 There we go. Okay. All right, welcome to our return to in-person meetings been back here for a few months. This new format is integrated with members of the public via Zoom. Members of the public who are using Zoom, maybe you and listen to the meeting as noted on the city's website and on the agenda. Welcome board members and members of the public. Thank you for joining us today. My name is Logan Pitts, the chair of the board of committee services. I have the vice chair, Paul Castillo here and board members Guido, Boca Leone, Carol Spence, Carolina, sorry, Carolina Spence, Carol Cuant, and Omar Lopez, I swear I know your names. Thanks for being here. Okay. We also have our meeting host, Julie Guzy, Amy Hennessey and Shelley McClure. The host will coordinate comments from the public and assist during the meeting and take notes for any follow-up needs. And as a reminder to all present, please silence yourself, owns and devises. If you're phoning in to join the meeting and you choose to speak during the public comments portion of the agenda for privacy concerns, we will rename you the caller and only show the last four digits of your phone number. And additionally, the city of Santa Rosa is committed to providing a safe and inclusive environment free from disruption and hate speech and we will not tolerate hateful speech or actions. Everyone is expected to participate respectfully or if necessary, the meeting will end immediately. Host, please explain how public comments will be heard at today's meeting. Thank you, Chair Pitts. If you are attending in person, there are cards located at the entrance. Please complete the card and place it in the basket. You will be called up by name when your item number has been discussed and is open to public comment. You will be asked to approach the podium and state your name for the record. After an agenda item has been presented, the chair will ask the board members for their comments or questions and then immediately following the item will be open for public comments. If virtual hands are raised on Zoom prior to public comment, the host will lower all hands until the public comment item is open to all. Once the chair has called for public comment, those in person may raise their hand and wait to be called the podium even if the comment card has been completed. Those on Zoom may then raise their virtual hand or if you have called in dial star nine to raise your hand and will be called in the order they appear on the screen. Those joining by phone will be called by the last four digits of their phone number. The host will then determine the order in which the public may comment whether on Zoom or in person. All public comments will be heard until there are no more hands raised in person or virtually. Each public comment is limited to three minutes and a courtesy timer will appear on screen. Any email comments that were received by the deadline will have been included and uploaded to the agenda prior to the start of today's meeting. Emails received are not read into the record. Thank you. With that, I call this May 24th, 2023 meeting of the Board of Community Services to order at 4.09 p.m. Post, may we have a roll call? Please respond when I call your name. Chair Pitts? Yes. Vice-Chair Castillo? Right now. Board Member Boca Leone? Present. Board Member Cruz? Board Member Lopez? Here. Board Member Spence? Here. And Board Member Cuant? Here. Let the record reflect that all Board Members were present with the exception of Board Member Cruz. Thank you. On the agenda item three, I'd like to open the floor for public comments on non-agenda matters. This is a time when any person may address the Board of Community Services. Our matters not listed on this agenda but are within the subject matter of our jurisdiction. Do we have any public comments right now? Post. There are no hands raised at this time. Anyone present? No. Okay. On the item four, the approval of minutes. Are there any edits or corrections to the minutes of April 26th, 2023 from Board Members? All right, seeing no hands, we will consider those approved as submitted. On the item five, reports on upcoming events and accomplished events. Deputy Director Sanfos, hello. Hello. Let's give you a report. Thank you, Chair Pitts, I appreciate it. And I'll just direct your attention to the attachment you all have for upcoming and accomplished events. And I'll highlight that for upcoming events on June 12th, Howard Park will be open during the week for its summer operations, Sunday through Thursday. And then on Saturday and closed on Fridays. It's exciting. So we'll be starting up our regular summer session on June 12th. And then I also want to highlight the Kids to Parks Day that happened on May 20th. It was a huge success. About 500 participants. Really a really fun day of lots of activities. And we wanted to give a big thank you to our vendors, Santa Rosa Water, Santa Rosa Creek Stewardship, REI and the National Academy of Athletics. They provided activities in support of the event. So it was a really great day. That was the end of my report. Thank you, Jen. Will you provide the director updates at this time? Thank you. Yes, I will. And I'm wondering if we could pull up. I do have a little slide presentation for you about slide presentation. One slide here for you to look at, which is a little bit unusual, but I think it'll help provide an update. There was been a couple of questions over the last couple of months about a development project off of Herne Avenue. And if you can see on the map here, Herne Avenue diagonally stretching across the screen, Old Stony Point Road on the left. And the blue highlighted box is the new, that is the development that has been in question over the last recently. And so I wanted to show you where it was in relation to Herne. So the developer is being required to put in sidewalk on the front of their Old Stony Point Road, where their development fronts the road. The other part of it, only a tiny corner of it touches Herne. So there is no requirement for them to put sidewalk along Herne for this. However, the city is putting in a crossing across the property just south of this. Right here, you can see the red arrow being highlighted. So there will be a crosswalk there allowing folks to get south of Herne and then anywhere else from there. So I wanted to let you know and remind you that while the parks department does review these development reviews, our per view is for parks or park impacts. And so we really don't have, and therefore the board does not have any jurisdiction over sidewalks and verification of that. So if there's any questions about that, I as your liaison in here, I can help you offline with answer that question and get you connected to the right planning department person if you would like more information. Thank you, take that down now. And then also there's been a question about the streetlight at Southwest Community Park where the bus stops at Southwest Community Park. And I wanted to let you know that we have brought this to the attention of the appropriate departments, which are the transportation and public works department, specifically transportation, as well as our transit department in transportation and public works department. So those folks have been notified that there's a request for additional lighting there that's not necessarily within the park. The park closes at sunset. So there is no need to have lighting inside the park necessarily, but we'll keep an eye on that and see how that progresses. And again, it's one of those things it's on the borderline of a park. So we try not to get too prescriptive about what's required, but we do have put the recommendation forward and we'll keep you updated as we hear more. Also like to announce that Luther Burbank Home and Gardens is always looking for volunteers to work in the gift shop and lead docent tours. It's a wonderful organization that runs that park for us and that historical buildings. And if there's anybody interested if you know anybody, certainly you can reach out to me, but feel free to go directly to Luther Burbank Home and Gardens. We also want to note that the Prince Gateway Park Sprayground is going to be opening this weekend on Saturday. And it'll be open starting this Saturday until the end of summer from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. every single day. Super excited about that. Little cool to open it, but you never know. We have to pick a date and it'll be highly used as it always is. Last time I mentioned some folks that were recognized for service to the city of more than 10 years and we had two groups of folks that have been receiving recognition. And I mentioned a group last time that I wanted to follow up with the group this time as well that were left out of that. We have with 15 years of service, Jason Parrish, our administrative services officer for Reckon Parks and Ryan Shepherd with 20 years of service as a rec coordinator and Rob Beale, our recreation supervisor with 35 years working for the city. So I wanted to put that out there. I also wanted to update you all that you heard last time that our aquatic supervisor dog hits every tiring in July and we are happy to announce that one of our own Brandon Hammond has been promoted to replace John Hicks and so there'll be some great overlap there of training going on. We're really excited for Brandon to take on that position and for the training to ensue and to have the download of John's knowledge as much as possible. And last but not least, I also wanted to mention that yesterday at city council, we had a public works week proclamation where our parks maintenance staff were there to receive accolades for working as hard as they do and out there servicing the city's infrastructure along with all of our other public works partners in public works, transportation of public works. And they tonight are having an event from five to eight, 30 at Courthouse Square in recognition of public works, city works. And so there'll be a lot of equipment and maintenance staff out there. If you have time after this meeting tonight, it's a great place to go and check out. Okay, end of my report. Thank you. Any questions from the board on the report? All right. We will now move on to reports from board members. So this is just our brief updates relevant to wrecking parks within our jurisdiction. We'll start with board member Lopez. Do you have a report from the smart? I do actually. I was able to come in and read about a golf course. This was actually my first time and that's the specific venue. So I say it was a really beautiful venue, the view of the golf course from that venue was amazing. And so I was very happy to attend. Thank you. Board member Spence, do you have a report from the smart? I was at the same event. And it was great. And it is a beautiful view. And I think the more people see it, it's going to really catch on. I think it has a whole lot of potential to it. And then I went also, because I was doing the call on Saturday at the arena to another silent park. And that's a lovely little setting. It's just peaceful and quiet. It really is. I would encourage anybody who has a little frantic day to take a little drive by there. It's just, it's really wonderful. So I encourage you all, not that you are all not in total control of your life. I wish. Yeah. Thank you for the report. Board member Kwan. So the thing I was most excited about was going to a youth park. Very long time ago, both my daughters were camp counselors at Camp Uchi and I never got beyond the surface. So after I checked out the 16th scale train, which I felt uncomfortable riding without a small person with me, I got out for a walk. And I had no idea that there was 70 acres to that park. I kept going further and further. The Frisbee golf course, the bicycle track. What, what, I don't want to talk about that. It was just amazing and overgrown and I made some inquiries and I heard at one time there were development plans for this park. Jen, I would love to hear some background on youth park because it is a diamond truly in the rough in the Northwest quarter. I also got myself down to city council and placed myself front center to take pictures of two of our park maintenance staff, Elia and Tim. While they were being recognized with the rest of the members of public works. And I was able to help up, help for a while with the Clean Santa Rosa, Mendocino Avenue Cleanup a couple of the Fridays ago. Nice. Thank you for staying active, Carol. Board Member Boca Leone, do you have a report from this month? Nothing special other than the Southwest Community Park is very good, very busy and neat, it's clean. And I was glad to hear some of the comments that our director made. So I'm glad that some of that is going to be looked at. Thank you. Good, thank you for advocating. Vice Chair Castilla, do you have a report? I checked out Pioneer Park. It is a lovely little park. It's very close to my home. My kids enjoy it, it's great. Second comment is something to get on record. I was actually downtown sitting on the benches and thinking about the bench issue. And just for the record, my thoughts are we should either have comfortable benches or perhaps no benches and use that money towards public guards or public something. But having benches that are uncomfortable for everyone there's really no point in having those benches. They're more little statues at that point. So that's my update, that's what I got. Thank you for the update, Paul. My update for the month is, my new park for this month was Furrage Park in Fountain Grove, which is a small one. I think it was rebuilt pretty recently. Everything looked brand new. And also a quiet little refuge up there. And I attended an event on Sunday in Courthouse Square. It was hosted by the Art and Public Places Committee. It was to work on the general plan for the city and they were trying to bring in more young residents using artwork. And I got there at the end, near the end. So I'm not sure how the attendance was, but it looked like there'd been a lot of folks there. There were a lot of hosted notes on the board and great to see Courthouse Square being used like that. So, here's my report for the month. All right, moving on to our scheduled items. We are going to switch these around a little bit and go for 8.2. We first will hear from Assistant Parks Planner, Emily Ender, who will present the BOCS ordinance recommended updates. This is just as a reminder, the subcommittee that was formed of myself and Carol and our former member Terry Griffin to update our ordinance, which hadn't been done in quite a while. So thank you again, Carol, for that work. And hopefully we can kind of wrap that up today. So take it away, Emily. I'm your Chairman, Vice-Chair Castillo, Mr. Gordon, I'm Emily Ender, Parks Planner Assistant, and I'm here today to follow up with you on three items in particular related to the board's bylaws and ordinance, which we last discussed in February. Next slide, please. The three items that I'd like to discuss and hopefully come to decisions on today are the meeting start time for your monthly meetings, whether or not the board should add a youth member, is also what type of advisory body this group should be. I'll go through each item separately and then provide the opportunity for the board to discuss this item. Next slide, please. So one of the subcommittee's proposals to the full board in January was to change the start time of the meetings from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. We discussed this in January and February, and the first time it was discussed, it seemed like the most of the members present were comfortable moving forward to a 5 p.m. start time. When we brought it back in February for a decision and then Chair asked each individual member their opinion that we had a pretty even divide between 4 p.m. and 5 p.m. or whatever works best for the board and the public. So the board asked that staff get back and researched that further and then bring its findings back to the board. Next slide, please. So we kind of have four points of consideration for you to make, hopefully, help you make this decision. So staff looked into where the board's meeting time appears and therefore where it will need to be updated if you choose to change the meeting time. And we found that it appears in the board's bylaws, but not in the ordinance or any council policies or in the city code or the city charter. And this is a very good thing because it means the decision is completely in your hands. It doesn't need to go any further. And then so in addition to that, we met with the city clerk's office and the clerk recommended that if the board desires to change the meeting time, that that change should occur as soon as possible. And that's because she felt that the appropriate time to change the meeting would be when a new council is seated and they make their appointments to the boards and so you have a new group or a partially new group of people as we have now. And the third thing, the clerk said that if you do choose to change the meeting time, she recommends that you do it for a minimum of two years. That helps you kind of get into a rhythm, see if it's working for the public, if it's working for you. And then it's a little bit less of a burden on administratively on the clerk's office and on the reporting secretary. Next slide, please. And then I also just wanted to remind you that the city charter does say in section 11B that whenever practical, boards that deal with issues of interest to the public, such as the Board of Community Services, that your public hearing should occur no earlier than 5 p.m. And I believe that in general, staff in communication with a board chair try to organize the agendas of each of the meetings so that items that are of interest to the general public occur at or after 5 p.m. Of course, it depends on how quickly the meetings flow, but it is certainly the intent to do that. Next slide, please. So if the board would like to change some meeting time, how do you go about doing that? We begin by a member motioning to change the meeting time to whatever time you choose. And then it being seconded by another member and the majority supporting it. And then we would update bylaws and we would adopt the bylaws at the time. And then Shelly would work with the communications team to update the webpage for the board. And she would update our meeting time, our meeting minute templates and the agenda template with the new time. And she'd have to work with the city clerk's office to update the guide for city advisory bodies, as well as legislature. And legislature is the city's calendar where all the meeting minutes for boards and commissions in the council are available to the public. Next slide, please. So as you know, the meeting time is currently 4 p.m. The proposal is that it changed to five, but staff is certainly open to other meeting times as well. With that information, kind of like to turn it back over to you and see what questions you have and what your interest is at this time. Okay, thank you, Emily. Do you want us to do these each individually? Is that better for you? That was my tent. If you'd like me to go ahead and talk about it at the end, I'm happy to do that as well. We can do this now. That's fine. So let's have a discussion among the board. We'll have everyone speak just so we can hear from everyone. Let's start with Elmar. What are your thoughts on this? So I absolutely support the five p.m. time, I think for us very early for a lot of working people. I know I myself have to take time on my job to come here. So I think if we're doing something in the interest of public accessibility and involvement, should we change to five or whatever? Okay, thank you. So five, do you have any other suggestions or just five? Five would save five. We do run into conflict with Santa Rosa City Schools Board of Education on Wednesday, so that's sort of six. So I would say five would be a good time, especially if we are looking to put public interest towards the beginning of our agenda. Okay, I appreciate that background. Thank you. Caroline, what are your thoughts? Well, I love the four p.m. time, but I realize I'm not in the clock-climbing business anymore. What are other options? Any option you want at all? That's up to us. What if we split it and set it for 30? That's an option. Okay. Now kind of have a big tantrum. You can have a tantrum if it's important. A respectful one. Okay, thank you for your thoughts. Carol, what are your thoughts on this? So I don't know if this Board, which has been in existence since the 1980s, 1980s, has always had a four o'clock start time. If there has been public concern before, my main concern is that the public's input, which does not happen at every meeting, but when there is public input, it's usually about a very passionate situation, such as pickleball, and that the public have options. There is the email option, there is the recorded option, there is the phone-in option, and there is the in-person option. So what's most important to me is that the public have that opportunity regardless of the start time. With a four o'clock start time, with our meetings usually lasting two hours, we're usually done as a group around six o'clock. If we go to five o'clock, we would be finishing more like seven. And as I recall, the staff additional expense would be approximately $5,000 a year, amortized over how many meetings we have. Thank you, Emily. So it's not a tremendous amount of money being spent. Again, like Carolina, I am retired. I don't like driving home in the dark. That only happens during the winter. I need to be respectful of people who do work for a living and respect people who go to school and work for a living. And if a later start time is better for them and the public is neither hampered. I see that kind of as a push that the public has opportunities either way. I also appreciate the splitting of 430, but for people who work for a living that may be a token effort at best. So maybe not enough, but I will go with the will of the majority. Okay. Thank you, Carl. Guido, do you have any thoughts on changing the meeting start time? Well, Carol made a good point. That was four, you're done at six. You go five, don't get done till seven. And if you got to get home and cook, you're not ever missed your dinner. So it really doesn't make any difference because I'm retired. But just thinking of people with children and kids that might want to watch some of these pro-meetings that kind of interrupt stuff right in the middle of the dinner time. So that's the only thing that I can take out of it. Okay. Paul, what are your thoughts? Well, first question, did we get any sort of public comment or input on this? Is this, did anyone submit anything? No, we didn't have any sort of public comment. All right, let's be by big issues. You just wanted to be here obviously but we're on a personal level. I mean, the later, the better for me. So we did six o'clock would be awesome. But as far as the four historic start time, obviously I'm here, with respect to five o'clock, I think that's fine. My only concern to Guido's point, if you have small little ones or something you're trying to get around, that's like just a tough stretch. Not that four to six is that much better, but I feel like, you know, if you can get your public comments within the first 20 minutes and get out of here by like 4.30, that's probably helpful to people. But I'm not saying token, I don't think 5.30 would, you know, crush people, you know. But it's important people are gonna show up regardless of the option. So with that being said, I'm fine with five, I think that works. The nice compromise of 4.30, I don't even think about that, that's a good one. But for individuals that work, taking time off, I understand and that's worth some as well. So I'm either in the 4.30 or 5.30 camp, whatever, whatever kind of works for a team. Okay, thanks for your thoughts, Paul. So originally five was my suggestion at the sub, the Ordnance subcommittee. I thought about it more and I think six would actually be better. But I'm hearing folks saying that might be a little late. And so I think five is a good midpoint right now. I think also, while I appreciate the suggestion to do it for two years, we can do whatever we want because these are our bylaws. So if we really hate it, we can change it after a year or after six months. And there's good reasons to do it for longer. But that's up to us. So if we really hate it, we can, someone can introduce another motion to change it and guard our majority and then it will be changed right then and there immediately. We won't have to go through a longer process. So, and I did some research on some other cities. For example, Petaluma starts some meetings at 6 p.m. to encourage more public access. And like I said, that's kind of where I've moved towards but I understand if that might be too late for some folks. So I think five was a good landing spot. We did discuss that at our subcommittee so we didn't just bring it out of nowhere. If we want to change the time, we need a motion and a second. So does anyone want to do that? Make a motion that we start at five o'clock. Thank you. I'll second. Okay. Any further discussion needed from board members? Do you have any other thoughts? That's totally fine. I will say if we look at all of the boards and commissions, I think most of them do happen during the work day. It is the exception that happens at night for rural in Santa Rosa. I did not look at anything outside of the city of Santa Rosa. That's true. The only board that starts after five is the community advisory board, which is at six. I think, yeah. And the idea being that they are the community advisory board and people should have access. That's a good point, Carol. Okay. Any other discussion on that motion? Well, we did this in three months until we did that. Whoa, I don't know about that yet. That's a good idea actually. We'll do that. Why don't you save that for item 11 and we'll put that on a future agenda to review it. I have one other point to the working people. 430, it's worthless to you guys. 430 is the same thing. If it doesn't push all the way to five, it's as if it didn't push at all. Is that correct, Logan? That's all right, people. I don't know. Other thoughts? Oh, for me, it makes no difference. Again, on the work-wise, best is six. So, but 435, all the same. I guess the way I would look at it is if people get out of five, it's supposed to be 30 minutes to commute here. During those 30 minutes, we do our sort of beginning process that does not necessarily require the public to be here just yet before we start going through our item. So that would be my thought. If we do 430, that shifts to five. So right as people are getting out of work, they need to rush over here to make a public comment if they want to. I agree. Okay, any further discussion? Do you want to amend your ordinance to come back in if you want? You can do that. Or we can just have it on a future agenda. I think future agenda is fine. As long as it's calibrated, we know. I'd like to see if we get any more public participation on this. That's my biggest thing. People start showing up at five, I think that's cool. And then we know that kind of works. But I think, you know, let's try for a few meetings, see how it goes and take from there. And maybe we do end up compromising 430. Okay, one question for staff. How is this advertised? Is it just like an update on the website or is there any sort of announcement of a new meeting time? Okay. When you update the agenda and go to the city, we would make a note that that's a new time. I, yeah, please note the new time. Is it possible the city could at least do like a social media post or something just announcing the new time? I can certainly. Thank you. Okay. Great. Any further discussion needed? Okay. Then we'll call the vote. All those in favor of changing the meeting time at five PM, please say aye. Any opposition or abstentions? Great. Pass unanimously. Okay. Thanks, Emily. Next we'll move on to the... Oh, sorry. A follow-up question. Is that going to start as we amended as of this day? So it's going to start immediately. Next meeting going forward. Next meeting. Yeah. Good question. Unless you would like to defer it to a future meeting. I think... Take your time. If we're doing it via amendment, I think it's an immediate action. Mm-hmm. It's like... Yep. We'd have to do another vote if we wanted to defer it. So next month is when we'll start this conversation. Great. Thank you. See you guys at five. Yep. All right. On to the youth member. Next slide, please. Name the subcommittee proposed adding a youth member to the board. The full board was interested and supportive of that idea. So we got staff to go and just research and then return to the board with what we learned. So we talked with the city clerk's office as well as the city attorney's office and other reporting secretaries about if and how this could work. And although there was no language regarding these members in any of the city's governing documents, we did learn about two recent examples of youth members on advisory bodies. The first example, which Logan brought to our attention is the city tribe review committee, which he served on. There was one youth member on that committee and that individual was appointed directly by the mayor. The second example is on the citizen advisory committee for the general plan update. There's one youth member on that committee and they are non-voting in that large number. And they were recruited at the beginning of the general plan update process, the planning and economic development staff created a presentation that they took to many of the Santa Rosa high schools to introduce the students to what general plan is and try to encourage them to get involved in Santa Rosa's general plan. And at that time they said, hey, if you're really excited about this, they'll allow the city application and join the citizen advisory committee. So I'm not exactly sure about this, but I would assume that staff and the, I would just stop, but maybe that staff and the consultant team chose candidates from those who filled out the applications and then included one member who was a youth. And then that went forward to the city council and they approved the membership of that entire committee. Next slide, please. So based on that information and then on the conversations we had with the city clerk's office and the city attorney's office, it was recommended that if the board wants to add a youth member that these criteria of at least a starting place for us to apply to a youth member, they would need to fill out the city standard online application. They would be a non-voting member and they would represent the entire city. They'd have to be a resident of Santa Rosa and enrolled at a Santa Rosa high school. They would have to have the consent from their parent or guardian. The position would be a one year term. We think that it'd be great to have the recreation staff involved with outreach to recruit youth, particularly through the neighborhood services program and the work experience program where we know have excellent team leaders already. But of course, we would outreach in other ways as well. And then that member would be chosen by the board chair from all the applications that were received. And so that information will be added to the bylaws. Next slide, please. So the process for adding a youth member to the board would include someone making a motion or making a motion to add a youth member to the board and then having seconded and supported by a majority of the board. Then staff would take your recommendation forward to the city manager's office to see if they were supportive of that. If they're supportive, then staff would update the bylaws. We'd add a section for youth members under the membership article and also add a duty to the board chair, which would be like select youth members. But we would update the bylaws and we'd bring them back to you review and adopt them. And then this information will be added across the various documents and platforms that are still there. Let's go here. Next slide, please. So currently there is no youth member. So the proposal is to add one voting app large youth member to serve for... Okay, thank you, Emily. Can, Shelley, can you leave up the slide that has like all the criteria? Like two back. Slide nine. There you go. Yeah. Great. So we'll have a discussion now. Does anyone have any thoughts on adding a youth member? Guida. I got a comment. You didn't say anything about an age when the song says it's a youth. I think it should be a senior. Senior and good possibility that he's got his driver's license so he can come and go. Mommy doesn't have to bring you. But you know, it should be a senior. Okay. A high school senior? Yes. And would they need to be under 18 so they're not an adult? That's whatever the legal application is, but at least he's senior. He's been in the parks. He's played and he's this and that and come and tell us this is great that we should change, you know, he's got some experience. Right. Okay. Omar, do you have some thoughts? No, I'll take care of it. So fun fact, I was the student board member for Santa Rosa City Schools. So I do have some background as a youth member on that group. Part of that was also clarifying. This will be open to all Santa Rosa City Schools, not just Santa Rosa City Schools. But yeah. Well, I don't know. Well, it's one thing I was wondering is it can it be public and private which is just public schools? And that would be something maybe, let me start with this question. Yeah. Right now, if we were to make a motion, it would be simply to add or not add. And then we would go back to the actual sort of nitty gritty details of what that student board member would be. So to that extent, I definitely support adding a youth member. Absolutely. Going into the nitty gritty, I would definitely, I'm not against doing the private school or anything like that. Obviously there are still students or you're still youth in our community. So I would not recommend against it. I just think we could definitely leverage our partnership with public schools, especially Santa Rosa City Schools. We are mentioning high school students in these recommendations. So without a specific age requirement, we are looking at a school age requirement. Senior, I'm not, how do I word this? I understand where it's coming from. Maybe junior and senior. I think I'd be open to that. I think that'd be best just that way. I was like juniors can definitely have the driver's license experience. So I'd say junior and senior. But besides that, that's my thoughts. Yeah, Carol. Points of clarification. This is a non-voting member. So this person's person does not affect the forum. Correct. Some point of clarification as a non-voting member, there would be no requirement to actually attend. I mean, I think that that is something we could discuss right. There is no requirement to attend. But if you missed three meetings, the same way as you, if you missed three meetings, then... That would be something I would be interested in exploring moving forward. The other thing, and we have two new board members, you guys have been on the board for three months. Roughly, roughly, a little bit longer. Four months. You feeling up to speed? I don't think so. Pardon me? I don't think so. Okay. One year really isn't enough time to come up to speed. If you were appointed by a member of city council who has a four-year term, one would assume that you would be on this board for four years and will learn more about a one-year term. You get your feet wet, you go to prom, you go to college, you're going. And I think it's conceptually a very good idea. I have questions about its practicality. Okay, thank you, Carol. Yes, just in general, I love the idea. I think it's great. With respect to making an individual voting, that would require an amendment to the charter, right? Is that correct? Thank you. Okay. And then the charter amendment, all different process, yeah, part two of all. With respect to the one-year term, since it is a youth individual, I understand that they're not gonna be able to do much, but honestly, it's more just to get a presence in the room, have someone youthful speaking. And if we're being honest, a lot of this is also to kind of have the resume as well, should put something on there, just show that you do have community engagement. So as long as the individual is present and engaged, I think one year is sufficient for kind of what we're looking for, just kind of a present. Maybe we do cut it down to two, you know, in this two meetings or something like that, since it is such a small term. With respect to the age requirement, I think high school is fine. I think if you got some ambitious 14-year-old kid in there that wants to make his voice heard on the Parks and Rec Board, go for it. You know, if he's a qualified applicant, so be it as long as they're in high school and they're articulate and they can say what they gotta say, I'm all for it. So this is my kind of general thoughts, but as far as moving this forward, I'm completely in favor of this game. It's gonna be close to it. Okay. Thanks for the thoughts, everyone. Let me ask a few questions, Emily. So do you want us to do all this criteria today to like the eligibility and... I would love some of the feedback on this, this is the information that we got from the city attorney's office and the city clerk's office. Because my ideal was to be able to draft some bylaw language and put it back in front of you for you to be able to reflect on and build off of. Okay. I think that's what I was thinking. However, if you think it'd be better to bring the subcommittee back together and hash through language that way, that's another option. I don't think we need to do that just for one thing. Because I think we'll be able to do it at a normal meeting. Maybe not at this meeting though, and that's okay. Sounds like everyone wants to do a youth member. So why don't we, would it be helpful for you for us to just do that motion and then come back later and do the criteria? Okay. Do you want anything else, would anything else in the order in that motion be helpful for drafting what you referenced? Okay. I was honored by the mayor to register on this committee. Got a hold of me and asked me, and I said I'd be more than happy to. And I'm sure the rest of us have all been pointed by one of the city council people or such. I think that a city council person should develop on getting a person for each district, district one this time, district two next time, so on. That way that person, that student gets involved with the program of how things work and gets to meet the city council person and points them to this committee, you know what I mean? I think it should start there, just like I was appointed for us to serve. Yeah, that's nice. So you would want it maybe to say like a rotation of each council district? Right. Okay, that's interesting. That way they get involved as well, you know what I mean? Yeah, no more. I do support that initiative. That was one of my questions is accessibility. We have a very diverse community in Santa Rosa and some have more access than others, unfortunately. I know Santa Rosa City Schools, they would rotate the high schools specifically. So each high school would get one year and then they'd come back to it six years ago. The way that's pointed is really good about rotating districts. Obviously then the question would be, is that the high school district, the high school or their neighborhood district, which one do we choose? But at least something to make an effort to make sure that all areas of Santa Rosa have an opportunity to send somebody. Okay, yeah, I like that idea too. I don't want to do it per high school because you can transfer high schools so we could still end up with everyone coming from Bennett Valley or Roseland or whatever it happens to be. And then that misses that point. I like the rotation idea though. I can just follow up on that to the issue of access. I mean, that would require obviously having access. Maybe somebody in your school, somebody of that nature. Perhaps also an essay element. I don't know, maybe there's some kid out there who isn't necessarily super vocal and making his face present everywhere. But here's about this, right, to kill our essay. Yeah, someone to say, he's on the board. I just think having it as open as possible would be helpful. That's my sense on it. Okay. But your point, mate, also is a good idea. Carolina. I'd like for this first time to make it as simple as possible. If you can get a council person who has a young person that they would like very much to put on and have a talent for it. I think maybe it's the first time we're gonna go with that. We're making a really big deal of this. And what we're just trying to do is get probably two years out of a young person who would sit and get the experience of being on this side of the table. And not everybody drives and not everybody cares to drive anymore. I would worry about how they're gonna get themselves here. Yeah. You know, I'd like to keep it as simple as possible right now and see how we all do with each other. And if we wanna flesh it out later, great. But let's not make a mountain of them all for starters. All right. Thanks for that comment. Great to go with it. I like that comment. Yeah, Carol. Unfortunately, I'm gonna throw some dirt on it. I'm gonna turn it into more of a mountain. Let's just say for the sake of discussion, it coincided with the beginning of the school year. It's obviously not gonna happen in the summer because the kids aren't gonna be in school. So let's say for the sake of discussion started in September. It was hard to roll out the school year. I wouldn't want students who were considering to say to know from the get go, this is a 12 month commitment, which includes summer. I would want anyone who's making that even consideration, just like us, don't apply for a board if you're not gonna be able to make nine out of the 12 meetings. And that that creates a bar. I would like the students to be held accountable for the get go that they're engaging in a city governing body. If this is like a job and it's a life skill, it makes it more of a mountain. Not. More of a mountain. It makes it more of a mountain, but also it makes it more of a gold setting that this is not something, it is more than just another line on your resume. Well, I agree, but I think they're also trying to pass the stats. The kids that are gonna apply are gonna be those that this is. And unfortunately, I wish it was the kids who were in neighborhood services and they're lucky if they could go to the JC because they got to get a job. Well, maybe we'll get them too, I hope. But what if we did it for a school year instead rather than a calendar year? I think it's more realistic to expect them to not show up in the summer. I think making a student sit here in a meeting during the summer is a risk. So maybe it could be a school year length, like September to May or something like that. Seeing some nodding heads. That is exactly what's in there, it's the city schools. Yes, all right. Copying people, yes. All about traffic. If this worked for them, I know for student attendance, starting the school year for them is 100%, if not slightly lower. So, but the high summer, they just crop it up from that period. So that is always the conclusion. Especially if we're looking at a high school student and we're emphasizing the student aspect of that. So let me ask you, Marwan, you say that do you think it shouldn't be a student? Or should this be anyone who's a non-adult or? That's actually a really much I did not think about. The idea of someone who is slowly new to not be a high school student in our community. They want to be involved in it. Yeah. Tell me what age you mean when you say that. Maybe some 18, but maybe I forget the word where they, I think 14 plus it means. 14 to 18, not just not necessarily in high school, obviously some students may drop out. There's alternative pathways, marriage stuff. I can't think of all of that on my head. So I guess my question is, could that be exclusionary language that's not necessarily needed? If our goal is just age? I didn't want to have the high school. That's why I asked you. That was sort of a leading question. I don't think we should have that as a criteria because maybe someone graduates a year early and they still want to be a youth commission member and we don't want to exclude them because they're not in high school anymore or whatever circumstance in life they're going through. So that would be my feeling on that. Let's, okay. I have one more question. Sorry. Yeah, go ahead, Carol. Has staff given any thought to how much staff time is additional? Will it take? We haven't done any analysis of that at all, but we can bring that back. If you would like to make a motion to have a youth member we can bring that back as part of the bylaws or you can wait to make a motion and we can bring back additional information. I think that is an important consideration. We do need to see if the city matters obviously more above the two. Okay. We have discussed this for a little while now. So I think that we're, let's try to do a motion to do the youth member and then at a future meeting figure out this criteria and if it really can't happen the next meeting we will reform our subcommittee and do some separate meetings. Hopefully we can do it next meeting. But if not, that's okay. We always want to hear everyone's thoughts. So I think what we're looking for is a motion to just add a youth member right now. Nothing else on that I think would be best moving forward. I'd like to make a motion to initiate the process to add a youth member. Great. I'll second it. Okay. We'll give that one to Carolina. So motion by Omar, second by Carolina. All those in favor please say aye. Aye, aye, aye. All those opposed? Any abstentions? Great. Okay. We're adding a youth member. Thank you, Omar. Fantastic. Next we'll talk about type of advisory body. In February, staff brought forward to the board if you'd be interested in changing the type of advisory board how you are from a board to a commission. And the board again has staff to explore how changing the type of advisory board would impact your functionality and the type of decisions you'd make and bring that research back. So staff discussed the advisory body type of both the clerk's office and the city attorney's office and both stated that Santa Rosa does not base an advisory body's decision making ability or functionality on the type of advisory body that it is. So the decisions an advisory body makes are based on what is needed of the body from the department that it's advising. So what does the parks interact with me from the board of community services? Or what the council needs from the advisory body? So for example, it was council's decision to abolish the recreation and parks commission as well as the community relations commission in 1976 to form the board of community services. And this information also explains why the board of public utilities and the planning commission have similar decision making authority even though they are different advisory body types. So really this decision comes down to what type of advisory body you want to be if you think that it makes a difference to you or in the community to be called a board versus a commission. Next slide, please. So the process for changing the type of advisory body is similar to the others, a little bit more infested but you would make a motion here today if you would like to change it, 50 seconds and we can support it by the group. And then we would go to the city manager's office and ask for support to change the type of advisory body. If they supported that, then the staff would have to update the ordinance with the board to commission change and that would be adopted by council. And then staff would also update the bylaws to reflect that and then the update would be made across the various places that needs to be made but this would need to be made more extensively than either the youth member or the meeting time would need to be made. So we would recommend that you make that decision before the ordinance goes forward to the council late at the summer because the name would have to be changed in the ordinance as well as city code and city policies where in laser feature, where all of our public documents reside as well as all the other locations we talked about with the other two items here. So keep that in mind. I mean, if you decided in two years to change to a commission, we would have to go back and update all of those documents. So that wouldn't be ideal but it's certainly doable. Next slide. So currently the name of the board is changing to align with the name of the department as you decided in February. So the department name will be decided by the city manager's office before the ordinance and support council or before the ordinance and support council. So staff would like to know from the board are you interested in changing the type of advisory body from board to commission? And that would look like going from the recreation and parks board to the recreation and parks commission or the parks and rec board to the parks and rec commission. And I also want to say and we are really meeting again with the city attorney's office to actually talk about if you're interested in scaling up the types of decisions that you make so that like master plan wouldn't have to go forward to council. We are going to talk about that but that has nothing to do with the type of advisory body that you are. Okay. Thank you Emily. And just two questions from me real quick. Wasn't there some sort of name change voted on at the budget workshop? Jen, did that happen? No, council did not vote on it. It was discussed. Okay. No, no gaction was taken. Okay. Discussed positively, right? It was discussed as you know, it could be either way. Okay. Does it seem likely to happen that we'll become parks? It's not likely to happen at council. Not likely. Not likely any decision we made at council during the budget session. So we're still working with city manager's office. Got it. Yeah. Okay. Thank you for that update. And then Emily, did we, we didn't advance this through the subcommittee, did we? I didn't remember. No, we did not. Okay. No. Okay. We just because they seem to go hand in hand we wanted to go forward. Okay. We wanted to talk with council about it when we went forward with the ordinance. If they were supportive of that or not, that was before we understood that it's more non-inclusive then. Yeah. Okay. Decision made responsibly. Thank you. Any other questions from folks or discussion on this for change in our name? Carol, I'm sorry, Guido. Call me dense. I would really like in black and white what the difference between the board and commission is other than the number of letters in the board. For Santa Rosa, there's a lot of different ones. No difference. Thank you for that clarification. Guido, as I brought and showed you that I have a nice accommodation from the state of California, Parks and Recreation Commission. And I say that I was on the Pettiloma, the Pettiloma was on the board Parks and Recreation Commission down there in the early 10 years. That's the word they use. State of California uses it. So if we should get a recognition, we get it. In our case, we get it worded differently because we're different. But I think we should go with Parks because they come before recreation. Park goes in first and the recreation is put in and they'll be in commission. And then we're in line with the state when you get a nice award. It's my feeling. So if it's the state, it's a commission. We should be Pettiloma is, I don't know about the other cities around here, but I think we should do it. Okay. Any other thoughts from board members? For our guy, you can also, anyone else? Okay, Carol, go ahead again. So I have my iPad with me and I was able to call up city boards, commissions and committees. Emily, I bet you could cite this too. It's committee board services, utilities, committee board, board, board, authority, committee, board, commission, planning, commission, board, board, that's it. I don't know if anyone else is considering changing my names. My personal thought is commission is much more official sounding. And as a member of the park and rec body, I feel that board is much friendlier than I'd like to think of park and rec as a friendly place. Just my opinion. Thank you. I don't think it matters for a commissioner board. That's my personal opinion. I would like us to become parks and recreation. So that seems to be the direction the city's going in. So that's about the only change I care about. Yeah, go ahead. A lot of things that are sort of a question regarding the next step slide and maybe a meeting with the city manager city attorney's office and then introduce the ordinance about the ordinance. That is for more decision making authority. That is nothing to do with the name change also needs to be approved via city code. It's going to be updated in the city code. And it'll be updated in the city policies as well. It's kind of a trickle down effect. And we want to do it all at once. Yeah. To get on to the council agenda. So we're trying to just get this all into one item for them to vote on. I understand. I didn't realize it had to go through much. Is there any sort of negative school impact as far as that's concerned? You got it. Everything's digital. Anyone says it's a good change? And can you explain to Emily, whoever you're not going to like go out and buy all new stuff. It's basically as it your brand. Yeah. It's as you need to order it, right? Well, and we'll be working with the city manager's office to find out what the decision will be going forward. We'll certainly provide the feedback we received tonight to the city manager's office and kind of go from there to see if we can get a decision making point on recreation parks or parks and recreation. So outside of that, we want to add commission or board. That would be great to know tonight as well. Okay. Any input on this issue or thank you. Not yet. We're still waiting for the board's feedback. Sorry. The clerk and the city attorney's office have provided feedback, but not city managers yet. They didn't weigh in one way or the other. Yeah. Especially because they said it's irrelevant. I said, hey, we got more important things to do. Yeah, exactly. Okay. It's like the board of public utilities. I think that's like, that's the only one that's in the city charter. The only one that is specifically spoken about the city charter. So I would say that that's probably. Okay. Most important board, you know. So I think we all want to change to parks and rec, but do we want to do a commissioner board? So if we want to have a motion from someone to change it to either one, we can do that. And one will pass and one won't, all of them just have one, whatever we want to do here. I'll make a motion that we go with parks and recreation commission because sports is kind of boring, everything's important. And the commission just has a little bit more of a prestige kind of organization. I'm indifferent. So that sounds good to me. You want to be a commissioner. And I did meet with the mayor at a meeting with her and she liked it too. She said, what's it up to her? She had to, you know, talk to her. Hello, people. Yeah. She thought it was cool. So is that a motion to change us to the parks and rec creation commission? Guido, were you making a motion? Yes. Yes. Okay. Do we have a second? And we will have a discussion before we go. Don't worry. I don't want to second that. You all want to stay board members? I didn't say I'm very impartial to this decision. So I'm just. Okay. I think you have a second, I'll second. Are you seconding the motion? Board member Lopez. Okay. So the motion has been introduced and seconded. Do we need further discussion on changing our name to the parks and recreation commission? Carol. Call me old school. It's always been a board. I think it's more informal to be a board, especially considering 90% of the other boards for the city of Santa Rosa are boards not commissions. That's just me. Okay. That's a good question. I don't know if you can answer. Do you have an opinion on this? Are you guys scared? We do not have an opinion. We are looking to city manager's office and as far as commission report. Again, it has no legal meaning for the city of Santa Rosa. It sounds a bit stuffy. Okay. We need four votes. You can vote no on Guido's motion. That's up to you as a board member. Do we have any further discussion on Guido's motion? All right. All those in favor of changing our name to the parks and recreation commission, please say aye. All right. Let's raise our hands. Just didn't get this on the record. Okay. All those in opposition. Yeah, I guess all of them. Okay. I did lie. Do we have another motion? Can I motion to become the parks and recreation board? Okay. So we now have a motion to become the parks and recreation board for the city of Santa Rosa. Second. Second. Do we have any discussion on that? Okay. All those in favor of changing our name to the parks and recreation board, please raise your hand. Okay. All those in opposition. Okay. You name it. Thanks for being a team player, Guido. We can, we can make the same. All right. That's why we keep you around. Great. We will submit that to the city manager's office and they can also just shoot it down. But we'll, we'll see. Great. Thanks, Emily. You're welcome. Well done. Great. Okay. No questions on next steps? Excellent. Any other questions from folks? I think we covered all that. Okay. And we're going to come back later with the youth members stuff. Yeah. Sounds good. Thank you. Thank you for switching the agenda around. Well, thank you very much for switching the agenda. It's like, get to my son's school. That's very important. It's a situation we're trying to see. I'm sorry. I did move too fast. Do we have any public comment on that item? Thank you, Shelley. We have no hands raised at this time. Okay. Anyone present? No. Okay. We will move on then. Thank you, Emily. Yep. To item 8.1, our volunteer cemetery, rural cemetery volunteer program, the deputy director of recreation, Jeff Tidnitz will introduce the rural cemetery preservation committee overview of the volunteer program at the cemetery. Good afternoon, Jeff Tidnitz, deputy director. I guess I'm becoming the hack guy from previous presentations of exploring different hats. So I want you to recognize me before I prepare myself for the introduction. Wow. So it is an honor to be here this evening and introducing this group. I know we've done some presentations in the past where we have had, you know, made parents from programs or participants from programs. And we've always heard such great feedback from the board members when we've done that. We know you love to hear from us, but that special aspect of hearing from participants or parents or those types of things. So fortunately for you this evening, we have a similar type of presentation where we have an amazing group or our rural cemetery preservation committee for. I'm gonna try to be as brief as I can so I don't steal the spotlight of what they're gonna tell you about the group. But a group that has been formed for a very long time has put in countless hours over the years of volunteering, raising money, so many different things. I came into the volunteer program and got involved with the group. I was very honest from them upfront while my mother was someone who loved to go to cemeteries. I never understood it. It's not my passion, but I quickly got involved with the group and realized what a special group it is, passionate, dedicated, and we are very blessed in San Rosa to have such a group. And it quickly as I was getting started working with the volunteer made me realize to see the best of the best of what volunteering can do for a community, for a city, and in this case for the rural cemetery. So with that, without stealing any more of their thunder, it is my honor to ask the Bill Montgomery, the volunteer staff liaison to present on, I don't know how much the story is gonna tell you because it's a three decade plus story, but to tell you the story that he was preparing for you today. Okay, thank you, Jeff. Thank you for your patience also to volunteers and for appearing in costume, maybe not in character. That's okay. We usually appear in costume and in character, but tonight I'll just be Dr. John Boyce. All right. I arrived here in 1852. So early resident of the town of Franklin, which precede to Santa Rosa, and I served as a doctor in this town for four years. And now I'm up at the cemetery. So I'm still here, but I'd also like to introduce two other characters I have with me. This is getting kind of early back to the same kid. She's representing somebody from about 1900. And Nancy Gottfried representing somebody from about 1927. And we're all representing about a hundred plus volunteers who have been involved in the city of rural cemetery for a long time. Let me sit down so I don't have to weigh the pictures. So we'll just start talking about what it used to be. And this will not take long, I don't know if I should go that way. Of the center of the rural cemetery was first established in 1854. And the first picture we have of that cemetery is what you see up here in 1920, 70 years after it was established. We keep looking for older pictures, but I've not been lucky to see that. This particular picture was taken several days after the notorious hanging in the rural cemetery, three suspects, and they run from the tree that's there in front of you. And if you look up the hill, you'll see that the cemetery was basically a grassy hillside, very few trees, and looking pretty good. In front of you you see the Grand Armour of the Republic Memorial, which was put in in 1915, which was five years before this event. So following this picture, things changed a lot. At this point, the cemetery was actually four separate cemeteries. It was the Stanley, the Volk, the Fokerson, and the Center of Rural Cemetery. Those cemeteries were private cemetery companies that had at least some maintenance responsible in the cemetery. And as time went by, particularly we believe the depression, what you see here relative to the good maintenance, disappeared. So the cemetery, which was established in 1854, organized officially in 1861, became a common phenomenon. It was almost abandoned for about four years, from some time in the 30s to 1979. And during that time period, birds, planted seeds, people put in all kinds of interesting things in the cemetery, so it became quite different. But by 1979, it was a disaster. Anybody left to remember that time? And at that point, the city decided to take it away from the domain. The city was being blamed for its condition anyway. Private cemeteries were pretty much gone, so the city took it away from the domain. The city put the fence up around it in 1979, set up the first walking tour, and didn't put a whole lot of other effort into it. So by the time 1990s arrived, it was quite a disaster. It was thick with exotic plants and trees, probably half of the tombstones had been broken down, a lot of tombstones had been sold. It was a discredit to the community. So in 1994, let's go to the next slide, please. In 1994, we started the Santa Rosa Rural Cemetery Preservation Committee, and this is a picture just recently of what has evolved over that time period. From 1920 to current, 100 years, all those trees have sprouted. So the old oak trees up there that many people think are 700 years old are usually only about 100 years old, and the cemetery is looking quite green and beautiful, and the Grand Arm of the Republic Memorial in the front, which was decimated of its metal, but World War II has been replaced, the metal has been replaced, so it's a good shape. So we now have a committee of about 100 and some volunteers that have involved in a whole bunch of activities at the Rural Cemetery. So let's talk about some of those activities. Next slide, please. So we have a variety of things we do. One of them is maintenance, and you'll find that the majority of our volunteers go into maintenance. About 2,000 volunteer hours were devoted to operations and programming the cemetery in 2022. You can see someone's added more volunteers and the rest of Santa Rosa Rec and Parks combined. And a few shots of what we do there, you see down at the bottom left, that's Kate Conover who specializes in restoring cemetery tombstones, and she said, I have done. Once I get it done, I have to start over again. She mostly does the chemical treatment to get rid of the molds and funguses that make the tombstones almost impossible to read. You see in the middle, we have people that work on tombstones, so I'm restoring them, replacing them. You see people that work on just the landscape purposes throughout the cemetery. The majority of the cemetery, which is over 15 acres, is maintained by volunteers. We have a little help from the city, but mostly it's on by volunteer groups. So next slide, please. So in addition to the maintenance, we have a interpretive and programming group. And these people are the ones that do the costumes, like being the costumes. And for the last 25 years, they've been doing something we call the lamp light tour, which is a tour in September of each year, where we go to about eight gravesites with characters from the past in costume with lights and props, act out a scene from their lives. And it has been sold out. This is the 25th year now, or somebody in the 25th year. It's been sold out for every single one of those 25 years. In addition to that, we have regular tours for the summer. We have free Saturday tours with a variety of different subjects. You have in front of you a brown camp brochure, which has a list of our activities during the summer. And then we also have special tours for come scouts, schools and things like that. So next slide, please. Within the cemetery, we also have two special gardens. We actually have three special gardens, you have to say. One at McDonald entrance and one at Franklin entrance are both habitat gardens where we specialize in native plants and habitat plants. And those are thriving at this point. They've been there in one case for 20 years and the other case for about five years. We also have a memorial rose garden. And both of these gardens, two of these gardens have been used for memorial stones. We're someone that does not have a, has a loved one that does not have a grave site and install a stone in honor of that. So right now those are being stored, what's stored in the rose garden. Okay, next slide, please. And in addition to all that work, we have people that do the research and the research is extensive. We're researching 5,500 people and lots of information. And the most recent product of that research team is this book, which is a product of 12 years of work for several people. And in here we have 5,500 names with a little bit about everybody in here, which is as accurate as we can. And we'll keep adding to it even to this day. So we have people that do their work too. So a lot of people do a lot of stuff. And what's good about it is everybody's having a lot of fun with it. It's a very medical group. Everybody enjoys being with each other. Okay, now we have surprises at the cemetery. We can understand it's been there 170 years. So next slide, please. So this is the most recent supply prize we came up with. A worker in one of the plots came up with a metal plaque, which was the plaque that was on a coffin at one point in honor of Grace Coulter. And the plaque was in a plaque for the Coulter family. However, the records show no Grace Coulter in that plaque. So that gave rise to extensive research as to what was happening. And we discovered this was a grave of a man named Sterling Coulter who arrived in the Santa Rosa area in the 1850s. First lived in Franklin, the town was here before Santa Rosa. Then he moved into Santa Rosa. And later was named called Ster, called Squire Coulter. Because he was a tall impressive man. He was on every city board and commission. And somehow during the time that this family plot was there since the 1850s, his daughter in law, Grace Coulter, died. However, she was not buried there. We're not quite sure what happened to her ashes and what happened to the particular coffin plate. But at some point they were installed probably without anybody knowing it. Right there in that plot. And only recently discovered. So we constantly have surprises about who's there and what's going on. So now we have a new name to add to the book. Okay. Now I'd also like to tell you just briefly about some of the interesting characters. We represent these characters all the time. So next slide please. And characters are diverse and there's heroes and there's villains. All kinds of folks to talk about. Interesting person to talk about specifically is Dr. Annabelle McAfee Stort, who was born in the 1840s in Virginia. He became a nurse in the city in the Civil War. She was a nurse who went with her husband who was a doctor. And by the 1870s, they were in Santa Rosa. She had completed her medical training. She was a doctor. And while she was in Santa Rosa, she got the title of Dr. Deere. She brought so many babies into the world. Dr. Deere was her title. And her family memorial is there. Her husband, who by the way, was injured in the Civil War, died later, about 20 years later, of his injuries. She became a very famous character. Also her two sisters. One was Francis McAfee Martin. She became a pharmacist. And another sister became a lawyer and ultimately superintendent's goes for Santa Rosa. So here, young ladies, three young ladies, born in the 1840s in what is now West Virginia, at the time of Virginia, goes to those sadists here in Santa Rosa. Next slide, please. Another important person we have here is, as you can see, this is a very important Victorian grave. You can see the grave to the right. It's very impressive. Probably crossed by anyone who was installed in 1879. You may be surprised to learn that Mr. John Richards was born a slave. In 1824, managed to buy his freedom. Married a woman from New England by 1850s. They're here in Santa Rosa. And he has a skill as a barber. So he first opens a barber shop. And later on, he opens a series of, of bathhouses. He had one bathhouse in Santa Rosa, one bathhouse in Yuccaia, one bathhouse in Calisthoga. The bathhouse in Santa Rosa, you can see it. This is the Kogan house. Kogan house stood about where city hall is right now. And just behind it, that building to the left of the eye, that was John Richards bathhouse. So John Richards did well, a former slave who did truly well, but he didn't just leave it at that. He wasn't just interested in his money. As time went by, he realized that the few African Americans who were in this town did not have the same rights as everyone else. For example, in the school district, we set up black Indian and Asian children, not allowed to go to the local schools. So John Richards took upon himself to start the first black school in Santa Rosa. Also at the same time, there were other civil rights actions going on, including the Freedmen's Convention in Washington, DC in 1870s. And John Richards was the representative of Santa Rosa to that convention in 1870. He did lots of other things in support of the black community. It's for the community always in Rosa. Okay. Next slide, please. And finally, father daughter combination, Colonel James Boydston Armstrong, his daughter Lizzie or Elizabeth. When Colonel Armstrong, right in Santa Rosa after serving the Civil War, he went into lumber business. He realized by the 1880s, that all the regular trains are being cut down. And he said, we need to save some of these. The reaction from the lumber industry and basically the community was you had to be kidding. They're all the way from Santa Cruz to Alberta. That's ridiculous. But he persisted and he actually set aside worse of this land that he'd like to give to some of the citizens of Clark. He died in 1903. That didn't happen. His daughter Lizzie there took up the cost by 1912. She got the Armstrong woods to be declared a county park. And by 1935, it became state parking. So this is the type of stories and type of people. We have there in the cemetery. And with that, are there any comments from the other custom characters here? I'd like to say if you think you can take your way. Come up to the podium, please. It doesn't need to be in character unless you want to. Thank you. My name is Nancy Godfrey and I saw a paper and years ago, June 1994, about the cemetery looking terrible. I love cemeteries. This is where you find out about your town. It's in the cemetery. The stories that I told on the stones. And you start, well, why is that? Why did she die then? And all those children died or whatever. So it's always very interesting to find out. And I saw that. And I knew Bill through Montgomery High School. I said, I want to do that. So here in 19, whatever you know, we're 2023. We're still up to bottom line cemetery. It is my privilege to say that I have had the cemetery become what it is today. It is a thriving place. If you haven't been there, you need to take a walk. You go up there and walk around and see those stones in the flowers. See the native garden. See the rose bird. See the birds. Get on the top of there. You can just hear the birds singing away. It's a delightful place. I encourage you all to go and take a walk one night. Thank you. Everybody's dying. You take a decision. You know what? That's what my husband said. He said, well, I asked him to come out and help. And he went out there one time, got poisoned open, said that's it. And he said, you know what? I don't want to go there. Everybody's dying to get there. I'll be there one day. You know. Nancy is one of the few remaining originally volunteers for the. For almost 30 years. The kids that have volunteered for. Yeah. Oh, about 10 years now. So I'm going to say that I'm a kick on over. And I'm a relatively new member of the Santa Rosa. Rule cemetery preservation committee. My husband, I moved here from San Diego in 2013. And we are like, religious converts to Santa Rosa. We love Santa Rosa. My husband, a lot of research consider a lot of places we can move to. And we decided on Santa Rosa. And when we founded rural cemetery, it was like. Jewel. In what we already love about Santa Rosa. So hats off to. Bill. Nancy. They've done years and years of work. And I'm going to say thank you. Thank you. So do we have any questions? Does anybody ever look at the. Calvary cemetery. Yeah. My family is very good. Yeah. There's people. Lots in. Back. I mean. Just. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I mean. I think that's a good idea. I mean. Just forever. I think that's 1964. I think when. 1964 I think. I, uh, I go down there because I can't. Yeah. But I walk around and I go back and talk to her. I just don't. And to see it's all. This is amazing. Well, I already assume from 1854. And many of the cemeteries in this area have followed our lead by having lifelike tours. They happen quite a bit around here. Any other questions or comments? It's a good question regarding the native plant apta garden. Is that part of the park, the park funds go towards the maintenance of that? Or is it all volunteers? Volunteers. It's all volunteers. Installed and maintained by volunteers. Awesome. Incredible work. And it's also recognized by the California Native Plant Society. Your training session there. One in Southern California, one in North California. They selected that garden for their training session. It's very cool. Congrats. Great. Well, thank you, Bill, Nancy and Kit all for coming in and for being patient sitting through our thrilling ordinance update. Thank you for what you do. I'm a big history fan, local history fan. I've been there many times and look through the graves. It's really cool who's there. And I do have one question. This maybe, maybe it's too serious, but what is going to happen when the county redevelops the old Sinead site? It doesn't have border. Your cemetery or is there. No, the county has two old cemeteries to. The one in the north of the city. The one in the south of the city. The one in the north of the city. The one in the north of the city. Formerly Parker fields. Yeah. What is in Sinead. And that's part of the whole issue about what happens up there. My understanding is that they've set the criteria that that cemetery is preserved. Okay. But in 1947, seeing that that cemetery was getting full. They bought a portion of the center was a rural cemetery. So that's the fifth cemetery down there. So that's where the cemetery is. So that's where the cemetery is. So that's where the cemetery is. So that's where the cemetery is beginning to get more active and maintain. Okay. But that won't be redeveloped as part of that. Okay. Okay. My understanding is it's to be set aside. Yeah. Okay. I've been wondering that. So thank you. Well, great. Thanks for coming in again and for telling what you do. Thank you. Carol for being a great volunteer. She keeps us updated on what, what you're doing. So Monday at noon, I'm going to talk about the graves of veterans at Florida. 1812. The green one. I have a question. Any tickets left for left light. Last time I heard we sell about Florida tickets last, there's about 70 left. Left light is September 15th and 16th. And we have eight tours each night. You can. You only, you buy your ticket the earlier toy. You can get right now the tours available are probably late ones, which in my opinion are more interesting anyway. So if you're interested, tickets can be purchased at the front desk. All right. Any other questions or comments from the board? All right. Thank you again. Yeah. Thanks for doing what you do. Now you have to keep the hat on. I take my hat on. I'm just saying there you go. All right. All right. All right. Good stuff. Okay. We are now on to. I'm sorry. Do we have any public comments on item. 8.1. We have no hands raised at this time. Okay. No one present. Thank you. I remember. All right. Next is item number nine committee reports. Still no mayor's lunch happening. We are working on that. Okay. Hopefully next month it'll happen. Do you have a waterways committee? The waterways committee will be having its first in-person meeting tomorrow morning. Very exciting. And two projects will be discussed. Both. Canary project, which is informational. And a project being built. And it will be on the airfield. On one of the runways. Both projects will be discussed. Tomorrow. Where do they need that? Upstairs. City hall. Cross from chambers. Number. 9am Thursday morning. Okay. Great. Thank you. Great. Thank you. We got a park there called airfield park. That used to be on it. Thanks, Carol. Okay. Item nine or item 10. Jen, do we have any written or electronic communications? We do not have any. Okay. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. Okay. Okay. Great. Great. Great. Great. Great. We do not have any written or electronic communications. Great, thank you. Okay. Item 11. Are there future agenda items you'd like to see? I think we have one from Carol for that. A youth park update at some point in the future. Did it in my characterized? Right. As much as an update is. A historic overview. it and I'm not asking for a heroic deep dive but if there's some department folklore like where to come from and where it's going. Great and I think with adding our youth member that makes sense to know more about the youth park. Another agenda item I don't know if it's appropriate but to revisit Fremont Park we seem to be getting very close to the apartment building across the street. Okay. Any other future agenda items to give up on the park? Yeah, what are you the start time? Just see if we get any sort of comments, feedback, see how it's going, see if we have more public comment at 5 o'clock than we do before. So August or September? Yeah, I think that's how I work. Yeah, let's do September. Okay, great. See how that's working. I have one thing. I guess we need to still figure out the youth member criteria. So you got that. Of course you do. It's great. Anything else? Okay, well then that will conclude our meeting. The next regularly scheduled meeting of the board will be held on Wednesday June 28th at 4 p.m. and with that I adjourn this meeting of the Board of Community Services at 5.41 p.m. Thank you everyone.