive and equitable these 13 um statements are defined on the staff report and we didn't want to take more of your time and We we just um are mentioning them. We can please go to the next slide and we wanted um your approval and uh, I will um, I will pass it on to Amy Lyle so she can guide you through the next steps of of our process. Thank you Thank you so much. Beatrice. So the vision statements that are provided to you in the staff report encompass the collective expression of what we heard over the last few months from our community And so we're going to continue to refine these based on your input today and other comments received today as well So these will be used in the next phase in reviewing different land use and circulation alternatives And so that is the next point when we will come back to you We will be doing another round of community and um engagement and events and activities around the different alternatives and how those those visions can be expressed in a land use framework And hopefully we'll be able to do that in a more hybrid environment and not just virtual at that time Next slide, please So for today We are looking for your input and review of those vision statements And we do anticipate hearing more from the community We are continuing to meet with different community groups As soon we had quite a few last week and we even have one yesterday And so we will continue to refine and learn and we look forward to hearing your questions and comments. Thank you so much All right. Thank you so much and thank you for your work on this I'm going to turn it over first to the chair of the planning commission miss weeks If you want to go ahead and do questions from the from the commission Thank you, uh, mayor rogers um and also Excuse me. I'd also like to thank my fellow commissioners for being here on a tuesday rather than the thursday and As we know the general plan is vital to Our long-term vision for the future and so i'm excited to have this opportunity to meet with the council to Give input as onto the vision statements So, um, i'm going to go last So we'll go ahead and i'll reach out to my fellow commissioners We'll do alphabetically as we do. Um, so commissioner carter Any comments Yes, thank you chair weeks and and thanks I'd like to add my thanks to the staff that's put this together and our consultants and especially the community advisory group who have a pretty daunting task to assemble Community input into a legible plan. I really appreciate their efforts in that arena, um Some high-level questions. I just want to make sure the way i'm reading this There's no ranking to the vision statements. Uh, the slide showed them in a circular arrangement So i'm assuming they're all all equally important And I think the characteristics are a pretty good summary of the things that make uh, santa rosa special but I just wanted to Verify that we're not talking about a ranked an order of vision statement um I think I'll withhold questions or comments on the specific language of the Specific statements to later in the process um Another kind of high-level Uh question I had was where do we see the input from the technical advisory committee? I think it's really important to understand The challenges facing the people that have to operate the city on a day-to-day basis and some sort of summary from that group's input While not more important than the neighborhood input certainly would be welcomed and then Finally, I would like to see as we move forward. I appreciated the way we took a neighborhood focus on collecting input and I think it's really important that we continue a neighborhood focus as the plan moves forward so that um We can have identities of our specific neighborhoods in town and people can Relate to those and and perhaps provide even greater community involvement as we focus on neighborhoods and districts within the city So those are my comments for now. Thank you for the opportunity and the good work to this point Thank you commissioner carter commissioner dug in Hi, thank you. Um, I echo um commissioner carters. Thanks to the staff and Just how much work you've created and so such little time already that all the um Background documents. It's a really an impressive product. Um, I don't have any specific questions I think commissioner carter hit the The questions on the nail the the nail on the head there with um wanting to know if they're ranked And I'll save specific comments for the statements and later in the process Thank you commissioner crepeki Uh, yeah, I don't have any questions at this time. Oh, okay Uh, vice chair peterson Uh, so I I also don't have a specific Questions is now the the appropriate time to just kind of uh Throw out some some specific comments and general comments Uh, let me ask uh, mayor rogers. How do you want to handle that in planning commission meetings? We usually do Um more specific comments later on in the item. So how would you like us to handle that? Yeah, let's Let's stick to questions right now and have a chance to hear from the public before we make the general comments And then we'll come back and make those statements later Thank you Great, then the no questions. I'll save it for later Okay, I do have a couple of specific questions. Um And in it has to do with the section under state That's referenced safe. It says streets are safe And my assumption is that means infrastructure Uh, so that was one question And also I wondered um If it was a little daunting for the public to see this many Categories of the vision and if some could be combined. Um, and that's it for my specific comments I have more general comments later on Thank you, and I'll turn it back over to uh, mayor rogers Thank you so much madam chair council members. Do you have any additional questions for staff? Let's go ahead vice mayor Um, so my question was I heard that we need to try to engage non-english speaking, um, but I also saw on slide 10 that um african-american and native Uh people that identified as african-american and native had a very low percentage of attendance So I guess my question would be Were those um comparable to our actual Demographics for the city of santa rosa and why weren't those identified as Uh people that we need to get more outreach to Does that make sense? And i'm looking for staff Hi, um So with regard to our outreach, um, I think probably I like via trees to to comment on that But I'll say before she does that Really our outreach In this first round was was really testing our capacity and identifying our needs to Refine our methods of outreach Um Beyond just using traditional email social media And and word of mouth So I'll hand it over to Beatrice Thank you, Andy. Um, vice mayor roger's in relationship to the different ethnicities and racial minorities of the city We have been doing uh additional outreach We did not mention specifically because as annie mentioned we have to require Demographics for the meetings and it's a little bit more complicated to request this information ahead of time Because um, we have to sacrifice the requirement of information Um, if we want people to participate because sometimes they don't want to fill in Additional documents, but we have definitely reached out to the black community to the native american communities And some of the asian groups, uh, we definitely have to do more work in relationship to this But um as uh, amy and andy, uh, we're mentioning in the timeline We're still at the beginning so we know this and we will definitely be reporting on our next On our next presentation. What has been the advance with these groups? Okay, I just wanted to know if it was comparable to Our actual demographics in the city about how many people Showed up. I think that that was missing for me. Um, and I probably should have started with this But thank you guys so much for your hard work. I really enjoyed meeting you guys on uh The sessions that I was able to attend. So thank you else member alvarez Thank you, mayor I definitely don't discount the the fact that we are exiting cobin As well as that this is the first time that we can have a go at it My question to you and probably at three specifically is what did you see work for For the outreach especially specifically in the Hispanic community and where did you see that we can definitely improve as we move forward? Thanks for the question mayor City council member alvarez I think for the spanish-speaking population There are many challenges as I mentioned But I think what worked for us was to reach out to specifically groups that are already organized and This was very successful. We we reached out to different groups in in roseland specifically and other areas of the city We joined efforts of vaccination fairs and events And we when we're looking forward to in-person meetings because we believe that a lot of the community outreach would be More accessible for people if we do it in person. Unfortunately till now the city has not been able to Do community events, but we believe that just reaching out directly to communities and Taking away the language barriers and also Reaching people where they are so using grocery stores vaccine vaccination centers and places where people shop as places where to contact the Hispanic community if And and yeah, we will keep trying to do this work as soon as the city let us Be present in in this community events or doing our own outreach And I definitely understand that the the obstacles and I'd love to hear that that you are approaching Where the people are such as grocery stores or where they make their purchases and spend their money I find that to be the most effective place and I hope that you will further explore those options. Thank you Councilmember Schwedl. Thank you. Mr. Mayor on the same lines First of all, thank you for this report. Um, and I might have heard or read it What is the strategy for actually getting some of the youth voice into this? Uh, specifically, you know, it looks like we don't have any voice yet from the youth What's the strategy the atreus respond to that? Um, she's been working closely with Latino service providers Thanks, Andy. Um, I've been working as as Andy mentioned with latino service providers who have been our voices both in english and spanish to communicate with the youth We also want to recognize the work of the two cac members that we have who are who are Students still and we also want to say that we have two future activities going on with our consulting team Which would be jose engagement engagement and uh, two of them would be related to art So we don't want to spoil the the Proposals that just let you know that uh during this This summer we're starting the youth engagement activities that are related to photo voice messages that we will request from from youth and we're finalizing this this Two opportunities for not only youth but kids to be part of this of this Of this participation process for the general plan update because we also want uh kids to be part of of this outreach since they're going to be the ones uh who would leave in the city for 2015 Right and that was kind of my point that's really going to be affecting them more so than maybe some of us But are we partnering with any of the school districts in the city? Not yet. Uh, we were leaving the schools alone While they're reorganized and went back to to classes. So now after The the restart of classes. That's that's our next step to to start a community youth engagement plan Great. Thank you. I'd really encourage that just our experience with the rebuilding of coffee community park Working with the local school getting the feedback from the students who we used in that park was invaluable to the ultimate design of the park So thank you I see no other questions from council members. Let's go ahead go to public comment on this item I'll start in the chambers and I don't see anybody who's jumping up to speak mostly because we're all alone in the chambers So we'll go to our zoom live public comments We'll start with woody followed by gregory Uh, can you hear me? Yes, we can All right. I'm assuming is yeah only one woody here. So woody hastings Here today, uh Representing myself, uh, you know as a sonoma county resident also with the coalition Opposing new gas stations. I think it's great that I heard it earlier stated that you're Looking at all these policies through an equity lens Something I didn't hear really I don't think I heard at all is anything about the climate crisis and a climate lens and I I know that City of santa rosa has adopted a climate emergency resolution that commits the city to looking at its power through a climate crisis lens And so I would want to see or hope to see Some discussion some inclusion really in all of the key Key areas that that were mentioned in that context slide of the sort of the topic areas Um, that really climate be infused as as equity would be infused throughout all of the All of the issue areas that you're looking at I mean The news is just coming in, you know day after day of epic unprecedented anomalous wildfire and heat episodes and floods Unprecedented anomalous floods and the climate scientists are telling telling us that these episodes are not just rare Not just unusual. They are off the charts by by many orders of magnitude of what should be experienced in our uh, you know in our modern 10 000 roughly 10 000 year old, uh, you know current, uh, holocene climate and we are in a period of of unprecedented unprecedented peril and it is incumbent upon all governmental entities from the federal international federal state and really down to the local level to address this issue meaningfully to to begin to you know do something about the coalition opposing new gas station says You know stop pouring fuel on the climate crisis fire And stop permitting new gas stations for example, and I know that there's action being taken on the part of the city To pursue that and that's good We're happy about that, but I'd like to see more More focus on the climate crisis in this conversation. Thank you Thank you, woody. We'll go to Gregory followed by jenny Thank you mayor and members of the council and planning commission. My name is Gregory Farron I um I want to listen to my wife who tells me that this is just visioning And it isn't uh details Because it looks you know pretty but there's no content here And the content that is here seems to be driven by the technical advisory committee I want to point out. I want to answer commissioner carter's question about where the technical advisory committee is It's in the briefing book and in the existing conditions If you read the entirety of this not the visions because while pretty and like I say lacking content I want them to go to you know real goals and objectives and Measurable outcomes so we can really figure out if we're getting to anywhere like where we want to go But if you back up and you know take the five mile, you know above view This is really just a place kind of a holding panna validated collection of budget requests and policy alternatives are um actions that The staff has wanted and put into uh the briefing book and the existing conditions You've got hundreds of pages in this that are nothing more than what i've seen and heard at city council meetings For years about what it is the staff wants Uh and while that's very important to listen to It's about 90 of this package you're reviewing The other you know five percent is these hearings and people wanting aspirational You know idealized Views of the city and that's what should be driving this and the city is not land and Circulation which is what you're hearing Land and circulation is an old style general plan update that says all we have to do is figure out Where to build housing and how to straighten out roads? this at the aspiration of this general plan and this state of california's Direction to general plans is to get into people to have social interactions that strengthen neighborhoods that build cities that are vibrant because of the people in it finding real value in being in it and seeing their aspirations brought to bear and it's not Where a house ought to be or a building ought to be or what are a street ought to be Fixed we can get to those and that's not the aspirational aspect of a real general plan I want this to get into strengthening neighborhoods. I want this to be able to deal with the social interactions The way in which people live Beyond what street they live on and what house they live in Thank you very much Thank you. Gregory. We'll go to jenny followed by david Hello, everyone. Thank you. Mayor rogers Chair weeks and members of the city council and planning commission It's nice to see those of you. I know But haven't seen in a long time and to meet the many new representatives of our city Thank you for your service and thank you to the staff for all the work you've done on this important document I'm a longtime resident of santa rosa newly retired from the american lung association after 24 years And now serving as president of the sonoma county bicycle coalition I applaud the city for the broad and inclusive approach being taken to develop the plan I would urge you to include more ambitious And specific language to ensure the city's achieves its ambitious mobility climate health and equity goals and I do Really support what both woody and greg have have said that yes, this this is a vision document But we need a vision and a plan to get to the reality The american lung association and the broader health community recognize that climate change is a public health emergency And a public health crisis Transportation is our number one source of climate emissions The quickest way we can quickly reduce emissions and improve community health and connectivity to our neighborhoods Is to make it easier and safer for people to ride a bicycle With its geography and climate santa rosa should be One of the most bike friendly cities in the country and yet as you know the majority of people Don't ride a bicycle because they do not feel safe doing so Santa rosa desperately needs a network of safe Protected bicycle corridors connecting all parts of our city and our neighborhoods The urgency of the climate challenge requires us to be bold and radical in our street designs To promote cycling and roadways that work for all ages and abilities Our next general plan can and should have measurable goals for meeting Its bold vision for bicycle and active transportation And the city council also has a key opportunity to set the direction for this bold direction And to direct staff to be bold as well climate science requires Nothing less so i've made some suggested language changes for the vision statement that i have submitted and Happy to send i'd send it to most of you. I will send it to the ones who don't have it yet And I uh, of course welcome your ideas to make it bolder. Thank you so much for your time Thank you, jenny. We'll go to david followed by kevin Looks like we lost david All right david if you get a chance Oh Can you unmute? Okay Yeah Yeah, um picking up on jenny's statement I um have been involved with the southeast greenway campaign and I couldn't agree more in terms of really creating Bicycle spaces that connect the community and I think that's a The greenway would really serve us a lot of people that The whole city in a sense because It's a kind of a key Route in terms of connecting the city and connecting it Even the county on farther Also The comment that was made earlier about art and supporting getting Kids young adults Take on things. I think there's a lot in an art that could be done Say with the greenway and looking at things that could be done on that and that's close to schools Something like I think it's 15 schools are within a half mile or something. So I think those kind of things should be supported in terms of the community Mapping of what you can consider your community Living Off a lupa You know, I think of of all the things here you have the golf course you you have The wonderful parks You have the shopping You know kind of like Montgomery village and all the stuff on summer field and I would just Mention that I think that The golf course it's that's a really important Asset as is the park that surrounds it. There's what probably five or six different uses in that And I'd hate to see the golf courses has been proposed or at least studied is What are you going to do with the golf course? And this my understanding is the golf course has actually been quite profitable Over a number of years it's perhaps the dining part Bar restaurant that hasn't been so profitable But I think that's an That's an important part of the side of town and You know, if you look at that park That it's in so many different uses you got soccer you got baseball fishing tennis you know, so you got a multi Sports complex and I think that's important to keep As well as I would imagine that the Golf course is All right. Thank you so much. David. We'll go to kevin followed by eras Hi friends Hi kevin kevin anderson here representing myself, but also A future for humanity santa rosa. I moved to santa rosa in two in January so very excited and working in the santa rosa general area for the last five years with high school youth On climate and environmental projects I'm not going to go too deep into the climate environmental connections I think woody greg and jenny already laid a great groundwork for that My main point is the youth voice which has already been brought up a couple places I do want to say To to amy Beatrice and andy. You guys are doing a wonderful job Getting out there. I've seen you a couple different meetings now And so well done in these unprecedented times you're doing a spectacular job I would definitely though it's someone that has worked in the santa rosa city schools and all over the county With high school youth would like to see more and when I when I say this what I mean and this might go for everyone here Simpler to understand language. What is land use? Why does it matter to the youth future to our future? That includes future housing, of course, which is a huge concern if you're if you're anyone right now But certainly our youth Neighborhood connectivity. Why is that important to not only climate but also social Also, what will what will these places provide for fun for coming together increasing social interaction? And then how are neighborhoods currently connected? We all know they're connected by Automobile traffic and that needs to change for lots of reasons first and foremost It does not provide enough space for youth to interact for all of us to interact Also in terms of santa rosa, I'd like to say this pedal luma is getting a lot of press lately Their climate action committee is doing some some serious work big band gas stations And frankly, I think that's great, but I think santa rosa if we're actually looking at things has better bones We we need to to be proactive and use those better bones So I'm talking about we have a pretty comprehensive network of creek paths But they are they are disconnected ultimately and don't go to schools don't connect to each other don't connect neighborhoods frankly well enough Our public art in the city is pretty fantastic Tara Thompson has done a wonderful job over the years, but still an opportunity there Also distinct neighborhoods in world world-class parks But unless we connect the why this matters to 2050 and paint a positive future for what it could look like Starting with just the fact that that life will be better for everyone if people can get out of the automobiles and onto bikes onto public transit And of course walking about So I would love Any way I can plug in I've offered my support many times And I I'd love to to be able to ameliorate your efforts I think the youth voice ultimately should drive this should be the most important voice here. And so that also includes BIPOC communities as well. Thank you for your time Thank you so much for your comments. Kevin. We'll go on to eris Hi, thanks. I'm eris weaver. I'm the executive director at the Sonoma county bicycle coalition I spent some day at a memorial service praying vibrant artistic productive Santa Rosa resident Who was killed while he was riding his bike by a driver? I have spent hours holding the hands of the bereaved In Sonoma county courtrooms during the trial Of the drivers who have killed their loved ones I would like to address the issue the line item in the vision about safety Said streets are safe. How do we define that? uh public safety services Yes, we want our public safety services to be caring and thoughtful and all of those things but Those are After the fact picking up the pieces after things have already happened. I have been serving on the county's vision zero advisory committee and for those of you who don't know what vision zero means Our our culture our country our society Assumes that traffic fatalities are a given our part of our commitment to being able to get around as fast as we want to In cars and the design of our communities reflect that the idea of vision zero is that instead we say no traffic fatalities Are preventable and we instead make a commitment to zero fatalities two european cities have achieved an entire year with zero cyclist and pedestrian facility Fatalities we have an average in Sonoma county of about four bicycle fatalities a year And i'm sorry. I don't know the number for pedestrians because I don't traffic as much as I do cyclists So I would like to see stronger language defining safety In our general plan that we are making a that the city makes a commitment to vision zero to a vision of Zero traffic fatalities and then backs that up with action on the streets. Thank you Thank you Okay, thank you so much eris That's the last hand that I see for public comment. So I'll go ahead and bring it back to the group Amy Andy or Beatrice I'll ask a couple of the questions that I heard from from public comment first. I'll start with Eris's comment How do we reflect in our vision statement the city's vision zero goals? all uh All of respond by saying we're really shifting the focus away of And looking at more comprehensively the idea of mobility throughout the city How we connect our neighborhoods not only in terms of efficiencies of moving people and goods about but also the qualitative and safety experience within the city so It is my view one of the biggest assets that the city has is it's is it's public right away It's the biggest public public domain we have and a greatest opportunity to not only influence The character and the and the look of the city, but also how we experience it in terms of safety as cyclists pedestrians for all age groups for people with mobility impairment and who are not able to drive so The policies of the general plan will certainly Be built on community input and the findings we make during the process of public review on on this issue and I'm pretty confident that we will be addressing implementation programs like vision zero Okay, then there was a sort of a broad question that I think strikes at the heart of this At what point will the community start to see more ambitious or more specific language? around Some of these elements whether and I'll touch on the the climate lens or vision zero Or equity focus at what point will we see more specifics that are more outcome oriented than the aspirational? yeah, so We are going into the second phase where we're building alternatives and that's really where we'll start to see on the ground Expressions of not just these aspirational ideas, but actual land use circulation questions about Safety as we were just talking about that's where we'll be able to really look at places and have these detailed discussions and comments The I will Invite my colleagues to to add more, but it's really this next stage After this very general discussion where we roll up our sleeves and hopefully in a face-to-face format With the community start pointing at maps and having the tough balancing questions and I invite my colleagues to to add to that Yeah, I'd love to help respond to some of the comments related to climate action So we are updating the climate action plan as part of this effort And there will be more touch points related to climate action than some of the other areas of policy So right now we are poised to be releasing a vulnerability assessment. That's just been prepared And we are also working on a new greenhouse gas emissions inventory We are working closely with rcpa on the climate mobilization strategy And we will be coming to the climate action subcommittee in august august 11th To provide a broader update related to climate action specifically And we will continue to come to that committee to give updates on the progress of that Climate action piece, but I will say we really did hear a lot from the community on climate action But it was infused in various other ways. So we have jumped into conversations about adaptation specific mitigations So we did hear a lot about bike and ped And just better options for mobility looking at the connection between where people live and work and and trying to Bring those closer together and then of course just resiliency in general as far as the hazards and some of the It just natural disasters that we've been experiencing So you'll see it infused throughout the general plan process But we are fortunate enough to have the funding and the consultant team and the regional collaboration to do that climate action piece So um it there will be touch points at the climate action subcommittee that I would invite people to join To really get in depth with those But I I will say just in general we are at the somewhat at the beginning of the general plan process So we really haven't had the opportunity to get into those policy discussions about how a lot of these Vision statements would be implemented in policy. So I identify with gregory's comments that this is kind of a A squishy phase. It's somewhat nebulous to be thinking about these broad vision statements and words But the next phase is when the fund really starts when we start to really look at how These things get implemented on the ground in different scenarios And then what kind of policies do we attach to those scenarios? And and also just to reply back to some of the planning commissioners comments the vision statements are not ranked So these are just um equal expressions of words that We have put together based on the community's comments I appreciate that I think that myself and a number of My colleagues will be looking as we go through this process to see how The city's mission vision values and goals are reflected in the document as well Whether it's community engagement or climate action or vision zero or are pushed for for greater equitability throughout our community And so I appreciate that there'll be multiple touch points on that Madam Chair do you want to take it away for comments from the planning commission? Sure Let's start with commissioner carter Okay, I'll I'll go through where I had specific comments on the division statements I you know, even though they're Not ranked. I think ordering of the list is important and It seems to be ordered appropriately at this time. Um, these are the things that We're hearing comments about uh equity and inclusion, which is under Um, the just one and I think climate change there could be more said and sustainable about The effects of climate change. I thought the language to mitigate drought seemed a little specific. Maybe We're talking about mitigating Environmental hazards, uh, such as climate change We also I would like to see something in the sustainable statement that that mentions Habitat accessible green space for everyone is actually quite important But we need to remember green space also supports other natural systems and organisms So something in there I think under the sheltered Vision A word about innovation needs to be included. I think we need to expand our Our understanding of what's appropriate Shelter in our cities and and keep the widest options open Um Under the educated vision, I think education Um requires access to good information and uh, I'd like to see that uh, we recognize that our an educated community is an informed community Um, and then in the cultural vision, uh, I found it curious that live music is mentioned as separate from arts And other lively arts, maybe actors and dancers fill left out with that being included But uh, those are my comments on the specific vision statements. Thank you Thank you commissioner carter commissioner duggin Hi, thanks. Um, first I want to just say how impressed I am with the quality of the public comments I thought all the comments made from the public were Uh spot on and I don't want to repeat everything that they said but um I'm fully in support with what they said about vision zero and climate action and greenhouse gas reduction So just in general, I'd like to see more comments about active transportation and safe Bike and pedestrian infrastructure I want to point out that that could be under sustainable healthy equitable and connected Um, I know one thing that that happens at the planning commission. We see a lot about Projects that have affordable housing components and because of the nature of our city lots of times they're at the edge of town And if you live at the edge of town You probably have to have a car And one thing that's very expensive to support is a car and if you can Have good infrastructure where people maybe only have to have one car per household because they can bike and walk To their daily needs and to school and such then that helps people save money So that could be under the equitable component Um, let's see and also I think um that could Having safe infrastructure and more people biking and walking creates a more connected community because there are more people on the streets and uh More opportunities to run into your neighbors and stop and chat I know that's happened in my life because I live downtown and bike and walk everywhere Uh Yeah, let's see if I missed anything else But I do think because this this document is you know for 2050, which is You know, not that far off that it's a ways off but we have to be more forward thinking and more um Not pushing people but kind of guiding people into the future And I think we really do have to read and start greenhouse gases massively And get people out of their cars unless they absolutely have to drive somewhere So um anything we can do around that I think would be greatly appreciated And uh, I'll stop right there. Thank you Thank you commissioners dug in Commissioner Krepke Yeah, I don't think there's much more I could add to what my fellow commissioners have already said In terms of the points the one thing that was Troubling to me a slightly was that two of the points are around inclusive and equitable and we have Without a hard number on it looks like about five percent participation from uh, hispanic and latinx community 2% from 18 to 24 And zero percent from 17 and under. Um, so I'm not a demographer, but I can tell you that less than 10 percent. Uh, hispanic and latinx is not reflective of our city Um, and uh, if we're doing this for 2050, we really need people under the age of 24 to have a say in what's going on Um, so other than that, um I don't have any real further comments based upon what my fellow commissioners have said already Thank you. Vice chair Peterson Thank you. Yeah, I think I think we've heard some great comments from the public. Um Great comments from the the council and the commissioners Uh, you so let me let me add my voice to the chorus of people advocating for Really a bold forward-looking Uh, you know, this is a vision statement. This is aspirational. So let's set the bar really high. Let's say You know specifically under you know, say sustainability Let's not minimize greenhouse gases. Let's eliminate like let's find a way that we can really you know Change the the city for the better and try and undo 70 years of car centric development. I know it's a huge task, but I think for santa rosa, you know the fires the the other challenges that the city has faced um is has Exposed a lot of the issues that Come with car centric development come with the the community we live in and I think that this is a great city I think it's got a lot of potential and I think You know bold Tangible goals are something that this vision statement could really benefit from I know, you know We'll kind of see how that shakes out in the process. But you know, I think commissioner dug in commissioner crepti Have hit on some key stuff in terms of specifics That are that are really great along with a lot of the the public comment So again, just adding my voice to the chorus, you know aim big. I think is the short version Thank you by sharp peterson as usual the commissioners have said it all but I am going to add just a couple things and That is um, I would like the uh sections on resiliency and and resilient and prepared to be expanded somewhat or even um Combined and then with more um Meet to it, um And then um also under educated You talk about uh, you know strength and families there are a lot of people who aren't in any kind of a family structure and so I think that that Maybe should be reflected And I already talked about the that streets Or that safe, um that the streets are safe Probably implies infrastructure, but somehow put the infrastructure in there And I really like the idea under sustainability Of eliminating the word minimum and just eliminate Um, I do think as commissioner dug and said this is in the future And so we have to look at what the future is going to bring us and um As uh commissioner peterson said, you know be more aspirational But I do want to make a couple other comments and that is I went to a number of the community meetings in my living room and They were great and I really appreciate all the hard work that staff did putting those together. Um, I know it can't have been easy during in this zoom environment and it was um Really interesting to see in different parts of the community what were important to people And so I really appreciate you doing that and I hope you do some more And thank you to staff And I'll turn it back to uh, mayor rogers unless there's any other comments from my fellow commissioners All right, well, thank you so much to the planning commission for your comments on this I'll go to council members first on zoom to see if we have any additional feedback I'll start with councilmember alvarez Thank you, mayor For me what I heard a lot from my community, especially in district one was a need for more safety It was one of the top priorities and and maybe that these can can uh Be be an agreement with that and another topic that was really brought up and a great concern Is the amount of hardship that the renters are having in acquiring living spaces when we look at uh Our someone from our community who might not have all the means for portable documents to acquire living space and they're paying Beyond the three thousand dollar per month fees while of those of us who are fortunate to own our own houses Our mortgage payments could be between one thousand two thousand and maybe even higher depending on the size of the structure But it's definitely adding to the sense that the poor are staying poor while those with means are definitely able to save Money, so I really wanted to share that concern that was that to me really affects the community in respect to home ownership to Uh adding to the piggy bank for for those for those uh cloudy days. Thank you Thank you councilmember any other comments from our zoom council members All right seeing them. I'll come to the dais Councilmember swedhelm Thank you, mr. Mayor So I really do appreciate the vision statements and the challenges we've heard others people say it is aspirational Because i'm kind of like who's going to be doing what by when and that's not what this purpose is But one thing that I would like to maybe be added on slide 20 We have santa rosa's a place with the following characteristics and then we have all this great data All those different categories. I know council before when I think the mayor mentioned the mission vision values If we can incorporate saying you know san rosa is the leader in the north bay and we define that by the following characteristics Some other aspirational thing. I know the police department vision statement Was we want san rosa to be a safe place to live work and play something aspirational You know in that statement and then the content is what all these other vision statements are which I think are golden I think it's great. So I would just If we could work in that type of a statement in that initial comment, I think it would be great. Thanks councilmember soyer Thank you, mayor I apologize for not speaking up while you were mentioning the the zoom, but I was I was making a couple of notes You know, I first I want to thank staff and the community for a real comprehensive list of issues For the perfect title center was a forward And it'll be interesting to know in 20 years when we when there is another update to to to this to the general plan and how these updates have have Evolved over the years. Many of them have the same themes and sometimes they're there are new ones I think if you don't have a safety a safe community, you have nothing And how the council and how our various boards and commissions deal with safety in our community will be very interesting over the over the next number of years but safety is a Whether it be derived from the from our police department or from our fire department or any of the other safety our other safety departments Not not the least of which is centers of water. I mean the challenges the center was a water over the next three years will be be really Interesting is not a really good word, but it will be Fascinating to watch how they deal with our community You know, one of the one of the themes that I that I did not I saw once on slide 19 When though they're all of the words that were brought up and put into a grouping And the word beautiful was was there in small print And I think that that a community Along the safety it needs to be attractive The aesthetic of a community is very very important at least to me and I don't think it's lost on on both The council and our various boards and commissions But an attractive community is really really important If if it's not an attractive community people are not going to come and live here and if they're not living here They're not demanding some of the those very important elements that that Have come up this this afternoon I'm not the least of which is climate action. So I think that that someplace In not such small print in in In in not kind of a lost comment is Even though perhaps beautiful is not the word that I would necessarily choose Lacking another word Beauty is an important element in any community whether you're surrounded by it or you created yourself and through art or whatever whatever and Commissioner, uh crepti mentioned Are I believe was I believe it was him in mission art the the individual that mentioned art art is it is elemental to to the the to the the progress of a community and And so I would I would Impress on us the importance of of a beautiful environment Um, it touches on almost every single one of the elements that was that it was brought in that in that circle of So I just would like to highlight that Most all of the if not all of the other elements have been highlighted by one of our By by the council or or the the planning commissioner and I appreciate their comments They are all smack on and um, so I'll I'll leave it there. Thank you Thank you councilmember I don't need to repeat the comments that I've heard from most of our colleagues in the planning commission But I did want to punctuate one that was made by the vice chair and the chair And go even just a little bit further This is a vision statement for what santa rosa is going to look like in 2050 And given that we have a goal as a community of being carbon neutral by 2030 If we miss that goal by 20 years then our plans were not aspirational enough And I feel fairly confident that we can put in our plan that by 2050 We will be carbon neutral that we will have reduced our reliance on greenhouse gas emissions and have done our part To be able to address climate change. So that is the one area Where I would really emphasize is going further and being bolder I think that all of the other things that we've talked about from Equitability to safety All of those things are captured in some of these different components well enough and we can flush those out with the details But that's the one that really does stick with me as well as we're not minimizing greenhouse gas emissions We need to not have any by that point And that would be my one piece of feedback for staff Is there any other additional feedback that that staff needs on this item? No, I think that's great. We really appreciate all of your all of your comments and review Great. Thank you so much. And then with that, I will excuse the planning commission Thank you all so much for joining us here today I know it's not your typical time or your typical day But we appreciate the feedback and we'll keep working with you hand-in-hand on this as we move forward Mr. City Manager item 3.2 Mayor Rogers and members of the city council item 3.2 this afternoon Is a study session item on the potential financing of the city's unfunded actuarial liability With issuance of pension obligation bonds Jan Mzik our chief financial officer will be presenting the staff report this afternoon. Good afternoon, Mayor Rogers and council members You know, it might be helpful for me to start with just a couple of anecdotes about pensions And more specifically The city's unfunded liability and really around why we're we're having the conversation today So a couple of weeks ago Right after the start of the fiscal new year One of the accounts payable staff came in And she's bringing me a really sizable invoice to to to authorize A payment for 53 million dollars And I think she was expecting 20 questions She says, you know what this is and I said, yes, I do she goes. It's a really big amount Part of that was for the unfunded liability part of it is our normal costifers And if we prepay it once a year At the beginning of the fiscal year we get a 3% discount and so I you know sort of shared that with her and she was relieved I signed it and she went on Today I took a look looking we were looking inward looking outward Um at the forward calendar for the bond issuance calendar that is So there's a slated forward calendar For four billion In pension bonds That's just between july 2021 And probably just beyond The new year A couple of really biggies Santa Ana 626 million Almost a billion dollars for the city of anaheim And for a 1.4 billion dollars city of san josei those are all Finansings that are way long enough Um so that they make the forward calendar And a remainder of about 15 cities Make up the issuance So the question is you know What is it? Why is it this is such a big issue today? And sort of what are the underlying dynamics many of this this will get into in the presentation But one it's really difficult to make a You know a jolt in unfunded liabilities without debt issuance bond issuance pob issuance specifically We've got low interest rates High cost debt The unfunded liability until last week Was at 7% debt interest rate, which is what we're paying on it that rate was just Lower to 6.8 and it's expected frankly to go just a little bit further And so I think the idea is I wouldn't I would never say that pension bonds are the solution They're part of the solution solution But there are other aspects that really need careful consideration And so what I'd like to do today is introduce, you know, I think your understanding to how liabilities work And what that means and you know, what sort of Bigger picture should we be talking about and putting together with regard to the city's unfunded liability? So with that if we can Go to slide three, please So what I would suggest is a really very high level takeaway. It's going to be difficult For and you shouldn't have to understand it at the level which I do But there are some important points to be taken away, you know, what are the factors influencing the city's increasing costs? number two You know, what are the alternatives for addressing the unfunded liability? And three, what's the way forward from here? And so with that, let's go to slide four, please So these terms are familiar to me, but they're unfamiliar to most people You know lay persons that is And I may use them I'll try to be thoughtful when I use them because they're not, you know, going to be the typical phrase you might lose but let me introduce you to them because I you know, you'll hear them um The actuarial report so every two years helpers does a report All of the information with which we're working today is based on the 2019 report so it lags And you'll see here It was last done at the end of the year in 2019 We are required All governments are required to now disclose its funded status of its pensions In the notes to our financial statements Regarding the pension plan I remember from the very brief overview that was provided in a recent meeting In response to council member Tibbetts's question about a 10 million dollar investment. I use the word basis So bases are made up of gains and losses Benefit enhancements changes and assumptions And overall actuarial performance You know things like death late retirement early retirement disability and termination Each base has a fixed dollar payment schedule Such as a loan payment with terms that range from five to 20 years The discount rate which is also the borrowing rate But also the hurdle rate for investment returns It was 7 percent when I prepared this report It's now down to 6.8 percent and it's likely it's going to go just a little bit lower You'll also see in addition to this it serves as the interest rate to calculate the city's UAL payments That's the high cost of debt that we're talking about Funded status means it's really the unfunded liability Less the net value of our assets and that gives us the unfunded Percentage of our funded status So in addition to our unfunded liability payment think of the unfunded liability payment by the way as a past due amount But we also have a current amount due those are normal costs for people who are currently on our payroll And those payments are made as a percentage of payroll as opposed to fixed dollar payments Such as the unfunded actuarial liability And finally UAL we all used to use The abbreviation UAL And which is meant to say Unfunded actuarial Assumed liability because it's changing and it's dynamic Um, I just say UAL frequently. I will say unfunded actuarial liability And we talked about that just a minute ago So that is the estimated future benefits And the market value of assets and the difference in those amounts Represents the unfunded amount or the past due amount for benefits earned By current employees as well as people who are already retired next slide please So defining the problem, um are The costs associated with our unfunded liability Are and they're increasing and you'll see a diagram with regard to that Are crowding out the city's ability to fund other basic And necessary services and improvements So in addition so in the pat this current this fiscal year beginning um I was going to say Last year beginning last year Um our payments step up step up for about another 12 years consistently And just that increasing amount Is 110 million dollars The first such an increase of three and a half million was paid to calpers and the payment we met the 53 Uh million dollar payment. I mentioned that was the first of the step up in payments Next slide please So here are the typical expenses. Um the calp we have with calpers The normal cost rate. That's our employee rate. That's what we're paying for those who are currently employed Um the actuarial report that's exactly what it looks like Most of the time and um, I know it's and and we get it. It's done every two years And then the discount rate, um, which has recently been reduced Um from seven percent Um down to six point eight percent And just in case you're thinking that may be really good um Calpers has really been reluctant it matters and it matters because What's likely to happen and depending upon results is that, you know, it may have The reverse effect on our balance sheet, which is an increased ual Liability next slide, please So here is a history of calpers performance since 2011 So remember we're earning or wanting to earn above seven percent But that's also the cost at which we're borrowing To pay for the unfunded liability So anytime it's above the seven percent level. We have gains If it's below the seven percent level We have losses And you can see sort of the overall performance from about 2011 through 2020 Last year, I believe calpers has Did have losses. We haven't seen it yet and um, or it hasn't showed up in the overall calc as yet This year and partly why we're seeing the reduction in the ual Cost or borrowing cost is because calpers is expected to return Actually, they announced a return of 21.8 percent. So it sort of softens the blow next slide, please This is exactly what bases look like Each of these represents alone The city for the city of santa rosa You can take a look at it. I put it here just for um illustrative purposes So you'll see miss All together we have 63 loans um miscellaneous fire And police all of these are individual loans gains and losses alike um that for which we will make a payment The unfunded liability payment to calpers next slide, please This is called layer cake I didn't prepare it, but I used it From one of our consultants and What this is it looks like in picture form The black line really represents The amortization or the payment schedule To calpers but all of these are made up of gains and losses for a total of 60 Three different loans to calpers Next slide, please So we're really now beginning to get into the math of How this is all calculated or 65 loans. Sorry in total Normal costs which we talk about 20.7 million. Those are employees who are here The unfunded liability made up of retirees the past due portion of our loans 30 30 million dollars is sort of the baseline So here's the accrued liability combined It's 1 but 1.3 billion Our market value of assets is 946 million That gives us an unfunded liability amount of almost 400 million or 398 0.5 million to be exact All of this is financed at a rate Going forward of 6.8 percent So it's expensive yet Next slide, please This is what it looks like I've highlighted The escalating payments that go through 20 36 before They sort of get back to the level at which it was in our base year Just that increasing amount That i've circled on this slide Represents an additional 110 million dollars That the city I actually think of it as avoidable costs if we do something about it But right now they're there It will be an additional 110 million Above the baseline Of about 30 million over the next Yeah through 2035 Next slide please So I've tried to break it up a little bit Um the challenge to be solved the steady increases above the baseline Um, which we I mentioned earlier will really provide Of they are a financial challenge It's difficult now and has been I think for some time Given the lower cost of payments So just the notion of adding another 110 million With an interest cost additional interest cost all of this is financed At a rate to be going forward at about 6.8 percent And here is what the payment schedule or the amortization as we call it that Accompanies are unfunded liability for police fire and miscellaneous So in the right hand column I actually take the difference Or the actual increase above the amount and you can see how I get to the 110 million dollar Um 0.8 million That's at the bottom of the slide Next before we're going to we're about to go on to another section So this particular section has largely focused on the unfunded liability And I know this is a lot to take in and it's really challenging for those of us who don't talk about it every day um And so I just want to pause and ask If anyone it's important to me that I don't lose you But any questions regarding the unfunded liability portion of this Yeah, I'll look for hands from council members and I'll start with councilmember Sawyer Thank you mayor and thanks jan It is very complicated. I agree with you What I'd like to jump back to and where I felt I really got lost Um, I was on slide eight when you were just talking about the 65 loans Um, could you elaborate a bit on the nature of these loans? Because I think of a loan I think in a in a certain way and the clearly this is not Not the same way I look at loans and it's certainly not in these amounts So could you explain to me what these 65 loans are? So Every year We will okay, so you have gains and losses Last year you had a loss this year you'll have big gains So each of that So we have three plans every year two additional bases Her plan Or is added So the next time I see an amortization or let me say a payment schedule From calpers there will be six additional bases here So they actually they don't take it all it's like gains and losses. They all get amortized They all get built in to the plan specific to the city of santa rosa So if if if if next year for well last year Let's just say calpers return four percent That's a three three percent loss Below where they expect it to return have returns Before you go on let's do this let's go up to 2003 Very the very first Loan and the very first numbers you have there. Tell me what happened in 2003 Okay, you had a gain. Well, there was an assumption change So remember when I introduced the language Or sort of the nomenclature of what calpers uses You know, we can have gains and losses You can have assumption changes just a simple assumption change Depending on any number of factors, but that afforded a gain of 1.8 million If I'm looking at miscellaneous plan It also said that you had a change in asset assets Of you know 28,000 and change And then there was a method change for instance in 2004 And so all of these bases are made up Of a variety of activity Gains and losses And any number of other changes that would impact your liability status And these changes are brought on by Calpers themselves Well, let me I'm I'm going to just go back and read what it's made up of gains and losses benefit enhancements change in assumptions Actuary change in actuarial performance death late early retirement disability Termination all of those get reflected in our calpers calculations So this is in part what makes it so complicated and so different than what nor what what the average joe is going to be looking at when trying to to understand What we're dealing with When trying to to Make sense of these numbers Yes, and so when I started out the presentation today You know what because I mean some of it is just you know, I mean it's really in the weeds But what I wanted to to lay the foundation of It's really a simple foundation This is expensive debt 6.8 percent 7 percent It's expensive debt And we're now you're going to see you know, we're going to talk about that But this section I wanted to focus on just What the underlying Issues are when we think about calpers And I think the word to think about this particular section is it's dynamic It is currently changing. You'll hear me talk about risks if even we do a financing And there's no certainty to any of this What we can take are calculated risks, which we'll talk about But there are so many things that impact what that All that said It's expensive debt. That's the takeaway Understand those sort of some of the underlying issues And why they're constantly dynamic So at the end of the day that the takeaway is and and this and this does speak to me Expensive debt. So I have that those two words are Very meeting and I appreciate it. Thank you. Okay, council members. What oh Thank you, mr. Mayor Jan you had mentioned that the discount rate it had been seven percent. It's just been dropped to 6.8 percent Which to me sounded like a good thing But then you also kind of you made comments that it may not in the long one be a good thing. Could you further explain that? So remember The assume that the actuarial rate or the hurdle rate as I is what I usually call it You're expected to earn above that rate Let's just use seven percent as a number because it's easier But you're you're what we're hoping for Is to have Earnings performance above seven percent The reality is that as you saw from the graph that looked at calpers returns It's been really difficult since 2008 For calpers to consistently make That performance or that hurdle rate And you may be underperforming quite a bit So, you know On your investment gains, you know, if you're gaining below Something less than that seven percent So it's both your borrowing rate, but also your investment sort of peg And you know either one of those things Ultimately have an impact on the unfunded liability So when it goes down to 6.8 percent implied in that assumption Is you may likely earn less If it goes down to six and a half percent The assumption is you're likely going to earn less And therefore if you earn less you don't have as many or the potential for as The significant gains As if you were in a higher Rate environment earning rate environment And that's what potentially causes the increase In the unfunded liability amount That you may See depending on overall performance Reflected in our financial statements So jen if if I can because I've I've spent a lot of time talking with constituents about this If I can offer what I think is a simple explanation you can tell me if it's accurate or not So the pension fund comes largely we pay for it with three primary sources return on investment Employees that pay into it and the amount that the city pays into it So if you lower the amount you're getting from investments And if you have a fixed cost on your contracts with your employees Who picks up the tab is that third attribute which is us? Is that a fair way to say it jan? um I personally wouldn't characterize it that way. I think there are parts of it that yeah I I I you know I just sort of keep it at if I earn above seven if I earn above the hurdle rate That's great. If I earn below it. That's not a good thing And if you lower it because the expectation Or the actuarial expectation is you're going to earn less going forward A greater liability potential So okay, mayor senior manager. I could I hope I'm not going to add to the complexity or confusion of this I there's probably enough of it for everybody at this point, but I think the other Item of information that's contained on this chart is the term It's listed in the middle column in between gain and loss and the numbers and what happened in Around 2008 You'll remember there was a significant downturn in market performance And so you'll see some sizable losses listed there At that time perz adopted what they called a smoothing program And essentially what they did was they lengthened the term Of those bases or loans to help cities adjust over time to the losses in their portfolios Otherwise if they were still doing them over a four or five year term You would have seen the payments required of employers Jump up Even more significantly than they have Conversely If it was you know followed by three years of gains Significantly they would have lowered the cost significantly. So what what you have here is a package of bases or loans That have been put together over multiple years for differing terms to help smooth the impact to employers And it's complex as jan said it Essentially, I think the mayor's description of the three factors that go into determining You know What uh your pension costs are is correct its employee contributions Its employer contributions And it's what your investments earn or lose in the marketplace All right, we'll go on to councilmember tibbetz Thank you, mayor Jan i'm gonna try to take a stab at my own form of understanding this So forgive me if i'm wildly off-dice and feel free to tell me if I am It could we go back to the slide of the graph that showed the returns vis-a-vis the seven percent mark? Let me see if I can find the slide to read it That's like you can't I can still close the question without it Okay, so my question is In 2012 there was a one tenth of a percent return Does that mean that our ual went up by 6.9 percent? Meaning we owed more money Well, you would have had significant losses Driving up the unfunded portion So it's not a commensurate amount where it's for example, we were 6.9 percent below the seven percent target We didn't and therefore end up owing. Let's say our our pension obligations was just to make an easy number 100 million dollars at the time so that means our our ual or our total debt didn't go up by another 6.9 million I I would assume not so again I don't know what those losses were in terms of actual dollars um and again The bases or the payment schedules are made up of a variety of elements Not okay Investment gains or losses are a significant component But not the only components Okay I mean, I think you can say look 21 Look, here's here's what I will say this year where we're expected to return Or CalPERS returned 21.8 percent You are going to see a significant benefit You'll see when the valuation is done Huge gains That was part of the calculus of CalPERS decision to lower the unfunded rate um The city manager talked about some of the smoothing elements Right, so let me just say this back in 2008 I sat in a meeting with standard and PORS then CalPERS Standard of PORS said back then you need to be it's We believe the real rate ought to be six and a half percent Now however many years ago that was No one could do that it would send cities counties everyone into a tailspin And so they adopted the whole smoothing element But you know, there's a benefit that comes with that and in that it makes your payment structure easier The challenge with that is you're seeing the result In that pyramid That we talked about Which makes it really challenging now to sort of make those step up and make those payments So, I mean, I guess as I understood PERS it's it's a giant investment account and these returns are what the market is It's typically reflective of the market Yeah, I think everybody returned over the past year roughly 20 percent And you know CalPERS return 20 now granted they have, you know all sorts of investments Um, I you know, it's certainly not just stock market. It's real estate. It's made up their portfolio They have portfolios made up of all sorts of investments So when the investments don't provide a healthy return Our liability Goes up And so what we've effectively got and this is my punchline what I'm What I with the way I'm seeing is it's like we've got this giant debt on a variable rate I know it's not one loan with a variable rate, but the concept that The rate is constantly changing and the amount we owe or don't oh goes up and down based on market performance Gains and losses are changing based on returns Yes constant it's dynamic So and I don't want to get too ahead of the presentation, but are you effectively just proposing that we secure fixed fixed interest bond debt to to shrink this to reduce the Lack of predictability around what we owe I think I'm suggesting that we take time To come up of which bonds again, I talked about scale at the beginning Um You know the question was asked you asked a question which I thought was a great question What would 10 million dollars get us? You know that was an a session passed which we talked about it You know 10 million on a 400 million dollar liability Helps it's a drop in the bucket and it's it should form part of a strategy but I'm saying there are Yeah, I you know POB's are part of the answer Just because of scale and just because of where the absolute level of rights are today makes sense But I do think Well, it's worth having A bigger conversation about what that looks like Well, well, I if the reason why I'm asking is because I I'm trying to couch this in a way I understand and I think the way that the general public understand We all understand I think Finance in terms of a home loan and you've got two kinds you got the variable in the fix And what san rosa has is a variable loan essentially And if I understood the materials correctly and I'll stop talking so you can continue on with your presentation But you want to basically take away some of the right 6.8 percent is The rate at which the loan is amortized What the word I would use is It's fully dependent upon performance Yeah You're just trying to Are you just trying to fix it at a lower rate by doing POV's? That would be the conclusion of one of the options Okay, thank you appreciate it All right, jen if I can get you to go to slide 11 Sure So my it's it's really a fundamental question Is the baseline which you you put at 30 million? Is the baseline the amount owed multiplied by The discount rate from cow purse I don't think so, okay, so you've got that 400 million How do you come up with the baseline and then can you explain in kind of simple terms why that baseline continues to grow for a while? Okay, this is the amortization given to us by cow purse Okay, so it's already stated What it will be So again, we talk about gains and losses and sort of the smoothing elements that went on for a few years But what that results in is you have this additional amount here So this is you know, it could have been it is loans pass. Remember, this is a pass due amount um, and so it's amortized or At a rate of seven percent So when I we talk about the 110 million dollar this this is a fixed schedule Given to us by cow purse As to here is what your payments will be For some period of time known okay So where does the 30 million baseline calculation come from that you refer to throughout Cow purse, okay, so cow purse. So cow purse just says that's what it is, but doesn't tell us how they get the 30 million So what I'm trying to figure out is how does cow purse set the baseline Based on How much we owe based on their discount rate Because I understand that this is the pass due which means future performance of the market isn't impacting This this is based on what we owe. So how do we get the baseline from cow purse? What's the formula? So Did the city manager say Maybe I can take a stab at this So in a One of the slides she showed she talked about the 65 bases or loans that we have In this chart really represents a compilation Of those loans and the terms And the annual payments So you're taking a particular year like 2024 You're going through all 65 of those and saying These are the public safety related ones. These the fire related ones. These are the miscellaneous employee Related ones that have payments due in that year And that added together Gets that 30 to 40 million dollar number in payments. That really helps. So I guess my question is do each of those years Have a different percentage that's due That that is fixed to that year Or is there a macro percentage that's due of the total liability? Okay, so um on slide 12 the next slide um Here are the payments Over where it says it in the total column Those are the payments s over the next um Yeah 25 years So I I don't think that was your question though so, but yeah, so I'm looking at the If we're we're spending way too much time on this we can move on But I'll try one more stab at it. So you have each of the different amortizations for what was passed to do at this point As you look into the future as we look into 22 23 24 Is the amount that's due for miscellaneous fire and safety Based on a an aggregate percentage of what's due Or you have to go back and look at 2008. What was the percentage then 2009? What was the percentage then et cetera et cetera and add them together? So one of those charts had a term in the column And so you'd have to look at the term if it was four years You'd only be looking at a four-year impact. It was a 20 year impact. It'd be 20 years of impact The other variable that we have is that As jan has mentioned PERS looks at the performance of their investments and compares them to Their projected rate of turn or that discount rate that she talked about of 7% And at one time it was even higher than that They they were much more optimistic about what they were going to earn from their investments And they have been gradually reducing that down And I believe their target is you know in that six and a half percent range to get it down that far The problem is every time they reduce that It raises the the cost to employers participating in the plan. So they've been doing that very gradually So each one of those bases or loans also has a You know a discount rate or an interest rate associated with them. So Inside each one of those summary numbers by year are you know a aggregation of loans Payments per year at differing interest rates. Okay, so you just answered my question I appreciate that it is the aggregate of each of the individual bases as discount rates for the time of that That that amortization Not the discount rate applied to the whole pool. That's helpful. This last question that we can move on is much more simple As of before the the market crash in 2008 santa rosa was over 100 funded, correct? I I don't know the answer to that question um The number that I have in my head was 100 I seemed to remember it was 104 funded prior to the market crash But maybe allen or somebody else can find that number while we finish the presentation I just wanted to underscore how much of this was at the whims of the market And now we can move on jen Allen isn't here Um, maybe somebody from the budget office if they're here or we're you know, I yeah, I don't I don't I don't know the answer to that Yeah, okay Let's continue with the presentation. Okay All right going on to the next section Uh next slide, please Next slide. Thank you so Clearly pension bonds come with risks But they're financing approaches and they're budgeting approaches Um, and some of this is going to get a little bit squirrely just in terms of understanding But here's here's a simple one. I think That I think about so If we're having a discussion about for instance It's Taking 10 million dollars Um, and this is not intended to put anybody on the spot It's just one that I've mentioned Before and so it comes to mind. So if I have A fire station for example to finance And let's just say it's 30 million dollars whatever the number is 10 million. It doesn't matter what the number is I can do that tax exempt and I use the terms highest and best uses of dollars And it's not to say one decision better than the other it is to say Where might I be better served financially? And so if I can borrow tax exempt in today's market tax exempt rates taxable rates are very compressed Pension obligation bonds Have to be issued at taxable rates. We can talk about why that is later But I might say to myself when when sort of those spreads were much wider um pre 2008 You know, it was a much easier, you know easier thought You know, you finance capital because you can borrow it tax exempt And you don't have those sorts of risks going forward Pension bonds which are borrowed at taxable rates meaning higher, you know, that's where corporate securities Borrow, you know pension bonds are priced what we say is a spread off those securities So it's more expensive to do it that way and it's riskier to do it that way So if I had 20 million dollars I was going to take and put towards a fire station Maybe I would opt to go finance it and get rid of my higher cost debt for example 7% and so that's, you know, how we think about Budgeting approaches, how do we, you know, so to make that all work Assumes that there's, you know, fairly sizable cap capital program and you know might think about alternate strategies Um council member tidbits brought up the use of reserves or one-time monies. Are we better off, you know Pfm, you know, you know, whatever monies are invested there um, for example If we have an extra 10 million dollars Um of funds sitting there might you might we be better off, you know financing Um more costly debt or one-time monies PG&E dollars as an example, you know, where do we sort of get, you know That leverage reduced um from pension bonds Um on the financing approach side, um the answer today, I think is pension obligation bonds Um tax exempt exchange was what I just talked about That's how we think about it. If you have something in the capital program that you say this, you know I'm better off financing this and paying, you know, and putting money into CalPERS You know, that's, you know, what a tax exempt change might get you depends on a sizable capital program a leveraged Refunding means that we have current refunding opportunities to sort of accelerate savings We don't have that opportunity those opportunities right now And so, you know, we couldn't really execute on that right now But there, you know budgeting approaches. Let me answer. I don't have the slide with me But the 10 million dollar answer as just an alternative to how we think about pension bonds is that depending on where we are on what we're wanting to do and financing And or a financial solution Isn't necessarily a budget solution. They're not of equal proportions And so if we looked at a shorter amortization, I think you'll see this actually in a slide So I probably shouldn't talk much about it here But those are sorts of the questions we ought to be asking to come up with a bigger strategy rather than just settling on one thing But again pension bonds have scale. And so that is the go-to solution Next slide, please So When I think of the real CalPERS problem, I think I pointed this out on a previous slide before Is how do we get rid of that triangle? How do we make it level? How do we not have that increasing 110 million dollars that we're paying? You know out over the next 13 14 years We would have to refinance it You know just given sort of where that is that's what we would have to do One of the solutions we did look at is what would it get us If we were to take 10 million dollars right in here, but it's it's such a big number That it didn't go very far I think it made a lot of sense financially It wouldn't have gotten us to perhaps the budgetary response that we did Again a comprehensive solution probably serves us best And with that we'll go on to the next slide This says four. It's actually three Sort of I took this in three parts so the strategies for pension bonds Would be from the front end certainly through the escalating component of This chart You know what gets us through? I think it's 20 34 35 You know, how do we get enough money to be able to sort of levelize is the word we use This payment structure So you don't have increasing costs A tax exempt exchange might be something we look at in conjunction as those opportunities present themselves Again, that's where you think about Financing something on a tax exempt basis if you were using cash to pay for that structure fire station I go back to maybe you Make an investment in calpers you or we can do it into a trust But that's what we mean by a tax exempt exchange reserves one-time monies to answer the question Of what was the result of that analysis Our most expensive debt because we're carrying it the longest Again at seven percent or six point eight percent That's the most costly part of our debt So it would make sense to take that out And I as I read as I recall just Looking at that, you know, it probably got us a 23 million dollar financial benefit very little on a budgetary basis On the front end where we looked at using the 10 million It got us better budgetary benefit Because it would literally take out take away some of these Payment schedules in here same as on the back end they go away But it got us little but or more budgetary benefit But less financial benefit. It was about 13 million versus 23 million financial benefit We're better served if we're going to use monies to to take out the longer and I think there was one Big amortization back there that we looked at in the 20 million plus range in the middle Expensive, but there's a lot of debt there. You need scale to do that So it had no budgetary benefit lots of financial benefit there Next slide, please Next slide Okay, we're now we're going to talk about how pension obligation bonds really work Um, these are taxable obligations that we issue um It meant a lot more When rates were higher and less compression between taxable and tax exempt rates Um, and I'll just give you some uh points of context Um, the the city would issue bonds below the CalPERS discount rate. There was a transaction done I don't remember who the california issuer was Done last week at about 2.6 percent For purposes of all the math we're doing on pobs. We're using a borrowing rate of three and a half percent Um, just to be safe The goal is to reduce the CalPERS contributions And keep in mind, um, this is a hard one for people to understand We sort of never really know where we stand with CalPERS until It's it's all done sort of at the end of it. Um, in which, you know Probably is beyond our our time in sort of thinking about this but I I put this chart in here Just as a picture I took from somewhere the reason the bonds are taxable So We issue governments in the united states I think it's the only one in the world that gets to do this issue a tax exempt rates and people who invest in them Don't pay, you know federal income taxes and so You if you borrow tax exempt, you're not allowed to invest those monies as out of spread They're owed to the federal government And so if you're interested if we're issuing bonds That it implies we're going to invest it out of spread arbitrage is a word we use Spread is the other word we use to the benefit of making money Then the bonds must be issued on a taxable basis. That's why pobs are issued on a taxable basis Next slide, please um Issued at a lower rate if we're assuming three and a half. That's just the rate. I'll stick with for talking purposes here Although that's high Below the you know the opportunity is to earn upside between What we've issued the data and where we expect to earn And so we replace the higher cost unfunded liability. We've got to deposit all monies into cal Into calpers But it does produce both cash flow as well as budgetary savings And we're replacing much higher cost debt So the way the savings are calculated Is between the two streams of cash flows The debt service on the new bonds And the unfunded liability creates savings budgetary savings Next slide, please I think I started talking about the forward calendar looking at four billion in issuance um, we talked about the dynamics of that interest rates are low um We've got high cost debt. That's the takeaway it provides savings relief cash flow savings and budgetary savings um In making new investments into the fund It results in a higher funding status. That is a good thing For all bargaining units and it reduces the reliance on the city contributions Going forward next slide, please This is just a graph of how it works. We're required to deposit all the pob proceeds into the pension fund um, we make the payment to bondholders and um You know probably still obviously if we're not taking out the entire liability Which I wouldn't propose that we do we will still be making Payments to CalPERS albeit reduced payments to CalPERS next slide, please So this is an approximate timeline. Um, I know there has been conversation around the potential um Or or what validation means and the potential for challenge um, what we would propose to do I don't have a timeline. I'm just using this If we were to do this if there were a decision to do this and I'm not asking for that decision today um We would probably just draft the bond documents upfront You would approve them. We would file the validation right away Um to save time We're concerned about inflation and interest rates growing up So we'd want to capture Rates at the low end of the market And at that point we would propose to just work on the bond financing And we would have to return to the city council for a variety of authorizations Yeah, it would be looking about a six month Timeline assuming no challenge. Um to closing the transaction Next slide, please so I would suggest that we think of the ual portion only Um depositing pob proceeds into calpers It doesn't bring the ual to zero. So I should point that out, but we're not I wouldn't propose to finance Uh the entire liability because that increases risks Um, you know taking a leap into the market all at one time in the same interest rate environment And from a credit perspective the primary concern is around implementation Of a comprehensive plan They want to see we have skin in the game They'd like to see perhaps the setup of a trust Perhaps a one-time investment But you know, um, they see all sorts of pobs, but those things do serve For better rating considerations Next slide, please We've talked about some of the benefits, but just to reiterate Um immediate reduction in our unfunded liability payment, um to calpers Cash flow and budgetary savings literally cash out the door and we save it on a budgetary basis not Consequential Um from a market timing perspective the lower rate environment in which we issue Is really better able to protect us Um to any volatility At calpers which we'll have that's just a given And then the time value of money with increased investment in the fund, you know, we accelerate Are the compounding effect of earnings next slide, please There are risks POB's have come a long way and I'll just go right to that next slide Um, they're enumerated largely in the presentation Okay, they're here You can go ahead and just I I didn't know this was doing this just Right And you can do the other side as well because I'll speak to both of them. Thank you You know, we learned a lot from the first generation of pension obligation bonds Um, we sort of call these pobs to 2.0 and by the way, I neglected to mention That the city actually has pension bonds outstanding. Um, not a lot You know, they're non-callable. So they're not able to be refinanced. Um, that's one of the big issues But um in any event, uh, what people have learned is that fixed rates work best So yes while CalPERS may go up and down It's really tough to manage variable rate and variable rate requires we have letters of credit And that is a complication in and of itself. So having to You know renegotiate ever so many years letters of credit and they're expensive so I think we dealt with a Debt burden issue that used to be an issue conversion of a soft liability to a hard liability We're required to post it on our balance sheet Essentially, it is a hard liability and it is reflected on the balance sheet Bonds used to be sold non-callable and that's because taxable bonds in the corporate market are pretty much non-callable instruments I think for purposes related to governmental entities Largely now they're all sold with a 10-year call. So you'll have an opportunity to refinance Should rates go lower at some point? Um We're not allowed to extend out payments beyond the UAL We're required to use it for that purpose. So you're not sort of extending or taking on additional risk Pension bonds are well, let me say this what Standard and pours is credit neutral on povs Moody's and Fitch take a stronger stance about it. So what if issuers done they just go to see standard and pours But ratings obviously are you know How we address the overall plan I think will matter I think it's a good thing to do financially, but it'll also matter on a credit basis um We talked about why we shouldn't do 400 million all at one time, you know We may choose to do it in different rate environments. So there's nothing certain about rates going up. They may certainly go lower You know if we did I don't know I'm going to pick a number a couple hundred million here Maybe you do 50 million another time in a lower cost market But dollar cost averaging into the market is a better solution next next slide, please I think we sort of covered these um, but just to restate them issuing less That I think mayor rogers commented or asked about was the city overfunded overfunding is a risk And that's a reason we wouldn't do the whole thing Because if you have extraordinary gains You're gonna have overfunding And what most people learned during the 2008 crisis was you issued all these bonds You now have overfunding and oh by the way now we're having all these losses So that in and of itself is a risk. We mitigate it by not doing 100 of the bonds um issuing multiple tranches meaning over time To dollar cost average into the market Low interest rates they matter you're we're trying to earn the difference between what we borrow and what we pay to The amount paid to car coppers um How do we mitigate that other risk is look the bigger spread we have meaning the lower rate we issue at the better our benefit will be And then avoid adding complexity, uh, which variable interest rates people did mark interest rate swaps on top of it They work in certain environments probably not the best one here And be ready to issue when the time is right So if we were to prepare to issue bonds and rates went higher My depending on what that spread looked like you might hear us advise Let's wait. That's what's meant, you know and be prepared, you know when the market improves next slide, please These are and that concludes the presentation. There are pob risks Enumerated in the appendix The timeline in the appendix. They're all there And i'm happy to take questions at this point All right. Thank you so much jan. Let's start by Having you give us just before we go to additional questions from council members and questions from the public What type of feedback are you looking for from the study session today? um, I think the feedback that I would be looking for is I'd like I'd like to suggest that we take a look at this And I'd like to take the time to come back with a comprehensive approach I think we talked about what some of those approaches might be I don't know that we will have a comprehensive answer to all of those things when we come back I I it's likely going to include pension ops um, it may include What I call sort of a tax exchange or the opportunity to look at it It may include You know a decision in some amount to buy down Some of the debt And I think that we're going to have to look at it more closely with not a lot of cash on hand Um, not much, you know a limited opportunity, but let's do that. Let's come back with a recommended strategy If you're interested of what a financing might look like What those savings might look like what other components might we add and how do we plan to address the risks? And you know speak specifically to them at that time Is why we don't just cut benefits So setting aside the promises have been made to employees. Can you talk about the legal landscape? around pensions that have been promised So there's two different landscapes out there in the pension world one for our current Employees who are members of the pension system And one for retirees Um retirees are guaranteed their benefits. You cannot go retroactively and impact those agreements that were implemented over the life of their employment and so Set aside the retirees california rule california law The other set of landscape involves current employees and you Also cannot go retroactively with current employees in other words If I worked for 15 years for the city And had a contract that said I got these employment Related retirement benefits and I made my employee contributions and the city made their employer contributions I'm entitled to get those benefits What you can do is negotiate On what the benefits will be in the future and so We have had that a couple of different times in the city of santa rosa the pension formulas and programs have changed several times Both up and down for current employees and That is the case going forward. You have to negotiate because we have collective bargaining here in the city but That's that's the basic pension landscape that I would describe in response to your question And the most recent one was pepra the public employees pension reform act in sacramento back in 2012 that created that secondary tier for new employees, right? That's correct. Right. Are there any questions from council? I think Council members are still getting their head around everything. So we'll go to public comment and then we'll come back for for statements from council members in direction Again, I see nobody in the chambers. So we'll go to live public comment via zoom I don't see any hands. Did we have any pre-recorded voicemails? We have no pre-recorded voicemails Okay, then I'll go ahead and bring it back. Who'd like to start by giving some direction to staff? All right council member tibbetz Thank you mayor Jan, I really appreciate you doing this. I know that I asked the question a few months ago when we were having this discussion about one-time monies And I guess I'll just make the comment for any members of the public listening and even for that matter representatives of some of our bargaining units Because I know that the public and employees and just the community at large has a really significant interest in the use of this one-time money And and their first thought might be is why are you taking this money to? Uh pay down your faulty debt or your faulty obligations or bad decisions that city hall made 20 30 years ago While I can't argue that the those were probably some bad decisions. They are what they are. They're locked up in contract Um, but the amount of money you mentioned that 53 million dollar check Um, I mean last time I checked our budget was just over 350 million That's a huge chunk of money That could otherwise be going to services And so if we make these minimum payments essentially, uh, we're constantly going to be writing those checks And yet we have this one-time money which in my mind The question that I wanted to answer it and you've answered it really well in spades Is how can we use this now? To return money to the public On an ongoing basis from here to for And I and I think that that is actually probably the most judicious form Of our money We've talked about things like our parks are underfunded. Well every year as we just went through in our budget process this year We pulled some money. I think it was out of reserves or no excuse me out of the one time Uh to fund certain things in our parks But we have these discussions every year and they're a large part due to these This huge expense that we have looming over our heads and it's constantly changing. It's unpredictable Um, and I really really appreciate the work that you've done and you're going to continue to do I hope On uh coming up with ways that we can return some of this cash to the public every year in the form of filled potholes better wages Better maintained parks. I really believe that's what we're discussing here today So in that in that vein, I um, absolutely Support all the three options you laid out the pension obligation bonds mixed with tax exempt exchanges And use of the one time money And I guess, uh, you know, since we what we don't have today is sort of a a mix of of these assets What I'm going to ask for is that You may be come back with a couple of scenarios and say if we do 10 million in pgne one time money This much in pension obligation bonds and this much in tax exempt exchanges Here's what we believe we can add to the cash flow of the city budget on an annual basis and and give us a few of those options Um with different amounts in each pool because I'm sure that between now and when you come back Uh, you know our ability to borrow our ability to use one time money may have changed somewhat or we may get more community priorities between now and then for the one time money from pgne Um, and we have to be flexible. It may not be 10 million. It may be 20. It may be five Who knows the point is is some sort of a comprehensive mix from you would be much appreciated in my opinion And thank you very much for this presentation Thank you councilmember councilmember soyer Thank you mayor. Well, you know This is very complex and I appreciate the presentation because it attempts to try to get me to understand um Our various options What I would be Looking for in a in another presentation would be a firm recommendation based on on your Financial knowledge and that of your team Um, it's hard for me to know You know, there are risks you mentioned risks. There are always risks when dealing with with um These kinds of instruments And other instruments as well But what what I'm not what I I guess what I'm not feeling is a is a is a firm recommendation and um The the use of our one-time dollars. I've always felt would be well used In an investment environment Something that pays off in the long run And it sounds like That could be right up our alley with with some of the recommendations or some of the The information that you've provided us today So I'd be hard pressed to know where to go After the presentation But I guess I think what I'm looking for next would be a A pretty firm recommendation Yes, thank you, mr. Mayor. Yeah, thank you Jan for the presentation. I think On slide 15. You have the one bullet point develop a long-term comprehensive plan with multiple solutions He also talked about a comprehensive approach. That's what I'm really looking for Come back with some recommendations almost like what some of my colleagues have said because it's very clear to me There's no magic solution because if there were other cities would be doing it And so I do like the diversified approach because I think that is very much more strategic And less risk involved with that. So I'd be looking forward to that information coming back with some specific financial recommendations. Thanks Thank you councilmember vice mayor Um, I'd like to thank you uh for bringing that report to us today. Um, I would also like to see you come back I would make a request that if it's hard for council members to follow that I won't use the term that I normally use but bring it down to a level to where The General public will be able to follow whether we're Looking at how that would look in a regular health. I mean just bring it all the way down where we're not learning your terms You're bringing it down to terms that the general public Would use would be my only request. Thank you Thank you vice mayor, and I'm going to echo those comments as well For me when I look at this what we're really talking about is providing a level of predictability for our community and it's been just Wildly unpredictable in the market What we're going to owe year over year and it makes it hard to have long-term strategic plans in place What I appreciate the most about this is the way that you can have the fixed cost that we can rely on At its peak going from 44 million that's owed to down to about 28 million was the discussion in our Long-term finance committee. I know that everybody in this community can find Needs that that 16 million dollars could go towards that are That are desperately needed throughout our community. So I'm going to be very supportive of this And you're bringing this forward Long-term, I think we have promises that we've made to employees that we need to keep and this allows us to do that While while also not crowding out additional services. So anything we can do to be flexible I also appreciate the conversation around particularly for fire stations for other fixed infrastructure Finding different ways to finance them as well We have our facilities conditioned index where we this council has talked about the long-term Liabilities that we have that not just within our pension system But within our assets as well And if there's a way for us to mirror this conversation with that Conversation and find flexible financing tools to make the investments we need to keep those assets I think that the council is going to be very interested in that as well With that I just want to thank you. I know it is a really complex topic I know that you do have a lot of questions coming at you from council members that You've handled it very well and I appreciate the the approach that you're bringing to the office Are there any additional questions or comments from council members? All right. Thank you so much jen Thank you We are done with our study sessions Our next item is at four o'clock. So council will take a brief recess. We'll be back at four For those just joining the meeting live translation in spanish is available And members wishing to listen in spanish can join the spanish channel To do so click on the interpretation icon in the zoom toolbar It looks like a globe once you join the spanish channel We recommend you shut off the main audios So you only hear the spanish translation i'm going to promote uh Our interpreter to translate for us Pablo are you able to translate for us? All right, madam city clerk. It's four o'clock. We'll go ahead and call our meeting back into the session. Could you please take the role? Yes, thank you councilmember tibbetz here councilmember schwedhelm here councilmember soyer here councilmember alvarez vice mayor rogers president mayor rogers here Councilmember alvarez. Have you joined us? Okay, let the record show that all councilmembers are present with the exception of councilmembers alvarez and phleming All right. Thank you so much. We have no proclamations tonight. So we'll start with staff briefings. Go ahead mr. City manager Mayor and members of the council My portion of the staff briefings this evening are in our covet 19 response update And i'd like to just share some points with the public and the council um First is regarding masks. Uh masks are recommended for indoor activities for everyone regardless of vaccination status As you may have noticed daily cases are rising Covid cases have doubled in the past months and continue to rise Sonoma county has joined the counties of alameda contra costa marin san francisco San mateo and santa clara and the city of berkeley in the recommendation The recommendation comes is the delta variant spreads throughout the state The delta variant is now the most common variant in the u.s. And is also the most contagious Masks and distancing are the cheapest most effective way to curb the spread Young adults experiencing are experiencing the highest rates of growth in covid cases The unvaccinated remain the most susceptible to the infection and hospitalization The highest rates of hospitalization over 90 percent And icu visits are unvaccinated people county health officials urge people to get vaccinated And some notes regarding our homeless shelter at the sam jones hall Shelter intakes remain paused after the shelter staff became aware of covid cases at the shelter on july 2nd Last week the county of sonoma opened an alternative care site at the best western dry creek in and hillsburg And most of the covid positive individuals from samuel jones hall have been transferred to this location The alternate care site has capacity for 60 residents Six individuals remain in an isolation area established at sam jones hall In the shelter annex area and these individuals will be completing their isolation period soon sammy jones hall data as of july 20th The total number of shelter residents exposed are 153 number of positive cases 90 With six new positive cases from the last round of testing conducted on july 15th Of those the number of confirmed fully vaccinated positive cases 32 And Next date that we'll be testing will be tomorrow on july 21st of this year In sonoma county the number of cases of july 19th we have 926 active cases 327 deaths To date from the pandemic And you if you want uh information on getting a test, uh, which we encourage anybody who feels they've been exposed or Are experiencing symptoms to do Go to sonoma s o c o emergency dot com Forward slash test For testing information or just go to the county website and you can be directed there Uh information on vaccines as of july 18th we have 299 106 individuals fully vaccinated 32 677 partially vaccinated And a total of 613 803 vaccines administered overall And there is uh enough vaccine supply For all eligible californians to be vaccinated And once again we encourage all Individuals who are eligible to receive their vaccines And go to the snow sonoma county emergency dot org Um forward slash vaccine site soco emergency dot org Vaccine to get information on where to receive those Thank you so much. Mr. City manager. Do we have any questions from council? Okay Let's go on to our next update Our second update to our staff briefing is the glass fire recovery and paul loanthal our fire marshal will be giving this update Good evening. Mayor rogers vice mayor rogers and members of the council paul loanthals is in fire marshal with the fire department On behalf of the glass fire recovery task forces We reconvene both the watershed and debris task forces To determine where we're at from a recovery standpoint. We have progressed nicely with a couple remaining projects On the debris side with the intention of figuring out where we're at To report back to the city manager and eventually council on needs for the emergency order that was in place With that some quick updates Cal OES is reporting that overall in the entire branch that encovers Six to seven counties. They're about 75 complete with returning properties back to property owners In the city limits, we have fully accounted for all debris removal on both Private debris removal as well as public debris removal With just a little bit left under county jurisdiction on city property at low skill of coast campus In addition to that as far as the ongoing tree issue that you've become aware of We are still working very closely with both the county of sonoma and napa as well as outside council Council regarding our cpuc issue to advocate for a wood management program to be re-implemented In addition to that PG&E has Started to roll out what they refer to as a wood hauling program But we want to make very clear to the community as well as council is that Although they are offering a program It is not the full wood management program that we're advocating for for our respective communities But we will be doing everything we can to coordinate with PG&E as well as our Community both in the city of santa rosa and outside the city to make sure as many residents opt into that program as possible What we've seen in the tubs fire was that as we know all too well the dead and dying trees Are something that is of great concern of ours for the potential for repeat incidents So the wood management program is what we're ultimately fighting for But we're also going to work diligently to make sure that as many Community members take advantage of the wood management wood removal program Including the city of santa rosa Some of our own wood was removed. Sorry felled by PG&E So even the city will be opting into that program to help reduce Our threats to the community as well as the risk for future wildfires With that that is the conclusion of the update for the glass fire All right. Thank you so much paul council any questions Okay seeing none we'll go to public comment on our staff briefings for tonight item number seven I'm not seeing anybody rise in the chamber I don't see any live hands In our attendees and did we have any voicemail public comments? We have no voicemail public comment on this item. Perfect. We'll keep moving then Let's go on to city manager and city attorney reports. Who wants to start tonight? I have no report this afternoon And I have no report this afternoon either All right. Nice and quick item nine statements of abstention by council members Do we have any tonight? Okay, seeing none noted. We'll move on to mayors and council member reports Does anybody have anything that they would like to add? councilmember tibbetz Thank you mayor. I'd like to i'm pleased to announce the return of patty sisco to the planning commission to replace akash kalia who is Outgoing at this time and I want to take this opportunity to really thank akash for Bringing his youthful energy and his perspective on low-income housing and development to the planning commission I'm really really proud of the work. He's done And i'm also excited to bring back the long-standing institutional knowledge to the planning commission that patty certainly brings The second appointment i'll be making is andrea rodriguez to the community advisory board So dina and or stephanie. I believe she's already submitted an application So please let me know of what other paperwork I need to do there. That's it mayor. Thank you All right. Thank you so much I just have a couple of quick things for tonight one is to report back to council that Last week we had a scta and rcpa Meeting one of the substantial items that came out of it is the formation of an ad hoc to Look at a climate change measure going forward potentially in 22 or 24 I was appointed to that ad hoc and we'll be serving on that And then over the next couple of years I also wanted to let the council know that on last wednesday Myself the vice mayor the city manager the city attorney and other leadership from around the city Did a briefing in the eoc drill? Going into what is expected to be a difficult and challenging Public safety power shut off in fire season We did then have a red flag warning pop up a couple days later So it was appropriately timed and I just want to thank everybody For their time in that I think it's going to be really reassuring for the community to see us do that And it's going to work really well for us to be prepared going into this next year I see no other reports. So we'll go on to our approval for the minutes We have two sets of oh, excuse me, and I'll I'll take public comment now on councilmember reports I see no one in the chambers. I see no live hands on zoom Do we have any pre-recorded voicemail public comments? There are no voicemail public comments on this item. Okay, then we will go on to the minutes We have december 1st 2020 and october 13th 2020 minutes Do we have any additions to those minutes or alterations? Seeing no hands I'll ask for public comment on those items Any voicemail public comments? There's no voicemail public comment on this item. Okay, then without objection We'll show those as adopted with the vice mayor recusing from both of those items We have no consent calendar We'll come back for our public comment after five o'clock And let's go on to item 14.1. Mr. City manager Mayor and members of the council item 14.1 this evening is a report item On the proposed allocation of 10 million dollars in pgne settlement funds to the renewal enterprise district known as red The housing fund in the form of a loan Allocation of $50,000 in pgne settlement funds to the red to address one-time member assessments And an amendment to the red's joint powers exercise Authority agreement Excuse me Presenting the staff report this afternoon will be claire hartman our acting city manager Yes, good afternoon. Mayor rogers vice mayor rogers and members of the city council This is i'm presenting to you tonight sort of a bundle of items some of which relate to The red proper renewal enterprise district and others that are specific to the red housing fund Next slide So the actions we are looking for action tonight And the actions include allocation of the 10 million dollars of one-time funds from the pgne settlement To the red housing fund And with that we want to get agreement with the city council on our term sheet That would go with that loan And in addition to that authorizing staff to take the next steps develop the final loan documents Uh and essentially execute that loan agreement I then sort of separately and we can handle these separately and get through one and then move on to the other but separately We're also looking at making our first amendment to the red's joint exercise of powers agreement And in addition supporting the red with a one-time member assessment of $50,000 Uh and then lastly this isn't by motion or this isn't by resolution But simply acknowledgement that you have an opportunity now that there is a red housing fund board You have an opportunity to make an appointment I'm not presenting it as though you're going to make it tonight, but setting up the appointment opportunity in the future for a city representative Or a representative that will represent the city on that red housing fund board next slide So this is how the presentation will go tonight. I'm going to give an overview on sort of how we got to this point And why it makes sense to allocate this money That is a limited resource, but why it's so important to allocate it to the red housing fund We will also hear from Michelle Whitman. She's the executive officer of the renewal enterprise district So we can learn more about uh, you know, they're the background and where they're headed in terms of a joint powers entity And then also we have four site street advisors here on hand to answer questions about the red housing fund itself Now in terms of the city team, I'm the presenter, but uh, we all we have all hands on deck here We have Megan bassinger who's worked closely with me on developing these terms She's our interim director for housing and community services And we've also sought guidance from city gallery or our city attorney and from gene Music, um, our chief financial officer Uh, next slide So i'm not going to go over this in detail, but just to bring you up to speed for how we got here In essence, you know, we're dealing with the housing crisis and it's been ongoing And there's been stumbling blocks and complications. So Back in 2015 the city council made it a top priority housing and affordable housing We developed the housing action plan which had I think 30 different measures to address housing in lots of different ways And then shortly after that we had the The tubs fire in 2017 Which complicated and compounded that housing crisis. So i'll get to that in a second Um, and as a result of those two things sort of converging upon santa rosa One of the initiatives that came out of that set of conversations is the renewal enterprise district and that was formed in 2018 Uh in 2020 um pg and e Ended up settling with the city and the county And we received some settlement funds. So The city received 95 million dollars in settlement funds and the county received their share So sonoma county board of supervisors um late in 2020 they considered How they might use these these limited one-time funds Um, but they quickly directed 10 million dollars of investment into this red housing fund And they asked that it be contingent on a city match So we went into discussion with the city council And we held a discussion in december of 2020. Um, and at that time, if you recall Um, we didn't just look at that one option. We looked at a couple of other options or at least another option So at that time we looked at if we were to invest say 10 million dollars into housing You know, what are our options that are sort of in the moment? Ready to go one was to initiate this red housing fund And the other was to invest it into our city's housing authority it was um Excuse me at the city council goal setting session where the council unanimously voted to To take the initiative and match that county offer And invest 10 million dollars into the red housing fund Um, so we've been working um over many meetings the city team the county team The red staff the red board Really a lot of conversation about how this fund will get created What will be the parameters the logistics the governance of it the accountability of it? And that's what's been taking place over the last several months Uh in summary, we took what we um considered a sort of a recommended term sheet to the city's Long-range or long-term financial and audit subcommittee And there were a couple of policy areas which we focus on And and uh what was presented to you tonight is what's come out of that subcommittee And that brings us to tonight next slide so just in a series of pictures here just to show how uh housing and The resiliency factor of using these specific dollars matches up quite quite Specifically, this is a map that shows our very high fire severity zone. So in the red hatch marks This is the area That we designate for special restrictions However, we don't prohibit Housing from being constructed in these areas The blue is where the tubs fire Hit our city And you can see that it covers coffee park fountain grove and parts of oakmont The green is the glass fire burn area and you can see that sitting skyhawk channel drive area and the across from oakmont And This has compounded our housing crisis. So next slide So like I said, we were already in a housing crisis by 2015 You can see that we were averaging about 200 300 units per year to meet our housing goals We really needed to be reaching 500 to 800 units per year So we were we knew we had an issue to deal with when we got hit with the fires We were in the throes of implementing our housing action plan And one of them were financial incentives or gap financing But at that time we had a rebuild effort and as you can see here in the gray We had great success in rebuilding our city Over the 2018 2019 2020 years But all those resources all the labor all the materials all the Energy in santa rosa is going to rebuild which is great, but it definitely Absorbed an opportunity that we could have had citywide. So we might have been able to get more housing So you can see we're going to be deficient meeting our regional housing needs And we are entering into a new regional housing need cycle And again, it's similar numbers. So it's really 500 to 800 that we'll need to accomplish per year Next slide So one of the initiatives is kind of multifaceted and it goes hand in hand with working with what we've learned since the wildfires You know looking outside of the wildfire areas Looking for areas that are transit oriented efficient. So they meet multiple objectives resiliency climate protection Mobility and so we look to downtown and this is just a slide that covers so many of our different incentives that we have Looking at downtown and it really is kind of our centerpiece for promoting housing Now we need housing for all we need it in different parts of the city But we have been really focused on getting housing downtown so These tools whether we're prioritizing which means we streamline we take we try to process those first if they're downtown We've reduced the review authority that saves time and money on the applicants What while not negating public notification? Seek with streamlining. We've updated our downtown plan Could raise the ceiling on that environmental review so that projects consistent with the plan can move forward Lots of different fees and incentives We have an opportunities on which we've actually partnered with Property owner to make sure that they can make use of that federal initiative and then And then also that red housing fund. There's other opportunities through red that we're looking at which is the eif d enhanced infrastructure Enhanced infrastructure district finance district. And we also work with red to collaborate on grant preparation and things like that all that stuff Goes hand in hand and one thing that we've heard a lot of and I'm sure you have as well is Our downtown developers use all these tools. There's not one that's like, oh, that's the one and that's the only one I need They are layering all these tools together. So Red housing fund is yet another tool But all of them are important next slide So I'll let Michelle I will steal her thunder. I know she has uh some words to say about her experience setting up the red But I will say that the red is uh unique in sonoma county and that it's a joint powers authority And it's two members currently are the city of sanarosa in the county of sonoma And it was designed to be creative sort of out of the box Something that we don't have instead of being segregated in our housing pursuit To come up with a joint regional model. And so that's what we're testing Um, one of the things that we've been looking at is pooling and leveraging financing tools. So like I said, I mentioned Uh, we'll the red housing fund is one Uh, eifd is another and again Uh, you'll see coming up. I think it's in your next meeting or the meeting after that The city is applying for uh an infill Infrastructure grant with the state which collaborates with downtown development to to sponsor and get grants for downtown infrastructure Uh and then uh, one of their key principles is to really focus on climate resiliency Really focusing on affordability equity and resiliency. And so all all arrows point to priority development areas station area plans And the like and they have set up red criteria for projects that would be eligible for their attention Whether it's grant support or actual gap financing Next slide And the red board and the red staff, um, they aren't doing this on their own They've contracted with four side street advisors This is a firm that has established housing funds throughout the state and the country And they've guided us through the process So they've been very great about being available for questions and working through lots and lots of details to get the project set up Next slide So i'm going to go over some high level things and then we'll drill down to some of the key terms That are in your term sheet for today It's a 10 million dollar city loan. So it's not a grant This would be matched with the county's 10 million dollars. So we were looking at a 20 million dollar opportunity The idea is to leverage that And it's not uh, it's quite possible and we are concerned Supporting red in pursuing additional funds whether it's private or fill philanthropic But that is the potential. So it's not limited to just the city and county's money But we are certainly the catalytic seed for the fund And then I talked a little bit about the eligible project criteria um, I wanted to Just mention what would be required and then there's a lot of Areas where projects could gain higher points for example, but just what every project would have to to To meet up against just to even be considered for support by red. So You have to be located on an infill site. You have to be providing mid-tie density And here's a here's a key locational criteria You have to be located in a transit rich planned area specifically transit priority areas priority development areas rural community investment areas specific plan areas high quality transit quarters and or qualified opportunity zones So it is that specific because really the intent is high density in the right place And then lastly one of the fourth requirement is that You're either all residential Or if you're mixed use you have at least 75 of your total building space dedicated to residential So those would be attached to the red Housing fund and that's probably the most limiting criteria that we have And those could be amended over time by the red board. So the red housing fund is a separate entity It will be a standalone entity. It was elected to be a 501 3c type of entity and the red board relates to the red housing fund through this eligible project criteria So the policy making the decision about what projects will be eligible for What comes out of the housing fund will always be with our elected representatives through the red housing board And before I am remiss in thinking that our board members that have spent many meetings Developing this in the last couple years our current representatives are council member Fleming and council member tidbits the county representatives are supervisor rabbit and supervisor coursey So We are not being shy about this initial push and what we're trying to do We are looking to activate market rate housing downtown in santa rosa for mid and high-rise housing We do not have a solid stable market for this type of housing So they are the developers are piecing together lots of different layers of financing to make it work But what they're finding is that they're having challenges getting bank loans Because there's just not enough comparables to make this happen. So what we're trying to do is catalyze that market That will set the stage for after this first Catalytic event of this housing fund Activate the market for downtown. Are you not hearing me john? Okay, great And so we're trying to change the market so that we have one and that we will have comparables And we can move forward with additional. So what we want is a diversity in developers We don't need we don't want just one or two that can somehow finance downtown We need a diversity set of developers that can make our downtown happen And then that will set the stage for our other station areas and that's the idea behind this initial fund And then one last note before we leave this slide Is we are ready to support the red In fact, we know that the housing fund You know in its first start to really sort of get up and ready ready We have a plug and play Staff with our own city's housing authority that can process the NOFA We prove when we can do it quickly and effectively and we're ready to help them do that So we are looking at potentially contracting with the fund to make that happen Next slide So I won't go through all the nitty-gritty here because you can you have it and you have it in your staff report But a couple key items one It's a 20 year term loan The principal is due at maturity. So it is up to the council what you'd like to do once It matures or is paid back You can reinvest it you can decide to apply it to Something else that you the council wishes to apply it to but So that is one of the key terms of the agreement Uh, it should be noted that our Both the city and the county loans are going to be subordinate to all other debt You know, we are the seed money and so that's set up as such and then any investment For the fund as it is Evolving over time will will of course be consistent with the city's investment policy It's going to have flexible product types And our terms accept that so for affordable housing where they kind of we don't really know exactly where they need help Sometimes they need it in pre construction and other times they need it Later in the process It really depends on timing where they're at. So we're the most flexible for affordable housing And for middle income and market, you know, we're looking at supporting construction loans and that's kind of a key one Because that's the one they're having a hard time getting and ultimately they could have permanent loans In terms of eligible projects, we talked about linking it to the red project criteria Also, we want to protect that these are this is for housing. This isn't for housing in its first week We want to make sure it's housing. It stays housing So Now we can only can put a right or contingency on our 10 million dollar loan But we have added that and the county did as well and that's to make sure that these Projects that get this money remain residential for the life of the loan term And then see here soft cost maximums the soft cost maximum is something that is unique to the city's terms But we just wanted to Put a cap to make sure that most of the money is going to the project There's lots of other leveraging that can take place for soft costs. This money is special We want to produce housing. We don't want to just design housing We've already had that kind of experience with some other initiatives So it's important for us to really get it into projects Especially projects that are ready to go So you can see our maximums that we're proposing here 25 percent for a flurable and 50 percent from middle of market I do have a Technical edit to make so when we get to that resolution that's adopting the terms Right now it just says 25 of the loan what we want to make sure we say is 25 of the project Would max out for soft costs And so when we get to that resolution at the end of the discussion I could help through through those types of edits In addition, there was another thing that came up that we discussed at the subcommittee level and that was administrative costs and that's we're talking about operating administrative costs for For the red housing fund and then there was some discussion about Having some of that interest income also being used for the red That was really the focus of the subcommittee because there's been just a lot of agreement Of the course of all these discussions with with all the parties involved And we're really down to to that one And we are we are looking at agreement with our proposed amendment there as well So it's it's the last bullet under Use of proceeds in the term sheet And where we had ended up after the subcommittee discussion is not to have a we were staff was proposing a cap on administrative Uh on the revenue that could be used for administrative costs And two out of the three subcommittee members Didn't want to be that restrictive frankly Wanted to have that flexibility but What we put on the table tonight is is a something that's not a right now We don't have any cap and there's really no direction for what to do with the interest income And it could go into the red so what we would suggest And we would match up exactly what the county's terms is to Add an additional sentence to that last bullet That really directs that that interest would go to the operating expenses of the fund not the red And This has been vetted with the the red team and foresight and they're in support of that amendment Next slide So uh another thing that we share in common with the county is obviously some accountability We want to make sure we have quarterly reports annual reports with auditive financial statements We want everyone to be able to see full transparency What was earned? What was what was Transpiring terms of the form of the loans with types of loans And we want to report progress right because this is all about catalyzing downtown development Did we create units? What type of units was it useful? Where was it the most useful? And so we we intend to receive those types of reports from from the red team And then we have a red for a housing fund board structure So it is a separate entity and we're looking at seven voting members So you need at least three to set up a 5013c and the red board has already acted to And initiate those those initial three which allows us to have a fund and allows us to move forward And then as you'll hear tonight in my next slide, we have an opportunity to appoint a city member To represent the city And there will also be four independent. So let me see we go through this real quick So we'll have a the seven member Voting members will be one representing the county in their interest the city representing the city and their interest One representative from the red board Which the red board is selected as michelle whitman because she works with all members of the of the red And then four independents and the red board did select two independents already One is the Veronica Ferguson and the other is Todd Sheffield So remaining are these four city member county member and two independents the two advisories you see here is Idea it's not necessarily executed at this point. It's an idea that came out of the red board's discussion The opportunity to have one of the red board members Um, represent one representing the county and one representing the city be in attendance and be allowed to Um, participate in the discussion, but they would not be able to vote next slide So in terms of the city member, um, we have Offerings of the same criteria that we're looking for for any of these members With the emphasis that they would be familiar with our city's goals and our city's interest um, so obviously being aware of The red our project criteria how this will work any economic background or Financing background credit background would be helpful One of the things that I wanted to note is I've been working with michelle today making sure that Any advertisement or solicitation for especially these additional members whether it's For the city or the county or these independent seats that are left Want to make sure that that we're making use of our own cup delivery system and so We that's going out today in our city's newsletter the opportunity to Apply for one of these seats And so the due date for those applications will be on the 5th of august On august 27th the red board is will be considering the two independent seats that are left And so what I would be suggesting to the council is um to Make use of the solicitation of Applications and then we can bring those options to the council for consideration that the august 17th or august 31st meeting And next slide Okay, so before I go on to a next topic, which is the red So we can back up on the slides I wanted to make sure that there's an opportunity for any questions of city staff at this point Looking for hands Seeing shaking heads vice mayor Um, I wanted clarification of how the red board member Would be different from an independent if they're appointed by red You understand what i'm asking Yeah, no, that's a great question. I should have clarified so the city as a member The city is through the city council Will have an opportunity to appoint That member for that the one that's highlighted says city member And the county board of supervisors will appoint their county member that you see The board the red board Right, which is city county representatives, and it's the joint jpa They have the opportunity to appoint a representative for the red which is The one at the top there, which would be michelle wetman And then they also have the opportunity to recommend four independent seats And then it's the actions by the red council So that's how that works Okay, I get it. It just appears that Whether you label them independent or red board it appears that red has five Seats the city has one and the county has one by way of appointment You're correct. They have actionable actionable influence over five of the seats They appoint one of the seats just like the city report appoints one and the county appoints one They have recommendation authority over the four independent That's a good question and good observation and and we can also hear from We get the presentation by michelle and foresight. We can we can read. I'll have them revisit that that element Thank you, mr. Merritt, and I don't know if this would be more appropriate with michelle because I had some of the same concerns that Two independents were appointed But the solicitation for Applications did not go through the city connections website Correct and so that's one question is the criteria that is listed on slide 13 The same criteria what they were looking for For the two appointees and mr. Tibbs. I think you are also involved in this process So you might be able to help out with that one too I'll speak to the solicitation and and why it didn't go out with the city One I I don't think I I know from my perspective. I wasn't known that Um When it was going out or that it was an option for me to to get flagged to go through our system We certainly would have shared our our government delivery system. We have quite a large audience There is overlap though. I must say between the county's gov delivery audience is in the cities And the red staff was simply taking direction that they received from the red board and The county spoke up about going through their system Let's see what councilmember tibbet says to say and then we'll come back Thanks mayor, so uh for fear of running afoul with michelle and uh Forsythe street. We're going to give a presentation in a minute. I'll take a stab at some of these these questions and concerns um Madam vice mayor your question about the the board was the same as I had When we just came before the red board and I was confused at first why The red board was appointing an independent board and I'm going to look to michelle and Olivia And julie's to speak to this during their presentation But but the reason is is actually has to do with the irs You can't have if it's if it's controlled by a majority of government appointed or elected officials It then gets recognized as a government agency And the red board as a funding entity has to be a nonprofit if we want to have some of the same success that they're seeing In san francisco the peninsula and other areas where they've kind of done this before Um, so I've I've got faith in in their process that they've identified Um, albeit it is a little bit wonky and not um, you wouldn't you know, you wouldn't call it common sensical Uh, I think that the people we've appointed so far are good. The red is appointed michelle Uh to represent the red because she has the most knowledge out of all of us She is going to be Continuing with the agency as some of us electeds come and go over time serving on the board So we felt she was the right pick Veronica furgusson um given her background in uh law and legal counsel As well as some development when she worked for the county administrator's office And then we found a great uh guy his name escapes me sheffield is the last name Who is the ceo of first community credit union retired and you thought perfect person to represent the financial side We are going to have and tom this is to address your concern, you know, I'm going to take responsibility For not running it through the city's connections. Not only am I the chair I'm the one up there representing the city's interests and I did not it did not occur to me that we should run it through city connections But you have my word. I'm going to go back to the red board. Actually, I think michelle is already planning on this I believe maybe you have already spoken Uh, we're going to make sure that we delay the process a couple of weeks to run it through city connections Um now I think did I answer both your questions tom or did you have another one? Somewhat um because it's my understanding again I was surprised when I learned there were six people that filled it in And did you guys conduct interviews or was it just a paper evaluation before you selected the positions? It was a paper evaluation I guess that's where my level of uncomfort especially as much as this body has talked about open government and transparency and Very limited and I know It went out to a lot of different people, but it it didn't go out to everyone and I know we can't Unring the bell. So I guess I would ask for the next two that it does does brighter broader Solicitation and actually is we've experienced during the last couple counts meeting some form of a verbal interview to make these key positions here it's um, there's a little bit surprising that that wasn't done on this and Reading the staff report who actually makes the appointment. Was it the red or was it the Council for the red? It was the red the new enterprise district So the four you made the appointment versus because I think there was some language there that the actual council to the red Actually made the appointment based on the recommendation and again, it was just new language that I haven't seen another 501 entities Yeah, that's that's one for for michelle. Um, we during the meeting We actually that question came up and it was if my memory is serving correctly It was had more to do with procedure And I think it was the way that the red council interpreted the law That she was the one making the appointment But I don't want you to think that the the red's attorney was the one that looked at the applications And then made the appointments. They went to the red board We saw all the members of the red solved the applications evaluated them and then came forward with our recommendations And then approved them But I think the language in the staff report may have reflected that the council was making the appointments But again, that doesn't mean that they did that in a box right Thank you. So that that was helpful jack And then can we just get confirmation because even on the first slideshows I've heard it referred to as a 501 c3 and a 501 3 c And I'm guessing legally Which type of entity is this? Slide 10 add 501 c3 slide 12 head is a 501 3 c That's probably my typographical area. My understanding is a 501 3 c 3 c. Thank you. That's all I There's a lot of new Acronyms and whatnot that I've had to learn along the way to even just facilitate this conversation and that was one of them I Think you mayor, um, very quick question. Who was counsel to the red? uh council to the red I I don't know the full name. I'm sorry off the top of my head Okay, local outside. It's where do we know the Drama style I believe it's contracted by contract Uh to support the red Okay Thank you Let's go ahead and keep going and go with michelle whitman's portion of the presentation and perhaps she can answer some of these questions Okay, but also I have a uh what we can do is we can go through that but then I also have uh I have a couple of slides to talk about the Red First amendment and then also the 50 000 one time assessment member assessment request Okay, let's go ahead and finish your presentation first that and then we'll go to michelle Okay, great. Um, okay. So the red, um jpa first amendment. Um, essentially In the the first two years of the red um was considered a pilot period where it would be a lot of um activities in terms of exploring opportunities for the red what uh potential Funds private public could um occur through the red um And then it was there was a commitment that after the two-year formation period that there would be a time to reflect on just the joint powers agreement one of which we were What we were monitoring is interest We knew we had interest by the city and we knew we had interest by the county so one of the monitoring aspects of the first two years is Will there be private money? There wasn't not in the first two years. Um There wasn't even public money in the first two years, but is there interest? by other jurisdictions It was never any formal interest by another jurisdiction and there wasn't any formal provision of money for projects There was uh money for supporting the red concept, um, which is to help developers Figure out, you know, what what is needed to make their projects work Support grant applications and the like but one of the things that they did discuss at length When they did their two-year review is this idea of new membership so currently the joint powers agreement requires or Basically has a statement that for new members after these first two years after we've had this first two years of experience That the new members shall be admitted to the agency and then there's a couple of Uh contingencies on that that they're an incorporated city or town within the within the county limits And that they agree to the terms of the agreement Uh with the red board discussed that length across a couple of meetings And then by unanimous support supported to change from shall to may is because the red board wants to use some discretion Right now we have two strong members We have the city and the county and as you can see what they're both offering To be catalytic in terms of their investment into the red and the idea is when we do have new members to really consider um if if A new member would be a fit to that That type of model do they have Do they have offerings? This is supposed to be a regional housing model with a financial arm And so that's one of the things that I think the the red board wanted to an ability to use discretion when adding new members Next slide And in terms of a red member assessment I'll just say that the city does support the red quite a bit we we host an office for its executive officer And we were successful. We we partner with the red to seek out grants for operating expenses And we were recently successful in helping red get a hundred fifty thousand dollar grant But one of the items that the red needs to address on a year-to-year basis is It's it's financial model in terms of ongoing operating expenses. And like I said, it's it's still even though It went through its first two pilot periods. We saw from my earlier slides. There was a lot going on for santa rosa at that time So in in some sense, we are still emerging in its opportunity But What came to pass in discussion at the red board was this interest in in having not just operating expenses, but You know some reserves on hand To have some flexibility throughout operating year And so they voted for a one-time member assessment of fifty thousand dollars Next slide and so this this action took place unanimously in may of this year and To be quite frank. We've gone through a number of Council discussions on budget and even one-time requests. This is one of many coming through our portfolio I'm putting it forward on the table because it was requested by the red board. It's fifty thousand. It's one time I don't have another source that's earmarked for something like this So I would look to the pg me one-time settlement funds for it In the same vein that we looked to it for the for the house red housing fund investment It doesn't sound like it's a lot of money But every dollar counts in a budget that we're going through There's and it's not i'm bringing it to you because it's timely and requested not because it's prioritized across my portfolio Uh, and there's a separate resolution for this action than the ten million dollars So we tried to separate it out so you can have separate discussions on each of these actions And that does conclude my presentation. Is there any questions about the assessment or the jfa amendment? I'm happy to answer And so with that, um, we do have uh, Michelle and foresight have a presentation and we'd be great if we can get theirs. Oh, thank you Am I good to go claire? Yep go ahead All right. Thank you, mayor rogers. Good afternoon Mr. Mayor vice mayor rogers and council members I was asked to review the rod the reds project criteria explain how it was adopted and um And how the criteria will regulate the red housing fund claire did touch on the red project criteria components Um, but I will do a little deeper dive. So if we can go to the next slide I'm going to lead off with the vision statement from our county's recovery and resiliency framework Because the renewal enterprise district its joint powers agreement between the city and the county its project criteria And the red housing fund are all rooted in this in this vision To paraphrase the red seeks to catalyze a balanced climate smart and disaster resilient housing market That is affordable to area workers and where all of our community members have equal and fair access to a diversity of homes Located near transit jobs and services in a vital economy The red and the red housing fund are an implementation of this vision Next slide, please The red housing fund has been designed to align with the reds project criteria, which is shown here claire talked a little bit about it First I want to quickly review how the criteria criteria developed beginning in february 2019 The red board and public stakeholders were presented with a first draft of the project criteria and that was drafted by city attorneys and Council from or attorneys from county council's office to begin with the red board council city uh The red board council city and county staff and community stakeholders Spent the next year in bi-monthly public meetings informing deliberating and then finally adopting the criteria that you see before you And looking back a bit further the core principles that shape the criteria Were based on public priorities and policy goals identified during well attended community meetings Facilitated by the county throughout 2018 to identify the highest priority disaster recovery activities your constituents Said should be the focus of a resilient recovery That community engagement included seven large county white meetings with materials provided in both english and spanish And translation services available at every meeting additional outreach included an online survey And more grassroot style meetings with over 80 community organizations and local partners including city of san rosa staff and elected officials Back to the criteria now to initially qualify for consideration for red financing or other support Like claire said a project must meet the threshold criteria criteria that's represented across the top of the slide On the mixed use point Projects must be at least 75% residential use like claire said But an exciting example of mixed use is there's a project in the downtown san rosa pipeline That wants to include daycare, which would be a really beneficial mixed use. That's exciting projects that meet meet threshold criteria are then assessed based on the project's inclusion Of one or more of the second step evaluation criteria Which are essentially a menu of desired project project features or benefits at the end of the day These criteria and the red housing fund honor the idea that the right kind of housing in the right places Should satisfy a diverse range of community needs and public policy goals Next slide, please So um now let's Sharpen our focus on the binding relationship of the red project criteria to the red housing fund by design The red housing fund will be structurally obligated to the red project criteria This point has been critical to red board members throughout the process of designing the fund The red housing fund states under article nine of its bylaws that the corporation And that's the nonprofit Shall adopt loan pros loan policies that are consistent with the project criteria of the red And in its application to the irs for determination of tax exempt status And by the way 501 c3 is the correct number The red housing fund will include as an exhibit the red project criteria as a qualification for the fund's primary activities The aim is to ensure The application to the irs is tied to the red's project criteria Making clear that project seeking loans will only be available for funding if they meet red project criteria and finally Uh and and claire touched on this any future amendments to the red project criteria Must be approved by a majority vote of the red board itself the red housing fund board Does not have the discretion to change or amend the project criteria I'll quickly add that sue block from berkwilliam sorenson is the legal counsel to the red And um city and county attorney attorneys Did help me when that rfp was out in evaluating the applications for red council So at this point i'd like to turn the presentation over to fourth eye street advisors and olivia spec daniella gravel for a deeper dive into the red's housing fund It's Michelle. Um, can we go to the next slide please? So my name is olivia spec. I'm joined by my colleague daniella gravel and we are excited and appreciate the opportunity To share with you all and speak to you all and update about the red housing fund Um, we have a bit of a brief presentation, but hopefully it can answer some of the questions that you have Um, first we'll spend some time focusing on where we're at and really creating the fund itself and where we're at the project's work plan We'll spend some time reviewing and discussing the fund's financial model as well as some of the implications in the city's term sheet And then we'll end with the review on the fund's sort of governance and legal structure Some of which claire and michelle have already touched on Next slide please So just to review our team has been working pretty closely with the red over the past 18 months or so to identify ways in which this new housing fund can Really catalyze development in santa rosa and other urban areas of sonoma county This has involved pretty close coordination between the red itself and later on representatives of the city and county And over the past several months, we've been working pretty regularly as claire said on drafting and negotiating terms for the city and county's investment in the fund in parallel Um at this point we've reached a point where we're nearly final with the city's terms An action item of which for today is to approve those terms and authorize the execution of a loan agreement based on those terms at a later date Um in parallel, we've been working with the red on really Operationalizing operationalizing the fund and actually had its first board meeting last week Next slide please And I will pass it over to daniella to review um the products as well as the financial model component Thanks, Olivia So yeah, I wanted just to provide um an overview of the loan products that the fund is offering to developers And this was included in the options and feasibility report that we released last summer and it was based on Research and conversations the number of local stakeholders So the first product is for affordable housing and it's a subordinate loan That's available from pre-development through the permanent period This loan would be available for up to 18 years At a very low interest but with required monthly payments. So the idea here is that The developer would need a two to three year construction loan And then on top of that at least a 15 year permanent period and that's because most tax credit investors Will want the permanent loan to extend as long as the tax credit compliance period And this subordinate loan is really meant just to fill in that last gap in the project's capital stack The second the second product is for middle income and market rate projects And this is a subordinate construction loan that would cover approximately 10 of the project's development cost This would be in second position behind the bank's first position construction loan But it's really meant to solve that problem where right now we're finding that the construction lenders You know are offering construction loans smaller than the developer really needs So this construction loan would be available for two to three years And a repaid upon completion and lease up and stabilization However, there may be situations On the on the market rate side where if the market rents are not proven And the developer is not able to secure a permanent loan That is large enough to repay both the bank's first position construction loan and this subordinate loan In that situation, this construction loan could be converted To a mezzanine or a mezzanine, which is a subordinate permanent loan And on on the market rate and middle income side This loan will be available for up to 10 years again with required monthly payments Um next slide please So one of the items I just wanted to provide an overview on was earlier Claire had mentioned that at the subcommittee meeting in June There was one term that was sort of up for discussion And this is whether The city should place a cap On the amount of interest revenue that the red housing fund could use to cover its annual operating expenses And in the um the earlier term sheet had proposed that 50 percent of interest revenues could be used to cover expenses in its first in the funds first three years of operation And then thereafter no interest revenue could be used to cover operating expenses for the remainder of the 20 year term On that term has been Struck in the current version of the term sheet And I just uh wanted to say that foresight recommends that there is no cap On the use of revenue to cover the funds operating expenses and just wanted to walk you through two scenarios to show why it's not recommended So first of all, uh the funds ongoing annual revenue comes from three sources And you'll see that at the top um in the top of the these numbers here So the first is interest so monthly interest payments from the construction and permanent loans That the fund provides to developers The second are one-time origination fees when the housing loans are closed the developer pays an origination fee And the third is interest earnings from any excess proceeds that are invested in a permitted investment instrument And there's also grants that you see here and that's really just meant To cover the first one to two years of operations These are funds that we've raised from outside donors to cover expenses as the fund is ramping up its activities And so it's always been our intention that this fund would be self sustaining meaning that it would generate enough revenue to cover its expenses and so um So that's the premise here, but I also want to be clear that the fund is not using Any of the of the ten million dollars in principle from the city or the ten million from the county to cover any of its expenses That's purely for lending activities And so on this slide, this is a base case Where there's no cap on the use of revenue, which is our recommendation And obviously these are just draft projections, but to give you an idea of how this fund operates So at the very bottom the bottom right you'll see um the cumulative cumulative net income over the 20 years of the fund And as you can see it's positive, which is about six hundred thousand dollars over the 20 year term However, um in the early years If you look at the line above it called net income in the early years The fund has positive net income because it's generating more revenue from its activities Then then the expenses that it's also um using However over time if you look in the later years and your 15th or your 20 What happens is as the fund is winding down and it's you know stop. It's not issuing any new loans There's there's less lending activity and thus less revenue But the fund still has expenses that it needs to cover The fund still needs to continue monitoring and servicing those loans and and paying for its insurance and so forth So in the out of years the fund may not generate enough revenue to cover its expenses So what happens is over the 20 year term The fund will conserve net income in the early years and use it to pay for expenses in the later years So overall the fund supports itself By you know using its revenue over 20 years to cover all of its expenses over that same term Um next slide, please And so this slide is the second scenario which which which would show you what happens if we tap Um, how much interest revenue can be used to cover expenses? So in this scenario, we're only using 50 percent of the interest revenue in the first three years And then we're using none of the interest revenue thereafter And so what you see at the very bottom under the cumulative net income and the far right You'll see we've got a loss of almost 3.8 million dollars over the 20 year term and so um And the reason for this is because interest earnings Are actually a significant portion of the fund's ongoing revenue source. And so if that's capped There's not enough revenue to cover its expenses over the term over the funds 20 year term And if this is to happen, we would actually need to be raising grants year over year Um to cover the fund's expenses, which would end up Further increasing expenses because we've got to pay for the fundraising the time to fundraise Um, I also just wanted to make three more comments Um, I know that there was um a question or a statement at some point Um that it was always intended that the fund would attract additional investors Who would help pay for these operating costs? And that is true So if the fund attracts additional capital from other lenders That means we'll have more money to increase its lending activities But with more activity, there will be more revenue But there will also be more expenses. So there'll be additional underwriting underwriting closing costs and staffing needs Um, also on other funds we have worked with um, we have not seen caps on funds And so what typically happens is as this fund grows Over time excess revenue could be used um for new business lines Or to increase lending capital on its current products But those decisions typically get made over time based on actual financials Um, and so we really want the fund to have the flexibility now To jump on opportunities as they arise Um, and you know, that may not be on our radar today And so the less constraints we put on this fund today the more opportunity we really we really have in the future And then finally just to note There will be an annual budget process. And so the red housing fund board Every year has to approve the annual budget as well as approving the cost of you know, third party Contracts or staffing and so as time goes on The board will be able to review actual historical expenses and make better educated decisions about upcoming needs and future expenses And so it will stop there and we can respond to the next slide Thanks, Daniela So to switch gears a little bit and talk about more of the legal and governance structure for the fund The fund will be governed by its board of directors and so to talk a little bit About who those people are and then what their responsibilities will be on the next slide and The board is going to be comprised of three representatives appointed by the public sector So the red board will have an appointment of which they've already made As well as one appointment each from the city and the county And then the remaining four seats on the board will be independent directors And these individuals will be recommended by the red board But appointed by council for the first two and then because we already have a fund established The current board members will be taking that recommendation for the next two seats And so council member tidbits was in his comment earlier Correct in saying that the reason that we're trying to structure it this way and it is a bit wonky is that We need to have make sure that a majority of the board is classified as independent Which means that it isn't point isn't appointed by a public agency And that is because the irs will there The irs would view the fund if it was appointed or a majority of the board was appointed by a public agency as an instrumentality of government And this can also affect the fund and its ability to fundraise over time For instance, if the fund at one point wishes to become a certified community development financial institution a cdfi Um cdfi certification Um isn't extended to instrumentalities of government So the fund would not be eligible to become a cdfi at a later date And so that's kind of just a little bit of why we've structured it this way and how kind of the process is played out And the reason for that process And then i'll add as they're said to at a later point the red board may decide to add two non-voting advisory members to the board as well And so these individuals will be able to participate in meetings and voice their opinions But they would not be able to actually vote on matters Concerned by the board of directors Um, and as I mentioned we have the first three board members already in place two independent directors as well as the reds appointee And the remaining four directors on the board will be filled later this year later in the summer Um to recap just a little bit on the legal structure of the fund So the fund because we have those three board members in place We were able to submit the articles of incorporation which formally create the fund as a 501c3 a non-profit corporation And so now our next step is to apply for federal tax exemption from the irs And so our team working with the red and council is currently in the process of drafting a form 1023 Which will submit to the irs for federal tax exemption Um, lastly from an operational perspective, we're anticipating a very lean staffing model for this fund As daniella, you can kind of tell from the slides that daniella reviewed the expenses We're trying to keep this as light touch and lean as possible. And so therefore the fund at this point We're anticipating that it will contract with third party service providers Such as the city's housing authority to provide all the capacities that the fund needs to operate Um next slide, please So the board as I mentioned is going to have the primary decision making role for the fund And you can kind of think about these decisions in three broad categories categories There's sort of a governance component. And so that's kind of adopting or amending any key governance documents or policies and so We already have the bylaws and the articles of incorporation But if at some point the fund wants to establish further policies that it needs to abide by the board would be responsible for creating and adopting and amending those as well Um, if at some point the board would like to add new members to the fund Um, that is something that the red housing funds board will need to decide and they'll need to decide who and when to appoint those members um There's a financial component separately Which is kind of anything associated with the fund raising ability as well as the budgeting process. And so If the fund is looking to raise additional capital The board would be the body responsible for approving terms and eventually agreements of those investments into the fund As Daniela mentioned, the board will also be approving the fund's annual budget. So they will be reviewing You know the nitty-gritty details. Who is the fund going to be contracting with what are the size of those contracts things like that? Um, there's also an oversight and reporting component So the board will be guiding the fund through its annual audit and 990 procedures as well as receiving and filing reports around those processes as well and then importantly, there is the programmatic aspect which is Really deciding what projects the fund will be lending to what projects the fund is going to support As well as if the board wants to add new products or programs at a later date The board will be approving those as well And so we've listed here just a few kind of different types of backgrounds that we've seen represented in other funds That foresight has worked on And just kind of to help the city think through, you know the different types of individuals they might want to appoint And so we've seen Individuals with backgrounds in housing and community Development sort of public agencies Individuals who have more of a philanthropic or corporate finance background Law is always very important as well as any sort of local advocacy or local stakeholders as well And so I'll stop there. That's the presentation that course I've had And I don't know if we want to answer any questions or if there's player that you want to get back to your process The rest of your slides as well No, I want to make sure that they have an opportunity to ask you questions, especially those that I could not answer Yeah, well, we'll go ahead do a couple of council comments or questions here I do have a few myself First and I apologize if I missed it. What's the length of the term for board members? The initial term is I believe it's We're going to let me just double check um an initial for your term though the um The representatives for the city county and red board public agencies can replace their board of directors at any time Okay, and Claire my understanding is that this would be similar to many of our appointments where Uh mayor appoints council approves That's the staff's recommendation is to treat it just like any other um regional appointment Okay And then michelle I had a question about the criteria if we can Can go back there As I understand it you have the four criteria that are required and then you have Uh a requirement that at least one of the additional conditions are met One of the required criteria was transit rich planned area But then one of the listed plus have to have Was proximity to transit bike and pedestrian crossing They sound like they're similar to me, but i'm hoping you can parse through the difference Because it would seem that the initial criteria that is required Actually would satisfy the condition That is that is intended to be additive Sure. I'm happy to take that The first reference across the top of the screen refers to I think it's five different designated planning areas And there is a more detailed project criteria sheet with the legal definitions, but the Designated areas are priority development area world community investment area specific plan area high quality transit corridor And qualified opportunity zones What you're seeing in the evaluation criteria is Not a legal definition, but More um general definition of you know, let's make sure that there are modal Transportation options in proximity to these developments Okay, so it's possible to satisfy the transit rich and planned area criteria without Satisfying the proximity to transit bike and pedestrian connectivity Certainly the um, I think it would sweep in the Proximity to transit maybe not the bike and pedestrian proximity Okay All right. I just wanted to make sure that that wasn't That the the plus one or more of the following I assumed it's supposed to be additive and I just wanted to make sure that there's at least some form of a distinction that you don't just Automatically have that if you if you meet the basic criteria Yeah, I think that oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to go for it I think that What that evaluation criteria is getting at are things like the Multi-use path which wouldn't fall under the definition of any of those planned areas Okay, right. Thank you and then the last question that I had was a Partially for Claire partially for Michelle sounds like the board has had a pretty exhaustive conversation on this but when we Did the original design of the renewal enterprise district through The build rebuild ad hoc committee The intention was to open this up for other cities to participate After two years and I understand why we're not at that point now I have talked with council members in other cities who are interested in participating and I think if we are encouraging Other jurisdictions to do their part with housing as well And I know that many of them are feeling the sting of the new rena numbers I'd be a little bit hesitant To make it more difficult for them to join the renewal enterprise district And so I guess I'm just asking for a quick pitch. Like I said, I know you did a more comprehensive Discussion on it But what's the pitch for making it more difficult for these cities to join? We haven't made it more difficult We haven't made it what we've done is amend the language so that it's not Um automatic It through the course of setting up this housing fund It's important to get it this it established and it's legal structure established Before we start adding members Um, but I've talked with council members and mayors from other cities that have expressed interest as well um, and it looks like Council member tippets wants to add to this And he is chair of the red. So I'll yield to him Go ahead council member Thank you, mayor. I just wanted to try to address your your question and your concern Um with rehashing our discussion during meeting about this very thing The the the red board was unanimous in its agreement that we need to welcome in other cities From an impact perspective like you're talking about housing is a regional issue Um, and also from I think just kind of a best practices, you know, let's let's pool resources Both in terms of human capital and financial capital Um, so that is absolutely the intent going forward I will say speaking for myself and I want to stop short of speaking for other board members But I do think this might have been some of the sentiment Is we we didn't get to a point of discussing resource allocation beyond the $50,000 membership fee And what I'm driving at here is As the person representing the city of santa rosa's interest on the red board I feel a fiduciary responsibility To see to it that that $10 million is serving the city of santa rosa first If we start issuing loans and these developers are able to get occupancy in their buildings get cash flow And then go out and get a better loan refinance and we're repaid Personally, I think it would be great if santa rosa could lend a hand to the rest of Um our community again with the understanding that housing is a regional issue But right now I feel like My charge has been to protect santa rosa's Interest in money and meet the housing needs of our city And since the red is so new that really had to be my focus If you and the in the council want to change that focus, I'm happy to take those sentiments back to the red board So Why wasn't there a discussion about a return for the for the time being a return to source requirement? That that it would seem to me more prudent that you would say that the 10 million dollars that the City put in needed to be used on projects to finance projects that were in the city rather than Make it so that others couldn't join you could then basically say to runner park and to healdsburg If you put in money that'll be able to back projects that are in your jurisdiction until we see how this plays out Yeah, and mayor what i'm saying is we just didn't get that far because we recognize that that's the question of the day, right? It's the return to source question as one of seven on the council. I like return to source um, but we have not Frankly just had the time as a red board to to have that broader discussion about What what is the the payments? Into the red board look like for these other jurisdictions. What does return to source look like? We have just been entirely focused on navigating The legal structure of the nonprofit in the eyes of the irs the criteria for how we will evaluate projects And the selection of what will be hopefully a good and strong independent body So i'm sorry that that's not it's kind of a cop-out answer, but it's the truth No, no, I think it's a fair answer and I appreciate the honesty Councilor, are there any other questions? Councilmember schwedhelm. Thank you, mr. Mayor I know this may sound in the weeds, but i'm a big proponent of let's ask the question before Before us so on the red housing fund. Um, what's the process for proxy votes? Are they allowed or not? They are not allowed So that's specifically In the I guess would be the articles of incorporation It's in the bylaws. Thank you. Okay, and then um, I know that Did the board discuss any opportunity for the in-kind donations? I know the city santa rosa is providing office space. Is that just How how was that being looked at? Is that a question for me or for staff? Yeah, yes, it could be for anyone Yeah, um, I think it's a question for red. Um, because michelle can talk about their operating budget and what they rely on and how that functions and how The ask fits into that bigger picture I wanted to just make a point of clarification. We do provide Additional assistance besides just a member assessment Sure, so I do have a a cube in room six of city hall and uh, the The red has provided value to the city the city is providing value to the red for example I just got a there's a Red grant to the city to fund part of the eifd study The city did assist with the red with an application to mtc that got $150,000 grant The red paid for a grant consultant to complete a grant application For a state grant that's coming to your council For approval in the next couple of weeks so There is a a lot of mutually beneficial collaboration going on The The neither the city nor the county have contributed financially to the red so far. We've been extremely fortunate That we got the hula foundation grant to start this up as a pilot project And we've gotten grant funding to help offset some of the costs of Creating this housing fund and I do a lot of fund development still seeking grant funding. So The answer is we've been great partners actually city staff and the red in attracting resources for housing projects here last year The red worked with four different developers to submit state grant applications that won 38 million dollars in funding City staff has worked well with the red and with community stakeholders to Capture a larger share of the disaster low-income housing tax credit pie Some of those credits we're slipping through our fingers. So I think the answer is we're doing great together and we're We are attracting more resources to devote to housing here in center roads in Sonoma county And I totally get that I I guess my interest is as long as the red board acknowledges that and we're recognizing that and we're okay with The geographic location for the executive directors of the city facility And and period we're not expecting any compensation because I totally get what you're saying michelle about the mutual beneficial agreements with it I'm just all about because if we do is the mayor was talking about if other cities do join Situations change and let's just make a conscious decision that we're good with it versus Didn't think about that. So that was the only reason why I brought that question up And then lastly, I think this would also be for you michelle on the attachment five Which you did a great job of explaining it was a memo to claire That's included in our staff report about how we came up with the 50k But I did notice on one line item From fiscal year 2021 was a red grant to housing project to 150k. Could you share a little information about what that was? Sure, that was a placeholder that was put in the original red budget that I inherited We didn't know we would have a red housing fund. We didn't know we would attract all this state grant money You know tens of millions of dollars and so Before I was executive director the red board Set that money aside not Dedicating it to anything at the time just let's set it aside and In reality as you know councilmember schwedhelm that funds less than half a door of a housing development So early in the year when we did budget workshops with the red board And then adopted a preliminary budget It was determined that the highest and best use for that $250,000 was to Keep the red going through this process of setting up the housing fund because that's where we're really going to Make the biggest difference if we can get this if we can stand this thing up Deploy 20 million dollars to Get sticks in the ground on these projects that are stuck that's going to make a lot more difference than $250,000 You know like I said half a door in a multi-family housing development Great. Thank you for that explanation. So just so I'm clear there was no No other housing project got it. It stayed within the fund itself Right. Thank you We have any other questions from council members All right, we'll go to public comment on this item Is there anybody in the chambers interested in speaking? All right, we'll go to Our live zoom comments. We'll start start with luke and then go to adrian Good afternoon. Mayor rogers and members of the santa rosa city council My name is luke lindenbush with generation housing a non-profit organization supporting the supply of diversity and affordability of housing in Sonoma county We submitted a letter cosigned by two dozen local leaders strongly encouraging you to match the county's 10 million dollar investment in the red housing fund I'm here to reiterate that recommendation that you seize a once in a generation opportunity To accelerate the piece of housing production by allocating a portion of pgne settlement funds to fund the inception Of the renewal enterprise districts housing fund This match with the county of sonoma's recent allocation to the red is the culmination of a long process and nearly complete This is a watershed moment in realizing a vision that has been in the works for years And this is the product of many years of hard work and many community members elected officials and local government staffers who refuse to give up on a commitment to housing production in downtown santa rosa In particular in the wake of the 2017 fires The effects of the red housing fund will support a vibrant community both within and beyond santa rosa This is a regional approach to housing that's starting right where we need it most As has been mentioned local funding is instrumental in attracting additional state dollars to adequately finance the many projects That struggle to secure the full stack of funds needed to break ground There's no single solution to make housing production viable and the city of santa rosa has been recognized by governor newson Is doing pretty much everything you can to streamline the processes of permitting but In terms of what what could be a silver bullet even though there isn't one To make housing production more viable The red housing fund just might be it because it addresses financing and financing is the most complex challenge Getting in the way of us delivering on housing production here in santa rosa and sinema county We need a lasting self-sustaining funding mechanism to bring more mid-rise and high-rise housing at all levels of affordability to downtown santa rosa Thank you to council for your continued support of the red and thank you to staff clear hartman megan bassinger foresight street and of course michelle wittman for all of the hard work in developing an innovative And resilient solution in the making when it's driven I made out by comprehensive project criteria consciously designed to address key community development and disaster recovery needs We appreciate your service and we understand the difficulty in balancing compelling and competing needs and priorities for what to do with This funds and the challenge in prioritizing funding when there's simply not enough money for everything We encourage you to rise to the opportunity of this moment By prioritizing and investing in housing the red housing fund is the best way we have to ensure This settlement money has significant lasting and generational impact. Thank you Thank you. Luke. We'll go to adrian Thank you. There you go Yeah, my name is adrian lobby. I'm the co-founder of homeless action It's really so nice to see all of this effort to build more housing It's a core Desire of all of us and I'm really grateful for everyone's work to get us this far Now as I'm sure you know building market rate housing does not solve the most important housing problem We face in san aroza, which is the lack of housing for poor and homeless residents To house this community takes planning and oversight And I'm really pleased to see an emphasis on this as one of your core principles So I have a few things I'd like to bring to your attention One is I want that you would make an effort to support the housing plan so that the Share of extremely low and very low income housing is actually built There's a long way from this moment till that and it's important that you watch out Every local entity wrestles with the percentage of these very low income units. They're not easy to fund And they often link it to the density bonus It is really important that the red not leave these decisions to the local entity But to make them as part of their contracts In addition You and the red board should very strictly monitor variances That are Given in your documents say if other financing requirements preclude Then they can get a variance So we can't let anyone involved in developing these units ignore the need to house the poorest residents including homeless residents It's so core to what we're trying to build in in Santa Rosa right now, which is an integrated community And this brings me to the final point, which is the potential for off-site affordable and workplace housing I'm hoping this doesn't mean what I think it means which is oh if you can't afford to do them right next to your Fancy luxury apartments. You get to do them over in roseland somewhere or in some other very low income neighborhood This is not what we want We want affordable and workplace housing to be integrated in each project And certainly within each area and not shuttled off to some Low-income neighborhood ensuring that it becomes more and more low income as time goes by Thank you so much. It's really interesting listening to all the details and I wish everyone the best of luck Thank you so much adrian I did see hazus guzman's hand pop up and i'll see If it pops up again We'll go to gregory furan Thank you. I like adrian I'm excited about the possibility of raising more funds for doing housing Low-income and the missing middle We all need housing And your housing authority and this the county's housing authority have been I won't say fun places, but they're the places where folks like me and others who want to build low-income housing Have gone to wrestle with all of these questions And as legislative bodies under the board of supervisors in the city They're open to us. They're Brown act compliant What I was a little Alarmed at and I've been to all the meetings of the red Was the what seemed like? The setting up of a non-profit Not being under anyone's sort of control in order To get out of the brown act Now I'd like someone to to say yes or no because that bothers me it it is Unusual to hand this much money to a non-profit organization If what you're trying to do is to meet behind You know somewhat closed doors meaning you're not going to let us know enough to be able to do what you know Every other commission of the city or county has to do In order to be able to do this in the latter day and be transparent So someone please tell me i'm wrong that these are all going to be Private meetings of a board that isn't really under the control of any elected Thank you Thank you. Gregory. I'll go ahead and pull it back and see if we have any voicemail public comments We have no voicemail public comment on this item. Great. Thank you And michelle, I'll go ahead and throw that question to you. Will this board For lack of a better way to put it be brown act compliant the A 501 c3 a non-profit is not subject to the brown act Transparency has been important to the redboard and through the account of the Quarterly and annual reports that will be made to the city council and the County and any other investors to the fund There will be some accountability there We do have community members who are Have skill sets that are valuable to the fund who are Have served on other community boards. Todd Sheffield, for example Has served on the cap board. I don't believe the cap board is Subject to the brown act, but none of us would deny that You know, it's doing amazing work non-profits Have to adhere to Standards to remain non-profits. This is a model that has been used That foresight has used in other cities across the country Because it works because it promotes investor confidence so that we can attract outside funds So that we can down the road perhaps become a cdfi and and access the US treasury cdfi funds I think for a deeper dive on why this model works and What its advantages are Through the mayor if you wanted to pitch the question to olivia and daniella they could probably add to it Yeah, I can definitely Have them weigh in on that I think we all understand that because this is a 501c3 and not a government entity the brown act wouldn't apply As it's written. I think the question is and I think it's a good one from the public If we're putting 10 million dollars towards this of the public's money Where is the public able to weigh in? And what I heard from you is they can weigh in on decisions that have already been made when they're reported back to the jurisdiction But you're saying that there's no Upfront engagement. There's no opportunity for them to comment prior to funding decisions being made I guess prior to the financial decisions being made those are credit decisions that are being brought to the red housing fund board with proprietary information private financial information They we do have a really robust Participatory planning process here in Santa Rosa and certainly in Sonoma County There is a lot of public participation and opportunity for public participation there There is the red board meetings are Brown act and We invite public participation every time are we post an agenda. I distribute it widely but I get that I guess the question is Once the funds leave the city go to the red board and are allocated to the 501c3 The public has no way to participate And no way to know that the decision is being made or what projects are being funded Until that quarterly report comes back Right the public knows or should know and the elected officials who are accountable Should know that these projects are going to be bound by the red Project criteria those project criteria align with public policy goals The fund has to operate as a public benefit charity as a 501c3 and I think Those check the boxes of where is the fund accountable? but is the public going to come and go through the financial statements of a project sponsor And have the opportunity to review their credit and give a thumbs up or a thumbs down Um, it it's not designed that way Okay, I'll see if there I would just weigh in through the mayor The emphasis for public interest participation in this model is going to be that red criteria. So I'm getting proactive getting interested in what that criteria is And that reliance is on our our red board, which we have two representatives, but that's that is the participation point Otherwise just as michelle noted Okay, thank you. Are there any other questions from council members? All right, we do have three different resolutions Here i'm going to ask council members if you're going to make statements on them Go ahead make them now before we start to parse through each of the three of them Council members what helm do you want to start? Nothing nothing to add. I appreciate the presentation. This is a very complex subject And I appreciate the time and energy that went to its production. Okay council member tibbetts Thank you, mayor. I've got the resolution Approving the 10 million dollars in front of me. I do not have the other two I don't know if i'm looking at an outdated agenda Oh, never mind. I have it red assessment and resolution three. Okay Um, here we go. I'm move a resolution of the council of the city of santa rosa approving an allocation of one-time pgyny settlement funds in the amount of $10,000 in the form of a loan to the renewal enterprise district housing fund To assist with the development of infill housing in the city of santa rosa and wait for the reading of the text second Motion by council member tibbetts and a second by council member soiler and now claire was there an amendment that you wanted to make to this one I want to make sure it's captured Yes Thank you. Um Now I could just summarize the amendment so the amendment is to the exhibit a that is attached to that resolution Which is the city's loan terms the term sheet uh, and we're suggesting is to replace the The right after the third bullet under use of proceeds I just want to specify that there's No more than 15 of proceeds from the loan may be used to fund soft costs for any of the market rate projects And no more than 25 of proceeds from the loan may be used to fund soft costs for any affordable project We want to make that text amendment. So it's specific not to 25 of the loan But 25 of a project And then the second one go ahead No, sorry, please continue And then the second one is just the last bullet under that section, which is Essentially, it's still not professing a cap on administrative costs or administrative Use of interest income There's so there's no cap that we're professing but we want to match the county's language that does restrict the interest income um to the fund and not have it um Move on to the the red as well And so that we'll add that language into the loan agreements to uh to match Thank you So moved on both amendments and I realize I said 10 000 not 10 million. So I'd like to correct that Michelle was sweating there for a second. Is that okay with you councilmember Sawyer? I just have a question for clarification clear. Um, so when there when the conversation was was around the cap Does this Does this fall within a reasonable Change that will not hamstring the endeavor Yeah, this is a change to the terms that Checking with Michelle and team they're comfortable with And again, the county has the same terms and the intent all along is that the interest income would Stay with the fund and we're just being specific because our the draft terms that we submitted with this packet Um, wasn't specific. So we'd like to be specific just like the county Okay, as long as it's like I said as long as we're not hamstringing then um, I'll accept that I'll I will second that Hey Let's go ahead call the vote on this resolution councilmember Tibbets Hey Councilmember Schwedhelm. Hi Councilmember Sawyer. Hi councilmember alvarez Vice mayor rogers. Hi Mayor rogers. Hi That motion passes with five eyes with councilmembers alvarez and Fleming absent Councilmember Tibbets, okay I'll move a second resolution of the council of the city of san rosa approving an allocation of one time PG&E settlement funds and the amount of $50,000 for a one-time member assessment to the renewal enterprise district and wait for the read second Motion by councilmember Tibbets and a second from councilmember Sawyer. Let's go ahead call the vote councilmember Tibbets I councilmember Schwedhelm. Hi councilmember Sawyer Hi councilmember Alvarez Vice mayor rogers Hi Mayor rogers. Hi That motion passes with five eyes with councilmembers alvarez and Fleming absent Councilmember you're going to do the third resolution as well I am I was hoping my son would let up so I apologize Okay, I move a resolution of the council of the city of san rosa approving the first amendment to renewal enterprise district joint exercise of powers agreement modifying section 4.02 allowance of additional members and wait for the reading second Motion by councilmember Tibbets and a second by councilmember Sawyer As I expressed previously I do have concerns My preference would be that the board review return to source not change How difficult it is for members to join and I do think it makes it more difficult for them to join and much more subjective So I will not be supporting the motion But with that let's call the vote councilmember Tibbets Hi councilmember schwedhelm. Hi councilmember Sawyer Hi Vice mayor rogers. Hi Mayor rogers. No That mask that motion passes with four eyes with mayor rogers voting no and councilmembers alvarez and Fleming absent Okay, thank you so much to the foresight team and to michelle for all the great work that you're doing with the red Thank you claire and to our legal staff for your work on this item as well It has certainly been a a big project and we appreciate the impact that it could have Councilmember Sawyer. Did you have anything additional to add? I do. Thank you, mayor. It's a something to consider First of all, thank you to all involved in bringing this forward We are actually putting our money where our mouth is And it brings me to 10 years hints We have experienced as a council intentions from years ago that lost some of their clarity and Then then the monies that which were intended for one purpose Somehow in in those 10 years or 15 or 20 years which can go in the blink of an eye became less clear Is our documentation clear enough to future councils that are the spirit in which these monies were loaned This in 10 years there it's going to come up before a council the to either reauthorize that loan or not Um, would a would it help would it be helpful to future to a future council to have a letter of intent And spirit that lets them know why we did what we did And that we hope that they that they uh have seen the value and would want to continue In that same to read to reauthorize that loan Or or to or to at least consider heavily reauthorizing that loan because of its original intention And I guess the question is is it necessary? Would it be prudent? Is it even done? because we've seen what can happen when when employees go when employees retire and uh and councils Fade away as will memories So I just as long as the as long as the language is captured in our documents Um, I'm fine with it, but somehow sometimes and we've seen it happen The the intentions fade and the intentions become less clear And that would concern me given the importance of this 10 million dollars in 2021 Um, it may not be all that important in 2031, but I'm just wondering if a If if a secondary letter or some kind of attachment to this document would not be prudent It's just a question. It's not a requirement, of course I'm not asking for a motion. I'm just thinking is would it would it be prudent? Mr. Mayor if I may I I'll weigh in and then of course, uh I'll also give Claire and Michelle and the foresight team an opportunity as well From my perspective first, I clarify it is a 20 year loan So we're talking about the council in 20 years Are the documents um have not yet been Prepared the final documents the final loan documents But I would anticipate that they will lay out and it would certainly be my intent in looking at them to make sure that they lay out very clearly what the intent is and My own sense certainly within the discretion of the council But that document should be sufficient. There'll be several documents. They're all involved. You'll certainly have the proceedings from today as well That that would would be sufficient To clarify down the line what the original intent of this money. I also recognize that over time uh Circumstances change and there may be reasons that things shift in 10 years or 15 years And that it would be within the discretion of the council that is then Seated at this dais or at the dais of our new city hall somewhere That that that council would be able to weigh if there are appropriate changes that should be made so From my perspective, um, I don't see a need for any additional documentation, but again That would be within the the discretion of the council And I would note that any such documentation still would not be binding on a future council I appreciate that madam city attorney and I and I apologize for the for the the time error But it actually It enforces my concern 20 years is of course a lot longer than 10 And uh, but I I'm sure that you're the language in the documentation Will will clarify our spirit at the at the time and of course things drastically change And so I just I it just it brought up a concern because I've experienced in in in how things get lost in in the Over time, but I I I trust your ability and your Your your team's ability to make our intention Clear at least in in 2021 and I appreciate it. Thank you council member tibets Thank you mayor two things First I I want to reinforce what what john is saying because I I think that's so important You know and in the five years we've seen a lot of these things Come back and the one that immediately comes to my mind is the real property transfer tax discussion And I know these are slightly different, but I think that he's right on about communicating intent to What's going to be a vastly different council with as sue stated vastly different priorities and I'm you know, I always wanted to even bind it for more than 20 years for that that very reason But I recognize what sue said rings true We may need that money for something much more important In 20 years and that's fine, but at least the intent gets communicated. So I guess my request Feel free to veto it mayor, but my request is to staff to draft a letter and we don't have to necessarily make a Agenda item out of it So maybe if it could be provided in the written communications at the end of one of the next meetings or something I know I'd love to review it But that that would be wonderful The second thing that I wanted to bring up is actually for the council Sighting your concerns mayor. I'm sorry. I didn't do this sooner, but in the term sheet I believe there is a clause about proportionality about use of funds So the city's funds that are used the city puts forward have to be used Within the city of santa rosa in a proportional one-for-one basis So it doesn't specifically call out the return to source Phrase but I think it's achieving the same goal, but I would nevertheless that our next board meeting take your sentiments back Thank you so much councilmember. So first of all, I'm not convinced that john won't be here in 20 years So I just want to make sure that that's on the record second oftentimes When sacramento passes legislation they also allow the author to have a legislative intent that is entered into the official record What I heard from councilmember tidbits is a desire for staff To have a legislative intent that can ride with this discussion as well And I can work with the city manager to have that Accomplished and circulated to council members Thank you, mayor Okay, we'll go on to item 15.1. Mr. City manager Mayor members of the city council item 15.1 is a public hearing Regarding the introduction of an ordinance of the city Of the council of the city of santa rosa amending title nine Of the santa rosa city code by adding chapter nine dash 30 Zero food wear ordinance Joey hennewicks our administrative analyst will be presenting the staff report Good evening mayor rogers and members of the city council. Can you guys hear me? Okay, thank you My name is joey hennewicks. I'm an administrative analyst with the transportation and public works department. I'm here to bring forward to hear a Zero waste food war ordinance with which most of you have some familiarity with especially those on the climate action subcommittee So we can go and get started next slide, please So just to kind of set the stage as to why this ordinance is needed in in santa rosa Production management associated with single-use plastic food wear is typically used once and then thrown away And this does have significant environmental impacts Those environmental impacts are listed down there on the second bullet next slide Bringing this a little bit closer to home into our northern california region In 2011 there was a clean water fund study of various street litter That found that 67 of the 12,000 litter items that were counted were single-use food or beverage packaging Similarly a 2017 study More locally here of the russian river found a similar percentage about 60 of the over the 2,500 litter items collected were single-use plastic items of some variety Is listed there you can see And in the 2019 the city of santa rosa stormwater and creeks team removed over a thousand cubic yards of trash That was deposited into our storm drain system or into the active channels of our creek So we obviously see a need And an issue with some of these single-use disposable products next slide So over 80 percent of marine debris originates on land Primarily is trash or ribbon runoff and it makes its way into the waterways, which ultimately will make its way into the ocean One of the scary kind of things about this is marine plastics have been found in human consumption items such as fish bottled water, honey sea salt and more And the practice of giving out single-use food where automatically um, really doesn't um It really encourages, excuse me customers and food vendors to pay a little attention to The materials that they are providing and and um the environmental impacts associated with that Yeah, just to be a friendly reminder that the city council did adopt santa rosa zero waste master plan in january of 2020 And a food ordinance was one of the plan's central strategy recommendations So that's going to kind of set the stage for the why as to why we are trying to pass this ordinance here in the city of santa rosa Next slide Another friendly reminder for the council and for the community The zero waste master plan that was passed by city council in january of 2020 had two overarching goals Those overarching goals were to reduce landfill dispose of the less than one pound per person per day of franchise waste by 2030 Currently we are at about at about 2.5 pounds per person per day To kind of give you an idea of where we've been the direction we've been moving once ecology took over in 2019 We were at about 2.8 pounds per day per person per day. So we are seeing some improvement in that realm And the second goal was to achieve at least 75 diversion of franchise waste from the landfill by 2030 santa rosa currently sits at about 45 diversion from landfill Up from about 39 percent in 2019. So we are seeing some some increases as a positive metrics working towards those goals Next slide So there are there's kind of jurisdictions in northern california all throughout california that have that have passed similar food wear ordinances some for example our Alameda san francisco san amonica There was a recent one recently passed by culver city Which is pretty aggressive But our jpa our solid waste jpa zero waste sonoma did develop the model ordinance for member jurisdictions to consider and review And that model ordinance there lists the following kind of policy areas, which is going to be prohibit polystyrene fume food wear from being sold And providing excuse me poly polystyrene fume wear from being in specified products being sold by retail stores It does require food and beverage providers and special events to use Composable recyclable disposable food service wear in that to go condiments and Cutlery lids accessories excuse me are going to be a provided upon request only They do encourage the use of reusables and more recently it did make an amendment to Provide service wear products without fluorinated chemicals also known as key fast So that kind of was the guiding kind of source for the city of santa rosa model We did bring this model to the climate action subcommittee and had some review through through those channels There was some discussion early on about moving into a fully compostable model in santa rosa And that was the direction that we received from council. There was some challenges behind that and i'll detail those here in the next couple slides So if we can go to the next slide, please And as i mentioned there was some significant City council and also climate action subcommittee review as you can see there this has had its chance to be reviewed By both the you know city council the climate action subcommittee and also to receive public comments and feedback on the ordinance Let's take a second to review that and we can go to the next slide, please So just a touch base kind of where we fell with the compostable going the fully compostable model Especially for those folks that are not on the climate action subcommittee. You have you know, I've heard this presentation a few times But pretty much all compostable food wear at this time is is contains polylactic acid or perl and polyfluoroccles PFAS These act as a grease or liquid proofing agent. They're really designed to prevent grease or liquid based foods from leaking out of food containers PLA is made from a plant in corn starch Excuse me most of the time and there really isn't any adverse health effects that are linked to that But there is some recent studies and some some more studies that are coming out that there that PFAS can actually lead to adverse human health effects And so it was a request of the city council and of some some public comments that were received to go ahead and consider the PFAS in banning that in san rosa And ultimately we went away from going the fully compostable food wear route at the moment Due to the fact that after significant research on my end, we found out that the Composting facilities where santa rosa takes our materials do not Accept the PLA or the PFAS They consider this a synthetic material They're no longer able to market their compost as Organic and as such their business model is is significantly Hurt because this it's about 75 reduction in the the price that they can charge For their compost. So for the time being we won't be moving forward considering the compostable food wear element But I just wanted to kind of catch The rest of the council up to speed and also maybe the public who was part of some of those earlier meetings Next slide, please Okay, so now that we've done a little bit of kind of history and background of how we got here today I want to go ahead and review the policy elements of the current proposed food ordinance as it stands right now So prohibited products and retail products This this ordinance would prohibit food wear that contains polystyrene also known as styrofoam from being sold Prepared to distribute it otherwise given away This also would apply to food wear containing PFAS or anything that is fluorinated Peru polyfoil out was there And this would also prohibit retail establishments. We're selling either one of these two products You might be wondering what kind of products are these do these include so these common products include coolers ice chests or similar containers packaging peanuts and other packaging materials often have the styrofoam And obviously with any food wear or food wear accessories that contain polystyrene or PFAS would no longer be able to be sold on a retail level Next slide Okay, so specifically regarding dine and food wear This ordinance would Are allowed for food facilities that they should sell or provide food and beverages for consumption on the premises Using reusable food wear and food wear accessories So what this means is that any brick and mortar Food facility that is allowing for onsite dining would only be able to use reusable food wear and reusable food wear accessories that are durable reusable washable Instead of providing single use Disposables for folks that are going to be dining inside their establishment Food facilities shall provide all other food wear accessories and you have some examples there of what's food wear accessories are Upon request only These could also be served upon request or at self-serve stations But it's it's the basic intent is behind this is that instead of automatically providing it to the customer The customer has to choose to use those Use those food wear accessories As an affirmative request there And then finally food facilities shall offer condiments and reusable dispensers rather than prepackaged single use packets Next slide So now we're kind of switching gears a little bit to specifically take out food wear and take out food wear regulations on the proposed ordinance There are ways food wear ordinance here Food facilities are prohibited providing are prohibited from providing food wear and food wear accessories that are made from polystyrene Or PFAS so that's something we've already heard but just wanted to reiterate that Food facilities shall provide these food wear accessories upon request only This is especially important in the take out food realm Especially as we are still in You know Covid protocol and we've seen an increase in take out food from folks ordering from home and either working from home or staying home More than they did previously And oftentimes they just will dump the the fork the knife the napkins the the jellies Into your bag and you know we take that home The thought here is is most of the time when you go home you don't really need those those products and a lot of times those end up being thrown away And so the the the thought here is that you know, we want we want these folks to These patrons to these businesses to affirmatively request these food wear accessories And the hope is is that's good. That's obviously going to help with our Diverting these materials from the landfill and the unnecessary creation of these materials to begin with Um, and then finally food facilities shall provide options for customers to affirmatively request these food wear accessories Um across all ordering and point of sale platforms. Whether that be the telephone in person or um are online Next slide continuation of some of the take out food wear regulations Food facilities, this is a little bit specific, but something that we didn't want to Put into the upon request option Food food facilities or take out food delivery services may include lids spill plugs and sleeves without requests for non reusable cups for delivery Those are for delivery and safety purposes Um food facilities are encouraged but not required to charge customers receiving to go food wear accessories 25 cents And the customers obviously must affirmatively request these food wear accessories The thought here is is if there is going to be, you know A optional charge that the business can decide that they want to um put on for these accessories number one It will potentially help the business recoup some of those costs for those materials that they're purchasing And secondly, it will hopefully act as a deterrent for customers to to not necessarily Need those food wear accessories and they can use the um, you know durable durable reusable materials that they have at home Um food facilities are encouraged but not required to provide the 25 cent credit to customers bringing in their own hygienic reusable food wear containers for to go items Ultimately, this is um designed to hopefully encourage folks to to bring in their own um food wear containers for to go items There is a um state law that allows for this process to occur AB 619 that was passed as long as customers bring in hygienic um reusable food wear containers And it is okay um from the business the business obviously needs to Agree to um provide or to put the food into that container. Um, there are some kind of more significant Protocol behind that as far as hygiene is concerned But the thought here is we're trying to get into this back into this reusable model where Instead of having that disposable food wear that's used one time and thrown away We can have them use a Reusable tub wear or something of that nature To where we avoid using these products all together And that that ultimately is going to be the highest on the zero waste hierarchy Is you know reuse reuse is really where we kind of want to go and focus on But at the moment, this is what we were thinking was we can start by encouraging some of these food facilities and maybe bringing this culture change to You know our food patrons and also the food facilities themselves And lastly the food facilities shall not provide takeout bags composed of plastic And shall only provide a takeout bags composed of natural fiber Customers would be strongly encouraged to bring their own reusable bags And this fits in line with the um the plastic bag ordinance that also the city of santa rosa has been a part of for for a handful of years as well Next slide okay Additionally within this ordinance, we are proposing a three bin waste stream requirement Obviously a three bin waste stream is is pretty much utilized all over Most of our single family home sector pretty much all of that as well as the majority of our commercial sector So food facilities to provide solid waste containers for customer use On the side they must provide three separate containers for garbage recycling and organics Typically what you see now is really just that one single garbage bin And so obviously as we as we sort at home and we sort at you know our commercial businesses We are also asking for us to sort at the front of the house In the in the restaurant and the food facility space Other guidelines would be consistent with our franchise hauler recology and you see that listed there To the extent possible Understanding that there might be some spacing constraints We do we do ask that all the containers be placed adjacent to one another And that there'd be graphic rich signage posted above each waste stream as to educate the customers on proper sorting techniques And recology does have PDFs that we will be able to link to make available Make readily available to our business community So they'll be able to have that information provided Online and that'll be easy for them to receive and to get And next slide Okay, so kind of focusing a little bit more on city city events city sponsored events and city staff facilities The plan is for you know the city to to lead by example And um with that what we're going to be doing is passing a A memo an internal kind of city manager memo where Effectively as of january 1st as well aligning with disorders all city staff facilities shall use reusable foodware and foodware accessories The thought here is you know if we're going to ask the community to do this We should also be doing it here. Um, you know as a staff facilities here for for city employees And then city sponsored events city permitted events shall also follow the requirements of this zero waste foodware ordinance Which effectively is going to be you know the ban on the holly stiring foodware the ban on the the PFAS foodware and the Accessories upon request is really going to be the main drivers there. We're going to be asking you our vet community Next slide So I just wanted to kind of wrap up Um And kind of compare the model ordinance to to also the proposed zero waste food ordinance This was a request by one of the council members in a previous meeting is to see kind of You know a comparison of what the model ordinance did versus what the city of san rosa ordinance Is going to do so you you see the the differences there and also the similarities I would remind you that um the zero waste cinema model ordinance originally did not include the ban on PFAS They decided to make a friendly amendment after the city of san rosa began entertaining that policy discussion But we do go above and beyond that a little bit in more of the aggressive approach of the dining facilities must use the reusable foodware The three bin system And then as well as you know the city leading by example by only using reusable foodware and accessories For city staff facilities Next slide Okay, one last thing I would just Remind the city council that um the city of san rosa, I believe was was Certainly the first public agency in sonoma county to institute the three bin system in our city staff facilities Um, that was about two years ago two and a half years ago. That was a project You've seen those bins around city city facilities for some time But I just wanted to remind you as well that the um, you know The city of san rosa is going above and beyond there to try to to lead by example With the rest of the community So there are going to be a few exemptions In the ordinance here, um, obviously anything that's packaged outside of the city limits We don't really have any jurisdiction over so we are going to encourage those entities to follow the provisions of this ordinance But we don't have the jurisdiction to necessarily mandate that Polystyrene aka styrofoam that is used for insulation or flocation purposes surfboards life preservers, etc would be exempt and um For the immediate preservation of the public space health or safety due to an emergency or natural disaster The city manager or his or her designee may exempt food facilities At all from from doing business in the city for for a specific time frame dependent on the city manager's discretion Next slide Additionally, we wanted to Include a waiver process in in this ordinance for any folks that might potentially have a an undue financial hardship or practical difficulty Not available to other persons in similar circumstances So we will have a waiver protocol where food facilities may apply for a one-time waiver for up to a year Not to exceed. Um, basically, you know, january 1st 2023 um, and that these the waiver will be the waiver review will be Partaken by the city manager his or her designee and they want the full discretion to verify the waiver application In grant or deny that waiver next slide So the effective date of the proposed ordinance would be january 1st 2022 This would be administered through our code enforcement department We are proposing a reactive enforcement mechanism to where we are going to be relying on the community and we'll have a A system set up to where folks can make You they could basically let us know if there are businesses that are not following, you know, the the ordinance itself Um enforcement would first include a written notice of non-compliance and a 90 day opportunity to correct And then failure to remedy the situation after the 90 days would be subject to potential administrative citation penalty listed below Next slide So I didn't want to touch base just on some of the community outreach that has been done on the ordinance um There was an informational email that was originally sent to uh the chamber of commerce The sander was a downtown district in the hispanic chamber of commerce detailing Um the the origins of of the ordinance. This was about a year ago I did recently just send the ordinance Language as well as the staff report to those same entities And I let them know that we would be discussing this tonight in the public Hearing forum and that if they had any sort of comments or concerns that You know, this would be their opportunity to to make those to make their voices heard Um, we did also I did see I did also meet with some of the members of the sander's downtown district about the ordinance at this point the ordinance was We were really kind of focusing on the fully compostable model and that was really probably the most um The most concerning aspect of it from the business owners that I spoke with There was about 10 to 12 of them on the zoom call at that point They were really concerned number one of the increased costs for the fully compostable and what that would have on their bottom line And also the fact of the um potential for the reusables during during the covet The covet environment was also a little bit of a concern But by far the largest concern was was the uh moving to the fully compostable and the financial burden on the businesses Which obviously we've moved away from that model And so I believe most of those those concerns will be alleviated with the us moving away from that Did also meet with Quite a few food truck owners out on sabastical road and business owners there The kind of the crux of their concerns or or discussion points were They were worried about the onsite dining the reusable Component there and they're them not having the ability to essentially have You know washing machines dishwashers be able to to provide that service And so what we're going to be doing with that is considered They are mobile and we are going to be kind of considering under the framework of this ordinance The food trucks would be considered as as an event So we would just be assuming that they food trucks would not be providing to go food in polystyrene PFAS um and providing those Foodware accessories upon request is what we'd be requesting of those folks that do on the food trucks consider They're not really a brick-and-mortar You know establishment and also had a meeting with some members of the latino business owners group No major concerns from this group What they did want to talk about was just to gain some clarity on the the differences between the zero waste saloma model And the city of santa rosa model as Obviously, some of the members were located in santa rosa and some of the other folks were maybe Located outside of the county or in the unincorporated areas So they I did provide some clarification to them on the the differences between the the two ordinances there Next slide So last but not least, uh, obviously with with an ordinance that's going to impact our entire city and the entire food facilities In our city, we want to make sure that we have a communication strategy So I have been working with our outreach and communications team And this is going to be the high level communication strategy that you see there documented And the hope is is that you know once and hopefully we do approve this zero waste food ordinance that we would be working to make sure that You know the the community is aware of the ordinance knows the specifics of it knows the requirements And that we we make sure that we get that shared on a broad a broad spectrum here So everybody is aware of the of the pending ordinance as it has it has it's determined tonight Next slide So without further ado it is recommended by the transportation public works department that the city council introduce an ordinance amending title nine of the santa rosa city code by adding chapter nine dash 30 zero waste food wear ordinance And next slide i'm available for any questions or comments that you might have All right. Thank you so much joey. It's always a very thorough Presentation so we appreciate that councilor. Are there any questions? All right seeing none. We will go ahead and open the public hearing If you're interested in speaking on this item go ahead and Put in your speaker card or raise your hand on zoom. I'm going to start in the chamber with lis Good afternoon In 2019. Oh, i'm sorry. My name is lis bordelotto And i'm a santa rosa city resident and also the chair of the sonoma county local task force for integrated waste management In 2019 research combining the results of more than 50 studies found that on average people could be ingesting The equivalent of a credit card of plastic every week In the air in food and especially in water This amounts to about a hundred thousand tiny pieces of plastic every year These results were widely reported and i'm sure some of you Good people have seen some of that reporting That particular study was done by the world wildlife fund or was commissioned by world wildlife fund And then by the university of newcastle in australia However, the findings may be an underestimate Because the micro plastic in staple foods such as rice wheat corn bread pasta oils and milk has yet to be studied These findings among others serve as a wake up call to governments If we don't want plastic in our bodies, we need to stop the millions of tons Of plastic that continue to leak into nature every year To tackle the plastic crisis urgent action is needed at every level of society This ordinance is a small piece of that necessary urgent action I urge you to approve adding the zero waste food wear ordinance Thank you Thank you so much. Liz we'll go to michael Hi, michael hilber My main concern would be to the the issue of contamination of the compostable materials because There's just a tremendous opportunity for people to throw away Compostable food container with leftover food and also have like a plastic straw Or a plastic utensils or aluminum foil in it and you know, we need to understand that contaminating the Compost is really Serious problem I understand that typically the The material will go through a grinding machine first before being put out to compost and If you grind up any, you know, plastic it's common that plastic and other things that you don't want in there and people really are concerned about Contamination of the compost You know understandably so I think For one thing the utensils should be biodegradable as well and Based on what I heard now. You're talking about The single youth's utensils Must be requested but not necessarily biodegradable. So I think it'd be better for them to be Biodegradable utensils if if I understood the presentation correctly Thank you, michael I'll bring it to our live zoom comments. We'll start with sunny followed by ava Hello My name is sunny galbraith And I am part of 350 sonoma and also on the zero waste north bay community group And i'm part of the sabassable city council zero waste committee And i'm very excited that this ordinance is being considered that will greatly reduce landfill waste and plastic pollution in our waterways And I urge the council to approve it And I think I successfully recorded a voicemail comment. So I'll I'll save that part for then But I wanted to add a couple of things I appreciate the places where the santa rosa ordinance goes a little bit farther than the model ordinance And we will definitely be considering those points With our city of sabassapal Committee and I just wanted to report we passed our ordinance in 2019 march 2019 and we've had um When we went around and did restaurant visits restaurants were largely supportive and appreciative of the ordinance and the education that came with it And also zero waste sonoma staff has been incredibly supportive and wonderful to work with in terms of helping us make custom signage for our city for our restaurants Being available for questions Advice for what foodware to use and then also having the online reporting Service where people can report an establishment that's out of compliance um And I emailed in postcards from the santa rosa junior college climate action night where we featured this model ordinance We emailed in postcards photographs of postcards from santa rosa residents So that um you guys can take a look at that loss of support for the ordinance from santa rosa residents and then um lastly As part of the zero waste north bay community advocacy group. I work closely with the s r jc waste diversion technician Guy tillotson. He said he emailed in a comment and he couldn't make it tonight, but did want to Relay his support for this. He's done an incredible amount of work on his campus in switching to compostable and recyclable items But it's very difficult for Him and his staff to deal with contamination from outside vendors Using polystyrene non compostable non recyclable Where and then Adding the burden of his staff having to sort through that and pull that out of their Composed and recycling waste stream. So this would greatly help their efforts on the s r jc campus And he wanted me to relay that so thank you so much for considering This ordinance and I urge you to vote yes All right. Thank you so much. Sunny. We'll go to ava Eva, are you able to unmute? Oh, sorry about that. Um, my name's eva holman and I am the policy organizer for a national nto upstream And I apologize to the loud room. I'm in it suddenly just got really noisy um, we focus on um Drafting and implementing fewer policies all over the u.s. But in particular here in the bay area and are so So excited to support wholeheartedly this model policy with the add-on of reuse Um, while the model itself is fabulous and reduces harmful chemicals and plastic pollution Adding the reuse portion really will save restaurants a ton of money Not having to pay for Expensive single-use disposables. So we commend you for considering this We urge you to pass it and are really excited to see this next step moving forward All right. Thank you so much. Eva. That's the last last hand I see here So I'll go ahead and go to our voicemail public comments There's a city council. My name is vincey tan and I am a resident of santa riza I'm calling in support of item 15.1 the zero waste food wear ordinance on the agenda for the july 20th city council meeting As you know during coveted and post coveted people have been eating a lot of takeout And a lot of waste is generated from this Even if people want to do the right thing Many vendors don't use recyclable or compostable food wear or they automatically provide disposable utensils condiments and napkins when people are already eating at home and don't need them Making this policy decision on the city level is the easiest and fastest way to decrease unnecessary waste By requiring food wear to be recyclable and compostable Or and require vendors to provide straws utensils etc upon request only There are alternatives food wear that is compliant for these food vendors to use and the cost differential is minimal I just want to remind the council That the landfill we have in sonoma county has only 26 years left in it This ordinance will help increase the landfill's lifespan and help the region decrease the demand for version materials and resources However, passing this ordinance by itself is not enough Resources and support for the businesses are imperative so that it is easy for them to comply Education for businesses and consumers on the importance of this ordinance should also be done concurrently Make sure that people understand how to properly separate the recyclables and compostables from the trash So that these items actually end up recycled and composted Furthermore, I urge the city to buy recycled Please update your environmental purchasing policy So that your staff members are buying local and recycled products as much as possible to close the loop In summary, I urge the city council to pass the zero waste food wear ordinance And I really appreciate all your environmental and sustainable efforts I hope that the city will continue to adopt policies and programs to encourage Zero waste and reusable in the future. This community needs to keep moving forward towards a zero waste culture Thank you. Bye. Bye. Hello My name is Anne jack-o-petty. I live at 4939 deerwood in santa rosa I'm speaking about item 15.1 I'm supporting. I'm calling to strongly support the polystyrene ban that we have these Objects in our environment that are not biodegradable They are not recyclable They pose a real problem for our waste companies our landfills And even more seriously when they get into our water and our marine environment They are ingested by marine animals Eventually killing them There is no real reason to continue with this I'm not even sure what to call it The substance polystyrene. We need a ban. Thank you very much Hi, my name is bob deso. I'm in santa rosa on the west side. I'm calling about the polystyrene ban schedule for july 20th Legend of item is 15.1. I believe I'm retired now, but for 30 years I was In San Francisco as a recycling and waste reduction manager Technically polystyrene is recyclable. However, it is extremely difficult to capture From the waste stream and it needs to be absolutely clean. No food waste residual stickers dirt or anything Then it needs to be densified in special equipment for shipping Polystyrene is usually complicated and expensive to recycle Ultimately, it usually ends up in the landfill or worse in our environment Or it creates pollution of our water And soils Please support polystyrene ban. It's an unnecessary product And just a waste of everything. Thank you Mayor that concludes public comment on this item Great. I will go ahead and close the public hearing bring it back to council Madam vice mayor. Do you want to put a motion on the table for discussion? Motion on the table for discussion For the uh for the model ordinance As written for the model ordinance as written and wait for the reading of text Perfect Second, I've got a motion from the vice mayor and a second from councilmember Sawyer We have any discussion Mayor I believe the title of the ordinance should be read into the record Okay, we'll pull that up really fast I have the copy here Okay, great And I would ask that it be made clear that we're introducing the ordinance tonight I like to make a motion To introduce the ordinance of the council of the city of santa rosa amending title nine of the santa rosa city code By adding chapter nine dash 30 Zero waste food wear ordinance And wait for the reading of the text So that was a motion by the vice mayor. I think I had heard a second from councilmember Sawyer. Let's see if that still holds Still holds Perfect Uh, does anybody have any comments they'd like to make? Go ahead vice mayor. Um, one of the comments that I wanted to make is um, I would like to encourage Restaurants that if they charge the 25 cents that it would be Good to provide a credit for the 25 cents because we would like to change people's behaviors And if people get a credit then that is a good way to Help to encourage them to change that behavior. And also I know we previously spoke about giving Restaurants and vendors Options um that are quick and easy to to go to so for reusable food wear accessories I think that's a a really good thing to have available At uh restaurants and vendors. Um, I know recology provided me with a reusable knife fork and spoon And I really don't leave home without it and it just has become a behavior of mine When I go out to have that in my purse or you know available So thank you All right councilmember Sawyer Thank you mayor, and I'm gonna um ask for the council's indulgence I want to do a little bit of leave it to beaver um When I was a kid the garbage cans that we used to use for family of five were about the size of the smallest can that The recology offers today We've done a lot of damage since then Uh with our packaging etc styrofoam was a gift from god and plastic bags were the best things since sliced bread and Joey and his team and I think he is a team of one. I maybe not Yes, um Has done amazing work. This is this is a very bold move Uh for santa rosa and for our restaurateurs and all those that deal with food service and um, I just I want us I'm proud of the council Uh, I I have to assume that there's going to be an affirmative vote I'm hoping there's going to be an affirmative vote with this You know these little bit less than 30 words in this ordinance Uh, but the meaning is really monumental Um, when I was a kid, I didn't think that the the dump out next to the to the airport was ever going to fill up And then when meacham was opened up, I never thought that certainly meacham would never fill up And now we're dealing we're talking about its lifespan And we're talking about little plastic forks and knives and straws Etc because they all make a difference And getting them out of our waste stream getting them out of our environment Um, maybe was not something that I was thinking about when I was a kid But it's certainly something that I think about um on a regular basis now and every day So thank you joey for your work. This was not an easy ordinance to put together And it is comprehensive. It is bold And I'm very proud that santa rosa is looking to move forward With such an ordinance and thank you Thank you councilmember councilmember tibbetz Thanks marriage. I wanted to give a quick shout out and expression of thanks to joey joey I thought you did an amazing job just watching from afar and and you know, you really I think hit the community outreach out of the park So thanks a lot I want to say the same thing joey, and I know you really have been a team of one You've walked not just the subcommittee, but the council all the way through this process and have done it With just incredible community engagement as well to try to strike a balance between The art of the possible and where we're trying to go with our climate goals I know this council has heard me preach this Since i've been on council But we need to reduce our use of single use plastics and we need to reduce Our use of things that completely continue to damage our environment like styrofoam Every single piece of plastic and i've said this before but it bears repeating because it's so astounding to me Every single piece of plastic ever created is still around today. It does not go away It breaks down into micro micro plastics It gets into the waterways it gets into our public spaces and then that ultimately ends up in our bodies A study that was done a little over a year ago found that over 70 percent of breast milk that was tested had micro plastics in it That is just making its way into the next generation and the next generation So any steps that we can take to reduce that to try to mitigate that impact And to not have that impact for our future generations is going to be really critical As we move forward. So i'm very proud of this ordinance Joey great work And I hope that the council will will end up supporting and I think that they will With that madame city clerk, let's go ahead and call the vote councilmember tibbetz Hi councilmember schwedhelm hi councilmember soyer hi, hi Vice mayor rogers Hi mayor rogers. Hi that motion passes with five eyes with councilmembers alvarez and Fleming absent Great. Thank you so much and great work joey really really appreciate it Thank you With that i'm going to turn over the meeting to the vice mayor for this next item Mr. City manager, can you introduce item 15.2 please? Yeah, I do Vice mayor members of the city council item 15.2 is also a public hearing The matter before the council is the santa rosa fire department's annual weed abatement program report paul lowenthal or fire marshal will be presenting the reap staff report this evening Good evening mayor rogers vice mayor rogers members of the council tonight is the annual public hearing related to our weed abatement ordinance This is an opportunity for the public to object to any of the costs associated with the program I keep in mind this would be the point at which the properties were made out of compliance and eventually either brought themselves back into compliance after multiple inspections and or Had to be abated by our department and this would be the parcels that remain that have not paid their balance and would itemize lists would be submitted to the county next slide So the santa rosa fire department coordinates the city santa rosa's weed abatement program This is an inspection program that is in Uh properties in throughout our wildland urban interface. So all properties within our wui are required to comply With the program as well as all vacant undeveloped parcels throughout the city santa rosa So vacant lots across the city as well as any other property with more than a half acre of undeveloped land The other properties Can still be addressed and typically that's handled through code enforcement The weed abatement program is addressing kind of the highest priority sites again Those are the 9 000 plus properties throughout our wui as well as the undeveloped properties throughout the city santa rosa As you heard this year, we changed the way we declare fire season So this is actually correct for last year, which is what this public hearing is regarding So in previous years the fire season was declared by the cal fire However, with the current conditions across the state, they no longer declare the season So our fire chief now declares it which he did this year based on the conditions being that they are much earlier than we've done in the past Next slide So properties are inspected after the fire season is declared Once they're inspected they're either Found to be in compliance or out of compliance those inspections are done by our prevention staff Throughout the entire fire season next slide So if a property is not in compliance, they get a notice to comply. This is not a violation It's more of a correction notice and gives them an opportunity to bring themselves into compliance Should be noted that by the time the season is completed will have come roughly conducted roughly 13 000 inspections So it does take us some time to get across the city Typically upwards of almost a month to get that first round of inspections Then after the first round of inspections take place a reinspection occurs If the reinspection finds they're still out of violation, which at that point is typically well beyond the declaration of fire season And then after two inspections, they do receive that notice of violation next slide If the property remains out of compliance and we do try and do everything we can to bring them into compliance Whether it's doing direct outreach communication Then ultimately we do have the ability to abate the property That abatement is currently handled by a SAC, Supervised Adult Cruise, which is a contract we have with the county of Sonoma To handle our abatement Should be noted that's the same contractor that does a lot of the work for us in our open spaces throughout the city of Santa Rosa And it's a contract we've had in place for several years now All associated costs with the abatement Are then billed to the property owner And of course if they are not The reimbursement doesn't take place then eventually it's passed on to the county as a lien next slide so The recommendation is the council by resolution ratify and confirm the itemized report that was provided To you by the fire department for the costs associated with the ruin rubbish Ordinance as provided by the city code sections listed Any questions I would like to ask council do they have any questions of staff? All right seeing none Um, I'd like to open the public hearing Okay, vice mayor. I see no hands raised. I'll move on to um And we don't have any voice recorded voicemail public comment. Uh, thank you. Um I'd like to ask council person tidbits Oh closed public hearing Now I'd like to thank you vice mayor Sorry I'll move a resolution of the council of the city of Santa Rosa Confirming the itemized report of the Santa Rosa fire department of the cost of removing weeds and or rubbish from upon or in front of Certain lots or parcels of land within the city of Santa Rosa and wait for the reading of the text Second, I would like to bring it back for comments from the council Seeing none um, I would like to call the vote Thank you, vice mayor councilmember tidbits I councilmember schwethelm I councilmember soyer Vice mayor rogers I Mayor rogers I That motion passes with five eyes with council members alvarez and blaming absin Great. Thank you so much. Madam vice mayor. We'll move on to item 5.3 Excuse me 15.3 Mayor rogers and members of the council item 15.3 is also a public hearing This is a teffra public hearing an issuance of bonds by the california municipal finance authority In an aggregate aggregate amount not to exceed 20 million dollars For parkwood apartments an affordable rental housing project located At 6 8 9 9 monocidal boulevard And for any members of the public who are interested teffra stands for the tax equity and fiscal responsibility act of 1983 Excuse me. The staff presenter this evening will be angela morrigan our program specialist Good evening council The item before you today is is a request to hold a public hearing And approve the issuance of bonds for the public for the park wood apartments project Next slide please Jurisdictions are required to hold a public hearing Receive public comment and approve bond issuance consistent with the tax equity and fiscal responsibility act of 1983 and internal revenue code This action will not result in any fiscal Impact to the city's general fund and the response and the financial responsibility shall be of the borrower In this case the borrower shall be bhdc park wood apartments llc And the sponsor is burbank housing development corporation Next slide please The project is an existing affordable rental housing development located at 6 8 9 9 monocidal boulevard near rink and valley community park public schools and shopping Burbank housing development corporation purchased the existing project formally a market rate housing community Next slide please Once the sponsor has obtained the necessary project financing it will preserve the affordable housing units and further Council tier one goals by meeting housing needs within the city's jurisdiction Furthermore, the housing units are restricted to households with incomes ranging between 50 percent to 80 percent of area median income Next slide please The recommendation before you today is to one conduct public hearing under the Under the requirements of the tax equity and fiscal responsibility act of 1983 and the internal revenue code of 1986 as amended And two by resolution approve the issuance of tax exempt multifamily housing revenue bonds by the california municipal finance authority In an aggregate amount not to exceed 20 million dollars to refinance the acquisition and finance rehabilitation of park wood apartments 6 8 9 9 monocidal boulevard in san aroza Next slide please This concludes the presentation myself Megan basinger our interim executive director as well as charles crow from burbank From burbank housing development corporation and anthony steves from california municipal finance authority Are all available to answer any questions you may have All right. Thank you so much angela. Are there any questions from council? I'm seeing none. So we will go ahead and open the public hearing See if there's anybody who's interested in speaking on this item I see nobody moving in the chambers. I see no hands on our zoom. Do we have any pre-recorded voicemails? There are no pre-recorded voicemails on this item. Great. We will close the public hearing and bring it back Councilmember soyer. This is your item Thank you, mayor I'd like to introduce the resolution of the council of the city san aroza Approving the issuance of revenue bonds in an aggregate amount not to exceed 20 million dollars By the california municipal finance authority for park wood apartments a 55 unit multifamily affordable riddle housing facility located at 6 8 9 9 monocidal boulevard For the benefit of vhdc park wood apartments llc A california limited liability company in accordance with section 147 f Of the internal revenue code and the joint exercise of powers agreement relating to set authority and wait for the reading second second Motion by councilmember soyer second by councilmember schwethelm. Do we have any additional comments from council? Okay, let's call the vote councilmember tidbits Aye councilmember schwethelm. Aye councilmember soyer Aye Vice mayor rogers. Aye Mayor rogers. Aye That motion passes with five ayes with councilmembers alvarez and flaming absent Okay, we have no written communications for item 16 We'll go on to our public comments for non agenda items If you're interested in talking to the council about something that was not on tonight's agenda Feel free to hit your raise hand on zoom Madam clerk. I'm not seeing any did we have any pre-recorded voicemail public comments There are no pre-recorded public comments. Okay, then we will go ahead and adjourn our meeting. Thank you everybody