 this body. Can we do a formal roll call? Oh my gosh. Sorry, I'm like, where am I? Okay, committee member, oh crap, Keith. Here. Committee member Alvarez is absent. Chair Rogers. I'm here. We have two out of three. I think that's good enough. We are good to go. So does anybody have any announcements other than how much they enjoyed watching the cowboys beat down the giants? I didn't enjoy watching the raiders beat the Broncos. None? None? Okay. We'll move on then. We have July 31st minutes. Do you have any additions? Nope. Any changes? Let's go to public comment. Any public comments on the agenda or on the minutes? Cool. We'll show those adopted as presented. Let's go to public comment for non-agenda items. Do we have any comments on the online? Nobody online. Okay. We'll go to item 5.1. Thank you. Good morning. So this first item is in response to some of the burglaries that have happened, particularly recently with our cannabis businesses. And so we discussed that as a subcommittee last month, how the city can partner with the industry that we have made great strides in supporting for our ordinance developments and program elements. And we wanted to respond with working with the community and setting up a workshop to help them self-empower on how they can harden up their facilities and work with the city to prevent or avoid security issues. And so I want to bring up Monet. She's been working with our police department and also the cannabis community. Monet is dedicated to our cannabis program through grant funds from the state. So she works on cannabis program support 100% of the time. And so she has been the one directly involved with working with the businesses and the police department to set up the workshop. Good morning. So I will start about our plan. So we have reserved the UF4 room on October 3rd. There's no cancelment in that day on Tuesday from 5 to 7. We will have two people from our police department, Kyle and Dan. That will have also a presentation. I have prepared agenda and Nick is providing some additional attendees who would like to speak in this meeting. So the agenda is not completed yet because we might add more names to it. But as soon as I have all the people who want to participate and provide like a comment, I will create a website and they will send the emails out to all the participants or whoever has interested in joining this workshop. So we have agenda. I can give you a brief who was going to talk about. So first part we will have a police department providing data about the trends and information, regional context and express collaboration with other retail theft issues. And the second part we will have best side security design and techniques. We have representative from two dispensaries who will give like a information about the best designs or practices that will be like a successful which which too. Eli Melrod from Soulful and Brandon Levine from Mercy Wallace. Okay. Okay. And then the third part we will have a threat assessment training how to evaluate your location. We will have Clayton Taylor and Ron Epema senior security analysis and Dan Specialist. And then we will have a tabling event mixture and we will have someone from intelligence security camera design. There might be more people attending but as soon as I have all the names and list the agenda will be finalized and the website will be created. Any questions? Not about that. Are we also going to talk about other options that we thrown on the table last month like around potentially helping out with the finances of security? I think it will be it will be definitely part of the conversation naturally because one of the one of the focuses of the workshop is just to understand sort of what the issue is and what they can do within their own program because security is part of the ordinance. They're supposed to have certain elements of security. There's a lot of different ways to implement those the security and there's a big difference in price tag. So one of the one of the strategies of the workshop is really to talk about instead of just jumping to the 24-hour security guard which is the most expensive strategy what else can they do from the very beginning things that that are tried in and tested that have worked that are less expensive that might already fit within their means just a matter of education shopping around and trying some things out for those things that are cost prohibitive for businesses I think that's going to be a follow-up workshop type of conversation about what are the what what is actually needed how expensive are those things and have they tried those lower cost items first so that that is the strategy of the workshop it's not just to jump to how can we fund the most expensive option. I'd like to do it in parallel because we're talking about this in the economic development committee not in the public safety committee because we wanted to develop resources to continue to support the industry so I think it's great for us to do this workshop and to get on the same page but specifically what we wanted to talk about in the economic development was what can we do to try to develop tools to give to them to either incentivize or require or do whatever because my assumption is yes safety is in the ordinance my assumption is that people are still meeting that criteria right now and yet still having some additional problems so I'm looking for the yes and right I think the the workshop will be really good to get people on the same page hopefully it takes care of the low hanging fruit and I don't want to wait another six months for us to start developing tools if we identify that we need additional tools there. I think it's note taken and that's part of what Monet does and she's looking at how to support the the industry and yet this is just one of the elements where they need support yeah so I got that you're good okay let's see if there's any public comment if you're attending via zoom and wish to make a comment please raise your hand there are no hands raised okay all right sounds good thank you and can we make sure that the invite to that is circulated to council members who might want to attend and listen to them also cool thank you all right let's go from the 5.2 okay give me just a second there you go okay well so this one is our economic development strat plan I just want to start by saying that we're looking for very specific feedback at this point on what we're going through because from today's meeting I need to start writing the actual plan because we're on a very tight timeline and so the more specific you can be the better I've heard things like it's too broad it's too specific it's too big it's too short too hot too cold right and I'm like what does that mean and where would you like we're not from you guys but I'm just saying the general feedback has been very high level and not actionable for me at this point so as I'm going through this presentation feel free to stop me to dig in at any moment yes you will I get deep and know that I am hard to insult okay so just a quick reminder the vision statement for this plan is that of the one that you guys created and the mission is yours as well last time when we met we talked very briefly about input and engagement I want to go actually a little bit deeper into what people are saying and and we touched on this last time because the thing that's interesting is that what we heard in 2016 we were doing the housing action plan is not dissimilar to what we heard in 2017-2018 when we did and the way was myself Ethan Brown from economic development board and Peter Rumber War and Ananda from the chamber when we did a series of extensive interviews with our major employers and some of our small employers again interestingly not that different from then 2021 we did a survey similar to so many of the other jurisdictions in our area and you know from sure across the world you know we looked at what we were doing there are many plans that were started that sort of had that equity overlaid their economic development draft plans but with this equity lens because of what we're dealing with in 2021 2022 so we have a lot of those plans a lot of input from them from those not totally dissimilar to what we're hearing yet again both through specific outreach engagement that I'm doing that I'm hearing from the community from feedback generally and also we're fortunate to sort of be running in tandem with the general plan update and there there is an economic development element in this and so much information that is relevant to how we how we engage with this so you know what I really need to know given the tight timeline specific to some of our engagement things is whether or not we're still missing some critical information or input and whether or not that would be done through like a survey as any of the feedback input we're receiving you know particularly different than what you guys are hearing because I think you guys are the ones who are every day all day out there hearing and listening and taking the feedback and then lastly if I'm missing something is it something that is serving worthy I think I said that I'm not sure but anyway so that that's what we're going to go into a little bit more here all right so I touched on this a little bit but didn't give you the details last time we had just taking from a bunch of different places focus groups that we did again one-on-one engagement stuff we had some a lot of information that kind of we put into either opportunities and strengths or challenges threats and weaknesses some of the things that I will call out are again ongoing streamlining process processes and increased access increased access to information continues to rise to the top of what people want helping people find what they need and sometimes even if we create policies as which we've done are they equitable are they accessible are they kept up over time but we have a good opportunity then that we're continually iterating like once we started we're continuing to do it the other thing is kind of going hand in hand with that is having some clarity economic development is very small but most of the calls we get are for other departments so like understanding what is a role where do we fit in how is this the conduit but what we're seeing too and having a lot of conversations with other partner organizations is as well as internally throughout the city is you know the seamless point of entry so we have a big opportunity to sort of be a little bit clearer on what the resources are interconnectivity within the site night within the city and I think some of the website stuff that we're doing hopefully will help with this another thing I just want to call out in terms of a strength of the division itself is that and the city is that arts and cultures is within economic development we hear this surprisingly it's starting to pitch up again as we need more things to attract young people and and this inclusion of arts and culture in our division is as really helpful so long as we can are able to continue to maintain the interconnectivity between cultural arts arts public arts and economic development and then the other thing that we're hearing then now before perhaps I feel like is you know we were so successful in rebuilding after 2017 there was a real Chris Corsi supervisor Corsi says it was like a unicorn time we touched the unicorn when this this feeling of creativity innovation collaboration internal within the organization external from us that we have the model that we need to continue pursuing that because we know we've the city's done it we know we can keep doing it in terms of challenges this comes up a lot and we economic development particular is under staffed and under resource but that they're talking about us but that goes across this the city in so many departments for us in specific to this it's myself and Rafael it is this sort of leads to some of the perceptions and it's difficult to get information you know if I'm writing this I'm not answering emails I'm not taking calls Rafael is doing that a lot of those things but he's not doing this so it continues to be a challenge that affects the perception and I know we're not alone so I don't want to say that we're alone on this I think the challenge on that is the increased collaboration across the board and again looking at at the opportunities around that lacking tools of and incentives you know this is again specific to business business attraction and retention you sort of touched on it just now with cannabis how how open is the city the perception is we're not that open to looking at creative incentives it becomes it's an area of opportunity for us but it's a perceived challenge right now the oh yeah so going back again the perceived inefficiencies and slow processes you know they understand that there is a difference there's interestingly we're still hearing that people aren't really blaming staff they're blaming processes and so that's helpful but it gives us an area of opportunity which we actually are currently working on and is in the proposed plan housing and affordability remains a big issue for us because this is where we're seeing tension around a limit the limits our growth for workforce attraction and thus limits also our growth for business expansion we did a number of engagement things we did in 2021 we had focus groups and in 2023 we have been like I said participating in the general plan update this some of the information that in the next couple of slides is repetitive to both efforts as well as the engagement activity one-on-one discussions and tabling that I've been doing in the last month and basically again it's a reiteration of a lack of affordable housing high cost of living is the limiting factor in attraction and development of businesses and workforce costs are high for businesses but also for employees and then again I was at a tabling event I want to say two weeks ago and it was just the group of people who must have walked by I was at my gummy village and it was they talked a lot about the need for downtown entertainment living options the attraction of young professionals so again lots of repetition and coming up through this also there was an interesting thing for you know the need for inclusive approach to economic development this is an equity thing that has come through a lot again it you know if we're looking at a 2021 surveys at given where we were the civil unrest and COVID and the clear disparities between how people were faring that equity and inclusion piece of it goes throughout it so and some of it I will say this the first bullet point under that to perceive chef from traditional economic development approaches to community building resiliency is really a sign of the times but it was interesting how it's can it's showing up in different ways in current conversations as well so they're still damaged or like emotional damage I guess I don't know what from like what we went through which is so easy to forget because we're so done with it but the damage is still there and talking like the big box wars yes I'm talking about a number of things I'm talking about the fact that we still like just after 20 the fires as we did with COVID as we did the civil unrest there's an there's an equity issue in terms of who's faring okay in the shocks and stressors that we deal with every day with and then on top of that you're looking at other so the so the natural shift from us to focus on what are we if our our previous plan was really focused on small businesses business attraction you'll see we have some data from our market study that shows you know the the biggest number of of employers are those with under 10 employees right where we get our attractive historically and then it's showing up again in the day that like the 2020 market study is it's you know we're not going to get Google we know that but we get we get offshoots of these things and so it's showing up and how how we sort of shifted away dealt with community resiliency are we going back and then there is this kind of tug between we need a Walmart we don't I mean that's cheap money that that's never been said but that big box is you know retail what easy money versus the hard money and where are we investing in those things so in our 2021 survey that we did we had a really good response rate we sent it out and through this laborious process to all of our the emails that we have for the business tax certificate holders in the city and so I think for that reason we had a very good response a slight majority of them were actually business owners so the information to us is really valuable in terms of how they were viewing what what we were asking interestingly most of the service I look at mostly the women participate men got to start stepping up a little bit more again mostly mostly with a BIPOC population is is underrepresented of which we see that fairly consistently so in from those surveys and again I we're seeing some similarities in in the other service that went out through other divisions and departments the most important issue for the future of Santa Rosa was identified both business owners and residents prioritized housing and affordability but for obviously because it's top of their mind business owners really want business development whereas non-business owners their top concern at that time was equity inclusion the challenges and barriers to engagement we asked this in a couple of different ways this is like with just the division as well as you know in perceptions with the city I'm just looking at this one in terms of city why but it's not totally dissimilar that they find so one of the things that we found out is the bulk of people like 90% of the people come through the doors at room three which is where planning building and engineering really set their newbies they need something that had they've never asked for before and they don't know how to operate and then businesses are somewhat the same they're very few times where they feel like they need to like the general things you can figure out how to get a business tax certificate but when they have an issue they want to change it's a building permit it becomes difficult and so the city processes for them are difficult to navigate again that is not something that's changed particularly through the years that we've been doing this survey that comes up consistently I'm sure what city resources are available this is particularly relevant when we have a big issue like a big shock like COVID as a county because we're stretched then the information is coming fast and furious similar a little bit similar to with the fires we consolidated some of the information and used economic development board as the key resource but it's not something that's a viable solution ongoing we need to figure out how to be clearer how to better understand what the needs are and resources are that people are looking for at any given time and be more responsive on our website and then city processes so time costs uncertainty always city processes or time consuming we hear that a lot from our businesses and when the calls are for us or the emails for us a lot of times it's like can you help us where is this we're not getting a response where are we in in the process the economic development issue areas of most importance to business owners so again we split we're able to split this data out the number one thing first and foremost is business assistance you know other came in soon after that and the kinds of things that were in the other category public safety homelessness small business support infrastructure environmental wildfire planning so again there's there's given what's happened since 2017 to today we are constantly it for businesses it's a constant onslaught of having to deal with things I don't think were yeah I don't know it's just seemed so out of the nor ordinary for so long now but it is now the new norm you know non-business owners they're really you know businesses assistance did come up but they're really most interested in what it is to live here so again from that workforce development standpoint they're looking for something a little bit different the general plan update survey there were a series of them and I just took a snapshot from their summary and just wanted I was the one who highlighted the things in green again continuing it's it's housing for all it's enriching community public service amenities it's promoting jobs and economic growth again very similar survey results in all the things that we're seeing through the various departments putting them out new jobs and economic opportunity of ring tie in those surveys as well in 2022 the general plans I just wanted to capture some of these things because again it's been an ongoing process of really diverse different kinds of input and this slide just is a summary of the things so you can see again we're seeing equity pop up we're seeing the cost uncertainty for development businesses it's just many slides of the same thing saying we know okay so in terms of the survey that we put out because last time we spoke we said do kit should we do a new survey so I want to let you know what we surveyed last time and based on not just that 2020 survey but all the other things in the ongoing current input that we're doing are you seeing anything that we're missing that you want to have included and is the survey the right way or should we do something more targeted and I'm going to say this and then shut up for a hot second which is you don't have to ask that now because we can go through how we're placing this and then see if with that additional information there's something you want so who's the audience for the updated survey is it just broad throughout the community so um yeah the the 2021 survey for the updated survey that we're doing now yeah I would probably do two things like we just like we did last time is one is just make it broadly available um and then ask um lawns group to to promote the heck out of it um but where we got very few responses at that for with that I went through and literally did the same email in groups of 20 to the entire list of our business tax certificates it's phenomenally time consuming but it gave us the best survey results we've used um we've fined our applicants you know who whether they're applying for sign permits or business permits or whatnot we've fined our database for the last three years and actually I've had really good results using that list um that's more recent than just the general blast the general blast tends to get residents they have time they're locked in it's the business businesses applicants are really hard to get to yeah to go to them in the way that they are used to going to and so yeah in terms of a blast these are the the lists that we have that have been effective but there's other means we can go to focus group meetings those are more time intensive but and you only get that group but it could be both yeah and I will say that last time as we usually do we partnered with the various um community organizations all the chambers have put it in their newsletter etc so we would still do those things those are just common actions that we do yeah and the reason that I ask is I've always been curious about this question and and you might remember we use this a lot actually during redistricting where we are asking people what do you consider to be your neighborhood right like that helped inform where district lines should go I think that a similarly interesting question in a survey would be an open-ended question that just asks what's missing from your neighborhood and then if we could capture which neighborhood they came from we could start to look kind of how we had talked about being a little bit more strategic in how we went you know went after a grocery store down down or you know went after entertainment in coffee park or whatever have you if you had kind of that open we focus on downtown a lot for a good reason and I think it'd be really interesting to see what the responses would be across the community if you just ask them that open-ended question do you think um so there's two thoughts that I have is one um a similar or like maybe it's a kin to that question was asked for the general plan update so we do have some information I think pulling from that is appropriate pulling from that so I will pull from that but I really like this idea as we get into more detail because at this point the market study and some of the other data is showing look you need to and and actually and this is how really strongly inform the general plan update um is that neighborhood centric growth right but I would you be okay if that's a question as we start getting into some of the tactics of these that we can then focus in on sort of neighborhoods like I think it's super helpful and will be super helpful um like does it have to happen before this plan is written or can that be part of a plan to do a study no and I actually think that that could be an action item that comes from the the plan but I think if there's that level of intention of you know we've got this 15 minute city concept that we're actually trying to implement through our general plan how does that actually filter that out down then to the perception that somebody has of their own neighborhood and what's missing yeah um like do I have to get in the car to drive someplace because I think that there's no grocery store close right uh or is there an ability to kind of work through that and and provide more of a kind of complete feel with how we're doing the general plan design and integrating the economic side of it I'd just be really curious to see what people's perceptions are yes and and how we can tailor incentives specifically to each kind of pocket and what they're missing right just in terms of that the business yes does tools right like coupling that with okay well how are we supporting those interests if we're not right not going to get them right we have to actually be proactive to go get them I love that and I loved it I love it especially as an action because I will tell you in the past month the the conversations I'm having in um like through the Latina service providers in Roseland are so different right then the rink and valley was one but two um I had the good fortune that was being assigned in interim deputy director of the community engagement just after you know during George Flynn just after and those conversations are the ones that still live with me today in terms of I want to walk outside of my house find what I want in my streets and have pride right so those kinds of thing I think um it'd be super helpful to go in and be very very specific yeah I mean even just to use an example of something we were talking about earlier right West 9th guy hit with graffiti right over the weekend right and if you did a survey in that general area about how important graffiti abatement is it's going to be a lot more important than if you did it in Oakmont exactly but if you did it as a city-wide survey how important is graffiti abatement it might hide the fact that there are certain areas that have different needs and desires than the other areas of the state and so how do we be more intentional in the economic development side of this to you might look at it and say you know we've got making this up right we got plenty of bars in Santa Rosa and when you look at the data there might be a complete area that has nothing where those people are traveling I'm not saying we need more bars but I'm using it as an example of like something that you might not know if you just look at the accurate exact end of dovetail off that how do we how do we get an equitable equitable response because when you say like graffiti abatement it's not important to somebody like an oakmont right oakmont historically has a higher participation participation level correct than other areas right so when we're you know when we're trying to get that information that's so specific how do we not get it drowned out by a large portion of an unaffected community or a community that has a grocery store down the street and the classic example is how is how important is housing right if you only look at the aggregate data and you don't look into who owns versus who doesn't own and their response right you're going to get a completely different and age or not age so again one of the conversations was just like I was like did you set this up because I had a long conversation at one of the table events at my company village was somebody who was like I rate at the um at the uh you know the the mid-rise housing that's going on on the outskirts because he couldn't get to target right the next guy who came up was like I am living for $1,200 in a tiny bedroom with my girlfriend and dog and I want housing and it yeah so I think um I see a pathway and I'd love it because we can do it by district but even within districts sub districts within your districts and that's the kind of help um that we're looking for as we do implementation we do a precinct level would that be feasible I mean probably there's two precincts is probably not the right one but you could do census designated area and we could figure that out per because again it's very different per district I mean even just on a simple level you could drop points across the city right and then assign everybody you know whatever one you're closest to everything within two miles I'm making that up right that could be a way that you do it too and we've tried to locate or add that locational data or even at age data it is on the optional list yeah um so and we we put it at the end because if you ask upfront you just lost your audience you're asking too many personal questions like what's this thing really about that especially the audience we want to get to is the folks that aren't regularly clued dialed and ready for your next survey um so we do have to be careful but we work on better at it and we are starting to collect that data because we will build the trust with the questions up front like what do you care about um and then try to get the location order that age data I mean I wonder maybe this is way too far in the weeds but I wonder if one way to fix that is at the end of the survey you have a map that you just say click on the general area you live in right you're not giving an actual address you're not having to type anything out psychologically you're just like I'm over there yeah we had people in the general plan up there we had them basically define like click on a map like uh to find your neighborhood because that and that helped us inform those those nodes so maybe we can couple with yeah find your neighborhood like circle your neighborhood and that way you know and pull the data based on we're not asking specific like zip code address questions which is kind of what we did with the redistricting which was right really effective zip codes are very difficult but the other thing that we're aware of and that I'm trying to build into the plan is um leveraging so you know again um it sometimes it's like when people say well you you know you're one person right so I'm like yes but I'm going to put the apartment that's also doing this and guess what transit is going on doing this so we're trying to be able to be of service and leveraging these other things and I think in that way we're going to get also interesting specific information um so we'll you'll see that um when we're going through so from a survey question thing I want to move on keep it in your mind but I love this idea of involving surveys because one of the things that we have in there is actually a feedback loop in the thing so um something that's common in all economic development strata or most strata plans not all I've been looking at a ton is um landscape and data um you know this is just stuff that I pulled easily um so I don't want to spend a lot of time here um but um you know we have a lot of basic data at our um accessible to us right now um the market study data that we have is is again from 2021 we have no funds right now to do a market study we could probably do one and and and the next couple of years I will say I would not have guessed our median age was 40 oh yes it was higher yes and I'm telling you I was like 40 is pretty good because the last time I did it we were like so bookended but it's not great and so you know I some it's helpful to have this information because like the information that comes in is like we're doing this and you're not doing this and I'm like understand our landscape and so I wouldn't go to build this part out of it you know unemployment rates are very low they've been historically very low it means that we just don't have a workforce that can feel like you know to fill our jobs um what's the source this one is the um state it's the go biz um I didn't put the data source on this but it's the um governor's office of business um and they have the um GIS entry uh oh my gosh I'm blanking on the names of the common oh good in the future we'll let's just put the source yes I put the source on there um what's the time I did it yesterday no this is like current or yes yeah yeah like I literally that is a live data source um so yes this is current um the other thing that is um that comes up a lot like I think at one point I said you know our our um we're stagnant in our growth um and if you talk to some folks like you know I think uh operations like you know that's great because we can't you know we can't afford to service the infrastructure I'm like but guess what you can't afford to service more people until you get the revenue from those people so this is round robin things so there's there's a constant tug within the city on what what we're trying to do um it's what's that um uh Dr. Seuss Buck it's like you know growth happens anyway um or it doesn't happen we can help it happen so um we currently do not have um that I've heard um what's the word I'm looking for it's it's uh we have juxtaposing ideas on whether growth is good or bad and so uh any guidance on this we want the money um but with the money comes people like this that's the story for the last 25 years yes right I will I will say that's why it's much easier to focus on downtown is because that at least you are getting a better rate of return on the infrastructure investments that you're making than if you sprawl right that's right so just I mean I'm sorry go ahead go well just that's why the general plan we're trying to bust out of just downtown sort of the it's there and then everything else is something else no we're trying to do these walkable notes so that is the emphasis of the general plan for the next 30 years that's that's the premise and so we want to build all of our policies through that lens so that they're not downtown there's something else but they're not the suburban sprawl model that left unattended is is is not going to have the efficiencies and also the targeted approaches to actually build those up so that downtown but they're walkable they're fun they have what they need and this you want to build sabbatical you don't want to build freestone right or nothing wrong with freestone right all beautiful communities that serve our Santa Rosa right but I mean and I think that the the thing is too is um you know is understanding when you're looking at those that um the fiscal impact is less because your service is consolidated that said we cannot control the free market I mean so except we can influence we can influence it we can be proactive about attraction and streamline in those locations so that's what we're trying to double tail across the organization across our price and I think what's not a question is it is a it is a policy priority a political priority for the state for us to address this affordable housing crisis and so understanding that right not just here in Santa Rosa but statewide understanding that our arena numbers are real right we have to prepare for growth that's correct and that's the value of these plans it is not the attitude of all so okay knowing that I think you guys probably it's a pendulum it swings back and how much people will tolerate and in the political realm you probably know that more than anybody but sometimes you're like why are you doing this one it's a state law or two you know because yeah that's I I mean not to deviate too much but that's my favorite question to ask people is what do you think our growth should be based on and it all boils down to ultimate doesn't matter what your answer is there's a lot of great answers right at the end of the day you're told yes right right exactly my other favorite thing this is why is sitting in these public spaces and you know they need to they need to and I was like oh do you have a degree no but you know and I'm like just to be clear this day is us so like you can give us these things yeah we are them but I love it I love that community engagement so again here on this more data just basic I'm going to flush this down you know knowing our labor market will affect the type of businesses like when we're starting to talk about this attraction kind of things and expansion types of things so knowing our labor market for example is going to affect the type of businesses we want to go after that that we can attract that we can retain and then just quick note you know always and forever we say this you know less than 10 employees is where we we get our is our sweet spot when we're talking to people who are interested in coming in it's usually owners with the lifestyle change that they're bringing their small business and they have grown we have worked with some that have grown and then it starts to get into infrastructure issues so from our market study in general we have a diverse economy our strengths as you probably know are in healthcare retail trade manufacturing and tourism related activities you know I think most of you none of this is is going to be a surprise you know healthcare and retail traders where we are we often talk about economic development what is a what I'm looking for what what our head of household incomes you know healthcare there's a huge disparity and what it is and they were some of our largest like in terms of labor interest in our expedited minimum wage same with retail same with with tourism those are some of our major employers so where we're really looking at and where we see the most opportunity based on both the what our landscape is what some of our business interests are and what our market data is showing us is advanced tech you know r&d manufacturing type of things but even within that we need to start looking deeper into what that looks like and then in that we need to start understanding dive deeper into some of the infrastructure needs we have issues around education and workforce pipeline and our major competition we are not seeing like pedal it's like that could have a grade or something like this they don't go over at Petaluma still has a link over to San Francisco you know obviously southern Sonoma County Marin we have we're a tertiary market in this area and again have some of the some of the workforce growth issues that we need to deal with two questions real quick yeah in terms of accommodation how many if I recall correctly in the tubs far we lost 25 percent of our hotel rooms is that roughly accurate yeah we rebuilt and we're slightly above where we were okay that was my question and then second advanced tech r&d and manufacturing takes land correct thank you so ask so do we have that land and then secondary to that are there opportunities the areas that do have land it would be the county within our serve influence and urban growth boundary are there what are the prospects for us to be able to try to attract some of these businesses using county land that would then if they were to build be annexed into on a on a lot basis right into the city I'll tell the county that's what we're doing I'm just I mean but I think I think that they've they you know I think we've all heard the sort of rumors that threats are whatever around this if you don't do this we're going to do this right in the county line I will say in the county land our biggest competitor is the airport area they have land they have willing landlords and landholders they have some infrastructure issues so yes on the south side we have active interest in industrial we have some or manufacturing that type of industrial land uses and we have some what's the word why I just can't think of simple word today connections or like relationships with people who have connections to places that might come up we have a lot of foundational work we need to do to be able to prepare so we can be looking at some of these things and a lot of them are in that southwest area so I want to say about six months ago I was talking a lot to somebody out of Taiwan who's looking to open a second plant here you know we identified a location we've got tiger salamander issues we've got some other other issues they were a interestingly slightly less concerned about being able to pull the workforce they felt that they could do that but there are so many issues we might have land it's either not currently zoned which some of it is being addressed with the general plan update and the specific plan and the specific plan or it's outside of our jurisdiction within our fear of influence and there is still benefit to us taking a regional approach so again right now it's Ethan Peter Rumble and I are really looking at so we have a brokers meeting industrial brokers meeting coming up to try to better assess this I asked Jill about software that we can understand without going through like Keegan and Copen what our inventory looks like so there's that answer and then another subset of it is is it looks very different for different things right so sometimes for manufacturing we need a lot of land what are we looking at what kind of new technology new industry looking at but is actually a smaller footprint and we have not yet adequately studied that so my follow up question to that is in looking at this walkable future when we're trying to attract these large organizations to come here that I mean I'm not going to say it's going to be a thousand plus employees let's say it's you know 100 to 249 employees or somewhere in that area and then we talk about affordable housing where that affordable housing lies where housing period lies is there anything we're doing within the general plan update to be flexible about being able to say like hey we're going to buy you know these whatever seven whatever size acreage and we're going to build a facility to work in and then at the same time we want to use half of that lot to build a workforce housing so they can with mixed use so they can just walk to work yes so one of the things that the economic development team has been really active on with the advanced planning team is trying to claw back some of our historic industrial lands because then you get this sort of merger of things that are non-noxious that have been historically live work kind of so maximum core is a very good example and we asked for that I'm curious as to why it's a funny one but but I think I know but that kind of example we know that that maker mix use kind of thing works that there is a stated desire for it and that again there's when people think about R&D or other kinds of things it's it can be compatible specifically with new technology types of things and that's sort of where interest yeah I'm just talking from like a I mean if you want to use a you know kind of classic Americana example if you look at like Pittsburgh in the 60s and 70s where you have the steel mill before all the economic issues that they went through but you got a steel mill down the river and everybody lived up the hill and at 8 a.m. every morning you know people came out of their houses and just walked down to the mill to go to work yes that's you know and that's the kind of opportunity I would like when you know steel but opportunity I like for us it didn't you know be able to track somebody to be fair because the flip side of that coin is at the time property property taxes were designed in a way where they were exorbitant if you didn't do anything with your land and you were able to take deductions based on improvements that you made or preservation that you did for parks or whatever have you so there's an incentive for folks not just to grab land and sit on it for a long time which people have a much bigger incentive to do in California than other places but I hear you but no I'm not saying this or you go that route but you know somebody says like hey I'm bringing 400 employees I need a place for them to live I'm just saying I'm not all I'm just saying we've got $200,000 some of the land that would be good for those sorts of things people are just sitting on yeah so that's fine gotcha yeah I think there are a couple mechanisms that are worth exploring in the strat plan and that is is we have the maker mix use which is a designation for the city we are we only tested it out with Maxwell court it hasn't taken off in Maxwell court for you know different reasons we need to look at what other of these nodes might play out more productively for it there's also opportunities like innovation districts where you really are it's not just the city saying no it's permissive but it's a little bit it's a more proactive assertive approach to connect the dots between partnerships because we aren't landowners in southwest we're not even in jurisdictional boundaries yet but start to plant the seeds for potential innovation districts where we can partner with and you mentioned attract it there may be opportunities with retention and expansion with companies that are doing well that know the benefit that already know the benefit of working in Santa Rosa and then in in both of those opportunities or avenues just being conscious of that housing industrial mix we're protected for where industrial landscape you don't get to get that back people don't reason to industrial they reason to housing so being sensitive to that and so what types of industrial land uses can we support and that we can play our strengths too right with water and the permissiveness that we yeah I like I like the the innovation district that concept a kind of what are they doing for brag it's not great blue is it a blue district blue so during COVID they were hit really really hard because they're almost literally on an island up there and they're I think it's it's they've are in the process of developing and I could be completely inaccurate on this but they're in the process of developing an idea to attract ocean-based research and development and economic drivers on that because that's what they have a large amount of access to and so I'm wondering if there's an opportunity for us that makes our area slightly unique to to attract those kinds of to create something like that so two things one so the land use things so we're in service everything is in service to the general plan right so land use will be dedicated on that one but those are the kinds of things that we've got a section that we're looking at I'm creative incentives and so what I'm hearing from this and I think is an easier thing to bite through is when we can look at them because again every neighborhood or area is going to have sort of slightly different infrastructure meaning like land availability zoning whatever you know access to water whatever it might be so we can add those those are the things that will will sort of flesh out within the tactics of the plan and I think not only can they be targeted to neighborhood I I'm hoping there's a tolerance where where we can prioritize areas and industries because if we're looking at temporary incentives and we seek to do those they're easier in more specific areas and we have to be aware one of the issues obviously that we're facing is our general fund is not in the best of shape any incentive that might have that fiscal impact is generally not what less well received shall we say yeah those kinds of things and I'd like the focus to stay on like what do we need to do right not like what could we afford to do that that's the second half the conversation because we do you know in our reserves we do have fully funded reserves and then some we know that over the course of a couple of years that completely doing those and disappears and obviously we wouldn't build a structural budget around it but if we can create some one-time incentives that actually enhance economic development I think that that's a good use of that investment so I want us to do what's what's ideal in the planning phase and then figure out the practicality of implementation also okay are we working with um I don't know I don't know if you've called community part but telecommunication companies for example like if we do want to attract advanced tech R&D they're gonna want fiber internet right right and so how do we get that those kind of resources out to there you know and I know that there have been a number of times where we were doing public works projects and partnered with some of the telecom providers that they put in kind of I Claire probably knows well that's open might as well just go ahead yeah right uh one one trenching yeah yeah the policy is yeah single trench yeah dick wants I mean and that brings up but like a side note in some of these areas where we have the most land available for these types of cases we have massive infrastructure gaps um I'm sure all of you know like about some of the the issues we're having in the roseland area I mean even some of the residences don't have sewer right but we have some industrial areas where that is a critical issue for us and could be one of those Maxwell courts sort of like multi-use kind of spaces um there was something else I was going to say oh you know what is interesting is we do get a lot of um we're on the list for the um GO-Biz the state um uh business recruitment thing and those businesses that are like 100 employees they're they want six you know like the typical thing is 60 acres and and on a rail track um we don't always have those kinds of things right um or they're like you know we've got um you know like toxic waste we need to be able to bury it it just is not going to happen year um so yeah that that again speaks to what kind of targeted things and then having a realistic exhortation of like um the the current the growth trajectory of business like that okay um so yeah um I think based on I've been asked a number of times what's your through line and equity sustainability growth come up and by growth I mean we need revenue growth we need economic growth but we want it I know based on council um objectives and the feedback we're getting including internally with the other departments is you know we have a chance for climate action kind of greening type of things which I think is something is of interest in this area but we do need to retain an overarching understanding of equity and so all three of those words mean multiple things um and so that is sort of the framing that I'm looking at um this probably hard to read slide don't worry about it I go into it later but I just want you to know that um that as I'm fleshing this out at the end what I started with was sort of this matrix of what are we doing um and um as we agreed to before it's going to have goals um objectives and tactics but also this matrix that the end needs to have metrics and targets it's going to have lead economic development does not do all of this these are things that are done and owned communally um there's high medium low priority we're looking at a five-year plan so we have probably some of the actions are going to be on the earlier side that are currently being done because we've been working on this thing for quite a while um and then um also a question of additional resources so I do want to let you know that that is going to be part of it um probably as a summary um thing at the end of the just so really fast where in there is business recruitment economic vibrancy is the false under economic vibrancy okay we should call it yeah I was going to say because I see support Santa Rosa businesses which to me is existing I think you'll see it in the next slide yeah okay um okay but no that's great we want to make sure we capture definitely the core things and then back to her earlier point like are we are we reaching out to you broadly we want to make sure we don't lose sight on the really important core things that we have the other thing I want to know before we go on to this is timing so our intent is to bring you a draft plan so we're really trying to get to separate we're going to bring you a draft a rough draft plan at the next meeting yeah right so told me that by the end of October we'd have it finalized great that what did I say that we this is what we come into right so we want to we want to set ourselves up for uh the start of the next year right and we this is important instead this is still topical categories but we will start drilling down into more directional um objective statements we're going to bring that to you that the next meeting so this is to make sure instead of spinning our wheels really broadly let's my interest is to narrow it down and be very laser focused so that we can actually get this down be successful so so that point what do you need from these gentlemen today to get that that's what we're getting into so yeah and I just wanted to segue that as we start to look at how broad we can span this but the broader we do it the more water down our focuses and so I just that's the lens I want to look at when we go into these next slides and and what's just and these next slides um they're already changing based on the conversation we just had so um that's helpful um and when you said I'm already getting the weeds get in the weeds because like I said all the feedback has been so general I'm like yeah and contradictory I'm like I need some help um okay so um so you know when we're looking at these I tried to make them I think the same colors but anyway again goals the the the main goals are climate culture communication economic economic vibrancy and oops I forgot to change you have a capital too it's like community resiliency but um it's resiliency and community resiliency and community what have I said um so then we can start getting down into objectives and tactics and again I want to say these are already changing um in my mind based on your input but basically this the climate culture communication is really how how are we to do this how are we doing business um we know um I wanted to make sure that we have some current things that are going to be again foundational to some of the things that we want to be doing um so as an example under improved business climate streamline services and support which again came up again and again again one of the first things we're doing in the midst of this development services strat plan um so other strat plans affect how we do business that's ongoing so we'll have some things that are currently happening and some things that we need to um to create after that um we know that we need um in terms of business satisfaction we don't have an adequate we used to but we do not have an adequate um feedback loop that um we is actionable and is tied to other things a lot of it we know is sort of website driven or access to information easily helping other people help themselves becomes kind of a an interesting thing same thing client management system we used to have one we do not have one we need to be able to track things as we go through communication and marketing huge um for us again speaking to the fact that people don't know what our resources are don't understand how to access them becomes um something um we know from you guys directly but also based on the few um business visitations that we've been able to do um post covid bringing in relevant departments we know this company is having an issue with this we'll grab some folks from planning and building and we'll do a visit we'd like to do those more on maybe like a quarterly basis but um using the economic um uh sub development subcommittee and perhaps like it's maybe the chair and the mayor and the same manager so that we can have directed conversations so you guys can see these businesses within the area i'm not sure exactly what that's going to look like but um but that's another means for um for feedback we've been understanding emerging issues within industries um we needed a place also to to put the um the ongoing strong interest in um equitable economic opportunities these are upstream investment types of things these may be sort of one-time use funds but this would rank in that matrix sort of high because we're already um doing those but we also need to do against the more foundational work like the five business auditing and um and things like that um any questions on this one before i go to the next so a couple of things um so love seeing the update to information tools the digital i'm going to keep harping on the concept of a virtual city virtual city that does something you can go on to um somewhere in there uh when we talk about the attraction of businesses um like i said i've been talking with charlotte in austin and other places that have been doing economic development well uh building in a process where anybody who reaches out to the city with an inquiry about moving their business starting a business whatever have you gets a personal phone call from a council member the mayor of somebody right just like a hey heard you were interested let me tell you about my city if you're interested kind of a roll out the red carpet because i think that that also goes back to the fostering the community partnership right um so i really like that idea um and i'll let you keep going through the rest of them but got some more granular with that one i think would fall um i think oops um or the chair of the economic development committee you can do you can do whatever right market it however you want towards businesses yeah i think that's really good because um we did see really really great response to um you know again i have to go back pre-covid but when we were we were recruiting certain businesses um and having conversations even if they didn't land thank you covet but um like with some businesses we did actually have um either the city manager or actually mostly it was assistant city manager but we usually had um the mayor at the time um in with us or in available and that changed so many things yeah we were working with some those businesses at the time and actually some of the developers um came in i know i think i've said it before for simon they still loved it um so if we have that ability um to do that we can definitely include that yeah and i've told this story and i'll keep telling this story but you know my mom started a non-profit in santa rosa 25 years ago right and within a year they were outgrowing their building so a mayor in runner park had a conversation with her helped partner her with a uh vacant space a space that had been vacant where they got three months free rent for the move they've been in runner park for 25 years since then they've outgrown that building and they outgrow the next building so they're in their third building in runner park but they've never left a runner park it's funny enough they're actually leaving for santa rosa now because they can't find a place big enough in runner park right but the whole reason that they've been there for 25 years is because the mayor contacted her and said hey we've got some vacant space and they're willing to cut a deal for a non-profit do you want it right and so so many things in there and i'm gonna move it on to this one this economic vitality thing because one the way we find out is usually not because somebody's called us like right outgrown our space it's because we're hearing it through the grapevine our our um our beer thing it's such a tired story now but um still one of my faves um it was a side note that i read on something else right and then and then worked with everybody else to get it right um we usually find out from other people so one of the key things about our economic um vibrancy element um which is um actually i think this is i think i pulled this from a dated thing because i did have a line that specifically said business attraction retention so i apologize i'm looking that this is i pulled from a dated thing yeah but support centers of businesses i think was really specifically um economic and business attraction retention i'll fix it um but um but uh one of the key elements that's going to make us more successful is to have a seamless points of entry and it's not just within the city yeah um and getting things pulled over but it's also working with our community partners so that is something that um that we're working on is seamless points of entry um these are just so broad but here's where under support centers of businesses it's the business attraction stuff so we need um attraction tools we're starting to work on some of these things we've got um there's different levels of them so like for downtown vibrancy we're looking at um uh uh streamlining some things for you know ground floor retail things we're trying to attract additional um uh all sorts of things with residential and um and cultural things um we've got our our fund of business support programs again um those are on hold right now but we hope to get those um start rolling again um those are the priority um something that is of interest that we have been working with and we're sort of piloting in the downtown but we were trying um sort of the business uh like locational asset tools so we we um try something to place your ai so that when people call and they're like well what's my foot traffic here where people coming are going to um gap analysis we're finding that that didn't work very well um so we're trying to work with our it folks to be able to get more specific information um but how do you make that um uh accessible readily accessible those kinds of things are the ones that are becoming really important to the small mama pop kind of i want to invest here yeah and i really like the re-tenoting streamlining yes exactly to kind of that concept that i mentioned like if somebody's not going to get a rate of return on their building rather than having an empty storefront if we come up with an incentive program to help put people in there it's kind of a win-win for for right and i think some of the other things that we talked about earlier like i'm going to uh i really just love this idea of um of district targeted um research will fit somewhere in here um i will say two temp incentive programs come up all the time for when we were doing development those things yes there some of them um are continuing to be extended but can we do something similar it'll fit in with here um also infrastructure and economic accelerators those types of things we can look at um you know special districts um uh that type of thing um also studies and reports to see you know those fit there too and then the last one is um the resiliency and community investment public art is part of our program we have a great strategic plan we're getting a lot of positive feedback on that sort of place making stuff the upstream investment items work in here in terms of workforce development we don't have a dedicated staff person workforce development but we have invested in um our partnerships to this end and we have new opportunities so um like partner with the web and other community workforce programs so for example if we get the tcc grant um a lot of the community organizations that are participating in that would be having an element so our interest would be in looking to support what they're doing and provide whatever data information that we can to make those things successful and then physical infrastructure improvements that fit here um one of the things that came up during the um exec staff and sort of internal um meeting was you know do we have um you know is there an opportunity for sort of uh climate and green initiatives do those fit here where do some of the um actions and activities of some of our other operational departments fit and they would fit in with here so lastly because I know we're running out of time is the timeline yes I'm going to start writing tomorrow I'll probably watch this again and start writing um but we anticipate by the um by the next um meeting again that even if we do another survey I don't know if we would have time to put those results in but by october yeah I think especially if you have the general plan survey results you can pull from that that's a good starting spot yes um you could put into the plan that it's going to be to flush out this more with kind of more targeted approach but that in general these are the concepts we saw from the general plan that might be a good kind of starting point and I think the trend lines are clearly similar but yeah where are the nuances for the action steps and that will inform the action steps but I think the trend lines are going to be similar yeah I also I don't think we'll see anything that we wouldn't otherwise know I know Raphael in particular is very plugged in talking to people about what their needs are near their their homes if you work out in the ground every day like Raphael go find those out he's like right so we have 10 minutes left if you're willing to stay to the to the end here just are we getting this right is this starting to look like the plan that you imagined is it too broad is it too specific you're trying to do too much we're really kind of looking to you to give us that high level feedback and then we'll go right we'll write up the objectives and the tactics based on some of the things that you said or if there's other things that you didn't get to say I'd like to do this um no I think it's I think it's great work so far especially incorporating the feedback that we've discussed as a group um uh yeah I mean too broad too specific is more personal opinion I think the natural application um but I think everything that we've covered everything that is included in these draft concepts and yeah I'm I like it yeah I really like it too uh it's it's at this last time but it still remains true it's my favorite thing that we're working on on council right now is this plan um and I think that you are striking a good note between keeping it broad enough to stay relevant for longer while also providing enough specifics to give the overall intent on what we're trying to do and I'd say the first couple of steps in particular of what we want to accomplish um to really address uh the economic needs of the city we can't answer in a plan the question about how much growth how quickly all of that uh on an economic plan because some of it's going to be based on luck quite frankly the broader economic climate climate inflation things like that but I think we can set the table for for some significant improvement yeah 100% agree thank you thank you um and if something hits you in the middle of the night or when you shower in the morning please details nothing is too deep in the woods it's all phenomenally helpful good you're good all right let's go to uh public comment on the item if you wish to make a public comment and are attending via zoom please raise your hand no hands erased okay uh only other thing I'll add and it kind of goes back to the the care and feeding for businesses is making sure that we're regularly checking in with businesses yes um business monthly round table whatever it is that we need to to set up but we should build kind of like I said with the accounts member the mayor whomever calling businesses that have interest let's build institutions that provide pathways for communication yeah to that point no strength in our relationship and build that expectation right so right so when you say you know when we see it in the numbers that people don't always know how to access information we've got this consistent monthly meeting check-ins that we're having with businesses and you know a business owner's talking to the business next to them and they said well why don't you just go to this meeting and ask your question that's an entry point right you say there's a lot of community engagement isn't an event it's uh repeated yeah yeah um so on the something struck you at random and bring it up uh process um and I don't know how this would be built in there and god forbid I bring up any sort of additional employees with Alan in the room um but um just as a concept um I know some agencies have a um an either employee or someone that they work with that does an economic analysis of each and every um item that comes before council right so like for development we do that with sequel where it's like that you know this has no effect well blah I think in terms of tracking metrics or or something like that and this is just like I said struck me right now I'm just going to throw it out there I don't know how implementation or the actuality of it would work whether it would be something we could or could not do uh or what the cost would be but any item that comes across if there could be an economic analysis of it so that you know when we're reading our packets and and the items it says like hey this could generate theoretically x amount revenue for the city or this amount of it attract this amount of employees or something like that so tweaking the fiscal analysis yeah yeah it it should be built into the process yeah so I hear you loud and clear and we'll have some conversations that's aren't only how we can get you what you need yeah yeah yeah usually our our fiscal analysis is as simple as the budget yeah it's as simple as you already budgeted for this right and so instead of a fiscal analysis more of an economic greater economic analysis yeah it's fiscal and economic impact yeah we usually look at them and separate and separation but they should be considered together correct yeah and I like that yeah and I think we can work on we can include that as a action step um and then through that action process define what um what measures you want us to report on you know is it jobs sales tax you know because everything is where do you draw the line because obviously that could be reported sure yeah but I'm just thinking you know it's one of those things where you know there's very few things that come before us that are clear cut right and so as a tool of you know weighing the positives negatives and the more gray area than positive negatives um having that kind of information you know could influence or or educate an individual on their opinion right and the connectivity to the other pieces yeah yeah I like it I don't know how you're gonna do it it just like I said random thought when it gets defined it's easier to do yeah yeah sure but that's I think that's definitely something we can add but like I know other agencies do it's something that maybe we could just you know yeah maybe a copy don't worry and quite frankly this is also the kind of thing that EDB should be helping with like that that's the other part that I think needs to be recognized here is we have an entire economic development board for the county I don't really know what they're doing to assist us since that might be helpful for us to better understand we're going to assist and hopefully this is the clarification yeah I mean I will say that um the relationship is much stronger and um Ethan was only just recently fully hired yeah um and they are looking at reviewing a number of their elements in their economic um they did an update to their strap plan and one of them is organizational capacity they are aware of relevancy and one of the sort of um tension points that we have with the county whether it be EDB or Sonoma County tourism for example um our assessment funds pay for that is localizing the data it's a constant struggle um and so we get general stuff um but uh both working internally and with um we should and I have to say with Visit Santa Rosa we should be getting able to ask the question have that information readily available yeah and then we definitely help some of the elected to elect the conversation yep yeah I think you know to be honest with you um some of those questions particularly when it comes to Visit Santa Rosa and Sonoma County tourism is getting being able to have access to that data given the amount of money that um supports the organization is something that we at staff level have not been able to achieve and it may be um something at a city manager level okay all right uh do we have any department reports this just this all right we can go ahead and adjourn thanks okay thank you