 The hour of 12 o'clock having arrived, the Santa Cruz City Council meeting will come to order and the clerk will call the roll. Thank you, Mayor, Council Member Newsom. Present. Brown, here, Watkins, here. Council Member Brunner is absent. Calentari-Johnson. Present. Vice Mayor Golder. Here. And Mayor Keely. Here, quorum having been established, we'll move to statements of disqualification. Anyone have a statement of disqualification? They'd like to see and hear none. We will move on to the public comment on the closed session. Items on our closed session, if you are looking at the agenda, would be items one through four inclusive. This would be the opportunity for anyone who is with us today in chambers or anyone online to comment on any of those items we will be discussing in closed session. First, let me see if there's anyone with us in chambers today who would like to make a comment seeing and hearing none. Ms. Bush, do we have anyone online? No. We do not? All right, thank you very much. The real property items are those that are listed on the agenda, seeing and hearing no other business to come before us. We will stand adjourned into closed session. We will return to open session no earlier than 12 noon. The Santa Cruz City Council is back in session following our closed session. The clerk will call the roll. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Newsom. Present. Brown. Here. Watkins. Here. Council Member Brunner is absent today. Callentary Johnson. That's it. Vice Mayor Golder. Here. And Mayor Cooley. Here. We are on oral communications. For those of you who might be unfamiliar with it, this would be the opportunity to address the city council on a matter under our jurisdiction, but not on today's agenda for a period of time, up to two minutes. And there may be some people online who want to do that as well, but we'll start with the public. Anyone wish to address the council on a matter under our jurisdiction, but not on today's agenda, please come forward and do so. Good afternoon. Right now. Keep moving. There you go. Keep going there. There you go. You're there now. Good afternoon, sir. So I'd like to address a consideration that I have to deal with very recently. It's the- Let me ask you to do this. Move that microphone just slightly up. You have a very soft voice, so I'm gonna make sure we can all hear you. Recently in my neighborhood, there has been the fruit cart vendor with a colorful umbrella, the little glass case, it cuts the pineapple and stuff with the loud bicycle horn that comes through kind of late at night. Pretty intrusive. It comes through, even into our parking area. I asked him not to a couple of times, so he stopped, but he still makes the circuit there. But when I got concerned about this, I started to do some research online to see what the story is, the history of the fruit cart vendors in general is, and in Santa Monica, there's been an explosion in LA County, but especially on Santa Monica Pier, it became a huge problem. The Code Enforcement Health Department approved 12 to 14 permits for the pier at the beginning of the season. This was just relatively recently, not this year, but previous. They approved 12 to 14 carts. Unopened and did that 110 carts out there. So they realized it was gonna be an issue. So once they got organized with the Health Department Code Enforcement, they said we've got to take a look at the health and safety issue of these carts. What are they serving and selling? When they went out there to try to enforce some of the guidelines, they received threats to their family and their families and stuff. There was organized crime behind this fruit cart vending operation. You can read about it online in Santa Monica. It's pretty well known. What I'll give you is 15 more seconds. So the Sheriff's Department from Santa Monica started escorting them out there and to pursue the Health Department's Code Enforcement. Okay, thank you. Thank you. We just, sir, come back here for just a second. Where is this problem that you're associating in Santa Cruz just roughly? I was bringing up the example of the growing problem in the Santa Monica area. No, no, I understand. Do you have an issue here in the city of Santa Cruz that you're concerned about at a specific location? Emolence area. Okay, thank you very much. Reason I ask is, council members represent districts now? Yeah. And so somebody represents that area and they may be in contact with you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Do we have anyone online? We'll take the person online. Good afternoon. Welcome to the city council meeting. Yes, good afternoon. I ask the room for ethical improvement in your recent uses of mass persuasion. Do you really think it is ethical to use the public's money to get your hands on ever more of it, spending funds on a mass persuasion consultant pollster to divine what are actually no real commitment for our shiny objects, spending words, but also using failed threats of a loss of core essential services on the measure our ballot title that was intended to persuade voters to vote for what is really instead just a regressive general sales tax rate increase. Is it also the timing suspect or sneaky of the filing date of the initiative to just after the last possible council meeting before the arguments of milk deadline, thereby minimizing any time for opposition to file arguments against it? Doesn't that have similarities to the public funding of a mass persuasion consultant doing polling and organizing pretentious persuasion workshops like the failed citizen affordable housing bond initiative fiasco that also used allusions of a cornucopia of everything people want while it really was more of a con of a potential private workforce of stooges to help pass an actually unrestricted ever growing pure money grab property tax increase that got dropped like a hot potato when the scheme failed to persuade? That does seem also similar to the even more exotic expensive consultancy of the rest of the 50 year plan trying to persuade the public that they are the source of is really just the staff's original runway plan with managed coastal retreat. Most of those plans your plans were usually just to get an unrestricted more of the public's money to blow ignoring the systemic overspending mismanaged budget problems. The rest of 50 year vision mass persuasion workshops as usual and get attended by easily manipulated special interest participants combined with a final closed door filter of a handpicked special interest focus group who coincidentally arrived surprise, surprise at the very same original staff with these rise of these unsound methods are clear because instantly thousands of people signed a signature opposing the 50 year plan. Thanks. Thank you, sir. Anyone else in public wish to address us under our communication? Anyone else online, Ms. Bush? We'll take the next person online. Good afternoon. Welcome to the council meeting. Good afternoon, Mayor Keely council. This is Bradley Snyder. I wish to speak today about something that is a little bit of a puzzle, an anomaly. It's enigmatic. There's an acceptance rate at UCSC of about 64%. That's the average. And there are a lot of very, very large applicant pools from high schools in the East Bay where the acceptance rate is like 65 to 70%. And what you find that's absolutely astonishing and rather scandalous. And I know politicians don't like words like that. The acceptance rate for Santa Cruz High School is the second to last on the graphic as shown by the San Francisco Chronicle webpage that shows you the acceptance rates via various high schools in the state and around the country and the world. So Santa Cruz High School is about 1.6 miles from UCSC and it takes 30 minutes to walk. But apparently it's even harder to get there because it's uphill. And I'm kind of incensed that it's almost seems like the university discriminates against the community. And I hate to sound cynical like that, not have any kind of real proof of that to back up a statement like that. But I do think it's something that perhaps should be looked at and talked about. Thank you very much. That's all I've got. Thank you so much. Anyone else online, Ms. Bush? We are finished with oral communication. We are under presentations. There will be a presentation by Council Member Brown to Elizabeth Millwee, the purchasing manager for the city. We are declaring this as a procurement month. Ms. Brown. Thank you, Mayor. It's my pleasure to take this opportunity to highlight the work of some of the unsung heroes in our local government and in public agencies around the state. So I'll read a little bit from the proclamation and then come down and present it to you. So whereas contracting and procurement professionals play a vital role in the acquisition of a broad range of goods and services, essential for the effective operation of the city of Santa Cruz. And whereas the public procurement profession plays a significant role in the efficiency and effectiveness of both government and business, and I'll just select here among the warehouses, the work you do in purchase of goods and services, adding value to government agencies by performing functions like developing procurement strategies, cultivating collaborative relationships with the business community and other partners, consulting on best practices, identifying opportunities for savings, maintaining compliance with rules, regulations, policies and procedures, all very complex. And whereas these procurement professionals recognize support and practice the public procurement values and guiding principles of accountability, ethics, impartiality, professionalism, service and transparency as fundamental tenants of their profession. Now, therefore, I, Council Member Sandy Brown on behalf of Mayor Fred Keely, do hereby proclaim the month of March 2024 as procurement month in the city of Santa Cruz and ask you all to join me in congratulating them and thanking them. Everyone right. Please. So you're looking at the purchasing division up here. But we can't do it alone. We have a lot of help with many, many wonderful gifted staff in the department since we are a hybrid decentralized procurement model here at the city. I wanted to take some time to thank Mayor Keely and the entire city council for their continued support of all of the hard work that's being completed around the city to help ensure an open, transparent and ethical public procurement process at the city of Santa Cruz. With your support this past year, our team has implemented a number of initiatives to ensure further alignment with public procurement best practices like implementing a new e-procurement platform, Opengov through the city of Santa Cruz website that has allowed vendors to register to compete on competitively bid solicitations and contracts for the city of Santa Cruz. Just in the past six months, we've issued close to 50 solicitations for different contracts here at the city, which is a huge improvement over previous years. We also held the city's first ever virtual vendor open house. We had over 160 vendors attend this event where we trained them on how to do business with the city of Santa Cruz and we had some special guests from the parks and recreation, public works and water department that also shared some information about some exciting solicitations that they'll be issuing them next year or so. I also wanna take this time to thank city manager Matt Huffaker, assistant city manager Laura Schmidt and our finance director Elizabeth Cabell for their continued support of our team and for all the city staff that are doing this very important work each and every day. So thank you, this means so much, really appreciate it. Well, thank you so much. Thank you very, very much. Good to see you guys. We are on item number six now and this is a mayoral proclamation regarding the Santa Cruz Antiques Fair Appreciation Day and council member Scott Newsom is going to make that presentation. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Mayor Keely. It is my pleasure to recognize the work of the Santa Cruz Antiques Fair. So since 1993, the Santa Cruz Antiques Fair has operated in downtown Santa Cruz on the second Sunday of every month and it is one of the longest running antique fairs in Northern California and this fair began as a way to attract people to our downtown after Deloma Preta earthquake and for the last 20 years, Bonnie Belcher has put on the fair attracting many local residents and out-of-town residents to our community throughout the year contributing to our economy and to a vibrant downtown and to our environment by selling items that will be reused and treasured and in honor of these contributions and all that you have done for our community, I, Scott Newsom, on behalf of Mayor Keely and incredibly honored to present this proclamation to Bonnie proclaiming today as Santa Cruz Antiques Fair Appreciation Day and Santa Cruz. Good afternoon, Mayor Keely and council members. Right by you here is Mr. Newsom. There we go. Sorry. He can't sneak up on anybody. Don't worry. Well, good afternoon. Thank you so much. First of all, I would like to thank Judy Gunstra for nominating me and councilwoman Kalintari Johnson and the city council for facilitating this honor. As a Santa Cruz native, it is a privilege to be recognized by my hometown for doing something dear to my heart in a city that I love. I look forward to continuing to represent Santa Cruz and to provide a positive experience for the downtown area. Therefore, it is vital that in the event that parking lot four becomes unavailable to us, that we have the ability to stay on the 100 block of Lincoln Street between Pacific and Cedar and use the adjacent parking lot eight, which would allow us to remain in the location we have thrived in for over 20 years. Thank you for your consideration. Thank you. We're on item seven. We'd ask the Parks and Recreation Director, Mr. Elliot, to come forward regarding the clam chowder cook-off update. I see you're bringing. Bringing back up here. Mr. Reyes, you can't escape. Get closer, get closer. All right, mayor. Thank you and the city council for the opportunity to share some highlights from a record breaking clam chowder cook-off. This year I'd like to introduce our recreation superintendent to main head and Jones and Chris Reyes, the Director of Public Relations with the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk to give a short presentation. Thank you. Good afternoon, sir. Thank you, honourable mayor Fred Keely and council. We had a wonderful clam chowder cook-off this year as to illustrate that we actually did break records. We grossed over $133,000 this year. Our average revenue from that event is typically ranges between $70,000 to about $80,000. So clearly it was a record-busting year. In terms of kit sales, we had over 2,000 presale kits, which totaled over $30,000 in presale, which definitely trumped last year's presales. Last year was our first year for presales. So this is something that we expect to continue in the future. And for the day of, we had over $100,000 for the two days. So $51,000 on Saturday and over $49,000 on that Sunday. So amazing. In terms of turnout, we had a record number of our participant requests to participate in the event. I believe there were over 90 different requests, but 82 different chefs showed up. And that was amazing in and of itself. The board was just packed on both days with beautiful weather and a great opportunity for people to enjoy a community event. So with that, I'll pass it over to Chris. Thank you. Mr. Reyes, good afternoon, sir. Good afternoon, everybody. Good to be here for something fun and hopefully not have anyone mad at me for being here today. That's a rare thing. We'll see about that. Yeah, we'll see if we can change that in a few moments. We are thrilled to be part of this. I think, was this our 40th year? 43rd year that we've been doing this in partnership with Parks and Rec. It's just getting bigger and bigger every single year. It used to be a one-day event. Recently we had to make it a two-day event because it's grown to be so popular. And we're really proud and thankful to partner with Parks and Rec and the City of Santa Cruz and have so much help and assistance from the team over at Parks and Rec. Some of you have had an opportunity to be judges for clam chowder cookoff. I'm sure you've tasted clam chowder that maybe didn't taste like clam chowder, but we're grateful for those participants as well. Some of you has judged our chili cookoff as well. So it's just a great example of a positive public-private partnership that's good for everyone. It turns out what would normally be a sleepy February weekend into what is more like a July 4th weekend at the Boardwalk. And then obviously produces some great results for Parks and Rec. So we're really grateful and gonna keep doing this for another 43 years. And as long as there's a City of Santa Cruz Parks and Rec Department and the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk we'll be doing clam chowder in February. So thank you all. Thank all of you very much and all the participants. Good work. Presiding Officer, announcement none. Statements of disqualification on the agenda. Any members have disqualifying? Seen hearing none. Additions or deletions to the agenda, Ms. Bush? There are none. Very good. City Attorney Report from closed session. Mr. City Attorney. Yes, good afternoon, Mayor Keely, members of the City Council. Council convened in closed session this afternoon at 12 p.m. with Council Member Bruner absent to discuss the following items. Item one was a conference with Legal Council concerning liability claims. Those are the claims of Liberty Mutual Insurance and the claim of CSAA Insurance Exchange. Those items are listed also as item 13 on your consent calendar this afternoon for council action. There are two items of real property negotiations. First item approximately 8.15 acres located on Mount Herman Road in the City of Scotts Valley. Parties to that negotiation are the City of Santa Cruz, the owner of the property, commonly known as the Sky Park Property and the City of Scotts Valley. The second item was an item of real property negotiations concerning city-owned property at 302 and 326 Front Street. That item is also on your afternoon agenda for City Council action. And item three was a conference with Legal Council concerning existing litigation. Case entitled Alicia Lopez versus Mary McCoy at all, currently pending in the Santa Cruz County Superior Court. Last item was a conference with Legal Council concerning anticipated litigation. One item of significant exposure to litigation. There was no reportable action. Thank you, sir. Meeting calendar, Ms. Bush. Any updates you'd like to draw to our attention? No updates. Thank you so much. We are on the consent agenda for those of you that might be unfamiliar with this. We will take up items nine through 23 inclusive by one motion. We will go around the council chamber, excuse me, the dais, see if council members have questions, comments or want to pull an item. We will then give you that opportunity to comment on close, excuse me, consent agenda items. We will also give that privilege, of course, or that right to folks who may call in. Let me start around. I will start with Ms. Contar Johnson, Ms. Contar Johnson on the consent agenda. Thank you, comments on items 16 and 17. Please go ahead and make those. Okay, item 16 is the annual housing element and general plan progress report. And I just wanted to congratulate and acknowledge the team, the planning department, economic development for all of your great work. We are among 6%, only 6% of the entire state that met our last fifth cycle RINA goals. And that it's inclusive of all the levels of housing, very low income and affordable housing. And that has, of course, allowed us to be, receive the pro housing designation, which opens us up for eligibility for a number of affordable housing grants. So I just want to call it out and thank the team. I know a lot of work has gone into us accomplishing these huge milestones and goals. That's it on that one. Then 17 is the pay and play equity in sports competition. Really excited to see this. When I first joined council, this came to my attention. Somebody from the surf equity group had reached out and when I reached out to Tony, Elliot, the Parks and Rec planning director, he's like, yep, we're working on it. And to see it here on our consent item, I just wanted to acknowledge it, give it a shout out. Once again, the city of Santa Cruz is at the forefront, among some other cities across the state to really not just talk about equity, but to implement equity. And this is equity in action. So just really, really happy to see it and want to thank all the work that went into this item. Thank you. Madam Vice Mayor. I just have a brief comment on 16 as well. I just got back from the Cal cities policy meeting on Friday down in Southern California. And although I was in the public safety meeting, everyone was talking about housing and nobody actually believed me when I said we met our housing allocation and I had to pull it up and prove them wrong. And what's kicking in in other cities is builders remedy and Santa Monica was telling me they've got several 24 story buildings coming in to town that they can't stop. And so when I said in regards to measure them, whether you want housing, you don't want housing, what you want to keep is local control. And so I think having this certified housing element is so important. And I really appreciate the team and all members of staff that work to get this done for us. So thank you. Thank you, Madam Vice Mayor, Council Member Watkins. I just have a few comments and I could pull item 15 also just for further discussion with staff. It's nice to see that on here. I'll just associate myself with the comments that were made by my colleagues in regards to our progress with housing. Congratulations and thanks to our team and our community for working in this way and really a great recognition for all the reasons that have been mentioned. And then also on 17, just, you know, it's wonderful to have this and also somewhat disheartening that it's taken this long to have us have equal pay and equal representation in this way. Certainly something to celebrate. Certainly something to be proud of. Absolutely something to see put into action and I can't wait as it should and as it should have been. But here we are today and thanks to our Parks and Rec team for bringing it forward and I look forward to seeing it implemented and thanks to all of our wonderful athletes of all genders who deserve equal pay and their abilities. So I'll leave it at that. And those are the only comments that I have on this. Thank you. Council member Brown. Thank you, mayor. I would like to pull item 10 and I also have questions on 12. These really, these two items go together and I'm wondering if I pull the one. Can I also kind of ask some questions that go into 12 or should I pull them both? Let's pull them on. Okay. I'll go ahead and pull items 10 and 12 then. You got it. Very good. Council member Newsom. Thank you, Mayor Keeley. I just want to associate myself with the comments that my colleagues made on item number 16 and item number 17 and thanks staff for bringing this forward. And I also want to make a quick comment on item number 18 just thank Parks and Rec director Elliot for bringing this forward and receiving this additional funding to make this project move forward and to renovate the restrooms on B street which are much needed. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Let me go to the public now see if there are members of public who wish to comment on items that are on the agenda. Keep in mind, we're going to take items 10, 12, 15 we'll take those separately other than that other items that are on consent you wish to comment on this be your opportunity to do so. Good afternoon and welcome. Thank you so much. Good afternoon, Mayor Keeley and honorable council members. My name is Rachel Kippen and I'm a volunteer organizer with surf equity an organization that supports equity and equal pay at California and surf breaks and throughout the nation. I'm also a coastal advocate and resident of Santa Cruz County and I've worked on ocean access issues for the majority of my career. I'm here to support item 17 for pay and play equity and sport competition permitting. I encourage you to adopt this item and the resolution for equal pay and play and updating permit language to reflect this. This is a fantastic effort brought forward by the city parks and recreation department. I want to specifically thank parks director Tony Elliot and all the parks and rec staff who helped move this forward, including Lindsay Bass. You all might remember a few years ago, there was a surf competition in 2021 where men were offered $10,000 in prize money and women were offered 1000. Said another way, this was a 90% gender pay gap. The surf competition was not the only circumstance where equal opportunities were not offered. There are times in this county where it might feel like we're still in the 1940s, where women of all backgrounds are not seen for the athletes and leaders that they are but are positioned secondary to men or men are considered the default and a woman's category is viewed as a bonus. While the city is of course not responsible for the various competition organizers antiquated viewpoints, it is within the city's purview to ensure that cities sanctioned and permitted events are equal across genders. I'm grateful that director Elliot sat down and surf equity on multiple occasions and listened to community concerns. I'm also grateful that he put these words into motion that are before you today and I'm hopeful that you'll put that now into action. The benefits of ensuring equal pay and play are numerous and extend beyond anyone scenario and beyond surfing. By adopting this proposed item, you are making a statement that Santa Cruz stands for equal opportunities regardless of gender that we can see for ourselves a future that women before us could not. The ocean does not discriminate. Thank you. Ms. Kippen, thank you and thank you for your good work and ocean conservation over the years. Very much appreciate that. Let me see if we can alternate. Do we have anyone online? No one. Very good. Thank you. Welcome to the council meeting. Thank you. I'm Sabrina Brennan and I wanna appreciate everything that Rachel just said. I agree with all of it. I'm the executive director and founder of surf equity and I was absolutely thrilled to see that this was on your agenda today and on consent, all of that, wonderful. And I just wanted to let all of you know that it's my hope that we see more of these types of resolutions on agendas at other city councils throughout California. And you are the second city council to approve such a resolution in the entire state of California, Half Moon Bay being the first. And it's very significant in Santa Cruz because of the number of events that you have going on here. This is huge. And I truly appreciate the work of staff and particularly the parks and rec department. So thank you so much for your time and your support. Thank you very much. Anyone else on the consent agenda? Matters back before the council. Move the consent agenda with the exceptions of items 10, 12 and 15. There's a motion. There's a second by council member Watkins. Debate or discussion. I just have one. I wonder if we could maybe have a press release to go out about how we're taking action as the second city in regards to item 17 and hopefully inspire other jurisdictions to do the same. We're happy to do that. I think we might already have one ready. Appreciate that comment. So noted. For the questions, comments, further debate or discussion, click will call the roll with the exceptions of items 10, 12 and 15. Council members, Newsome. Aye. Brown. Aye. Watkins. Aye. Calentary Johnson. Aye. Vice mayor Golder. Aye. Aye. Motion passes and so ordered. We are on item 10. Council member Brown, you asked that that item be continued. We'll take that up now. Thank you. I'm speaking sort of to both items 10 and 12, mostly 10, but there may be questions that come up related to item 12. So for the public, these two items are related to funding for some affordable housing projects, including the downtown library project. Item 10 and then 12 is an extension of a contract with our owner agent, I think, who working on the library, the downtown library project. So I want to first appreciate the information all that reflecting all the work you've done. It's nice to see the amount of funding that's been received for these critical projects, Pack Station North, and then the funding that you're working on for the library project. It's impressive. But it would be really helpful to get more of a thorough report or overview, I think at this point. People really are wondering what's happening with, and I'm speaking specifically to the library project now. And so there's financial information and some detail in here that's helpful. But I'm not able to get a clear picture of all of the components. I think I've asked about this in the past and we've said that we want to have regular updates on this and so I appreciate it. But really trying to understand what's funded, what isn't, where are the gaps for the different components of the project. And so, in particular, kind of parsing out the parking garage library, affordable housing, where we're at in those areas, what's secured, what's committed, what we need to come up with. And then with respect to, and it was good to see the timeline in item 12, so we can sort of get a sense of what's coming, that it is coming. But I see that it kind of ends at shell and core construction. And so that begs the question then, what are the next steps? When do we anticipate the library component to actually be constructed? So just hearing maybe a little bit more of an overview to help us understand the full picture would be great. And I don't need a lot of detail right now, but I think it would be very helpful to have some kind of report that presents that to the council at a coming meeting. So that's my general set of questions. I may have a couple of specifics. Thanks. Good afternoon, Mayor, members of the council. Thank you for your questions, Council Member Brown and your general comments. Overall, we're happy to come back to you with an overview of the project. In fact, I think in May we're going to be doing a presentation to the Joint Library Board as well, the JPA, on sort of where we are with the budget. So we'd be happy to come forward to council, either around the same time or prior to that if possible. Overall, largely the components of the downtown library affordable housing project are largely funded with the exception of the library portion of the project. We are currently working with the city's financial advisor through the finance department and really looking at the parking revenue bonds. And that looks like that from an amortization schedule is something that will be cash flowed with available funds. We've closed the gap on the affordable housing piece with the grants and funding awards that have been awarded to the project, which is great. The item before you this evening is specific to basically budgeting those grant items, including the congressional earmarks of 2 million each for PAC North and the library project, as well as the affordable housing sustainable community grant and the infill and infrastructure grants, those two awards of 29 million and a little over 20 million respectively. A portion of each of those grants are going directly to the developer for the affordable housing component of each of those projects. And the balance of that around nine million from one, about 10 million from the other are going for infrastructure public improvements for each of those projects. And that's what the budget adjustment related to this item is before you today. Where we do have a gap not on PAC North, that's fully funded and construction is starting, but on the library project is on the library component itself. And that's largely because of the state level rollbacks related to the library grant that we thought we were gonna be able to get this year. So that's where we do have a gap. We are definitely looking at the overall project, the project timeline. I will say to your point you raised around sort of the overall timing of the schedule. It always was anticipated that we would have two phases because the original piece was part of our developer selection for the shell and core. And then separately we'll have a separate budget that will go out to bid competitively for the tenant improvements. And so we have it fully funded to do the shell and core of the library and some of the tenant improvements right now. So, but we need to get the rest of the tenant improvement funding raised. A portion of that 2 million has been committed through the friends of the library. And so we have that sort of gap to solve for. And whether or not there'll be another grant, whether it's a state library grant or other grants, we definitely are looking at those and we'll be applying for those and are looking creatively at other funding opportunities to close the gap just on the library piece. As I said, the rest of the components of the project are funded. Thank you, that's helpful. And I would love to, when it's time to make a motion, take you up on scheduling a presentation for the council as well. Thank you very much. Further on this item? Ms. Brown, further on this item? Jack, make a motion on this item. I think we have members of the public who want to speak before I make the motion. Who wishes to comment on this item? Good afternoon, Ms. Brown. Well, I want to thank, my name's John Hall. I want to thank Bonnie Bush for her comments and thank Council Member Brown for pulling the item. It seems to me that the quarterly reports that the council used to get are really important and especially now that the project is moving forward and congratulations on the grants that have been received. We were told prior to the time when the entitlements were voted by the city council that it would take about a year to get finance and procurement for the entire project. That time is now up. We're now told, and we were told that construction would begin 18 months after entitlements. That would put construction starting in September of this year, but Griffin structures now tells us that construction in their estimation won't start until January 2025. Given the change in the time estimates for the project, I really support Council Member Brown's request for a full and complete update. From my point of view as a member of the public, that would include a current budget update that would be for the entire project and for components, and then including inflation adjustments for the project, a detailing of all expenditures so far and currently committed and available for each component, details on further funds applied for or projected, again for each component of the project. And finally, I think it's important to have a revised timeline based on current planning and funding. So, given the importance of this project for the city, it just seems to me that we need to have a full and public accounting from time to time about how it's going, and I'd appreciate it if the council would support that. Thanks very much. Thank you, Mr. Hall. Anyone else with us in chambers wish to comment on this item? Good afternoon, sir. Welcome. Good afternoon, City Council. My name is Alberto Lustre with the Northern California Carpenters Union Local 405, and then I'm here just to speak about actually the labor part on the projects. How do we actually, when we do public works, how do we choose the actual responsible contractors? Where do they go to bits? Who do we choose? A lot of times we've seen that these prices go with the prevailing wage, but who monitors those projects? Who does it? Who's, are those people getting paid in healthcare? Even though it comes from the public money, but who does it? I don't see nobody checking those projects. 80% of the projects are Santa Cruz. They're being done with people with non-union, or they don't have any type of apprenticeship, local hire, which is about maybe having two projects, and maybe out of 100 people, maybe one person out of Santa Cruz. For apprentices, we have a big issue right now. We got a little homeless. We're not giving those people a shot. We're the only ones that can actually take him in and train him, give him an opportunity. But the training part and the apprenticeship, I don't see nobody doing that. Every single project on the public works, it doesn't have any type of following or who's doing it. I've seen, like, I was looking at the library project and how this project went to bit. Who got it? Who developed it? How come, you know, who's donating? Where is the money coming from? Where is it going to spend? I just want to know, I want to have a further conversation with the city council. What are those projects coming in? How come, no other projects are going with the actual, for the actual locals. No locals are in the place. And that's pretty much my comment. Thank you for your time. Thank you very much. Do we have anyone online? Take the person online. Good afternoon. Welcome to the council meeting. Three, two. The housing grants for Pack Station North and the library are examples of a trend toward a state control of an ever-growing socialist and corporate Marxist housing reality. It's an anti-free market because it creates a state-sponsored, subsidized, uneven playing field so that tax-paying private housing developers are frozen out of the low-end market while these non-profit subsidized developers are income and property tax non-paying deadbeats. The rest of taxpayers must make up for that whether it is a socialist or a less-regulated, none of the city's business welfare situation. It is not a scalable economic. It eventually runs out of other people's money. You might say greedy private developers don't want the low-end market preferring the profits of market-rate housing or decide the price-controlled market since the same commodities, hey, where are the council members going? Meetings have been going on for half an hour. They're taking off. What's the deal? Anyway, where was I? You might say greedy private developers don't want the low-end market preferring the profits of market-rate housing or decide the price-controlled market. That's not true. Capitalists and businessmen don't ignore any markets that tend to saturate and satisfy all markets as long as there are actually all profits to be made. And for a competition by subsidized developers, remove tax-paying private sector developer incentive to provide while the rents might be lower, the actual societal cost can be very high. Acknowledging the reality of challenges to building their income housing coming from government-induced inflation, fees and regulation, I do reluctantly endorse the blanket 20% of four billion requirements since if that were the sole requirement factor applying to everyone, it is then a level playing field. And whatever impediments remain to allow profitability should then be ideally removed by innovation, not subsidy. I would mention our density bonuses. The critical which reduce affordable housing percentages. I would also mention looking over the Eden FTF website, you sure picked a far-leftist social-justice type organization to subsidize one that believes land use is structurally racist, that everyone deserves to live anywhere they want and copied the alphabet people adding a letter to DEI and their spouse, DEI B, diversity, equity, inclusion, and then they added belonging, my mind. Anyway, side note, take notes, the public is getting tired of wasting public money on DEI like the recent ban endorsing that in Florida schools. Anyway, so the last week, our strings attached to the money, like data collection as part of the government left us a hellhole of race ethnic reporting. And I just wonder if they're going to discriminate against who lives there as an ultimate act of pure critical discrimination at public expense. There are these data required to be collected and used and your required annual analysis to demonstrate assisted housing is provided to all people. Hopefully that doesn't mean there will be too many wild people. Actually, under OMB reporting, thank you very much. Thank you very much. Anyone else online, Ms. Bush? All right, matters back before the body. Ms. Brown? I will move items 10 and 12 with additional direction to staff to return with a full update about the library, the downtown library mixed use project, including, excuse me, including information about the current budget and funding components for current budget and funding sources and expenditures for all components of the project, taking into account cost escalation along with the revised timeline. That works. There's a motion, is there a second? I'll second. There's a second by Ms. Watkins. Open under motion, Ms. Brown. Excuse me. What item is, you said 10 and 12. Are you making one motion? I'm making one motion for 10 and 12. I pulled them together. The city attorney advised me I could move them together so we can just get through that. So the additional direction will all add it to item 10. I think it makes more sense there. I'll make sure. Approval as recommended on 10 and 12 with the additional direction on 10, as you indicated. Correct. That's the motion, that's the second. Ms. Bush, are we good on that? Would you like further clarity? I can send it to you. Okay, very good. I'm in debate and discussion. You may open on your motion. Thank you. I don't have much to add here. I want to appreciate the staff for being willing to provide more comprehensive information. I do think that the community is very curious about this. And while reports like this can be very helpful for us, folks who are really inside the discussion, it would be great for the public to have a better understanding of where we're at and where we're headed. So thank you for that. I also just want to make a comment from the gentleman from the Carpenters. Absolutely. I believe that we should be using public funds for union apprenticeship programs, union jobs. It's why support project labor agreement, which I won't talk about here, but I'd hope to see the council take that up at some point in the future. You're absolutely right. We have a responsibility to use public money in a responsible way and support our workforce. And with that, I am done. Thanks. With a debate or discussion, stand here and none, click or call the roll. Council Member Newsom. Aye. Brown. Aye. Larkins. Aye. Calentari-Johnson. Aye. Vice Mayor Golder. Aye. Mariculio. Aye. Motion passes. Just watered, we're on item 15. This is the compensation study phase three. We will hear from Ms. De Leon, Ms. Cabell and Mr. Huffaker. Thank you, Mayor. We actually made the request to pull the item to give an opportunity for our members of SEIU to come and speak this afternoon. So we'll go ahead and hand it over. Thank you. Good afternoon, sir. Welcome. Thank you very much for doing that for me. I appreciate it. And we all appreciate it, don't we? Yes. Okay. Awesome. So I am Ken Bear. I'm a city employee as well as the president of SEIU 521, the city of Santa Cruz chapter. And I'm here to urge you to pass the classic comp study third phase. I want to make sure that it includes parking attendance and facility attendance. I heard a rumor while I was meeting with my friends here that that may have been dropped accidentally. So some consideration on that would be awesome. And we stand by to hopefully thank you for taking care of that for us in a few minutes. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Ms. Daly-Owner, Mr. Huffaker, can you comment on Mr. Bear's? Sure, I'll ask Mr. Daly-Own, our human resources director, to come up to speak to that. Good afternoon. Thank you, Mayor. So regarding the parking attendant and facility attendance, they are not in this analysis because they had insufficient data in accordance with their 2021 study. So they are not part of the phase three implementation before you today because of that insufficient mark, but they are slotted to be looked at for our 2024 compensation study and methods there. Thank you. Anyone else wish to comment on this item? Good afternoon. Welcome. My name is Emilio Galvan and I'm a facility attendant for the London Nelson Community Center. I don't know how many times this has been brought up. I've had numerous meetings with Sara Daly-Own myself and I was never informed that there was insufficient studies for my position. I believe that it is truly unfair that there's insufficient studies for my position. There's multiple cities around us that could be looked at for comparison. And I would like to be added to this compensation study. You know, you can ask the community, you can stop by the London Nelson Community Center, you can ask about me personally and you can see the type of work and impact that not just myself, but other facility attendants in the center make for this community. When you're talking about projects and the things that you're doing that bring revenue to the city, you know, it's something that, that center itself does an incredible job. And you know, I'm very passionate about what I do there. I work with the older adults, the senior community center and you know, I wish to be added back to that list. You know, I want to be compensated for the work that I do. You know, I feel like I deserve it. And if I'm not on there, I feel like it's truly unfair. And I hope that you really consider it, not just for me, but for the rest of the people, the service employees here in the city that make the city such a beautiful place, not just for the people that live here, but for the people that also visit the city. Thank you. Thank you very much. What else would you address the council on this matter? Anyone who's with us today? Do we have anyone online? We do not. Mr. De La, would you be kind enough to come back up here for just a second, Sarah? Would you be kind enough to come back up for a second? So that we all understand it, the sequencing of which positions are evaluated when in the COMP study and so on, the gentleman has made the argument that perhaps his classification should be included. Will you address this issue a minute ago? Can you expand on your testimony? Thank you. So first, regarding the facility attendance specifically, those have been an ongoing conversation, not only with our unions, but our department, which is why we have submitted a classification study request to look at specifically facility attendance as well as box office representatives. There's a, my understanding from the department that perhaps there's a smaller career path for those individuals than that classification. So we're looking to desk out at those to see if something else makes sense. And as part of that class study review, which looks at the work that they're doing, their knowledge skills and ability, after that study position, description questionnaires are completed by each individual, a reclassification to something that makes more sense could be that potential path for those facility attendance and box office representatives. That process is separate from just our compensation studies that we do every three years. So those are the ongoing conversations about specifically our facility attendant position that we're still dedicated to, and we expect to be done within the next six to nine months potentially. So that is a bit of a way out. Regarding the analysis that we have done for you for phase three, it looks at classifications that were done in our 2021 comp study that are out of market more than 10% and brings them at least to 10%. There's something different that we did with phase three though. Not only are we trying to bring all those benchmarked and mapped classifications to 10%, we want an extra step by trying to incorporate other classifications that historically were not mapped or benchmarked in our 2021 study, our 2018 or our 2015 to capture those unique functions of our city, such like our wharf, parking has been an insufficient data, resource recovery. Those are things in the 21 study that, yes, it says insufficient because we didn't have enough matches to surveyed agencies, but this extra net we cast it out for phase three is a first attempt recognizing that we have the 2024 compensation study coming up. So I hope that makes sense. Happy to answer any questions. Make sure I understand. So the gentleman's correct in terms of it's not in this, but it is in, you're working on it's in the next one. Correct. Is that essential yet? Okay. So it's not as if it was not understood to be an issue. It's understood to be an issue. Correct. And it's not only being looked at in the compensation study, but we're taking extra steps specifically for our facility attendant route through a classification study review. Thank you. I can see Ms. Brown-Henner. We have a few. Thank you for the overview. I'm still not entirely clear about this, how the process unfolded. And so I want to try to get a sense. So were these positions are not 10% out of range? And so they, because they're in and in some way they're in the classification and compensation study. I mean, all of the city's workforce really was. And I recognize this is a different track, but apart from that, why are they not included here and does that because they're not more than 10% out of range? Correct. Okay. And about how many workers are we talking about here? In this phase three implementation? No, we have that information, but who are not included, who were under the impression that they might be, and which is also very unfortunate that we're here today with that still not clear. Just how many workers are not included who are speaking up here? I'd have to get the number of active parking attendants and facility attendants. I could get that. Back of the envelope, 27. Okay, I'm not sure what's to be done here today, but I'm concerned that we're talking about 21 workers who are in a process that may take another year before they realize an increase in their pay. Is that, the rents are gonna keep going up for the year and food costs are gonna keep going up. And so I guess I'm just, I'm trying to understand, was that, that was agreed to by the union that this particular group would about a year from now potentially have? No. Okay, so what was agreed to? So the agreement was the analysis that we presented that we were looking at all classifications outside the market by 10% and throwing that additional net to capture the classifications that were unmapped and not benchmarked, but have potential linkages to other things that we know are outside the market. Now the thing to remember here is that it's not just parking attendants and facility attendants that have insufficient data per the 2021 study. And that insufficient data is a direct result because we did not have enough matches to other agencies. And that methodology right there is the exact conversation we agreed to in our contract that we would meet and confer in good faith on the method and approach for the 2024 study by September 1st of this year. And so I think that's also where it's being moved down as trying to address a larger methodology issue holistically for all of our classifications that are insufficient because it isn't just parking, it's resource recovery, it's water, the utility supervisors, it's wastewater. It has to do with all the job descriptions not being up to date. And so those are the conversations that we've been having to make sure that we can take 10, 15 year old job descriptions and make sure they're up to date so we can find better matches and all agree to better mapping and better methods moving forward. And thank you for that. I understand, although I'm really disappointed to hear this, I guess I wanna ask why nine more months. I mean, this is contract negotiations and the discussions around compensation studies are kind of ongoing. And the idea, at least as long as I've been here and I imagine for decades prior, why are we having such a hard time getting sufficient data? I mean, it seems like if we have the will to do it, that could be done at least more quickly than nine months from now, given that I would hope that we've been working on this. If we couldn't find the data, what are we doing to make sure we have it and can this process be sped up? So the answer is agreeing to different or additional, I will say, surveyed agencies. And that's exactly the open conversation that we've been having with the unions. It's insufficient data because, for example, parking, we only found that the city of Watsonville and the county of Santa Cruz were the only two matches for surveyed agencies and we required four in the 2021 study. So that's part of the methodology conversation coming up, the RFP cycle opening this summer, the work we've been doing to start our jobs back updates and get this analysis done for who's missing for the better preparation of the study. But we have an RFP coming out this summer to assess who's going to be potential vendors so that we can start the methodology conversations with every union because that alone, trying to get those lenses of who they think should be included in the surveyed agency study is going to be pretty heavy conversation, especially since we have a certain baseline of data for 12 surveyed agencies of the past. Gotcha. All right, given the potential here, I'm not gonna try to add anything to the direction here because I am concerned about the potential for taking the group that's here today, but if waste management is not, those workers aren't here and everybody's kind of facing the same challenge, I don't wanna, that's not my role, right? I mean, that's between the union and our negotiators, but I do wanna strongly encourage members of SEIU to contact the council about your concerns and be as specific as you can so that we can hopefully come up with a way to provide some direction about this because I'm not satisfied with waiting another year for workers who are making pretty close to minimum wage at this point. And so I would like to see us move more quickly on that and if it takes more resources, then maybe that's something we need to talk about at budget time, but I mean, for the consultant, that piece of it, we talk about the other part and that will happen. So I just wanna be really clear that I don't feel okay about this and I think that we need to be really clear with our workers, our workforce and again, SEIU, please let us know what the specific things we can do, a council member could do it because I'm happy to work with you on that. Thank you. This walk is just recognized. Thank you for the explanation, it's helpful. I wanna make sure I'm clear also. What I heard is there's sort of the study that's gonna be forthcoming and in addition to that, there's the reclassification process that's also being looked at as part of that that could have actually a shorter timeline, essentially. Is that correct? Correct, okay, okay. I've been involved in the reclassification process. I know how that works and it's painful but it's exciting that that's happening and hopefully could happen in advance for some of these positions specifically or people working out of classification for opportunity and advancement in addition to the bigger, broader study associated that you've described. Okay, just wanted to make sure I was clear on that. Thank you. I'm happy to move the recommendation. I also just really wanna thank our city staff and our union members for bringing this to our attention last time. Our voters for passing our sales tax and for us being in the position to be able to bring up these positions to make sure that they are proportional to what you've been deserving. So I don't wanna lose sight of what's to be celebrated here as well so I'm happy to move the recommendation. There's a motion. Is there a second? Second by the vice mayor. Under debate and discussion, you may open on your motion. I already did. I apologize, it's the old way of doing it. It's okay, it's all good. Ms. Contari-Johnson. I'm sorry, I changed my, you were ready to vote. I see. Good. Under debate or discussion? I just wanna say one more thing. I wanna thank you, Ms. De Leon. I grill you when you come up. I give you a hard time. I do appreciate the work you're doing and I think we are making progress so I didn't wanna end my comments with the, I'm unhappy, I am, but I'm also very thankful for your work. Thank you. The, thank you. Ms. Brown and I appeared before SCIU during the sales tax discussion. I wanna thank SCIU for your support on that matter. Certainly helps us do all of this. Thank you for that, the clerk will call the roll. Council members, Newsom. Aye. Brown. Aye. What is it? Aye. Contari-Johnson. Aye. Vice Mayor Golder. Aye. Mayor Cooley. Aye. Thank you all for being here. We are, we're on number 24, the second reading final adoption of ordinance number 2024-07, amending the Santa Cruz City Municipal Code at chapters 13.12. Is there a, any presentation on this item? Yes, good afternoon. Mayor and City Council members, Deputy City Attorney Stephanie Duck will present this item. Ms. Duck, good afternoon. Mayor and City Council members. Council approved this, Council approved the introduction of this ordinance, Santa Cruz Municipal Code chapter 13.12 at your last meeting, and it is on the agenda today for a second reading and final adoption. I am here to answer any questions you might have. Thank you, Ms. Duck. Questions or comments? Seeing none, anyone with us wish to make comment on the second reading on this ordinance? Seeing none, Ms. Bush, anyone online? A motion would be in order. Move the staff recommendation. The staff recommendation is Contary Johnson seconds under debate and discussion. Seeing none, the clerk will call the roll. Council Member Newsom? Aye. Brown? Aye. Contary Johnson? Aye. Vice Mayor Golder? Aye. And Mary Cooley? Aye. Motion passes and is awarded. We are on item 25, including items 25.1 and 25.2. This will be a public hearing regarding the Cruz Hotel. We'll first receive a report from Mr. Bain, Ms. Lipscomb on this item. Mr. Butler, good afternoon, sir. Hello, good afternoon, Mayor and Councilmembers. I mean, just a moment. All right. We are here today to talk about the Cruz Hotel at the northeast corner of Front and Laurel Streets. And want to give you a very brief overview before handing it over to Ryan Bain to jump into the details of the project. As the Council knows, it takes a wide range of uses to create a healthy city and employment uses are critical to that health. They're critical from an environmental perspective so that people don't have to commute large distances to their place of work and so that they have time to build their social ties and volunteer in the community rather than spending time commuting. Employment uses are critical from a personal health perspective as they allow for people to use active transportation to get to and from work in our compact community. And employment uses are critical from a fiscal perspective because those uses typically generate net positive fiscal benefits in contrast to housing which often can have a negative fiscal impact over time. For the hotel project before you today, one very important aspect is the support that its patrons will provide for downtown businesses. For decades, the city has sought to better connect the beach tourists with the downtown and this hotel will draw tourists into the downtown who would otherwise be staying outside of the downtown or even outside of the city, like at Shamanad for example. They'll have easy access to downtown shopping, eating and entertainment where they'll be supporting many of our locally owned downtown businesses. And of course, transient occupancy tax will help the city deliver a broad range of quality services. We focus a lot on housing in our council conversations and for a good reason. We're clearly in a housing crisis due to decades of under production and because much of our new development is housing as a result of that pent up demand from the under production. We've heard from some that housing and particularly affordable housing is a priority including for this particular site. And those uses are priorities, housing and particularly affordable housing, but it is not the city's only priority. And for the aforementioned reasons, housing cannot be the only priority if our city is to remain healthy and sustainable. Here, the city sites are being offered for sale that are being offered for sale are too small for viable standalone affordable housing projects and serve a better purpose as a hotel, given the support that this use will lend to downtown and given the surrounding development context. And I wanna talk to you a little bit about that surrounding development context. The council is well aware of what we've been doing with housing production. We heard the annual housing element report update just on the consent calendar this afternoon. And I wanna point out a few of the success stories in the immediate proximity to this site in our downtown. We have over 300 affordable housing units on city-owned land moving forward right now. Three projects, one ready for occupancy later this year, another about to start construction and another working on building permits submittals. We've talked about some of those earlier this evening. Those are all city-led projects. We've also facilitated over 100 additional affordable housing units and two more 100% affordable projects. One about to be occupied and the other having recently been entitled. And we have another 57 units of affordable housing integrated into two market rate housing projects just north of the hotel site. In short, we're doing great work in producing housing, particularly affordable housing, as was shown in the annual housing element report. And as you all noted, we met our regional housing needs allocation targets in every income category for the fifth cycle, something that only 6% of jurisdictions in the state were able to accomplish. And in that timeframe, 53% of the units in the city that we produced were affordable. 53% bears repeating because that is a very, very significant number and quite an achievement and want to thank the many partners that we have in the development and nonprofit community that helped to make that happen. Back to the issue at hand, and the applicant has worked closely with city staff and with staff at the Coastal Commission and has on top of the attractive project that they've proposed, voluntarily offered a range of contributions to affordable housing and to visitor serving accommodations and facilities. Ryan will cover those in his presentation and staff are supporting the proposal and urge the council to do so. With that, I'll turn it over to senior planner, Ryan Bain. Mr. Butler, thank you, Mr. Bain. Good afternoon, sir. Good afternoon, mayor, council, senior planner, Ryan Bain. So, for us this afternoon, we have a hotel project. I'm sorry, it's not being shared, is it? So, the project involves six parcels located on the northeast corner of front and Laurel streets, you can see here. Three of the parcels are owned by the applicant and contain the building of parking lot occupied by the former Santa Cruz Community Credit Union. And the other three parcels are owned by the city with the project continued upon the acquisition of 4,400 square foot parcel and a portion of a 4,600 square foot parcel along Laurel Street. The third parcel, which is the furthest northern parcel owned by the city will remain owned by the city and would contain a 50 foot wide public passeo, which would be the Maple Street passageway connecting Front Street to the Riverwalk. It'll be designed, constructed and maintained by the hotel, but as I mentioned, would remain under the ownership of the city. So, the project involves demolition of the commercial building on the site, combining five lots into one and constructing a 232 room hotel consisting of three levels of underground parking to house 214 parking spaces with six stories of hotels and amenities including ground floor, retail, banquet, and conference space, a restaurant, bar, cafe, and associated hotel amenities such as a gym, spa, and a rooftop pool. In regards to entitlements as part of this project, there are several. The non-residential demolition authorization permit is for the demolition of the existing building. There's a heritage tree removal permit to remove 11 heritage trees. There are 36 new trees being proposed, including street trees, and this meets the minimum requirements in terms of replacement or exceeds the minimum replacement requirements. There's a boundary line adjustment to combine the existing lots, a coastal permit, as portions of the site are within the coastal zone and the shoreline protection overlay zone. There's a special use permit to allow the development of the outdoor extension area within the floodplain zone district. An administrative use permit to allow for low-risk alcohol to permit the service of alcohol as part of the restaurant, the bar, pool bar, and as for the hosted events at the banquet. Then there's a design permit for the new construction in the downtown plan area, as well as for the outdoor extension area and to allow an increase in the building height. And then a revocable license for an outdoor extension area to allow the publicly accessible outdoor area proposed atop the levee fill that'll be between the building and the river walk. And I should mention that while most of these permits here would be normally approved by the city zoning administrator or the Planning Commission of the Additional Height Requests in the Additional Height Zone B does require city council approval. So that's why we're here. So mentioning the Planning Commission, they did hear the project on February 15th. There were about 10 members of the public spoke at that hearing, both in support and in opposition to the project. In terms of some comments from the commissioners, they felt it was a well thought out, attractive building, that it would become a part of the identity of the downtown. They've talked about the housing thing that not every site can be housing. It's a great location for the hotel with the river walk, giving access to the beach and the rest of the downtown. That as Lee had mentioned, no other city is building affordable housing like Santa Cruz and with hundreds of affordable units being built downtown and directly across the street that this was a great location for the hotel. Other comments involved a lot of the public benefits that were being provided by the project. The city basically receiving privately developed parts which we could not afford to develop to maintain at this time amenities and public benefits such as the river walk which is the open space will be a tremendous benefit to the river walk area in the downtown as well as the Maple Alley and the hotel being a big overall economic, big part of the overall economic development of the downtown which will benefit all the businesses in the downtown area. There were some concerns raised about where hotel employees would be parking and there were some suggestions regarding free passes, free bus passes being available to employees. They also thought that the rooftop was being well used with the amenities that are being part of it. So ultimately the Planning Commission recommended approval on a six to a vote and as part of the motion, there were several minor changes to some of the conditions of approval which I'll get to. So the majority of the project site where the buildings proposed has a general plan used as designation of regional visitor commercial, RBC. Proposed use of the parcel as a hotel is consistent with the intent of the RBC downtown designation. The area of the project on city owned land east of the building to the river walk that's proposed to be filled and landscaped with outdoor amenities has a land use designation of NA or natural area. This designation allows public recreation use and the downtown plan and the San Lorenzo Urban River plan call for publicly accessible outdoor extension areas connecting the development to the river walk in this area. So it's project is consistent with these designations. There's many general plan policies that I listed in the staff report that are the projects consistent with. I just listed a few here in terms of the project adjacent to the San Lorenzo River includes patios overlooking the river enhance connections to the levee trails it does all of these things encourages buildings to be oriented towards the sidewalk public plazas walkways or rivers including features such as public benches and natural seating areas creating pedestrian friendly frontage and streetscape supporting development expansion of businesses that make a balanced contribution to the cultural environment and economic health of the city specifically downtown. Also revitalizes the riverfront area encourages the development of facilities that would accommodate conferences and conference goers as it has conference facilities as part of the project. The plan general plan also attract calls for attracting top-end full service hotels to expand and improve their year-round conference segment of the tourism market provide for the development of supporting land uses adjacent to retail and maintain and enhance the recreational value of the San Lorenzo River. So meets all of these general plan policies. The site is located within the downtown plan area and the project it buildments the downtown plan first principles and in several ways. The proposed building has its own unique character while maintaining consistency with the design standards and guidelines within the downtown plan. The building height is consistent with the additional height zone B. The project provides visitor serving hotel which will in turn support other local businesses such as restaurants and retail businesses in the downtown area. The design creates a strong linkage to the river by having the restaurant bar and banquet uses on the east side of the building oriented toward the river walk. And finally the site lay out enhances pedestrian and bicycle usage within an outdoor stairway and new accessible pathways connecting front street and river walk as part of the Maple Alley passageway. As I mentioned, there's also additional height requests. The project is located in additional height zone B which includes the properties between front street and the San Lorenzo River from Soquel to Laurel Street. This additional height zone allows an increase in building height from 50 to 70 feet. And this additional high zone, this planning commission considered all of this and recommended that the additional height approval to the city council. So the project meets the additional height zone B development criteria detailed in the downtown plan development standards. And one of those criteria is affordable housing in Lufi's, which is what I'm talking about here. So with the hotel qualifying as a non-residential project and requesting additional height project is required to pay an in Lufi affordable housing public benefit of at least $5 per square foot of gross flurry occurring above the 50 foot base height. So with an estimated 45,500 square feet of gross flurry above that 50 foot base height, the minimum fee would be approximately $230,000, which would be required to be paid into the city's affordable housing trust fund prior to the occupancy of the hotel. In addition to this required in Lufi, the applicant has volunteered to implement an affordable workforce housing program whereby the hotel operator would lease no fewer than four market rate offsite dwelling units located within the city with preference for units in the downtown area and make them available at a subsidized rents for qualifying low or very low income employees of the hotel as affordable workforce, force housing or a period of 20 years. Rents should be subsidized such that hotel workers would be paying no more than 30% of their income in an event that the applicant demonstrates that despite good faith of their efforts that it's not feasible to implement the program, the applicant may alternatively provide an in lieu public benefit fee equivalent to the average construction cost of providing those four units, low income units. Estimates at this were approximately $700,000 so that would be in the range of $2.8 million if they went the in lieu fee route providing that. In terms of the design of the hotel, the site, probably a lot of you are familiar with it, it's generally flat, frontage long front, Laurel Street and then it slopes up to the east, up to the Riverwalk, top the levee. So the project proposes to fill in the city on property between the east side of the new building and the levee and create a publicly accessible outdoor extension area connecting the development to the Riverwalk. Three levels of below grade parking will extend approximately 30 feet below the existing grade. Parking 214 cars by way of a valet system that incorporates vehicle lifts to park and retrieve those cars. Here's a look at kind of the front street elevation. So vehicular access will be off of front via Port-au-Cachère entrance that will be managed by a full-time valet service. The main hotel lobby entry is located adjacent to the Port-au-Cachère and this consists of an entry that leads to the second floor lobby area and the front street level also contains bike parking, hotel administrative offices as well as a commercial retail that's adjacent to the Maple Alley and then also there's an open cafe bar and commercial space that's proposed next to the lobby and faces front street and the Laurel intersection. Trash closures, access and utility rooms will face front street and are accessible from front street and Public Works has approved those facilities. The second floor plan includes the main hotel lobby which has a bar in the lobby area, restaurant, meeting rooms as well as the banquet and ballroom. These spaces can accommodate meetings and or banquets with tenants of up to approximately 350 people if fully occupied. This is looking from the Laurel Street Bridge. This is basically again the second floor area looking from the Riverwalk and Laurel Street Bridge and then there's the levels that are above that which contain a spa and fitness room in regards to parking. The City Council of Reso defines a vehicle and bicycle parking for all land uses in the downtown area. Hotels are required to provide 0.25 spaces per room. So with 232 rooms, a total of 58 spaces are required. So with the 214 spaces being provided, it's well over what the requirement is. The project is required to supply a total of five, class one and 42, class two bicycle parking spaces providing 82, class one and 32, class so those are all being met. And also bicycle parking is located within the first floor parking garage as well as provided along the Riverwalk adjacent to the outdoor extension area. In regards to off-site improvements, news sidewalk, curb and gutter, 12 foot along front, eight foot along Laurel Street, new street lights along front street, the Maple Alley pedestrian bike connection which I'll explain a little bit later. The Riverwalk levy pathway, new street trees, directional curb ramp at the front street and Laurel intersection extension of the Riverwalk along Laurel to the intersection and then underground utilities among several others. As I mentioned, the Maple Alley provides a direct pedestrian and bike connection between the downtown and the Riverwalk. The plaza is a public space with movable and amphitheater seating. It's connected to the Riverwalk via an accessible pathway and stair through slope terraces planted with trees and landscaping. As I have mentioned, ownership will remain by the city but it will be designed, constructed and maintained by the hotel. As I mentioned, the proposed project requires a coastal permit because it's located within the coastal zone and an SPO overlay district. So as proposed, the project is consistent with applicable policies of the local coastal program which seek to minimize the impact of development on coastal resources and provide visitors serving uses in the coastal area. The city, coastal commission staff and applicant have been working together on this project over the last year plus and the coastal commission staff has indicated that there will be certain requirements regarding low cost visitor and recreational facilities pursuant to the Coastal Act. So the term low cost visitor and recreation facilities can apply to both physical public access which is certainly abundant in the city such as the Warwalk, West Cliff, the Wharf as well as visitor serving accommodations. So most of the LCP policies addressing the visitor accommodations seek to upgrade existing hotel facilities and attract quality hotel and conference facilities and the retention of moderately priced accommodations. So the proposed project balances these goals, two goals through hotel room rates, the inclusion of conference facilities and the overall package of visitor serving amenity and overnight accommodation improvements and monetary contributions. So in addition to the numerous public enhancements such as the previously mentioned Maple Alley Passageway, Riverwalk improvements and outdoor extension areas, the applicants are proposing to address this Coastal Act and LCP policy with the following voluntary measures which have been memorialized in the recommended conditions of approval. So kind of going through some of these, one time financial contribution to the Santa Cruz Hostel Society in the amount of $50,000. If you recall in the staff report, planning commission actually, I think the original proposal was for, I wanna say 15 or 20,000 and that was one of the amendments to the requirements, the conditions of approval was that that'd be up to 50,000. That's both for the Santa Cruz Hostel Society as well as to the Boys and Girls Club. Bike rentals that are free of charge for the public for the first 90 minutes. No fewer than three community days, community days for local nonprofits to have access to rooftop and conference facilities. Amenities such as the restrooms, bar restaurant services and rock improvements will remain publicly accessible during operating hours subject to the city authorized rules and regulations. The applicant is offering to contribute $50,000 toward the operation of the city's all electric trolley service that provides low cost public transit services between the downtown and the beach area during the, I think the spring and summer months. And then tower viewers for visitors to view the river habitat. This was another condition that planning commission had recommended to be removed but the applicant would like to keep that as part of the proposal. In addition to the above noted benefits the applicant has voluntarily offered to include the following conditions of approval to meet the low cost visitor accommodation policies of the Coastal Act. So no fewer than six family suites to accommodate families of four or five without the need to book multiple rooms with the suites including kitchenettes. The applicant shall pay an in-loop fee for low cost visitor accommodations determined by calculating the product of 25% of the total number of rooms in the project at the time of building permit issuance not including those six rooms I previously mentioned and a fee of 144,750 per room. That amount shall then be adjusted to reflect a credit for the following, the amount of the affordable housing in-loofees will be previously discussed, the 50,000 contribution to the hostel and to the Boys and Girls Club. So ultimately the total low cost overnight accommodations will come to 5.17 million with the total being 8.3 minus those credits we just talked about. CEQA provides several categorical exemptions which are applicable to categories of projects and activities that lead agency as determined generally do not pose a risk of significant impacts on the environment. A CEQA exemption review was prepared by the city's environmental consultant which determined the project to be exempt from CEQA under CEQA exemption 15332, class 32 for infill projects. And it should be noted that questions surrounding VMT, noise and flooding were brought up during the planning commission hearing and further review was conducted to answer some of those questions post planning commission. And it was concluded that the VMT generated by project employees or visitor to customers would not result in a change or net increase in regional VMT and does not exceed the city of Santa Cruz adopted VMT threshold of significance. Therefore, the VMT impacts resulting from the project were found to be less than significant which was confirmed by that additional review. Additionally concerns were raised regarding the adequacy of the noise study specifically related to impacts on residents in the area from construction and operational noise generated by the project. So a supplemental noise assessment was repaired that concluded that the proposed project would not result in substantial increases in permanent noise levels or construction noise levels and would not constitute a significant impact. Also there was some discussions about flooding in the area. So the city is updating the FEMA flood maps and while a portion of the site will remain in the flood zone the vast majority will no longer be in the flood zone and while these small areas may be subject to puddling on rare occasions public work department is already working to address these issues with new pump stations which will pull the water back out to the river. So the project meets all the required site area standards as detailed in this report and various attachments on the project of elements goals and policies of the general plan and downtown plan to support a new visitor serving hotel enhance the vitality of the downtown revitalize and connect people to the San Lorenzo river and promote alternative transportation and walkability. So the project proposes a wide range of public benefits from publicly accessible amenities to affordable housing contributions to low-cost overnight accommodation contributions and these public benefits far exceed what other similar hotel projects have provided in the recent past here within the city. So staff is recommending approval based on the findings and conditions of approval that are attached as part of the resolution. I'm available for any questions and then I believe also there's public work staff available for any questions and I believe our city secret consultant is also available. She's not here. Thank you very much for your presentation. I think what we'll do if it's agreeable to council members will also hear from Ms. Lipscomb then we'll go back and take our council questions and comments. Ms. Lipscomb, good afternoon. Welcome to the council meeting. Good afternoon, mayor, members of the council. I'm just gonna have to pull up the presentation. Just give me a moment. I've been triple pulling up the network. Can we just? Okay, take your time. We're good. Good afternoon. Good afternoon, mayor, members of the council. So the item before you today is the option and purchase sale agreement for the proposed hotel project. And that is an option and purchase sale agreement between the city of Santa Cruz and SCFS Ventures LLC. And specifically, while you just heard from planner Ryan Bain about the proposed entitlements and conditions of the project, I'm going to talk for a few minutes about the actual sale of the city parcels and the proposed sale of the city parcels. So the developer group or team came to us in about 2021 and they approached us about the proposed hotel project on Front Street. But in order to move forward with their project, they would need to purchase from the city two city parcels. And I'll show you where those are in just a second. And Ryan had showed you earlier on his map, but those are two parcels that have formerly been used. One is still being used as city public parking lots. One is currently being used as staging for one of the construction projects downtown. Additionally, I would say that the proposed hotel, and again, you heard about this earlier, but it would include certain public improvements on the city property as currently they're being used either for parking lots or for construction staging, the proposed hotel would actually make improvements to the city property consistent with the downtown plan. So specifically, the proposed Paseo would be a continuation of the Maple Alley Paseo that's located between Pack Station South and Pack Station North across Front Street and then continuing up to the Riverwalk. And that as well as activating several sections of the Riverwalk for the general community and benefit of the public. So the two city parcels, you've seen them earlier again, just highlighted in blue, 302 Front Street at the corner of Laurel and Front and 326, a little further up north on Front Street. So you can see it in the context of the overall project, the overlay of the hotel does go over into, south into the city parking lot and north into one of the two contiguous city parcels. Briefly, I just wanted to go into sort of the rationale. You heard earlier from Ryan on the many benefits and from Lee at the opening statement of the benefits of why from a staff level we support going forward with the hotel. I won't repeat all of those, but I do want to emphasize, Santa Cruz is a major tourist destination and a tourist based economy. And there are some pretty major benefits from having a hotel, and specifically I wanna say in the downtown core. With changing retail patterns, online sales, for the long-term sustainability of our brick and mortar businesses in the downtown, I think having a hotel with over 200, 232 roughly rooms in the vicinity will go a long way for long-term sustainability of these businesses. Through the pandemic, we have seen how vulnerable our businesses are to changing economic conditions. Having a hotel with visitors who have disposable income shopping and dining in our downtown stores and restaurants is vital for ongoing health. We would have this without the pandemic. I think the pandemic was a real reminder of what our sort of economic ecosystem is like and how fragile it can be. Having a hotel and being able to diversify the different draws into a downtown core are really important for long-term viability. So for that reason alone, we're really supportive of having a hotel because I think it supports our existing businesses downtown. And in addition to that, we've had a couple of studies over the last 15 years that have supported and really identified the need for quality hotels in Santa Cruz and basically said, you know, Santa Cruz is really underserving the potential draw both of your community, but from visitors in the region. We're getting passed by visitors that are looking for conference facilities, for et cetera. We're not competitive, as you know, with Monterey and Carmel area because of some of the amenities down there. Having a hotel here, having some of the hotels in the beach area, all of those collectively make Santa Cruz more competitive in the region. And again, a major draw to our area. So for those reasons, that's I think from the staff level is really why we support having a hotel in the downtown core. And so with that, I'll briefly go into the overview of the proposed terms and the option and purchase sale agreement. This is based on a recent appraisal. We did an appraisal originally in 2021. We've since updated it within the last six months. And so this is reflective and there's actually been an increase in the purchase price. So reflective of 2 million and 50,000. Additional consideration, and I want to just briefly explain why we have this separate from the purchase price. We've been several times over the last few years when we've taken public parking lots offline. We have sold those for various reasons. But when we had other development projects, but when we have, there's that recognition that we're actually taking public parking offline. So in addition to the assessed valuation of that lot, we're also acknowledging and being compensated for taking that public parking supply offline. Fortunately for us in this situation, we're also in the process with the downtown library affordable housing project, creating and adding on some new parking supply. So we do have that in our future. But overall, and it's, I think it's really good direction that we're going in, but we are impacting the public parking supply downtown by developing many of the surface lots. I think overall, there's a real benefit to participating in this project and contributing these lots for the greater good of the community. But with that said that we have the 500,000 that's being added as additional compensation to the purchase price. So for the total compensation to the city of 2,550,000. The additional consideration public benefit will come later than the original purchase price at the close of escrow, but not much later. At the latest, it would be three months later than escrow. And it's an acknowledgement that there may be a period in which we're using those existing lots that were parking lots at one time and may become again, depending on how long the process goes and what the state is of construction in downtown may be utilized as public parking. So once that parking comes offline, the additional consideration will be paid to the city. The deposit is 150,000 non-refundable. The option period and this is in recognition of sort of the can be the long process of a full entitlement period, including the coastal commission process is up to 3.5 years. And that's another one of the reasons why the deposit is non-refundable and just in recognition of how long it does take to move sometimes move some of these projects forward. During the option period, the buyer will have the opportunity to exercise that option and that moves it in closer to going into close of escrow, but they will need to meet certain conditions. They really will need to have, they're all their building plans and pay all their plan check fees in order to exercise the option. And then once they exercise the option, they'll have 180 days, a maximum of six months beyond that option period in order to close. At the outset from the date of execution, what we call the effective date, they'll have a total of four years, but it could be considerably sooner if they meet some of those milestones earlier. And in order to close, they will have had to pay just like you do when you pull a building permit, all building permit fees, other impact fees, and they'll execute an enforceable commitment to pay all of those. So we have that additional security. We do have default provisions in there. There, as you see on the screen, in the event of a buyer's default, the city shall retain the $150,000 deposit. In the event of a seller's default, the buyer shall be refunded the $150,000 deposit. In a few minutes, I'll go through a few changes since we went to print last Thursday, just so you know what a few differences around the default provisions and another provision from the packet production. Additionally, we'll have the ability, as I mentioned, to license from the buyer after close of escrow. We'll have that right all the way through the option period, but after close of escrow, if there is a period between the close of escrow and either actually starting the construction staging or starting construction, we'll have the option to lease that back to continue the parking. The goal is to just not have it be vacant. Additional benefits, Ryan went over a few of these earlier, but we do have them codified, acknowledged in the agreement, the buyer's obligation to construct the public Paseo, the Maple Alley Paseo, as well as to enter into an agreement an obligation to maintain and operate the Maple Alley Paseo. This is sort of similar to the concept behind the Abbott Square and where it's a public area, but there's a public-private partnership to maintain and operate the Paseo. And then finally, that's also included in the conditions of approval. The hotel owner will enter into a voluntary fee collection agreement, which provides hotel guests with an opportunity to contribute to the city of Santa Cruz. And that's, you know, outlined in the conditions of approval in specific areas. Okay, this is a lot of words, but basically it's to protect the city. And it's to protect the city in a situation in which, you know, there's a legal challenge. And we want to make sure that if there's a legal challenge that delays our ability to fulfill our obligations related to our conditions to close that we're not considered in breach of contract. And so that's what this provision is about. It's to the city's benefit. And similarly, here in the default provisions, we have some additional language that protect the city. That's an addition since we went to packet production. And then finally, just a couple of minor edits and just sort of clarifying the timeline related to covenants and buyer. And that is the seller that will be basically to seller satisfaction as far as what the security instrument is related to the enforceable commitment. And with that, the recommendation is before you and that's, and I will add to this in just a second, but the resolution authorizing and directing the city manager to execute the option and purchase sale agreement between the city of Santa Cruz and SCFS venture for the purpose of purchase, the city owned property at 302 and 306 Front Street in a form to be approved by the city attorney subject to the edits presented today in the last three slides and subject to any non-substant changes and to take any further actions and authorize the city manager or his designee to execute any other related documents necessary to conclude the sale. And with that, I conclude the presentation and happy to answer any questions. Ms. Lipscomb, thank you very much. For clarity purposes, we're going to be asking questions on both item 25.1 and 25.2. And when we get to testimony, we'll receive testimony on both of those items at the same time. Let me see, yes. This is more of a process question. I'm just wondering if it might be possible to have people who are here in the audience speak to us and then ask questions. I may, I often find that I have questions after people speak and they've been here a real long time. Just wondering if that might be possible. We can do that. We can do that. And that's procedurally possible to do that. In fact, we will do that. Thank you. And then what we'll do is we will reserve our questions and comments and then take our action. So without objection, we'll do that. This would be the opportunity for anyone who wishes to address us on items 25.1 and 25.2 to do so. Good afternoon. Welcome. Good afternoon. My name is Joaquin A. Benitez. I live in the city of Tisai. Very good. In the Monterey County for 1981. The city needs to make sure the cost can be enjoyed by all. By approving a luxury hotel with almost no lower cost room, the message is clear that access to the cost is only for wealthy. Hospitality workers like me cannot afford to stay at a hotel we work at. And this high-end hotel will be no exception. I would like to all workers, people like me, who live out of town to be able to business on a cruise, enjoy the city like I do, but that won't be possible because, without, I'm sorry, without more actual lower cost accommodation, not just a mere six hour of the 232 total rooms, which is less than 3% of the hotel and much lower than the 25% often required by the cost commission, nor are fees a good substitute because they do not guarantee timely development of alternative accommodation. Housing is extremely expensive in Santa Cruz by selling this land for an upscale hotel instead of affordable housing. You are sending the message that Santa Cruz is for wealthy visitors and not for workers, class residents. To me, there is nowhere like the Monterey Bay area. I love live here and could not imagine live somewhere else. Please don't lose sight of the concern of the community. Thank you. Thank you for being here, sir. Thank you for your testimony. Good afternoon. Good afternoon, City Council members. My name is Hector Asquieta. I'm in United Heads, Local 19. These projects plans to provide subsidized housing for a few workers raises several concerns. Beyond the fact that it is an excuse to reduce the price contribution to lower cost accommodations by nearly $3 million. First, it is concerning that the hotel is planning to have very low wage workers. Second, first, subsidized studio apartments will pay in comparison with the added demand for affordable housing created by the workers who will be employed at this hotel. Particularly given the hotel's projection that it is service workers will have very low wages. Why only 20 years when the project will operate well beyond that? And where cities often have affordable housing covenants lasting for 50 years. For subsidized rooms, bills in comparison to the amount of affordable housing that could be built at this location, which is the real opportunity cost for the city selling its scarce developer land. Working class people like our members are suffering from the housing affordability crisis, especially our members who were near the cost are having to move further and further away to find houses that they can afford. This will lead to long communities, more vehicle, miles, travel, great greenhouse gas emissions, and less time spent with friends and family. In the midst of this crisis, we are disappointed that the Zero Santa Cruz is selling public land for unabscaled boutique hotel with an exquisite multi-level spa and a rooftop pool bar, rather than prioritizing affordable housing. The community of Santa Cruz deserves better. It is not too late to reverse course and prioritize affordable housing over luxury hotels. Thank you. Thank you, sir. We're going to take someone online. We'll just toggle back and forth. So we'll take the first person online. Good afternoon. Welcome to the council meeting. Good afternoon. Thank you so much. I just wanted to talk more about actually what the other people talked about. One of them being that the hotel has already anticipated that there will be low income employees employed by them. And I do love the idea of having a hotel and bringing more business into the area, considering I am a hospitality employee and I've been for many years. I do understand how affected and exploited these employees get and how difficult it is affordable to live in the area. For instance, I've been looking to live downtown for years to be able to participate in my community without community and it is near impossible. This just seems like it might be another way to exclude people who are already in the community for more wealthy people, which isn't a bad thing, but I think we should integrate our community like we want to. It will also contribute again to more community and traffic pollution, which is a problem and seems counterproductive to what we are already trying to do. I just kind of see that having some issues in the layout for the community, everything seems to be a little bit more superficial. And I would like to see the plans, the income, how they plan on employing the community, because so far it seems like they would like bus passes so people could still commute and live out in Watsonville, live out in the skirts to be able to afford and create more hurdles to get to low income jobs. So I don't really find that so far to be supportive of the community. And I would like to see a hotel. I would like to see more connection between the beach and our tourism. That would be wonderful, but at the moment with the plan that they have so far, I don't really see the longevity for the community. I do want to say thank you again for your time and allowing me to be able to speak online because it is difficult to live far and participate in things like this. So thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thank you very much. Good afternoon. Welcome. Thank you. Good afternoon, council members. My name is Celica Valdez. I am with UnitedHearLocal19, the Hospitality Workers Union that represents workers on the central coast of California. We urge you not to approve this project because the provisions for lower cost overnight accommodations are grossly inadequate. The developer is proposing to provide six relatively affordable family suites out of 232 total rooms. That's not even 3%. The rest of the contribution for lower cost accommodations will be in the form of an in lieu fee. This raises a number of questions. Why can the developer provide more on-site affordable accommodations? Second, what are the series planned to actually use in lieu fees to increase the supply of lower cost accommodations in the coastal zone? We have a serious concern about whether these fees will ever result in the creation of more lower cost accommodations. To make matters worse, the city staff proposes to allow the developer to reduce the amount of the fees through credits for various other payments, including an affordable housing in lieu fee that is required by the planning code. Why should the developer get credit towards lower cost accommodations for an in lieu fee that is required by law for another purpose? Even worse, city staff proposes to allow the developer to reduce his contributions to lower cost accommodations by $2.8 million over a third of the total as a credit for subsidizing a mid-list for studio or a one-bedroom apartments for low or very low income workers at the hotel for a 20-year period. This project should contribute to affordable housing. After all, the city eliminated the requirements to develop housing in taller buildings downtown for the sake of allowing this project. But those contributions should not be an excuse to reduce his contributions to lower cost accommodations. Please do not approve this project without a real plan to provide an appropriate amount of lower cost accommodations. Thank you. Thank you for being here. We'll take the next person online. Good afternoon. Welcome to the council meeting. So, hey, rich people got a party overnight somewhere. It looks nice. Let's do it. It is a better use than small parking lots. We all understand leisure and hospitality or low-paid jobs, but more jobs is more jobs. But I just as a question though, what is this three days non-profits get to party on the rooftop pool and conference room idea? Yeah? Just any old non-profits? Where did that come from? That is the end. Okay. Thank you very much. Good afternoon. Okay. My name is Nicholas Whitehead. Over 60 years in this county, I've lived in the city and the unincorporated areas. I know what the city is trying to do. Short of revenues, so very likely wanting to approve a high-revenue hotel. I understand that. But it's the condition then to which such things happen. 180,000 deposit, that's tiny. If people can afford to build a hotel like this, that is a tiny amount. And we don't gain the interest on that. All the time we're waiting for the rest of that deposit. We should use the interest for revenue. Why don't we double 180,000 and use some of it to subsidize the rents of these workers who are complaining like hell at every public meeting in the country about the extortionary rents they're paying. That's something that should be included in these bargains between high-level commerce and the working class, please. I didn't appreciate when our presenter dropped his voice as soon as we got to the Sequa. Sequa was mentioned and unfortunately he dropped his voice and I couldn't hear what he was saying and I'm in the second row. Don't do stuff like that. So anyway, thanks for paying attention. Thank you. Next person online. Good afternoon, welcome. Three, two, one. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Can you hear me? Can hear. Mayor Killian, before I begin, I'd like to ask if I prepared two different talks, one to talk about the sale of the property as well as the project itself. But I have an additional time to speak on both and some two separate issues. No, you can do it all at one time and I won't count that against your time. We'll start the clock running again. You've got three minutes. For everything. Good day, council and mayor, the city's planning department, mantra and policy for a long, long time has been housing and more housing at any and all costs. Now, a few well-connected developers dangle revisionist history and inflated promises to building luxury hotel using city parcels no less. The mantra is magically suspended at least until some other sites down the road open up for 150 foot developments. Sure looks and smells and feels like hypocrisy in motion. Approval of this oversized monolith to environmental stupidity in the river flood plain with inadequate parking that goes three levels below the river requiring continual pumping, inadequate improvement for pedestrian and bike and street access and safety increased congestion and excessively priced rooms for the majority of residents or visitors and most importantly, a lost opportunity to comply with Reina. All these points for denying this project. Where's the environmental impact? For the river, for the wildlife and the alteration of the levee. No transportation and parking study. What does the city attorney say about the city's liability in 20 or 30 years when the liplifaction could cause damage to the structure? What does he say if the project's modification of the levee causes it to fail leading to damage to other surrounding properties? Will the residents of the city be on the hook for the failures and damages? The hotel developers asked and got increased height from the general plan 50 to 70 feet and in the hotel plans they've added another 15 feet with council approval. These changes were supposed to be in synapse with affordable housing, not a luxury hotel. When does the shopping and jiving end? Should you approve this development with all the benefits the city has given the developers? How about negotiating some very substantial public benefits? How about affordable housing for far more than the four employees in perpetuity? How about you're around affordable rooms? You're around affordable use of the facilities by local organizations. Increased parking, increased TOT. The display of a big hearted generosity of $50,000 to each the hospital society and the Boys and Girls Club takes my sarcastic breath away. How about a significant financial commitment whether we're the local organizations? How about a few of these public benefits for all the benefits bestowed upon the developers? Sure, it would be honorable and fair for the staff to also represent the residents and the public interest rather than just showing for developers. Not a word was given to the problems of just developed by staff. It sure looks and feels like the fix is in. It gives developers what they want and the public be damned. This luxury hotel should be rejected. There's always the Coastal Commission to assure environmental protection and public benefits. Thank you for your time and thoughtful consideration. Thank you very much. Good afternoon. I'm going to ask you to pull that microphone just a little closer. You have a soft voice. There we go. Thank you. Buenas tardes, consejales. Mi nombre es Josefina Garcia. Vivo en Marina por 10 años. Good afternoon, Councilman, members. My name is Josephine Garcia, and I live in Marina. Todos los días se han manejado por lo menos 45 minutos de un solo sentido. Every day I drive at least 45 minutes, one way to work, because I cannot afford housing closer to my job. Pasando casi dos horas en el carro, es muy agotador sin contar lo demandante que es el día de mi trabajo. Tending nearly two hours in the car is exhausting on top of a busy work day. And it takes away from the time I could otherwise spend at home with family. Esto toma tiempo que podría pasar con mi familia a la semana gasto entre 80 y 90 dólares de gas. I spent around $80 to $90 in gas. Tener viviendas económicas en Santa Cruz sería un gran beneficio para la gente trabajadora como yo. If I were to live in Santa Cruz with my family, it would cost around $5,000 at minimum. I don't make enough to pay for that. Porque estaríamos a una distancia corta de nuestros trabajos, lo cual reduciría el costo monetario y ambiental de manejar las distancias largas. A affordable housing in Santa Cruz would benefit more to people than me, because we could live a short distance from our jobs, which would reduce environmental and monetary cost of the year. Respetuosamente les quiero pedir que consideren a las familias trabajadoras en esta área. I respectfully ask you to consider working families in this area in our need for affordable housing and to use City Land to develop affordable housing instead of building a fancy hotel for tourists. Gracias. Gracias, senor. Anyone else online? We'll take next person online, then we'll get right with you. Next person online. Good afternoon. Welcome to the Council meeting. Can you hear me OK? Yes, we can. Fantastic. Thank you so much. Again, my name is Jordan Sisson. I'm a SQL land use attorney. I'll speak on behalf of UNITE here in Local 19, who has roughly 200 members who live and work in the city, some of which you heard today. Local 19 does have concerns about the project's compliance with SQL and the Coastal Act of the Local Zoning Rules, which were raised in our original comment submitted last month and responded to in the staff report late last week, which included a new SQL analysis. Earlier today, we supplemented those comments. We emailed those two of the entire city council. We apologize for the delay, but under the circumstances, it was entirely unavoidable, since we just got the information last week with the release of the staff report. When I limited time, I want to highlight five real quick points from that letter. First, we submitted expert evidence demonstrating that the class 32 infill exemption is inappropriate. There, the expert noise comments showed that the noise study used the wrong thresholds, which masked significant construction impacts. Additionally, the VMT expert showed substantial evidence that workers, worker VMTs, would be significant. And you heard today that the whole goal of this hotel is to generate more people patrons going to the site. Those have not been analyzed through a full VMT analysis. Second point is that the affordable housing fee, we found to be too inadequate. First, I think it's important to remember that when the city considered this project in the context of the LCP amendment, it was a $5 minimum per square foot. That was also expressed by the Coastal Commission. Here, the induced workforce demand for workforce housing really is much more than the $230,000 in the affordable housing fee, as well as the forced subsidized lease for low-income workers. We questioned the use of the bare minimum square footage. My third point is that the in-loop fees, we do believe, is also inadequate. We really do urge you to incorporate on-site affordable housing or lower cost accommodations. I want to make just three quick points here. Here, the developer reduced their full $8.3 million fee down to $5.17 by claiming over $3 million in credits. Neither the Coastal Commission nor the city has indicated that those fees could be reduced by these credits. In fact, it made very clear that affordable housing fees were independent of the lower cost accommodation fees. Two, there are no plans for how these fees are to be used. And so to assume that there are going to be Tommy Biltts is a step too far. And furthermore, there is no feasibility studies saying that on-site affordable accommodations that makes this project economically and feasible. In fact, the developer just three months ago in December said that they couldn't even do fees. Now they're making a kind of 180-degree turnaround. But these are inconsistent. Fourth, the city charter section 1428 does require a majority vote of electors or five council members to find that this city will land for public purpose. Thank you for your time and I wish you the very best in your decision making. Thank you so much. Thank you for your testimony. Good afternoon. Good afternoon, members of the commission. My name is Rosora and I live in Seaside for 25 years. I work in the hospital and I'm a member of the union for five years. I'm here to support my neighbor's county of Santa Cruz. I cannot believe the city is planning to sell public land for a fancy new hotel instead of building affordable houses here in Santa Cruz. Housing is not affordable for families like me. There is not enough affordable houses in Santa Cruz and the determination for affordable housing is not accurate based on the cost of the living. Every time when I come here, I directly see the effect of not having affordable housing. There is a crime and drug addiction. People don't have a place where they can go to the bathroom, let alone to take a shower and drug use and banda leaves are done openly. This creates a health hazard for community, for this community. In having housing that is actually affordable will help alleviate these issues. Selling this land for a hotel development instead of housing will not be fair for the people who call Santa Cruz home. The city and developer need to think of the consequences of this city, such as homeless and trash, rather than thinking solely on profits. Santa Cruz residents deserve a decent place to live. Please prioritize affordable housing for residents over the profits of hotel developers. Thank you for your time. Thank you so much. Another person online, Ms. Bush? Next person online, good afternoon. I'm Nora Hochman, good afternoon. First, I want to thank Council Member Brown for recognizing the public here and the public's need to speak, giving the public and the workers equal weight to the developers and to all of you, I guess. For a long time, as many of you know, I was a union organizer and a union representative. I had a 30 year career working for labor unions. I'm very proud of that. And one of the unions that I worked for was Unite Here, both the international and the local, based out of, at that time, Monterey. And so here's what I learned when I did that work. Occupancy is everything. I know you all think this is gonna contribute to a more robust economic downtown. I just don't know how that happens with a hotel that has a restaurant, a bar, and a cafe. But hey, if y'all are thinking the fix is in, which it probably is, I'm sure the developer has convinced you that people will walk into the downtown from Front Street. Occupancy rates for a whole year should be looked at if you are really looking at evidence-based, data-driven projects. The degree to which one hotel or a number of hotels are occupied year-round is how you measure your impact on visitor-serving services. So here's what I learned when I worked for Unite Here. There are very few hotels that make it over the 65% occupancy mark. So that's what you're looking at, because Santa Cruz is no different. In fact, you're gonna build a luxury hotel that's gonna compete with the Hyatt on Broadway and the gargantuan cruise ship of a hotel, the La Bahia. You're gonna be competing against all these places for all the money and land that you're gonna give to this project. That's who's gonna get it. You all are gonna share occupancy. So why don't you ask this developer for this luxury hotel if they've built other hotels and if so, what the occupancy rates are? If they haven't built other hotels, go ask the Hyatt on Broadway. Go ask the Paradox. Go ask Shamanad. But you need to know that in order to claim that it will have a viable economic impact on the city. Occupancy is year-round. That's what counts. Thank you. Anyone else online, Ms. Bush? Good afternoon. Welcome. Good afternoon. Alberto Lustru, Local 505 again. And it's great to see this project and the envelope coming to the city. But it'd be better if we have a responsible general contractor to build this project. General contractor to pay. Liberal wage, apprenticeship, local hire and health care. In a liberal wage ensures that construction workers like myself can afford rent in the city. Be able to support our family and our basic needs. Not leaving check by check. And not leaving check by check gives the opportunity to send us to school, have a chance. Also, it gives the people like myself that couldn't go to school a chance to have this in-job and actually be able to have a liberal wage and be able to support our family. Also, paying a liberal wage ensures that general contractors, contract or subcontractors stops wage theft, fraud. All of that happens more than often. And in all cities. And I've been all over the California working for the corporate coverage union. It happens everywhere. And Santa Cruz is not an exception. Having a general credit responsible contractor ensures that construction workers have health care. And then they don't become a burden to the system. So 50% of the construction workers depend on some kind of system. And who pays for that? The citizens. We do our taxes. Apprenticeship promotes training, education for a resued minorities, women, homeless and for four year programs. See, a lot of us think about housing is gonna fix the issue. We gotta have jobs. We gotta have careers. We can build so many houses, so many things. But if you have no jobs, no training, it ain't gonna fix. It's just a vantage. That's what it is. It's just covering the one. But it's not gonna help it. Local hire. Myself, I committed four years to Southern Francisco. Leaving at three in the morning, coming back at 3 p.m. every day. Not having time with the family. Not having time to the community. I can't make it to the meetings. Whenever there's a meeting, I can make it. Or if I can't make it, I'm gonna go to sleep on the wheel, I wanna go home. So I can't be part of my community. So I will ask the city officials and the developer, please use a general contractor that will pay healthcare, apprenticeship, local hire, and healthcare. And the last question, is the land on the Paseo, is that gonna sugar propel in which? Or not? Because it's under our land, on the city land. Is it gonna be pre-owned or not? Thank you for your time. Thank you, sir. Good afternoon. Welcome. I'm here in council. My name's Grant Wilson. And I guess I would actually concur with the last speaker because I feel like with the, was it Denton or DevCon project that's the block that's right across the street at the Laurel and Front Street and to Laurel and Pacific. You know, I've talked to many people working there and I've yet to find one person who actually lives in Santa Cruz. They, you know, most of them, either the Bay Area or the Central Valley. I'm sure it's good for hotels here because they're putting them up for the week before then they can go back on the weekends to see their families. But I think if you have some strength and some power, and I feel like you also have backbone to be able to say in a negotiation to request a certain percentage of the workers be local workers. That seems like a reasonable request that benefits the community. I've also yet, I've probably spoken to maybe 15 or 20 workers at that site. I've yet to see one woman on that site. You know, I don't know their hiring practices or their labor practices, but it just feels to me like for the past year and a half, two years, there really hasn't, it hasn't been benefiting the local community. You know, it's been helping people that are hardworking people and skilled workers but not the local community. And I feel also frustrated in that this is an agenda item in the middle of the afternoon. I'm a working person, like it was very difficult for me to get here even now. I didn't get to hear what has gone on previously so I can't really refer to any of that. But to me, it's very frustrating because I feel like many other city council meetings have been in the evening. If it's something of community concern, it happens in the evening so that working people can actually come to it. And I feel also frustrated that, you know, I called the city offices today to try to find out when this might come up in the agenda. You know, I wasn't, there was no specificity because it's number 25 on the agenda and it's hard for the secretary to give any predictions. That's also hard for a working person. It also is difficult even to find information. Like I spend a bit of time but I feel like it's investigating. Like where's this project, what's the website and where is it at? And it's really hard to keep up with it all. And I feel like it would really benefit the community if you really care about the community to inform the community in a better way so that people do know what's happening and that the community has an understanding of what's presently happening, what's ahead, what's going to be happening because I think a lot of people don't know. And so I think that's it for the moment. But thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Good afternoon. Anyone? Good afternoon. Hi everyone, Joy Shendl-Dekker. I just, I've spoken up about this project a number of times. It especially bothers me to sell public land for a non-public use. But I'm not gonna go on about that. I just wanna note it one more time on the public record. This is a project where if we had a city-wide community workforce agreement, which I think that we should have had years ago, that would satisfy a lot of the community concerns and the labor concerns for local hire, apprenticeships, reducing wage theft, all of the things that you've been hearing. I'm especially thankful for all the Unite here workers who have been coming to meeting after meeting to talk to you about their concerns with their projects and their need for places to live close by and for places to stay when they visit. I think the very least you could do in your considerations would be to maximize the amount of money that you put into the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. Put that money like really where you say your values are. Don't put it into any other fund except the Affordable Housing Trust Fund, you're marked for affordable housing, and that $5 per square foot fee, maximize that. Don't do the minimum legal requirement to like eke through the CEQA process. Really negotiate on behalf of the community and on behalf of the workers to get a great deal for them. The contractor, the developer, the hotel owners, they're going to be reaping rewards for this project for a very, very long time if they run their business well. The city should be maximizing that for the affordability, not to gentrify the overall core of the downtown clientele. It's been pretty clear from the beginning of this project that there was a gentrifying intention and you've been hearing repeatedly from people who detect that. They know that's what's happening. They're calling it out that they're being excluded and it's impacting their home lives. That is a reproductive issue for the moms who clean our hotel rooms, that they cannot spend time with their children and they're spending money on gas instead of their families. It's an injustice. So thank you for listening and for considering and your deliberations to maximize the good for the people that have spoken to you today. Thank you. Anybody else online? Do we have anyone? Mr. Lawler, good afternoon. Let me hold on for just a second here. Go ahead, Mr. Lawler, good afternoon, sir. Good afternoon. I'll try to be brief given the extensive testimony and the wonderful presentation from city staff. It's been a long process to get to this point and we're excited to be here this afternoon finally being this project. In addition to myself, I have our attorney, Frank Petrellis here, Steve and Chan, my partner on the project who's an extensive hotel development experience throughout the United States and Chris Funett-Ockensburg with BCV Architects who designed this really spectacular building which got, as was mentioned, really rave reviews at the Planning Commission. In fact, it said the most beautiful building that's ever been proposed for downtown Santa Cruz. So we're excited to bring this forward. I'd like to thank the staff, Ryan, Lee, Eric, Bonnie and Matt for all the hard work that's taken to get to this point. And it's really been an extraordinary effort. A lot of work's gone to get us to this point. And just given all that's been said about the project, I want to say a few words just about the context of this site and where we are here. So the first general plan to propose reconnecting the downtown to the river was in 1977. So it's an important date. It's a date I got my driver's license. This begins to repair a break that occurred between the downtown and the river with the construction of the levee system in the late 50s and 1960s. So it's been almost a half a century that this community desire has been unfulfilled. And so I'm happy to be part of this process to reconnect the downtown with the river. I think it's really, in a way, connecting the heart of the city back to the river. So by doing these things, we're promoting a real walkable transit or in downtown. And I want to say, and I get far, I know I don't have a lot of time. So I do want to say that we really share the often expressed concern around affordability. And as you, those of you who know me, I've been involved in many, many affordable projects that are downtown and I have a vision where we have a lot more. And I know that this council shares that as well. There's no substitute for building a lot more affordable housing downtown, but this one project can't solve 50 years of neglect on housing. So we're here to be part of that solution. I see my time's growing short, so I'll stop right there. But if you have any questions, we're here to help and we really want to be part of the solution. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Anyone else who's with us, wish to testify on this item? Ms. Bush, do we have anyone else online? All right. We're going to return to council. The council members, we changed our process a bit. So rather than make a motion at this point, questions, clarifying questions, that kind of thing would be in order. Then we will take a motion. So let me start with Madam Vice Mayor. I did have a question regarding transient occupancy tax and what is the expected transient occupancy tax for this project? Have we calculated that? And could you look at a comparable hotel in the area or do we have that figure? If you don't, it's okay. I just was curious. Ms. Lipscomb, I know that this has been estimated anyway or range, so would you care to answer that? Yeah, I actually don't have the number. It is based, I'm looking for a finance director and I see Lee, do you have it? I think Mr. Butler might have something here. Okay, good. We were prepared for a property tax question. We're good, we're good. No, there's a TOT question, not property tax. Yeah, they were prepared for a property tax. It's annual? Yeah, first year it's estimated at 2.4 million. TOT. TOT, transient occupancy tax. And then there's sales tax and property tax issues. Sales, yeah, sales tax would be separate. Property tax, if that was going to be your next question, is based on the assessed value after construction. And so that would be roughly in the range of 240,000 a year paid. I do have another question for you, Bonnie. When someone spoke to selling public lands, we've also been buying public lands. So we've been buying public lands and I can think of pack station north and south that we've been converting to affordable housing. Can you think of any other projects or do you have an estimate of how many public, or private properties the city's acquired for the public use of affordable housing lately? Yeah, for all three of the projects, the public projects that we have that are 100% affordable projects, which is just under 400 units. And all three of those projects have required the city purchasing land in order to make those projects happen. The first project actually was a land dedication from the developer of which this developer team was part of. So they helped create the project for pack station south. Pack station south is the project that's across the street from the proposed hotel project. It's under construction right now and it's 70 units of affordable housing. And I did wanna add on one thing about the affordability level for those public projects is that they are affordable for between the range of 60% of area median income down to 30% or below. And so for the public projects that the city invest in, we really invest in those that are hardest to get built and we do monitor those annually. So that ranges on average of from a studio to around $900 a month up to a three bedroom family around 2400. Looks like Mr. Butler has something to add. If I could also add real quickly, Vice Mayor, in addition to the projects that Bonnie just outlined, those are most top of mind because they're currently underway. But we also recently acquired as the council knows the corner of highway one and nine where the current central home supply businesses with the goal of also advancing additional affordable housing on that site. And I'll add in because as we're talking about too, and Lee's in my ear, we also acquired 125 coral in the last two years and we're contemplating that site for potentially an expansion of homeless services that could include housing as well, whether it ends up being permanent supportive housing or other short term emergency shelter housing. And then in addition to the highway one, nine, we also acquired the outdoor world property that's currently in an application that we just submitted for with the developer for another affordable housing sustainable communities grant. And that was over I think a $22 million grant application. So it's fair to say we've acquired for far more properties than we've disposed of. That's accurate. Yes. Oh, thank you. And just out of curiosity, and I don't know if you have the answer to this either, but just from meeting with people up in Sacramento, we couldn't find really any other cities that were building affordable housing with their own money. I don't, but that was just from folks that we met. Do you know of any other cities that are doing this around the state? I think for a city our size, no. I mean, definitely some of the larger cities that have either active housing authorities within their city are building housing as well. For a city of our size without a housing authority, I'm not aware of another one. Okay, I think that's the extent of my questions. I do have some comments, but I'll wait. Thank you. I'm gonna work my way around if that's all right. We've got Ms. Calentari-Johnson. Thank you. I have just a couple of questions. See here, this is maybe for Mr. Lawler. The affordable workforce housing program, really great to see that. I wonder if you could just explain what the decision-making process is for selection of who receives those subsidized units or how the subsidized units would get allocated. We'd definitely qualify folks for those units on an income basis. We would likely have a lottery if there's more than more subscription than available units. Okay, I do have one more question that's probably to you. Sorry, I lost where I was. Okay, is there a plan for a local's discount or employee discount during off-season? I know some hotels do this and the dreamin' does this. So is there a plan for that? Could there be a plan for that? What are your thoughts on that? I think we certainly could have a plan for that certainly in the off-season. Okay, thank you. Those are my questions for now. Thank you. Ms. Watkins. Yeah, thank you. I'm gonna thank the folks that are here today. And I heard overwhelmingly the interest in wanting to understand affordable housing. And I had a question similar to the vice mayors around kind of how much property, but not really how many downtown kind of units of affordable housing has the city invested in or will be seeing coming online estimate? We have about 1,400 units currently in the pipeline in downtown. And of those between 800 and 900 are affordable units. So more than the majority of those units. And that largely is because of both our inclusionary ordinance, which requires that in market rate projects, but also the 100% affordable projects that are currently in the development, three of which are city led projects. And then there are additional project under construction to nearing completion right now. That's 100% affordable as well. Great. And so for folks who might be interested in wanting to see if they could be eligible, how would you, as we start to see these come online, you know, expect people to kind of learn about what's possible for them? Yeah, on our city website, chooseSantaCruise.com, we have a button for housing and you can go down to housing resources and we have two interactive maps. One has all the affordable housing projects that are currently built and you can look at that and they have a contact information on that. The other has links to the planning's website that has all of the major development projects, housing projects in the pipeline. And you can actually look at each project by location. Those that are affordable are outlined in yellow. So you can look on the map and click on each one. You can look at the breakdown of affordability as well as units, what level affordability, how many are from studios up to three bedroom. And then additionally on our website, you can contact our housing team and they'll put you on a list for when these projects do come up to connect directly to the developer or the property manager for each project. Great, thank you for sharing that because I know I heard overwhelmingly a lot of folks really interested in living in the downtown and knowing that there's more properties coming online, it's wonderful to see opportunity arise in that way. So I appreciate you sharing that. Yeah, and additionally I would just add in sort of a acknowledgement of the housing authority who does maintain a number of lists and properties that are available for affordable projects and those that also have vouchers in the community. Great, and I'll actually have you stay up if you don't mind, I have one more question. In regards to the trolley, I know that there was 50,000 set for that. I was wondering if that is one time or if that's on an annual basis? I think that the original sort of proposal was one time. Okay, and so for others that do contribute to the trolley, is it usually a one time contribution or is it usually an annual contribution? So we have a number of sponsorships and they are on an annual basis, although we do have to go back and confirm each year that they're going to contribute again. I wonder if, I mean, I'd be open to seeing if that could be possible for this project as well given that the trolley is operational annually and having a contribution proportional to those that are also contributing on an annual basis makes sense to me. If you were to anticipate that could be possible, how much do you think that would, what would be a meaningful contribution in that way? Our total operating is between 118,120,000 a year. We currently have sponsorships for a little over half that. So we're subsidizing it by about 54,000 a year. So that's our gap annually and to the extent we can fill that with a variety of sponsorships that would be great. Okay, and for this project specifically, do you have an estimated amount that you would see feasible or maybe you might have a suggestion? It might be a developer question. Okay, yeah. I'd be interested in understanding if whether or not that could be possible. Maybe if we could have the developer come up and potentially speak to that. We'd be willing to commit 5,000 a year towards the operation of the shuttle. Does that seem appropriate to our city staff? I mean, we would take any sponsorship that helps annually. I do think some of our larger sponsorships past we've had seaside have been 10,000 a year. Okay, okay. Yeah. For the questions? Yeah, I don't necessarily have further questions. I just would say I'm open and we can talk about the amount to seeing that as an annual contribution on a regular basis. It's a wonderful thing for our visitors to have access to and given that we're having the first hotel in our downtown, I think a regular contribution makes sense to keep that going personally, but we can get to that when we get to the motion. And I guess I'll just say I really appreciate you sharing the amount of investment we've had in affordable housing. I hear overwhelmingly an interest in that. I know from our community, we need that and certainly agree with that. And I also understand that we don't have a hotel in our downtown and we are a tourist destination. And this is a meaningful contribution in that way. And certainly will benefit our local businesses as well. So I appreciated the hearing that as well. So anyways, it's all of the above. And that's the last I have to thank you there. Council Member Brown. Thank you. My questions I believe are gonna be for the developer. So I can intuit why some of them are gonna be why questions. And if you could help explain, and I can make some inferences here, but I'd like to hear your perspective and logic in the ways that you are proposing to address the low cost accommodations and the housing to the extent that there is a requirement there. I appreciate that you're wanting to make a contribution in that arena. So I'll try to just get right to it. Why are we looking at the affordable housing contributions in the same, they're not really conflated, but compiled in a way that makes it appear that the affordable housing and low cost accommodation commitments are sort of, they happen together, right? So you're suggesting that we're gonna reduce the low cost accommodation commitment or discount it because we are, because you're making a commitment to housing. And I'm just wondering a little bit about that. So that's one question. I just wanna put them all out and the others are maybe a little more simple. I'd love to better understand the rationale for the project taking on that affordable housing subsidy for four potential workers. I recognize there's gonna be a lot more workers than that. You are recognizing in making this commitment that these will be at least some of them low wage jobs. And so just kind of wondering why not just a bigger contribution to the housing inclusionary and in low fee. Just it's a question, I'm just trying to understand because it seems administratively complicated. Maybe at your end, you feel you could work that out in the operations, but just would like to hear a little bit more about that. And the last question, why not consider meeting some of that low cost accommodation commitment with rooms on site? I know that is a priority for at least some at the Coastal Commission. And I certainly feel, have a sense that, well, separate is an equal, I'll just say. Separate is not equal. If we're paying for low cost accommodations to be happening elsewhere and people are not able to access this hotel in the coastal zone, that to me doesn't feel as perhaps genuine as making some of those rooms available. So just wondering why you're not looking at that. Happy to answer those questions. They're good questions. Let me start with your last one first. Santa Cruz has traditionally been a community that's a lot of low cost visitor accommodations already. We have a large collection of motels on Ocean Street. This issues came up at the approval of the La Bahia project. So I want to put it in that context. We're not Santa Monica, we're not La Jolla. We've always served as a community going back a hundred years, visitors of modest means. That's the tradition of Santa Cruz. We're building, we have two very expensive hotels, one under construction and one both on the beach. They're gonna serve very high end clientele. And this, our intention is not to be in a luxury hotel. This is meant to be a cool hotel, but not a luxury hotel, okay? And it's meant to be affordable of people of relatively modest means, not of the lowest means, we understand. We understand the Coastal Commission has an interest in this issue. We're trying to address that issue through another project that has been identified by the county that's important at Greyhound Rock. That will, we think this is a really good use of the funds. Putting, we don't think, I mean, I'll just talk for myself philosophically, that downtown needs more affordable accommodations. It already has a lot of affordable accommodations. So that was the rationale behind why we structured the way we did. As far as, then the four units, we understand that this is a small number. It's a win-win if we can get more affordable housing downtown and more of our employees live walking distance to the hotel. It's a win-win for everybody. It's a win-win for the employees and it's a win-win for us. We don't relish the idea of people having to drive long distances to work. It's not in our interest. It's certainly not good for the employees. But we can't, as a hotel, have a viable operation and provide, subsidize more units. We want to be helpful. We wanna show that we care. But there's a limit to what one hotel operation can do financially in this regard. The answer is what we've discussed all today, which is the community, and I hope I'm a part of that, to build a lot more affordable housing downtown. That's the ultimate solution to this conundrum that we find ourselves in. And then you asked about why, and I'll let Frank address the first question you asked. Good afternoon, Frank Petrileva, Landy's attorney with Complance. So to reframe our thinking a little bit, so if you were to look at the zoning, the cities, LCP, the downtown plan, the general plan, there is no requirement for low-cost overnight accommodation. We are in the interest of maybe over-disclosing or being overly candid, anticipating an appeal to the Coastal Commission. And we've developed a really good working relationship with Coastal Commission staff and are trying to voluntarily propose a set of sort of additional public benefits effectively in anticipation of what that process is gonna look like. So what we've done is try and come up with from the standpoint of like economic feasibility, voluntarily proposing an additional condition that would require paying 8 million on top. That is an unusual thing for an applicant to do. But again, we think right now, it's necessary and the right thing to do in advance of what we anticipate is gonna be an appeal, right? We have talked to, and I think the city has spoken with the county about a potential project at Greyhound Rock, which would result in tangible overnight affordable cabins. And I think some opportunities too for academic programs for underserved youth. It's a super cool project, super early days, these conversations are just happening like in real time now. We've talked to the Santa Cruz Hostel and understand kind of what their operating and other needs are. So I think the idea is to try and leverage the money and put it to work as soon as we possibly can. And also being mindful that until, to the extent that four units is not the right number and that number might be a little bit higher, that the resources that are available to basically kind of be allocated towards overnight accommodation versus what we think is a super creative and kind of innovative workforce housing program, that's one bucket of additional kind of public benefit resources. That's kind of why the credit structure was proposed, the way it was proposed. On the housing side, just to amplify some of our thinking there too. So originally we were, so some background there just to kind of step back to. The only legal requirement in the LCP now is to pay that at least $5 a fee. I'm sorry, at least $5 a square foot above the 50 foot height limit, which is about 230 grand. We heard from the Coastal Commission and then from the council when you ratified the Coastal Commission's recommendation to include that at least language. So we knew there was a floor, but we had no idea what the ceiling was. We have also been paying attention to, again, some of that dynamics with hotel projects and mixed use projects at the Coastal Commission where you've heard the concerns today about intolerable commute distances and our initial thought, and certainly an issue that's come up in other mixed use projects more in Southern California in the not too distant past, where you've got like a hotel component or a Resi component with an onsite inclusionary BMR. The challenges with fair housing laws, long wait lists, there's no way to guarantee that those affordable units, that in some cases those developers are building actually can get set aside for hotel workers. So what we initially were like, okay, we will develop stuff off site. We will partner maybe with some other folks and try and actually deliver de-restricted units. But as we started thinking about the real, what that would do in terms of preventing us from actually taking care of some portion of our workers, that was not gonna be doable. So that's the sort of leasing thing. It is novel, it is creative. We're gonna have to hire a consultant to help us figure it out. I mean, we know it's doable because we worked on or I personally worked on a project in Menlo Park where there was a DA public benefit condition involving workforce teacher housing. So there were like different preferences and priorities. We worked with a group called Hello Housing to figure that out. So we are definitely gonna have to do something similar here. We are also mindful of not wanting to administratively burn it Bonnie's team because they've got their hands full. And so what we came up with was kind of a construct and a proposal, but in terms of how it's gonna work implementation wise, it's gonna require some thought and require some third party expertise. But that's where we were coming from with that too. I appreciate that. Thank you. Further, Ms. Brown? Good. Mr. Newsome, good afternoon. Thank you, Mary Keely. I have a just quick question for, I believe director Lipscomb. Do you have the estimate for the property tax as well? I know we've got one for DOT and sales tax, but you have an estimate for a property tax. Yeah, I mean, based on 150 million assessed valuation, 1% paying in property taxes and then was 16 cents in every dollar. I think that'll get us about 240,000 a year, at least starting out in year one. Madam Vice Mayor. I'm so sorry. I did have another question after I heard Councilmember Watkins question. The annual contributions that were suggested to go to Boys and Girls Club and the Santa Cruz Hostel, could those also be changed to annual contributions rather than a one time? I don't know if it's possible, but not at that high amount, but at a lower amount, but annually. I just think like over time, and I saw 50,000, I think 50,000, and I don't know if it's possible or if you can even speak to that, Mr. Lawler. We want to be helpful to the community. We'd love to find a way to make that. One of the ideas we had was to have an annual fundraising events at the facility for the Boys and Girls Club to help raise hopefully more than that. You know, we think one of the great things about having a downtown hotel, and we see this as it's a great venue for fundraising events of all types. And so we think that's, and we're open to possibly, if are you asking, are we replacing the one time with an annual? That's kind of what I was thinking, but maybe it wouldn't be that full 50,000. I don't have the exact amount, but I was thinking, have it just be an annual and contribution to both the hostel and the Boys and Girls Club? And I don't even know if that would be what they would want, but I was just thinking, if it was me, that's what I would want. And I know they're both nonprofits, so it's tax deductible as well, so. Well, it is if it's not a condition. Oh, if it's a condition, it's not tax deductible. That's right. I didn't know that. I just knew, okay. I'm gonna have to think about that. Mr. Butler, a question of you, if I could. The two city-owned lots that are part of this proposal, what my question is on this is, are either of those lots developable as affordable housing? The size of those two parcels would preclude any meaningful affordable housing development at roughly under 5,000 square feet apiece. An affordable housing developer would not be interested in building something to scale at that location. You typically need closer to a half acre, so it's well short. Thank you. Unless there are other questions clarifying nature, a motion would be in order. I'll make a motion, Markie Lee. I'd use one. I'd like to make the motion to accept the recommendation for 25.1 and 25.2 along with the added language if Ms. Bush can bring that forward. The additional. I'm not sure about your added language or that. Yes, my added language. So we're gonna have, so the motion so far is the recommendations as presented and now you're going to add additional. Along with the additional added direction to direct staff to deposit the sale proceeds and additional consideration into the affordable housing trust fund and also to direct staff to explore options for designating a portion of the sale proceeds, additional consideration and future transit occupancy tax revenue from the hotel for the following three affordable housing programs funded by the city and administered by city partners. So the security deposit program, the emergency rental assistance program and the landlord incentive program slash owner assurance program with the goal of broadening the reach of the programs and the level of assistance received by recipients and to make such program changes as necessary in order to achieve these goals in order to and the level assistance received by recipients and to make such programs as necessary in order to achieve these goals. Such changes may include but not be limited to the following conversion of program funding from loans to grants, increase of terms of assistance, increase funding when needed to provide assistance for additional recipients and lowering the threshold to qualify for assistance. There's a motion. Is there a second? Second. I have a second with a friendly amendment. Do I add that now? Let's get this first. So there is a motion and a second. Let me see if the gentleman wants to open on his motion and we'll be right back with you, sir. Thank you, Mark Healy. So I want to thank all those who came out and spoke today. I think this project will be a great addition to my district and by extension, our community. First, this project will provide 150 jobs in our community. So that's 150 more members of our community receiving a paycheck and households receiving a paycheck and potentially health insurance and other benefits such as 401K. But this project will also provide $2.4 million per year of much needed TOT tax into our city coffers or an estimated along with $240,000 in sales tax and $240,000 in property tax. So $2.8 million annually into our city coffers. And it will be a vital business to our downtown business community that will help contribute to a vibrant and thriving downtown. Now on top of these benefits, the developer as we've discussed has agreed to pay a $500,000 public benefit contribution, make a $50,000 contribution to the Downtown Boys and Curls Club that will go towards a new swimming pool for kids in our community to enjoy. A $50,000 contribution to the Electric City Charlie program that runs from downtown to the beach and $50,000 to the Santa Cruz Hostel community. So in total, the developers agreed to pay an additional $650,000 for upgrade in our community. They also will pay $227,000 contribution to the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. And the developer will also provide improvements to our Riverwalk with this project, with this project along with a, along with constructing new Paseo connecting the Riverwalk. Now, there has been some concern as we've heard over affordable housing in this project. And I think the added direction addresses these concerns. First, $2.55 million from the sale of the land for this project and a public benefit contribution provided by the developer will be directed to the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. And that's not something to sneeze at. That's a significant investment that can be used to construct much needed affordable housing, but this money can also be used to fund programs that help our workforce attain housing in our community and remain in their housing, such as the security deposit program, the landlord incentive program, which incentivizes landlords to accept Section 8 vouchers and has been very successful in our community, and the emergency eviction prevention program, which has been vital in helping community members in our community retain housing. And the added direction calls for this additional money to allow for these programs to be more generous and to apply to a larger swath of our community. And it also calls for a portion of the TOT tax generated from this program to be used for these programs so that they can remain more generous and allow more people to qualify for their benefits as we move forward. You know, I think this is a great project. They'll bring many great benefits to our community and I'm happy to support this project. So thank you. Ms. Calantari-Johnson is recognized. Thank you. So the friendly amendment that I wanted to propose is a request that, and I haven't sent this yet to you Bonnie and I will, the request of the developer and future hotel operator develop an employee parking plan in consultation with city staff prior to issuance of certificate of occupancy and that the plan permits the use of onsite parking spaces for hotel employees as capacity allows and that it solves for other low or no cost parking options for employees when onsite parking is not available. That's the first part. I'll email it to you. I don't have it. I will email it to you right now. Okay. We'll hold for just a second here. All right, I didn't do that. I had a time. It's okay. It's all right. Okay. All right. Just sent it. Got it. Okay. And there's the second part. Okay. Please proceed. Okay. And the second part, and I know council member Watkins was getting to this and maybe had some additional amendments but amend the condition providing a one time payment for the downtown trolley to provide an annual payment of 10,000 for a period of 10 years rather than one time payment of 50,000 and 10 years because that is the expected lifespan of our current trolley. That's how we landed on the 10 years. So let me first check to see if the maker of the motions in agreement with this. Yes. It's acceptable. So that is now the motion in chief. If you wish to open on your friendly amendment, feel free to do so. Great. Thank you. A lot of the points that council member Newsom made, I'm aligned with so I won't reiterate them. I hear the concerns of employees who have to travel long distances. We hope that we could change those conditions with what we're doing here in the city with affordable housing and with what council member Newsom has just put forward. And I know that we have some ways to go. I know that as part of this packet, we have alternative transportation options as well but the reality is that's not gonna work for everyone. And we're working on it on the Metro Board to make our transportation system more community responsive. But again, we have some work to do. So that's why I wanted to put this piece around employee parking to make sure that we think through that. And the trolley, I think council member Watkins spoke to it well. I don't know if you have any additions to add to it but I think this is a great project. I just wanna thank everyone who worked on this. I know it's been a long time to get to a point where this really is in the benefit of the community. It will bring new and old visitors back to our community. We heard about all of the revenue it'll generate that will go back to the community. So I just wanna thank all the work and I'm excited for the local discount and maybe I can take my family there. Through the debate or discussion. Council member Watkins. I'll just briefly say that I appreciate the motion. I appreciate the direction. I appreciate the additions. I agree. I think the 10,000 as suggested makes a lot of sense and it also meets the low cost visitor accommodation goals to be in compliance with the Coastal Act as well as our climate goals and experience for our visitors and our locals. So I think that's a great add. I appreciate that being added and then accepted. And yeah, look forward to seeing this move forward. For the debate or discussion. Ms. Brown. Yeah, I do have a number of comments. Actually it's 62 in the document but I'm not gonna go through all of those. But first I think I do have a kind of specific and then some general comments. So I just wanna talk about the $5 per square foot fee for a moment because that is a decision that a policy decision that the council made a little while ago. I can't remember this year. Or maybe it was last year. Recently that was an attempt to account for the extension of really density bonus heights and heights for non-residential projects. And it's very low for this project. It would get us half of an affordable housing unit in a density project, $250,000 around there. I believe and I was pleased that the council agreed to take the Coastal Commission's recommendation. I'm not sure we had much of a choice in that to make that $5 at minimum square foot charge. And this is a policy change that has a significant benefit to this developer and other developers in the future. So I think we should not gloss over that. We have that as one benefit, the sale of the properties, which I have significant concerns about selling property for this purpose. Those are benefits to the private sector. And now I'm getting into my general comments. I'll stop for a moment and I wanna ask if my colleagues might consider a friendly amendment to increase that $5 per square foot to $10 a square foot. That would get us one unit of affordable housing out of this project in addition to the four for the 20-year period that the developer is offering to subsidize. So I'd like to make that as a friendly amendment. There's a question to the maker of the motion. No. So thank you, I just had to ask. Will that go in the minutes? If it doesn't, then I wanna make it. Okay, thank you. So I'm gonna say a few other things now. A lot of people have spoken to what we're giving up as a result of selling this surplus land, an opportunity to build more affordable housing in our community. Yeah, we're doing a great job relative to other cities. And in the time I've been on this council, rents have more than doubled. So in terms of how that impacts people in our community, it's very hard for me to feel celebratory about that. And when we talk about, and the city doesn't really have much by way of a policy framework to leverage what I would consider to be public benefit in these projects. We don't have a policy framework for that. The city councils over the years have not opted to do that. No project labor agreements, no requirement that there be union jobs or apprentice is in these construction jobs, no neutrality in union organizing for the operator, and the service workers. We don't have any of that. And therefore I have very little that I can put forward that I think is reasonable and even reasonable things are not supported by my colleagues. So I am just gonna say here that we, what I see is the city accepting gentrification and displacement as acceptable outcome from our non-polices. And I don't support that. What is happening to the hollowing out of our community as a result of the cost escalation for development. Every move we make increases land values, which means that it's gonna be impossible on other parcels for us to get affordability if the land costs are high, right? And it goes on and on. And so I'm not gonna go through all of that. But particularly because there is not a meaningful commitment to helping to support our affordable housing needs in this community. I can't support it. I can't support the sale of public land for what I consider. I think I have a very different perspective on what's public benefit. A lot of what I see here is like customer benefit. Maybe some benefit and benefit to the city in the form of tax revenues, but it's not really public benefit. We've also heard from the bike community that the new Paseo is gonna make it, they're not gonna be able to use it to access the levy. So it's gonna actually, for some people, it's gonna make access more challenging for their purposes. So again, I could go on, I'm not gonna do that. I appreciate the, and I'd vote yes on the amendments that you made, but I can't support this proposal. And I'm sure I'll think of something else I should have said, but that's, I'll leave it there. To the debate or discussion, the vice mayor is recognized. I had said before that I had some comments that I'd like to say. I think that the public benefit, the SAU workers were here earlier, that TOT tax revenue will help pay for their compensation. I am sorry that the workers that came and spoke today have to commute long hours. I know people in all income ranges, actually almost everyone I know, aside from me, commutes over an hour a day to work, to live here. I looked up, this week is one of the spring break weeks. I looked up some hotel rooms just here in town and I was surprised to find there was 39 rooms available. There was two of them priced over $300, four of them over 200, six of them over 150, six of them over 100. And with under 100, there was 21 rooms available. Some of them around $55 a night, including the hostel, which was $35 a night. There's camping available at state and private campgrounds, less than a 10 minute drive. So in terms of affordability, I feel like Santa Cruz is very much still a blue collar destination. And I don't see anything wrong with kind of, I feel like it's almost the opposite. By having some higher end accommodation, some people wanna pay that. They wanna enjoy luxury, whatever it is. And I don't even think this is gonna be anywhere near no offense, it's not gonna be Pebble Beach. It's gonna be something that maybe somebody that has more money, wants to come and stay at a nicer place, fine. Let's get the tax revenue, let's have them come dine at our restaurants and having two or three hotels around town that charge more, I don't see anything wrong with that. I think that if anything, it's gonna be diversifying like our city's portfolio and who can come. And if we don't have this, they're just gonna drive on past. They're still gonna go on vacation and they're gonna head to Monterey and Carmel and they're gonna spend their dollars elsewhere. And so that's where I disagree with you and I do not think it's deviating from our values and I think that there's options available for people in all income levels in our town and I appreciate that. For the debate or discussion, Ms. Calantari-Johnson. I just wanna add to what the vice mayor was saying. I don't know how others define public benefit but Boys and Girls Club and a public park that we couldn't otherwise, but in our community, I view as public benefit. And the four affordable housing units and the $5 a square feet, those are substantial pieces that we're bringing with this project. So I just wanna add that to what the vice mayor was saying. For the debate or discussion. Seeing none, the clerk will call the roll. Council member Neusen. Aye. Brown. No. Vodkent. Aye. Calantari-Johnson. Aye. Vice mayor Golder. Aye. Mayor Keely. Aye. Motion passes and it's awarded. Mr. Condati, for the business to come before the body. There's none. There's none. Ms. Bush, for the business to come before the body, there's none. A motion to adjourn to be in order. The vice mayor moves. Second. Ms. Watkins, second. It's not available. Those in favor signify by saying, I oppose. Motion carries. It's awarded. We stand adjourned. Don't consider gifts because here's the thing.