 All right, Stephanie, it looks like we have a quorum. Let's go ahead and call the meeting to order. Today's special meeting, and let's go ahead and take the roll. Thank you. Council Member Tivitz. Good morning. Council Member Schwedhelm. Here. Council Member Sawyer. Here. Council Member Fleming. Council Member Alvarez. Present. Vice Mayor Rogers. Present. Mayor Rogers. Here. Council Member Fleming, have you joined us? Okay, let the record show that all Council Members are present with the exception of Council Member Fleming. Great, thank you so much, Stephanie. Before we dive into tonight's meeting, I just wanna take a moment and thank folks who are joining us here tonight via Zoom, or who have had a chance to send in their comments via email or voicemail that we'll hear later today as well. I really wanted to just take a quick minute and set the stage for what we're trying to accomplish over the next three days. Tonight is a purely listening session. We want to hear from you folks in the public about what you'd like to see us accomplish over the next year as a Council and as a city. It is a three-day process, as I mentioned. Today will be public comment. We'll then be taking a recess overnight, and then Council will be back at 8 a.m. tomorrow to be able to hear from our key staff about all of the different things that are on their plate in the next coming year, so that we can better understand what their constraints are, how much we can actually reasonably accomplish and then come back to the community to talk about what our priorities are. With that, I will turn it over to the City Manager to see if he has any introductory comments. Very briefly, Mayor Rogers, Council Members, this is a different setting for us. We did a brief version of this last summer. Typically, these workshops would happen in a space where staff and Council Members could sit together. There would be team building. It would be an interactive experience. Unfortunately, during the pandemic, we've had to make this adjustment, so it's a more structured conversation. I think the Mayor has outlined the next couple of days perfectly, and I just look forward to listening to the public comment. Greg Larson, who will be doing the facilitating, won't be speaking tonight. He will be introducing tomorrow morning, but he is also here to listen to public comment, and thank you, and thank you to the members of the community for turning out. And now, before we jump into public comment, I do want to come back to Dina and to Stephanie to do a little bit of housekeeping, to go over some of the ground rules for the next couple of days, as well as to let the public know how they can better participate in the meetings here tonight. Thank you, Mayor. For those of you just joining the meeting, live translation in Spanish is available, and members wishing to listen in Spanish can join the Spanish channel by clicking on the interpretation icon in your Zoom toolbar, and they look like a globe. Once you join the Spanish channel, we recommend you shut off the main audio so you only hear the Spanish translation. Charles, would you be able to make that statement for me, please? Para los recién llegados a la reunión, la interpretación en español está disponible, y las personas quienes desean escuchar en español pueden pasar al canal de español. Para cambiar de canal, haga clic en el icono de interpretación ubicado en la barra de herramientas de Zoom para hacer un globo terraqueo, ya que según al canal de español, recomendamos que apagan su micrófono para poder escuchar la interpretación claramente. Thank you, Charles, and if the interpreter on the Spanish channel hasn't already began, please commence translation for the Spanish channel. And then as we go to public comment at agenda item four, the mayor will ask for council comments and then open it up for public comment. The host in Zoom will be lowering all hands until public comment is open for the agenda item. Once the mayor has called for public comment, the mayor will announce for the public to raise their hand if they wish to speak on the specific agenda item. If you're calling in to listen to the meeting audibly, you can dial star nine to raise your hand. And then the mayor will call on the public who have raised their hand. Public comment will be limited to three minutes and a timer will appear on the screen for the council and public to see. Once all live public comments have been heard, the meeting host will play voicemail public comments. If you provided a live public comment on in the meeting, but also submitted an email, e-comment, or recorded voice message public comment, your email, e-comment, or voice message public comment will not be duplicated during today's meeting. Throughout today's, tonight's agenda, when the mayor calls for public comment an interpreter will be prepared to assist anyone needing interpretation. Those using interpreter support will be afforded additional time for your public comment as required by the Brown Act. We ask those listening in on the Spanish channel, but wishing to make a public comment to turn off, leave interpretation entirely at the time you hear your name called, so you can join the main channel to make your public comment heard and translated into English. This icon may now look like a circle with an E-S in the middle and the word Spanish underneath. You can then rejoin the Spanish channel at the conclusion of your comment to continue listening in Spanish. Thank you. Great, thank you so much, Stephanie. Before we go to public comment, are there any questions from the council members about what we're doing tonight? Great, saying none. We will go on to our next item. It's the only item for tonight's agenda. It is the public comment on our priorities here at the city. If you are interested, go ahead and hit the raise hand feature. As a point to note, council members cannot get into a back and forth on items that have not been publicly agendized for specific discussion. So we'll be taking notes on the priorities that we do discuss them in the public meeting tomorrow and the next day as they pertain to our priorities. But don't be surprised if council members are taking notes and not getting into a back and forth discussion. With that, we'll start with Kevin and we'll follow that up with Tom. Okay, thank you very much for this opportunity. You know, with a lot of pride, I can say that Santa Rosa's done a lot with the climate in terms of having an emergency resolution. We have a climate action plan. We made the climate crisis a tier one priority. We have a climate action subcommittee. We're slowly electrifying our fleet and lighting our streets with LED, you know, exploring municipal microgrid past the reach code. We'll be discussing the idea of revising the criteria used hopefully for permitting new gas stations, the zero waste ordinance, all of these things working with the RCPA and with the climate center on their initiatives. But yet science tells us that catastrophic effects of climate change could be irreversible by as soon as 2030 and greenhouse gas levels are at an all-time high the last 10 years having been the warmest ever on record. So climate change is creating, as we know, a refugee crisis in many parts of the world, even here. Locally, we saw many residents of Paradise having to leave that town to descend on Yukai and sit in a parking lot trying to figure out what they're gonna do next after closing and losing everything to the campfire, the deadliest and most destructive fire in our history. So I see one big hole though in our efforts and that's why I'm calling and that is that we don't have a sustainability director and we don't have an implementation team. The process of implementation is where many plans go to die. And we know this from what happened through our climate action plan that was passed back in 2012. So even if we have the best plan imaginable, it means little if we don't have a finely tuned, well-funded, effectively functioning implementation team. So tonight, I urge you to fund a sustainability director position, put an implementation team together that meets regularly and have the sustainability director join the urban sustainability director's network so that we don't have to reinvent the wheel on some actions that are working in other communities and let the line items on our budget reflect the priorities of our city that is gravely serious about addressing this existential crisis that we all face. Thank you very much. Thank you, Kevin. And I have those notes down for us to discuss when we talk about climate tomorrow. Tom followed by Shirley and Bob. Tom, go ahead and unmute, excuse me, unmute yourself. I apologize. Mayor Rogers, members of the city council, my name is Tom Woods. I'm here in my capacity as the co-chair of the North Bay jobs of justice. As you all know, the COVID pandemic has affected members of our community severely in a number of different ways. In one of our region's biggest industries, hospitality, the impact has been felt in the form of mass layoffs. These layoffs have disproportionately impacted women and people of color, many of whom work relatively low wage jobs and have little savings available to write out the pandemic. Now that vaccination has begun, and we can all see a light at the end of the tunnel, many hospitality workers fear that their lives may never go back to normal. Most of them have no guarantee that they will get their old jobs back. Workers with decades of service are faced with a prospect of starting over from scratch. If this happens, it will lead to more poverty in our community and more displacement. As the eviction of foreclosure moratoriums and workers who don't get their jobs back will be forced from their homes and from their communities. One of the most important ways you could help our community recover from the pandemic is to prevent this dislocation of displacement by passing the right to recall and worker retention ordinances for hospitality workers. And that's why I'm here because North Bay jobs of justice urges you to prioritize these ordinance and take care of our workers in our community. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you, Tom. And I have right to recall and worker retention in my notes for discussion. Shirley and Bob followed by YCH shared room. Hello, this is Shirley. Can you hear me? Yep, go ahead and share with me. Good, good. I wanna talk on about safe parking. I wanna remind you, and I know you know this, but Housing First model states that the goal is to move people as quickly as possible into permanent supportive housing. And I wanna emphasize that quickly as possible because as a volunteer and a safe parking program at the moment of First United Methodist Church, I wanna urge you to set aside enough money for the housing focused model that was outlined last week with the specialized housing staff and the case management. This would ensure that all folks are not just parked, but moved through from these supposedly temporary supports. This must be applied to any new safe parking program and be extended to include those existing, yes, the existing faith group overnight operated safe parking programs. I urge you to do this. I think that more people will move through and you'll be able to help more people in the long run. As I've said before, we've had people in our safe parking program for over two years and that is not okay. We need the housing focused model. And thank you for all you do. It's a mammoth task and I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you, Shirley. I have down the housing focus for our safe parking program. We'll go on to the YCH shared room followed by Ann. Good evening, Mayor Rogers and council members. I apologize for not having my name up on my Zoom, but I couldn't figure out how to do this. This is the Ahensel and I'm representing the Southeast Greenway Campaign. I'm here tonight to give you a status report on what's been happening with us and request that the Greenway project be included in the goals setting priorities. Within days, Fidelity Title will have completed all the title searches on each individual parcel comprising the entire 57 acres of land called the Greenway. Last week's Sonoma Land Trust in the Greenway Campaign engaged Synqueenee and Pasirini, a local surveying company to match each of the 54 parcels. This work will be completed within 45 days and a requirement of Caltrans before we move forward. With this information, appraisals will be accomplished by firms that are approved by both Caltrans and the open space district. We anticipate that the city will begin negotiations with Caltrans for procurement of this property sometime in the fall or early winter of 2021 and be completed in the 21-22 budget period. With the timeline I just described, I think you can see the importance of the Greenway being a goal for the budget cycle and allowing staff the time to successfully complete this portion of the project. Thanks for the consideration. Thank you for your comments. I had a feeling that it was you when I read the name. I've got down the Southeast Greenway as a priority as well. And followed by Ty. And can you go ahead and unmute? And you may be having difficulties. So we'll come back to you. We'll try Ty, followed by Tamara. Good evening, Mayor Rogers and members of council. This is my name is Ty Hudson and I'm with Unite here local 2850, the hotel and food service workers union and the North Bay and East Bay. As you may know, the hospitality industry has been one of the hardest hit industries by mass layoffs due to the pandemic. As business convention and leisure travel have nearly shut down, most hotels are operating with a tiny fraction of their staff and some are shut down completely. At the beginning of the pandemic, our union's membership across North America was 98% laid off. And today, nearly a year later, about 75% of our members are still laid off. Surviving the pandemic has been difficult enough, but many hotel workers now fear that their lives may never go back to normal. Most hotel workers, including union members and non-union workers, have no guarantee that they'll be able to go back to their old jobs when the economy recovers. Even as the vaccine offers the promise that business will return to the hotels, many workers, even those with many years of service to their employers, fear they'll be left behind. The right to recall and worker retention ordinances would provide these workers some hope. The right to recall ordinance would require employers to offer open positions to the employees who held those positions prior to the pandemic in order of length of service. The worker retention ordinance would ensure that workers keep their jobs if ownership of their hotel changes. Because of the turmoil in the hotel industry currently, we expect many properties to change hands in the coming year. These are common-sense ordinances that don't cost employers anything. They merely allow people to keep their jobs and to recover from the pandemic as their employers recover. Cities all over California, from Oakland and Santa Clara, to Long Beach and San Diego, have recently passed similar ordinances. Please throw Santa Rosa hotel workers a lifeline by prioritizing these ordinances and passing them as soon as possible. Thank you. Thank you, Ty. Looked like Ann was able to unmute there for a second, so we'll come back to you, Ann, and see if you are able to speak now. Yes, I am. Thank you very much. Hello, Mayor Rogers, council members and city staff. I'm Ann Hammond, Sonoma County Library Director. Thank you for your belief in the value of a free public library. Since the 19th century, you have partnered with local libraries, and today one quarter of all Sonoma County Library branches are in Santa Rosa. Together, we provide incredible resources to your residents. This year, we have an opportunity to make a permanent investment in your city and a highly visible commitment to Santa Rosa's newest neighborhood by joining the library and the philanthropic community to build a permanent new library in Roseland. You have already committed that work with annual support for our lease at 470 Sevastopol Road, a temporary location that will serve Roseland for the next five years. Our next step is to identify a permanent site for the Roseland Library, and we're grateful for the cooperation your council and staff have given the school. The original concept of sharing a small space in the Roseland neighborhood village has become impractical, which provides an opportunity to expand our search. A permanent library in Roseland has been a top tier goal for the council for many years, and with access to wildfire settlement funds, you have a once in a generation opportunity to make an investment in the public resource that will serve your city for decades. Santa Rosa libraries provide support for school readiness, student success, workforce development, family and community needs and gathering spaces. A new library will do all this and more and will be a much needed community hub with direct and measurable impacts on community recovery and resiliency. We ask you today to consider a $10 million commitment to a permanent library in Roseland and for the city to hold and encumber those funds for up to three years while we work with your staff and the community to identify and acquire a site. We are not here with a shovel ready project, but we do have a neighborhood ready project, a community ready project, a heart ready project. And with your partnership and support, we'll have the momentum to carry it forward. The pandemic has exposed many gaps in our communities and we urge you to join us in this effort to help our communities recover. We recognize that this type of funding rarely comes along and with this commitment, you can send a powerful message to residents West of Highway 101 that you are committed to a permanent library for Roseland in the next few years. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Anne. And I have the library on my list for discussion. Tamara followed by resident 9977. Tamara, go ahead and unmute. All right, Tamara, we'll come back to you. Let's go to resident 9977 followed by Ananda. Hello, can you hear me? Yes, go ahead. Thank you. My name is Juanita Galipo. I am a resident of Santa Rosa for more than 25 years. I am 60, almost 61. I work for the Hyatt for 15, 16 years around that. And at my age, if you don't do the right to recall for jobs, we probably won't be able to get a job that is at least covered or main necessities. I used to make around 45, 50000 a year. If I don't get my job back because of my age and because I'm not very high tech, my work used to be mostly physical. If I don't get my job back, I probably, if I'm lucky, I'll get a job for the minimum wage, which is that equal. So what we're having right now with unemployment, which covers 450, after taxes is only for 10, 820 every two weeks. That's 1640 and that's 1620 a month. Right now, I think that we're getting a little extra from the pandemic, but that only covers, and I'm lucky to have that my basic rent needs, I would say mortgage, and I'd say it's only 1,500. That leaves me with 120 dollars, which with that I have to buy health insurance, dental insurance, cover my bills, electricity, cable, water bills are the basic necessity for us to leave groceries. And that's not counting, that's not taking into consideration that sometimes you have orders expensive, like the day before yesterday and yesterday, I spent almost 1,300 fixing my furnace, which cost me more than 620 doing my, my body doing my smoke, my cable, pay my cable, and my BNB, and I still have to do my oral change. Those are things that I'm not considered into. As you see, I'm just giving you an example, how awful my life would be if I don't, if you guys don't pass the right to recall or jobs. Because of my age, and it's just, that would really turn my life upside down. That's not considering that if that doesn't pass, I have to sell and move somewhere else. I've learned on my daughter here, leaving my grandchildren behind, which is really sad because that's what keeps their mothers alive, their grandchildren. That's why I'm really, I'm pleading to you to pass the recall, the right to recall. So we can go back to our jobs and at least some of us. And I'm not mentioning that renters pay a lot of money and they have- I need you to go ahead and wrap up your comments. Yes, thank you for listening to me. Absolutely, thank you so much. And I have your comments down in my notes as well. Let's try Tamara again, followed by Ananda. Tamara, we're still not able to get you unmuted, it looks up, there you go. Hi, sorry about that. This is the first time I've used Zoom, so please forgive me. That's all good, you're unmuted now. Okay, thank you Mayor and council members. I really appreciate the opportunity to speak to you tonight. I'm calling about supporting, keeping the Bennett Valley Golf Course in Galvin Park as it is for all residents. I won't keep more of your time tonight because I have written a letter with details, but I couldn't meet last night's 5PM deadline. But please don't contemplate destroying this fantastic attribute of Santa Rosa, the city designed for living. Thank you very much. Thank you, Tamara. And we do all have your letter as well. Ananda, followed by Jennifer. Good evening Mayor Rogers and council members and Nanda Sweet with the Santa Rosa Metro Chamber of Commerce. I'll keep my comments fairly brief as we did submit a letter with a request for your attention on six key areas and specific requests within each. Those areas are economic recovery and business support to sustain critical services, jobs and our tax base and to initiate our local economic recovery and ultimately to support the health safety and security of our community. Housing and opportunities to increase our housing supply is really critical to our long-term success. Homelessness and a comprehensive and collaborative plan with an evidence-based approach. Minimizing the risk of fires and a comprehensive plan for preparedness and mitigation as an ongoing effort. Downtown investment as an opportunity to support thriving employers, good jobs, environmental sustainability and increased tax revenue and support of early childcare and education as really critical to Santa Rosa's workforce today and crucial investment in Santa Rosa's future. We focused on these six priority areas as those that maximize an opportunity to support a vibrant and stable economy coming out of the pandemic. They're really key to a healthy economy and thriving community for all. Thank you for your time in this process at a really critical time for our community and I wanna emphasize that we stand ready and committed to participate in helping these efforts. Thank you. Thank you so much, Ananda. Jennifer, followed by Maddie. Hi, can you hear me? Yep, go ahead. My name is Jennifer LaPorta, homeowner resident in Santa Rosa since 2012. The city needs to prioritize updating its telecommunication ordinance in order to protect residential areas, schools, daycares and outdoor recreation areas from the toxic radiation from cell phone antennae. We also need to prioritize fiber to the premises, which is the safer, faster, more energy efficient alternative to cell phone antennae. Fiber can be lain via a dig once policy whenever streets are dug up or new housing developments built. Why did the city have time to recently sign a master license agreement with AT&T for small cells while the city doesn't seem to find the time to update its telecom ordinance? With four study sessions on this topic over the past several years, why isn't it a priority to protect the health, safety and property values of the residents of Santa Rosa? Who among you would be okay with the placement of a wireless transmission facility or WTF in front of or near your home? Because if this is how the city works, you should be the first people to offer to place one of these antennae in front of your home. AT&T will now be rushing to get their WTFs permitted wherever they want because we have zero means to control placement. Do you understand this? Why is the city operating booty backward? Is someone getting paid off? Or did you sign the MLA because AT&T sued the city in November, 2020? Why are the needs of big telecom more important than the residents who pay taxes? Look, with fiber to the premises, the city can regulate this utility and offer various tiers of payment to its customers, thus bridging the digital divide. This is preferable to the ever-increasing cost from big telecom. Why enrich big telecom when the city can benefit from fiber optic lines? Chattanooga, Tennessee installed fiber to the premises and reaped a 1,000 return on its investment. Businesses from neighboring towns flock to Chattanooga for this reason. Stanley Andrew, California has fiber to the premise. I am frustrated. I might have to move from my current home. I don't wanna give up my fruit orchard and veggie garden so carefully planted and nurtured for all these years. Where can one even move to? That doesn't have WTFs anymore. Look, we do not consent to be guinea pigs in this massive science experiment. This radiation affects us as we leave our homes to go on walks or hang out in our yards and play in our gardens. We don't wanna be prisoners inside our own four walls. Many walking trails are now bathed in toxic radiation. I've tested many trails with my EMF meter and I know my recreation, outdoor recreation options are getting more and more limited. What do COVID-19 and radio frequency radiation have in common? Both are highly dangerous yet invisible threats to our health. Thank you, Jennifer. Need you to wrap up your comments, please. I just did, thank you. Excellent, I've got it on our list. Thank you so much. Maddie, followed by Pat. Sorry. Hi. Good evening, Mayor Rogers and Vice Mayor Rogers. That's confusing. And council members and staff. My name is Maddie Hershfield and I'm the political director with the North Bay Labor Council. So during this pandemic, we've come to you with many policies such as the emergency paid sick leave and you've risen to the occasion. We really, really appreciate that. Taking care of Senator Rosario's residents. We now come to you with the right of recall which a couple of others have spoken about and really want you to take a serious look at this. With the vaccine rolling out, we can sort of see a light at the end of the tunnel and we wanted you to give some of these workers a light at the end of the tunnel. It's very scary to lose your job. The worker who spoke to you, I can relate to. I lost my job when I was 63. It's a very frightening thing. So the hotel workers have really been hit hard. You've already heard the percentages of them who've been out of work from the beginning. It's a little bit better now but and I've worked with some of the United Here people. It's a really, really tough place to be. So we'd like you to pass this right of recall so that these people can get their jobs back. And again, a light at the end of the tunnel. That's all we ask for. It's been mentioned. This is a no cost situation. And people who work in these hotels often have been there for decades. Very loyal workers. And so they should be welcomed back and their employers should be loyal to them. So all we ask is that you take care of this issue, pass the proposed right of recall, worker retention ordinances, and please prioritize these ordinances and give hotel workers some hope. I believe you'll do that. You've done the right thing all along. So thank you so much for doing that. Thank you so much, Maddie. Pat followed by Adrian. Pat, are you able to unmute? All right, there we go, Pat. Good evening. My name is Marvin and Pat, Mai. We urge you not to spend the $150,000 on the contract with CBRE. We feel that Galvin Park and the Benidelle Golf Course, although we're not golfers, are important as a firebreak for the entire city of Santa Rosa. If you visualize a fire coming down from Annadale across Benidelle Heights and Fairway View Estates into across Summerfield, if there's no golf course there, you won't be able to stop it until it gets to the freeway again. The other issue, of course, is Galvin Park is a vital asset to the entire community. The soccer fields, the tennis courts, if you look at Howard Park, the tennis courts there are always full. So the overflow goes to Galvin Park. And of course, the driving range and the golf course, Santa Rosa as a city of this size deserves and should have a municipal golf course. Yes, we have Oakmont, but that's still a private course, although it is open to the public, but we need a municipal course. And we need that open space to protect the entire community. Thank you, Mayor and all council members for your time tonight. Thank you, Mervin. Adrienne, followed by Brianne. Hi there. Thank you, Mayor Rogers and council members. My name is Adrienne Covert. I am a resident of Railroad Square. Sonoma County has the second largest per capita homeless population in the Bay Area, second only to San Francisco. And the bulk of the county's homeless residents live in the city of Santa Rosa. Only about a third of the people experiencing homelessness in Santa Rosa are sheltered. This is far below the national average. Unsheltered homelessness undermines public health and safety for the homeless more than anyone else. Homeless residents are at elevated risk of homicide, suicide, respiratory and cardiovascular illnesses and death by accidents. All told, homeless Californians live 37% shorter life spans than their housed counterparts. Yet for two long cities around California, including Santa Rosa have tolerated people deteriorating on our streets before our eyes for the lack of investment in shelters. However, models for emergency shelters pioneered elsewhere in the Bay Area and elsewhere around the country can be scaled right now on city land and within existing budgets. We don't need to wait on the state and the federal government to bail us out and do this for us. We have the means to do it ourselves, at least a very major part of it. The past few years have demonstrated that the most likely alternative to a shelter isn't a permanent home, unfortunately, for the vast majority of homeless residents, but a permanent tent. We can, should and must do better. Thank you. Thank you, Adrienne. Breanne, followed by Karen. Can you hear me? Yep, go ahead. Good evening. My name is Breanne Galvin Murphy. I was born and raised in Santa Rosa. I live in Bennett Valley. I am not a golfer, but I come from a family of golfers and I enjoy and appreciate the game and the beautiful grounds it has played on. My grandfather was Dan Galvin, the chairman of the committee that was instrumental in the development of the Bennett Valley golf course. Unfortunately, I did not have the pleasure of knowing my grandfather. He passed away the year before I was born, but I do know this much. He loved life, he loved Santa Rosa, and he was all about bringing people together. I am certain that that was a driving force in his vision for the golf course. Furthermore, I am definitely certain that it was not in his or his committee's vision to grace our community with such a treasured landmark, only to have it ripped out or repurposed 50 plus years later as a result of revenue seeking motives. It was not about the money. The founding committee's goal was to bring the community together to provide people with affordable access to golf and recreational activities, while at the same time showcasing the serene landscape that is Bennett Valley. And after hearing the testimony of the hundreds of people who have voiced their sentiment so far, it is safe to say that they accomplished way more than that. The Bennett Valley golf course and the entire 175 acres for that matter is truly a beloved asset to our community. It is a landmark that is valued by both men, women, and kids of all ages and races, including non-golfers like myself. I understand that money is tight and you have budgets to balance. And I understand that the golf course has maintenance issues that need to be addressed, but that would be the case with any investment over time. However, dismantling the golf course is not an acceptable solution in your attempt to mitigate costs and to fix what is essentially your predecessor's mistakes when they chose to overspend on the clubhouse years ago. No real estate developer or consultant that you hire is going to present you with unbiased options. They have one goal in mind, to make money. An option one status quo is not going to provide them that. They cannot appreciate nor will they fully take into account the enormous intrinsic value that the Bennett Valley golf course provides to the community. Local residents, especially those living in Bennett Valley can speak to this key element and our input must be equally represented in the decision-making process. As city council members, you were elected to facilitate that right and not be steered by your own personal agendas. So many willing and qualified members of our community have come forward offering their expertise. Let's save the $150,000 and take advantage of our local resources. The Bennett Valley golf course is the place that I first learned how to swing a golf club and it's the same place that my husband and I now take our children to do the same. It is my hope that my children and all of our youth in our community will be able to grow up and enjoy the benefits of this beautiful golf course that has provided all generations before them. It is a true gem and it must be preserved. So I ask you to please honor the vision of my grandfather and those he worked with, respect the wishes of the thousands of people in our community who are wholeheartedly against your new vision and leave the Bennett Valley golf course and Galvin Park alone. Thank you. Thank you, Brianne. I've got the golf course down on our list. Karen, followed by Cherie. I'd like to sec, can you hear me? Yep, go ahead Karen. Good evening. I'm a native of Santa Rosa myself, 69 years old. I have lived in West Santa Rosa. As a child, probably up until junior high school. And so I've lived as a single parent in Santa Rosa. I've lost my home in the fire. So I've been through different experiences. And I'd like to point out that I really think the Bennett Valley golf course where I do not play golf is just beautiful land that should be preserved. The 175 acres are once gone, will be gone forever. And I kind of look at Central Park in New York City. I mean, if New York City, the most expensive real estate in the United States can leave a 350 acre park in the center of Manhattan. It sort of speaks to how valuable that land can be to have a green space in place where people can go. So once again, I'm supporting saving the Bennett Valley golf course as green space or however that plays out, certainly a golf course would be in keeping with what it already is. Thank you. Thank you, Karen. Cherie followed by John. Yes, good evening, Mayor Rogers and members of the city council. My name is Cherie Cabral. I am the head of the North Bay Building and Construction Trades Council as their secretary treasurer. And I am attending this meeting by Zoom tonight to respectfully request that one of the things the council consider moving forward with their goals and priorities is that of policies on an administrative level that will prioritize jobs for local residents as part of your building and infrastructure plans. So specifically, we would like to see the council consider the utilization of a project labor agreement and an implementation of set agreement in order to prioritize local dollars used in infrastructure building for local jobs. And also to look at the implementation of skilled and trained workforce language overall in your governing documents. Most specifically, we think that this is particularly relevant from a proactive standpoint for local employment. When you look at the extreme hardship the area has been placed under over the course of the last few years, not only with fires but with COVID and that local jobs and opportunities through apprenticeship programs are one mechanism that the council can use from a policy standpoint to address some of the overarching issues that all of you are facing as part of your hurdles in decision-making as a council. When you look at homelessness, you look at the general feeling of individuals coming out of the education system feeling that they really don't have a place for longevity within Sonoma County that they're being pushed out not only by housing issues but by wage issues by not having jobs that are local and not really having a future. We'd love to have you consider how a partnership with the building trades through a project labor agreement and skilled and trained workforce language can help facilitate some of those resolving some of those issues. So thank you very much and have a lovely evening. Thank you, Sherry. And I have that on our list for discussion. John, followed by Annie. Hello, Mayor Rogers and council members. My name is John McIntyre and I am lucky enough to serve the men and women of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 551 as their business manager. That's the electrical union also known as IBEW Local 551. I wanna thank you for the opportunity to speak today and what we believe is important to the sustainability of our community. I'd like to speak to you this evening about the importance of opportunity. We need opportunity for our younger folks to see that there's a future for them here in Sonoma County. Too many of the kids today don't believe that they can have a sustainable life here. Even the Sonoma County school superintendent said that 70% of the kids graduating this year and next as our juniors and seniors, 70% of them don't see a future for themselves here in Sonoma County. They don't see themselves only in the home, raising a family, helping their kids with their homework, having their kids go to schools where they went to as kids. They don't see any of that. How could they? Everything is so expensive. They're getting priced right out of the market even before they have a chance to dip their toes into the market. Project labor agreement would guaranteed upward morbidity, guaranteed wages, benefits and pensions will show that the community that there's a future for them here in Sonoma County, a future that includes them not having to work multiple jobs to make ends meet, a future that means only having to work 40 hours a week to provide for your family, a future that includes healthcare for you and your family, a future that includes a pension that will allow you to retire with dignity, still having the ability to hold your grandkids and swing a golf club. This is the future that a project labor agreement brings, more opportunity for more community members. How can we ask our future workforce to plan to stay here, build here, live here, pay taxes here when we don't take advantage of the opportunities staring us right in the face? I hope you, I hope and ask that you make project labor agreements a priority in this coming year. Thank you. Thank you, John. Annie followed by Sarah. Good evening, everybody. My name's Annie Barber. I'm a resident of Coffee Park and the vice president of Coffee Strong. I would like to address the PG&E lawsuit money. I understand that this money is unrestricted and can be used for anything. It was technically earmarked by PG&E to take care of the unmet needs of the community due to the fire. I totally understand that the city is behind the eight ball with the pandemic and the disasters and every the homeless, everything that is going on. Originally, we'd come up with a formula where roughly $1,400 a resident for the fire areas would compute out to be about $20 million leaving you in excess of $70 million for the city. We're not trying to have anything done that has, that is not imperative to our communities. The roads, the burned fire, the burned outlines of the cars, the garbage cans, the curbs that the debris removal have ruined. All of these things are triggers and flashback worthy items for our community to see every day. So we're just touching base one more time to let you know that we'd like to still be under the radar. Let you see what we're still going through see if we can possibly find a happy medium of getting our community back and making it whole again. And I speak as a coffee park resident but I feel the same way about Fountain Grove and Hidden Valley. I think it's really important that we remove these reminders. I appreciate how hard the city has worked to help our community return. We put a lot of work out also and took the ball and ran with it. And I hope you can appreciate that and know that we're trying very hard not to ask for more than we think that we deserve. We just would like to be made whole again. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Annie. And I do have infrastructure and rebuild on our list for discussion as well. Sarah followed by Amy. Hello, can you hear me? Yep, go ahead. Thank you. I don't have any prepared remarks tonight because I've written two letters to each of the council members and one letter to the city manager. And I also participated in the mayor's recent Zoom session. So I'm sure that my letters are somewhere on somebody's desk. But just to remind you, I happen to have been married to the person who used to be director of recreation parks and golf and who was hired for the purpose of helping the fledgling Bennett Valley golf course become successful. It was only two years old when we came to town. So that was been 48 years ago. He worked closely with the staff all during those years with the city council and with the city council's subcommittee on golf and things have been very successful in that area. Right after he retired was when the city council at that time made the suggestion to make the current clubhouse at the time into an event center. He tried to attend meetings to discourage that from happening and it has happened. And now he would be turning over in his grave, I'm sure to find out the situation that you and we find ourselves in. I'm wearing golf green tonight in support of the movement to save Bennett Valley golf course. In addition to its being a lovely environment, it's a special golf course. It must be maintained in its current regulation size of 18 holes. Nothing else will be acceptable. It's rated by the Northern California Golf Association from time to time and meets all of their requirements as a highly rated golf course, not just that they say it's a nice golf course, it's highly rated. The Raiders come from the Northern California Golf Association and spend a whole day doing different calculations about the course. Because of its standing, we attract a lot of out of town tournaments which are profitable for the golf course. So I would encourage you not to consider cutting the holes back to make it a half course hole, like nine holes or eight holes or any other number of holes other than 18. And just to keep it status quo, my refrigerator magnet says golf is a game for life. I think that speaks for itself. Thanks for your time and your consideration. All right, thank you, Sarah. Amy, followed by Mark. Hello, can you hear me? Yep, go for it, Amy. Hi, yeah, thank you. I'm also speaking in favor of the Bennett Valley Golf Course. I was born in Santa Rosa, went away to go to college, grad school and have my career, but came back here to have our family, which is actually unusual, someone else alluded to. Most people don't actually come back sadly. But yeah, I'm here supporting the Bennett Valley Golf Course. Everyone I know in the community uses it for so many purposes. When my kids were babies, we went to the playgrounds for mommy and me. As they got older, we went to the soccer fields. Friends and family, we often go to the restaurant or just walk around the grounds. My husband golf said with friends from all over the county and all over many, many different situations, they all come because it's the affordable, nice golf course. And we also go there to walk the dogs. And so it's used for so many things, it's just a jam. And I really think that spending $150,000 to assess using it is just an astronomical waste of money when it's a well-performing public good. Thank you. All right, thank you, Amy. Mark, followed by Luke. All right, finally unmuted. Can you hear me okay? Yes, we can. Thank you. Good evening, Mayor Rogers, Vice Mayor Rogers and members of the City Council. My name's Mark Mortensen and I appreciate this opportunity to speak. I believe that the City of Santa Rosa with its far-sighted leadership and engaged community members is uniquely positioned to be a leader and an exemplar in dealing with the existential crisis, a threat of the climate crisis. So I'm here to make something of a different request and one that I hope will resonate with most of the goals set and the actions taken by our city coming up in the year ahead. In unanimously passing the its climate emergency declaration, our council stipulated that addressing the climate change underscores everything that we do. And I totally agree. I believe that the climate crisis must be viewed by our city council as an overarching concern, a lens through which all decisions and actions be taken. And so actions to adapt or to mitigate the climate crisis really don't fall into a category, but they're more of a mindset. And I'm thinking that one part of this mindset or one helpful solution would be hiring a sustainability director to help guide our efforts, the efforts that are necessary in making these connections between the various actions and the climate crisis. I just think that going forward, it's essential that the goals that our city sets and the actions that it takes in all areas must be developed, implemented, and evaluated through the lens of the climate crisis. Thanks a bunch for your time. Thank you so much, Mark. Luke. Good evening, Santa Rosa City Council. My name is Luke Lindenbush and I'm speaking in my capacity as project and policy coordinator with Generation Housing. As you know, affordable housing is a top priority for the city of Santa Rosa. And today we are advocating for the single largest action that you can take at this juncture to alleviate our affordable housing affordability crisis and catalyze a generation of city-centered housing production in the city of Santa Rosa. We encourage the city council to match the commitment made by the County of Sonoma and invest $10 million of PG&E settlement funding in the Renewal Enterprise District. For members of the public present this evening who may not know, the Renewal Enterprise District, also known as the RED, is a joint powers authority between the city of Santa Rosa and the County of Sonoma to fund the development of desperately needed infill affordable housing. This opportunity for the city of Santa Rosa to invest in the city's future is unprecedented. The RED would generate the revenue needed to subsidize de-restricted affordable housing while accelerating the pace of housing production across the spectrum of affordability. And this would largely be focused in downtown Santa Rosa which has been identified as a priority for development city-wide and county-wide. Thank you all for your work, especially council members Tibbets and Fleming with your service on the RED Board in support of the Renewal Enterprise District. Our entire community is counting on you all to take it across the finish line and match the county funds. Thank you very much. Thank you, Luke. We've got Moira followed by Linda. Moira, are you able to end you? All right, Moira, we'll come back to you. We'll go to Linda, followed by a 415 number. Yes. My name is Linda Fraley. I am a resident of the community of Santa Rosa and Benton Valley Heights. And I think that the golf course for me is, I don't play golf, but it is a green spot. It is very important to my well-being. I believe that it's most famous, at least for me, position in our city was as a firebreak for the nun's fire that was coming over the hill at Trioni. We watched them set the backfire from Galvin. I am a tennis player, and I of course have more consideration. The tennis courts are very important to me. And I heard from Ms. Andrews about what we wanted for the tennis courts. And I never dreamt that there was a whole other process going on here. I think that affordable housing can be placed in other places in Santa Rosa. There are certainly other places that haven't been developed and have been under consideration for 20 to 30 years. And I think that changing this one right now is not a good idea. Okay. Thank you, Linda. We'll try Moira one more time here. Moira, if you can hit the unmute button. It looks like your talking has been permitted. All right, Moira, we'll come back to you again. Resident nine, excuse me, 5957. Hello, can you hear me? Hello, can you hear me? Yes, we can. Go ahead. All right, sorry about that before. This is Moira Jacobs. I had it on my iPad, but I'm talking on my phone, so you can disregard. So thank you for having this meeting. And I just want to strongly object to any development of the Bennett Valley golf course, that area and that park is very widely used by not just everyone in Bennett Valley, but also throughout Sonoma County, people come to enjoy that space and that amenity. So I think that we have a lot of other options in Santa Rosa that should be looked at first for housing, both low middle income housing and any other housing developments. There should be a big plan along Santa Rosa Avenue corridor to beautify it and give property owners along Santa Rosa have various incentives to redevelop for new community housing and also at the county headquarters, there's a huge development project in planning phase for the headquarters of the county offices. That is a huge opportunity for also low middle income housing right there on transportation corridors. And again, with an idea to beautify Santa Rosa, Santa Rosa can use a lot of beautification, trees, bike paths, walking paths along the transportation corridor and not taking away park amenities that are widely used by people and that provide for the wellbeing of everybody in Bennett Valley, but also beyond. I just think it's very poor planning if you cut into an amenity like Bennett Valley golf course that is probably just very poor planning if that decision is made. We have a lot of work to do in Santa Rosa to improve our community, but really there's great opportunities and there was a plan of very long time ago to redevelop Santa Rosa Ave all the way from the Rohnert Park border up to downtown. There is so much that could be done with that corridor where already you could put dense, higher level housing but with very nice green areas all around it and it just takes some creative planning and partnering with housing development places. I would love to take that offline and share with you information I have about how other cities municipalities have done that very successfully rather than sacrificing existing park lands and recreation centers. So please just consider that. Thank you very much. Thank you, Myra. Glad we were able to get you there. Next is Jen. Did we lose Jen there? Go ahead and unmute Jen. Okay, I've got it now. Good evening, Mayor Rogers and council members. This is Jen Close, Executive Director of Generation Housing where we advocate for more, more diverse and more affordable housing. And we do that not for its own sake but because we know that safe, affordable, stable housing is necessary for a healthy community, healthy in the broadest sense. And we do that because we know that we have been behind in housing production for decades and that housing scarcity and affordability has been thought of as a crisis even before the 2017 wildfires that took 5% of our housing stock in a single night. And now we also do that because it can be part of the recovery from the economic slowdown caused by COVID because housing production is a strong economic engine. But I know that you know all of this. So we are here tonight to encourage you and embolden you. You have the tools to attack this crisis and we are here to help. We are launching soon a public wheel building campaign to help change hearts and minds on housing to support your efforts. So please be bold. We encourage you to launch an EIFD but to do so thoughtfully with inequity lens. We encourage you to take action to preserve existing affordable housing, to enact policies that help encourage development of missing middle and infill housing. We encourage you to look carefully at using public land for housing even if this requires redevelopment of current sites. We encourage you to enact policy. You lose Jen again. Thank you so much Jen. Thank you so much Jen. There's anybody else in the public who would like to make a public comment before? Okay, we've got Phillip. Yes, you are. Go ahead, Phillip. Good evening, Councilman and women. And thank you for having this public forum and just a side note. I didn't know what to say. But having this public forum and just a side note, I did have the opportunity to meet and speak with several of you individually and your commitment to public service is honestly truly inspiring to me and I can't tell you how much I appreciate it. As you know, I'm here really to speak about another voice and support of the preservation of the Benton Valley Golf Course. I just wanted to report to you that what I've heard from several of you is that there's a need to better understand the financial situation with the golf course and how to preserve it long-term for the city. I did have the opportunity through some contacts that I have to speak to some people at one of the leading golf management companies in the United States, TRUNE. They're standing ready to be an alternative to CBRE as a consultant. They are absolute experts in golf preservation and course preservation so that the financial contribution of that land and the use of that land as an enterprise zone for the city will be positive and remain positive for years to come and perhaps even improving the experience and the amenity for the people in the city. So as I've said to many of you, I'll just say it again, I think that there's many options, constructive options that can be taken that the community will support to make sure that the financial stability of the golf course is created and I really urge you to think about those alternatives and we're here to help do that. And then one last thing I would just say is with all of the support that I'm trying to advocate for this bit of public land that in no way takes away from, in my view, the need for affordable housing and how important that is for a city and I think it's a critical thing for the city and for you as councilmen to address my only difference is that I wouldn't take away public land that's used as an amenity to do that. So thank you. Thank you so much, Phillip. Appreciate your comments. Janelle, followed by Efren. Hi, can you hear me? Yep, go ahead. Okay. My name is Janelle Perry. I am the creator of the Save Bennett Valley Golf Course Facebook group and a Santa Rosa resident. We have a large group of supporters for the golf course. One example is in just nine days, we now have almost 2,200 followers. That's in only nine days. I want to express that I agree with all of the public comments thus far stated by our Save Bennett Valley Golf Course team. CBRE is not the right consultant for the golf course. My daughter uses the driving range and I hope my baby boy can use it too. We need to save this course for future generations to come. Getting rid of or downsizing our only municipal golf course would be extremely upsetting to say the least. Thank you. Thank you, Janelle. Efren followed by Gregory. Yes, good evening, Mayor Rogers, Council members, Efren Carrillo, Director of Housing for Burbank Housing, Homegrown, Nonprofit, Affordable Housing Developer. Mr. Mayor, I want to begin my comments by first setting the context. I've participated in past city council goal-setting sessions over a little better part of the last 10 years and have to commend your council and your staff in looking back at prior goals. You've not only fulfilled the promise of those goals, but you've exceeded, I think, community expectations in acknowledging the challenges that are faced by local government. Having worked with the city in annexing Roseland, that was part of a goal-setting process a few years back, your commitment to recovery and rebuild and housing affordability. Your council and your staff should be commended for your leadership in really stepping up to the plate and making housing affordability a top priority. This evening, I want to say that we're here to support you to continue to build on that foundation to build really a just recovery towards housing affordability across the city. We recognize that there are significant needs in demands and a lacking housing supply. I would encourage you to continue to direct your city staff both in the planning department and housing and community development. Your respective directors of these departments have really taken your leadership and have run with those goals in mind and have achieved some significant successes. Do want to say that we hope that you will support or prioritize any funding that you can contribute to match the county's contribution for the rest of the city. And really incentivize infill affordable and housing development within the city limits. Additionally, as you know and the council supported the recovery of the former journey site 3575 Mendocino Avenue you have been there side by side with us. We are fully funded for the first phase in rebuilding the 92 affordable senior low-income residents through phase one. We would encourage you to continue to partner with us as we look at phases two and three for that full recovery. Mr. Mayor, I thought it was important for me to attend this evening and acknowledge that goal setting is important and you should be commended for having met past goals and I expect the same with the goals before your council. Thank you so much. Thank you, sir. And I will now introduce the council by Jamie. Good evening, Mayor Rogers and members of the council. Once again, the annual presentation of the community's goals is going really well. I just joined it so I have no idea if anybody has spoken to the issue that I want to raise. But it's important. Not only is housing important, but I want to remind you that those with the least amount of resources, those who have experienced a crisis in their housing for long before we had fire losses, long before we had even moderate income housing losses. We had losses and issues and gaps in the lowest of our residents' income and I'm talking as you can see there is like every other group that's come before you a huge amount of the community who care deeply about homeless people and who want to be able to continue their work with you to produce that kind of shelter, transitional and permanent housing. We stand ready as we always have to partner and to bring in resources from every funding source, every level of government to partner with the city to be able to pull that off. You know we'll be there when the opportunities arise and we hope that you'll be with us as partners in the process. I hope that that's on your council goals once again for next year and we appreciate your work. Thank you very much. Thank you so much, Gregory. Jamie, followed by Steve. Thank you all. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Okay, great. I am also calling in support of the Ben & Valley Golf Course. I appreciate that you're all still sitting here and not running from the screen every time you hear those words. We are a very strong community and we are all very upset about this consideration. Most importantly for me that the selection of the consultant needs to be revisited. The research that many members of our community have done into this company suggests that this is not the right company to provide insight into how can we make the Ben & Valley Golf Course and the clubhouse and the space within a profitable one that's not causing financial issues that you all are stuck with balancing. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. This is a beautiful space. I'm one of the individuals who's taking in the Ben & Valley Golf Course interest from the website and putting into our own database and spreadsheet. This is in addition to what's going on with our over 2,000 people who have added in the last nine days to our Facebook site. This is the firebreak which is really important. It should not be forgotten. We watched that firebreak as well from our home. It was critical. It was very hard for our children to see what was going on at that time. That was critical. When the other fires that have come through, especially this most recent year, we all said that the golf course is going to save us. It's going to save us. It's going to save us. It's going to save us from watching the birds and wildlife. Why are we going to strike the space to put more housing? Although we need the housing, I really don't like that we are pitted against that as the need here. It's really unfortunate because that needs as much attention as it can get as well. Exercise, golf, soccer, tennis, going for walks, all of it. They're children. They go there with their grandchildren. It develops experiences. We come from a family. I have two boys and a husband who coaches. Sports fields are absolutely critical. They're super important in our family. They should not take the place of this current site. The pandemic, golf has saved us in a lot of ways. It's an outdoor activity that we can all do on our own. We're not going to be doing anything like that away. That's really the summary of my comments. I support everything that everybody said in support of the golf course. I hope that reconsultation for the consultant can be done in a speedy way. Thank you. Thank you so much, Jamie. Steve, followed by Cindy. Steve, can you unmute? There we go. to talk to you today. I do appreciate the struggle that you're going through with all the demands on the city and the city services, but this is one opportunity that you have to keep a community asset that the previous city councils have invested in and the entire Sonoma County community has invested in. I think it's critical that you keep it as a golf resource for the entire community. This is probably one of the most equitable places in the golfing community for folks to play, both from a youth perspective, from the older folks perspective to, you know, the entire community gets a chance to play here because it's such an economical place to play for all of us. And I guess I would challenge the council to consider other recreational opportunities that don't have a revenue source as does the golf course. They're not self-supporting. And I think that's a unique situation here in the city that we should consider. You know, this is an asset to the community. And I think you've started down the path of that this is a liability that you need to address and have selected a consultant that views it as a liability. If you turned around and looked at it as an asset, you would make a different choice for the consultant that you chose to give you opportunities and reviews of what is possible there in terms of reinvestment, in terms of new operators. I think in the town hall meeting that we had last week, you heard two current operators who think this is a very, very good location for a golf course and think it is very viable. And then from the restaurant and the conference area, you heard from local business people who have said that there's opportunities all over the place. And it's probably the best sit in Sonoma County in terms of a patio and enjoying the outdoors and just the opportunities for restaurateurs. And I don't think you've really developed what that area really should be for the entire community. So I appreciate that you guys are looking at this. I understand the dynamics of all the different needs in the city, but this is one of those investments that once you lose it, it never comes back. And I hope that you reconsider the consultant's choice of CBRE and step back and actually look at this golf course as an asset and a valuable location for the city of Santa Rosa and the County of Sonoma in total. So thank you for your time and appreciate your efforts for us. Thank you. Thank you very much. Steve, Cindy, followed by Sandy. Hi, hi, thank you for everyone's time. I'm calling to support the Benavali golf course with the current state of our economy due to COVID, you're undervaluing the golf course and all of its amenities because the restaurant's gone, you cannot say that it's because it's not functioning. It's because of COVID. Using the Benavali golf course as an option as Jen stated to triple our bottom line, it's not a reason to destroy a community asset that has truly been a link for our schools, our companies and family get-togethers from so many generations. I know with myself, my family, we've been here for four generations. I've had four generations play at that golf course from my grandfather to my children and I absolutely love the golf camps at that golf course. They do a phenomenal job. That team is absolutely amazing. I cannot stress enough, please save the Benavali golf course. Thank you. Thank you so much, Cindy. Sandy? Good evening, everyone. And thank you so much for allowing us to have this forum. I too am a member of the same Benavali golf course community. And I believe there's been a lot of excellent points made. I know you've heard them. I know you'll hear more of them as time goes on. But a couple of things I'd like to bring up are the idea of marketing the area through Airbnb and VRBO. When I went to the Visit Santa Rosa website, the number one thing the author posted that she likes to do during COVID is walk along Summerfield and the trails near the golf course because it's so beautiful. Like her, I don't golf. My family does. My daughter was on a high school golf team. That is a recreation you do not want to take away, especially in times of COVID and in times where children are in front of screens all of the time. It's just beautiful. And the dog park is lovely. And we all could go on and on, but I just want to raise my hand to somebody who would like to be a part of being heard to save the golf course. And thank you again for taking time to let us speak. Thank you so much. Jorge, followed by 7466. Hello, can you hear me? Perfect. Well, hello, City Council Santa Rosa. I'd like to chime in today. My name is Jorge Inocencio, and I would like to ask the council to renew their commitment to a permanent Rosen library. I'm sure this is something that you've heard before and I know it's been part of the goal setting for the last number of years. But again, I would just like to, given that we have a new council and a lot of changes with COVID and there's a lot of priorities that aren't going to be weighed against each other. I think that renewing the commitment to a permanent Rosen library so that children here, Latino children and children all over Southwest can have access to a safe place, a place to get books, a place to learn and really to have a place for the community to be able to go and have access to computers, access to books, access to a lot of things. I remember growing up how powerful going to the library was and reading all the books that I could and thinking that a lot of kids in Southwest Santa Rosa don't have that same opportunity or might not have the same access to that kind of opportunity is a big deal. So I would just like to encourage the City of Santa Rosa and our council to once again renew their commitment to a permanent Rosen library because it's a very important issue and it's one that's going to affect many generations to come and it could have an immediate effect as soon as it's ready. So with that, thank you very much and I see my time. Thank you so much Jorge. Residence 7466. And thank you so much for having this opportunity to speak. My name is Yvette Minor and I'm calling on the behalf of the Rosen library. We have had many emergencies that have put a strain on our priorities and goal setting within Santa Rosa. I have been a part of many goal setting sessions for a while now. I support many of the issues that are being expressed here tonight but I really like to express the need for the Rosen library to be funded. They have provided valuable resources to those who are unable to purchase technology, books, get training, resume writing, study guides and much more. With the expansion of Wi-Fi, it allows patients outside of the library to use the Wi-Fi. Did I mention that they were all free? Even though we are experiencing tough times, we would like to express our need for the Rosen library to go forward. When you look at the Sabachable Avenue corridor, you will see a much needed school stuff. So please provide the necessary money to provide the equity that is so much needed in Rosen. Thank you. Thank you so much, Yvette. And it looks like that was our last hand. I'll give a couple seconds here. See if there's anybody else who's interested in speaking. Got one more. Oh, nope, he disappeared. All right, Brett, followed by Cynthia. And it looks like we lost Brett again. We'll go to Cynthia. Yep, go ahead, Cynthia. Yes, everyone. All right, very brief. My name is Cynthia Dennerholz. I'm a member of the Santa Rosa Library Advisory Board. I'm a tutor in the Santa Rosa Sonoma County Libraries Adult Literacy Program, and I'm a former Superior Court commissioner. I would like just to take a few moments to support Director Anne Hammons and the other speakers' requests for a $10 million commitment to support a permanent library in the Roseland neighborhood. I thank you very much for the opportunity to address the council and want to stress how important it is to have a permanent branch in the Roseland neighborhood. This will, in turn, support, as has been mentioned before, learning, including the all-important digital literacy, and provide a community center, which is really what libraries have become in the modern age, the community center, not just places where someone goes and gets a physical book. Of course, there's digital books and all kinds of digital resources, but they're really places where everyone gathers. And one of the few places, as mentioned before, that are free for everyone and where everyone in the community is welcome, something that we really need to treasure. And this is particularly important in Roseland, which is the primarily Latino neighborhood, as all of you know. Again, thanks so much for your time, and I appreciate the difficult job you'll have in allocating these resources. Thank you so much, Cynthia. Brett? There we go, right? You hear me? Yeah, there we go, Brett. Thank you. My name is Brett Greib, and I've lived in Santa Rosa since 1974. I hear in the meeting tonight, many people calling to say, save the Bennett Valley golf course. I don't hear people calling to say, remove it. Tonight, my point comes from a reminder of a philosophy that I learned many years ago. It's called the donkey theory, and it goes like this. If one person calls you a donkey, then don't worry about it. Everyone has an opinion. If two people call you a donkey, well, it might be something to think about, but if 10 people call you a donkey, well, it's time to wear the saddle. So the lesson is, when there's overwhelming opinions about something, it may very well be true. So as we've heard tonight, the overwhelming opinion is, keep the Bennett Valley golf course as it is. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Brett. All right, I'm not seeing any other hands. We'll go to our voicemail public comment and see if any last minute hands pop up while we're listening to the voicemail. Hello, my name is Joanna Mecan. I'm calling regarding the goal setting meeting. I would really love if the city council made an investment to fiber to the premises, a top priority in the goal setting. I would also love if the city council kept their constituents in mind once the small cell policy update will be reaching their desks anytime soon. We've been in many, many study sessions with the city council and we continue to bring these issues up and it's really important to see an investment of fiber to the premises and it's a great return on investment for the city council. We've brought this up many times in weekly meetings, goal setting meetings, budget meetings, and if the city council just did a little bit of digging, they'd see that this is a great way to make a return on investment. Thank you. Hi, my name is Mike Turgeon and resident of Santa Rosa, a member of Friends of the Climate Action Plan. And I wanna say how much I appreciate everyone in taking on the goal setting session this week. I wouldn't wanna have any one of your jobs because I know how hard you have to work to address all these issues. I'm a bit puzzled that we three and a half years after the Tubbs Fire haven't elevated addressing climate to a more specific policy driven approach. And the point being that addressing climate because it is such an existential threat is addressing homelessness. It is addressing housing. It is addressing equity. And so as we go through the whole deliberation of what our goals will be for the coming year and year or two, I just want to stress how important it will be to think climate first and then address everything else. And we absolutely have no other choice at this point. As we approach the fire season coming up this year, it's going to be right back on our face again as if it already isn't. So thank you so much for what you do and we appreciate the hard work. Thank you. Yes, hello, my name is Amanda Maris and I've lived in Santa Rosa for over 10 years in the newly incorporated Roseland and the newly annexed Roseland neighborhood. And I'm calling because I was really hoping to have more conversation from the city and between the city and the Roseland neighborhood regarding small cell towers and this contract between AT&T. I've been really hoping that the city would invest in fiber optic cables. It was in like that South Korea who has always been a world leader at investing in fiber optic cables and also most of Europe because they've never had wonderful public services for telecommunications. So they've always thrived ahead of us first in terms of cell reception and now with fiber optic cables and it's cheap and affordable because the countries have invested in them decades ago for fiber optic cables. I was also really hoping that there would be more conversation between Roseland as a newly annexed portion of the city to understand the concerns of the constituents in this neighborhood. We finally have representation in our district and I know that the newly elected city council member had a position on fiber on small cell towers and wireless in general, but I don't think he's heard from all of the constituents here. I wasn't able to speak to him myself personally, for instance. So I would caution the city to move forward with lots of contracts for AT&T small cell towers until we heard more from the public and I'm encouraging more outreach to the public regarding the potential health effects and harm and the unknown factor regarding health effects and environmental effects with small cell towers versus the long-term benefits we've seen from around the world with fiber optic cables. That's my comment, thank you very much. Hi, my name is Sydney Cox. I appreciate this opportunity to leave a comment for your goal-setting meeting. Just so you know, I love Santa Rosa and have a deep appreciation for all the issues you have to deal with and I know you wouldn't be sitting where you are if you didn't feel that same way too and undoubtedly to a much greater extent as you have to devote so much time and energy to those issues. Having said that, I hope you will do everything in your power to make the passing of the small cell ordinance one of your top goals. That ordinance will affect the placement of small cells on city-owned light poles as well as PG&E poles for decades to come. Once installed, telecom can upgrade them at any time with more transformers and higher emissions with no oversight. As attorney Andrew Campanelli stated, the truth is these facilities are actually completely unregulated. Even if they are FCC compliant at the time they're built, what about all times after that? Thank you for all you do for Santa Rosa and for considering this comment. Bye. Hi, this is Sherri Williams and thank you so much for all you do for us and our city. It's much appreciated. As far as the goal settings, I request that there be more connectivity with your constituents and transparency and the ability for the citizens to have two-way communication and one-on-one meetings with council members, whether it be Zoom or an outdoor setting. It's been over three years now in four study sessions and hundreds of citizens calling for a policy to keep the cell towers out of our neighborhoods, parks and schools. I've been unsuccessful to get a meeting with any council member. We are lucky to have Gabe Osburn who I understand has put a county policy together and perhaps it's in the review process. We've waited patiently for years now to protect our property values and quiet enjoyment of our streets and so forth. However, it is disappointing to find out that the AT&T recently got their master license agreement signed by the city and that the council policy is still not finalized. It's critical at this point that this council policy be properly vetted and include requirements for least intrusive means and proven gap in coverage among other requirements discussed in the study sessions. This is an urgent matter. Along those lines, please invest in our future with fiber optic cable to and through the premises. As a public utility, it will cultivate a vibrant city because everyone will have access to a high quality internet. It's safe, fast, reliable, private, sustainable and so forth. And it's also will provide a return on investment year after year. Lastly, as you enter a new year again, I ask you to please allow for a more open relationship with your city residents. I grew up here and raised my children here. There are times when I'm not recognizing it anymore. Large corporations can be overbearing such as the telecoms who come in and quote only part of laws in order to leverage themselves illegitimately. Please listen to the people. Use your power. We elected you as officials. We pay you and please question our city manager on a regular basis. Thank you. Mayor, that's a conclusion of voice message. Public comments received. All right, thank you. I saw two hands pop up. So we will go ahead and take those and then we will close public comment. We've got Maureen followed by Alex. Muert. Hi. Am I being heard? Yes, you are. Go ahead. My name is Maureen Graffeld and I want to thank the city council for your service and this forum. I'm here to advocate for saving the Benavali golf course. The article in the press democracies two weeks ago unleashed an incredible ground swelling of support. I've been involved in community efforts before but I have never experienced anything like this with such unity. I think it's important for you as a city council to realize there's been no dissension, no opposition, no splinter groups at all. I'm sure you know how unusual this is with community issues. Everyone, actually thousands, have united and focused on one goal to save our beloved Benavali golf course. I have personally been inundated with phone calls and emails. People from Santa Rosa, Sonoma County and throughout California. I've heard from so many children and friends that have moved away and yet they still have a love and a connection for this course. I've heard from people in Florida, Texas, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, Arizona. The course is clearly an asset to our city and an incredible source of pride. It has a loyal following. While cities provide parks and recreational areas just for the enjoyment of their citizens without any monetary expectation in return, the golf course actually generates revenue for you. Developing this beautiful piece of valuable green space would be tragic. With a population of 180,000, a municipal affordable golf course of this magnitude is truly an asset that other cities would be so grateful to have. We urge you to not sign a contract of $150,000, more than most people in this county don't even make in a full year's work with CBE to develop this treasured landmark. For those interested in supporting us, please join Save Bennett Valley Golf Course on Facebook. We are 2,200 strong. We have a myriad of committees. You can help with donations, petitions, yard signs, restaurants and event center research, legal IT, web design, membership. Banners and yard sign distribution is this Friday at four o'clock at the Bennett Valley Golf Course. Thank you so much City Council for listening to me. Thank you Maureen. Alex followed by Kathy. Hello Mayor Rogers, City Council, City Attorney, Mr. City Manager. Again, I want to just bring up the issue of the placement of telecommunications facilities within the city. You know, we need to have good cell phone coverage and that needs to be accomplished in a responsible way. And you have the responsibility to make sure that that occurs. And unfortunately over the years of dealing with this issue, the City Manager and City staff have not provided you, in my opinion, with the most accurate information. And you do have the ability to control the placement of telecommunications facilities. And actually the law says that specifically in the 1996 Telecommunications Act, just as long as you don't, you know, make it the determination on health effects, if the levels are below the FCC standards, or if you don't effectively prohibit the services of that provider. So that simply means that you can say, yes, you cannot put this near a school or in a neighborhood unless that is your only way of closing a gap in coverage. And that gap in coverage in that telecommunications act written in 1996 wasn't about internet service, wasn't about streaming videos, obviously back then, they didn't know what a smartphone was. It was about making phone calls and text messages. So I encourage and I really hope that we can get something passed finally to protect people and really this whole issue and not getting anything published has put you guys into kind of a hole with AT&T at the moment and has really, you know, may our cellphone coverage services probably suffer overall when it could be dealt with in a responsible way. And on the point of fiber optic to the premise, something that you've heard many of your constituents bring up in support, I just wanna say, you know, you don't have to lay fiber to every home in the city to start. You could start with a small program that's doable, either downtown, maybe even a place like Roseland and start small and use the returns on your investment to build the program. Let's be innovative and let's be creative and let's look for a future. And this would be something that would be great, not only for our economy, but also for our environment because it is a lot more energy efficient to have data running on a fiber optic cable than it is to spray it through the air in hope that the device picks up one 1 millionth of that electricity. So thank you for your time and consideration. And I hope we could hear something about this issue when you guys actually talk about it on, I think, Friday. Thank you. Thank you, Alex. Kathy. I received a note when I enabled Kathy's speak permissions that she's using an older version of Zoom. And therefore I cannot enable her speaking permission. She needs to update her Zoom app in order to participate. All right, Kathy, I hope you'll send us an email so that the council can see it. And with that, that's the last hand that I have for public comment. I'll go ahead and bring it back. I did wanna mention what I heard and see, make sure it's what council members heard. So I heard climate crisis, a sustainability director and implementation team, right to recall Safe Parking Southeast Greenway, Roseland Library, Bennett Valley Golf Course, economic recovery and business support, housing, the red investment, homelessness, fire preparedness, downtown support, early childcare and education, telecommunication ordinance and fiber to the premises, project labor agreements, skilled and trained workforce, coffee park infrastructure, beautification. Is there anything that other council members heard that I missed from my list? Revisiting the consultant for the Bennett Valley Golf Course, not just not getting rid of it, but revisiting the consultant that we're hiring. Yeah, I apologize. I had that in the Bennett Valley Golf Course discussion as well. So just for setting the framework for tomorrow, it won't be deep dives into particular issues. It's about setting the framework for the work plan. We absolutely can look at all those things when it gets to particulars in a particular area of concern. Yep. Yes, sir. All right. With that, we will stand at recess from our meeting. We will resume tomorrow at 8 a.m. See you council members then.