 the hour of one o'clock having arrived at the Santa Cruz City Council for the meeting of April 25th 2023 is called to order the clerk will call the roll thank you mayor council member newson present Brown here Watkins here Brunner present Calentari Johnson as it vice mayor Golder here and mayor Culey here quorum having been established we will proceed to our closed session agenda this would be the opportunity for anyone who is either with us in chambers or online to make a comment about our closed session agenda let me ask miss bush do we have anyone online we have nobody online anyone with us in chambers wish to make comments seen and hearing none the council will now adjourn into closed session we will return on or about 2 o'clock not before that for our regular session of the city council at this time we stand adjourned into closed session recording stopped good afternoon the Santa Cruz City Council is back in session for its April 25th recording in progress third meeting let me ask the clerk to call the roll thank you mayor council member newson present Brown here Watkins Brunner present Calentari Johnson as it vice mayor Golder here and mayor Culey here quorum having been established we will move forward on our agenda our first item is item for a master recycler volunteer training program recognition I'll recognize miss O'Malley good afternoon our presentation here good afternoon mayor council members fellow staff and members of the public thank you for the opportunity to come today and give you some information about the city of Santa Cruz master recycler volunteer training program next slide so the program was started in 2018 was our first class it was paused in 2020 and we just resumed this year in 2023 so we started a master recycler volunteer training program because we really started to notice a lot of contamination in the curbside recycling carts in 2017 National Sword was the operation with China and the east stopped accepting a lot of recycling so it was important for us to educate the community about recycling contamination and we also got a lot of feedback from tours and people that attended the tours at facility we wanted to build community awareness and most importantly we wanted to stress the priority of waste reduction so our vision originally the great news is when I first gave this presentation to council in 2017 the vision was just written on a page and there were no pictures so now we have some great pictures that have come to fill this page in the five years next slide so the framework really is 20 up to 25 people they attend two hour sessions weekly over the course of six weeks and then they commit to 20 hours of volunteer service over the course of 12 months curriculum is an opportunity to educate our residents that there is a difference between the city of Santa Cruz are recycling and what we accept curbside but also how it's different in the county and also even for those who attend school up at UCSC and our off campus residents it was an opportunity to prioritize the food education waste reduction and compliance with state and local policies next slide some of the tools and knowledge that we get to leverage with our program through the master recycler program is we engage with city schools we have a Dory pole lending program to mitigate litter from balloons our food scrap diversion program our newly curbside collection program food scrap drop-off in our home composting rebate we have our annual garage sale weekend that's coming up and then Earth Day which we just had this past weekend next slide then the master recyclers at the end of their six weeks of training get to decide how they're going to spend those 20 hours of volunteer time many of our newest participants started to fill their hours this past weekend at Earth Day so they manned way stations at city events community outreach and education tabling they look for alternatives to hard to recycle materials and then they bring awareness to the community about some of our policies like our environmentally acceptable packaging and products ordinance next slide we did have to pivot during COVID as we all know and are still doing a little bit we were able to maintain the participation through online chat groups in social distance volunteering out on the curb to help get carts restickered so that residents knew what went in there and then a monthly newsletter and special guest over zoom next slide so the great news is in 2023 having just adopted our climate action plan it'll be more important than ever to help our residents understand the importance of recycling but as we prioritize waste reduction next slide here's a list we'd like to say thank you to all the participants almost a hundred over these years and Bonnie if I could ask you to just click on that blue link reflections and then there'll be one more arrow to start well when we check back into the video that was uploaded we had some words from some of our master recyclers to share their reflection and their input for a program so thank you for the opportunity to share a little bit about this program and we look forward to coming back in the future with new updates we're gonna see if we can get this yeah just at the bottom the reflections if you click on that gotta love technology thank you very much and all of the volunteers it's just wonderful work that you do and providing an opportunity for other people to help make this a stronger better community thank thank you so much let me ask if if council members like to make any remarks so I think on behalf of the council miss Bruner I just wanted to briefly say thank you so much I know that I've been up at the recycling center and have done one of your tours and not the master recycling program but it's so informative and so important and a wonderful community engagement kind of light bulb on for a lot of people I know that I've gone through the master recycle program and and what a great way to have those people share with their neighbors and other people and to be engaged in events and and I saw them out there for Earth Day so thank you for all of your work around this thank you very good very best wishes thank you so much thank you it all the help you've provided to the city thank you we are on item number five a proclamation declaring the month of May is affordable housing month and I imagine every member of the city council is excited about that I know that every member of the city council has been working on housing affordability for some time as our members of the community what I'd like to do is invite bunny lips come up I'll present the proclamation miss lips come ask her to make some remarks I see if there's some other wonderful people like mr. Lane and others who work in this space thank you mayor and Bonnie lips and director of economic development and housing for the city this is our favorite month thank you very much this is our favorite month of the year and our housing team I just want to acknowledge is at the back of the room so if you guys can raise your hand we have Jessica Jess Andrea Tiffany and Emily and they work day in day out on affordable housing and housing programs throughout the city from implementing our CDBG community development block grant program to doing housing agreements to ensure affordability on new units that are created in the city monitoring those units administering programs for housing preservation tenant assistance emergency rental assistance throughout the city with many of our community partners they work hard so thank you there are many exciting events this month and I think Bonnie may have something she can put up on the screen which shows all the events and definitely that one of the the most amazing first events one of the first events is a kickoff and I know that Don Lane who's here today is is leading that effort and that's an affordable housing month kickoff with housing Santa Cruz County and so you can see the in-person events we do have this flyer with clickable links to register for any of the events on our website under our housing page and if you scroll down to the bottom I'll just mention also there's a lot of great virtual events we at the city are putting on a couple virtual events which are affordable housing finance 101 class and housing choice voucher program webinar with housing authority and so just a lot of great content this month and so hopefully all of you can get out to attend a couple of these events and hopefully we'll see you there so thank you thank you very much mr. Lane come on up mr. Lane's the co-founder housing Santa Cruz County and of course a former mayor of this body thank you so much for everything you do good afternoon sir thank you sir and I especially send greetings to the other co-founder of housing Santa Cruz County council members great to be here thanks for giving me this moment I do I just want to echo the comment about May 6th affordable happy month kind of our launch event and it's set it's gonna be big and diverse we're doing it at Cabrillo to be county-wide we have an author Shane Phillips from UCLA who's a policy expert but then we also have an author a children's book author who's written about housing gentrification in her in her neighborhood in the neighborhood led by a nine-year-old battling that gentrification we have all kinds of different ways people can engage and that's what affordable housing month is about is lots of different ways to engage at lots of different levels so we invite people to come out for that and on May 6th and then all the other events and then one final shout out those guys behind you and you guys right here Santa Cruz is really kicking butt on affordable housing right now there is so much great work going on more to come but just was reminded by is an article I just read that almost half of all the housing units being built right now or how recently built in Santa Cruz are permanently affordable units and that is not something that many other cities are doing so shout out to you for that great work thank you thank you sir very much thanks to all of you back there God love you really appreciate all the work that you do I know that to some extent use your toil and obscurity over and in that don't often get the kind of recognition we're giving you right at this moment but lots of what Don Lane just said about being able to hit numbers and and exercise some real leadership on this is because you're so creative and thoughtful and imaginative about how you can pull in money from any and all sources possible to make the housing that is constructed as affordable as possible so thank you all very much and best wishes to you all thank you council members good all right there we go our next item is item number six and this is declaring the week of April 30th through May 6th as municipal clerks week so municipal clerk which would of course for those of you not familiar maybe with with city government the city clerk's office is the small end of the funnel for getting us to this moment every other week which is to assemble the agenda the packet and provide all manner of other support activities for this governing body as well as for the city generally and we are very blessed to have two outstanding public servants Bonnie Bush who is our city clerk and Julia Wood who is the assistant that do a great job all the time and much the same as our affordable housing people you sit here quietly every other week and help us get our business done and we literally literally not figuratively could not do this without you and your very fine work so thank you so much and we acknowledge your your great work by declaring this April 30th the first week in May city clerk week thank you all you both very much to say but I will be the first to say and I say this every year I recognize that not a lot of people know what we do I appreciate you giving a little foresight of that but I really appreciate this and on behalf of Julia and the clerks team thank you understand you have a new member of your team as well yes we have Brittany who is our admin assistant three our new member of the clerks team so swing by and say hi to her if you guys are in the area very good thank you both very much best wishes to you thank you all right we are on item we are on presiding officer announcements I have none statements of disqualification any member have a statement of disqualification on today's agenda seen and hearing none additions or deletions are there madam clerk any additions or deletions to the agenda there are none thank you so the attorney reports out a closed session sir yes good afternoon mayor good evening members of the city council this afternoon the council met in the courtyard conference room at one o'clock in the afternoon to discuss the following three closed session items the first was a conference with the city's labor negotiators concerning two bargaining groups that se i u temporary employees and se i u service employees item two was a conference with legal counsel concerning liability claims the claims of Brent Barbera and the claim of Christopher Allen moussak those are also listed this afternoon on your consent calendar is agenda item number 17 lastly the council met with legal counsel to discuss one item of significant exposure to litigation council received a report on that item and there was no reportable action thank you sir council meeting agenda madam clerk anything we need you need to draw to our attention that regard nothing all right very good we are on the consent agenda this would be items eight through 26 on today's agenda those of you unfamiliar with it the consent agenda we will take up all of those items on one vote if you wish to make a comment about or have an item pulled first let me ask the council if you have any items you wish to have pulled or further discussion on them councilmember Watkins yes thank you mayor I have some proposed language to add to item 12 so I will go ahead and pull that item 12 that will be pulled any other councilmember wish to have an item pulled any councilmember wish to make comment on any of the consent agenda items seen and hearing none this would oh I'm sorry excuse me excuse me would you like that pulled comment please proceed I just want to say that this was brought to my attention by kids at my house and kids outside of my house that go to Santa Cruz high school along with city school staff and I just want to appreciate that this is more complicated than I think the council initially thought and I really want to thank Heather and Matt and other members of the team in collaborating with Santa Cruz City schools leadership and trying to resolve this issue and unfortunately it's not going to be as quite easy as we thought to fix but I just want to acknowledge that it's people are working on it and working really hard thank you very good anyone else miss Brown I just have a very quick comment on item 27 which is confirmation of the city's commitment to using CDBG funds to I'm sorry 27 no I'm sorry it's the number is wrong number is wrong that I just gave you it's I just had it written in my notes wrong where is it find it okay never mind it's take a second just take a second it's fine no no it's okay we're gonna be here all night anyway so I'm good I'm good so 27 I've got yeah no I'll I'll just yeah my other comments sorry okay okay all right all good all right anyone with us who wishes to comment on an item on the consent agenda good afternoon sir good afternoon my name is James Ewing Whitman I have a couple items on the consent agenda but first I want to say I really appreciate the clerks work particularly in this room probably dealing with clerks in this county professionally for 25 years and extremely dependable yeah so number 11 initiative number 21-003 to a one the taxpayer protection and government accountability act I don't know what to say except that it's extremely comical what corporation would want the actual citizens that are the peasants to actually use the laws against the corporations so city of Santa Cruz is a corporation so why would they I mean I think anybody would really appreciate reading some of the dialogue and number 11 I know I had fun yesterday and I'm glad that number 12 is coming up for more discussion I do not support Senate bill 331 or SB 311 about the child custody there's just a lot of stuff going on it just seems to be coming more and more of a bureaucracy and not open dialogue between parents thanks thank you very much anyone else with us today we should comment on the consent agenda mr. LaBerge good afternoon sir an item 16 sure can I ask you to get to the microphone over there please it'd be in the board's packet the letter of the CFSC and asking for forgiveness it's all here yes the city council to pull that from the consent agenda we have a very strong argument all right we'll pull that that's item 16 we'll go ahead and pull that 12 and 16 we will we'll take up separately further on the consent agenda questions or comments I do have somebody online whoever is with us online you are now recognized good afternoon yes thank you this is good as to item 11 I need to consider this public ballot initiative more but I will say for now you are opposing control limits on actual cost or reasonableness in fees that the city charges meaning you would prefer the option of milking the public with both hands like a big fat cash cow win and however you can one of those radical fee hikes is on the agenda today okay I'm planning a little but the essence of the initiative you oppose is that there should be a high bar with rational cost-based reasons and public operation to raise taxes and fees because in California we pay a national max of those and the people are mad as hell and they won't take it anymore it would seem not surprisingly you don't prefer these limits and I think your answer to a fiscal imbalance is always to raise taxes and fees and no size limit of government is too big or any joke justification will do well it's on the ballot and the people will vote this time around not you as you don't get a deciding vote this time some initiatives show up by special interest but I also see the people's interest in this so far I'll give a real consideration when I think about your gigantic 400% increase in green building consultation fees your most convoluted vapor like connect the dots between developers and childcare impact fees and so forth I can see where the citizens are getting the idea of federal government style corruption is finally filtered down to the state and so you know and they've had enough government is a monopoly lacking free market competition which can and does lead to abuse unless there are either uncommon ethics of goodwill or legal controls that produce similar I believe the people really really if they want something they will pay for it is not the only important taxpayer initiative on the ballot the people will have much to consider and why you're sending an opposing letter to other representatives is strange sense really it's up to the people to decide what kind of government they want not you the item 1415 parklets is more of the city raising revenue while benefiting some very special interests while sacrificing and permanently denying the public it's public property right of way it supports unfair competition and has no real public need anymore it doesn't matter soon the public will tire of dining at full fare on the street in parking spaces one wonders if these parklet incentive subsidies that remove parking and create parking fund deficits are essentially paid for now by other people's higher parking fees the accounting is a mystery in Santa Cruz at least to me and I would mention the minutes of the special meeting last week could not possibly have been written to convey less of what said or decided about the city's important five-year strategic plan the meeting had no recording I don't think and some outside consulting agency hired by I don't know who that will quote prepare a draft strategic plan and at some future meeting you will all be voting I I probably on the consent agenda and the only people who are in that room they're the ones that why or whether Baker Tilly whoever they are has it right or is just as instructing thanks thank you Mr. Phillip anyone else online Miss Bush anyone else with us on the consent agenda motion to approve the consent agenda with the exception of items 12 and 16 would be in order motion by Miss Johnson second by Councilmember Brown the clerk will call the roll councilmember is Newsome I Brown I what can I printer I Calentary Johnson I vice mayor Goulder I Mariculee I motion passes and so ordered we will now take up the consent agenda items that were pulled let's start with Ms. Watkins on agenda item 12 thank you mayor and thank you to my colleagues who brought this item forward I appreciate the thought that went into it and I do agree with the direction I think it's gonna be really great for our system I knew this was forthcoming given conversations I had had with our staff and I wanted to also just can propose additional direction for consideration and the context before I make that motion and proposal is essentially when we move to proposing to our community to have a directly elected mayor and a district process that we knew that compensation was something we wanted to look at but didn't necessarily build in and know that there goes a lot of work into that as well so I think it's appropriate having consulted with our city manager to add this to this item and so I'll go ahead and make that motion if I may mayor start with the motion okay so the motion is to accept item number 12's recommendation to approve the city council policy 6.21 district engagement with the additional direction and Bonnie I could send this to you to request that staff conduct a market comparison of mayor and count council compensation amongst comparable cities and bring back their findings along with outlining the process for the council to consider proposing potential changes to council compensation to ensure we continue to stay competitive with the market as well as attract higher caliber candidates to these important positions it's very hard I will say it is really hard to get individuals interested and this won't necessarily impact myself or others right now but as we move forward if we want a diversity of representation we have to understand the impact of compensation that that has especially in our high-cost community and has been brought to my attention from community members as an interest of theirs to explore as you can see if I can get a second council member Brown second step motion on the motion itself miss Watkins yeah thank you and so essentially to have this additional direction within this item seems appropriate for our consideration so that we can understand what choices we might have before us that will ultimately lead to a representative government of our community so I appreciate the second and any conversation that thank you for the debate or discussion miss Brown yeah I just wanted to put this in context this is something that I know since councilmember Watkins and I have been on the council has come up in various through various channels and we've provided some direction that's been pretty general about looking at this over time and we just haven't quite we haven't done that and I absolutely support the and I think it's it's a goal that we've had collectively the different iterations of this body and for myself it's a good time given that it won't affect you know I don't have a personal interest in this because I won't be on the city council by the time we review that and of course the city voters would have to approve something so just want to make say that as well and then I did have a question since this got pulled which I'll ask related to your your thinking and I appreciate it and I I've also have been supportive of efforts like this I know mayor Chirazas when he was mayor wanted to try to get something like this going again take take some time right to make it happen so here we are there are several of us who are just two of us no no four of us it's still who are out large representatives who are kind of not really formally assigned to our district so I'm just wondering how that would work for the coming year you know whether we would be engaging in that as well with with district representatives or if that would just be kind of transitioned in I think as a look would have it each of the at-large council members are residing in what will be the new districts and so my interpretation of it would be that it would also apply to council members elected at large thank you for the question or comment seen and hearing none clerk will call the role on the amended motion do we have public comment or not yet I'm sorry thank you very much anyone with us today wish to comment on this item anyone online that always happens I always bring it up and nobody's right we'll call the roll hello it's great to have a little bit greater understanding of what this actually meant I really couldn't understand it when I was reading it yesterday it's just kind of amazing you know that Santa Cruz County has a lot of really best and show individuals some of you have some really fascinating bios I think that this county I don't know if it's a blessing or a curse to have so many corporate entities that are supporting us in California corporate flags I'm just a little peasant citizen that is an observation of stuff this city council in the county is really pretty amazing you know this morning speaking publicly being lied I suppose got into a nice one-on-one conversation with Gail Newell and I said we should continue this conversation over coffee it's enough for now thank you thank you sir clerk will call the roll member Newsome I Brown I Watkins I Grinner hi Helen Torrey Johnson I base mayor Goulder I and Mary Keeley hi ocean carries and so ordered we are on item number 16 which was requested to be continued by excuse me moved to this part of the agenda by Mr. LaBerge good afternoon sir thank you again mayor Keeley city council I'm here to argue for the forgivability of the 74,500 dollar loan it was originally given in 1991 to create what we call the Darwin house which is a AIDS housing project I'm the chair of the board of CFSC we've been in existence 1981 we have over 70 units of affordable housing but we appreciate may be an affordable housing month of Santa Cruz and we're a key player in that we have housing on Broadway on Darwin on Water Street we have housing throughout the city of Santa Cruz and throughout the county right now we're applying for a four million dollar loan and the freedom area to provide transitional housing for termed out foster children we've been a reliable partner for over 40 years and back in 1993 when the note was the promissory note was written for this the city council that sat in this very room agreed to potential forgivability for that loan and the reason we're asking for that is that freedom from that debt load will allow us to continue to provide more housing more affordable housing in the city of Santa Cruz at absolutely no cost to the city of Santa Cruz the original seed money was from a Red Cross grant following the earthquake so I think we proven we're a reliable partner we want to continue to provide affordable housing in the city and County and the forgivability of this loan will put us in a much better position Mr. Bursch thank you very much let me ask if Miss Lake is here and if she would like to make any comments on this item and I could speak to the philosophy behind that if I couldn't ask them and then you can make whatever comments you wish a good afternoon miss Lake thank you mayor Keely so the the language that mr. LaBerge is referring to did add claws to the loan saying that the determination of forgiveness could be made at a later date by City Council but in contrast we had another $105,000 loan but at the time City Council decided to convert to a grant so really what they did was just sort of delay the decision to forgive that was sort of a common practice back then at the time and now what a best practice is considered to be really is keeping the loan keep having leverage to ensure continued affordability over time and the current staff recommendation is to again defer all payments so there should be no impact to their operations thank you miss lake miss LaBerge and once again CFC picked up this in 2012 when the AIDS program gap and it up disbanding and we picked this up in 2012 and the minutes of our meeting said that part of our understanding of picking this up was that that forgivability provision and the City Council thought about that discussed and authorized it back then and I understand the city's concern for some providers but we're not that provider we're a nonprofit that's been here for over 40 years and we've consistently provided year after year of quality affordable housing so it'll put us in a much better position if this loan is made affordable or forgiven and we're putting a position where we could instead not having this debt loan that we could actually use money to provide more housing in the city and county of Santa Cruz thank you should be considered a one-off from that philosophy because we've proven our reliability and we we've proven our passion for low-cost mental health housing in the city thank you councilmember thank you and thank you mr. LaBerge for saving me on the CDBG that I had a comment and question on there's we have two CDBG and I just found the wrong one so I wanted to ask you about because I recall this being before us and at the time we did decide to continue along the same path that's being recommended today and and I recall there was some discussion but I don't recall the conclusion to that discussion about the potential to provide loan forgiveness in exchange for affordability for that property and perpetuity because as we heard miss Lake mentioned their you know best practice is is intended to try to maintain that to preserve that affordability and we know that's what you're doing but how do we sort of ensure that continues over time if we're making this if we were to make that move I think that's a good question and in legal parlance there's a rule against perpetuity just for that precise reason that this is a 1947 house the next year we're in the process or this year we're in the process of putting almost $30,000 into the rehab and this is CFSC money we're putting into rehab of that the concept of perpetuity somewhat boggles the mind of a day-to-day homeowner the concept that forever and ever and ever and this housing is going to destruct through termites and passage of time and on a yearly basis we're putting in maybe 30 to $50,000 now that to forestall that day but to have it in perpetuity doesn't really make common sense to any landowner in the city we want to be in a position where someday we may rebuild on that land but we're not going to have that housing and I'd say and I understand the city's concerns but when we've been here for over 40 years providing affordable housing we're not cutting and running we're going to stay in and we're going to do more affordable housing and not having that death load is going to put us in a position to make more housing that's that's my for the questions or comments by council members let me if Miss Lake could could join us again for a moment thank you good afternoon again Miss Lake thank you I think that the city's policy would I understand to be the policy about not forgiving I understand the notion of protecting the city's assets which that loan is an asset of the cities and I think that that's the right policy I also think that the reason for that policy is not as persuasive to me in this case Mr. LaBerge has articulated it they're not going anywhere it's been our partners for 40 years I understand if we make an exception here somebody else going to come in and say well we've been here 32 years and somebody 18 year whatever it may be well that's why we're asked to exercise discretion from time to time so Miss Lake I think the policy is quite good I think it makes sense I think in this instance having an illiquid asset at the bottom of our pile of assets as the city of Santa Cruz is misleading in the following regard that's we're never going to liquidate that asset simply not going to happen so it's irrelevant that it's on our books from my point of view well if we're not going to liquidate that asset and we've got a partner who is trustworthy and it's going to be in their interest to help us get more housing of the most difficult kind to undertake I think it may make sense and I'm going to need a bit of guidance here about whether we can today make a different decision here and now my preference would be to exceed to the request of mr. LaBerge and and the Darwin Street housing project and and go in that direction making some kinds of findings that while we respect our own policy on this it does have we do have discretion and in this case we're exercising that discretion because we do have a long-term partner and because this is a illiquid asset that is unlikely to ever become a liquid asset for any other purpose for us so I'm asking mr. Kandadi would the appropriate motion be to do that or to continue the item and have it come back in some way consistent with the general direction that I'm trying to move in I would prefer the latter because I would want to look at what legal mechanisms we need for sure this is done in an appropriate way am I am I correct though in believing that we have the discretion to do what I just described I believe so but I would also look into that question prior to the council taking formal action let me ask if the council would have any objection to continuing this item until our next regularly a gendered meeting a genderized meeting scheduled meeting with direction to the city attorney to and and the other appropriate staff members and perhaps miss Lake and others to meet with mr. LaBerge and others from your organization and see if it is possible to structure a forgiveness of that loan with certain findings that would not make it a precedent that we would always do that but instead here's a narrowly cast exception around which we have jurisdiction or discretion rather is that agreeable to council members did you make that motion I'm happy to make that motion and I motion is there a sec motion a second motion by miss walk in second by miss brown I'd like to add additional language to ask our staff to explore if we were to move in that direction are there any other unintended impacts that could be associated with that direction as well I'd like to have all the information before I decide and I would just you get to agree to it fair enough I would just ask given that I expect that we will be speaking with mr. LaBerge and also having some internal discussions that the council direct that will be brought back at the May 23rd meeting given our current timeline for agenda preparation it's a little tight to get it back by the night that's fine 23 more than happy to meet 23rd will be the report back date debate or discussion on this seen and hearing none clerk will call the roll do we need public comment because we do have someone online anyone with us wish to make public comment anybody on the phone clerk will call the roll I have one person online we will listen to that person good afternoon are you talking to me yes I'm temp it's Morris I'm actually calling about 481 is this the inappropriate time to do that about the I'm so I'm so hold on say I'm sorry did you say I'm 31 on the I'm sorry maybe my game the numbers wrong but on the gun issue I was calling about that well so let me tell you the item we're on we're on item 16 223 Darwin Street is that the item you wish to comment on no I don't okay we'll be back with you when we get to your item I thank you clerk will call the roll member Newsom I Brown I what can I Brunner I voluntary Johnson I vice mayor Boulder I Mariculee hi motion carries in this order yes we're gonna stand in recess for two minutes council is back in session following a brief recess we are now I'm going to recognize councilmember Watkins for a motion for what reason yes thank you so I'd like to make a motion that we postpone until the first meeting in June item number 33 which is the tobacco product waste update and have that discussion at that time is there a second second second by the vice mayor on your motion yeah just I it was brought to my attention that we have a very full agenda today and most likely would have this request come before us when we got to the item and I wanted to acknowledge and thank our county partner who's here but also wanted to save you hours of your afternoon not necessarily needing to sit here until we actually have this question come before us at item number 33 so essentially looking at how we can move this item up in our agenda and then have the discussion forthcoming at the first meeting in June it was an update but then discussion in and I mean Matt you're welcome to speak to it was just essentially say that we don't have a good we have a full agenda so this was one that could potentially be moved at this time do you have anything you were saying this item from the county yeah what we're trying to do here is is get through our agenda not have you wait until eight or nine o'clock tonight to testify we're gonna post all the way to June rather than eight or nine o'clock tonight but when we do hear it we'll hear it more timely fashion for you you won't have to wait around you have any objection to that you okay okay all right okay good further question or comment clerk will call the roll in the motion council member newson hi Brown hi what kids hi Brunner hi Calentary Johnson hi vice mayor Golder hi and mayor Achilles I motion carries and so ordered we are on the consent public hearing this is items 27 through 29 inclusive we will be taking these items up let me ask if there are council members who wish to pull an item or have a comment on these items yes finally my comment miss Brown okay so I just wanted to say that this is this is a much bigger item on the HUD annual action plan within that we have committed to funding improvements at the Civic Center and we have we've heard from folks from the community about this and I just wanted to say since this is gonna happen with little fanfare I absolutely very much support this I'm glad that we're able to do it at this time and appreciate your your love of our Civic Center which I also love and your continued patronage of the facility so thanks for for being here and speaking up anyone else any consent any public comment on these items anyone with us on the phone or online no okay okay these are public hearings on items 27 28 29 last call for any input or comment testimony seen and hearing none motion to approve those items as presented would be in order miss brown moves miss calling tarry Johnson seconds clerk will call the roll council member newson hi Brown hi what can't I runner hi Helen tarry Johnson hi I smear golder hi I'm here killing oh you're welcome very much all right we are on item 30 this is a public hearing item concerning 530 Front Street and other related matters miss stanger oh it is not miss Tanger it is mr. Butler thank you mayor leave about our director how are you sir doing great how are you very well hello mayor and council members I'm leave out their director of planning and community development and just as a brief introduction to this item back in 2017 the city council approved height increases to the area roughly between Soquel and Cathcart streets south down to Laurel Street in our downtown area plan and that has spurred a significant amount of redevelopment and this project is is one of those projects that was spurred as a result of those height changes and we just issued building permits two or three weeks ago for the front Riverfront project at the easterly terminus of Cathcart Street and we're really excited about the the results that we will see as these sites redevelopment as these sites redevelop on the east side of front street between Soquel and Laurel in particular because they're gonna be offering the opportunity for us to change what the development pattern was many decades ago which is where we had turned our backs to the river and these projects are really gonna offer the opportunity to celebrate the river and the great asset that we have in our downtown with that river as the second level of these development projects will meet up with the newly filled area between the current Riverwalk and the levee or in the second level of the new construction and so I think that's a really exciting component and something that our whole community is gonna have the opportunity to enjoy and I just wanted to point out that the council's efforts back five years ago six years ago now have really made a difference and as these projects move forward I think we're gonna have a really great asset for our whole community to enjoy and with that I'll turn it over to Clara to present the project okay sorry for the delay I'm good afternoon mayor and city council members my name is Clara Stanker I'm a senior planner with the Department of Planning and Community Development I'm gonna give you a presentation on 530 Front Street that's a mixed use it's a development application for mixed use I'm building eight stories 276 apartment dwelling units and 6865 square feet of commercial space so starting with community engagement the project completed a pre-application review in early 2020 after the pre-application review and before formal submittal of an application for entitlements the applicant held a community meeting on May 19th 2020 consistent with the city's community outreach policy for development applications so this community meeting had about 40 attendees committee members expressed questions and comments about design for climate change and solar panels automobile and bike parking unit size and affordability project timeline and building lifespan accessibility to open spaces bird safe design and flooding potential then after the initial project review of the formal application by staff the applicant submitted revised plans that showed a substantially larger project then that was shown to the community because the applicant hadn't now incorporated a request for 50% density bonus so at staff requests the applicant held a second community meeting and this meeting also had about 40 attendees questions and comments from the public included bike parking bike lanes on Front Street building design programming along the levy design of artistic light ballards landscaping water supply unit affordability developer profit and wage standards for construction workers and then while a planning commission hearing was not required for this project the applicant consulted with staff and decided to bring the project to the planning commission at the March 2nd meeting to obtain feedback and a recommendation so the planning commission recommended approval of the project with some additional conditions of approval including for any color or material changes to be approved by the planning director prior to application for building permits for the planning director to refer any significant design changes to a planning commission subcommittee for review a condition to select the mural artist and ensure that the mural proposed for the building is completed along with building construction and conditions to increase the number of electric vehicle charging stations and reduce the potential for clutter on residential balconies so these recommendations are all included as conditions of approval okay so the project site is located in the downtown at the corner of Front Street and SoCal Avenue it's surrounded by mixed use and commercial uses and it's also adjacent to the San Lorenzo River the project area includes four lots as well as an area of city owned land between those lots and the Riverwalk lots have a general plan designation of regional visitor commercial slash downtown which supports mixed use developments and other uses allowed by the downtown plan the city owned land has a general plan designation of natural area and that accommodates undeveloped land including land designated for public recreation and this part of the project site the project will fill the levy or fill the space between the levy and the building and construct a public extension area connecting the new building to the Riverwalk okay so the proposed building is eight stories and a little bit over 92 feet tall I'm gonna describe how the project got to this size and how the buildings is big and also how the amount of and also talk about the amount of housing and affordable housing that we'll get as a result so the base height for projects in the front street riverfront area of the downtown plan is 50 feet this is the maximum building height that would be allowed without an approval for additional height and the base height is shown by the red line that you can see across the elevation drawing the site is located in additional height zone B which allows height above the standard 50 feet up to 70 feet when certain criteria are met with a recommendation from the planning director and approval by city council so this project includes a request for additional height and the resulting building is the additional height is shown by the pink line in the drawing and then if the additional height is approved the project then that project then constitutes the base density project from which the applicant is requesting a 50% density bonus and so the density bonus which is the ultimate project that the applicants proposing here is shown with a green line on the top so as you can see in the chart the resulting project the density bonus project has many more units and also more affordable units than a project that conforms to the base height or the additional height which is the base density project the additional height project adds 13 more low-income inclusionary units compared to a base height project the density bonus doesn't add a greater number of affordability compared to the additional height base density project but as you can see quite a number of those units are now very low income instead of low income okay so talking a bit about the project design the ground floor along front street and so Cal Avenue has commercial uses a residential lobby and an internal parking garage floors 2 through 8 have the residential units that range from studios to two bedrooms the project is generally designed to meet the design standards of the front riverfront area of the downtown plan the downtown plan on this site specifically calls for the Soquel and front intersection to be treated as a gateway to the downtown and this project accomplishes that with a pedestrian plaza at that intersection a well articulated building wall on Soquel Avenue and a couple of outdoor dining patios along the Soquel Avenue frontage this is a view of the building from the south on front street you can see there's a consistent and detailed design that wraps around this side of the building this is a view of the east side of the building facing the Riverwalk and also the north side facing Soquel Avenue on this side the ground floor has commercial and also active residential amenity uses the upper floors are all residential there's the public plaza extension area and that has stairs and pathways connecting it to the Riverwalk and then in the northeast corner of the project which is on the bottom right of the screen there are accessible pathways connecting the extension area Soquel Avenue and the Riverwalk so here you can see the shaded area near the bottom of the screen between the Riverwalk Soquel Avenue and the proposed building which this area has been identified by the Public Works Department as the location of a future pump station the new pump station is in the conceptual stage it's for pumping stormwater in high storm events it's in the conceptual stage and at this point staff doesn't know how much of this shaded area the pump station will take up as you can see this area includes the outdoor dining patio the accessible pathways and a substantial amount of landscaping the project in this area was also proposing to use to implement some stormwater infiltration to meet stormwater requirements for the project so in an effort to facilitate development of this project while the pump station design is still not known staff and the applicant have collaborated to include a condition of approval that will allow the applicant to construct a portion of the restaurant patio install temporary landscaping in this area and move the stormwater and accessibility features further south on the extension area once a pump station design is known the city will install other public amenities in this area such as lighting or pedestrian pathways and we'll collaborate with the applicant on enlarging the dining patio if that's possible and mutually desired the applicant has also been working on a concept to show how this will be addressed and I believe they're going to present that today okay so finally staff is recommending minor changes to two conditions of approval condition number 11 is a standard condition regarding vacant buildings this standard condition got some updated language late last week and that's shown here and then in addition staff is recommending some slight changes to the wording of condition number 12 regarding the pump station and indoor noise attenuation for the new building on summary staff recommends that city council adopt the resolution acknowledging the environmental determination and a project with their proposed conditions of approval and the revised conditions 11 and 12 this concludes my presentation and staff is available for questions well thank you very much do we have questions at this time from council members we'll also reserve the right to ask you some questions a little later on during this presentation but let me see if there are initial round of questions at this moment okay so thank you very much for your presentation let me ask of mr. Bristow and the Swenson builders for your presentation good afternoon sir good afternoon so first of all I just want to say good afternoon mr. Mayor vice mayor and city council members my name is Jesse Bristow with Swenson builders I'm the development project manager for this project and we really appreciate your time today and taking this proposal development proposal under consideration so while staff's pulling up the presentation just want to first off say thank you to planning staff and public works it's been a long road there's been some unforeseen things that have happened but I think we're able to get to a project that is meeting the overall intent and design of the of the downtown plan and I think we we came to a final project that that meets city's goals staff's desires and our intent for the project so we appreciate that very much I'm ready to open it it's some sense somebody else has it open I just want to make sure the intention is for me to do it I think that's a question I'll do it I'm executive decision thank you I'll try to be relatively quick I think Clara's staff report was very thorough and we'll just try to highlight where we started and how we got here and today so we first originally submitted and a pre application in 2020 and that had 170 units that required a community meeting where we receive feedback from planning staff and city staff and we receive feedback from the community in general and so taking that into account through through 2020 with you know everyone was dealing with kind of an unforeseen situation that no one had ever been in before with the pandemic we took that time to to implement new design take that community feedback and and I think somewhere between mid to the end of 2020 we submitted a full application of 170 units during during the time between 2020 to 2022 during 2020 the state density bonus was 35% California state density bonus and so our original application didn't include a state density bonus but in 2022 new law went into effect where the state density bonus was 50% increase on on your conforming model and so that that was an incentive for us to to kind of redesign the project and that's when we submitted a full application 184 units with the 50% increase giving us 276 units and at the end of 2022 we were deemed complete and believe in March we went to planning commission and received a five five to one approval recommendation of approval to the city council and we're here today so next slide so this is a very rough design early on with our preliminary application we feel we've come a long way we're happy with the design that we we have today but this is what we first presented and and it's obviously it's evolved quite a bit with with staff and community input next slide please so this this was our full first full application in 2020 so this was a six-story building and at 170 units and one note I'd like to make in the front we see that triangular green we call the pizza slice and ended up being a parcel that was owned by parks department staff planning staff and parks reached out to us and asked if we could incorporate that into the gateway they felt that you know was was being underutilized so how can we do that so we took that into our consideration incorporated into our design and took that time and resource to get where it is today additionally we were told to open up the the interface the living interface that we call it the levee deck and right now it's a little close there's a lot of landscaping the next slide you'll see it's it's been opened up where we have the ramping we have some lighting we actually added an amphitheater which I'll speak to a little bit more in detail later and and we opened up the staircases one thing I would like to highlight before we go to the next slide the south two towers go straight up and we were asked by planning staff to have this step back even further to ensure that we have we're more in line with the design standards I believe this is a standard that we could have a wave with a density bonus but we elected not to so the next slide so they they step in to have the building wedding cake a little bit more and this is the final design that you're hearing today so next slide please so just a quick overview we have 184 units in the conforming model and 20% through the city requirement is 37 below market rate units so we have 15% that are very low income and 5% that are low income so we have 28 very low income units and 9 low income units and with that density bonus we are receiving 92 extra units so in total of 276 next slide please and I just want to highlight this is just a quick summary of the unit programming but of the six units or the six commercial spaces those are all conditioned to be food ready if we have the appropriate tenant we do have the designated restaurant space at the north end of the building that's because we wanted that to be the attraction it's where we want in the activity where we would lead people up from more the core downtown such as front street and Soquel and Pacific Avenue leading people up to to the levy next slide please in addition I'm not sure if Clara mentioned this but we have a hundred percent rental I'm not sure if that was brought up so this is a hundred percent rental project it's a hundred percent electric there will be photovoltaic solar on the roof we did have a 22 electrical vehicle charging stations at the request of Planning Commission we up that to 36 and we have 372 class 1 bike parking spaces that means that they're actually secure and in a enclosed area such as a bike cafe or a storage locker and then we have 12 bike spaces that are you know your standard bike lock that you'd find outside we're really trying to encourage multi-modal transportation with this development next slide please so just want to highlight a little bit about the the stepbacks that I discussed so with our conforming project in those 92 units from the density bonus we essentially took the third and fourth floor and doubled them so our fifth floor and sixth floor became the seventh and eighth floor and the top floor requirement in the conforming model requires 60% of the four below so it can only be 60% of the four below we're requesting it to be 74% and that's because we we made the building fatter but we still wanted to make sure that that we're meeting that that step in we wanted to be respectful of the downtown design again I think this is something that we could have waived as far as that design but we're just asking to go up a little higher and make some adjustments as far as these standards we still want to meet them what we build is our as a reputation and has our resume on it so you know we're very conscious of what we do here next slide this is our typical first floor one thing I just want to highlight on the south end or the bottom right of this photo is next to the lobby and leasing is there are two transformer rooms and that's because it is 100% electric so the gas that is not normally sent or historically sent to residential now needs to be made up with more electrical capacity so it does require more transformer rooms and we just want to as we develop the downtown and make changes within our city and try to have a greener future that's just something that be conscious of we're gonna have larger rooms with our walls with I think they're blast doors that can't be painted and it's part of the utility requirement from PG&E so it's kind of out of our hands but again we we think it's a good concept for it to be 100% electric next slide please so I just wanted to highlight some of the amenities here and what we've added to the public interface we do have the two private courtyards on the interior but everything out of those courtyards is publicly accessible all those businesses are operating we as the applicant and the developer are required to maintain and keep that as a safe area we have added the an amphitheater which I'll speak to a little bit more and so just want to highlight the the public interface that's going to be built here and and everyone's gonna be able to use so thank you next slide and here's just the the top floor that highlights that instead of it being 60 percent it's 74 percent but we also have a rooftop garden which is accessible to the tenants and it also serves as a stormwater control method so thank you next slide and so briefly just want to highlight some of those things that I spoke to so on the very south end is that amphitheater so we we've met with coastal watershed and planning staff mentioned that the San Lorenzo urban plan I believe it's called the Slurp has a long-term plan to build an amphitheater in the river that's not feasible with its sensitive habitat so we did have a switchback there pathway which wasn't very open so we feel this is a passive staircase it can be somewhere where people just sit and but it also can be programmed for a play for people to play music and there is a little bit of a bulb out and that is a utility requirement for the utility vehicle so it has multiple functions and we think it serves the levy well and additionally this just kind of highlights where we've stepped back the building and we have those open staircases and pathways up so next slide so this was brought up during planning commission and I'm not sure if Clara brought it up but I think often when you look at one project independently it can be a little daunting with the height so what we wanted to do is just demonstrate what is what is coming today right now we have the Anton project which is on on Laurel in front that's 85 feet and what we want to do is just give it a little bit perspective of how that looks to scale so if you go to next slide please so this is very rough but and it's from a Sketchup model so I apologize to the other projects architects we weren't able to articulate it but it just shows that that you know of all these buildings that you see right now there is an existing building that at 68 feet and everything else that's being built except for the potential cruise hotel is going to be 80 feet and above or between 80 and 90 feet and in our project sits at 89 feet so you see the relationship that will exist as we move forward with with with these types of projects next slide please and just want to show the relationship between the riverfront project south of us that was I believe approved in 2019 might have been 2020 and then you can see in the foreground the library that's at 84 feet so they're relatively similar heights thank you and one more thing I just wanted to speak to is that you know we are providing 37 affordable units that levy interface that we're building and required to maintain that's probably about two million dollars worth of construction but additionally you know we do know we're building for lots of people when we understand that there are impacts and this is I would say 30% of what our total costs are going to be with city fees and in processing and whatnot but I just want to highlight that you know 50,000 is going to the green building education fund we're going to pay about two hundred thousand dollars at the traffic impact fees the school districts going to have a 750,000 dollars child impact child care impact fee which I believe was implemented last year through the city I might be wrong but that's a hundred thousand dollars there and we're paying 176 to fire department safety and almost 180 to police safety so just that one sub totals 1.4 million dollars which is my highlight that we we do contribute in multiple ways and and we're happy to do so we're happy to be here and invest but we just want to highlight that we're not just building marker 8 housing and that's it so thank you next slide and this is our conceptual design for the potential minor modification I do have the actual file if you want to it might be hard to read but essentially the the light blue area would be public works and we have a little bit of a cutback for the restaurant so the restaurant deck is that purple area where we can still have some tables we can still have a pass through and the stormwater control that Clara mentioned we plan to move it over to the area in front of the bachi ball court so potentially we'll have a switch back there for people to ramp up to to the deck and because that ramp that's in the public workspace we just don't know yet so in order for us to move forward with our project and our requirements we're trying to accommodate so and so potentially the bachi court might have to go away but we could probably replace it with some benches or maybe somewhere to play cornhole or something like that so we would like to present this as potentially something if city councils has concern about not understanding what's going to be there we would like to present this as as a condition of this you know you would like to see this happen when we come back for the minor month that allows us to keep moving forward with our design and next slide and that's it so I'm here for questions thank you all right thank you very much thank you staff thank you mr. bristow very much appreciate that we're going to take a five minute break we will be back on this item in five minutes time councils back in session after a brief recess this afternoon we're on item number 30 this is a an item regarding 530 front street development proposal we have received a staff report we've received a presentation by the applicants went some builders we're now on council member questions of either staff or the applicant let me ask if there are questions miss brown you have your microphone up yeah the applicant is here do I see the applicant here yeah justy thanks so I did want to ask a question we had a conversation about the project I I recognize the incredible work that you've done to try to create a project that will accomplish our need for housing and you know also you know be viable for you I and when this project was in a different iteration we we talked about this as well so I wanted I do want to ask you though because and I ask about this pretty much every anytime we make a decision that involves a project approval and how it relates to our inclusionary ordinance and I recognize that I'm not going to go through that whole conversation people kind of understand where I'm coming from but what I see here is you know the new project with a 50% density bonus a lot of benefits have kind of been included in the new state laws so significantly reduced risk for building a project like this I would I would argue the costs are you know there's a lot of benefits a lot of financial benefits and incentives associated with the new state laws you know what they are and what we have here is a project that is now significantly greater height and significantly higher number of units with you know the change I see is you know pretty minimal number of affordable units the level I get that the the depth of the subsidy for very low income units is important and but what we're talking about here are units that are going to be if I'm looking at the figures you know I'm trying to figure this out and it depends on the unit size and the you know whether it's a single person or not but essentially you got to earn $27 an hour to qualify for the very low income units that's that's the cut that's the percentage under HUD guidelines of our median income that's a lot of money for you know very few very few units at that that level of affordability so we're not we're talking about you know again 13% of a project being either low or very low meaning that people who earn 27 to $37 an hour will be able to afford those units and then another 87% which are going to be market with whatever that means we'll find we'll we'll know when that time comes so I just wanted to hear from you a little bit more about why we can't work towards achieving that 15% in a project again recognizing the rules the framework that we're in it seems like we've got a significantly bigger project significantly greater height significantly higher community impact as a result of that which I am not opposed to but in the context of the affordable housing crisis we just I feel like we need to use every tool we can so I'd just like to hear you comment on that I recognize there are other community benefits in the project sure certainly so thank you so right we did highlight the the public benefit of this interface and the cost to build and maintain that we did highlight the impacts the impact fees that are going to the city a part of allowing this type of project to move forward and regarding the HUD numbers one and we don't have control of that so you know as far as that application and qualification I'm not sure I'm not sure if you're limited to that under the low or extremely low but I I don't have the resources or the knowledge right now to to respond to that but the one thing was is that you know it was acceptable for planning commission that our 37 units and we appreciated their their insight secondly when it when it comes to our previous project that we did get entitled which was 130 Center Street we were here and we did present to planning commission that if the project did not get appealed we would offer four more units and we'd go from 31 to 35 over 233 units in total and it was appealed but we did acquiesce to city council members request and we provided four more units but we did that under the guys that we didn't want to set precedent and if we do offer more we're setting precedent you know the project next to us they did a density bonus they didn't have to offer more than what was required I don't think and so we'd be appreciated to be held to that same standard in a in a larger discussion and maybe not appropriate right now but if the city were to come to Swanson with Rena numbers and say hey our total renumbers Rena numbers are we would like Swanson to build a hundred of these units on this site I'd say sure we can do that but I need to build 600 market rate so I think there's a way to reverse engineer it because at the end of the day someone else is paying for it and we don't qualify for for state benefits or federal benefits and grants to allow more affordability so the market rate units are gonna pay for that they're gonna subsidize it some someone is paying for it it's either through taxes or it's gonna be the market rate in it so at this time unfortunately I don't think we'll be able to offer any more the council members questions comments I didn't I don't have a follow-up question I appreciate your I didn't want to leave it like that I appreciate your your comments and I really appreciate your interest in having those conversations I think that's what we mean that's the purpose of planning right and and we have a housing element item on our agenda for later today that is gonna open up the conversation about how many units we need to be working towards and and so really appreciate that as part of your response absolutely thank you thank you very much this would be the opportunity we're going to open this for public comment participation this be the opportunity for anyone who's with us today who wishes to come in on this particular item to do so also those of you who may be watching and want to join online this would be the time to get teed up to do that good afternoon Miss Greenside good afternoon Mayor Keeley and council members in this era the public feels a little bit like David against Goliath when it comes to these incredibly massive buildings and I think that the one that's under construction at Laurel and Front Street the city's website says that is six stories and the developer just said that it was of the representative sorry Swenson representative said that that was 85 feet for six stories this he says his eight stories at 92 feet so maybe one of you could just ask a question about that I think for most people in the community or many many people that if they're shocked shocked at the one at front Laurel the mass the scale of it and this will be even bigger I try to I listen carefully not try to and I still can't quite understand if today you are approving the extra height from 50 to 70 if that's so I would ask you to seriously consider not approving that people who are building these big buildings they get their density bonus which they don't have to factor in to provide below market rate housing so it is still a pretty sweet deal but this feels to us in the community I'm sure there's some others who disagree but I think for most people this is out of scale out of character and when we bring in a lot of market rate to new people that has an impact well beyond just providing housing this abstraction was not abstraction when they're provided with but a very small percentage of below market rate the low-income very low-income people I know earn $18 an hour they won't be able to compete for these very low-income apartments and it's only as I calculated quickly 13.5% so I also when you're presented with schematics like this I've noticed that frequently it's from an aerial view or a higher view nothing shows what it will be like at ground level and I really think that that does a disservice for the ability to imagine the impact of this scale in our town and lastly I don't see the time again oh it's up there where is it oh 22 seconds I should remember that thank you lights in most of these projects they say the lights will conform to ADA requirements and they don't this looks like it'll have a lot of lighting from the commercial residential I think that something condition of approval thank you thank you do we have someone online we will hear someone online at this point good afternoon hello my name is Gabriel Sanders I am the director of housing and community development for the Monterey Bay Economic Partnership and you probably saw in your packet a letter of support from our organization for the 530 front street project the fact is that the Rena number is high this project contributes some of the affordable housing that it's looking for and some of the units that are not already set aside in the project for affordable housing are indeed affordable at the moderate income levels toward the upper end of it sure in that 80 to 120% of my range but that's what we call affordable by design because when you achieve this kind of density on extremely expensive land that's something that everybody commenting should keep in mind I think when you're building on land this expensive it is quite a task financially to make the numbers work both in favor of the community and the developer and fact is developers like this account for at least 80% of development in California so when a developer is able to make something like this pencil we can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good so adding 267 units to the housing stock sorry 276 to the housing stock in Santa Cruz is a significant step toward achieving some of the Rena as well as working with the supply and demand that are natural in the market are those the answers to all the housing needs in the city of course not but one thing to keep in mind is it is also a city this is a growing city growing economy and there is high demand for housing and this project meets it I hope that again we don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good and Mbep is happy to support this project with the understanding that helps the city meet its renewables and it is in compliance with the downtown expansion plan almost to the T so we applaud Swenson for making something work on this parcel and we hope the city will acknowledge that and could the project. Thank you. Thank you very much. Good afternoon. My name is Lee Broca. I'm a general contractor 35 years with the license 40 years in the trade. But first I'd like to make a comment is a 22 year resident of Santa Cruz grotesquely oversized compared to future grotesquely oversized does not make it pretty or acceptable. As a contractor I noticed that there's been a lack of discussion about the underground for this building. This building has to be anchored into the ground is not going to be built on a slab there's going to be one two or three stories below in order to keep this building erect and they haven't talked about it and it's so close to the river by the time you're about eight maybe 10 feet down you're going to be at the level of the river in hydrostatic pressure forcing water into a hole. Even if it has a cement wall around it is not something that you can gloss over. You're going to have to pump water out of the basement of this building and away from the foundation of this building until the cows come home for ever. Thank you. Miss Bush someone else online. No. Good afternoon, sir. Nicholas Whitehead. Wow, I'm sorry I fell asleep during the COVID era and missed all those exciting Zoom meetings. Now I wake up like Ripman Binkhole and I see the magnificent edificis being when I first saw the picture I thought are we in Palm Beach or even Mar-a-Lago or somewhere you know. It doesn't look like the kind of thing that you'd expect to see in a small seaside town. However, of its design, the kind of design it is, it is an interesting achievement. I do congratulate the designers. They've gone all out to make it a standout building but it's just so huge. I want to ask a few technical questions. A developer says it'll all be electric powered. Okay, with an enterprise so large, what happens if there's a storm failure or other damaged electrical system? Does that mean we have to turn on a lot of diesel motors? Boy, that's a lot of pollution. Well, maybe they're going to use the power wall, the Tesla power wall, so it's a huge electric self. I'm surprised you didn't answer that question. My final point is circulation. You know, if we keep building these blockbuster designs, is the wind, is the fresh ocean breeze going to really travel? Is it going to be healthy in these buildings and between these buildings? It's something our planners, overall, public and private, should give more attention to and the state should have developed policy on that. Thank you very much. Thank you, sir. Still no one else online, Ms. Bush? Very good. Good afternoon, sir. Hi, Bradley Snyder. I just wanted to say that, you know, after having lived in several buildings built by Barry Swanson and seeing him develop 555 from scratch, from, you know, from the ground, you know, to the day they topped out until they finished it, and then looking at this new development at Laurel and Pacific, roughly that block that's been developed and just thinking about units that are in the dimensions that I've lived in two Barry Swanson buildings. I lived at the St. George for three, approximately three years and at 425 Pacific for three years. It's been so long, 401, 401 Pacific, excuse me. Basically, they're tiny. I mean, they're very confining and they're really, really pricey. And so I feel a little bit like, you know, it does solve, you know, a concern or an issue, which is, you know, people don't have options to rent the students. You know, UCSC's kind of gotten to the point where, you know, I'm feeling like, ironically, suggesting the city changes its name to UCSankers. It's basically, you know, yeah, everybody, everybody from many, many different sides of that particular problem are, you know, they're struggling for, you know, access to places to rent, but I just don't feel these are going to be very affordable. And then also one concern I have, one definite concern I have is that the scope of the building, the size, the height, if you subtract say the 10 foot or however tall the levee is, 10 to 12 feet, you're looking at 80 feet of, for a very narrow parcel, you're shielding the afternoon sun from the estuary, which, you know, has its consequences on the habitat there. So that's my input. Thank you very much. Thank you, sir. Ms. Bush, still no one else online? No one else. Anyone else wish to make comment on this item? Hearing's closed matter is back before the council. This would be the opportunity for the council member to make a motion, then we will debate that motion. I'll make a motion. What is your motion, sir? Motion for development proposal at 514, 516, 518, 524, and 530 Front Street involving lot line adjustment, non-residential demolition authorization permit, special use permit, design permit, additional height requests, density bonus requests, revocable license for outdoor extension area, and heritage tree removal permit to demolish existing commercial buildings, reconfigure four lots into one, remove eight heritage trees, and construct a mixed use building with 276 residential dwelling units, including a 50% density bonus and 6,865 square feet of commercial space with design variations to downtown plan development standards on a site in the CBD slash F-P slash F-P-O zone district and within the Front Street riverfront area of the downtown plan. Second. There's a motion. There's a second by Ms. Calantar Johnson. Mr. Newsom, you may open on your motion. Thank you, Mayor Keely. I'm excited for this project. I think this project will be a great addition to our downtown and our riverfront, and by extension my district and our city. The project provides 276 units of much needed housing with 38 of the units being affordable housing and 28 of those units being very low income. And this project will also draw more focus towards the river while bringing more investment into our river walk. And it will also allow for members of our community to live where they work and use alternative means of transportation when commuting to work. So I support this project. Thank you, sir. Yes, Ms. Bush. Sorry, I do just want to confirm that what you were reading, Council Member Newsom, is actually the title of the report. And I just want to confirm that the recommendation is specifically about a resolution. I can put it on the screen if you want or if the staff recommendation. You just read the whole title as opposed to the staff recommendation. Let me see if we can make this a little quicker. By way of clarification, you are moving the staff recommendation. Yes. Okay, there we go. That will be the motion. Agreeable to the second? Yes. That is the motion. Now under debate and discussion. I have a question. I asked the question earlier during question time, but I was just curious. And maybe staff and I may have missed this as I stepped out for a moment. In regards to the pump station and the timeline, did you specify kind of what that looks like in relationship to this development and process? Or could you expand on that? I can speak a little bit and then I'm going to lean on public works. So basically we have a very general concept, but we don't have a design. And we don't know that the timing of the design is going to line up with when the applicant is going to pull their building permit. That's why we kind of do this work around in that area. And I don't know if Curtis wants to come up and speak a little more to that. Okay. Let's do these at the microphone if you had a response. Thank you, sir. Good afternoon. Good afternoon, Mayor, Council. Curtis Buzinart, Public Works Engineering. I'm an engineering associate. As far as the timing of it, we're not sure. Shafran Wheeler is a consultant working on it. It's very, very conceptual at this time. Time frame. I really don't know. Katie Stewart is on the meeting and I think she can touch on that better than I can. Let me, if I might ask on that question. Perhaps for some of us, the question is, we approved this project as recommended. You have sufficient, the city then has sufficient space in that property to do it. You need to do going forward. You may do it concurrent with or following or whatever, but those are not in conflict with each other. Is that correct? Correct. Thank you. I think we're good. I just had a few comments, but I appreciate you framing that way, Mayor. That's essentially what I was getting at in terms of making sure that we had adequately planned for that or not had missed an opportunity to adequately plan for that. So anyways, thank you for framing it that way. I just had a brief comment. I know that there was a slide that went up in regards to the different impact fees and I appreciate that slide. I think, and I appreciate the context of community benefit associated with the slide. I, having been really trying very hard my whole time on council to get the childcare impact fee, I am really happy to see that on there. And just so you are in the broader community is aware, we have a serious challenge with childcare in our community, especially as we're thinking about our downtown and having density in terms of people and workforce. So it is a critical component of the fabric of our community and in addition to the other impact fees that are associated with that. So it is about a holistic community and putting that in that context, I think is important to reference and I'll leave it there. Thank you for the questions and comments. Ms. Brunner is recognized. Thank you. I just wanted to ask whoever could respond to how it will be anchored in the ground. I think that was brought up also the question about the six stories and 85 feet, eight stories, 92 feet. So I don't know if that would be Lee Butler or Jesse Bristow or both that could answer those questions that were brought up. Good afternoon, Mr. Butler. Good afternoon. Thank you, Council Member Brunner for that question. I can answer broadly speaking with respect to both of those that we have our experts in our building division, our building official, and our plan check engineers who review the building design at the building permit stage to ensure that the foundation is meeting all the various standards, both the seismic standards as well as the structural standards and taking into account the subsurface water flows that were identified by the prior speaker and making sure that the building foundation is sufficient to withstand the necessary forces in order to make sure that everyone is safe. So the foundation type can vary. I would defer to the applicant if you want specifics on what type of foundation they are seeking to pursue for the project. But we will be looking at it carefully as part of the building permit process and making sure that it's meeting all the applicable regulations from the building code. With respect to the number of stories, if you look at the Pacific Front Laurel project, that project has a first level from the exterior that is roughly 18 feet or so in height. You get that variation 18 or 20 feet or so. And that appears as one level from the outside. There's a mezzanine on the interior there. There are two levels of parking behind that 20 feet. And in portions of that area, there are offices and bike parking. And so that one level is perceived by some from the exterior. Sometimes it can be perceived as two levels depending on where you're at in the building. Similarly, there's a portion of that building above 75 feet. I believe it is where there is an eighth floor. If you're counting that first floor as two, then there's an eighth floor, which is only for a portion of the building, but that's a mezzanine level above some of the top residential levels. So as often is the case with our work, the answer for the number of floors is it depends on where you are looking at it in the building and how you're looking at it from the exterior or counting some of those interior levels. Thank you. Welcome. I also had a quick comment to Jesse Bristow who gave the presentation. I just wanted to also thank you for answering some of my questions. And I appreciate the visual of showing the context of the buildings that are coming around this site. I think that's something that when I talk with members of the public about all the development, it's hard not to look at the entire neighborhood. And if we only look at this one project, I would be crying out for more, for example, very low and low housing units. In the context of the five or so surrounding blocks, we have four buildings that will be 100% low income housing coming up right around it. In the context of the bigger city, we have a lot underway. So it was helpful to see those heights and the context of the surrounding blocks. So thank you because I think that helps everybody understand. And I also, let's see, on my notes, I think that, oh, Council Member Watkins asked my pump station timeline question. And my more further nuanced question on that was why that specific spot versus across the street, for example. Hi, Council Member. This is Katie Stewart, senior professional engineer in the Public Works Department. Hopefully I can give some more context to this. So at this point in the pump station design project, we have completed a feasibility study. So that evaluated all the possible locations along the storm drain line that runs along the toll of the levee where we could potentially site a new storm pump station to alleviate some of our capacity issues in that storm drain. We looked all the way from Josephine Street all the way down to Pump Station One, which is located just south of Laurel Street. And the location that was identified, this is the only feasible location to sort of solve our issues of capacity in existing storm drain pipes that are too small. Specifically the pipe that runs from Soquel Avenue south into the Pump Station at Laurel Street. So you're limited and there's not a lot you can do upstream to reduce the amount of flow that's entering the pipe there. So the current location was the one that was identified as our best and most feasible spot to site this. Thank you, Katie. I think that answers the question for me. And I just, overall my final comment is that, you know, in speaking with a lot of members of the public and some of the emails we've received and comments here in person. I think that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And we must remember that when we speak about something being grotesque or ugly. And we really have to look at the benefits of the housing and the housing inventory that this will bring to our city. And it's our housing demand of housing inventory at all income levels is so great. And I'm so proud of our city. If you all haven't read our recent press release that we are, I think it was 6% of the state. We are one of the 6% of the state that met our fifth cycle regional housing needs allocation goals in all income levels of housing. And so as we enter into our sixth cycle with, I think like triple the numbers. And I think it's really important to really look holistically at each unit as a win-win, especially when we have hundreds of voucher holders that cannot find a unit to rent. And they've received subsidized housing vouchers that will help them pay rent. And that includes even market rate rents in some cases, depending on the individuals. So I just want to put that into context and thank you so much. That concludes my question. Thank you, Council Member. Ms. Calentari-Johnson is recognized. Thank you. I'll just make some brief comments. I had the opportunity to meet with Jesse Bristow and team and staff. So I've asked my questions ahead of it, but I know that a lot of work has gone into this over the years. And I really appreciate the community engagement that's happened. I appreciate community coming to the various forums and providing feedback. And I appreciate city staff and Swenson working those into what we see as maybe the final product or close to final product. I know that while we are going through these shifts as a community, it's really challenging. We don't know. I mean, we can see all the renderings that we want, but we still don't know what it's going to look like and how it's going to feel. And change is hard and it can get messy. But I think what I want to invite folks to do is to be open to it because our community needs are changing. And so we need to meet those needs as my colleagues have said. I'm so glad that you brought up that we were one of the 6% that met the arena cycles and we have a lot more work to do. So it's just, it's an invitation to everybody, whether in support of this project or not. It's an invitation to think about how our community does need to shift in order to meet the changing demands and needs. So thank you for all the thoughtfulness that went into this by everyone, the staff and Swenson and community members. And I'm happy to support this when it comes to a vote. Thank you. Ms. Brown is recognized. Thank you, Mayor. Well, I actually have a question, a follow up question. And then I have a couple of brief comments because I do think and thank you, Councilmember Bruner for asking some of those follow up questions. But one that was also asked was related to the schematics, the renderings showing a particular perspective. And it's a question I've asked in the past about why, for architects and others, when projects come before us, why we don't see that street level view. And because we aren't going to know what it feels like, why don't we try to get a little bit closer to understanding what it's going to look and feel like. And so that question about why we can't have street view renderings. And I'm going to just add in here because it's people come and ask me, and I've asked about it, story polls as well. That would give people a real understanding, I think, or some better understanding. I mean, it's not going to do shading and all of that, but to get a sense of the height and kind of scale of these projects. So why can't we, I guess, why aren't they there and is that possible to do? Why not, if not? I'm going to permit that question. We don't typically do this under debate and discussion on emotion, but could you answer the general ladies question? Yes. So we have a checklist for what's required in applications, but we do require renderings and we do want them to be from the street view to see how it's going to look to a person on the street. We do have that for this project. I didn't show all the renderings in my presentation. I can share some with you now if you'd like. That's okay. I've seen them in the packet. I was just talking about, I mean, that's the schematic. I'm talking about renderings with people and stuff and so, you know, the feel of it, that kind of material. But it's all right. I don't want to be out of order here. It just occurred to me since a member of the public asked and it's been on my mind. I'd really like to better understand that if not here then at some point. And then I do have a couple of comments. Please, go ahead. Okay, so I guess I'll just say a couple of things. I want to clarify what we are doing here today. Just provide some information to help kind of clarify or crystallize what this project is. And I'm not saying this to suggest that I'm opposed to this project wholesale. But I do want people to understand and I want my colleagues to think about the fact that what we're doing here is, we're approving a project that is 106, no, yeah, 106 units more, so 60% more than what was previously approved for this site. And we are getting three additional affordable housing units for that. So I just want to say that because I recognize that we are in a constrained realm of possibility. I've said it over and over. But we have a situation where in this case, the developer is receiving a lot of additional incentives and benefits through state law and has asked for these waivers and concessions, which I know are technically by right. But there are other questions that could be asked. We haven't asked them here. I'm just going to suggest one of them. I'm not asking the question, but this is rhetorically to say, hey, we have, you know, I believe we should be, we could do better and we should be doing better and that we as a body should be asking for more. I'm very glad to hear Mr. Bristow that you are willing to engage in that conversation moving forward because I want to find a way to get to do better. Three more units that are affordable to people earning, you know, around 40 bucks an hour out for an additional 106 units is a pretty significant benefit with not much affordability. So I just, I wanted to be very clear about that. I'm also a bit dismayed by the lack of evidence. There's an assertion that's made as our planning staff generally do about the, this is what is needed in order for this project to pencil out. And it's just hard for me to imagine that that's universally the case that there aren't, you know, questions that could be asked in ways of looking at this a little bit differently when we're talking about such a massive increase in the scale and the number of units in the project. So I just have to say that I can't support it under those circumstances that there's a high, there's a significant height increase and we're again not getting any additional affordability out of that. So I think I'll leave it there and I look forward to future conversations. Further questions or comments? Thank you. A couple of thoughts before we go to a roll call. I don't think it's any big mystery that throughout the state after decades of local governments maybe not taking anywhere near as seriously as they should housing across a range of incomes, that the state of California whether, well, the state of California decided that the new housing policy is being defined in and sent forth from the state capital. City councils or the supervisors have lost enormous amounts of local land use control. If you like what's been going on the last few decades and then you don't like this, new world we're in. If you didn't like it, what's been going on in California in the last few decades, then you have a different view of the state legislation. I would say to those who are concerned about such issues as massing and height and other issues, your issue is with the state legislative delegation and if you haven't already brought them into your conversation, I suggest you do so. We are not the state legislature. We're a city council that needs to comply with the law. This will, however, the change in the state's approach to who is in charge will result in very significant making up of time in the city of Santa Cruz relative to building housing across a range of income categories. I don't think the state has that exactly right yet in terms of how they're trying to operationalize their desire to see substantially more housing and again, if you don't like the current state, I would suggest you speak with the state legislature and the governor about that because that's now out of our hands. We do have some discretion and exercising that discretion is important because building something in Santa Cruz versus someplace else, we all, every city, every community claims that it's unique and you know what? They're all right. Everyone is right. They're unique. Doesn't mean they're better or worse or something, they're unique. So building in Santa Cruz has always been a challenge. It's now, I think, becoming less so, quite a bit less so. I think the state has made it very clear. They are incenting the development of housing generally and they're doing more than just giving a head nod towards affordable housing. But from my point of view, if they wanted to be earnest about it, they would put a multi-billion dollar affordable housing general obligation affordable housing bond on the ballot, which if it's approved doesn't raise taxes because it has first claim on the state's general funds when they're assembling the budget. Those are Sacramento issues. I had my opportunity to be a state legislator and cast those votes and think about those concepts. Now I'm a mayor and I have to deal with the hand that has been given to me by the dealers in Sacramento. And in that regard, and without reference to that, without reference to that, I think this is a good project. Certainly with reference to that, then I think it's a quite good project. I wish there was Mr. Bristow and others with Swenson. We've had conversations about this particular project. I think you've gone a great distance on this. I would like to see two, three, four more units. I understand from your point of view with all the issues that you have to deal with, that's not available to you at this point from a business perspective. I respect that. I think Swenson has done more than a little bit of good development in the city of Santa Cruz. I consider you a local developer. I was telling the Swenson folks that I remember several years ago that the homeless garden project had its annual Hall Day wreath operation ready to go. And they had a downtown space that was ready for them and they was vacant and they were going into it. All of a sudden those folks had a tenant. There was going to be no homeless garden project wreath deal. And Swenson says, well, here we got a vacant office space, go ahead and do it. I think that is who you are. I think that is. And you've proved that time and time again. Asking for more or engaging in the conversation about more, especially in this case, two, three, four more moderate income level. I don't feel bad asking for that. I understand why you say no to that in this instance. And I look forward to the other developments you're going to bring forward because I know what you will do is you will engage us in conversations, especially. And I don't think there's an exception on the city council. For those who are looking to see what is the maximum opportunity for us to meet our extremely low, very low, low and moderate income housing goals. So we will be in conversations with you about that. And I thank you for all the good work you've done. I thank you for taking a hard look at the request for additional affordable units. And I look forward to our engagement earlier in the process on your future projects. Click will call the roll. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to clarify also that the staff recommendation was to approve the resolution with the conditions of approval, but staff actually proposed who edit the conditions of approval and I just want to make sure that those are to be included. The resolution is those amended portions of the recommendation from staff. Yes. That includes that. Okay. Council Member Newsom. Aye. Brown. No. Watkins. Aye. Brunner. Aye. Calentary Johnson. Aye. Vice Mayor Golder. Aye. And Mayor Achilles. Aye. The motion is approved, projects is approved. Thank you all very much for being here. Thank you for your input and your participation. We are on item, tell your wife, let's take 10 minutes. I wanted to do it with my cards. I do what he says. I wanted to do it with my cards. I wanted to do it with my cards this way. And on the back, John, Don Addison, and Gail Pellerin. Yep. City Council is back in session. We're going to make an amendment to our, to the order in which we're going to take things up. We are, instead of going directly to item 31, we are going to go directly to, thank you. We are going to instead proceed at this time to item number 34, proceed of the annual Assembly Bill 841 military equipment report. We are going to take this up in the interest of a couple of members of the public who have some other items that will conflict other calendar items for themselves tonight. And the Chief has been kind enough to accommodate this, this change in the order. So members, again, we are on item number 33. Chief, good afternoon, sir. Good afternoon, Mayor and council members. This is Bernie Escalani, chief of police. And I'd like to introduce Sergeant Josh Trog who will be introducing the report, the required AB 41 annual report. And you also received the detailed report with a higher level of details, but we're going to give more of a just a higher overarching review of that report and, and available for questions. Thank you. I'll turn it over to Sergeant Trog. Sergeant, good evening. Good evening, Mayor and council members. Thank you. So just for a little background, effective January of 2022, the state legislature required that we report on all items deemed as military equipment. So in May 10th of 2022, the city of Santa Cruz adopted ordinance and the Santa Cruz police department's policy 705 regarding all of these items. We are required to present an annual report. The report requires approval and the ordinance requires ongoing approval from the council each year that the report is presented. And the intent of the report is to establish safeguards and transparency and oversight for all of the department's equipment that falls under this AB 41. Next slide, please. So these slides, which I will go through fairly quickly, are just an overview of the items that we were talking about with some visual representations to assist. So this slide notes the items in category one, five, two and three, which are the robots, unmanned aerial vehicles, command and control vehicles, and the armored vehicle. Next slide, please. The slide depicts the transport vehicles specialized firearms and ammunition of less than 50 caliber and firearms and ammunition of greater than 50 caliber. Of course, a pepper ball, tear gas, flash bangs or noise flash diversionary devices, the 40 millimeter launchers and associated ammunition, the long range acoustic device. And then item 15 is all other specified equipment and for our policy, the items that fall under that were the department's AR 15 rifles as directed by council at the time that the original ordinance and policy were approved. The graph indicates where these items were deployed or used throughout the year. The yellow denotes training, the light green color denotes in the field, the dark green color denotes AOD or assist other department. And then the blue color, the darker blue color indicates refueling and then the lighter blue color indicates a demo. So with that, the AR 15 rifles were used in training 15 times throughout the year. We did not have a use of force with those rifles during the year. The 40 millimeter launchers were used 24 times by use. That means they were deployed doesn't necessarily mean they were used in the against a person, but they were deployed as a less lethal option in an active law enforcement incident. There were three times in training. We used flashbangs, tear gas in twice in training, firearms, an ammunition of less than 50 caliber. We used in training the command and control vehicles are patrol cars. They get used every single day, providing a metric of where they go and what they do. For the purposes of AB 41, they are quote command and control vehicles and fall under military equipment, but the department only uses patrol vehicles. They're deployed every single day and being able to provide an exact number. The armored personnel carrier, that report is redundant in the AB 41 report to the one that council already received for the bear cat use report. It is the exact same data and how it was used during the year. We requested the use of the sheriff's office unmanned aerial vehicle twice last year. Both were used in, once was to search for a subject and the other was in assistance in mapping a crime scene. And then we used the recon robot in the field twice in training and in community demonstrations. So this is a little bit better breakdown of the bear cat use. It's a little bit easier to digest the data on how we used it. If there are any questions about this, I can go into it at that appropriate time. I'm not going to belabor the point with reading this graph. Next slide, please. So costs associated with all of the equipment. As you can see, the bulk of our costs are associated to training. There are maintenance costs in there, refueling equipment and training courses. Most of the training costs associated here are absorbed in normal department training. This is just a reflection of what the dollar amount associated to the best that we can compile for that training. Next slide, please. So intended acquisitions. We've already seen council related to the recon robot that was approved last month or earlier this month. The department intends to may explore a unmanned aerial vehicle program coming this year. So we are expressing that intention. And then we also are expressing the intention to purchase some ammunition for the breaching shotguns that we have so that we can continue training and have those available for use if needed. We will be having a community event for the AB 41 report. It will be on May 16th, 5.30 p.m. via Zoom. And we will be able to go into the report for the community and answer questions and take comments then. That is the end of my presentation. Thank you very much. Appreciate your presentation. Let me do this. Let me see if council members have questions. We are going to also receive two presentations here from members of the public that have requested opportunity to do so. Yes, please, Ms. Brunner. I just had a, I was curious about the armored personnel carrier vehicle. It looks like three of the four uses were to assist other agencies, Scott's Valley Sheriff and Watsonville. And then the refueling, how does that cost work out for the fuel cost? I was just curious. So when I was compiling this report, I reached out to the yard, the corporation yard, and I asked them for any and all data related to the vehicles that were sent here or that were covered under this report, and they provided me with a spreadsheet and those costs of how much they have record of the fuel that it costs to run that vehicle for the reporting period. So that's where the data for the fuel cost came from. Thank you. For the questions, comments. Ms. Watkins. So for the aerial, is that a drone? Yes, I apologize. No, no, no, I figured as much, but I just wanted to confirm things. Let me go to the members of the public who requested time. Good afternoon. Good evening, rather. I'd actually like to request that Peter Gelblum online be allowed to go first because he has an engagement. Not a problem. Go ahead. We'll go to the online if he's, is he there? What's the time? Am I giving people three minutes? I'm sorry. Am I giving three minutes? Three minutes on this. Yes. Tell me when we're good to go. Good to go. Good afternoon. Good evening, rather, Mr. Goldblum. It is still light out. So this, this in a very significant way is the easiest item on the agenda for tonight because all you gotta do is do what the law tells you to do. The law says it very simply without any kind of opportunity to avoid it. And you need to do it. So what, what it says in the staff report refers to it. This statute, AB 41 prohibits you from approving from renewing the ordinance unless you make three or four findings. So the three important ones are, and this is in the staff report, the military equipment is necessary because there is no reasonable alternative that can achieve the same objective of officer and civilian safety. The proposed military equipment use policy will safeguard the public's welfare, safety, civil rights and civil liberties and see if purchasing the equipment, the equipment is reasonably cost effective compared to available alternatives that can achieve the same objective of officer and civilian safety. I've read everything that's been submitted. You have no information before you, zero information before you in which you can make any of those determinations. So all I asked and I said it's simple is to ask the sergeant or whatever representative of the SCPD is appropriate to answer those questions for you. To tell you what are the alternatives they haven't given in. How does this protect civil liberties and civil rights? There's nothing in the report that tells you that. And by law you are not allowed to approve the ordinance or renew the ordinance unless you make, unless you know those things and make those determinations. So it's real straightforward. If you don't have the information, if you don't have it, you can't approve it. The burden is on the city council members to do this because you're the backstop. There's no private right of action for this. If you approve it without that, those determinations, you are quite frankly breaking the law. The resolution that's been presented to you by staff has those findings in them, but quite frankly at this point, I'll be blunt, that's a lie. You have not made those determinations and you cannot make them right now because you don't have any evidence on which to base those determinations. There's tons of other problems with the submission that you approved last year, but then we just focus on those three because if you do that, I'd be very curious to hear what the answers to your questions are, but please somebody ask the questions that you're looking to make for determinations. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Mr. Brokaw, good evening. Do I have my eight minutes? I don't see a clock. You will have your eight minutes. Please proceed. Thank you, sir. The state has codified AB 481 military equipment used by law enforcement in such a way that you council members are the enforcers. This, as I see it, is a responsibility that you may not have realized as you sought your elected positions. For the most part, approving of vehicles, trucks, and other listed equipment is benign, although I didn't know we had an armored personnel carrier. Being a veteran, an armored personnel carrier means something very specific to me and we don't own one. However, when it comes to lethal weapons specifically, sniper rifles and assault weapons, by your vote to approve their use in our urban environment, should someone, anyone be injured or killed by these weapons, I would suggest council members are responsible, as responsible, as a law enforcement officer who pulled the trigger because you allowed it. That's what responsibility is, taking responsibility for your decisions and your actions. This is a serious vote that you're about to have, maybe the most serious vote you will ever make in your life. The law allows you under Code 7075 to set your own rules with regard to military equipment codified under Code 7070 to 7075. You have the power, for instance, to vote to postpone the vote on this report until the chief has made the required public presentation, which he has scheduled for after the vote, and that makes the public participation null if it's already approved. Why would anybody come to a meeting to talk about it? And in my opinion, his report does not follow the law. You have the power to tell the chief to get the policy section 705 corrected to be in compliance with the law. It is not. I'm not here to go through that. I have to say that the mayor and I have had conflicting schedules trying to get together so that we could have an informative discussion. The group that I represent would be very open to having a Brown Act meeting with council to go through the law item by item, even with law enforcement present to rebut what we're saying. I don't care, but you're a school principal. You teach in the university. None of you have experience with this sort of stuff. I'm a military veteran. I've qualified on an M14. I've qualified on an M16. I've qualified on a 45 semi-automatic pistol in the 70s, early 70s, during the Vietnam era. And I'm proud to tell you that when I shot at the target downrange, I aimed over the target because that was the way I could resist. That's not in my remarks. I'm sorry. I got carried away. The questions I'm going to ask are questions that council should be asking. The job assigned to you is to ask questions of law enforcement and not rubber stamp what they have given you. You have as much time as you need, you do not need to rush. With regard to the Bearcat, there is no mechanism in the SCPD policy manual, which is part of this submission, to ensure that the borrowing agency, Sheriff, Scots Valley, Watsonville, that they follow our procedures. We own that equipment. We have created procedures by which we as a community want to see this piece of military equipment used appropriately. It is our moral responsibility to ensure that our values are enforced when that equipment is used by others. There is no enforcement mechanism in writing on the policy. 705 or in the report that was just presented to you. Number five under Bearcat, demonstrations. Listed for the Citizens Police Academy, which I attended with Miss Brunner. List no complaint. However, I did emphatically object to the Bearcat being on display in front of the police department for an extended period of time before and after it was used as an adult jungle gem for the attendees. When we set the rules for the use of the Bearcat, it was to be used for very specific things. Parades and demonstrations were excluded. The demonstration could have easily been in the walled-off parking lot and not on display for the public who were coming and going at commute hour. There was no need for it to be there, and my complaint was blown off, and obviously it's not registered. On 11-16-22, you list the training costs of $78.50. Are you kidding me? That's about what we pay with benefits for one hour of one law enforcement officer. How many officer person hours were involved multiplied by their wages, the benefits, the cost of amortization because of the use of the vehicles. These are the kinds of costs that are required to be public knowledge. The general statement, the following general statement that appears in the report in writing for every category is insufficient and not in keeping with the law. That statement says, annual costs for personnel, training, transportation, and storage were absorbed into the department's operating budget. I didn't tell you anything. The law requires specifics. How many dollars were spent on labor? How many dollars were spent on materials? How much value was lost because you used the equipment? These are the kinds of costs that are supposed to be in this report. This kind of a statement is what I'm going to give you a new word, copaganda. This is copaganda and 481 was crafted to make that transparent. Absorbed isn't in compliance with the law item by item costs, not generalities. Statement two, our group has been trained by the American friends in every aspect of this law. We've studied it, we've presented it to the public on a forum on 481. We offered to help SCPD comply with this law as they prepared for the report because I was told it was labor intensive, a lot of data. We offered to help so that we wouldn't be going through something like this. I'm seeing 23 seconds, that must not be accurate. Pardon? I'll be glad to run the meeting. When you're elected mayor, you can run the meeting. We offered to do this so we wouldn't have to try and do this in eight minutes and in front of the public. The chief's exact words in response to my offer were, I have to go feed my kid and he left the building. I can't make this up, this is accurate. Category eight, fire... What you can do is wrap it up. Category eight, firearms greater than 50 caliber, shot guns, launching shotguns. How many times were they used under color of authority in the past 20 years? What's the annual cost? Firearms less than 50 caliber. Your time is up. You're half a minute over, you and I negotiated eight minutes. You've got your eight minutes, your time is up. Thank you very much. Anyone else wish to comment? Good afternoon, good evening, sir. I don't want to dwell on the negative because, you know, it's very serious. We're talking about basically higher ordinance than normally be considered normal for police enforcement, the law enforcement arm of the Department of Justice. Well, okay, the last three officers that have died in the line of duty in the county, to my knowledge, well, you could construe how they died is, you know, the use of military technology. Now, I know that it's just, you're talking about gun rights. But, yeah, I want to say that drones, first of all, drone technology is very invasive. It's, in privacy, is a huge issue for most citizens and the idea of, you know, having unmanned, that word unmanned, the UAV, unmanned, oh, good. There's no one flying around in that thing. You know, so, yeah, drones, we're talking about drones, just like a toy, a hobby drone, but it's, you know, it's scoping out the situation. If you look at what happened before the last election, the presidential election with Kyle Rittenhouse, if you know what happened in that scenario, he began to be chased by protesters when a drone took off. The moment the drone took off, he began to be chased by protesters. And then he was cornered and what took place in his very, very serious business. So what really contributed to that situation, and I know this sounds like maybe something you've never thought about before, but it was, you know, the drone in that situation kind of whipped people into a frenzy. Now, we've had all kinds of demonstrations in the city of Santa Cruz far, you know, over the years. We've had them block off Highway 17, close campus. That happens every February or, I forget if it's February or March when they close campus, but you know what I mean? We have all kinds of demonstrations, I mean, just ever so frequently. And, you know, it's gotten quite strident. You know, in my recollection from having lived here for, you know, over 20 years of my life in Santa Cruz, it's gotten quite strident quite often. And having military technology really doesn't protect officers to any huge degree in those scenarios. And then the crime, the other, like the criminology, the standard criminology analysis, I don't really see them as very necessary. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Good afternoon. Good evening. Good evening. Yeah, I go after room for 10 minutes. We skip over some items. I want to talk on 34. If we skip over 31 and 32, I know we're going to skip 33. Yeah, and we will be returning. Okay, great. So what was it? This item four weeks ago was like 44 pages. Two weeks ago it was three pages. Today it's 53 pages. Believe me, I would have loved to have commented on 30, but, you know, I've got other places to go and I want to be efficient. You know, Mr. Keely, you made a comment about the state making these laws and regulations, so I'm just going to read this as part of it because it works for whatever this one is, 34. You said the state, so I'm going to say it slightly differently. The state, deep state, has made enough issues as clear as this is progress or this is idiocracy. So how this affects all of us in law enforcement, first of all, since 1917, the city and county council members are controlled by their city and county managers. You guys are just following scripts. Now, I've said before, without law enforcement, we don't have enforceable laws and those personnel are doing a very important public service. So yeah, about every officer to my knowledge has still issued their own AR-15 and they're required to know how to use that. I think that's really important. You know, it's not that difficult to hit a one foot sphere at 500 yards. It's not that easy either. So I'm in some disagreement about some of the priorities here because once again on those 53 pages on page 10 of that, on the military weapons allowable, the microwave weapons came up on page 10 and that's just an elephant in the room that is affecting all of us whether we want to acknowledge it or not. I've spoken before about how only teachers and youth are being thrown under the bus more than law enforcement because of the unshielded frequency devices and I made a few people laugh in this room for saying I had my hands on a phased ray antenna. Maybe that was my own get out of jail free card. I'm not sure but that was a great mistake. So things are going to happen the way they're going to happen. My understanding and I wrong all the time is that law enforcement really became connected as a paramilitary force in 1996 in this country. Now, if you were to interview law enforcement in the United Kingdom 78% refused to say that they're part of the masons which is a completely different subject. So it'll just be interesting as far as how we're all going to choose to be personally accountable for ourselves and other people's safety and welfare now and in the future. Thanks. Thank you, sir. Ms. Bush, we have someone online. Next person online. Good evening. Few people currently. Good evening online. Three, two, one, we'll take the next person online. Good evening. Hi, this is Scott Graham. I was just wondering why they're seeking the approval for this before the public meeting. I would think that you, as our representatives, would want the public meeting to happen before you approve this as soon as you're putting the cart before the horse with what they're doing here. The other question is, who will this military equipment be used on? Will it be used on the public, members of the public here in Santa Cruz? Is that what it's for? Or is it for some invading force from outside the country? How often have these military equipment been used in the past 20 years or so? Like Lee was saying, he went through a bunch of things. This is category 10, firearms less than 50 caliber sniper rifles. How many times under the color of authority have they been used in the past 20 years? Category 11, missing what is it? Category 12, flash bang tear gas pepper balls. Flash bangs explode in a decibel that caused permanent hearing loss. If you want that on your contents or a lawsuit about it. Tear gas is governed by AB 48 as much as different than you have seen historically. When is it time to replenish tear gas that is inspired? I would hope you'd ask why we need it in the first place. How many times used under the color of authority in the past 20 years? Annual cost of having this tear gas. Category 13, LRAD. Another device that can cause permanent hearing loss. How many times used under color of authority in the past 20 years? Annual cost of this item. Category 14, 40 millimeter lockers. Used because suicidal person refused to comply with a command. This is a good example of what the Santa Cruz Police Department should not be doing. Assault weapons do not track firearm usage. Carbines, sea handouts, LMT carbines. 556, 223 rounds damage. Hollow point bullets explode when they hit something. These are considerations. Consider that you must resolve to approve the Shirley report. There are many more issues with the 705 policy manual to bring into compliance. It's really unbelievable that this is before you right now. I would say that the best thing you could do is put this off for at least another month. Or maybe two months. Thank you. Thank you very much. Anyone else online, Ms. Bush? We'll try the other person. Try the other one. Okay. Good idea. Good evening. Good evening. If you are online, good evening. Good evening. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. I'm here as a member of surge showing up for racial justice. I'm Santa Cruz County. And I, I want to just. Yeah, reiterate the. Call to, to not make a decision today because. Because there hasn't been the public conversation. And to make a decision today before that, it would go against the intent and the purpose of the law. I also want to. Double the emphasize how serious this issue is. And just in case. In case you haven't had a chance to read the law, like the very first paragraph lays out a lot, like the acquisition of military equipment and its deployment. It, it has an adverse impact on the public safety and welfare, including increased risk of civilian deaths, risk to civil rights, civil liberties, physical and psychological wellbeing. And significant financial costs. It's more frequently deployed against black and brown folks. Well, I changed communities to folks. But I'm reading from the law, meaning the risks and impacts of police militarization are experienced more acutely and marginalized communities. So I just want you to really take to heart how serious this. Your task is right now and that you're. Our oversight body. You're the ones responsible for this. The report does not appear to be complete at all. They're the issue of how, what the agreement is with other, with other agencies when we don't, when we loan out equipment, that needs to be super clear. The, so tear gas. So the bear cat is a huge one. And there needs to be a lot more detail on that. And so tear gas is, is governed under AB 48 and AB 481. And tear gas. Did you know it was prohibited for use in war by the Geneva convention because of the impacts it has on human beings. It's flash bangs. It's also mentioned permanent hearing loss. These are things that can contribute to death. But they're, they're euphemistically called less lethal. Please take the time you need to study this issue. Well, thank you so much. Anyone else with us online? Miss Bush. All right. Matters back before the council. Miss Brown. Thank you, mayor. So I have, having been involved in this, this decision, the past year when this law was initially passed the state law and brought to us a first round of inventory and the initial ordinance. A lot of questions were raised. And I think the police chief, thank you at the, at the time you were open to including some additional information in that inventory. And I appreciate your willingness to, you know, take, take this issue seriously. As members of the public have suggested this is, you know, the council has been given through AB 481 some serious responsibility. I may not feel that way, but we really do. We may not have asked for it, but here it is. And as we decide how to implement a law that's like arguably very convoluted, difficult to interpret in some places and kind of vague, it's, you know, we are challenged and, you know, the goal of this bill was on increased understanding and transparency. And I'm not really feeling like it's achieving that goal. That's another matter for the way the state law has been written. But I also want to talk about here that I agree with our first caller that we really don't have the information that I think we should have to make findings of necessity, public welfare assurances and cost effectiveness in this inventory. I'm not suggesting you didn't do your job, but I don't feel that it's here. And so, and I'm also really hard pressed to understand why we can't make this decision after a community meeting is held. It just seems so backwards to me. So I'm going to, having heard everything and heard from the public, I'm going to move that we delay making a decision on this ordinance and the inventory until after the May 16th meeting that we bring this back. Not for another round of... Motion. Is there a second? Sorry. Is there a second? Motion dies for lack of a second. No. Matters still back before the councils? I'll recognize someone for a motion on this. No motions? No. I'll go ahead and move the recommendations. Staff recommendations moved. Is there a second? I'll second. I do have a question. Second by Ms. Countar Johnson. You are recognized for a question. I am also curious about the timing if someone could speak to that. Why today and why not after the community meeting? So we actually have the city attorney's office. Stephanie Duck, I believe is online here and she can give her legal perspective, but I will basically read government code 7072B, which states within 30 days of submitting and publicly releasing an annual military equipment report pursuant to this section, the law enforcement agency shall hold at least one public well-publicized and conveniently located community engagement meeting at which the general public may discuss, et cetera, et cetera. This was posted in our transparency portal on April 20th, 2023. Although, as Council Member Brown mentioned, the way this legislation was written, it is very vague, is very hard to understand. Therefore, we've relied on the city attorney's office to give us some interpretation on this. And their interpretation has been after the city council meeting. So that's what we've relied on, but I'll let Stephanie Duck weigh in on her interpretation. Ms. Duck, good evening. Good evening. I think that she hit pretty much every point I was going to make and while the statute is not entirely clear in some aspects, I think it is actually very clear with this annual report and community meeting timing requirements that the community meeting is to be held 30 days within 30 days of being submitted to council and publicly released. That does not mean that the council cannot decide to push this and have the community meeting first and then hear and vote to renew the ordinance. But the AB 481 seems to contemplate having the annual report come to city council, the council receiving the report, voting to renew the ordinance and then holding the community meeting within 30 days after that. Thank you. One more question. What are the next steps after the community meeting? How can council be kept abreast of what transpired and concerns that were brought up? Or can we be? That's a great question. I would assume that if there were any changes made to the policy or the ordinance, then we would have to bring it back before the governing body for approval of that change. If there were no changes, that annual report would sit for the next year. Thank you. Thank you. Chief, you and I engaged in a conversation yesterday about this precise point about whether the law is clear on this, about where the report is, where our action is, where the public meeting is. I do think that it is, I think a plain reading of this could be interpreted as follows. That's my thought about it. It says within 30 days of submitting and publicly releasing the annual report, submitting, assuming that we are the body to whom you are submitting it, and publicly releasing the annual report. There it is. My reading is it could be submitted to and released to the public at a point in time. The department shall hold at least one publicizing conveniently located, et cetera, at which the department should discuss the report and respond to public questions. My plain reading of that is that it is not contrary to the statute that once you have submitted the report and made it publicly available, it's not inconsistent to then hold the public meeting because the statute then says to discuss the report and respond to public questions regarding funding, acquisition, use, and military equipment, then it seems that it would not be inconsistent that based on that information we then agendize the entire item for an action by the City Council. That's how I read this, that it does not prohibit the public meeting. What is, I think, not allowed is to have a general public meeting on this subject without the report being submitted and made public. That that's the basis of the public meeting is that. I don't read this to say we couldn't then, after you've submitted, been made public, hold the meeting, then you bring the entire package to us for council action. That's how I read it, that it is at least sufficiently vague to permit that order of things. Chief and I talked about this yesterday. As I understand, our conversations are starting next year with next year's report. I believe you said you do not have an objection to providing the report, then hold the meeting, then come to the council. If I understood our conversation correctly, if that's not accurate, I don't want to say something that's inaccurate about our conversation. That is accurate. Okay. So I think that perhaps a way to go here is to adopt the motion that's on the table. If the maker of the motion would agree to it, I would like to add additional direction that for the next annual report, that the report be submitted and publicly released, followed by the public meeting, following that you would return to the council for a final action by the council. Is that agreeable to the maker of the motion? I made the motion and that is agreeable, but I do want to get one clarification before. Very good. Please go ahead. Maybe it's for the city attorney. If you have the submitting of the public report, does it need to first be received or what is that point of submission to? I think the mayor accurately described a fair interpretation of the of the statute, which I will echo the sentiment about the vagueness. What I would suggest is that the report come to the city council in an agenda packet as an information item only. At least 30 days before the council takes action and the public meeting can then be held within that 30-day period. Such is my amendment. Good news, Bush. Clear on that? Agreeable. Agreeable to the second? Yep. All right. Thank you. Is there a debate or discussion on the motion as amended? Seeing none, the clerk will call the roll. Councilmember Nussbaum? Aye. Brown? No. Watkins? Aye. Grunner? Aye. Calentary Johnson? Aye. Vice mayor Golder? Aye. And Mayor Keely? Aye. Motion carries and so ordered. We are at a quarter to six in the evening and we have several more items to get through. Let's do this. Let's take up item 31 and let's take up item 31, take a break, come back and finish up our agenda. Agreeable to members? Any objection to that? I do know that there are some community members who are waiting to speak on 32. On 32? No, 31 is going to be, I imagine, rather quick. And Mayor, I will also share we have county staff that have been standing by for item 32 as well. Well, as I said earlier, we're going to take up item 32 before dinner as well. All right. There we go. Let's go to item 31. And this is Children's Fund Oversight Committee. Excuse me. Appointments. Ms. Bush? We have applications. Yes. Thank you. So we have, currently we have two at-large appointments for the Children's Fund Committee. So if we have any nomination to fill those, you can name up to two if you want. Sure. And before we do, let me see if there are any comment from the public on this item. Anyone wishes, who's with us in chambers, wish to make a comment? Seeing and hearing none, Ms. Bush, do we have anyone online? We do not. I recognize Ms. Watkins. Sure. I just want to, first of all, say thank you to all the applicants. It definitely makes our job hard. I, but I want to nominate Ryan Coonerty to serve and appreciate his perspective, given his history with... As a motion. Was that one? Or did you name two? I'm sorry. And Allison Guevara. Sorry. There are two nominees. Is there a second for those two nominees? Oh, okay. It's gone to our Johnson. Motion and a second. Further nominees? Nominations, Ms. Brunner. I'd like to nominate Aracely Contreras. I'll second that. Okay. There are three for two positions. Give me just one moment here. Let's just... One each. You okay? Okay. How I'd like to proceed is, we will take a vote on each of those and we will then, when we've gotten there, we'll get there. All right. The first one is Mr. Coonerty. Is that correct? Yes. Motion. Let's move to a vote on that. On that nomination, Mr. Coonerty. Okay. So for Ryan Coonerty, Council Member Newsom. Aye. Brown? Aye. Watkins? Aye. Brunner? Aye. Callentary Johnson? Aye. Vice Mayor Golder? Aye. And Mayor Keely? Aye. Let's move to... Is it Ms. Contreras? Clerk will call the roll. Council Member Newsom. Aye. Brown? Aye. Watkins? No. Brunner? Aye. Callentary Johnson? No. Vice Mayor Golder? Aye. And Mayor Keely? Aye. The vacancies are both filled. We'll move on to the next item, Item 32. This is an item regarding the collective of the collective of the collective of the collective of the collective of the collective of the collective of the collective of the collective of the collective results and evidence based progress report. Ms. Schmidt, good afternoon. Thank you, Mayor, Vice Mayor and Council Members. Laura Schmidt, your assistant city manager. I am just here to briefly thank and introduce our colleagues from Santa Cruz County. On the line, we have Randy Morris, the director of the Human Services Department. And with him is Kimberley Peterson, deputy director from HSD as well. And I would like to thank them thank them for their ongoing partnership with core and all of their dedication in numerous hours that they invest in this program. So with that, I will hand it over to Randy. Thank you. Thank you and nice to meet you, mayor and council members, it's good to be here again. I have a screen share as my understanding, Bonnie and Laura that I will pull up after some very brief comments and mayor your request for a brief presentation has landed, we will be very quick we hope and then turn it back to you for any questions and public comment. First wanna piggyback on Laura's comment, deep appreciation for particularly Laura has been the one constant throughout the arc of this conversation. I've been here for three years. I know this conversation moving from community programs to core predates me, but there's been a lot of analysts turnover and city manager turnover, but Laura has been our constant. So thank you to Laura. I really wanna highlight that she has been the go to and everything we present to the County Board. We also present to your city council and it's lock and step with the city manager's office. So we hope that is representative for the effort to do what core is the letter C and core is collective impact. It is only a partnership at least in funding between the city of Santa Cruz and the County of Santa Cruz, which brings your one plus million dollars of general fund and our 4.8 million dollars of general fund for just shot shy of $6 million to really try to fill a hole of many, many millions of dollars. So it's very hard decisions. And what brings us here today is after the recommended awards came to the board and your city council back in June, very controversial, a lot of emotions. There was three times the amount of applications there than there was money available, a lot of consternation is this is a continuous quality improvement after action review update to the board this morning into your council about a roadmap for how we would like to apply the lessons learned from lots of stakeholder feedback in advance of the next RFP. So we don't think there's some significant policy questions in front of you today. It's more an update and a request for approval to move forward. I want to put in context and then I'll start the slide as a newer member of this community. I've been in County human services for almost 30 years. I've been working in the health and human service safety net for a very long time in my career, but I'm both humbled by the gift the city council and the County board give to this community that does not exist where I used to work that is a much larger system. But with the gift comes a curse. Once you put this money out there, how do you choose to spend it? Very complicated, very controversial. So we are doing our best to staff to help make each chapter of this effort improve every step of the way. For some context, this is a very County centric statement but because County runs health services and human services and we have a large number of contracts I wanted to make sure you were aware from the County's almost $5 million investment, we actually have $75 million of contracts with community-based organizations delivering safety net services. And it strikes me as a newer member to this community that this community programs model and the core model that has now in place gets way more than the 7% of the share of safety net contracts attention. It is the one pot of money that you as a council on the board have full control over. Most all of that other 75 million is driven by state and federal regulations. So we appreciate the complexity but I did want to put in perspective it is only 7% of the County safety net contract of CBOs. And if you really look at the entire safety net and you look at health and human services and our contracts, we are $415 million of federal state and county general fund and your city funds investment in the safety net. And so it's really 1% of the entire safety net. So I just want to share that in context that as much attention as this gets it's well-deserved because it's at your discretion but it is complicated to tease out how much of an impact this is having given all the other funding that's in place from public systems and community contracts. So I hope that context is helpful. It was interesting to me as a newer member of this community, I've been here almost entirely in COVID and I look forward to being in your chambers at some point but I appreciate the accommodation to be remote because we didn't know when we would be up today. So I'm going to do the screen share. I'm going to wait for confirmation that it is up and then I will start. So if somebody could let me know if the screen is showing the PowerPoints. Did I hear it is up now? Yes, it is. Okay, thank you. So, okay, has it moved to the agenda? Yes. So thank you. The agenda for today, I'm going to cover just briefly the recommended actions in front of your council, a quick summary of the lessons learned, the materials that are in front of you are a lot more than lessons learned but that's going to be our brief focus today. And then I'm going to turn it over to Kimberly, our deputy director to speak about the importance of all the community-based organization voices who participated in this lessons learned process and we end with some proposed next steps which is really a roadmap between now and the next procurement. So the recommended actions to summarize are for your council to accept and file the materials that we developed in partnership with your city manager's office that were made public this morning for the county board and for your council to direct your staff to coordinate with us and county human services to return to your council no later than December 12th to give a progress report on both the first full year of current funding because we are only mid-year through the current core contract cycle but also with an update on the community engagement process that will play out between now and then if your council as the board this morning approved the proposed set of next steps which is item number three which is where Kimberly will end the presentation, a timeline and next steps roadmap. So this is a very brief summary of a very long document we put together and we tried to create executive summaries for the very long documents because we know the volume of materials the public and US electeds have to read but it was helpful as we as staff looked at this with your city manager's office that the feedback from both elected officials at the city and the county, a staff at the city and the county and community-based organizations really cleanly fell into three buckets and it helped us prepare this recommendation by sort of distilling and separating out this feedback. Bucket one is misunderstandings. There was a lot of feelings about hearing that some organizations that had been funded a long time were not awarded and there was a lot of misunderstandings as we see it from staff and it was verified in most of the stakeholder feedbacks. We wanna summarize those. We also got a lot of feedback that there were a number of things that worked and they didn't get a lot of public airing because the misunderstandings and feelings about changes and contracts I'm sort of dominated the discussion. So we wanted to lift those up to make sure you heard what we heard in the feedback and we keep those things moving forward. And then the last is a number of proposed adjustments that we received some really good constructive feedback that we think is actionable and part of a continuous quality improvement process we can apply going forward if the board and your council approves ultimately we're not asking for your council to adopt anything specifically but just sharing what they are and then we'll work with community providers and come back to the board and your council in December with some specifics. So this is a quick summary of those three buckets of lessons learned feedback. The first is the area of misunderstandings. I want to disclose that I have been in the field as I said for almost 30 years and I've been on every side of an RFP. I've been a panel member. I've been an applicant to federal and state grants and philanthropic grants. I've been the administrator of them 25 years in another jurisdiction. And I have to say this RFP process because of how limited the funds were and how competitive the process was had to be built upon the procurement process which was a best application wins process. And that process was clean, fair, objective and there are lessons learned to seek more direction because lack of any specific direction from your council or our board left it open to go with a best application wins process. So we can apply some concerns that we heard from community and elected to the next process to build some more specificity, some direction, some priorities but absent that the process was best application wins. The process was clean and applications were recommended for award based on scoring. The next was services for older adults. There was a lot of concern because of a couple of organizations that provided services for older adults had been funded for many, many decades were not recommended for award. But the math is that there was actually a 2% increase in the number of awards to CBOs providing services to older adults. Some of the contractors changed. That actually went from a 21% share of the money to 23%. And also there were only two contracts that were awarded by board, county board and your city council agreement to remove from the competitive procurement process both for older adult programs. No other population got that benefit. One was the mandatory local government match to pull the older Americans Act funding to fund our local nonprofit area agency on aging. That was agreed to pull out from competition. And the other was the agreement that the Meals on Wheels program is such a priority in this community to expand the number of meals on wheels being delivered to vulnerable older adults that that was carved out from procurement. And the direction was to align the award with whoever the AAA selected which ended up going to community bridges. So both seniors council and community bridges did not have to compete for those funds. Everybody else had to compete for funds. The third was that there was cuts to the safety net. That was a narrative in a statement made. Just wanna confirm there was an actual $500,000 increase in the base of general fund between city and county which represented an 11% increase in investment in the safety net. And what I think got conflated is there was a agreement by the city council and the board to create a first time ever $750,000 deep investment called targeted impact. That $750,000 grant did pull from the general base but it was a community informed and elected official agreement that I think got conflated a bit because when people saw that award go out there was comments that that pulled from the safety net. That is a safety net investment. The last is the role of the consultants. We did not have a direction from the board to discuss this. We did have a direction from your council through an action of council member Brown. We responded to that in materials but there was questions about whether or not the contract that is run by the county there's no city funds in it. It was a direction from the county board right after the first procurement in 2015, 16, I believe to hire an independent body to run a community engagement process to delink it from us as funder. And that contract has been renewed every year in front of the county board. And there was a question if they had a role in making any decisions they were firewalled out from any decision making and they ended up helping us as staff both on your side and our side because we all had deep vacancies were in the middle of COVID. And so they helped with us administratively. And second, it was one of the most highest ranked feedback from community-based organization with an appreciation for the technical assistance they have provided to CBOs applying so that they could be as competitive as possible. But I think there was some confusion about what role the consultants played and we tried to answer the specific direction from your council and the material as your city manager's office submitted. The second area is what worked. This did not get a lot of attention because the areas I just discussed got a lot of the attention. There was consistent feedback, I will say given how emotional this was and upset a lot of people where it was nice to hear this that there was appreciation for how much community engagement there was. There was actually five community stakeholder meetings, seven public hearings. So 12, I came from a community where there's zero RPs were just released. So there's multiple stakeholder opportunities both public round-act hearings and CBO stakeholder meetings and all the CBO said, keep that going for the next time that's helpful. Equity is a much longer conversation but we are in a place where equity is an easy, cheap word but how do you actually turn it into action given this is a safety net investment? So we intentionally heard from the community-based organizations that they wanted to be afforded the opportunity to tell us in their application what inequities they see in the community, how they would address those inequities and then if awarded a contract build that in their scope of work. So this is the first ever round of what was community programs. The first RFP did not have this built in. This is the first round of contracts where there are equity mentions built into the scope and when we have the first annual report we're able to report on those outcomes. So there was a lot of appreciation from the CBOs and the stakeholder. Please keep that going forward. Technical issue, this was the first time we were at an online electronic application portal that please keep that. The panel members, and this gets back to the misunderstanding issue, a number of panel members had participated in a lot of panels and gave us consistent feedback. This was the most well organized. They felt very well trained and they felt they were able to apply objectivity to their ranking and not impose their personal subjective bias, which is the goal of a public procurement. So the panel members said, please keep that format in place. And then as I said about the confusion about the role of the TA support, the applicants almost unanimously said that was very helpful and they wanted more of it. Here's where the adjustments are and then I'll turn it over to Kimberly to close us out. There was a recognition that all of the emotions around who was not awarded eclipsed all the many organizations who were proud of and excited about and wanted to share publicly their enthusiasm about how they could help community but they did not have a chance to celebrate and they felt very disappointed in that. And so there was a request to make sure we carve out opportunity for recognition of all sides of this going forward. Deep recognition from us as staff included, this happened in the middle of COVID, Omicron variant further complicated and delayed some things. We want to propose the RFP process much earlier. This will be specified in Kimberly's closeout comments. This is the tough one, council members, you're late in the evening. I really call you to listen to this. This is going to be hard. We have not enough general fund money to distribute through this process, whatever adjustments we make. General agreement amongst all stakeholders, please build in an identification of values and priorities first. And we as staff can build that into the RFP that will make it easier for all of us when we recommend towards next time if we have direction from you as a council and the board through a community engagement process, we're gonna have to make some hard choices. If we don't make them, we will be back to having an open best application wins process, which is okay, but then it's about application. So we think there are ways to work on that with elected officials and community. A lot of CBO said, okay, this was a hard process. Can you simplify it? We'll work on that. There was some reasonable feedback, I think, from the CBOs that given how much this was built on scoring, they felt there wasn't enough specificity in what we were scoring. That was in large part a byproduct of the rush and the timing and the Omicron variant. We feel we can apply that in a way where we're more clear about what's being ranked and how. And then the last is there was particularly some feedback from South County that there wasn't a feeling that the panelists were shared publicly that we would like to find a way to increase panel diversity. And I think with more time, we can work on that with community to achieve that goal. So with that said, I'm gonna turn it over to Kimberly and she has two slides to close us out. Thank you very much for your presentation. Ms. Peterson, good afternoon. Good evening. Thank you. Good evening. So as Randy described throughout the core process, stakeholder engagement and community feedback has been an integral part of the process, supporting collective impact in the centering of equity in the core movement and the RFP. And HSD heard many voices before, during and after this last RFP was completed. Only some of which was heard broadly in the public and summarized here. And HSD feels that as our lessons learned, it's important that we do our part to lift up all the voices, critical and constructive that we hear. And so one thing that we were able to do earlier today that I'll do my best to summarize here is we actually had a sampling of voices from three executive directors that participated in the core process. And the executive directors spoke in the chambers. They were each dedicated women in their fields. I'll tell you who they are in a moment. And they came with different experiences and lenses to the core process. And they had different outcomes from the core process. One represented an agency that lost funding compared to prior years. Another represented an agency that gained funding compared to prior years. And another represented an agency that was newly funded. And so it was three women executive directors who spoke and it was Monica Martinez, executive director from Encompass, Maria Elena de la Garza, executive director for community action board and Keisha Browder, executive director for United Way, Santa Cruz County. And I will give a couple of highlights of what they shared, but I wanna strongly encourage you to take some time tonight or tomorrow to look at the video to hear from them directly. So first, Monica Martinez, she shared that she was a core staring committee member, a former human services commission member and had been involved in the core process for over a decade. Her organization Encompass was actually one that had been historically funded through the community programs process and in fact received more funding than all the other agencies at that time. Though she shared that as a health equity organization, they recognized that that process that was, was not responsive to emerging needs and did not promote equity and left behind those with the greatest barriers and most in need. So they leaned in and participated in the process to make changes to core, acknowledging continuous change in how public funding and revenue streams evolve and how community needs evolve as well. They did receive three grants for three new programs and she shared that they found the process to be accountable, inclusive, and approach challenging questions with curiosity and an equity center. She also acknowledged a need for improvement and gave a couple of examples, including small programs having a harder time applying and so not being as represented in the funding and the need to account for some type of disaster response and recovering the future is that something we're unfortunately dealing with frequently now. The second person who spoke was Maria Elena from the Community Action Board or CAB for short. She shared that CAB grew through the core process and she also had been involved in conversations regarding the continued development of core and the centering of equity starting five years ago. She shared it was not an easy conversation, it was uncomfortable, prickly was the word she used to describe it, but people kept showing up and moving through the process together. She said that through core, CAB was able to increase work with the immigrant community, employment support for those barriers, support rental assistance, transition age youth and youth programs in Davenport and the North Coast as well. She also highlighted the importance of that technical assistance that even with an organization that's 57 years old, they found technical assistance important and then she closed with a very strong message that we are not done, that we are just getting started and centering equity in core and moving forward. And she said that what she would like to see is how do we ensure accountability for equity and that all touch points along the core process ensures equity and that the services ensure equity. And then lastly, Keisha Browder with United Way spoke. United Way's been around since 1941, it was their first time applying and winning. And she shared that this should have been something to be greatly celebrated. However, she gave a very powerful message about the realities of how the misunderstandings that Randy spoke of translated into very negative, hateful threats on her voicemail, including racially based messages due to the misunderstandings. She said that the celebration of the accomplishment for her staff and for cradle to career was taken from them and those calls to her were very personal. So overall, at that time, the core awards were very overshadowed. No leader should experience what she experienced as a result of core. She wanted to say, of course, we're better than that as a community and as humans. And that through the award that they won, which was cradle to career, it was that large impact award Randy mentioned. It gave a chance to provide services that were previously just in my vote to grow those services to San Lorenzo Valley and ultimately to serve those from San Lorenzo Valley to the Pajaro Valley. She also noted the value of technical assistance and shared that core as we're going allows us to think differently and move differently through our community. And again, I can just summarize here, but I do encourage you to take a look at that video. The perspectives were insightful and the voice is very powerful. Thank you. Next slide, please. So now what you're looking at is a timeline for what we're proposing for next steps. And so what you're looking at is what we would like to do in taking account those lessons learned and moving up when we start the RFP. What you can see is that with your approval, public hearings will be community engagement, excuse me, community engagement will start this summer and that will include public hearings. And that would also include conversations about values and priorities. Some of the feedback that we heard last June and during the lessons learned revealed the desire of some to prioritize certain services, carve outs for various reasons or funding options and naming what the values and priorities are of the community and the elected officials in advance will be really critical to the design of the next RFP. The RFP itself would be released in the spring with applications due in the summer of 2024. With a report back to the board on any trends that we see. And then final recommended awards would be made in the winter, fall or winter of 2024, providing a long runway for organizations who are newly funded to prepare and get contracts completed. And for those whose funding will not continue to make adjustments themselves for when the new contracts begin. So this concludes our presentation and we are happy to take any questions. Thank you very much. And I'm wondering, do we have any questions from council at this time? Thank you, Vice Mayor Golder. And thank you to the HSD staff, Mr. Morris and Ms. Peterson for the overview. I heard the extended version earlier today. So I, and I did hear from the folks who came and spoke and I also recommend, this is kind of commentee, but I'll just say I recommend hearing their voices. You can, it was very moving. And so I do, and I have some comments I'll save, but I'm still trying to get an answer to this question that I've been asking regarding the cost of dispersing these funds. We, so foundations disperse funds to non-profit social service programs, public agencies do this and you do this for a significantly larger number of contracts for a lot of these services and some of it overlaps and some of it is new and emerging and innovative programs. I love all of that, but I'm still don't have information about the cost of dispersing these funds. What you've said is a relatively small pot, about 7% of the county's social safety net programming budget. No idea how much it's cost to disperse these funds. So I'd really like to get a better understanding of that. Mayor Kaley and council member Brown, would you like us as a matter of process to respond to each council member's questions during this moment? Yes, please do. Thank you. Okay, I think to be very direct, we charged the city nothing. The only adjustment we made to the consultant contract was because we were down three analysts and our planning and evaluation director resigned unexpectedly and our deputy director before Kimberly Peterson had retired, a planned retirement and all of that added up. We made one augmentation to the consultant contract which costs significantly less than the salary savings of the vacancies which was used to cover that consultant cost. And at the risk of making this personal, you didn't know this council member Brown, but when you made that comment, you were talking to Randy and Kimberly who carried the water. We met every morning at 5.30 in the morning for six weeks and every weekend for about six weeks, at least eight hours a day without complaint and you didn't have that context. And that is free because we are executive hires, we get paid a salary and we just did that. So back to the misunderstandings, I can appreciate that absent information. Everyone's trying to figure out what happened and people who lost money are filling in the blanks and saying, oh my God, all the money went to, there was salary savings and we carried the waters county without complaint but I'm being candid now this spring raised up. We can talk to you more later if you'd like but there was no cost to the city, no extra cost to taxpayers because we just handled this on our backs. Thank you. Again, I just would really love to see some data about that and I understand that you've done, I'm saving that for my comments. I recognize the work that's gone into this. I'm just trying to get a handle with some actual numbers costs and I recognize that's not gonna happen today but I'm gonna keep asking. Thanks. Thank you. Other council members? No other council members? Questions or comments on this item? All right, they recommended the, let me ask if anyone with us in the public who wishes to make comment in chambers, anyone online? Ms. Bush? First one online. Good evening. Good evening, Clay Camp, Executive Director Seniors Council. Thanks for this meeting and of course, thanks for all the funding that City provides. Mayor Keely, you'll remember that there's been a lot of reform in community program funding. There've been multiple cycles. I've been involved with this for four plus decades and it seems like every five, 10 years there's an effort to improve the system and I think all of us delivering services wanna get better at it. So hopefully we're evolving in a positive way. There are some recommendations that I think we could look at in order to improve where we're at right now. A couple of them, county staff have already referred to but I think it's really important that we have a conversation about what are we trying to do with these funds? Are we trying to maintain a social safety net or are we trying to fund new and innovative projects? They both have their value. I have a personal bias in that I think the hardest funds to get are actually to sustain what you're currently doing. As opposed to a new project, there's lots of foundations out there to do that. So I would encourage going down the social safety net path. And in that we should have some priorities about what is that social safety net? Is food and shelter and protection from violence our top priority? I think it should be. I think fund projects like going out at a boat trip or encouraging people to eat vegetables. Those are good projects too but I don't think they're quite as important as something that's life sustaining. So hopefully we can have some prioritization and some discussion about that. And another piece of it we should look at is mandated services. What is required by law? And that's a place that as a funder that the seniors council was put in a really difficult situation where one of the programs we're mandated to fund was defunded in this process. And we literally had to take caregiver dollars away, respite dollars that people providing 24 seven care desperately need in order to fund a mandated service and stop an agency from literally going under. I also want to encourage that in this reform process that we keep in mind that ageism is a huge issue in equity. And that I have a personal problem when I see 750,000 go to cradle to career and our equity investment specifically excludes older adults. And the irony and contradiction of that effort is just so overwhelming. It's really difficult for me even to speak of. So we need to address that. We also need to just remember that the public process is an important part of this. And you will remember and others will remember that it was beautiful when we had community programs and services made comments about how much the programs benefited them. Do this, take another few seconds to wrap up here. Don't feel cut off right now. Just take a few seconds so and wrap up. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. So that really was my kind of wrap up is that engaging the community is a really important part of it. And one thing that I think we did do in this last process was look at some new partnerships or new ways to align different programs in the community and see that the community program process and some of these sustainable services and their funding sources align so that we're not butting heads and working against each other's best interests. Thank you for your testimony this evening. Ms. Bush, do we have other folks online? All right, how many more? Two. Two more. So let's hear from the first one. Thank you. Good evening. Good evening, everybody. This is Allison Guevara. I'm a Santa Cruz resident, mom of three and social impact consultant. And I'm here tonight in my capacity as co-director for Cradle to Career Santa Cruz County. Core investments has given Cradle to Career also known as C2C, the opportunity to engage and uplift diverse families in Santa Cruz and throughout the county in a way that centers are lived experiences and wisdom to guide community transformation. As many of you know and understand very well, investments in young children and families lead to long-term, lifelong positive health and wellbeing outcomes for our community. At the heart of this work is an understanding that social connections, belonging and inclusion are the bedrock of thriving families as a core condition of community wellbeing and equity. We are working with our school and community partners to create spaces where parents can voice their hopes and dreams for their children and be part of co-developing upstream programming and support systems that truly meet their needs. This includes increasing access to evidence-based services like Triple P positive parenting program, trauma-informed health education and access to recreational and cultural activities in a way that is customized by and for each unique school community. We're also seeing gradual shifts in how schools are approaching family equity and inclusion as key hubs and touchpoints to connect with our most vulnerable families, link them with resources and build community resilience. The core targeted impact funding is also allowing C2C to deepen parent leadership development through our new countywide family learning leadership circle where we are building a coalition of family leaders from Santa Cruz in the north to Watsonville in the south to gain advocacy skills and build collective power to advocate for families and children in our schools, government and health systems. The core process helped reinforce equity, data and evaluation as central components of our work, bringing more capacity and rigor to help us work with school partners to track and monitor equity outcomes and indicators. This is setting up our organization to have more robust technological tools and data systems to understand our reach, identify gaps and pave new ways of data sharing between partners. C2C is grateful for your foresight and leadership to design a process that is allowing our community to invest in strategic collective impact strategies that address the root causes of inequity. But thank you again for your continued support and for this game changing opportunity to keep our community moving forward through the core movement. Thank you very much for your testimony. We have another person online, correct Ms. Bush? Thank you. Good evening. Good evening. Good evening, everyone. My name is Martha Seha and I am the Santa Cruz City Schools community organizer for Cradle to Career. Our funding has enabled C2C to expand its innovative model of systems change to reconfigure how decisions are made by putting community voice at the center. This opportunity to do things differently is a chance to uplift equity and move upstream to create lasting positive change. To support the health and wellbeing of our community, parent input must be included how systems are set up in order to serve their dreams and needs. Through the support of C2C will bring greater diversity of voices into schools, the creation of local programs and even policy priorities. In a recent advocacy workshop we hosted, we asked parents what their vision of a resilient community was. Parents shared the values of love, peace, unity, gratitude, connection and empathy where families feel connected to their community, their schools, resources and support and to one another. This is what thriving families look like and this is our vision of what we hope to achieve through this grant. We are excited to continue to pave new pathways, uplift equity, engage the community and build county wide connections with the support of CORE. At Santa Cruz City Schools we have begun to provide parent leadership committee meetings and computer literacy workshops to uplift parent voices, unite parents and teach them how to advocate for their families in person and virtually. One of the parents we work with stated, I have only known about C2C for a few months but already feel immensely supported and connected to my community. I'm starting to learn about what resources are available to me and how to access them. Thank you for this game changing opportunity to unite and transform our community through our investments. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Ms. Bush, that is the last person online. That's all I have yet. One last call for anyone here in chambers who wish to comment on this item. Seen and hearing none, matters back before the council. Councilmember Cullentary-Johnson is recognized, rather. I'll move the staff recommendation to accept Santa Cruz County's Human Services Department core five year look back lessons learned, 2022 mid-year assessment and alternative funding source summary update and direct staff, do you want me to read it all? If you will. Direct staff to coordinate with HSD to return on or before December 12th, 2023 with a progress report of the FY22-23 annual summary of core investments, funded programs with an update on community engagement and three, approve the proposed timeline, next steps for the RFP process and I do have some comments. Motion and a second. I will second. By councilmember Brunner, on your motion. Okay. First I want to thank Randy, Kimberly, your entire team and everyone who put so much work into the work last year and in this past year in gathering what you did and bringing it before us and articulating those three pieces, the misunderstandings, the moving forward, those three pieces so well. So just thank you for your work. I also want to acknowledge and appreciate the work that you did with organizations after Org's found out that they were not recommended for funding. I know that was council direction but what I've heard is that that process was really smooth and the community appreciated it. So thank you for all your efforts. I did want to speak to what Mr. Kemp said earlier and I take issue with raising the ageism. Young children literally don't have a voice. They don't have a vote and I would hope if this hasn't happened already that all organizations, nonprofits, go and listen to those videos and listen to the sentiments because we're perpetuating that again. We're perpetuating us versus them and this competitive nature that doesn't get us anywhere. Seniors are important, so are young people. Safety net resources and organizations providing safety net resources are important, so are innovative organizations providing innovative solutions. If we only do one thing, it's a partial response and we'll never see outcomes. So it's important for us as a community to think about the full spectrum response that we need. We need direct services. We need organizations that do systems and culture change which is what C2C is trying to do and we need to have it be value based. Now, we don't have all the money in the world so yes, we do need to make some hard choices but I really want to invite everyone in the nonprofit world. It's already hard out there. I mean, I've been in that world to not pit ourselves against each other and to not use that language with each other and I will just share as a grant writer these innovative solutions and projects start locally. Yes, there are foundations out there. There's federal grants, state grants. There are those resources for safety net organizations as well and foundations want to see that we're seeding some of that here. So I am really proud to be supporting programs and organizations such as C2C and others because then we're showing the rest of the funders out there, state, federal foundation corporations that were invested. We care about the whole spectrum of our population and the whole spectrum of the types of responses it takes to move the needle on some of these challenging issues. So just thank you to all the organizations that are the boots on the ground, that do the work. It's really, really tough and there isn't enough money out in the world to compensate the great work that you do but we'll keep chipping away, we'll contribute as a city as much as we can and just appreciate all the work that everyone's put into it. Thank you. Thank you. Ms. Brown. Thank you, Mayor. So I do have just a few comments that I'd like to make about this process. I've made many, many comments, many very specific over the time that I've been involved in CORE as a city council member. But before I do, I just want to just respond, I think to council member, Calendary Johnson reads some really important points and so I want to kind of just thank you for that. And I also want to acknowledge that I guess acknowledge more fully that the process, whatever process we have is gonna have some competition built into it if we do not work to expand this pot. Well, really even if we do because we know the need is limitless and the capacity of public agencies to support this programming is limited but we are, I mean there is that, that's built into the process and so I don't wanna blame agencies for their reactions to what was really challenging for them, those who did lose funding because it's not like they're not providing really critical services too. And so I guess I just wanted to say that and acknowledge that we're gonna have disappointments and we're gonna have competition and we all should be invested in trying to expand that pie through whatever resources we can bring together. I wanna appreciate the efforts of HSD to manage this process. The County Human Services Department, it's been a tremendous amount of work. I know you have really put your heart and soul into it and so I don't wanna, I don't want my critique to sound like I am critical of your efforts and your intentions in any way. I just wanna highlight some of the challenges that I see and so, and I recognize you inherited the process. I'll say that too. It's not that I wanna just rep this process or dismantle it but I do think that there are lessons learned that we ought to be acknowledging more fully in this process. The report itself is very positive and I appreciate that and it also, and again I say this really with all due respect, it doesn't tell me much about how the change process has helped us to achieve these goals and I know it's early. But for example, hearing from some of the programs really provided some substance to this question about what are they doing with the money and what does equity mean? Equity, you've acknowledged it's used here, it can become a catch all term and with different definitions. So but in terms of the actions we take to promote equity, I wanna be clear that we're taking all of that into account and I gave a lot of feedback. I said I was initially very excited about this report and I'm glad to see it but I am also disappointed because it doesn't really help me understand how core has improved the process of providing services to meet the needs in our community. I wanna know that and I hope that the next report that comes will help fill that in for us and it doesn't help me understand who's being served and how that's different from the previous process. So there's a lot of claims about progress made and equity being achieved and I just can't really understand through the data that's here, the limited data, what that means. So I'm sorry that I'm still gonna be a voice of critique here and it may sound curmudgeonly but I do, I also wanna say that I, and this is not to anyone in particular but I do feel a bit resentful of the framing those of us who have been making these critiques, something we're like in the Stone Age or something or we wanna go back to some Stone Age where the bad old days of funding distribution where it was locked in, that is not what, I mean I've never said that, I would never say that. What I'm saying is let's figure out how to make this process more transparent, more accessible and to help people understand what the consequences are of the decisions that are being made, funding-wise. Who's lost funding, what does that mean for our community? What services have we lost and what services have we gained? I wanna see that. So I hope that that will come in future updates. I'll leave it there, thank you. Thank you, Council Member Brunner. I see Randy Morris' hand raised and I don't know if it's in response. I see a hand raised, Randy Morris and I don't know if he's responding to any of the comments but I will continue, yes. Which ever comments you wish to make. I just wanted to thank Kimberly and Randy for your time today for providing this information thus far in this process and the reflections and the information learned through this process and I see it as an ongoing and I really look forward to identifying, I think one of the proposed adjustments was to identify values and priorities prior to the next RFP and I think as a city council body and our members of the public in the city, community engagement, we can really work on that agreement and alignment and understanding prior and I see that as a very clear proposed adjustment so overall thank you very much for this reflection and this report and proposals to go forward and continue this process the best way we can. Thank you, Council Member. Further questions or comments? Very briefly, hopefully briefly. This is always difficult, I understand that and I went through the first process, my first time through the process of allocating county dollars at that time. I was a staffer at the Board of Supervisors and I remember the process at that time was just awful. It was an endless parade of nonprofits and very, very needy and convincing people parading in front of the Board of Supervisors with the Board of Supervisors having no standards, no anything and mostly making people very disappointed and unhappy. Then in came a new CAO. New County Administrative Officer comes in, at that point I had horn swoggled the people of the Fifth District into electing me supervisor and I saw another process and I thought the new CAO at that time, Susan Mariello actually tried to make good sense out of this. She said, let's have the family and by that she met the applicants. Let's have them find a way to make peace in the family. Let's have them have conversations with themselves, conversations with people in the county and so on and that made the process a whole lot better, a lot better. I think that this core process has an element to it that I've not seen in any other similar process and that is that willingness to examine and make a self-reflection on the process in real time. I think that that shows a kind of openness and courage and willingness to reflect upon the shortcomings within the system and I think that that's very, very helpful to what is as, I want to associate myself with the comments of Council Member Calantari Johnson who made I think one of the best public comments and observations I've heard in a long time when she made her statements a few minutes ago on this and I think they're very thoughtful and they're right. Thank you to you, Mr. Morse and Ms. Peterson and the others involved and our county staff who are sitting in the chambers here this evening. Thank you very, very much for your very fine work on this. I think that this kind of self-examination makes the progress, the process rather, better every single year. The next year is gonna be better than this year. This year is way better than last year. So thank you for that willingness to self-examine the process in what will always be, as the member mentioned earlier, a process where the need is always greater than the resources, we can allocate towards it. So doing it right, knowing what we're managing towards, knowing what outcomes we're looking for is so critical to this process. But thank you to all of you who've been involved in it and done such fine work and the clerk will call the line. Council Member Newsom? Aye. Brown? No. Watkins? Aye. Brunner? Aye. Calantari Johnson? Aye. Vice Mayor Golder? Aye. Mayor Keely? Aye. Time passes and so ordered. I believe that what we will do at this time is take a recess for a bite to eat and we will return. It's now, let's call this a quarter to seven. Let's come back at 7.30. So we have 45 minutes for this break and we'll come back then. Everybody good with that? We stand in recess until 7.30. No, sir. Where you at? Yeah, the thing. You good? I'm ready. All right, boss. There we go. After an evening recess, the Santa Cruz City Council is back in session for our April 25th, 2023 council meeting. We will move to oral communications at this point. This will be the opportunity for anyone who is with us this evening in chambers to address us on any matter under our jurisdiction, but not on today's agenda. We will, I'll acknowledge the gentleman here, and then do we have anyone online? We have two, right? We have two folks, so sir, good evening. Yeah, there's, okay, a few people following me on the Zoom version of the meeting. I find it kind of limiting and kind of a little bit strange to use the Zoom to make comments, just personal preference. Anyhow, sometimes taking a step forward with technology, they're taking certain steps back. Brad Snyder, recovering alcohol. No, wrong meeting, sorry. Let's see, there are two real sensitive spots in the city I wanted to talk about, and there's limited access to these two spots, and I really think, I don't know, people should maybe base these particular issues. One is that the intersection, a lot of people feel really strongly about this, one where they want to, well, I want to defer, they want to punt on the issue, they don't want to talk about it, or they really care strongly about it. At Lincoln and Pacific, there's a little courtyard that used to be the purview of the two kiosks that serve food and the new leaf. The other place that I want to talk about that's kind of near and dear to the hearts of people who long time residents grew up with access to this point, this spot, is the sandstone promontory on the right-hand side of the river mouth, the San Lorenzo river mouth. I have 38 seconds to kind of sum up my thoughts. I don't know, I feel like where you're limited to, by the fencing, just presumed you're not supposed to go there, could be extended, and I feel a lot of locals would be really, really excited to see that happen. Another thing is that steel fencing, I presume it's ferrous material that's in front of Lincoln, and that could be repurposed. That's 45 feet of steel fence, it's very ornate, it's very nice, you could extend 20 feet from where it currently is, but that's it. There is, there are rather two people online, let's take the first one. Yeah, hi, this is Garrett again. Hey, on April 18th, the first of its kind, Berkeley natural gas ban on hookups was overturned by the Federal Ninth Circuit Appeals Court on the grounds it cannot supersede federal authority. While it only struck down the Berkeley law and is uncertain how sweeping that is, I fail to see how our ordinance is all that different or why it would fare any better under a challenge. I think it would be prudent to suspend our natural gas ban prohibition ordinance in new construction here, pending any further appeals and to avoid litigation. This is a great opportunity for a lesson learned not to blindly follow the leftist home office in Berkeley. When anyone loses in court, it usually means they were wrong. I think the timing of your ban was far prematurely too wrong anyway by many years, maybe decades. You blew through asking for public comment so fast on item 29 parking rates. I was unable to comment, so I'll only make a generalized comment now. Assuming all expenses are related, it is appropriate to establish Enterprise Reserve Fund operating balances or rebuild reserve fund balances or create yearly balance watch targets for enterprise funds. The extra balances of these funds smooth out year-on-year imbalances, but it should be two-sided, meaning fee rates should be adjusted up when the trend is that the reserves are always going down, nearing zero, but also a high limit established that fee rates need reducing if the year-over-year trend is always going up, which is a sure sign you are indeed overcharging. The rejections after the parking fee increases for parking fund balances as presented last meeting only went one way rapidly up year after year with no terminus indicating you do intend to very much milk the public like a cash cow with parking fees. And I fear when large fund imbalances like that are laying around, the money gets inappropriately used for unrelated expenses. Consider two-sided watch targets and create such for enterprise reserve funds. Thanks. We have a second person online, I believe. Good evening. Good evening, Mayor Keely and Council. This is Eric Radberg. I wanted to follow up with Council on a comment I made several weeks ago regarding the temporary diesel generators at the waste fire treatment facility. Thank you, Mayor, for directing staff to answer my questions. I know they were detailed and I had a lot of back and forth with Katie Stewart, who you heard from earlier tonight. And I appreciate that and the graciousness that she handled my detailed questions. I thought I should let Council know how this all works. The two diesel generators together produce up to five megawatts of power. That is the peak demand at peak flow times for the wastewater treatment facility. The wastewater treatment facility also has a 1.3 megawatt co-generator that runs primarily off of the wastewater, the methane from the wastewater, but it's also supplemented by natural gas from PG&E. And I believe you also had an item to supplement the use to pay for the natural gas. So primarily the diesel generators, they weren't front to capacity. Mostly it was run off the 1.3 megawatt co-generator, which is appropriate. The reason I bring all this up is I think it's really, it goes to Garrett's first comment. We need to be really aware of our needs. And we're not ready to go completely electric and get rid of all natural gas. In this case, the wastewater treatment facility was running off of natural gas, both produced from the methane from the wastewater and supplemented by PG&E and diesel generators. So while I think that electrification is great, I'm right now in a Chevy Bolt talking to you. I'm parked, but and so I'm not a climate in our, but we really need to be fully, we need to look at this in a more holistic way. And I really encourage council to do so. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Ms. Bush, anyone else? Good. This last call for road communication. Seen here none. We will move forward onto item 36 on our agenda this evening. This is draft of the sixth cycle housing element update and review for state submittal. Mr. Butler and Mr. Van Wa, no? Who have we got? Yes, we do. Good evening to both of you. Good evening. Thank you, Mayor Keely and council members. I'm Lee Butler, director of planning and community development for the city. And with me is principal planner, Matt Van Wa. We also have some of our consultants available in the audience and also on our zoom meeting. And I'll kick it off very briefly before handing it over to Matt. We're excited to present this draft housing element to you all this evening. I wanna start by thanking the community members that have participated thus far. We've had a lot of engagement activities and opportunities through workshops and online comments that have been received. And I also wanna thank the city council subcommittee that consists of mayor Keely and council member Newsome and council member Calentari Johnson. They've put in a lot of effort in also improving this document. It is an iterative process and we've had a great consultant team working on it as well as a great amount of staff work that has gone into this document. We have a better document as a result of all of that input. And so I just wanted to express my appreciation there. We, as you all know, achieved our fifth cycle, RENA housing targets, that's the regional housing needs allocation targets as of a few weeks ago in every income category. And that's quite an achievement that puts us in the top 6% in the state in meeting that fifth cycle. We also are looking forward now to hopefully being in the same position eight years from now, which is a heavier lift, a bigger task, because the numbers that we have in our next cycle that Matt will be talking to you about momentarily are five times what we have in our current cycle. And we've been increasing the rate of development recently and in large part, the state laws have been facilitating housing production and that's helped us to achieve the RENA targets for this cycle. And with that increased production, we recently met the targets, but we're gonna have to increase that pace of development by about two times as much, a little over two times as much in order to meet that. So even the targets are five times where we are for this cycle and the pace of development will need to essentially double in order for us to be in the same position eight years from now. So a lot of work ahead, but a lot of work that we've been putting into this with our consultants and with the community to set us up to be in position to partner with our economic development and housing department, who produces a lot of affordable housing on behalf of the city and our residents as well as partnering with the development community to make these projects happen. With that, I'll turn it over to Matt Van Wa. Thank you, sir. Good evening, Mr. Van Wa. Good evening, Matthew Van Wa here, Principal Planner. Thank you, Lee. So I'm here tonight to present the housing element and online we also have a Nesquil Mish from Kimlin Horn, who's our lead consultant on this as well as Bill Wiseman in the stands here. And should be noted again that this housing element especially is much more complex than previous ones. And we're really fortunate to have a consultant team that's worked on a lot of other housing elements in the state. And so that's been very helpful going forward in this process. So they're here to answer any questions as well that I can. So just the agenda tonight, housing element background and taxes. Matt, sorry to pause you guys are not yet sharing screen. This is why it's city clerk month. Year. Year, right. Thank you, Ms. Bush. Thank you, sorry about that. All right, so for the agenda tonight, we have a housing element background and sections, the candidate sites strategy, housing goals, community engagement efforts to date, and then next steps. And so just briefly, what is the housing element? It's really mainly the required chapter of the city's general plan that identifies projected housing needs by income category and also provides goals, policies and programs and objectives to address those current needs and guide future growth as well for all income levels. And then also requires certification by the Department of Housing and Community Development, HCD is often referred to with the state to be in compliance with the state housing element laws. And again, that's something that's, there's a lot more attention being placed on this housing element cycle than previous ones by HCD in that certification process. So housing element sections, we have an introduction and then one of the larger sections is our policy plan and then there's many appendices and that's community engagement, review of past performance, housing needs assessment, fair housing assessment, housing constraints, housing resources. And then another large section as our housing sites inventory and then finally our glossary. And I'll start with our housing sites inventory. This is the section of the housing element where we're taking that arena that Lee mentioned, the regional housing needs allocation that we get from the state and from the Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments, AMBAG, we get a target number for each of these income levels as part of this arena and the housing element each eight years we have to show the state there's capacity within the city to meet that, to meet that number of units as our arena target. It's not necessarily that those will get built but just as we have the capacity to do that. So there's kind of two different elements to this. So one is this housing, the housing sites inventory which is this paper exercise showing that we have the capacity and then there's every single year we're reporting units to the state that count towards that arena calculation in us meeting our arena. And so just briefly Lee touched on this again. This is our fifth cycle arena, our current one that we're in. And as you can see, we've now hit all of our arena targets for that cycle and quite a bit over in terms of a low income especially. But as we also mentioned, that number increases substantially in this next cycle by almost five-fold to 3,736 units. So really again, like I mentioned, where can those 3,700 units go in the city? So that's where our sites, our candidate sites requirements and sites inventory strategy comes into play. And so we're looking at sites that can accommodate the city's arena. And then the state's also looking for sites that are located by community resources and transportation have access to utilities, things like that. And then there's also a new component to the housing element this year which is affirmatively furthering fair housing, AFFH as you'll often see. And that's where the state is looking at more equity into where housing is placed. So they're looking at some dispersion of units to allow for some amount of housing in higher resource areas. So housing isn't just in one specific part of the city but can be dispersed to give people more opportunities in these higher resource areas of the city. And so those candidate site strategies, they can really be broken down into four pieces and the first one is a big one. That's the pipeline projects. Those are projects that have already been submitted to planning or have been entitled by this council. And they're a little more definitive. And HCD appreciates seeing these in our account because it shows that there is development interest on these sites. And there's a little more guarantee that there will be units built. So we count those. And then we also have a projected A to U's vacant residential sites. And then another large one is infill opportunity areas. And so these three areas are areas where we use more of a projection to show based on past history, how many units might be built on these sites that we've included in the sites inventory. And those four are added up essentially to show the state that we have this capacity. And so again, just briefly, the infill opportunity areas to break those down further are downtown areas, including that expansion area. And then our corridors, churches and other sites and churches, I'll just touch on briefly, we included that in there because there has been recent state legislation that has made it a lot easier to develop housing, especially 100% affordable housing on church sites and on church parking lots. And we do expect to see more of that development, including the Cedar project downtown right now as it has utilized some of those state allowances. So we do expect to see some more of that. So we have included some church sites in the inventory as well. Then all those are broken down into the number of units between the pipeline projects that have a discrete number of units attached to them based on what they've applied for and then these projections. And this is a slightly different table than what was in the public review draft. It's been organized a little bit differently. So if you've previously looked at the public review draft that was available about a month ago now, this table breaks it down slightly differently but the numbers are very similar in how we've done that. This now we've taken just the pipeline projects and then everything else below in terms of those projections. So some other key differences from that public review draft were some sites that we've removed and then also sites that we've changed as well. And I'll just touch on those briefly. Again, that it changes our numbers slightly. The golf club drive sites, those were sites that are in our general plan that require an area plan to be part of them to develop this area. And we really found that because of this area plan requirement in our general plan, there was some uncertainty as to whether these sites would actually develop over the next eight years in a made sense at this time to take them out based on those requirements. There is a great opportunity for a good housing project on this site but it's just not something we wanted to include in the housing element sites inventory at this time. And again, I'll mention too that these sites were also, I should add that we have a council subcommittee on the housing element. We've met with them and talked through these sites as well and these were also recommended to be removed through that subcommittee as well. A couple others there are the County of Santa Cruz site, another great opportunity and something that the county has mentioned. There have been discussions in the past between the county and the city on doing housing project on this site. But again, it's something that there is a lot of uncertainty whether that's actually gonna happen in the next eight years and we chose to take it out for that reason. And then finally, Anson Ali Pond site on this slide, there's a few concerns over this one, one being coastal commission has raised concerns about development on this site and then there's also sensitive species on this site as well. So there's likely a more lengthy environmental process and again, a little more uncertainty in terms of the development. So those three sites which are larger sites that did have a lot of units attributed to them in that draft review or draft update were removed. So that did change the unit count a little bit. And then finally, this again was a discussion we had with the subcommittee and this was removing the existing library site as a housing site and instead adding lot seven, the city's lot seven. So we swapped those two city properties essentially. And again, that had to do with what was deemed most ideal to include in the plan as far as these downtown city properties go that have good development potential. And so with those changes, you can see that the numbers did change a little bit from the public review draft to the updated total. They decreased just slightly except for the very low or low that increased just slightly based on those changes. And there's one other, there's a few other changes that we're considering that aren't yet in these numbers that you see before you right now. A big one is the downtown plan expansion in the draft. We, the public review draft, we had talked about the downtown plan expansion as a rezoning project. We chose to remove the rezoning component of that just for the housing element itself just because there's that additional uncertainty about the rezoning process and how many units we end up with things like that and what that rezoning looks like. It was much cleaner to just have no rezonings in our housing element for HCD's review. And so we removed the rezoning discussion and we went with a base capacity of units in that downtown plan expansion area. And that number was also revised since the numbers that were in the council packet. There was actually one mistake in that base capacity calculation. So it's about a hundred units less than that 1,145 units that's in the council packet before you. So that's one change. There's a few other changes too that we've had a really engaged public that have submitted a lot of comments and looked very closely at this, which is wonderful because they're catching stuff that we didn't in this first draft. Some of those are like our pipeline project affordability edits. For instance, 190 Westcliffe, the project in here that was fairly recently approved. It had a, the project description was correct in our site's inventory, but the units were attributed in the wrong category. So it was, it's an 89-unit project and our table had all those 89 units all in low income when there's actually only 10 units in low income. So that's one big change that hasn't been reflected yet. There's gonna be an instance or two like that as we go through this to finalize everything before HCD submittal. So just note that there are changes like that still coming as well as pipeline projects we've heard from the community, double check all your pipeline projects, make sure they're still actually moving forward, they're active, and there's a few that we've caught that we've realized this really hasn't done anything for years where it's expired and it shouldn't really be on our pipeline project list anymore. And so that for instance, 525 Ocean Street, there's 56 units of low income attributed to that in our site's inventory that will also be taken off. So there are still changes like that that we're doing. One final bigger piece that we've talked to the subcommittee about our, and this is briefly alluded to in the staff report to council, is that sites that are included in a housing element site's inventory, two straight time, or two times in general, if they're in two housing elements, it automatically triggers a ministerial approval process for that site. And what that means is if this site has been in two housing elements, if their project comes in and meets all the objective standards, it would only need a building permit to be constructed, including no environmental, the California Environmental Quality Act CEQA process. So we look through our site's inventory, there's currently four sites that have been included in previous housing elements that would qualify for this ministerial process. And the subcommittee recommended that we remove those sites from this to not trigger that ministerial process. Another thing too is just to consider that there's a number of sites in our site's inventory that only have above moderate market rate housing assigned to them based on their size. The HCD typically requires sites of a certain size to allow affordable housing to be attributed to them in the site's inventory. And there's a number of smaller sites that only have above moderate income assigned to them in the site's inventory. And as you saw in the previous tables, we have a lot of above moderate income housing percentage. So that some of those sites could be removed so that they could be in a future housing element and not trigger a ministerial process in the next housing element, for instance, without really hurting the buffer in the percentage that we have of those above moderate sites. So those are some key changes to consider going forward. We're gonna switch gears here and talk about the policy plan chapter really briefly. We have, it's broken down by seven goals and then there's policies under those goals and then objectives under those policies that have more discrete tasks assigned to them to meet those policies and objectives. Really quickly, goal one, housing production, goal two, affordable housing, goal three, special needs housing and homelessness. Goal four, housing assistance. Goal five, neighborhood vitality. Goal six, affirmatively furthering fair housing. That's its own separate chapter in this and our own separate goal in this. And then goal seven is resource conservation and environmental stewardship. And so I just wanna touch upon a few policy objectives that were added also since that public review draft was completed and these have also been reviewed by the subcommittee. So we have in here a more streamlined process for specific projects that have actually been approved already. Their building plans have already been approved on another site. So essentially it pre-approved plans. So if someone submits the same plan that there's a streamlined process for that because it's already largely been approved on another site. Another one is working with partner agencies to advocate for homelessness response services within the county but outside the city's jurisdiction. Other jurisdictions in this area to be doing their fair share of the homelessness services. And then a establish program that promotes rental protections that are in effect and utilizes a variety of our communication means that we have to actually get this information across better to people of those rental protections. And then another one, I think this is the last one that we're currently applying for an AARP, age-friendly community designation. We wanted to memorialize that in our housing helmet as well. If we get that designation, it just opens us up to a community of these age-friendly communities. Finally, there's a few additional policy objective recommendations that we're considering based on what we heard from the planning commission and the comments at the planning commission. And that is additional discussion on extremely low-income units. Our policies currently have a discussion on supportive housing, which is an extremely low-income unit, but we don't talk specifically about extremely low-income, which is 30% or less, say, am I? And that is something the state is looking for us to report on in the future. So it is an area we want to just specifically touch on in the policies. And then also consider refinements to housing preservation and rental protection and displacement policies. This was something we heard a lot at the planning commission, both by the commissioners and the commenters. And this is really just saying we want to look more closely at our policies over the next couple of weeks before we submit to HCD. Really make sure those are refined and have best practices included in them to best meet those goals here. Community engagement efforts to date. Just very briefly, we had workshop survey, last year, tabling events at beach flats and lower ocean neighborhoods. Stakeholder meetings. We had our city, the subcommittee meetings that have been around monthly since early this year. Public review draft release. So we had that review period for a month. Our community workshop a couple weeks ago, planning commission, and now tonight. And again, just that public review draft was available for one month for comments and questions. And we're taking comments and feedback on this on the housing element at any time, but specifically comments received during this public review draft period will actually go into our submittal to HCD. We do have to show the state how we're addressing and considering those comments. And so just really briefly summary that community feedback, facilitate more affordable housing, consider the impacts of water traffic, or consider impacts on water traffic parks and parking. Seek state and federal funding to assist affordable housing and homelessness. Consider design and bulk of potential developments. Plan to exceed RENA for the lower and moderate income units as in a higher buffer. And then recommendations to support mobile homes, especially for seniors. Consider the effects of short term rentals and vacation homes, up zone, single family zones to allow multifamily development in them, maintain existing city character, and consider flooding and wildfire risk for new development. That's just the flavor of some of the comments we've received so far. And we're at our tentative project schedule here. We have our meeting tonight and then our HCD submittal will be a couple of weeks from now, the second week of May most likely. And that's followed by a 90 day HCD review. Address those HCD comments towards the end of summer and start the process again with another HCD review. And at that time, when we're getting together that next HCD review too, that'll be another touch point with the community as well to address the HCD's comments and comments we've received over the summer on this too. And then finally, there would be a second submittal to HCD and then going back to planning commission and city council by December of this year. So with that, happy to answer any questions. Thank you very much. Well, thank you very much. Thank you both and thank you for all the people in the planning department. I know that you sit in the seats here and there's a lot of other folks involved in this and thank you very, very much for this. We are under certainly new set of state laws and have not been through this process under this set of state laws. And thank you for all the fine work that you've been doing on that. Let me ask council members if they have questions or comments. Ms. Brown. I have a lot, okay, okay, I'll do it. I'm gonna try to move through these quickly. And first, I just wanna say thank you for the very clear overview of a lot of information that I know has taken a lot of work to bring together. And I wanna thank my colleagues for being a part of that process through the subcommittee. I do have some questions that I am hoping to try to get answered. Some of them are clarifying questions and then others are more about the possibilities for including potentially additional specific elements in the draft housing element. So first, page six of the staff report discusses a possible outcome of being included in the inventory. So we're talking about the inventory here. If a developed site hasn't been included for two consecutive housing elements and has not redeveloped that a new proposal may use a ministerial process. So I, and I appreciate you pointing this out for us. I did just wanna check though because the government code that cited I couldn't find that language in there. And so I'm just wondering, I just wanna make sure I'm clear about where it is. It's I'm a policy nerd and I talk with policy nerds and we're just trying to make sure we are clear. So that's one and I'll just, I've got a few more. And then, and I know I think we've heard this before but I just would love to know where in the state law the restriction is that we can't use student dormitory units to help meet our arena. It just feels very, it doesn't feel right given that we're looking at building projects that are essentially gonna be not student dorms but essentially meet the same need. And those count, but the others don't. And so I just wanted to ask about that as well. And then I have three more that are just clarifying. So the staff report also talks about realistic capacity, the need to project the number of units that could be produced on the element and using this idea of realistic capacity. And I'm just wondering where that's like how we come to understand that that's what we need to do. I believe it and I'm glad we're doing it but I'm just wondering how that works. And then, and that's sort of a bigger question. So if it may be not appropriate to go through all of that here, I don't wanna take up a whole bunch of time. And then quite another question. What's the role of the Coastal Commission in terms of approving amendments to the city's LCP for housing element policies in the coastal zone? Does that come next or is that part of our existing local coastal plan or just, so those are some. And then the recent ADU study that you conducted, I recognize a small sample. I know this is something that and this is on page, bottom of page six, top of page seven of the staff report that what you, the reported data tracks with the assumptions that are made about how the percentage of ADUs that are affordable. And I know we've, this has come up at other council meetings and then we got more additional information. I'm just wondering is that, can we see that study? Not with the names of respondents or anything but is that information we can like access? But what was that study again? The survey of ADUs to determine affordability and I really appreciate it that you do that. We got one, we got some additional information one time and I'm just wondering if it's possible to get that. Okay, so those are, and then I have some questions about how to move forward. Thanks. Mr. Butler. Thank you Mayor Keely and thanks for those questions and comments, Council Member Brown. I'll take a first swing at him and then I'll pass it over to Matt to see if he wants to fill in anything else. The answer to a number of those items is the HCD guidelines. So you asked about the comm of inclusion in the inventory and the ministerial process. I wanna clarify the way that I've read the guidelines. It's not actually two consecutive sites inventories. It's any two inventories and that is for a developed project, excuse me, a developed site. If it's a vacant site, then three inventory listings upon listing in the third and I wanna be clear here because for a developed site, it's upon listing in the second that it becomes a ministerial review and so that at the beginning, yes, that's correct and that was part of the conversation with the subcommittee with respect to many of the sites that Matt referenced for that are only providing the above moderate income, the market rate units, those if we don't need them right now because we've got the excess capacity in that above moderate income category and so by taking them out, if we need those sites in a future inventory, we might have to add them and they wouldn't automatically be ministerial approvals at that point in time. We pulled the government code from those guidelines so there might be a typo in those guidelines but we are happy to go back and reference that and follow up with you on the specific code section. Same thing with the student dorms, not counting. We've had also a conversation with Council Member Golder who expressed that same thing. We have a policy that recommends and I'll get the actual number here so you can reference it but it recommends that we work with the state in an attempt to have them count more non-traditional housing types towards RENA so it's policy 1.4C, encourage the state to recognize non-traditional types of housing units for RENA purposes by providing feedback to HCD and state representatives. We've already had conversations with both UCSC and they have connected us with some of our state reps with Gail Pellerin's office and so we're jumping right into that because the sooner we can make that happen, the better off we'll be especially as UCSC has a number of housing projects in the pipeline that we wouldn't be able to count. There are quite a few that we are able to count based on their independent living units. They've got a kitchen and they've got a bathroom so it's our review and analysis and we've also seen HCD presentations and looked, pieced that together so we believe that those can be counted but not the dorm rooms. The dorm rooms, we can't count and that's a big chunk of what the UCSC housing production is. I completely agree with your comments. We should be able to count those because they are providing housing for our residents. So, let me go just really quickly while you're going on to the next one. I realize that question three was about this question about realistic capacity is kind of a little bit more ephemeral and I'm happy to talk about it with you offline so we don't have to put a lot of time on it here unless you have a quick answer you want to give me. I'll try to, so again the guidelines speak to that but one of the things that we did is we looked at land to building value ratios and we also brought our own local knowledge about what developers have said to us and also some of the properties that showed up we knew the property owners were not interested. We've talked with them about project and they're not interested so it's a combination of statistical analysis and local knowledge that goes into that and really it's telling the story to HCD so that they can understand that yes, these sites there is an actual potential for them to develop in the next eight years. What's the role for the Coastal Commission? We've coordinated with them on this. The Coastal Commission, there are provisions that essentially took housing out of the hands the Coastal Commission in the early 80s and so this is not a local coastal program amendment. This does not have to go through the Coastal Commission and we've coordinated with the Coastal Commission to confirm that we're on the same page there so that's a good thing that it's our document and then the recent ADU study, absolutely we're happy to get you the information from that study. Thank you. One last thing, I believe Matt or Inez may be able to, Inez is our consultant on the line here. The ADUs, we have our own breakdown of affordability levels and the state has their own breakdown. I believe we use the state breakdown for this. Is that correct? Matt, nodding. Correct. I believe the state breakdown is 60% low, very low, 30% mod and 10% above mod whereas our ADU studies granted it's a small sample size and it's self-reported but we've seen about 90% low, very low in that self-reporting. So we're hoping that our ADU projection in the site's inventory is actually conservative. Okay, so now I have a few more substantive questions related to potential additions and so I'm, as you all know, I'm very much interested in doing everything we can and using this document and being one of those everything we can in that category to promote possibilities for affordable housing development and the protection of affordable housing stock and really as a part of that tenant protections keeping people housed as we know is just so critical given the crisis that we face. And so I wanna ask about the possibilities and some of this I'm gonna, I'll be a little general here but I have a few proposals that I'd like to put forward when we have the opportunity later just to discuss with you all as part of a motion but I'm wondering about in particular inclusionary is there anything that would like legally prevent us from including consideration of amendments to the inclusionary? I know it's in here to look at that but to require higher levels of affordability for density bonus projects. So that's one and the others maybe not quite as legal of a question but also including considering implementing a program to require workforce housing units in market rate projects and looking at that workforce housing and also supporting and facilitating the efforts of Santa Cruz City School District to provide housing for its employees. I just don't know because some of that involves other agencies and the density bonus issue is very fraught, I will just say. So those are questions that I just wanted to if I can get your thoughts. Yeah, thank you. I can speak first to the inclusionary question. So as part of the housing element, one of the chapters we do actually have to show the state impediments to housing. HCD actually views inclusionary as an impediment to housing. So that's a, it's one, it's something we can obviously have as a city but we also have to show the state that it's not impediment to housing as through this housing element. So changing that inclusionary right now without that study or additional review would certainly be a red flag for HCD as part of this review currently. So we feel based on that, it makes more sense to include still a policy in here that it is something that we'll study and look at but come back at a later time. That's how we're currently addressing looking at the inclusionary and whether changes need to be made to that. Gotcha, that was my question was about including consideration of this, not that this is something we were gonna pursue. Correct, yep, yep, objective 2.1B. And then the other city school partnerships, workforce housing. So I think the workforce housing component actually falls within that 2.1B. Matt, since you've got that pulled up, I was just searching for it. It specifies review the inclusionary ordinance to determine if amendments are needed to ensure that the inclusionary requirements provide the maximum number of affordable units or deeper levels of affordability without being a barrier to housing development while considering implications for how developers will use density bonus. Analysis will evaluate affordability levels to incentivize deeper levels of affordable housing or more moderate income units depending on needs. So that last bit, the more moderate income units is where we could look at a policy that says there are trade-offs. And some cities actually have this. They've got different ways to meet the inclusionary requirement. So you could provide fewer, very low and low income units. You could provide more moderate income units and that or some mixture between all of those. And that provides more flexibility for the developers to look at the specific product type that they're putting on the market and to understand what's gonna best meet their needs. But I think your point is a good one about how can we incentivize the workforce housing? We have some things in here that relate to housing production, particularly at that, the smaller projects scale. So the one to four units, for example. And that contributes, but it is certainly a gap because right now our inclusionary is at 80% of the area median income. And those people that are falling outside of that, Council Member Golder is nodding because we had this conversation yesterday about her teachers. They fall outside of that 80% AMI, but they don't make enough money to really live comfortably with rental or to purchase a residence. And so that is something very important and that common as well taken. It's something that we can look at even with the Council Subcommittee in advance of submission to the HCD of the first draft to see if there are ways that we can strengthen those policies. And then the last one that you had was the schools. And we did, as you all recall, we made some updates a year or two ago to, in some respects, address that workforce housing issue because the schools were falling outside of that 80% income bracket that our inclusionary would otherwise require. And we have a provision that was put in place to facilitate those school district projects, but that's not to say there aren't other things that we could do. And so we can certainly look at that as we're moving forward. And there may be some opportunities, even if we don't get things into this draft because we do wanna get the draft to HCD sooner rather than later, but there still may be some opportunities and they're gonna come back with comments and have requests for us to make modifications as well. So we don't wanna introduce a whole slew of new things if we're coming back with a second draft, but if there are some things that are targeted that are affirmatively furthering fair housing or that are really promoting a objective that isn't adequately covered already, then that's something that we can also consider. Thank you. Really appreciate your comments there. And so now I have a couple of questions about things that I would adjust or some things I would like to not see in the housing element, but this is again just me. So my questions are one around particularly SB 10 and it comes up in across different parts of the housing element draft, but under the policy plan on page two dash five, objective 13E, we're gonna adopt SB 10 provisions. Is it really necessary to do that? Given that we are in the process of implementing SB 9, we don't yet have a clear picture of how this will affect development within the context of neighborhoods. And so I'm just wondering, is that necessary? This is, and I'm speaking a little bit in shorthand, I'm trying to keep it quick here. There's a reference on, so it's page two dash five of the housing element draft, objective 1.3E, that includes reference to adopting provisions of SB 10 and another state law related to increasing density infill. And so we're in the process of implementing SB 9 and so the question is just, is it, I just feel like we're really pushing and I appreciate the need for that, but given where we're at and that we've got a housing element that shows we have the capacity or an inventory here, I'd just love to hear your thoughts. Yeah, thank you, Council Member. This is one we definitely talked with the subcommittee on and we knew it would require a softer touch. And we feel like we came to a place where this policy objective in particular speaks to looking at this and considering it and bringing back council options for how this might happen, but there's no specific decision on implementing itself. So we felt that was a good middle ground between exploring the possibilities of it without implementing it. I do want to point out that SB 10, as you noted, is mentioned in a number of places. And one of the places that we also mentioned is 6.2D. There is a greater level of specificity in 6.2D. And that is expressly looking at how we might affirmatively further fair housing. That is one of the things that the state is going to be looking at very carefully and making sure that we are taking great strides at improving the great work that we're already doing. But this is one of the areas where we felt we can utilize that state law. And just so that the members of the public understand what SB 10 is, SB 10 allows for the city to change the general plan designation and or zoning designation of parcels such that they can allow up to 10 units on each parcel. And that process itself would be exempt from CEQA, but the subsequent projects would not be. And so the thought here was that where in 6.2D, we speak to focusing on higher resource areas and that's a way to get at the affirmatively furthering fair housing is looking at some of those high resource areas and identifying places where we could utilize, in this instance, flexible density units, which are small units of 650 square feet, 650 square feet or less that could. Then they have the potential to allow for people to move into areas that have traditionally not been accessible to them based on the prices there. Thank you. I have one last question and then I'll pass it off. And I will just say, just given what I am hearing, I have to just make this comment because I don't know if I will get a chance to make it again. It just feels like a lot of the way HCD is approaching this is more affirmatively furthering more housing. So I want to see the fairness, I want to see the equity in it. So just more units, to me, it feels like there's more housing. But I appreciate your thinking about the approach and the resource, high resource areas. The last question I have is related to owner occupancy requirements for ADUs. This has been before us in the past. We did not opt to do that and then the state made the decision for us but that's a temporary law. Maybe perhaps we'll also be taking care of for us if the state, highly likely. But for now, we have some ability to make that choice for the longer term on our own. And so I guess I'm just, I'm wondering if that is desirable and I'm really asking the question for all of us to think about. Do we have any way to evaluate, this is a question for you. Do we have any way to evaluate the effects of this policy? And I'm gonna make a comment, commenty question just to say, I'm particularly concerned about this because I feel and many do that it incentivizes speculative investment in our local property market in a way that has a negative effect on people who wanna buy a home and live here. And perhaps build an ADU to house a family member or have additional income to help pay their mortgage as a very different dynamic than what we know is the wave of highly leveraged speculative investment in our community and we can't stop it but this is one thing that kind of mitigates that I feel. So is it really desirable as a question for you all? Do we have any way to assess the impacts of the at least five year elimination of that role? Thanks, council member Brown. That's a great question. And I'll start by where you started where you said the choice may be eliminated for us. There is a bill pending at the state right now and this legislative cycle that would have the current expiration of 2025 extend indefinitely so that we could not apply owner occupancy standards to ADUs. I believe that that is going to pass and I believe that that is going to pass because of what plays into your second part of the question. Do we have any statistics? Our ADU production has ramped up substantially and I do believe that that is in part based on the fact that we have no ability to require owner occupancy during this timeframe. Anecdotally, I have heard that from some individuals that have constructed who have said, now's the time, I got to do it in these five years. And your point is a very valid concern. That was a question that was debated years ago, 2019, I believe when we brought the ADU owner occupancy considerations forward and council said, go off and study that and then we had in 2020, the state say, well, no owner occupancy requirements for the next five years and so we've kind of put a pause on that but council has given us direction to go off and study that and to talk with the community about it. And so if there's concern about the way that the policy is currently worded, I don't have it in front of me right now but if there's concern about, if it's more definitively stated then the council is comfortable with right now then we can certainly dial that back and adjust it in advance of our submittal to HCD. Council Member Brunner. Thank you. Okay, so let's see, thank you for thus far and I was part of working on this last summer and the resolution and so seeing it come to this state there's a lot in there and my question just to kind of summarize, I shared this information and the links with a lot of people that are very interested in housing in our community and it's really hard for a lot of people to digest everything in what is in here and so my couple of questions I have, I think there's the next community meeting for input is in summer, is there? That's correct August timeframe. Okay and so nothing until then it goes through this draft process and so the next opportunity for public input on this would be summer. Yes and if someone still wants to make comments on the current draft or the draft, we'll post the draft that we submit to HCD which will be revised based on what we're hearing both from the planning commission meeting and tonight. So we'll be posting that draft and if individuals wanna comment on that during the interim we're happy to receive that feedback. In fact, the earlier the better as we're gonna be working on things while HCD is undertaking their review but the next big push for additional outreach will be in August. Okay and I guess that helps because one thing that I'm always trying to help with is education and understanding on these topics that are very important and that people in the community really want to weigh in on and so for example, I've been giving it a lot of thought about how we can make it more accessible for people to understand and so we throw around the term low income, very low income, moderate, affordable. To us in this context and I know from sitting on, for example, the housing authority board for many years that term is a defined term that we're following a state table based on how many people in your household based on your income level, based on the area and for everyday people, the term affordable means can I afford to live there and when we just at our strategic plan meeting our top industry is tourism and hospitality so those people in those industries when I did a quick search on the internet for that salary range, we have retail workers, restaurant workers, hospitality workers and a lot of them are downtown in these corridor site areas. People wanna see that maybe language called out so it can identify with them, teacher, bus driver, our own city workers, not the terms that we use and I don't know if there's a way to get at that between now and the next community input creating a little video that's just lay person, clear, here are some sites and in a way that someone can not feel intimidated and know what they're commenting on and so I just, that came up several times with several people and then some of the housing groups that work on are more familiar with these terms and state law and what not, it took a while to get through all that too and so I just wanna ask that question for consideration as we move through this process and to think about how we can reach by the time the next community input is being asked that we think about our language that we're so used to using but rephrase it in ways that are more accessible. So I guess that ended up being more of a comment than a direct question or clarifying question and so I really, I appreciate all the questions that were asked thus far so I will pass it on at this point, thank you. Thank you, thank you for your comments. More comments? Ms. Watkins. I have someone, well actually I just have two, did you have some? Go, go. Okay, two. You can't leave until I'm done anyways. Okay, you're right. Sure, there you go. We're all in it together, very good point. Okay, thank you. What is just like a weird nuance question in regards to the county site, my question was would that be a double count for their Rina numbers as well? No, it would just be the city specific. Okay. That's correct. It would just be ours but we don't anticipate that it's gonna happen. No, I know. So we're recommending that that site be taken. Right, right. Okay, gotcha. I guess, so my other question was about the university. In terms of the context of the ADU conversation that was brought up by Council Member Brown, bringing it way back I think to our housing blueprint work and our community engagement strategy, what we heard is that our community is really supportive of more dense housing happening in or downtown and places away from the residential areas. Therefore, having ADUs being produced through an owner, that kind of context was like, okay, well that will keep the integrity of that area. So I mean, just to kind of provide a little bit of input that all came really from the outreach efforts that took place to help inform our strategies. And then I guess lastly it's sort of just a larger question is something that I hear often is, how come Santa Cruz is producing all this housing? How come it's these big buildings going up in Santa Cruz? What about other communities? And I'm just wondering how you would respond to that. Or you know, I mean, how do you explain that? That's a great question. I think there is a confluence of factors affecting us here. We're all here because we love many things about Santa Cruz and it makes it an attractive place to live with whether it's the natural environment or the climate. That's certainly one component. UCSC and the proximity to UCSC is another significant driver to that. And when you look at some of the neighboring communities, you're getting further away from UCSC. And so even right now before the UCSC expansion, they've got roughly 19,500 students and a little under half of those are not living on campus. So that's a significant number of students that are in all likelihood looking for places closer to campus than some of the other cities. And then our proximity to Silicon Valley is an influence there as well. Again, we're closer to Silicon Valley than other neighboring communities. And maybe finally I'd go back to just a tangent from the first thing that I mentioned. There are a lot of attractive things in Santa Cruz and not just related to the natural environment, but also there is a higher concentration of jobs in Santa Cruz than elsewhere in the neighboring communities. And so people looking to live close to their jobs. We also have better transit options than neighboring communities. And a more walkable and likable location than others. So people that are looking for that lifestyle are also looking to move here. And I will say that the, I said finally, but I've got one more thing. Because the work from home dynamic, I think has made Santa Cruz more attractive in that people that were working in San Francisco or the South Bay or the East Bay wouldn't necessarily commute five days a week to that job. But if they only have to commute in two days a week, all that becomes a more manageable commute. And I'd say that is bearing out in the development proposals that we are seeing. I've talked with colleagues over the hill and they have seen a slowdown in some of the residential development applications. And even with the interest rate hikes that we've seen in the last eight months or so in particular, we've had a lender authorize development and lend on the front riverfront project, which I'll throw a number out there is probably a $70 million project, right? So the lending community is very much still believing that our local market is strong because of all of those factors. Interesting. Well, given the university and the influx of population from the university, I think having the dorms counted makes a lot of sense and would definitely benefit our community. So however we can advocate for that at the state, I'm all in. So anyways, thank you. I know that was a not an easy question. I appreciate your thoughts. Madam Vice Mayor. I wanna thank the subcommittee and I wanna thank Director Butler and your staff and thank you for spending an hour and a half talking me off the ledge yesterday as I read through it over the weekend and I was like, I don't like to bother them on the weekends but I was thinking heart attack, heart attack. And I'm also wondering where are all the people that don't want the tall buildings? Where are you now? So you're leaving me on my own. So one thought that I had had throughout these conversations that I didn't think of till now was, is there a possibility and not now but in the future to limit the square footage in a single family home in town? And the reason being is I think we can all agree that at a certain point, people aren't having nine kids anymore. Like how many bedrooms, how many square feet do you need? And then it would force people to put an ADU if they wanted additional square footage or force people into building duplexes in single family neighborhoods if they really wanted that additional square footage. Does that make sense? Absolutely. Does anyone thought of that? So a couple of things. We do have a large home ordinance right now that adds a different process for larger homes. I think it's fairly large. I'm gonna look to Eric. It's 3,000 square feet, is that correct? Yes, he's nodding there. So homes over 3,000 square feet, quite large, right? Yeah. I can tell you that there are some innovative models out there and I think that Portland is doing that well with respect to- Sorry, I was thinking of Portland, yeah, we're using- So, we could, maybe not their base square footage, but I believe if I recall correctly, 2,500 square feet is their base square footage for a typical R1 lot. And then if you wanted to add another unit, they allow up to four, I believe it is. You wanna add another unit. You get an extra 1,000 square feet and then you wanna add another unit, you get an extra 500 square feet and you wanna add another unit and you get an extra. So that's along the lines of what I think you were contemplating is add these additional units and if you need them while say your kids are here, then they can- In a kitchen and counting for us. Yes. That's what I'm saying, yeah, exactly. And so I don't know if we could explore something like that, not in this, but moving forward with the subcommittee or with your staff. It's just a random thought I had. There is absolutely that possibility in terms of also how it fits in with some of these other objectives that we have. What's that? Non-traditional, back there at 1.4, whatever it was. And even the things that we were talking about with council member Brown earlier with respect to flexible density units in areas of high opportunity, it could be that in those areas we're requiring a smaller house but then you get additional flexible density units. And one more thing that I would want to say related to that, the SB 10 allows for up to 10 units. So that doesn't necessarily mean that we've got to go with 10 but it would allow for some flexibility there. And so I think that's also what you were getting at, Vice Mayor Golder. It was, thank you. Council Member Watkins again. Sorry. No, not a problem. Since Council Member Golder brought up kind of creative options, one thing I wanted to know and I'm not sure if it's here is in terms of like the passive housing concept and how we're really wanting to move forward with environmentally strong development, how does that fit into a potential policy? And if not here then potentially where? I mean, and that will have impacts on our grid and other carbon outputs, et cetera. Thanks for that question, Council Member Watkins. So policy seven speaks to supporting green building principles and building decarbonization efforts to reduce and respond to global warming and the impacts of climate change. And so we do have some objectives related to that. And we don't specifically call out the passive house design, but we're calling out green building objectives and allowing for flexibility because things are going to change over time. So we could, if the council chose to have us pursue a passive house approach, then we could look to these policies to support that because they're talking about building decarbonization and expanding efforts related to that. And that's exactly what is happening with the passive house designs is looking to minimize the energy use and capitalize on natural ventilation and shade and shadow and so forth to help the heat and cool the house. Well, I mean, I'm definitely all on board for that. And I think that'd be really forward thinking given that we're anticipating extreme weather and extreme heat. And so anyways, if we're thinking for the future, that would make a lot of sense to me. But thank you. I appreciate that. I don't know. Thank you, council member. Council member Cullen, Tauri Johnson. Thank you. I have more comments and questions. I also just want to acknowledge and thank the staff for all the tremendous work and all of my colleagues here for all of your great input. I've been sort of vigorously taking notes on everything that you said. And I think we'll have some thoughts and ideas to take to the next iteration of this. But I want to name, I think some of the core things we were really trying to do as subcommittee and staff is to provide a housing element policy draft that not only meets our housing renails, but has us be innovative and be bold in housing production. And as I said earlier, to really meet these emerging needs in our community. Now, doing that while balancing the integrity of the values of our community. That's a tough balance. Sometimes they're in contradiction with each other. But as we were looking through the policies that were presented to us and kind of hashing through and pulling it apart, in my mind those were the things we were trying to balance. Go beyond meeting the rena numbers because we are forward thinking. We are in the top 6% and we're proud of that. We should be proud of that. While really hearing the community concerns that are real and taking that into balance. So I just kind of wanted to name that in my mind. I saw that as our goal. It will take partnership. So I'm glad that that was brought up. City schools was brought up. I wanted to mention that the Metro, one of their top three goals is to build 175 units of affordable housing on Metro transit centers. So there's a lot of opportunities. There's other agencies and entities in the city and the county that are thinking about this now. Because we have to be. So I think as we continue to work on this housing element and continue to do this work even beyond when we get approval right away from HCD because we're so awesome like that. To continue to have these conversations and to think about, we're not alone. People are thinking about this. People are designing differently. People, I mean groups and entities and agencies. So just just for us to keep that in mind. Sorry, I'm slipping. It's nine o'clock and I went to bed really late working. Oh, the other thing I wanted to say is I brought this up in our strategic planning sessions. And I think we talked about in our housing element subcommittee is to also make sure we have policies that work towards home pathways to home ownership. So I can't remember where it's at in the housing element but I know that we talked about it and it came up in the strategic plan. So we'll make sure that we that that's there in the next iteration. So just sorry for him. Thank you, council member, council member Newsom. Thank you, Mayor Keely. And I wanna thank director Butler and the staff for all the work that went into this document and to my colleagues who are on the subcommittee and to the rest of my colleagues who for all your questions today. I did want to briefly or just ask a question but if you could please speak to just briefly too. So there's a chart on 36.7 that shows the very low income, low income units, affordable housing units and above moderate income. And I was wondering if you could speak to how those numbers will potentially be higher than what are shown due to how HCD counts those numbers. Thanks so much for asking that. And that is something that we meant to incorporate into the presentation. And even if it was mentioned, it bears repeating because the above moderate units, so the market rate units shown in that table do not account for our inclusionary. So HCD, Department of Housing and Community Development in the state doesn't allow us to count inclusionary towards, take it away from the market rate and add it into the lower income category, which is where our inclusionary currently has 20% of those units. So I really appreciate you raising that point to the forefront because even as we're looking at this buffer and above market rate, 20% of those would be going into the low income. Thank you for the questions or comments. Mr. Butler, thank you for this. If I might return to some ground that's been gone over before this evening. The relationship between our general plan and its housing element with all of the components in it and our local coastal plan. Let's assume a fact, not an evidence yet, which is that we get through this, HCD has approved it. Now we have an approved housing element to our general plan. Now along comes an application for something. And in analyzing that, we believe when looking through the lenses of the general plan and the housing element, it's something that is being proposed is consistent with that. And yet when we look at our local coastal plan, there may be a conflict. How does that resolve? Local coastal program will take precedent. The local coastal plan will take precedent. In the coastal zone, we have to conform to our LCP and we'll have an analysis related to the general plan consistency, which will include the housing element consistency, but we also need to make the findings in the coastal zone that the project is consistent with the LCP. And so if we have something in the LCP that's let's say more restrictive than something that we have in the housing element, then we would have to conform with both, meaning the more restrictive LCP. If the LCP is more lenient, then the housing element, you have to conform with both is the answer in the coastal zone. So in the instance that there is this conflict and we determine consistency with our general plan and our housing element, we look over at the LCP and we say there's conflict. We now have to, in the instance you raised, I see that if it cuts one way, but the way it cuts is always in favor of the LCP. If the LCP is more restrictive, it's just generally the case, right? Say it again, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. The LCP, if it's more restrictive, that's generally the case. The LCP is gonna be more restrictive. I would imagine. And so in that case, the LCP we would need to find consistency and there may be some alternative ways to find consistency. For example, we've got a provision in the LCP that allows for density bonus projects, right? So maybe through the density bonus provisions, it could conform with the LCP, but we're gonna have to find consistency one way or another. If the, so we've got probably a couple of hundred cities along the coast of California who have LCPs, maybe 258, just throw a number out, that are along the coast, so the 460 cities in California. We've got a couple hundred of them at least that are on the coast. So they're going to be dealing with the same thing we're dealing with. Does the Coastal Commission locally or at the commission larger? Does either the staff or the commission get involved in the process we're engaged in right now? Generally no. As I mentioned, the early 1980s provision housing was originally in the Coastal Act and in the early 80s, it was removed from the Coastal Act. And the Coastal Commission has a list of prioritized uses. Housing isn't high on that list. They generally stay out of that. They're looking at visitor serving accommodations as their primary uses and also coastal resource or coastal dependent industry and so forth. So why wouldn't a developer, a question, why wouldn't a developer if faced with a situation where our local coastal plan is more restrictive than the housing element, the general plan, the zoning law, then why would it, I'm sorry, let me rephrase the question slightly. We've got some local authority up to a point. We had this discussion in January at the very first meeting. We can do everything we can to manage towards, for example, south of Laurel, 12 stories, 1600 units, 20% affordable. That's what we're managing towards. We're going to try to put that policy together, make it hold. But you've cautioned us that there may be occasions where the state says for this set of reasons that isn't going to hold. So let's imagine that that is then, it's all of a sudden no longer consistent with what we think either. Developers propose something that either we say no to and the state then says yes to. Where does the local coastal plan come in then in that instance? It seems like then you've got two state entities fighting with each other rather than us. Great question because there certainly are instances where we would say there are state policies coming down from HCD and from the legislature that are seeking to really promote housing production. And yet there's a tighter level of controls on the coastal zone and through the coastal commission. And you actually see this in some of the legislation itself because a lot of the legislation in recent years, SB 35, for example, which we saw with 831 water, SB 35 does not apply in the coastal zone. And so there are specific carve outs that the legislature makes to say, yes, we want to promote housing and we recognize that the coastal zone is a special place. They don't do that for all of the bills. AB 2097, which we discussed earlier today, the parking restrictions, those are applicable inside the coastal zone as well. So the state is recognizing that that challenge and is sometimes seeking to directly exempt the coastal zone from those laws. And sometimes they're making the stance that they expressly want to make sure the coastal zone is included. So yes, there is that tension that continues to exist between some of those state level policies as it relates to the coastal zone. I predict this will not be the last time we discuss this topic. Let me move on to another issue. Thank you for that answer. The council member Brown raised the question about workforce housing. And I think we're, I don't think there's anybody here not interested in that. If we were to add language in objective 2.1D that said, I'll let you get there first. Tell me when you're ready. 2.1D? 2.1D as in dog. Is it a new policy? Wondering about this. If at that point, what would you think of adding language? It said, consider implementing a program that increases workforce housing and market rate multifamily projects with adequate financial incentives. I'll be glad to go over that again if you'd like me to because I know it was a few words here. Consider implementing a program to incent workforce housing units in market rate multifamily projects with adequate financial incentives. So the incentive is the financial incentives. Yeah, I mean, I think. Wondering if that is any heartache in terms of how the state would view that is that that's not a barrier and an impediment that might actually, as we're saying that, considering. Right, I think a couple of things. I do think that we'll want to wordsmith it a bit to be more definitive about what, because HCE, we actually have a lot of policies that are crafted in this manner and one of the things that we're gonna be doing over the next week is refining how those policies are very definite in terms of what the action is. So that would be some, but we can certainly, the base of that is just fine and we could wordsmith that and work with the subcommittee to come up with language. Thank you. When we get to a motion, whoever's going to make it, I'll ask you to either in your motion or I'll ask you if you would accept a friendly amendment to the motion, whoever makes the motion to include that. Let me go to another issue here. This whole issue around protection of tenants. We do some things in that regard programmatically here and through the budget and so on providing assistance there. My goodness, that's a subject matter where there's a lot of folks with a lot of needs in that regard. I wonder what you would think, again, whether or not you imagining that you're HCD and trying to determine whether this concept would fly or not fly. If you put in something, for example, on page two dash 18, adding a policy 4.3 and I'll wait till you get there. We have, oh, adding a new policy. Got it, so this would be a new policy, great. So we good, where you are? Okay, thank you. If we were to add something which said to the effect that providing protection for tenants from unaffordable rent increases or excessive, excuse me, or excessive application fees. This doesn't, I wanna be very clear. This community's fought over the question of rent control. This is not a rent control being run in in the dead of night here. That isn't where I'm trying to go. I'm trying to see that when it comes to these two issues, is there anything we might be able to do that is not called rent control? Because we've been there, done that several times in the community. So I'm trying to look at a somewhat different issue here. Sure, so we do have some protections right now, specifically related to large rent increases that the council has approved and those are in place. And I think we've got some policies in here that speak to how we can help promote that protective policy in low income areas of the community in particular, but throughout the community in general. And then the excessive application fees, that is something that we've heard from COPA with respect to the individual applying for a apartment having to fill out and pay a $50 application at multiple. I do think there could be some potential opportunity there, how that is implemented. I think we might look to some community partners to assist with that, but I think on its face that sounds like something that's worth exploring and we can work with the subcommittee to wordsmith any of the languages. Let me move to Paige. Let me stay there and ask a question about if we were to add an objective 4.3.b that would read something to the effect of considering an ordinance to ensure that rental application fees comply with the provisions of state law. I wanna make sure you get that first and then I'll... Implement an ordinance to ensure that rental application fees comply with the provisions of state law. Yeah, the issue there is similar to the issue above and you hear from more than a couple of renters and people searching for rentals and so on about these application fees which some folks see as an infected is for some folks a barrier to even getting in the game to rent a place. So if there's no, do you think that has any would be objectionable in any way to HCD? I don't think that would be objectionable. I also think that it reminds me of some of the things that we heard we heard her speaker at the planning commission say for example that they see advertisements that say no section eight and as we all know, there is no discrimination based on income and so section eight you cannot discriminate against individuals for that and so I think that we may even be able to expand a policy in this respect to address multiple aspects of consistency with state law. Thank you, sir. Could pay if you would if you'd go to page six dash two four. Which objective or policy? Under the fair housing policy objective 6.1 G add a G to it. Again, consider this, I will read it to you then what I'm looking for is some assessment as how each CD may receive this. Establish a community based displacement housing task force to advise the city council on the potential displacement effects of proposed policies or projects and recommend policies to reduce the potential displacement impacts of new development. I'll be glad I know that was a lot of words. You tell me how much more you need and I'll go back over again. I got it. Very good. You're better now I'm at that then. So we have a policy and actually let me go back to where I wonder if it's the same one here. We have a policy in here that speaks to displacement and bringing information back to the council. I want to compare those two. So that is, it's actually I was looking at 5.5 B in relation to HUD's upcoming equity plan requirements evaluate the effectiveness of existing anti-displacement strategies and tools and present to council best practices and recommendations for additional anti-displacement policies and programs such as additional anti-retaliation policies and revised first right of refusal to tenants displaced to new development. I think that we rather than do mine could you simply add into that policy and consider an anti-displacement task force. We'll put that in there. That may fit better where you're talking about because I think that's the only new idea suggested in the sentence I read to you. Right generally I think it is. Okay, good. Let me wrap this up with a couple other questions. I know wrapping up meant stopping. This business, we've been over this and the council subcommittee's been over this and every member of the city council has gotten input on this. So I want to do it once here in open session. So on those site inventories that you had where you showed at Nellie pond and there were three I think, right? There was a map with three on it. Yeah, golf club drive and hands Nellie pond and so on and so on. So the county building, thanks. And the county building, right. And so my recollection at the subcommittee and in our discussions also on this is that with respect to the golf course, golf club drive parcel or parcels that the issue there is that from planning's point of view this would be very, very difficult to have an area plan put together. If I understand it, at least the current thinking is that one of the property owners at least would seriously object to that, to having their parcel included in an area, I think it's an area plan. Am I right about that? Yes, it does call for an area plan. The general plan calls for an area plan. And then there's another, I'm sorry. The general plan calls for an area plan. Yeah, okay, thank you. And then there's another property owner who says I really want to do that. So you've got one that says I really want to do it, one that says I don't want that done. So my threshold question is can an area be, can area plan be undertaken if a property owner in the area doesn't want it? Absolutely. Absolutely, that's what I thought. So who is the moving party when that happens? Who starts that area plan process? So for, so several ways that that could start. The council could give direction and allocate funding. We would typically bring in a consultant both to assist with the development of the plan and a consultant, typically a separate consultant to assist with the CEQA analysis, the California Environmental Quality Act analysis. And so the council could give that direction and allocate the funding towards that. There are also opportunities that they, and we have said in this instance, I'm looking at your reaction. For this particular site, we've looked at grant opportunities for citywide projects. And we have focused those in areas that have greater citywide benefit. For example, the downtown plan expansion to the south, which is grant funded, and our objective standards process, which were grant funded. There was advocacy on behalf of the, some property owners in that area to seek grant funding for that. And what we've sought is looking at dedicating those grant funds and seeking to acquire those grant funds, which are limited in nature and staffing is limited to areas where there's a greater public benefit. There is a very significant private benefit and out on golf club drive. And the provision of housing also is a benefit to the public, but in terms of amenities that the greater community will enjoy, things like the objective standards have a greater citywide benefit. So we've focused our efforts in those areas and said that the developer can choose to propose that they fund the staff and consultant work and present that if they want to do that, then we could present that to the council and say, here's the proposal that's before us. The developing community is looking to fund this. We would take the lead on that effort so that we stay in control of the process and direct how that area is shaped in coordination and communication with the community. And then we would present those findings to the planning commission and city council. So it can happen in multiple ways. We have suggested up until this point that it is a privately funded matter and that if the developer wants to come up with the funds related to that, we will then look at how we would be able to potentially accommodate that or hire a consultant, even a consulting staff member to supplement because as you can see from the housing element that's before you, we have many tasks and we will have to report on an annual basis on how we're accomplishing each of those tasks. And so inserting large work efforts that are in addition to what we have in this are going to be challenging to achieve and that's where we would also look for that developer to likely fund a consulting staff member that comes in-house in addition to the consultant. So probably more than you needed to know. No, it isn't. No, thank you for that. I appreciate your nuanced responses to these questions. These are not simple questions. Well, mine might be but other council members ask complex questions that deserve complex answers. So thank you for that. Staying with that subject for a moment, looking at it through the lens of the property owner who would like to develop housing there on that site or part of that site anyway, the part that that person owns. If I understand it correctly, I think what you've said to me is if we were to put it in now, if we were to put the golf club drive in and nothing happened on that in this round and then next round it stayed in and nothing happened, the developer then has a by right ability to develop that property, is that correct? Those sites, I believe each have development on them. It's like a single family house. And so I would expect that the HCD would characterize those as developed property and not undeveloped property. And so upon those sites inclusion in the next inventory they would become ministerial. Third. No, second. Second. As soon as they're in the second, as a developed site, as soon as they're in the second, it becomes ministerial from day one. Say it again, Matt, I'm sorry. From day one, they would be ministerial in the next element, so eight years from now. So nothing. Thank you. Thank you. No, I got what I needed to get on that. I think I have a better understanding of what you're talking about. Let me, the matter is, let me see, have we gotten public input yet? I don't remember if I did or didn't, all right. Anyone with us, wish a comment? Anybody online? We have how many folks online? With their hands, right? Okay, good. Let's go with the first one. Good evening. Yes, hello. Hey, it's Garrett. Hey, MBags 3700 plus housing unit extortion building demands only makes sense if the communist indoctrination facility on the Hill, AKA UCSC completes its plans to load the asylum with thousands of new extra combat recruits and the groomers to add many thousands of such, which I personally would not look forward to. We know some of the MBag allocation was because those racist deemed Santa Cruz too white and thank God we weren't considered too affluent or the number would have been even higher as they think injecting core people, which they also assume are people of color into wealthy or white communities is some kind of virtue. Now you haven't yet, but you must acknowledge California is in a decade long population growth rate decline which has now turned negative for a number of years as well as the county and now the city has without UCSC housing demand, quantity demand otherwise is a big fat lie. The recent city population drop confirms this. The reasons for a continuance of this trend are many including a decades long decline in male fertility, boomers dying off and aging population, a rising age of first born, COVID deaths, a troubling persistent new excess mortality, lowering life spans and a lot of people leaving California to do the sky high taxes or horrific business regulation climate and another be as politic. These are not replacement units. They are new additional households which without UCSC growth could easily result in a massive permanent increase in vacancies, even 13% without more people. If that occurs, it's a disaster, but hey, maybe there'll be a lot more affordable housing done on the hard way. No, massive vacancies are not the ticket to prosperity. The timing could not be worse as interest rates are causing housing to be on the verge of a bubble bursting. Overbuilding into a financial housing bubble burst is about as dumb as a rock. Think Stockton in 2009, there could be mass casualties. The idea of solving overcrowding by stuffing people into historic density housing in block long, six plus story high, monoliths with cigar back studios, smaller than my garage is a very strange thinking. The idea you solve, my rent is too dang high by offering people to rent half a sandwich instead of sharing a whole one at the same price isn't my idea of a bargain. Yes, it is possible the housing mix should change for that the cost efficiencies of high density will attract people out of their present housing situation, but a very poor permanent vacancy could easily occur without UCSC. The idea you should assist by giving away public land belonging to all is subsidy to further this risky cause to benefit the very few is a government meddling in the free market and quite socialist communist method. Government subsidized low income housing can invite poverty into the city. The states and now you're seemingly brainless push for density removal of travel freedom. I suggest ignoring some acts of agenda 21 control methods which seal a crowded jail off with the inmates inside. Thank you very much. Ms. Bush, we have one more? Three more now. Three more now, all right. Next person up. Good evening. Good evening. Good evening, mayor and council. I'd like to draw your attention to table G2 and appendix G which lists UC Santa Cruz housing as a, all of it is in the very low low or moderate. And that's just flat out wrong. There is no undergraduate housing on UCSC campus that is not completely exorbitantly priced. And so I'd like, I'm looking at the 2023-2024 apartment rates. So for example, a double room in an apartment which is an independent living unit which would count in the arena numbers is $1,735 per person. So that's 3,400, almost $3,500 per month for two people to share a bedroom in an apartment with multiple bedrooms. So there is nothing that you'd have. I mean, there's different configurations. They do not list the prices per apartment. So you have to do a whole bunch of sleuthing to get that. But I would like staff to address that appendix G. That's an error. And it is in line with UCSC's false narrative that they're providing affordable housing for undergraduates is the most expensive rental housing in Santa Cruz are none. And that is part of the problem because they will never build enough housing to house more than 50% of their undergraduate student body because they can't fill it at those rates. And so that's also, they also made false representations in front of the Regents in terms of their new LRDP about the price of housing. Chancellor LaRieve has promised 30% below market when in fact their own cost of living studies show that the on-campus price of housing is significantly about two to three times above the off-campus rate. So I would like staff to address that. Where did they get those numbers? Why did they use them? You can look up it's online on the UCSC site. Just go to UCSC and put in housing space rates and you will pull up the current rates for apartments. I don't even bother with dorms but just for the apartments which include kitchens and bathrooms. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Two more, Ms. Push. Good evening. Good evening, Mayor and council members of the store office on Enfield. First, I just wanted to thank all the hard work that the staff and the subcommittee have been doing on this project. This is not an easy task. And I think we're in a really good place for being this relatively early off in the process. We still have a long ways to go. I just wanted to remind the council that the rate of production that the state expects of us is nearly double the rate that we've experienced in the last few years. And just really want to encourage the council to think boldly about what sorts of policies we can implement to continue that or to accelerate essentially unprecedented growth within our existing zone capacity. The sites on the site inventory, we're not planning on rezoning any of these sites. This is already what we're already allowed to build. And at the planning commission meeting last week, one of the commissioners brought up an interesting point which is like, why do we spend so much time on the review process for projects that already meet all of our standards, all of our general plan and zoning standards and that we actually can't legally disapprove. So we really should be thinking about ways that we can streamline that process when we have to approve them anyway. We've made some recommendations to do that. I think there's a number of ways the council could go about doing that. But I think that's a really helpful way that we could encourage production in Santa Cruz that not a lot of other cities are looking at and help us accelerate our production to meet our housing goals. I also also wanted to agree with the last caller about the concern about UCSC's low income numbers. I would like to see some more evidence from the university that those units actually will be as affordable as we're hoping that they will be. But overall, and finally just one more thing about the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing, people have mentioned using SB 10. And I thank director Lee for pointing out that SB 10 requires a finding of Affirmatively Furthering for housing to use it. And we really should be thinking creatively about replacing our segregated living patterns with integrated living patterns. And that's what using that tool would allow us to do. So I hope that we continue to push for that. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Sonnenfeld for your participation in the process. Ms. Bush, one more? Two more, all right. Good evening. Good evening, Darius Mosnine here. A couple of comments, one frame is a question. Is this basically this whole arena cycle, housing cycle, essentially paper exercise? Basically lays out a housing inventory. Where units can be built, but at the end of the day, the city does not build housing, developers build housing. How many of these sites are either A, too small for the big guys, or too big for the small guys? And then how financial are some of these programs? Take a look at the urban, whatever the urban project, with no parking requirements. I'd be concerned if there's a lender out there that would finance such a potentially risky endeavor. Housing with no parking. So again, it's comment slash question, is this really, will we realistically see, I predict maybe a quarter of the arena numbers would actually get built. The second, I would be careful on using ADUs as a hero of meeting, helping the arena numbers, particularly in the climate of increase in tenant protections. We now have SB 567 on the table, where it looks to close loopholes in AB 1482, the Tenant Protection Act, in terms of just causing fiction. Tonight, as there are landlords in Oakland, in Alameda County, going to bed, going to sleep for the third year in a row with a tenant that hasn't paid rent in three years, committed numerous violations, and they cannot evict them because of the moratorium. And of course, Oakland, Alameda County, extreme data points, I get it, but they are progressive cities as is Santa Cruz. So it just established a precedent that yes, it is possible to have someone in your house as a roommate or a junior ADU, or on your property's native U that has, you cannot get rid of. Anyway, thank you. Thank you very much. One more, Ms. Bush. Is that correct? And good evening. Good evening, mayor and council members. Ryan Mechel with Santa Cruz, you'll be here to start with saying I agree with everything that Rafa said, and with the caller prior to our office said about accountability for those cost estimates for the university housing, it'd be great to see some proof that they will be that low. And I do hope they are that low because we need more affordable housing for students in the city. I just wanted to add, well, first of all, I want to congratulate the city and staff for meeting the fifth cycle target. That is great work. And I believe what it's 6% of jurisdictions have done that. So serious pats on the back all around. That's awesome. Just to make sure that we do hit that again for the sixth cycle. And I really hope that we do, but in order to hold ourselves accountable, I would love to see the city commit to a mid-cycle review. So at that four-year mark, halfway through this next cycle, looking at how much production are we seeing and are we on track to meet that at the end of the eight years? And if we're not seeing that, have some policies, some incentives, maybe a rezoning plan, whatever staff seems appropriate to make sure we can up our production at that point and at the end of those eight years, meet or exceed our goals. That's just one more thing I hope you consider. We also sent a letter in. I hope you'll read that and consider those policies as well. That's it, thank you. Thank you very much. Ms. Bush, anyone else online? Very good. Matters back before the council. Ms. Brown. Thank you, mayor. I would like to make a motion and I've sent multiple versions to Bonnie, but hopefully you got the last one just trying to respond to some of your questions and comments, mayor. And so, and I recognize the hour is late. I recognize these are new for you to see here and I also just wanna say they've mostly all been covered in our conversation here in the Q and A with the exception of one item, which I'm not even sure is in the right place, but. Yeah, I'd like you to make a motion. Oh, I'm sorry, that's right. I meant, I thought. I know you meant to. I'm sorry. Okay, so here's the motion. So the motion is to accept the sixth cycle draft housing element update with the following conditions on page two dash eight under affordable housing. This is a revision to the inclusionary, to objective 2.1, to state to review the inclusionary ordinance to determine if amendments are needed to ensure that the inclusionary requirements provide the maximum number of affordable units or deeper levels of affordability without being a barrier to housing development while considering implications for how developers will use density bonus. I have included here in italics and blue, the revision including considering higher levels of affordability for density bonus projects and so on. That's the language that's in there. Add objective 2.1 D to state, consider implementing a program that increases workforce housing units in market rate multifamily projects with adequate financial incentives on page two dash 17, add objective 3.7 B to state, support and facilitate the efforts of the Santa Cruz City School District to provide housing for its employees on page two dash 18, housing assistance of a series here, add policy 4.3 to state, provide protection for tenants from exorbitant rent increases or excessive application fees. I guess maybe that's an and. Add objective 4.3 A to state, support programs that provide legal assistance to tenants challenging unlawful rent increases. Objective 4.3 B to state, consider an ordinance to ensure that rental applications follow the provisions of state law. And this is the one that's maybe out of place. Add objective 4.4 to state, consider rent stabilization measures for mobile home parks in accordance with new state law. And then on page two dash 22, I believe I have found the location to add language to objective 5.5 B to state. In relation to HUD's upcoming equity plan requirements evaluate the effectiveness of existing anti-displacement strategies and tools and present to council best practices and recommendations for additional anti-displacement policies and programs such as additional anti-retaliation policies and revised first right of refusal to tenants displaced due to development and consider the establishment of a community-based displacement housing task force to advise the city council. There is a motion, is there a second? I'll second that motion. Under discussion you may open Ms. Brown. So I have include, I've asked some questions about this. I know that the mayor also asked some questions related to the possibility of including some of these more specific references. And so I thought I'd give it a shot to get some of these into the language for the draft housing element as we move forward. On the motion, Ms. Contari-Johnson. I just had questions about, sorry. Can we put the motion back up please? I'm sorry. No, it's quite all right, take your time. Take your time, we're fine. Oh, I can't move it. Okay, so policy 4.3, provide protection for tenants from extrovert rent increases or excessive application fees. When you brought that up, council member Brown, could you remind us of what your response was? Was that in there? Was that, I've heard somewhere, God. Mr. Butler. Thank you. We do have a large increase ordinance on the books and with respect to excessive application fees, I think there is a way, I think that frankly for every one of these, we need to have flexibility to wordsmith them because this as written, it seems that the city might be doing some of these things and we may be working with partners to do some of those things. And that's what I mentioned previously is that if we were to look at an application fee and individual application fee that is used with the universal application, we would be seeking assistance likely from the housing authority, for example, to see if they could help implement a program to that effect and I don't see that that would be implemented in-house. So that's where, you know, if the council finds agreement on some or all of these policies, I would still be asking for the council to give direction to us to come back and work with the subcommittee to work through how the actual policies are drafted. Okay, because I, yeah, I just. Wonderful, what we might do in that regard on that point is add to the motion exactly that, that whatever direction is contained in here that we have added tonight is for the purpose of general direction here, you would come back with the appropriate language after consulting with the subcommittee and so on. Is that how it would work? Would that work? Yeah, either a friendly amendment or if you wanna amend your motion. Yeah, I'm happy to amend the motion and I was gonna say, you know, I had thought about setting this up as a direction to work with the subcommittee on it so we can change that initial part of the motion too. Right, yeah. Ms. Bush, did you track that? Are we? Okay. It's late. I wanna make sure. No, not at all, not at all. So I think what we just did is said that these additions that are in blue that are being added by the council are being essentially referred to the council subcommittee and to the planning staff to take the spirit of these directions and bring them to the council subcommittee with your recommendation for appropriate language and for us to then consider that as whether we integrate or don't integrate that as we move along. Ms. Contar Johnson, you see where we're going with that, would that be okay? And it's all of it, right? The ones in blue are what you've added to it. Exactly, yeah. And then I had one. That'd be all right with you? Yeah, yeah. And I just, just to make it, hopefully make your job a little easier here. So the first sentence in that motion would be accept the Sixth Cycle Draft Housing Element Update and direct staff in the council subcommittee to consider the following additions for the final draft or for the draft. I like that. We start with that, then we go through what those are. The direction is clear to do, is that direction clear to you, sir? That is helpful as then we can wordsmith these and come to an agreement both with the subcommittee now. I want to make sure you seconded that motion. I recall. You did. You did. You did. I knew it was somebody smart. I was about to, but you beat me to it. I did. Well, I'll agree to it then. But I want to make sure that gets your issue. That gets to the issue. And so I won't ask a lot of the rest of the questions I had because I think that gets to the issue. But I do want to just say something about the, if you could scroll down, the housing displacement task force that you brought up, Mayor, I think we just need to, and we will, we will all be really thoughtful about how that's formed. If it's going to be formed, how that would be formed and what that looks like. Cause I have some concerns about that particular piece, but we can continue to discuss it in the subcommittee and then move it back. Very good. And Mayor, Council, if I may just weigh in on the motion. I might also request an addition to have referring it to staff and the subcommittee for consideration. It's also exploring feasibility. What's being recommended here. I just didn't hear. Explore the feasibility. Feasibility. Of what's being recommended, which is, you know, it's implied in consideration, but I want to be really clear that there's- Objection, Ms. Brown? No, no. Objection, Mr. Keely, no. All right. Further on the motion. Debate or discussion? I just wanted to- Ms. Goldberg, certainly. I think the question was more for you. Just, and maybe it doesn't need to be asked because it can be discussed at a later time, but when you said excessive rent increases, there's already some state law around that and there's like a certain percent. So do you mean in exit, she looks like she wants to say something. Really, what I think my intention in trying to address this is, yes, we do have an exorbitant rent increase ordinance on the books here and there is statewide rent control and it is violated that those rules are violated constantly and tenants have no way to address them if they can't afford an attorney. And so we're talking about how we can support those kinds of protections being operationalized in practice with community partners. That's my intention. I'm not suggesting that the city start considering a program as much as I would love it. Yeah, just for me, the word excessive just seems vague and then I'm not gonna belabor the point, but we have had a rental in town for 19 years and we just started breaking even this year. And so when you say rent's expensive, mortgages are expensive. On top of that, we pay the water and that's going up 100% in the next 10 years and I can only raise the rent in a certain amount and I don't wanna raise the rent. We don't wanna raise the rent more than that because we like the people that are living there and they're wonderful and having said that, I know there's a lot of people in the community that are monpaw landlords that are trying to do the right thing and I wouldn't wanna unnecessarily penalize people with vague terms like exorbitant. I don't know what that means without a percentage and I know there's percentages and we follow the percentages and that's what I'm saying. Can we get help from staff on that? Sorry, because we have an ordinance on the books that's been adopted and so whatever those figures are is what I'm talking about. I wonder if the way to go on that might be if that sentence read provide protection for tenants from unlawful rent increases or unlawful application fees. Perfect, I like that. Thank you very much. Ms. Bush, you got that or unlawful application fees. I don't know that there are laws on the application fees but we'll give us something to research. Give us something to talk about in the subcommittee. It's time to find more items to talk about. All right, for the comments, Ms. Brunner. Yeah, some of my questions I think are being resolved in the fact that we added that intro first sentence because otherwise we'd be here wordsmithing. I see some duplicative direction potentially and I have several questions so thank you for incorporating that first sentence and I hope that staff and the subcommittee can explore each of these suggestions that are being asked to be considered. Thank you. Very good, thank you. Very, very last comment. Thank you and all of your staff. Please get in contact with Ms. Donovan Teller that we all said thank you. Yes, thank you for saying that. Not happy about her retirement, but thank her. She was terrific during this portion of the process. Thank you very much. Clerk, we'll call the roll. Council Member Newsom. Aye. Brown. Aye. Watkins. Aye. Brunner. Aye. Calentari-Johnson. Aye. Vice Mayor Holder. Aye. Mayor Keely. Aye. Is there further business to come before the council seeing and hearing none, a motion to adjourn and be in order. The vice mayor moves to adjourn and Mr. Newsom seconds not debatable and favor signify by saying aye. Opposed? Aye. We stand in recess. You're a good man. And he also put on light. Very well. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.