 Good morning and welcome to the 11 o'clock am public portion of the closed session of the April 26, 2022 City Council meeting. If you would like to comment on a closed session item now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen. In this part of the meeting the council will receive public testimony thereafter the public line will be closed and inaccessible. Please mute your television or streaming device once you call in and listen through the phone. Please note there is a delay in streaming so if you continue to listen on your television or streaming device you may miss your opportunity to speak. For anybody in the public here in person. No. Okay. Thank you. I would like to ask the clerk to please call roll. Thank you mayor councilmember Calentary Johnson. Present. Boulder. Currently absent. Coming. Here. Brown. Here. Myers. Here. Vice Mayor Watkins. Here. And Mayor Brunner. Present. Thank you. Are there any members of the public who would like to speak to any items listed on the closed session agenda. If you are attending virtually please raise your hand by dialing star nine on your phone. Or selecting the raise hand feature in your webinar controls. When it's your turn to speak you'll hear an announcement that you have been unmuted. The timer will then be set to three minutes. You may hang up once you have commented on your item of interest. And I will pull up our attendee list to see if there's anyone via zoom. We have nobody. No members of the public in person. And let's see on zoom. It looks like nobody is attending the assume. Okay. So seeing none this meeting will now be adjourned and council will go into its closed session. Thank you. Okay. Good afternoon. And welcome to the 12 30 p.m. session of April 26 2022 meeting of the Santa Cruz City Council. Our first meeting back in person. Welcome. I would like to ask the clerk to please call roll. Thank you mayor council members Calentary Johnson. Present. Boulder. Absent. Coming. Here. Brown. Here. Meyers. Present. Present. Vice mayor Watkins. Hearing. And mayor Brunner. Present. Thank you. Our first item on today's agenda is a mayoral proclamation declaring May as affordable housing month. And I would like to welcome director Bonnie Bush as well up to the front and Jessica Dewitt. And our housing team from the city. What did I say? Bonnie. I'm sorry. I'm multitasking here. Good afternoon mayor members of the council. It's so exciting to be back in person with you this month for the exciting announcement of affordable housing month. There are some really great activities in line for this month kicking off actually this Sunday with housing Santa Cruz County at the Cezna house. Thank you. I have a proclamation to read briefly and I appreciate it if you stayed there and and please come up this you work so hard as well. They have I'll say the whole housing team and not all of them are here. We're missing. Please. Everybody. Andrea and Tiffany as well. But with me today is Jessica Dewitt the housing program manager and community development manager and Jessica Miller the management analyst for the housing team. Thank you. So whereas quality affordable housing is vital to healthy safe vibrant and diverse communities. A fact that continues to be highlighted by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and whereas access to a stable healthy affordable home is necessary to take critical steps to preserve individual and public health such as sheltering in place and self isolation. And whereas affordable homes are the solution to homelessness and provide support to seniors families youth veterans people recovering from illness and people with disabilities. And whereas even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic rising housing costs have led long time residents to be displaced living overcrowded and substandard homes or become homeless. And whereas creating new permanently affordable homes and preserving and improving existing housing makes for stable vibrant communities helping residents maintain community roots and fostering racial and economic diversity for generations. And whereas affordable homes close to public transit and jobs reduces greenhouse gas admissions and provides low income families better access to opportunities and amenities. And whereas nonprofit organizations local jurisdictions community organizations faith based groups and many others continue to build inclusive communities supporting low income people and those with special needs. And whereas regional housing organizations are continuing to recognize the month of May as affordable housing month because the housing crisis can only be resolved when the entire region takes action. And whereas local jurisdictions such as the city of Santa Cruz play a critical role by raising local resources for affordable housing to leverage the federal state and other funds. And so now therefore I Sonia Brunner mayor of the city of Santa Cruz do hereby proclaim the month of May 2022 as affordable housing month in the city of Santa Cruz along with other local leaders in the greater San Francisco and Monterey Bay Area regions. Thank you. Please. Thank you. And I just wanted to draw attention. I know that the events are posted above on the screen. I did want to draw attention in addition to the kickoff this Sunday are the groundbreaking of our pack station south project which is May 19 which is you know decade plus in the making. And so we're so excited and appreciate all the support of council and past councils and mayors and making this reality of this affordable housing project a dream come true for our community. So look forward to seeing you all there on May 19 at 11 a.m. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Our next agenda item number four is a mayoral proclamation declaring May 1 through May 7 as municipal clerks week. Bonnie Bush and Julia Wood here with us today are our clerks office. Whereas the office of the municipal clerk a time honored and vital part of local government exists throughout the world and whereas the office of the municipal clerk is the oldest among public servants. And whereas the office of the municipal clerk provides the professional link between citizens the local government bodies and agencies of government at other levels. And whereas municipal clerks have pledged to be ever mindful of their neutrality and impartiality rendering equal service to all. And whereas the municipal clerk serves as the information center of local government and community. And whereas municipal clerk continually strive to improve the administration of the affairs of the office of the municipal clerk through participation in education programs seminars workshops. And the annual meeting of their state province county and international professional organizations. And whereas in 1984 president Ronald Reagan signed a proclamation officially declaring municipal clerks week as the first full week of May. And in 1994 and 1996 president Bill Clinton also signed proclamations confirming municipal clerks week. And whereas whereas it is most appropriate that we recognize the accomplishments of the office of the municipal clerk. Now therefore I Sonia Brunner mayor of the city of Santa Cruz do hereby proclaim the week of May 1st through May 7th 2022 as professional municipal clerks week in the city of Santa Cruz in recognition of the exemplary dedication to public service. And extend deep appreciation to our city clerk Bonnie Bush deputy city clerk Julia Wood and the staff of the Santa Cruz city clerk's office. Thank you. I will just say we might be the oldest public service but we are the least. That'll be the question I get is what do you do. Starting the meeting off on a very nice note. Moving on to our next agenda item. Number five we will come back to around 4 30 4 4 30 will be the estimated time it will be the outstanding volunteer recognition. I have a few announcements and then we will continue with our regular meeting. Today's meeting is being broadcast live on community television channel 25 and streaming on the city's website city of Santa Cruz dot com. Our rules of decorum are on the window ledge to my left. It's my job to keep the meeting running without disruption and we ask that you please respect your fellow citizens when you are inside or outside of chambers. For the consideration of our community please stay home if you have any symptoms of a cold or flu or are feeling unwell in any way. If you wish to comment on an agenda item today and are attending virtually please call in at the beginning of the item you are wanting to comment on using the instructions on your screen. Please mute your television or streaming device once you call in and listen through the phone. Please note there is a delay in streaming so if you continue to listen with your television or streaming device on you may miss your opportunity to speak. When it is your time for public comment please raise your hand either by dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar controls on your computer. Please note that public comment is only heard on items council is taking action on and not regular updates and reports. The items that will be open for public comment during today's meeting are numbers eight through 28 on our agenda. I'd like to ask the council members if there are any statements of disqualification today. Okay I have one statement of disqualification item number 25 for 15 natural bridges. I think you need a reason. And the reason is I currently sit on the housing authority board of commissioners and that is one of our projects. Are there any other. Okay moving on. I'd like to ask the city clerk to announce any additions or deletions. I'd like to call on the city attorney to provide a report on our closed session this morning. Yes good afternoon Mayor Brunner members of the city council this morning the council met in person in closed session in the courtyard conference room at 11 a.m. To consider two items the first item was a conference with legal counsel concerning existing litigation. The name of the action is manual Trujillo versus city of Santa Cruz. It's a case pending in the United States District Court in San Jose. Second item was a conference with legal counsel concerning significant exposure to litigation. One potential case was discussed in closed session. Council received a report from the city attorney's office and gave direction on those two items. There was no reportable action. Thank you. Now is the time for council members to report out on actions at external boards committees. And joint powers authority meetings. Mayor sorry you skipped six. Continue with item number six the city council calendar meeting calendar and I'll call on the city clerk to provide any updates to the calendar. There are no updates. Thank you. Agenda item number seven. This is the time for council members to report out on actions at external boards committees and joint powers authority meetings. For future meetings please come prepared to provide an update on any meetings or actions that occurred since the last council meeting so that the council and public can be informed. And I will start on my right with council member Calentari Johnson. So since our last meeting where we had the opportunity to provide updates we have had some metro meetings and the big news is that our new CEO of our metro district Michael tree has started and he started yesterday. I wasn't able to make it to Friday's meeting so I'll let council member Myers give that update. And then just that the TSA mask mandate expired on April 18th. So that's what I have for the metro city schools committee also met. Lots happening there. Lots to talk about parks and rec of course launched their summer registration successfully. And so we're communicating and working with city schools on partnership continued partnerships for summer programs. I'll let council or vice mayor Watkins talk about the Children's Fund. And we're working with city schools on potentially partnering on highlighting looking at school campus opening school campuses on partially on weekend. So that's still in discussion. And just as part of that I'll give a quick update on the Children and Youth Bill of Rights. Some of us council members have been working with a youth action network. That's the youth group that is under United Way working on creating a youth liaison that would directly work with council members. And just an announcement that the youth action network is hosting their Santa Cruz City pop up in partnership with the teen center tomorrow. Tomorrow at the London Nelson Center in part from two to five. And that UCSC there's a UCSC class that's taken quite an interest in the Children and Youth Bill of Rights. So they're working with us in terms of how does it look for operationalizing and implementing the Bill of Rights at a city. And then my last committee that I'll report on is the health and all policies. We are looking at really focusing on analysis of city commissions and committees and what they look like now and how we can improve inclusion and diversity in city commissions and committees. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Callantari Johnson. Council Member Brown. Thank you mayor. So I will start with the regional transportation commission. We've had a lot of activity and have been using our extra time that we have for transportation policy workshops to learn more about some of the particulars around transportation finance. Which is very complicated as well as thinking about how we will potentially use the measure D funds through bonding to finance larger projects moving forward. There are pros and cons and we've talked about this year for infrastructure in particular with water. So I think all are familiar with the concept. So we've had some really productive discussions interesting discussions about how we'll proceed there. But I think it will give us an opportunity to be able to build out some of the projects that the voters told us are very critical to them and do that in a shorter time frame. We did at our last regular meeting did vote to increase funding for the Santa Cruz metro lifeline and local jurisdictions through Transportation Development Act funding. We've received some grants from CalTrans for two sustainable transportation projects focusing on climate adaptation and transportation equity in Santa Cruz County. And we also got an update and talked about the benefits of the Go Santa Cruz County program. So I wanted to just highlight that here. The city of Santa Cruz has had a major role in that and our staff was really at the forefront in putting this program together. It is the Cruz 511 program that provides information for commuters residents who are interested in finding alternative commute solutions to look for those and also to plug in to a system where they can actually record alternative transportation commutes and receive benefits as a result of their participation. It's a great program. It's expanded into the county through the RTC and will continue. So Go Santa Cruz County, I recommend getting the app and using it, looking at it and kind of learning about all of that. We also had, next one I'm going to go on to the Area Agency on Aging. Our most recent meeting we discussed, we finalized our Area Plan, which is really a comprehensive plan for San Benito and Santa Cruz counties. That's the jurisdictions that are part of the AAA. We talked about some good news related to nutrition infrastructure funding, ARPA funds and OAR funds that the AAA will be able to distribute to local programs. And we also talked about some good news with the state budget, which seems to be a theme at least for this year in a variety of arenas given the state surplus. But what that's doing, given the impetus for really focusing on older Americans and the older Americans Act and the master plan on engineering with the state is now established. And so I think that we will see some funding coming to programs that really meet a variety of critical needs for low income seniors in our community and beyond. So that's updates from the AAA and our last Air Resources District Board meeting was relatively mild mannered. So I don't have a lot to report there, but we did get a presentation from students at UCSC who are involved. And this is a really interesting partnership that the Air Board has established with the University of California, Santa Cruz to help fund a class where students come in and actually get to work on projects around air monitoring and finding new innovative ways to conduct air monitoring and take policy action as a result of that. And I think for the Budget and Revenue Committee, I will pass that on to one of my colleagues because I did have to leave early last week to get an update on that. And that's all. Council Member Cummings. Thank you, Mayor. Let's see. LAFCO met on the, I believe it was the 6th of April and the one significant action that took place at that meeting was Opal Cliffs District. The Recreation District was reorganized and has been officially dissolved and that district has now moved into County Service Area 11. At the, we had a special meeting of AMBAG and at that meeting we approved to continue moving forward with remote meetings and we will be revisiting that topic again in May. I would also like to mention that for LAFCO that the City of Santa Cruz, the cities that are participants in LAFCO rotate every few years and at the first meeting in May will be the last meeting that Santa Cruz will have a seat on that board I think for the next two years. And so my position representing the city on LAFCO will end after the meeting in May and I believe it will be about two years before we have a seat on that commission again. And that I believe is all I have to report. Thank you, Council Member Cummings. One more thing, sorry. We were, the Public Safety Committee had been meeting and we had scheduled monthly meetings but it looks like we're going to move back to quarterly meetings so we will be meeting, our next meeting won't be until June and so I just wanted to make that update as well. Was there a reason to move to quarterly? Historically the Public Safety Committee has met quarterly. This year we put placeholders on the agenda to potentially meet monthly should something arise. And so if there's a reason for the Public Safety Committee to meet before the June meeting then I believe that we will have those meetings. But as it stands right now it doesn't appear that there will be anything forthcoming that will require the Public Safety Committee to meet until June. Great, thank you. Okay, Council Member Meyers. I'll report a little bit more on the Metro, recent Metro Board meeting which was held last Friday. Council Member Meyers can you move your mic closer, thank you. The Metro Board did meet on Friday of last week. A couple of exciting things that were completed in that meeting was a long range bus replacement program including the analysis necessary to test the initial zero emission buses that were purchased last year. And to forecast the building of zero emission bus infrastructure before the agency transitions to a fleet of 100% zero emission buses. A big transition there for our transit agency. The other thing that the Board took action on was actually to release a request for proposals for a South County zero emissions operating and maintenance facility plan. This would be envisioned to be built in the South County area and it would basically create a regional facility where zero emission vehicles, primarily metros obviously, but I believe there's some discussions with other agencies that we would have basically zero emissions operating and maintenance facility in South County. So that's pretty exciting to imagine more of that infrastructure being built throughout the county. So metros taking the lead on that and they will be issuing a request for proposals or a consulting team to begin the planning work on that and that's being funded by federal grants to look at that analysis. I'm also on the Mid County Groundwater Agency now and that agency met, we had our meeting at the end of March and that's a quarterly meeting I believe. The agency adopted a $7.6 million grant relating to various water projects for the Mid County Aquifers that are a focus of the Groundwater Sustainability Act. So that includes additional scientific investigation of the aquifers but also implementation projects such as conservation, well metering, things like that to get a sense of how to better manage that aquifer from seawater intrusion. And then a member of the Cowell Working Group, that group will be participating, members of that group will be participating in the 10th anniversary of the World Surfing Reserve which is held this coming Friday on the 29th, headed up by Save the Waves Coalition and there will be facilitated discussions at that event, focusing on water quality as well as climate adaptation, public access and what's the last one, one other subject that will be used, these facilitated sessions will be used to forecast the new stewardship plan for the World Surfing Reserve here in Santa Cruz County, that's this Friday at 1 to 8. The 5 to 8 period is a public celebration out at Lawn Greenland and will be participating in the Climate Adaptation Group helping to facilitate that with Tiffany Weiss West of our staff. And those are my reports. Thank you Mayor. Thank you Council Member Myers. And Vice Mayor Watkins. So let's see what I have to add. So Visit Santa Cruz County met May, no excuse me March 30th and we had a chance to meet the new executive director whose name is escaping me at the moment. So I'll look to you Mayor if you can recall. But we have a new executive director who filled the big shoes of Maggie Ivy, really jumped right in, talked a lot about data, his passion for data. We had conversations around some of the topics that impact the city, say to the industry COVID-19, TOT proposed increase, homeless issues, etc. And then also just looking at the trends in terms of visitors coming into our community and sort of what we're learning and what kind of kind of populations we're drawing on as things have changed with COVID over the years, these past couple of years. We have the two by two meeting and we talked about emergency shelter and safe sleeping status updates, street outreach capacity building, home key update, the 14 million investment plan and status updates along with the eviction and homelessness prevention planning. And the Housing for Health Partnership had its second meeting, a lot of very nuanced discussion around the integration of many different agencies and entities and billing systems that I'm learning a lot about. But also around really the prioritization and kind of initial feedback from the board on how we want to prioritize the continuum of care coordinated entry system policies, procedures, etc. So some conversation about really re-upping that process, which will essentially in turn kind of think about how we're designing some of our grant funding and other strategies for prioritizing different populations. And in terms of the Children's Fund, very exciting to have that resource. Thank you to the council and the community for voting that in. I'm really just looking at firming up how we want to move forward since we've had a relatively informal process in place prior to having the voters affirm our dedication of this resource to kids to a more formalized process in which the ballot language identifies specific entities or stakeholders to help advise the council on funding moving forward. So conversations are ensuing. The funding is kind of retroactive, right? So we audit and then we think about the funding so that we have a little bit of time to establish that process. And I think that covers my updates. Thank you council member or vice mayor Watkins. Okay, so I will just add with the revenue budget committee we did meet and we had a brief presentation with our finance director and looked at where we are with some of our after some of our reductions. And we looked at projected graphs and looking forward if measure at the revenue measure were to pass versus it not passing. And we also continued to explore other revenue options. And one of those options was exploration into real estate transfer tax and some research done in other cities. For example, San Jose was brought as an example and how they have an tiered approach. And so properties over, you know, a couple million are assessed at a higher rate than those not. And so that creates a larger revenue stream for different cities. We also explored the relationship on the various taxes and what the city receives versus the county receiving and that about concludes that meeting and our other meeting that I attended was the homelessness two by two meeting. And we covered shelter capacity and current and upcoming we have a navigation center and armory location which is up near Dela and the timing of closures of the COVID shelters that the county is running there. And the timing and plan for the safe sleeping and sheltering site that the city is standing up there. We had a home key update housing program capacity outside of the city and we had discussion related to the $14 million that we are receiving a one time fund. Competitive grant awards for Santa Cruz County. And there was PLALHA and I don't remember what that stands for. I apologize. If anyone here knows or remembers what PLHA stands for the acronyms CDBG funds, HDAP funds. And we also had discussion regarding encampment response and relation to our newly adopted homelessness response action plan. And we had discussions around outreach, homework bound flexible funding and county services standing up temporary services around the Benchlands. It's permanent local housing allocation. Thank you permanent local housing allocation. Thank you councilmember Brown for looking that up. And councilmember Cummings. I just had one question since you all got an update on the county, kind of how it's shutting down its services at the armory and we're opening up our services. I'm wondering if there was any update on what will happen with the people who are currently there? Are they being housed? They've been working with, they have teams of folks working with those anybody up there. They've already been reducing it over the past several months. And they have also had a rehousing wave program that has been working to rehouse with housing vouchers. And at two meetings ago, they did give an update on those numbers. I don't have that in front of me, but I'm happy to have those notes given to you. And then one more thing. A member of the public just reached out and they said that it would be good if we speak into the mics because we're speaking a little soft and kind of far away and people who are watching online aren't getting it picked up. Thank you councilmember Cummings. Okay, we're getting used to being back in person. So thank you everyone as we navigate through what's working and what we need to improve on. So I will lean closer to the mic and ask that all council members and anybody speaking lean right into the microphone. Thank you. Okay, moving on with our agenda. If there are any members of the public that would like to speak to any item on our consent agenda with the exception of items pulled by council members. Now is the time to do so. Next up is our consent agenda items eight through 21 on our agenda for members of the public who are streaming this meeting. Please call in with the instructions that are on your screen. Remember to mute your streaming device raise your hand either by dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar controls on your computer. All items will be acted upon in one motion unless an item is pulled by a council member for further discussion. Are there any council members who wish to comment on or pull any items councilmember Cummings. I'd like to pull item number nine and item number 11 councilmember Brown. I would like to pull item 12. I've been asked by members of the public. Council member Cummings is pulling item nine and 11. Councilmember Brown is pulling item 12. I also was going to pull item 12. So I will add that and anybody else. Great. If there are members of the public that would like to speak to any of the items on our consent agenda with the exception of items nine 11 and 12. Now is the time to do so. If you are attending virtually please raise your hand either by dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar controls on your computer. When it's your time to speak you will hear an announcement that you have been unmuted. The timer will then be set to three minutes. Members of the public who are joining us here in chambers and wanting to comment on an item on the consent agenda. Please line up to the right of the dais. You will have three minutes to speak. We request that you sign in to ensure correct spelling of your name in the meeting minutes. However it is not required. Seeing that we have no members in the public I will go to zoom and look at our attendees in zoom. And I have one hand raised. Equity transit. Go ahead and unmute yourself. Thank you city council members for your work and the time you spend on these very long and important agendas. I just want to say also thank you for speaking closer to the mic it was hard to hear some of you. I just want to briefly say because it sounds like the item is being pulled I was going to support opposition to measure and thank you the city council for that I imagine that there are reasons for it being pulled which I don't understand. So that's all I'm going to say at this point. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any. I just wanted to see if we could clarify excuse me to clarify that the reason for having it pulled was so that we can have discussion about it. The caller was disappointed that it was pulled but it's being pulled. Thank you for clarifying council member Brown brought up the clarification that the pulled items 9 11 and 12. We will come back to those items after this time right now this time right now is for the other consent agenda items. If there are any members of the public that would like to speak to items 8 through 21 with with the exception of 9 11 and 12. Now is the time to do so. Okay. Seeing none. I will bring it back to council for a motion on the consent agenda. I'll move the consent agenda. I have a first by council vice mayor Watkins. I'll second that. And a second by council member Myers. Okay. Now we will come back to the pulled items in the consent agenda. I just need to take a roll call vote on the motion. Thank you. We will now have a roll call vote on the motion made. Council member Callentary Johnson. Aye. Council member Golder. No absent. Cummings. Aye. Brown. Aye. Myers. Aye. Watkins. Aye. And Brunner. Mayor Brunner. Aye. Those consent agenda items passes unanimously with Golder absent. May I ask a question around the order? Yes. So I'm just curious, since this is the first time we're meeting in this hybrid format, I'm just curious about, because I know previously when we met in person, we take motions, all those in favor, please say aye. All those opposed, no. And now we're doing, we're going individually. And so I'm just wondering if that's because we're hybrid or... We've never, we've always done a roll call vote. In person we... We've always been a roll call. In the case, when we met in person... We can clarify that for our next meeting. And if you have any further questions, I'm happy to discuss. Thank you. Okay, are we ready to move on? Okay, we are moving on to... We had a pulled item in our consent agenda. Item number nine is the first pulled item. And that was pulled by council member Cummings. Thank you, mayor. This item is the minutes of the April 19th, 2022 city council special meeting related to district elections. During the meeting, I brought up how many members of the public feel that this process has been undemocratic, that district and by ordinance violates the state constitution, and the sixth district number 602 map reduces the percentage of voters of a protected class in concentrated areas, which reflects gender... gerrymandering and perpetuates systemic racism. And so for the record, I would like the motion, the minutes to reflect that council member Cummings voted to oppose the draft map 602 because the process was undemocratic and dilutes concentrated communities of a protected class, specifically Asians and Latinos, which reflects gerrymandering and perpetuates systemic racism under item number two and item number three for the record, council member Cummings voted to oppose the ordinance because changes in the city charter by ordinance is undemocratic and violates the California state constitution. I sent that language to the clerk so they could be put on the screen, but largely just making sure that language is reflected for the record in the minutes. Is that what was said and that it was reflected, or is that what your interpretation is now that you want reflected? Does that matter? I expressed that a number of times during the meeting, and would like that to be reflected in the minutes. Just to clarify, there wasn't the previous initial for the record, so we didn't put it in the minutes as part of the record, because there was a lot of conversation, so we couldn't determine if it was something for the record or not, which is why it's not there. But it was said at the meeting, during the meeting. I would have to go back and clarify that, but I know that there were comments made, and we did not put them in as a record. That's all. Okay, does that clarify your question? Vice Mayor Watkins? Well, yeah, I mean, I think if it's a for the record that was stated that should go in the minutes. That makes a lot of sense, but if it's your interpretation of what your for the record should have been said and now you're trying to change it, I think that's different given that these are, this is an item on the minutes. So I guess if it reflects what was said, then that makes sense, but if it is now different and worded different, I don't know how that works. We can go back and watch the video, and then if this is what it says, we are happy to amend the minutes as reflected, and then if not, maybe we could, I could re-agendize this for approval later. And City Attorney, if you could weigh in. Yes, this is actually addressed in the Council's policy manual. What it says is that the minutes shall be kept by the City Clerk Administrator and shall be recorded in the file, kept for that purpose with a record of each particular type of business transacted by the Council, set off in paragraphs with subheadings. City Clerk shall be required to make a record only of such business as was actually passed by a vote of the Council and shall not be required to make a verbatim transcript of proceedings. A record shall be made of the names of persons addressing the Council, the title of the subject, whether they spoke in support or in opposition to the matter. With regard to remarks from Council members, the rulebook says that a Council member may request through the Presiding Officer the privilege of having an abstract of that member's statements on any subject under consideration by the Council entered in the minutes. And if the Council consents, such statements shall be entered in the minutes. Okay, thank you for clarifying. So we have a clarification from Council Member Cummings regarding the minutes from our special meeting on April 19th. Council Member Myers? Just, I'm curious to hear from our City Attorney. This, I guess these terms are, I mean this statement is pretty definitive. And the way I read it is, does this expose us to any kind of litigation? I don't know how that determination of any of those statements. I would argue in court that it's a lay opinion, not a statement of the law. So I don't see this in and of itself. Exposing the city, the litigation, but it does state facts which, if correct, might support a claim against the city. But it's, like I said, I would characterize it as a lay opinion. And that it wasn't, I mean, given that our demographer had given us legally viable options, and their expert opinion, correct, that this is actually not accurate and that is a lay opinion, correct? That is correct. Our demographer provided the Council with a range of options that the demographer concluded were consistent with the requirements of the California Voting Rights Act and the Council selected among options that were provided by the expert demographer. With regard to item three, I would say that the statement that changing the city charter by ordinance violates the California Constitution is not a legal opinion that I would agree with because cities, several charter cities in California have under the California Voting Rights Act changed to district elections without amending their charters. When last clarifying question. Then for the minutes, would it be that Council member Cummings voted to oppose the draft map 602 because in his opinion he felt as opposed to that being more factually stated or you don't put that in the minutes? Because that would, I think, feel better. Or no. As I said, the Council can authorize statements to be included in the minutes other than the actions that were taken. But it's a Council decision. So really what Council member Cummings is asking the Council is for the Council to authorize these statements to be included in the minutes. The Council should vote on that if that's what, if that's what's requested. So I've read this as a form of emotion that the Council can either accept or reject by vote. Did you have anything to add? No, I was just going to say whenever somebody does a statement for the record, we do it verbatim. No question. Council member Cummings, is that your verbatim statement there after hearing the other comments? The statements that you made are more statements rather than opinion. It's a statement for the rationale. It's a statement of rationale for why I voted the way I did. Great. Thank you. Okay, so we have a motion by Council. It has to go to public comment first. Yes. Did you have one more? Thank you. At this time, we have a motion. Council member Cummings has pulled Agenda Item 9 to include some statements for the record from our April 19th meeting. And I will go out to attendees. On Zoom, we have no attendees in person. And I see one member of the public with their hand raised. If you'd like to raise your hand, press Star 9 on your phone or raise hand in the webinar controls of your computer. So phone number ending in 4844. Go ahead and unmute with Star 6. Can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you. Good. First of all, you skipped over the public comment on 13 and 14 when you were offering an opportunity for the public to speak. I dialed in and for some reason you ignored me, which is unfortunate because I only had a brief comment which is open the bathrooms up. If you're going to be spending this kind of money, it's really important that you actually have people who, members of the public, have access to bathrooms like the San Lorenzo and the Loudon Nelson bathrooms, which they haven't had for several years. However, regarding this particular situation with the minutes, it seems to me that the public needs to have as much and as detailed an understanding of what goes on in city council as they can have. And I've always been concerned when members of the council, perhaps for purposes of simply speed and efficiency and maybe to save a little wear and tear on the city administrator or the city clerk try to cut this short and make it a much more sort of template. Only the actions get recorded and so forth. None of the comment. This also goes for the public. When the public has comments to make, we get so brief a time to actually talk to each other and to the city council, although I feel that most of the time the council follows the directions of the staff and isn't too interested in what the public is saying. So I would say that if a member of the city council, regardless of their political orientation, wants to correct a record or add a statement, I mean, why not show that person the respect to do so? I mean, I would say to the council majority that you may be in this situation at some point in the future and it's just a matter of simple justice. Thank you. That's all I got to say. Thank you for your comment. Are there any other members of the public that would like to comment on agenda item nine and the consent agenda that has been pulled? Seeing none, I will bring it back to council for deliberation. There's no further comment to keep the meeting moving. I'm happy to. Yeah, given that it's actually inaccurate, I mean, I personally don't feel comfortable adding that. So I don't know what the motion would be or what your motion would be to add, but. The motion was what was on the screen. So we can do a roll call vote. It sounds like you may be voting no. Yep. I'm not aware if there was a second. I didn't even get to make the motion. I was still stating it. My understanding was that was your motion. Yeah, so I'll make the motion that was proposed to accept the staff's recommendations of the minutes with the proposed amendments to items number two and three. Thank you. Is there a second? I'll second. So we have a motion by council member Cummings and a second by council member Brown. I have a comment before we go to vote. Okay. And now I will take it for discussion. Council member Calentari Johnson. I'll support the motion, but I just want to comment that these are inaccurate statements and it undermines the work of staff and the work that's been done, but I'll support the motion of my colleague if that's how he would like to be stated for the record. Okay. Any other comments? Thank you, mayor. Council member Myers and then council member Brown. Thank you, mayor. I'm not going to support the motion. I agree that statements are incorrect. And I think there's a way to express the reason for voting against the item without having definitive statements that we believe to be not legally sound. So I'm not comfortable with using our minutes as a way to try to state something that I think our attorney has stated is probably not legally accurate. So I will not be supporting the motion. Typically I would definitely want to honor a member's desire to correct minutes as needed, but not with inaccurate information. Thank you. Thank you. Council member Brown. Yeah, I just wanted to say, you know, I understand the concerns that I'm hearing. However, I wanted to remind my colleagues that we did, you know, that was a pretty intense discussion and we did receive a message from our city clerk afterwards asking us to provide some clarity and succinctness in our making comments for the record because our wonderful city clerk does try to capture that for us and so that was quite difficult, I think, to capture. And so I think that regardless of whether we agree with the statement made, that's the feeling of a particular council member and they were statements that were made during the meeting and so I think supporting it is appropriate at this time and I certainly was reminded and again reminded that making very clear and concise statements for the record will help us not do this moving forward. Thank you, Council member Brown. And I'll just echo what you said. It's very important that as we honor our city clerks during City Clerk's week, especially, that we remind ourselves to make any for the record statements as clear as possible in a mid-discussion and I see this item, Council member Cummings, as not a statement of fact, but a statement of what you wanted to have reflected on your vote and your intention with that meeting and that item. So with that, let's go to a roll call vote. Mayor, Council member Calentari-Johnson. Aye. Boulder, absent Cummings. Aye. Brown. Aye. Meyers. No. Vice Mayor Watkins. No. And Mayor Brunner. Aye. So we have four, two and one absent. Four in favor, two against and one absent. Okay. Moving on to the next polled agenda item. Item number 11 was polled by Council member Cummings. Thank you, Mayor. And I wanted to start by thanking the Council members who brought this item forward. Consistently, you know, since I've at least been on the Council and I would imagine prior to me joining the Council, I know that the Council has been in support of the rail and trail. And what's before us is on item number 11 is opposition to measure D, Santa Cruz County Greenway Initiative and reiterated support for continued rail planning on the Santa Cruz branch line. I've actually pulled this item because just given the sentiment around measure D in the community, I just thought that because there were other items on here that we might have received comment on the providing space for this item to receive independent comment was probably something that the community would appreciate. And so I actually pulled this for the purposes of allowing community members to specifically have their public comment time allocated towards this item as opposed to it being included with all the other items. And so I just want to express my support and that concludes my comments. Thank you, Council member Cummings. Are there any questions from Council members? Council members, I will take it out to public comment. Okay. So now I will take it out to public comment for item number 11 on our consent agenda. And I will be allowing members of the public in person as well as on Zoom to make public comment. And we do have a member of the public in person for item number 11. If you can step to the right and sign your name. And I will just look out to attendees in Zoom as well. It looks like we have four attendees with their hands raised. So if you are an attendee on Zoom and you would like to comment on item number 11, opposition to measure D, Santa Cruz County Greenway initiative and reiterated support for continued rail planning on the Santa Cruz branch rail line, you can press star nine on your phone or select raise hand in the webinar controls on your computer. And when it's your turn to speak, you will hear an announcement that you have been unmuted and the timer will then be set to three minutes. I will begin with our member of the public in person here at council chambers. So you may approach the microphone. Thank you. And please try to speak into the microphone. I will. Thank you. Thank you council members for bringing this to actually public but also consent agenda. I very much support your opposition to measure D. I am a bicyclist. I'm a walker, but I also love trains and other forms of rail transportation. We need it. We are in dire need of more public transportation. And having written Amtrak and San Jose public transportation on rails, I find it both a community very enticing and pleasant way of transportation. I think we need to preserve it for the future. Whether we have a light rail at this point or a PRT at some point, that is up to the future council members to decide, but do not do away with the rail. You will need it later. So thank you for your opposition. Please vote for the opposition to measure D. And I hope the public thinks, studies it and thinks carefully about what they're doing. Thank you. Did I say my name? No. Matilda Rand. Matilda Rand. Thank you very much for your public comment. I will go out to zoom attendees and we can come back to in person chambers if there are any more members of the public on this item in person. But for now I will go out to our zoom attendees. I see Brian trail now. Go ahead and unmute yourself by pressing star six. Yes, thank you. This is Brian peoples with trail now local organization been organization for 10 for over a decade in transportation. And we're strongly advocating for you to not support no on D. At the end of the day, the RTC staff is moving forward with rail banking, which is preserving the coastal corridor for future transit. That's not the debate. That isn't the debate. For the greenway initiative. What it is, is it is giving direction to the county staff to update the general plan to give us more options right now. Our hands are tied. We only have rail. It's roll rail only. What the county staff needs is that option options with rubber wheels on asphalt transit. That's what we need. You're making it actually more difficult for our community to achieve grants. We are now in any position to get rail grants. The RTC executive director guy Preston specifically said that we would have to spend millions just to do a 30% design for a rail. And then we'd have to do that. Then we got to compete with LA. We got to compete with all these local large facilities. It just isn't madding up. So we're truly asking you to not stir the pot more. RTC staff is negotiating with the rail advocate. Rory can miss Clark. Don't tie his hands. Don't step on him. That's you all need to support staff. And that's what we're asking you to do. So please do not oppose this. And think of Watsonville. You all got your trail in Santa Cruz. Yeah, great. But Watsonville, South County, Aptos, all Capitola, you have yours. We need to open up the coastal trail now. So please do not support this radical opposition. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your input. Our next member of the public is Pauline Seals. Go ahead and press star six. Thank you, Mayor, for this chance to speak. Brian Peoples, as part of our group, has been trying to rip out the trail for years. They are against public transport. They have a very limited vision. I'm so happy that the council is going to vote no on this. We need public transportation for climate fighting and social justice reasons. The people who are stuck every day on Highway 1 in their effort to get to jobs at Dominican hospital, the county offices, metro drivers, et cetera, have no other way to get here and can't afford to live here. It's a bad situation. Also, Measure D would slow things down. There's one section of trail already built, where I live on West Side, and three more sections that are shovel-ready that will be delayed and put on hold. So, Measure D will definitely not help us get a trail. It's the exact opposite. I am speaking on behalf of Santa Cruz Climate Action Network, which has 1,700 members. Thank you very much. Thank you for your comment. Our next member of the public is David Hart Public Transit. Go ahead and press star six to unmute yourself. Good afternoon, esteemed city council members. This is David Van Brink. Thanks for all you do. I do have a prepared statement. Can you hear me okay? Yes. Okay, this is my prepared statement. Please support resolution opposing Measure D. Please tell everyone. This concludes my prepared statement. Thank you for listening and thanks for all your efforts. Carry on. Thank you. Our next member of the public is Matt Farrell. Go ahead and press star six to unmute yourself. Good afternoon, council members. I just wanted to point out that proponents of Measure D are not being truthful. What Measure D does is it amends the general plan and removes all references to rail planning or study, as I'm sure you are aware, and inserts only the development and authorization for a greenway. So to pretend that somehow these people are supporting transit is a falsehood. And secondly, I just like to say that as Pauline and Matilde have mentioned, the trail is under progress now. And moving forward with rail banking will delay all that work, which is what the proponents are recommending. So thank you so much for bringing this resolution forward, and we deeply appreciate your support. Thank you. Our next member of the public is Equity Transit. Welcome. Hi, thank you. This is Lonnie Faulkner with Equity Transit. I just want to remark, Brian Peeples mentioned earlier about rubber wheels on our tracks. I just have to say as a biochemical endocrinologist that our rubber tire industry has been directly related to a huge, huge rise over the last 50 to 70 years of autism, cancers, Alzheimer's, all sort of untold diseases. I could go on and on and give you lots of data behind that. But I just want to say that Measure D is not Democratic. Greenway has been controlling the message and misinformation campaign alongside Trail Now, which the earlier speaker was a part of. And we really can't have a Democratic vote unless the public understands fully what they're voting on. And with the current misinformation campaign, I support you in voting to oppose Measure D. I also want to say that Measure D does not guarantee us a trail. Of course, they have to attack and destroy Felton's Roaring Camp line in order to attack our line and destroy our line. We are already building a trail now. We have the 2014 award-winning Monterey Bay Sanctuary Scenic Trail that it was awarded the master plan. We are building that now. So we will have a trail and a rail. We can have both. And we have huge amounts of money that are coming available through the state rail plan as well as through the federal infrastructure bill, which I have attended some of the grant workshops. But really there are activities that have to be done before we can get access to those funds. And right now Greenway has managed to put a stick in the mud and stop those processes. The removal of the rails from the general plan, all wording around rail and from the general plan for our branch line basically will prevent us from doing anything, including applying for grants and moving forward on bringing a clean electric light rail in our community. And we can have both. Rail and trail is a true multimodal system. The systems that are now being built throughout the world, systems that the top environmental activists and scientists throughout the world are promoting is exactly what we can have here. We've been noted by a number of top government officials throughout the country that I've talked to who have said our system is a very front running system would be eligible for a lot of money. But that information is actually being squelched by Greenway and trail now. And then just having conversations with underrepresented communities, people with disabilities, the elderly, having both rail and trail serves equity, the environment and our future economy and our future children. So thank you for bringing this up and bringing it for the option to vote to oppose measure D. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your comment. Our next member of the public is Maggie Alma. Hi, welcome. Hi, can you hear me? Yes. Yeah, hi. I'm the committee chairman for the climate committee for the Santa Cruz Sierra Club. And I'm also the committee chair for the Santa Cruz for Bernie climate committee. And at the state level, the Sierra Club has opposed measure measure D and they have opposed it for many reasons, but specifically if measure D passes, then it will require that not only they take up the rail track, but they remove all of the ballast underneath it that some six feet wide and three feet deep of gravel and rocks. And those rocks are contaminated now with chromium, which means that this stuff once removed, we'll have to go to a one grade below a superfund site, which will be hauled away in trucks. It will cost tens of millions of dollars according to our calculations. So it's incredibly important that the public and the county and the city do not support this measure because it is going to cost everybody a lot of money. And above and beyond that, we do need public transit. We have now a plan to connect our rail with the Monterey County rail and with the ultimate light rail that's going to be going around the Bay Area. And that in fact will connect with a bullet train that will go to LA and down to Mexico. And all of this is insanely important for the future of the climate. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Our next member of the public has a phone number ending in 8359. Yes. Hi. Hello. Hello there. Yeah. Hi. My name is Laurence Guernty and I thank you so much for putting this on the agenda today. And I wholeheartedly support your position to measure these. I want the trail and the rail. And as we all know, the transportation sector is responsible for more than 40% of all greenhouse gas emissions in our county. We really need the rail and public transportation options. That is the really the only solution. The climate emergency worsens every day and we must absolutely do everything to curb auto emissions. And again, the public transportation must be a part of the solution. Thank you. Thank you. Our next member of the public via Zoom is Barry Scott. Hi there. Hi. Thank you, council. And my name is Barry Scott. I live in Aptos. I'm the chair of the Mid County Democratic Club. And I want to say how proud I am of all three candidates for supervisor who presented to our club and expressed absolute opposition to this terrible idea called measure D. I'm proud of the work that you've done before in your opposition to the unanimous vote to oppose adverse abandonment of the Felton line and the Santa Cruz main branch rail line. And I'm going to presume that you all realize that several studies have resulted in the every single time that rail transit is the right thing to do for our community and for our future. And the idea that an initiative can be put out there that would reduce our options and it really there's no question now that what Greenway plans to do is simply remove our rail line forever. It's absurd and it's it's it's awful. And we are also encouraged that the council would come up with would would would bring to the agenda this resolution and I I hope we see another unanimous vote in support of the resolution. Thank you so much. Thank you for your comment. Our last member of the public from Zoom is Garrett Phillip. Yeah hello. I wasn't going to speak to this but since a lot of people are speaking I would just say that I'm not as confident as you are that rail is a cost effective or will anytime soon be a mass transportation option even though you would really like it to be. I'm not endorsing the Greenway but it's going before the voters and I'm not so sure you need to weigh in on this one. They will decide you can all go vote in June like they do. Thanks. Thank you for your comment and now I'd like to bring it back to in person chambers. Are there any other members of the public that would like to speak to this agenda item. Please come forward. Thank you. Welcome. Good afternoon council members. It's really good to see you back here again and I think you should rejoice and kind of wallow in this niceness for a moment that sounds like most of us agree about what we're talking about here right now and I just want to say that the production of this conversation is very valuable the city of Santa Cruz and makes Santa Cruz a shining star for what good government should be like and I just want to say that this measure D I agree with you so happens by coincidence is a good example of a bad example in community government in citizens participation it's an example of one of the worst things money could buy of not participating in the process and instead of having one or two people's ideas come out and be bought and paid for at huge expense and I'll just give you an example because you probably all got the same 11 by 17 flyer on your doorstep that I got in fork pick four colors very expensive to drop door to door at every doorstep in the county and inside it I don't know if others picked up on this but inside it is a section of the rail line I think it's down around La Selva Beach or someplace like that where there's this little urban community just a little tiny urban community right at the beach and it showed the rail line right there which parallels the road in front of those four or five businesses and it shows it turned into another road so here's the existing road which is more than adequate for the small village and another road next to it and it shows the lie that these people are telling because the rail line is gone there's more paved roads there's about four lanes separated by curbs all visible in this fairly big picture and they're throwing this in our face and saying here's what we're advocating well I'm sorry these are the few people who are not in tune with our community and I'm thrilled that you guys are doing this production and be happy about this and be happy that there is agreement amongst us and maybe that can rub off on some of the things thank you for your comment that concludes public comment on this pulled item number eleven on today's agenda I will bring it back to council for action and deliberation is there any council member that would like to make a motion and we can continue with discussion I'll move we have a second it motion by council member Calentari Johnson to approve the motion as stated as stated in the agenda report thank you I just wanted to confirm seconded by council member Myers are there any council member comments council member Brown yeah I'll just make a quick comment I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this item to our agenda I do believe it's a really important step for us to take as a city to reflect what I believe is a will of the city of Santa Cruz and you know we've had a lot of opportunities to support moving forward and and this I see as a real attempt to block that forward progress so I just really appreciate you bringing it forward for all of the reasons that are discussed in the resolution I'm gonna support it I also wanted to add that council member Golder who is unfortunately not here she has a conflict today did want me to share with you all and with the public that were she to be here she would be supporting this and appreciates you bringing it forward as well thank you council member Brown any other comments I would like to say I believe this item does can is consistent with past and present council direction and action we've all unanimously taken a stance opposing measure D so this is an opportunity to make that clear and support with that we will do a roll call vote on some members Calentary Johnson I older no absent coming I Brown I Myers I vice mayor Watkins I and Mayor Brunner I that motion passes five in favor one six in favor one absent okay we are now moving on to pulled item number 12 on our consent agenda this is item Senate bill 886 California Environmental Quality Act exemption for University of California housing developments and I asked to pull it and to ask if we can continue consider a motion to can continue this item to our next meeting based on all the community input we've received on this item and in looking at the urgency of the timing of this at the state level I think it warrants a further research and information from the public as well as council members and I know that council member Brown also pulled this item so I'll hand it to you sure I just wanted to you know I don't have much to say here I did have a conversation with some members of the public who are not very happy about our bringing this forward who have you know different perspective about the urgent need for housing on for student housing on campus and so I did say I'd pull the item however I'll just say right now that it has not changed my perspective on what to do here and so I do want to have the opportunity for folks to engage in that dialogue but thus far I have not been persuaded so I didn't pull it to change course but I did want to give that opportunity council member Myers yeah I just wanted to yeah the more research that I've been able to do as well as what up from what I understand from the bill history that there's a hearing tomorrow in the senate environmental quality committee this bill seems to be still under revision and even though I definitely support some of the intent behind what this bill is trying to do which is to really make sure that you know housing built on campus is is available and able to be completed sequel is an important law and I've talked with some of the folks who have been upset about the opposition of this and explain that you know as a jurisdiction whereby the University of California is you know conducting development you know we need to maintain the ability to have mitigation that is you know that it addresses conf potential impacts within our community and it should be binding mitigation and so from what I understand hearing about some of the amendments that are going on in the bill over the last few days it does seem to be changing and I think it's wise to look at a more current version of the bill today in interaction so I would support them the motion to table thank you council member Calentari Johnson yeah I'll reiterate the same sentiments I think it's at a critical moment and I would be interested in seeing what it looks like after it's gone to committee and I would be in support of tabling it as well any other council member comments council member vice mayor Watkins I just want to make sure that we're it's clear to clarify that you're proposing a motion to continue the item to a future agenda not to table it yes you're right sorry yes yes I'm sorry no problem so I'm supportive of doing that I'm for coffee thank you thank you council member Cummings thank you mayor yeah I'll just say that I haven't as an author on this I wasn't aware of the changes that were being made I know there's some people have been trying to reach out and but was not aware that this is going to be continuing because my understanding was that this was going to session this was going to be in session either today or tomorrow and that was the reason why we were pushing to make sure that it got on the agenda and so that we could take a stance before it was voted on and so that's the reason why it's been coming so quickly and I know that we've you know that's part of the reason why we wanted to hear it today and so I'm just it would be great to understand when we're expecting this to be voted on at the state level because I think you know what we want to do is ensure that we're supporting not only communities needs but the actions that have been taken by our county supervisors and supporting you know ensuring that the voice of the community is being heard at the state level and that the state's aware of our position before this is voted on and there was some you know difficulty of getting this on this agenda and I know that staff put in a lot of effort into this to us and took our feedback and interest into account and so getting some clarification on that especially given how we brought this forward with such urgency I think would be great so that we can in the community can understand you know why we're holding off on taking action today. Thank you council member Cummings I completely agree and one of the reasons I brought this suggestion forward was as of today or this morning I learned that there is a hearing tomorrow and for us to submit any type of letter of support or opposition is too late for tomorrow's hearing and so given that there is still time to give our input I thought it would be best to see where tomorrow's hearing brings as well as hearing based on input from the community hearing about how there's a lot this is such an important item and we want to make sure that our community impacts are really the intentions of this are really clear in this bill and understood so. And mayor if I may yes and thanks for the question council member Cummings because there is always time sensitivity to these bills as they're making their way through the committee process so it's already has been mentioned today there's a hearing scheduled tomorrow with the Senate Environmental Quality Committee it will then depending upon what changes are recommended through that committee's review will move on to the appropriations committee so we did have an opportunity today to connect with our state lobbyists and they recommended waiting to see what happens with tomorrow's hearing and that we will have time to weigh in on influencing the bill as it moves on to appropriations so we'll continue to track that closely and we can plan to have this back on for May 10th of that if that made sense. Can I ask a follow-up question? Yes go ahead council member Cummings. Do you have any sense of when this is supposed to be heard by the Appropriations Committee? That to my understanding has not been scheduled yet and it will depend on what type of changes come out of the hearing with environmental quality. There are likely to be amendments that are made through that process and that will determine when it will come forward to appropriations. I have a question. Council member Meyers. The only other option would be and I don't know how we would register this based on what the mayor just stated but I don't know if we could oppose unless amended. City manager Huffaker just to go on record as opposed unless amended and obviously amendments are underway and I know that that probably can't be registered by tomorrow's meeting but it could potentially just very simple letter. That would be an alternative motion potentially. The mayor that could basically state that at this point without further amendment the bill won't work for us as a city that would be willing to make that alternative motion or at least have that discussion if my colleagues are interested. But I'm also in agreement that we can continue the item and most bills are in session right now and they're very busy time up there right now. So I just that might be another option to look at. Council member Brown. Thank you mayor. I just I was that was what I had raised my hand to put forward as a possibility. No, no, you were ahead of me. So you know I do think that I mean that is common practice. The League of Cities does this. They make recommendations all the time for local jurisdictions to proceed in that fashion of either supporting or opposing legislation as written or unless amended and so my preference would be that we make that that statement today. We've known about this committee hearing and that it was going to be heard at this committee for a while now. What we don't know is what the nature of the amendments will be. I've heard some discussion about what is intended, but obviously there that will be fully fleshed out tomorrow. But my preference would be to take the position today. We our staff has done a lot of preparation that kind of the conditions for opposition have not changed for me. And so my preference would be to move forward today with a motion to support this with the I guess a change of the language to include that we're directing the mayor to send a letter. So I guess I'll make the motion unless is there an official motion on the table? No. We haven't gone out to the public. That's right. So no, I'm not going to make the motion yet, but I would like to see that happen today and including language unless amended seems appropriate. Any other questions on this item? I will go out to public comment. I will begin with members in zoom. And if there are members in the public who would like to comment on public item on this item number 12 on our agenda, you can sign in at the front to the right of the dais. So going out to attendees in zoom with their hand raised, you can raise your hand by pressing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand feature on the webinar controls of your computer. And the first member of the public has the name Joseph Thompson. Go ahead and press star six to unmute yourself. Hello. Yeah. My name is Tom Thompson. I am speaking to you on behalf being a UC Santa Cruz students working at our local Starbucks. And also as a candidate now for state assembly. I'm asking you guys to really support SB 886 and not this motion. The main reason behind it is because after taking the time to actually read the bill, I think it's not only a good bill and not only for students but also any person who supports housing projects that favor affordable housing people, specifically low income people such as myself. And recently I submitted a letter to the council describing specifically about how SB 886 will only exempt the individual projects from CEQA, not the guiding plans. That determination really looks at the location, environmental like mitigations of the university expansion. The projects still have to comply with all sustainable building codes of both the state and university standards. The CEQA exemption only streamlines the environmental review process for housing or university owned land that is not environmentally sensitive. So it still has most of CEQA intact. It's just really streamlining the process and really making sure that with the UC Santa Cruz students being over 9% are homeless. We need to build affordable housing and there was recently a housing project a few years back which would have provided about 3,000 additional beds because of CEQA this is still held up in the process because of this. And SB 886 would really stream on that process to make sure we have beds and affordable housing for students on campus. And recently about two days ago I went door knocking on campus talking to people about the campaign and other issues. The biggest issue for students overall is affordable housing. Every single person I talked to their main concern was affordable housing and it's really because this issue not only hits home but also really affects students mental health, their ability to educate and learn themselves. Students should not have to worry about affordable housing in a city like Santa Cruz and not have to worry about affordable housing and also have to worry about people who are not going to school. Again, I urge the council to support SB 886 and against agenda item number 12. Specifically, Rob and I are supporting SB 886 so we really appreciate you guys to move forward with us and look forward at really taking the time to not only look through the actual bill and really understand the environmental impacts but also understand to look like we're supporting the populations that need it the most. Again, thank you for your time. I really appreciate the council considering this motion and I appreciate and hopefully you guys will vote for SB 886. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Our next member of the public has the name Zane Sanchez. Welcome Zane. I think from the perspective of another UCSC student which I am and I urge you all to support UCSC campus housing. I actually was affected by the lack of housing in Santa Cruz. I was unfortunately pushed into homelessness in a way. Luckily I had family that lived nearby but I saw many other people who had to leave the area or who had to stay in hotels for multiple weeks and I as well as other people who were in my same position did not have the ability to stop looking for housing. It was a continuous search all the time so I do think it's important that we do increase the student housing on campus and for the council members that say that they support that idea but not specifically the bill. I do hope that you in the future support other bills that encourage student housing. Thank you. Thank you. Our next member of the public is Zenon Yolayate-Crow. Hi, thank you very much. My name is Zenon Yolayate-Crow. I'm a first year politics major and president of the Student Housing Coalition at UCSC. I really want to thank you all today for the dialogue around this motion. It's really important to us as an organization as we are co-authoring the bill and really looking at the UCSC situation. This is where this bill was born out of. Really to go over some quick things. Only in this year only about 65% of freshmen applicants to a UC were admitted compared to 84% in 1990. We've seen that across the state UCs have been affected by the lack of ability to build housing on campuses and that's resulting in our access to opportunity and access to education decreasing significantly. When we talk about the bill today before you, we really want to make clear that this bill does not exempt the long-range development plans from CEQA. Currently universities have prepared California Environmental Quality Act reports for both the long-range development plans and each project under those plans but SB 886 only exempts the individual projects from CEQA not the guiding plans that determine the location and environment mitigations of university expanses. We see that, you know, having LRDPs as a process for legal enforceable local input is really important in the process of building student housing and so we really want to safeguard that and as said allow for those LRDPs through the settlement process to be carried out as right now what you'll have is individual projects being proposed and then sued even while they're trying to carry out the original LRDPs that were sued and settled under and so really what we're asking today is we know we've received a lot of really good feedback on this bill and we've taken those considerations and we're hoping to introduce a lot of different amendments at the committee tomorrow and so what we're asking is maybe we could potentially pursue a support if amended to position to go ahead and, you know, take into account a lot of the things people are saying in terms of wanting to directly tie student housing to things that to making sure it is incorporated under the long range development plans and to making sure they're adequate mitigation measures when it comes to construction, when it comes to traffic management when it comes to reducing our greenhouse gas emissions and VMT miles traveled so I really implore you guys to please go ahead and support this bill with amendments today and keep in mind that, you know, while we make these decisions while we push for these bills there are 9% of students at UC Santa Cruz homeless and 20% of community college students are homeless so it's not a problem that doesn't go but go away by the day so I really appreciate you for the time and thank you so much Thank you for your comment our next member of the public is Ray Diaz Good afternoon City Council thank you again for allowing me to speak so kind of just echoing some of the remarks that some of my fellow students have made I am as well a student at UCSC and I do want to bring it back to the issue that SB886 would only solve a problem that has been ongoing for years now a lot of electives have been asking for a solution and here it is, here is a solution that students have brought forward and have taken all the way to the state legislature have taken time out of our days long hours, long nights to present a state bill that can genuinely solve a problem going back to the issue low income BIPOC students who are directly impacted by housing and security we just finished up with campus elections here at UCSC and the biggest issue that we heard all around throughout this campus throughout 17,000 undergraduate students was that housing is the biggest issue and knowing that they want to have secure housing going and moving forward so I urge this council to also support SB886 and go more indebted to law and to the bill and read into what's actually the language pertaining to the CEQA guidelines but appreciate your time, thank you so much for the opportunity to speak and I urge this council to support SB886, thank you Thank you for your comment Our next member of the public is Bodie Shargle Welcome Hello Yeah, thank you to the council for hearing public comment as always My name is Bodie Shargle I'm a first-year student at UCSC co-chair of the YDSA which includes the Student Housing Coalition as well as a lifelong Santa Cruz County resident I'm actually on campus right now I dipped out of a lecture to make this comment so I'll try and keep this as quick as I can I'm urging the council like everyone else to support SB886 This is really important to the whole issue of housing in Santa Cruz County It seems like the conversation often goes where someone says that we need more affordable housing in the county then someone's in opposition to that they bring up something about students making housing more expensive and that's true students do make housing more expensive along with the incredible economic impacts that they bring to our community and they say that students should be living on campus and I completely agree with that but the fact of the matter is that there's not enough housing on campus for all the students because of things like Zika lawsuits so SB886 is the next logical step to addressing this problem that students can't find housing on campus The fact of the matter is that we need more housing on campus if we want to solve the housing crisis in Santa Cruz and if you if someone will have that previous conversation and then not support SB886 I can't then go and believe that they're pro housing if you have that conversation and then you oppose SB886 the fact of the matter is to me you're not a progressive you're not pro housing you don't want to improve housing in the community so I was really disappointed by the result with the county board of supervisors a couple weeks ago and I'm urging the council here to support SB886 thank you thank you for your comment our next member of the public is Reggie press star 6 to unmute yourself hi can you hear me yes hi I guess this comment is really just like the broader public who might be on this call um this is an issue where I feel like we need to support the students um in their call to make this change the regulations because I know that there's like concerns about the environment and sometimes these concerns are legitimate but historically they really have not been and the housing situation just from my like personal amount of experience knowing a couple students is truly dystopian on campus people are crowded they're paying way too much money and it's true that if the campus you see system is using this housing in a very unethical way a lot of the time they're charging market rate rents that are totally unaffordable to students and it is within their incentives to make this housing unaffordable um but you know that's just the situation it's better for us to build this housing um we've already got hopefully the empty home tax to put pressure on the housing to be like a little bit lower price and not hold a lot of vacancies so we have to like have at least the resource there and then we can fight for it to be more affordable but as a stand and seek has been used to just stop all production and we have to get past this and we have to as like a left wing constituency be united here uh and not get like some of us you know don't have the same sort of urgency on this issue just as some of us don't have the same urgency on deep unpoliced or abolition but we have to respect the urgency of some of our uh you know folks of different communities and we have to push for it as though it is our issue as well so thank you thank you for your input our next member of the public is Philip Boutel welcome thank you mayor and council members I just want to echo I'll just say I'm a local resident I'm a homeowner and I support what that earlier caller said that the council is going to take a position today I think that instead of saying you you know are against it unless amended you should say support unless amended because this is really a solution driven bill and we're all after solutions and you know all bills go through the legislature and they come up with amendments to make them a little better as people you know come up with the fix the kinks and stuff and this is a great opportunity to have that input and find out what do we want because like the previous another caller said this still keeps most of sequel intact still has the environmental protections intact permits are still required etc it just makes it a little quicker and we really need that more than anything so I'm hoping you will take the support if amended position if you are going to take position today thank you thank you for your input are there any members in the chamber that would like to comment on agenda item number 12 please step forward I again council members Ed Porter resident of Santa Cruz and I think I'm pleased with the debate that has taken place here and the discussion that you would consider amending or revisiting in the next meeting presumably but I'm delighted that council member Myers and council member Brown council member Conning supported some statement of importance along with that today and I think that can be gotten to our legislators especially our local ones in a timely fashion for tomorrow's hearings in Sacramento so that's a great step but I really believe that CEQA is being the whipping boy for this housing problem it's not a CEQA problem it's a problem of UCSC since it was founded in Santa Cruz and probably all the other campuses too but certainly here I know about that certainly here UCSC has failed to ever provide housing for even 50% of the students who attend the campus and the rest are thrown into this city and now there's pressure to build here and oh by the way let's build more on campus which is an obvious solution and throw out CEQA what a ridiculous thing well I'll just tell you historically it's hard to look at California and understand why that's a bad thing but just read some history of the United States especially looking at New York where housing has been a major issue and a major problem for more than 100 years and in fact before any of us were born huge tenements were built in the city of New York under the same kinds of concepts as throwing out CEQA forget environmental quality forget any impediments just because developers told a lie that we couldn't build because environmental quality was held in too high of a standard in too high of a level of importance CEQA is critically important and I just want to remind I support the students who say yes there's a housing problem I agree wholeheartedly but to corner me and to say as one of the collars just said that if I'm not in favor of Senate Bill 886 that I'm not with them well I'm sorry that's wrong I am with them they deserve as they have said to have affordable housing and to have adequate numbers of units so that there are no homeless students of course how could we disagree we agree but CEQA is not the culprit here the culprit here is the university as I said that forever has not provided the housing and this bill should be targeted to that problem and not targeting CEQA thank you for your comment are there any other members here in the chambers that would like to speak to this item number 12 on our agenda I'm Matilda Rand I'm very much in favor of you opposing 866 and possibly looking for the amendments I agree with Ed Porter when he says that CEQA is not the problem CEQA has been helping California quite a bit so off the bed we cannot just do away with a proven legislation and an act that has helped us both locally and throughout state I am very disappointed with some of the statements that the students made I do believe that no I don't believe I know we have a housing problem and the housing problem is not just for students I am looking at my students who grew up here in our county and can't find any housing or decent jobs that pay them enough to afford the housing so we need to look at the overall picture of what are we doing for housing how are we creating more housing how do we get people off the street I think we need to really have a comprehensive plan and not just because students at this point are screaming we need housing we need housing and they have a bull horn and they have people running for assembly that's not the solution to the problem the problem is we are not phasing and not heading on straight forward the housing problem let's build a plan a comprehensive plan do not approve or be complicit with any bill that says well we need housing there so we will just lax the requirements for them CQA is not here for nothing so please continue with your conversation I hope you enjoyed and I would say vote for the opposing of the 866 with the inclusion of possible amendments thank you thank you for your comment we have zoom attendee Mitra Zarinabaf if you would like to press star 6 to unmute yourself my name is Mitra apologies if my internet is making my voice a little scraggly I'm a third year student at UC Santa Cruz I have lived at Santa Cruz for the past three years and I'm here in support of SB 886 I do want to add that the housing crisis is of course insane in Santa Cruz and all throughout the UCs especially UCs that are in small towns but CQA for the last decade UCs have had to face these CQA lawsuits and stated specific housing that is meant to expand students and also ensure that the environment is being taken care of specific examples are theater living and UCSC UCLA Extension at UCLA Student Housing West here at Santa Cruz People's Park at UC Berkeley and Aggie Square at UC Davis I also want to add that SB 886 is still taking consideration of the environment it does not want to erase CQA entirely with those environmental standardizations I would like to add that there are still environmental quotas and regulations to ensure that we aren't destroying the land that we're on it's to simply create a streamlined process for housing of students as an RA2 I would like to add that over 500 people apply to this position and we can only accept about 40% of them and the insane amount of people that did apply is due to the housing crisis that we have here and that we haven't been able to build student housing on campus so here again in support of SB 886 also support SB 886 in consideration of students and future students at UC Santa Cruz Thank you Thank you for your comment You did cut in and out a little bit but I think we were able to get the majority of your comment Our next member of the public via Zoom is Hunter G Welcome Hello Thank you for discussing this here today to the council members and I just really love the inspiring comments from our community members but yeah, I'm a community member here at Santa Cruz and I just really want to urge the council to support Senate Bill 886 and also support I have amended Some of the two communities here in Santa Cruz are the workers and people who are trying to work here and find something that's affordable for students that we've all heard I've seen time and time again in a lot of these meetings a lot of the workers coming in and saying hey, we need more housing on UC Santa Cruz campus they're competing with all of the local renters here like finding rental units so one of the projects like student housing was and just like other future projects that are slated could actually alleviate like units being built just think about that process in like 2-3,000 less people competing for rental units with the workers here and people who were locals here in Santa Cruz but are being slowly pushed out further and further into other communities along with the students so it's really one of those times like where I've talked to a lot of people and I also on a lot of the stuff for like the long-range development plan talk to a lot of people who go to those and community members and this is the one thing that we're all generally really supportive of I think there's been some confusion and some of the other community members opposing it saying that it's going to somehow get rid of CEQA but really it's in a way like focusing the importance of the LRDP and CEQA because it still upholds the CEQA laws so I don't understand why there's confusion there because it's not at all like getting rid of CEQA laws those are still a very strong thing in the LRDP so I totally support Senate Bill 8-6 and I really hope the council members do as well if amended because it's one of those times where all of the community is just kind of watching this and we're like yeah we want more housing built so we're just hoping that council members and you guys kind of help fulfill that promise and just like seeing who we're going to vote for in the future election this year based on this because there's a lot of attention brought to this meeting today so I just really appreciate it and thank you thank you for your comment our next member of the public is Benjamin Breen go ahead and press star 6 to unmute yourself hi can you hear me yes I would just like to say thank you to the city council for listening to the voices of students on this issue and I'm a faculty member at UC Santa Cruz I know this is a divisive issue but I really want to say that the student housing coalition and the movement for housing on campus has been bringing a lot of needed change and I think it's important to listen to them on this I believe that there are people on both sides with valid points however the inaction on housing especially the inaction on building housing on campus is inexcusable and we need to do better so I think it's sending the wrong message to oppose this bill and I urge you to reconsider that motion thank you very much thank you for your comment it looks like that concludes our public comment I will now bring it back to council and we have a council member Brown who I believe is ready to make a motion I am I was too ready before I am ready now I want to thank members of the public for speaking and I will I do have some comments to make but first I'd like to make a motion to direct the mayor to send a letter opposing senate bill 886 which would exempt University of California on campus housing developments from complying with the California environmental quality act with the addition of opposition unless amended can you clarify that please so it's a I'm just trying to use a standard phrase that is used when oppose unless amended it just is used by community constituents the general public when they are weighing in on legislation so that's just the standard language that's used oppose unless amended so I guess it would be send a letter opposing senate bill 886 unless amended I have a question for city attorney maybe I would like to oppose the bill unless amended would mean if it were to be amended it would we would have the opportunity to come back with that item correct I would think so I am familiar with instances in which for instance the League of California cities takes a position to oppose unless amended in a certain way it might be useful to have to give some thought to how the city would support it if it were amended but presumably if that was the limit of the council's motion and it is amended then we can bring it back to the council for consideration of the future I guess my clarification also considering that through several amendments how that process would look like would we be reviewing it each time it's amended or as a standard phrase what does that actually mean what's the definition that's great question I think just as the council was discussing this I did go on to the legislature's website and put in the information to track the bill so that if it is amended I'll get notification and other council members if you're interested can do that as well just plug you know just google the bill number and it'll take you directly to the legislature's webpage where they have all that information and mayor if I may the staff report also makes clear a number of concerns related to the existing bill in its current form so I think what I would suggest and as I mentioned the council member Brown's request to be unless amended based on the concerns raised in that staff report and city attorney's point we will continue to closely track this bill as it moves through and if appropriate if there's additional action that the council may want to weigh in on we can certainly bring it back at a future date thank you for that clarification so we have a motion by council this is on item number 12 on our consent agenda to oppose senate bill 886 unless amended and is there a second we have a second by council member Myers and now we're open for discussion I was wondering if I could make a friendly amendment with my vote and with my second which would be adding language to the motion that city its current stance is opposed unless amended reflecting issues brought up in the staff in the staff report letter would reflect that yeah I think you mean the agenda report I'm sorry we did sign that agenda report yes can I just ask for clarification I assume the motion is to direct the mayor to send a letter expressing the council's opposition unless amended to reflect the concerns raised in the agenda report yes thank you council member Callentary Johnson had some comments I think it's premature for us to send this message I think that this item deserves more conversation and a presentation we heard from some community members I'm sure there are other community members who would like to weigh in I won't belabor the points about the homelessness and the housing crisis I know we all know that but I think if it's not urgent and our decision isn't going to impact what's going to happen in committee tomorrow it doesn't feel right for us to take a position right now we haven't this was on consent we haven't had a formal presentation and it just seems premature and rushed council member Cummings and then council member Brown so I just have some comments you know and also I want to say that council member Brown council member Myers and myself have both sat on the UCSC task force for two years up until we dissolved it earlier this year and so this is something that we've been tracking and working on and following and getting input from the community on for quite some time I just want to first start by you know expressing that one I'm a renter and so this you know the housing crisis directly impacts me because with my income I don't have an opportunity to buy a house in this community any time soon I've fought for things like rent control which have failed but you know we've continued to move forward with approving many affordable housing projects trying to increase the amount of affordable housing in our new developments and one thing I just really want to point out to the students and members of public who called in regarding this item is that I totally agree with that you know we need to provide more affordable housing and the campus also needs to provide more affordable housing but the concern I have and this is coming from myself being an environmental scientist is that one there's a real slippery slope that you start you know that you get on if you start making exceptions to CEQA because if we make exceptions for the university then developers are going to say well I'm trying to put in housing in these areas I know that the community needs housing you should exempt us from CEQA then affordable housing developers will say you should exempt us from CEQA then small people who are single family homeowners who may want to you know build on their lots I mean obviously they're exempt from CEQA but I think the point is that we want to be careful with starting to have these exemptions from CEQA because we can end up on a real slippery slope where we completely undermine the purpose of CEQA which is to protect our natural environment so I just want to say that but I think the big issue that's come up as well is that the concern that's been raised by students is the lack of affordable housing and that's something that the campus is not providing and so I think what would be really good for us to do is figure out how we can push the state to provide more affordable housing on campuses and make that funding available so that students aren't rent burden paying some of the highest prices for housing with the least amount of square space in our community and then I just wanted to point out one other thing that was in the agenda report so it's clear to the public that at the University of California Santa Cruz since 1985 over nine student housing developments have been approved with EIRs and four approved with negative declarations the only only the 2018 Housing West EIR has been legally challenged SEQA has only delayed this one UCSC housing project and remains an integral part of development within and around the community so I just want to point that out that this SEQA hasn't delayed tens of projects for housing that come forward it's only delayed one project at UCSC and so I don't think that we need to be in support of a state law that's going to have sweeping impacts across the entire state and further up so I am very I think that the comments that have been brought up are really important for us to take into consideration and I very much look forward to working with the students on campus so we can figure out how to bring more affordable housing into Santa Cruz but as this bill currently states is currently stated I don't think that it's actually going to have the intended outcome that the students are anticipating with this bill allowing for the production more affordable housing on campus thank you council member Cummings council member Brown thank you mayor I just will add and this is going to be brief but a little bit repetitive because I do want to drive the point home here the University of California has not in my to my knowledge ever built a unit of affordable housing the only reason there was affordable housing on the University of California Santa Cruz campus was because of the campus community driven effort to develop a trailer park there that provided some affordable housing there is no affordable housing on the UC campus this legislation would not lead to the production of affordable housing on the UC campus and while it might lead to more housing getting developed even that I believe is in question UCSC does not build housing there is a housing crisis for students in our community and it's rippled out into the community at large because the University of California does not build housing and they will not commit to building housing this body has entered into a lawsuit as a result of their failure to commit to building housing so I think that we are clearly committed to that that happening it is not CEQA that is preventing the development of housing on the UC campuses I recognize that there have been lawsuits that have delayed housing projects and I recognize that that is frustrating I am frustrated by it as well however using a blunt instrument like the elimination of all entire environmental review to address a problem that is really much broader than the question of CEQA and it's a problem with housing production and I am very happy to work side by side with you take your lead students in going to the UC regions going to the state of California and saying we demand that you provide the resources to build that housing that's what we need that's how housing is going to get built and I'll leave it there I think that my colleagues council member Myers and council member Cummings and the three of us we spent many many hours in meetings developing a strategy to try to avoid a lawsuit to push the university to build housing to house its students on campus I'm not going to go into all of my issues around the LRDP concerns about the LRDP being the only level of review for projects those who want to talk about that I'm happy to do that offline but I think that making that a clear statement and although our letter wouldn't necessarily go into the record, the public record I am quite sure that the message will be delivered to the committee if we make this decision today so thank you thank you council member Brown council member Myers just wanted to do just a couple of comments I want to thank the students I talked to a couple students today and I appreciate the student housing coalition leadership they really they continue to bring up and bring forward their concerns as members of this community around their choices for housing and I appreciate that I had a pretty long conversation with one of the advocates involved in the organization and we had a very productive conversation around the difficulty in pushing a bill such as SB 886 in a one year frame time frame I mean changing anything having to do with CEQA typically would be completely hands off nobody in the million years would ever touch something like that this bill is trying to change the dynamic around the expediency of trying and the predictability of actually getting housing built on UC campuses throughout the state that's just a very ambitious thing to do it's a very complicated thing to do and that's why I think at this point today may change may 10 when this comes back I think a very safe place for us to land as a community right now just as a council excuse me right now would be to oppose unless amended I think we have brought up some good things in the agenda report and there are things that we have continued to negotiate with UCSE on such as binding mitigations around providing housing even binding mitigations with regards to transportation demand management so again without having any land use authority over what UC University of California can do on their own property we as a community as a city council have to advocate for the kinds of things that we would typically do if we were looking at a similar development within the city so I think these are healthy conversations to be having and I don't think anyone authors a bill like SB 886 knowing that they're not going to be going through a lot of amendments and they're going to be hearing from a lot of different sides I really appreciate Councilmember Calentari Johnson's recognition that you know this is a moving this is a moving target still and for us to oppose today does feel very final and I do think if we can if we can use if amended and then explain the kinds of things that we would like to see I think that puts us in a position where we're still at the table and as a community that has a University of California campus in it I actually asked some of the some of the authors of the bill who had said they were involved I said well how much community outreach did you do with the cities who have UC campuses in them and they actually said that they had been in conversation with several of those cities so I think this is an important bill it may provide some assurity of not necessarily affordability of the housing but certainly the production of housing in the future that's of great interest to me as a city council member because we want to see that practice be more productive on campus but I'm hoping that this feels like a safe step in one direction and on learning more about where the amendments are going in the next two weeks we bring it back and continue to have the conversation but we at least have an opposition on record so those are my comments thank you thank you council member Myers I guess I will comment as well briefly so my initial suggestion on pulling this item and postponing it to a future or next council meeting depending on timing of where the bill is and any potential amendments as it's in progress and process I think one of the my understanding based on all the information up to this moment is that the CEQA exemption in this bill would not apply to the long range development plan and in the agenda report it also outlines where it would not apply to specific areas that are environmentally sensitive areas and where there would be impact and so this CEQA exemption would apply to individual student housing projects but not the overall long range development plan and the overall environmental impact reports there so my understanding is that this could be a way for the community what's important is that our local impacts are voiced and that analyzed and understood and that is the benefit of having CEQA and environmental impact reports and that's really important to include and that opportunity would be there in the long range development plan although I'm hearing from council member Brown that that's not an adequate to have that as the only level of review and so it seems that this this bill would provide an additional layer of environmental impact for individual housing projects underneath the entire long range development plan and overall plan where those environmental impacts have been stated and defined already so at this point we have a motion on the floor by council member Brown and a second by council member Myers are there any other last minute comments before we go to a roll call vote I would like to call on council member Cummings I just had a question in terms of the motion because I was wondering if it was included in the motion that this would be revisited if that we would be able to revisit our position if amended so it was just wondering if that's part of the motion I didn't say it in the motion explicitly but I think that it was kind of implicit that that would happen and council members can certainly bring it back at any point council member Callentari Johnson sorry go ahead were you not done I was just gonna say like if that's the case then like I was gonna make a friendly amendment but it's implied that this would come back if amended I guess my only question would be I guess that direction doesn't need to be provided I think we hear that intent in the motion thank you for clarifying that council member Cummings council member Callentari Johnson I was gonna ask the same question to make the same friendly amendment but I do also want to get clarity when it does come back in the staff report we talk about how many projects here at UCSC have been delayed but I'd like to look across UCS to California and see what the impacts have been and then I would like to have more clarity on that this is not exempt from LRDP CEQA and this bill proposes to potentially remove a duplicative layer and I don't know that that's actually correct but I'd like to get some clarity on that when it comes back thank you council member Callentari Johnson thank you I want to thank everybody for the discussion I haven't weighed in I know we're still on consent and I appreciate just having the time to really discuss this but I also know we'll have further opportunity to do so I just also want to at kind of a larger meta level just remember this is sort of the process it's iterative and it's an opportunity for us to weigh in I appreciate the direction we're going in that we're signaling to the legislation that we want to see amendments made and I'm happy to hear that they've reached out to different jurisdictions who have universities in their town to understand the impacts I think that work is really critical but I don't think we also want to remain silent on the issue either so I'll leave my comments there and appreciate the conversation in the direction we have at this time thank you council member Cummings I'm just wondering as well when this comes back if staff might be able to bring some information on just general information on campus housing financing so people can understand because I mean it sounds like the university isn't responsible for building housing and often times it's for profit developers but I think there's some misunderstanding in the community that by the university being able to be exempt from CEQ and build more housing that they can build affordable housing on campus which they're not doing I think it's important that the community understands how housing is built on campus I think to council member Collin Terry Johnson's point you know what does CEQ look like on campus as it relates to the LRDP and individual projects and I think that'll help clarify not only for the community but for newer members of the council what are the different constraints around building housing on campus thanks for the question council member Cummings and we can certainly do more research into that thank you last thing I promise can we not have this on consent so we can have a yeah thank you thank you council member Collin Terry Johnson and council member Myers was that a former amendment or just a direction to staff because either way I'm happy to accept it it sounds like it's the intention the staff's got it yeah okay I appreciate the request I just want to make sure that this isn't drifting into a discussion about affordable I mean it's the University of California it's not the city of Santa Cruz so I don't think it's it is not our job to oversee the development of affordable housing on the University of California's campus so I think it's just important that we understand our lane and as someone who used to write CEQA documents at the University of California's Santa Cruz or projects that were developed there 25 years ago you know I mean University of California has to follow CEQA just like any other applicants so I think what this bill is trying to do is recognize that at the project level which is where I think you get a little squirrely is that you know efficiencies in CEQA maybe he used to again try to keep development moving rather than tied up in court so I think there's just doing that is just a very difficult legislative outcome it's a very surgical approach and it's not gonna it's you know that's why I think we really need to wait and see where these amendments are going it may be that the bill comes to a place where we can you know support it but you know CEQA is just a tool it doesn't have anything to do with affordability or anything else CEQA has not it's agnostic about whether you're building a mansion or you're building you know whatever so it's job is just to look at the environmental components to what happens at the community at large so I think you know I'm supportive of the staff having staff look at these but I don't want to send our staff into looking at affordable housing on campuses because I just don't think that's a good use of our staff time frankly so you know we can have the university come and talk to us about that if you'd like to understand those finance structures better but I just feel like we're kind of gotten a little off topic on the on the amendment which is really a CEQA based bill. Thank you Thank you council member Brown sorry I just want to make one more comment I agree with council member Myers but I think you know I just want to go back to the suggestion that council member Cummings is making and I think it's more and it's not about understanding you know the big picture financing and affordable housing questions and mechanisms for affordable housing per se but it's it is important to have information about you know for example the p3 model and what that does to housing the rate rental rates on campus in a conversation where the predominant argument we're hearing is we want you to support the elimination of CEQA for housing projects because we need affordable housing I think it is important as just a piece to understand that and so it's not I'm not getting it as like a big research project or moving in a different you know outside of this lane but just understanding a little bit more about well really that's I mean for me it's like I know that's not what's happening and it would just be nice to have that as part of the picture as we consider future action. Thank you council member Brown. All right are we ready for a roll call vote on the motion that is on the floor? Okay may we have a roll call vote please. Councilmember Cullentary Johnson. Hi. Holder currently absent Cummings. Aye. Brown. Aye. Meyers. Aye. Aye. Vice Mayor Watkins. Aye. And Mayor Brunner. Aye. That motion passes six and one absent councilmember Golder absent. Okay so now we are at let me get to my agenda we are that concludes our consent agenda and now we are moving into consent public hearings these are items number 22 through 25 on our agenda and I will just reiterate that I have recused myself from item number 25 so we will begin with items number 22 through 24 and then I will step out of the room for item number 25 item number 25 for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if you wish to comment on items number 22 through 24 now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen all items will be acted upon unless an item is pulled by councilmember for further discussion are there any councilmembers on or pull items 21 through 24 okay seeing none I will now pull up the agenda one moment can I ask you a question councilmember Cummings since items number 22 through 25 are on the consent public hearing do we need to pull 25 so that the mayor can step out since she is recusing herself I understood the mayor was dealing with only up to item 24 at this time so that the council can consider that separately just confirm are you pulling 25 then okay I'm not pulling it unless I need to officially pull it if that's what it takes to recuse I've recused myself from item 25 I have to physically leave the room for that item so you could vote on it separately I think that's maybe the direction you're going so we'll vote on it separately yes we'll vote on it separately and vice mayor Watkins will take over item number 25 okay at this time members of the public that would like to speak on any consent public hearing items 21 through 24 now is the time to call in and raise your hand by pressing star nine your phone and when it is your time to speak you will hear an announcement that you have been unmuted first I will bring it out to council members for any questions can I just confirm it's item 22 or 24 not 21 thank you items 22 through 24 okay I will bring it out to public comment are there any members of the public in the chambers that would like to comment okay thank you let's see if there are attendees in zoom we have one caller with their hand raised phone number ending in 4844 go ahead and press star six to unmute yes members of the community including council Robert Norris of Homeless United for Friendship and Freedom this is item 24 is the second reading of an ordinance that should actually be getting a full agenda item not just what I feel is rather artificial and public excluding consent agenda public agenda which is never used in past years at least not in my memory this is the way of streamlining the agenda is the way of redlining the public out and I am pleased that Mayor Brunner has restored comment on agenda items in the last few minutes but I hope that she restores this this change restores the public hearings to public hearings when we have real laws that require a decent second reading there is no justification for this law in terms of the actual arrests or real citations that were indicated around the whole issue of public gatherings this period in our national and local history when awareness produced protest against established inadequate overreaching or simply illegitimate institutions you may favor or oppose Black Lives Matter movement, the vaccine mandate protest homeless civil rights and service demands or whatever but it seems that the clear that governments both local and distant are concerned as they were in 2011 during the Occupy Movement in shutting down protests this is the kind of thing that this does it contains them so tightly they no longer have any meaning I'm surprised the ECLU hasn't registered concern I hope that it will at some point again the specific problems here are that this is an anti food not bombs ordinance and it has to do with it adds specifics about 25% of the usable area city park, beach or open space on a regular basis the public health is occupying it at the time and nobody needs to or wants to and the community would like it nonetheless this ordinance can be used to go after people and I've heard it argued that it can be used to well it can certainly be used by a new provision to establish a public nuisance just by fiat if you're found to have violated any of the ordinance provisions spontaneous demonstrations as Garrett Phillips pointed out last time the town clock in the city hall is ridiculous and also it simply won't work people will ignore this and show disrespect for it as they should but why why provoke that that seems to be wrong they haven't been aware that any permits have been sought or demanded for the last two years nor needed I have not so I'm surprised that I'm not surprised with this council frankly but I think that the community may be surprised with me so this city is farewell to the food now bombs latest assault promises more legal problems for the community and it violates the rights and needs of the unhoused community which is of course why I'm really bothering to speak to a group that really has made up its mind and sort of rubber stamp this thing from the beginning you may rubber stamp it but I certainly appreciate what you're doing although who knows I don't know where this ordinance actually came from it's not really clear since stats about permit violations I don't know if you heard the buzzer but if you could finish your sentence that would be great no I didn't okay thank you okay that's good thank you thank you thank you for your comment our next member of the public via zoom is Garrett Phillip I haven't read the item 23 long letter I sent in on this green fee item I notice the details of the fee increase are omitted for today but it was set last meeting to four times the previous rate which is outrageous and the number of public employees receiving compensation from this fee source also increased including a few that never spend a minute behind the building or playing department counter talking to citizens it adds many thousands to the price of even a modest housing project there is a serious dialogue that needs to occur between the public and the city government about the need for rational justifications for fees as in who pays how much and why your record of ignoring the need for connecting the dots between your need for money and justification of what city service the city delivers to the actual fee payer isn't perfect I cite the disconnected rationale behind the child care developer impact fee these green building fees are not a fee for service provided builders and that they do not benefit from them there is no justification why educational seminars or travel junkets for public benefit should not be paid by taxes but by select individuals just because you can extort money from them or no house for you the educational fund aspect of this fee is a dodge it also pays other city expenses like salaries of general public benefit from this fee instead of by tax dollars the hiring of a green building expert is something more about your regulations not the incompetence of normal compliance personnel or perhaps the need for private sector green certified designers the fee also indiscriminately falls on to everyone getting a building permit whether they need help or not these fees lack a direct service benefit to builders but instead enforces your vision of eco community benefit dictating green materials and design elements that must be included at a considerable cost a loss of liberty and cost and then charges them outrageously extra for that whether they ask questions or not this is like if the IRS charge to file tax returns when will you start charging to talk to any public employee paid by tax dollars that works for the public benefit if you want money for public benefit you go to the people to vote on it if they say no you just don't get to do that extra you wanted to otherwise we get an always bigger government and smaller citizens these outrageous fees and giving your sales holidays the likes of which few private citizens have are not going to make a permanent highest interest sales tax increase palatable it's a matter of trust and empty pockets haven't helped us when even more misjustified climate change fees pop up this green building fee is a course of mechanism this government uses to extract money from a small select public without their consent to force them to spend money on a specific general environmental public benefits but the kicker is charging them while we extra for the privilege of that mandated monetary extraction I hope you are all next in line to pay the extra three five hundred dollars if you remodel a house or buy a new one thanks thank you for your comment our next member of the public is Reggie to agree with Robert Norse about the sort of really unfortunate nature of this use of consent public hearings to sort of just move right on through with second readings of ordinances just in batch there was a lot of opposition to what I'll just call it the food not bombs ordinance public gathering there wasn't a lot of rationale for why it should be done and so I find it very concerning that basically city council just rubber stamp this and now the rubber stamp in it even more by just throwing it on a consent agenda I mean this was something that we're expected to believe city lawyers our deputy lawyer and our city lawyer are just sitting around just like nerding out over public gathering ordinance language Justin Cummings made the point he sort of revealed what this was about if you don't get a permit now you can be prosecuted by the city because it's a misdemeanor and so since we know what's going on I just like some like real discussion because that was at the very end of the first reading when that question was made and then answered let first of all at the very least somebody make a motion to just call this the food not bombs ordinance because that's what it is if you're not going to if you're just going to let it go through at least call it what it is because there isn't a ton of people out there not getting permits for public gathering that the city is actively interested in going after especially Cassie Bronson who presented the ordinance just a couple months ago it was very public that she wanted them to get a public gathering ordinance and so this is so obvious and it's just shameful that this was presented in such a like muddled unclear way to try to hide what's going on because they fear it's unpopular well it should be unpopular but it should be people who are hungry outside and the city isn't taking up the task so yeah I mean just do better I mean Jesus Christ this is ridiculous thank you for your comment are there any other members of the public seeing none I will bring it back to council we have a motion and deliberation on agenda items 22 through 24 on our consent public hearing agenda I'll move the items I have a motion by vice mayor Watkins I'll second and a second by council member Tari Johnson welcome council member Golder you have to speak into the microphone thanks okay I will then if there is no further discussion I will take it to a roll call vote council member is Calentari Johnson I Golder I coming Brown I do want to register a no vote on item 24 but for the rest of the consent public hearing agenda I Myers I Mayor Watkins I Mayor Brunner I those that motion passes unanimously with the exception of item 24 a no vote from council member Brown at this time I will step out and pass it to vice mayor Watkins for agenda item number 25 on our public consent hearing thank you mayor do any of the council members have any questions on this item item number 25 on our consent public hearing seeing none are there any members of the community who would like to address the council on this item what no and how about on zoom are there any members of the community on zoom who would like to address us on item number 25 which is a resolution acknowledging the environmental determination approving the lot line adjustment plan development permit design permit coastal permit and heritage tree removal constructed 20 unit single room occupancy development based on the findings contained in the attached draft resolution and conditions of approval you want to speak to this item you can raise your hand now if you're on zoom see any hands raised okay we'll go ahead and bring it back to the council for a vote council member Cummings yeah I'm happy to move item number 25 and I have a comment after someone seconds okay we have a we have a motion by council member Cummings seconded by council member Golder I think I just want to point out for this item that this is for because one of the previous items that we just discussed was about affordable housing and this is you know providing support for a hundred percent affordable housing project to move forward I think that this these are the kinds of projects that our community has been saying that wants to see our council take action on we haven't received any letters of opposition and so I'm just happy that we're able to you know continue to support the construction of affordable housing in our community great thank you okay let's go ahead and take a roll call vote council members Calentary Johnson I Boulder I Cummings I Brown I Myers I Vice Mayor Watkins I I Mayor Brunner that passes six council members voting in favor with Mayor Brunner recusing herself for this item we'll go ahead and bring her back but it looks like we go into a break at the moment so we'll go ahead and maybe call for a quick break and let me go ahead and ask her when she wants to come back because she needs to stop right back thank you council Vice Mayor Watkins that brings us to a brief break in our agenda we will it's 324 right now see we will return at 345 back in chambers and via zoom thank you first meeting back here in the city council chambers so at this point in our agenda we are now at item number 26 I've allotted an hour for this item however we will be pausing to jump back to item number five which is the volunteer appreciation since that was a specific time that the volunteers could be here so we will begin item 26 and there is a possibility we will have to pause it for our agenda item five and then return to item 26 item number 26 on today's agenda is a public hearing for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if this is an item you wish to comment on now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen the order will be a presentation of the item by staff followed by questions from the council we will then take public comment and return to council for action and deliberation the item is a two zero dash zero zero zero eight slope regulation ordinance amendments to chapters 18.45 24.04 24.08 24.14 and 24.22 of the Santa Cruz municipal code we have with us today I believe via zoom our city presenters staff Catherine Donovan and Matt Van Hoa good afternoon mayor and members of council it's exciting to see you in the council chambers I'm not in there it's exciting to see you there so let me just share my screen and start my presentation thank you the item before you today is amendments to the city's slope ordinance and this project has some history to it the slope regulation amendment originally was included in a packet that went to the planning commission in September of 2020 at that time the commission continued the slope regulation portion of that packet and the rest of the packet moved forward and was approved we returned the slope with the slope amendments to the planning commission in January of this year and it was continued on the first meeting until February 2017 and at that time the commission voted to recommend the approval of the amendment five to two and a little background on this the general plan is the guiding land use document for the city and the zoning ordinance implements the general plan our general plan 2030 updated policies related to the development on slopes but the zoning ordinance at this time still reflects the 1990 to 2005 general plan policies for slopes so this amendment is intended to bring those policies into conformance with the 2030 general plan the earlier general plan had policies that were set based on the development of slope and they limited any development on slopes greater than 50% they prohibited the 2030 general plan directed an update of the zoning of the slope regulations and had asked that they be based on new construction techniques and best management practices and also directed that reports be required when there was a potential for slope instability and I just have a little graphic here on the bottom to give you an idea of what those numbers mean so I couldn't find one that had 30 and 50% but this shows 17% is the lowest slope then a moderate slope at 33% steep is noted at 66% and very steep at 100% oh I'm having a little trouble with my mouse excuse me for technical difficulties here no problem taking time replace my battery not letting me do it Catherine I can go ahead and share my screen okay it's I got it I just had to put in new battery okay so the goals of our amendment are to comply with the 2030 general plan to reduce and streamline applications for minor projects to allow development on slopes where it's feasible and to require site specific geological reports with science based engineering solutions when there's a need for them and the specific proposed updates would require a geotechnical review on or near slopes of 30% or greater they would require engineering solutions or relocation of the project if the geotechnical report said that there were slope related issues in that location it would add some exemptions to where a slope permit would be required and it would change the grading exemption which is now there's now an exemption if it's 100 cubic yards and we've lowered that to 50 cubic yards when we visualized how much 100 cubic yards was we decided that was an awful lot we also updated the findings to address visual and environmental impacts and we removed there's a list of regulations in the plan development permit section that plan development are exempt from those regulations and prior to this the slope permit was listed in that section and we've removed that because we think that it's totally appropriate for plan developments on slopes to do geotechnical reports we also updated the application process and I've made this little chart because when we tried to describe it verbally it was a little difficult to follow so currently no public caring is required if the project is greater than 10 feet from a 30 to 50 percent slope and what we're proposing if it is on or within 20 feet of 30 to 50 percent slope it would not require a public hearing a public hearing is currently required before the planning commission if it's within 10 feet of a 30 to 50 percent slope and we're proposing to require a public hearing before the zoning administrator if the project is within 20 feet of a 50 percent or greater slope and currently development is prohibited on a greater than 50 percent slope and we're proposing that development would be prohibited based on the geotechnical report and whether there were issues related to the slope and whether or not there were solutions feasible engineering solutions sometimes there's engineering solutions but they're really not feasible we had also originally when we took this to the planning commission we had included this as an LCP amendment but we spoke with our local coastal staff and they reminded us that the current LCP which is what they would be reviewing this coordinates under has the same standards as the old 1990 to 2005 general plan which reflects the zoning ordinance language that we are trying to get rid of right now so we are in the process of updating our local coastal program and we are now proposing to not move forward with the LCP amendment portion of this regulation until that LCP update is completed and that would mean that until that LCP update is completed and then the amendments are taken to the coastal commission and approved these changes would not apply within the coastal zone however most there are not that many available properties within the coastal zone that would be affected by the ordinance so we don't see that as a something that should delay the rest of the amendments when we went to the planning commission there were specific concerns that were raised they included increased density on slopes and SP9 impacts I'm not sure if you're familiar with what exactly SP9 is but that's the state bill that was passed that went into effect in January that allows the development of two units on most properties that are zoned single family and also allows the most single family zoned properties to be into two lots that can then each be developed with two units and so the planning commission wanted us to address SP9 as part of this ordinance they were also concerned about wild hazard wildfire hazard being exacerbated and whether the TICWA review that we had done with this project whether that was appropriate so addressing the density on slopes density is regulated by the general plan which requires that development be of at least the minimum density unless constraints associated with natural environment require a lower density and that's the direct quote from the general plan the percent of slope alone is not considered a constraint there are many instances where you can develop on quite steep slopes so that percentage in and of itself is not considered a constraint but the geotechnical reports that we would be requiring with this amendment would discern whether there was an actual constraint or not and so if those geotechnical reports determined that there was a constraint then we would be able to approve development at a lower density than the general plan density for that property so this amendment because of that this amendment would not increase the number of units that would be allowed on sloped properties if at most would determine the location rather than developing a unit here and a unit over there on a slope you would have to develop both of the units on a less sloped area we also had looked into the wildfire hazard issue and there's no doubt that wildfire danger is increasing in the west the city has recently adopted a wildland urban interface ordinance and that ordinance allows the building division to apply additional standards for fire protection in properties that are within that wui area and the proposed amendments because they're not increasing the number of units you could build in the wui area and so therefore it's not increasing the wildfire hazard because it's not changing it's not increasing the density or the number of units that could be developed and in terms of whether the sequel review was appropriate when we started working on this ordinance we retained to review the compliance of this ordinance with the general plan 2030 EIR and Dudek reviewed what we're proposing and reviewed what exemptions are available under CEQA and determined that an addendum would be the appropriate environmental review for this project because there's not a specific CEQA amendment that would apply and the addendum determined that there were no substantial changes to the general plan and so therefore the analysis that was done for the EIR would still be in effect and would not change at the planning commission meeting there were specific concerns about the addendum itself the wording and the exemptions and so we worked with Dudek to revise the wording of the addendum and provide a better document we also hired Rami Mous Manly a law firm that specializes in CEQA and land use law in California to prepare a legal opinion regarding both the addendum and the application of SB 9 and whether the approval of this amendment would require any environmental review of SB 9 and Rami Mous Manly determined that no in fact there wouldn't it would not be appropriate for us to do CEQA review for SB 9 because we were not imposing SB 9 if it was already an approved statute and that the addendum was the correct legal document for this amendment and that is my presentation and I would be happy to answer any questions you might have. Thank you so much Catherine Donovan You're very welcome At this time we will ask councilmembers if anyone has questions regarding the item or the presentation and we still have a screen view there we go Councilmember Brown I do have a quick question although I just wanted to say it's 405 so I know you want to shift gears Yeah I got the wrong power point I'm looking for it I'll just ask my question very quickly I'm just curious has the staff analyzed it all I recognize this is intended to reduce barriers to housing production part of a whole package as you said of changes that we are making do we have any sense of like how many additional units what the increment would be allowing building on changing the requirements or actually eliminating a slope requirement above 50% which has been the standard do we have any sense of how that might possibly I know it's speculative but we also do speculate about how much housing can be built within our zoning codes and land use designations more generally so was that done with this? Yes and actually the number was surprisingly small we determined that we looked at all of the properties that are sloped and we looked at the portions of those properties that cannot now be developed that could be developed with this ordinance and then we removed any portions of those properties that had other development constraints which not surprisingly many of them did they had creek setbacks with a big one and also endangered habitat or endangered species locations so given all those constraints we came up with 28 units additional units could be built on these sloped areas so it's not a large number but the ordinance is not only about units we get the current planning division gets many applications or requests for development that is mostly deck extensions or trellises or terracing or something of that nature that's not a housing unit that makes their property more usable and they either have to go through this because it requires a public hearing it's a relatively expensive process for such a small project or if it's on a slope that's 50% or more they simply can't do it thank you thank you I'd like to ask the city clerk if the volunteers are ready are there any other questions from council members at this time before we pause this item I had a quick question I was curious and I think you may be touched on it briefly or slightly about inside the coastal zone how many how many development how many properties would that apply to and I think I heard you say not many within the coastal zone I don't have an exact number for that but most of the coastal development where there are slopes most of it is right along the coast itself and that's not developable so there would be some properties along kind of near more creek in that area because the coastal zone does stretch up the hillside there but it's a limited number that are actually in the coastal zone and those properties for the most part are either not developable because they're parkland or something like that or they already have development on them and while they might want to do something like extend their deck or some of these other projects that I was just speaking about and they would not be able to at this time we are trying to get that LCP amendment update or that LCP update so that we can get this amendment completed as soon as possible great thank you okay at this time we will pause this item number 26 on our agenda and we will jump backwards to item number five mayor if I could just all the council members have actually councilmember golder I don't think you do because we didn't know if you'd be here but there's a little script and you will have a section I don't know if you all saw it but okay and so item number five if you give me one moment to the online thank you I was looking for the title the agenda title so I'm going backwards here it is outstanding volunteer recognition and we have Christina Thurston city serve program volunteer coordinator here via zoom welcome Christina wave your hand please there you are okay hi welcome and do you have the volunteers are they is everyone here and accounted for yes I'm here great alright well we have each a script and we will read a little paragraph about each volunteer and I'd like to start off by saying that national volunteer week is about inspiring and recognizing and encouraging people to really seek out imaginative ways to engage in their communities it's about demonstrating to the nation that by working together we have the fortitude to meet our challenges and accomplish our goals the city serve volunteers who give their time and their commitment to the city of Santa Cruz are outstanding examples of what can be accomplished when people care about their communities today we have the honor to recognize the finest of these volunteers Christina I'd like to now hand it over to you for any opening remarks thank you yes as you said it's an honor to recognize some of the finest volunteers here during national volunteer week after many city serve volunteer programs were placed on pause due to the COVID-19 pandemic we're finally reopening and engaging both new and returning volunteers the individuals we're honoring today are committed to bettering our community and how to adapt to the constant changes during the pandemic we thank them and I would like to thank you for joining us to serve the city of Santa Cruz despite the many challenges they faced in the past couple of years I'm here with Karen Delaney the executive director of the volunteer center of Santa Cruz county who will be assisting the and Mayor Bruner and honoring the rest of the city council and honoring the volunteers and most of our volunteers are here virtually some of them couldn't join us we're just going to honor them anyway and the first is Alan Allen I've got certificates here that you can't see but I'm going to mail them out to everybody thank you all right Alan Allen is a parks maintenance volunteer one of his main projects is caring for the lovely rose garden located at city hall he also prunes plants throughout the grounds and assists city staff with weeding and general garden maintenance he's always willing to take on additional projects and is currently working on owl nesting boxes for city hall Alan is enthusiastic and has become an integral part of maintaining the beautiful gardens at city hall Alan's volunteered over 240 hours and we thank him for his service with neighborhood parks the next volunteer is Diane LeMond all right I'll start by thanking you for your service and for volunteering for our community Diane has been volunteering with the Santa Cruz police department since 2018 and has reported over 750 volunteer hours she dedicates her volunteer time to supporting the Santa Cruz police department and the community oriented services she conducts foot patrols around the Santa Cruz wharf and is always willing to go above and beyond to serve our city Diane's professional background as a special education teacher has prepared her for encountering the many personalities downtown during her patrol assignments she has a natural talent to calm people down and is able to connect with both children and adults Diane is always willing to make time to listen to individuals and assist them however she can she serves as a positive police ambassador to the community by increasing policing initiatives enhancing our community relationships and patrolling for crime prevention and outreach thank you so much Diane a volunteer who I see has been able to join on zoom is Drusilla Ho hi Drusilla thank you so much for your service I'll say a few words about your work Drusilla has been volunteering with parks and recreation every week for the last four and a half years accumulating over 270 hours of community service she's been regularly volunteering as a Qigong instructor for the downtown seniors program at the London Nelson Community Center when the community center was shut down in March of 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic Drusilla quickly adapted her class to stay connected with her students and led weekly classes using zoom she is a thoughtful and present instructor to her students Drusilla is continuously furthering her Qigong and wellness education so that she can create the most impact for her class the community center, local seniors and the Qigong community we're grateful for your service and thank you for being here today next volunteer is Mary Scheller hi there Mary my name is Donna Myers and I'm here to honor you on your volunteering here at the city of Santa Cruz Mary has been volunteering with the waste reduction department for three years and has reported just under 100 hours of community service as a master recycler some major tasks Mary has taken on include tabling at city farmers markets giving presentations and webinars about reducing plastic consumption meeting with local businesses to discuss ways to reduce the use of plastic Mary's passion and interest in waste reduction really shine through her volunteerism and waste reduction advocacy within the Santa Cruz community her dedication and ability to inform the public have had impacts far and wide congratulations and thanks Mary just a quick note I know all the volunteers have joined here you are welcome to share your video if you want or if you want to say a few words when you are recognized our next volunteer who is also here is Kaia Kaia Juliano Monroy sorry Kaia is it Kaia or is it Kaia it's Kaia Juliano Monroy she got it right the first time no problem I just wanted to make a choice well Kaia my name is Martina and I get to honor you today so Kaia is an ecologist with the coastal watershed council she's dedicated to improving the habitat along the San Lorenzo river and Santa Cruz river walk park she coordinates teams of youth and adult volunteers who have planted 335 new plants along the river comprising of 10 unique native species Kaia and her volunteers plant native plants remove evasive species and overall increase biodiversity along the San Lorenzo river Kaia's passion for caring for nature and our city parks is infectious she's not only an incredible volunteer to the city herself but a role model for others particularly youth who relate to Kaia's experiences and became inspired by her stewardship well incredible work congratulations Kaia thank you Kaia our next volunteer is Jeb Bishop and the ground swell coastal ecology hi I have the honor of recognizing Jeb he's been a parks and recreation volunteer since 2011 over the past 10 years Jeb and his group of dedicated volunteers have completely restored the native riparian habitat along Pilkington creek within Tyrell park Jeb and the whole adoptive park group have taken on invasive removals erosion control and have established native flora to rejuvenate the local habitat of this region Jeb and his volunteers have a deep passion for public service and volunteerism their hard work has also greatly contributed to the educational experience for many local school groups that visit the museum of natural history which is located at Tyrell park our community thanks Jeb and each volunteer in the Pilkington group that has dedicated their time to restoring the beautiful Tyrell park thank you Jeb thank you very much are there any closing remarks from Christina Thurston or Karen Delaney thank you this is Karen Delaney from the volunteer center and we want to thank all the volunteers and also take a moment to thank the city council and staff the partnership with the volunteer center that makes CityServe happen has been going on for more than 30,000 more than 30 years and volunteers have participated in this effort over the years and as part of our celebration of Global Volunteer Month this isn't something that the city is required to do but it is something that really helps our community when people volunteer the individuals who volunteer data tells us are happier healthier more engaged in their community they even live longer people volunteer have higher voting rates they have lower crime rates they have higher rates of donation to nonprofits that volunteering and promoting and welcoming and supporting and thanking volunteering is one of the things that helps us promote a healthy civil civic infrastructure and weaves our community together and there's a lot of things pulling us in different directions so I really want to thank the city council and the city staff for their support of this effort this year and every year and really want to encourage you as you move through your daily life to talk to people about volunteering to invite them now that we're all reopening to come on down I want to take a special moment to thank your city staff for the willingness to mentor and guide city-serve volunteers and make them feel at home and welcome in their own city Joyce Blaschke at the police department Mike Goodsey at parks and recreation Kelly Mercer Leibov at the senior center Kaylee Soon at waste production Mayisha Nicholas at neighborhood parks Laura Egan and the whole coastal watershed council and we hope that any staff any member of the community any council member who wants to get more deeper into volunteerism will always reach out to us thank you thank you Karen are there any further comments from council members council member brown my only comment is I heard somebody say if there are members who are received an award today volunteers who want to say something I'd love to hear from you if you want to speak I know we're on a time crunch but this is a really important thing that you're doing are there any volunteers that would like to say a few words please raise your hand Gersella to say thank you to the volunteer association and especially to as you mentioned Kelly at the senior center and her staff have been really, really welcoming and helpful and it has made my experience really gratifying kudos to you all thank you thank you Gersella are there any other volunteers that would like to say any closing remarks well thank you so much for joining us today we really appreciate all of your volunteer hours thank you for your work in our community okay at this time we will continue our agenda and return to item number 26 and that is our slope regulations agenda item ordinance amendments and we have city staff Catherine Donovan with us who just gave a presentation we have had city council member questions and I'll return it to Catherine Donovan thank you I inadvertently opened the older version of my PowerPoint and there were a couple of slides that I didn't have in the older version that I'd like to show you now so Lee Butler our director actually noticed this morning that we needed to make this minor edit to the change we were proposing under the 24.04.030 types of permits and other actions authorized by this title we had added the slope development permit and I had inadvertently copied the language from a different section that included the honor within 20 feet of and that doesn't need to be here so we were just proposing to take that out of the ordinance and then we also wanted to provide you with the motion and to add the language keeping in place the existing code for areas within the coastal zone so it is very clear in the motion what exactly we're doing and we're also going to when we bring the ordinance back for a second reading and actually bring the language that we will need to have in our code to separate out what's happening in the coastal zone and what's happening in the non-coastal zone areas. Thank you. Is there an anticipated timeline on the coastal zone? The local coastal commission staff has asked us to do extensive change in the direction of the LCP that we had released a draft in November of 2021 and they told us in February that they didn't give us comments on it they simply said they wanted us to go in a different direction and so we are anticipating that we will have that ready to go in the fall or possibly the winter of this year and then we have no control over the coastal commission staff schedule but we're hoping that they can get to it relatively quickly and then once it's approved by them we would bring just a simple resolution to you to approve to take it to the coastal commission and then take the amendment to the coastal commission so that part of it would take no more than a couple of months probably but it's the LCP update itself that is unclear to us how long it's going to take to get approval from the coastal commission. Thank you. Okay, are there any further questions from council members before I take it out for public comment? Okay, at this time I will take this item out to public comment. There are currently no members of the public in chambers so I will look to our Zoom attendees and if you are a member of the public that would like to speak to this item now is the time to raise your hand either by dialing star nine on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar controls on your computer and when it's your turn to speak you will hear an announcement that you have been unmuted and the timer will then be set to three minutes. Okay, and I don't see any members of the public in Zoom with hands raised I will bring it back to council for action and deliberation. Are there any council members that would like to make a motion and then we can continue discussion? I'm happy to make the motion with the amended language that was brought before us by Catherine acknowledging the coastal distinction. We have a first by vice mayor Watkins, is there a second? We have a second by council member Myers. Are there any comments or discussion? Council member Brown. Thank you mayor. I have a couple of brief comments that I'd like to make and I think I'm going to propose an amendment which I unlikely to be a friendly amendment but I'm going to give it a shot. So I recognize the also I forget to take my mask off when I'm speaking and so you can hear me so I'm going to try to get better at that. So for me the substance of this item is really eliminating current slope regulations that we've had in place for some time now allowing development on a slope of any angle if an engineer says it's okay I recognize that engineers have the ability to provide guidance to suggest don't build but they also have incentive to find ways to build because they are employed by the folks who want to do that building. So there's some concern there about the legitimacy I'll just say the word legitimacy of those reports in some cases it worries me and so eliminating that prohibition of building on slopes of 50% or greater does represent in my perspective a retreat from the city's longstanding commitment to environmental concerns including building out into open spaces and it's really one of the only objective standards that we might be able to maintain for use under the housing accountability act as well related to environmental concerns. While I'm I understand the rationale and the motivation to move in this direction and I will support the ordinance changes I want to I'd like to just move an amendment to and I didn't go through the whole ordinance and I did decided not to bring up a bunch of changes like finding where all the changes that would need to be made if we did adopt this amendment but just to eliminate the regulation or to maintain I guess maintain the 50% slope regulation and to maintain the ability to request exceptions in those cases rather than blanket permission. So that's my I'm just trying to think about a way to do that in the language that would I mean if it would be sufficient to just say eliminating the removal of the 50% regulation for now and then should I get a second or support for this we could kind of figure out how that would play out in terms of the specific language I don't want to take a lot of time on this where I anticipate the council is headed but I do want to try to put that out there as a possibility and just give you briefly my concerns so that's my motion or my amendment my proposed amendment and we'll see if I get a second all right council member Brown has an amendment to the current motion is there a second I'll second okay I wasn't sure if that finger point was your second I was gonna wait until you were done just so my hand was raised it's very different being here in person having everyone in my peripheral so thank you so we have an amendment by council member Brown in a second to that amendment by council member Cummings and so now at this point council member Cummings you had a comment I wanted to I won't reiterate the points the council member Brown made but just want to express my agreement with those points and I also just want to point out that there was a recent survey and we had a presentation by a group that really went out and surveyed the community and one of the things that survey pointed out was that there was a lot of overwhelming community support for protecting the city's environment and open spaces and you know removing the 50% prohibition would you know in some ways go against this desire for us to do what we can to help protect and preserve our environment and our open spaces when possible in addition to a lot of the concerns around building on steep slopes and so I feel like this is a reasonable compromise I mean there's a lot of things in here a lot of updates to our slip requirements that you know we're moving forward with and this seems like it would be one way to find compromise on this topic and so that's why I'm supporting the amendment thank you council member Cummings I wonder if Catherine Donovan is available to speak to that amendment yes this amendment would have nothing to do with development in open space it would not our open space is not developable because it's open space it doesn't have anything to do with the degree of slope this would strictly apply to private property development the city has no intention of developing their parks and most actually the vast majority of sloped properties within the city of Santa Cruz are park lands so this would not have an impact on open space development at all it would be strictly related to private property development thank you and I see we have Matt Van Hoa yeah thanks I would just like to follow up on Catherine's point too and just say that the 50% slope you know getting rid of that also allows for a lot more flexibility on properties for property owners to have an ADU something like that you know when there are current science-based engineering solutions that would allow property owners to be built on a property in a different location but say it's on a 50% slope you know something like this would allow that as well but it would also allow a property owner to just even put stairs in their property on a 50% slope which isn't possible right now so the majority of this is really to give property owners the ability to build on these on these slopes anywhere from a minor project thank you thank you for that clarification do any other council members have questions regarding that 50% elimination I don't have a question but I appreciate the clarification I think it really helps yeah and given that information I don't feel like it's necessary to not include that so I won't be in support of the amendment okay so I think we can do a roll call vote on the or it sounds like the amendment was not accepted well it wasn't friendly we have a first and a second so now we do a roll call vote on it on the amendment having to vote on the substitute and one vote thank you council members Calentary Johnson no Boulder Brown no Vice Mayor Watkins no no that motion does not or the amendment to the motion does not pass with five against two in favor and so now we return to the motion there was a first by Vice Mayor Watkins and a second by council member Myers may we have a roll call vote council member Calentary Johnson aye Boulder no I mean aye sorry I'm spacing coming no one for the record these changes you potentially pose impacts to our environment which is a core value for our community and has been held for quite some time Brown no Myers yes Vice Mayor Watkins aye that motion passes with five in favor and two against thank you thank you to Catherine and Matt at this time we are now in recess until our evening agenda we will return at 630 with oral communications and the continuation of agenda items 27 and 28 thank you good evening 630 p.m. session of the April 26 2022 meeting of the Santa Cruz City Council and I would like to ask the clerk to please call roll thank you Mayor, council member is Calentary Johnson present Boulder here Cummings here Brown here Myers here Vice Mayor Watkins here and Mayor Brunner present our agenda oral communications is an opportunity for members of the public and community to speak to us on items that are not on today's agenda for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if you wish to comment on oral communications now is the time to call in instructions are on your screen oral communications is an opportunity for members to speak to us on items not listed on today's agenda if you are interested in addressing the council raise your hand either by dialing star 9 on your phone or selecting raise hand in the webinar controls on your computer you will have three minutes to speak members of the public who wish to address those who are here in person please line up to the right of the dais you will have three minutes to speak we request that you sign in to ensure the correct spelling of your name in the meeting minutes however it is not required please remember this is a time for council to hear from the public and we are not able to engage in dialogue with each member of the public but when we are able we will address any questions raised after oral communications has completed I will now pull up my zoom window just to see if any attendees via zoom wish to speak for oral communications if you do please press star 9 and at this time I do see members in the public welcome everyone so we will begin with oral communications and the first person in line have you already signed in great please approach the microphone please and if you could speak clearly into the mic sure having reflected on the election redistricting decision my impression has changed that it could have been better I now find the six district sequence flawed in so far as it is badly asymmetrical with four districts alternating every two years between voting for mayor and then later a council member but the other two districts vote for both mayor and council member every four years then in the intervening election they don't vote only the two west side districts will have incumbent council member terms to then run for mayor which disadvantages incumbents in four of the six districts if incumbents in the other four districts want to run for mayor they must either wait out two more years or abandon their seats which isn't realistic this is then lopsided in district unequal it's a subtle issue but also want to be politicians are few in a small town walk on and experienced candidates have little chance of a straight up mayoral election victory over time we need the largest council experienced mayor candidate pool possible to balance the two districts possibly need to field two politicians but the others always only one and again there is that two district advantage of the mayoral election incumbent timing it's best that an equal situation should exist for each of district over two cycles I'm okay with the maps and my strong preference is still for an elected mayor but to me the perfect symmetric solution should have been three districts voting in November for council and then a two year transitional period appointing the current vice mayor to mayor another council vote for mayor again for just 2024 then the public mayoral at large election voting cycle would begin in 2024 election electing a mayor for a two year term which then accomplishes a perfect voting symmetry among districts with zero district incumbent disadvantage you could still have done your map and sequence self interested rigging but also left the people with a completely fair and district equal election system for generations to come but you didn't and this less than perfect change for the mayor and the council vote for the mayor for ever in the seven district model the council picks the mayor forever without public input is a total no go for me may I suggest for seven districts either the rotating council seat vote should have been in June no runoffs and either an at large vote for mayor chosen from the entire willing future council be in November or an at large after November special election mail and mayoral ballot would have remedied that defect I think member Cummings item was sage although it would have been even sage or to table everything and go with a better seven district ordinance including a publicly elected two year term mayor chosen from among all the willing future council members then revisit the balanced six district model with an at large two year term mayor elect plan for 2024 charter vote the remedy of district elections to eliminate supposed at large racial voting discrimination to form districts even more likely to racially discriminate is just more of the far left growing antiracism racism in disguise their activism tears some people down without rational proof assigned privilege to others supposedly as victims and they call that equity thanks thank you may I have the next member of the public welcome hi Kyle Davenport I'm pursuing a PhD in chemistry I want to help the next breakthrough in science for sustainable energy electricity electrical cars and those types of things please give me your blessing on that I have been inauthentic not authentic not putting my time money and energy into what actually means anything for me I have spent my life wasting away on things that are completely meaningless to me in my heart I separate subject the people experiencing a lack of housing in the camps who have a lack of safe comfortable sanitary housing obviously they're living on the streets and in the camps and in the gutters three years ago I spent a year studying the phenomenon the situation I looked into everything that had been looked at on the federal level the county level the state level the city level everything you have tried all the organizations in this county I looked at every single census that has been taken I made graphs I looked at everything the only thing that I found is similar to sort of a scientific method in that our brainstorming and our solution finding processes aren't working whatever we've been doing has not been working the situation is getting worse and worse and worse so I spent a year and thousands of dollars on this coaching and ontological training to figure out how do we brainstorm better are we creating the problem with our solutions are our solution finding processes coming out of the problem the only thing that I found well I mean I found a lot the most direct if you if you're excited about this as I am I'm very excited about it the most direct way out of solutions that don't work that in fact recreate the same problem the most direct way is if we can be honest and I'm sharing this with you because it is simply what works and that all human beings are not honest and not authentic all the time by saying it out loud you engage the prefrontal cortex or the frontal cortex or whatever it's called that part of your brain has the ability to kind of like reform the rest of the brain into better answer finding processes even better neurology that's outside of the culture and the mentality that created the problem in the first place so it's like getting outside of the box how do we get outside of the box I'm telling you it I hope you can believe this it starts completely with saying out loud to other people I've been dishonest I've been unauthentic I've done tons of things that are not authentic to what's actually meaningful to me whatsoever I have and I'm sure we all have if you can say that out loud it starts getting your brain outside of that box that's creating the problem in the first place and I've been doing it and it works hidden sorrows grief hidden bad memories from the past whatever they are so I tell myself every night turn the bad memories into good memories and it's working daily thank you thank you next member of the public welcome hi my name is Keith McHenry McHenry like the library and I'm here to invite the community to come to our preparation for nonviolent resistance on Monday May 2nd from 6 to 8 at the resource center for nonviolence at 620 Ocean Street we are preparing to resist the city's attacks on free speech and we are preparing to defend the rights of the homeless here in Santa Cruz who are also threatened by city policies as I'm sure you're aware the increase in homelessness is getting very dramatic we are running out of food often within an hour sometimes of setting up because the need is so great I just went to St. Francis yesterday to see when they're opening because we really would like to go back to Saturday and Sunday as we had done for years but they are telling me that they will not open until maybe June maybe later so this means that roughly 200 people a day would go without food in downtown Santa Cruz of the people getting hot meals and the 400 people on the bench lands are depending upon us for our food deliveries there every week as are another 500 undocumented members of the community who get food from us each week and so you know we have this nonviolence training we're welcome to come not everyone attending needs to feel it's necessary to risk arrest but that is one of the possibilities as people will need to risk arrest and we also go over past successes and other communities where we've resisted attacks against free speech such as in Fort Lauderdale where we won a federal lawsuit protecting our first amendment rights in that district and of course there's the several million dollars that the city of San Francisco spent trying to stop us which failed and so you know we are experienced in resisting police state tactics by vicious governments like this one and so we will be doing the same and again I want to everyone's welcome it's preparation for nonviolent resistance on Monday May 2nd at 6 o'clock and it will be at the Resource Center for Nonviolence and we encourage all community members that want to defend free speech in this city and defend the rights of the homeless against these vicious attacks to attend and you know as I'm sure we're all aware there's the amount of homelessness that is going to skyrocket and there's a very good chance that we'll double in the coming months so we need to prepare for that thank you very much thank you and now the next member of the public welcome hi there I signed in I'm also going to be able to make public comments on 27 at this time we're doing oral communications for any comment on 27 when it comes up that's great wow I haven't been here in about two years what to discuss there's been a lot of time at the county meetings as you're probably covering or not covering about the same different types of information seems like the city's even more stringent than the county a lot of state laws that are going through that are really affect people's freedom and their choices seems like a lot of the community is going to understand the difference between legal and alienable rights that are presented to fellow citizens that are made by other individuals in lawful unalienable rights that you could say are given by God so I have a lot of leeway to talk about stuff what's really of most importance there's been a lot of destruction of the food supply and the fuel supply and transportation this city seems to really be promoting the agenda 21, 2030 and 2050 doesn't seem to be talking much about what the real cosmology resets are actually going to be but there's lots of dialogue about subjects that seem important where many are just being missed so I'm not quite sure exactly, I wish I was when the UN took over the United States I think it was 1946 or 1947 so I'm holding a document here from the World Health Organization this was all nations from what I thought we're going to lose their sovereignty in early 2024 although it seems like there's some really used to being an American state national this legislation is going to go through in less than a month you wonder why the borders are open in the United States that's deliberate because they're going to eliminate the borders so I guess it's just nice to see all of you I recognize half of your faces and stuff and it's nice that I can be here so thank you very much thank you and now the next member of the public and if you could please speak into the mic as much as possible thank you can you hear me? yes, thank you good the city manager's council here is still silent on the sweeps on March 8th city manager Matt Huffaker advised the city council that the benchlands encampment is a sanctioned campground this means the city's new harsh sleeping ban the camping services and standards ordinance could be enforced and to top it off the benchlands, Huffaker and his lieutenants Butler and Wally told us it would be dispersed in July anyway I see he's here perhaps he can elaborate on this after the oral communications period but I doubt he will no details whatsoever about where the hundreds of unhoused folks surviving there would go council members might ask him this question but they won't when asked repeatedly by callers about this at the April 12th council meeting council members Brown and Cummings as well as Myers Watkins, Calamari Johnson excuse me about that one and Golder were tactfully silent no questions that might embarrass the new city manager at today's city council meeting Mayor Bruner's report on her city county homelessness committee was likewise barren of news real news, specifics the association of faith communities stubbornly refused to give details of its so-called safe parking program of how many vehicles it can house or how it responds to concerns complaints and exclusions yet in the last few months largely stripped of the COVID-19 shelter-in-place protections and with project room key and home key temporary housing shutting down we have seen sweeps throughout the city Hoganip Coral and Lime Kiln streets Highway 1 railway tracks Highway 1 east of the San Lorenzo river the old camp paradise area Hills Trail, Lott 27 the West Levy and the Soquel Creek footbridge are only some of the folks who were told to clear out in apparent violation of the Martin versus Boise federal court ruling Huff proposes housed members of the community and that's homeless united for friendship and freedom set up a daytime presence city manager's office since he seems to have the power in this situation demanding real answers to these questions I notice he's not looking at me we insist he direct the SCPD to stop its sweeps and want some real answers as to how 14.5 million dollars the city council has pocketed is slated to be spent how much will really go to those outside and how and in what programs to provide coffee and snacks and invite people living outside to join us to seek answers and tell their story if you're interested contact Huff and just grab one of these flyers before you leave and I'll give some to the council in case anyone wants to serve food to homeless people thank you and now the next member of the public hi there welcome can you hear me oh I guess you can my name is Solis Armando I am a retired public health nurse and have worked many years with the county to help impoverished citizens obtain access to services and food programs Food Not Bomb saves those people's lives who have no money and nothing else to survive on trying to shut down Food Not Bomb is cruel and callous towards those citizens who would otherwise starve and die on the streets if the city stops the volunteers of Food Not Bombs from doing their honorable mission to feed the hungry it will create a public health disaster there will be likely an increase of deaths on the streets there will also be an increase of ER visits and hospitalizations the spread of disease in this population will probably skyrocket likely crime will also go up I foresee that this will create an immense financial burden to the city and county budgets the city cannot provide low-income housing and food services minimally it should allow Food Not Bombs to continue its humanitarian mission we should be applauding Food Not Bombs not trying to shut it down the city should be adopting ordinances that support the viability of all the citizens including the marginalized thank you thank you and now the next member of the public and if you're not speaking or in line please have a seat thank you good evening members of Santa Cruz City Council I'm really glad you're back meeting in person I was wondering if I was going to have to instigate a movement to make that happen I really don't have time for that so trying to find a paid job so I'm really glad you're here thank you for opening up I'm here tonight to talk about the city considering regulating the space at the town clock so I want to start out with something that may sound far afield and that is the normalization of nuclear war that is going on right now so much has been written about this but what's particularly sad for me as I am in my sixth decade is to see something coming back that I had hoped really went the way of things like diapers that you had to wash in the washing machine and things like that but maybe that's a good idea now because disposable diapers are an environmental problem no it's just nuclear war is unthinkable we will not survive in nuclear winter we can't have this happen in the mid 80's who signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty what does this have to do with the town clock well the town clock sorry Sonya I'm just so like I'm not very flexible so I tend to look at whoever is straight across from me the statue at the town clock it's about collateral damage and it's Santa Cruz has a history as one of the most humane and peaceable and compassionate towns but that is a thing of the past and with every passing year it becomes more and more a thing of the past because big money is here and ruling politics and big concentrated wealth is one of the ways that you shut down democracy you marginalize speech and that is what's happening at the town clock we have a law citizens united that allows free speech to be equated with money I would love free speech to be equated with sharing of food food is necessary for life we've been in the midst of an economic war for 35-40 years and many people are homeless and poor if not for long periods of time short periods of time so I just want to say a couple things about food not bombs there food not bombs is doing the work that the city should do and used to do used to serve two meals every day at the Coral campus that was shut down a few years ago under Cynthia Mathews, Donna Meyers and other people who say they're Democrats but I do not consider them the classic form of Democrat we are in the midst of all kinds of meaning war as well that's it too bad thank you thank you our next member of the public welcome my name is Taylor Lane I'm the founder of the cigarette surf board we have 15 surf boards that collect over 500,000 cigarette butts all picked up from each California can I interrupt you sorry your microphone if you could raise it higher and there we go first rodeo here so as stewards of the Monterey Bay Sanctuary we have a moral and ethical responsibility to lead an example for the entire world of what a marine protected space means and right now single use filtered cigarettes are threatening the sanctuary they're leaching toxic chemicals and micro plastics into an ecosystem up the food chain and into us we've traveled the world with these surf boards and every place we go this issue persists with 4.3 trillion cigarette butts littered every year Big Tobacco takes zero responsibility and externalizes all the costs onto communities like ours non-profits, volunteers and millions and millions of dollars of our own taxpayer money the world needs a solution and Santa Cruz is the most prime place for this to happen we have a huge track record of championing environmental issues and initiatives and with surfing in the ocean being so centric to our way of life here it's a no brainer after all filters are a complete sham and studies have shown that they increase more deadly cancers because they allow smokers to inhale toxins deeper into their lungs let alone increasing adolescent smoking because it allows it easier for these children to smoke cigarettes a year ago you all passed a resolution setting that toxic human environmental threats against cigarette waste are reckoning our community and I'm wondering what we're going to do about it we're not asking to ban tobacco in this community we're merely asking to ban anything that's sold as a single-use filtered cigarette big tobacco at the end of the day is a bunch of crooks and conmans that will lie and deceive their way for decades to come and have been ultimately when this product is used as directed it kills people businesses in this community will hurt because they will not be able to sell single-use filtered cigarettes however these are fundamentally and ethically false grounds for which an economic argument should be made for these businesses human lives and our environment is priceless big tobacco doesn't care and we should not be afraid of them when all the facts are on our side several model several model policies currently exist in the public health law center that Santa Cruz could begin to customize for our own needs all of you up here have an opportunity to be heroes the world is watching and this does not need to be a vote that the entire public needs to go through you have the power to do something to protect generations for myself, for yourself, and after us please move forward with the model policy to ban the sale of single-use filters in this city of Santa Cruz thank you I also have some materials for city council that I would like to end out can I give that to you thank you for your time thank you and now the next member of the public thank you hi council members it's been a while nice to see you my name is Ali Webster I'm chair of our local Santa Cruz chapter of the Surfrider foundation and I'm here to speak in support of a single-use cigarette filter ban I went for a walk this morning I left my house and in 45 minutes I filled up my jar with cigarette butts I thought it would take a couple hours but it took 45 minutes probably at least 300 cigarette butts here and I think the most important thing to ask just to start is to start noticing it when you walk around look at the ground and you see them everywhere and we're planning to make that more clear to the whole community coming up here in our campaign we're under no vision that this is some easy thing that we're asking you to do we know that it's real businesses and real people and a lot of money and it's never been done before it's a really huge thing that we're asking but Santa Cruz has before and can again be so important to force the hand of big companies and if we were to do something like this we would force the hand of big tobacco companies to do something like this but it's never been done before to clean up their act we've been the catalyst for a lot of huge environmental changes throughout the world from being the first to do stuff like this so I just want to encourage you to work on this with us and we're really excited moving forward to figure out how we can make it happen thank you thank you and now the next member of the public City Council my name is Sean and as a professional server coordinator for the Santa Cruz World Surfing Reserve run by a local non-profit Save the Waves and growing up in Santa Cruz I spend a lot of my time in and around the ocean but you don't have to spend your whole life around the ocean or do numerous beach cleanups to understand that there's a trash problem here in Santa Cruz and across the globe but as a beachgoer the one piece of trash that stands out to me more than anything else is the cigarette butt not only are they toxic to human health but they are the most littered item in the world I believe it is here in Santa Cruz a place with a surfing reserve, marine sanctuary and great stewardship leaders that can start a wave of change I stand here today in strong support of an ordinance banning the sale of single use cigarette filters in Santa Cruz thank you welcome hi thank you thank you Mayor Brunner and council members we have a couple of other bills all of these surfboards out of cigarette butts that he found on the beach so pretty incredible incredible work my name is Trent Hodges I represent Save the Waves Coalition I'm the conservation programs manager and Santa Cruz is one of ten world surfing reserves we have across the world we have an incredible resource here in the Monterey Bay full of incredible surf and incredible marine ecosystems that we need to protect so I just want to mention that Santa Cruz has to be represented as a world surfing reserve and as part of that world surfing reserve Save the Waves helps manage a stewardship plan to help control contamination to protect our coastal resources and as you know the Cal's working group and protecting Cal's water quality was a big focus and trash also needs to be a big focus for the world surfing reserve and we know that cigarette butts are the most polluted item we find in our beaches and every beach cleanup that we do along with groups like Save Our Shores Surfrider and others consistently cigarettes are the number one item that we find on our beaches and we know that once we pick up a cigarette butt it will return there the next day data for years and years has shown us that cleanups over and over again are good to raise awareness about the issue but really they're not a solution to the problem as we saw with the California plastic bag ban we saw that that was really the only change that allowed us to really make a dent in the plastic pollution problem here in California and so just like the plastic bag ban we see that an ordinance that would ban single use filters could help us move in the same direction there's been some movement at the state level to ban single use cigarette filters but we believe that Santa Cruz can really be a leader in this in this effort and can really cause a domino effect so that we can really make a difference here if not here in Santa Cruz well I also would say so we really look forward to working with all of you council members on this thank you for all your leadership protecting the ocean and the coastlines of Santa Cruz and we strongly recommend that you look forward to an ordinance for banning single use cigarette filters here in Santa Cruz, thank you very much thank you and now the next member of the public hello and thank you so much for your time everyone my name is Camila Vega today I'm here representing Save Our Shores we're a local nonprofit to ensure ocean conservation throughout the community on average our volunteers collect around 17,000 cigarette butts per year as a coastal community that relies on the health of our ocean we strongly urge that you ban the sale of single use cigarette filters thank you so much for your time thank you welcome my name is Chelsea Woody I'm resident of Santa Cruz co-founder of Textured Waves an organization that promotes diversity in surfing and access to aquatic and outdoor spaces and I'm an African-American female surfer the health of our environment affects us all that's why I strongly support an ordinance banning the sale of single use cigarette filters in Santa Cruz thank you thank you how's it going? I'm Willem Banks I'm just here to put more emphasis on the ban of single use cigarette butts and plastics in general it has a surfer growing up in Santa Cruz I'd love to see our oceans clean for our generation and the next and I've taken part in quite a few cleanups that I've given back to these works of art behind me and it's not a pleasant sight to pick up a cigarette butts behinds fishermen and surfers that are just littering as they're reaping the benefits from the ocean hopefully you guys can make a difference and help us out thank you thank you if you're not in line to speak if you could please have a seat just so I can see how many people are left okay great thank you hi there I'm Joseph Schultz formerly known as India Joe's it's great to see you in person in real I tried to comment in various zoom zoom meetings you've had and I was unsuccessful in getting any comments in whatsoever so it's great to see you in real even if you don't pay any attention to what I say I'm here for two reasons one is is to support food not bombs operation the other is to just look at a larger question here we're often asked to pass laws to prevent things that might end up being a problem sleeping ban is a good example no one is saying that sleeping by itself is any sort of a problem but we want to ban sleeping because people that sleep outside might defecate in public or they might block the sidewalks or they might do something antisocial I'd like to separate out the harmless activities from the harmful activities I have no problem with criminalizing people who do antisocial activities of any sort whatsoever but banning all activities in order to prevent some antisocial activities is a fool's game the cigarette ban is a really good example someone just said they picked up 17,000 butts off the beach it's a terrible thing and it's a drag and I'm sorry there's so many litter bugs in the world it's bigger than just smokers but 17,000 butts is less than 1% probably one tenth of 1% of the cigarettes that are smoked so banning all cigarettes in order to get 17,000 butts off seems like it seems disproportionate in the same way I think we can all agree that the homeless as they're affectionately known are associated with certain problems around Santa Cruz I wouldn't deny it for a second I deal with them on an almost daily basis criminalizing poverty which is what we're really talking about is not the answer to criminalizing the kinds of behaviors that we're trying to prevent in food not bombs has done an extraordinary job for the last couple of years of providing a service at no cost to the taxpayer whatsoever that probably should be provided by some sort of governmental agency the raises that most of our government has gotten in the last year the raise alone is higher than our total budget for the year I think that it's an amazing bargain that the city is getting for food not bombs they keep the area clean they're even pressure washing the streets afterwards they're there for a very short period of time they're in a place where it's unlikely that we're going to see the unsightly shantytown springing up around it so minimal impact and maximum value I food not bombs will not be stopped and if it's necessary to go to jail to support the compassionate sharing of food I'm for one ready to go to jail thank you thank you thank you I'm Greg Benson I'm a resident of Santa Cruz I'm not sure which district I belong to anymore but I will vote I do vote bring votes to the um I live in Santa Cruz a park I do thank food not bombs for keeping me alive I also thank the police department and the fire department for keeping me alive on a couple occasions putting off her bidet but you never know where your life is going to be saved and um we need to keep options open for how that happens um not block off things to allow things to happen and to keep eyes open ears open, soles open um it's but a lot to say but food not bombs rocks thank you thank you it's nice to see you all in person here and I well I would like to say I really appreciate the fact that we can be here and you can be here and I see you in your well actually in the authentic city council chambers which is great because I think it has been frustrating I think to many of us not to have the opportunity to speak before you because it feels to me like it's part of the democratic process is having dialogue with constituents and people in the community and I think the zoom world has made that uh a substantial hurdle for many of us and so I just want to thank you for opening up and having us here I would also say that it's I've been surprised that it was just word of mouth that I found out that this was even occurring I haven't seen and you know I don't get the sentinel on a daily basis maybe it wasn't the sentinel but I haven't seen anything the good times I haven't seen anything on the radio and I see that chambers are relatively quiet at this point and I it's a cause for celebration because I think it's it's an engagement with the community and I feel like that's an essential part of being the representatives that you are your representatives of the community and I think it's an important responsibility to communicate with the community to say this is what's happening where this change has occurred or you can now speak in person so I would uh love it if the council or the city did some further outreach to really let people know because I think it's really important so thanks for being here thank you welcome hi everyone nice to be back here um I want to tell you about my experience um back in 2000 beginning at end of the 2011 through 2017 I believe it was um I did food not bombs and what my experience was is that we used to clean up very uh make it make sure it was immaculate and um excuse me and what happened was we did public records request and these people a whole bunch of people wrote in and showed pictures of like a cup here there a cigarette bot or whatever it was which you can find all around the city by the way um once in a while there'd be a little more there and what we would find is is we'd end up um starting to um get to food not bombs and set up and we'd find things there that came from someone's kitchen no way did it come from people living out in the street it was look like someone took their their uh garbage from their um trash can and just threw it there and then they would take pictures so we started taking pictures because of that so I've heard that one of the reasons that you want this permit is because you've heard negative things about things being found in the fountain and complaints and you don't know who put that there really don't if it was there and I've also heard many people go by and see that there have never you know that it's always clean once in a while they may have caught it where someone from their house went there and dumped something there um you know I'm taking a risk by saying this because by saying this someone out there will get the idea and start doing this even more so it's it's to try to stop and make food not bombs look bad and they help people they know if you stop them and even they were to get a permit which I doubt it which I will go to jail too even if they were to get a permit um it's only four days a week and if it was if they had to move people don't know where they're going to be and it's just very difficult that there's no other place for people to eat these days they closed on the Monday night red church they've closed down places all over this is how they sustain themselves you've already taken away a lot of places where people live and you're about to do that in San Lorenzo Park which I highly suggest you don't um anyway so that's I'm thoroughly against the ordinance that I think you have a second reading perhaps next time is anyone going to smile or shake their head can't answer okay thank you and the next member of the public hi welcome everybody hope everyone is well my name is Mae so I'm here on behalf of well myself but I'm here in support of food not bombs being permitted to continue its operations without a permit because they're feeding people who in many cases don't have a place to get food and it's not only houses folks that they're feeding I'm pretty poor myself so once in a blue moon I will go there and get food because I have no other place to go at the time also I'd like to point out that if the city sweeps the bench lands that's going to make it a great deal more difficult for service providers medical professionals or case managers to contact the people living in the bench lands because they're going to be dispersed all over the city all over the place and that's also I think for business interest that's going to be a bad thing because it's going to cause trash to pile up all over because there's not going to be any concerted area where people can put the trash away so it's going to cause people to die as well because those people there are supporting each other in whatever way they can as the government fails to support them so I'm just going to leave it at that thank you please don't sweep the bench lands and I am also willing to go to jail in defense of food not bombs thank you okay and I will now take it out to our zoom attendees I'm seeing phone number ending in one two nine eight and if you have already spoken here in the chambers if you could please have a seat thank you go ahead and unmute yourself on zoom press star six hello can you hear me yes hi my name is Kalia I am a local case manager shelter and also pretty involved in serving the community experiencing homelessness and I'm really concerned over the lack of effort on support for those living in the bench lands considering the pending closure of the encampment in July throughout my service there over the past year I've gotten to know folks I have no option but to live there and I know the names of many of those lives are really fraught with the turmoil and exhaustion caused by city sweeps natural disasters and the uncertainty that's lying ahead and with the millions that are allotted for rehousing during COVID it's really the right of our community members to receive the restorative support they deserve rather than punitive chasing we cannot close the bench lands without providing these people safe, dignified and supportive housing and as an avid member if you're not bomb who's relied on the resources offered there myself I urge the city to create policies that promote community members ability to serve compassionately and freely we are trying to be the solution to our own community's unmet needs and we need our city's encouragement so that we can focus on caring for one another as a case manager and a shelter I see daily how a lack of wraparound support for traumatized and marginalized folks passes these social ills onto future generations if we want the best for our neighbors we must realize that the vitality and morality of a place is most clearly seen and how it treats its most vulnerable thank you and let's see it looks like that concludes members of the public in the zoom meeting and that concludes members of the public in person and so I would like to bring it back to council I know there were a few questions and statements brought up so we since we're not allowed dialogue in oral communications we do have the opportunity to kind of further address some of the questions and statements that were brought up I would like to start with the cigarette surf board thank you for coming and we did recently as a council write a letter of support on AB 1690 for banning single use cigarette butts and I know that there's still work to be done at this time I don't know if there's any updates on that but I do know that we have been keeping tabs on that that bill and I know also I'd like to pass it over to vice mayor Watkins for the update that you had thank you and yes thank you for your presentation or for your oral communications and although we can't take action or have I know robust conversation I serve as tobacco education and my other capacity and have been a strong advocate against big tobacco as well as really pushing forward with our flavors ban that we enacted first in the county then led to other jurisdictions so I just wanted to offer that I am a member of the tobacco education coalition and there's a number of initiatives that are underway around tobacco waste policy particularly around state agencies and county wide agencies throughout the state coming together to come up with a framework for model tobacco policies as it relates to tobacco waste and I'm happy to either connect you if there's questions and or if I know our county partners would be happy to come and present some of the work that they're doing at the state level in regards to some of the tobacco waste initiatives and policies that are underway really just factoring the realistic abilities for ordinance to find success not only in passage but also in enforcement right we know that there's limitations around a capacity there and then also just really thinking about how we're going to be part of this bigger movement which ultimately as we know it's about thinking local but also the impacts of global and I spoke to some of my colleagues at the county they're happy to either be a resource to any community members or council members and or more happy to come and present if we'd like to have that at a future time as well so I just wanted to make that announcement thank you thank you for coming thank you for that update I also sorry council member Cummings I know that you had a question or you wanted to address one of the oral communications thank you mayor I had two items one was a question for the city manager there's obviously been some communications from the public related to the Benchlands I'm just wondering if when we should expect some kind of update I know that I'm not sure if it was quarterly homelessness updates or if we're going to get updates with the city manager's report which is every other meeting so I'm just wondering for members of the public if we could just get an update on when we might hear more about that process publicly yeah we appreciate the interest in that this evening and thank you for the question council member Cummings we are currently working and planning to bring a quarterly update on May 10th and so Larry and Wally as well as Lee Butler and our homelessness response team will be bringing a comprehensive update on our current homelessness response work including a detailed implementation plan related to our homelessness action plan as well as more details regarding the closure of the Benchlands as well that will all be on May 10th for those who are interested more details to come thank you and then the next item so I just want to thank the cigarette surf board people for coming out here tonight as someone who has a PhD in biology and evolution of biology and someone who's dedicated their life to environmental conservation because of what we were hearing about 20 years ago as it relates to the impacts of climate change environmental pollution and our need to do our part for future generations I think that's really critical that we're addressing these issues around pollution I've already conducted two beach cleanups this year and I know there's a council competition again and I won that competition last year but I also was really compelled when I saw when you all came out last year for your beach cleanup and I know that this is something that your group and many other groups have wanted to address and just want to state for the members of the public and the council this is an environmental health issue or sorry public health issue it's an environmental justice issue it's a social justice issue we passed resolutions saying how cigarette butt waste is a problem and we also know that this fits well within health and all policies and I actually want to thank Vice Mayor Watkins for the work that she's done and also pointing out that county partners is willing to present on this item so I would be willing to pass a motion that we bring back an item for discussion no later than the second meeting in August to discuss the topic of banning single use filtered cigarettes I think that this could be an opportunity for us to figure out a pathway forward if we want to put together a subcommittee if we want to bring an ordinance forward I think it's a great opportunity for us to hear from county partners and it's an opportunity for staff to hear from us and work with the members of the public who brought this forward so we can actually have an item on the agenda and have a discussion about how the city can move forward on this topic second thought thank you council member Cummings so we have a motion from council member Cummings with a second from council member Golder to bring back an agenda item for discussion what was the date no later than the second meeting in August to discuss the topic of banning single use filtered cigarettes in the city of Santa Cruz may I just add one correction on AB 1690 so it was recently amended and it was stripped of where this is not the time but I'm happy to have that dialogue with you after this formal process yeah that part is just no longer part of the bill that's why we're seeking a local ordinance okay vice mayor Watkins I was wondering if the maker of the motion would be open to having a presentation from county public health just because they have done a significant amount of foundational work they're connected to statewide county agencies that are looking at making sure that they're able to have a public health policy across the board and I don't think it would be who of us in any jurisdiction really to be connected to these bigger initiatives and really just in terms of the bigger strategy so a presentation I think would be a really great first step in terms of how to get us primed for what could be possible I think we want to be informed that we're going to be engaged to have that presentation possible and I think it would be great if staff could get input from the council as we put this together so that we're really trying to address the community concern and also the concerns that members of our council have brought up and the other thing sorry if I could just add it's tech is an open meeting so anybody who's willing to roll up their sleeves get to work learn how to understand the issue all the nuances of the issue learn from the community talk to the best practices participation so those that are interested please join other community initiatives that are already working on this issue and that's one way to do it and let me know if you have questions Thank you Vice Mayor Watkins Council Member Brown Yeah I I'm happy to hear that we're taking this seriously and wanting to talk about moving forward and I just wanted to ask Vice Mayor Watkins if you could share how folks who are interested can actually reach out and get involved in those efforts just to come away to connect So the county has a dedicated team around tobacco education and there's the Tabacco Education Coalition which is tech which is what it stands for and they meet on a regular basis they adopt a number of policy priorities and strategies one of which was environmental impacts of tobacco waste really working with other jurisdictions throughout the state of California to identify model policies that are possible that could have stand legal muster and also make an impact I think ultimately to make a big movement and start to change the way that we do things and I think the flavor tobacco band that's how I learned about it there's model ordinance language this is something that isn't out there really in terms of model language so I think there's a lot of work underway really thinking about holistically in strategy around it on the county website there is a page and on that page lists a number of resources as well as meeting times and welcomes participation for people who want to get to work on the issue as well as really educated and knowledgeable professionals at the county who are willing to address the community and the public on where we stand and some of the bigger issues that are underway within the state and yeah it's really exciting actually there's a lot of movement happening in the next month or so we're going to be hearing from a number of statewide agencies to ultimately come up with a whole strategy around tobacco waste policy so really a lot of stuff happening in this area I just want to say that the public is not appropriate thank you it's not a dialogue I appreciate your your passion for this thank you okay so council member Cummings just one more comment related to this is if we could also get an update on the state bill AB1690 at that time and with that I'd just like to say that this is likely going to be a long process as is a lot of legislation especially when it relates to going after big tobacco hopefully we can have a robust discussion and figure out a pathway forward and those are all the comments I have thank you so much once again the website is the county of Santa Cruz county department of health website they have a tobacco page on the county website and that was the website that vice mayor Watkins was referring to with that we have a motion on the floor I'd like to ask for a roll call vote please thank you mayor council members county attorney Johnson aye Boulder aye Cummings aye Brown aye Myers aye vice mayor Watkins aye mayor Brunner aye that motion passes unanimously thank you everyone continuing on with our agenda bear with me one moment while I pull up the next item okay next up on our agenda is item number 27 AB 481 military equipment funding acquisition and use policy for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if this is an item you would like to comment on as the time to call in using the instructions on your screen the order will be a presentation from staff followed by questions from council we will then take public comment and then return to council for deliberation and action and at this time I would like to welcome interim police chief Bernie Escalante can you speak as close as you can to your mouth and speak right into it thank you good evening mayor Brunner and council as you mentioned I'm interim chief Bernie Escalante and I'm here with sergeant Josh from the police department so tonight we got a presentation outlining the things that we've done the things that we're doing according to assembly bill 481 that passed in September of 2021 go ahead next slide a lot of items here we'll work through it as quickly as possible we'll talk about the purpose of AB 481 the timeline we'll define the military equipment that we currently have based on the definition of AB 481 I won't go into the details of our policy but our policy is online it has been online policy number 705 we'll talk about all the current inventory that we have related policies and legislation that already govern the use of this sort of equipment we'll talk briefly about the citizen complaint process that exists now and reporting requirements the annual reporting requirements per AB 481 all the community engagement that we've done over the last a couple months and impacts based on the decisions that you will make tonight so again as I mentioned this bill was signed in September of 2021 it was effective January of this year essentially in a nutshell it basically requires us to obtain approval from council to acquire basically govern the use of acquire the equipment when we can acquire the equipment and it requires us to establish new policy and post that policy on our website and make it fully transparent to the community it also requires public hearing not only the previous public hearings that we've already had but also annually we have to report out to the members of the community and again we will submit an annual report regarding any use of the equipment and there's more to AB 481 any complaints that we've received any new equipment that we purchase all of that needs to be included in that annual report per the legislation the process of getting approval needed to begin by May 1st so here we are just before that deadline next slide so why do we have this equipment you will see shortly that most of the equipment that we have are less lethal options for our officers to resolve very difficult challenging situations and the equipment that we have allows our officers to have additional tools and resources if they are appropriate for each and every situation and it allows our officers to safely resolve situations not only for the individual involved but the greater community and at this point we're not aware of any reasonable alternatives that do the same thing and accomplish the same goals that we're able to accomplish with this equipment typically the equipment is funded through the general fund depending on how much of the equipment we're going to purchase we obviously follow city guidelines and policy around certain levels of approval whether it's city manager or the city council level but the money that we use is from our budget and we typically budget for that every year we have used a federal grant to purchase the armored vehicle but other than that all of our other equipment has been funded through the general fund we do not participate in the program that's known as the 1033 program there's currently a resolution I think from back in 2020 that stated that we would not participate in that and we do not none of the equipment that we have currently has purchased through or acquired in any way through the 1033 program and AB 41 does not distinguish the difference between how we acquire the equipment whether it's the general fund grants or the 1033 program it doesn't make a difference we still have to present it for approval through you so I'm going to have Sergeant Trog go through these categories but based on the definitions from AB 481 these are the categories that we had to cover and so you will go through the different pieces of equipment that we have that fall under these categories thank you sir good evening mayor and council members again my name is Sergeant Josh Trog I'll be going through the list of items with a brief explanation of each one and their capabilities and then go from there next slide please okay so in category one AB 41 requires that we document any type of robotics the Santa Cruz police department currently has one robot it's the recon scout which is depicted in that photo what it looks like it is a small device that has a remote control with a black and white screen on it similar to a video game controller that can allow the robot to be driven around in the area that we put it in it can't climb stairs on its own it has to be thrown that's why it's called the throw bot it's fairly robust in its construction it's designed to be to help it get into places where there's like balconies things like that it doesn't record audio or video we can't talk through it we can't hear through it the image that it projects on the screen is in black and white it has some low light infrared capabilities it can see in the dark to a point that is all we the robot that we possess robots that we have access to are the avatar 2 robots that the Santa Cruz Sheriff's office has next slide please unmanned aerial vehicles again in category 1 the unmanned aerial vehicles that we have access to are all owned and operated by the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Department if we need them we must request them we have to follow their department's approval for authorization for use so it has to meet their guidelines for deployment feasibly we could ask for something that they wouldn't allow us to use them for if that situation existed they can be used in a number of instances mostly providing an aerial view of a given area natural disasters, significant critical incidents where we need to see what's going on over a wider area it gives us that ability and it helps us see where people may be where other officers are just gives us a better idea of what we're looking at in the vicinity that we're working next slide please so the armored personnel carrier the Bearcat we've had it since 2015 it is a armored vehicle built on a Ford F-550 truck chassis it is capable of with standing small arms fire up to 50 caliber and small explosives such as can I stop you for a minute just with the mic and maybe we can take a minute to troubleshoot the mic and perhaps switching places with Chief Escalante that you could pull it closer to your mouth I know it's uncomfortable to have that screeching sound sorry to disrupt you is that better hopefully that works and if not I don't know if there's someone from IT available the problem was I had to turn the volume all the way up because you were talking kind of low and I think it kind of affected I will speak louder and more clearly the Bearcat armored vehicle as I said is designed to withstand small arms fire up to 50 caliber and it can withstand small explosives improvised explosive devices such as small pipe bombs or classes of explosives like you would think of a military-style hand grenade that size much bigger than that it's not designed to withstand next slide please so with the Bearcat we have already had a use policy for the Bearcat since we got it it has to be authorized to go anywhere we have to sign it out even if we're going to take it and put gas in it get the oil changed anything like that it has to be signed out the reason why it's going out and then it has to be signed back in when it comes back so we know the timeline of how long it was gone it has to be used for critical incident a watch commander has to approve it if it's happening now if it's a preplanned operation that would go through the chain of command and decide whether the Bearcat would be used we don't use it for anything we don't take it out on patrol we don't do car stops with it we don't do anything like that it only gets used in training or in operations where it is authorized next slide please so some of the situations where it's been used one of the most recent and tragic ones was on 6.6 of 2020 when Sergeant Damon Gutsweiler was killed in the line of duty the Bearcat was used to rescue officers who were pinned down by the suspect in that instance where the Bearcat was taken up there the suspect had the high ground had a tactical advantage over the people that were pinned down on a very narrow mountain roadway that was not a good position to be in and the Bearcat was used to get in there and get those people out safely without any other serious injuries the suspect was using IEDs had IEDs in the form of pipe bombs and the Bearcat was used to great effect to protect the first responders that were up there and many other people that were in and around the area so that was used for that's the purpose it's used for the Watsonville PD situation the subject had barricaded in a vehicle with his child there was numerous felonies that were wanted there that the subject was wanted for but the sheer size and weight of the vehicle was used to stop him from being able to leave in his vehicle and take the child elsewhere and law enforcement was able to bring a safe resolution to that without injury to the suspect or the child we've used it on numerous barricade situations in 2021 we had an arm barricade subject reportedly in possession of a firearm making statements about killing others and themselves we used it to provide coverage for the officers who were dealing with that situation and there were numerous other instances where it gets deployed with the approval of chain of command and these are the types of incidents that we take it to next slide please so AB41 also requires that we document anything that could be considered a command and control vehicle so those will be the next few slides that you see this vehicle is a 2008 F-350 transport vehicle it's a standard Ford F-350 with a box on the back of it it's got multiple storage compartments it's got bench seats in it so people can sit in there and we keep all manner of equipment in there shields, tools medical supplies things that we might need on a ongoing critical incident it provides us the ability to have that equipment on scene and then any other additional equipment we choose to bring with us is what we would use this in addition to people this slide discusses our Chevy Tahoe patrol vehicles three of them are the marked black and white supervisors vehicles that drive around the city every single day the other one is a the one that the lieutenants drive it's the same vehicle it's just black in color they're all marked patrol vehicles and they can act as mobile command centers they have small compartments in the back of them that keep different things whiteboards, markers, medical supplies and it can function as a hasty command center if the need exists next slide please should we take a stretch break a two minute stretch break while we figure this out this design to defeat locking mechanisms and hinges on doors that is its purpose to rapidly make entry into a structure we mainly would use that in the event of a hostage situation when there are extremely violent things occurring now and we need to make entry and we need to do it as fast as we possibly can that is when we would use this tool the other is a 12 gauge pump action shotgun it's a Remington 870 it was repurposed from an out of service shotgun that we had we had it rebuilt brought back into safe functioning order and it has been turned into a chemical agent launching shotgun and that is its only purpose it is no longer capable of firing live shotgun rounds so it can only launch chemical agents it is marked clearly as less lethal the stock and the forend are bright orange safety orange and they say less lethal on them next slide please ammunition of greater than 50 caliber the launching cartridges for the 12 gauge launching shotgun it is a black powder blank cartridge and the expanding gasses of when it goes off is what launches the canisters from the end of the shotgun that's what its purpose is next slide please specialized firearms and ammunition of less than 50 caliber the department has four precision bolt action rifles three are a company called Defiance they manufacture them the other is Accuracy International they belong to a group of officers that are part of the emergency services unit tactical team the precision rifle team there are four officers each one is assigned to an individual officer they are not available for anyone before an officer can actually use this rifle they have to be selected to that team they have to go through a selection process and then they have to attend at minimum a post basic precision rifle school before they are ever allowed to deploy with this equipment and then the ammunition that goes along with it is 308 caliber 155 grain match grade ammunition it is extremely accurate ammunition it's designed specifically for these rifles they are designed to address lethal threats in violent situations at distances and through barrier mediums that other weapons systems cannot defeat and that is their purpose next slide please so flashbangs tear gas, pepper balls under category 12 so noise flash diversionary devices is the technical term for a flashbang the department has two devices that fall under the flashbang category we have the defense technologies low roll flashbang that one is designed to if we use it in an indoor situation it is designed such that it can't just roll away from where we put it it is designed so that it just kind of goes right where we leave it and doesn't get away from us but it is a device that emits a very loud bang and a very bright flash it's designed to overwhelm a disorient people and it provides us a window of time where we can intervene in extremely violent situations this device the flash and the light and the pressure that it generates it can be disorienting and if that's the difference between saving a hostage and not saving a hostage that's what we would use these types of devices for and they can be used factually as a distraction device if I want to divert attention from one thing to another thing this device could be used in that manner if it is within policy the use is justified given the instance that we're using it in the other device that we have are called Stinger grenades they're a rubber ball that has 60-32 caliber rubber balls inside of it as well as a small NFD device when it goes off the device opens separates and it expels the smaller rubber balls these are useful in violent riot situations they can be used in small areas say on a barricade armed barricade in a building if the suspect was in a small area they could be used to help make that person want to leave the area that they're in and it's got the NFD portion to it the smaller version of the other flash bang it produces a loud bang and a little bit of pressure when it goes off next slide please also in category 12 chemical agents these are all of the agents that the department has the control cs canister a riot control cs canister that device is intended for outdoor use it expels cs gas which is an irritant it's uncomfortable to be around the trichamber flameless is a canister that expels cs gas but it's specifically designed to be used indoors it's a baffle device that creates the risk of fire danger in indoor scenarios the baffle launchable cs canister is also a baffle device designed to be used indoors and it is launchable it's launched with that shotgun that I mentioned earlier on in the presentation the triple chaser separating canister also expels cs it is a device that once deployed it inserts itself into three smaller canisters that expels cs it can cover a little bit bigger of an area but with a smaller amount of agent aerosol oc fogger is a non pyrotechnic device it looks like a bug bomb that you get at the hardware store it's exactly what it looks like and functions like it expels oc like what's in the pepper spray canisters that officers carry works really well in small rooms, vehicles, things like that and it is not pyrotechnic it just uses compressed air to expel the oc and then the cs and oc liquid projectiles those are designed to be defeat barriers windows, light wooden doors they allow us the ability to introduce an agent into an area through a window through a door it's a small amount of agent and when it goes in the hardened round once it penetrates through the agent it opens up and puts the liquid agent inside the room most effective in small areas and they are not for they can't be fired at people they can be fired into areas where people may be present but they expressly cannot be fired at people next slide please so pepper ball guns the department has four they are paintball guns that's exactly what they look like and function like they fire a round that is the size of a paintball instead of paint inside of it it has a irritant powder derived from a pepper plant and it can be fired quickly a number of projectiles in a given area or at a specific individual and that's what it can do it's designed to be used at specific people who may be involved in behavior that is riotous illegal violent where we would be justified in the use of force to deploy it on that person it's it helps us not be indiscriminate it's designed for a point target for lack of a better term next slide please so the LRAD or the long range acoustical device this is it serves a couple of purposes it's a amplified PA system that's portable very very loud very very clear so we can use it to communicate with crowds with people it can be heard a very long distance away it can play pre-recorded messages it can play mp3s it can play almost anything we want it to it also has a hand mic for just like any other PA system so a person can speak live using this device and then it also has an alert tone that is very uncomfortable to be around and it is a directed tone it can be directed at specific individuals or groups of individuals engaged in behavior that needs to stop and it is not a less lethal device it's not a pepper ball gun it's not a baton it's an uncomfortable noise that makes people want to leave the area and we can direct it specifically where we would like it to be and it is again helps us not be indiscriminate it doesn't affect a crowd as a whole we direct it where we want it to to be used next slide please so these 40mm projectiles that I will talk about here are all less lethal munitions and they all are the same level of force even if they carry a irritant payload or some other type of like a marking powder payload so we have the department has single barrel launchers designed to fire these 40mm rounds every single patrol car in the fleet has one assigned to it so that whenever a patrol car arrives at a given scene there is always a less lethal tool available for the officer multiple in fact the department has two four shot multi launchers they are both assigned to the supervisors vehicles and then the ESU tactical team has a six shot multi launcher that is assigned specifically to the team and only team members can use it if it we are allowed to use it then the ammunition that we have are the exact impact the 40mm which is we call it a sponge round it is made of foam rubber soft spongy like material the direct impact is a impact round that carries a powdered OC payload so in addition to the impact less lethal force you have the irritant powder that can be added to that and then we have the marking round as a it is like a powder that is really hard to get off and if we need to mark a specific person say if there is a a large scale crowd control event going on and there is an individual who is throwing rocks and it is only one individual or bottles or Molotov cocktails and we need to identify that person for a rest we can use these marking rounds on them it is hard to get off it is hard to disguise that you were the person that was hit with this round and law enforcement can find you and take you into custody for whatever crimes may have been committed and then we possess training ammunition we buy these in 24 round kits they are more affordable than the service rounds and we can train a significant number of officers for a lesser dollar amount so that is what we purchase those next slide please ok so some of the things I wanted to bring to your attention tonight is several laws or policies that already exist that govern how or when we can use these all of this is considered use of force and we have to justify it and so there is many layers to what I believe that exist that protect the civil liberties of the community that we serve first is AB48 it is new and basically what it says is that it protects freedom of speech it protects peaceful protests or demonstrations and it clearly outlines when we cannot utilize some of the less lethal options that Sergeant Trog just discussed with you AB48 clearly tells us that the situation needs to be dangerous it needs to be violent and riotous for us to use these sort of devices next slide as I was just saying our use of force policy it is online it has always been online it drives a lot of what we do it has always driven and created the boundaries for us on when or how in which situations this sort of equipment may be considered so our use of force policy used to say it had to be objectively reasonable now it states it needs to be objectively reasonable and necessary so there is a standard that's been in our organization and still is in our organization that is part of the policy around the militarized equipment and the equipment that we've talked to you about tonight this policy is still in place and it's something that we follow and we have followed and it really governs the use of some of this equipment or all of the equipment that we've talked about tonight next slide our de-escalation policy has not changed it's still in our policy it's online, it's been online we still require our officers to go through the process of trying to find a reasonable solution a reasonable safe solution through using de-escalation tactics when feasible and appropriate so this policy is still in existence and still applies when we go through the process of evaluating the use of any of this equipment and whether it also complies with this particular policy in our organization next slide we also as an additional layer we have policy 302 I'm not going to go through all of our policies line by line but this policy also governs when we can use this equipment the training that's required there's only select people that have some access to this equipment at all because they have the training if you're not trained on it you don't use it and this particular policy speaks to it's a guideline for us about the situations that it's justified versus the situations where it's not appropriate I would encourage you to go online and look at this policy along with some of the other policies that I've spoken to next slide another layer to AB 481 is creating a process and access to the community to file complaints about our policy about the use of any of this equipment we did not create a new system or a new process our current process is online under our transparency portal where you can access a complaint form on our complaint form there was an existing category if you will that allowed members to check off they had a policy or a question they had a question about our policy and or process that is still in existence those forms get routed to our professional standard unit supervisor and ultimately we assess those complaints respond back to the community members and ultimately if there is an internal investigation as you know we have a police independent auditor that also reviews our investigations next slide as stated before AB 41 requires an annual reporting requirement these are the categories that the report needs to include additionally if there was any request to acquire additional equipment this is where you would find that request is in the annual report we also could always bring it to council separate from the annual report based on the timing but this would also this report would include that process of explaining what we wanted what we were requesting and why and go through all the categories that AB 41 requires us to disclose and there is an entire process that includes public input in a public meeting for feedback on anything that we want to acquire that is on this list and as you could see the first one will be in May of 2023 here is a quick rundown of what we have done up to this point back in March of March 18 we posted our policy we worked through feedback from the community we had legal advice from the city attorney's office we consulted with the Santa Cruz sheriff's office other organizations in our county really tried to do our homework it was a draft and so we molded it as we moved along through this process we had a public safety committee meeting which all of this material was presented to the public safety committee members in March I presented all of this information to the chief's advisory body in April April 11th we had a virtual community meeting open to the entire public and here we are April 26th and then ultimately May 10th would be the second reading of this proposed ordinance the impacts you know they're significant with whatever decision is made the continued use of this equipment significantly increases the safety of the community as a whole not just law enforcement but the subjects that we may be dealing with or anybody in the surrounding area this equipment is less lethal almost everything on this list is considered less lethal use of force and their tools they're not appropriate for every situation or scenario but they're nice to have when you have them or when you need them and we feel that policy and law guide and govern the safe use of all of this equipment obviously there'll be a significant increased level of transparency which we are totally in support of this is what we have and the community knows what we have and when or how we can use it without approval I will tell you it will change significantly how we are able to respond to critical incidents a lot of this equipment allows distance for the officers to be able to address individuals it avoids the need for physical force or in a worst case scenario a higher level of force it is most of this stuff is irritants and uncomfortable but in my opinion it is a better response than physical force or in worst case scenario potentially lethal force it forces the officers to get closer to a situation and in some situations we believe would actually kick off a more violent situation it would change significantly our response to mutual aid there's every agency in this county depends on our armored vehicle and they request it frequently which is all documented they actually use it more than we do but when they are involved in a critical incident involving weapons in a violent situation without the approval of this particular piece of equipment it would change the response to all the agencies in our entire county without this equipment it is my belief that it decreases the safety of everybody in the community this equipment actually increases the safety and how we are able to resolve real challenging situations there's a lot of training and there's a lot of skills that we would lose there's been a lot of investment these tools are not toys we take them very seriously officers have to frequently and routinely train with them and continue to go back and retrain and be recertified in the use of this equipment to lose all of that investment would be significant for us as the leader of the organization I would say that officers would feel less safe they are not being provided with the proper tools and equipment and technology that's available to the industry and I would have a hard time retaining and keeping officers in this organization I would go to other organizations whether in the county or outside the county where they are allowed to have these tools to resolve some of these situations and I'm not aware of any reasonable alternatives and that's part of AB 481 if there's reasonable alternatives that's a decision that all of you are here to make I'm not aware of it those are the impacts without approval next slide to wrap this up I really want to express I've been here for 25 years and we've had all of this equipment for the last 25 years and I feel confident and proud to say that all of the layers of policy and law that already exist I believe has guided us in a real successful direction and we've been able to resolve complicated situations without the use of lethal force because of these tools and of course some of the other tools that we have but they're not under the definition of military equipment again most of these items are considered less lethal tools which again that speaks volumes to our abilities and as we work through these situations and try what most is going to be effective to resolve the situation again these tools aren't new the conversations that have been going on they make it sound like these are new tools we've had these tools and I think that we've done really well with the tools and use them appropriately by what we're governed by I think that's the next slide thank you for your time any questions? thank you interim chief Bernie Escalante and sergeant Josh Traug thank you very much at this time I will bring it to council members for questions that will follow questions from council thank you do any council members have questions I have one general question I know that you mentioned that you used some of the items for training but like how often do you these are sort of do you use them regularly? are they not used regularly? okay just to clarify we train regularly I think I had a question can you remind me on the liquid agents and can you give me an example can you give me an example of the liquid agents the use of those a scenario where that might be used there are there's many different agents that we have the ones that are the canisters that I spoke about they are pyrotechnic devices so their use is controlled on when we can and how we deploy them so the ones that are designed specifically for indoor use we can use those indoors how we would use those is if we are and for instance engaged with a armed barricaded person like a criminal barricade and we have been at it for however many hours and we are trying to bring a safe resolution and sending officers into the location it has a high likelihood of forcing a lethal force situation so in addition to the multiple layers that would be involved into the situation like this hostage negotiation, mental health professionals being on scene and engaged helping the hostage negotiators for the crisis negotiators we may start to introduce agents to help that person want to leave and leave peacefully agents are uncomfortable to be around so we can introduce them to create a situation where they don't want to be there anymore and in addition to the other layers they would come out peacefully and surrender we can use them to deny areas of a building if we are involved in a criminal barricade and we know that the armed subject is on the first floor and it's a two-story residence I don't want someone that is armed having the high ground over the police officers the ability to shoot down on us so we could use those agents to deny the second floor make that an uncomfortable area to be in and confine the person engaged in the criminal activity to the bottom floor containing the problem the liquid agents and the pyrotechnic or gaseous agents are the same chemical composition they just have a different efficacy so the liquid agents are going to be more persistent in that they will hang around for longer but they affect a smaller area the gaseous agents can affect a larger area but dissipate over time and go away and lose their effect that helps to clear who does, thank you and then I just thank you for showing all the examples of what is defined as military equipment I was surprised that some of the emergency response items and even the vehicle the SUV would be considered a military equipment so it was helpful to have those visuals with each of those items to understand their use and how many you had so my other quick question was you listed quantities on all of those items that we have and you said 25 years are any of them one-use items or and how what are they and so would this AB 481 which would require purchasing of new equipment does that apply like if something is used and now it's no longer rechargeable or it's a one-time use item yes so almost all of the items on this list all of the agents and the 40mm less lethal the launchers will keep they are more than one-time use the shotguns obviously are more than one-time use but all of the ammunition things that would be classified as munitions are one-time use what we generally do is they all have a manufactured recommended lifespan most of it is five years so we use the items in training because training as close to realism as possible is best and we cycle those through so what we've done in the past is the munitions that get towards closer to their expiration we'll use those in training we will refresh the stock by ordering new and just sort of keep that cycle going so that we don't end up with a whole massive expired munition that we can't use and we don't end up with just way too much stuff because we frankly don't have the room to store you know infinite amounts of this stuff is that that was my question I was picturing how that's managed and trying to understand that thank you that concludes my questions councilmember Cummings thank you mayor and thank you all for the presentation and I just want to say that being on the public safety committee now for two years you know often times I think people don't come to those meetings and we have a lot of discussions around how equipment is used and so I just wanted to ask a quick question just to confirm something that I already know but maybe the members of the public aren't aware of I remember back at some of our public safety committee meetings and I was trying to look for an old agenda but you all I remember seeing kind of reported out the use of the bearcat I'm just wondering if you could speak to the public on when equipment is used how frequently it's reported out and under what circumstances is the use of whether it's military equipment or standard issued equipment like how often the use of that is reported out currently we're required to report out annually on the use of the bearcat to council and then now with AB 481 will now be required to report out several factors including the use of any of this equipment so yeah and I think that the list for our bearcat deployment is not large again it gets deployed regionally and and we also capture any time it leaves the back parking lot and answer your question I'm also curious about because I know and I think there's one item in particular that people brought to our attention which is the fact that one item of standard issued equipment is the AR-15 and also the fact that you know pistols can be considered lethal use of force yet they're not on this list because they're standard pieces of equipment and so I guess you know for example when officers pull their guns or if someone if they discharge their arms is there any policy related to how that's reported out yes a good question so we have a use of force form every time a taser is deployed or you know just pulled out displayed the officers have to fill out a use of force form that gets reviewed by the supervisor and the watch commanders so the same is true with any of this equipment I mean all of this equipment would be followed by a police report justifying the use of it so yeah we use of force is applied they fill out a form and write a report on that okay I have a couple of the questions if that's okay I also was curious because some members of the public have mentioned you know like AR-15s are you know firearms that are meant to kill and you know these historic you know in the past I would imagine those weren't standard issued pieces of equipment but now they are and so I'm just wondering what is the process for making something a standard piece of equipment for public safety officers does that come through the council or is that is there a policy on that because I guess the question is you know there are a number of pieces of equipment that we saw presented to us that are not lethal or they're less lethal and I think for some folks they'd be curious about understanding how does something like an AR-15 become a standard piece of equipment that's not listed on this list whereas we have you know pepper ball guns are something that are on this list and so I'm just wondering if we can kind of public and council understand how certain pieces of equipment become standard issue that might be considered lethal or military versus others yeah you know the AB-481 does not define standard issue unfortunately and what we would define standard issued equipment is equipment that we hand each and every officer to go out into the field with so I mean you could say their ballistic vest is standard issued right their axon body camera is standard issued their sidearm service weapon is standard issued around the AR-15 the way that these are defined as far as in AB-481 it excludes those weapons because it discusses that the exception is standard issued service weapons at the Santa Cruz police department every officer is assigned their own AR-15 I don't know if that's the case with other agencies in the county or even in the region they have their badge numbers on their weapons they're specifically cited in for those individual officers and they go out into the field with their own weapon system not only their handgun but their rifle we do that for a variety of reasons one is they are required to maintain their own weapon they are required to keep it cited in for accuracy if we have to use lethal force you need to be accurate right I mean there's other citizens around especially so that's very important so several years ago we made the investment to purchase a rifle for every single officer and they deploy out into the field with their rifle that's why we did not include that in this list because we consider it their service weapon that they deploy with every single shift and I guess I'll ask one more question is there is there a place on the city's website where people can find policies on the use of lethal and non-lethal force and also is there a list or would it be appropriate for us to direct a list of the various types of lethal and non-lethal standard issued equipment and I ask that because I think we'll have a list of what's considered military use equipment but I'm not sure if it's clear to the council or members of the public if some of this standard issued equipment is public information on that and I think that one issue around transparency is just understanding what those pieces of equipment are and since we're moving in this direction of making the militarily acquired equipment public then is there an opportunity for us to do this with the standard issued equipment as well? I will reference one of our policies it's 306.3.0 and just out of that policy it says authorized department issued patrol rifle is the AR-15 that's in our policy our entire policy is on our transparency portal on the Santa Cruz PD website all of the policies that I reference tonight are online or anybody to look at so I think that that answers your question thank you councilmember Cummings councilmember Brown thank you mayor and thank you for the overview just somewhat daunting I'll say just for me to hear all of those all of that listed out and I appreciate getting better understanding of their purpose I'll have comments on that later but for now so one of my questions is about the potential to make available lists of other equipment that is not required under the purview of 481 my understanding is that the law does not preclude adopting stricter regulations in our own local ordinances or providing that additional information and so I'm very interested in trying to find a way to make that information available to the public as well so I'll I guess I'll I sort of got an answer but I think about it a little bit more maybe come back around during comments my question right now is related to the fiscal impact and costs that are associated with this equipment the inventory has a pretty clear listing of the costs for these items in and of themselves but you highlighted in your presentation the considerable amount of time that goes into training and you know preparations for the personnel costs and the training costs associated with the potential use of this equipment and so I'm just wondering is there a way that we might be able to get a handle on that you know you suggested it's a significant investment and it would be helpful to know a little bit more about that as well and I'm not asking necessarily for that information in the moment I know that's and I'm not asking for some kind of accounting of all of the hours or time and what the time is spent on but it would just be helpful to have some sense of the associated costs as well I see City Attorney's office stepping up to City Mayor City Council members I'm happy to speak to that the annual report that STPD will be required to provide to Council a year from now will include that information that annual report should include the total annual costs for each type of military equipment including acquisition, personnel training, transportation maintenance, storage, upgrade and other ongoing costs so you will receive that and also keep in mind some of the standards that we have to meet are guided by post that are requirements of what we have to meet and our tactical team has to train so many hours every month or also become a huge liability for the City understood I didn't mean to suggest that there should those costs should be reduced or in any way I'm just kind of wanting to get a handle on what so I have one more quick question my understanding now is that standard issue equipment can overlap with the military equipment or not well per AB 481 you could decide to put whatever equipment you want to put on the list that we have to report out to that's ultimately your decision if you want to go beyond what is defined as military equipment per AB 481 okay thank you okay any other questions from council members if not I will take it out to public comment I'm going to check the zoom attendees and I see one attendee in zoom with their hand raised and that is uh joy s if you are watching from via zoom now is the time to call in and comment on item number 27 and you can press star 9 to raise your hand and you will have three minutes to speak or you can choose the raise hand feature on your webinar controls okay go ahead and unmute yourself hi can you hear me yes thank you hi this is joy shundle decker um I just wanted to speak to one particular area of this report there's I think a lot in every type of equipment that could be addressed but the tear gas section just because I know a little bit about this equipment and it's it's really disturbing that we have so much of it in stock especially these triple chaser CS canisters which are chemical weapons that are banned in war uses but not in domestic policing situations for example they've been used extensively in portland, Oregon Ferguson standing rock you know often used against people who are black lives matter or indigenous land protectors protesters I think generally they escalate rather than deescalate situations they don't keep the populace safe whether they're used on individuals or crowds when they're thrown they separate into three parts so they're kind of hard to control where they're going to land, who they're going to hit and how people can get away from them they also in the report it says that they do not cause allergic reactions which is they do cause allergic reactions there's extensive safety information that you can find with an internet search you can find the official safety data sheet for these canisters it's a 19 page document they also come with a prop 65 warning that they they include lead salts and hexavalent chromium which are known to the state of California to cause cancer and they also contain lead salts which are known to the state of California to cause birth defects or other reproductive harm they obviously can cause serious injury because they're projectiles they contain heavy metals they are persistently toxic in aquatic environments and they're toxic to people and animals there are several lawsuits in Portland that are ongoing because people have had problems with their health following exposure even when they have not been protestors people who just live within say a mile of where these have been used they also you know they're not so expensive but they only have a shelf life of five years so it's a kind of a cost where you have to keep buying them and keeping them in store and ultimately they have to be disposed of as hazardous waste which we know that our hazardous waste goes into 55 gallon drums and then is sent elsewhere so then just polluting some other community thank you for your time thank you for your comment I will now bring it to a member of our public and I'll do an alternating rotation here so please step forward thank you for waiting my name is Lee Brokaw I'm not speaking for the ACLU but I am chairman of the ACLU local boards police accountability and transparency committee I'd like to thank the lady for her in depth knowledge of tear gas I've been tear gassed by the best of them highway patrol Berkeley police and Alameda County tax squad and I can tell you that they evacuated hospitals and schools because of the drift to the tear gas I am here to tell you well first of all I've already communicated to you in writing in depth much more logical than I'll be able to do tonight I'm here to tell you that Santa Cruz police department has not satisfied the requirements of AB 481 the state has provided the people of this state the opportunity to look at what the police department have in a way of weapons what Santa Cruz police department has done is they have left off their assault weapons and I heard a discussion here amongst the staff and or the council and interim chief Bernie about service standard issue service weapons and that is what he's hanging his hat on by not telling you how many assault weapons we have in the city I asked him specifically I said I'd never seen anybody on a bicycle patrol with an AR-15 over their shoulder he says no they don't I said I've never seen anybody walking the streets of Pacific Avenue with an AR-15 over their shoulder he says no they don't and they had considered putting them on motorcycles and then decided against it if it is a standard issue it is carried all the time the Glock 22 is a typical standard issue of police and it is carried on by officer and every single officer carries that weapon they wouldn't even take them off for the Martin Luther King march at the request of Brenda Griffith and NAACP so the argument about standard issue does not hold and I would just like to say that Santa Cruz is an outlier just on a random survey on a Sunday afternoon when I would have rather been doing other things I found out capitol of Scottsville Santa Clara, Santa Clara Sheriff San Rafael Napa, Berkeley, Folsom Oceanside, San Diego San Diego Sheriff and guess what Andy Mills in Palm Spring all list their assault weapons I asked Andy I said well I call him up and congratulated him for publishing his assault weapons and he said there were people there who urged him not to do it and his reply was follow the law and one of the things that I've done for this community was advocate strongly to hire Andy Mills and I'm proud of that and he's following the law I've offered to work with the city attorney and the interim chief I bring the Quakers with me I bring the ACLU with me and go through all of this and make sure that this is in compliant with 481 as it is presented tonight thank you for your comment and now the next member of the public hi there welcome James Ewing Sheriff corner Jim Hart and Sergeant Robbins gave a presentation on March 22nd pretty good similar to yours I appreciate that you guys provided similar and different information thank you then I think it was April 10th that some other that Sheriff corner Jim Hart produced a little bit shorter presentation so this is all public information the what day was that that's the March 20th secretary wait I'm incorrect come on March excuse me the April okay I have the date wrong but there's some information that is not being disclosed as far as the other weapons that can be used there was the long range sonic weapons of ours the phased array antennas also do that kind of damage and have effects this is a really powerful weapon only one watt depends on how far it is from you but it's actually a really powerful weapon by my count there's over 50 phased array antennas the one that's just right up the street across from the post office that technology is very clearly explained this has only one watt one of the devices is eight 300 watts the other one is three 500 watts you can kind of imagine Star Trek lasers those things operate billions of trillions of times a second I actually think Justin Cummins for bringing up what's not listed and that's the standard issue equipment maybe the phased array weapons are standard issue to control people in this county and that's why it's not listed so I'm looking forward to being here more and maybe sit down with you a couple times and I thank you guys for what you produced thank you very much thanks for the comments of the staff thank you I will now take it to a member of on zoom if you can just hang on one second I'll do an alternating method here so I have out in zoom a couple of participants and the first hand raised is Jennifer to go ahead and press star six to unmute yourself hi can you hear me clearly yes thank you thank you this is Jennifer to with the American Friends Service Committee and I just wanted to encourage the council to really think about under what circumstances this equipment should not be deployed we heard in the presentation tonight about the extensive training and we learned a lot about who is allowed to deploy this equipment but we haven't heard anything about when the equipment should not be deployed so one particular example would be should any militarized equipment be deployed when there are children present when there are elderly present when there are vulnerable population members present and so I would really encourage the council to consider giving this guidance to the police department on under what circumstances the equipment should not be deployed kind of similar to that in the presentation we heard about how 40 millimeter impact rounds could be used in protest situations but then later in the presentation we also heard about how AB 48 does not allow that circumstance and so that's also a similar situation that it would be really helpful if the council could clarify and then I just wanted to echo what the previous a couple speakers ago Lee had mentioned about the AR-15 and just close with a question for the council which is we've heard that the AR-15 is standard issue for your police and we've also heard that they do not actually carry it as the previous speakers said in all circumstances the question I would like to leave you with is what public safety concerns does the city of Santa Cruz have that is different from all of these other municipalities that Lee had surveyed and found weren't using AR-15 as standard issue but had included them in their AB 481 policy thanks very much thank you our next zoom attendee is John Lindsay Poland go ahead and press star six to unmute yourself can you hear me okay yes welcome good evening my name is John Lindsay Poland I work for the American Friends Service Committee and we have been conducting a study of militarized equipment used by law enforcement throughout California for the last year really multiple years and the first thing I want to just emphasize is that the AB 481 gives you 180 days from the presentation of the proposed policy by the department to make a decision before the lack of making a decision has any impact on the use of the equipment which means that you can talk to the department you can talk with community members you can talk with constituents you can go back and forth you can send it to a committee you can do a lot of work on this 180 days to make sure that it's a good policy I was in one of the community meetings with chief in which we talked about the AR-15s and I asked that question specifically of the chief is there given that the surrounding jurisdictions and other jurisdictions in California are not classifying their patrol rifles which they have 95% of these departments have them as standard issue what is the public safety circumstance in Santa Cruz that has led you to issue these as standard issue to your officers and the chief did not have any response of any public safety difference if you don't want to go to them and say they shouldn't be standard issue or they should be justified as why they are standard issue at the very least you should ask for transparency piece which other departments have done Capitola said they are standard issue for them but as a transparency measure they are including them in their military equipment policy I want to remind you throughout this country by law enforcement is used disproportionately against people of color when you include military equipment into that equation it amplifies the harm so the disparate impact of use of force by law enforcement is amplified when you have militarized equipment which makes it all the more important that you have what other callers have called for which is prohibitions on certain types of use to be clear to the department that you want certain types of things prohibited laid out side the authorized uses of that equipment rather than language like included but not limited to or other types of fairly ambiguous language so I hope you will send it back to staff and we are very willing to work with you in any manner in order to make this a good policy thank you for your comment I will now take it to the POP members here in person and first member of the public thank you for waiting please approach the microphone welcome I'm John Golder what the heck sorry, I apologize I'm the alleged victim of the August 21st Santa Cruz maniac write out can you ask for a name what I look like our number one civic and community goal is informed and involved citizenry and responsive and effective government which is a clause I had inserted in the general plan and unanimously voted by the council on my birthday in 2008 during that event which was two months after the city council passed three ordinances to control mass rallies and events and marches and protestors every single traffic law in the city was violated in a 5000 bikers came through this town and raised hell and the Santa Cruz maniac maniac write out web page has 13 photos of the clubs with their star writers or presidents I don't know who and if you push on those pictures you'll get a video with a song which will tell you exactly what it was all about and basically it was all about we're the stars, we're the show we follow the rules, get out of our way and I watched the whole thing I'd seen it years before but it was incredibly disruptive and of course I've had conversations with many many people after what happened to me and there were hundreds events I did a record request for every 911 call for the city services I got eight responses including mine my victims the officer wrote the report completely screwed it up I didn't get to see the report until a few weeks ago and everything I told him was wrong and I'm going to do a citizen supplement and my victims advocate didn't get back to me until December and the next thing she told me was the case was closed because they couldn't find the security tapes you know when they looked for them in January I didn't keep security tapes around that long I saw at least three cameras that could have caught it so real quickly negligence by the city sloppy ordinance language like disturbs the normal floor traffic the city doesn't have vagueness in the law and I'm not going to hit you but get yourself a copy of the California peace officer's legal source book I got the law library to get that and that will inform any citizen how the police are supposed to act in every situation in anybody with the you know how good a book that is it tells everything an officer should do in different situations have it available as a resource for the people to learn and be informed and involved so these guys can be responsive and effective and we won't have civil unrest and need all these damn weapons thank you for your comment our next member of the public please approach the microphone I want to provide a perspective that might be somewhat general and a little bit unusual maybe in this type of discussion the Bearcat was pretty new we just bought it a couple years ago actually I think we got it free from the federal government and so it is actually new and I object to a lot of the language through this presentation it's basically an advertisement and I've seen this before I saw it when the community found out we found out quite accidentally that the city was considering acquiring a Bearcat we had a robust protest when that happened because it was military equipment and we fortunately found out about it but it is new and this is an advertisement I want you to know that it is an advertisement to use military equipment in a civil setting so at this point I just want to say we're facing food shortages we're facing increasing numbers of people being homeless because after 30 to 40 years of this neoliberal agenda with a concentration of wealth which is a weapon used against people poverty is a weapon having people out there deprived of mental health services when they desperately need it it's a weapon I know a young journalist in this community who's out on the street he had an interview with his therapist yesterday he's not getting another one for six weeks this is for somebody who needs probably a couple of appointments a week I'm saying we need to address the needs in our society people's needs need for food need to have environments that are not so polluted the military is one of the biggest polluters on the planet please let's step back and really get informed and not just swallow this advertisement like we swallow commercials for food with corn syrup that is also lethal we need to step back from this way of policing our community I want to add by saying she absorbs some presentations up at UCSE I wish I could remember the lady's name so I'm not going to try to say that but she studies the police nationwide her researchers research nationwide the police in LA are providing computers to elders in communities as a way of securing their favor we cannot just go blithely into acquiring military equipment except very keenly very specifically and I want to say Lee Broca told me that in that first incident that was listed up there that the equipment was used on 6.6.20 a resident took the assailant down tackle him none of the equipment was used for that thank you very much thank you for your comment and next member of the public here in person thank you hi I'm Tim FitzMorris justified here 2015 it was against the bear cat and I walked out the door this place was crowded I walked out the door and I was immediately intimidated by a lieutenant of the police department for not understanding what the police needed in order to do their job I understand how intimidating this situation can be for you the presentation was full of that type of intimidation you're going to lose officers you're going to risk lives you're going to those kinds of intimidations which are constant you have to decide what your legacy is going to be this is a moment to decide that do you know what time it is do you know what day it is do you know what year it is this is not even 2015 when maybe there was something in someone's mind that said the militarization of the police was not a bad idea this is a new day we're in a transformative situation that may end up protecting the police by making them more integrated into the community rather than the force that controls the community I know what the word police means I know what the word policy means you do policy, they do police there's two different things everything I heard in the report that had to do with policy you take it with a grain of salt at least I went to every swearing in I could go to when I was in office I met the families every time I heard a siren go off from 1998 to 2006 I felt responsible for the person who was in the vehicle I knew they were in danger I knew that was a difficult situation and that I would have to live with whatever my decisions were with regard to them I know you feel the same thing I really respect that that this is an important decision and you're going to want to figure out a way to costume them with power and I work in a prison I've been involved in pepper spray events and riots maybe a dozen times in the last six years I've seen the costumes of power and the necessity for being able to control events but please please understand that this is your legacy you will be judged by this this is the reason I came back after seven years to address this body because this is important because now is the time to change what policing is in our community and the only way you can do that is by changing the costume by taking away the armor and putting people out there with all the vulnerability that citizens have when they address each other we all have that vulnerability I really like the fact that the AR-15 was brought up that shows you that things are not being presented accurately that's a problem I think I've said what I need to say and I do appreciate what you folks have to decide but decide carefully because when the results occur your name is going to be on it this is not them they're the people who are operating the system you're the person who's in charge you're the person whose name is on everything they do everything they do they follow orders when they're at their best they do it excellently beware next member of the public in person please step to the microphone welcome good evening council members I can't resist saying you should be proud of this day today I feel like we could be on the verge of saying you hit a home run this day after having been here this afternoon and having feeling appreciation for what you're doing right now which is something that's long overdue this is not a topic over history that has been widely discussed at Santa Cruz City Council meetings before and I don't know who it is but we should thank the author of AB 481 that it's a topic tonight because this is darn important and deputy chief please forgive me if this is impolite but I want to say something that you said in different words you should you said something to the effect that I bristled at and that was that we should use those tools that are available to the industry and I recoiled when you said that because we should use those tools that are available to protect public safety we've painted it on our police cars for decades and it's not about the industry it really isn't that's what's wrong here tonight is that it is should not be about the weapons industry should not be about can we get a better toolbox I mean it's a nice metaphor it's okay but the fact is we should be seriously and repetitively thinking about these things that are happening in our town and they're happening in towns all across the country and whether they are protecting the public safety so let's think in that frame most of the time not what's the best tool in the industry and I just want to say some brilliant comments happen tonight already and regarding the use of force incidents which when I was on the city council for eight solid years sometimes wonderful sometimes dragging my feet ever so slightly those discussions didn't happen I think it's unique that we're having this discussion tonight and it's important and it's valuable for all of you and all of us who participate in this thing called community government and so why should the use of force incidents be hidden away in reports that just happen to come forward to the public safety committee get read there but nobody in this town or very few people even know that those meetings are taking place and somebody even made a comment that people don't come to those meetings I know three council members go to those meetings I was one of the first ones that did that and I wasn't thrilled with it because we used to have a citizens police review board and that was a good thing I know that it had problems but it was a good thing that we had these discussions so keep having these discussions be happy that you're going to hear this again on May 10 in between now and then put in some modifications to this so that if we're going to have AR-15s we at least acknowledge it they're designed to kill people thank you for your comment next member of the public in person good evening I'm Scott Graham the chief of police was mentioning appropriate use for the situation and I'd like to give a few examples of where this went awry many years ago at the town clock on New Year's Eve two minutes after midnight the police in full riot gear surrounded the crowd and tried to disperse everybody instead of letting people enjoy the moment well somebody some drunken inebriant in the crowd decided to throw a bottle at a police car so then the police went into high gear and started corralling the crowd and forcing them down Pacific Avenue instead of down Water Street towards the jail it made absolutely no sense to herd people down Pacific Avenue and then once people were being herded down Pacific Avenue of course a number of other drunken idiots started breaking windows to me that was all caused by an inappropriate use of force by the police if the police hadn't tried to break up the New Year's celebration two minutes after midnight and it had allowed people to just enjoy themselves for a few more minutes none of this would have happened it happens all the time not only here but all around the country where the police show up in riot gear to some peaceful gathering whether it's a protest or not and the police because they're in riot gear cause a riot to happen that's not appropriate use another example Sean Arl had a rake he was swinging around an appropriate response would be to check him with a shovel not unload your gun into him which is what happened and the city paid millions of dollars to his family because of that so when you hear that they're going to use appropriate use there's too many examples when that doesn't happen I would implore you to not rush this through there's no reason to rush this through there should be a bunch of public engagement in this the citizens of this city need to be engaged need to be part of this process so having one Zoom meeting is not public engagement I'm sorry so we need to have a lot of meetings not just one we need to have several meetings so put this off do not pass this tonight please let the public be involved in this thank you thank you for your comment it looks like that concludes our public comment from in person as well as Zoom and actually there's one hand I'm just double-checking Zoom there's one hand raised if you are commenting on item number 27 your phone number ends in 5542 go ahead and unmute yourself and even the council members mayor I'm on the pomegranate a few years ago I was very impressed and admired hell police chief Mills in motion the Santa Cruz police department's role towards 21st century police and blueprint in part that would mean police officers would see their role as guardians and not warriors the equipment and use policy guidelines before you today run contrary to this direction there's six pillars in the 21st century police and blueprint take note of pillar one building trust pillar four community policing the question I posed to the council tonight is how do you reconcile the contradiction between 21st century policing and the use of military equipment residents are not enemy combatants I asked the council to look at really look at the list of military style equipment that's been approved over many years military equipment used in more situations is this what community policing and building trust and legitimacy looks like I think not are these weapons that guardian tabs I think not if you've got the proverbial hammer everything looks like a nail I thought I'd offer you what's best for the community what's best for the police department and vice versa for me this is seriously minimized military equipment to the barest potential and policies to avoid the look and feel of an invading military force of warriors allowing people allowing use policies of military style weapons escalate to dirty fear especially for poor and people of color and provides and promotes tools of escalation rather than de-escalation de-escalation of tent situations is the best way to go to protect officers and the public as well I find many of the police department's military weapons and supporting policies potentially in direct conflict with First Amendment rights as well as needlessly endangering the public with serious injury and or health consequences as you've heard tonight chemical weapons are one such example I believe that officers need good protection to do their job the public also needs protection from excessive force please keep the preponderance of military weapons on the battlefield and not in our yards and our streets or in other public places I sent in a couple days ago I hope you'll take a look at one of the advertisements of one of the contractors that provides for tear gas if that doesn't look like a battlefield situation I don't know what does, I wish I was there to show you in person I thank you for your time this evening I hope you'll seriously take much more time for this very very serious matter good night thank you for your comment and it looks like that concludes our public comment on item 27 this evening I will bring it back to council for action and deliberation Vice Mayor Watkins I just wanted to see if the staff wanted to respond to any of the issues that were brought up by the members of the public I did take note on one specific question or scenario regarding the use of some of this equipment with children or elderly present what's really difficult is to present every possible scenario that we could be involved in and talk about whether this equipment would be used or not used and specifically say that if there's a scenario where we have time to do our homework and our tactical team will go out several days in advance to do their homework on a particular location if there's signs of elderly or children present at the location all of this sort of chemical agents and less lethal devices are not approved for deployment period so I did want to touch on that again it's really hard to capture every single possible scenario but I'm proud of the work that we do prior to any sort of pre-planned situation and even unplanned situation to determine what is the safest piece of equipment to resolve the situation again around the AR-15s I've worked closely with the city attorney's office and Stephanie Duck we're utilizing the law and the way it's been given to us and we think that our scenario must be different I don't know about all the other agencies but I know that for example, I know Watsonville was mentioned they do not issue every single officer their own individual AR-15 so I just think that the scenarios should be put into context and I think that our situation is maybe unique but that's why we've come to that conclusion the weapons are in every single patrol car as they get deployed we're not trying to hide them so everybody knows we have them it's not a matter of us trying to hide them it's basically we're just complying with how we interpret the law Council Member Calentari Johnson I have a follow-up question for Interim Chief Escalante what would it take to include AR-15s in the inventory and what would that look like, what would be the challenges could we do that you can make that decision as a governing body and we would add them it would be included in all of our future annual reporting moving forward that's your that's part of this process actually there are other equipment items that we may not know about that would be similar to an AR-15 that might be considered to be included nothing no, I mean there's other equipment that we carry like tasers batons OC spray again all standard issued equipment when an officer goes out to patrol I mean the 40 millimeters are already included because they're called out based off of the definition but we do have other equipment that also did not fall within the definition Council Member Golder well, I appreciate the members of the public that came out and I was really thinking hard after hearing what what Mr. Fitzmorris and Mr. Porter said and it got me thinking to what some of the callers also called in and said and I'm just curious I'm trying to think back in my head with these uses of force in our community how many of our own officers in the county have been killed in the line of duty in the last, I don't know, 10 years and I don't know if you know versus how many people have been killed by officers and I'm not counting the ones that got killed or maybe counting them with how many instances like that where the uses of force have become lethal either way I don't know statewide just in the county or just in the locally within the last 10 years I know we've had two officers killed and obviously the sheriff's office just recently had one and unfortunately we do hear and read a lot about violent crime on the rise across the country and so from my perspective like when I think about the AR-15s I guess it makes sense to include them but what I was also thinking is I've seen also on the Santa Cruz police and the sheriff's Instagram pages where you've taken those off the streets out of the hands of criminals too and so it's just from a public safety standpoint for me it makes sense for our police to be carrying the most effective weapons I mean you don't want to be outmatched I don't have to say it articulately but when someone's out there protecting the community I wouldn't want them to have less weapons than are readily available to people on the street and so and even when I was thinking about when someone said around seniors or students we practice safety drills for active shooters on campus all the time you know a couple times a year at every school and I would really I appreciate that you have the non-lethal but I also appreciate that you have some lethal weapons it's really terrible to think about what these kind of tragic mass shooting events happen and I don't like to live in a state of constant fear but I want our police department to be equipped with the most effective tools to protect the people of the community so I am happy to move the motion I'm happy to include that bit about the AR-15s and I don't know if we want to continue going around the community but I would like to thank you. Councilmember Golder has made a motion to is it the staff recommendation and then we could add the AR-15s to the inventory and if that's the only thing and I can second and if I may clarify mayor I believe that would technically include including AR-15s in the definition of military equipment so in the definition of what qualifies as military equipment AB-481 includes any other equipment as determined by a governing body or a state agency to require additional oversight so here you would be saying you think that AR-15s require additional oversight and therefore you want them to qualify as military equipment to be included on the list yeah that sounds reasonable and I think that's kind of sounds like that was your intent thank you for that clarification okay we have a motion on the floor Councilmember Golder seconded by Callentary Johnson and we can have discussion on the motion Councilmember Myers I just have a question based on our attorney's comment then so requiring oversight that would put the AR-15s just trying to understand put the AR-15s into a category that would require for example employment policies trainings all of those kinds of things that were outlined with the various other um categories that we have went ahead and put into the military category weapons category and do any of those actions take place now or is the AR-15 basically in a sense a field a field response you know you mentioned they were in every patrol car so I'm just trying to just trying to understand what that looks like that particular point you just brought up in terms of this additional oversight because to me that renders that particular weapon used by our force to I'm just trying to find out I'm trying to understand a little bit more about what that means I think essentially what it means for us is that it's added to the list and part of the annual reporting and everything that is currently required by AB 481 to be included in that annual report would now include the AR-15 so whether it's replacements whether it's any acquisition cost of trainings and so forth but it wouldn't impact day-to-day operations within the department no are there any other comments or discussion from council members council member brown thank you mayor I'm forgetting to take this off so I can hear me so I just want to say first off you know having read the inventory and listened to the presentation it's pretty daunting and I the comments I'm going to make right now are general thinking about this on a societal level just because I feel the need to say it that frankly I can't understand why we as a society accept using some of these weapons which after all are weapons of war on civilians and again I'm talking at a general level here my comments are not specific to the SCPD intended to question our officers use of equipment appropriately I'm talking about the fact that these are weapons of war that are intended to maim and in some cases kill the chemical agents alone which are categorized as less lethal and probably on balance that's true but evidence suggests they can certainly be lethal we were told tonight that they can't be fired at people but the reality is they can be and they are not here that I know of but they are happening in communities around the country the item before us though tonight is not about whether or not we're going to ban these weapons or consider what to do about them right now we are as I heard we've had them here for many years but what we're talking about is compliance with AB 481 and a consideration of how it is that these weapons are acquired, used potentially utilized and you know, managed in our community I'm glad that there seems to be support for including assault weapons the air 15s on the list because I believe that that transparency is an important first step and that's a lot of what AB 481 is about it's opened up a conversation that I welcome although it's difficult I would like us to spend more time now that that conversation has been opened up reviewing the equipment on this list getting a better understanding of what the consequences are the potential impacts and I'd also like for us to consider elaborating in this policy the rules under you know under what circumstances this equipment should not be deployed I understand you take this very seriously and the rules that you have in place and the training you have in place prescribes much of that but what I see in the language in the document is in the documents we have before us a lot of including but not limited to and I think a few of the public commenters raised this that provides a pretty wide opening for use beyond what we might anticipate what the expected use is and it concerns me and I take the comments of folks who are here who have served on this body have thought about these matters very deeply and I think that we do have an opportunity here to use this as a conversation to open up a conversation about how we move forward and try to demilitarize our environment our community so you know right now I don't know that I have the information that I feel I would need to vote that we've made the findings that are required to move forward here I would like us to spend more time on it and get more information and I guess I'll just leave it there and see if others have comments before we thank you council member brown are there any other comments for discussion from council members council member Cummings thank you mayor and I want to thank the members of the public for their comments on this item and I do want to just acknowledge something that was said around engagement and discussion and you know I think that as a governing body I believe that even throughout the course of COVID and as we've been really trying to make sure that we're getting information out to people that moving forward I think there's opportunities for us to do better as well with getting information out to the public about what items are being heard by our various committees and subcommittees because this item did go before the public safety committee and that is one of the layers of transparency and community engagement that we use in order for the public to be able to engage with us on these topics such as these where we really do want to get community input and I should say that there were people here in the audience who did come to that meeting and who did express their opinions about this at that meeting so I just wanted to be clear that we are trying to do our best to make sure that there is transparency and communication around especially when it comes to items of high significance like this one I think Council Member Brown alluded to this but we also brought this up earlier that before this item came up before council we didn't have any policies around transparency of this type of equipment and we also to my knowledge and I stand to be corrected but I don't know if we have as much transparency around what as I mentioned earlier what are the non-lethal forms of standard issued and I think it would be good for the public to know what that is to and that it's easily identifiable on the website because just by doing a quick search of lethal equipment or what have you it's not really easy to find out what types of equipment whether it's standard issue or otherwise that we have in our police department our police are using and so I think that this is helpful I did just do a quick search and Capitola has their policy online about the use of assault rifles and you know maybe that's something that we could build on in terms of you know we move in this direction and it doesn't seem like based on the language that really hinders the ability of police officers to use that equipment and I will say to you know what came up in the presentation and you know being mayor during 2020 when we did have the incident that led to the death of a police deputy and the entire Santa Cruz police department was a way of responding to that call and the bear cat which there's a policy and that policy is public on how it's used every year and it's demonstrated consistently that you know it really is used for the purposes of safety and that's a really good example of how it was used to protect officers who could have otherwise been hurt or potentially killed and you know it's unfortunate that our country is you know being militarized more and more we're hearing about more and more school shootings mass shootings we had not only Ben Lohman but Gilroy a couple years back and this is something that we really need to be conscious of and make sure that when those situations occur that we're able to actually provide increased public safety and so you know I think that there is a balance that we're going to have to there's a tightrope we're going to have to walk as it relates to you know not militarizing our public safety to the point where people live in fear but also giving them the tools they need so that when people are intending to cause harm on mass scales to our communities we're able to protect ourselves and so I guess I'll leave my comments there I had some other questions and yeah I guess one question because I'm interested in potentially making some friendly amendments I don't think might be acceptable but I just want to circle back because one question I do have is around how pieces of equipment become standard pieces of equipment because I don't think any of us know like at what time did an AR-15 become standard issued equipment and who made that decision and like what was that based on so I'm just kind of curious about that because it sounds like the way the law stands is that if we were to designate another form of lethal equipment to be standard use it wouldn't necessarily have to go under this policy and so I'm just trying to reconcile who decides when something becomes a standard issued piece of equipment especially if it can be used for the purposes of force I would say that the standard issued definition is when a new police officer shows up and we issue all of their equipment that they're going to deploy out in the field every single day that's standard issued so I mean everything from a duty belt to boots to body camera all of those pieces of equipment that are standard for them having their possession when they go out into the field that's what I would consider standard issued may I just clarify so AB 481 does not exempt all standard issued equipment it only exempts standard issued shotguns service weapons and standard service issued handheld pepper spray I wanted to get that clarification out there yeah I guess I think I don't know if my question might not be clear but I guess at what point so like let's say I would imagine back in maybe the 1980s AR-15s weren't considered standard pieces of equipment and I guess who determines when something like that becomes a standard piece of equipment maybe the city attorney can speak to that well the problem here is that the statute refers to standard issued service equipment but it doesn't define the term so so in consultation with my office and the police department we determined that because AR-15s are issued to each and every police officer that they are a standard issue item and I would just note that the statute specifically refers to assault weapons with the exception of standard issued service weapons so by implication the legislature contemplated that assault weapons can be standard issue and as a practice they are here but we don't have a statutory definition upon which to hang our hat okay I think possibly and maybe we could talk about this on the public safety committee but I think my question is more related to how does something become standard issued equipment because like for example if we were going to say okay tomorrow like an M-16 considered a military weapon and then who is the like if the police department was then going to issue M-16s to every single officer and that's now considered standard issued equipment who would be the body to make that determination that's what I'm trying to get to. I think the answer to the question councilmember Cummings is that before this new law went into effect then there wasn't a clear process for doing that but now that 41 is in effect that's what you're doing right now so there wasn't a clear mechanism for you know dealing with that situation before and this is the legislature's attempt to sort of bring that process into the public sphere. Thank you that was my question so and then and then I guess also just the I just want to make it clear to the community that back in 2020 the city council unanimously approved that any military great equipment whether it's going to public safety or public works or any department would have to come through the city council for approval and I believe that's what NS29862 which is the resolution that came before city council is that that is correct. So I just wanted the community to be clear that we've been proactively trying to work on this issue and this really what's before is applying with state law and so sorry if I wasn't being clear earlier but thank you for the time. Thank you council member Cummings Vice Mayor Watkins. I just have a really quick comment because I think what I am hearing in general is that these are iterative and that they're new and they're learning and will refine and if other equipment comes about that we need to take a look at then we could adjust our policy and even adjust our ordinance in the future but this is where we are now with this legislation and I feel comfortable with the motion and I appreciate the addition. Thank you Vice Mayor Watkins. At this time we still have one more item after this our parks and recreation report and I know that they're still waiting. So if that concludes our comments on this very important item thank you so much everybody thank you to members of the public I'd like to ask the clerk to take a roll call vote on the motion on the floor. Thank you Mayor. Council Member Calentari Johnson. I. Boulder. I. Cummings. I. Brown. I. Myers. I. Vice Mayor Watkins. I. And Mayor Brunner. I. That motion passes unanimously. Thank you. At this time we will take a two minute break to just readjust the equipment and allow the city clerk to reset. We will return at 948. Director Elliott might be drinking coffee. I can hear you now Mayor. Are we up? Thank you. Thank you. If council members are all present great. We are now at item 28 on our agenda today. This is Parks and Recreation Department annual report for fiscal year 2021 and I'd like to welcome director Tony Elliott and Lindsay Bass principal management analyst via zoom. Thank you very much Mayor and city council for the opportunity to present our annual report for fiscal year 21. Thanks for staying up late with us as we present. Just by way of a quick acknowledgement, yeah principal management analyst Lindsay Bass is on the call. Also out there is our park superintendent Travis Beck and then coming in from Texas tonight is our recreation superintendent Rachel Kaufman. So happy to answer questions once we get to that point. So let me go ahead and share my screen and we'll move through this presentation pretty quickly here this evening. Okay can you see my screen? Yes. Okay so yeah we'll move through this pretty quickly this evening but please don't let my brevity in the presentation discount the really exceptional work that's been done here in the Parks and Recreation Department and by Lindsay and Travis and Rachel to put this report together. So for the council and the community this report is available and so even though the presentation will be short tonight a lot of really great information and detail in this report for the community. So the purpose of doing this report every year this is our second edition the purpose is to summarize this report folio to the community to benchmark and assess performance against the department's mission goals and objectives and to summarize service level demands and needs within the community and for a little bit of context and especially for the community as we're looking at this we're talking about fiscal year 21 we're currently nearing the end of fiscal year 22 and we're planning for our budget for fiscal year 23. At this moment we're looking what seems like a long time ago backwards but it's relevant to look at where we've been to help us be very strategic about where we're going so just wanted to give a little bit of that context in terms of the time frame on this. The mission of the Parks and Rec Department is to provide quality public spaces and experiences that build a healthy community foster equity and better the environment and within the report there's some really great narrative that drills down into detail about that mission and what we do. In the report you'll see a number of goals, our 2021 goals that we have outlined here and by way of numbers you can see some of these on the screen I think one that we often talk about in Parks and Recreation here in service to Santa Cruz is that we've got 96% of all of our residents within a 10 minute walk of a park so we have 50 total park properties, 32 neighborhood parks so a really world class a truly amazing park system we've got more than triple the national average of trails so from a numbers metric standpoint we stand out nationally and we stand out among our comparison agencies even throughout the state of California so if you look at our Parks Master Plan comparison agencies like San Luis Obispo Santa Barbara so on and so forth even surpass our levels of service compared to a lot of these communities so a real point of pride there again I'm going to move through this very quickly so a couple of the highlights that we've included in this year's annual report and reflecting on 2021 during the sort of during the pandemic and challenges we faced in 2021 we had about a 10% vacancy rate that vacancy rate was even higher within our park maintenance division I think it was over 20% within our park maintenance division at its worst but even with staff shortages we were able to keep 99% of our park acreage open and accessible to the community and we saw a real increase in usage of parks during fiscal year 21 use of west cliff was up over 100% the golf course had increased over the year in terms of play and revenue so parks were in heavy use a number of highlights in terms of our investment in the natural environment from investment in clean energy from solar to our street tree master plan and work to migrate our gas powered equipment to battery powered lawn equipment in addition to others reforestation tar plant recovery at erotic gulch as well so significant investment in our natural environment even in the face of staff shortages in a challenging year in fiscal year 21 we also made significant investment in our community services so 2021 was not a normal year so we were providing essential worker child care at the London Nelson community center summer school classes began at Bayview and galt elementary schools offered a number of teen employment opportunities to get teens plugged into local jobs and a lot of efforts geared toward reaching our senior population with new technology working with new wave of vista elder day and number of programs to serve our senior community as well in 2021 so a number of lessons that we've learned now with our second annual report at number one here our report can really help us support a dialogue with the community on the value of parks and recreation that's part of the reason that we're here tonight and we've continued to put this document together to inform the community on the value of parks and recreation and so we're seeking feedback tonight from the council on how is this report what can we do to improve it and what is your feedback on this report and our efforts to communicate to the community and to the parks and rec department secondly we continue to do work this was a topic that the council raised last year when we presented the annual report we continue to make progress standardizing our benchmarks our KPIs our key performance indicators on what are we measuring and what is the community want to hear what do they need to hear in terms of metrics and measurement from parks and recreation we've done that and taken the council's direction from last year but we continue to work on that and that's a real focus for me and Lindsay and the team to really get solid data key performance indicators so that we can report to the council on that over time and then our perpetual challenge is how to cover everything that we do in parks and recreation communicate this out but keep it as succinct as possible as a challenge as we go into the report so just a few key takeaways I want to leave the council with and the community just reflecting on fiscal year 21 is that parks and recreation is really essential and we saw this more perhaps than ever in 21 from an infrastructure standpoint parks and our facilities are infrastructure and served in that capacity in an emergency service capacity during the CZU fires the essential child the essential worker child care opening our facilities to that need and then again just parks in terms of that infrastructure to serve the physical and mental health and well being of our community we knew that, we talk about that a lot from the health and wellness and health and all policies that lens but when everything was shut down we were still going through those early months of the pandemic we saw even more so that parks and rec provides critical infrastructure for physical and mental well being another key takeaway is just that we continue to face the challenges of the time in fiscal year 21 that included the pandemic and wildfires but in the annual report we do a spotlight on the impacts of homelessness and parks an ongoing challenge as we're talking about San Lorenzo Park and the bench lands and so forth and then just tight budgets we've got really tens of millions of dollars in deferred maintenance and so really facing those challenges at the time and finding innovative and creative ways to address those challenges that's kind of a key theme I mentioned it briefly earlier but I think that the parks and recreation system and the staff here in Santa Cruz it's such a point of pride I think we truly have a world class park system here really high levels of service iconic amenities west cliff and the wharf and so on and so forth highly ranked amenities and assets throughout the city so there's a lot to be proud of there earlier in the council meeting today heard from a number of volunteers and the volunteer recognition that occurred around four o'clock this afternoon I think that was a great reflection on a real key aspect in parks and recreation which are partnerships if we are successful in parks and rec it's likely because we've got a successful partnership going on and that's credit to our volunteers through partnerships with some of the organizations that we heard from this evening save the waves, save our shores so on and so forth so a lot to be proud of the community loves the parks they're engaged and so again wanted to leave the council and community with these key takeaways from our annual report and with that I will end my presentation and again just acknowledge Lindsay Travis and Rachel for all of their work on this acknowledge the parks and rec staff and just appreciate and thank the council for your support always of parks and rec and we'll just welcome your feedback on things that we can work on and improve on this report moving into the future thank you thank you director Elliott I appreciate you giving that overview and really all the work that your department has contributed during that time period really calling out the investments in some of the above and beyond or unusual programming and services the summer school classes and essential day care and really really thankful that you're investing in some of the environmental aspects and seeing examples like battery powered lawn equipment and so on so thank you for that overview I'm going to bring it to council members for any comments and discussion on this item we do have it's an item to review provide feedback and accept the parks and recreation department fiscal year 2021 annual report councilmember Golder I just wanted to thank and appreciate everyone who worked on that report all of the quality work that went into making everything happen in the last year I can't thank you enough for all of the work that you did to provide services to our community and all the collaboration you did with community partners it's a great comprehensive report I appreciate it thank you councilmember Golder councilmember Callantari Johnson I'll echo those sentiments thank you Tony and team for the report and the work that you do that is clearly articulated in the report and I was really thrilled to see the Children and Youth Bill of Rights as one of the objectives under the goals and objectives so thank you for your continued work and a thorough comprehensive and easily digestible report thank you Callantari Johnson councilmember Brown I'll add my enthusiastic appreciation for the report and for all you do and I just have a couple of comments this is a wonderful report I was thrilled to see it last year really thrilled that this is an ongoing goal to provide this information in a way that really highlights some of the really innovative and amazing work that's being done makes it accessible to the community and to council members and I just have a couple of comments the first take away that you included Tony or director Elliot was that parks and recreation is critical and I would say or essential absolutely and I'd love to see some more reference I think in general in the the work that parks and rec does that parks and rec workers are essential I mean the work that you all do in the field the hours that are put in the challenging issues that have come up over the past couple of years I'd like to see highlighting of workers in addition and maybe that could happen in these reports through a profile and I know that happens in other formats and other mechanisms but highlighting the workers who are doing this when I talk to parks and rec workers their commitment is just you know undeniable they really embody the mission and values that are espoused in our parks and rec master plan and in the department's guiding documents and so just wanting to really bring that out I get a little bit tired of hearing comments from the public and we don't hear a lot of it but there seems to be a disconnect we hear people say stop all this the workers get paid too much we need services at the same time that there's a denial that we need resources to pay people to do those services so I'm just saying that is it like a frustration and I think a way to maybe make that more highlight that more for the public it would be nice to see that in this format in other ways and I'm saying it now is a way to highlight it as well I didn't see Neri Lagoon and I have a couple questions about what's happening there I mean it is a treasured part of our parks network wetlands and you know really you know a significant ecosystem an ecological resource as well as a recreational resource and I know that we did get some funding for some repairs along the walkways and just wondering where that's at and maybe it wasn't something to highlight because it's in process but just would love to hear a little bit about that yeah thank you Council Member Brown and appreciate the comments about highlighting staff I think really appreciate that I think that's a good idea something we could include but yeah well said yeah our boots on the ground staff are the ones that make it happen so I appreciate that comment I would welcome our Park Superintendent Travis Beck if he's out there to speak to updates on Neri Lagoon thank you Tony and thank you Council Member Brown for that question yes we did receive funding from the State Parks System to replace a section of the floating walkway in Neri Lagoon and we've been working on laying all the ground work for that so Lindsay and our park planner Noah Downing and Field Supervisor Blake Westner have issued a request for proposals for contractors who will perform that work and we are expecting to receive those proposals at the end of this week which will keep us on schedule to do the actual construction work once we enter the permitted season for that work which will be later this fall thank you and I'll lastly say I did appreciate the picture the last page with the goats and I'm really a big fan of the goats these days so we got them for the RTC right of way and just love it thanks thank you Council Member Cummings thank you Mayor thank you for that presentation and I'm actually going to build off of something that Council Member Brown brought up in her statements and this might not sound related at first but it's related so one of the things that I think would be good for us to have a discussion about the childcare tax got passed by the community and that money is the cannabis childcare tax I don't even know if it's childcare tax or if it's the children's tax but the idea being that children's fund not a tax though the children's fund right so that funding is supposed to go towards supporting programs related to children in our community and we haven't really had a discussion as a body on how that money is going to be spent sounds like I know that having been on the City Schools Committee there's some discussion there but I'm wondering if there might be an opportunity for us to discuss that because Parks and Rec offer a lot of programs for children in our community and when I was on the City Schools Committee we had scholarships and I think the last time we had an update there was a substantial amount of money in that fund but I think it would be good to get a sense of how much money is being generated from that fund annually and could some of that money be used to provide staff who are going to be working and operating these children's programs because I think one thing that I've heard meeting with some Parks and Rec staff is that they're in charge of running whether it's Junior Guards or other camps but some of these staff members are running around trying to support these programs that are understaffed and if there's a way for us to have whether it's one staff member who's supported from that fund or what have you I think it might be good to see how we can make sure that we have enough staffing programs for the children in our community and for the programs that support children in our community and just have a look at how that money's being spent I think it would be good too because often times members of the community don't understand where that money's going towards and what kind of programs it's supporting so I think it might be good whether that's during budget actually maybe budget's appropriate that we can look at that fund and have the conversation. I'm happy to see that. Vice Mayor Watkins. There's been a lot of discussion about that and it changes the structure in which the funding recommendations will be coming forward in the future but the retroactive approach to it and I mentioned this earlier in the report this next year we'll have recommendations from the City Schools Committee to the Council to use the funding but also simultaneously there will be a process to use or identify key stakeholders in our community who want to help us in a more formal oversight advisory that will also provide transparency and leveraging partnerships and resources like we do with First Five currently they don't have any administrative overhead that they take for providing a lot of our scholarships I will say though that the fund is written pretty specifically in that it's not used to backfill staff or programming but it's essentially used to provide kind of an equity lens to support our most vulnerable who could use scholarships to support the kids and families directly so that conversations will have to ensue around a different purpose or a leveraging of another funding source for that kind of purpose but in the ballot language is on the City's website so I encourage you to review that too and to get more familiar with the nuances of it but I also know that we do have recommendations from the City Schools Committee that will be coming to the Council and the discussions that could be held around much time as well just a quick moment just want to thank Parks for your presentation and for the essential work you provide all the time for making Santa Cruz so uniquely amazing and beautiful for all to experience this was a beautiful report Thank you Vice Mayor Watkins Council Member Myers I'll just make it very brief I just do want to thank you for everything that you guys do every day in the City I think your department is one of the ones at all levels of their families and their experience and I thought the report was great I like some of the suggestions brought up today it might also be great to maybe in future reports do a little deep dive into a particular park or a particular facility we have a lot of capital needs and it's hard to learn all that in a budget framework so help us understand what are the needs for the Civic Auditorium when are we going to rebuild that gosh darn lifeguard headquarters put a face to these issues that we need to be thinking of for some of these capital investments for our future generations give us the ugly pictures and the nice pictures it's fun also to just learn a little bit about the history of the buildings and the places we own and so that's another place to just sort of bring pop that information for us helps us remember and distinguish thanks for your work you guys thank you Council Member Myers alright if that yeah that concludes this meeting we will go to public comment on this item and then come back before we conclude this meeting I am checking the attendees on zoom thank you for being with us and if you are a member of the public and you are joining us via zoom now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen and you can press star 9 by raising your hand or selecting the raise hand feature on your webinar controls on your computer when it is your time to speak you will hear an announcement that you have been unmuted and the timer will then be set to three minutes members of the public who are joining us here in chambers and wanting to comment on this item please line up to the right of the dais you will have three minutes to speak we ask that you sign in to ensure correct spelling of your name minutes however it is not required okay so now I will look to our attendees and I am not seeing any hands raised in the zoom I am not seeing any hands raised and now I will bring it out to members of the public here in person if you would like to comment on this item please approach the microphone thank you thank you my name is John Golder grandpa and I have been doing this for 30 years more than 30 years diving into city parks and rec programs and ball fields in particular and everything about the green bell planning and everything in fact I want to enter into the record a fresh copy of a tattered document I did 12 years ago the quimby basics the first two pages of the basics I give you all the basics I did all the research and then another eight pages that the attorney told me I knew more about the quimby act than any attorney in town because I had every decision and everything could think of so this please enter into the record so I have 19 points to make and I will be super brief if you want more I have got it Rene knows it I don't even have my glasses so we will start with number one you want a world class parks and recreation system this city has built one ball field in the last 50 years I was quoted by the Sentinel in a meeting years ago at that rate my grandchildren's grandchildren might see the next one built I was president I was president or vice president of the Santa Cruz rugby club in 1984 for 10 years we never had a home field and basically had to leave Santa Cruz because we could never get a home field and we played teams from all across the world how could it be a world class if you got the De La Viega plan has been unfinished since 1962 and the golf course revenue that Gary Lustelot used to brag about that was made money the city had to forgive a $2 million loan to the golf course the Charles Derby small ball range was destroyed and $300,000 worth of infrastructure improvements with no public meeting about the closure only about the remediation deep old park the first ball field in 50 years two acres a green plastic failure the field within two years and cost $1,387,000 repair and I don't know if that even includes the litigation Quimby for 37 years no parks have been purchased with that money the money for P&R CIPs have been gone almost off repair and maintenance and I've got the figures to prove it there's no criteria for different activities in parks there's no description of park zoning every time we have a new park there's endless debate about it the definition of parks essentially an unapproved partial use for recreation does that describe urban parks? I don't think so general plan land use you're supposed to be able to tell a difference in the land use plans the city the buzzer buzz will you give me extra time go ahead and finish up your sentence general plan land use map which is an extremely important document you're supposed to be able to tell a difference in land use heavily improved city parks are the same color and pattern as the state parks Wilder Ranch, Henry Carl that's a mistake that came from using the assessors maps describe parks thank you for your public comment on this item we've received your documents and the public comment thank you you appreciate it with all due respect Mr. Golder your time is up and this thank you really appreciate your input and thank you for joining us in person I will bring it back to council now and is there a motion to accept the parks and recreation department fiscal year 2021 annual report council member Cummings I'll move the I'll move accepting the parks and rec department fiscal year 2021 and the report has to have a comment to make after there's a second is there a second council member Golder seconded okay and any further discussion or comments council member Cummings I wanted to follow up on a comment that was made by the member of the public and we'll want to say to the parks and rec director that there is a group in Santa Cruz that very much is interested in trying to establish a rugby field here and I think they're also you know willing to try to help fundraise around that if there's a park that might be adequate for having such a field so just wanted to let members of the council know and members of the public know that there is still interest in that and also just speak on behalf of that group because any time I see them they ask me about you know what can we do about getting a rugby field in the city so if there's a park that needs some some love and you know some additional funding and might be adequate for putting a rugby field in I think that might be worth considering so just wanted to mention that since Mr. Golder brought up his time playing rugby and they're not being a dedicated field here in Santa Cruz thank you council member Cummings alright I think we are ready for a roll call vote please thank you mayor council member is Calentary Johnson aye Golder aye Cummings aye Brown aye Myers aye Vice Mayor Watkins aye Mayor Brunner aye that item passes unanimously thank you very much for that report and this meeting is now adjourned oh there you go