 Hello welcome everyone it is March 26 2024 and this is the Santa Rosa City Council meeting it is now 1232 and we will be starting our meeting Singapore and Madame City Clerk can you please call the roll. Thank you Mayor, Council Member Rogers, Council Member O'Crepke, Council Member McDonnell, Council Member Fleming is absent, Council Member Alvarez, Vice Mayor Stapp, Mayor Rogers, let the record show that all Council Members are present with the exception of Council Member Fleming. Thank you moving on to item two we have items 2.1 and 2.2 on our closed session for today today is a special meeting and we will be addressing on 2.1 conference with legal counsel with existing litigation and 2.2 conference with legal counsel anticipated litigation and with that Madame City Clerk can you please facilitate public comment on these items. Mayor there is no one in council chamber to provide public comment on these closed session items. Thank you so much and with that we will recess to closed session thank you. All right welcome back everyone we will now resume our meeting seeing a quorum Madame City Clerk can you please call the roll. Thank you Mayor, Council Member Rogers, Council Member O'Crepke, Council Member McDonnell, Council Member Fleming is absent, Council Member Alvarez, Vice Mayor Stapp, Mayor Rogers, let the record show that all Council Members are present with the exception of Council Member Alvarez and Council Member Fleming. Thank you looking to Madame City Attorney can you please give us a report out on closed session. Thank you Madame Mayor there was no reportable action taken during closed session and with that we will adjourn the special meeting. Good afternoon I'd like to ask the interpreter currently on the Spanish Channel to convince the translation of the meeting for those just joining the meeting live translation in Spanish is available and members of the public or staff wishing to listen in Spanish can join the Spanish Channel by clicking on the interpretation icon in the zoom toolbar it looks like a globe once you join the Spanish Channel we recommend you shut off the main audio so you only hear Spanish translation Pablo will you please restate this in Spanish. Any person or staff who wishes to listen in Spanish can join the channel to join it, click on the interpretation icon which now appears in the zoom function toolbar as a globe once you join the Spanish Channel we recommend you shut off the main audio so you only hear Spanish interpretation. Again welcome everyone to our March 26 2024, Santa Rosa City Council meeting it is now 1.44 and we will be starting our meeting seeing Singapore madam St. Clerk can you please call the roll thank you council member Rogers council member O'Crepkey here council member McDonald here council member Fleming is absent council member Alvarez present council vice mayor stop here and Mayor Rogers present let the record show that all council members are present with the exception of council member Fleming we will now proceed to item 3 which are closed session items for today we have 3.1 conference with real property negotiator 3.2 conference with legal council about existing litigation and 3.3 conference with legal counsel about existing litigation madam city clerk can you please facilitate public comment on these items yes thank you mayor we are now taking public comment on the closed session items 3.1 3.2 3.3 and 3.4 if you'd like to make a comment but have not yet provided a speaker card please make your way to the podium you will have three minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period as you approach the podium please state your name for the record if you choose to do so the first public comment will be from James Duncan James please go ahead i'm James Duncan i have participated in virtually all of the official proceedings regarding the Jennings avenue rail crossing including cpu c proceeding a 1505014 the community organizations that have expressed their support for the Jennings crossing to the city council the smart board of directors and the california public utilities commission include the sonoma county bicycle coalition bicycle santa rosa sierra club sonoma county transportation and land use coalition friends of smart sonoma county conservation action greenbelt alliance disability services and legal center north bay organizing project and the league of women voters the city council has been wonderfully steadfast in support of the Jennings crossing the Jennings crossing application has been approved repeatedly by the cpu c but the crossing is still closed smart's role in the continuing closure is well documented in public records and by the press democrat the extraordinary challenges for the city of santa rosa cannot be forgotten the disastrous tubs fire in which so much was lost by so many other wildfires civic unrest and coven but the people of santa rosa and their city have stood up to those challenges and turned to rebuilding and recovery the council is urged as part of that recovery to direct that the Jennings crossing be built and reopened for public use thank you thank you the next public comment will be from keith afternoon keith rogall 4048 sonoma highway napa california i'm here in that i'm aware that the matter of garage five and its hoped for future is certainly a topic for the council and that has been and will be i'm sure in the near future and i thought it would just be appropriate for me to briefly make an appearance and just give us a small update i'll begin the update that was stepping back it was about five years ago when uh by and partners turned our strong attention to downtown santa rosa we were motivated by tremendous efforts made by the staff at the time and the council real breakthroughs regarding the courthouse square and a wide variety of regulatory changes that we thought were remarkable in their initiative and creativity in order to encourage dense downtown development since we began at that point we we retained superb land planning experts that we've used before to really look at the whole of the downtown and identify sites that had the greatest potential and from our perspective the garage five site was one of the most compelling in terms of its ability to be transformative that is to say to take something that has a current use and condition which is poor and make something that would be substantial be beautiful and be useful for a variety of city residents and visitors it seemed a tremendously appealing site in that regard and we in turn made an investment on fourth street to buy a property that would be contiguous in order to further enhance the potential for the redevelopment of the garage site so 644th street since that time as the prior speaker alluded to there have been a few changes the matter of the pandemic tremendous spike in interest rates the inflation as a result of the pandemic and other matters and some changes in the surplus land act so a number of years have passed what has not passed is our interest our sincere belief that it's an exceptional site our view and our confidence that we can transform it into a site that would accommodate the parking that the city desires housing both market rate housing at a significant level which has been very difficult to finance but we think will be feasible there inclusionary affordable and accommodate a space for a daycare public park and children's playground area we're committed to doing it we're excited to do it we look forward to working with you thank you mayor i do not see anyone else in council chamber wishing to provide public comment thank you very much and with that we will recess into closed session mic check loud and clear hey welcome everyone to our march 26 san rosa city council meeting it is now 404 and we will be starting our meeting sing a quorum madam city clerk can you please call the roll thank you mayor councilmember rogers here councilmember okepke here council member mcdonald here councilmember flaming is absent councilmember alvarez president vice mayor stop here mayor rogers president let the record show that all council members are present with the exception of councilmember flaming thank you moving on to item six which would be our closed session item madam city attorney would you like to report out thank you madam mayor council members there is no action no reportable action from closed session thank you thank you and madam city clerk would you like to facilitate facilitate public comment on that item we took public comment on ahead of closed session on those items perfect we have no proclamations for today no staff briefings item nine city manager and city attorney reports good evening thank you mayor members of council i have no updates to report tonight and thank you again madam mayor and council members i also have no report this evening thank you moving very quickly through this agenda i like it i like it uh item 10 statements of abstention by council members see none we will continue uh to item 11 which are madam mayor flaming my apologies i do have a report this evening i thought we do but i didn't we do have a thank you and i thank the clerk for reminding me um there is a litigation report um and i'm pulling up that item right now we forgive you it's been a long day already madam madam attorney madam mayor would you mind skipping this item and coming back i can i am trying to pull up the item now thank you my apologies no problem so we will continue with item 11 uh which is our mayor and council members reports i will start off with the reporting today doing something a little different so i would like to uh first request an item be placed on the agenda i would like staff to look at the impacts of vacating portions of four street temporarily this request is being made to promote economic and community vibrancy which is a priority of the council and so i would be looking to um council members second all right so i have a i'm sorry can i get clarification if that's a temporary vacation or it uh it would be temporary okay thank you so i have a um an item that i requested to be placed on the agenda and i have a second from rogers thank you mayor i will place it on a future agenda the next um available agenda that meets our open government criteria it may be the ninth but most likely it'll be on the april 16th agenda to um have further action taken perfect and thank you uh council member rogers for that support um i would also like to report out on the ad hoc or the ad hoc that we have with uh san rosa school board so the ad hoc committee um has met uh a few times and we've determined that the best direction to establish is to establish an sro program uh and that would be to engage a working group which is comprised of staff members um the working group has been tasked with uh developing an m o u and setting the foundation necessary for implementing a pilot program the working group is actively engaged in regular meetings but due to the timing of the school year an sro program by august is not feasible additionally during the ad hoc meetings school representatives acknowledge there are not sufficient funds uh for them to support such program and the rolling out of a program the city remains committed to working to finalize a pilot program to present to the ad hoc committee for the school board's approval so that is the status and update on our engagement with the school board right now uh moving on i had the privilege of attending a community meeting at south park on february 28th with councilmember alvarez at the meeting i was able to meet residents but also hear the concerns they had regarding traffic parks and public uh safety presence to name a few things and on february 29th i was able to attend the 2020 2022 service awards for employees and retirees who achieve service milestones um and so it was very nice to to be there and to be able to honor those that are giving back and providing service to our community that work within the city in march 21st i attended the north bay monthly executive meeting which was held at finley community center i say 21st i hope i said march 1st but i don't remember i always said 21st so march 1st uh on march 1st i also attended the police annual awards dinner honoring those that serve our community in multiple capacities to ensure that we are safe i would like to thank the technical services division special services division filled services division and administration and a special thank you to our wonderful chief uh for the love that you put into the job and thank you all for your service and um your sorry your service and the congratulations to all that were honored um that evening on march 5th and 6th i was honored to attend the yale mayors college and ceo caucus which was held in washington dc this was the 10th yale mayors college and 142nd ceo event i would like to thank the yale school of management for the invitation to collaborate with 39 other mayors um and former mayors from across the country and thank the senior associate dean jeffrey sonnenfield for the opportunity march 10th through the 14th uh myself along with others were able to attend the nlc congressional city conference in washington dc um vice mayor sap councilman mcdonnell uh city manager and other members of the team while n dc we were able to meet with uh representative mike thompson representative jared huffman senator we met with a lot of people in a lot of departments um to advocate to to get more resources uh for our city and i think we did a really good job so i wanted to thank the team that attended and went and on march 15th um i attended the herne avenue interchange groundbreaking the groundbreaking represented the third phase of this multi-phase project which started many years ago when the council member uh to my right council member rogers was only three years old so that's a big a big thing and it's been a long time so it was definitely um very nice to attend that council member rogers alvarez okraki and philming were present and thank you to scta cal trans city staff um in our city uh everyone that has worked on our city project team and everyone that has worked on the project thank you to the city bus operator who made sure that we arrived uh to and from the site that was uh very nice so uh thank you to that department and also thank you to congressman thompson senator protan mcguire and assembly member connelly for their continued support and investment into santa rosa and our region as a whole we are definitely uh better working together and i will look to that was long i'm sorry you guys i missed a council meeting i will look to my council members to see if anyone else has a report um and we'll go to council member rogers thank you mayor uh and i'll pick you back and just really briefly and say thank you to everybody for the herne groundbreaking as well it is a long time coming and i know that this council made difficult decisions about a year ago to consolidate funds and make sure that we really got that project across the finish line and want to thank scta and rcpa for stepping in as project managers to help out with that as well on a related note last month i passed the gavel officially as the chair of scta rcpa after two months and so the new chair is supervisor linda hopkins she'll have a two-year term there and i know that we've got a really good working relationship with the supervisor so look forward to that continuing we had an economic development subcommittee meeting a couple of weeks ago i want to thank the mayor one of the discussion points that we had was about adding to the agenda a closure for fourth street uh that actually uh just to flush out a little bit what we were hoping for and i'll see whether the the motion still carries is from d street down to the square jumping the square and then continuing from essentially la rosa to b street so that it both closes off and allows for bicycle and pedestrian access but also allows that flow at the square for some of that parking and we've done that before i think that'd be a good starting point for our discussion uh when we bring that forward the other item uh that we were really interested in bringing forward is a new way to activate vacant parcels particularly in our downtown there are a number of parcels that right now don't provide any real amenities to our downtown and in particular i know councilmember o krapke was interested in having children's playground uh or something that could be a pop-up utilization of space until a project does continue to move forward just to create more vibrancy uh so i'll look to i'll make a motion to add that second perfect and then finally we also had what was the first uh open government task force meeting in about a year where we did discuss a number of of items that i'm just looking for thumbs up from the mayor and councilmembers for the open government task force to work on specifically updating the lobbyist ordinance as well as independent expenditure reforms that had been previously proposed and i believe that my colleague here will add a couple things potentially as well but again just a huge thank you to everybody those meetings were actually really well uh i i felt like uh productive on moving things forward councilmember alvarez yeah i do want to start by saying thank you on behalf of district one for for the efforts sacrifices and the commitment from the city of san rosa and so many other partners throughout the state of california to assure that district one infrastructure equals the amount of housing that's been introduced into the area so really it's it's much more than than just the dollar amount that that i know it's a great amount but when you look even in the backdrop as we sat there uh introducing our speakers and and digging the shovel into the ground you saw a mother with her two children running over the overpass and what that actually means when it comes to the quality of life of the residents of san rosa as a whole uh one inform actually i believe spoke about the the event that we held at at south park and that was great i mean uh just and the story that i remember most is hearing a mother say how she was scared to let her child outside of the house to uh to play and now she lets her her daughter walk the poodle around the neighborhood and so i figured if you let the poodles run free and she'll say we're in the right direction barring the dog pound right um in regards to the open government task force it is true we spoke about the lobbyist we spoke about many other other issues that are pertaining to the city of san rosa and we're also looking at the signage ordinances and we were looking at at how we can actually increase the communication from from cab as well and how we could actually get them on board into the efforts of of city san rosa and really what cab was meant to do and it's it's an origination which really to increase participation and information to and from the city of san rosa uh policymakers council to the community that that we serve um is there anything else that i have here let me see i want to congratulate walsh uh for his appointment to the retirement uh board uh he actually actually did that on the prior meeting so again i just want to congratulate him for the great work that he's done with the bpu in city of san rosa um and also want to congratulate one of our our our business owners here in the city san rosa eddie's from eddie's kitchen not only because of the namesake but the man is producing great food and he's really bringing a revitalization when it comes to the business owners of the city of san rosa so definitely want to congratulate him as well thank you council member okraki thank you very much madam air um so earlier this month uh sonoma county lafco met and gave feedback on the disadvantage of unincorporated community study which is not complete they were seeking some guidance on it um and so the commission gave some feedback as well as we heard the municipal uh municipal services review outcome that our city had requested which i'm sure will be coming forward at a future time um and um it was some great information uh that'll help us both with our services going forward and and possibly economically um i also had the chance to meet with sc t a uh executive director james cameron um as an alternate i don't attend all the meetings because for some reason council member rogers likes to go to every single meeting um and uh i've rarely had the opportunity to interact with them i got one um but uh i would be able to sit down and talk about the future of sc t a and then and transit in our community um on um the uh 13th um i was able to meet uh actually um i was not able to be i was able to attend a um uh an event held by providence memorial hospital with uh some or both of our assistant city managers um to hear what they have going on at the hospital as well as some of um future issues they're facing in terms of legislation that's been passed and seismic retrofitting and um uh as well as take a tour of their facility uh and so i was uh grateful to have the opportunity to do that um and then the very next day i was able to have um lunch with representative jared huffman uh who met with my colleagues the day before and um just able to discuss with him uh his newly incorporated parts of santa rosa that fall into his district and what some of our needs are and what some of our um uh some things we can collaborate on and then um that is it aside from if i can if i step out of line please let me know um i just want to say that um uh two weeks ago um a great man passed away uh 99 year old world war two veteran who led um some mobile home um uh revitalization and and efforts to to fight for the rights of mobile homeowners um he's a former police officer former lineman for the for the phone company and he's also happened to be uh my grandfather so i just want to say um uh acknowledge that because he did a lot for his community totally not out of line and our condolences are with you we're sorry that you lost your grandfather councilmember mcdonnell thank you mayor so i have a few announcements to make one of them i wanted to say thank you so much to the parks department for hosting our arbor day at skyhawk park where we had over 70 volunteers attend and we planted over 37 trees so i just want to say thank you so much for them hosting that there it was very successful this was an area that had been hit by the glass fire so it was great to have so many community members come out and staff members as well to come out and assist um with planning of the trees and yes i actually dug a hole and planted a tree mayor i want you to know my shoes are still muddy from that day so um i just want to say thanks again for that that great event um i just a couple highlights i was able to attend the um legislative conference in washington dc along with mayor and vice mayor and it was always a great opportunity to go and meet with our legislators to advocate on behalf of the city but there was over a thousand city um elected officials that actually went to capitol hill and i think that that's pretty significant when we're looking at what we're trying to do on behalf of the communities that we represent but we were able to hear president biden speak to the group which was quite a highlight to be able to hear our president speak as well as um i attended a luncheon from the biden harris house poly housing policy agenda and there was a couple of great things that came out of that specific meeting about how many homes are being um funded if it goes through congress and and through the whole process but they are attempting to have about two million affordable housing projects go through um first time home buyer incentives workforce housing is a part of the policy agenda and it is known that over the last 15 years they have exasperated all of the housing because um we've had a real decrease in in those building right now in addition to the last couple of weeks i also had a meeting or we also had a meeting of the violence prevention program there's just a few announcements from that particular meeting the choice grant cycle release date is coming up it's going to be on april second and those applications are due by may ninth we had a presentation from dr perliot who is um the executive director of a group called man-to-man it's an urban youth advocate group that particularly focus on on boys who do not have male presence or children who do not have a male presence in their home and um so he gave us some statistics that there's about 20 million children in america that live without the physical presence of a father in their homes he shared with us about a program that he runs out of san quinton and the benefits of helping um even inmates understand their role as a parent and so um that was a that was a great presentation we also um had an update from our outreach team that is working with our schools and um that they've been able to join some of the restorative justice circles that they've been able to assist law enforcement when it's appropriate and so we see a real collaboration with our violence prevention program and partners um and with our school system as well and then the last meeting that i went to was i am a member of the um north bay cities it's a league of cities um conference that we held in bourbon this last week we had an update on the governor's budget and how that's going to affect the cities as well as a presentation and updates on the public records act which was riveting and then we had an update on calpers as well as we went through all the legislative agenda for the california cities so with that madam mayor that concludes my report thank you very much and we'll let vice mayor stop for opposite thank you mayor it was a it's been a busy few weeks for the center was a plain ground order sustainability agency we've had two meetings in the past couple of weeks on march 14th we had a regularly scheduled meeting where we received the annual water report a little bit of good news for the community our groundwater levels are recovering nicely after after a few years of drought so obviously we're monitoring groundwater levels very very carefully um but we're in good shape right now as far as the county goes um and then on march 25th there was a special meeting for the for the gsa and the reason for that special meeting was also a big news a few months ago the gsa received a five point four million dollar grant and that affected both our budget for 2023 and 2024 and then also our 2024 2025 budget so we needed a special meeting to adjust the budgets for both of those years um but again the receipt of that grant means that the gsa gets to do a bunch of good new work for the for the county and for our groundwater supplies um at that meeting there was also an extended discussion around the current groundwater extraction fees that's going to be a hot topic and then wants to come especially for our ag community those rates may be adjusted there will be discussions ongoing for the next over the next couple of months um but all all groundwater users in the county will be watching those those rate discussions pretty carefully so more news to come on that and then just one one addendum to the to the mayor's report uh both she and I were were at the long-term financial policy and audit subcommittee meeting last week and the main item discussion was a deep dive into the budget for the benet valley golf course and how it's how it's been operating this year um that will be coming that a version of that discussion will be coming to council here in a few months so stay tuned um but again based on the report we receive we're very happy with touchstone our operator um there are some there the golf course is on good footing at present although the city is going to have some big infrastructure decisions to make over the over the next couple of years that's it thank you very much and with that madame city clerk can you please facilitate public comment thank you we are now taking public comment on item 11 if you are in the council chamber i would like to comment but i have not yet provided a speaker card or your name please make your way to the podium you will have three minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period as you approach the podium please state your name for the record if you choose to do so mayor i'm seeing no one approach the podium and no one has submitted a speaker card thank you and with that we will now go back up to item nine which is city manager and city attorneys report and i believe we have a report madame city attorney yes yes thank you mayor and again my apologies um we have i do have a litigation report uh that was included in the agenda materials for um our litigation report for february 2024 so just to remind you this is a snapshot a snapshot in time as of the end of february we have no settlements over $50,000 occurred in february our caseload remains fairly consistent with approximately 30 litigation matters many cases are currently in discovery phase with trial dates assigned to most matters we continue to try to resolve smaller cases with little or no cost to the city and that is the end of my report if there are any questions thank you we are now taking public comments on item 9.1 the report of settlements if you'd like to make a comment please make your way to the podium if you have not already submitted a speaker card you will have three minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period as you approach the podium please state your name for the record if you choose to do so mayor i'm seeing no one approach the podium for public comment on 9.1 perfect so we will continue um and we are at 11.2 which is our board commission and committee appointments um i will be making the appointments today and asking council um to approve those appointments i would like to say by state law the housing authority must elect their own chair in addition the waterways advisory committee um selects their own chair so with that uh our in public places i would like to uh reappoint and bombing garden there we go uh and bicycle and pedestrian advisory board ken brought in for uh board of building regulation and appeals there is no appointment for that one and board of community services logan pits board of public utilities dan galvin uh community advisory board calum weeks cultural heritage board brian muser and design review board melanie jones carter uh public safety and prevention tax citizens oversight committee evet minor housing authority who appoints their own personnel board lisa maldonado planning commission uh caron weeks and waterway water advisory committee selects their own chair so madame city clerk can you please facilitate public comment on these appointments thank you we are now taking public comment on item 11.2.1 if you are in the council chamber would like to make comment but have not yet provided a speaker card please make your way to the podium again you will have three minutes and a countdown timer well alert at the end of that period may i'm seeing no one make a move to the podiums for 11.2.1 all right um so it is my recommendation that one of you give me a second for the appointments that i would like to make for a second thank you very much with that can we call the vote thank you thank you councilmember rogers hi councilmember ocrackie hi councilmember mcdonnell hi councilmember flaminas absent councilmember alvarez hi vice mayor step hi and mayor rogers hi let the record show that passes with seven seven affirmative pardon me six affirmative votes thank you moving on to item 12 which are our minutes we have two sets of minutes February 27 2024 and March 5th 2024 council are there any corrections to the minutes seeing no corrections to the minutes madame city clerk can you oh do you have one madame i just need to abstain from February 27th um approval of those minutes okay um and i would like to say that i was not present for march 5th but i did take the time to review um the meeting and the minute so so with that madame city clerk can you please facilitate public comment on those two sets of minutes thank you we are now taking public comment on items 12.1 and 12.2 the minutes for february 27th and march 25th regular meetings if you are in the chamber would like to make a comment but if not yet provided a speaker card or your name please make your way to the podium you'll have three minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period mayor i'm seeing no one approach the podiums on this item all right and so with that we'll adopt the minutes as presented moving on to our consent items madame city clerk can you please read the consent items thank you mayor item 13.1 uh motion for finley aquatic center spray ground and renovation project contingency action item 13.2 resolution bid award approval and issuance of a purchase order for the purchase of two forward transit x2c body style passenger vans item 13.3 resolution fifth amendment to professional services agreement f002029 with jessica rasmussen and that concludes the consent calendar thank you very much bringing it back to council are there any questions with the consent calendar seeing none we will continue to public comment thank you we are now taking public comment on the consent calendar items 13.1 through 13.3 if you are in the chamber would like to provide a comment but have not provided a speaker card please make your way to the podium you will have three minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period mayor i'm seeing no one approach the podiums for consent thank you vice mayor staff can you please make a motion i move that we approve consent items 13.1 through 13.3 and wait for the reading of text have a motion made by vice mayor staff and a second by council member rogers madam city clerk may you please call the vote thank you mayor council member rogers hi council member okrepke hi council member mcdonald hi council member flaminas absent council member alvarez hi vice mayor step hi mayor rogers hi let the record show this passes with six affirmative votes thank you um and due to it not being five o'clock we cannot have our public comment on non-agenda matters so we will continue to item 15 which are report items madam city manager thank you mayor item 15.1 is a report item sinoma county water agency 2024 2025 water transmission budget and rate increase thank you hi good evening mayor rogers and council members i'm nick harvey acting deputy director of administration for san eriza water i'm here to introduce lake jake spaulding and lin resalia it's sinoma water who will present the proposed water transmission budget for fiscal year 2024 and 25 before they begin i wanted to quickly review the annual process for approving the proposed budget and rates and explain where we currently stand in the process after developing the budget and proposed rates they're then brought before and discussed by the finance subcommittee of the technical advisory committee in conjunction with staff from sinoma water the process of discussing the water transmission budget and proposed rate increase with tax budget subcommittee was concluded on february 28th where the subcommittee voted unanimously to recommend the proposed budget to the full technical advisory committee on march 4th the tax itself also voted to recommend the proposal followed by a vote recommended a vote to recommend rather by the bpu following the report item at its march 21st meeting from here each contracting agency will work with their representative on the water advisory committee to coordinate how their agency representative will vote for the purposes of wax recommendation to the sonoma board sonoma water board of directors rather which is scheduled to take place at its april 8th 2024 meeting this evening at the conclusion of the sonoma water presentation we request that city councilmaker recommendation regarding how it should direct its wack representative mayor rogers to vote at that meeting as a reminder it's ultimately up to the discretion of sonoma water of the sonoma water board of directors to make the decision on how they will proceed including setting the rate increases it will ultimately be implemented all votes leading up to that point in the process are simply recommendations senator as the water's current rate structure was developed assuming maximum wholesale water rate increases of six percent after factoring in an anticipated one percent increase in water deliveries due to growth as well as sonoma water's proposed 9.88 percent increase to the wholesale water rate we estimate our fiscal year 2024-25 water purchase budget to be about 19.7 million dollars this figure exceeds our fiscal year 2023-24 water purchase budget by approximately 1.8 million dollars senator as the water's current rate structure includes a rate increase of up to 6 percent as such the remaining increase of about 513 000 will be absorbed using undesignated fund balance and with that i'm going to hand it over to sonoma water thank you nick good afternoon council and mayor my name is jake spaulding i'm the finance manager with sonoma water and today i'm going to give you a brief overview of our fiscal year 24-25 proposed budget and rates for the water transmission system and at the end of the presentation any questions you may have both lin and i are available for for them so each year we do develop a budget that allows us to meet the water transmission system's operations maintenance capital as well as the regulatory demands that we have this year similar to last year there is a heightened need for infrastructure repairs and upgrades so that sonoma water can continue to maintain the system and operate it reliably 24-7 so just as a reminder the water transmission system has three main aqueducts the sanarosa which serves the city the petaluma and the sonoma aqueduct each one of the water contractors is is located on one of these water aqueducts and per the terms of the restructure agreement they pay the rate that is associated with that aqueduct as nick mentioned you know kind of the process sonoma water is proud of the process that we go through when we're setting a budget and our rate schedules you know each year we bring a budget a draft budget to the technical advisory committee sorry to the tac budget ad hoc subcommittee and then we go through a transparent and collaborative process with them before finally bringing it to our board in mid-april and we would like to thank not only nick but also jennifer bark and peter martin for their participation both on the tac and the whack and as nick mentioned that it was supported by the tac just another reminder you know the the water transmission system it's not just one fund it's actually many funds the categories are shown on this slide here each one of these funds has its own budget and rate and then those are combined to make a composite rate that the that the contractors pay depending on the what the terms are the restructure agreement so sonoma water we do have a relatively robust water system but we are facing several challenges that are not unique to our water agency you know the first being that our rate is stipulated by the restructure agreement to be fully volumetric and you know why this is a challenge for us is that in the last five three five and ten year period we've seen negative growth and actual deliveries you know this was intensified during the historic drought that we had fiscal year 2223 was actually our lowest water delivery year on record with us selling just over 36,000 acre feet in addition to that you know we do have aging facilities most of our infrastructure is 45 to 65 years old a lot of it's expended most of its useful life in fact about 40 percent of it has only 10 to 20 percent of its useful life remaining and not too different than owning an aging car you know both maintenance and repair needs to increase with age in addition to the effects of age the system is also vulnerable to an array of natural hazards primarily flood fire and earthquakes earthquakes are biggest vulnerability in terms of both extensive damage to the system as well as service disruption to all the customers that we serve and I mentioned them this because the budget we're presenting today does include efforts to address all of these challenges so what's in the budget on the capital side this year we've made a lot of progress on a few key hazard mitigation projects and we continue to advance these projects to build both system reliability and address vulnerabilities and to natural hazards all the projects that you see on this slide will serve the customers of Santa Rosa but in particular the collector liquefaction mitigation the pump and motor control center replacement and the seismic retrofit of the storage tanks are all either on the Santa Rosa line or at our common diversion facilities which benefits your constituents and we have also been able to make use of about 10 million dollars in FEMA grants in the last few years and in fact the water transmission system I believe has gotten about 26 million dollars in grants in the last 10 years to fund not only hazard mitigation projects but other capital projects and we do anticipate continuing to seek additional grant funding both from this the federal level and the state level as we go forward in addition to those natural hazard projects the capital budget also includes other projects to increase resiliency in the system every slide you see or every project you see on this slide is also benefiting the city of Santa Rosa but in particular you know we would like to point out the Santa Rosa Plain wells project we were able to complete one of the three wells that's part of this project during the drought we were able to serve some water from it to the water contractors the remaining two wells that you see here the Occidental Road and the Sebastopol road well are both in the budget in FY24-25 and we do anticipate that both will be complete by the end of that fiscal year and this will allow us to provide additional flow during future droughts on the operations and maintenance side we've highlighted a few of our high priority projects here including a multi-phase cathodic protection program that prevents corrosion in the aqueducts 10-year 88 million dollar tank maintenance recoding and rehabilitation program as well as the procurement of emergency inventory in case we do have a natural disaster these are some of our highest priority projects it's it's not a comprehensive list but you know they're all important both not only for water supply but also for water reliability this fiscal year we've also made good progress in advancing several design on several projects advancing the emergency inventory procurement program performing rehabilitation and replacement of several collector wells in the system for their pumps and valves and also advancing the tank maintenance and recoding program and in regards to the tanks you know in addition to inspections washouts and minor repairs that we did on six tanks this year we do have three tank recodes in progress one is almost complete another one is getting underway and one is under design and should be awarded before this fiscal year end and two additional tanks should be awarded in fy 24 25 including the ralphine tank for a ralphine tank that serves the city in the sub funds on which are for things like the biological opinion the water supply planning water conservation we continue to work on the dry creek habitat enhancement project we're making good progress on this project on phases four five and six and we do experience significant cost savings on this because the U.S. Army Corps picks up 65 percent of the cost share in addition to that Sonoma water and the Sonoma Marin water saving partnership continue to implement their robust and successful regional water conservation and education program and that continues to attract a lot of outside funding as well which helps us to leverage local dollars so what's in the budget so as you can see on this slide our total budget for fy 24 25 is 74.43 million dollars this is offset by 18.13 million in grants use of fund balance and bond proceeds the total budget that you're seeing here is 6.14 million more than the previous fiscal years budget which is due to the transmission systems on them and capital needs that we talked about a moment ago you know the operation the maintenance budget increase is is really needed to fund the significant infrastructure maintenance and repair needs and the capital budget is to push forward those hazard mitigation and other system reliability projects i did want to point out that the capital budget this year is fully funded by grants use of fund balance and bond proceeds and that what that means is it's not having an effect on the rate that you're seeing today and the sub funds that you see up there with a decrease that's primarily due to the use of accumulated fund balance that we were able to use to try and keep the rate low real quick just to show you where our costs go operations and maintenance are roughly 61 percent of our budget that's followed by capital projects at 21 percent the sub funds and then finally debt service so real quick i wanted to give everyone a primer on how our rates are calculated they're done in accordance with the restructured agreement for water supply and what that says is basically we take the cost of operations and maintenance of the system and we divide that by the lesser of either the average of the last three years of annual water deliveries or the last 12 months of water deliveries and when you do that calculation you get roughly a dollar you know a cost per acre foot and this is a simplified example so it's not it's not the exact calculation um what you can see here is the lesser of the two is actually the 12 month figure um that's what we usually would use and that's what the water uh the restructured agreement tells us to you to use however there is a clause in there that says that if because of drought or other um uh water supply conditions that we don't believe that that number is representative of what we will deliver that we can deviate from it with whack approval uh Sonoma water did uh go to the whack and recommend that we use the three-year annual average and the whack did approve that at their February meeting um and what that means is that uh if we had used the 12 year number we would have been budgeting off a number that was 2.3 percent less than what last year's number was by using the three-year average we're budgeting off of a number that's 2.4 percent more um and that helps to bring the rate increase down because we've increased the deliveries um you know this is a a calculation to show you how the volumetric rate really affects the cost per acre foot and just to keep exemplifying that um uh this kind of gives you an example of what would have happened had we used those 12 month actuals um as you can see if we had used the 12 month actuals the Santa Rosa rate increase actually would have been 4.7 percent higher than what we're proposing today uh alternatively if we had used a higher number like 44 500 and that that is a number that we have reached in the not too distant past uh the rate increase would have been under 6 percent so it's really you know this is an example to show you how much in effect the budget deliveries have on the rate increase each year um you know three years of historic drought uh mandated conservation measures by the state they resulted in the historically low water deliveries that I mentioned earlier in fiscal year 22 23 um that led to low water sales revenues and it significantly reduced the fund balance reserves that we use to stabilize rates so even with that 2.3 percent uh increase in the budget deliveries that I mentioned by using the three-year annual average because of these low reserves increasing operations and maintenance costs to keep up with the critically uh needed infrastructure improvements and maintenance projects has led us to this point where we do have another elevated rate increase we did make significant efforts to cut the rate increase as much as we could um to do that we worked with the budget subcommittee during that process I talked about and we were able to reduce the rate increase for customers off the Santa Rosa aqueduct from 14.57 down to 9.88 percent we did this primarily by deferring $8.9 million in uh lower priority maintenance projects uh trimming budgets and using as much grants fund balance and bond proceeds as we could um and as I mentioned also using that three-year annual average as the delivery number helped bring the rate down farther um I did want to mention lastly you know we are using 2.25 million of our prudent reserve in this fiscal year's budget uh in order to uh ensure that we can maintain our three-month operating reserve in the ONM fund um it's possible uh that if we do have to in fact use this prudent reserve that the WAC may want to replenish those funds in a future year and that would lead to a rate increase in a future year um so as you can see on this slide uh the rates for city of Santa Rosa which are kind of in the middle there uh are proposed to be 9.88 percent um the water contractors do have the discretion to set an aqueduct an aqueduct capital charge um each year this acts both as a rate stabilization tool and also helps build fund balance for future year uh projects on that uh said aqueduct the water contractors on the Santa Rosa aqueduct did elect to keep their rate the same this year which was $11 dollars so this is uh an example of this is lindercelis sonoma water uh this is an example Santa Rosa aqueduct rate scenario uh long-range financial plan that takes into account all of the capital uh operational and uh other projects um on the in the system um and takes looks at rates grants and bond financing what scenario what mix of those items are needed to actually fund the the suite of projects that are in the long-range financial plan and so this is an example of what the rate increases will be based on certain assumptions it assumes water demand growth of 2 percent for the five-year period based off of 2024 budget deliveries of 41,847 acre feet that 2 growth is probably a little bit higher than we've actually been seeing in the past uh a few five three five ten years uh but we nonetheless uh use that as an example here uh we've estimated nine percent growth in on m expenses and four percent growth in capital projects project costs um there's 55 million dollars more in projects that all of the water contractors pay for that isn't honest that aren't on a specific aqueduct compared to last year uh and so this just is an example of what we would anticipate the rate increases might be given the assumptions that are here of course if deliveries we we redo this model every year and if the deliveries change that has a significant impact on this model and the rates and just just to finish off here this is a slide that shows wholesale water rates per acre foot for other wholesale water contractors in the bay area you can see that we are on the far left side and we're the lowest of the uh the five that are listed here in fact we're 31 percent below the lowest one on below zone seven and we know this isn't an apples to apples comparison but it nonetheless gives an example of uh you know that our rates are lower than our comparable other wholesalers in the area and also um you know just anecdotally we've been speaking with other uh with some of the whole water wholesalers and they've indicated that uh they may be increasing their rates by as much as 15 percent so in terms of budgetary impacts uh to the Santa Rosa water budget um again our current rate structure without the pass through for wholesale rate increases was developed to absorb a maximum of six percent increase for wholesale water given the six percent ceiling the initially proposed 14 and a half percent increase would have resulted in a total increase to the water purchase budget of 2.8 million dollars with 1.5 million of that increase being unplanned the currently proposed increase of 9.88 percent would would result in a total increase of 1.8 million with an unplanned increase of just over half a million dollars in order to absorb the cumulative effects of these increases as well as sharp increases in other o and m cost categories Santa Rosa water has proposed significant cuts to the year one funding of our CIP program in order to balance the budget in terms of customer impacts our rate structure is already set for next year with increases of four percent on our water usage and fixed rates so our customers will see no additional impacts for next fiscal year our current rate structure is configured to generate between 520,000 and 530,000 dollars for each one percent increase to our water rates between the current fiscal year's budget and our proposed budget for next year our cumulative water purchase deficit or the amount by which wholesale rate increases exceeded the six percent provided for in the model is about 2.4 million dollars as such we estimate that we need to implement an additional 4.7 percent water rate increase for next year to catch up on our water purchase budget that only covers increases to the water purchase budget and does not provide for cost escalation in our other o and m budget categories or our CIP program we'll be monitoring our budget's first actual expenses and take these impacts into account when developing our new rates the first of which is set to take effect july 1 2025 so what are the next steps you know we we have been presenting to town councils and the water district boards for this month of march the next step is going to the water advisory committee for a vote on april 8th and then we'll take it to our board for consideration on april 16th so we also did just want to share these hyperlinks you know Sonoma water has made a big effort this year to try and do more outreach to the community on social media and by other avenues we have put together a series of videos on our infrastructure and what the agency does these are good resources not only for the council but for the public in general and we've been trying to push this out as much as we can and so you know in summary you know our infrastructure it's been it's been gradually aging for decades a significant portion of it is approaching its useful life you know we have pushed off a substantial level of deferred maintenance for years to keep rates low especially during the fires the floods and during the pandemic and we can't push everything out any farther you know because of the low deliveries from the drought we have additional pressure on our rates and so you know we took as many measures as we could with the the tax budget subcommittee to create a rate that we think is fair softens the rate impact as much as we can and allows us to you know be responsible to the system that we have a mandate to maintain so this proposed radius rate increase is really needed to invest in the critical infrastructure we have and to remain prepared for natural hazards and with that I think we're open for any questions you may have all right well thank you for being here thank you for that presentation I was telling vice mayor I feel like I'm having deja vu like you guys are just here looking to counsel to see if there are any questions or comments regarding the presentation seeing none madam city clerk can you please facilitate public comment thank you mayor we are now taking public comment on item 15.1 if you are in the chamber I would like to make a comment but have not yet provided a speaker card please make your way to the podium you have two minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period may I'm seeing no one make the approach to the podium on item 15.1 all right so council member step can you please make a motion sure before I do that before I do I just want to make a quick comment perfect thank you thank you very much for the presentation the use less pay more conundrum in which we find in which we're finding ourselves it is counterintuitive for so many in our community we're seeing it obviously in the cinema water system and in Santa Rosa in the same context as playing out with the groundwater with the groundwater rates so we're going to have to find a way to message this I'm glad you emphasized in your presentation that we're not kicking all of our infrastructure projects down the road we underinvested for too many years and we're going to have to find a way to pay for those but it's simple as your as your graphs made very clear this is going to be an issue for years to come we're looking at 10 plus percentage increases for the foreseeable future we're going to have to find a way to message that Jake thank you for for providing those links I know that cinema water and the city are both trying to find ways to get the word out and making it clear to consumers what they're getting in exchange for the investments that that we're making but obviously that's going to be a project for us for the for the years to come and with that I'm pleased to make a motion one moment let me come back to my notes I move to approve this in a county this normal water budget and a proposed rate increase and direct the water advisory committee committee representative our representative our mayor to vote accordingly at the water advice the water advisory committee meeting on April 8th 2024 and wait for the reading of the text second a motion made by vice mayor staff and a second by councilmember rogers madam city clerk may please call the vote councilmember rogers councilmember okrepke hi councilmember mcdonnell hi councilmember flaming is absent councilmember alvarez vice mayor step hi mayor rogers hi let the record show this passes with six affirmative votes thank you very much again for joining us thank you going back up to item 14 which is our public comment on non-agenda matters it is two minutes after five so we are right on time this is an opportunity for the public to speak to the council on matters not listed on this agenda but which are within the subject matter jurisdiction of the council madam deputy oh madam city clerk can you please proceed with public comment thank you if you are in the council chamber would like to make comment on non-agenda and excuse me non-agenda matters please make your way to the podium if you haven't already submitted a speaker card you will have two minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period we will take up to 12 speakers under item 14 if we have more than 12 public comments on nine agenda matters the remaining speakers will be afforded the opportunity to speak on item 18 non-agenda matters as you approach the podium please state your name for the record if you choose to do so the first speaker will be steve followed by marco then susan or susan uh good afternoon city council my name is steve harris i'm a field representative for north cal carp excuse me north cal carpenter's local 751 here in sonoma county uh five years ago i decided to become a field representative to give back to my brothers and sisters the organization is the reason who i am today it has changed my life for the better over the years it has given me a career to provide for my wife and my three children i have been in the construction industry for 36 years now i began the journey by enrolling into the carboners apprenticeship program which has a duration of four years and i had the privilege to learn on the job training and in the classroom with the certified instructors throughout thanks throughout the four years while earning a livable wage to support my family and be getting being debt free of a student loan health care is something that was provided to me when i began this journey since my three children were born and have grown up i realized the importance of having health care and benefits along with earning a livable wage i believe anyone with a family can agree that having health care is a necessity over the years i have commuted all over and have always worked only worked in close that over i have only worked close to home a handful of times and i i can personally speak on the triumphs and struggles that the construction workers face on a daily basis that's why i believe that labor standard language for future projects and critical as to type guidelines for developers to follow like specific language like guidelines for developers that a livable wage apprenticeship health care local hire would set the standards for developers when they come time to calculate in the project and in conclusion this is my question how can we thank you the next speaker will be marco followed by susan then ruby start thank you marco go ahead good evening mayor town council members and staff my name is marco alfaro i'm a field representative for the norCal carpenter's union local 751 located here in san aroza i'm speaking here tonight to talk to you about ensuring the future of our construction industry and the community there are a variety of factors that i hope you will consider in all of your future endeavors to lift up the local community first and foremost is ensuring the men and women who are building your community are provided with health care by choosing contractors that give this benefit to their employees you empower the people building your community and give them the safeguard that we all need as a community our health on average one out of four construction workers in california lack health insurance which is two and a half times all california workers that cannot be a statistic we see in our community fall into as elected officials you have the power to ensure that doesn't happen policies that require contractors to offer their workers family health care with raised standards in the construction industry while also enduring that employers who do offer health care can compete on the level playing field another factor is hiring locally all too often do our community members have to work two to three hours away from home which in turn has them spending that much more money and gas and food in other areas leaving our town to miss out on that tax opportunity as the state and local communities look to reduce carbon emissions local hire should be a part of any green or sustainable construction strategy as more and more construction workers are forced into other communities local hire policies can help bring the stability to families and the community ensuring workers that can spend time with their families instead of spending hours and hours every day in traffic lastly most importantly is living wage ensuring our local workforce earns living wages vital to our communities success thank you for your time thank you the next speaker will be susan followed by ruby then matt do i just turn this on you can turn it on and then i will get you connected down here too okay uh susan lamont district two i'm sure that you're all familiar with this photo by nick utt wine spread publication of it raised awareness of what the u.s was doing in vietnam and it played a part in ending that war some of you may know this photo by kevin carter of a starving child being eyed by a patient vulture which raised awareness about the famine in sudan that photo helped raise funds to alleviate the famine which sadly is is back again i'm sure you've seen photos of dead and dying children in palestine but they haven't been enough to move you to action maybe you're numb seen too many dead children on our streets can only muster thoughts and prayers this graphic was created to remind us of that earlier famine the vulture is wearing an israeli star of david of pictures and photos like this susan santag wrote there is shame as well as shock in looking at the close-up of a real horror perhaps the only people with the right to look at images of suffering of this extreme order are those who could do something to alleviate it or those who could learn from it the rest of us are voyeurs whether or not we mean to be those of us who come here meeting after meeting refuse to be voyeurs it is a moral imperative for us damn your supposed rules which have been designed to thwart a compassionate response to horror we know that people are threatening you you can refuse to be threatened by them all our cultural heroes have done that or you can sell your souls for the money and support that people richer than we are threatening to take away from your future campaigns a ceasefire resolution may not make the change we want but how can you refuse to join the growing chorus to try and is beyond my comprehension i just don't understand it ceasefire now thank you the next speaker will be ruby followed by matt then arie ruby no ruby no ruby nun curtis district three um i'm here to urge you to call for a ceasefire resolution the un just passed a resolution demanding a ceasefire from which the united states abstained this signals to me that our government is in opposition to the rest of the world's moral objection to ceaseless slaughter in gaza it becomes our imperative then at a local level to stand for a permanent ceasefire in gaza i would further urge you to consider divesting from companies that support the occupation and genocide in palestine and gaza if you aren't willing to call for an end to the genocide at least reconsider the ways in which we at a local level are complicit i do not think indifference to genocide is a morally neutral perspective or position that's all thank you thank you the next speaker will be matt followed by arie then jason no uh yes if you guys can look up again from your computers that would be fantastic it's so disturbing to come here and have you guys just not pay attention at all and if you can turn on the overhead projector i will need it in just a few minutes you guys said that uh this needs to be a local issue for us to discuss this here and this is absolutely a local issue 12 million dollars of san rosa tax money has gone to this war 12 million and where would 12 million dollars get us well let's see 12 million dollars could give us 14 000 units for affordable housing well i'm sure we don't need that um one thousand dollars worth of free health care uh for children i guess we don't need that either 130 teachers we don't need that my daughter is actually in a combined grade level uh classroom we could definitely use some teachers but apparently that's not important either and i would like to open this up oh yeah and then uh we could handle some of the student loan problems that we have and if you could turn on that overhead projector right now so i would like to show you that some of us are really in high support of your campaigns and so these posters will be hanging up around the city and you will see them we are handing these out and we will end your careers because we're sick of it do something say something ceasefire now thank you the next speaker will be ari followed by jason then gary my name is aria vinyan i'm a resident of san rosa i'm also here to ask you all to please add an agenda item about having a ceasefire resolution in san rosa albany just passed one yesterday this is like there's over 100 cities in the united states who have already called for a ceasefire resolution there is precedent i do not understand why you won't even add this to the agenda when there is such large local support who keep coming out every meeting to ask for you to represent us to even have a conversation it's so convenient when we're in this public comment where you don't have to respond you don't have to actually tell us why you don't think that san rosa is a good fit for a ceasefire resolution it's absolutely absurd people are dying every single day children are starving families are starving why is it okay for them to starve when you are not why why can't we all be working towards a future that is not death for our world right the american public has overwhelmingly come out saying that we want a ceasefire the un is calling for a ceasefire why don't you have the courage to even add this to the agenda i also related topic really wish that we could have these meetings on zoom i know that white supremacists have messed that up for everybody but it's also a huge disability rights issue right we also have workers out here who might not be able to come to these meetings right it creates access for people to participate do you not want your constituents to be able to speak i think you do i like to hope that you do please make these changes please add an agenda item for the ceasefire resolution thank you thank you the next speaker will be jason followed by gary then tammy good afternoon hi all um jason sweeney district five i i just have a few comments i emailed the entire city council on march 7th and i have only received one response from victoria fleming just confirming that she had received it and read the email so i just want to i'm going to read these questions to you really quickly because i asked five questions that were in bold and underlined and the request was that i would get responses on these questions how does the council provide feedback regarding non-agenda request from the public due to your policy of not responding during the meeting i got a little bit of clarification from the front desk but that would be a response to email questions would you please provide the reasons why you are not willing to bring forward any resolution on this issue even one of your own creation are you where are you getting your numbers from and why is this information not being made public if there's some reason if there's a number of people that are in opposition if it isn't in fact a count please explain how the city council has determined what is in fact the preference of the majority also please explain mark staff's recent comments that passing the resolution would be a net negative i didn't really understand that and i i didn't get decent clarification from mark the last question i think that was it um we just so i i also wanted to say you know we're it's just been a frustrating number of months uh the number of city councils have have stepped up to the plate and passed resolutions i'm going to read you a quote from this uh the mayor of sacramento this resolution is not about the middle east so much as this resolution is about sacramento we are not at war with each other here in sacramento he added that the contested resolution had not created division in our city but rather exposed the divisions that already exist and we have an obligation as leaders no matter what our walk of life to try and make it better that's what we're asking thank you thank you the next speaker will be gary followed by tammy then michael i'm gary i'm a little blue in the face from saying so much but uh i'll try to say a little more i know that i passed out flyers to all of you from a website if americansnew.org it tells the truth of how many children have been killed how many children have no legs how many children have one leg how many children don't have mothers and so forth and you sit there calmly i don't know how you do that i highly recommend everyone sees the documentary five broken cameras it's very basic it's on cd it reveals the desperation on a daily basis of these poor souls and that's before the tragedy that's going on now what they've been putting up with for many many many years the website if americansnew.org it has citations i advise or recommend or suggest that everyone goes there so they understand what really goes on the u.s media is is is real centric so they need to see the truth please call for a ceasefire now thank you the next speaker will be tammy followed by michael hello my name is tammy joe i am a long time resident of sinoma county and lived in santa rosa for many years for months many members of this community have been showing up to request a ceasefire resolution mr alvarez after the last city council meeting you attempted to manipulate us by playing dumb in regards to bringing a resolution to the table claiming you are unaware of that process let me educate you in the city of santa rosa city council manual of procedures and protocols subject to agenda item b place of items on agenda states quote council members wishing to have items placed on a future agenda may take a request during mayors council members reports to add an item to a subsequent meeting agenda a concurrence of one other council member will be sufficient to place the item on the agenda in accordance with the city council policy 000-35 early council agenda policy let it be known here today and on public record that we i will no longer allow you or any member of this body to continue weaponizing your incompetence in this regard i will no longer play along with your politics of empty promises false respectability and selective morality it's about time to start calling out what we are witnessing what i am observing in front of me is a bunch of facile bootlickers eager to please the inept chain of command obsequious lap dogs of this amoral empire your ancestors well at least mine are likely rolling with fury and sacred rage that you will rightfully see expressed through the upcoming generations after 171 days of slaughter and genocide your legacy of inaction and cowardice will not only not be forgotten but will be duly noted by the and for generations to come ceasefire now free palestine thank you the next public comment will be from michael on my name is michael i'm from district two of santa rosa i'm here to support a call for resolution for a permanent ceasefire against the people of palestine stop the genocide i think all of us every single city needs to sign on to this this should have been a pretty easy ask i mean it's not it's all it's asking is to approve a resolution for peace it's really not anything that should have been a big deal but it's dragged out and you know the un is finally you know put together a ceasefire resolution that passed because the u.s. abstained which normally when a country abstains from supporting a genocide that's a bad thing but this is the world that we live in and maybe there's a slight difference that's being made because people are finally starting to speak out i'd love to see santa rosa finally do this tomorrow santa rosa school board is going to be voting on a resolution for a ceasefire uh you should join them everybody should join them this is easy um so please join the call thank you i see no one else approaching the podiums for public comment on nonagenda matters we have received 10 public comments thus far under item 14 thank you very much we will now be moving to item 16 which are our public hearings for today madam city manager item 16.1 as a public hearing shared scooter system program ordinance amendment if each team member could introduce themselves for the record uh good evening mayor rogers and members of the council my name is alexander osigera i'm the active transportation planner for the city of santa rosa good evening i'm terina wilson i'm the transportation planner for city of santa rosa i'll be presenting on the scooter ordinance uh amendment so a little bit of background the city council approved the scooter share pilot program in december of 2021 following a competitive application process um the the city awarded bird rides ink uh a pilot program permit bird flew in the first hundred electric scooters on july 1st 2022 bird operated scooters in santa rosa until ceasing operations on august 31st 2023 in january of 2024 staff met with representatives from police fire parking the dao and the historic railroad square district and all were in favor of transitioning the pilot program into a formal shared scooter program in 1996 and 2001 the city council adopted ordinance 3249 and 3516 respectively prohibiting skating activities and scooters on sidewalks and streets within the specified downtown area the specified uh railroad square area in shopping centers and on other specified areas of public property the project includes an amendment to the santa rosa health and safety code chapter nine dash 22 to allow for shared scooter system program um the operations of the shared scooter system program would be consistent with state law and just a little history of our shared scooter program we had about 13 318 total rides during the time frame of the um operation of the shared scooter system and there's a couple other numbers in here they kind of jump out at you 1.85 miles was the average distance um we had a total travel distance of 24 697 miles so chapter nine dash 22 the revision includes adding a subsection exempting scooters from prohibition to operate on public streets public alleys and public gutters nine dash 22 dot zero two zero d prohibition these devices will be prohibited from operating on sidewalks per the existing code so it is the recommendation by the transportation and public works department that the council introduce an ordinance to allow all scooters to operate on public streets public alleys and public gutters by amending chapter nine dash 22 of the santa rosa city code related to bicycle skateboards roller skates in line skates and similar devices i now open it up for questions thank you very much for that presentation are there any questions from council members council member rogers thank you so much so as you mentioned we started as a pilot program with bird as the only operator would this amendment allow other operators to come in and sort of fill that space or fill that void and if not could you update us a little bit on what those discussions look like yeah so the process would be we would end up having to come back to you and have an amendment to our permit conditions um or i think maybe a resolution so that would be the process moving forward and so i think the idea is to to bring forward more the availability for more operators to be in santa rosa instead of just one uh we'll now open the public hearing we are now taking don't work thank you we are now taking public comment on item 16.1 if you are in the chamber would like to make comment but have not yet provided a speaker card or your name please make your way to the podium you will have two minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period may or mc no one approach the podium on item 16.1 i will now close the public hearing and bring it back to the council are there any comments council member mcdonald thank you mayor i just have a quick question i see that this amendment is actually for scooters and as somebody who probably shouldn't be on a scooter would this include us to be able to have like shared bikes or or a program like that i know that that's something we were just in dc and there were scooters or bikes or a lot of electric little things that you could rent and so i'm just curious if that would this language is inclusive of that so i as far as i know there isn't any prohibition on bicycle riding so the bike share system should be fine we actually have a program coming up that is a joint partnership between the county's of sonoma and uh marin so um we're going to be implementing a bike share program in the near future hopefully rolling out sometime late summer okay thank you all right seeing no additional questions or comment mayor i just wanted to make a quick clarification and maybe staff can correct me that the the ordinance is not attached to a share program so this would be allowing the scooters to operate on the places that you talked about independent of any shared program so this is a little different than the pilot that's my understanding is that correct that's correct okay i just wanted to make that clarification there with that i would just suggest that you open the public comment open the public hearing and allow for public comment given that clarification and then you can go ahead and close all right we're going to open up the public hearing again to see if there are any comments um with the clarification the language that was just presented by madame city attorney and i'm seeing none so we will close the public hearing um and i will bring it to council member alvarez i will leave for the motion thank you madam mayor i'd like to introduce the ordinance of the council of the city of san rosa amending san rosa city code title nine health and safety code chapter nine dash two two bicycle skateboards roller skates inline skates and similar devices to allow scooters to operate on public streets public alleys and public gutters and way further reading of the text second we have a motion made by council member alvarez and a second by council member mcdonnell madame city clerk may you please uh any additional comments no comments madame city clerk may you please call the bill thank you council member rogers hi council member okrepke hi council member mcdonnell hi council member flaminas absent council member alvarez hi vice mayor step hi mayor rogers hi let the record show this passes with six affirmative votes we will now move to our second public hearing of the evening uh sorry thank you for being here we'll now move on thank you for your time no problem our second public hearing of the evening madam city manager i'm sorry councilman alvarez is excited about the scooter program let me go to the next item item 16.2 is a public hearing way finding sign ordinance and fee resolution good afternoon mayor rogers members of the council just quickly introduced myself and then handed over to christian i'm jessica jones deputy director um of planning here at the city uh good evening mayor and council members uh before you today is the way finding sign ordinance uh this is file number rz 2309 and this is to cover city wide uh also my name is christian i'm a city planner so before you is the project description so this is going to be a zoning code text amendment for wayfinding signage uh before you are uh different types so this business wayfinding and public civic amenity wayfinding and then there are provisional changes for standards related to these two so that includes general standards eligibility criteria design standards the application process the removal of them definitions and then how the zoning code is going to be updated and then how this might affect transit hubs so for the project timeline of this project uh this started off with railroad square business wayfinding pilot program um they were given a temporary use permit for one year and this allowed the city to go through the review process of how we might want to bring this and allow it within the city because it is currently prohibited to have um advertisement wayfinding um then in september last year the downtown received its own wayfinding sign program this is permitted and we allow public and civic type of wayfinding in the city and then we conducted a public survey from october 9th to november 9th last year and then we brought the project to the cultural heritage board for recommendation and then we went to the design review board for the same and then we went to planning commission in february and then before you today is the project so i wanted to show what these look like as existing so on the left are the business wayfinding sign programs in railroad square and on the right are the downtown public and civic way findings that you will see around the city so there are some definitions being added these are the ones that you'll see before you so business wayfinding is being added and then we're defining public and civic amenity wayfinding sign plaques sign post sign header iconography and pictograms two areas in the city are going to be allowing these type of wayfinding programs that would be the downtown station area and the north station area these two areas were specifically chosen because they have specific plans and these specific plans specifically called out to have wayfinding sign programs in the future so these are the proposed dimensions that are being proposed for the wayfinding programs and then there are additional information that is required of businesses for the business wayfinding program so the maximum signpost height is eight feet the sign plaque would be 12 inches in height by 24 inches in length and then the font size would be two inches minimum and six inches maximum and then this also has some additional font requirements for business logos so as I showed before the railroad square is existing as well as the downtown and I wanted to show how they might be out of compliance and how they might comply with the proposal before you today and then additional photos of what the railroad square signs look like out in the area and then there are nine signposts for the railroad square district about 40 businesses are participating in this program and there are about 110 signs in this program here are types of the downtown signs these ones are they can interchange so some of them are color coordinated and the white ones are for events so those might change throughout the year as we see different types of events and this program has 27 signposts and some of them are front and back so these are the general standards so there is a three signposts minimum for the program this also includes public right away standards such as like for sidewalks and then additionally there are ADA standards traffic standards and zoning standards they would have to follow design standards we would allow walking time estimates so this is if someone would want to know the time it would take to walk from maybe courthouse square to city hall that could be added to a sign if the applicant would like to also prohibiting flashing and digital signs and then directional arrows are required for these programs and then the sign header is also a requirement and that would need to display the area's name and imagery of the location here are some business wayfinding standards so we will allow proposing to allow six sign plaques per business currently railroad square only offered three per business so they are within this parameter and then one public and civic amenity sign is required for business wayfinding signposts including iconography logos and then prohibiting business phone numbers physical addresses cure codes and website texts for public and civic wayfinding standards there would be uniform design including color palette font size and font type and then also including English and Spanish texts iconography and directional arrows for the application process this is a list of all the requirements that are required for each application submittal for a wayfinding sign program it is including location map conceptual rendering color palette font size font type iconography pictograms directional arrows the sign plaque header and posts dimensions materials and then a mock-up to scale additional changes a part of this text amendment include for transit hub signs we are looking at as I said we're looking into working with the metropolitan transportation commission and we'll be getting different types of transit hub signage within the city and this is going to cover informational kiosk maps and other transit hub signage and wanting to differentiate between the wayfinding sign program and these types of signs for the survey this was open for a month from october 9th sorry october 9th to november 9th and we had over 400 individual respondents and then this is broken down into a theme of common comments this would be cost for the city budget and applicants sign design great for tourism and residents promoting bike and pedestrian usage city would need should also receive emergency 911 poles signs not necessary due to present-day technology remove all wayfinding signs public civic amenities should be required and clear too much long-term maintenance for these programs code enforcement would need to remove all sandwich boards and remove parking meters to promote walkability with wayfinding as I mentioned before we went to other boards and commissions before approaching today we receive recommendations from the cultural heritage board on january 17th these are the recommendations they provided and have been included this would be each sign post should have a sign header indicating the name of the district businesses should include individual logos to showcase what Santa Rosa has to offer with individuality and culture incorporating public and civic amenities should be a requirement and historic landmarks should be counted towards complying with the public civic await amenity wayfinding requirement on january 25th we went to the designer review board and we incorporated their recommendations listed here those would be the sign plaque dimensions should be increased to 12 inches in height a wayfinding so sign program should be a minimum of three sign posts creating specific sign program application requirements a sign header should be required business logos should be allowed public civic amenity wayfinding should be uniform in design and should be using pictograms as legally required there were additional recommendations not included from the drb and chb this would be to ensure that this process is going to be out of a ministerial process and not adding any discretionary level so some recommendations not included our concept review by both of these boards sign posts would not need to match the character of the area and do not need to match the historic character of the preservation districts in february we went this project went to the planning commission and it was through the public hearing process and it was voted unanimously to by to be recommended to council to adopt an ordinance the commission agreed with the proposed language and included keeping the process streamlined and ministerial which means not adding any of the discretionary items as referenced before as of now we haven't received no public comment and there have been no issues at this time the proposed amendments have been reviewed and complied with the california environmental quality act and this is exempt under the seco guideline section 15060c2 and then not defined as a project on a seco guideline section 15378 it's also exempt under a seco guideline section 150303 and 304 this would be adding signs to existing right-of-way and then 15183 consistent with general plan zoning community plan this is for under the center of the general plan the north station area specific plan and the downtown station area specific plan a text amendment has required findings so these are the ones before you that would be proposed amendment is consistent with the general plan the amendment would not be detrimental to public health and safety additional finding of the zoning amendments would be make sure it's internally consistent with the zoning code and then it is also reviewed and compliance with seco it is recommended by the planning commission and the planning and economic development department that the council introduce an ordinance amending the top text of title 20 of the center of the city code chapter 20-38 signs to provide standards for wayfinding signs and section 20-70.020 definition of specialized terms and phrases to add definitions related to wayfinding signs and to by resolution establish wayfinding sign application fees and if you have any questions my information is also here and I wanted to note that the downtown sorry the railroad square and the downtown groups are available if you have any questions for them as well thank you thank you very much for that presentation and thank you for having the visuals it's really nice to be able to see a visual but it will look like are there any questions from council quiet group tonight all right so with that we will now open the public hearing madame city clerk we are now taking public comment on item 16.2 if you are in the council chamber would like to comment but have not yet provided a speaker card or your name please make your way to the podium you have three minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period pardon me two minutes um excuse me as you approach the podium please state your name for the record if you choose to do so they are seeing no one make the move towards the podiums for item 16.2 then we will now close the public hearing and i'm looking to councilmember okraki all right i'll move to introduce an ordinance amending the text of title 20 of the santa rosa city code chapter 20-38 signs to provide standards for wayfinding signs and section 20-70.020 definitions of specialized terms and phrases to add definitions related to wayfinding signs and to move to approve a resolution establishing wayfinding signs application fees and way further reading of the text we have a motion made by councilmember okraki and a second by councilmember alvarez council are there any questions comments seeing none madame city clerk can you please call the vote thank you councilmember rogers hi councilmember okraki hi councilmember mcdonald hi councilmember flaming is absent councilmember alvarez hi vice mayor step hi mayor rogers hi let the record show this passes with six affirmative votes thank you very much for the presentation we will now continue to our third public hearing of the evening um and i would like to look to councilmembers to ask about any ex parte communications um a disclosure so we will start with councilmember okraki i visited the site and spoke to two planning commissioners that have nothing further to disclose we're just going to go down yes i have nothing to disclose i spoke with planning commissioners and also the appellant team nothing to disclose i went to the site i also talked to a couple of folks who are opposed to the project but learned nothing that isn't publicly available in the documents i also visited the sites uh have written communication with the appellant as well as constituents as well as phone call with constituents and have nothing reported is not already in the public documents thank you and i have nothing to disclose thank you thank you item 16.3 verizon telecommunication facility appeal okay i'll quickly introduce myself and then we'll go down the line here uh jessica jones deputy director of planning here at the city i also want to note that we have gale carish with bbk who is on zoom uh she'll be assisting us as outside council on this item um will be available for any questions moving on down the line i'm susie murray i'm supervising planner for current development and here in support of the project planner good evening mayor rogers and council members my name is susanne hartman and i am the project planner presenting to you at this uh verizon wireless telecommunications facility um appeal so a brief project description is that uh this project uh has a conditional uh apologies this project um needed a conditional use permit for a proposed 69 foot tall wireless telecommunications facility and associated ground equipment as well as a design review permit this is the aerial view of the project site we have a motel area to the left or west of the site we have uh cosco and the shopping center that is south um an industrial use directly to the right or east and then we have medium density residential and other various retail uses to the north this is kind of just a zoomed in aerial of the project site with the stars um representing where the tower is proposed to be the general plan land use designation is light industry and the zoning district is light industrial this is the project site plan and this is just the site plan with the more of a zoomed view and that site plan is also within the plan set which is in the attachments provided so just a little background this conditional use permit and design review um application was submitted of last july um in 2023 and the planning commission approved the conditional use permit on january 11th of 2024 and the design review board approved the design review permit um with two added conditions on january 18th of 2024 and then an appeal of the planning commission's action was received on january 22nd and the close of the appeal period for the design review board was on january 29th and no appeal was received for the design review permit so in making sure that this presentation doesn't drag on i'm just going to um stick with uh calling out the responses to all of these grounds of appeal so we'll start with response a as noted in the general plan section of this report and in the draft resolution of approval the proposed project has been found to be in compliance with the city's general plan specifically while there are no specific goals or policies related to telecommunications facilities these types of facilities have been found to implement a variety of overarching general plan goals by creating a functional place and for those who live and work within the city staff's response to ground to be as noted in the zoning section of this report and in the draft resolution of approval the proposed project has been found to be in compliance with all the political sections of the city's zoning code response c the proposed project has been found in compliance with the california environmental quality act while the appellant did not provide any specifics regarding the assertion of an environmental threat concerns were raised during the planning commission meeting regarding the faux pine needle material entering into the adjacent creek and causing an impact and it should be noted that during the design review board meeting there was a condition that the telecommunications tower be proposed to be a monopole instead of my own a pine which would remove the foliage that was proposed response d city staff has found this project to comply with the city's zoning code and we are not aware of any inconsistencies response e the city's zoning code does not discourage proliferation of telecommunications facilities and encourages consideration of multiple shorter facilities the code requires applicants to co-locate if possible however in this circumstance the applicant determined that there are no existing wireless facilities where co-location can meet its service objective and therefore a new facility is required to meet rapidly increasing demand in the area response f the zoning codes permit findings and telecommunications standards do not require demonstration of a gap in service lack of capacity or need for a new wireless facility these concepts are drawn from federal law and court decisions but apply only if a wireless facility is denied and the applicant files a lawsuit against a city claiming a prohibition of service and violation of the federal telecommunications act therefore these concepts are not applicable to the city's decision response g federal government has largely preempted local government regulation in the area of radio frequency emissions or rf emissions making the federal communications commission the federal agency responsible for setting nationwide guidelines for safe rf levels and severely limiting local authority to regulate rf emissions or to deny an application to install wireless service facilities based on concerns about rf emissions and the federal law specifically provides that no state or local government or instrumentally thereof may regulate the placement construction and modification of personal wireless service facilities on the basis of environmental effects of radio frequency emissions and the extent such facilities comply with the federal communications commissions regulations concerning such emissions response h there are no requirements for a fall zone or safe zone in the city's zoning code or within the building code response i the city's building division has required or sorry has reviewed the plan submitted for a conditional use permit and design review and has not indicated any issues with the proposal the next step for the project will be submittal of a building permit at which time the proposed facility will be reviewed for compliance with all applicable building code requirements response j the applicant has provided an analysis of 14 alternative sites for the necessary coverage the applicant's alternative site analysis shows that the proposed facility is ideally located in an industrial zone near the center of the service gap and will be over 200 feet away from residences i will also refer to the applicant for further to further explain their findings with the alternate upside analysis response k the gap again the gap in service does not pertain to this appeal and i will let the applicant address their findings regarding the gap in service response l the design review ward was able to make the finding that the architectural design of the proposed facility is compatible with the character of the surrounding neighborhood and that the base of the cell tower and all related ground equipment will be screened from public view and placed behind an existing commercial building to minimize visual impacts as much as possible response m the city's action on required permits are required to meet specific findings as stated in the zoning code and the findings do not include a finding regarding property value response n the applicant provided updated photo simulations that show the proposed monopole at the requested vantage points response oh again the zoning codes permit findings and telecommunication standards do not require demonstration of a gap in service response p zoning code section 20-44 dot 0 6 0 section b through subsection b directs that minor modifications to existing legally established minor and major towers and any zoning districts shall require both minor conditional use spent use permit and minor design review it should be noted that pursuant to section 6409 an increase in height less than 10% or less than 20 feet does not constitute a substantial change and therefore a conditional use permit would not be required but it would however requirement not still require a minor design review staff finds that the project complies with all requisite requirements of the zoning code and that all required findings listed in city code chapter 20-52 can be met it's permitted within the industrial zoning district by obtaining major conditional use permit and minor design review permit and the installation of the proposed facility implements a variety of overarching general planned goals by creating a functional place for those who live and work within the city the base of the cell tower and all related equipment will be screened from public view and the proposed height of the tower is necessary to maintain adequate height for function while allowing future co-location on the site existing the existing site is both developed and surrounded by existing industrial and commercial development and the project included any me report which was prepared by waterford consultants and received which was received by staff on july 26th of 2023 and it concluded that the proposed placement of the tower at the subject site will not result in exposure of the public or excessive levels of radio frequency energy as defined by the FCC rules and regulations staff finds that the project also complies with all requisite requirements of the zoning code and that all required findings listed in the city code chapter 20-44 can be met the proposed facility is ideally located in an existing industrial zone near the center of the service gap and it's well over 75 feet away from residences as shown in attachment five the applicant has provided a written explanation why the subject facility is not a candidate for co-location and much of the monopole and great ground equipment will be screened from view by nearby buildings and trees as shown in attachment 10 there will also be vertical space on the monopole for future co-location of antennas by other wireless carriers and no new road or parking is required due to the facility being proposed and located at a previously disturbed site as shown in attachment five Verizon Wireless has submitted reports from a license engineer confirming compliance with the FCC's radio frequency exposure limits in a radio frequency emissions compliance report prepared for Verizon Wireless by David H Kaiser electric ill engineer which was dated march 20 sorry may 24th of 2023 it was confirmed that the radio frequency exposure assessment report to be accurate as shown in attachment seven and again staff would like to say that the federal government has largely preempted local government regulation in the area of RF emissions making the FCC the federal agency responsible for setting nationwide guidelines for RF safe levels and the city has no discretion to deny a telecommunication facility due to concerns about exposure the project was found to be in compliance with the california environmental quality act pursuant to sections 15303 and 15183 which exempts the construction of new small structures and that telecommunication towers are considered small structures that are similar to this project and the use is eligible for streamlining a streamlining measure as it is consistent with the general plan of 2035 for which an environmental impact report was certified by council in 2009 it is therefore recommended by the planning commission and by the planning and economic development department that the council by resolution deny the appeal and approve a conditional use permit for a wireless telecommunication tower and associated ground equipment for the property located at 244 colgan avenue and this is my contact information on the screen and if you have any questions let me know and we also have the applicant present um to present as well and if you have any questions thank you thank you very much for that presentation it was definitely a lot so thank you for sticking sticking with this with that one uh looking to council members to see if there are any questions seeing none um we will now have uh karen weeks our planning commission chair oh well you were up there i thought earlier good evening mayor rogers and members of the city council as you know my name is karen weeks and i am the chair of the planning commission as planner hartman indicated on january 11th 2024 we reviewed this item and we found it consistent with land use and zoning code uh which is the planning commission's purview and we were able to make all the required findings and approve the conditional use permit it was a six uh vote uh one person absent um so if you have any questions i'm happy to answer them but looking to council to see if there are any questions seeing none thank you very much for being here with us and i'll stick around in case there's other questions perfect and we will now uh open the public hearing madam city clerk at this time mayor to follow the procedures and protocols um we are going to call the appellant up for their presentation so if the appellant can make their way to the podium and the staff members going to pop open the appellant's presentation advance the slides on behalf of the appellant uh sydney cox and team is representing the appellant so you will have 10 minutes for your presentation please go ahead i'll give you a one-minute prompt verbal prompt at the um one-minute mark play a homeowner and i live across from the proposed rise and sell tower application i'll be speaking out against it summarizing three arguments and then i'll be concluding with a couple of miscellaneous points next slide the top three arguments as stated there will dig into note that each one of them on their own would be sufficient to reject the basis of the applicant sell tower and we'll take them each in turn but all of them together pose a mighty trio next slide the first point is that they have not established a gap in coverage next slide based off of their own map as you can see here this these are all of the horizon sell tower sites in santa rosa there's some 40 that's not including 15 from atn t and as a result we think this application deserves great scrutiny because there's considerable overlap next slide that map that you saw started to look like a pin cushion so it shouldn't be surprising santa rosa has the highest concentration of cell towers in any other bay area community bar none per square mile within a two-mile radius of the proposed applicant site there are in fact 12 additional towers those are the ones that are owned by verizon alone we're not including any other carrier based off of the current ordinance you cannot place a cell tower within a two-mile radius of an existing on camouflage or on screen cell tower so they failed on that alone it should be rejected next slide in addition there's a failure of the gap in coverage based off of objectifiable data they've given you self-serving maps what they haven't given you are drop call lists or drive-by tests that show any type of broadband usage those are objective measures that cannot be manipulated and if you decided today that you wanted to postpone a decision in order to have real data in front of you we would be in favor of that right now they haven't done it they haven't provided either one we think you should reject it because if we were to ask the question is there a gap how big is it where does it reside and is this application too much not enough or just right you wouldn't be able to answer us and that's the problem verizon's credibility is suspect on this next slide right now they're speaking out of both sides of their corporate mouth they're saying to you there's a gap they're saying on their own website there's plenty of coverage in fact it's exceptional shown in the dark red on the screenshot that's here so who would they be fooling you or the FCC this is a form of commercial speech that's subject to FCC scrutiny and they would be subject to fines for false advertising next slide the next compelling argument argument concerns visual blight which causes harm to the neighborhood next slide the design itself is 69 feet tall that's 30 feet taller than any other building in the neighborhood it's out of character it's ugly it's intrusive it's visually obscene and that should come as no surprise because this project has faced considerable opposition because of its aesthetics there's some 68 letters that have been submitted both to the planning council in combination with the city council unfortunately it doesn't end there next slide the visual harm here can be compounded if this is approved they could jack up the height another 20 feet so it's already a monstrosity becomes a leviathan and unfortunately the city council would have no clout to reverse it as staff has just stated they'd have to come in for a design review but they wouldn't be able to stop them from raising the height next slide the mere imposition of this tower in the location would harm property values and that's something that's well within your wheelhouse to protect on average cell towers that ensued residential neighborhoods drop the values by 10 to 20 percent there's a study in the journal of real estate finance and economics it was published in february of 2017 along with the appraisal journal of summer 2005 a seminal study on that so this has already been proven in the neighborhood we have middle income low income retirees people of modest means who don't have a lot to protect what modest assets they do possess this would expand the economic divide the proposed tower also would violate the general plan in what you would support as a livable community it blights the visual view that we do have it would also undermine the general plan because the general plan seeks to avoid conflicts with between land uses we have light industrial and right across the street nothing but residential so you should take greater care in considering this application next slide verizon has also failed to mitigate what harm that they seek to impose in the neighborhood next slide there are there's a three prong burden that they bear one they have to conduct alternate site analysis to minimize visual impacts three co-locate were feasible in january they testified that this is in anticipation of future growth along koanich springs but the proposed tower isn't in koanich springs it's on coal again so it makes no sense and other options that they could have considered like atop a hilltop where something 69 feet tall would be most appropriate simply has been rejected out of turn verizon has failed to exhaust numerous possibilities that it has control over the 12 that already exists within a two-mile radius nor have they camouflaged or screened or reduced the tower's height they're stubbornly holding on to the 69 foot height they also have enacted in good faith or performed due diligence in fact they're counting on it let me give you a case in point their number one alternative was a t-mobile site that they claimed didn't work out you know why because it doesn't exist on the corner of colgan and san rosa avenue there is no cell tower hadn't been there for two years we're not looking for phantom due diligence we're looking for actual due diligence they failed to live up to their burden next slide i want to comment on two side issues that do impact the application next slide the shot clock the telecommunications act added a shot clock to make sure that municipalities didn't sit on their hands or let applications die on the vine but once you take action whether that's asking for more information whether that's rejecting the application or even improving it that's considered action you're taking that tonight once you take action of any sort the shot clock evaporates next slide emergency chatter i've been hearing about AT&T operates the first responder network not Verizon adding a antenna would require AT&T doing so to affect AT&T but it would only affect their customers the bottom line that you should know about is that when anyone makes a 911 call it is the first available network that steps in it doesn't matter who it is t-mobile AT&T AT&T so it is not dependent on this tower next slide we asked that you reject it based off these main arguments however i want to note for the record that only one resolution was actually posted to the website the one in favor and not the one against and i doubt that council or that is your staff knows how you're going to vote in advance i just want that noted for the record i'm going to defer the remainder of my time to my colleagues you have two and a half minutes remaining for the appellate okay i just posted some put some pictures up there that shows visual blight right there i don't know if you can see it i don't have a camera here so i can't use the camera but i just want to say okay there are the posters and i also want to point out another important poster and i have something that i can show you later i can actually make it available to you this is the formula that the Verizon needs to explain to you so that you know what the FCC limits are does anyone even understand what this formula is here's an explanation about what happens using this exact formula when people are exposed 24 seven or eight hours or two hours the exact formula from the FCC that's the first thing okay when i first heard about this tower i thought there had to be some mistake right behind casco no way i visited the neighborhood i talked to folks there i found an old friend i made new friends i really care about these people in vintage park and last planata one thing led to another meetings flyers we hired attorneys we spent money we devoted months to our opposition all along thinking we had a chance to stop this crazy idea of a cell tower behind casco across some seniors families and we filed an appeal we saw the response from Verizon the city resolution denying our appeal my heart is confused and sad what chance do we have tonight if you deny the tower tonight the shot clock stops it should have already stopped write a new resolution Verizon can always appeal to the courts but maybe that's where it should ultimately be decided anyway thank you is that the conclusion of the appellants presentation you have 30 seconds left there will be an opportunity for the public to provide public comment but we have 15 seconds remaining on the appellant 30 seconds i have 30 seconds okay the staff mentioned several times that their hands are tied and that they can't do anything because of the FCC i want to point out to you that many cities have a setback from cell towers from residential areas that are 15 sir that concludes your 10 minute allotment for the appellant so sir what she's saying is uh you can't finish right now but during public comment if you would like to speak you can have two minutes to speak during public comment looking to counsel to see if there are any questions for the appellant seeing none oh councilmember alvarez thank you madam mayor oh i'm sorry question for the appellants i'm sorry it was question for staff i'll remind wait for my turn all right so seeing none madam city clerk we'd like to call up the applicant for presentation and staff again will be uh presenting the applicant's presentation and advancing slides on behalf of the applicant arandela o in team again you will have 10 minutes and i will give you a one-minute prompt uh at the one-minute mark remaining okay staff can you put it in presentation mode sorry one moment you're okay take your time thank you for your patience let me get the timers started please go ahead um mr. delo you have 10 minutes okay thank you susanne for your presentation and thank you council members for being here tonight my name is arandela o with centerline communications representing verizon wireless on this project i have four subject matter experts with me here tonight evan pentos verizon's municipal engagement partner pablo sanchez verizon's network engineer dav coden is with waterford consultant he is an rf emissions expert and paul bredin who's verizon's legal counsel next slide please this shows our application timeline what i'd like to point out here is that verizon has been looking for a solution to the network capacity issue since it was first identified in 2020 it took two years of hard work researching candidates talking to landlords and designing the site to get to the point where we could make an application to planning we submitted our planning application in june of 2023 the project was later approved unanimously by the planning commission and then approved by the design review board with the change from a mono pine to a mono pole next slide please our application is for a 69 foot co-locatable mono pole with verizon's antennas at the 65 foot centerline the ground equipment and tower in the 90 900 square foot lease areas surrounded by a six foot tall chain link fence with brown vinyl slats next slide please we prepared photo simulations taken from eight different vantage points which are all included in verizon's response to appeal letter which is attachment 23 in your packet our goal was to help refine our design and to show city decision makers and the community not just what the benefits of the installation will be but also what the visual impacts would be this slide shows the installation what it would look like from across colgan avenue which is where the vintage park senior apartments are we did our best to obscure the installation by positioning it behind the industrial building to hide as much of the installation as possible next slide please this view was requested by planning it's taken from santa rosa avenue near the redwood in it's a very busy area the site is hardly visible with the hills the backdrop next slide please this view was also requested by planning to see what the installation would look like from the residences along petaluma hill road this view is actually looking west not east from petaluma hill just south of colgan avenue only the top part of the tower is visible in the distance next slide we had waterford consultants do an rf emissions report to determine the predicted public exposure levels and the results are well under the federal limits we have dav cotton from waterford consultants here tonight he can answer any questions you may have on this topic next slide we looked at 14 different candidates over that two year time span searching for the location that best suited the code and the needs of the network this image shows the location of those candidates you can also see the large commercial and retail areas and how the area is surrounded by an interspersed with residential developments our proposed location is shown as number five in green it's not only tucked in behind industrial buildings but also on the other side of the cosco building from the cosco parking lot and the entrances to the businesses in the san rosa marketplace next slide please this is just a list of the 14 candidates we looked at and why they were disqualified some of them could not fill the service gap some had owners that weren't interested some were too close to residences and would have in have had inadequate camouflage so we discarded those as well next slide the san rosa marketplace well this is an increasing an area of the increasing demand on verizon's network the san rosa marketplace has 540 000 square feet of retail space and thousands of visitors each day then there is highway 101 with an estimated 140 000 vehicles per day and san rosa avenue which is another heavily trafficked area you can also see the residential developments that i mentioned earlier all of these are important service objectives and this high number of users is putting a strain on verizon's network to describe how this is affecting the network i'd like to bring in paul all britain verizon's legal counsel to take it from here paul good evening mayor rogers members of the council thank you so much for your time this evening considering verizon's application uh as erin described this is a highly congested area for Verizon wireless we're experiencing growth rates of approximately 10 percent a year we put that information in our letter which includes a detailed rf analysis by our engineer paul asanchez who's here this evening which means that the service demands are doubling approximately every seven years and this is a highly congested area needing needing more service next slide please uh so from this slide you can see we have three sites in the area uh to the northwest is our rosalind site about a mile away to the northeast is the sonoma fairground site and that's also as you know a location of a red cross evacuation center that's been used in the last couple of years and then down to the southwest about a mile over a mile is the dutton site these are the three sites that are providing service into the area right now their over capacity uh the area is what we call a lack of a dominant signal because all three of those facilities are providing signal into the area and phones have difficulty finding a signal to catch onto and maintaining a signal so we're experiencing low data speeds and drop calls i want to demonstrate that in the next graphic if you go to the next slide we're looking to hear a data from the rosalind site that's the one that was up to the northwest the upper red line shows the percentage of data resources used by that facility in trying to provide service into the area during a period from February 9th to February 16th of this year as you can see every day the site is maxing out in capacity in terms of its ability to provide data and throughput and voice to the area at that same time the data rates are dropping that's a green line dropping excuse me red line green lines at the top red lines at the bottom showing the reduction in data throughput every day which is dropping down to almost two megabits per second FCC defines broadband as 25 megabits we're down to two and so the network is from that rosalind site is extremely compromised because it cannot keep up with demand the next slide please uh shows the same problem where we've got the sonoma fairground site maximum capacity being hit every day from that period from February 6th to 19th and the throughputs dropping so now we've got two of the three sites in the area and then the third slide is our Dutton facility once again we've got capacity being reached on a daily basis in the throughput dropping so we've got huge demand in this area from the 140 000 trips on highway 101 the 24 000 trips on santa rosa boulevard the 500 000 square feet of business park the 2000 parking places in this area are sucking up the the available capacity of the verizon wireless network there's no issue here of coverage maps you get signal you get bars on your phone but you can't get on the network and you can't maintain a call and your data throughputs are very slow next slide please i think the staff did an excellent job of reviewing the appellants concerns i'll just briefly roll through them the uh general plan and code are clearly complied with the planning commission your staff the design review board all agree unanimously i don't think there's any question there the question of a gap i just explained the appellants are concerned about coverage maps and that's really not the issue anymore that's the old argument uh today the gaps are with respect to capacity and trying to fulfill the service needs the comment on aesthetics the design review board perhaps was happy with the aesthetics a slimline monopole in behind buildings in an industrial area uh we've fully comply with setbacks we're over 300 feet from the north closest home when we could be 75 feet and we're at the back of the lot we think the photo sims confirm that the aesthetic concerns are much to do about nothing same thing with the property value concerns there are several cases that say any concerns about property values that are related to rf emissions concerns are barred by federal law and we think that's mostly the case here uh in the 2005 study that's referenced by the appellants is dr cold dr gold she's in new zealand uh scientists who said that her her papers are not applicable in the marketplace the united states they were related to uh information from from new zealand one minute remaining thank you um they also commented on peripheral proliferation of sites i have to say uh verizon wireless has 14 macros facilities and 30 small cells in santa rosa and approximately 42 square miles and approximately 49 square miles in san francisco we have over 600 small cells and over 60 macro towers so santa rosa is far from being uh over overly burdened with with wireless facilities and what we're trying to do is provide service to meet demand we have an excellent panel of experts i encourage you to ask all of your questions if there are any of the appellants concerns that you think would cause you to deny this site please ask us and we'd like to respond to that and we'll end right there thank you so much for your time all right looking to counsel to see if there are any questions of the applicant we're back seeing none madam city clerk may you please conduct public comment thank you we are now taking public comments on item 16.3 if you would like to make a comment but have not yet provided a speaker card please make your way to the podium you will have three minutes and a countdown or pardon me two minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period as you approach the podium please state your name for the record if you choose to do so and if you have previously spoken on behalf of the applicant or the appellant this is not another opportunity for comment there will be a rebuttal period for both the applicant and the appellant um after the public comment has been received the first public comment will be melody followed by michelle and roxanne hi melody is left she was really upset my name is michelle misino deluca and i want to thank the folks who spoke on behalf of the the um the appellant um i'm speaking as a human being i can't speak all this legal stuff i'm speaking as a human being that lives right across the street i hope and i say i hope what i say will touch your hearts and motivate you to make the right choice our lives are in your hands what is really most important here is people not profits this proposed cell towers opposed to support people but the location and the size of it clearly don't the proposed cell tower will be way too large nearly seven stories which cannot become cannot become camouflaged by buildings around it there are no buildings anywhere near that height um nearly seven stories tall and nothing approaches that height it will be a horrifically ugly i saw for everyone looming large and threatening over our heads in our views from our windows doorways patios decks and pools i have too many words here so let me just say that although you cannot consider the health concerns the american cancer society says that there are some reasons that need to be investigated and most experts agree in that that leaves a community of elders of which i'm one plus other neighbors pregnant mothers children and people living in the worry and concern for this which should be your concern as well we're the ones who voted for you you also represent us and not just business interests this could be very very harmful for us please deny deny Verizon's application let this council be a leader in safe cell tower construction as they are in petaluma many other places this is just wisdom this is commons thank you the next public comment will be rock sand followed by mary than kim i'm rock sand lenius and i live directly across the street from this proposed monolith um it will be a nice word there's no way to camouflage something that seven stories high it's just a ridiculous idea one of the statements the people that are uh representing Verizon said that some of the places were declined uh they declined to use the certain areas because they were in populated areas well we live in a populated area there are entire families in our area not necessarily wealthy people most of them aren't and that's i think that might be in the end one of your considerations you probably got the land a little bit less because of the area but the fact of the matter is we matter to no statements went out in spanish we have a huge population that spanish speaking none of them even know this is happening i have also the uh the notices that did go out i've talked to many neighbors that said oh i threw that out because it was too small to read all these things are happening as if we don't matter and we do matter thank you thank you the next speaker will be mary followed by kim then e orlean i have a picture to show one moment this one yes hello i'm mary doll my presentation is in regards to the safety and welfare for all who live work or shop in the vicinity of the proposed micro tower at 244 koglen avenue kaiser permanente listened to me and took proper action will you listen to me too this was an ad advertisement of kaiser's a tender picture but deadly note cell phone which omits extremely high levels of radiation rfr infants and small children absorb rfr faster than adults kaiser responded gratefully to my letter pointing this out they took immediate action but we are not here today to talk about cell phones except they need all cell towers to function the warning sign was placed about six feet on the pole with a simple with a single cell tower just 42 feet from my home that was turned on july 2018 i fought long and hard to stop it to no avail what rights does the city and verizon have to be judging jury sentencing one to a life of suffering without a fair trial in 2021 i was diagnosed with ad a electromagnetic hypersensitivity a disabilitating health condition that will never go away but will only get worse even when the single cell tower will be taken down it is extremely hard to face physical sufferings but one but when one is victimized by the rising people who get their way at my expense that is so wrong safety and welfare of theirs is a joke verizon doesn't protect their subcontractors or workers with protective clothing thank you the next speaker will be kim followed by e or lean and then richard good evening mayor rogers and members of the council thank you for all you do for the city of san rosa a key point in our appeal is that verizon did not adequately consider the coverage potential of using multiple of the less conspicuous reduced height feasible alternatives as explicitly required by the zoning ordinance in admission of the insufficiency of their original application just one week ago verizon submitted exhibit d to attachment 23 of the agenda verizon identified a number of new sites that they claim were investigated for location of their facility yet verizon declares them infeasible because they provide coverage to a smaller geographic area however this assertion does not offer any qualitative analysis of the extent to which this smaller area still succeeds at providing services to a number of verizon customers more critically verizon entirely failed to discuss the possibility of multiple facilities of reduced heights as explicitly required by section 20-44 dot 060 f 13 verizon hasn't weighed the combined coverage of multiple telecommunication facilities of lowered heights and they are required to do so verizon hasn't met the burden of proof for alternative sites required by section 20-44 dot 060 to ensure the least potential impacts therefore this application should be denied and the appeal upheld is the city of san arosa comfortable with verizon's claim that the single mass of cell tower is necessary without providing objective raw data to support this and is the city comfortable that their claims that no alternative locations thank you thank you the next speaker will be e or lean followed by richard then sydney although i believe sydney spoke on behalf of the appellant earlier so e or lean good evening thank you for letting us have this opportunity to speak i want you to know this is very personal my husband who worked at sonoma state university for 35 years the last 10 years was faced with a cell phone tower on top of the science building across from the administration office where his office was and he now has leukemia i do not think this happened by some chance coincidence the uh in 2011 the international agency for research on cancer part of the world health organization classified emfs as a class to be carcinogen meaning possibly carcinogenic to humans many scientists on that panel wanted to name it a class 1a carcinogen meaning definitely carcinogenic california firefighters are well aware of this as sp649 exempted fire stations from cell phone antenna in 2017 this was the result of firefighters illnesses linked to the antenna in their stations the firefighters suffered from headache insomnia brain fog getting lost in the same town they grew up in sometimes forgetting protocol and routine medical procedures mood swings and infertility in 2004 a spec brain imaging pilot study was conducted on california firefighters who had lived in the shadow of a tower for over five years the study conducted by gunner hoyser md phd found brain abnormalities in all six men including delayed reaction time lack of impulse control and cognitive impairment if we care enough about firefighters health what about the rest of us we do not consent to be guinea pigs in this experiment on our health and lives i have written a book about 5g which i'm going to give to you as a gift that has two chapters about all the health impairment thank you thank you the next speaker will be richard followed by april then jennifer richard uh yes i'm richard boiled retired physics professor and as such i could not resist trying to understand how verizon got its estimates of the radiation limits thank you so i took the equation of a massive thing that sydney cock showed and reduced that to something that was more salvageable so for starters they gave the the radiation level at ground ground level we're not really interested in that feet are pretty impervious to radiation of any type what we're interested in is is what is it five and a half feet in the air brains are very sensitive to radiation and it's virtually impossible to tell that from the the water for estimates although it's clear uh that the radiation level increases with altitude so how much will that increase the 11.8 percent of the fcc limit i don't know but it would certainly be appreciable uh another thing there are a lot of other cell towers in the area and i don't believe those were included in the calculation either they certainly contribute something uh verizon reported no dropped calls so we know there's a plenty of radiation around cell phones in that area uh so how much this would add to it i don't know but uh you know another significant chunk uh finally there's an effect that verizon probably doesn't know anything about uh and this is scattering uh it's a standard physics problem though uh the radiation will scatter from any objects that are that exist in the area and uh that can be a big effect and um and and so that needs to be at least estimated and verizon could do that with a simple simulation uh why do i say all this uh i think i just tried to present that there was some serious chicanery going on thank you the next speaker will be april followed by jennifer than alex stan the financial gain by putting the 69 tower behind 69 foot tower on colgan behind cosco and target not enough people have looked into the imminent harm of 5g towers emit into the atmosphere these towers are harmful to humans plants and animals there is a care home around 250 feet away from the proposed site some of the side effects but not limited to our headache insomnia cognitive fog fatigue vision problems heart issues flu like symptoms muscle nervous problems pro inflammatory pathways i personally suffer daily from debilitating migraines to interfere with parenting and life please do the entire research on the harm before making a final decision they do lower the price of homes and there is much information on the nih.gov website they're not making our cell phones faster and more efficient in fact most people know to a slower connection speed i cannot live without having an emf thing in my pocket because it is so debilitating and i hope that you'll look further into it before making a decision thank you thank you the next speaker will be jennifer followed by alex then paul okay um fact there are no safety standards currently there are no national or international set standards for safe levels of the radiation emitted by wireless or microwave devices as stated by the FCC there are no federally developed safety standards after years of a robust research effort by us agencies the us eb epa was tasked to develop proper safety standards and was developing two-tiered guidelines on both thermal and biological effects then in 1996 it was defunded hmm instead of proper safety limits the u.s. government adopted guidelines developed by industry based on decades of old research guidelines have a much lower certainty than a standard as proper long-term safety testing was not done to ensure the public was protected in fact no safe level has been scientifically determined for children or pregnant women therefore the claim that a device meets FCC standards or that radiation levels are FCC compliance gives a false impression of safety um look the FCC is run by industry insiders and doesn't have a single scientist on board their 1996 admission guidelines were found to be outdated by a us court of appeals for the district of columbia circuit on 8 13 21 yet the FCC has refused to update them their guidelines are not based on any biological effects people only thermal effects the u.s. has some of the highest emission guidelines in the world the precautionary principle is a scientific term for common sense that requires holding off on any new permits until the new guidelines are in effect enough is enough santa rosa already has 40 cell phone towers and right now there are more in the works there's an application for another macro tower at 27 15 giffin off corporate center parkway adjacent to a residential thank you the next speaker will be alex followed by paul i'm alex krone born and raised in santa rosa i'm a physical therapist i work hard and contribute to this community raising two young children first of all i'd ask you tonight to do the right thing don't do the thing uh which is clear that you're probably afraid to be sued by verizon in this situation okay first of all what's verizon's new business it's streaming services sign up for verizon pay five extra dollars a month and you get to netflix free netflix and other streaming services so these cell towers less than one percent i'd guarantee where i'd bet of the rf radiation in the power coming off these is actually for phone calls and for text messages like the the 1996 telecommunication act was probably referring to not video streaming services they've given you zero objective numbers or data to prove that there is a gap in service and there's any problems with phone calls or text messages they're looking to stream videos here they gave you one i think attempt tonight the first slide i've seen they first gave you these colored maps which meant nothing um that was they showed you some red and green lines and some numbers on there and it was just for 700 megahertz but they're putting six other different frequencies and 12 antennas on these towers so so where's the the objective data for for those they already have another provider going to co-locate and add probably 12 more antennas to that poll they said that in their documents they told you that a gap in service doesn't apply here because of the ordinance and what's that what that's really saying is your your city ordinance is so weak that we can basically put a macro tower in any industrial zone we want and that that doesn't seem right the FCC is the most captured agency i hope you know what that means please ask the engineer how they determine the safety standards i'd like to know talk about the the pulsation and the polarization and how you measure it is it average or is it on the peak levels of radiation thank you the next speaker will be paul i'm an urban environmental planner the staff kept telling you that they couldn't do anything uh you know in fact there are many cities in cat california that have large setbacks between residential lesone land and cell towers sometimes up to 1500 feet and many other uh requirements uh that would if if santa rosa had this you wouldn't have even have seen this application so my suggestion is that to strengthen your telecommunications ordinance before the entire city becomes a pincushion with many more cell towers than what we really need and the cities that have strong cell tower cell telecommunications ordinances also have excellent cell phone reception so that we don't need this high intent and intensity and the other point i want to make is that we submitted a 26 page rebuttal and in support of our appeal it doesn't seem that staff took many of these points and told you what they said i don't know if he'd even read this we had we hired a telecommunications attorney uh to prepare it and uh i trust that you would take this into consideration thank you thank you i'd like to invite anyone else remaining who would like to provide public comment to make your way to the podium you are not required to submit a speaker card if you've already spoken on behalf of the applicant or the appellant you will have an opportunity for a rebuttal or closing comment mayor i'm seeing no one else from the public wishing to provide public comment on item 16.3 thank you so with that we will invite the applicant for a rebuttal or concluding comments and you will have five minutes good evening paul albritton outside council for verizon marliff's again thank you for your time i'll just cut touch on a couple of issues i think you know that once we've demonstrated with our outside professional engineer that we comply with the FCC standards that that takes it off the table for as a decision point for the city of santa rosa that doesn't mean that we don't take that issue seriously and we do by having the the 40 years that i've been representing wireless companies that's been an issue um and we and we do take it seriously um the the world health organization the american cancer society the epa the food and drug administration and indeed the FCC have all concluded studies and confirmed that there's no direct correlation to the health effects that are being described from our omissions the FCC renewed its review of the standard as recently as 2019 um and verizon of course cares about people um i'm sure you're aware that uh all wireless alerts comes through through wireless phones these days that's part of the FCC uh and federal mandate the city of santa rosa itself has over a thousand verizon wireless lines amongst its police department fire department and city that are used for responding every day to emergencies uh i don't want to personalize it but i lived in fountain grove in 2017 and it had had not been for my verizon wireless phone i would have not known to evacuate at that time so verizon does care about people and this is incredibly important for them and for your community this type of emergency response and just the simple daily communications between communities uh with respect to some of the other issues there was a suggestion that we should have more more small cells more smaller facilities as you already know we already have 30 small cells we need to complement the macro towers with the small cells in order to create an efficient network verizon's doing everything it can to create an efficient network to provide the coverage and capacity and that's needed by the community they have no interest in overexpending on infrastructure to make that happen uh and will continue to do so to provide reliable service uh in santa rosa there was a comment about a state law that excludes firefighters that was misrepresented that law only applies to deemed approved remedy for a modification of a facility and it clearly says that the fire departments need more time to to determine the accessibility to their facilities before you can deem an application approved in 60 days and the industry agreed with that and that's how it ended up uh there was discussion about streaming video and so forth all wireless services data these days verizon uses its voiced over lte which is a data voice service and is its primary objective is to provide uh voice services there may be some confusion with the verizon's fg 5g home service which is entirely different i do want to say i think you know on the federal law side and i know you've got a federal legal expert on the line here you need to have substantial evidence to deny a wireless facility that means you need to have facts that match with your code or law in order to deny a facility for example a setback we comply with the setbacks if we didn't that's the kind of evidence you need to deny a wireless facility and finally we went out of our way and showing a gap and that was to also meet the federal requirement that if we show this is a significant gap and this is the least intrusive means of filling that gap that we meet the federal requirement uh that the the site should be approved in order to avoid a prohibition of service uh and we would of course we submit that information to also create a case that will allow us to defend the city in the event of any litigation uh subsequent to any approval facility we brought all these great experts here if you have any questions please ask but we very much appreciate your time and patients this evening in reviewing this application and encourage you to affirm the decision of the planning commission the design review board and your planning staff to allow Verizon to catch up from one minute remaining from 2020 to provide the capacity and service to serve your community we'll open any questions thank you we will now call the appellant for a rebuttal or concluding comments and you also will have five minutes thank you for allowing us to have another response would you like to respond also okay if we only have five minutes total uh let um Carmen speak first thank you i find it ironic that uh Verizon claims you need facts to decide but yet it withholds those facts that you need to make that objective determination you don't have the drop call list they haven't even told you for example of the 12 towers that they do have what percentage could be co-located in order to overcome this gap that they claim is there is it 30 percent of this tower maybe 50 percent of that they don't say and even of the other uh respondents that they looked to there were two that they didn't even follow up on that hadn't given them an answer i i just find that there's a substantial lack of due diligence and that's actually required by law that's not a do it if you feel like it they overstate their claim and they mistake their claim at the same time they're saying that you know it's more than 300 feet away it's not we actually pulled out the google maps you could do it yourself it's 260 feet away from the nearest uh resident and where you have a tower this proposed tower to be on private property adjacent to a service area um road or an alleyway it has to be camouflage it has to be screened that's what the ordinance says and they don't do that they're again they're stubbornly holding on to a 69 foot tower i will add that you're going to see a film called groundhog but it's going to be in the form of the topic of cell towers because on thursday the planning commission is taking a look at another proposal at 2715 giffen with the very same dimensions a 69 foot monotone pole and it's two miles away from this intended site they are looking to just focus like a voodoo doll let's enough is enough there are three minutes remaining for the applicant concluding comments i have another minute another minute you have three minutes oh three minutes well first of all i just want to say something about the fires we had the fires of course and um i have a verizon phone i hardly ever turned it on um i did not have cell service at my home so uh the fact that the the verizon network worked during the fires well you know landlines landlines work the best i also want to say um zoning code 20-10-020 to fulfill the purposes it is the intent of the zoning code to a provide standards for the orderly growth and development of the city and guide and control the use of land to provide a safe harmonious attractive and sustainable community b implement the uses of land designation by the center of the general plan and avoid conflicts between land uses c maintain and protect the value of property e protect the character and social and economic stability of residential areas and that's from your zoning code thank you uh we'll close the public comment sorry about public hearing close the public hearing i'm sorry i will close the public hearing and looking to council to see if uh there are any questions council member alberus thank you madam mayor uh first to staff on page 14 uh the applicant has provided a written explanation while the subject facility is not accounted for co-location is this information that was provided by the applicant but not validated by the city center as a staff or do we actually look at their their explanations and then confirm validate so it's a um thank you for that question council member so um the city uh does review all materials that are submitted to the to the city uh we do not have um expert staff on board um uh we do take a look at it everything that they have provided if if we uh look at that in consultation with our city attorney's office and other departments within the city and um we have any concerns we do uh we would tend to ask for additional information or um a a peer review potentially my understanding is that there was two entities that looked at this if i susanne is that correct yes yeah two went sorry can you say that it repeat your so i think we've got the the engineer that wrote it and then there was somebody that followed up with the with the confirmation yes yeah go would you better provide who those entities were that that confirmed or validated that information sorry could you repeat that question who validated or confirm that information so i think those are in the attachments susanne can you bring those up and in the meantime um when it comes to information and and it seems that whether it be that the the levels of produced by these antennas is information that the city according to what i'm reading in my in my documents is something that we simply don't look at when the termination of these of these projects is that correct so i think um i might want to bring on gale um to help with um you know how what the city's review is our limitations so to speak yeah specifically on page 15 the city has no discretion to deny a telecommunication facility due to concerns about exposure so gale can you help out with that one yes i i can and uh good evening uh madame and and council members um i hope you can hear me uh just fine um so uh it is a long established uh federal law actually dating from 1996 that uh places those limits on local authority to consider um rf emissions exposure uh in uh they're uh either in development of regulations or in uh individual applications um to the extent that uh the applicant demonstrates that there is compliance with the federal standards and i just want to correct something that was mentioned by one of the speakers there are existing federal standards that the court of appeal the dc court of appeal did not um throw out fcc standards they um they did uh ask the fcc or remand a decision of the federal communications commission when uh that where the commission terminated an inquiry that it had started about updating the standards so the standards that were developed by the fcc are still out there and required to be complied with by applicants applicants typically submit an an expert report demonstrating compliance sometimes cities hire an expert to do a peer review of that report some cities don't do that um but uh once uh if if the evidence in the record is that uh the proposed facility is going to comply with the fcc standards and that's sort of the end of the matter in terms of regulating uh the or making a decision on the application based on rf emissions standards compliance very well and i appreciate that that answer uh did we find the information to the first question i posed yes sorry i took a second um it's found in attachment 11 um it's oku solutions is the company that proved the uh report um it's signed by david puttowski and the um original report was signed by david h i think it's kaiser or kisser um who's a sort of electrical engineer for waterford l or any of their representatives here today for questioning yes perfect sir could i pose the question to you sir if you'd like to through the mayor may you please approach the podium sir i'm dav cotton uh professional engineer i represent waterford consultants uh david kaiser was my colleague there thank you for for being here sir i see that you also have the legal counsel of rising next year so i imagine that you have represented rising in the past or are you an independent entity who works uh for both as a as a subject expert for the city or just a subject expert for verizon we have represented not just verizon but the other wireless carriers as well have you ever represented the city of san rosa no very well that's all sir thank you now moving forward um in regards to the font notifications that were sent out to the neighbors or at least the notifications that were sent out uh what were they so i believe it was in reference to the notice of there was first an order it was the notice of application and then about i would say two weeks later was the notice of public hearing um i do think there may have been confusion between the two because one obviously addresses and provides the information for the meeting and the other does not um but both were sent out prior towards the meeting and i think the i believe it's 10 days prior towards the public hearing and they were both duly noticed um i also want to uh also call out that sorry i'm just pulling up we also um the city received because we received several comments um we also provided an additional notice um with a larger font uh prior to the i believe it was the january 18th meeting a design review board meeting to accommodate the uh responses about the uh small font um if i don't know if anybody else here has anything to add to that we have a standard size font and i believe it it ranges between 10 and 12 and the font size um and again as susanne said we did send out a courtesy notice it wasn't required just to address the the large font size but that's a font size that we use for all of our noticing citywide very well were any of the notices uh sent out in any other language other than english uh no there was uh no notice sent out in any other language and there was also no request for a spanish translation for those notices as well i appreciate that and what is the current required setback for these towers and residential areas the tower is required to be at least 75 feet away from any habitable structure um and on the plan set um it does show that the nearest capital structure i believe is it's going to be well over a hundred feet i think yeah i i think sorry let me pull up the plan set to just confirm but i believe from the housing across the street um facing north it was about 321 feet away and from the i don't think there's an exact measurement from the neighboring motel but they do measure the building that's also that's still on the same property from each corner essentially and that's at least 130 feet so the it's going to be well over 150 feet from the motel no i know that we're definitely an exception to many of rules but i'm wondering of original cities uh other cities here in the state of california is is there like an average setback that we've seen or is it simply just city by city uh entity by entity i think it's by city but i'm not a hundred percent sure there's a minimum set forth by the state of california maybe i don't know if there's a minimum setback i would defer to our outside council um on that but we have not done any research um to date on uh the average setback to other jurisdictions certainly um information that we can be ready for next time but i will like i said defer to council on i don't know if she's aware of any average setbacks um or if there's anything in state or federal law thank you um i'll reserve for actually my last question uh shot clock what does that mean it's it's it's it's the allowable time for review so typically these have to be reviewed i think in 150 days for the 160 160 days for the entire review and in order and if we don't complete the review in that period of time they are deemed approved um the i'm i'm going to defer to the applicant why but the um applicant has been very agreeable and extending that up into this this time for to accommodate the appeal very well and that was 150 days from the submission of the project or the review process which is also the submission of the project not the appeal process not any of the other uh process in in in it's upon submittal very well and i'll reserve for the questions thank you mayor thank you council member rogers i believe i can't answer that question i believe that someone was approaching the dies to explain the shock no actually no i'll reserve i the answer that you gave me was sufficient i appreciate it ma'am ma'am i'm unable to allow you to do that um council member rogers thank you uh one of the questions that uh some of the uh appellants had the applicant sort of responded to was about why 69 feet uh why does it have to be bigger why couldn't you achieve the same level with less intrusive uh cell uh technology particularly that could be better hidden or maintained could you talk a little bit about what that discussion looked like on our side particularly for the city how do we make that determination that it's sufficient for them to do one giant tower as opposed to something that is lower smaller yeah so it's really we defer to the applicant that's why we require all the information on the analysis that they have done on looking at alternative sites coverage gaps to determine what is necessary to meet their needs and we rely on that information that they have provided was there any discussion about that at the planning commission sort of looking over at the planning commission chair yes can you ask me again chris sorry yeah was there any discussion at the planning commission about rather than having one monolith having multiple small wireless technologies around the area no there was not okay and i i guess i'm gonna ask the applicant again for a little bit more information on i mean objectively 69 feet uh unhidden is an eyesore good evening councilmember rogers paul albert an outside council for verizon marlis of course we had originally proposed a camouflage tree uh tree pole and that was rejected by the design review board that uh felt that the monopole that this the slimline monopole was uh more attractive than the than the faux tree that verizon marlis had proposed the antennas themselves are actually at 65 feet instead of 69 feet there are a couple of reasons for that and pablo sanchez our rf engineer is here to can and can describe that but when you're setting up a cellular network it's sort of like sprinklers on a lawn you're trying to uh it create a dominant signal where a site uh the call is as the car moves from one cell to the other it transfers and and achieves another dominant signal so it's very real very much related to how the network operates in this case you've got a number of uh business businesses around this uh tower and that's because we're putting it in a light industrial zone and surrounded by light industrial buildings which are 30 to 35 feet tall so we need to get then we need to get the antennas above that level in order to project the signal above that level at the same time there's a requirement under the code that we make this tower co-locatable so that another carrier could place its antennas below our tower out below our antennas in order to minimize the number of towers in the area while also providing service from another carrier a third factor and this is relevant to some of the concerns of your community is that the rf exposure from a tower has reduced uh exponentially uh you double the distance and you and you quadruple the reduction in power levels so if you begin bringing the antennas down you've been begin increasing the amount of rf exposure on the ground or on the adjacent rooftops so another reason for this height is to is to balance the signal over the rooftops balance the exposure at that level at that at that higher level there's nobody up there obviously at 40 feet in the air um 30 feet in the air and then to allow for a co-locator also to go onto the tower and that's overall network design in addition if you bring the tower down you're going to reduce the footprint it's going to require another tower somewhere uh and it's going to have to be above the height of those rooftops so the the i want to say cost benefit analysis is but it's not really cost it's the design analysis is really that this is the uh this would be the preferred network design as you see we're right in the middle of a triangle of three other sites and if we start putting medium size heights sites high sites in that area along with the small cells it's it's poor network design so those are the principal factors behind that height and uh pablo sanchez is here he's our rf design engineer and pablo i don't know if you have anything to add to that good good evening mayor vice mayor and all the council members and the rest of the city officials i'm pablo sanchez rf design engineer with verizon i worked with verizon for 11 years so going back to the question i started the design to understand the need of the network where the gap of service in terms of capacity so in our existing network we have three macros exceeding twice its normal operating condition instead of mitigating three macros i essentially locate the probable ring which is the search area right at the center of these three macros and then uh like our council pollo britain said we have to balance the need of the traffic the coverage and the e-m-e so especially on the e-m-s side of it when you lower the center line of the antenna we will be compromising the e-m-e also that's all i can say thank you did we answer your question sir so to be really clear could you achieve the same level of coverage that you were trying to get by lowering the height but having more towers i asked pablo to run those numbers um and he estimates that he would need approximately 12 small cells to replace this macro tower and those small cells would have to be in the residential areas exactly where we don't want to go uh in order to bring the the smaller footprints uh to the to the end users and customers where we're seeing uh demand we're seeing quite a bit of demand to the east of this tower in the residential zones okay thank you thank you for the question look in the council to see if there are any additional questions before we move on council member alvarez i appreciate it madam mayor you know i'm i'm i'm only thinking about the policy that that senator has developed in regards to to a multi-language outreach especially we want participation from every sector of our community and i'm hearing the word rosin mentioned a couple times with us from rising council as well as the application and a lot of the maps that we're seeing here and i'm pretty sure that when it comes to rosin specifically district one is as a whole most notices should be sent out to rosin in spanish as it's a language spanish-speaking community and i'm wondering why that wasn't done and how that affects the the the appeal so the city does not currently have a requirement for doing spanish translation it is something that we try to do when we know that there is a high spanish population um our noticing requirements are within 600 feet of the site so i'm not sure i'd have to do look at the map to see if it actually gets over to the rosin area um we do have a disclaimer on all of our notices that you know if there is a request for spanish translation we will provide that but at this point in time and it is something that we are looking into and want to you know do our best to provide more noticing in both spanish and english but at this point to my knowledge it's not required i think the it's almost like the catch went to how do we ask for it to be in spanish if we don't know that this is happening for the spanish speaker so we're pretty much asking a question in which we will never get a response to and and for myself i see that as uh equity justice as well as uh communication justice and and inclusion which really as a city center was that we're really looking at uh to overcome that hurdle so i do take great issue with that madam city manager uh so through the chair councilman alvarez i i completely agree um this is probably something that should have been called beforehand um it's probably a little bit hindsight 2020 to apologize but i do apologize to the residents that did not receive this communication um in spanish um but i do it should be a priority and if we are talking about rosin and um if deib is one of our priorities it is definitely something we should make certain that we look at in the future city manager appreciate that comment very much um sadly that that that doesn't today and today's and and through the mayor i'm sorry through the mayor uh and i'm sorry for responding without your your approval oh no i was just making i just said it doesn't make it right it doesn't correct it correct correct so so but i definitely want to make that known and and and for the record and for those that might be hearing us on on the translation that as a city we are definitely trying to do better to include you whenever and i speak for spass for for staff as well as council that our efforts really are being made to make sure that everyone in the community is included so i don't look at it as as something like that like like a stain on our efforts but something that must must make uh publicly known and hopefully we can do better in the future thank you council member alvarez for for bringing that that issue up in madam city manager thank you for acknowledging it um and it is something that we will continue to work on as council members and as staff um but thank you for your hard work on this this is just something that we need to continue to to work on um council member rogers you have it motion thank you everybody i appreciate your comments i will introduce a resolution of the council of the city of santa rosa denying an appeal and upholding the decision of the planning commission approving a conditional use permit uh for a wireless telecommunications tower and associated ground equipment located at 244 colgan avenue apn 044-011-053 file number prj23-009 c up 23-043 and wait for the reading of the text second we have a motion made by council member rogers and a second by council member oak oak crepeki uh madam city clerk you council member rogers hi council member oak crepeki hi council member mcdonnell hi council member flaminas absent council member alvarez yes i will be voting nay on this on the basis of uh page 14 where i feel that the vice mayor no on the on the basis that uh i wish that we did have subject matter experts that would assist the staff of the city santa rosa to to make the decisions that sadly are beyond uh our our abilities so nothing on the staff of the city santa rosa it just happens to be one of the things that i wish i could say we don't know more about but sadly we don't have the subject matter experts at hand and readily be available but i do appreciate the efforts of the staff of the city of santa rosa to present the best project possible thank you vice mayor staff hi mayor rogers hi let the record show this pass with five affirmative votes with council member alvarez voting no and council member flamin absent moving on to item 17 our written communications uh we have 17.1 notice a final map for a review madam city clerk can you please conduct public comment on this item thank you we are now taking public comments on item 17.1 if you'd like to make public comment please make your way to the podium if you have not provided a speaker card or your name you will have two minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period as you approach the podium please state your name for the record if you choose to do so may or see no one approach the podiums for item 17.1 thank you we'll continue to item 18 that's our second public comment on non-agenda matters madam city clerk thank you mayor we are now taking public comments on item 18 non-agenda matters this is a time when anyone who was not previously addressed the council under item 14 public comment on non-agenda matters can speak if you're in the chamber would like to provide public comment but have not provided a speaker card please make your way to the podium you will have two minutes and a countdown timer will alert at the end of that period again this is the second public comment period for non-agenda matters may or see no one approach the podiums for the item 18 non-agenda matters all right we have come to our our last item which is adjournment i would like to close the meeting tonight in honor of detective mary lou as we approach the anniversary of santa rosa police detective mary lou armors passing due to the devastating effects of the corona virus pandemic her untimely death on march 31st 2020 marked a tragic milestone in our history as she became the first california police officer to succumb to the corona virus it has been four years since detective armor a dedicated member of our force left us too soon at the age of 43 detective armors legacy is one of commitment compassion and courage throughout her career she exemplified the essence of law enforcement working to ensure the safety and well-being of those she swore to protect detective armor is survived by her husband and daughter detective armor began her career at the santa rosa police department as a field evidence technician in 1999 before becoming a police officer in 2008 she finished her career as a domestic violence sexual assault detective where she demonstrated exceptional bravery and selflessness spending her final weeks in service contacting victims and local hospitals helping to provide services and guiding them through the court process i want to thank detective armor and her family for her service and ultimate sacrifice for our community i also want to offer my support to all our police personnel as they remember her loss this week to the santa rosa police personnel especially those who worked alongside detective armor i extend my sincerest support and in solidarity with you and her remembrance let us reaffirm our commitment to service and sacrifice that inspire us all and with that we will adjourn the meeting thank you