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AlamedaCC_03032015_2015-1338

Speaker 0: Good evening, mayor and city council members. I'm Ninette Mercado in the Community Development Based Fees Department. Tonight, we're asking you to approve a six year lease with the Water Emergency Transportation Authority for its maintenance and operation center. If approved, this project will mark the first new construction to occur on Alameda Point. The proposed project would provide maintenance services such as fueling engine oil changes, concession supply and light repair work for the LEDA ferryboats operating in the central San Francisco Bay. In addition to the proposal. In addition, the proposed project would be the location for operation activities of Weta, including day to day management and oversight of services, crew and facilities in the event of a regional disaster. The facility would also function as an emergency operations center, serving passengers and sustaining water transit services for emergency response and recovery. The site selected as an area transferred referred to as Term one, which is property always owned by the city but was formerly leased to the Navy. The Navy had tight control of the area until around 2001, when they extinguished the lease and removed improvements at the city's request. The area is also part of the state title and so it's restricted for maritime and water related uses. We two staff will walk you through the improvements they're proposing for the property on the land and water side. I will describe the details of the transaction. We will be paying a base rent of approximately of $5,125. The city's development impact fee for all Me two point is 9790 $956 per acre, and potential developers can opt to install their fair share of infrastructure improvements as outlined in the master infrastructure plan. In lieu of paying that fee, in other words, and acres worth of improvements for every acre of land, we will be installing infrastructure instead of paying that impact fee. Using the fee structure, we just landside obligation would be $714,640 because their landside improvements comprise 0.73 acres. Recognizing that there is some water side impact. Staff negotiated $2.5 million in infrastructure included in the master infrastructure plan because we too also will be leasing 3.4 acres of submerged parcels. The most significant improvement will be the installation of the $1 million water line running from the base to the water main on Pacific Avenue. This will be the first line on Alameda Point Water line on Alameda Point that will be in compliance with East Bay mud standards. Other master infrastructure plan improvements include a portion of the waterfront park contributing to the reconfiguration of Main Street and flood protection improvement. Approving the list tonight will only give way to the real estate right to develop the property. We also will need to go through the planning board for use, permit and project conditions. They currently are scheduled to go to the Planning Board on March 23rd. At that meeting, the planning board will determine use conditions. I think that's an important point to make, to remind the community that the planning board will be making decisions about this project and more specifically because of a phone call I receive later today regarding concern over the height of the proposed building. After conferring with the city planner, I was informed that the proposed building is 65 feet tall, and the height restriction in that district of the of the base is 100 feet. For further frame of reference, the USS Hornet is 190 feet to the top of its mass. So the scale of the building is not out of line with its surroundings. Also keep in mind that the long term lease with the Department of Transportation Maritime Administration anticipates that there'll be a new warehouse adjacent to the piers. If the existing warehouse is torn down for development. So there potentially would be another structure of similar size in the vicinity. The issue that is most discussed in the public arena is the removal of the seal haul out at the project in the project area. Over the years of negotiating this project. Harbor SEALs have established a hall out area on the old dilapidated pier, which is approximately 80 feet long. After all of your environmental consultations and conferring with the city's biologists, there doesn't seem to be an impact in removing the hall out entirely, especially given the ample hull out available on the nearby breakwater. However, there are community concerns for which we too has agreed to use commercially reasonable efforts to locate, design and construct an alternate hull out via a negotiated MRU with the city. The reason we're not bringing the menu to you tonight or an additional approval is because we need to determine the appropriate location for the facility and be mindful that we don't create another unwanted environmental impact on the waterfront affecting other species, creating obstacles to additional waterfront improvements such as a small marina or an additional ferry terminal. We just don't know yet. We don't want to put the hull out in a place that will tie our hands later. Finally, staff is able to recommend the approval of this project for several reasons. First, consistency with the general plan and zoning designations for the property. This is in the Alameda Point Enterprise Zoning District, which is to support maritime uses consistent with the Public Trust Exchange Agreement, provide land for employment and business uses and residential use of this land is not permitted. Because of disaster preparedness as an island community with limited access to the to the region, Alameda must do everything it can to prepare for a major disaster. It will be a major benefit to the residents of Alameda to be home of Guido's EOC and the region's ferry boats in December of last year. I attended a half day meeting with the fire chief, public works director and representatives from DC and regional FEMA offices to tour Alameda Point. The Wheeler facility played a significant role in the response and access planning for the city of Alameda. Alternate transportation services. This facility is an important step towards ensuring a strong partnership between the community and the regional ferry provider. Investment in Alameda Point. This project will take a small parcel of land and invest 45 to $50 million in construction of the facility and infrastructure. Public Park and Bay Trail Improvement Plan will align the Bay Trail to its long term placement, and the project will improve the adjacent adjacent public park area. I hope that you can support this recommendation tonight, and I'm going to turn the discussion over to Kevin Connolly, the manager of Planning and Development. Speaker 3: Thank you, Nanette. It's been a pleasure working with Annette on this project. My name is Kevin Connolly. I'm the manager of planning and development for the Water Emergency Transportation Authority. With me tonight is Michael Garrity, who is the project manager for this project. And we're happy to answer any questions you may have, which is going to run through a quick overview of the project. As Ninette said, really, I'm not going to add more than what she's already discussed. This is a rendering of our building. And as you said, it's just below 70 feet tall. It's about three stories. If you include or do not include a mezzanine, the third story is the emergency operations center, which is a key part of this and function of this building today. Our emergency operations center that we use in the event of any natural disaster would be our San Francisco facility on Pier nine, which is woefully inadequate in terms of its size and scale and functionality. This would be our center centerpiece for emergency operations in the whole Bay Area when it is complete. Look at the next one. I got. Speaker 2: It. Speaker 3: Here's an overview of the facility. There would be berthing space for 12 vessels here. All the auto vessels are used in Alameda service. So these are Alameda Main Street Harbor Bay and South San Francisco service. South San Francisco is sometimes forgotten among alameda commuters, but we have a healthy proportion of of our commuters to south San Francisco are coming from Alameda origins. So those are the 1212 for the 12 berths for our vessels on the water side that's a little bit over three acres of of overwater lands. Their power supported floating docks. They do not represent actual actual construction on the water they're floating. And they can be and will be removed on an occasional basis for cleaning and and and maintenance. There's also a maintenance facility, the major facility proper, which is mainly a light industrial light maintenance facility. Oil changes fueling light maintenance are heavy mean. This really takes place that bay ship on the estuary as well as in seaport as in shipyards up and down the West Coast. Seattle and San Diego have typically done our major maintenance work. One area where our service is really at vulnerable is we only have one day's worth of fuel at any given time. This facility will allow us to have up to five days storage of fuel in the event of a natural disaster and the ferries will be relied upon to serve the Bay Area. We will need those five days of fuel. We cannot really survive with only one day's of fuel. As the net said, the key infrastructure improvements here. One is the Bay Trail that runs along east west along Hornet Avenue. The second is the park area, which is just immediately to the east of our site that we are improving. Third is the main is the water main that's coming from Pacific. And fourth, we didn't mention is we're actually providing $250,000 towards improvements for parking at the Main Street terminal. And if you're aware of the situation there, Main Street is incredibly impacted today. A close up view of the site. And you can see we have fuel storage tanks across the street. That was a way of of reducing the project costs, making it simpler and making it easier to build. And it's also been incredibly productive in terms of the safety of the facility. In addition, you see there the West Hornet Avenue Bikeway that's going to be put in by us. We're improving the street as well, as well as the park. All of our facility here is being raised to seven feet above sea level for sea level rise at the 50 year level. And then finally, the SEALs issue that Nanette mentioned, and this is just a little project history on it, we first became aware of it roughly about a year ago, and we consulted with biologist at NOA and it NIPS the National Marine Fisheries Association. There was public comment, there was onsite meeting with the city staff and local residents in December. NOA issued its findings last month. And, you know, our intent is to build something for the SEALs. And as Nanette said, from our perspective, we submitted a memorandum memorandum of understanding, a draft about a month ago to the city. But we understand the concern that we do not know enough about where this location is yet. But when we do, we are committed to funding and constructing that hall. So with that I can answer any questions or I can turn over next. Speaker 2: Vice mayor of two questions. You were here before. Who's responsible for spills and containment as you're being changing oil and fueling? We are. And is that in the contract part of the lease? Or how does how does that how does that get assigned? Speaker 3: That's part of our regulatory responsibility with the Coast Guard. Coast Guard provides us licensing. Speaker 2: And. We're protective as a city. As far as liability from. Speaker 3: Yes. Speaker 5: Yes. We have provisions in the lease that that make any spills the responsibility of the tenant. Speaker 2: And the second is, you're still, according to the staff report, and what you said is you're still committed to building the hall out prior to dismantling the current one. Speaker 3: Right. We are going to work with the city staff to identify the best location and timing for doing that. Speaker 2: Prior to removing the existing one. That's. That's still your position. Speaker 3: That's that's that's our intent. Speaker 2: Right. Thank you. Speaker 0: Councilmember Ashcroft. Speaker 6: And I just wanted to also clarify that in the lease, even before I knew that this the report of the the spill in the estuary was going to be on this agenda. I bookmark that there are pages in this in this lease agreement that we are approving tonight that have to do with. The installation use of fossil fuel storage facilities. They are required to be double walled Maersk and any fuel dock must contain adequate measures to prevent and detect any fuel spill spills or leaks. And it goes on, as I said, for pages. I thought it was very thorough. So I would just say that I want to be sure that no one who's listening gets confused with what's being presented here proposed tonight and the presentation we heard about the estuary spill, because after all, that's still a mystery. I mean, somebody we don't know where it came from, but it's clear that these sorts of procedures weren't in place. If you if you read this lease, as I said, riveting stuff. But it's it's very thorough. And see.

Regular Agenda Item

Introduction of Ordinance Approving a Lease and Authorizing the City Manager to Execute Documents Necessary to Implement the Terms of a 60 Year Lease Agreement and Approve a Temporary Right of Entry Permit with Water Emergency Transportation Authority (WETA) for 0.73 acres of Undeveloped Upland Real Property and 3.4 acres of Submerged Lands located along West Hornet and Ferry Point Streets at Alameda Point. (Base Reuse 858)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_03032015_2015-1324

Speaker 6: But with regard to temporary measures, I wanted to I'm prepared to make a motion, but I wanted to just check in with the vice mayor. Was there a modification? You're talking about a modification of the language so this could come back for the second reading? And was there language from what Mr. Mchunu stated that you wanted to have incorporated? Speaker 2: And before I answer that question there, and I was wondering if. We can have an explanation of the the next step of the process, because Mr. McConnell mentioned prior to a use permit being granted at the at the planning level that use permit. In order to get that the noise issue is may be gated at that point. Is that correct? And the placement and maintenance responsibilities for the hall out may be placed at that at that point, is that correct? Speaker 6: So the two issues were the noise issues and the placement of all that. I was just getting it from my notes. Speaker 5: So I guess what we're trying to figure out here is how we can put the planning board and put conditions on the use permit here. I don't see any planners out here who can help us out. But we would hope that we could put some conditions. I mean, we do conditions on developments all the time. But frankly, to answer that off the top of my head, I really can't give you a firm answer. That's certainly what we intend to do. And I appreciate this. Will listen to the readers. We a staff, if they're willing to accept something like that. But, I mean, it's a matter of how we would design those conditions. So go ahead. Speaker 3: I'm just going to address quickly. This project had Environmental Impact Report and an environmental impact statement that represents roughly 500 pages of analysis on issues such as noise. And if you're really curious about noise, those are the documents to reference. This isn't the first time this project has has been analyzed. It's been analyzed extensively in terms of those issues. Truck travel and truck paths to it are all documented in that document. And they follow the city code in terms of where those trucks are allowed to travel on your streets. You have laid that out very specifically about the streets that are allowed and not allowed. The trucks will go on this allowed streets. In terms of whether we're allowed to or whatever the arrangement is, we are more than happy to do an m0u to build a seal haul out money is not the issue. We are spending $50 million and so 80,000 is fine. You drive a hard bargain, but we will spend that 80,000. We provided an email you to the city and with the hopes that it can come to you tonight. But the city had had reservations about that moving forward. If those reservations could be overcome on the city level, we're happy to execute that. But really on our side, we were prepared to do it. If there's any other questions. I'm since I'm already standing up. Speaker 6: No, I. This is something I was just going to make a comment about a come I heard from the dais about not wanting to hear any more cavalier attitude from staff about wildlife. And perhaps I missed it, but I'm actually quite impressed with all the discussions and negotiations and preparation of IMO use. It's in process addressing the wildlife. So I, I don't think if anything, I think perhaps it was misinterpreted. I think we're taking this quite seriously. Speaker 2: I think. Speaker 4: Thank you, Madam Mayor. I do think that the comment made by one of the members of the public that. That stuff just kind of dismissed the idea that said, oh, they can just go to the break, the breakwater. My point was, I kind of agreed with that, that member of the public that said that. So. I think my comment was I'm not taking it back, if that's what you're asking. Speaker 6: Oh, I know you're not. I'm not taking mine back either. Speaker 0: And I believe at this point we're waiting to hear from staff on. That's so right. So that everyone's aware at this point. We're waiting to hear back from staff in response to members questions. Speaker 2: I have, I believe. When I was. Speaker 6: Little. Speaker 3: If you do that and you have to open up. Excuse me, Madam Mayor. I'm sorry. You know, I have a tremendous amount. Speaker 2: Of respect for the public process. This, however, is a business. Speaker 3: Meeting that needs to be conducted. Speaker 2: Like a business meeting. And Mr. Peterson, walking up to the proscenium and directing everybody how the meeting should proceed. Speaker 3: Is frankly inappropriate. The Clerk No. You directed all the way across here. Speaker 2: I'm not going to speak with Mr. Peterson. This is the point. This is the point. Madam Mayor, I'm sorry. You two get control of the chamber, please. Speaker 0: So. So this. I'm sorry. It's my understand. We're waiting to hear back from staff. Speaker 2: We're trying to do that, but it's very difficult to. Speaker 0: Make you. Speaker 3: Do it. Speaker 6: We thank you for your time for a five minute break. Speaker 0: So we will be taking. Do we need a motion to do that? No. Okay. We will be taking a five minute break and reserving 10:00 for that clock. Thank you very much. Everyone, if you can, please take your seats. We're going to resume the meeting. Uh. Thank you very much. Appreciate your patience and staff. Will you be responding? Thank you. Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you, Madam Mayor. So in consultation with our potential partners that we'd have. The solution we've arrived. Speaker 2: At that we proposed to the Council is. Speaker 3: To. Speaker 2: Have an memorandum of understanding in writing. That will be in the package for Thursday, this Thursday, and will be given to the Council to vote. Speaker 3: On at the time. Speaker 2: Of the second reading of this agreement. Therefore, if. Speaker 3: The Council is not satisfied with the. Speaker 2: Memorandum of Understanding at the time of the second reading, the Council then can vote down the second reading and you don't have a lease with WADA that you don't want. The first reading is tonight, but that doesn't. Speaker 3: Render the least effective, least effective upon the second reading. 30 days after. But the second reading is when you authorize it and then the 30 days happens, but you can't do is have the have the second vote and then undo it on that. Speaker 2: Well, we. Speaker 3: Don't want to go down that road. So our proposal. Speaker 2: Is. Either vote it up or down tonight. If you vote it up and it goes to a second reading. Speaker 3: Then at the time of the second reading at the March 17th meeting. Speaker 2: You will have an MRU in front of you that deals with the question of the hall layout putting money into. Speaker 3: Escrow to pay for the hall out. All of those. Speaker 2: Items would be in writing, and that's how we propose to solve the dilemma that we find ourselves in tonight. Speaker 0: I have a follow up question to the attorney. Does that mean that this is not a substantive change? Speaker 5: That is correct, because what you're voting on is the lease itself. And what you're adding on on the second read is basically a conditional document that we've already referenced that's been a promise which has given some trouble to certain of the council members that it's not a firm enough commitment. And what we're suggesting is that staff, both of WETA and the city work very hard and get the actual document that you're looking for in place. So that Condition two going forward with the lease would actually be satisfied for you before you would do the second vote. So you're not modifying the actual ordinance of the lease approval, you just have the document in front of you. Speaker 2: And then you choose. If you don't like that. Speaker 3: Document, then you choose not to vote. The lease. Speaker 0: And the the NYU language does not have to be contained in the original reading of the lease to still satisfy the public's right to notice. Speaker 5: The well. The public will get the type of an M.O. you is required to come to the Council for an approval. And that's how we're setting this up. It will get its 12 day advance notice for council to take action. And what we're suggesting is that council will be able to look at that, decide if it's adequate to what you are looking for. What we're hearing from you here tonight, if you if you believe it is and you vote to approve that, then I assume you would be willing to go forward on the second reading, which is just confirming then the approval of the lease, because you have satisfied that your concerns, if instead the memo you that we bring forward does not do that, then you have the opportunity to just not do the second reading because you haven't had that issue satisfied. But we're not building in the hall out issue into the lease itself, so we're not making any kind of substantial change to the lease itself. Speaker 0: That's clear. Any other member questions or comments? Speaker 2: Just to be clear, that's mayor M.O.. You went. Should it be approved at the next council meeting will be a binding contract between Leda and the city of Alameda. Speaker 5: That is what our intent is, that it doesn't. Speaker 2: Need a second reading on its own. Speaker 5: No, the MOTU does not. The reason we have a first and second reading for the lease is because again, our charter requires that we do leases pursuant to ordinance and so an ordinance requires two readings, an introduction and then an actual adoption. The two readings but regular contracts, agreements, what have you only require one vote. And so the IMO you which is a separate document related but a separate document only requires one vote. Speaker 2: Thank you. And, Madam Mayor, that satisfies my concerns. I, I want to see the jobs here. I want to see our marine related industry expanded. I want to protect the environment. Same time we had has mentioned and was in the staff report that they are of the same mind. And I think I appreciate staff. I seen this of very intensely in the last 10 minutes. So I'm ready to move forward on the first reading and anticipate getting the ammo used so we can make sure that, you know, the public has a chance to look at it and we all are comfortable that it satisfies the concern Speaker 0: . Our second plus was that emotion. I thought we had emotion before, but it's just your emotion now, Vice Mayor, is that emotion that. Speaker 6: We didn't have before. Speaker 5: We didn't. Speaker 6: Know. Speaker 0: So where are you planning to is that did you want to frame emotion? Speaker 2: I confirm emotion around. Speaker 0: That's up to. Speaker 6: You. I mean, your emotion. Speaker 2: Is here. The emotion is that we approved the first hearing of the lease as written. With the condition that a memorandum of understanding will accompany the second reading. And it will be reviewed and disposition at that time. Speaker 6: In our second. Speaker 0: Although some favorable comments. Yes. Speaker 7: I just want to say to the members who are here tonight and to the watching public, I think this is exactly the example of staff really putting the grist to the wheel, so to speak, and making and working things out. The residents raise concerns and as proof, you know, we care about the environment and we care about moving forward with the economic development. So tonight, it's a good night. You know, everyone, we should feel happy about this. I support it. Speaker 0: And remember, it is all right. All those in favor I oppose. I oppose. The vote passes 4 to 1 and I oppose. First of all, I believe that this should have been included in the first reading. I'm not satisfied that a separate and we're coming back separately actually satisfies the intent of the law that in regards to the first reading and the second reading. And then also I have the concerns that were stated that I in regards to an environmental review on this issue, having experts brought in, it's not just putting up some floating dock that there's actually a special specialist that spending time analyzing this. I'm concerned about the noise, the hours of operation. And I think that there should also be simulation sharing that with the community. And I, I think it's actually very important that the size of the building itself, as well as all of the additional docks, be clearly shown and depicted in a manner that's clear to the public before we proceed. Speaker 2: Madam Chair, may I ask a question of staff? Speaker 0: It's usually not appropriate, but I'm not sure what you're going to be asking. Speaker 2: This question is on the process of the use permit and the planning process for actually building what the lease now and what the lease will have will include public input and planning board decision on the size, shape and scope of the building and will deal with issues of noise and put mitigations and additional restraints on if demonstrated there needed will allow the public to weigh in. So there's a whole process in front of this. Is that correct? Speaker 5: Yes, you are correct. They still assuming the lease is approved finally and it is effective, then we will have to go through our process of the design review and getting approvals from the planning board, which is all public process and all of the things that you mentioned. Vice Mayor Matarese would be part of that. Speaker 2: And if the Planning Board's decision doesn't satisfy one member of this body, that member within ten days of the decision can call it for review. Is that also correct? Speaker 5: That is correct. Speaker 2: So I think there's a it's not trust us, it's subject to scrutiny by the council, subject to scrutiny by the planning board, and it's subject to scrutiny by the public. Speaker 0: So actually, I think comments like that need to be made prior to the vote. So moving on to item six be. Speaker 1: Introduction of ordinance amending Alameda Municipal Code Chapter 19, Section 19 for underground utility districts to approve the redesigned underground utility district policy. Speaker 0: Mr. Steiger. Speaker 2: Good evening, Mayor Spencer and members of the. Speaker 7: Elmira City Council. Speaker 2: I'm Glenn Steiger. I'm general manager of Alameda Municipal Power. And we're before you here tonight to introduce the redesigned Underground Utility District Program, which has been in place since 1984, but which was suspended in 2012 for the express purpose of redesign based on certain concerns that were raised at that time. And with that introduction, I'd like to turn this presentation over to our Assistant General Manager of Engineering Operations, Doug Drager, who will walk you through the redesign program. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Drager. Speaker 3: Thank you, General Manager Steiger. Mayor Spencer, members of the council, appreciate your time tonight. I want to run through a short presentation, introduce you to the background of the U. D program. Talk about the proposed changes, as Mr. Steiger indicated in the redraft. I talk about quickly about some next steps, and of course, to answer any questions. The first thing I do want to do is publicly thank members of the public who served on our stakeholder committees throughout the entire process, some of which are here tonight. I'd also like to thank Lori Cusick of Public Works, who is my liaison with Public Works and was a great assistance. Also my peers, Robert or Veda and Rebecca Irwin and Gary Spirit, who helped develop this program. And then, of course, Bob Hein and Mr. Steiger, the department heads of public works and and AMP, respectively, who acted as the sponsors for this program. As General Manager Steiger mentioned, this program began in 1984. It was a beautification program for the city. Ordinance was written to convert through underground districts that were decided by designated by the city council to convert from overhead to underground facilities that involved all overhead facilities, those regulated by the CPC as well as AMP, which is regulated by our Public Utilities Board and ultimately by the council. A fund was set up to collect 2% of the AMP electric revenue and that fund was set up exclusively as a reserve to fund this undergrounding program. To date, about 50% of the island is underground. That's a combination of underground that was installed as underground and new developments as the electrical system was built up. We also have completed 25 yards to date, which accounts to about 433 customers. In about 2011, when we started working on District 31, which is the Webster Crossing, we really reached a consensus with our public and staff that there was existing problems with the current process that had not really had any kind of major changes since 1984. One of the biggest concerns was district prioritization. There really wasn't a process in place for understanding why one district got funded over another. The public and staff had considerable concerns over the public participation, and then there was a substantial interest in the cost of conversion for property owners, especially during the time we were just coming out of a recession. And actually a lot of people weren't even out of the recession by that point in time. So staff made a recommendation and council accepted that in 2012 we would redraft the program in order to reflect some of the conditions and concerns that the public and the staff had. There are four main considerations that we that we wanted to address. The first was the prioritization. At the time, there were 16 different criteria that denoted the prioritization of of you. Some of them didn't even have an objective ness to them at all, and there really was no historical backing as to where they came from. So so we needed to really focus on how how districts were prioritized and chosen. We also wanted to take a look at not only the including the public in the process of the redrafting of the program, but then how the public would play a part in in implementing the program. We also wanted to take a look at the financial obligations as to what kind of cost sharing fit with with the modern times and then implementation in understanding the different city roles. It really breaks it down into three parts. The policy is what's in front of you tonight that's reflected in the ordinance. The master plan and the and the scorecard are two of the of the behind the scenes or the implementation tools of the process and would be things that would would be would change over time as as eventualities came up. But the policy would be something that's it's an overarching guidance. It would have city approval. It obviously is memorialized in it and in a ordinance. And we want to come back and review it every five years. And that's an improvement from the old process. We want to at least take a look at it every five years. So let's take a look at the program from from kind of a 30,000 foot level and go through the each of the each of the steps. It starts with the district nominating board. The intent of the district nominating board is to involve the public with with city members to really denote to taking a look at the overall map of of where you these could be positioned within the city work with applying the criteria that that have been introduced. And I'll go over I'll touch on a little bit in more detail, apply those criteria to the different parts of the island in order to get a some kind of recommendation for areas where you Udi's would would best fit and would rise to the top of the prioritization. And in doing so each, each of the foods in order to fulfill the program for general public interest and benefit. And the counterpart is rule 28. If you've heard about it on the CPU side or the regulated side, each of the foods would have to meet one of the three criteria listed there. And the reason for that is, is under the CPC Rule 20, a, any CPC regulated utility such as AT&T or Comcast would need to have one of these criteria present in the UD in order to be able to participate. Well, they could participate, however, they get funding for it, so they would need that. Otherwise they're not going to cough up their own money for it. We wanted to address that to other you. You did the two other underground situations within the policy. However, they haven't fit within the program in the past and that is of general public interest, but primarily of local benefit. These would be you, you, these are underground districts that don't meet any of the CPC criteria. And so they wouldn't be in the general public, they would would be in the general public interest. We would want them underground, but it would be primarily for a local benefit, such as a developer who wanted to underground. This could still be incorporated into the program. However, the fees and costs would be paid by the developer, by those citizens who wanted to do that, and then areas of insufficient general or local public benefit. It fits with Rule 20 C on the CPC side, those who continue, they would sit outside the program and they would continue to be funded by the private party. Who benefited from that? So the CPAC criteria this came this was derived out of a series of stakeholder meetings with the public. It was actually a public stakeholders who put together these criteria. They also found that they wanted them. Oops, sorry, it's not on the slide. They wanted them waited. So the tier ones would we have with the scorecard that I alluded to earlier, it would provide an objective score around the criteria. The tier ones would obviously be weighted a little bit more heavily. Their tier twos would be weighted down from that. This would allow a prioritization, an objective prioritization that would give us a sense for what what you would rise to a higher level than others. And it's it's information and allows us to prioritize them. The program is generally wants we generally are the stakeholders generally wanted to favor island entryways and heavily traveled road. The reason for this is the reasoning is is that that would derive the most general public benefit for the citizens of Alameda that they contribute to this. The second is a holdover from the old program is the Technical Advisory Committee. Back in the day that was headed by public works in about 1990, AMP took over the leadership in the in the nineties, AMP took over the leadership. AMP would continue to be the project leader. This is the step where we really define the exact boundaries of of the recommended UDS that come from the DMB. So we would want to the TAC would want to find what between one and four UDS that rise to the highest level on the criteria define the define the exact boundaries so that everyone the public knows specifically the UDS that we're discussing because the next step of that is to take it to a town hall meeting. The town hall meeting is to expose the citizens within those districts that are being considered as well as anyone who has any other interest of exactly what the boundaries are going to be and any issues and conditions relevant to to the UD process. That's followed up by a district selection survey, and that serves two purposes. The first is to catch anybody who didn't come to the town hall meeting, who might be in one of the UDS and in provides them with the same information and the same Q&A that they happened at the town hall meeting will be dispensed with the district selection survey. The second is to gauge interest from those people who are in the foods, to give us to give us to ultimately be able to make a recommendation to you council on some kind of basis of feedback for how they feel about the issues or recommendations or the issues about you you do, and the boundaries, etc.. Speaker 0: I'm sorry, before you continue. Our protocol requires that by 1030 that we'll need four votes to consider remaining items. We still have item 60, 66 E and nine A and it's 1030, approximately 1030. The Council would do. Want to discuss. Are there so much do you think, that you want to go forward with all of these items tonight and you want to have any items that we don't necessarily have to go forward with tonight? And the comment. Speaker 2: Is. Speaker 6: Still. Speaker 0: 60, 60, 69. Oh, yes. And then go back to closed session after. Yes. Speaker 2: Vice Mayor, I will ask if I can or my council referral. To a future agenda. This is going to be late, late, late. I want to. Speaker 0: Thank you. I appreciate that, vice mayor. Are there any other of these agenda items that we don't necessarily need to proceed with at this point? Staff. Just cause we have feedback from you or any council members. Speaker 6: Well, I think with the vice mayor's gracious accommodation, I would move that. We go past that we consider additional items after 1030. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 0: So I'd like to start a response, if there are any, that they don't think we need to proceed with this evening. Speaker 5: That we don't need to correct. Speaker 0: It could come down that I. Speaker 5: Would potentially look at is succeed, but I would defer that to Mr. Nguyen. Speaker 6: And I would just also want to make sure that we're not then overloading another agenda because we, you know, want to keep doing this to ourselves. Speaker 0: Well, actually, we don't all keep doing this to ourselves. I don't prepare the agenda. Or as I know, you don't prepare the agenda. This gets handled. This gets brought to us. Yeah. Thank you very much. Speaker 3: We could defer six C or just. Speaker 2: Delay or smarter parking. Speaker 5: Meters. Speaker 6: Uh. Speaker 0: That. Okay. Speaker 6: Do we think that one would even take that much time? Speaker 0: A council. Speaker 4: I prefer. Just keep it. But. Speaker 0: All right. So we have a motion on the table. Second, all those in favor. I propose I oppose the votes 4 to 1 to pass. I oppose because I think it's inappropriate, as we had an earlier speaker this evening, say that we're not really public when we're having such late meetings. I think we're going to have an agenda building problem. So you may continue. Thank you. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mayor Spencer. The next step of the process is after receiving the district selection survey. Feedback is for the TAC to bring between one and three yard recommendations to City Council for approval. City Council then at that point will make a determination and and ultimately by resolution, put the districts, choose the districts. At that point, a single master contractor will be used to coordinate and install all the electrical sub panels and do and do all the work. Again, that was another recommendation that came from from our stakeholder process. In light of the cost sharing program for areas of general public interest in benefit, which has been this program since 1984 , the general master contractor. And the intent of the program is to cover underground laterals from back of sidewalk. Obviously the distribution in the street, but the back of sidewalk to people's meter meter on their property. The conversion of the panel is also included in the program. What is not included is if a resident decides that at that point in time they want to convert to a larger panel, such as going from 100 AMP panel to a 200 AMP panel, the duty fund would not fund that. Also, telecommunications under the CPC ruling will pay for the first 100 feet in Alameda. That applies for almost every service that's out there. Most customers will not have an out-of-pocket expense in the conversion. That's the intent of the program. However, there and when I say most, I mean we're hoping 99.9%. There's probably two different situations where people may have costs. They may choose to have a path from the service point, a back, a sidewalk to some point on their house. That AMP does not agree to and believes that it's an excess above, above and beyond. I think what would be normal and agreed upon and we don't believe that the fund or the rest of the customers should pay for that, for that excess. But we do find that we understand that not all paths will be an exact straight line if people have encumbrances in their yards. We can work that out. And that's why the policy does allow for AMP to approve any anything that's that's out of the ordinary. However, if things are extremely out of the ordinary, we believe that customers should pick up that extreme expense. Also, there will be a few services that might be over 100 feet in which they will have some cost to the telecom company, although we anticipate it to be very, very small. And will it really be a case by case basis? Again, as I mentioned, four areas of general public interest, but they do not meet a CPC criterion in public benefit. Those would be funded 100% by the applicant or applicants. We ask only a few things from from business owners and their responsibility. We do want them to be involved in the process. We do want them to come to the town hall meeting. We do want them to provide survey responses. Although we do have a master contractor, we understand that some people want to hire their own and we want to allow that. However, the reimbursement costs will be based on on a determined square foot costs so that, again, the fund or everyone's general money isn't paying for someone's excessive costs for what they want to do. So as long as they stay within that standard rate is determined by the master contractor, the fund will reimburse them for those costs to cost share as appropriate. There was some concern that came out of the process in Alameda. The resident owns their underground service from the point of service, which is behind the sidewalk to the meter panel. There was concern by some residents that they didn't want to take on that risk of having an underground service. So AMP will set up a maintenance fund. It'll be funded through a monthly contribution by those who choose to be involved in it. It will be very small. The amount would be very small. And if there is an act, if their service does fail for any reason other than third party malice, basically a third party digging into it if if it fails for any other reason ample come out and and it will be repaired under the maintenance costs. So it takes away that risk. So in summary, the redesign really captures, I think, the the design of what we wanted to capture it. We do have what we believe to be a fairly solid objective scorecard. We will be if if you do approve the policy, we'll be working with stakeholder groups to make the last final additions to that and making sure that it's a very solid, objective scorecard for prioritizing districts. I think it's a much more transparent process because it's quantifiable scorecard. It's and we also are going to do it in the public arena. We have every intent to publish everything that we do within the stakeholder meetings. And then ultimately as the DMB and the TAC move along, we plan to publish all of that as well on the UDD website and we believe that we have a better process for gathering public input than we had before and that the plan proposes, promotes or creates a maintenance fund. This was presented at a town hall meeting back in late November, in November and in it passed it was a robust meeting was held a robust meeting with a lot of questions and the policy that's before you with just some very minor tweaks by the PCB and December eight policy. That's before you was robustly supported by everyone at the town hall meeting back in November. Next steps, disregard the revise the ordinance. You can consider this the first reading of the ordinance unless unless there's other direction we would if the policy is approved tonight, we would AMP would need to revise their rules and regulations that are based on the on the old program. And then we are already in the process of program initiation and gathering the team, but we would want to put that in high gear. The intent is to try and get the D and B together by early summer, no later than August. Try to get you dudes in front of you, hopefully before the Christmas break or not soon after so that we can get going on the master contractor. That RFP is going to take some work, but we want to get that done because hopefully we can get a shovel in the ground in late spring or maybe early summer of next year. With that, I'm all yours. Speaker 0: Any clarifying questions? Speaker 6: I've got my. Speaker 0: Member, ASHCROFT. Speaker 6: Thank you, Mayor Spencer. And thank you for that presentation. And by the way, for all of you who put it together, that was a really great staff report, really interesting to read. I think this is a great project. And my only question, by the way, there was no shortage of acronyms in that presentation, although I think I followed most of them. But so the D and B is the district nomination board, and I'm looking at exhibit one. I'm on page three, and it talks about how the district nomination board A, D and B is responsible for the initial nomination of proposed districts. I mean, you've done a great job on public outreach already with these town halls and, you know, hearing from from stakeholders. But it wasn't clear to me from reading this material how will you notify the public and solicit public interest in serving on the DMB? Because I would imagine you want see geographical representation around the city or whatever your criteria are. So how will people who might be, who might be interested, who haven't stayed up till 1042 listen to this presentation. I know about that. Speaker 3: Our intent is to publish it as widely as possible. So the ULI program and all supporting documents are on the UDD site at Alameda Municipal Power. We have a quite a public. Stakeholder group that is that has an email that set up in our email blast. And so that information around where we are in the process and what's coming up would be sent out on that. And we would also be partnering with with the City Hall and publication around. Speaker 6: The city website. Yes. Speaker 3: Absolutely. Speaker 6: And what about local publications like print publications? Speaker 3: Absolutely. Our intent our intent is to publish it to garner as much support as possible. We're hoping to have to ask people to wait until the next one. Speaker 6: Right. If they've already served. Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 0: We do have a speaker on this of clarifying questions. Speaker 6: My question. Speaker 0: Yes. Member Brody. Speaker 4: I think you met a mayor back on this, this DMB, the three people. How are they all one. How are they going to be selected? I mean, is that something AMP selects or the council selects or the mayor appoints? And two are what are the qualifications to serve on this board? Speaker 3: The qualifications is that you need to be a customer of of amp that can be both a landowner or an actual meter a meter customer. Beyond that, we're not restricting it. The selection process is we haven't we haven't 100% written it out, but it would be something where we would solicit interest and and in some kind of application, it wouldn't be too involved. How we would go about ultimately deciding what what person it may be, again, bringing together a stakeholder group. We don't want to put a lot of restrictions because we want everyone, but we will have to limit it. Otherwise it becomes an unwieldy committee. Speaker 4: Okay. Thank you. Speaker 0: Then let's take our public speaker, Travis Wilson. Speaker 2: Again. I've been through this for the last four years and I wanted to come and I wanted to say that. Speaker 3: I like this policy and I think that you should pass it. Speaker 2: I think the process has worked out pretty well. And I know you have a lot of people who want to be underground, and I think this is the best policy you're going to get. And Doug is the dedicated guy, and he has really brought a lot of this stuff into this policy. And I think that although there are not details like that, I think that they're going to develop in the in this structure. And I think it's really kind of well put together. And I want to use the rest of my time to tell you a little story. Four years ago, I was sitting with a bunch of other people in District 31 and some of you remember this. That was our it was our I was I was one of those guys. It was our questions and and confusion and dissatisfaction that inspired me to redo this policy. We really believed that the majority of our district would want to to be exempt from undergrounding. We really thought that most people didn't want to do it in our particular district, but we didn't know if that mattered. We didn't know if we could change our fate. And we we tried to ask and we couldn't find out. And we read city ordinances. The language is actually the ordinance itself is actually pretty similar to what you see in this new plan. A lot of questions have been answered in this new plan. And I'm hitting the one that hasn't if you haven't seen where I'm going with that, you know, we knew the city could require undergrounding in certain cases, but we didn't know if those cases applied to us. And we just. Speaker 3: Asked, can. Speaker 2: Our district opt out? Can we say as a group we're going to opt out? No straight answer, no. No documentation, nothing written. We could consult. So the plan gets an overhaul. A couple of years later, I go to the the stakeholder meeting that Doug mentioned. I was I was one of those. I asked again, can a district opt out? It was not something that made it into the criteria. So, again, no, no information. And I go to pub a few months ago when this policy has come in and I ask him, I was that guy again. I asked him, you know what? What if this plan is better? But some people are surly. And what if you get a group of of a district where the residents don't want to dig? And they were very accommodating and they took it very seriously. And they got lawyers involved. And. Like Doug has written in your packet, the lawyer said that there would be too many legal issues involved with measuring residents opinion, and so they they too many legal issues involved in acting on that. And so they weren't going to do it. Which, by the way. Side note, that's a hell of a thing to say. I think it's legally complicated to ask the residents what they want. So. So we're not going to do it. I hope that we have better public input channels than that. And and that they reach more people than those who could show up to the town hall. Hopefully there's a middle ground some way we can measure the opinion of a group of people and take it seriously. But that's not my point. And it's not AMP's job to deal with that. And tonight, my request is, please change that. Please be clear. Talk among yourselves. But say something. Please be clear whether a district that doesn't want to be underground did. And whether they have a recourse to be exempt. They can follow the due process. But but, you know, we ask and everyone says if it happens, we'll ask council. And it happened four years ago and it came to council and we redid the whole plan, but we still don't have an answer. And because this is designed to speed up the process, I'm saying maybe you could get something on the record tonight that people can use to know whether they can decide as a district to opt out or not. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 2: Otherwise, I really. There's been tremendous progress here. So thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. And we have we do have another speaker now, Rosalinda Fortuna, Kaveh. Speaker 1: Good evening. I'll be quick. I'm a property owner close to Webster Street. And I was concerned with. The neighborhood. It's very close. Webster Street is very close to single family homes. A lot of these owners cannot. Hey, for, you know, all these improvements that they have to do. And I don't see how in I don't know how the telecommunications companies will pay for the first 100 feet, which is. Very expensive to do because I've done sewer laterals and I know how expensive those are. So it's pretty similar to doing a sewer lateral from what I see, because the majority of a sewer lateral expense is the labor in digging up the soil. And that's why now we have the sewers being done without digging it up. And you have other ways of replacing sewers because it's just way too expensive. So I'd like to find out how, you know, these telecommunication companies intend to do the first 100 feet, which would be wonderful, and pay pay for all of this expense for us homeowners and property owners. I, I don't think that's realistic, but I'd like to find out how they're going to do that without raising everyone's bills to an. It just. I just don't know how that would happen, but I just know that, uh, it's very expensive to maintain your property. And I'd like to be a part of trying to keep. The property owners informed because we always get hit with a lot of expenses and it's it's either through bonds or whatever. And, you know, there's there's only so much that property owners can do. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. We have no further speakers on that item. Member questions or comments? And Brody. Speaker 4: I actually want to thank you for the presentations very thorough. And I neglected to mention that earlier when I asked my question. I'm actually going to make a motion to move approval of the ordinance. Amending Limiting Municipal Code Chapter Roman Numeral Exec Section 19 Dash four to approve the redesigned utility or underground utility district policy. Speaker 0: I'll second if you have any member comments. Speaker 7: I have some comments and questions. I think if we can address the questions raised by Ms.. Fortuna, that would be great. I think one of the things that we want to definitely try to be clear about is that.

Regular Agenda Item

Introduction of Ordinance Amending Alameda Municipal Code Chapter XIX, Section 19-4 (Underground Utility Districts) to Approve the Redesigned Underground Utility District Policy. (Alameda Municipal Power)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_03032015_2015-1323

Speaker 3: Ultimately, we may decide to do things differently, and that would be a council decision with public input. Speaker 7: Okay. All right, then. That. I appreciate that point. I think my sense that there is a notion of a free. Understood. Cos I mean that was my reading of Policy three when it referenced the pre-established limit. So a limit. Suggests a certain amount of cost is understood, but that's fine. I think where we're at, or at least getting it on record, that we're going to deal with the effects of inflation and to some extent the five year policy. Five check does that. But I just want to make sure that that that it is on record that this was an issue that was discussed so that people don't suddenly get a sticker shock. So just to summarize, let's say there is a. Speaker 2: House. Speaker 7: And the house as it could in in year one, it can hire a person, the master contractor, to dig up the line. And he's going to use the same equipment in that year. One is going to actually do that job for that house is going to cost 3000 to $4000. But for whatever reason, it's not done in year one, but it's done five years later. But five years later, that same contractor is not going to charge $4,000, I suspect, but will take in the fact that, hey, labor costs rise. The cost of me buying this new equipment rises, i.e. to take into account the inflation. But when you mathematically adjust for the the effects of inflation. The dollars of an item expressed in the first years should really be the same as the dollars expressed five years later is just effects of inflation. So I think we we are on we have you know, we're having a discussion here that kind of lays it out that this is an issue. And so appreciate. Speaker 0: I have a question in regards. There was a speaker that spoke to how does the neighborhood opt out? Is that possible? Speaker 3: Under the policy. It is it is covered under, I believe, the second or third sentence or sentence to in the policy that the pub instructed actually this sentence to be included. And it's a resolution designate. An underground utility district requires that all property owners within that designated district comply with the necessary actions. Speaker 6: Mr. Tager, can you just direct us to what I knew? I read it somewhere, just direct as to what you're reading from. Speaker 3: Sorry policy to second, second in. Speaker 6: The in the staff report. Speaker 3: No, no, no, no. In the underground. Speaker 6: Program master. Speaker 3: Policy. This is actually wording in the evidence itself. Speaker 6: Okay. Is this exhibit one? Speaker 3: Yes, it would. I believe it. Yes, this is exhibit one. Speaker 6: Okay. And tell me again where. Speaker 3: Excuse me. Exhibit one. Speaker 6: In New. Speaker 0: York. Speaker 3: City. Speaker 6: It is its enter policy, paragraph two. Is that correct? A resolution designating an underground utility district requires that all property owners. Speaker 3: Except. Speaker 6: One. There's the attorney know. Speaker 3: Okay. Speaker 0: So what is the procedure to opt out? Or is there none. Speaker 3: Under under the ordinance under the ordinance in 1984 and under the ordinances before you today, there is no option to opt out once the Council designates a uut. Speaker 0: Thank you. That's what I was that was the question earlier was can neighborhood opt out? And the answer is no. Correct. Speaker 3: The answer has always been no. And under the ordinance that was written in the ordinance before you today. Speaker 0: Okay. And then and in regards to the speaker of an undue hardship on a homeowner. So a homeowner, if they have this problem, everyone will be paying into this fund. Somehow this fund gets paid for. And then if they have an issue paying for it or do they apply for it or how how do they not have to pay for it if they have this issue? Speaker 3: I'm not sure I understand the question. The program is intended to cover 100% of the cost for 100% of the people on the island. That's what the program is intended to do. Speaker 0: They said no homeowner should have to pay anything under this. Speaker 3: That's the intent. Unless they do something extraordinary beyond the standards of the program. Speaker 0: Which would be what? Speaker 3: Which would be wanting to have a service lateral run in some configuration that's above and beyond the standard path from the service entrance to their meter. Speaker 0: Okay. So then should a homeowner contact you in advance to make sure that they're not doing anything or requesting anything that would incur additional costs? There's some procedure for. Speaker 3: That in the policy, and there would be situations where if a homeowner has a request that's outside of what would be the standard configuration, it certainly could be agreed to by AMP if they believe it's reasonable under the program. Speaker 0: Okay. And actually, I understand it's 11:00 and we would need a motion to continue the meeting. And this requires three votes to be have such a motion. Speaker 2: They'll move back. Speaker 0: All those in favor I oppose. And so the motion carries for two one and and I oppose because after 11 and we've already had a speaker on that this evening, that we need to come up with an agenda where we end in a timely manner, which I would suggest is, in fact, no later than 11. Speaker 6: And I have a follow up question to Mr. Driggers. Answer response. So I understand that neither under the previous nor the current proposed ordinance can a neighborhood opt out. Why is that? Speaker 3: The way the beautification policy was written was that by city council ordinance, there was a desire to. Put put facilities underground by by council ordinance. What Mr. Travis was referring to is that if the council determines that by ordinance that a neighborhood should go underground, if there is a mechanism for that neighborhood to overturn a council's direction . That's a legal matter that we that is above and beyond this program. And we need to rethink the whole program. Speaker 6: Thank you. Speaker 0: So I have a question. I'm sorry. Speaker 5: Let me just and just briefly that this is a public health and safety issue, that we have a utility that is in the business of handling and transmitting power and providing utility service as determined is needed to be able to continue the maintenance and operation of its system. It's not something that is really appropriate for people to just decide they don't like the idea esthetically or what have you. This is that is the utility saying there is a public health and safety issue here and they are doing their job as a utility to operate and maintain a viable system for the entire community. Speaker 6: Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. So can can a district request exemption from being designated an underground district? Is that possible? Speaker 3: I think I think it's the role that the reason for the district survey is to provide that feedback mechanism. The TAC did not believe that is in the position to tell the city council what areas do or do not want to participate in the ordinance. We believe that through the survey we can bring that recommendation or that information to the city council and then after public comment, you can make a determination as to whether an area does not is not underground. It so. Speaker 7: Madumere. So just to be clear, so the point at which the process by which. The potential district. Would not be subject to undergrounding would be through this process and especially that survey. Once the survey is done and once, let's say in 2017 and a majority, whatever the number is, the majority of residents say they want you used . Then that and then it goes to council that says, okay, therefore we are going to identify that neighborhood as a union neighborhood. Then in 2023, if we follow the process, they can't make the they can't undo the decision. If they're going to make a decision, they have to make it. Earlier. Speaker 3: The intent is is that once once the council under the ordinance. For lack of a better word, ratifies EU. Hmm. That falls under the ordinance to be underground. And the intent of only bringing 1 to 3. Mm. Is is to get away from the problem we had in the past of six, seven, eight, nine, ten that would stretch over 12 years and no one could remember the one that was approved ten years earlier. The intent is to keep them very current. So if neighborhood X is approved, neighborhood X is going to see a shovel turn within a year or two. Mm. And so we would do them one C Tuesdays at a time, depending upon their size. It may make sense to do three at a time because they're very small districts. It makes it make sense to only do one district because it'll take two years to do it. We want to bring them in sizable chunks of that. The public can keep tabs on what's going on. So those people who are concerned have an opportunity to have public input. Speaker 0: Thank you. We have a motion in the second. Going to call the question. I'm sorry. Speaker 5: Already. Speaker 6: We have a motion. Speaker 4: That we voted on already. Or we just voted on it. Speaker 2: Yeah. Speaker 1: And you just go to the meeting? Speaker 4: Oh, yeah. I'm sorry. I was talking to the city manager. Speaker 6: What was I vote. We just voted to continue the meeting. Speaker 0: Okay. Speaker 4: I was curious why we are still talking about it all the time. My apologies. It's the mayor's right. It's late. Speaker 0: So did we have a motion? Speaker 4: Yes, we did. Yes. Speaker 0: Okay. That's what I thought. So. Okay, so we have a motion in the second. All those in favor. Speaker 4: I. Speaker 0: I oppose that. No, no. I'm sorry you oppose this. So it passes 4 to 1. Did you want to explain? Speaker 2: Yes. I'd like to be able to have a if it's a matter of beautification and or public safety, I'd like to be able to have a mechanism, at least where that can be reviewed to see if a district this has a long history, has there's a compelling reason for a district. Not be designated. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 5: Mm. Is there a process. Speaker 7: For explaining why we vote for. Speaker 5: The matter? Speaker 0: So you can explain my in one sentence, or you can explain why you're voting yes or no. But it's not proper to ask questions. Well. Speaker 4: I think. Speaker 5: If I may, the rule actually is that the members of the council should make their comments, which would indicate their vote prior to taking the vote, because that might be persuasive to some of your fellow council members as to what the debate is after the vote is taken. That should be the end of the item, actually. Speaker 0: So I understand this. There are rules shared with us. That said, I think the opposite that you can explain yes or no after a vote is taken. Speaker 4: I just looked at them, I think. I think the actual the city attorney is correct. I just looked at them now because I thought I was confused that we were talking about something after we voted on it. Speaker 6: Yeah. Speaker 4: But it was on that, that open. I'm sorry. I think it was on that that open house meeting and it does say once it's done, it's done and you make your your comments before before the vote is done. I mean, I can look it up if you want. Speaker 6: And I would just add that to the extent that we are concerned about being here til all hours of the night and into the morning, if we would do our comments before we vote and then vote and then move on to the next item. And in if speakers could even help us out by adhering to the three minute rule, it would benefit everyone in the room and the poor people watching us too. Thank you. Speaker 0: So I'm going to ask our clerk because I believe she shared something before that we connect that after a vote you can explain yes or no. Yes. I'd be happy to do that. Speaker 6: Isn't it because that cute picture of oh, we're not looking at those are. Speaker 0: Just items sexy. Speaker 1: 60 is health recommendation to work contract in the amount of 567,000, including contingencies to IPPs group for the purchase installation operation of 822 single spaced smart parking meters and authorize the city manager to execute any necessary documents. Speaker 3: Madam Mayor, members of the City Council. Good evening. I am Liam Garland with Public Works and I'm actually here to dispel a myth. And that myth is that only my brothers and sisters in Alameda and Municipal Power knows something about smart meters. Tonight we're talking about smart parking meters. I have here with me Liz Acord, one of our management analysts, and somebody who knows a lot about our parking program here, as well as the provider for these particular smart meters from a company called APS. And it's Mike Chiodo who might be able to be available for questions in case they do come up. So today we are recommending the purchase and installation of about 822 smart parking meters in the city of Alameda. This really got rolling back in June of 2014 when the city council authorized a three month pilot from October through December of these single spaced, credit card enabled smart parking meters. So the key oh, actually, before even before the ball got rolling here, we had lots of outreach in early 2014 to the public, to the West Alameda Business Association and to the Park Street Business Association, asking what their needs were. And the use of a credit card came up as a big need in the community, as well as we wanted to find out from folks their preference of a single space meter versus a kiosk. And there was a very clear result in that outreach. We did a survey of 800 plus Olympians, and the result was a strong preference for the single spaced meters and against the kiosks. So the single spaced meters, some of their features are of a large LED screen that's interactive and customizable. You can use both a credit card and also coins. And if you look on the bottom right there, there's a solar panel. So there's both solar power, plus a back backup battery. And if you look at the green light below the solar panel, that green light shows that there's a time that's been purchased. So this is important for Alameda police because traffic enforcement are going back. They can see that clear green light or it's red if there's no time that's been purchased. So this is a big benefit from the enforcement perspective just to be able to see, see clearly whether the meter is on or off. So when we installed the meters for three months, we did so on a block of Webster and then a block of parts to Park Street, and we kept tabs with our local business association stakeholders. We convened the departments, including Alameda Police, in order to get their input on the process as well. And now I can share some of the results of that tonight. I'll come out and or in a in a slider to I'll talk a little bit more about the public input. But a good place to start is literally with the transactions. So we had over 26,000 transactions just in these two blocks for the three month period with no reported failures. About 17% of those transactions were by credit card. But 36% of the revenue was through credit cards. And there there's really two reasons behind that. One is, with the more time you're purchasing, you probably don't have coins to cover all of that. So you're going to use a credit card. And the second reason is credit card users are probably a little more likely like myself. Full disclaimer to max out just to avoid a ticket to make sure that even if they're only doing a stop for 30 minutes, they're going to buy as much time as they can just to be super safe. When we did a public survey to find satisfaction with the smart meters, we received 104 survey responses. 72% of them of their responses showed clear satisfaction with the meters. But that actually understates the satisfaction with the meters. And here's why. The light blue in that pie chart, the other 28%. A good portion of that light blue were folks who were telling us that they weren't satisfied with the height of the meters. And we're going to talk about that challenge in just a moment. Not about the smart meters themselves. They were supportive of the smart meters. Just wanted to fix the height problem. The other reason that this slide understates the case for the meters is a fair amount of the light. Blue represents folks who were complaining about the kiosks and they were taking the opportunity of this survey to voice their displeasure about the kiosks. So again, that's all to say that it's probably around 85 to 90% satisfaction with with the smart, smart meters. So let's talk about height. One of the really fun parts about this project was to solicit this public input and get something that I frankly had not thought about, which is because of the nature of the screens they're angled. If you're five foot five or under, it's hard to see that screen. And so what we are going to do is in the current pilot areas, we are going to cut the meter poles to make sure that that LED screen is between 42 and 48 inches. When we learned about this problem, we immediately reached out to some of our partner cities who have installed similar meters and found out that this was the best practice. We're going to make sure that for our meetings in this height range that this actually works for them. So we're going to get users to use the meters that have been cut down to this hour in between this height. If that works, then we'll go to all of the 822 meters and make sure that when the meter head is installed, it's within this range. So that's our plan for addressing some of the feedback we received around height. Finally, we have a really competitive cost here, so it's about $435 per meter head and about $121 per meter per year. So it's about $10 a month per meter per year.

Regular Agenda Item

Recommendation to Adopt Plans and Specifications and Authorize a Call for Bids for Fire Station No. 3, No. P.W. 12-14-18. (Public Works 310)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_03032015_2015-1386

Speaker 3: So that's our plan for addressing some of the feedback we received around height. Finally, we have a really competitive cost here, so it's about $435 per meter head and about $121 per meter per year. So it's about $10 a month per meter per year. The these rates are based on a Sacramento contract with much higher volumes. Essentially, we had Sacramento purchasing about 6000 of these meter heads. We're only purchasing 822. We were able to get those same Sacramento prices, but in Alameda with a lower volume, we probably saved in the range of $50 per meter. And with that, you've got our recommendation to both purchase and install 822 smart parking meters. And I'm happy to answer any questions you may have. Speaker 0: Does anyone have any clarifying questions? Remember, they. Speaker 7: Suck. Now, I believe, like in Walnut Creek when I use that, I think. I don't think it takes Discover Card. Are we just limited to MasterCard and Visa? Speaker 3: Liz, the court is going to correct me in a moment, but I believe right now it's MasterCard and Visa and we can elect to bring in American Express. And I'm not sure about Discover Card. Yes, we can bring in discover. Speaker 7: Cards that we can elect. We would elect to do that. Okay, great. Thank you. Speaker 0: Any other clarifying questions? Do we have we don't have any speakers, I believe, on this item. Speaker 1: Oh, we have one. Speaker 0: I do. Thank you. Speaker 4: But you're still going. Speaker 0: All right, Rob Rado. I'm glad I asked for speakers. Speaker 2: I. Rob Reiner, executive director of the Pass Through Business Association. And I'm sure this is going to come as a big surprise to you that I am here this evening to emphatically endorse the 822 smart parking meters, not only for Park Street, but for the entire city of Alameda. Leon was a little dainty in his explanation of. What happened when the previous council raised the parking rate we got in the first week. Speaker 3: We got lots. Speaker 2: And lots of complaints about the rate. From then on to today, we get complaints about, oh my God, we got to bring £3 of quarters with us to get 2 hours of parking. So that was that's been a huge problem. We've had these in for a number of months. And I'll tell you, the folks I've talked to who are members, every last one I've talked to wants this. And how I know that the members that I haven't talked to want this because they haven't emailed me, called me, or come to a mixer and complained about the smart meters. And most of you know my membership, and if they have not complained, then they don't have a complaint. I believe there were a number of years ago when we did streetscape phase two, Pittsburgh backed. The chaos at the time. And I will tell you why. Because at the time, that was the best. Technology available. These were not available then. Unfortunately, the kiosks have proved to be problematic. They have some maintenance issues, not a lot. But when a kiosk goes down, unlike when a meter goes down and you can just screw another head on it, a kiosk goes down and you're walking, you know, halfway down the block you're walking across to get the little you know, the little slip. And frankly, it proved that a lot of folks don't like the little slips. Sorry, we tried, but this technology is absolutely what we believe is going to work, not only for Park Street, but for Alameda . So, of course, we are urging you to vote and let's get this stuff done as quickly as possible. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: Thank you. We have another speaker first, Linda Fortuna. Speaker 1: I just wanted to comment that when I was traveling in Riga, Latvia, about three, maybe four years ago, they have a really good, smart meter. They have it so that you can take your cell phone, pay your parking bill on your cell phone. And it's it's all it's easy. And you can download an app. Or is that? Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 6: This. Speaker 0: Go ahead. Remember, Audie. Speaker 4: So as excited as you can be about something at 1120, this is I remember they excited about this and this is little anecdotal, but I had a meeting with with Doug Biggs the other day and we had to end early because I ran out of of and it never changed to to have a long enough meeting. And you know, West Cafe's a really good place. I'd like to sit there a little longer sometimes. And then this afternoon I was in Oakland, but my 45 minutes in and didn't have to worry. And actually, you know, the city got extra money out of me because I was done in 15 minutes. But to the to the public comment that park mobile I'd like to see us consider that park mobile it's it's really convenient they have it in Oakland you punch in your zone know you can renew it. I don't know if we want to do that, but you can renew it. You know, if you only put a half hour in and you end up staying an hour, you can renew it on your phone to 30% charge extra and truly convenient. And, you know, I'm excited to see this technology come to Alameda. Speaker 3: Absolutely. So in the survey of the public, it was very clear that using the credit card that was folks is number one priority and then it's down the list from there. But paying by phone would be another. We're hopeful that in June or July, when we come back to report on the results of the parking meter study , that one of the recommendations we're going to make at that point is an option for paying by cell phone. Speaker 4: And is this are we doing this all at the same time, or is Webster Street going to get some smart meters before the rest of Park Street or what's the rollout schedule look? Speaker 3: Well, the pilot is on both. So the pilot is on. It's already one block of Webster, one block of Park. The big task in front of us is to figure out this meter height challenge. We're going to do that within the pilot areas and then we'll try to roll them out across the city. After tackling that challenge within, you know, it'll probably take four weeks to do the whole city, I'd imagine. Speaker 0: The other member member ASHCROFT. Speaker 6: Thank you. So if I understand correctly, the option of paying by cell phone could be considered, could be added, because I will also throw in I haven't been to Latvia, but in British Columbia, Canada, and probably ten years ago I was visiting and I thought it was really cool that the relatives I was with, we were at a restaurant and could go, Oh, we got to add money to the meter and I was ready to run out and it just whipped out the cell phone. Would it cost more to add that feature? Speaker 3: It depends. So the short answer is most cities choose to put the what they call convenience fee on the user. So I believe in San Francisco it's around $0.45 or the city can elect to essentially absorb that. Speaker 6: I wasn't saying I wasn't offering that. You know what I mean is would the meters themselves, themselves cost more if they also had the smartphone capability? Speaker 3: Probably not. Speaker 6: Probably not. So I just think more options are better than less. And especially I mean, it's one thing if you're just one person going back and forth, sometimes you're a parent with little kids or, you know, someone who's elderly who might not want to have to hassle back because they realize they didn't put enough time in. So I would strongly, even if the survey doesn't show that, I think some people might just might not have experienced that feature. But I have to think you'd love it once you try it. Let's keep that in mind, please. Speaker 3: Of course. Speaker 0: So I have a question in regards to that. If it's a two hour parking space, can you add time via your phone to go beyond 2 hours? Speaker 3: No. You can build in restrictions so that it maxes out of that 2 hours. You cannot add beyond that. Speaker 0: Thank you. Do we have a motion? Speaker 7: Well, I met a mayor. I'd like to move stats recommendation and include the comments regarding use of cell phone and discover card. Speaker 2: So second. Speaker 7: Oh, American Express as well, if you can take a look at that. Speaker 0: We had a second. All those. Any comments? All those in favor, I suppose. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next item six D. Speaker 1: The recommendation to adopt plans and specification and authorize call for bids for fire station number three. Speaker 2: Evening, Madam Mayor. Member of the City Council. Bob Hahn, Public Works Director. The item before you tonight is a recommendation to adopt plans and specifications and authorize call for bid for fire station number three located on Wayne, a vista adjacent to Herbert Street. This is really a 15 year project. If you remember in the year 2000 is when the existing fire station number three was declared uninhabitable and seismically unsafe. And since that time, the firefighters on station three have been renting a house next door and living in that house. The city's female hazard mitigation plan has identified the replacement of fire station number three and the EOC as a critical item. This process started in 2012 with in the fall of 2012, with three meetings, community meetings around the site, and followed by another meeting in July of 13. There was an outreach to all the community around the station and quite a discussion. And these meetings were well-attended. On October 15th, we executed the contract for the EOC. The EOC was bid a short time later in the fall, and we had a bid protest. One of the reasons we were bidding in the fall was to kind of get ahead. It was the September bid. We could get a foundation in the ground, start the EOC. The EOC was fully funded as opposed to the fire station at that time. And so the decision was move was made to move ahead with the EOC. Even the bid protest was was basically an issue regarding subcontractor licenses being listed on one of the forms. One of the contractors threw up a protest on that. By the time we resolved that protest and would have gone back out to bid, we would have been right back in the middle of the winter again here and precluding us from getting a foundation in the ground. So at that point in time, the decision was made to combine the two projects. The reason for combining the projects were is that cost savings and some of the cost savings would be we would only have to do one mobilization. Contractors typically charge anywhere from 50 to $100000 for what they call mobilization. Bringing a trailer out there, phone lines in battle lines, erecting the temporary fence and things like this. By combining the two projects, we eliminated that need for to pay for two fencing, two trailers and stuff like that. Because there was always a possibility we would end up with two separate contractors with each one of the structures. We only have one contractor now for the entire site. We don't have any finger pointing back and forth between contractors, the contractor contractors, not blaming it on the fire station contractor. And so we have a much cleaner project in that respect, too. We're gaining an economy of scale where you have a larger project, more materials, and therefore there should be a significant cost savings on that regard to. It's a coordinated project. We have one contractor now, so everything is coordinated between the two structures. There is interaction between the two structures in the event of an emergency that they actually act in concert. The fire station is kind of the public face of the of the complex where the piano would be located, the volunteers would be dealt with at the fire station site, and the EOC site would be separate. And lastly, we would have more competition with a higher number. Generally a contractor like Arma Rosso that are that are built our library across the street, they usually have a de minimis amount of $10,000. They did give us a bid on the EOC kind of as a favor to me, but this certainly made it more attractive. All of the three contractors were pre qualified. These are essential structures. These structures are designed not to fall down in a 7.0 on the Hayward fault. There's a lot of rules and regulations and criterias and certifications involved in the construction of these contract, these structures. And all three of these contractors have put up a number of these structures. So we're very confident in this particular group. If you look in your staff report regarding the the closeness of the bid on the EOC, that really shows it speaks well of the architect. The numbers were relatively close for this type of work. And so the architect of that just indicates the architectural plans were very tight and everybody came up with the same number, more or less. So I am recommending that we move forward on the plans and specs and build the fire station and the EOC together here. And just as an aside, we are working with the city of Napa in the construction of their new wells EOC, because both the city's EOC up at Napa and the county EOC up at Napa both failed in the event of that recent earthquake. And they were both in in interested in constructing a separate EOC at this time. I'm available for questions. Speaker 0: Do you have any clarifying questions at this time? And we do have three speakers. Speaker 7: One when madumere one clarifying question I have is the estimated debt service is not to exceed $300,000 annually. So that's principal and interest. That's the debt service, $300,000 annually. But in total, over a 20 year period in total, the debt service, principal and interest when we repay all back will equal $6.9 million over 20 years. But when I when I add $300,000 a year over 20 years, I get $6 million, not 6.9 million. Speaker 2: I'm going to turn this over to our interim finance director. Forward. Speaker 5: Everyone. Good evening. I'm Julian Boyer and I have served as the interim finance director and I have come back to answer questions on this financing since I've been working on it. You're probably correct that the total debt service, which includes principal and interest, is the greater amount. Speaker 7: Yeah, you know what actually it means? Julian Boyer, the city mayor, just actually did the math for me when I was looking at $300,000. I was looking at it. Not take into account their $50,000 annual savings. That because when you add up the $350,000 over 20 years, that comes out to be $7 million, which is roughly 6.9 . Okay, I'm satisfied. Thank you. Speaker 5: Okay. I appreciate. Speaker 2: It. It was a great job. Speaker 5: Happy? I could answer your question. Thank you. Speaker 0: Remember, Audie. Speaker 4: This may be the last time we hear from you for a while. So I do want to thank you again for your your service. Speaker 5: Absolutely. Speaker 0: Clarifying questions. Member Ashcraft. Speaker 6: I am. This is something that I actually raised in an email and thank you for answering me during the afternoon. But and I thought member de SAC was going to touch on it. But when somewhere in here there is a table that says the total amount. It's probably the other staff report says that the total cost of the the fire station it is it's exhibit three the staff report from July of 2014. And it and it talks about the different funds that are being put into the construction of the the fire station three, which I support. But it says total cost of fire station three is $5 million. But then as we go down into the financial impact paragraph, it's well laid out, but what all the financing costs were. So that was my email. The question was. So what is the total cost of fire station three, really? And I likened it to if you buy a car on and you take an auto loan out, you would have on because it's required by state law the amount of principal you're paying and the amount of interest and what the total amount of your purchase is. And the same if you have a mortgage on your home. Only it's even more startling. So just for the sake of, you know, the public information and the councils is well, if there is a way that we could call the total amount, the total amount, because after all, it is what the city is going to be paying over time. But I do also want to echo Councilmember Odie and thank you for your service and patiently explaining all these things to us at these really ridiculous hours. And we do appreciate it. Speaker 5: All right. I watched and I took a nap. So you're right in that the principal amount is $5 million. That's what it cost to construct the building. However, what does it cost to finance that $5 million over approximately 20 years? So we have a lot of internal funds and we had proposed a 3% interest rate on those internal funds. Some of it is cash from the sale of the existing fire station. When everyone's moved out and it's abandoned, then the sale of that was included in that list of funds. It's included with the equipment replacement equipment replacement fund and sale of the property. At 1703, Grande Street is estimated at about $425,000. So that's a part of it. So that doesn't have any interest attached to it, but it comes at the very end of the project. What what I have been able to determine is that the. 2013. Excuse me. Let me back up a minute. Those funding sources for the fire station are mostly internal, so the interest rate is about 3%, which is about 50 to $82000 a year in debt service, 1.6 million. The eye bank loan of 3 million is yet to be determined, but we believe that we have a locked interest rate of about 2.95%, much lower than had been predicted in July. Speaker 6: Right. Yeah. And numbers went down. Speaker 5: Yeah. So the question at this point is, has to do with the term how well along that loan would be. And it probably will be about 18 or 19 years rather than 20. But the debt service on that is about $217,000 a year. So we're looking at that in the neighborhood of 3 to 400000, 33, 50 a year in debt service. We'll have it pinned down as we get to negotiating with the bank and get the details really finalized on that. And we we have a cap of $3 million that the council previously approved for the financing. So we're working within that. We've also identified some unspent bond funds from the redevelopment agency that we are looking at the possibility of using. If we do that, that will relieve some of those internal loans and we won't have to pay interest on the internal loan funds, but we will be looking at the repayment of the unspent bond funds. Speaker 6: So that sounds better still. Speaker 0: And can you clarify when you said a cap that's on the principle of the loan? Pardon me? The cap of 3 million? Yes. On the principle of the loan? That's correct. The total cost. The total back. The loan. Thank you. And the total cost that you're estimating is 6.9 million over 20 years of what the city will be responsible for. Speaker 5: That's correct. Okay. Speaker 0: And this doesn't say in here, but would this money be coming from where the general. Speaker 5: Fund. Speaker 0: That this would be encroaching upon the general fund? Yes. So out of. Do you know where it would be coming from? More specifically, what we would be taking it away from? Speaker 5: Well, taking it away from. I'm not sure that that's how I would phrase it, but it is an additional expense added to the existing $75 million or whatever the budget number is in that particular year. Speaker 0: So are you suggesting we have extra money annually in our general fund that would go towards us, that we it would not impact any other appropriations that are currently made? Speaker 5: I don't know the answer to that question yet. The budget has to be developed and this would be accommodated within the budget. Speaker 0: I'm sorry. Could you repeat your answer? There was. There's chatter. I couldn't hear you. Speaker 5: So the the debt service would be a part of the budgeting process and would be accommodated within the within the budget. Speaker 0: Thank you. Any other clarifying questions? All right. I'm going to go ahead and call the speakers. The first one, Neill Flicker, and then Gerry. And you holler. And then Gretchen LeBeau. Speaker 2: It's late. Speaker 3: My name is Neal Pflueger. Speaker 2: A 25 year resident of of Alameda. I am a CERT member. But my my. Speaker 3: Main interest. Speaker 2: In being here tonight comes from from my 20 years experience with Alameda County Office of Emergency Services as a volunteer. And I'm glad we've gotten. Speaker 3: To this point. Speaker 2: It's. In my humble opinion, overdue. Thank you. Let's let's move forward. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 2: Hello. My name is Jerry Jala. I'm a member of the Alameda Executive Committee for those new on the council, surf stands for Community Emergency Response Team or Volunteer Group under the Alameda Fire Department's Disaster Preparedness Office. Over the last 15 years, we've had over 1200 people trained by the fire department in personnel and disaster response. One of the functions of the executive committee is to provide ongoing training and exercises to keep everybody skills up to date and sharp. And the new EOC will help accommodate that going into the future. Thank you for your support of this event. I do have one question. Have you taken into account the cost savings of not having to rent the building next to Fire Station three in the future? Okay. Thank you. Speaker 0: The bill. I think she may have left. It's a 20 to 12. So no other speakers. My understanding. Remember? Comments, questions. Speaker 2: And America. Speaker 5: Yes. Speaker 0: I mean. Speaker 2: I think the existing fire station is inadequate. And we've been renting a house in before that, a trailer. So this part of the of the proposal, I think, makes sense, especially with the comments made by our public works director. I don't see how we can't delay this. And the opportunity is now as we put more jobs and put a new facility out at and made a point of we're going to need the coverage. So I'm supportive. Speaker 0: Any other questions? Comments. Number Day. Speaker 7: Thank you, Madam Mayor. You know, I've supported this proposal when it was a stand alone AOC and I continue to support this when it's combined with a fire station. I think it's important that we move forward, especially with the new EOC. And clearly, the fire station on Grand Street, we all know it's inadequate. You know, it's going to cost money. You know, money doesn't grow on trees. We all know that. And it's going to come from the general fund to repay the amount. And, you know, but these are tough decisions that we have to make. And I and I know one thing, not having an up to date emergency operating center and not having the best modern fire station that we can have centrally located in town, I mean, there's certainly a ticking time bomb cost there. So we have to factor that in. So I'm going to move I'm going to certainly support this action night. Speaker 6: And Ashcroft and I would echo the two prior my two prior colleagues on that. This is a it's a as was noted, a very centrally located on the island fire station. And it's a quaint little house, but it certainly doesn't even accommodate the size equipment that we have now. And yet this is a very important station that will will serve all over the island. And while I had my differences over the design of the EOC, I know it's now going to serve even more public functions. And the training of the search teams are very important. So I think you're right. Councilmember Desai This is coming out of our general fund, the debt service. But I think one of the high priorities of our residents is public safety and they want to know that when there's an emergency that our our public safety first responders get to them. And so part of that is having the appropriate facilities to house both our public safety first responders and their equipment that help keep us safe. So I'm supporting this as well. Speaker 0: I'm ready. Speaker 4: I'll be brief and echo the comments of my three colleagues. And then also, you know, this is way overdue and I appreciate the work of Mr. Horn to figure out a way that we can do these two important projects together and actually do it more cost effective. And thank you very much for your hard work on this. Speaker 0: I also appreciate combining the bid process to save money. However, I'm not satisfied with the answer from our finance person that the general fund in regards to the General Fund 6.9 million over 20 years will just come from the general fund. Unfortunately, that it doesn't just come from the general fund. We do have if you look at the city's multiyear budget, we are running deficits in the future. We also have the highest unfunded OPEB liabilities in the county as a percentage of our annual general fund, as in its 140% greater than our annual general fund revenue. It is a serious problem. I think it's incumbent upon staff and the council to designate where the money will be coming from. And I would prefer waiting until we go through the budget process and answer that question. Thank you. Speaker 4: I'm going to I like to move recommendation to staff report to adopt plans and specifications and authorize a call for bids for fire station number three. Number PTW 1214. Dash 18. Speaker 0: If you have a second. Speaker 7: Look at. Speaker 0: All those in favor. I oppose the vote passes 4 to 1. Speaker 1: Six e recommendation to award contract in the amount of 256,292 to cultivate studio and urban planning partners to prepare the Main Street Neighborhood Specific plan for Alameda Point. Speaker 8: Good evening. Mayor Spencer, council members. I want to introduce myself. I'm Liv Kushner. I've been working for the city since September, so. Not so long. So I haven't had an opportunity to meet some of you, but very excited to be here. I'll be talking about the main street specific plan just to give you guys a little bit of background on the a little bit of background since it's late on what's come up before this. In 2000, eight city staff applied to MTC to have Alameda Point named a priority development area PDA. This is basically some there's a bunch of PDAs around the Bay Area basically allows us to receive grants for planning documents and for transportation. This is the same kind of grant that staff applied for and want to fund the town center plan, which was approved in 2014. And we've then applied for and received been awarded this grant in late 2014 to pay for the Main Street neighborhood specific plan. These kinds of specific plans, they all are required by the Alameda Point Zoning, which was passed by City Council in 2014. So it may seem that there are. Quite a few documents about how made a point in having worked here for a few months and read some of them. There definitely are. But these specific plans go into more detail than the master infrastructure plan. Zoning. They go into a finer grain of detail about these subdistricts, and we'll talk about what specific plans do and what specific plans don't do. They do serve as a platform for extensive community outreach. They create essentially a framework for the built environment. The community gets to dove in and talk about, you know, what these neighborhoods could look like. The they inform a street typology. So, you know, will the streets be wide? Will they be narrow? What will the streets and what with the open spaces as well look like? I also. Should say. That the specific plan specifically for Main Street will allow the Alameda Point Collaborative APEC to move forward with their development plans. So as you can see, they have quite a bit of property in the Main Street neighborhood and they are looking to consolidate and build new buildings for the supportive housing that they offer for the community. And because the zoning requires the specific plan to be completed and approved before any development happens, they are waiting for this document to be written and approved. But I do want to clarify that specific plans do not commit the city to any sort of development timeline, and they do not address disposition issues. They are strictly a planning document to talk about a framework for future development. If a council decides they want it to go forward at some time in the future does not supersede Council's ultimate authority to deal with disposition issues. And finally, the specific plan does not allocate housing units between different neighborhoods. So speaking more directly about the process for this particular specific plan, staff issued an RFP in September 2014 to over 160 firms architecture, landscape architecture, engineering, urban design firms. We received five proposals and these proposals were reviewed by a selection committee that comprised staff representatives from Alameda Point Collaborative, the planning board, as well as someone from the Alameda Association of Realtors. Of the five firms that submitted bids, the selection committee reviewed three selected. Three of the different submissions to review tend to interview. And of those three, it was unanimous among the selection committee that Urban Planning Partners was head and shoulders above the competition. Specifically, some of their strengths are community outreach. When we called all of their references, they all said that they had a real ability to speak both the language of municipal government and of communities and to bridge the gap that sometimes exists between the two. They have excellent design skills and placemaking. One of the things that staff agreed was that their the proposal was very not only very well thought out, but very appealing esthetically. And that kind of attention to esthetic detail can really speak to what kinds of designs are put into the illustrative, not illustrative plans, excuse me, are put into planning documents and thought about what the neighborhood may look like in the future. They also have a supporting housing expert, a historic preservation expert, and interestingly, they have an urban agriculture expert on their team. You know, your first thought is what is an urban agriculture expert? And I thought it was very interesting because specifically the Main Street neighborhood has an existing urban agriculture facilities with plowshares, as well as the urban farm. And I thought it showed staff thought it showed a real attention to detail for this is what's in this neighborhood. This is what could be done to leverage the existing facilities in the neighborhood to increase the community benefit. And it just showed a strong attention to detail. Finally, financial. This is a $250,000 grant from Mtc's staff is the city is matching that with staff time as well as an additional just over $6,000 because the cost of the consultant exceeds the $250,000. That's my presentation. I'm happy to answer any questions. Speaker 0: Any quick clarifying questions. Member Data. Speaker 7: Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me hear what your thoughts are on this issue. I think in a way, city council as well as staff have to act like a master developer, that we have to take a look at what we're doing at Parcel A in conjunction with, say, the Main Street neighborhood in conjunction with, say, the historic district. We have to look at how all these different interact. Understanding that there are different needs and different place in it in the different sub areas. So are you saying that if we move forward with the Main Street neighborhood planning, that there's enough flexibility in there to deal with issues in different areas that might be somehow treated by planning in, say, the Main Street neighborhood? Let me give you a case case example. Overall, we have a 1400 residential unit number for Alameda Point of the 1400. We're looking at roughly 800, possibly at the parcel, a specific town center. Now, that means that there's roughly 600 to be divided somewhere at Alameda Point, some of which will be at Main Street neighborhood, some of which could be at the at the historic area, the adaptive reuse area. As we move down the pike with Main Street area, at some point in time, we're going to move down the pike with Alameda. The adaptive reuse area and the adaptive reuse area has certain costs there unknown. But we know that there are costs that are associated with dealing with the historic structures, costs which would be in part underwritten by the ABI residential parcel potentially. So to the extent that we isolate in on the remaining 600 balance or Main Street neighborhood, that could then have some effect in terms of residential for the historic area. So the question is, is there enough flexibility to take in the fact that there are these different areas, these different costs in different neighborhoods, and that the residential outside of parts of L.A. now is getting less and less. And yet it's the residential that is potentially a source to help, not the full answer, but to help deal with these different costs in different areas. Speaker 8: I'm glad you asked that question. Yeah. I mean, there is definitely a amount of flexibility in these documents. They do look at, you know, first I should say, as I should repeat, that it doesn't the document specific plans do not allocate housing units directly. So they are a higher level view. And they they they do talk about the different financing issues. But specifically, you're just as these documents allow the flexibility by creating a framework within which development can happen. So they're not directly they want spillover from I guess I'm what if this is what you're asking they don't spillover from one district to another. Right. So it'll it'll give you the framework for what the street neighborhood may look like physically, and it'll give you a sense of the density of what the development may happen. But it it's not going to directly apportion different housing units to different neighborhoods. So what you're asking it's. Speaker 7: Part I am partly asking about apportionment apportioning quantitative units, but it's also apportioning types of units because to the extent that you say that, that the adaptive reuse place is going to have. Actually, to the extent that you say Main Street neighborhood is going to have single family homes rather than multi-family homes, that has fiscal impacts in terms of revenue generation, feed generation that could be used towards dealing with, say, the costs that that are the historic renovation costs in the historic resource area. So it's not just a number of quantities of where the quantities are allocated, but it's also knowing that we're going to have enough flexibility in terms of the types of housing , because whatever business deal that we strike with whomever is as the main street area, there might be more revenue generation through single family homes rather than multi-family homes and is in it. And it doesn't matter whether it's multi-family homes, single family homes. We can only deal with 600. Speaker 3: Correct? Speaker 2: No. Speaker 7: That is the flexibility that we need to deal with those. Speaker 8: How much? Is there a question? Speaker 7: But the question is, is there left flexibility? Speaker 8: Yes, the answer is yes, absolutely. Speaker 0: And Brody. Speaker 4: Can I kind of add to that? Can you kind of explain to some of us new on the council what exactly is going to be in this specific plan? Because, you know. I've been told there's location studies in there, but then maybe that's not true. And then there's, you know, financial analysis. My concern is not getting to count somebody's socks when he said they're 625. You know, we have to take care of APC and of that 200 and we're only left with 425, so. Correct, I guess. So what when we see this stock, I mean, what what are we going to see, you know, in layman's terms or or rookies on the council? Speaker 8: Sure. Specific plan generally includes, you know, they'll be chapters about building typology and street typology. So talking about the physical nature of the space and what the open spaces look like, how they may be arranged. There also is a financial analysis that looks at the different costs and how things different unit types and how things may pay for different types of financial strategies that that we may take to move forward. There's also. Let me think about. They're kind of the constraints issues, right. So you look at the types of. Constraints that we face. So like the first chapter is basically going to look at, you know, what are the seismic issues, what are the, you know, floodplain issues, how do they affect this specific area and, you know, as opposed to just the base as a whole? And so you get a chapter on constraints. You get, you know, a section of finance, you get a section on the built environment. It's kind of a big picture of it. Speaker 4: And then what are you using as the base? I mean, are you using an idea of 600 units, 400 units? I mean, or there has to be some, you know, some guidelines where you're going forth and doing the specific plan. Speaker 8: Sure. I I think there's a there's an ultimate sense that Main Street neighborhood is going to be of much of a lower density than the town center. We're also very aware, you know, that there's a limit on the number of housing that can happen. And so the documents definitely take that information in mind, but it won't specifically say, you know, this number of units have to go here and this have to go here and you have to keep these things in mind as you go forward. But it won't be specifically dictating those things. Speaker 4: Thank you. Speaker 0: Any other council questions at this point? Hey, I have a question. We had spoken before as a council in regards to transportation plan, and I don't know if you were aware of that conversation. That's my understanding. At some point, staff will be coming back to us in regards to an overall transportation plan. Will this be considered in that plan or will we be or are we being asked to approve more housing without a transportation plan? Speaker 8: You know, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I know you. Speaker 5: Yeah. So we will be coming on March 12th to talk about a response to I'm sorry, 10th. Speaker 2: Night. Speaker 5: At 12 at night. Now March 10th next week to respond to Councilmember de. Speaker 3: SAG's referral. Speaker 5: Regarding a comprehensive citywide transportation solution, Alameda Point in particular already has an approved transportation demand management plan, which is essentially a transportation strategy, gets into a lot of detail about costs, how we're going to fund it, what. Speaker 3: Services are going to be provided, how fast those services are going to be provided. Speaker 5: Who gets to do a lot of detail that was approved in May of last year, and then every project that comes through is then required to actually submit and get approved at what's called a TDM compliant strategy or essentially a transportation compliance strategy. So they have to show. Speaker 3: Every project. Speaker 5: Has to show how they're in compliance with that overall. AMI 2.2 plan. Speaker 3: So we absolutely have a plan for transportation at AMI two point. Speaker 5: This project was contemplated as part of the Aluminum Point EIA Environmental Impact Report. Speaker 3: Which studied. Speaker 5: All the potential traffic impacts related to the 1425 units in the five and a half million square feet of. Speaker 3: Commercial. Speaker 5: So we believe that we have we've addressed these issues, but these issues as the team plan, clearly states are going to evolve over time, have to adjust. We have to adjust what's successful, what's not successful. And so a big part of that plan is monitoring, you know. Speaker 3: Every year, doing surveys. What's working, what's not working? Are we meeting our goals? And if we're not meeting our. Speaker 5: Goals and things aren't working. Speaker 3: Then how do we. Speaker 5: Tweak things? We might need to spend more money to do something to be more effective. And so these plans, even though we've put in the framework and we've approved them with a lot of detail. Speaker 3: There needs to be. Speaker 5: Constant kind of monitoring and evolution of those plans to make sure that they're successful. Speaker 0: And as part of this plan, will there be a designation, for instance, of affordable housing for seniors or affordable housing for vets or affordable housing for families? Speaker 5: Well, the the settlement agreement with the city has requires 25% affordable housing. Speaker 3: For. Speaker 5: All new market rate units, which that settlement actually actually excludes the collaborative units. So in addition to. Speaker 3: 200 supportive housing units gained rebuilt the new facility, which is the plan that provides supportive housing for. Speaker 5: Veterans, for women. Speaker 3: Survivors of domestic women. Speaker 5: And children, survivors of domestic violence, and families at risk of homelessness. Speaker 3: Those are the 200 units that are being rebuilt on site. Speaker 5: And then an additional 25%, which will. Speaker 3: Be 9%. Speaker 5: Moderate income, 10% low income and 6% very low income. So it's. Speaker 3: Actually when you actually add those. Speaker 5: Together to even. Speaker 3: You know, it's going to be over 30%, you know, even more of affordable housing. Speaker 0: And in regards to the selection of so it's my understanding we're being asked to approve the selection of a specific planner this up. And have they done any projects for the city of Alameda in the past? Speaker 8: Yeah. Uh, uh. They worked in, uh. A while ago on the on the northern waterfront, they did community meeting facilitation and they worked at the city's behest to. There was a citizen advisory council that the 15 member citizen advisory council that they worked with. Speaker 0: Is that included in the report tonight? I didn't see it in there. And I just think that if we have if they if an entity has done work with us in the past, that should be included and disclosed to the public when you recommend not use specifically, but when they're being recommended again, because the public then will know if they may have an opinion, if they agreed with the projects that a certain company had been involved with in the past. Does that could be included in the future? Speaker 8: Sure, absolutely. Speaker 0: So they were involved with the Northern. Speaker 8: They worked on a quite a few projects out at the base as well as the Northern Waterfront. Yes. Speaker 0: Okay. And then do you know specifically what people were involved on the panel from the community that are not staff members? Speaker 8: I'm sorry. Speaker 0: Is this the silver lining? Speaker 8: Mm hmm. It was Doug Biggs from APC, as well as Donna Alvarez. Is that her last name? Tanya Alvarez. And then, I don't know the name of the woman from the Alameda Association of Realtors. Speaker 6: And to Bartolo. Thank you, Stephane. Speaker 0: So there was really one member of the public and a buyer leaving this because I believe Doug Biggs works for APC and Donya is on our commission. Speaker 2: But. Speaker 0: Thank you. And, um. And then the timeline to accept this grant. When when does that expire? The current grant is the. Speaker 8: With the grants. You know, we've accepted the grant. We're slightly ahead of schedule for some of the other communities, municipalities. But there's there's not necessarily a timeline. If we delay beyond a certain amount, it's possible that they ask us to reapply for the next grant cycle. But I don't know of a specific timeline. Okay. Speaker 0: So so in regards to narrowing it down to one firm that's being recommended, do you know what criteria was used? Speaker 8: Yes. Speaker 0: Because I think our choice is really to go with this one as well. You really asking us to approve one planner this evening? Speaker 8: Yes. This is the you know, the selection committee reviewed all the different applicants and decided this firm was superior. I can read you the selection criteria. Would you like that? Speaker 0: Yes, thank you. Speaker 8: A the consultant teams project manager and key staff persons, persons past experience and results with similar projects and demonstrated expertize outlined in section four. Role of the consultant. Of this request for proposals. B The consultant teams demonstrated understanding of the proposed project in the Alameda community and of the need for an efficient and effective approach to successfully completing the project. C The consultant team's ability to deliver a high quality, specific plan within the budget amount of $256,500 in 12 months schedule. D The consultant team's ability to meet the city's standard contract requirements. Speaker 0: Thank you. And in regards to the the percentage of far below market rate housing. Is it possible that this planet could come back with a higher percentage of below market rate housing than the 30%? Because I think we all know that the 200 are used all the time that we could. Absolutely. Is a greater percentage in our community. Speaker 8: I'm sure we belong to look into that. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 7: One more question, but I think I've already asked question if there is a. Speaker 4: I am Mormon. Speaker 6: Oh, and that the mayor's comment about the affordable housing just reminded me. I really like this yuppie consultant agreement exhibit too, and I think this is pretty exciting. But it does have this section on phasing and financing that I think you use the term fine grained Mr. Christian, but it talks about the cultivate slash urban planning partners team will identify existing priorities and conditions that will impact implementation and establish a plan for the chronological order and location of proposed development. This chapter on phasing and financing will include a financing strategy for infrastructure, transportation, affordable housing, open space and other capital improvement elements necessary for specific planning implementation. And then into the next paragraph it talks about. In addition, the strategy will include discussion of how financing needs relating to the reconstruction of the supportive housing facilities. At some point, collaborative can be integrated with the overall specific plan implementation. It is assumed that the affordable housing developers selected by the locals, supportive housing providers and or collaborative representatives will provide information on project financing gaps, i.e. subsidy needs that would remain after accounting for anticipated project revenues, tax credits and other affordable housing funding sources that the developer anticipates utilizing. I appreciate that depth of information being in there and also that people who know a whole lot more about financing affordable housing projects. I know it's a lot of cobbling together of different sources from the ones that I've seen, but I know that they'll do their best to include as much affordable housing as possible. Speaker 0: I'm sorry, is this. Speaker 6: So I'm just asking is that that would be part of the to look at how much affordable housing could go. Speaker 8: In. Absolutely. Speaker 6: Okay. Thank you. Speaker 7: Yeah. I have a question. Yes. Now the the parcel a process started the specific planning process started by getting. So I think it was someone to be the outfit that did the specific planning for parcel a which kind of which did a great job of kind of filtering out, tweaking what we had done through the zoning process . And I imagine that for the Main Street neighborhood yuppie, that would do the same. Now the thing about the parcel a so and process, the city council was not as involved in that process. So what thoughts have you given to having council involved in the process with through that this process and Main Street neighborhood. Speaker 8: That we're definitely committed to involving council in the in moving forward with Main Street specific plan in much the same way that we're doing with the city development. Speaker 7: Wonderful. That's great news. Thank you. Speaker 0: And Brody. Speaker 4: Thank you, Madam Mayor. My question back on flexibility. Hypothetically, this is Question Time. Hypothetically, if the council later on today says we just want you to focus this specific plan, the priority is the 200 HPC replacement units. Mm hmm. And then we're not going to prioritize the remaining 425 or the remaining part of of the main street neighborhood. Is there a flexibility in this specific plan that we're going to ask to, that we can separate an evaluation of APC and from the rest? So if we want to move forward with APC and we want to shelve the rest or delay the rest for some undetermined period of time, will that flexibility if the council decides they want to do that well, that flexibility be in there? Speaker 8: That's a good question. I would imagine, like you can defer to Jim, but I would imagine that we would since we're required to do this document, it would make the most sense to do the whole neighborhood while we're at it. You know, if you've got the hood up, might as well do the work on the entire neighborhood. And then you can always choose to move forward in phasing as council decides. You know, and again, this this specific point doesn't really speak to disposition, you know, issues such as that. This is really just creating a framework and city council can decide as at a later date to move forward and whatever phasing they decide. Yeah. Speaker 5: Just want to add, as I think we could absolutely. In this specific plan. Speaker 3: And I think Doug. Speaker 5: Biggs executive. Speaker 3: Is probably going to make sure we do this. Speaker 5: Is that we create a phasing plan that contemplates them moving forward without the rest of the neighborhood. So that when we talk about our infrastructure. Speaker 3: And financing and. Speaker 5: Implementation approach in. Speaker 3: The specific plan, we do it for the whole neighborhood. Speaker 5: But that we're very clear that there's a way that this. Speaker 3: Project, his project, can move forward without the rest of the neighborhood and start. And if there's. Speaker 5: Some potential infrastructure issues with that that we outline what those are, so that it's very clear how he can march. Speaker 3: Forward. Speaker 5: Without the rest of the neighborhood. I think we can absolutely do that. Speaker 3: I think that we would probably be. He's going to make sure we do that. Speaker 5: Okay. Thank you. Speaker 0: Now remember questions. We have a speaker, Doug Biggs. Speaker 7: Speaking of. Speaker 0: Thank you for being so patient. Speaker 4: Good morning. My name's Doug Biggs. I'm executive director of the Alameda Point Collaborative. Speaker 2: And I guess since I'm. Speaker 4: Not a member of a public, I get to talk a little longer than 3. Speaker 2: Minutes. Thank you very much, Mayor. Appreciate that. Speaker 4: But I'll try not to. ABC as you do know, I was a partner of the grant submission to the MTC which has funded this proposed project. Our role in the project is a critical component since we make up the bulk of the housing and community space that's in this area. A key outcome of the proposed project is to do a site and financial analysis looking at alternative locations in the Main Street area within which we can rebuild our community. I can't overstate how important it is to us. Speaker 2: And I can't read this thing right now. Speaker 4: I can't overstate how important it is to us and our families that we have housing that supports efforts to overcome homelessness and allow children and families to thrive. As I like to tell folks and some of you have heard me say this before, I think we've built a pretty amazing community out there with really crappy housing. Speaker 3: It's time. Speaker 4: You know, we could do so much more with accessible, appropriately sited housing. We can't get there, though, unless we take this important step. Speaker 2: And as was mentioned previously. Speaker 4: We need to have a specific plan in order to move forward on any development out there. Speaker 2: That that's part of the agreement that's in place. We need to. Speaker 4: Look at alternative locations because that's going to impact the financing. And you can't do that in isolation of just doing that component. You have to look at what's going in around you, what's potentially going in around you, whether that's phased in later or not. So so it all is kind of tied together and it's hard to pull out one piece. Speaker 2: The grant was awarded in June. Speaker 4: Of 2014 and written up in the local papers. Shortly after the grant was awarded, we worked with the city to help identify prospective planning firms. We brought to the process skill sets around supportive housing that we would want to see in a firm. We wanted firms that would be able to talk our language and know the people that we're working with. After RFQ was sent out, there was a well-attended applicant briefing that was held to discuss the project, and we participated in that as well. Once the applications were received, interviews were held and we participated in those. And as live mentioned, while there were several firms that impressed us, Urban Planning Partners brought a breadth of experience and approach that was very much in tune with our desire to build on the successes we had already achieved. We believe that the UP team has excellent, supportive housing expertize and one of their team members, Bruce McCuddy, who's actually worked with us for several years on community planning efforts. He understands our community. He understands the people we're working with, and we're really excited about Sage, the urban agriculture experts, because bringing them in really indicates that they're willing to work with what's out there already. They're willing to help us create an innovative, sustainable main street. Speaker 2: And to build on the work we've. Speaker 4: Already started. DeLay of this project can greatly impair our ability to provide the services our residents need and desire. Moving forward will provide critical information and data that can inform our process. At the end of the day, though, as has been mentioned several times tonight, this is a planning process only it does not break any ground. It does not approve any development. It only informs and as we tell our youth every day at our education center, information empowers leaders, approve this contract and allow us to move forward. Thank you very much. And I'd be glad to answer any questions you may have. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Do we have any comments? Speaker 2: Vice Mayor What I'd like to get out of this for Alameda is, number one, that we take advantage of spending other tax dollars that don't come directly from our general fund. So that's number one. Number two, I'm looking at the tasks that have to happen, and I would like to prioritize the repair, upgrade, redesign and rebuilding of the 200 collaborative units as the top priority. I'm looking at test number two, where where it says cultivate up will prepare a market assessment of various housing types and densities. And then working off this marketing study and in meetings at Task one, they will prepare a series of site planning alternatives. I'd like to have them include a site planning alternative that caps the number of units to what exists they. Not what was talked about in 2008 or in 2012 or 2014, because those didn't anticipate the multifamily overlays outside of the base and the northern waterfront. So I'd like to have an alternative that's discussed that that puts the cap. On on building new units over and above. What's there? I'd like. An alternative that preserves the neighborhood around the big white. I'd like an alternative and that comes back to the Council for a preferred alternative is selected so that the council is the gatekeeper of what's the preferred alternative. I think it's very important to look at this not only in the context of other development at the base, but the other development in the rest of the city. And I think that goes back to the comments about addressing the transportation, addressing it both locally in and in the city. So that's that's what I'd like to see us. When in place is controls and guidance for this group provide us with a specific plan because that specific plan is going to be the foundation of how we zone it and then what's built there. Make no mistake. Speaker 6: Amber Ashcraft So I was thinking about this. Mike Grant It's it's pretty impressive that we have this $250,000 grant to work with and, you know, $6,000 of our own money. But we're leveraging quite a bit because when I represented Alameda on the Alameda County Transportation Commission in the last administration, it was a constant source of frustration to me that I would see these MTC grants being doled out to other communities around this large table. And Alameda wasn't even eligible because we had very few PDAs planned development areas because at that point we still hadn't had the conveyance from the Navy. So it wasn't our property. We couldn't do, you know, the things that were required to get this grant. And so this is public money and yet it was going to trust me. And Oakland got a lot of it, but every every other jurisdiction around the table. So now we're in a position to take advantage of this. And I did enjoy reading the staff report in the consultant agreement, and I did have some questions that I emailed to staff earlier. And one of the a couple of things that I want to make sure are incorporated is I asked if our existing development guidelines require that new construction be energy efficient or achieve zero net energy objectives. If not, how can we include these objectives in this specific plan? And the answer I got was that staff intends to address sustainability issues in the Main Street specific plan, much as was done with the recently completed town center plan. And I, I'm also pleased to see that there will be sustainable streets. So again, not just complete streets that look at all different modes and users, not just autos, but bicycle, pedestrian transit, but also taking the concept one step further, including bio swales or something similar to treat runoff on site. I love the urban agriculture component of this and that's important for so many reasons. First of all, there's not a lot of places around the Bay Area where you have urban agriculture. And I have been out there. Mr. Biggs gave me a lovely I think we walked for 3 hours one day tour and his residents in a lot of them, the young people are out there and they're working in these various agriculture enterprises, whether it's the beekeeping or the planting and the orchards and plowshares is lovely. And I want to see and you know, we're doing a community garden at the Jean Sweeney Open Space Park. I mean, this is something Alameda can really be known for. And so I'm glad to see that that's a big part of this specific plan. And I'm the OC and so I think it was Councilmember de SAC raised this my question was with regard to the preferred alternative selection, I wrote how and when does City Council offer its input on development and evaluation of these alternatives? It seems like everyone but the City Council will be consulted, yet we have ultimate responsibility for approving the draft specific plan. I prefer a process similar to what we're doing with City I. Monthly updates to the Council with Opportunity for input and I. The response I got was that's what we're going to do. And a couple of things that I especially like about this was the development standards I thought were very well stated, the flexible form based standards regarding existing historic structures and compatible new construction. I know Christopher Buckley has left, but he would he would like that too. And finally, in the in the agreement on pages 17 and 18, I said I'm very cool online participation platform, so not everyone can come to a meeting that lasts until 1230 at night, but everyone can sit at their computer or a computer somewhere and let your your thoughts and your your opinions about this Plan B be heard. So I'm looking forward to seeing this go forward. Thank you. Speaker 0: Remember, Audie. Speaker 4: So this was the other item that I was very torn on. In addition to the weather one. You know, in an ideal world, we would put this off, we would take care of make a decision on siting and see where we're going on site, a work on a site, B, developing the enterprise zone and put off the decision on more housing until we're further down the road on site A and we've had an opportunity as a council to evaluate traffic and show the public that we're taking the results of the election seriously. But on the other side, you know, we have the 200 substandard units that the folks in APC are living on a living in. So we need to, you know, rebuild and relocate that the APC housing, I mean an ideal world we'd have that inside a and then we wouldn't have to worry about this and we could push this off for another couple of years. But I don't think that's going to happen. But these people need better housing. They need to be better situated. They had the same infrastructure issues in the housing that we've heard from the business, the businesses that are out at Almeida Point, you saw the map. They have a huge footprint. We want to have a smaller footprint for APC. So. I, I like the idea that the Vice Mayor suggested that we really have a robust series of site planning alternatives. Again, if APEC was not in here, I would not be voting to move this forward. I would just say, let's not deal with Main Street neighborhood until we've we've taken care of site. But, you know, we do have a social responsibility to the folks that live in APC to get them out of their substandard housing as soon as possible. So I'd like to see the, you know, the hypothetical I mentioned where, you know, we focus on taking care of APC and, you know, the alternatives, maybe some that turns out do nothing. Maybe the alternatives are having the cap. Maybe, you know, the alternatives, you know, are banking the land and dealing with it, you know, in five or ten years, I don't know. But I'd like to see those alternatives, but not hold up the process of of taking care of the APC residents and getting them into higher quality housing. Speaker 7: Well, thank you. First and foremost, I want to say thank you very much to Doug Biggs for coming out to my office hours this past Thursday. We had a great conversation. He, you know, let me know about the planning that the homeless collaborative Alameda Point Collaborative has undertaken and why this is an important step in moving that along. It seems to me that in moving forward with the Main Street neighborhood, we can certainly help his cause even more. And it is important to remember that, you know, base conversion isn't just about, you know, working with the catalysis of the world or working with the streams of the world or the slums of the world. But it is intimately about also working with the Alamo to point collaborative of the world for that reason, you know, to give real meaning to turning arms into plowshares. I think it's a vital part or what we're all about at Alameda Point. So I think we should, you know, be unapologetic in and in doing what we can to assist Alameda Point Collaborative in achieving their goals. From my take, I think the framework began when it comes to residential is the 1425 and of that 1425 we're looking at roughly 800 for parcel a and I hear clearly what staff is saying with regard to Main Street that that we're not locking in into any particular numbers. But I do want to raise, though, that the point that Vice Mayor Matt R.C. raised in terms of putting a cap that could have substantive effects. So I don't I think, you know, if Vice Mayor Matt, R-S.C., would like to include a cap in his in his approach, then I say, fine, include that in your one of your analyzes. But as one of the analyzes, because it seems to me that if you put a cap based upon what's existing there now in total

Regular Agenda Item

Recommendation to Award Contract in the Amount of $256,292 to Cultivate Studio and Urban Planning Partners (UPP), Inc. to Prepare the Main Street Neighborhood Specific Plan for Alameda Point (AP). (Base Reuse 819099)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_02172015_2015-1190

Speaker 0: Or be recommendation to accept the Treasury report for the quarter ending December 31st, 2014. Speaker 7: But evening, Madam Mayor and members of the city council. So. Oops. Oh, we've got to change. Change the scene over here. I'm going to talk with you about the quarterly investment report. All right. Faster than I could have done it. So as you will recall and we talked about last time, the government code requires that if the city council so directs that we are required to report to you on a quarterly basis and we must state that it complies with our investment policy and that there is cash coverage for the next six months. Those are the requirements in state law. Our investment policy was last updated in February of 2014. So it's coming back to you soon. It stresses safety, liquidity and yield. It provides limitations on the type credit, credit, quality and duration of investments as outlined in state law. And the policy itself is located on the Finance Department website. In case anyone is interested in reading all of the fine details included in that policy. All of these limitations are intended to preclude the misuse of public investments in risky investments over a long period of time. And the city's statement of investment policy is very typical and is in conformance with the State Treasurers Association. Last month we were asked the question about limiting losses. And Kevin Kennedy, our elected city treasurer, is going to speak to that issue when we address the update to the investment policy. The report contents are determined by state law as well. In the staff report. A short summary is of the portfolio is displayed. The investment types are listed from the most liquid to the least liquid. Market value is provided by the investment advisors and reflects the market on the final day of the quarter being reported. It is compared to the cost or book value for review purposes only. Every negative number indicates that the market value is less than the book value. The average duration is the average age of the investment. To measure the performance of the portfolio, the two year U.S. Treasury bill rate is used as the comparison. In this case, the portfolio performed at about 2.28%, better than the two year Treasury bill rate. And the exhibit contains the detailed investments by INSTRUMENT, and the advisory firms report on the credit quality and the return for their individual portions of the portfolio. Most of the portfolio is in restricted in its uses. The majority of this is debt service funds or other special revenue funds. Those funds are not totally restricted, are in the general fund and in the internal service service funds. Cash is managed on a daily basis with the goal of making certain that six months of need payroll accounts payable, debt service will be met. Historically, Alameda has had two investment advisory firms. The 1 to 3 year portfolio is managed by public financial management. And the 3 to 5 year portfolio was managed by Chandler Asset Management. Both firms must, must comply with the investment policy, and the policy also prohibits investment in companies which receive more than 51% of the gross revenues from cigarets alcohol or other gambling products. And again, elected city treasurer Kevin Kennedy will speak to the issue of socially responsible investing when we address the investment policy. This is a summary of the investment portfolio as of December 30th. Investments with bond trustees. Are those funds required to be held by the trustee by bond covenants? A duration less than 3030 days indicates that they are very liquid and the local agency investment fund is managed by the State Treasurer's office. The maximum that we are allowed to invest is $50 million. Between these funds and cash on deposit. The six month cash needs are met. The certificates of deposit are safe instruments for holding small amounts required to be maintained for a variety of purposes. The remainder are instrument instruments managed by PFM and CAM two investment advisory firms. The quick thumbnail gives the reader a quick view of the elements of the portfolio how the book and market value compare and the duration and average yield. Last quarter, the average will yield was 0.35% and the total total portfolio was about 157 million. This this increase in cash is due to the closing of the 2014 refunding bonds sold on December 23rd, 2014. And that concludes my report. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel, do you have any questions? I have a comment. I have a comment. I just wanted to share that the second page of the Treasury report provides that Kevin Kennedy, our city treasurer, has reviewed the City Values Treasury report for this quarter ending December 31st, 2014, and found that it complies with the investment policy established by his office. We have a motion. Speaker 6: M.A. I'd like to move approval of the staff recommendation to accept the Treasurer report for the quarter ending December 31st, 2014. Speaker 2: A second. Speaker 1: All those in favor. I oppose none. Motion carries unanimously. Thank you very much. And our next item is for C. Speaker 0: Recommendation to accept the second quarter financial report for the period ending December 31st, 2014.

Joint Agenda Item

Recommendation to Accept the Treasury Report for the Quarter Ending December 31, 2014. [City Council] (Finance 2410)

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Speaker 1: We have a staff report. We do have speakers. I appreciate the speakers at this point. Speaker 5: Sure. Speaker 1: All right. The speakers will be Richard Banker, Irene Dieter, Doug Seiden. And then Gretchen LeBeau. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mayor. Members of the city council, city staff for bringing this forward. I'd like to take my 3 minutes to just get in my digs against the GSA. I hope at the end of this process, we not only have expansion of a regional park, but an expansion of oversight over a federal agency, and possibly the ending of a loophole which not even the Pentagon has a loophole in federal land disposal that allowed the GSA to arbitrarily bypass the normal public benefit conveyance option and go straight to an auction. Not even the Pentagon could do that, as the Pentagon never said anything about recovering relocation costs for moving their military base. No, they haven't. But of course, the GSA wants to recover the, quote, relocation costs for moving the Department of Agribusiness down the street from offices they weren't using. And they spent $3 million doing that. And now they won't even tell the public how they spent that $3 million. But in the Freedom of Information Act, request and see if you get the file. They won't release it. I can tell you what they spent part of the money on. They put in a new parking lot. You can see it. But what did they spend the rest of the money on? We don't know. We don't know. Maybe the Department of Agribusiness saw an opportunity here to include some new equipment in this reshuffle. Outside the congressional. Budget authorization process. And maybe that's what they want to keep secret. We don't know. And now inexplicably, after this property has been zoned open space with only two possible owners, the federal GSA or the State Department of Parks and Recreation. The GSA is continuing to pursue eminent domain to take Mackay Avenue, which is owned by the State Department of Parks and Recreation, so that they, the GSA, can assume easement rights, that they can then in turn, assign to the state of California Department of Parks and Recreation. Now, I would call that cuckoo. And to quote Judge Judy. When something doesn't make any sense, someone is lying. In this case, I would say someone is hiding something. So I would suggest this. When your liaison committee is listening, I suggest that you liaison with our congressional representative and offer some personal encouragement to look into this. That is, if she's up to it. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker 0: Hello, Mayor and council. My name is Irene Deeter, and tonight I speak on behalf of the Sierra Club. We urge you to support this resolution. And thank you for bringing it forward. By doing so, you'll not only join the Sierra Club in actively opposing the federal government's eminent domain action and working to secure the highest and best use for the property. You will also join the California League of Conservation Voters, the California State Park Foundation, Clean Water Action, Citizens for East Bay Parks, the Golden Gate, Audubon Society's Friends of the Alameda Life Refuge. Citizens for a Better Environment. National Parks Conservation Association. Save Mount Diablo. Save the Bay. Not to mention the city's own Rex and Parks Commission, our Regional Park District, the Friends of Crown Beach, and of course, our State Attorney General. This resolution, at long last, would send the right message to the GSA and to our state and federal representative. We urge you to pass this resolution. Thank you. Speaker 1: Doug cited. And then it'll be Gretchen Lipo. Speaker 5: Wait a minute. Good evening, Mayor. Vice Mayor, council members, city staff. For the record, I'm Doug Satan Florida Direction Regional Park District and I want to thank you for this consideration because I think this carries out the will of the people and that 28 people voted for Proposition WW and it was very specific and included when it became available. The property that we're talking about tonight across the Crab Cove or part of Crown Park, and then you and your colleagues on the council previously approved setting that aside that the citizens petition so you set it aside is open space but is threatened now. And let me if you have seen the from the GSA dated January 15 of this year saying that the property is available and then they go on to tell you the things that if you are a federal agency and they're required to make it known, other federal agencies, they could be my translation. I'll call it a junkyard, a storage area, a place to put down construction equipment, a youth detention facility. Of not saying anything about me staying at a spoke as open space. So I want to show you the smoke, the choking point and what I think we need to do. Thank you. Okay. Looking at the K Street coming down and then the state, the Crown Beach, part of the state park and then the GSA property where they propose saying the federal agency, you could do all these things where they don't tell them is you can't get there. Now, I don't know if you're a realtor in town and you try to sell property and you didn't tell them you couldn't get there. I think you were in trouble with the federal agencies doing that. But what they say at the checking court talking point is, well, the GSA will get the federal government to sue the state of California so that we can get to that piece of property. And this is where I think we need to be together to say to to Congresswoman Lee, to our senators of the city and the park district are together. And you heard the support of the previous speaker that this maintain is that they stop this lawsuit using our tax money in order to get to that piece of property. So I would encourage the adoption of this proposed resolution. Speaker 6: Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker 0: Council members. Mayor, staff. The word Crab Cove, I can tell you, resonates. Speaker 7: With everybody now. It's a magic word. And so I speak. Speaker 0: You heard the background and you heard Irene, dear, talk about all the organizations that support this. Well, I'm talking about all the people in. Speaker 7: Alameda that signed the. Speaker 0: Petitions. Speaker 1: And when you say. Speaker 7: Crab Cove, basically Crab Cove, I mean, grandparents go back to Crab Cove. All kinds of activities have taken place in this area. This spot is sacred with the citizens of Alameda. So I'm here to cheerlead this issue on and I certainly support this resolution. And I hope you get in there. Speaker 5: Fight for Crab Cove. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. She was our last speaker on that item. Staff, do you have did you want to make any comments? Speaker 5: Now, this this resolution was drafted with the assistance of the staff. From the East Bay Regional Park District and then worked over a little by our staff. They're fine. We just made a couple of tweaks to it so that it worked within our our formatting. And this is basically what they've asked for and this is what we're presenting to the Council tonight. Speaker 1: Thank you. Yes. I'm proud of you. Speaker 2: Thank you. And thank you to all the speakers who spoke and good staff report. And I just want to say that since this item was last introduced and I certainly expressed my concern and opposition and yes, stemming largely from my feelings about entities who sue our city and the six figure legal bills that we have as a result. However, I've had a chance to rethink the issue. At the time I said that I didn't think that a large public agency like the East Bay Regional Parks District should need the. The city's, ah, little city's help in its dealings with the Federal Government. But after speaking, thinking more about this, speaking to our East Bay Regional Parks District Representative Doug Seiden, and trying to look at the issue from the park district's perspective, I realized that the Park District does need our help, the city of Alameda, because as the Board of East Bay Regional Parks District was told, the objective of the lawsuit that it brought against the city was to acquire the Crab Cove property. But that didn't happen. The lawsuit has been settled. Fortunately, the city, as it was noted, has enacted the ordinance to rezone the property open space, and yet it still is not in the hands of the Park District. So now the Park District has to pursue other avenues. And and I understand that. And I will say that there does seem to be some hard feelings, to say the least, between the Park District and GSA. I'm not a party to those transactions, and I'm not going to begin to speculate. I'm also not sure how much the city can do to help the Park District and the federal government mend fences between them. But a statement of support from the city and as outlined in this this staff report, certainly can't hurt and it just might help. And I so I said that in my notes that I will support taking the high road in this case. I think that's what the city's doing. We can say, okay, let's put the past behind us. I think what the Park District does best is run parks. It's negotiating with other parties. Might might not be as great as stellar as its operation of parks. But we would like them to get back to the business of running parks. And certainly the city of Alameda would benefit from that property at Crab Crab Cove being in the hands of the Park District. So there's a change of position on my part. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Speaker 1: Any other council member comments like madam? Speaker 3: I just want to say briefly, I think it's important for for all of us here on council and also our city staff to basically roll up our sleeves and join with the Park East Bay Regional Parks and the people of Alameda and the other nonprofits and community based organizations who want to see Crab Cove be what everyone so desires. So, you know, there's a lot of tough work ahead of us, but, you know, we've got to roll up our sleeves and get going. Speaker 6: As one echoed Councilmember De Sung said. And then just add to it a thanks to the vice mayor for bringing this forward. We talked about this all last fall, how it's important that we're all on the same page. So the city and the East Bay Regional Parties took fighting on the same side. I just want to thank the city manager or negotiating and putting together this resolution and as he always does, the most professional of ways. And I'm ready to support this, and I'm glad that we're taking this step as a city. Speaker 5: I just want to acknowledge the mayor's role in working through this with both parties. I also wanted to ask whether it would be appropriate at this time to have the city clerk give a brief report. Because at the time of the time I wrote this report, the city clerk was researching the matter of whether there had been a liaison committee in the past, and I let her tell you what she found. Speaker 0: I did find that the city council and the Park District held several joint meetings together in the eighties long ago. And there was discussion, other discussions in the moment about the council referring to meetings between the city manager and the mayor meeting with ECB Regional Park District. But there was never the formation of a subcommittee that actually met and had an ongoing relationship, so I could not find anything that supported. Speaker 3: That in the. Speaker 5: Record. And if I may, Madam Mayor, and therefore, I think it's important at this time to get instruction, to get confirmation or other instruction from the council about the proposal, from the staff in number three, which is. And it's the report says, you know, with council's concurrence, we would propose to speed the creation of a liaison committee with two members from each board to meet quarterly. The other alternative would be to have a joint meeting of the two boards. I don't recommend that their joint board meetings are unwieldy and difficult and usually don't get a whole lot of work done. But that is a potential option, given there was a clear desire at the time this referral came forward to look at the historic relationship. And the historic relationship going back 30 years is that they did meet jointly. Again, it's not the staff's recommendation or recommendation is two from each body and meeting quarterly, and we would propose that to the regional park district this week. Speaker 1: So yes. Speaker 4: Vice Mayor Yeah, I, I think that the formation of a liaison committee was clear in the referral. It's a method that's been used with the school district here. It's been a method that's been used with AC Transit District to much success. And those the members of that liaison committee would bring the recommendations jointly worked out in in those meetings to the respective bodies for action. And my question is, let's let's get started on this and let's do it now. I'm as is of the essence, I think. And we also part of this of this referral was to help rebuild a good working relationship between the city and the park district, because this is not the only project out there, $6.5 million of East Bay Regional Park money slated for Alameda Point. And I think a liaison committee would be very helpful in sifting through the pieces and bringing a recommendation to the respective boards on how to move forward on spending that money. So I'm in favor of getting this resolution on the board. I agree with the city manager. That joint meeting of the two boards, the council and the East Bay Regional Parks Board is difficult to schedule and unwieldy. And the liaison committee is the shortest distance between two points. Speaker 5: Okay. If that's the will of the council, the. Speaker 1: If possible, I'd like to address the adopt the resolution first of those one motion and then the second motion as to the liaison committee. Speaker 3: Madam Chair, I'd like to move stats recommendation as to the resolution. Speaker 5: Second. Speaker 1: And then comments. So I'd like to share. I want to thank Robert Doyle, who is the general manager of East Bay Parks, as well as our board member, Doug Seiden, for their continual good work to protect our parks and and offer Crab Cove to our community. And as a school board member, when I was on the school board and worked with these gentlemen and the Park District to bring a resolution in front of the school district, and I'm very proud to have been able to work with East Bay Parks again, to be part of bringing this to our city to to approve. And I agree and I appreciate member Ashcraft stepping up on this and her explanation. She's absolutely right. It is imperative that the East Bay parks have a resolution like this so then they can do their work and have the best possibility of being successful. So thank you very much. And again, so I also want to thank staff for their work on this. So keeping having that stated all those in favor. I oppose motion the resolution as approved unanimously. Thank you. And now in regards to the liaison committee. Speaker 4: To make a motion to establish a liaison committee as stated two members from each board and make that overture to East Bay Regional Parks to be seated at the earliest possible convenience. Speaker 6: Second. Speaker 1: And so I have a question. Would we select members at a future meeting or do we do that at this point? But to come back? Speaker 5: Protocol would be you have to wait for them to formally accept. You can bring it back at another meeting. Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker 5: It's it'll. You could bring it back. I mean, you could even put it on the agenda. I don't think it requires a report, a written report. You could put it on the agenda for the March three, the March three meeting. And then go into, you know, go and do that as you choose. But that's up to you. Speaker 4: And I don't buy most. Speaker 5: How you do that is up to you. Not if you. Speaker 1: Want to amend your motion by saying it. Speaker 2: Well, Matt. Yeah, I was just going to make the suggestion that perhaps because it seems like it's been sufficiently publicly noticed, perhaps the council could actually decide who are two committee members would be. And then certainly pending acceptance of our offer to the the acceptance of the park district's reciprocal agreement, this could then come back perhaps just on the consent calendar for approval. Speaker 5: I'm going to defer to the city attorney. I just want to be sure, because there's not an item that says appointment of I just don't want to run afoul of sunshine and it's not going to change how quickly you would be able to get a meeting. Sure. Because we're going to be speaking with them about a meeting date. So this week. So, I mean, not the meeting this week, but we'll be talking with them this week. Speaker 4: If we could put it on. Speaker 7: And as John was. Speaker 0: Speaking, I was reading the heading to see how it was noticed. Speaker 1: And I agree, I don't think it's sufficiently noticed to be able to take that action. It was mentioned in the staff report, but I think it's safer to wait. Thank you. The next. Speaker 0: Meeting. Speaker 6: But we could express an interest in being part of that liaison committee today. Speaker 1: So I. Speaker 2: Think. Does it matter to Wade? Speaker 1: However, Council is a first of all, let's get a motion. Would you like to amend your motion? Speaker 4: I'll amend the motion to add that follow the city manager suggestion to attendees. This item for the March 3rd meeting. Speaker 6: And until second. Speaker 1: And now for a conversation. Any comments? Yes. Speaker 2: So I'm Madam City attorney. Acting city attorney. So on the title of the the staff report here. So it's adoption of a resolution supporting a conveyance of the surplus federal property on McKay Avenue. We've done that and approved the work plan. Pursuant to City Council's directions. So the work plan, is it not these four specific actions under discussion. What is the work plan that we're discussing? Speaker 5: Well, if I may just I understood the workplan to be the four items that are under discussion. The only issue is whether somebody's looking at the agenda with no one appointment. What's happening? So, I mean, the council the council can take the decision it wants to take, but. Why not cross your ts would be my advice. Speaker 1: And there are four points that are specified on staff's report. And it says number three is establish a council, East Bay Regional Park District Liaison Committee. It does not include language and appoint members. And I think that's the issue being raised. Speaker 5: Up to the body. It's. Speaker 2: That's fine. It's not that I'm over the anxious that we have to do it tonight. It's just that we sent. We tend to have a lot of agenda items coming back to us. And I was just thinking, if your economy is fine, but maybe it's time to stop discussing this one and move on. Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker 0: Perhaps we could bring it back as a consent calendar item as John. Speaker 1: All right, so do we. If we want to discuss who would be on, we don't have to vote on that tonight. You want to have the discussion and then it could come back on consent, if that's the council's desire. Speaker 5: Were you to bring it back on consent, then you'd have to have the names, which means you'd have to discuss it tonight. Which means it doesn't talk about appointment here. I would. I think you should just have it as a regular agenda item at your next meeting so you can decide. Then going back to appointments. Speaker 4: Going back to the motion. The motion is to set up the liaison committee and to agenda is on the third. After hearing back from East Bay regional parks that they're agreeing to it and to sit the committee. Speaker 5: Right. Speaker 4: Thank you. Speaker 1: Remember Ashcroft. Speaker 2: Isn't it broader than that? Because it proves the work plan would be all four of those items, right. Or is that just assumed in proving this? Speaker 5: We're asking for you to approve the work plan. I mean, just. Okay. Yeah. You approve the work plan is the appointment that I'm advising you not to actually do. Yeah. Okay. And you can't do it by consent. Or you would have almost certainly violated the Brown Act by having a chain meeting to decide whose name was going to be in there to consent to. So you don't want to do that either. Speaker 1: Thank you. I'm going to call the question. All those in favor. I oppose none. Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Now we're on item six be. Speaker 0: Introduction of ordinance, approving and authorizing the city manager to execute documents necessary to implement the terms of the lease with complete coach works. The California Corporation for a lease for two years and nine months and a portion of building 24 located at 2301 Monarch Street at Alameda Point.

Regular Agenda Item

Adoption of Resolution Supporting a Conveyance of the Surplus Federal Property on McKay Avenue for Park and Open-Space Purposes and Approve the Work Plan pursuant to City Council’s Direction on January 21, 2015. (City Manager 2110)

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Speaker 0: Introduction of ordinance, approving and authorizing the city manager to execute documents necessary to implement the terms of the lease with complete coach works. The California Corporation for a lease for two years and nine months and a portion of building 24 located at 2301 Monarch Street at Alameda Point. Speaker 5: I'm sorry when you start the report, would you just briefly before beginning the report, can you just talk quickly about what we discussed today about presenting to council? Sure. At the at the budget. Speaker 7: Sure. Thank you. Okay. Speaker 0: Good evening, mayor spencer and city council members. I'm than that mchunu in the community development department slash base for use. And so I discussed. Speaker 1: With the city manager. Speaker 0: This afternoon based on some conversations. Speaker 1: That he's had with several with the mayor and some council members. Speaker 0: About figuring out how we how we approach. Speaker 1: Our leasing and making sure that our leases are on market and how we establish rates and things like that. Speaker 0: And so. Speaker 1: We decided that as part of our Open House during the budget session, that we. Speaker 0: Would. Speaker 1: Address the that concern and give you a broader picture of our leasing activities, specifically at Alameda Point. But as many of you know, we do leasing on tidelands and cell towers and. Speaker 0: Throughout the city so that we'll talk about that at that meeting. So what you have in front of you tonight is. Speaker 1: A lease renewal for a. Speaker 7: Complete coach. Speaker 0: Works. And there have been a couple of questions that came in. Speaker 1: During the course of the. Speaker 0: After the the publishing of. Speaker 1: The agenda. So I'm going to try to hit some of them. Speaker 0: So that everybody has the same information. So American bus repair has been a tenant in Building 24 since 1997, originally under the name City Car Star, Garage Car Star and May. Speaker 7: Of 2000. Speaker 0: The city approved the assignment of the lease. Speaker 7: To. Speaker 1: American Best Repair. In June of 2012. Speaker 0: American best repair in the city entered into. Speaker 1: A lease that was assigned to. Speaker 7: Complete coach works. Speaker 0: In January of 2014. At that time. Speaker 1: At that time. Speaker 0: When. Speaker 7: Complete Coach Works took over, they took. Speaker 1: Over in December of 2013, we gave them a one. Speaker 7: Year. Speaker 0: Extension that the lease was set to expire. Speaker 1: In six months and they were. Speaker 7: Really. Speaker 1: Nervous about that and they hadn't realized that they only had. Speaker 0: Six months. So we said. Speaker 1: The long term plan for this building is that. Speaker 0: We're going to have one tenant here and we. Speaker 1: Think it's. Speaker 0: Going to be Rockwall Winery. So you have one year. And so we worked with. Speaker 7: Rockwall and complete work Coats Works. Speaker 0: Cushman Wakefield, our broker. Speaker 7: Took complete coach works all over the East Bay looking at different properties. Speaker 1: To try to get them geared up and. Speaker 0: Ready to move out. And toward the end of that one year, Rockwall Winery wasn't ready to to expand until we gave. Speaker 7: So we're here. Speaker 0: Again with that with an extension. For three years. Speaker 1: We talked to Rockwall Winery and said, you know, we can't have these. Speaker 0: Starts and stops. Speaker 1: We need to have a. Speaker 0: Longer term approach to our leasing. And even. Speaker 7: Three years is a short period. Speaker 0: Of time. So Rockwall said, You know, this is well within our planning. We get it. So three. Speaker 7: Years is. Speaker 1: Within the horizon of our operations and it should. Speaker 7: Be within complete. Speaker 0: Coach works. I want to say that it is not the desire to have the painting facility as a long term tenant. Speaker 1: There and our spirits, our spirits. Speaker 0: Alley. But we had a bird in the hand using the building for what it was designed to do. And so. Speaker 1: We thought it was really just in not not. Speaker 7: Uprooting a company for the sake of uprooting. Speaker 0: But to. Speaker 1: Be more proactive and keeping them there and then to keep our eyes open and trying to attract a long. Speaker 0: Term tenant. Speaker 1: That is in keeping with our vision. Speaker 0: Of developing the spirits and, and. Speaker 1: Distilleries and breweries and all of those. Speaker 0: People over there and. Speaker 7: Food. Speaker 0: Eventually, knock on wood, I have with. Speaker 1: Me. Speaker 0: Ted Anderson from Cushman. Speaker 1: Wakefield, and he's going to try to just. Speaker 7: Briefly talk a little. Speaker 0: Bit about this lease in specific about. Speaker 1: The rent rate and what we think about when we set the. Speaker 0: Rates. But we're. Speaker 1: Going to do a broader discussion. Speaker 0: In our Open House session. Speaker 3: That evening, Madam Mayor. Council members. Staff. So I was kind of the architect behind this opus. So hopefully I'm in a position to be able to answer the questions that you may have as it relates to how we came upon the deal terms. So if you want me to just kind of start answering my own question, I'll kind of give you the thought process. Speaker 6: So as Ninette said, we gave these folks. Speaker 3: A one year extension renewal. At that time, we also, you know, recalibrated their rental rate and, you know, moved it substantially up to, you know, a standard that we felt was more commiserate with market on this most recent increase. Speaker 6: Or rather on this most recent renewal. We've also built in some additional increases, but they're 3% from where we. Speaker 3: Established that new basis a year ago. When you look at it in terms of a rental rate on the 15,000 square feet, I think it comes in a little bit over $0.70, which, you know, skews maybe a little bit high compared to what we've seen elsewhere. But you have to take into consideration they've got about a 23,000 exclusive yard area that in this Bay Area of ours is is very, very valuable because land is scarce. Speaker 6: So we've tried. Speaker 3: To monetize, you know, that asset to the property in conjunction with what. Speaker 6: We felt was a reasonable lease rate for. Speaker 3: The 15,000 square feet that they occupy. And then also put a little bit of a spiff in place because of the unique nature of the building, its improvements and its utility to their end use, because this operation isn't going to move anywhere cheaply. So I think it's a tenant that we will be able to have as. Speaker 6: The city's advocate. Speaker 3: For as long as we see fit, because I don't think they're likely to move. Speaker 1: Thank you. Council members questions. Nebraska. Speaker 2: Thank you and thank you, Mr. Henderson. And also Ms.. Marcano. And I was at least one of the councilmembers who raised the question in some correspondence with Ms.. McConaughey that I thought this was an unusual and I would say, undesirable juxtaposition of uses that we wouldn't normally see a winery next door to a company that paints busses . And I was also concerned with the painting aspect of the proximity of this building to the bay, and in the event of any spillage or leakage of what the environmental implications would be. I do understand that this was a hangar where this sort of operation took place during the Navy years. But as I also pointed out, we're still doing cleanup from operations that took place during the the Navy years. On the other hand, I, I miss McConaughey gave me an excellent detailed explanation, actually, several of them. She kept coming back. And I do understand the bird in the hand argument that we are making lease revenue off of this. There are environmental safeguards in place. And if you read the lease, there is you know, it's very specifically spelled out. So this is, as I understand it, a short term lease. You've upped the the the rental rate. And so the the city is benefiting from this. And I and I know that you're also going to be out there looking around and shopping for more desirable tenants for this location. And I have to think that an upcoming agenda item is this update on our site, a development at Alameda Point. And I think as those kinds of businesses that are being proposed get up and running, it'll just make our area even more attractive to potential renters and buyers for the properties. Speaker 7: So that's. Speaker 3: Certainly our hope and. Speaker 2: Charge. I know it is. So anyway, I think the team and for all the good information you provided me. Speaker 3: Thank you so much. Thank you, guys. Speaker 1: We have a motion. Speaker 5: Both. Speaker 1: Second counsel comments. I would like to thank complete coach works for continuing to do business in Alameda. I'm confident that they are being environmentally safe and practicing good work work habits, following the appropriate protocols to protect the environment. And I do commend them for continuing to do business here. And with that said, all those in favor. I oppose motion carries unanimously. Thank you very much. Next agenda item six see. Speaker 0: Status report on site development at Alameda Point.

Regular Agenda Item

Introduction of Ordinance Approving and Authorizing the City Manager to Execute Documents Necessary to Implement the Terms of the Lease with Complete Coach Works, a California Corporation, for a Lease for Two Years and Nine Months in a Portion of Building 24 Located at 2301 Monarch Street at Alameda Point. (Base Reuse 819099)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_02172015_2015-1308

Speaker 0: Presentation on Proposed Process for preparing approach to comprehensive citywide transportation planning and implementation effort. Speaker 8: Good evening, Mayor. Councilmembers. My name is Jennifer, our chief operating officer. I'm at a point in this particular case, I'm kind of wearing a citywide hat. I'm helping out. We're all busy and just I'm helping take care of these issues. We're working at our main point on a lot of TDM implementation issues with different consultants, and so I offered to kind of help move this forward and but it's going to be a inter-departmental team working with all of the different departments and very focused on citywide. So just because you're seeing me up here does not mean this is going to be a point centric. But really, we're going to be coming back on March 10th as part of a workshop, but just wanted to check in. We'll all listen to the tape from the 21st, January 21st. We just wanted to make sure we our process that we outlined here is okay with the council. I think we heard a couple of things. One was that you definitely want to involve the other commissions and boards, Transportation Commission, Planning Board. The council ultimately wants to take the lead in really directing this work. And to be honest, we actually the reason we have the process before you today is we took advantage of the fact that there was already a schedule transportation planning board committee meeting. It is, as the city manager mentioned earlier, it isn't an easy thing to schedule. And so to have that already on the calendar perfect with our timing, we've kind of jumped on it, got things done. And so we hope that you're okay with us, going to them first, talking to them about it, kind of giving it almost like a dry run presentation of what, you know, some of our ideas and thoughts about how we address the referral and then come back to you on March 10th with those their comments, the same presentation, maybe tweaked a little bit based on some of their comments and a staff report kind of outlining our approach to the referral and how we think the city should proceed. Also, just another thing to note is that at that particular meeting we find ourselves with staff and I know it comes up in the public conversation as well as when we start talking about transportation, we end up talking about housing. And when we start talking on housing, we start talking about transportation. And there had been a direction by the Council on January six to look at the density bonus ordinance and to address some issues related to density bonus ordinance and then the larger development occurring in the Northern Waterfront housing element. And so we decided there will be two staff reports, but it will be kind of a workshop housing, a transportation workshop. They're such dense topics. We do have two staff reports. City planner Thomas will give the housing the density bonus presentation and I'll do the transportation one and and then but we can talk about the issues together , how they're interrelated. But we wanted to put them in the same night at the same special meeting. So I just wanted to brief the council, make sure since we, you know, it's not exactly what you directed, but we wanted to make sure we thought it was in the spirit of what you had said, just to make sure that you were okay with that process. Speaker 1: Council Comments. Speaker 4: Vice Mayor I think this is extremely important because I've talked to some people who've been involved in the discussions around safety and they didn't realize that there was northern waterfront burden in 2245 homes just in the inventory, and that's density bonus aside. So I think it's very important to understand. From the public point of view in a workshop setting, I think is the way to do that is. What is the implication of the development up at the top of the island? The development here and the transportation, because it is it's not the number of people. It's the number of vehicles that go through the tubes is the problem. Mm hmm. And. The and that's why I brought up the question of commercialization out at the point, because the assumption is that people are going to work where they're live, where they live. But if there's no solid commercial base out there, you're going to have people living there and going to work someplace else. And I think we really the the March 10th meeting. In a workshop setting away from a council agenda, I think is a good way to start fleshing out the talking points and also to start informing us on what kind of decisions we're going to have to make. So I appreciate this approach. Good. And I appreciate you combining them. Speaker 8: Good. Great. Thank you. Speaker 1: Mary Ashcroft? Speaker 2: I think it's a great idea. I think it's well thought out. And meeting with the meeting to discuss both of these topics makes perfect sense because it's really hard to separate them. So thank you. We look forward to. Speaker 8: It that you. Speaker 1: Day. Speaker 3: Thank you. Well, thank you for the way that you outlined it. I think what we're doing is we're creating a framework from which even more precise follow up tasks will emerge. But we just need to know what the framework is. Right. So, for example, I do not have the expectation that on February 25th that we will we will know that we want a shuttle and we want a shuttle with ten minute headway. We want and we want to spend as much as the city of Emeryville spends on Emery go around, which is roughly $3 million. I do not have the expectation that that will emerge on on February 25th or soon abouts. But I do have the expectation that out of it will emerge a desire to as next steps to begin. What does it take to begin to get these kinds of an understanding as to the different types and levels of of transit solutions that we that we might go after a first we have to have some shared agreement that that that is in fact the approach. And I think in having the February 25th meeting that you're having and then subsequently the march, it begins to outline that. Speaker 8: Okay. I was just going to say, if I may, I just I want to I think that's exactly right. And that's what we've thought, too, is that, you know, and I'm glad I wanted to make sure, you know, and hopefully when you actually read the report, you still agree. But the intent was really we're not going to come to you with a detailed scope of every single thing that is going to be addressed in this scope of work. But what we are doing, though, is kind of setting out some I mean, we are going to, you know, staff's job, we believe, to make some recommendations to of, you know, look, we went back and looked at all the documents we have. We've talked to you know, we've really analyzed things and really thought through it. And so we do have some recommended approach to it and a process that we think might make sense to help figure this out. Some principles, some goals and things of what we might accomplish in the study. But that's exactly right. Like creating that framework, helping everyone to understand what that framework is that we already have. And then where are the holes? How do we fill them? What should the study do? And so that's what we've tried to make that approach or we're trying to take that approach. Speaker 3: And I am more than happy to kind of just type out. People still use the word type, type out. Some of the thoughts as to why I thought that when I mean, I, I acknowledge, you know, there there is a lot of hard work that went into the different teams. But in my opinion, I did think that there were some extra level steps that were still needed and that was the whole one of the points of it. So I'm more than happy to type out even more, you know, what do I mean by extra level steps and how does that sync up? Ultimately with the process that you're putting in place. Speaker 8: Right. And so we'll hopefully whatever we put forward will facilitate a productive conversation about that. Speaker 3: Thank you. Speaker 1: Brody. Speaker 6: So I also agree that this is, you know, a good plan, I guess. And thank you for expediting it. I have two questions. The last one, based on feedback provided by the council staff, prepare periscope and budget and consulting contract. So I know we kind of haven't had the February 25th meeting. We haven't had the March ten meeting, but know can you can you give me a ballpark on one the time frame to finish the finish, whatever the end product that we asked the consultant to deliver will be the deliverable and then kind of a ballpark on , on budget because I saw some number on the Internet today. And, you know, I'm not sure if that's a that's a lot of money. Speaker 8: So our ballpark for what we're proposing and it really is it's a range and it's a wide range because it really does depend on a couple of different factors, which I'll mention in a second. But is 250000 to $400000 to do a study like this? It really depends. And you'll see. And then the schedules are affected by the same thing. But we've outlined in the staff report that'll go out tomorrow for the joint meeting and then ultimately for March 2010 is a very detailed process scope and that is about it estimates. You know this is based I do a lot of consultant studies so went through is about 17 months. And 4 to 6 months, if you do an RFP takes 4 to 6 months to do and after being selected consultant and then probably another, you know, maybe if it's expedited, it could be 12 to 18 months. But it really in the factors that really is how much community participation do you want? How many times do we come back to the Transportation Commission Planning Board? We've taken a pretty aggressive, you know, a lot of that. So if you look at it and say, maybe we could save here, we could save there, we could cut down the time. But every time we go to the Transportation Commission, Planning Board, City Council, it's a month ahead of time essentially for the staff report, for each of those. And then if you want to actually have the council respond to what the Transportation Commission, the planning board says, you can't do them to close because you need time to turn around a council staff report. So those meetings, how many of those formal meetings we have make pretty much a a big difference in terms of cost and schedule. And so we've done the kind of very intense community engagement. And if, you know, if that feels like two months much, then we can scale that back an RFP, you know, maybe we could do it for months, but it usually, you know, depends on how much again, how much community stakeholders do you want involved in the selection of the consultant scheduling those things? It unfortunately just takes time, but that is that is what we're estimating at this point. Speaker 6: So the 250 to 400 is that include staff time or is that just the outside consulting. Speaker 8: Just outside consultant. Speaker 6: Time? Well, that's still less than the number I saw online. Speaker 8: Oh, okay. Well, that's good. Speaker 6: That's good news. Speaker 8: Hopefully we're right. Ultimately. Speaker 1: We do have a speaker for this. Thank you. So unless there's more questions, then I'd like to go ahead and call the speaker. Speaker 8: Thank you, John Spangler. Speaker 5: Thank you again, Spencer. Members of the council. I appreciate the vice mayor. His remarks early on about the connection between the number of people needing to be moved from A to B and the number of vehicles. And I'm glad this plant gestation process is underway. But I want to say that in the many months leading up to tonight's presentation on Alameda Point and on the Del Monte, I heard a lot of people saying. The traffic is terrible. First of all, it's not terrible. If you've ever driven into downtown San Francisco at rush hour. Okay. We have no problem at all. And an extra 2 minutes in the tube at 8:00 or 5:00. It's peanuts. We don't know how good it is. And if anybody has trouble parking on Park Street ride a bicycle, it's really easy. There is no parking shortage there of. The problem with most of the comments I've heard about traffic and congestion in the last 15 years I've been in Alameda is that people are thinking that everybody gets to drive his or her own car everywhere he wants to go. We are no longer doing that. When I helped the bikes onboard BART Task Force two years ago with some research, we found out that bike commuting in San Francisco and most other Bay Area communities is up 70% over less than ten years. And that is a trend line that is not changing. The same is true of BART ridership. It's going through the roof. And so is AC transit ridership. We don't have to worry so much about the number of cars in the tube because people are giving them up. And we need in our transportation planning process that was now underway. And I I'm glad to hear the organizational scheme that's that's been adopted. We need to look at making sure we rebalance the skills not only so that there's more rental housing and only to point, but so that there's more access to transit choice in Alameda. If our transportation is working on transit transportation choices, this is a major sea change. They are finally paying attention to what's been going on in the Bay Area for three decades. So we need to not be stuck in 1960s or 1950s thinking when we're talking about transportation problems and worry about how many cars are going to go through the tube with rush hour. We need to look at how we're going to move people and make rational choices based on how you move the maximum number of people. Given currently available technology it means you put more AC transit number 51 a busses on the road and it's very easy to do. We just have to build more housing that has higher density in more concentrated places like we're doing in the North Waterfront, like we're doing on measure a at site a rather so that we can justify sustainable, convenient service that takes care of the problem. That's all we have to do. Thank you very much. Speaker 1: You. He was our only speaker on the item. So my comments go to a. And I'm assuming the council members are done. My cases go to the notice on the for the February 25th meeting. I don't know if other council members are interested in attending that. I would like to attend and I don't know if we need to give notice to include city council members so that we could all attend if we wanted, if that's possible. Speaker 0: We can post that. Speaker 1: So I'd appreciate that. And then that was my only turn on that. And we're all welcome to attend. Thank you very much. Next item six E and that was for information only. Right. Next item six. Speaker 0: Adoption resolution declaring the city's intention to revise the sewer service charge and establish procedures for accepting protests pursuant to Article x i d of Section six a of the California Constitution regarding property related fees and charges. Good evening, Madam Mayor.

Regular Agenda Item

Presentation on Proposed Process for Preparing Approach to Comprehensive Citywide Transportation Planning and Implementation Effort. (Base Reuse 819099)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_02172015_2015-1247

Speaker 0: Adoption resolution declaring the city's intention to revise the sewer service charge and establish procedures for accepting protests pursuant to Article x i d of Section six a of the California Constitution regarding property related fees and charges. Good evening, Madam Mayor. Members of the City Council. City Staff. My name is Aaron Smith. I serve as the city's public works coordinator. Before it tonight is adoption of a resolution to set council's intent to raise the city sewer service charge, according to the procedures set forth in California's Proposition 218. Over the last few months, the city has engaged with Bartle and Wells Associates to conduct a comprehensive review of our sewer fund bottles and bottling wells as a local public finance and consulting firm. They have nearly 50 years experience guiding public agencies in California. The results of their findings are included in Exhibit one to the agenda item, the Sewer Rate Study and Alison Lajovic of Bartle and Wells will actually be presenting a summary of those findings this evening. One last note before Allison's presentation for clarity. The resolution tonight is not authorizing the increase of the super serious charge. It's authorizing city staff to move forward in sending written notice to Alameda property owners announcing the proposed rate increase and the public hearing that's scheduled for April 28th. The resolution tonight also establishes the submission and tabulation of protests for that public hearing. The city council does have the authority to approve the increase in rate subsequent to the public hearing, assuming that there's not a majority protest. So I'll be available for any questions. Following Alison's presentation, I hope that she'll be able to provide you with the content you're seeking. I can answer any programmatic questions afterwards. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. Speaker 0: Erin. Okay. So the bottom line is that the city of Alameda is under an EPA consent decree. So that's the Environmental Protection Agency consent decree to conduct sewer repairs and replacements and to have funding available for that. Sewer rates and charges must increase. And if funding is not available, sewer rates are not adequate to make those replacements of the sewer system. The city will face fines, civil liabilities and the potential for sewer overflows. So that is why we are here today. No. Yeah. Um. Yes, please. Oh, thank you. Okay. So the city owns and operates a sewer collection system, so that includes pipelines and pump stations that collect and convey wastewater flow to the East Bay Municipal Utility District, regional treatment facilities. So today we're just focusing on almeida's sewer pipelines and pump stations and East Bay Mudd's regional treatment facilities are totally separate from this rate study. So the city has already accomplished a lot of work in upgrading the sewer system. Continue. You've replaced a good number of miles of pipeline, reduce your sewer overflows. But there's a lot more work that's mandated, legally mandated by the Environmental Protection Agency. Three miles of sewer pipeline per year. Pump station replacements and condition assessments. And to fund this significant amount of work, the city relies on sewer rates and charges paid by the residents of this community. And what I found was that the city of Alameda, its current rates and charges are actually low to moderate for the East Bay. So this chart shows the average single family residential monthly sewer bill and Almeida's sewer bill is $23.23 per month, which is significantly lower than Oakland, Albany and Piedmont. And so Berkeley and City are actually lower than City of Berkeley or city of Alameda right now. But siege and El Serino has already adopted rate increases. And City of Berkeley is actually considering a 25% increases potentially that high. So Alameda is is well priced in this area for sewer service. Okay. So you the city last increased rates in 2010, there was a 14%, 14%, 14% and then inflationary cost increases thereafter. And the city also issued sewer bonds in 2012. And those sewer bonds are municipal debt that allows you to fund large repair and replacement projects. Those 14.7 million in projects and we conducted a financial plan for the sewer program as part of our analysis. And we are spending down the sewer bond proceeds first. And as a second priority, we're spending down available cash reserves. So those are past sewer rates and charges that have built up in a fund over time. But over the longer term, we propose to increase the sewer rates by 3% annually, and that's roughly equal to the rate of inflation. So I did some historical research. The Consumer Price Index has averaged around 3%. Pipeline replacement costs are increasing because all the other local agencies are redoing their sewers as well. So it's really on pace with inflation. And those cost increases are needed to fund your EPA consent decree mandated items to keep up with inflation and promote long term financial stability for the Superfund. And the good news is 3%. Equals $0.70 per month. It's only $0.70 increase per month for the average single family residential customer. And so this charges illustrates that the majority of the service base in Alameda is single family and multi-family residential customers. And this chart illustrates the proposed rates comparison to the current rates. So 3% annually for five years, that's the proposed rate of increase and $0.70 per month increase for the first year. And then $0.72, $0.74, 76, 78. And U.S. multifamily. Residential customers pay slightly less. They release less sewer flow on average, so they pay proportionately less. And then commercial customers have a minimum charge and then a flow charge if they release more sewer flow. Thank you. And so the bottom line is, even with the proposed increases, Alameda sewer rates and charges will be very comparable to all the other East Bay municipal utility district feeder sanitation agencies. So there's not even a change in ranking there with the proposed increases. Alameda is proposed to stay between berkeley and Oakland. So as Erin described, the next steps will be to authorize the Proposition 218 process. That's the legal statute that governs how sewer rates can be implemented in California. We would develop and mail a notice to all impacted property owners, and they would have the opportunity to protest the proposed rates. They would also have the opportunity to speak at a public hearing regarding the rates. And if there is a majority protest, then the rates could not be implemented. So those are the conclusions of my study and I'm open to questions. Speaker 2: Member Ashcraft Oh, I was just, I'm really going to make a comment because Councilmember Desai and I served on the previous council. We lived through the, the lawsuit and the consent decree and all that. So I am fully aware of the need to do this and ready to move forward. But thank you both to Ms.. Smith and to you for a nice presentations. Speaker 1: This. We don't have any speaker steps. So at this point, council, you could do both questions and comments. Speaker 3: Thank you. Speaker 1: Members, I guess. Speaker 3: Thank you. I just looked up my property tax bill to find out my sewer city sewer rates. And so my annual city sewer is 200 7876, which is basically 23.23. As you would indicate on the month end. But the important thing, though, for the public, though, it's really while we're we're talking things on a monthly basis, the 23.23, it's really the annual rate because we're multiplying it by 12. So so I'm paying 278 and then I will subsequently pay 280 795. But I think the key thing, though, and I think it's important. Is that, you know, by increasing it by 3%, as you indicate there. I think 3% is normal inflation, even though right now we're in an extremely low inflation period. But I think 3% is a reasonable rate. So technically, really not even ethnically actually increased. We're not increasing it in real inflation adjusted dollars. We're just it's the same money as increasing it. So we're always paying 278, but it's 278 expressed in future dollars. Speaker 0: Right. Speaker 3: So. I don't tell anyone that. So, yeah. As a council member, as he Ashcraft said, this is an important decision that we have to that we've made. And, you know, when I look at the rate at which we're increasing it, it's quite reasonable. We are right. I think most people right now are paying 278 or $23 a month, however you want to say it. And as we increase it from one year to the next using a 3% factor, I mean, that's a reasonable increase. Speaker 1: So I want to thank you for bringing this. And I. Speaker 7: I'm sorry. Speaker 1: I'm sorry. But I'm really. Speaker 6: Sorry. Thank you, Madam Mayor. It's a quick question on the process and then another one on the sewer system overview. So. The number was like 19,500. So a majority of those 19,500 have to protest in order for this not to go into effect. Speaker 0: Correct? 50% plus one. Speaker 6: Okay. And then on this, this may be getting into the into the plan. And I apologize. I'm doing that. But so we are the hundred 28 miles minus the 13 that we've already replaced. I mean, how many miles are we going to replace with this new. This new plan and over how long of a time period. Speaker 0: Was only 13 miles. In the last five years, the city has replaced probably about somewhere between 35 and 38% of its from original installation. The consent decree requires approximately three miles per year for the next 23 years. Speaker 6: Okay, so it's a 23 year project. And this is this is on the property tax bill. It's not like what they do in Oakland where they slap it on the East Bay mud bill. Speaker 0: It's stuff. It's dedicated sewer fund. We collect it through the county tax roll, but it's not a tax, but we collect it through county tax rules. So it's two and two payments, two installments per year. Speaker 6: And then on the on the plan for the the 23 years, are we going to see that at a future meeting or. Speaker 0: Yeah. So the city's near completion of what we're calling a sewer master plan. So we've conditioned assessed our entire system and we've ranked each pipes, essentially assigned a risk score that's based on the consequence and likelihood of failure. We'll be able to lay out which pipes are going to be replaced when during those next 23 years and then be able to coordinate other utility construction projects. Speaker 6: Okay. I'll save my questions on that till I. Speaker 5: Can elaborate on that. Bob on Public Works Director, essentially, we have to take. Speaker 1: It and I'm sorry to interrupt. Speaker 5: We have to do 2.6 miles per the consent decree. So the program is really three miles of sewer every single year for the next 23 years that we once we get the condition assessment, the finish up our CCTV, then we're going to rank the pipes well square the pipes. Leaving aside the progress and where we're going to hit first in the primary areas, that's the meat of the consent decree. There's some other ancillary things, but that's really the meat of the thing as far as the work that we have to do, because we transferred the private sewer or lateral ordinance over to the state. So the key is the three miles here. I just want to remind council I take every opportunity to remind everybody about this. The sewers in the city of Alameda are the city's largest asset at $202 million. So it's really an investment in our largest asset. Okay. This is biggest thing we own. The most expensive thing we own are the sewers. And one of my consideration in replacing pipe is we're replacing it. So there's going to be very likely a longer seismic lifetime. Okay. If we have an earthquake, clay tile pipe will not make it. But the type of pipe we're using that welded together as opposed to joints or things like that, that's going to have a much higher probability of survival. Speaker 6: Oh, yeah. Well, just briefly, statewide, I was asking that question. I was at a East Bay broadband summit a couple of weeks ago, and one of the things they talked about was Digg once and also about building a broadband infrastructure. So, I mean, I don't know if three, three miles a year, over 23 years, I mean, who knows what technology will be in 23 years? But I was just wondering if that was something, you know, we would be interested in, in pursuing. But it doesn't seem like it's going to be feasible. Speaker 5: It's kind of incremental and it's going to be again, it's going to be based upon the condition assessment of the pipe. So we might be jumping, we might be doing a block here and then moving over to the West End and doing another block over there. It's going to be really based upon. So we're going to be kind of moving around the island. Speaker 6: Okay. Well, thank you. Speaker 1: Yeah. And I think we need a motion to continue the meeting past 11 p.m.. Speaker 2: But second. Speaker 1: All those in favor. My motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Any other council member questions? Comments. Speaker 4: Got to do this. Speaker 1: All right. I did have some questions and I wanted to and also share on page. I believe it's on page eight of the report. It speaks to the history of the rate increases. And according to this report. It said that since 2010, sewer rates had increased by approximately 56% for the city. With the city completing its last rate study in 2010, which included annual rate increases of 14% per year for fiscal years 2011 to fiscal year 2013. So so that's a significantly higher increase that we're speaking to. Speaker 0: Yes. In 2010, Red Oak was actually the consulting firm who did that. And at the time, the city was under an administrative order. But the amount of work that was going to be defined under our regulatory orders was not it wasn't defined at that point. So if you you go back to that 2010 rate study, it's actually based on a number of different scenarios, of projected scenarios of what they thought was going to be the workload under our regulatory requirements. The highest scenario that they did was two miles per year of pipeline replacement. Well, here we are now under consent decree and it actually ended up being three years. So hence there's that additional increase needed in this this go round. In addition to the fact that the 2012 sewer bond provided a lump sum of money, the majority of that's going to pump station renovation. And then obviously, we'll kind of soften the impact of this this 3% rate increase as we spend that down in the next couple of years. Speaker 1: So what were the rate increases for fiscal year 2011 through 13? Speaker 0: They were 14% per year for three years and then it was CPI for the last two OC. Speaker 1: And then the CPI you shared earlier was approximately the same 3%. Speaker 0: The CPI for those specific years. Do we have that? 2.4% in 2014 and 2.7% in 2015. Speaker 1: Okay. So I'd like to share as much as we can with the community. So they're aware that back in 2011, 313 for those 11, 12, 13, those three years, it was a 14% increase per year. And then it was anywhere it was 2.4 and then 2.7% in years 14, 12, 14 and 15. So this is just a little bit higher than the last two years, but significantly less than the the prior three years. On page nine of the study shares that there's going to be a debt service reduction with the sentences that two of the SRF. But this is clean water. Revolving fund loans will be paid off in fiscal year 2018, which will reduce the annual debt service to payments of approximately 900,000 beginning in fiscal year 2019. So there so there will be less expenditures when we get to paying that off. And yet you're still thinking that we'll need the 3% at that point per annum increase. Speaker 0: Well, so remember we have will have exhausted the 2012 sewer bond, which right now, you know, we have from when it was issued a three year period to exhaust those funds. So we're making use of those now. Speaker 1: Okay. And then and I'm sorry, I don't seem to have the page number, but it says that there's a reduction, a drawdown on the reserves, too. Apparently, the study thinks that there should be a target number for the reserves and that the amount in the reserves has been above that, so that there would be what is best described as a moderate decrease in the amount of reserves. However, it's approximately 50% from 27.4 million to 15 million. And do we expect it then to stay at 15 million for future years once we get there? Are we continuing to draw down? Speaker 0: Yeah the target is and it's specified it's a believe a year of capital, 60% of operating and a year of debt service. And that is the best management practices for maintaining a baseline operating fund. Speaker 1: And the the 3% would be sufficient to maintain that 15 million. Correct. Speaker 0: And again, we're only approving tonight of five years. So borrowing whilst projection is for 20 years. So there's financial stability for those 20 years. But tonight's resolution and the proposition to 18 only dictates that we can increase rates up for a five year period. Speaker 1: And how many years before we reach the 15 million draw down? Where is that in this? Speaker 0: That's the end of five year period. Speaker 1: Okay. So at that point, we've drawn down to half of our reserves. But you're not continuing. Do you have your projection beyond that? Speaker 0: We would have to come back in 2019 for this very same process. Speaker 1: Okay. So my concern would be. So I'd like to see the numbers that say that in fact. After Year five, do we have to increase the rate significantly above the 3% to not continue drawing down because that just shows a great reduction. To me, a signal even was described as a moderate reduction and I would actually suggest that that's an inappropriate definition or choice because it goes from 27.4 million to 15 million, which is half, almost half of the reserves. So that's a significant drawdown. I don't interpret that as a moderate, and then that's within that five year period. Speaker 2: So in the appendix of. Speaker 0: Our report, we show all for the full 20 year period. And we show. Basically inflationary increases each year of the 20 years. And at that level of rate, the fund balance would continue to be at the minimum operating recommended target that we developed, which was the 60% of annual operating cost plus one year pipeline replacement expenditure, plus the annual debt service payments. So we have forecast over the 20 years and maintain that level of reserve. Fiscal year 2015 is a higher than normal reserve year because you do have all that bond funding still sitting in an account and you're legally required to spend that on projects. So that's a normal flow of funds to reduce that bond funding. The first two years, fiscal year 15 and 16 also have very high costs for the pump station replacements. So it's about 5.2, 5.3 million, and the remaining years don't have that. So it's a high capital expenditure in the first few years which will draw down funds and then will maintain a healthy level of funds. For the next 17 years. Speaker 1: So is there somewhere within this document or that we're approving that provides that because this is my concern really is come five years, someone else will be standing in front of us with some new numbers. So where is the protection to the consumer here? Speaker 0: Yeah, I don't think we'll legally per proposition to 18. We're not authorized to. Council's not authorized to commit the rate to anything beyond five years. So as much as I think this can lay out for in five years, when we do another rate study that will relook at this that can say, well, this was the plan at the time was to continue this 3%. But beyond that, I don't think there's anything legally we can do to bind the council in five years to a subsequent rate increase. Speaker 1: So I wasn't speaking to that. I was speaking to the target of maintaining the reserves at the 15 million for that that that's clearly set but spoken to somewhere in the document because that's that's what you're saying. Speaker 0: Correct. And we can can we can put that as like a financial policy related to the sewer fund. We could codify that as some administrative policy for our sewer fund. That that's how it operates. I should ask the attorney that. So that's but it would seem like that could be a policy. Speaker 1: So I would appreciate that because that was a huge reduction in the reserves, however, that could come back. I want to be able to continue my discussion at this point. Please. Thank you. And finally, finally, when you did your comparative rates, the example for Piedmont was on a property that was 5000 to 10000 square footage, which is , I think, above our average. And did Piedmont have a rate for of residences that are below 5000. Because I think that is more apples to apples in Alameda. Most of our lots I don't think are 5000 to 10000. Speaker 0: Yeah, there's a lower rate for Piedmont residents who are lower than that square footage that we could. Speaker 1: So I think that should actually be substituted here so that we see what that rate is and that should what would be what we should be comparing. There are not very many lots in I think the average and maybe staff knows, but I would think the average lot is less than 5000. And so since Piedmont has that lower rate, I'd like to substitute that for the rate that's here. And then I notice also the rate for Oakland includes a wasteful of 4055 gallons per month. And did you know is that what the average is for Alameda? Speaker 0: Waste the flow because that's. Speaker 1: So that's. Yes. Because that's when you look at how you chose which numbers to use for our for comparison we had footnotes that spoke to Oakland's rate was based on this rate weighs for 4055 gallons and I don't know if that is the average. And again, I think it's important that we're comparing apples to apples on our comparative on the comparison. Speaker 0: So each agency sets its typical residential rate based on the average flow or that service area. So each agency is a little bit different on how they define what a single family home is. So that's the most common rate charged for. Okay. Yeah. Speaker 1: Okay. I don't know if that translates to Alameda, though. Speaker 0: So each single family home, regardless, we don't actually if you're a single family home to be, we don't actually look at your water usage. It's assumed that you're going to use a certain amount and you charge the $23.23. I believe that the city of Oakland does it the same. It's an assumption of what's called an equivalent dwelling unit. So we assume that each equivalent dwelling unit is going to use a certain amount of water and that 23, 23 is a sign it's for commercial where we actually start getting into flow based rates, where we will get East Bay MUDs, water data and it is calculated based on that. So I think comparing a single family unit in Oakland to a single family unit in Alameda to a single family unit in Albany is apples to apples. Speaker 1: However, in regards to Piedmont, it sounds like there is a lower rate that could be used, so I'd appreciate substituting that. Speaker 0: Yeah, Piedmont whole structure is a little bit more unique than the rest. It's actually part of a tax over there, and I can't speak to the specifics of it, but certainly we can update the statistics. So it's more comparable to what we're presenting here for Alameda tonight. Speaker 1: I appreciate that. Thank you. Member Ashcraft. Speaker 2: Thank you. Um, I, I think the the salient point about what we're being asked to vote on tonight is really contained in the first sentence of the staff report. The city is required by state law and city policy to collect revenues sufficient to cover the costs of operating the sewer facilities. And because of this lawsuit that we've just come out of and the consent decree under which we're operating, we must fund these certain minimum improvements to the sewer facilities over the next 20 years. But we can only go out in five year increments legally under Prop 218 to do it. While I appreciate all the work that's gone into this, and I think you both did a very nice job. I'm satisfied with the information that's laid out in your tables and your charts. I'm less concerned about how Oakland or Piedmont does their billing, because I know that in Alameda, our pipes are of a certain vintage. They're old, and we've been doing a great job going around. You've probably seen the crews out in the street and we're, you know, using cameras and all this to see the condition. But we need to make sure that we're doing these repairs in a timely manner or we're going to end up in another lawsuit again and we're going to end up spending even more money on litigation costs and fines. So I think this is fairly straightforward, and I don't know that that any council decisions are really needed to say, you know, offer a different way of looking at the different rates in Piedmont. I'm not sure that the council as a whole is really suggesting that. So anyway. Oh, and did we do that? We did do the vote to go past 11. Okay. All right. Speaker 0: Member Ashcraft, I appreciate the comment. One other unique factor for Alameda is how flat we are. We have 34 pump stations that are a significant capital investment that those that live in Oakland and others that have are blessed with gravity don't have to incur those costs. Speaker 1: So I'd like to I'm sorry, I'd like to speak to member Ashcroft's comments. I raised the issue because there is a chart on page 17 in this presentation that does refer to Piedmont and with a footnote that the service charges for flat lots, size 5000 to 10000. If there is a dollar amount that is more accurate, that is more similar to Alameda, I think it is appropriate to substitute that so that we are being clear with our residents. And so so this point, Vice Mayor. Speaker 4: I think people need to understand that the lawsuit and the consent decree were because our pipes were spilling sewage instead of sending it to the the treatment center. And we do have to do this. I think it's been pointed out that we have pump stations that are big ticket items that we've bonded for and we paying for in this early end, which accounts for the drop down of the fund balance is really not a reserve. It's the fund balance, correct? So with that being said, we have no choice regardless of what our comparables do. But to fund this project. So I move that we adopt the resolution as presented and get the process going so that we can have the hearings, so we can get public input, so that we can meet our requirements to provide sewer service and to meet the mandate of the consent decree. Speaker 1: I second this in regards to discussion. So will this be this presentation will be shared with the public? Correct. So I would request that that charter in regards to Piedmont be modified. Where does the council where is the council on that? Speaker 2: Are you making a motion? Speaker 1: No. Well, I'd like to know you apparently have concerns about modifying the chart to be accurate. So I'm hoping that other council members are agreeable to making that modification. Speaker 2: I can speak for myself. I know, I said. I think we have all the information we need before us in the charts, in the tables, in the footnotes. And I think we need to move forward. Speaker 1: So I appreciate that. That's why I was asking if the other council members have a problem with that presentation being modified before it goes. So it's accurate for the residents. Speaker 3: My come on that topic, my comment would be, you know, any additional information is not going to hurt. I think what Mayor Spencer is getting at is just make sure that we're characterizing this as accurately as possible. Okay. You know, get the additional information on Piedmont, from my perspective. But in terms of the larger picture, my perspective is also that. As you know, the 3% that you're programing coming for the next five years, that's a reasonable increase. The reality is that council and the public really bit the bullet in 2011, 2012 and 2013 by doing the 14% increase just between those 14, 14, 14, accumulative, 42% increase. But now we're doing over a five year period, cumulative 15%. My caution would only be that sometimes it sounds too good to be true. I mean, if someone had to bite the bullet at 14% before, you know. You don't have to. Don't feel like you have to soft pedal the information. And I know you don't. You're not. But no. Because if the if the increase has to be higher than 3% and let us know. But but if that's your level best that that you think that that's what it is then then okay then I could live with that. And I realized that, you know, part of what? What? Feeds into the 3% increase is the fact that we're drawing down on the reserve. Had we not had a reserve and the amount that we've have it would have had it would have increased annual increases would have been would have had to be more than 3%. So. But by the same token, I realize that that reserve, though, exists because. We've accumulated dollars for this purpose in which we have not expended well. So it's not a real reserve in the sense that, for example, when we talk about our general fund balance. So. But but I think, you know, the additional information that Mayor Spencer is is asking for, I think it's. Sure, you know, let's let's gather it. But by the same token, I do think, though, that what's been presented here is reasonable. Speaker 1: Well, then, Brody. Speaker 6: I guess I'm not convinced that there's something inaccurate in the original report, so. That's kind of where I am. And I think, you know, get back to the vice mayor's point again. You know, it's about the big picture. It's about something we're obligated to do. Let's not lose sight of that. And in and spend a lot of time arguing about whether, you know, one person's interpretation of what a certain rate is versus another person's interpretation. Well, I don't do sewer rate studies as a living, so I guess I have to put a lot of trust in. And the folks like you that do it. Speaker 1: Vice Mayor. Speaker 4: I just called for the question. Speaker 1: All those in favor. Speaker 3: I. Speaker 1: Passes unanimously. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Six F recommendations approved joining in participating in the United States Department of Transportation's Mayor's Challenge for Safer People. Safer City.

Regular Agenda Item

Adoption of Resolution Declaring the City’s Intention to Revise the Sewer Service Charge and Establish Procedures for Accepting Protests Pursuant to Article XIID, Section 6(a) of the California Constitution Regarding Property-Related Fees and Charges. (Public Works 602)

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Speaker 1: Good evening, Madam Mayor and members of the City Council community members. I'm Gayle Payne, Transportation Coordinator of the Public Works Department. This item before you is a staff recommendation to join and participate in the U.S. Department of Transportation. Mayor's Challenge for Safer Streets. Safer People. Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety Initiative. The challenge is a yearlong effort and begins on March 12th with a kick off event. And it requires the city to make a public statement about the importance of bicycling and walking. It also requires us to form a task force and to take part in seven challenge activities that are shown up there on your screen. The first one is to take a complete street approach. The second one is to remove barriers for all road users. The third to collect data on bicycling and walking. The fourth to use best practices designs. Fifth, to implement bicycling and walking improvements with maintenance projects like resurfacing. And six out of the seven is to improve the laws and regulations. And the last one is to educate and enforce road user behavior, working with the police department on that one. We're really fortunate in the timing of this challenge because the Public Works Department is just embarking on an update, a required update of both the pedestrian plans and the bicycle plan. So we can easily fold this effort, this national effort, into our local effort that's required to update these plans. And we can use this as a national best practices checklist. And so we will be starting the work scopes of those updates next month. And so we don't foresee too much additional staff work on that on this effort at all. The questions and comments. I remember Ashcraft. Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you for that update. I. I thought, too, when I read this and I know it was recently added to the agenda because we just got this information. But I thought it was great timing because we're just about to do the ribbon cutting on this fabulous shorelines cycle track project. And I was just at a workshop that you led last week on the Cross Alameda Trail. And. But I did have the question in my notes about how much additional staff work and time and resources would be necessary. But it sounds like. What did you say that that Public Works is about to embark on. Speaker 1: That we're about to embark on on required updates for the bicycle plan? Okay. That was and also the pedestrian plan to the bicycle plan was update was back in 2010. So it's required every five years. And then the pedestrian plan was back in 2009. Speaker 2: Okay. And and I would just like to say that I would certainly want to see Miss Payne as a key member of this effort, because she is so knowledgeable and has been at the forefront of some really great projects we've been doing for bicycles and pedestrians in Alameda. And I think you did mention the police department because that was also my thought about the educating and enforcing proper road behavior would need to get law enforcement in on that. So other than that, I think this is really exciting. It's timely, and I think Alameda could be a good leader in this in this effort. So thank you for bringing this to us. Speaker 1: Any other member comments? Speaker 5: Up the nation. Speaker 1: So I personally would like us to do this. However, I want to clarify my understanding that we can do as much as we can do. There are some things that would have to the issuing the public statement. My understand that does have to happen and then forming the look. The top three are things that I think are supposed to happen and then you do as much of the challenge activities as you can. You're not expected. You don't have to do them all. And it's not as so they'll be following up and seeing if we in fact are able to do all of these, but that we try to we try and we do balance depending upon CASM, whatnot. But the top three issue, a public statement about the importance of bicycle pedestrian safety, form the local action team, and then take local action through challenge activities. So, yes, I do understand. We do need a motion to do this. Speaker 5: Moved. Speaker 2: Well, okay, it's has been settled because I want some clarification about what it is we're voting on. Speaker 1: So that we can sign up as it actually says. One of the steps to signing up mayor or a top elected official has or gets approval or and support from their city or jurisdiction to join the challenge. So I think we do. When when I read that, I think we do need council approval to sign up. Speaker 2: Yes, I agree that we need council's approval. I would certainly not want to see us limiting our goals before we've even begun, because I, quite frankly, think we're capable of doing all of them. So I think you you start out and you set your sights high. And I think I have a feeling we've already done more than three of these and, you know, probably aren't that far away from doing all seven. So I think Alameda is equal to the challenge. Let's do it all. Speaker 1: So we have a motion to the motion members. Speaker 6: I just wanted a quick comment, you know, kind of second. What was their second to the motion? No, I'll do that. But then also I continue my comment. Councilmember Asker We can't just say we're going to do this and give lip service, do that to this. And you know, the mayor make a statement. Yeah, I commit to this, blah, blah, blah. You know, we want to have safe, convenient roads and then we don't do anything about it. It just seems kind of kind of silly if if we're not going to actually go, you know, full in 100% of this. Speaker 1: We have emotion a second. Any other comments? All those in favor, I suppose, and passes unanimously. Thank you very much. And now we have City Manager Communications. Speaker 5: None this evening. Speaker 1: Oral communications, not agenda. We don't have anymore. No council referrals. Speaker 0: Oh, sorry. Oh, sorry. Yes, sorry. We missed this. Speaker 2: Came in. Speaker 7: Carol Goldstein, City resident I just had a question because that was on the last slide. It was about the transportation plant. It said that it was to make streets better for not just bikes and pedestrians, but also personal mobility devices.

Regular Agenda Item

Recommendation to Approve Joining and Participating in the United States Department of Transportation’s (DOT) Mayors Challenge for Safer People, Safer Streets. (City Manager)

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Speaker 0: Nine is considered directing staff to draft a proposed charter amendment relative to the creation of a mere nominating counsel. Appointed five member in a Civil Finance Commission. Speaker 1: And this is submitted by member de SA. Would you like to speak to this? Speaker 3: Yes, thank you. I am presenting this for your consideration. The creation of basically a municipal finance commission whose tasks are narrowly defined, largely because and appropriately so. The city budget is prepared by the city manager's office for the city council. So the way that I'm framing this is, as is indicated in the summary, is basically being a sounding board for the city manager as he goes about or she or he goes about preparing the city budget. In a way it kind of ties in with where city treasurer Kevin Kearney said earlier tonight when he indicated that perhaps there should be involvement ahead of time when, when, when the Budget is 90% done. I mean by the time it comes to city council for draft, I mean, it's, it's almost there. We just have to make the policy choices as council members. But prior to that initial first draft of the budget, I think what usually comes in May, I think first meeting in May. This would be an opportunity to have a finance commission to do and, you know, sound as a sounding board. And the other particular thing that I'm interested in is also a charter. Having it having an institutionalized way that says there is a group of people who are also a sounding board when it comes to our unfunded liabilities, particularly CalPERS and OPEB. I think the city manager has he discussed the trust fund idea? And we've also taken on a preliminary basis, there's been some initial concepts that that illustrate how the trust fund idea in terms of dealing with OPEB can get dealt with over a 20 to 30 year period, well beyond the time that I'm on council or beyond the time that many staff persons are here. Perhaps there can be this institutionalized vehicle that kind of. Is by charter. Um, yeah. Is one of his primary task is to say, okay, what kind of progress are we making with regard to these unfunded liabilities? So there is really no if from my vantage point, I have no real. This doesn't have to be done before the. The budget season is just happens to be coincidental that the budget our budget season is coming. I don't require staff to suddenly, you know, change heaven and earth to deal with this matter. I mean, it, you know, July, August I. But I did want to begin to have that discussion. I think many other cities. Speaker 7: Have finance commissions and committees. Speaker 5: So. Speaker 3: So that's the viewpoint. Speaker 1: Any members have comments on this? Speaker 2: Remember I had. I've been talking for so long. You go first. Speaker 6: Well, a couple of quick things. First, to those who asked me if I was not feeling welcome, that did not do a referral. Meaning I am fine because it is very much. Speaker 2: We heard a lot of coughing up here today. Speaker 6: Secondly, no, in all seriousness, I have a personal preference that if we're going to have new commissions that, you know, each council member gets an opportunity to appoint someone to that commission, because I think we all bring a diverse background, diverse views, and I think a diverse group of supporters. So I think that that would help if we do do something like this. I guess I'm kind of wondering, you know, kind of how this is different than will a the budget process be the council's ultimate responsibility to be the decision maker on these things? And then kind of it going on, Treasurer Kennedy's remarks, you know, the timeliness of it, you know, OPEB, you know, that's for my understanding, something that, you know, we either have to take an action on as a council if we want to do something unilaterally or we have to collectively bargain if we want any of our our public safety unions to, you know, make concessions or contribute, you know, in retirement pensions. I mean, we all know that, you know, CalPERS comes out with their rates. You know, we unless we have some state bailout, which I'm not saying that's going to happen, but, you know, that might be an option that is considered considering that all cities are kind of facing this. I guess I'm just kind of a little bit confused as to what, you know, the ultimate deliverable and the ultimate outcome of this is. And if we're going to have some type of finance, you know, committee now, I think, well, the Treasurer might be a person to have on there. But you know, my understanding is he gives us advice and the city manager, you know, consults him readily on these type of issues. And, you know, I don't think we're going to have any finance type committee without any representation from our public safety unions. Speaker 1: I swear. Speaker 4: I really like the point that was made on Tassie and that is to, to raise on a periodic basis. And I think Treasurer Kennedy spoke to it the frequency of it. But I think the nugget here is that it is put out in in front of the public that we have this unfunded liability. We have these background liabilities, I think is the term that Treasurer Kennedy used that need to be periodically checked. And I think I think that the council should have the front line on this and. I think it's our ultimate responsibility to approve the budget. And I think back in. In front of that approval. They have something that is codified either as a practice or as part of our budget process that accomplishes what's outlined in Task C is very important. So I think that that's a very good point. Whether this is a charter committee, I think the notion of charter is to make sure that it's it's there and it's constantly being looked at. I'm not sure of an. I guess. I don't know what other cities our size. Have. And in that regard, I know at one time we had a fiscal sustainability committee which. Did a certain amount of this type of work. I don't know how valuable that was. Given the times, but I'd like to see us at least address this as as a council, this this check on these unfunded liabilities. But I'm not convinced that we need a charter established commission to do that for us. Speaker 1: Member. Speaker 2: Ashcroft Thank you. And I agree with the vice mayor and council member. I, I think that one does not undertake a charter amendment lightly. And I think this is. A significant step. And again, yeah, are there other ways to achieve the same objectives, which I think are laudable, by the way, and I really appreciated hearing from the city Treasurer earlier this evening. We do need to keep our eye on those very important balls are unfunded liabilities in our and OPEB, but to the point made by the City Treasurer, adding even more meetings for the public to have to keep up with and attend is not necessarily increasing transparency. In fact, sometimes it's just the opposite because the public has a hard time keeping up with all of our meetings as it is. And I also look at the amount of staff time that is required every time we add a new a new task force. And I think that or committee or commissioner or what have you and I think there's something in here about that could meet twice a quarter. And ultimately, this is, as we said, the role of the city council. I think that it's a great idea to get these issues out before us, as the city treasurer alluded to, sooner than when 90% of the work in the budget is done. I think that's something the council can, through the city manager direct to be done. I'm asked staff to do. I think the the process described would be time consuming require extra staff time in duplicate a function already performed by the council. We can't always convene an ad hoc committee similar to the OPEB task force, which may be. And if that's different now, that is different from the Fiscal Sustainability Committee. So we've done this in the past, and I think that bringing together those kinds of task forces or committees that are tailored to a particular need at a particular time is more effective than something as extreme as a charter amendment that fixes it for all time. So why I again laud the the objectives that are are laid out in this council referral? I think that that's something that all of us on the council should pay special attention to. And I'd love to see these issues come to us well ahead of the budget. Thank you. Speaker 1: I'm really sorry. Speaker 3: Oh, thank you. I think everyone's comments are taken to heart. I do think that the magnitude of the challenge that we have with regard to our unfunded liabilities is some of which is $200 million, $100 million on the OPEB side and $100 million on the CalPERS side. And I'm not even including the unfunded liabilities when it comes to capital improvement. I think the magnitude of the challenges and the long term solutions that we will put in place, especially for OPEB, requires, in my opinion, a charter change so that we can have a vehicle to track this over time. And I mean, the voters will, one way or another, vote on this. And also, I think the magnitude of the. Of just our budget as the city council. We've got not only the $75 million general fund budget, but we have all our other non general fund items and you know, annually we're dealing with it a quarter of $1,000,000,000 budget. I think the magnitude of what we're dealing with requires at a minimum. Additional community input. So in my mind, this ranks up there as being a charter type of committee. Along with a library commission or the or the planning commission. And there will likely be a vote on this in the chart. So whether we decide on this tonight. Speaker 1: So I appreciate that. And I and I do appreciate the goal here of it's my understanding that staff is planning to have a workshop about the budget. Speaker 5: Mr.. Speaker 0: R.M. Thank you. And you. Speaker 1: Share with us what the process is. Speaker 0: Certainly. So actually we have I'm just pulling up the schedule right now. We have six meetings planned, the first two. The first is sort of an introduction of the process. The second is introducing the preliminary budget, including assumptions. And I think that would be the time that I'd suggest that we include early on the discussion of OPEB, CalPERS and maintenance. So that would be the second meeting. Then the next three meetings are our departments doing their departmental presentations. And then. Speaker 7: The final meeting, which is roughly in the early, early. Speaker 0: June, is adoption of the budget. So we're looking at a total of six working meetings. Speaker 1: Do you have dates. Speaker 0: March 17th to June 2nd? Speaker 1: Are any of these would any of these be a special meeting like on a Saturday, which is what I believe. Speaker 0: So we have right now tentatively. Speaker 7: Three regular meetings and three special meetings. Speaker 0: The special meetings. Speaker 7: Are during the week. We're not planning on having them on the weekend. Speaker 1: Okay. So that would be something that I would be interested in trying to do a Saturday morning meeting to if we or some other time so that to include different members of the public because I do appreciate the concern of making sure our public is. That we're very transparent about what we're doing and including the public. And I'm so so maybe that would be another way. Speaker 4: To tell if we talk about one of those weekdays. Speaker 1: Exactly. Exactly. Instead of a. But these are be like Tuesdays or Thursdays. Speaker 0: You know, I know the dates. Yes. One is the one is a Thursday. One is a Wednesday. And then one is a Tuesday in an opposite week. Speaker 2: And my only concern about Saturdays is I think families with children are. I mean, I remember when hours were home, you're just going from activity to activity. So I hate to. I hate to. Leaves them out. I. Speaker 1: So I hear the same thing about evening meetings that, you know, only certain people can come that parents can't because they're doing homework or babysitting or whatnot. So I was just thinking a choice so we could have some on the which we already have evening meetings on weekdays if anyone else is interested in making a different time available for different members of the community to be able to attend. Speaker 2: But of course, this would be a special meeting, so there's nothing else on the agenda, is that correct? Speaker 0: That's right. That's right. The special will and we can bring this back so that you all have the dates in front of you and then we can talk about it. But the first two meetings were regular meetings on Tuesday evenings. The special meetings were actually the individual presentations by the departments. So you would want to have one of those on a Saturday because they're not going to be able to hear the whole budget. You're only going to hear, let's say, police and, you know, a few departments. Speaker 7: So those special meetings are just departmental meetings. Speaker 0: And just a few of the departments will be going each time. And then the adoption of the budget is we're proposing that to be the beginning of June. So June. Speaker 7: 2nd. Speaker 1: And then in regards to Mr. Kennedy also brought up the certain slides. Be always part of the presentation. Speaker 0: Absolutely. Duly noted. Yeah, they will be. Speaker 1: So then that I think goes to the slides are in regards to the capital projects, summary unfunded projects, the CalPERS rates, projected increases in rates. Speaker 3: And I, you know, I mean, don't get me wrong, I understand the the substance and the process by which we deal with the issue, the budget issues from time to time, whether it's through, you know, workshops on Saturdays or or weekends or whether it's through the normal channels. This really is kind of independent. This is about creating a lasting institution. And to me, this is a missing piece. So from my vantage point, I mean, I would like to go out and collect signatures and and try to put this on the ballot. I we'll leave it at that. Speaker 1: All right. So so then we're going to move forward. All right. So then we have our next agenda item nine B. Speaker 2: What was the what was the outcome of this? If it's tabled. Is that what you're saying? Now, I. Speaker 3: Mean. Well, I bet I would prefer that that that it be moved forward, but it's being tabled. So I will move it forward on my own. Speaker 2: Oh, there is no motion. Okay, got it. Speaker 5: And if I may, just technically it should be described as withdrawn. If it's tabled mean it's coming back and it has to come back by a date certain. Call it if you like. If I may suggest to the council member the chair that you consider it withdrawn and you can say withdrawn at this time, but I think that'll be cleaner in the minutes. Speaker 3: Well, I prefer not to withdraw it, so. What would be the cleanest way to. Well, then I would make a motion to to pass to adopt the recommendation. And if it. Speaker 1: And then it's. But that's different from tabling it when it's tabled, my understanding. And it could come back at a later date. Sounds like you don't want to eat that way. You'd rather make the motions. Speaker 3: Yeah. All right. All right. Speaker 1: So there's a motion. Is there a second? Motion fails for lack of a second, and then we move forward with 9090. Thank you. You. Speaker 0: Recommendation that the City Council adhere to the Council referral process adopted by the City Council on December four, 27. The Senate was placed on the agenda at the request of Councilmember Rosa Ashcroft.

Council Referral

Consider Directing Staff to Draft a Proposed Charter Amendment Relative to the Creation of a Mayor-Nominated and Council-Appointed Five Member Municipal Finance Commission. (Councilmember Daysog)

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AlamedaCC_02172015_2015-1327

Speaker 0: Recommendation that the City Council adhere to the Council referral process adopted by the City Council on December four, 27. The Senate was placed on the agenda at the request of Councilmember Rosa Ashcroft. Speaker 1: Member Ashcraft. Speaker 2: Thank you. And I it's probably somewhat ironic or not that we're hearing this almost at midnight. I was concerned about meetings going long and maybe lacking direction earlier on. And so I went back and I did a little research into the whole council referral process and how an item is placed on an agenda. And I learned that indeed another council back in 2007 brought this very issue of who could place an item, who and how place is an item on the agenda. And what I found is that that job really belongs to the city manager. But a council member could bring a referral, could do a council referral to place an agenda on the item. And then it is simply up to their colleagues to decide whether or not or what to do about that proposal. And in fact, in going back and doing my research, I would think that the attachment is familiar to at least one member of this council, because the Vice Mayor was a member of the council at that time. And I thought that there was a so there was a workshop that took place in November of 2007, and it was a priority setting workshop, and it was the council setting deciding what their priorities would be and how they would accomplish them. And the executive management team of the city wanted one of the topics to be addressed to be their dilemmas. So Department Head City Managers Dilemma When a council member requested some action or a report or something to be done and that staff member was not really clear on whether that was the will of the whole council or just this individual. And it put staff in an awkward position because they didn't want to be the one to say no. They never want to say no to us, of course. But at the same time they realized that the Council as a whole or an individual coming with those requests might not see the big picture and realize what this meant in terms of staff time, monetary expenditure, pushing one priority off to the side while another one I took its place. And so there was I thought it sound like a very good workshop that was done. The consultant put together a great report and the they looked at, among other things, methods used by other cities to determine council direction on a council members request. And there was a consensus of all five council members at the time to use the Fremont City Council's council referral process. And the the combination of this workshop was a next step section that included council referral process will be written up and implemented. And then on December 4th, 2007, at a City Council meeting, the City Council adopted a resolution referencing this November 13th, 27 meeting to add a council referral section at city council meetings and even where on the agenda would go. The staff report included the precise wording of the Fremont City Council referral process and a council referral form which we currently use as an attachment. And lastly, the Council referral process makes no distinction between the mayor and other council members placing an item on the agenda. And so the one and only way any of us would be able to request that an item be agendas is through the council referrals process. And then the precise wording of the Fremont City Council referral process was included in that staff report. So I'm suggesting that this is something that a previous council spent a lot of time going over a Saturday workshop at the library, and they decided that this was a good method to follow. And I think that for clarity, I mean, this is actually on the books, it's what was voted. And so that decision stands. And I'm just asking that we adhere to this procedure that has been previously adopted. Thank you. Speaker 1: So I'd I'd like to actually clarify what you presented as there are minutes from the December 4th to 2007 meeting that are not included in your referral, that speak to some of what you're saying. But and I don't know if we're going to have this come back, but the motion for the resolution and the resolution that was that is included does speak to where the agenda item will go. And that was a 4 to 1 vote. It was not unanimous. And then the motion from. December 4th are separate minutes that are not here and that includes the motion was actually. Made by Mayor ah Johnson Councilmember Gilmore at that time in the matter as seconded it. But that included some of what but it was here from Fremont. It also included a point that it would be implemented in six months after adoption. The issue would be placed on the agenda to discuss whether council likes the practice and hear what the public thinks. And it's my understanding that that did not happen that come back in six months. So. And another way to look at this would be that we could have it come back and we could review it as a council. Speaker 2: I am interested in hearing what my colleagues think. I think that enough information was actually included in this council referral form. To move forward tonight. But and we certainly have an actual witness to that event here. And if anyone would like to chime in, please feel free. Speaker 1: Yes. Vice Mayor. Speaker 4: I do think the whatever happened after this, the council referral process actually fixed the problem that we were having. And I think it puts some structure around. A council member going to the city manager or going to a staff person and making a request that was. Constituted allocation of staff time, basically without out a vote of the council. So I think and by and large, it's worked. The question of what gets on an agenda, I think this is. Was for that initiative type. I effort that was I think was going on at the time. And the question of what goes on a regular agenda I think is a little fuzzy as far as I read the charter and as far as I look at our rules. So I think there may be some. Some. A point in looking at how an agenda is constructed in a first place. But as far as I do think we should follow the the council referral process as far as we all go with council members and it's working so far and I, I support following what we have in that resolution from back in 2007. If there are other issues that. Are outside the scope of of this things getting on the agenda in another way. I think that might be something for what we talked about it. If there's a gap in our procedures, there's a gap in the charter that we look at it in the Rules Committee. I think we talked about that at one at one point. It's the order of business and what kind of priority that has with against all the other things we have to do. I'm not going to suggest that. As an outcome for tonight. I think we have enough to deal with aside from that and as council members and our staff certainly has enough to deal with now. So I'm fine with we follow our counsel referral. Process as is codified in that resolution. And we try and be mindful of the job in front of us so that we don't take too many detours. Speaker 1: And I'd like to clarify, the resolution speaks to where it goes on the agenda. The most. The minutes speak to the process. Speaker 4: And I think we all know the process. Speaker 2: And the staff reports fills in the rest to Mr. Odiase. Speaker 1: And. Speaker 6: So oti. Thank you. I guess the. So the gist of this is that in order to get something on the agenda, that all five of us have to follow the same counsel referral process. And I think that kind of, you know, is a natural progression to the, you know, thought I expressed earlier about if we have new commissions that, you know, each council member has an opportunity to appoint a person because I think that council equity know is important, you know? We're all elected. But, you know, ultimately we all have one vote. And, you know, I, I have to commend the city manager for extending the courtesy that he extended to the previous mayor, that if the mayor wants to put something on the agenda, she has the courtesy to do that. But, you know. With great power comes great responsibility. And that's not from Spider-Man. That's from Voltaire. In case anyone wants to clarify that. And I think you know. We've seen in just a short time we've been here, you know, a couple of instances where, you know, I'm not sure that great responsibility was exercised with caution. You know, we had the first meeting on the Del Monte project that took up a considerable amount of time. And, you know, from what I understand, that was the mayor putting that on the agenda. There was no staff recommendation. There was no opportunity for members of council to sit there and sit up here and say, well, we think that's a good idea. I think that's a bad idea. You know, can staff come back and give us a report? Can they evaluate, you know, the positive and negatives of this? Can they evaluate how we can do this or how we can't do this? And there was no staff report. And, I mean, to this day, you know, we still don't have a reason to why that meeting was here. I mean, I, I checked in the minutes and, you know, in the newspaper and said, well, that's because we want to do it because of you. Councilmember de Song in your concern. And then, you know, there was another article online here that basically said, well, you know, staff made a mistake. You know, they didn't provide lack of supporting information. So, you know, maybe if everyone followed the council referral process, you know, then staff would have an opportunity to hear the input of the council, all of us, all five of us, and put together that process. And then I thought that meeting that we had on on that Wednesday, I guess I'll politely describe it is interesting because again, I think if we had an opportunity to go through the council referral process and have all of us say, Well, what do we want to see in a workshop? You know, what do we want staff to give us as guidelines? What do we want staff to give us as, you know, suggestions? So I think that would have been a lot more productive meeting because it ended up being, in the end, a free for all that that didn't follow any agenda , that people were getting up and talking and not filling out speaker slips and raising their hands and. Yeah. I think there could have been a little more order to that. So I guess, you know, tomorrow's the first day of spring training, you know, two strikes. And, you know, I'm not sure I really want to have a third strike. So what I'm willing to do is to try this way, you know, maybe for a year and then see if it's working. And, you know, if, you know, we discover and staff says, well, I only really need the mayor to have the opportunity to put things on the agenda without going through the formal process. Then we can come back and revisit it. But, you know, I think, you know, we all should should be treated equally and we all should be. You know, if one person can put it a can go to the city manager and say, I want to put this on the agenda. I think we all should have that that ability. And if we all have if four of us have to go through the staff process, then I think all five of us need to go through that process. So that's my thoughts. Speaker 1: Member day. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mayor Spencer. On the matter of the first council meeting, my sense is that we were in a interesting situation where we were running up against time. And in terms of when you can file something. And so I so I understand, Mayor Spencer, his desire to do agenda is the matter. That's the agenda on the regarding the Del Monte because there was a time frame and and there was it was just one of those odd things that every now and then you have to do some kind of pretzel shaped. And and I think within that context, I think all of us did our level best. On the second matter. I thought that, well, it's a workshop. So, you know, I think there are two issues. The first issue is agenda raising the matter, which is what is at the heart of this right now, this discussion. So in terms of agenda raising the matter, I had no problem with having a Wednesday workshop. Now, there were. Now, in terms of the meeting itself, you know, there were differing opinions. I you know, I don't have any particular opinions about the meeting. The meeting to me was a workshop. But nonetheless, there were differing opinions. But that is separate from from the heart of the matter. The heart of the matter for right now is agenda izing items. Now, if it is true that that there is some deference given by city managers to mayors. And that is a and I always thought that was the case. That is a deference and a traditional practice that I can live with for the reasons that I do believe that, as you had indicated, Spider-Man says, with great power comes great responsibility. And I suspect that, you know, as other mayors in the past, all mayors in the future and now will rise to the responsibility of this position and and deal with matters and place them on the agenda accordingly. So. I am not of the opinion of treating the mayor differently from not differently from the city council members. The mayor is different, and it is my understanding that there has been some deference given when it comes to interactions between city managers and the mayor. Maybe I'm wrong on that. It's just been my opinion. I've always thought that there was. But I do think that, you know, we're all. You know, if there needs to be pushback, the mayor can be rightfully pushed back, as I'm sure in the past, mayors have always been rightfully pushed, push back by, you know, by the city manager who, you know, in the past and to this day who we trust to do a level best professional job for the for the residents of Alameda. Oh, my. My thoughts on this. Speaker 1: I'd like to speak to this. If you go to the minutes back from December 7th, there is discussion from the attorney at that time. Mayor Johnson inquired whether one council member directing a member amounted to be placed on the agenda is a charter violation. And the attorney responded that making a request is not a charter violation. That is up to the city manager to put something on the agenda. If you're here would be he determines that is an operational matter that comes under the authority of the charter. It doesn't matter that one council member may have suggested it. However, no council member individual has the authority to direct the city manager to do a certain thing, a certain way if it's under operations. And. That's my understanding, is that all of us can equally suggest something to the city manager, and then the city manager ultimately determines what what is being put up, what actually ends up on the agenda. However, if in fact. The there's something that you want to have on the roof, but some other matter. And I think you do a referral for it. Now, I haven't done any. Me, personally, I haven't done. The only to I haven't done any of the referrals. I have done the special meeting. And that the mayor calling a special meeting something separate from what is on here. And then regards to the first item. I and I appreciate Member De Sykes comments. There was a 30 day period to take action and and I would actually suggest at some point that that be looked at in regards to if any council member thinks that there's something that comes up that we're not paying attention to for whatever reason, that that be brought to the city manager. And I would, you know, again then and I would expect actually more than likely that our city manager would accommodate any of us. And it's my understanding that that is how the process is explained and has been working. Yes, I think I. Speaker 4: Think that's the key word in the referral process. If you notice, it's not a direct staff, but it's direct manager. So that the referral was to prevent spurious direction from. Opinion from a single council member. Regardless it is. And when there was a direction and having to do with operation or expenditure that would come a majority vote of the council that was that was at the root. Of. Setting this up and the referral form the way it is. Speaker 3: I just want to make it clear, though, I think what I'm trying to defend, the argument that I'm trying to defend is and I could be wrong, but if there has in the past and I'm not I don't just mean with the manager, Russo and the previous mayor, Mary Gilmore. I don't get that. I mean, many, many city managers, if there have been, has been a deference given to by the city manager to requests made by the mayor so long as it was reasonable. And it didn't require any kind of, you know, going through the the the the process. Whether the process was the one that was said in 2007 or the process that was put in place per the ordinance that's already in there, that that specifies that we have to turn something in at Monday at 5:00, blah, blah, blah. If that difference has been there, I'm arguing that I don't think that we should now do away with that difference. If at some point in time it becomes unreasonably overbearing, then, you know, that's why I say, you know, I have all trust that this city manager and any future city manager would say, you know what, I'm out . And they would first say that to the mayor. Speaker 2: So if I could address that, you know, we spent a lot of time on this council talking about transparency and allowing the public to understand what we do when we when we take action and the the tradition of deference. And I you know, I don't dispute that it's been there is not something that was voted by this body and it is not something that you will find written down or, you know, could search for in the city's archives or on the website. I think that we are better served as a body and we serve the public that we that elected us better when we are a council that adheres to rules and regulations that are in place. And three of us on this body are attorneys. And we understand the concept of stare decisis, roughly translated to what let the decision stand. And it doesn't have to be a unanimous decision, of course. So I feel that what I'm trying to do is make. Bring attention to this procedure. That, again, has already been. Approved by a previous council and for all intents and purposes has been in place. And especially now, as we're starting out the new council, we have a lot before us with some very substantive issues that are coming before us. We want to make sure that we're using our staff's time and also the public's time with meetings and agendas that they have to sit through and listen to. We want to make sure that we're we're doing that judiciously and prudently. And so, again, as as the mayor pointed out, I think we all would agree with her. There is nothing that would keep any of us from going to the city manager and saying, Mr. City Manager, there is an issue I think is important and should come before the council. What do you think? And trust me, he'll he he's he's a very wise, experienced man with a lot of depth of experience in city government and was formerly a city attorney. He'll he'll he'll listen to us. And I, you know, so I don't think in that regard any, you know, any special requests that anybody had as long as, again, that it's operational and it's within reason can still be addressed. So I don't think we're foreclosing anyone from from taking that course of action. But at this point in time, I'm ready to call for the question. Speaker 1: Their motion. Speaker 2: I will move that the city council adhere to the Council referral process adopted by the City Council on December four, 27, as referenced in my Council referral. Speaker 6: I'll second. Speaker 1: And discussion. Speaker 3: My my discussion quickly is one, we had a similar issue way back in 1997. And while it wasn't involving the mayor at the time, it was involving a city council member. And issues like this arise from time to time. And I guess something happened in 2007 that led to that. My sense is that there are two incidences that are leading to this issue being discussed tonight. From my interpretation, I don't I don't I don't see them as defining moments that the system is broken, quite frankly, in terms of the first item, it was just one of those odd things, you know, you just had to do it in terms of the second item. I do believe it is a city's city mayors prerogative to to call special meetings. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it's in the charter. So, you know, you might say there are two strikes. I. I'm not seeing these strikes. I mean, I have no vested interest to defend this. But I do feel like that that that this is, you know, a an issue of mayoral prerogative and an issue of the council's relationship relative to that and to the city manager. And and the practice that I've seen in the past, the deference that I do believe had been given in the past, I see no reason why that ought not to be continue. And I think we can all agree that, you know, so long as, you know, we proceed reasonably. Speaker 1: The other comments. Speaker 6: BRODY You know, and to kind of give the flip side, you know, I'm not here to attack Mayor Spencer, but I'm concerned that, you know, we have this process in place and I think it's worked. We had the referral on the Park District and collaborating and we had a really robust discussion. We gave staff directions. They came back with a resolution that that fit exactly what we wanted to do. And the idea got fleshed out. We all had an opportunity to weigh in and discuss it, and I think we can be very proud of the end product. The same thing with the you know, the traffic idea. The traffic study idea. Now, I'm not quite exactly sure it was the exact same idea that, you know, it may not be the same that you envision it when you first put in the referral councilman or de song. But, you know, I think the amount of time that staff has put into it and and given thought to it and researched it and looked at all the different studies that have been out there, you know, I think we're going to have a really quality product that we can all be proud of when we're done. So I think that, you know, that's I like that process. I think that process works, you know, when we still don't have, you know, the vice mayor brought up, again, a rules committee. You know, I think if if that. Meaning. While I do Grant, the mayor has the project to call a special meeting. Yes, that's true. But I think if we'd been able to go through a more thorough discussion during the council referral period and give staff some direction, you know, we might have, you know, some actual concrete action items that we could discuss like a rules committee and some other agenda change ideas and things like that. So I guess I'm concerned that as Councilmember Ashcraft stated about the transparency and I, I got an email a couple of weeks ago about from a Sunshine Committee member, you know, wanting to decrease the amount of of notice that the city gives for our agenda item . So I guess I'm just concerned that if one person can put a not fully vetted item on the agenda and we're moving towards, you know, a discussion of, you know, contracting our transparency instead of expanding our transparency that, you know, we're not going to get the best ideas and we're not going to get them that are not fully baked and we're not going to get them that, you know, that the public has a real opportunity to discuss. So I mean, I, I do think maybe this is something we try on a trial basis. And, you know, if we want to revisit it in six months and revisit it in a year, you know, I think that would be a good idea. And if we say, well, it's kind of stupid, you know, we don't need that, or we say, yes, it's working, you know, let's let's keep it in place. But, you know, I I'm fully open to having some, you know, time limit on it. As we all know, start to get used to each other and learn how to work together. Speaker 1: Any other comments? Speaker 5: Vice Mayor. Speaker 4: This information the. Was adopted. 27 did not. The mayor calling a special meeting, that is. I remember. That special meetings were called by the mayor after the. Bay is just reaffirming. We already have on the books. Of course, I'd like to cover the question after hearing your comments. Speaker 1: All those in favor. I suppose I. I suppose so. Speaker 5: I suppose. Speaker 1: So. Three, two, two. A motion carries. And did you want to explain your proposition? Speaker 3: I just. Speaker 1: Did. Okay. So he explained, I will be opposing because I think that it's unfortunate that this was brought. I think that I have been afforded the same courtesies by the city managers were afforded to the prior mayor. And I think that a review of the referrals by the prior mayor make it clear that that was in fact the practice. So I would submit that it's unfortunate that I am being afforded a different respect from council members than the prior mayor. And with that, I will. Oh, actually, I think there's more on the agenda. Council Communications Number ten.

Council Referral

Recommend that the City Council Adhere to the Council Referral Process Adopted by the City Council on December 4, 2007. (Councilmember Ezzy Ashcraft)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_02032015_2015-1275

Speaker 3: Good evening. Excuse me. Good evening. This evening I'm presenting to you the first quarter of fiscal year 1415 financial report for both the city and the successor agency. And you have had the report for a while because this was carried over from a previous meeting. So I want to just briefly review some information with you that's background so that you have an understanding of how these reports come to be and when you will see them because they happen every three or four months. Oh, I know. Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. Speaker 3: Yeah. If you can do it, be better. I don't push and talk well. So the financial reports are presented quarterly to the city council and the successor agency of the Community Improvement Commission. The first three quarters are unaudited. That means simply that no independent auditor has looked at the numbers. It's simply our own internal review, what we see as being correct. The fourth quarter has some review by independent auditors, but it's not the final audit numbers. So we get the report ready. We get all the documents ready. The auditor is looking at all of our numbers. And so we kind of have an idea about what they think about how we're reporting things. So we include any big items that they found if if there are any. Fortunately, we haven't had any big ones lately. The fourth quarter has a look at where we think we're going to end up for the year. Are three components to each report the general fund, revenue and expenditures, capital projects and the summary of all funds. So the revenue and expenditures are a comparison to budget and a comparison to the same quarter of the prior year that and we presented in a graph form as well as statistical data just so that you have a way of looking at it and two different aspects. The summary of all funds provides you with year to date results. Those will not be the final fund balances. They are the fund balances as of the end of that quarter. So in the first quarter, the property taxes are still our largest item and we receive them only twice a year in December and in June. So our first quarter report is really not a good indicator of that revenue stream because of the timing. This is typical. That's how the county tax collector pays us. And so we know that ahead of time. And we just know that we really don't expect it until either late December or early January. Expenditures this year. In the first quarter, the spending rate is at a rate slower than prior years, but within the budget constraints. So it's slower but still under budget. Next slide. I've reproduced here the the schedule that appeared in the attachment to the report. And the first you will note that the first quarter revenues are within expected results. The property taxes are received in late December or early January and then again in May and May or June. Sales tax revenues are one payment behind in this particular quarter, but the collections are higher than prior year. We have to do a little bit of analysis to compare how many payments we've gotten from the state and how do those payments compare with one another. Utility users, tax collections are slower than expected. And I must tell you that utility tax users tax revenues are dropping. And we are concerned about that. We are. We have unique services who are doing analyzes of which vendors are paying how much and for what. And so we know that in future years, we will not be able to count on as much of this revenue as we do currently. We believe that we need to stay in tune with what the federal legislation and state legislation are, how they are impacting this revenue source for us. The franchise tax collections are on target, and that line is a combination of many different kinds of franchise taxes. The transfer tax appears to be ahead of schedule, but it includes approximately $250,000 in one time payments for sale of large buildings. So a building that is sold for over $2 million will produce $200,000 of revenue. For us, though, we've looked at how many of those buildings that are large value are being sold and taken that into account when we look at this and do the analysis. So it's on schedule because of that, those big one time payments. The transient occupancy tax is ahead of schedule as local hotels and motels are experiencing higher occupancy rates. This is we have not been able to determine that it's rate dependent so much as it is occupancy dependent. So more people paying the same rate gets us more money. Business licenses are renewed each July, yielding almost all of the revenue in the first quarter of the fiscal year. That's just the cycle that it takes. And so we know each year when we look at it that we expect to see by the end of the first quarter close to 100% of what we estimated for the revenues, departmental revenue. Speaker 4: May I just hop in here and say that I want to actually do a shout out to the Finance Department because our increase in the business license, taxes and fees is due largely in part to some really concerted, very concerted effort on the part of staff to go after the collections and stay on it. So whereas something like a transient occupancy tax, we're glad that people are coming and staying in Alameda and we've built more hotels. But this was really the work of staff and I just want to commend you for it because it's a big increase from one year to the next. Speaker 3: I will pass that along. Departmental revenues. Are those revenues unique to each operating department and they are on target. Interest in rental income is behind expectations, but we know that it catches up in the second quarter. It's just a timing issue. The cost allocation is those charges to other funds for services provided by the general fund operating departments, and it is on target. Transfers and other fees are administrative costs transferred in from assessment districts or other special revenue funds. So is all of the administrative services provide service to those special assessment districts? They are charged a fee and that's counted as a transfer in and that's on target. But the next slide, please. General fund expenditures. We are on target for the general fund expenditures. The General Government, City Council, city manager, city clerk, city attorney are spending at a slower rate in the first quarter. Administrative services, finance and human services are spending at a slower rate as well. Police spending is slower than anticipated as vacancies create the savings. I are spending is slower in the first quarter but is on path to be at budget in the next quarter. Recreation and parks is slower than anticipated but will be close to budget in the next quarter. And public works is slower than anticipated due to vacancies creating savings and the transfers out support other functions and are on target. That's the transfers out to the library, the recreation fund, those kinds of things. Debt service funds. Capital maintenance projects are under budget. This is typical in that first quarter of the year because we're just getting started with some of those projects. And so they're in the planning phase, which is the lesser expenditure. His projects don't follow an even expenditure path as projects are in different phases at different times. The Fund Balance summary shows that the subtotal by each fund group, which have similar characteristics, and the internal service fund group is represented by working capital, not the fund balance , and that is the usable portion of the available fund balance. The successor agency has unique reporting requirements. These were imposed by the law which closed redevelopment agencies. Total debt is included. The total of outstanding debt is included in each fund and is therefore it creates a negative fund balance. I don't want you to think that we're spending money or that we're creating something that is untoward. It is what the state expects us to do. Revenues are tax increments and are received in December or January and May or June, just like other property taxes. So in total that's we are in a good position at the end of the first quarter and I know that there have been questions asked and I will try to help answer any questions that you might have this evening. Speaker 0: We have any speakers on this item? No speakers. Right. So council members. Questions, comments. Speaker 2: And Ambra. Speaker 4: Oh, I was just going to recommend that we accept the report if there were no word limits. Speaker 0: Is to remember de. Speaker 5: Great. I just want to make a comment on the general fund expenditure slide. You'll notice that that at the top there's a reference to 25% complete. And just basically what that really refers to is three months out of 12 months is 25%, three divided by 12 because 25%. So when you look at this slide and you look at the percentage of the budget on all of the cost centers, whether it's police or recreation and parks or whether it's public works, what the finance director means by coming in slow is that we are spending less than 25%. Right. So there is so that's actually good news. That's not to say, you know, in a subsequent fiscal month, our fiscal quarters, that we're going to stick to 25%. But in general, each quarter, you should each quarter should represent 25% of your budget. Yes. On the expenditure side, because 25 plus 25 plus 25 plus 25 equals 100%. So what you see here is good work on the part of city staff, the city finance department and the city manager's office as well as everyone else, and doing their best to hold the line. The thing that really caught myself eyes on the revenue side is the transient occupancy. Granted. Overall, the transient occupancy is roughly $270,000, or roughly 18% of our overall revenue side of the budget. But compared to the previous year, it grew by 50% from roughly $180000 to $269000 now. And that's a great it's really good news because it means somehow people are finding Alameda to stay here. I suspect what's really happening is that as the economy is getting better, particularly in the Harbor Bay Isle area, more and more people are staying at the at the motels hotels, but they're resulting in this increase, this bump up in the transient occupancy tax. So that to me, that was the thing that really caught my eye, as did the sales tax. And actually in a later agenda item, we dug in deeper into the sales tax item. So I'll hold withhold my discussion there. But again, when you look at where that what part of Alameda is driving the sales tax number of $737,000 for this quarter and for quarter four for the first quarter. What's driving it is the area of the Harbor Bay Isle area, the commercial area, our Bay Parkway. Exactly. That kind of tells you something about the type of sales tax that's occurring, i.e. business of business and what kinds of, you know, policy implications that has. Speaker 2: Right. Speaker 5: Thank you. Speaker 0: And I do have a question on the staff report. It referred to sales taxes are significantly higher than for the same period partially and due to continued recovery of the economy, but also a one time favorable adjustment of $313,000. Can what was that adjustment so frequently? Speaker 3: And this is one of the reasons why we hire a consultant deal to review the raw data from the Franchise Tax Board. And what they look at is not just who's what we're getting paid, but are we getting paid by all the people we should be getting tax money from. And when they find a company located in Alameda making sales but reporting those sales at a location outside of Alameda. And this happens when companies move. It's not intentional. It just happens. They approach Franchise Tax Board who contacts the payor and they get an adjustment made. The payor gets a new tax number that's by this location and they report the sales accurately. Well, when that happens, they determine what date it started and then give us an adjustment. So we get those we get some money practically every quarter. But this time it was a particularly large amount. Speaker 0: Thank you very much. I appreciate that. Right now, do we have a motion? Speaker 4: Okay. I would be happy to recommend that we accept the first quarter financial report for the period ending September 30, 2014. Speaker 0: All those in favor. I oppose extensions. Motion carries unanimously. Thank you and no other agenda items. Comments. I will adjourn the S.A. CIC special meeting for this evening and now we will open our regular city council meeting. Roll call. Speaker 1: Council Member States. I'm here as the guest. Here. Here. Here. Mayor Spencer. Here. I present.

Joint Agenda Item

Recommendation to Accept the First Quarter Financial Report for the Period Ending September 30, 2014. [City Council and SACIC] (Finance 2410) (Continued from January 20, 2015)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_02032015_2015-1272

Speaker 1: Six A recommendation to accept the quarterly sales tax report for the period ending September 30th, 2014, collected during the period April 1st, 2014 through June 30th, 2014. Speaker 3: Good evening once more. This is another report. Excuse me. All of a sudden, my ear just went. Hmm. This is another report that was carried over from a previous meeting. Well, we report to you on a quarterly basis the sales tax revenues. Now. The. It is our fourth largest revenue source and it is important that there is attention given to the various elements and various impacts upon sales tax revenues. We should also be aware of the lag sales occurring in the one quarter are not our revenues received in the next quarter. So when we talk about this, we're talking if we're talking revenues there, they come later than the actual sales and we need to be aware of that as we talk about it. Most. There we have hired HDL companies to receive confidential data from the Franchise Tax Board and to provide HDL provides various analyzes to the city. These analyzes include the year over year change by major industry group historical trends over time by major industry group historical trend for the city as a whole. Historic trends by geographic areas and the geographic areas I just want to footnote were originally chosen by the City Council and we keep adding as we see new shopping areas, new areas developing. So we may want to revisit those at some point and decide if those are really things that we want to track. The surplus gap comparison. This really shows you how much sales tax dollars alameda alameda and spend in alameda versus what gets spent in other cities. It's referred to as the leakage report. It also has county wide comparisons, statewide comparisons and a general economic analysis of the nation, the state and our local east bay. This is a one of the analysis that we receive is called the 13 quarter trend. And it shows that over the 13 quarters since the most recent 13 quarters, we are trending up and that's good news. But it also tells us that when there is an economic downturn, this is a very sensitive and very volatile piece of revenue and we need to pay attention when that starts to happen. This. The next slide tells us about the per capita sales. This is the sales tax revenue per pop, per piece of population per person in the city of Alameda. And we still have the lowest sales tax revenue per capita as other major cities in our county. And we recently changed the county, the cities that we were looking at in order to be more comparative with those that we felt had similar population sizes as well as similar shopping, not just our neighbors geographically. So we are now looking at Oakland while they have. You know, bigger population. It still is interesting to look at. Per capita what they are generating and sales tax revenue. And as you can see, Alameda is still at the very bottom. Speaker 0: So I'm going to ask a clarifying question. In the past, have you included Piedmont? Speaker 3: No. This is one of the first times that we've included. Did we include people I can't know? Speaker 1: Piedmont is not included. We have. Speaker 0: Not now. I said in the past, that was my question. Speaker 3: We haven't in the past looked at Piedmont, but we have started getting some of that data so we can start including Piedmont as a comparison if we wish to. But it's not. Wasn't high on our list of comparatives. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 1: Madam Chair. May I make a comment? Actually, the two cities that we're looking at revising is Albany and Richmond, and the cities that we're thinking about supplanting it with is. Um. Um. Speaker 3: Elsa Prieto. Speaker 1: No, not. No. Sorry. Walnut Creek. Yeah. Speaker 3: And Pleasanton. Speaker 1: And Pleasanton. So comparable sized cities. Comparable. More comparable median income. Because Albany is much smaller than than we are. I mean, yeah, substantially smaller. And Richmond's demographic is much different than ours. Speaker 0: Okay, so we can have a discussion on that. Right now, I just want to leave it to our clarifying questions. Thank you. Speaker 3: So just to reiterate that the quarterly sales tax is a lagging indicator, but it's worth tracking because it is one of our four largest revenues. And we can as you look at the written report, you see that there are geographic reports and industry reports and some other charts that are included. So we can alter those to some extent. We do have a limit on the quantity of items that we can report, but we can alter them. So I wanted to point that out to you this evening so that if you choose to look want to look at different comparisons, we can start that process. And that concludes my presentation. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you might have. Speaker 0: And we have no speakers. Correct. All right. Member Ashcroft, did you want to start or. Speaker 4: Thank you, Ms.. Boyer, for all the presentations you're going to do for us this evening. So I you and I'm looking at the staff report now on page two. The and again, there is a lag in the actual collection of these. The reporting follows the the actual collections. So the South Shore Center, I was surprised to see a drop of 2% over the past year because it seems like so many businesses have been added. But is this just a matter of not having the most up to date information? Speaker 3: So remember that these are the sales that took place in the period ending September. Speaker 4: No other way from April to June. Speaker 3: April to June. Speaker 4: Okay. Speaker 3: So is that really a high sales season? Speaker 4: It's not the holiday shopping season. Exactly. Speaker 3: Or back to school are back. Those are the two real high points at a retail establishment that's mostly what you have at South Shore is retail rather than anything else. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 4: Generally, I see this as very positive. I realize that it is not only cyclical, it's dependent on the economy. And when consumers are feeling more confident, they are more confident about spending. And there is also. It's in this report. I believe the the fact that brick and mortar stores now have competition from the e-commerce. And yet there is a mechanism by which, yes, we are recovering. Speaker 3: We share in what's called the county pool. So what when a a. When there is an online sale and there is no brick and mortar presence in our in our city, the sales tax accrues to the county pool, and that's shared among all of the cities in Alameda County. So we get a share of that pool and that is increasing over time. Speaker 4: And then thank you. Which which is important for us to capture that. And then with regard to now, I'm on exhibit one and there's the per capita sales tax surplus gap comparison that you referred to. And I did also note the footnote at the bottom of this graph, the last sentence that says this The information is provided only as a starting point in identifying potential sources of sales tax loss and should not automatically be interpreted as an expansion or levering leveraging opportunity without more detailed analysis and assessment. And the the one example that just comes to mind, because it's been discussed in the community is somewhere on this table, I do believe, is the fact that we lagged in the gas station sales of gasoline in the city. And so we've recently added a gas station as you come in from the tube. And even though I certainly remember many discussions by this body previously, it apparently didn't get out to the whole community because mostly I'm hearing complaints from people about why are we looking at a gas station as we come out of the tube? And I think there's two answers to that. One of them is Sean Roskam in of Catullus promises me that that screaming from landscaping and possibly a fence even is going to help to obscure that view a little and make it a little more palatable as you come through the tube. But on the other hand, that's what sales tax generation looks like. We just did a couple of weeks ago the ribbon cutting at the new Safeway out at Marina Village, which is quite lovely. And already I understand we're not seeing it in this report, but that the sales tax numbers from Target that's been up and running now for more than a year and some of the other retailers, I'm sure that Safeway is going to do a great business because it's the first grocery store that far out on the island. But this this comes with, you know, it is development. We've heard some negative things said about development, but this is part of what development looks like. Speaker 3: To comments one grocery stores don't generate a great deal of sales tax. Most of what they sell is not taxable. It it it's hard to tell you exactly what percentage because each store varies by what they have to offer sales tax on gasoline because the price is dropping where that's going down. So it's very cyclical right now and not something that is going to really boost our sales tax revenues over the next three or four quarters, I would say. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 0: I smell. Speaker 6: A question. Thank you for the report. And stepping us through. It is good to have the allies to help guide. But I wanted to go back to the $313,000 that was recovered a basically to the positive of Alameda. Is that going to to stay because that business is here and now reporting here so will will get their sales tax not necessarily that number will get their sales tax. Or is that sales tax spread over a number of years and are in arrears? Speaker 3: I'm not sure of the answer because I will have to do some research and give you an answer later. Speaker 6: Because if I look at the total quarter. Um, and I don't know how that how that figure balances, but if that figure, if that $313,000 is part of the $460,000 from Harbor Bay Parkway, is that correct? On this is page two. Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm not I'm not certain. Speaker 6: But to see how that. Yes. To see how that. If that's a one time or. Speaker 3: Is it. Speaker 6: Ongoing or is it a we expected to see some of that continue out to. If you could clarify that in the next quarterly. Speaker 3: Yeah, I can clarify it. And then I can tell you that typically when they find an error, they give us all of they go back as far as the beginning of the year. They give us that money and then make sure that it stays corrected from that point on. And how much are we going to get? I don't know at this point. Speaker 6: Not going to look all the time when we were on the other end of that. Yes. Where a significant amount of money went the other way. Speaker 2: That's true. Speaker 6: So I think if we can make sure that we flagged that in the next report. Yes. See where it lies. That's all I have. Thank you. Speaker 0: Member de SAC. Speaker 5: Right. Well, thank you very much. Thank you very much. Uh, interim finance director Ms.. Borja. Really appreciate the presentation. You know, I think from the big picture of things, the reason why we sales tax is important certainly is it's one of the revenue sources by which we finance the quality of life that we all hope to have here in Alameda. So it's important. And unlike a number of other revenue centers, the sales tax is one which you can more or less plan around in terms of how you design and strategize with regard to your built environment, but also plan with regards to, you know, what kind of business attraction, business retention this is expansion strategies . So there is there is a lot of wiggle room when it comes to sales tax generation. So for that reason, it's a right place of focus. When I look at the sales tax bar chart that you had where you have like is this as an industry and in general consumer goods and then restaurants and hotels. The bar chart where you had kind of the dash colors versus the solid colors. What's really interesting is when you look at business and industry, it's great to see that it went from $500,000 in sales taxes to a roughly slightly over $600,000. But, you know, to staff's credit, we all understand that when it comes to business sales taxes, that, you know, it is highly volatile. More sales taxes, as it is, is a volatile revenue source business as as business. The business sales tax is that much more volatile business can leave or they can maybe change their their place from which they conduct the sales. So so I think rightfully, city staff is recognizing that while our sales taxes in general have increased, what has been driving that is perhaps a business to business sales tax. So on the expenditure side, just because we have sales taxes go up by what, 200,000, $300,000 on the on the revenue side, on the expenditure side, I know that staff isn't going to bake into cake 200 to $300000 more in expenses. So so I think, you know, staff is certainly on the ball there. I think there's a lot of opportunities that I think we as City of Alameda further contemplate how to utilize our economic development manager, Darrell Doan. There's a lot of places that I think we should be excited about. So. So it is true. We're an island. And by virtue of being an island, our sales tax per per capita numbers are going to be lower than many other places. But there are places where where we can mobilize. I mean, just by bringing right speed, for example, if we have right speed, make sure that when they sell a truck, make sure that we that the sales tax comes to us. And it's and as we plan Alameda point, maybe we should look for the you know make sure to prioritize those kind of businesses. And I'm sure that city staff is as is Jennifer Ott. And as we make our early discussions with prospective and developer Alameda Partners, I'm sure they'll keep that in mind as well. But, you know, there are strategies that we can do also that are on a smaller scale when it comes to sales tax retention. You know, we've we have a lot of vacant spaces in Alameda and with with some of those vacant spaces, perhaps we can, you know, have Darrell Doan and city manager staff think about, you know , what kind of pop up strategies that we might employ, pop up retail and do that. In a intentional manner. And finally, one of the things that we need to also do is, you know, figure out ways to get, you know, residents to make sure that that they spend here and in town, you know, and when they can , you know, maybe, you know, the special dress or the special suit, you know, maybe they'll go to San Francisco or Walnut Creek for that. But perhaps for a lot of a lot of other items, you know, that they're purchasing elsewhere, they'll do so here. One final point on on grocery stores, because grocery stores are an important part of a shopping center for obvious reasons. And while they are not a sales tax generating generally, maybe 30% of their sales is is taxable. Grocery stores are important in that they drive foot traffic. They drive customers to come. And that's why when you look at all the different shopping centers that we have, practically everyone has an anchor. Anchor store is anchored by by the grocery store. So so it is an important part of an overall economic development strategy, even if even if they're not as high tech generating as a target . But final point, it's great to have target here. We need that kind of sales tax. But we also need to think and I think we're on we're moving in that direction. We think about, you know, things like the business to business sales taxes. We need to think about small scale pop up strategies. So I look at this as data that is a beginning point for a wide range of strategies, and that means a lot of exciting times with our Darrell Dunn. Speaker 3: And we do include him when HDL comes to review the quarterly information, Darrell and his staff are included in those discussions and they have an opportunity to ask lots of questions and to secure more data. So it's an ongoing process. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 0: And Brody. Speaker 8: Just a couple quick questions. Again, thank you for the report. And, you know, doing all the reports today, it's a lot of work to generate this information and gather at all. So on the the geographic area, you know, where would somebody at home or someone like me sitting up here find the sales tax revenue for target Alameda landing. Is that is that so link or I'm sorry all other areas. Speaker 3: It's in all other areas currently but we have added Alameda landing and you'll see that in the next report. Speaker 8: And then even if you take out the 85,000 year over year for for Target, you know, we still had some good increases. What's going on with like north of Lincoln and Webster? Do you know that was one that actually had a deal? Speaker 3: I don't know. I would have to do some research on that. Generally, when we get this data, it's accumulated from other data. And so you have to really dig through the. All of the information in order to pin the exact where the changes occurring and why. Speaker 8: And then on the I guess it was exhibit one, the the graph. It's per capita. So that's the total per capita. So a place like San Leandro, which has a higher tax rate, you know, would by virtue of that, have a higher per capita. Speaker 3: If they have a higher sales tax rate. Right. Speaker 8: So it might be helpful in the future, you know, kind of compare what the sales with the sales rates on the yeah. Speaker 3: If if they have a general sales tax rate, they may have a sales tax rate that is to support a specific bond issue and therefore should not be reported in this. But I can check and make sure. Speaker 8: Yes. Just so you know, we're comparing apples to apples. Yeah. Speaker 6: So cars. Speaker 8: Cause they do sell cars. Speaker 4: Customers have a higher tax rate. Speaker 6: So and I think that's an important point because when the car dealerships left Alameda ten years ago, it was a precipitous drop. Speaker 8: Yeah, you can see it on the the green line or whatever. Speaker 6: There you go. Yeah. Thank you. Speaker 0: Member de SAC. Oh, I. Speaker 5: Just wanted to quickly say to that. My understanding is Peet's Coffee is interested in Webster Street. Did I read that correctly? Speaker 7: Yes, you did. Speaker 5: Well, that is exciting news. I just was, especially for it. Sales tax generation and foot traffic generation activity. Thank you. Speaker 7: We've been working on them for about 18 to 24 months. Great. Speaker 5: Awesome, wonderful. Thank you. Speaker 4: Clarification question. Speaker 0: Member Ashcroft. Speaker 4: Thank you. I'm wondering if staff could just clarify. Councilmember O.D. asked where we would find the target sales tax numbers. And I think the answer is, even when those reporting periods come up, we won't. And I don't think we'll see. CVS and some others could bring that to. Speaker 3: Us in order to get access to the Franchise Tax Board data, we have to treat it as confidential information. It is not even resident on our computers, so that's why we hire HTL. They we give them permission to get our data. We do not have nor can we release any information about specific taxpayers. That's what we have to agree to in order to get the detailed information. We can tell you in general, big categories like service sectors, or we can tell you by geographic areas. But and if we have something that's Alameda landing, you know, all the stores that are there, you have to make some assumptions. Speaker 8: Know that was the question. Are we going to be able to identify Alameda landing in the future? Speaker 3: Yes, we we have already asked for that, right? Speaker 8: Yes, you have. Thank you. Speaker 0: And I appreciate the report. Thank. Thank you. So in regards to sales tax, I know there are many elements that do shop on our historical districts and our historical districts and sales taxes, sales tax. So you can also continue to shop and Park Street, Webster Street. Of course, we have South Shore. And for me, in regards to whether we have another gas station, we have gas stations on Webster already. We do have other gas stations. And I will encourage people to shop all of our districts to our historical districts. And so personally, I am concerned about the building of more retail. Retail provides low paying jobs. And as we saw earlier today, many people are concerned about low paying jobs. That would be nice to have and to attract and some there were quite a few people that referred to car sales and maybe that's not going to be coming back. However, I think entertainment quite often is more of a win win in regards to our meetings are very supportive of, from what I have seen, entertainment, restaurants, things like that that are of other ways of bringing in sales tax revenue. So thank you very much. Yes, sir. We'll have a motion. Speaker 6: Please move that we accept the quarterly sales tax report I second. Speaker 0: Okay. All those in favor I oppose abstentions. Motion carries unanimously. All right, next item.

Regular Agenda Item

Recommendation to Accept the Quarterly Sales Tax Report for the Period Ending September 30, 2014 Collected During the Period April 1, 2014 to June 30, 2014. (Finance 2410) (Continued from January 20, 2015)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_02032015_2015-1273

Speaker 0: Okay. All those in favor I oppose abstentions. Motion carries unanimously. All right, next item. Speaker 1: Recommendation to accept the Treasury report for the quarter ending September 30th, 2014. Don't go. Speaker 4: Away. Speaker 2: Sorry, but. Speaker 3: Our office also manages the investment portfolio for the city in conjunction with the advice and consent of the elected city treasurer Kevin Kennedy. State law prescribes the requirements that we must that must be applied should a local agency governing body choose to invest unneeded cash and receive reports on those investments. Since the inception of this law, Alameda city councils have chosen to implement these requirements. The elected treasurer, Mr. Kevin Kennedy, chairs the Investment Advisory Commission Committee, which oversees the portfolio portfolio as managed by two investment advisors, Chandler Asset Management and Public Financial Management, Inc.. These two firms report their management activities on a monthly basis as required by state law. The Investment Advisory Committee reports quarterly on the results as stipulated in the law. The compliance with the investment policy and the cash coverage for the ensuing six months. While the state law states that the report will be made within 30 days of the quarter, close Alameda Sunshine Ordinance precludes presentation until the second month after the quarter end. Speaker 4: Could you just explain why that is? I read it about six times and I can't figure it out. Speaker 3: So quarter end September 30th, we don't get the data until, well, almost to the middle of September. And then by then, the 27 days prior to a meeting date has already elapsed. So we can't get it in until. End of October, beginning of November. Speaker 4: Help me understand the 27 days I thought. Speaker 1: When staff reports are due first within hours. Speaker 3: So it takes it's 12 days to be publishing. But then it's. Speaker 4: Okay. Speaker 3: More time. Speaker 6: So. So it's not just the Sunshine Ordinance. It's the time that's required to prepare to comply with sunshine. Or is that correct? Speaker 7: Yeah. The the new sunshine ordinance merely added to the existing procedure. The existing procedure has always been 15 days before it was you had 15 days you published three days before was 18. Now it's 27. Speaker 6: Thank you. Speaker 7: I'm so out of it. Pardon me. Part of it is because every report, as you'll see as a review from the city attorney's office, the finance office, as well as the city manager's office. So a department prepares a report. It's got to be checked by three other people, three other departments before it actually gets published. Speaker 4: Thank you. Speaker 3: We have. Speaker 1: Your privacy. Speaker 3: You're literally trying to find a way to make it work and it it just doesn't work. Calendars and we count it and it just isn't going to make it. Well. Speaker 7: If I may. Speaker 3: Yes. Speaker 7: It does. It actually, I'm going to take issue with that. It does work. It's what it takes to make sure everything is being checked properly. Yes. It's the price we pay for having a longer system and triple checks. And that's part of why this city has very few problems in terms of giant mistakes being made, in terms of what's in a staff report. Speaker 0: That these continue. Speaker 3: Almeida's statement of investment policy was last updated in February of 2014. The first principle therein is the is safety of the portfolio. The second is liquidity, quick access to cash and finally yield. That is what the investment earns. But all of these principles must also comply with the limitations listed in state law regarding the type of instrument, the credit quality and the length of the investment. All of these limitations are intended to preclude the use of public investments in risky investments over long periods of time. The city's statement of Investment Policy is located on the city's website in the finance department with a special button in the lower right hand corner. This report before you this evening contained. As contents are determined by state law as well in the staff report, a short summary of the of the portfolio is displayed. The investment types are listed for most liquid to least liquid. Cash we can get right away, cash that we would have to sell an investment in order to get the money. Market value is provided by the investment advisers and reflects the market on the final day of the quarter being reported. It is compared to cost or book value for review purposes only. A negative number indicates that the market value is less than the book value. The average duration is the average age of the investments. 146 days divided by 365 days equals 1.22 years. The limit by state law is five years or 1825 days. To measure the performance of the portfolio. The U.S. Treasury bill rate is used as a comparison. In this case, the report that you have before you the portfolio performed about 0.03% better than better than the Treasury rate. The exhibit contains the detailed investments by Instrument. The advisory firms report on credit quality and the return for their individual portions of the portfolio. We divide the portfolio into short term and long term. Public financial management manages the 1 to 3 year terms and the Chandler asset managers the 3 to 5 year terms. So they they have different instruments and they look at different pieces of the market and try to make sure that their portion returns better than the U.S. Treasury bill rate. So in this first quarter investment report. You will see that there is a big number, but a lot of that number is restricted in its use. It's not available for unrestricted uses of the general fund. The majority of this is debt service or other special revenue funds. Those funds are run. Are those funds not totally restricted? Are in the general fund and the internal service funds. Cash is managed on a daily basis with the goal of making certain that six months needs payroll accounts payable debt service will be met. Historically, Alameda has had two investment advisory firms. And both firms must comply with the investment policy, which includes the types of investment, the credit quality and duration as stipulated in state law. The policy also prohibits investments in companies which receive more than 51% of gross revenues from cigarets alcohol or gambling products. This chart is taken right from the report. And it it basically shows you. Where our money is invested and what the market value was. And the -237 says that the market value was less than the book value. Investments with bond trustees or those funds required to be held by the trustee by the bond covenants. The duration of one indicates that they are very liquid. The trustees are keeping them liquid in order to be able to meet any demands that we don't otherwise fund. The local agency investment fund is managed by the State Treasurer's office. The maximum investment that we are allowed to make in that pool is $50 million. Between these funds and cash on deposit, the six month cash needs are met. The certificates of deposit are a safe instrument for holding small amounts required to be maintained for a variety of purposes. The remainder are instruments managed by PFM, Public Financial Management and K.M. Chandler Asset Management. This quick thumbnail gives the reader a quick view of the elements of the portfolio how the book and market values compare the duration and the average yield. And that ends my report. Speaker 0: Any public figures? Speaker 1: No. Speaker. Speaker 0: All right. Of counsel comments. Brody. Speaker 8: I have a couple of quick questions again. Thank you for the report. Can you go back a little bit and talk about the investment policy? And I think you mentioned we don't invest in cigaret alcohol or gambling. So is that a counsel discretion or. Speaker 3: Yes. So the investment policy is actually a document that comes before you each year and should be coming before you soon. Speaker 6: Okay. Speaker 3: And it is reviewed by Mr. Kennedy and I and the staff. And we look at any new laws that have been passed. Anything new that. Ella Fournier dead advisory commission is recommending or the Treasurers Association is recommending be included in those investment policies. We then look at those and bring a revised policy before the Council. One of the issues was several years ago that we were asked to create that restriction rather than making it. You cannot invest in any company that does that. It's just if they get 51% of their gross revenues from one of those products. So it's just those three. Issues that we try to restrict. Speaker 8: Oh, but if we thought there should be more than the council because a couple of things you know, stuck out to me on that on that report on page six were actually investing in Walmart Global Notes. And that kind of disturbs me. You know, you look at the investment policy and it says, you know, we shouldn't be. I was at sea. Investments which serve only to enrich a few to the detriment of the people, will be strictly avoided. And I would hardly classify Wal-Mart as one that, you know, benefits small businesses, benefits workers, benefits working families. And, you know, I know Peralta went through this a while back. We have Chevron, you know, and Occidental Petroleum in there. And, you know, we're investing in fossil fuels. At the same time, we're all trying to sit up here and figure out how we're going to fight global warming yet, you know, we're we're helping fund them. So, you know, you're in the state. You know, the state doesn't invest money in gunmakers that actually produce and sell the guns that are banned here in California. So I'm hoping that, you know, has as we get to look at this bar, you know, we'll kind of be a little more socially responsible with, you know, where we invest our money. Speaker 7: And before you answer that, that that really is an issue for the council. It's that's a pure policy question. The job for the investment people is to balance off safety of the investment versus return. If there are things you don't want to participate in. It is absolutely the council's right as an expression of the democratic process. But staff is not going to bring those forward as ideas. So, for example, there's a political question, and I'm not by the way, I don't happen to disagree with you on this question, but it is a political question to say Wal-Mart doesn't benefit working families , may not benefit the working families who work at Wal-Mart particularly, but many working families get low cost goods via Wal-Mart. That's a policy question. It's a value judgment. It's not appropriate for staff to intrude into those types of judgments. I don't think we want staff going down that road. So I would just suggest when the investment policy comes forward, that counsel bring up exactly those kinds of issues, which is appropriate in the council's role, but not in the staff's role. Speaker 8: Yeah, I get that. But I didn't see, you know, cigarets alcohol and gambling in the investment policy is being restricted. So I was just kind of curious on how that how that came about. Speaker 3: It came about as a policy action by the council, by the council many, many years ago. Speaker 8: Well, I'll save that for another meeting then. Speaker 0: Member de SAC. Speaker 5: Well, thank you. I think it my take on this quarterly report, which is important, is always to take a look at, you know, how do I do my own? 401k And when I do my own 401k, maybe I'm not following the typical rules, but I'm always looking for security and safety to me over returns. So I'm always looking for things that granted, you know, will have really low volatility because even if it means I'm going to get, you know, small returns. To me, it's safety and security that that matters the most. And when I look at the instruments now tonight and as it has always been the case, your office, in conjunction with the city treasurer, from what I can tell, has always followed that. I mean, you look at the abundance of federal type of instruments, whether it's Fannie Mae or or Freddie Mac. I mean, or frankly, all the U.S. Treasury notes. I mean, you've got so much invested in cash. I meant. For the most part, I can't I can't remember if the U.S. if the buck was broken when we had a historic downturn. I can't remember. But it was a big issue. And and by that, what we mean is it's a safe holding. And and we are, for the most part, I think, investing very. So with safety in mind. So the take home, I think, is to make sure that we don't ever do what happened to Orange County in the mid 1990s when we start playing around with money and making, you know, an unwise and I know, you know, for all my years that I've been here, we've never been down that insight. But I think it's always worth when when this report comes up, it's always worth saying that over and over again so that we never do go down that path. Speaker 3: I'll I'll the state laws that I referred to this evening or as a result of what happened in Orange County. Speaker 6: Yeah. Speaker 5: I will say, though, it is interesting to see who we are invested in when it comes to like long term instruments for the nonfederal agencies like Berkshire Hathaway. We've got a few things with Berkshire Hathaway, i.e. Warren Buffett. So it's it's it's interesting. Thank you. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: There. Speaker 6: Just a question on the book value versus market value is, is there a alert limit or an alert point? That were were tracking to see how close that should be. That's right. You mentioned the $237,000 under. And is that something that you track to or the Treasurer tracks to make sure that it. Speaker 3: Doesn't grow enormous. Speaker 6: Yes. Yes. Speaker 3: The asset, the portfolio managers track that to make sure that they're within reason and there isn't an exact number. But if the market starts to drop, they're going to start liquidating. Speaker 6: Can we get a little statement in that, at least in a conclusion, statement in the next report that says where our trend is that we're within the expected limits or we're going to recommend some action or take some action. Speaker 3: I can discuss that with the investment advisers and try to include so it won't be in the next report. Speaker 6: But if there's something if there's something that can be to address that, whenever it's feasible to put in, I think it would be helpful. Thank you. Speaker 0: Remember ASHCROFT? Speaker 4: No, I was just because I agree with the vice mayor. That would be interesting information for us to have it. At what point was the determined determination made to liquidate? Speaker 0: Yeah. Thank you. And I'd like to add that as part of our quarterly investment report, it does provide that our city treasurer, Kevin Kennedy, reviewed the City of Almeida's Treasury report for the quarter ending September 30th, 2014, and found that it complies with the investment policy established by his office. So thank you. And do we have a motion to make? Speaker 2: I'm level. Speaker 4: Oh you move all second. Speaker 8: I'm acceptance of the Treasurer report for the quarter ending September 3rd, 2014. Speaker 4: A second. Speaker 0: All those in favor. I oppose abstentions. Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. And our next item is 60.

Regular Agenda Item

Recommendation to Accept the Treasury Report for the Quarter Ending September 30, 2014. (Finance 2410) (Continued from January 20, 2015)

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Speaker 1: Council Referrals is considered directing staff to create a proposed ordinance relative to a transitional retention period upon change of ownership, control or operation of a grocery. Speaker 0: And I'm going to hand this off to member ODIASE. It's his referral. Speaker 8: Thank you, Madam Mayor. As the as the referral says, requests of the city council direct the appropriate, I guess it should now say city manager because I wrote this before I was schooled on the proper way to write a referral to return and to draft to return to the City Council proposed ordinance relative to a transitional retention period upon change of ownership, control or operation of grocery stores. And I attached as a reference the grocery worker retention ordinance that the City of Los Angeles adopted. So just to kind of go over the highlights of of what the ordinance does, you know, new owners of large grocery stores are required to hire previous employees, excluding managers for at least 90 days after the store re-opens, the previous owner prepares a list of non managerial employees with at least six months employment and the new owner is to hire from that list during the 90 day transition period. The new owners to only discharge the hired employees for cause during the transition period. The new owner is to pay a written evaluation of each employees performance at the end of the transition period, and the new owner is to consider offering continued employment if the employee's performance is satisfactory. This ordinance is to protect the workers that work at grocery stores. As City of Los Angeles passes in 2005, it went through considerable amount of litigation until the California Supreme Court in Cal Owners Association versus City of L.A. 52 Cal fourth 177, now upheld the city's rights to temporarily preserve the status quo during transition of of grocery store ownership. And, you know, here in Alameda, you know, we do have one store, you know, that I think is in imminent risk of of possible closure. And that's the Lucky's over on the West End with the new Safeway now. This bill is being considered. You know, it may be considered at the state level, but, you know, my fear is that, you know, any state legislation would not be implemented in time to protect the workers over at Lucky's. And, you know, we wouldn't be going on a limb doing the only city that does this. San Francisco has this Santa monica gardenia. Other cities have other similar ordinances protecting other classes of workers. San Jose Airport, Oakland hospitality workers, Emeryville Hotel workers, Berkeley Marina workers. And then the state actually has a janitorial worker retention law in the labor code. You know, the mayor today, you know, referred to Cesar Chavez. We heard from the the recycling workers. You know, it's kind of apropos of that. I didn't know they were going to do that presentation. But, you know, that we also, you know, look out in Alameda for, you know, our grocery workers. So I'm hoping this is something we could we could consider. I think there's a first reading and then, you know, if my colleagues like it, then it'll go to a second reading. But I I'll close after after public comment if there's any public comment. Speaker 0: You do have one speaker. But before we do, we have clarifying questions as Mr. Otis presented this or we. Then I'm going to go ahead and call our speaker, my Canterbury. And thank you for being so patient. Speaker 7: While you were moving at breakneck speed earlier, my Canterbury Alameda resident president of the Planning Board and representative for the Lucky Workers down at Marina Village. I was going through some papers because I was interviewed by the San Francisco Chronicle about the takeover of Safeway by Cerberus. So I went back and I was looking at my files. And in 2006, when Cerberus bought the old Albertson's from Boise, they bought the stores in Northern California prior to Save Mart, taking those stores over, rebranding them as Lucky's. It closed. They announced the closure of 46 stores in one day. It was not a good day for grocery workers then and things have not gotten much better in the industry since then. There's an awful lot of consolidation. You don't know who's going to be your boss from day to day. It's very unsettling for families. Just like families and recycling, there's real workers and real families behind those jobs. Same thing in the grocery industry. So Councilman Otis referral is a modest proposal. It adopts what L.A. and Santa monica and Gardena already have and retains the jobs in the grocery stores when a new owner comes in for 90 days, doesn't require the employer to keep everybody. It's a very, very modest proposal. As far as the Lucky's is concerned specifically, I would hope that that company would step up their game, remodel that store and compete with Safeway in asking those guys for the last seven years to do that. I haven't done so. I'm not sure they're going to until we really face a crisis with that membership. So your assistance on this would be greatly appreciated and it would really help out Alameda residents and workers. Speaker 6: Thank you. Speaker 0: Q. Member Ashcraft. Speaker 4: Thank you. I thank Councilmember Ody for bringing this before us. What I wrote in my notes is that I certainly don't object to the principle that grocery workers or any workers, for that matter, should not lose jobs, their jobs, when a change in ownership occurs. But rather than just considering adopting Ella's ordinance outside and outside outright, I would I could support asking our city attorney's office to analyze and then advise on the implications for Alameda. And that's the sort of direction I could support, because although it's been described as a modest proposal, I would say that it is pretty detailed and I'm so, I'm sure appropriately so, coming from the city of Los Angeles, having gone all the way up to the state Supreme Court. I know there's a back story to these clauses, and they are perhaps, as Councilmember Ody indicated, based on state law, some provisions already in the Labor code. But I think that I would like to know and again, it to me it reads like a collective bargaining agreement and there is nothing wrong with a collective bargaining agreement. It's just that the collective aspect of it is missing here because we're just handed this document. So I, I, again, I support the principle that workers should not lose their jobs just because a new change of ownership comes in. On the other hand, I would want an analyst to analysis to look at are there other comparable methods that could be used to protect workers rights, severance packages, or some other sort of guarantee? Because the when you get down into the enforcement section one 81.05, this is very detailed about hiring and reinstatement rights and front or back pay for each day during which violations continues before our city enacts. That is an ordinance. I just want to hear from our city attorney's office what the implications are. I think, in fairness, we should probably hear from the business community as well. I would hope that we have good, reputable businesses who also want to see working families be able to support themselves and their family members. So and also, I would just note that I think there is some redundancy. I think a couple of sections got listed twice at the bottom portion of this. This ordinance anyway. Those are. Those are the the concerns that I have. But I'm I'm generally supportive, again, with the principle. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Any member decide. Speaker 5: Sir, thank you very much. Madam Mayor, I think this is a very interesting item, which I think I certainly would love to support. It's not the type of thing that we generally deal with on city council, but I think you really have to look at the issue. And then if you if you take the time to realize, to think about it, this is an issue that we actually deal with. It is within the purview of city council, particularly even when we frame it as a grocery store related issue in terms of law and in terms of of court cases. Certainly, there is a special place that grocery stores play have when it comes to the land use, especially, particularly with regard to grocery stores that are that anchor certain shopping centers and that are foot traffic generating. There's a lot of. Speaker 6: Law. Speaker 5: Built around that and there's a lot of case of court cases built around that. And so this is a right area for cities, for city councils to get engaged in on in terms of going beyond land and grocery stores and land use implications. You know, basically what I'm getting at is, you know, when Walmart opens up, there's a lot of discussion regarding, you know, how it might impact existing grocery stores. And so based upon those discussions, there's a lot of court cases with regard to to how those impacts are treated now. But what Councilmember Odie is bringing up has to do with labor relations. And insofar as the city of Los Angeles, this ordinance has been vetted by court cases up to the Supreme Court, California Supreme Court. I believe that, you know, to the extent that that that it's framed similar to what LA's ordinance is, it seems to be , you know, certainly reasonable that that that city council should should be supportive of something that that seems to be accepted. And when it comes to, you know, helping out working families, we don't normally get engaged in. Speaker 1: These operational levels. Speaker 5: But I but I don't see why not. I think the earlier discussion that raised by the residents, by the workers at ECI certainly raises issues that maybe this city council we we might contemplate, you know, going outside of our of our of of of our what we usually do. I mean, it shouldn't be just left to the cities of Berkeley or city of Oakland or San Francisco or Santa monica to deal with living, wage type of issues, worker rights or, you know, I think middle of the road, medium sized cities like Alameda have something to say about these kinds of issues. But back on to the point that Councilmember Ody has raised. I look forward to this discussion. Speaker 6: I guess I don't want to repeat what people have said. I think it's important for us, particularly because we live in a very expensive part of the country to protect. Workers from bakeries of large corporation. Moves. And I think the grocery businesses we're going to see something firsthand in Alameda, as it was pointed out with the lucky at Marina Village. I'm the only of. Additions that I would have to this referral is to include the city attorney in the in the direction to. Craft the, uh, the draft ordinance for discussion. And I look forward to when we have that discussion. Speaker 0: So thank you. And my comments go to I I'd like to know specifically which other cities have what ordinances. If it's Santa monica, Gardena and Los Angeles, which was hear and see the differences between those ordinances, when I looked up the California State Supreme Court, which was California Grocers Grocers Association versus the city of Los Angeles. It's my understanding that that turned on providing safe food to the community and that you had trained employees who were able to do their job. And the concern was that we had to continue to provide safe food. And I appreciate the comments that were here. When you the attachment from Los Angeles, it specifically provides that the city has an interest in ensuring the welfare of the residents of these communities through the maintenance of health and safety standards in grocery establishments that experienced grocery workers with knowledge of proper sanitation procedures, health regulations and understanding of the clientele and communities they serve are instrumental in furthering that interest and that transition and retention period upon change of ownership, control or operation of grocery stores ensures the stabilization of the workforce, which results in preservation of health and safety standards. So my understanding of this case was that the intent was truly to protect the health and safety of the community, as we are all dependent upon grocery stores for food and that, and then we are dependent upon that. This court held experienced employees to provide that food to the community. So I personally and I was in some there were some mention of other cities that have other ordinances, and I'm not familiar with those. But so if this is framed as a health and safety issue, then I would think that all of us would be in support of that. Not to speak for anyone else. And that is what different differentiates it from other types of businesses. I would also like to know and agreement with member Ashcraft. I'd like to know now this speaks to 15,000 square feet that it pertains to businesses, grocery stores that are at least 15,000 square feet. And I'm not sure which I'd like to know and the staff report what stores it would actually apply to specifically in Alameda. And in that case, the Los Angeles case, as far as I know, is the one that was tested and went to the California Supreme Court. So I. It's important to me that we try to honor what was already tested so that we don't find ourself in litigation because this was this did go through litigation. So but the other city but Los Angeles did the other cities that were referenced, I don't know if they modeled after Los Angeles, but that and if they are, my guess would be they have not gone up to the Supreme Court. So. But I would like to see the differences in those if it's available. But as it applies to and then I would agree with the speaker. Lucky is in Marina Village. I personally do shop there, as do I think many people in the area. And given now that we have safe way to protect this store, I would agree that lot of lucky could consider remodeling the store, visiting the store to keep the store going. Ideally, I think that the we know we now have two safe ways to add a different store, a large grocery store I would support and I would encourage Lucky to come and visit our store and we'd be happy to walk around and show you our concerns, express your concerns because it is a viable business in our community. And then in regards to staff's time, I think it's fair to say we have given this stuff many new items to be looking at. And what is the priority of this? If there's a way and I and I don't know. You know, I don't know how much time this is going to take, but I know you have a lot on your plate and we have priorities. For instance, the budget development traffic. There's been quite a few referrals lately. Speaker 7: I appreciate that. I'll confer with the city attorney, but I believe we can bring this is the first meeting of February. We should be able to bring something back in April for this. And that will be plenty of time for us to do the necessary research and still make the agenda. Appreciate I appreciate the consideration of the council that there are a number of items that are on our plate. And with the the budget beginning to loom large for us on staff and it's a two year budget, so it doesn't happen all the time. It is a limited staff. So I think I think, you know, certainly, April, we can bring this back. Speaker 0: And my bet, my recollection is in regards to the budget process, that it will be a lengthy process. So I appreciate staff being agreed agreeable to taking this on. Do we have a motion? Speaker 6: I'd like to move. Council member Otis referral. Um, with the specification to direct the city manager and the city attorney to work together to draft this ordinance, including delivering a report that talks about the impacts that specifies the impact of stores in alameda. That would. Fall under such an ordinance that analyzes the differences between ordinances that are out there and Los Angeles being the test case and to be in consideration for what may be specific to Alameda. Speaker 8: Second, that motion. Speaker 1: And. Speaker 0: At this point it was you refer over you like to make any other comments. Speaker 8: You know, when I when I was an attorney, you know, and the judge was ruling in your favor, you kind of shut up and didn't say anything. So I think I'm going to heed to that. But I will say in my closing, you know, was that one of the goals it would accomplish was ensure standards of service , compliance with health and safety standards that they remain in place when stores change hands. And, you know, I think important here is this law would apply equally to unionized and non-unionized work workplaces. So if a Trader Joe's closed and they met the threshold of the size, you know, then somebody else who bought that store would also now they wouldn't be forced to collectively bargain. You know, but the employees that work there and I think that was kind of the key on which the the case turned, because I believe that the the Grocers Association was was making the argument that it was force collective bargaining and that was the critical thing that kept the ordinance alive . So I want to thank my colleagues for supporting this. Speaker 0: Any other comments? Speaker 4: And so just for clarification, and I think we've crafted something that I can support. We are going to have both the city attorney and the city manager do an analysis of this as it would apply to Alameda. Speaker 8: I would assume that that happens on all ordinances. No. Oh yeah. Turning. Speaker 7: Yeah, it does. Although on as it does I mean different items. Speaker 6: But it was classified in the motion. So it's good answers. Yes. Speaker 8: Call the question. Speaker 2: All those in. Speaker 0: Favor. I oppose the abstentions. Motion carries unanimously. And thank you, everybody, for bringing this to us. Speaker 8: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Speaker 0: Our next item is Council Communications. Council members may address any matter not on the agenda, including reporting on conferences, meetings member Ashcroft.

Council Referral

Consider Directing Staff to Create a Proposed Ordinance Relative to a Transitional Retention Period upon Change of Ownership, Control or Operation of Grocery Stores. (Councilmember Oddie)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_01212015_2015-1265

Speaker 0: And can you let me know on this then? Is the staff have a presentation or do we. Speaker 1: Go to the council. Speaker 0: Pass it on to Ms.. Councilmember Odie. Speaker 6: Thank you, Madam Mayor. I'll try to get through this quickly, because. No, we still have a big agenda, but. I spent a lot of time on Harbor Bay. I lived there for 14 years, commuted on Island Drive most of those year. So I mean, this is not an academic issue for me. This is something real. And the folks that live out there, you know, it's real to them, too. And as I knocked on doors most, most all the Bay Farm, I was able to knock on. You know, there were a couple of recurring themes that people were telling me, and one which I already knew about was was the traffic on Island Drive. So no matter, you know, how many houses we build, whether we build zero or whatever on the rest of the main island, we still have a problem with traffic on Island Drive. So my referral is to direct staff to conduct a study. And people have told me there's a few things that they thought might help alleviate some of the traffic extending the turn lane, the left hand turn lane from island drive onto Robert Davey Drive, renegotiate the Bay Bridge. I'm sorry, the Bay Farm Bridge. Hours of operation understanding that might take an act of Congress, but. Speaker 2: Or. Speaker 3: God. Speaker 6: Will know that, you know, and I think one of the most critical ones is, you know, working with are having a partnership with a UCD to work on the school start times. From the way I understand it, you know Lincoln starts before Earhart so folks go off a farm island dropped their kids off at Earhart come back I'm sorry, at Lincoln. Come back. Drop them off at Earhart or Bay Farm and then go back off the island to work or go back home. So now that's a lot of single occupancy trips or even, you know, carpool trips for four children that that we may be able to reduce, if not eliminate. So and then the last item is checking signal synchronization from Island for Inside Otis to Broadway. So this is a critical issue. I'm the only person on the council that has actually lived on Bay Farm. And, you know, the issues of folks that live on Bay Farm are still important to me, even though I don't live there anymore. Speaker 0: Member. Speaker 3: Ashcroft Thank you, Mayor Spencer. I, if I understand correctly, from having reviewed the rest of the materials today and about council referrals, the Council can vote to proceed as directed in the council referral. And and I'm fully supportive of this and would make that motion. The one slight amendment I would suggest is the wording is to request that city council direct appropriate city staff to conduct a study to determine if some or all of the following suggestions would provide relief for traffic on Island Drive. I would like to include or other remedies in in addition to these. So this is I think this is a good list, but it's possible that if staff appropriate staffer to study these possibilities, they might come up with yet another idea or two for alleviating the traffic. Speaker 2: Just for formality. Can I just remind you it's the appropriate language in that sentences to direct the city manager so we stay away from council directing staff. Speaker 3: That is a very good point. I was just reading, but you're right. Okay. Speaker 0: And I appreciate that. Thank you. Speaker 6: And I'm fine with that. That friendly amendment. And I think it says some or all, you know, by no means are those an exhaustive list of what caused this traffic out there. So. Okay. If there's others, I'd be happy to find a way. Speaker 3: And I know the city clerk is getting. That would make me sound more eloquent than I sound. And so with that amendment, I would move. Speaker 0: I'd appreciate if we could have an opportunity to speak before you at this point, if there's any other council members that would like to speak on this or. Speaker 3: I was just trying to move the things along. Speaker 4: I agree with the what the vice mayor's I mean, Councilmember Ashcroft's suggestion to to broaden the list and incorporate also the wording from the city manager, assistant city manager that we're directing the city manager. I'm. Dr. study. A personal. Speaker 0: Emotion. Speaker 3: So a move. Speaker 0: And do we have a second? Speaker 6: I guess I'll second it. Speaker 0: So at this point in the event I'll speak and I can Steph clarify. So my, my understanding is that when there's an issue that someone has an issue in regards to traffic, nothing concerning that, that they can make a request to public works and the public works then. As to what I've heard is their cue, and then it makes it through the process and that they would initiate these items based upon their research and analysis. Speaker 2: And in general, that would be the case, especially for the next one or two. One, it's a really local issue. This particular one is pretty broad because we're talking about a bridge and discussing potentially with the school district to change the bell tower. So I think this one in my mind is definitely appropriate for the council to have a discussion. Because it's much broader than, you know, one corner or one intersection. Speaker 0: And in regards to the U.S. part of this, in the past, we have had joint meetings between the city and the district where we discussed, I would think, issues like this that it would go to that joint committee. Before as part of the process. And that's something that I would think that it's appropriate that that part of this referral go through that committee. Having been on the school board for six years, I'm familiar with that part of a process and and I would and this does say work with the wood. So again, I'm going to ask Steph. Speaker 2: When we when we get to that point. Absolutely. I think that's the appropriate body. Speaker 0: Okay. So. Would it be possible then to amend the motion so that through the joint? Meaning. Speaker 3: So having made the motion, I, I think I favor keeping the language broad rather than narrow because work with a USD to change the start time. I think it encompasses a lot of things. It could encompass a subcommittee. I don't think it it eliminates that. But on the other hand, if it was as simple as making a phone call or two and we didn't have to wait for the subcommittee to be formulated, convene, meet and that sort of thing, we may might get resolution sooner rather than later. And I think that's all in the public good. But then again, it doesn't eliminate the possibility of a subcommittee. I'm just trying to be broad rather than narrow. Speaker 0: So with all due respect to that common, having served on the school board for six years, I do not anticipate us requesting the school change their start time to be a phone call. I would be. I really believe that in all deference to the school district, it is appropriate to use the process that I've been part of for I think I don't know how long we've done that, but it's a long time. So I would. I think it's appropriate to go through that system, that process. Speaker 1: May I suggest some language? How about work with the USDA and with the subcommittee as appropriate? So you have you have the opportunity to do both. Would that work? Speaker 3: Now, that was work. Speaker 0: Yes, I think that's appropriate. They have their word. And I'd like to work for the board. Speaker 6: And I don't know. It may require negotiations with the labor union. So I mean, I don't I'm fine with the the correction, but, you know, I prefer not to be so prescriptive on on how staff should operate because I don't know the you know, what it's all going to entail. Speaker 0: So can and also in regards to the referral process, it was my understanding that the referral comes to us and then we we agree then that it goes on the agenda for another discussion, that it would come back to us as. Speaker 2: Yes, we would have to come back. Speaker 4: I, I think I. We have to figure out the. Speaker 2: Timing on each of these referrals, but I think at the earliest would be in two meetings. Just given our publication deadlines and we would come back with a proposal that essentially lays out the scope. And you know what it would take, how long it would. Speaker 4: Take and potentially. Speaker 2: How much it would cost. Speaker 0: Okay. Because this so so if you could clarify this statement in regards to changing the start time, it says work with a USD to change start time for Lincoln Middle School to 810. So that suggests that we are agreeing to change in America. Yes. Thank you. Speaker 4: Please. And I think the the notion of keeping this broad, it was important. And these as examples, because that's these are all anecdotal suggestions. They're not based in any kind of traffic engineering or any kind of studying. And we don't know if belt time changes are going to affect. They may make it worse. So I think those are examples to explore and that's why staff is going to look at it and give us an evaluation of what they think. And then I think we're a long way from calling, so. Speaker 0: Okay. So then I would so I appreciate that. In which case I would strike the time, but work with a USD to change, start time to allow a better flow of traffic as opposed to being specific as to a set time. Because I anticipate when they're hearing from us that we want to change their start time to 810, that that is actually I think that is specific. I do not think that is broad. I'm sorry. Speaker 4: But again, these are examples and they're anecdotal. So I think this is the referral process puts it it gives the council majority. An opportunity to direct the city manager to expend staff time to search these out and to apply. Speaker 3: And. Speaker 4: And to apply a solution if one can be had. Speaker 0: So but my suggestion is, would council be willing to strike that start time? Speaker 3: So I would like to the chair if I could ask Mr. Councilmember Ody, since this is his Council referral, why and the reason you have the 810 time in there was was what? Speaker 6: Because that, that would make it start earlier than then the elementary schools. Speaker 3: To start earlier than elementary school. So there was some rest. Speaker 2: Sorry. Speaker 6: Later than the elementary schools it's turned out now it's START. Speaker 0: Elementary starts at 820, Lincoln starts at eight. So currently that that solution actually does not resolve the issue. If you have to get there at 810 and do your drop off and get back to the elementary at 820. Speaker 2: Well, I mean. Speaker 6: I think we can get into the nits and that's of it. Speaker 0: You know, that's why it. Speaker 6: Comes back to us. This is just a broad policy level discussion that these may be ideas that work. They may be ideas that don't provide relief. But let's get some, you know, information on what does and what doesn't. So I I'd prefer not to be so overly prescriptive and just set policy levels at the council level from a high level and not micromanage every activity that that the count that that the staff is supposed to do. Speaker 0: So would you be willing to strike the 810? Speaker 6: Yes. Speaker 0: Thank you. That we have. Speaker 3: So it would just read then to work with us to change the start time for Lincoln Middle School to allow a better flow of traffic. Is that correct? Speaker 0: I would like to keep abroad and because I think that's contrary to the intent there. Speaker 3: And I thought this was one of the easier ones. So anything else? Speaker 5: Thank you, Madam Chair. The I support this. I think it's based upon contacts that council member Odie had with residents, so it reflects a concern. My my the one concern that I have, though, is, you know, as a city council, we are a body that has to juggle a lot of balls and deal with competing concerns. You know, to. But in front of the queue checking signal signalization for Ireland for insight Otis to Broadway. Wouldn't it be fair to all of the residents of Alameda say check signal synchronization for all roads in Alameda? I recognize that. You know, this is. Particular current concerns raised by residents that you met. So so now you're doing your responsibility as a council person. I recognize that. But I think part of my responsibility as a council person is also to say if we're going to do X synchronization and we're going to put this in front of everything else . You know, it's. To me, it's. There are other parts of town that might have the same issues. So the fourth bullet point I think is a general enough matter that that does raise concerns. I will support it nonetheless. But at the point in time that it is brought back to the city council, it's altogether possible. It raised the same concerns. I think the concerns with regard to Lincoln Middle School and the traffic flow there, I think the circumstances are so particular to their that warrant. Okay. We can deal with that because the issues there are particular. The Bay from Breeze Island to I mean, I think there's only one Bayfront Bridge in town. Right. But but on the fourth point, though, that I'll just have to it's possible that also that applies to the first point. I mean Mike we checked left turn lanes throughout. So it's nice support this but as this comes back to us first and fourth. Speaker 0: So I have another comment on something like this. Would it be appropriate to ask someone from public works to come and speak with us about how they would normally addresses and then their Q and action? Because I really don't want to micromanage public works. And I appreciate your comments that we have people from across our communities that have concerns with traffic and lights and why would we prioritize this area over other interests within our community? But they come and speak with us. Would that be part of the process? Speaker 2: We could certainly agenda's that because I'm pretty. Speaker 0: Sure none of us are intending to bump any other areas through this motion. Speaker 3: Question there. S So two things that I didn't really understand, that we were pushing this to the front of the queue. I understood that when staff is able to come back with a report, they will. And I would think that as part of that report, Public Works could weigh in on exactly the question the mayor raised. I mean, I think, you know, to the extent that there are other problematic intersections, we do tend to hear from our citizens. But, you know, certainly this this process is alive and well. And, you know, we all live in different areas of town. So, you know, this again, we don't want to micromanage staff. And just because we're hearing this council shrill tonight doesn't mean you go back and put it ahead of everything staff is working on. We look to staff through the city manager to tell us when this can be fit in. But I think we've all heard those concerns. And if you've, you know, tried to get back and forth over that bridge during school or commute time, you know, it's it's a challenging situation. So I don't think anyone's denying it's a problem. And we'll try to get to all of our problems as expeditiously as we can. Be ready to. Speaker 0: Vote of emotion in the second. All those in favor. I oppose. Motion passes unanimously. Thank you. And I appreciate you bringing that to our attention. Next item three Be. Speaker 1: Considered directing staff to conduct a consultant study to determine the feasibility for a wetland mitigation bank at Alameda Point. This item was placed on the agenda at the request of Councilmember Odie.

Council Referral

Consider Directing Staff to Conduct a Study to Review Suggestions to Provide Relief for Traffic on Island Drive. (Councilmember Oddie) [Continued from January 20, 2015]

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_01212015_2015-1266

Speaker 1: Considered directing staff to conduct a consultant study to determine the feasibility for a wetland mitigation bank at Alameda Point. This item was placed on the agenda at the request of Councilmember Odie. Speaker 0: Member OTI. Speaker 6: Thank you, Madam Mayor. So now switching over to the other side of the island. We talked about this in the earlier session of today's meeting or last night's meeting when we talked about South32 and the Northwest Territories. I mean, there's there's two spaces on on the base where there's wetlands, natural wetlands, as well as. Seasonal wetlands over there by the marina area, which is kind of to the to the west of the seaplane lagoon and using wetlands mitigation bank as a possible tool to to generate revenue for the city and generate revenue for Alameda Point. Some estimates say these credits could be worth up to $500,000 an acre and we could have up to 50 acres if the maximum available are the maximum number of acreages available for wetlands mitigation. And that could pay for a lot of what we want to do. I mean, we have a community vision that that includes a park in the Northwest Territories. You know, we've we've heard at least during there in the fall about how much that park is going to cost. Whether or not it's going to go to the East Bay Regional Park District at no cost or whether we're going to be able to get any money from them out of it. And then the measure. WW money that needs to be paid to maintain it. So I think this is not an opportunity that we can explore more in depth and see if if this can generate funds needed to create the park line and create the wetlands that we want out there. I also understand the VA is going to have to buy some credits because they do need to do some mitigation. So, you know, we have a unique opportunity where, you know, we can exchange wetlands mitigation credits with with the VA right there on that spot. So I think it's something that it's worth looking into. And the referral is to have staff look into the feasibility of creating a wetlands mitigation bank. Speaker 0: And we do have two speakers on this item. We're going to go ahead and proceed with our speakers, Richard Banger and then Irene Dieter. Speaker 4: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Excuse me. And elsewhere. Moroney. Wetlands at the top of the agenda. It's good. There are at least four things that are known about this, and one that's not one. One thing that's known is that wetland mitigation banks are highly regulated entity use for mitigating loss of wetlands. They're also from an environmental standpoint. They are they produce a better outcome than if, say, 12 developers in this watershed had to go chase down three or four acres by it and turn it into wetland to mitigate their project. In the case of Wetland Mitigation Bank, that that mitigation money is all aggregated at one site and so you actually produce a better environmental income outcome. But in our case, we're not really concerned about helping developers in the in the watershed. We're interested in accomplishing a goal. And by creating wetland mitigation bank, essentially we offer a business deal. We're not going to sell them land, but we would sell them a credit. That they could buy to mitigate for their project could even be a Caltrans project that has to impact wetlands somewhere. Second thing that we know is that Alameda Point is surrounded by water and in some cases has water in it. Another thing that we know is that the area encompassed by Alameda point used to be wetland. The last thing that we know is that the areas that Councilmember Odie referenced and the Northwest Territories and the west side of the Sea Point Lagoon are under our approved infrastructure plan, will not be protected from sea level rise. However, when those areas become inundated, just because they have water in them doesn't make them wetlands, makes them land that is wet and has about the same environmental value as a flooded basement. So now the one thing that we don't know for certain is if a wetland mitigation bank is a good idea for Alameda Point. We just don't know that. And I would like to offer for discussion at least a a preliminary step before we hire a consultant to provide a report on forming a wetland mitigation bank. And that would be that we contact our own California Department of Fish and Wildlife, which is one of the regulatory agencies that oversees wetland mitigation banks in California, and ask them to come down and just have a walk through like a lot of people with expertize in a certain field. You can pretty much walk a site and, you know, whether it's a candidate or not. So perhaps we could get some free advice before we take the next step of spending money. Speaker 0: Thank you, Irene. Speaker 1: I mayor and council. Speaker 7: I'm here to support Councilman Otis referral. I know that the. Speaker 1: On the city books on the plan everyone. All the boards and commissions and the former city council passed a plan to actually have wetlands. Speaker 7: Out at Alameda Point. Speaker 1: The only thing. Speaker 7: That was lacking was a plan to move forward to achieve that goal, and we were assured that that would happen in due course. Speaker 1: And I think this is a perfect. Speaker 7: Opportunity to move forward in that regard. Speaker 1: Because obtaining. Speaker 7: Information can never hurt. So I don't see any. Speaker 1: Harm in trying to gain information. And we may think that something is out. Speaker 7: Of reach when in reality it's right at our fingertips. So I would encourage you to support this referral. So at least we can make decisions based on real information as opposed to what we think can or cannot go forward with. Speaker 1: So please do the right thing and. Speaker 0: Support this referral. Thank you. Thank you. You may proceed to make. Speaker 6: A couple of quick comments. Yes. And there's also a portion of the of the referral talking about consultants to estimate the cost of removing the concrete over by the west side of Seaplane Lagoon. So that was one of the things I didn't cover earlier. I want to thank Richard and Irene for supporting this and speaking on this. And thank you also for staying late last night and staying late on the sixth and not getting a chance to to speak. So I'm glad to see you up and around, Irene, and and thank you for coming out and talking about this. You know, if if Richard's idea of, you know, an interim step of having somebody come would be helpful. You know, I'm all for that. You know, we're moving on on site A, you know, we're moving maybe not so fast on site B, and I'd like to see us get moving on the wetlands portion in the park portion of the of Alameda Point as well. Speaker 0: So would you like to amend your referral to include this intermediate step? Speaker 2: Yes. Speaker 1: I met a married. Yes. That we just clarify and say an appropriate agency so we don't restricted to just that one body because it may be another body that we would like to talk to. Speaker 0: Thank you. So with those amendments, are there any comments from council members? At this point. Speaker 4: I'd like to. To move with the amendment if it's in order. Speaker 6: I don't need to make every motion. I'll second. Speaker 0: So we have a motion that by vice mayor and a second by member. Brody. And then any discussion. Yes. Speaker 3: I'll just add that I think it is a good idea. I believe I heard Vice Mayor Madras, he discussed this on the campaign trail, too. And I know I've heard I do appreciate Richard Baron, Irene Deeter keeping us informed about these ideas. It sounds very intriguing. I also heard Mr. Banger say it might not be right for Alameda, and while gaining information never hurts, it does cost money when you're using consultants and as we know, it doesn't grow on trees. So I would favor the just the the cautious route of let's have whatever appropriate state agency come out, take a look, get the information and then go from there in an incremental process. But I think that's what the amended language encompasses. Speaker 0: So let me confirm member Odie. That's my understanding also that we would hear back and then pending upon what that person says, then we would review the next step or staff would review the next step. But. You're not at work yet. Speaker 6: That's fine. Speaker 0: All right. So we have a motion. Second of all, those in favor. I oppose their motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Next item is three C. Speaker 1: Consider directing staff to install flashing pedestrian crosswalk signals at two locations, Maitland Drive in McCartney Road and McCartney Road and Belmont Place. This item was placed on the agenda at the request of Councilmember Odie.

Council Referral

Consider Directing Staff to Conduct a Consultant Study to Determine the Feasibility for a Wetland Mitigation Bank at Alameda Point. (Councilmember Oddie) [Continued from January 20, 2015]

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Speaker 1: Consider directing staff to install flashing pedestrian crosswalk signals at two locations, Maitland Drive in McCartney Road and McCartney Road and Belmont Place. This item was placed on the agenda at the request of Councilmember Odie. Speaker 0: You may proceed. Speaker 6: Thank you, Madam Mayor. So again, take into consideration some of the comments earlier. I'll go through the referral and then maybe entertain some some changes to it. But another thing I heard from from folks living out on Bay Farm and Harper Bay was pedestrian safety. And there's two intersections in particular that they identified as being particularly dangerous and particularly busy. One is Maitland Drive and McCartney Road, and the other is. I'm sorry. It should be Maitland Drive and Island Drive. I think I made a mistake on that. And McCartney Road and Belmont Place. And the referral is to direct public works to install flashing pedestrian crosswalk signs similar to what we did on Otis after we had a tragic pedestrian death there. And since I've made this referral, I've been asked to also ask about Broadway and San Jose. So given the discussion we had earlier, you know, I'm amenable to changing this and maybe getting a report back on, you know, as the mayor said, what the priority areas are as far as crosswalks and and flashing crosswalks. But, you know, these are two that, you know, somebody said in one of the communication that they're medium priority. But the folks at Harper Bay, you know, they're kind of getting tired of being medium priority. They would like to have a little bit more attention. And, you know, I hope that through this process, we could give that to them. Speaker 0: So just a moment in response to your comment. I really appreciate that. So now follow up. Yes. Member Ashcroft. Speaker 3: Sure. The one amendment I would make is rather than. Well, and again, we demand the language, because rather than having city council direct a city department, we'll go through the city manager. But to implement that particular remedy, I think I would want to hear from a department like Public Works as to whether the flashing pedestrian crosswalk signs really are the best the best remedy. Because if I'm picturing the what is that down at the corner, at the far edge of the shopping center that we're talking? Because that's that's a big wide interface. Yes, it. Speaker 6: Is. You know, maybe that's the best remedy that that. Speaker 3: Well, and my point yeah. My point is just that probably as council members and laypersons, you know, I mean we all have some special here and other but it's we're not as well equipped to decide what something needs to be done. I agree to address the issue of pedestrian safety. This might be one thing to consider, but there's probably a whole toolbox that public works. And I know the Transportation Commission looks at these things to the police department as well. Speaker 6: I'm amenable to, you know, modifying it or, you know, coming back with a different referral if if my colleagues would prefer. But, you know. Speaker 2: If I can make a station manager. And this, I think goes towards what comments have been made so far, I'd recommend if we. How do I put this? Demote this from a council referral to putting it into the public works queue as three individual intersections and will go to work, as Councilmember Ashcraft said. There are many tools in the toolbox that they would have to study it and recommend the best one and or bring it back in and you can see how that works. Juxtaposed to the one guarding the bridge as the bridge. And because those are very two different scales of request, I would just add one more thing. Normally an individual or a group of neighbors would make a request and it would go into the queue and we would follow up and do the studies and public outreach. Speaker 6: And there's a process which we'll talk. Speaker 2: About when we come back. But we also view this body, each of you, as elected. Speaker 6: Representatives. Speaker 2: From the people. And when you bring these. Our assumption is that you're representative of more than one neighbor. So I understand, you know, and that's part of the balancing. Speaker 6: Act of why some things, of. Speaker 2: Course, referral or when it goes to the Q. So if we can take these and I can insert them into the Q. As. Speaker 4: As if. Speaker 2: Any neighbor lets in a quest, we'll bring them back to you and you can see. Speaker 4: The difference in the. Speaker 6: Procedures. I'm fine with demoting it. The neighbors that I spoke to basically said they had no response. But I know we have a new team at Public Works, so this was before the new team got in place. Speaker 3: Member Ashcraft And I would also remark that I'm not sure how widely known this public works system is. So maybe just by holding this public meeting and discussing it will help increase public awareness because I, I think, you know, it's one of those things that some people know about, but maybe not widely across the island. So we can we can always do a better job of spreading the word. But with that, I would be happy to live approval of the motion as the Council referral as amended. Speaker 5: I just have a question for staff before we have a second. Do we still have the TTC in place, the Transfer Transportation Committee, I mean, which goes through requests like for stop signs and things like that. We end and one of the controversies over that in the past was the use of state warrants, etc. Is that. Speaker 1: Still in place, that. Speaker 2: Process staff? Does that work? And we work with the immediate neighbors and public notice for the process. And if there's an appeal from any one neighbor, then it gets elevated to the Transportation Commission for a public hearing. Their decision is appealed by anyone which has happened in the recent past. It comes to this body. Speaker 5: Okay. Okay. Well, perhaps one of the issues then is and this is a side note is to, you know, improve the way in which we let our residents aware of that process. So. Speaker 0: So and so we have a motion, a second. And I'd like to comment that when we get to the the other items that we were going to be discussing at our special meeting, I did have a suggestion in regards to having an open house that we will be talking about allowing our department to improve that communication. So we will be discussing that at that point. So we have a motion and a second all those in favor I oppose and motion passes unanimously. Thank you very much. And I really appreciate staff's assistance in helping us through that. Thank you. Speaker 6: Thank you. Speaker 0: Next item. As 3-D and 3-D. Speaker 1: He insisted directing staff to collaborate with the East Bay Regional Park District on acquisition and expansion of Crab Cove. This item was placed on the agenda at the request of Vice Mayor Matt, R-S.C..

Council Referral

Consider Directing Staff to Install Flashing Pedestrian Crosswalk Signs at Two Locations: 1) Maitland Drive and Mecartney Road, and 2) Mecartney Road and Belmont Place. (Councilmember Oddie) [Continued from January 20, 2015]

AlamedaCC

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Speaker 1: He insisted directing staff to collaborate with the East Bay Regional Park District on acquisition and expansion of Crab Cove. This item was placed on the agenda at the request of Vice Mayor Matt, R-S.C.. Speaker 0: Vice Mayor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Madam Mayor, and thank you to all of you who have turned up now for three meetings, three very long meetings, and it's truly appreciated. My counsel referral is entitled A Collaboration between the City Alameda and East Bay Regional Parks District, and its intent is to establish a good working relationship between the East Bay Regional Parks and the city of Alameda, particularly in light of some history and in light of what goes forward from here, not the least of $6.5 million of WW money that needs to be spent at a park or parklands at Alameda Point. And to put a closure on the expansion of Crab Cove, which the city electorate overwhelmingly supported in the 2008 election for Measure WW and my referral s that this body directs the city manager to meet with the General Manager of the East Bay Regional Parks District and following that meeting, prepare a work plan for the steps that the city can take to support. East Bay, regional parks, land acquisition and expansion of Crab Cove. And those steps will include but not be limited to those needed to settling any remaining issues. And I understand that there are none related to litigation, which is a good thing to petition the GSA to cease eminent domain activities or efforts . And that was on the Mackay Avenue Strip and to establish a City Council, East Bay Regional Parks District Board Liaison Committee, patterned after the Liaison Committee that once upon a time we had with the school district. We had with the AC Transit Board and to use that to help establish a good working relationship between this park district and the city of Alameda. And I think there's some key deliverables that I mentioned that are not feasible with timelines. I understand that. And the idea is to get the the the meeting between the city manager and the general manager of the district to happen as soon as possible so that we can kick this off and and establish interests in order to accomplish the rest. Speaker 0: All right. And we do have five speakers on this item. Unless you have clarifying questions, I'd like to call our speakers. CNN. The first speaker will be Richard Banker, then Irene Dieter and then Karen Lucas. Speaker 4: Thank you, Madam Mayor and council member Matt Rossi for bringing this forward. There are certainly more than 3 minutes that any one person could speak on this issue. Briefly on the Crab Cove issue, I highly encourage you to draft a letter to the GSA to not only cease the eminent domain proceedings, but to accept the last offer of the park district for that land. And. They had a bona fide offer and. I could go on and on. But let's move on to Alameda Point. At the south eastern part of Albania point there's an area that is variously referred to as Triangle Park or Enterprise Park. It's about 22 acres. It was it was a park when the Navy left. It still looks like a park. The only upkeep there has been a contract with the soccer club, but for the most part, it's fallen into disrepair. The the base reuse plan specifically referred to that as a regional park. Back then it was referred to as Inner Harbor Park. But that. It's too confusing and was abandoned as a name, but nevertheless it was to be a regional park and it's now zoned open space. There's nothing else planned for that area. It should be a park. It was a park. It looks like a park. It has a bay trail next to it has a beach. There's a boat launch right adjacent to it. City is currently has an application, a grant application to resurface the whole parking lot, completely redo the inside out boat ramp. It would be a marvelous area to have as a park. But here's one thing that hasn't been considered. It's not just the money that the Park District has. They also have money for operations. And there's a bond measure, a tax bond measure that funds operations that actually still has money in it right now, that they that is being used gradually drawn down just to pay for the periodic maintenance of the Bay Trail. But that measure, Measure C is going to be renewed next year. If that park was in the hands of the Park District, well, maybe that line item would have a bigger number on it next time. Because as good as our own recreation park department is, they do not have access to a funding stream from two counties. So that's one thing. No matter how well our rec and park director writes a grant, it's not likely to come with ongoing operations money. So that would be another benefit to working closely and bringing this park on line. Speaker 0: Thank you, Irene. Speaker 1: Hello again. Speaker 7: I am here to support the vice mayor's referral. I think it sends the right message to all the parties involved. First of all, it sends the right message to your constituents. Then to the Park District. Speaker 1: Then to our legislators. And lastly, and most importantly. Speaker 7: To the GSA. Also. Speaker 1: I think that. Speaker 7: This this liaison committee can work to achieve some goals that will be best for all of Alameda Point and Crab Cove. Speaker 1: But we need to take an assertive role in getting legislative help. Speaker 7: And it will be up to a liaison committee to find out exactly what kind of help the Park District needs. Also, a liaison committee can also ask the Park District on help for setting up a wetlands mitigation bank because because they've also done that and it will help us pursue park land opportunities out at Alameda Point, just as Richard Banger just said. So I don't think it would hurt at all. More information again. Won't hurt. And this one, there's no cost involved. It's just time and energy. And I cannot see a single downside into this proposal. So I encourage you all to pass this referral. Thank you. This, Lucas. Good evening. My name is Karen Lucas and I am a member of the Friends of Crown Beach, the group that gathered over 6000 signatures in support of the Crab Cove expansion. Thank you, Mr. Vice Mayor, for putting this item on the agenda. Hopefully our city can now work in harmony with the East Bay Regional Park District. We know that Alameda is strongly supported and we also know that the Park District has funds available for the development of the Neptune Point parcel adjacent to Crab Cove. However, the city manager has shown a strong bias against the Park District and should be recused from any participation in meetings with the district. And here are some examples of the bias that he has shown publicly. On July 15 last year during a council meeting, he used the words Neptune Pointe nonsense. Here's another example. After the Park District filed their lawsuit against the city to reverse the residential zoning at Neptune Pointe, in an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle Chronicle, the city manager called the Park District arrogant and out of control. Another example later in the Alameda Sun, he called the park district's lawsuit. Against the city to accomplish the park expansion. Expansion. It called it irresponsible and an arrogant disregard for tax dollars. I request that you appoint a person less biased to negotiate with the Park District. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Our next speakers, Gretchen Lebow and Susan Gallimore in that order. Thank you. Speaker 2: Mayor and council. I can't tell. Speaker 7: You what a. Speaker 0: Positive. Speaker 2: Effort this. Speaker 0: Is to bring. Speaker 2: Forward a resolution to Crab Cove. I was in charge of the petition campaign and it was easiest job I ever had in my life because everybody wanted to see Crab Cove become part of Crown Beach. So I am here to support the resolution that Vice Mayor Morrissey brought forward and move it along. It's the right thing to do. Speaker 0: You. Speaker 8: Thank you. This is Susan Gallimore. I actually live right there at Crab Cove. And believe me, it's like the delight of my life living on a park like that. And I support the collaboration. Of course, I also would encourage you to consider Karen Lucas's comments. My my comment might be a little too in the weeds. I actually didn't come to speak on this issue, but since I live there, I thought I'd throw it in. We had the the parks gave us a map of how they would be reconfiguring it if if we went in that direction. And I gather that that's still the direction that they would go in. And the other thing that we also became very aware of, and those of us who live there know this already, is that Mackay's not a city street. It's there's another term for it. And I can't for the life of me think of it right now, but it's not maintained by the city. And. Right. What's the. Speaker 0: Tube easement? Isn't it an easement thing. Speaker 8: Yeah. And we discovered and I know because I live there, there's no sort of regular storm drainage and that kind of thing there. So it would be really great. I don't know if it remains an easement, but we really great if when we go into this process with them, they can also think about perhaps making it less muddy there during the winter. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. At this point, we have no other public comments on this item. So I would actually like to go back to Vice Mayor, is your referral. Did you have any comments? Speaker 4: First of all, I want to thank everybody for continuing to care about this. There was a huge effort and I think the 6000 signatures gathered very quickly showed that they the people of Alameda, are very interested in making sure that this happens and it validates what happened in the election of 2008, where this project was part of the campaign for w w a I think with regard to the comments made about who represents the city and how the city is represented in the communications and the relationship with the East Bay Regional Park going forward. I think the liaison committee where the elected board met two elected board members and two elected council members is a good model for for managing that for or setting the tone, for setting the cooperation. And I have expectations that our management basically follows direction and represents the city well in a and a conciliatory, in a productive manner going forward. And. I, I think it's important that we show that this is a critical issue to this city because it they're not there's not more parkland that's available. There's few opportunities in spite of what we've heard. And we have to make the most of it. And we have a sister agency that, uh, we, we need to, to work well with because they have a stake in Alameda and we have a stake in Alameda. So I think that the liaison committee would be at least the council members would be up to managing that. And I think our city manager would be up to managing. Speaker 0: Member comments. I'll start with member Odie. Speaker 6: Thank you. Also, I want to thank the the vice mayor for bringing this referral. I think it's is time we turn the page on this. You know, by passing this referral, we'll turn the page here on the council and we'll turn the page with the city manager. And, you know, hopefully the community can get on board and also turn the page. Gretchen, I remember you're the one that got me to sign right there out in front of trader joe's. So. Hopefully I was an easy one to get signed. I do want to suggest, you know, maybe a couple friendly changes if the vice mayor is open to them. We have a lobbyist in Washington, don't we? Possibly engaging our lobbyists to help assist in this matter. I think. It'd be nice if we had some assistance from our federal representatives, our Congress members office. I can speak for the Assembly office and tell you that we would be willing to lend whatever help our office could could lend. And I spoke to our state senator's office, and they said once the lawsuit was resolved, they would be willing to assist in any way possible also. So I think if we can, you know, ask our state legislators and especially our federal, because this really is an issue that needs to be resolved with our our our federal government . Now, I think we need to get on this posthaste. Speaker 4: And I think we do appreciate the support that Attorney General Kamala Harris gave to this this project and this effort. And I think all help is welcome. So I would accept that as a mission which broader to get the support and. And. Efforts on the other levels of government that are needed to clear the path to make this happen. Speaker 0: Member Ashcraft. Speaker 3: Thank you, Madam Mayor. I have a different take on this, this request. I have no problem working in harmony with our fellow agencies in the area. This agency, however, sued this city, and I do appreciate that we have a mostly new council. Only Councilmember Desai and I lived through the litigation in the closed sessions on the on the litigation. And what I can tell you now is, yes, the case was recently settled. So recent I put in my notes that the ink hardly seems to have dried on the settlement agreement. But that lawsuit caused this city in legal fees. Six figures, somewhere in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. That's money that comes out of our general fund. General fund that supports things like parks in Alameda. And we tried and I will give credit to Assemblymember Bond, his office, for stepping in and trying to help with the settlement . But even those good offices, I mean. Speaker 2: It might have. Speaker 0: Moved the ball. Speaker 3: A little farther down the field, but it was a long, costly litigation. And and the Park District was paying legal fees to I know they're their law firm, a good law firm. They used an expensive law firm they use. So as far as supporting the the park district's land acquisition of out there at Crab Cove, I think the city has done its part. The city council, the last city council voted to approve the ordinance. It was a great community, grassroots effort. It was very impressive. We we saw that the you know, this is what the people wanted, that open space zoning, that open space zoning, you know, might need a variance, but that's for the Park District to deal with when they acquire the land. But we have downs on the property to open space, putting ourselves at risk of a lawsuit by the developer that had the option to purchase at the time. He has since withdrawn that, but at some point the Park District is going to have to pay something or convince the federal government to give them the land. But I will remind the council and everyone listening, this was never the city's land. We got sued for land we didn't own. We did the we approved the ordinance. It is now the open space. That's what the Park District asked us to do. And I also don't think that it's the city's role to tell the federal government how to proceed with regard to its own property. GSA and the East Bay Regional Parks District are both capable of fighting their own battles. The East Bay Regional Parks District. What it does best is parks in across this county and Contra Costa County. We are very fortunate to have the East Bay Regional Parks District as the steward of some wonderful land. They do happen to be, I believe, still the largest park district in the country. And they didn't get to be that way by being neophytes. They they know how to fight their battles. I think that as far as establishing a good working relationship with the city in the park district. I have no objection to that. But that road runs two ways, and I haven't seen any overtures or indication on the part of the Park District to reach out to the city of Alameda. And I do appreciate Mr. Banger its reference to the the park out at Alameda point and I've I've gone out and seen that and there are a number of opportunities for the city to work with the park district in the future in Alameda Point and on the main island. But right now, for me, the memory of that litigation, what it cost, the intransigence and the refusal to settle for the longest time really bothers me. So what I would like to see is what sort of reciprocal agreement, perhaps, or overture the vice mayor, who, by the way, I hold in the highest regard. We go back a long ways. And I talked to him about this ahead of time because I didn't want to blindside him. But I just feel that at this point there is too much that the city I mean, we've we've done I think we've done our part at some point. Bottom line, East Bay Regional Parks District needs to find a way to acquire that land from from the federal government who owns it. We can't keep doing their work for them. And so I cannot support this council referral. Speaker 0: Amber Desai. Speaker 5: Thank you. I just want to begin by, uh, referring to the land area that resident Richard Bangert referred to. That is on Alameda Point near Internal High School. I'm referring to that because in the mid 1990s, 1995, 1996. We, the city of Alameda, particularly the neighbors in that area, including myself, were incredibly concerned about a project that the East Bay Regional Parks was contemplating for that area. But in a short while, by 1996, 1997, you know, we had we came out with a great agreement with the East Bay Regional Parks at the time. And it became, in my mind, a model of how we can air out our concerns and join together and move forward. I think, you know, the situation that we had with Crab Cove certainly didn't reflect how we had worked in the mid 1990s. And so I see I see nothing wrong and a lot good. And the proposal that's being put before us and. Now. Through whatever mechanism, whether it's the liaison committee that's contemplated here or whether it's through the city manager meeting, the general manager that's also contemplated here. I'm sure we will be able to iron out any details, pro or con, that gets us back onto a positive working relationship. I do think that it is the role of the. Residents of city out of Alameda as well as their representatives I us to let others including state level persons as well as federal level persons the sentiments of the community. And so I think this is. I'm fine with this. I'm. As a referral matter. Speaker 0: So I appreciate the referral. I appreciate the comments from the members of the Council as well as the members of our public. In regards to some. Sensitive issues that were raised this evening. And Mr. Russo, our city manager, is not here this evening. However, he is our city manager and. He is part of our team and we are working with him moving forward. I was elected to represent all our maidens and we are working together and I appreciate the comments that were raised and at this point moving forward. Given that also in regards to member Ashcroft's comments, there was a caveat that I want to add that the prior council did rezone the property to housing, which then, in my opinion, led to the litigation that opened the door. And so however moving and I appreciate that, but it's my turn to speak. So thank you. At this point. We all want what is best for our community, including the East Bay region as a whole. And East Bay Parks is part of that. And I personally have had conversations with representatives of East Bay Parks. I've also attended meetings with Sierra Club and we all appreciate the park and we will be working together in regards to this referral. And also I've spoken with state and federal representatives and we there was during litigation, I'm an attorney. We all know during litigation there are conversations that occur and positions that are taken and then we move forward and that's where we are now. And I would actually suggest that we invite East Bay Parks to an upcoming council meeting and they could update us on the status of their project and then we could add as appropriate , we could meet with them in some of these items in regards to litigation. We have council that I think is actually part of this conversation. But at that point, after we. Or should we invite them? I would like to invite these sparks, let them give them the opportunity to update the project. And then at that point, the staff and council recognizing that this is post litigation, take appropriate steps. And and and I truly do appreciate the the item being brought, the referral being brought forward by Vice Mayor and I too am a friend of Crown Beach. I am one of those people that did collect signatures to support our beach. And so that's my suggestion. Speaker 6: If I'd like to go into motion, I like to make a motion to approve the council referral as we've amended it. Include outreach to others. Federal lobbyists. State. Speaker 0: And the referral, as I understand, is to direct our current city manager to initiate this conversation. So could you read the. I'm sorry. Whomever is making the motion, isn't it? Who's making the motion? Speaker 6: I was going to. Speaker 0: So could you read it entirely then? Okay. Speaker 6: Read the entire entire referral. Speaker 0: The motion. Speaker 6: Your motion a move adoption of the Council referral from the Vice Mayor to increase collaboration between the City of Alameda and the East Bay Regional Park District, including the amendments adding federal and state elected officials who enlist for help. Speaker 0: Which. So this includes the part about we requested the city council direct the city manager to meet with the general manager of East Bay Regional Park. Speaker 2: And correct as well. Speaker 0: Is that what you're. Speaker 6: I don't think we have to read the whole thing. So. Speaker 0: But there were suggestions as written. Speaker 6: All right. Thank you. Speaker 0: Do we have a second? Speaker 6: I don't make motions here. Speaker 0: We have a second. Speaker 4: I'm going to second it with a note that the last line that talks about a February 2015 is adjusted by staff so that we can meet the notice requirements and the preparation time. If you could give us a time when that might be. Now if you can't. Well. You could inform us at some point. Speaker 2: Sure. And I certainly can't do it now. So I'd like to recommend a path for updating you. I don't want to assume that we won't. Speaker 4: Have seven council. Speaker 2: Referrals every meeting. But in order to get a timely update, I think what we do is we'll get the referrals that passed tonight and will bring back updates on on when to expect reports to come back to the Council. At the City Manager Communication. So we can do it quickly. Speaker 0: So now we have a. Speaker 4: Second. Speaker 0: Motion and a second. Now we can have discussion before I call the vote. Any comments before Parliament? Speaker 4: I just want to make one comment. Yes. This is a chance to to lead this effort, because if it if it is not led, it's going to languish. And I think because that part of of our park system, even though it's not under control, is so important and future parks depend on it. I think we have to lead. That's number one. And this is not a new method and it's very effective. The the liaison committee where this the manager of both operate organizations of. And I'll go back to the school district council liaison committee was the city manager to members of council, the school superintendent two members of the school board. And that group was initiated at a time when the city and the school district are fighting each other and communicating via their posted letters from here to there and back over Bayport. And I don't know if people remember that there was a big fight over over that.

Council Referral

Consider Directing Staff to Collaborate with East Bay Regional Park District on Acquisition and Expansion of Crab Cove. (Councilmember Matarrese) [Continued from January 20, 2015]

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_01212015_2015-1270

Speaker 1: Three F Instead of directing staff to initiate steps in preparing a structurally sustainable general fund budget, this item was put on the agenda at the request of Vice Mayor Nutter. Speaker 4: I thank you. And this is meant to be fairly simple, and it requests that the city council directs the city manager to take specific steps in preparing a structurally sustainable general fund budget and a. My intent on this is to actually establish principles for us to make a judgment on the budget, not necessarily to. Direct the city manager steps. And what I'm looking for is this council to establish working principles where we have defined one time revenues. That it's clear that their one time revenues by definition and they are not incorporated as general fund revenues. And that we have the opportunity to look at a general fund that's constructed without advances, loans or other transfers from funds outside the general fund. And we look at a way to further define that the reserve that fund balance is not included in the general fund revenue line. And. The reason is, is operations I think of have to do with operational income and. I think with these principles we can evaluate the budget that comes to us. And I'd also like us to afford this. This the ability to consult and obtain advice from parties separate from dysfunction. That is, the city treasurer and the city auditor, not the city treasurer. The city auditor is a treasure, but is the treasurer and all that and spell check audit. But I didn't. And that we apply these principles to our upcoming general fund. I also put this out there with an understanding that the city is already taking steps in these directions and it's much appreciated. The staff has the same thing in mind, but because we get so many people attending our budget sessions, at least in my experience in the past, I think it is very important to make sure that people are aware that when we talk about free bus passes or free park services, nothing is free. It it comes from a line item in a budget. And in order to sustain that, we have to live within our means. And our means doesn't include dependance on one time funding. And. I think because we have recovery fever, it's not recovery for everybody. I think we have very large unfunded liability. As the speaker who spoke at the at the opening of the meeting referenced that we still have a lot of work to do on that. And again, that's the the. Genesis of this referral and this one, unlike my other referrals, is open to. I'm perfectly open to hearing how people want to amend it. I have no. No set. That desire to see any one of these stay in tact other than keeping the principles that we live within our means. Speaker 3: Member Ashcraft Well, if I could just suggest what would be helpful to me would be to hear from staff, specifically Ms. Warmer Dam, because she takes such an active role in the budget and really understands all the intricacies of it. And I think so to help us understand this, this Council referral better and the implications of it. Speaker 0: Before we do that, I'd like to ask you have other council member comments. All right. Speaker 2: Arthur. Speaker 0: All right. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Madam Mayor. So I in fact, today I just sat in a presentation about Prop eight adjustments, and it talked about our property taxes and and how we see out in the economy that it's doing so well. And yet there are some adjustments because of reassessments that are are going to impact our property taxes. We'll see improvements in the future and probably next year and the year after. But this year, it's not as great as we, you know, we had all hoped. As we all know, the public sector lags the private sector. And it's that's just a fact. So I do appreciate I mean, I think the I think where you're headed with this vice mayor is the dependency on one time funding. And I totally recognize that. And we that is how we budget. We do not we don't budget when we know we have one time money and we're forecasting for the future, we take that one time money out and then we forecast based on what is sustainable and not that one time money. So and I think that that addresses your first bullet. I would like to ask, though, because I don't have the benefit of the finance director here tonight to discuss these in particular as we move forward through the budget process. In the very beginning, our very first kickoff meeting, we'll talk about assumptions and we can address this very specifically to make sure that that we're addressing your your concerns. But as we develop the budget, we absolutely are not considering one time money as our source of revenue. And then the other thing I just would like to say is I haven't been in contact with the city treasurer or auditor. I'm hoping that you have and they're okay with participating in this. So. Speaker 0: I think we can invite them. I don't personally. Speaker 4: Participate. Speaker 1: In the past. Okay. Yeah. And we have a good relationship with them, so I'm sure that's not going to be that won't be an issue. Speaker 0: Any other member, council member disagree. Speaker 5: Oh, well, thank you. Let me address this in several ways, in two ways. First, let me talk about my interactions with this and previous city managers. And then second, let me talk about. You know how I see the matter before us. As a council member, the way that I've always interacted with the city manager is, you know, we I go there and I sit down and, you know, I talk with we have regularly scheduled meetings. I think it was back in October, for example, in a Thursday meeting with city manager Russo. Liz Warm Adam was there as well. And, and and finance director Julian Boyer was there as well. We were talking about the fact that, you know, we were anticipating he was talking about that we were anticipating more revenues, that our reserves looked quite healthy. But it was city manager Russo who took the initiative to point out that. But don't get too excited because a lot of this is also one time reserves a one time, one time upside hits. So, you know, don't don't be making these long term plans as if, you know, you're going to always have X amount of dollars . And, you know, during the course of the conversation, we further talked about, you know, the nature of one time reserves and how, you know, we treat that from one budget to one budget planning to another budget planning. So I. And it's a type of conversation that I've had with previous city managers. Jim Flint, Rest in peace. This is city manager, acting city manager at the time. Rob Wonder when I first began. So. For the most part, you know, I've seen city managers and also Debbie Greta city managers who really are on top of their game when it comes to dealing with these issues. But by the same token. Now. Now to the second point. A lot of times when the information is put into, you know, pages 200 page budget document or the supporting reports that go to the you know, a lot of times it looks very opaque for persons who and it doesn't mean that you have to have gone to city planning school or or have been a council member for a long time. I mean, it's just opaque. And what I think that what council member, Matt Oreskes, vice mayor of address, is getting at, is making sure that that we're clear on certain key areas when it comes to tracking budget items, whether we're whether we're clear on one time reserves and revenues or we're clear on advance loans. But in my mind, these specific areas around which I believe Vice Mayor Matarese wants us to be clear when we interact with the public. I think these three specific items fall under kind of the general notion of what our best practices. So it's altogether possible that, you know, the conversation that we might want to have are, you know, what are the best practices when it comes to any kinds of financial items and in among any kind of financial items, perhaps these three items, Race to the Top. So it's probably a larger conversation that we as a city council might have to understand, you know, what are the best practices when it comes to one time revenues? As you know, it's true that while you ought not to make permanent plans around one time revenues, it's also true that from one year to the next, you have these one time revenues that bump up. They might bump up from different sources. You know, some property got sold and suddenly you get a lot of transfer tax. Or maybe the state makes this decision regarding paying back the city, some sales tax that that had accidentally given to another city, which I did, which did happen, by the way. Speaker 4: Went the other way, though. Speaker 5: It went the other way. Speaker 4: To somebody else. Speaker 5: Exactly. It was a company called Van Star that moved out to, I think, Livermore area. But anyways, these kinds of revenue one time hits happened in different ways. So. You know, it's. It's getting a handle on how to treat it. And I think that's where the best practices notion comes in place. I think it's fine to have principles and hard and fast policies, but. You know, based upon my experience and working with the different city managers, I trust that I can give them the leeway. So long as we're clear as to what constitutes best practices, I trust that we can give them the leeway to make decisions. I mean, in the big picture of things, I think the fact that we had after Sony's the fact that we had a big one time hit a one time revenue jump, that was actually good news because it meant that we could then begin to kind of. Stash it away towards dealing with like the OPEB unfunded liabilities to start up the trust fund for that. And you know, I've seen the city manager make some alterations to previous employee negotiating bargaining agreements. You know, getting the police and fire to pay more towards their their retirement. So. With this city manager and with previous city managers, you know, I'm confident that they can do the job and that where we are. So I wouldn't want to. And cut them into, you know, specifying, you know, in our budget this is how you're going to do things. Rather, I think if we give them the leeway and so they're clear as to what we think are best practices. And when we go through the budget session, we just simply have to ask, you know, to what extent have you followed the best practices that we had in mind? And I think and in part, if we if we're not if we don't agree with the city manager at that point in time or the finance director at that point in time, you know, we spell out our differences. Speaker 0: So and the other member. Speaker 3: I think going first a. Speaker 0: Lot, you. Speaker 2: Hear it. Speaker 6: I'll be brief. So I want to echo that. My thoughts are very similar to Councilmember de songs and Councilmember training. They said, if your colleague has said it already and don't repeat, so I'm not going to you. But I'm just a little concerned that, you know, we're setting policy without understanding the consequences of it. If we set a policy that, you know, certain revenues or or certain budget items should not be included, then are we setting a policy now that sets us up for potential service cuts? And I don't know if that's if that's something we want to do at this point. You know, I do agree that I think we do need to follow best practices. But I think the proper time to talk about that and think about that is when we get closer to the budget. At that am I my quick, quick thoughts on. Speaker 0: I'm going to let member vice mayor respond first. Speaker 4: And I just wanted to respond to those two sets of comments because I used the word principle on purpose rather than policy. And I prefaced my remarks because this is not so well written, because the preparation of the budget, according to our charter, belongs to the city manager. So we're not I my intention is not to direct the steps, but I think Ms.. Vollmer damn. Helped me out here saying that these are talking points. And if I would, I would really want to see out of here and and to get a motion passed that says that, first of all, we define all of these things . So we have a clear definition of of what a one time and I know you have something like that. What a one time revenue is. And we're reminded of it as we're going through our budget process that we understand and and it's highlighted in explaining the budget to us, because you mentioned that the the text on the paper is opaque. It's more than that. It could be gibberish, you know, if it's late at night, which doesn't always happen. Right. But advances loans and other transfers have a habit. And I have experienced some city manager, some good city managers. They have a habit of drifting off the high radar and they they drift down someplace. And by the time your eyes get down there, you don't see them. And that's why I think it's a good talking point to highlight those, so that we can either decide we we want to approve that that approach or send that approach back for adjustment. And the last is and this goes back directly to the graphic from the the midterm report, the projected our general fund reserves going to zero in fiscal year 2018. I don't know if that's still the case. But that graphic was put together with a lot of thought, and it's going to be adjusted, I'm sure, given the runs that we have. But we have to keep our eye on that ball because and I think it's important to remind the public of that, because that's in a public document. It hasn't been revised yet. It needs to be pointed out. And I think if we follow those and have those pointed out during our budget discussion and we give that direction to the manager, then I'll be satisfied that the intent of this council referral to accomplish. Speaker 1: I think we're fine with that is momentum. Speaker 0: I remember Ashcroft. Speaker 3: Oh, I think that because the vice mayor was referring to something that had been said by staff before that was appropriate. I didn't mind at all. Speaker 0: That you had wanted to. Speaker 3: Speak. I did, but I'm always happy to. You know, more information is better than less. But thank you. I. I'm grappling with this because I feel that. We are following these principles. I think they're good principles to be aware of. At the same time, we. We have recently had some one time revenue and I think the previous council dealt with it very responsibly. We we had a divided into separate pots and some immediate needs. We were able to take off the list, as I recall, some public works, you know, repairs that needed to be done. And and and we also set aside to start paying down, not start, but to continue paying down our OPEB liability. We took part of that way. I think that we need flexibility when we're dealing with the budget. I would like to see all of these ideas discussed when we start hearing the budget talks coming up by doing a council referral and singling out these particular principles, three principles seems to elevate them to a certain level that maybe they should share with other principles of good budget practice. And I, I, I do understand in, in vice mayor matters. He has certainly served in different administrations. Different administrations change. And but I think we've learned a lot from the past. I think that we, or at least those of us and I believe our new colleagues are all very mindful of what we face in our budget, the deficit and what we need to the debts we need to pay down. And so I think that I. I've been very satisfied with the work and the reports that have come out of the finance department. I miss terribly our former finance director, Fred Marsh. But I think our interim Jo-Anne Boyer is doing a good job too. But they have, I think, managed to breakdown the budget into clear, understandable language. And so I'm I'm just not sure that this needs to be a direction to the city manager at this time, but yet these principles can be considered along with others when we come to our budget talks. Speaker 0: In November day. Speaker 5: So thank you. You know, I think maybe this is the crux of the issue as I see it. And I'm not saying that this is a crux for anyone else. For me, the crux of the issue is that. We have we have known for the longest time since the 1990s. Particularly starting in 2000, that our budget is structurally. Impaired, so to speak. We have known that in the late 1990s. We knew that with the base closure and the impending impacts that were coming down, that the impacts were large and they were going to always be there. But the revenue with which we are going to deal with the incremental impacts weren't adequate. Likewise in the 2000. With the increase in our outstanding liabilities. OPEB as well as CalPERS, that we can see that we had not just the ongoing liabilities, but we also had to do the, you know, as as former Councilmember Doug Haan used to say in the out years. So and that our revenue stream coming in relative not just on an annual basis but on a cumulative basis relative to our our current and ongoing and unfunded liabilities. It was inadequate that it it it at that so that there was a structural problem with regard to our budget. We've known that. By necessity. It is the city managers ask whether it's in Flint, Rob Wonder or. Or Debbie Carita or. John Russo. By necessity, it is their task to juggle a lot of balls, to chip away at our long term obligations while trying to maintain current services as as well as possible. And as a result, sometimes that they will take a look at the general fund reserves, perhaps dip into it to pay to help pay for ongoing operations. Or other times maybe they will take some make some cuts and then put that savings into the general fund reserve. Or by necessity, they will deal with one time revenues and deal to sometimes perhaps deal with ongoing needs. All the information is always out there. It's the responsibility of the council members on behalf of the residents to ask the tough questions that if we didn't solve, you know, the structural deficit, our budget. Are we moving in the right direction or it's not resolving it? And the question is always, do you trust staff? Ultimately, that's what it comes down to. You trust staff that they're working in the interest of solving these outstanding issues. In the city manager and previous city managers. I know that we've always worked our level best. So to me, that's the crux of the matter is I'm not I don't think we have to prescribe to a tee what it is that the city manager has to do. So long as we're clear as to what our best practices are as well as what are our expectations. And we transmit our are and communicate that with the city manager as well as the residents. Speaker 0: So I'd like to speak to the side of I was just at a conference member OTI was also there for training for new mayors and council members and when it got to the fiscal issue for the state of California, they discussed Alameda County City's unfunded OPEB liability, which is in regards to as a percent of our general fund. And they had a chart that showed that the range from all the cities in the county of Alameda. And this goes to why this is very significant. And the range was 7% to 140% of this unfunded liability as a percent of the general fund as of June 2013. And Albany was at 7% and Alameda was at 140%. We had the highest percentage in regards to our general fund. And being the mayor of this city, when this chart was flashed in front of a room full of new members and mayors, all of a sudden everyone was looking at me. So we all recognized statewide that this is an important issue. So I truly do appreciate why the vice mayor's bringing this referral. And in regards to these other comments, and I and I also support and this is. I want to look at this language because. We have each of us do have a responsibility of due diligence to ask questions when the budget is presented. I have had meetings with staff in regards to the budget process and we will be having ample public meetings, workshops to include the public in this discussion. And the first part of it is, you know, request city council, direct city manager to take specific steps in preparing a structurally sustainable general fund budget for the upcoming fiscal year 2015 2017 cycle. And I actually have concerns in regards to that language. This is a long term process. We all know we are not going to be able to address this issue in this two year cycle that is here. And what I am actually looking for is a long term plan in regards to how we are going to chip away and and address this issue. And and these points are good principles that I'm sure we all out of context would say, yes, we fully support. However, without the information of our finance director and I also agree in regards to our city treasurer, our city auditor, having their input. I it's my understanding this is what the process will be, that we will have the opportunity, we will discuss assumptions, we will have input. And this is why. And so now City Manager Warming Dam, could you clarify what will be happening with the budget process? Speaker 1: Certainly. So we are looking at kicking off the budget process. I'm sorry, I don't have the actual date in my head. Do you remember me? Okay. Was it March coming? I think we're coming to council in the beginning of March and we'll be the very first meeting will be a kick off meeting, and I'll be talking about assumptions, sort of some of the the the the actual schedule. And that would be the time that we would talk about this. And if I may, I think I also do appreciate the flexibility from the other council members. I also appreciate the fiscal your concern. The vice mayor is concerned with the fiscal health. And I think I'd like to suggest maybe some some language that might help, which would be requests that the city manager, the city council direct the city manager, prepare the general fund budget for the upcoming two year cycle and ensure that the following principles are defined and critically evaluated during the budget process. And I think that's kind of what you're looking at to make sure that we really these are important I have gone to. Right. So you just want us to make sure that these are very important principles. We should be following them. We may not be able to follow them for particular reason, like we were in a recession and we couldn't follow them and we had to use our rainy day fund. So we needed that flexibility. But I think what your what the vice mayor is asking is that we critically evaluate these pieces and we included in the budget process. I think we are totally okay pursuing that and again, defining. Exactly. Exactly. Because you're right. Advances, loans and transfers from other funds. That has a whole set of definitions that I think are really important because some of these things you are ongoing, you get them every year and you would include them as your revenue. Some things are not there one time and you would not include them. So I think we do want to define them and we can do that in in our in the process. Speaker 0: So so and that is something that I actually I'm confident staff would do without our direction. And I truly do. And if if there is ever a definition that we don't think staff has adequately defined, then I'm confident that we can always remind, you know, and ask the question and then it comes back to us. So I'll go back to Vice Mayor, if you'd like to frame a referral that you think is appropriate. Speaker 3: May I make a comment motion? Speaker 0: Oh, yes, yes. Speaker 3: So I just want to say I've really enjoyed watching and listening to this discussion. I think it's been a really nice example of interaction among all the council and staff, and we have created something that I think I'm prepared to actually support where I didn't think I would, because I think this former dam really honed in on the concerns on both sides of this issue and just made it better. I also appreciate the affirmation of the respect for staff, their input, their expertize and their abilities. I think too often people don't realize how much is done by staff before the five of us ever get up here to do our deliberating. So I think that's really nice to have that affirmation in public. I mean, with this, I'll turn the floor back over. Speaker 4: And I like the language. I really appreciate help in having. It's obvious that you listened what I was saying to what my colleagues were saying, and I think that that makes this useful. So if the city clerk can read back the motion, that would be the motion I would make because it captured what my intention was. Speaker 1: It would be the city council directed the city manager to prepare the general fund budget and ensure the items listed would be defined and critically evaluated. Speaker 4: And those are those three points. And I would make that motion and also make a comment that. Even though it I specified fiscal year 20 1517 cycle it was so that would start right now and I do understand that we have a long way to go, but I think it's important that we do this ahead of the discussion so it doesn't get swallowed in. Speaker 0: And I think we all agree with you. We have a motion. Is there a second member? Yes. Speaker 6: Is the last paragraph still in the motion? Speaker 4: Okay. No. Speaker 6: I'm sorry. Can I hear it one more time, please? Speaker 1: Direct. The City Council would direct the city manager to prepare the General Fund budget and ensure the three items listed would be defined and critically evaluate. Speaker 6: The three items are one. One time revenues, advance loans and reserves. Speaker 4: Yes. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 0: We have emotion. Is there a second? Speaker 5: Um. Speaker 3: Okay. Our second. Speaker 0: And then at this point, the last paragraph was stricken. That was. Speaker 4: Yes, because I think the assumption is that the Treasurer and the auditor are already involved. Speaker 5: Remember what hesitation I exhibited moments ago was? Because I think going into this, I saw this discussion as being framed as something addressing the structural deficit, the nature of the structural deficit of the general of our of our budget, which we all know is there. But my sense then is that we've kind of moved away from from indicating that that this will indeed actually solve the structural general fund budget, a promise which I would say that was probably beyond the scope to begin with. So to go to the extent that that interpretation of what I guess is correct, and I'm supportive of this, I'm supportive of the literal wording of how it is now. Speaker 3: QUESTION So are you the that. Speaker 4: Is. Speaker 5: Because I think this is important. What I'm trying to say is this is that if we follow the little wording of of the motion, there is no implied predicate of dot, dot, dot. Therefore, we are on the path of solving the structural deficit is that's a promise which I think we can't make. But I think the motion, as it stated now in and of itself, has value to the public. It is valuable to specify these three items. Speaker 3: And my question to you is going to be, were you having trouble with the wording in preparing a structurally sustainable budget? Speaker 5: No, because I didn't hear that word in the way that you read out. Speaker 3: We did take that out. That's okay. Okay, then. Speaker 5: Yeah. So that's fine. Yeah, I'm fine with the literal wording. Speaker 4: That's why I appreciate this word. Speaker 0: So I actually would like to go back member day to give comment regarding the three the three principles. Speaker 2: Mm hmm. Speaker 0: So it's my understanding that we're not saying that these are things. These would be assumptions we would be considering along with other assumptions. Speaker 1: That's right. We're going to define them and evaluate them. Speaker 0: So this is intentionally broad. And I personally. I expect this is something that staff would have done without the referral. I don't think the referral is necessary to do this. I do expect that we will be working with staff. We will have the opportunity to do all of this. However, I will support the motion, but I do think it's redundant. So I'll call the question. All those in favor. I, I opposed. Speaker 6: Abstain. Speaker 5: On. Speaker 0: So forth. Four in favor. One abstention. Thank you. And our next item. Three G can. Speaker 1: Consider directing staff to reestablish the Economic Development Commission. This item was placed on the agenda at the request of Vice Mayor Madam.

Council Referral

Consider Directing Staff to Initiate Steps in Preparing a Structurally Sustainable General Fund Budget. (Councilmember Matarrese) [Continued from January 20, 2015]

AlamedaCC

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Speaker 1: Consider directing staff to reestablish the Economic Development Commission. This item was placed on the agenda at the request of Vice Mayor Madam. Speaker 4: Okay. I'm having technical difficulties. Speaker 3: What to do? Speaker 4: I got checkerboards instead of my referral. Thank you for paper. Speaker 2: Oh. Speaker 4: Oh, thank you. This is better. Speaker 3: Anyway. Been there. Done that. Speaker 4: Given. The. Allen made a point to say, as a creator of jobs, given that we are still largely a bedroom community, dependent largely on residential property taxes for revenue, and given that I had a good experience and I think Council Member de Song and I started off at the same place on the Economic Development Commission that delivered a strategic plan to the city that had some successful outcomes, and particularly on Park Street. And given the future of. I would like this council to consider reestablishing the Economic Development Commission, and this would be in order to have a body that recommends policies and plans to the City Council for bringing businesses to Alameda and replacing jobs . When the Navy left Alameda Point. This body could work with current businesses and business associations to attract and retain businesses in Alameda. And could work and coordinate with regional efforts to grow the local economy and to increase almeida's commercial tax base of. Thus relieving some of the pressure off of residential tax base and perform economic development activities at the direction of the city council. These can be very specific activities and I was further intrigued with the agenda items from the last two meetings with Right Spirit, Right Speed that came to town. They actually make something. And they're renting a building that they have a lease with option to buy. And it's a cutting edge business and a green business. And I'm curious, because they chose to come here without the essentials that have been described in many reports of things that need to attract a business like that. And I'd like to know why and how we can repeat that. And I'd also like to know how VF Outdoor it chose Alameda. And how Penumbra before them chose Alameda. Again, absent of some of those things that have been said to be absolutely necessary to bring these well-paid technical jobs to Alameda. And in the past, that was part of the function of of the Economic Development Commission. And I don't know if council member de SAC had the experience, but I certainly did as the chair to accompany the then mayor, Ralph Pizarro, on calls to prospective businesses to bring to Alameda and other members of the commission had that opportunity and other members of the council had that opportunity. And there was a concerted effort. Following a strategic plan that the Economic Development Commission prepared and presented the Council for adoption. So I think the time is right for this and I hope my colleagues will support it. Speaker 0: So I'd like to go to staff next week to share to share the history of this committee. Is that the. Speaker 4: Commission? Speaker 0: The commission. Would you like to? Speaker 1: Madam Mayor, I'm sorry. I didn't recognize the. The question that you had asked me when I was going to provide you with was just this a little bit of background that this item did come on October 1st, 2013, back to the Council? It wasn't that long ago, and there was a whole set of discussions at that time about why the Commission it was recommended that the commission go away and and what should go in its place. And I'm not sure that this council, because it was not included in the package week and that's part of the referral process. Right. But to go so that you all are aware of what actually was presented to take its place and I think that the council should have an opportunity to discuss that because it wasn't that we would just eliminate the EDC, it was that something else, a more nimble process, take its place. And I think it would be helpful for the Council to have the benefit of that conversation with with economic development manager Dale Doan, who's, you know, who's more recent, who's just been with us now nine months and has really done a lot of legwork in on economic development in general as well as Debbie Porter. So I think it would probably be better to have that come back and we can talk about it. And I know the vice LG member Ashcraft also had met with staff member Doan. Speaker 0: Member Ashcraft. Speaker 3: Thank you. I did. And I also was I looked up the. The agenda item. I mean, that the previous council voted on this. A lot has happened since the Economic Development Commission was created. And I believe Mr. Matter City and Vice Mayor was one of the founders. I served on that commission too briefly before I went to the planning board. But as the staff report mentions, the the role of the Economic Development Commission was greatly reduced after we lost redevelopment money because that took away a lot of projects in the pipeline. Fortunately, some of them, like the theater, did get completed. But the the projects that the Economic Development Commission, their big projects were things like the Bayside Shopping Center, the historic Alameda Theater Cineplex and parking structure, Alameda Landing. And but by the time this council got around to eliminating voting to eliminate that particular commission in January of 2012 , the EDC had decided as a body to reduce its meetings to six times a year because they just weren't doing that much. There weren't that many projects coming to them. And in 2013, two of the four meetings by the time we got to October had already been canceled due to the limited number of agenda items. I even remember that a little bit when I was on the EDC and then in place of the EDC, because remember whenever we have a Border Commission, we have to have a staff member, staff it and a deputy city attorney attend the meetings and in the case of the Economic Development Department and Darrell Doan is our manager , there are 2.5 full time employees, including him. And so then to take them off of the work that they do, going out and recruiting and attracting businesses to prepare staff reports and staff meetings, I would question is, you know, maybe not the best use of their time, but what was brought up in their place, what was created in their place, and we've seen some good results in recent days. Recent years is the use of ad hoc committees and task forces. And we remember the Fiscal Sustainability Committee was one of them. And then more recently last year, I guess now it was 2013, the America's Cup Ad Hoc Committee. And in that case, it was chaired by a highly respected and effective CEO of a local company with committee members from the maritime community in Alameda who brought their expertize and personal connections to this project and also created was a Mayor's Economic Development Advisory Panel composed of high level Alameda Businesses and Business Association executives. This is a seven member panel. So it the and I guess maybe this is one that needs to still needs to be staff because we have a we have a new mayor. But the idea and I think this former damn used the term being nimble was important because they could draw from different specialties and had, whether it was life sciences, specialty beverages or the maritime industries. And there's examples of local executives who helped the city in those capacities. For example, at at Saint George Spirits, we have Lance Winters, the master distiller who helped bring Faction Brewing Brewery to Alameda. And by attracting some of this talent, we have been able to leverage that because these folks in business know others and that is how we got right speed to the table. And so what and I I'm mindful of the concern that we continue to attract attract and retain business in Alameda point though I continue to believe based on the evidence we've heard from the businesses out there, that our biggest challenge is not so much attracting businesses. It's keeping the ones we have with the failing infrastructure. We heard last night and we heard last month about phone lines, electricity, water, sewage failures. It's hard to keep businesses. I understand that we've got some really exciting tenants out there now, and I think I'd like the council. I would like to see us find a way to kind of introduce some of these great, exciting tenants that I'm always surprised. I've seen lists, but I just think, you know, a little more information would really excite you. However, what I'm also hearing from meeting with a number of them is. Hey, you know, we came out here, it was kind of the Wild West. We were up for an adventure. That was 12 years ago. We can't keep doing this. It's costing us money. We've got to. As much as we love Alameda and we see the potential, we can't wait forever with Penumbra. I know the CEO. I've been there on a number of occasions and I will tell you, their employees wish they had more amenities. That CEO, because he's a big fan of a burrito place on Lincoln Avenue near Paisanos. Don't worry, they're staying. They're not leaving. But he's enticed him to open a burrito place out at Panera, well, adjacent to Penumbra. So his people have a place to go for their lunch because they know this is a busy company and they don't have time to go off, you know, to the main island. I will say just about the penumbra lunch room. The only place you've seen more microwave ovens is maybe at a Best Buy because they have so many employees and they can't, you know, leave very often to go for lunch. I've been to a food truck summit once a year. They'll do a food truck event for their employees. But no people out there. If there were more amenities, they would like more amenities. It's part of the reason the Harbor Bay Business Park still isn't fully occupied, so I'm mindful of staff time. Maybe this is another conversation to have, but I think the reasons that the EDC was discontinued are still valid and there are other things we might look at doing, sort of revitalizing a commission that was was terminated. If the economic development part of the general fund is in need of updating, we could look at that. But I, I am very hesitant about reestablishing this committee at this time. Thanks. Speaker 2: Yes. If I may add two quick points. There is also a very practical reason for disbanding that one commission. Our city staff attend regular monthly meetings of various business organizations, and it turned out that they were meeting regularly with the same people that they would occasionally try to schedule for the EDC. They were seeing each other regularly anyway. So we're trying to make it more efficient. I think this if I could ask the vice mayor, these four points you have here A through D, I think the issue is wanting to know that these tasks are being performed. How is it being done? Who's doing it? And I think if we can have Mr. Doan bring a report back to the Council. Speaker 4: To discuss this and. Speaker 2: Some of these other issues that may satisfy what you're looking for. So if you might consider perhaps just tabling this referral for now until you hear that report. Speaker 4: I think I'm open to that. I did hear a litany of of issues that I think the commission could work on. And I think the reasons of. For the commission, at least in the past when it was active and and it was truly accomplishing things where it was it had direction from the council to work on specific things that the downtown plan for parks. Park Street before that the blighted shopping center at the Fruitvale Bridge, which turned into Bridge Side Center, was not a redevelopment project. It was a a blight remediation project. And the commission has sufficient work. And the the deficiencies, both at the point and of the deficiencies at Harbor Bay were it's a matter of retaining businesses. Business retention was a big a big part of that commission back in the nineties and the early 2000, when we went from Silicone Island to something else. And it was kind of boom and bust time. And and I think that was the. Redevelopment was a small part of it that was trying to grapple with that, that recruitment and retention portion as well. So I'm willing to table this pending that information of. But I'd like to preserve the ability to bring it back with more justification. This is not enough for the council. Speaker 0: One member already. Speaker 6: If I just had a few comments. Actually, I'm not quite ready to dismiss this idea. I mean, I think it's it has a lot of merit. And I think if we were to vote today, I would probably say, let's go ahead and find ways where we can have a productive economic development commission. Staff can correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought. Right speed. Weren't they attracted by. Another tenant out there at Alameda Point. And then Councilmember Ashcraft talked about the the burrito place, you know, was attracted by another another tenant at Alameda Point to relocate. So I mean, that's kind of what I would envision the Economic Development Commission doing is business people in Alameda working to attract other businesses. And, you know, it's worked. So I know there were some issues with it in the past, but, you know, I'd like to see if we can kind of overcome those issues and reconstitute the commission. And, you know, I know this is a very diverse, you know, council. I think if you look at, you know, our backgrounds, our supporters, where we live, you know, we all probably know different people. Maybe between all of us. We probably, you know, know almost everybody in Alameda. But, you know, one thing that I think may be helpful also is that, you know, each council member probably knows a business person that they think would be an ideal person to help, you know, cheerlead for Alameda and attract businesses to Alameda. And if if we do reconstitute this commission, I would like to see, you know, each council member at least have, you know, an appointment. Maybe the mayor gets three or five or whatever it turns out to be. But, you know, so we can share some of the resources that we have. And, you know, I'd be inclined to support this vice mayor if he went forward with it today. But, you know, I'll defer to you if you want to if you want to continue it to another day. Speaker 0: Sorry. Do you want to? Speaker 3: Well, I was going to ask through the through the chair, if I could just ask Councilmember Otoo, your question. Speaker 0: Yes. Speaker 3: Thank you. So what I heard you say about the ADC who were brought back could work as businesses, attracting other businesses. It's my understanding that that's what our Chamber of Commerce does. One of the functions that that they do and they're quite a broad based organization. Speaker 6: And we. If many chambers of commerce, from what I understand, I still think, you know, I think it's a good idea. Speaker 0: That we have one chamber of commerce, we have other companies. Speaker 3: Businesses. Speaker 2: Associations. Yes. Speaker 6: I still think it's an idea worth considering. And you talked about redevelopment. The state actually did a replacement for redevelopment. Hopefully, we'll have a staff report on that soon. You know, I have our DS and and see if that can it can play a role in in some of these projects. But. I'm still supportive of your idea. Mr. Vice Mayor. Speaker 0: Member Daisuke. Speaker 5: Thank you. You know, for me, it's really a straightforward matter. A year and a half ago or so, we had established the Mayor's Economic Ad Hoc Economic Development Task Force. And on the night that we and his staff talked about it and established it. What excited me about that was. When I envisioned it, the names of the persons and the organizations that they represented. And the I mean, these were marquee organizations operating here in the city of Alameda. And what I envisioned was just what power, how powerful it would be to have a letter, I mean, from the mayor of Alameda and on the side of it indicating all the top flight businesses that are part of part of that task force. Because when it comes to attracting businesses to come to Alameda, I think that would be so. Impressive. The nature of the task force. To me, it's with actually the recent experience of Alameda in attracting businesses. For example, let's go back to write speed. Right. Speed was attracted to Alameda because they went to a conference in Healdsburg and at the conference in Healdsburg they met a person from Marconi last Google and that person they made Mr. Right interested in Alameda. So that is an indication of how networks personal contacts, the influence of such things. Even VF outdoors. I mean you know it was SRM making sure to do their due diligence in attracting the right businesses. That was a professional contact, to be sure. I mean, that's his job. But nonetheless, is is having the right people in the right networks. I kind of see the mayor's task force as as exactly that. I mean, if you can have on your letterhead someone that represents Wind River Intel, someone that represents Google slash McCartney, someone that represents the Oakland Raiders, I mean, these are national brand entities on your on your letterhead. That's powerful. And I think that's a model that we haven't built. I know Anne-Marie Gilmore was, you know, gung ho on that, and I think we need to continue that. So it's a model that I think we should continue. I hear what you're saying about the Economic Development Commission. But. I feel that we still need to give. That airs economic development as. Speaker 0: And I'd like to I'd like to share. So I have the document that where this was the change occurred and and I really appreciate all of your comments but to share this, it said to create a mayor's economic development advisory panel composed of high level Alameda Business and Business Association executives. The purpose of the advisory panel would be to enhance the business climate of Alameda, business parks and commercial districts and support the growth of Alameda is identified commercial and industrial business clusters by providing both strategic policy and tactical business attraction and retention advice. The seven and it has a seven member panel would be appointed by the mayor to your terms and report to the City Council. In contrast to the EDC, the advisory panel would be a more flexible and informal structure with the city assessing this rich pool of experience and personal contacts by working with the advisors individually or in subgroups. And here it says that the advisory panel may officially convene once or twice per year, but it would be and there are differences in regards to an ad hoc committee and a commission in this, really. And that's something I, I support the I actually think this is progress. That's when this decision was made by the prior council. And I appreciate having the inside of the council members that were on the council when this decision was made. So and I'm not sure that other people knew that this conversation had or that this had been discussed. But I, I would agree with Member de Song in regards to this. And, and I don't know if we'd want to, you know, at this point what you would like to do. You'd want to have Mr. Doan come and speak with us about why this change was made. Speaker 4: I, I think that we can all read why was change. I prefer a more formal and public process and I think a better plug in to the city. Um, I do think, though, that I don't want to. I want to table this for the moment. And come back with a I think, a more compelling argument. Because now I've heard the objections to it and. I don't think we need to take any more time at this point. We've had a we've had the issue heard. And I will come back with some additional information. Speaker 0: And in regards to this, so it's my understanding that this is something that has been agreed upon. And we are we can move forward with this. Mayor's Economic Development Advisory Panel. It is my understanding, yes. That this is something that. Speaker 2: Hurts. Speaker 0: My heart. So I in regards to this issue, it is something that I am proceeding with. And I and I really do think, you know, I'm looking forward to this. I think this is a good step moving forward. Speaker 4: Do I need to make a motion to table? Speaker 0: All right. So next item, actually, our regular agenda item. So we just I understand is we just completed the items from the last meeting, except for if I'm sorry, five, eight, five, eight. Yes. Which is the designation of a voting delegate and alternate for the League of California Cities. And do we need a motion to address that now? Because I'd like to move that up. That was something that was on the agenda at the last meeting, and it's something we really do need to. This one gets appointed by this, I understand, is by discussion of the council. It's not by my appointment with a vote of approval. And I want to share the League of California Cities. I was provided with a document about what it is. East Bay Division. But while the meetings are held, monthly media announcements in locations are sent to the representative. The designation of voting delegate at annual conference requires council motion, which is why we're here. The mission is to expand and protect local control for cities through education and advocacy to enhance the quality of life for all Californians. And it's my understanding that the liaison had been council member TAM and the alternate had been council member de SAC. And at this point, as member TAM is no longer on our council, I would actually like to pass the comments to Member de SAC. So if he wanted to discuss any more about what it is and I personally, if you if you were interested would support this moving up and I don't know who else is interested in this, but if you could at least share what this is. Speaker 5: Well. A-League. I was the city's representative also for the league to the league between in the years 2000, five, 2000. And I appreciated serving as alternate, which allowed me to attend meetings in Sacramento. The thing about the League of California Cities is that. As a group, the cities, through the various policymaking committees that they have actually influence major legislation. I'm a member of the Housing Community Development Subcommittee, and one of the things that that we really worked hard on was the massage parlor ordinance, because what many cities across California were concerned and that the state had basically taken over ways in which massage parlors are allowed to operate in locally. You would think that this should be a local decision, but this by state rule, they preempted that and this had been a concern over a number of years. But finally, when I started on the Policy Committee, members there had not only worked with state legislators, but they actually got the law changed so that the policymaking committees do have effect. So so being a member of a League of California Cities, I would certainly. I would like to. Speaker 0: And you would like to continue as the liaison then as opposed to the alternative? Yes, you are. And I don't know. Speaker 3: What else to say. I have a I was attending the East Bay League division meetings. Councilmember Tim and I and sometimes Councilmember de so great would come in those. Those are held at various you know, monthly meetings at various cities around the the East Bay. And I'd be happy to continue as that person representative of the East Bay League meetings. Speaker 0: So I'm not sure what that is. If we could discuss this item first. I think that's a separate. Speaker 3: Issue, not actually in what you were reading. Speaker 0: But for this. Speaker 3: But this is different. Speaker 0: I think it is. I mean. Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm sure it is. Because I wasn't. I would I would very much support. Councilmember de sag as being this the representative to a voting delegate for the league and this is on the state level. What I was saying is I just attend the more local ones. Speaker 0: So we also need an alternate. My understanding for this one, we need a liaison and that would be member Dysart and then we need an alternate. Is anyone interested in being our alternate? That's something we need to decide tonight that we have to vote on. Speaker 5: I just want to. Speaker 0: Yes. Speaker 5: Well, I got the. East Bay is. That's a different. Bigger cities. Speaker 3: It's the League of California's Cities is bad division. But we we hear and we are informed of the pending legislation and we and various items and we, you know, go back to our cities a couple of times, Leon. And I would bring matters to the council, sometimes even to vote on or to get a letter from the city. But it is not the same as going to the statewide meetings and actually having a vote at the state league level. But no, it's the the more local version of the state league. Speaker 0: I'm I'm sorry. Speaker 1: That's the clarification. I think Linas served as both, so we kind of had one representative on the league. And I think the league is looking for an East Bay division representative and then the actual and and and they'll have a voting delegate for that one, too. And then the actual voting delegate for the actual conference itself is set. They give you a timeframe when they want you to take that motion and have you decide that person. But there is the overall arching decision of if you wanted to break it into two different representatives in the past, typically been one, you know, done both sides. Speaker 0: So it's my understanding that we being asked to did you want to expand what I was told? Because I think that's contrary to what Steph told me. Oh. Speaker 2: Right. So what you have to do here is is designate a voting delegate to represent the city of Alameda at their annual conference. Speaker 1: That's in September, though. But with this. Speaker 0: Well. Speaker 5: So let's just make it straightforward then. And we'll iron out the East Bay matter when we can iron it out. But maybe. Or the voting delegate because that's what that's the question on the floor. Speaker 0: That's what I want. Speaker 4: To make a motion to. Speaker 0: So. Speaker 4: Nominate. Speaker 0: So before so actually staff talk to me about needing something and it's my staff. So I want to make sure we're doing what we need to get done. And the East Bay, that I think is actually separate from how it was explained to me. If you could tell. Okay. So and we remember dates. Speaker 2: As far as I'm aware we don't need to a council vote to. Speaker 4: Have representative attend the East Bay meetings. Speaker 0: Okay, so they're. Speaker 2: Reading something different. Yeah. City clerk. Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, the reason why this was brought up is the East Bay. The East Bay division actually got in touch asking who the voting delegate is. So they consider one in the same person. This is what I'm thinking. That's what I tried to explain earlier, and I'm sorry if I wasn't terribly clear, but they were looking for who the voting new voting delegate would be and to serve it, I think because. Speaker 0: Because I do know that we have these dinner meetings, which I've been also there's a Mayors East Bay something also. Speaker 1: Business Conference County. Speaker 0: But there's dinner meetings that are like monthly that that I'm invited to is that there is one that I think council has to vote on. It's my understanding and that's. Speaker 1: According to that email. It's the East Bay division of the league, not the state. And the next meeting is the 29th. Right. But they're looking who specifically who the voting delegate was because the voting delegate had left. And I mean, that's why I'm trying to read it. Speaker 0: And that's for the annual conference. Speaker 1: So I think that's why I'm saying I think it was always one in the same person. I don't think it has ever broken into two people. Speaker 0: I'm sorry that sometimes. Speaker 3: Well, Lina Councilmember Tamara. I would attend together. I think the reason they may want to know who the voting delegate is now, even though the conference isn't until May or until September, is that there are often these emails that we get about pending legislation and they may just want to, you know, I mean, very understandably keep us up to date on what the issues are, because all through the year, they do a very good job of keeping in touch with the council. So, yes, I guess. Well, what. Speaker 5: If we did this? What I again, I'm more than happy to serve as the voting delegate. What and if we do that, what if we continue the practice? The way the way in which you had worked with Lina will be the way in which we and you and I work together. Speaker 3: And I would add that. Speaker 0: I'm going to want a role in the East Bay Park and the East Bay issue. Speaker 3: We can work that out, but I think that. Speaker 0: We should actually keep it separate. I wanted. Speaker 3: Clarification. Speaker 1: And then if they're going to have to wait, should we. Speaker 3: Bring this back? Speaker 0: So, you know, we need to decide this. And it's my understanding we need to vote for this voting delegate for the League of California Cities. And the way it was presented to me was we had a liaison and an alternate. Speaker 1: Okay, so can I read me the exact email and maybe it'll help? They were they're going to be having an election of executive committee members at the January 29th East Bay Division meeting. So in order to be, I think, on the executive committee, you would have to be a voting delegate. And and so that's why they needed the information so that in case the city's voting delegate ends up on an executive committee. Speaker 0: A. Okay. Speaker 5: So I guess the question is, is the executive committee of the East Bay Cities separate from being a member to the east to the East Bay, bigger cities. Speaker 0: Because. All right. So is this the one that goes to the meetings that are held monthly then? So at this point, I would I would like to make a motion to nominate Member de SAC as the liaison. The member Ashcraft as the alternate. Any comments? All those in favor. Speaker 5: I and I will make sure to maintain the release the way that you had worked with. Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Speaker 0: Thank you. Now. Speaker 2: Yeah. Speaker 0: And we'll. We'll do better in the future on that. I'm sure we're learning. Yeah. All right. Speaker 5: Thank you, Madam Chair. Speaker 0: Now, we have for a which is actually I'm coming from the school board here in the past. On the school board, when we welcome new members, we would have a workshop where we would talk about our vision, our mission protocol, the just really an open workshop, welcoming the members and then including myself and then allowing us to

Council Referral

Consider Directing Staff to Re-establish the Economic Development Commission. (Councilmember Matarrese) [Continued from January 20, 2015]

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_01212015_2015-1212

Speaker 0: Now, we have for a which is actually I'm coming from the school board here in the past. On the school board, when we welcome new members, we would have a workshop where we would talk about our vision, our mission protocol, the just really an open workshop, welcoming the members and then including myself and then allowing us to discuss and and the staff would help guide us along with the sitting members so that then we can work together. And so I requested this be put on here. And when you read this, it says Discuss City Council rules and procedures for city council meetings and the possibility of holding a future City Hall open house. And I added that because when I was seated, I was invited to two days of meetings where heads, department heads would come from all of our departments. And then it's my understanding that they did the same thing with both together Vice Mayor and member Odie and my but, but what I think would have happened on the school board as we would have had a public meeting and brought in the department heads because the information that was shared with me is the majority, if not all, was not confidential. It is actually just information about really what they do, the number of employees they have, what their budget is. And I found it very informative. And so personally after that I came up with this term of coining it, the City Hall Open House, but and I have subsequently spoken with staff about this and a suggestion was that in the future as a school board meetings, we highlight a school every meeting and they get to come and talk briefly as in very briefly, I would think at most 10 minutes, something like that, to highlight their department. And the suggestion, my understanding from staff meeting with the department heads was that we would highlight a department that this would also dovetail into the budget where they would have an opportunity which which we will be working towards being very transparent on our budget and then also looking at having but I'm going to call a physical open house either at the library or at Mastec where we would set up tables and have our department heads there and information about each department and members of the public could come and talk to these people because some of us have no idea about what happens in this building or wherever else our department has actually function. And I found that very informative and I wanted to bring this matter here also. Yes. Speaker 3: Member ASHCROFT And this actually isn't a comment on that. But I did want to just note that according to the Sunshine Law, which we're going to discuss tonight, too, if the city council goes past 11:00, three meetings in a row, we must then add extra city council meetings for the rest of the year. And I don't know about you, but that proposal doesn't attract me. So we're okay now because it's just 925, but we may want to think about economy of. Time, words, etc.. And of course, we all will come to emotion at some point as to whether to continue. So thank you for allowing me that comment. Speaker 0: And and what staff did to support my request. As they tried to come up with all different resolutions and ordinances and then the Brown Act of things that support the workings of our council meetings. And so we could this is actually very open. Now, we do have some speaker slips. We have one. We have we have one. So I would like to start with that. That's all right. Council. Thank you. And our one is Susan Gallimore. Oh. Right. And you? Speaker 3: Well, one less. Okay. Speaker 0: Okay. So if there is something anyone from the public would like to add. Otherwise. I'd like to continue with. For me, the next item I wanted to discuss was actually agenda making, and I'm not sure where that fell under here, but on the school board, one thing that another thing we do. Speaker 2: Point of order. Yes. Speaker 6: We finished the discussion on the open house. Or is that. Speaker 0: So I don't know if we want to. I don't really want I don't think we have to vote on that. I. Yes, yes, yes. Yes. Member Ashcroft. Speaker 3: Well, one of my concerns that I wrote in my notes is I understand the council referral process. I understand it even better after we heard a number of them tonight. But I don't understand why this particular item didn't come to us as a council referral because we were just hearing about it. Now I have nothing in front of me to to refer to. And worse yet, the public doesn't know what we're talking about or any background to this either. So that's at least an item I'd like to reserve to discuss whether, since we're all members of the City Council, that if we want to have something considered, we should at least have to go through the council referral process. But I know Vice Mayor matters. You want to speak on the Open House proposal? Speaker 4: I actually have a similar concern. Is that. We don't have any detail on. On that and are we going to discuss detail and refer it on? That was my question. Speaker 0: So so. Speaker 4: Okay. Because because one of the concerns I have is are our agendas with the lists, the work sent out. Our full. And I would hope that any open house or any show until you have an appropriate time. And that would probably mean a workshop or a meeting that. Speaker 0: Separate. So. Did you want me to respond? Speaker 4: Well, ask my I. Speaker 3: The rest of the council. Yeah. Speaker 4: What? And are we again? Is our end to make a recommendation on this tonight is to ask staff to do something because. In order for staff to do something, they have to have council direction. Right. Speaker 0: So at this point, I. My intent is to just allow us to have an open discussion about if there are things here or other people have ideas of how we would be working together. Yes. Speaker 3: And again, because I have recently reread our Sunshine Ordinance, I'm just concerned that I don't dispute that these are very interesting topics to raise. But I feel that we're doing this without the public having the benefit of, well, the public and the council having the benefit of any context. And I, I just I've never encountered something quite like this. Speaker 0: So I could tell you why I'm bringing this up. Speaker 3: In the spirit of hearing from our colleagues. Maybe. Speaker 6: Thank you, Madam Mayor. I guess I have a few concerns. Also a new one on the open house. You know, I think as an idea, it's not a bad idea, but. We just gave staff a lot of work today. I think we gave staff a lot of work yesterday. And you know why I think it may be a good idea to think about? You know, I'm not quite sure I want to give them more work tonight on this because knowing our staff that if we ask them to do something, they're going to give it 110% and do the best job they can and be amazing at it. And to do that, I think, is going to take a tremendous amount of effort. And maybe this is something we table and and come back to maybe in the summertime. But, you know, looking at the discussion points, you know, the first one says, you know, submission matters and it refers to a municipal code section order of business refers to the municipal code section rules of order, municipal code section, start time and length and Municipal Code Section Continuation of items Municipal Code Section, teleconferencing, government code, Brown Act . So, I mean, if we're going to consider changing those in the public really doesn't have any notice on what those proposed changes are. And I think if we're going to be thinking about changing ordinances and, you know, talking about the Brown Act, I think we should provide some guidance to the public and what those proposed changes are , because I don't know what they are. You know, I don't have an opportunity to hear, you know, staff's in-depth analysis of what the impacts are. And, you know, I, I believe, don't even have to have two readings of an ordinance change. So I'm just, you know, I'm just not quite sure of, you know, what the outcome of tonight's meeting really is intended to to result in. Speaker 0: So I'd like to respond to that. In regards to how when I'm running the meeting, I think I think it's important that we review these so that we do know in regards to the referral form. But the processes now today we, we went through it, but it wasn't necessarily as clean as it could have been. But I've seen, you know, in regards to how we're going to do the meeting with the Brown Act, what exactly the protocol is. What I'm used to from the school board is that we call an agenda item. We have staff presentation. We have clarifying questions. We have public comment. We have our discussion and then we have our motion. Which is the way I've been running the meetings. Speaker 6: Yes. I mean, with all due respect, Mayor, I mean, you you are the mayor now. You're not on the school board. We have our own procedures. You know, I took a look at the school board's procedures today, and they are a lot different, you know, than ours. You referenced the the comment about being able to explain your no vote. I mean, that's in the school board procedures. I actually saw it. But, you know, we don't have that in our procedures. So, you know what? You're you've been promoted. There's no offense to the members of the school board. Speaker 0: Yes. Speaker 5: Madam Mayor. My interpretation of what we're dealing with is it seems to me it's it is appropriately a regular agenda item. And it's appropriate. And it's this will be further to the extent that we don't have any specific actions that alter any of the ordinances here. I think what I interpretation of what you're seeking to do is have a conversation about the submittal of matters, not necessarily saying we're going to alter the ordinance tonight, we're going to talk about it and flesh out. We're going to then have a discussion about order of business, and then we're going to have a discussion about rule of order that we're not. Because I don't think it will be brown. Perhaps brown. I don't know. We're not going to. Take specific actions that will alter any of this. So I don't. My sense is that we are not precluded from having such discussions. Now on the idea of the future City Hall. Now, I'm fine with that. Oh, he's just city hall. Open house. I mean. Speaker 2: I get tired there and. Speaker 0: I'm happy to bring that back as a referral. But I am. I appreciate that. I think it is important to have this conversation. A member Ashcraft. Speaker 3: I agree with you, Mayor Spencer, that it's important to have the conversation. My concern is I think a lot of members of the public might like to be in on this conversation. And I'm wondering that whether you would consider tabling this to just our very next meeting, I checked and the agenda is still right for our first meeting in February, and I think it would give time for a staff report to be generated with maybe a little more meat on those bones to really launch into a. Speaker 1: Oh, I just got to. Speaker 3: The pageant has to go to tomorrow. So this. Speaker 7: Staffer work. Speaker 3: But. Speaker 0: But we do have a speaker. Would you guys be out? Would you feel worth every day? Speaker 5: Madam, I just want to make sure to say in my interpretation of this is that this is. Properly. Described. In the very first sentence, the background the mayor is requesting to give the new council and members of the public an opportunity to discuss the existing practices and protocols for the conduct of city business. It's a straightforward description of what we're doing. We're going to discuss existing practices and protocols. And from that is all I. Ordnance. Things are subsequently referenced there. So that is the frame of reference for our discussion. The public be more involved in it. My sense is that the mayor put it on the Wednesday, January 21st because there wasn't going to be any substantive outcomes, much in the way that when we make decisions on Tuesday, there are subsequent substantive outcomes with regard to many of these. And. The fact that it was on tonight, I think it was duly noticed by little. Brown Sunshine Ordinance, though I don't think we're very. From. Anything. Speaker 0: Thank you at this point. Speaker 4: Go ahead for this. I'd like to hear the public speak. Speaker 0: I'd like to call Carol Goldstein. Speaker 2: Tony. I think you need a cup of coffee. You're speaking more slowly than I could. Anyway. Speaker 5: Blue Danube coffee office hours now. Speaker 2: With. With all this speculation about what the public thinks about this item, I thought you might like to hear from a member of the public sitting in the gallery about what we think. I know there's not very many of us here, but I actually got excited about seeing this on the agenda. I didn't reread the Sunshine Ordinance or the Brown Act, or I just saw the words Future Open House, and I thought, Hey, that sounds like something fun and cool. As I know that I was on the planning board in the 1990s, I was put there by Ralph Bazardo after I applied for the Historical Advisory Board because I'd been on the board of directors of the Alameda Museum for five years, and he said, Well, I'd really like to have you on the planning board. I didn't even know what the planning board did, but I said okay. And boy was a wonderful it not only, you know, opened my eyes to what goes on in the city and. I have been interested in those things ever since. And I think that what this item said to me is if more people knew what the various boards and commissions in the city did, then there would be more . More participation from the general public when it came to putting your name on an application to get on a board, because a lot of these city council meetings, they just fill up with people when something affects them in their neighborhood and then they get all hot about it and they take sides and people start arguing back and forth. But if more people in the city all over in general got on these boards and commissions from time to time, they have a better global appreciation for the way city business affects them and their neighbors in the East and the West and Central Bay Farm South Shore. So I hope this does come to fruition in the near future, if it if nothing more than to make it. More apparent to somebody and to anybody who just looks on the city website and wants to know, well, how does the city function? What how can I get involved in what would be the easiest way for me to do that? So that's my $0.02. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. We have another speaker slip now, Elizabeth Tuckwell. Speaker 2: Madam Mayor and council members. My name is Elizabeth Tuckwell, and I just want to approach this from a very folksy, down to earth point of view. I in terms of protocols and practices, I think one enormous benefit that this council could do is to impart a an appearance of fairness that was not always there. I mean, I'm not trying to I don't want to be negative about this. I want to be positive. We want to have an image of fairness. We just want that the appearance of fairness is very, very important when it comes to city government. And we did not have that at all times with the prior council. What do I mean? For example, the order of speakers, at least at times, the order of speakers, which is not the order in which we turned in our pieces of paper. I'm not saying it always should be, but in some cases that order was changed so that, for example, the developer's representative was given the, you know, the honor of speaking last, which is speaking as a lawyer, you know, a very preferable position to be in. And I'm not saying that's wrong, but, you know, I think this is a type of thing that should be addressed in a transparent way rather than sort of hitting us by surprise, which is the way this came out so often in the prior council. Another similar example is very important issues that affect people's daily lives, like whether they're going to be able to park anywhere, you know, within a mile of where they live, this type of thing, these issues being put on the calendar in a place where it was perfectly obvious they were going to be discussed between 11 and one , something like that. It was perfectly obvious that was the upgrade opportunity for discussion the public had. Now there is something a little bit duplicitous about that, and I know that Councilman decided, at least in one case, try to remediate that somewhat, but that was shot down. So that that's my that type of thing, I think would be a very I think that would be very noticeable. I think the public would love it and I think it could be done very easily without changing any of the rules or, you know, any of the official protocols, basically by abiding by the spirit of the law as well as the letter of the law. I think that's what it comes down to. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: Thank you. And so to me, this is actually more a workshop. I have the word discussed there. And I really appreciate the audience standing up and telling us how can we best serve you and make our meetings something that you do feel like you are participating and that we are being transparent and open and and I, I prefer having a separate than a regular meeting because that's the, that's the meeting where we're coming to discuss specific items. That's not what this is. This to me is we are not going on a retreat. If we could go on a retreat, that would be a similar event. To me, this is we are limited. We all need to be here because of our sunshine ordinance, the way we Alameda does business, we we do this in front of the public and I appreciate member de Sox comments and member Ashcroft's in regards to well. I did work with staff. We spent quite a bit of time writing this up so that the public would be aware of what we are here speaking about. And we actually do have quite a few members of our public here listening to us and that really the objective is to help us move forward. And I really do appreciate the public's comments in regards to being transparent, open, in regards to the slips being turned in. But we are doing is that they are being. I call the names out in the order that they are turned in. I'm not changing them. Staff is not changing them. And as people come and continue to submit slips, then I put them at the bottom of the pile. So then I call them last and we keep them separate per agenda item. And I and I think that this is great and we're going to have another speaker soon and that's not supposed to happen here. By the way, we are your city council. We are here to serve you. Richard Banger. Speaker 4: Thank you. This is as good a time as any to bring up one of my pet peeves. There aren't many people in the audience. In the council chambers tonight that I'm sure there are quite a few watching at home. I probably watch more from at home and from in the council chambers. There's nothing more. Perturbing. Been watching. A council meeting. And someone who is an expert with a PowerPoint talking about it. And that camera is on. And I don't have a clue what they're talking about. They're talking about a map. They're talking about drawings. And so whoever's running the audio visual department are no breaks. You know, if if someone is here, if an expert is called back up, it happened recently, I think it was with the Del Monte Project. And the architect, I think, was called back up and he said this and that and this and that about. I had no idea what he was talking about because the camera was not showing what was up on the screen. You all saw it. People here saw it. But that camera was on and I saw his face. I don't want to see the guy talking. I can hear him talking. I want to see or see the presentation. So, you know, it doesn't happen a lot. But and the other thing, I don't know if it's. Speaker 2: Mm. Speaker 4: Excuse me if it's been resolved yet, but there's been an ongoing problem with audio visual feed and you know, somebody will be talking here and then, then they're talking and but you know, or there's no audio at all. And Mel, you may get it on your computer but can't get it on the TV. And that's not helping people. You know, they're going to go back to CNN. You know, they're not they're not going to continue watching the at the the council meeting. So anyway, tighten up the. Speaker 1: Ave dept and happy to address a couple of those concerns. Thank you, Richard. Unfortunately, we've had the exact opposite complaint where people have said you've sat on the same slide, they're shown they haven't moved the slide. And now I'm not getting to see the person speak because you've shown one slide this whole time and I wanted to see the person speak. So we've tried to react, and so we've come up with the solution, which I'm about to put the buzzer off. Saber, stop this. And okay, so we've come up with the solution where we're trying to put a split screen that shows the slide and the person. And so we're working on solutions like that. In in addition, unfortunately, Harbor Bay recently had an issue with the we connect into two different three different systems the Web, AT&T and Comcast. And my understanding was Harbor Bay was having an issue and it wasn't happening on the island. So that's even where we're already transmitting within here to there, you know, out to them. And then even there, even within their transmission, there's being interruptions at different points. So unfortunately, we do have some dated Comcast equipment and I have told many, many people and we have called and drilled into Comcast as much as we can. And I have also told people, when you're having problems, call Comcast, Li call Comcast. So we have worked really hard to address the issues and I really appreciate the feedback and you're always welcome to contact me any time for any of it. And the sound issue on the Internet, even just tonight, I had somebody saying I couldn't hear it on my iPad, but that it was working fine on the computer. So then it becomes like, what is your iPad? Not refreshing. It just gets really technical. And so, you know, hopefully you can try a couple of different sources and I'm sorry that you might have to do that. But, you know, it's interesting the way these problems just bubble up and we keep trying to resolve them. Speaker 3: But I hope you can all see why we love our city attorney, city clerk Laura Weisinger. Speaker 2: As we turn. Speaker 3: Now, we like our city attorney, too. She was, but she wasn't the one. Speaker 2: That, you. Speaker 4: Know, that America will ever do. I mean. Speaker 0: Yes. Vice Mayor. Speaker 4: A couple of comments at the. Oops, thank you. Okay. Time's up here. The previous speaker reminded me of a comment that I was to relate tonight, that last night at about 1:00. The video went dark. Speaker 0: I heard that too. Speaker 4: And interested party. Speaker 1: To clarify. Speaker 4: Which on public access Comcast. Speaker 0: On Comcast. Speaker 4: Yes. Speaker 1: So it was still going on the computer here? Speaker 4: No, they don't know. I think it ran. Speaker 2: Out of coffee at that hour. Okay. Speaker 4: No, she was awake. Speaker 0: But I had heard that also that it went. Speaker 4: It was black. And people want to know what the end was. Yes. But with regard to the agenda item tonight, there are a couple of things that I'd like to comment on and I'd like to reiterate. For the open house or for the presentations of departments. My preference is those happen outside of a regular council meeting because I think they have to be given their due. And and it's not just because our agendas are full. It's. They have to be given full focus if we want to make sure that people understand and get the full, full benefit of the presentations. And the second is in looking at all all of our rules and in the one, two, three, four or five exhibits that are that are resolution or ordinance based. One of the things that strikes me, and I think you've alluded to it a couple of times, is that. How are our rules of operation I think could benefit by an adoption of either in part or in in total of of Robert's Rules of Order. And that requires some it's not magic. You can't flip a switch because it's like 700 pages. But it it helps the public and it helps us keep order and. And not talk over each other and and to put some structure that the the general public can recognize. Because the advantage I see in Robert's Rules of Orders, even though people don't know it, chapter and verse, most people recognize it and who belong to a club, who belong to an organization or a board. It's. But if followed and if there's a kind of a parliamentary procedure that it helps guide us and we can always suspend the rules if needed, that's that's allowed. But I think we would benefit and I think I would offer a potential way to get there would be to establish a rules committee that would deliver a product of of council members to deliver a product to the council. Much like when we have a charter review committee, which is council members who come back with proposed charter review. And we did that 2008 days ago. I think you were still on the council or. No. Speaker 5: It wasn't. Speaker 4: 26, but we there was a charter review committee that delivered a. Speaker 5: And there was a council member, Tim and. Speaker 4: Gilmore. Yes, yes. So I think those are the things that I think a rules committee might be a vehicle that we can use to. Adopt either in part or in total Robert's order to help guide the function of the. So then it's not it's not arbitrary. I'm not say arbitrary, but it doesn't float with either the emotion or the or the issue at hand. Speaker 0: And what I'm used to working with is actually a modified Robert's Rules of Order. And and I and I agree with you. I think it's actually very important. I've. It's my understanding, strictly with Robert's rules, you're supposed to do your motion immediately of someone second and then you continue, which is different from the way I've been doing it. However, I would support that. So I do think this gives us, as a council, an opportunity to have input with the public's input in regards to how we want our meetings to be. But but we want that the procedural aspects of it to look like. And I think it is very, very I support those reasons why committees do Robert's rules and I would support having and maybe I need to bring in a referral at this point and not I mean so I'm not sure what's how staff how we would proceed but if but I'm happy to do that in regards to allowing us to have that discussion. Speaker 4: Right now, if I understand this agenda, that's an idea. And if people are interested, they can submit a referral and we could agenda it so that the public knows. And I would also like to have have some background information to fill out what the other possibilities are. Speaker 0: And I'd like to toss this to the public that's here or any of you familiar with Barbara's rules. Who would you appreciate if we were more if you know the order that I've been doing it, which I've shared? Are you content? Do you like the way our meetings have been going and feel free to, you know, give us any guidance? That's what this is about. Step up here. And I mean, this is a workshop and I'm sorry we're not in the round. If you want to use the mic, you could and I can reach David. She just asked. Come on up here. We could. Speaker 1: My name is Ann Richter. Speaker 7: I love it. Can you want. Speaker 4: You can pull back to your level. Speaker 7: I just think if you aren't comfortable with it is for you to do just that. Speaker 1: And I think. Speaker 7: That helps public to. Speaker 0: Well, in another example, I'll say real quickly, as I have been allowing people to clap, and I think that the audience has been very respectful of each other. I personally think the meetings have flowed well and. And that the school board, we did allow clapping. And so it is a change. It's something that I'm allowing and it's been respectful from what I can tell. I actually don't think it slows down the meetings. I think we've been able to go through a lot of speakers, but I'm not and now I'm not sitting out there like I used to and I'm sitting here. But I mean, that's what this is supposed to be a discussion. I think Frank. Speaker 7: Has a point. Speaker 0: That you should talk about doing Robert's rules. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you. Did anyone else want to speak? Speaker 7: I appreciate the friendliness, the way you run the meetings. And I remember Mayor Beverly Johnson did so to, you know, people feel welcome here. It's their city hall. They feel free to speak. They're not lectured on what they shouldn't be doing. You encourage us to speak. And if somebody is a few seconds over the limit, you don't harass anybody or lecture. And if people are enthusiastic, let them express that it's an explore and applaud. So I really appreciate it. I like the structure of Robert's Rules of Order, and it's something that the whole country is familiar with. So I think it's a very good suggestion. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Speaker 3: Yeah, go ahead. No, no. I was going to say, I think we should hear from the city attorney at this point. Speaker 0: Did you want to speak next? And then we're going to have some more members of our public. This is exactly what I wanted. Speaker 2: But if you want to finish. Speaker 3: Well, and I'll just note that it's always wonderful to see members of the public. By my count, there are ten of them out there. So it's, you know. It's a very intense but small but interested group. But we do appreciate the ten of you. And I would like to hear from. Speaker 0: The well, if I may, Manama, and I know it's a workshop. Speaker 2: So you're going to encourage people to continue. Speaker 0: To address you, but to try to bring a little bit of maybe some structure to what we're trying to accomplish. So we all can get out of here tonight before 11:00. I think what we what we were finding is and what we pulled together as a staff is a. Speaker 2: Series of resolutions, ordinances, those kinds of things, which over time. Speaker 0: The council and your predecessors sitting in these chairs have adopted as to how they were going to go forward and conduct business. And they're kind of scattered all over, which is why you see so many different ones. Speaker 2: And then we have the Sunshine Ordinance. Speaker 0: Our our resolution. Speaker 2: One of these. Speaker 0: Resolutions that you have in your packet does reference Robert's rules. It says, these are the kinds of things that we're going to do, and it specifies various things which we identified in each section. But the fallback is to use as a guide. Robert's Rules of Order. I think most people do that. And yes, Robert's Rules. Speaker 2: Of Order, most people are. Speaker 0: Familiar with. But if you've actually looked at the book, it is 700 pages and it is incredibly. Speaker 7: Dense and. Speaker 0: Arcane. But people have even taken to doing a. Speaker 2: Condensed version and user friendly versions of Robert's Rules of Order. So, I mean, that's. Speaker 0: Something that if council wants to identify a. Speaker 2: Committee to go forward. Speaker 0: And pull that all together, you could consider all those kinds. Speaker 2: Of things. Speaker 0: I think what we were trying to. Speaker 2: Do is because with the new mayor and with. Speaker 0: Some different ideas about how she wanted. Speaker 2: To run the meetings. Speaker 0: We wanted to come back and say, okay, you know, so we don't get trapped in wheel. Is that what we. Speaker 2: Should be. Speaker 0: Doing? Is that a violation of what our previously adopted resolutions have been? Are ordinances to pull it together, try to get some guidance as to where you wanted it to be had headed, which is why it says discussion. And then we could go forward. Speaker 2: In under whatever and whatever system you would prefer. I mean, if you want. Speaker 0: Staff to try to come back and consolidate something, we need guidance. Speaker 2: From you on these areas and any. Speaker 0: Others that you could think of where we can at least try to. Speaker 2: Produce something to come. Speaker 0: Back as a discussion item then that you can go through or or vice mayor matters matter. This idea of if you want to appoint a committee and have that committee go through that process. But I think that's what we were. Speaker 2: Trying to. Speaker 0: Help have happened. Speaker 2: Here. And so the things that the kinds of things that we have are the order of business, because there have been. Speaker 0: Some discussion about, well, how do we establish what the order of business is? There's a resolution that it actually it's a sunshine ordinance that adopts the the order of business that that can be changed ordinance. Speaker 2: Ordinances can be changed with this council. It takes two readings. Speaker 0: Resolutions can be changed by this council. It only takes one meeting and one vote. But you have to have the resolution and it has to be properly noticed. Speaker 2: And all of those kinds of things. So that's what we're trying to figure out, how you want to proceed. And these were the kinds of things that. Speaker 0: We heard a staff already that were sort of. Speaker 2: Areas where we didn't. Speaker 0: Know how council wanted to go start times for the meetings, regular meeting dates. Speaker 2: Continuing meetings, teleconferencing. Those are the kinds of things that we've heard and we don't know if council. Speaker 0: Wants to pursue. Speaker 2: Them or. Speaker 0: Not. And that's what we're trying to get some sense of tonight. And Braskem. Speaker 3: Thank you. One of the things that I want us to keep in mind is that, first of all, there's a saying it's not so grammatically correct, but if it ain't broke, don't fix it. But what you know, what is the problem? Is there a problem? What is it that we're trying to fix? Well, I appreciate that. We have a new mayor. We're all members of the council. And as a body now, we'll be making decisions that we think are in the best interest of the the council, the city at large, as have previous administrations. And that's why reading through these resolutions and ordinances that are in this are the attachments to this agenda item or whatever this is, isn't the it was interesting to see the evolution that, you know, we did things as a council in a certain way, and then that was found to be not such a good way. One example is that we now have the opportunity for public speakers at the beginning of our agenda for on items, not on the agenda. And then we have another opportunity at the end of the meeting. If they couldn't finish all the speakers in the 15 minutes that were allotted, I would be hesitant to go into changing things like the order of business, the start time of meetings, because I think those are procedures that are working now. Well, they've been thought out by a number of councils. So I just think that and also I try to be mindful whenever we're asking something of staff of how much else we're throwing at them, if it's something that really needs to be done right away. Of course, you know, they're there to do what we asked them to do. But if something is working reasonably well, I think there's a good reason to continue with that. With regard to the rules of order and just looking at these five different attachments. One thing that I thought and maybe this is what a rules subcommittee would would tackle, is that I think they could benefit from consolidation, because right now, in order to get an answer to a question, you've got to look at a number. And that's a lot of work just for for staff to do. They do it, but I think that would help us all going forward. So I just would, you know, as far as the if we want to go one by one on these items, the I think we always have to be mindful of staff time when we're scheduling things like extra workshops for an open house for them to present. Bear in mind staff who are here, the ones who were here yesterday on the two Alameda point items that we heard, they get here between seven and eight in the morning. They left this building at 130 in the morning. And so just ask yourself, how much more do we want to ask of our people who are already doing very good work for us and still have them produce their you know, they're humans, they're not machines. And so I do like the idea. I really liked what I think Carol Gladstone said about the more people know about boards and commissions and opportunities, the more that we'll see people coming forward in applying. And I get really nice emails from people saying, I just moved here, I'm really excited, I'd like to get involved, how could I do this? And there's so many good things, not just in this building, but all across our city. But back to what I started out saying, let's try to be focused at what is it we're trying to accomplish. It shouldn't just be a wish list of, oh, gosh, this would be nice. What, you know, kind of a triage. What's the most important thing we need to accomplish? Are some things pretty good and could be made better and other things maybe another time when we have more time to tackle and approach it that way. Speaker 0: Okay. And yes. Do you want to come? Speaker 2: Yes. I think you'd have to have your head in the sand not to notice that people are about to meet us all. Something wrong with the prior council? We have Mayor, Mayor Trish Spencer and Vice Mayor Frank Matarese. Both of these individuals got over 50%, over 50% of the Alameda vote. Vice mayor matter. He had he had three people. He was. Both of them had incumbents that they were fighting. Both of them unseated incumbents. There's an enormous advantage to incumbency, but the incumbents were voted out in favor of these two. Now, what does this tell us? Not everyone was happy with the prior council. I certainly appreciate Councilmember Ashcraft pointing out that there's just very few of us here. And obviously the inference is that we don't count. But be that as it may, I've got my 3 minutes. So I think the important thing is to create an atmosphere where people feel welcome, where people feel that their ideas are welcome, which we did not feel under the present council or their prior council. Forgive me. I remember at one of the meetings, one of the former council members stated, I don't care what the people of Alameda want, I care what they need. I have what they need. Now, what does that tell us that this council member thinks she knows better than we do what is best for us? None of us thought so, but that's where she expressed that sitting right there on the dais. So that's the kind of attitude we don't like. Personally, just my own experience with lots and lots of committee memberships. I would not I would not do the committee on on Robert's Rules of Order. I think you're getting yourself into a quicksand situation where you just get dragged down and down and down. I would particularly in light of what the city attorney has informed us, that it's very easy to change most of the rules under which you work, either with one one meeting or two meetings course proper. You know, everything has to be done right. But basically it's a lot easier than I had thought. Tell you the truth, I thought maybe you have to get a vote of the citizens or something like that. And it sounds like it's quite simple to do so, but I think that the goal should be not to adhere to particularly not to Robert's Rules of Order. I mean, I, I can't tell you how many times I've been in a group that tried to. They want to do things right, Nathan. That's the way to do it. And I don't think that's the way to do it. I think it is, as the city attorney said, very arcane. I think it was written for another era. I think the important thing is hit the the main points, make people feel welcome. Make them feel that everything is fair, that that that you're giving serious consideration to what we say. In other words, if there's going to be a lot of public input, don't schedule the meeting so that, you know, the public input is not going to start until 11 and it won't end until 130 or two, which definitely was done in the prior council. And then the next meeting schedule a special meeting for 5:00, because that's when you want to get your vote and you want to make sure you got time for your vote before the new council gets sworn in, which is going to happen at seven. So, you know, when you do things like that and then you say, oh, we gave the public every opportunity. I mean, they could stay here till 5 a.m. and I think they had an opportunity for public comment. See, this is the kind of thing that that turns people off. So I think if we just look at the overall goals and frankly, I would just forget about Robert's Rules word, because I think once you get into that, you just get bogged down. And even if you have a committee to try to whittle it down the way the city attorney suggested, I think that would be the next best thing to do. If you insist on an Robert's rules or I do it that we it down, but I wouldn't get into it at all. Anyway, thank you very much. Speaker 0: So I'd like to respond to her comments real quick. This is achieving my goal. I love having members of the public here come stand up and tell us what they think is working, not work, and how we can best serve your needs. This is exactly meeting. My wife wanted to have this discussion and I appreciate that we can follow up with referrals and whatnot and I can when we will have an opportunity to work with staff more closely. I also want to respect the time we were here until 130 last night. I did not attend for us. When I set this. I did not realize that we would have we didn't know that we would have other agenda items from last night that would take that would go first. This is actually beyond the time that I would have had us here. But so briefly as other members want to finish up and then we can resume in the future. Speaker 6: Yeah, I'm just a tad bit concerned about, you know, the way this meeting has gone kind of down a rabbit hole and that it's turned into a, you know, session that criticizes the former council. And, you know, is I mean, the public obviously has a right to their opinion and a right to speak it. But, you know that the intention of this meeting was to, you know, sit there and bash the previous mayor and bash the previous council. Then, you know, you know, I think we're we're done because I don't think we need to hear that anymore. I mean, council member or Vice Mayor Matta Ricci put a referral on earlier today about moving forward on the the East Bay Regional Parks. And I think we need to move forward. You know, the election is over. I also won, by the way, and defeated incumbent. Just just for for clarification and to make sure the record knows that. And, you know, if you subtract the undervotes, then none of us except a lot of Hansberry got a majority of the vote. So, you know, you can spin anything and. Any way you want. But, you know, I don't have a problem with going through this and I don't have a problem with the mayor exercising her prerogative on how she wants to order the speakers and and run a medium. And that that's that's that's our prerogative. And if we want to discuss some middle of matters and order business and rules of order that that's another problem with that. But, you know, this is going to turn into, you know, a gripe session about, you know, the previous council. You know, I'd just as soon move to adjourn met. Speaker 0: So I appreciate that. I'd actually like to be able to respond. I think that that unfortunately takes out of context what the intent was the intent of as a stated here, however, I am always welcome to public participation in our meetings and. This is a public meeting and this part. So so I appreciate that. But for me, this was very productive. And member Ashcraft. Speaker 3: Thank you. If I could just take a moment to refer to the Sunshine Committee, a sunshine ordinance. I was reading it over this afternoon and then I had a phone call from my daughter. And this really is related. My daughter, who's 23 years old, is going to be on her way to London tomorrow. She's helping put on a workshop for she works for an NGO in Washington, D.C., that supports emerging democracies around the world. And her particular country of focus is Egypt. And because right now it is not safe for people who are trying to support democratic processes and parties in Egypt to meet in Egypt, they're meeting in London, but just getting arranging visas for all these people. And they have speakers coming in. Members of the Egypt of the British parliament are speaking and a number of different things. But to hear her tell about and she's she's done a number of these workshops in the last year. What these people are struggling with just because this is the first time that Egypt has had elected city councils and this particular workshop everybody is for city council members and for them. I mean, they really are risking their lives the jeopardy of their family investigation, she says. They always suspected at least one of their participants is actually from the government and is just, you know, keeping an eye on what's going on. And so I want to bring that back from Cairo and all the different provinces around Egypt and what they'll be doing in London over the next week. Back to the city of Alameda. And the purpose of the Sunshine Committee and the language that I found very powerful was that it is the city's duty to serve the public and to accommodate those who wish to obtain information about or participate in the process of making decisions. The right of the people to know what their government and those acting on behalf of their government are doing is fundamental to a democracy. And with very few exceptions, which this ordinance will clarify that right supersedes any other policy interest government officials may use to prevent public access to information. And it goes on to talk about, you know, assuring that all citizens have equal access to their government. But to me, that language is powerful. But it also reminds us that too often we take the benefits of a democratic society for granted. And I think we're doing a little bit of that tonight. I think we forget the purpose that we were elected here for. I think it is a noble undertaking all of us spend. We know how much time we spend preparing, reading, listening to our constituents. And I want to always make sure that this body serves our public. You, you in this room. And I do respect and appreciate all of you and everybody else, all 74,000 plus residents of this island that we do our best job in representing you. I do not think we're doing our best job when we let ourselves, as Councilmember Otis said, go down this dark hole of looking back, of attacking, of getting that last poke in. Everyone was elected. It's that's the democratic process. We can step forward and run for election without worry about repercussion to ourselves and our families. Once we hold this office, I think we have to conduct ourselves and in the manner that is expected of us, it's what our public would expect of us to put our best foot forward. And so I do think it's time to look forward that whether you won by the slimmest of margins or an overwhelming landslide, it doesn't matter. Once you're in office, you represent the people. And I think we all always just want to remind ourselves of the ideals that we represent, because from our founding fathers in Washington all the way down to Alameda, we're doing the people's business and we need to do it in the best way possible. Thank you. Speaker 0: So. I don't think it was disrespectful to call this meeting. It was to discuss these items. And that was what occurred this evening. And member de SAC. Speaker 5: I just want to say, I think the intent of the workshop is right on. I think it's about letting people understand the way in which government works. It's about opening the doors of City Hall even wider. And I think, you know, the intent and the effort is noble. And I think the substantive matters that are being examined are are are worthy of examination. And ultimately, we're not making any final decisions. We're having this workshop. We're gathering, you know, persons perspectives. And one thing I hadn't done was offer my perspectives. So for tonight, let me just say this. The views raised up here on the dais, I don't think there are any wrong views. And I do think, though, that, you know, having served on council, going on 13 years with four different mayors. Call me old school, but I'm kind of fine with the with the way in which we're operating. I'm fine with the middle of matters in an order of business is everything there. So but I think it's still a worthwhile to have, you know, works out like this because, you know, maybe if any one of the council members wants to pursue altering any one of these items that I read, maybe down the road, I'll change my mind. But for now, call me old school. I think I'm fine with how we do things. Speaker 0: And the other member comments. Speaker 6: And just one more. I'm sorry. Just to clarify, I never said that it was disrespectful to have this meeting and call this agenda. And I can agree with Councilmember de Song. You know, maybe there are better ways to do things, you know? I think we're doing fine as we are. As Councilmember Ashcraft said, if it ain't broke, don't fix it now. But, you know, we should feel free to bring suggestions. You know, I have no problem with that. And I have no problem with discussing those suggestions and having a public hearing and those suggestions. But, you know, for my mind, I think I think it's fine as we are. You know, I think we're doing fine. And I but I do think it was valuable to share this information. So we all you know, we're aware of some of these rules and procedures because I didn't know some of these rules and procedures until I read the agenda. So thank you for doing that. Speaker 0: So I appreciate that. That's what we're trying to move forward. Sharing vice mayor. Speaker 4: And the election is over. And I think, you know, we get what we get from the public. And I think our statements were focused on what the job at hand is, is is really important to move on with that. And it also sends a message to the public, we're here. We're here to work. And again, going back to my comments, I, I want to make sure that when we consider and we consider deliberately with a vote to have an open house, I think they're considerations of staff and their considerations of getting the focus. And secondly. I think if it's not fix, I mean, if it's not broken, don't try and fix it. But there's also something called continuous improvement and just listening in the last two nights on reconstructing the motion so that we can vote on it. The longer the time that passes, between the time the motion is made and the time the second occurs, it either gets better or it gets unintelligible. And I think there are certain certain aspects of a system like Robert's Rules of Order or some other system of order that gets the motion on the table. It gets a second, so then it can be discussed, and then we can check back and modify something that's real. And that's just the the practical application for my comment on establishing either some points of Robert's Rules of Order specifically, rather than reference in a book that 780 pages or whatever it is and some parts are arcane , but some parts are very practical and. We have to walk the line between freedom of speech, freedom of expression and practical policy applications to people who have to run our city. So. I think this is important. And if we do get an accumulation or need a consolidation of these, I would advocate a rules committee because it frees staff up. There's less staff, but there is some expertize that's brought to the table because it's council members and in the past it's work with or charter review. So I just want to emphasize those points and thank you for the opportunity. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 3: Amber Ashcraft to follow up on that. I think that I don't disagree with anything except that Robert's Rules of Order thing, but I, I do think we have a procedure for the way we are supposed to make motions. And second of all, there's I think we got in a little loosey goosey as we've gotten at some of that might just be something the city attorney can give us a little workshop on or even a a writing. I know when I was president of the planning board, I had I think maybe it was from the the it was probably the planning association, but they had a really nice guide and I always had a copy of the one that told you how to run it, you know, how to handle a motion. And it's, I mean, it's not intuitive. So I like my cheat sheets. But that said, I do think the consolidation would be a good thing, just going through all those attachments and to the point that the vice mayor raises about a rules subcommittee. We've worked together well and another little committee a few years back, and I would be happy if the vice mayor was interested in being on the Rules Committee to this point. Speaker 0: And I'd like to keep up the discussion. That's what that was. Speaker 3: But then in the last point I was going to make, though, is and again, looking over our last two agendas and as you can see, we had two bumps the three times. Apologies to those of you stalwarts who came back three times. I think we need to. I'm not sure how, but consider the number of council referrals that go on to an agenda. Maybe it's just because it's the beginning of a new administration and everybody had things they wanted to bring up. But if we have seven or eight every time and it's just going to get really long and then it is would be my preference that we are all able to do council referrals, to get agenda items, to get items on the agenda, but only through council referrals. And even though the mayor is the mayor, I, I think that it's more informative to the public and helpful to council members and staff to have those ideas come through a council referral. Speaker 0: So it's my understanding that in regards to how this has been done in the past, the Mayor works with the city manager and Laura to submit items directly, which is my understanding of how it has worked in the past that the mayor did not submit referral slips. However, at this point I actually want to adjourn the meeting. This has gone on longer than I had intended, and we were here until 130, with all due respect. Yes. So at this point, with all due respect, if I that during the meeting and I appreciate everyone's input this evening, I. Speaker 3: Think you need a motion to adjourn. Speaker 0: Don't you think so? No. Speaker 6: And we do have we have a quick counsel communications, which I think. Speaker 0: Oh, yes. Okay. All right. Speaker 6: Yes. You go first and then I'll go. Speaker 0: So. Speaker 6: Or either way, I don't know. Speaker 0: Someone that wants. Yes. So this workshop we have Council Communications is part of the workshop. Speaker 3: Excuse me. You know, earlier. No, I don't think you realize that. Assistant City Manager. This Wormer Damn was trying to get your attention. Mayor Spencer. She had wanted to make a remark earlier, and we. We passed over. I'm sure you would. Speaker 2: Be. Speaker 3: Willing to hear from her. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilmember is he Ashcraft? I just actually would like to clear an issue that that was raised tonight, and it's not a big deal. But I think that on behalf of myself and the city clerk regarding the agenda process, because we are the ones who put together the agenda. And there was a comment tonight about that. We put controversial items at the end of the agenda to limit the ability for the public to speak. And I just want you all to know and I want the public to know that we do not do that. As you saw last night, we had just two items. Basically, we had the bass and we had housing that took up all of 4 hours, almost 5 hours to get through that. So we try our best to get those items up front, but sometimes we have MIDI items and we go late and there's nothing that we can do about that. And I apologize to the public. Laura and I worked very hard to get those items up front so that people can talk about it, can be heard. We're not trying to limit public dialog at all, so I just want to clear that for your benefit. So you know that we work very hard and we're happy to work with the mayor to make sure that we continue to do that. But just felt like I wanted to clear the record so that you all knew that that's not something that we do. Speaker 0: And I appreciate that. Thank you. And I did I did not recognize that you were making a wave or whatever. So please. So moving on. So I did not realize that there was council comments and I actually thought the workshop was all comments. So if there's any concern. Speaker 1: About that, it for the continued item. Speaker 0: Oh for the continued. Yeah. Okay. And we already had those. Speaker 1: Yeah. But you can still, it's still on the agenda. Speaker 0: All right. So, um, so I'm not sure what comments you'd like to make, however, and let me just remind everyone at this point, it is 1023. So if you could really be brief, I don't want to discourage people from coming to my meetings.

Regular Agenda Item

Discuss City Council Rules and Procedures for City Council Meetings and the Possibility of Holding a Future City Hall Open House. (Mayor Spencer - 1210)

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Speaker 1: And the fire chief is going to us. Uh. Speaker 2: I think we have some that's going to lead us. Speaker 0: I pledge allegiance to the flag for which it stands, one nation. Speaker 3: Under. Speaker 0: God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Speaker 2: Thank you, Chief. Okay. Next agenda changes to this reaction. Speaker 1: Yeah. Do you want to? I think you have a lot of agenda changes. But also, do you want to hold the joint meeting first since that has auditors present who are being meetings. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 1: So quick. Speaker 2: So I don't know if any of you realize this, but we actually have another meeting that starts 701. That's council, a joint city council and successor agency to the Community Improvement Commission, S.A. CIC meeting. And for this it's my understanding that, okay, due to the interest of time I was going to request if staff if council is

Closed Session Item

CONFERENCE WITH LEGAL COUNSEL - ANTICIPATED LITIGATION Initiation of litigation pursuant to subdivision (c) of Section 54956.9 Number of cases: Three (As Plaintiff - City Initiating Legal Action)

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Speaker 2: All those in favor. I oppose motion passes unanimously. We have this. I'm planning to read this resolution. This is a huge honor for me personally to be here this evening. And I'm sure all of council and staff and in fact, our community, as you can tell, they are all here starting at the beginning. Whereas the Council of the City of Alameda records its appreciation for the years of service faithfully rendered by Chief Michael de Rossi for the city of Alameda. And. WHEREAS, Michael draws his career with the Alameda Fire Department spanned 35 years, including the last three and one half as fire chief. Chief Tarazi retired as a captain with the Alameda Fire Department in 2007 and came out of retirement in 2011 to lead the department as fire chief. And where I was during Michael, during his tenure as fire chief, he reinstated and expanded the Marine operations program, including 30 rescue swimmers, two rescue boats, a grant funded fire boat, and 60 rescue and fire operators. And. Whereas, Michael de Rossi helped plan the development of a new emergency operation center and fire station number three, along with the public works and police departments. And. Whereas, Michael de Rossi ensured the fire department's fleet was brought up to date with vehicles that meet current safety and emission standards while securing affordable financing with minimal impact on the city's general fund. And where, as Michael draws, his commitment to community accountability and collaboration was evident in his outreach and partnership efforts with various community based organizations throughout Alameda and Red Cross. Michael de Rossi was the president of the Alameda County Fire Chiefs Association, raising the accomplishments of the city and fire department to a regional level. And. WHEREAS, Michael de Rossi brought ingenuity and creative revenue generation initiatives to the city, including the Community Pier Medicine Pilot program, non-emergency ambulance transport program and ground emergency medical transport funding. And. Whereas, Michael de Rossi achieved the reinstatement of the city's Disaster Preparedness Coordinator position through a shared services arrangement with the police department. And. Whereas, Michael de Rossi developed a professional fire department administration through collaborative relationships with labor and management, providing suppression personnel with more operational program management responsibilities and accountabilities. And. Whereas, Michael de Rossi was hired as a firefighter on November 16th, 1979, promoted to lieutenant on December 1st, 1988. Promoted to captain on April 11th, 1999, and assigned to the Training Division as the Training De Director on February 24th, 2002, where he served for nearly five and a half years before retiring on July 22nd, 27, and or, as Michael de Rossi and his wife Laurie are looking forward to spending time with their children and grandchildren, they are also excited to do some traveling and enjoy the life of the life of rest and relaxation. And. Whereas, on December 27, 2014, Michael de Rossi officially retired from his position as fire chief for the City of Alameda Fire Department and will be greatly missed by the department, city staff and the entire Alameda community. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Council of the City of Alameda does hereby congratulate Chief Michael de Rossi for his outstanding achievement in his service to the city of Alameda and to the fire service. Speaker 3: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Truly appreciate this honor. I feel a little bit undeserving and truly humbled to be here before you tonight. And I just want to take a moment, if I could, to just mention that I've had the opportunity to work with just about everybody up here on the dais in one capacity or another. And I really want to recognize all of you for your dedication and for the efforts you bring to the city and for your unwavering support for the public safety of the community. And I'd also like to acknowledge fellow retirees, Chiefs Olsen and Tunney, on their distinguished careers tonight as well, and as well as the members of the fire department, the sworn members in, the staff who provide such outstanding service, who collaborate so well, and who are willing to take chances to make almeida's fire department on the cutting edge in Bay Area. Finally, I just want to say thank you to my family without their unwavering support and encouragement. I would never have made it to this podium tonight. Thank you all very much. Speaker 2: Hey. Next. Do we have? Darren Wilson. Agenda Item six. Speaker 1: Adoption Rights Resolution commending Alameda Division Chief Darren Olson for his contributions to the city of Alameda. Speaker 2: Thank you. All right. We have another one. I'm going to proudly read a motion. We have a motion in second. I think all the man. Yes, yes. All those in favor. I oppose motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Right. Whereas the first of all, City of Alameda Resolution commending Alameda Fire Department Division Chief Darrin Olson for his contributions to the city of Alameda. Whereas the Council of the City of Alameda records its appreciation for service faithfully rendered by Division Chief Darren Olson to the city of Alameda.

Regular Agenda Item

Adoption of Resolution Commending Alameda Fire Department Chief Michael D’Orazi for His Contributions to the City Of Alameda. (Fire)

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Speaker 2: Whereas the Council of the City of Alameda records its appreciation for service faithfully rendered by division chief Matthew Turney to the city of Alameda. And. WHEREAS, Matthew Tunney's career with the City of Alameda Fire Department spanned 29 and a half years, starting on July 1st, 1985, until December 12th, 2014, and included the following assignments firefighter, apparatus, operator , fire captain, division chief and Acting Deputy Fire Chief. And. Whereas, Matthew Tony was promoted from firefighter to apparatus operator on September 28, 1997. And. Whereas, Matthew Tony was promoted to fire captain on August 1st, 1999, and served as the Fire Department's Training Director from July 2nd, 2000 until May 4th, 2003. And. Whereas, Matthew Tony was promoted to Division Chief on November 11, 2007, served as acting deputy fire chief on several occasions from 2010 to 2013, and managed the department's facilities, projects, maintenance, capital improvements and safety since 2007. And was Matthew. Tony and his wife Felicia are looking forward to spending additional time with family and friends. And. Whereas, on December 12, 2014, Matthew Tony will officially retire from his position as division chief for the City of Alameda Fire Department and will be greatly missed by the department, city staff and the entire Alameda community. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Council of the City of Alameda does hereby congratulate Division Chief Matthew Tony for his outstanding achievement in his service to the city of Alameda and to the fire service profession. Speaker 0: Madam Mayor. Speaker 3: Council members and staff, thank you very much for the opportunity in this honor. It's been a pleasure. It's been an honor working and serving the city and the citizens of this town. I have had a wonderful career. I really enjoyed working with everybody. The fire department members have been just such a great group to work with over the course of the career. Many friends and family are the relationships that you leave behind. Speaker 0: And you take those with you. Speaker 3: For the rest of my duration. Thanks for this. Speaker 0: Opportunity. I greatly appreciate it. Speaker 2: So at this point, we don't have any more commendations, as some of you may want to be leaving. You're welcome to stay. Speaker 0: If you don't, we'll have to have the fire marshal in. Speaker 2: But thank you very much for coming out tonight. Nice to see all of you. Speaker 0: It's. Nick. Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker 0: Let's just. Speaker 2: Next on our agenda is going to be 60. Speaker 1: The correct presentation on the status of environmental conditions and cleanup at Alameda Point. Speaker 2: And I believe we're going to have a staff presentation on this, and I know we're going to wait a few minutes, but we can kind of start moving along to. Speaker 6: Try to sneak by there. Speaker 1: Nice. Speaker 2: Especially.

Regular Agenda Item

Adoption of Resolution Commending Alameda Fire Department Division Chief Matthew Tunney for His Contributions to the City of Alameda. (Fire)

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Speaker 0: That. Speaker 2: Oh. Speaker 6: Good evening, Mayor. City Council. My name's Jennifer. I'm the chief operating officer for Alameda Points, and I'm here tonight with a couple of items that are really information focused status reports on efforts going on. And I'm going to point out in a for Alameda point, it's been you know, the base was closed in 97. There's been a lot going on over the last 20 years there. So there's it's a chance for us with a new council to come out and provide updates on some of these important efforts that we're doing. The first tonight is on the environmental program, the second on. Right now, I'm going to actually turn this presentation over to the city's independent environmental consultant, Peter Russell, who's been working on behalf of the city as an independent reviewer of the Navy's environmental cleanup process. That leads very closely into the conveyance and ultimately the development process as well. So I work with Peter almost on a daily basis, and he'll be presenting today giving the Council an overview of how the environmental cleanup works at the base, touching on a couple of key sites. And then he and I both are here to answer questions. Any questions that you may have. Thank you very much. Speaker 2: We have two speakers, but that goes after the presentation, right? All right. Speaker 3: Good evening, Mayor Spencer and members of the city council. My name is Peter Russell. I'm a consultant for the city of Alameda for environmental issues, primarily at Alameda Point tonight. I want to provide a status report on environmental conditions at Alameda Point. It's an update to a presentation I gave in 2011. There's several new faces here, so I plan on dwelling on the slides only very briefly because I know you have a full agenda tonight and you can stop me if you need me to pause for anything. And I apologize in advance for not catching all the acronyms I'm likely to slip out because Alameda Point is full of acronyms. So tonight I'm going to talk about the background and history of Alameda Point, the environmental program with the state and federal regulators and how they work with the Navy and the city status of the clean up and property transfer. And then a few special topics that are particularly active now at Alameda Point. These two maps show what Alameda Point looked like before the Navy started showing it in at least the 1915 one does. 1942. Most of it had been filled in because the air base was geared up for World War Two. And the airbase continued through World War Two of the Korean conflict and closed in 1997. The base takes up approximately 2700 acres, and it was the site of many diverse activities, not only residential and some commercial, but various industrial activities. As a result, certain pieces of the base have contamination on them that the Navy is cleaning up. For comparison, the figure on the left is Lake Merritt and then Alameda Point is on the right. These two are drawn to the same scale, so you can get a visual image of the relative size of Alameda. Point to the local features. So an important fundamental concept to understand for the environmental cleanup at Alameda Point is that there are two parallel programs. One of them is the petroleum program, which has no federal involvement that is operated solely by the state of California. And then there is the circular program. It's an acronym for a real time trustee. You can read it there that involves many more agencies, including the federal government. Together, they they deal with all the environmental issues. The map on the right shows, the areas, although it's a little washed out, shows the areas where environmental issues are being addressed. You can see that. Well, first, the western portion is largely broken into runways with a landfill in the northwest corner and a landfill in the south in the north. In the southwest corner. And then there were industrial activities in the southeast to the east of Seaplane Lagoon and immediately north of Seaplane Lagoon. The balance of it was open space or housing. The first. I want to talk about the Circle program. This is everything but petroleum. So there is a BCT, an acronym for the BRAC cleanup team. BRAC itself is an acronym for base reuse and alignment. Cleanup that that includes the Navy, of course, the responsible party. And then the EPA represented federal interests along with the Navy. And the state of California. Has the Department of Toxic Substances Control or DTC and the Water Board, which pays particular attention to groundwater issues and surface water issues. And the city of Alameda participates in the BCT discussions as an observer. The Restoration Advisory Board is very important at Alameda Point. It's commonly called the RAB. There are several RAB members here tonight. These people have become quite knowledgeable about the environmental issues at Alameda Point and many of them put in quite a few hours keeping abreast of the issues and intelligently commenting on the on the current topics. The Petroleum program. Again, this is the complement to the Cercla program includes anything that had to do with petroleum. It was a lot of fuel handling at Alameda Point. So there are a couple of locations where there were tank farms. There were pipelines going around there, even a couple of gas stations. Many of these have contamination, but all of them are being investigated, investigated to either determine the extent of contamination or to rule out contamination. And where contamination is present, the Navy is cleaning it up. The the state and federal environmental regulators have lots of support, people with different disciplines that are brought to bear on the issues at LME two point. The clean ups that the Navy and the regulators agree upon. Whenever possible, clean to unrestricted use, which means residential use. Alameda Point uses innovative technologies whenever they can. They have they have lots of experts who are well versed with with. Clean up state of the art. And wherever possible, shorter duration clean ups are selected over a longer duration clean ups. This is just a slide of the Navy's funding and projected funding. And as you can see, for the last several years, their budget has dropped. So I wanted to talk briefly about the status of property cleanup and transfer. Until 2013, the city of Alameda leased about 1000 acres, a little more than a thousand acres in 2013, 1379 acres are transferred to the city. The Navy no longer owns them, so of course they no longer lease. And there are only there there are less than 500 acres left to be transferred. This. This image shows the facing the blue is the is the area that's already been transferred. The white is staying in federal ownership and the the other colors are imminent or within the next 5 to 7 years for transfer. This is another slide of the environmental sites that appeared earlier on in the comparison. I believe it is the comparison with Lake Merritt. These are two slides that just show the progress that is being made in the clean up. The investigation and remediation of these environmental sites is a very methodical process that goes from investigation to decision making about how best to clean up whatever needs to be cleaned up and then actually implementing the cleanup. The Green Arrow on this slide is the only one that is completely cleaned up yet. However, there are quite a few sites that are completely cleaned up and as you can see, many sites are are in the cleanup stage. So it's a matter of a few years before they'll be done. So now I want to speak about three sites that are that are actively being cleaned up now or an active decision making . One is either site one. Air is an acronym for installation restoration. And this is a former landfill in the northwest corner of Alameda Point. There was groundwater and soil contamination there and the Navy has completed the initial treatment of the groundwater. It will do long term monitoring. And for the past two years, they've been working on the soil contamination and expect to finish that this year. That will be available for passive recreational use. Seaplane Lagoon. In the two northern corners of Seaplane Lagoon, there were storm drain outfalls. And in the early years before the Clean Water Act, the Navy, like most other industries, discharged their industrial wastewater into the storm drains. So that all went out to Sea Plain Lagoon. Much of it flowed out and was gone. But some of the sediment settled in the corners near the outfalls, and the Navy has completed the dredging of that and done the confirmation sampling. And the regulators are all in agreement that they have cleaned up all of that excess contamination and the process of doing so. You may have heard that several small switches and dials were found embedded in the sediment very sparsely, that had fluorescent luminescent paint on them, which has a very low level of radioactivity. This is similar to baby bin alarm clocks and luminous wristwatches that you may have seen, and that is the only remaining issue that is still being discussed before. Seaplane Lagoon is completely finished. This is a probable unit to be. It's it's to the east of Seaplane Lagoon. It's near the east entrance to Alameda Point. And there was an industrialized area there where several different locations experienced spills of degreaser and solvents, which resulted primarily in groundwater contamination. That's the blue area that you see in the center of the figure. The Navy is completing its decision making on how best to clean that up and what cleanup levels are appropriate for that. There are lots of interested regulatory agencies and the city is also participating in that dialog. And then finally, this is Building five, the largest building on the base. It's to the north of Seaplane Lagoon. It also had industrial operations. Inducted there. And the decision making is completed. The Navy is drawing up plans for the for the cleanup, which is primarily going to be focused on solvents and groundwater, essentially the same situation that was at OYU to be to the east of Seaplane Lagoon. And the areas that are that are going to be most intensively managed are within the blue dashed lines. This is the Department of Toxic Substances Control. Overall program is just a little cartoon of how they continue their their involvement even after cleanup is completed. So in some areas, in the few areas where there are ongoing restrictions because of, say, contamination that is deep, that was not feasible to remove the DTC contracts with an outfit called Terror Decks that alerts it whenever anybody is going to do any digging so that they can make sure that the that the digging is handled responsibly . Wherever there is any residual contamination that does not allow unrestricted use or unlimited exposure, then the Navy and the regulators reconvene to to focus on that site every five years, at least once every five years, to see whether there has been any advances in. In toxicology. Changes in regulations. Any invalid assumptions where they should revisit their decision to decide whether it continues to be effective even after the full BCT is is finished. The DTC remains involved in perpetuity. And it's just contact information for for the Navy. Base Environmental Coordinator and for the information repositories where anybody can receive a document to review and and comment at the wrap. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. So at this point, do we take our. Speaker 0: Speakers or council comments? Speaker 1: The Sunshine Ordinances. If there's council questions, you should address those first and then call the speakers and then you can have more counsel discussion following the speakers. Speaker 2: Their counsel questions. Speaker 0: I could do mine after the speakers. Speaker 2: Anyone else? Any questions? I'm going to go ahead and call our speakers. Thank you, Kurt Peterson. Speaker 0: Harry. Let me. Speaker 2: I can. It's Curt, but can I have a slip for you on this one? I only have Kurt. So maybe there's. Maybe you'd like to fill out a slip. And then next to be Susan Gallimore after him. Speaker 0: Yes. Again, my name is Kurt Peterson. Thank you for allowing me to address you tonight on this issue. I've been a member of the Restoration Advisory Board as a committee member for since 2000. So over 15 years, I first became a member as far as the RAB because I was always very concerned for the safety as far as the cleanup out at the base of a very close to it. But one of the key purposes I was always on the board is the concern that I have as far as any kind of lawsuits or extra hidden charges that might be gathered as far as from the city when they took over the base property. One of the things I want to thank, Mayor Spencer and Congress Councilman Hardy as far as attending our last RAD meeting. Thank you very much. I know that we've changed, you know, a lot of this particular board. I just want to make sure that you are aware that there are numerous institutional controls involved with this property. And I would hope, though, you have other governing boards to look at it. I would hope that our attorney would look very carefully as far as to make sure that we aren't liable for any situation. It could be as simple as digging a hole for a tree in an unknown spot, especially 15 or 20 years from now . I just want to make sure the city, as you as members of the representatives of the city, are aware of this and that it could be hidden costs. And when you look at this, you look at that very carefully. And I know we have some other people that like to speak on this, too. Thank you very much. Speaker 2: Thank you. Susan Gallimore. Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Susan Gallimore and it was Curt on the Reb. I'm on the Reb. I've served now for probably about ten. Speaker 2: Years. Speaker 1: And this year I am the co-chair, so you might be seeing more of me. I also wanted to say that thank you, Mayor, for coming. We really appreciate it. I know Frank Matarese has been many times and we are looking forward to you being back at the Reb and Jim Odey was there recently. So I'm basically here today to introduce you all and the rest of the audience here to the REB members, many of whom are here today. I'm not going to reintroduce Curt, but I want to recognize George Humphreys and I'm going to ask people if they could just stand up. George. George is invaluable. He's an engineer. He helps us understand a lot of the chemical stuff. Um. Dr. Carol Goodstein is here. There she is. Burt Morgan. I don't think he's here tonight. He's been on the air for about 15 years. Jane Seewald. She's a new member and she's the vice co-chair this year. Skip McIntosh I don't think we're here tonight, but he's our geologist. Michael John. Tory. Victor Quintel is a new but he worked on the on the base for about 30 years so he knows a lot I would say where the bodies are buried, but I'm not going to do that. Dale Smith, she's not here tonight. We recognize her. William Smith, I know is. And Richard Bangert and Jim Sweeney is not here tonight. So again, I want to thank and recognize these people. They have put in years and years and years and years of work and enormous amounts of reading. And it's all very important, as Peter pointed out, that we go forward and, as could pointed out, understanding what we are going to be liable for in the future. And I also wanted to tell people here tonight that every year the Navy puts on a tour and it's open to the public. Anybody can come. It's a bus. And they take you beyond the fence where there's a fence beyond which you may not go. And this one takes us out to all of these sites that were mentioned tonight. And please come, because there's an enormous amount of work going on there these days, a lot of contouring, a lot of covering, a lot of institutional controls, really important stuff and also very interesting. So thank you very much. Speaker 2: Thank you. To. Yes. I miss him. Do you know the date of the next? Speaker 1: We are busy setting it so it will be sometime in June or July. I'm going to try and make sure that the newspaper advertises that. Speaker 2: So. Yeah. Speaker 1: Yeah, we certainly will. I mean, the more that more people that come out there, the better. So thank you. Speaker 2: And I can share. The next meeting is March 12th. The meetings are always 630 to 930. We are posting those dates on our city's calendar. So and they are open to the public. You are all welcome to come to join us in City Hall West. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you to everyone that does serve on this. This is actually a real important part of Alameda. We all we all want that cleaned up. And I really appreciate all the service of the Navy to help us in that regard. Comments So as far as I know, no more speakers. No. Okay. Than Council comments. Speaker 0: Okay. Comment unless someone else wants to. Speaker 2: Go, go ahead. Speaker 0: So I guess the speaker said I was at the red meeting on January 8th, a very interesting meeting, in-depth analysis of all the cleanup efforts out there. And one of the presentations we heard that day was on what the test results and plans for site 32, which is the Northwest Territories, out the area, out past the antiques fair I believe it's owned open space and the Fish and Wildlife biological opinion describes a park envisioned there for 147 acres along the Oakland estuary and that includes site 32. We're going to talk a little bit more about, you know, the community's vision for wetlands out there later. But I know for the most part over the years on the council, we really haven't submitted any comments on proposed cleanup remedies or alternatives, although Dr. Russell has submitted plenty of comments on our behalf. But in this case, I think it might be a good idea if the City Council is in the loop on this one, depending on whether or not there are institutional controls placed on the site restricting, digging, how those restrictions are worded, or even if there are none at all, for example, that will have a bearing on the future cost and hurdles in removing all of the remnant pavement, bunkers and on buildings so a park can be developed, you know, has often the case. This Rabb presentation came ahead of the official release of a site to investigation, report and feasibility study, which I believe is expected in early February. And there's a comment period. I'm not sure if it's 30 or 60 days. And then one of the criteria in the approval process of a circular superfund remedy is community acceptance. So I'd like to talk about this in February in the Council with with the rest of council, with staff, Dr. Russell and the community, when the alternatives are clearly spelled out. So maybe we can favor one of the alternatives. Speaker 2: Comments. Speaker 4: Thank you, Madam Chair. This is a very important issue. You know, many years ago, when we started the process of redoing what was then called east housing and building what ultimately became the Bayport community. Many years ago at the time we had gone through a lot of levels of approval when it comes to cleanup. Having not only gone through the federal process, but also having gotten signed off by the state, D.C. Department, toxic controlled substance substances, controls. And even after having gone through those different layers, you know, we still had to deal with this one item that just popped up, which was unexpected. Fortunately, we had our insurer who covered the cost of it. But the lesson from from certainly Bayport and you know, it was something fortunately that we could treat, but it was you know, the lesson of that is, you know, we all we have to be vigilant and push as hard as we can because even with these layers that we have in place and we might have to, you know, step in, though, as we did in the case of Ice House in Bayport at the time. Speaker 2: I remember comments. Vice Mayor. Speaker 0: Yes. A thank you for that report, Dr. Russell, and thanks to all the members of The Wrap for their their hard work. And, Daryn, I think it was between 2006 and 2010 of when the Ora Alameda Reuse and Restoration Authority, I'm not sure I got that acronym right. It was a at each meeting there was a report from the RAB via the council liaison with myself at the time, and we did provide many comments to records of decisions and also questions back to Drew, our consultant to the Navy. And I think it's extremely important not only for the the future use of these lands, but also the fact that almost half a billion dollars or a little more than half a billion dollars has been spent to date. And there's still another 84, 85 million that is yet to be spent for continued cleanup. And I hope this council assigns a grab lays out so it's not an occasional visit by a council member, but someone is assigned the task of reporting back to the successor organization on what what the council might want a question direct comment on regarding what the Navy's plans, their records of decision and any other related. Cleanup activities, two properties certainly that we're going to inherit or that's going to remain. You know, I think that's really important to establish that as a formal formal function with reporting that at our successor agency meeting. Speaker 2: So in regards to that, for those of you that don't know, we do have a special meeting tomorrow night when we're going to be talking about, I think, things like that. And it's a public meeting. It's going to be here 630. And you can find the agenda online that we're going to be talking about us working together, moving forward, along with staff. And so that is something we can look for at that time. Yes. Thank you, Mary Spencer. And I just wanted to echo a thank you to all the members of the RAB Board. I will make it to one of your meetings, maybe the next one, but I appreciate any of the volunteer boards and commissions that we have in this city. We're kind of one two. But you you do a lot of work and that's a really in-depth one. And thank you for your service to the community. So I do have a question. Occasionally, I'll be asked by a member of the public How safe is it for them to go out? And sometimes in regards to the specific area where they may be working or or, you know, taking their children and whatnot. So my question really is, if someone has a specific concern, who should they contact? I know they can go to the RAB meetings themselves, which are public and we discuss that. But if they aren't able to do that, what other suggestions do you have? Speaker 6: Oh, you know I can I'll speak to and then have Peter if he has other but definitely. Derek Robinson with the Navy his contact information he is the Navy's point person on environmental issues at the base of you can always contact him from the Navy's perspective, but they're also welcome to contact me directly. And then I can find that answer, you know, via Peter or via the Navy and try to be a conduit and try to get those answers as fast as possible. So my contact information is on the website. I'm, you know, JROTC at Alameda, CA dot gov. Happy to answer those questions that anyone may have. Speaker 2: And for Derek Robinson, I'm just I have it on here. I can read it. The phone number 6195320951 and then his email derrick d r e k dot j dot Robinson, the number one at Navy Mail. And then so between the two of you. Yes. And I would actually strongly encourage anyone, if you have questions, reach out to these people because they they can help you track down the answers and then you can be assured. Speaker 6: Absolutely. That's what we're here for. Speaker 2: Yes. Is so Ms.. Ah, if you can help me understand, would the public have access now to areas that are not cleaned up to a level that is considered safe or is that somehow roped off or. Speaker 6: Well, it depends on what the contamination is. I mean, Peter can speak to it more about, for instance, where there's groundwater contamination and there's there's not an issue with, you know, someone walking over that property, then there won't be any restriction. It's really the long term. So in some cases it may just be the long term exposure to something. In other cases, it's being cleaned up actively. The Navy may want to, you know, create a fence to make sure no one gets into it. No one interferes with their cleanup process. So it really depends on on the issue. But I can say that we wouldn't have open any area that wouldn't be safe for people to to walk around. I mean, we the Navy is very careful about that type of liability. We are. So if it's not fenced off or doesn't say anything, then it is it is safe to to be there, you know. Speaker 3: I'd just like to add just a little bit to that. I showed a slide that had the process that the Navy goes through to investigate and then clean up. What's not shown there is that the the initial examination looks at imminent threats, and if it finds any, it usually doesn't. But if it does, those are cleaned up immediately without waiting for the long term decision making about how to deal with the site as a whole. You may see some areas that are fenced off also because the Navy is actively working on them and there are just construction hazards, not not so much contamination. Speaker 0: Hazards as construction hazards. Speaker 3: And those move around as their activity moves. Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Any other comments? We can move on to the next agenda. Item six f. Speaker 1: Is right. Hesitation on Friday development at Alameda Point, including initial development concept. Speaker 6: Even the mayor, council members. Jennifer, our chief operating officer, allow me to point out this is the first meeting of the new city council. We'll be discussing the development plans that have been in the works and that are ongoing at Alameda points related to site A and I'll talk a little bit about what that is exactly. First, and this is the first time that the community will be able to comment publicly on the development concept that's been put forward by the proposed developer for for site a before delving into to the site a process.

Regular Agenda Item

Presentation on Status Report of Environmental Conditions and Clean-up at Alameda Point. (Base Reuse 819099)

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Speaker 6: First, and this is the first time that the community will be able to comment publicly on the development concept that's been put forward by the proposed developer for for site a before delving into to the site a process. I want to give a little bit of history. Just there's a lot of context. I mean, a point and a lot of that helps understand why certain decisions were made. And so I want to go back a little bit in time. I'll do it quickly. I know we have a big agenda just to provide that context. Once I'm done, I'm going to try to keep my presentation to, you know, 5 minutes, maybe a little longer. And then the developer is here to to present their development concept. So I'm going to let them present as well. I'm really after two unsuccessful master developer processes. And when I say master developer, I mean a single developer for the entire 900 acres of property. At Alameda Point, there were two unsuccessful attempts to enter into agreements with those master developers. And after that happened, the city really kind of step back and city staff and city council, where should we go from here? What should we do? And I think the real the real focus was on let's let's not engage again with the developer right away, let the community kind of look at its plans. Let's go over those plans. Let's have a real engaged community process. We learn from some of our mistakes. So the city has worked closely with the community over the last two years to adopt a vision or kind of almost in some ways re adopt a vision for Alameda Point, which really focused on a mixed use, transitory development that limits jobs and attracts our limited housing and attracts jobs. And that really was going back to a 1996 reuse plan that hundreds of hours of community time was spent developing and really kind of in some ways skipping over all of those the developer plans and going back to that original community plan from 1996 that said we didn't want to just take for granted that that vision from 1996 still made sense. That's obviously a long time ago. Let's make sure that that still makes sense for today. And so we actually before we did any kind of real detailed entitlements around me to point, we actually wanted to go through a process of reaffirming the vision from the community reuse plan. By adopting this planning guide is what we called it. Some of the looking really closely at some of the key policies and key principles of that reuse plan going through public process with the planning board, a number of meetings at the planning board, a couple of meetings with the council talking about that planning guide and kind of re adopting that as is kind of the overarching, overarching vision before we entered into a much more detailed entitlement process. Then subsequent to that, we had about 30 public hearings from all of almost all of the city's boards and commissions, 19 presentations to community groups, ten community events, including a really successful bike tour that we did that had over 130 people there. We actually biked around, talked about the different parts of the base, really fun event was a really great way to to see I mean a point in fact email blast Facebook, Twitter numerous articles in the local newspapers that all culminated in approvals of of the detailed entitlements, including on February 4th, the city council approving a zoning amendment. So we went from a industrial overlay at the base which was consistent with the Navy's use of the property to a mixed use plan that broke the project into subdistricts, that contemplated mixes of uses a master infrastructure plan. If we weren't going to if the plan isn't to reengage a single developer to take over the whole property, we need to make sure that we have a plan for how all the infrastructure is going to fit together. What are those costs? Make sure we look at all of that in detail and adopting this master infrastructure plan. So anything, you know, sewers, storm drains, sea level rise, flood protection, all these different issues. And then an environmental impact report that study very carefully all of the environmental impacts, potential environmental impacts from the project, including traffic, historic impacts to cultural, historic resources, biological resource, extensive document about this tunnel that looked at all of those impacts and disclose all of those to the public before any approvals were made. And then on May 20th, the City Council approved a transportation demand management plan and on July 1st, a town center waterfront plan. The zoning actually required in a couple of areas where it was around the waterfront or some of the housing areas where we knew the community was really wanting to delve into some of the details. We actually said, you know what, the zoning is not enough. You don't just get to have the zoning. You actually have to have a specific plan that gets into the real nuts and bolts and details of those areas before you can build anything there. And then. Funding from MTC, we're able to fund the waterfront town center plan. And in a I think in February we got additional funding to finish the other specific plan that will be coming to the council with a contract for. So then once it wasn't until we had these documents in place that the city decided to take a first step into engaging a developer. So really, instead of seeking a developer to come in and say, Hey, community, this is what we want to build, we took a different approach of saying, Well, we've gone through our process of deciding what we want. Now, is there a developer out there that wants to build that? So taking really a reverse approach to some of the past efforts and ultimately did an RFQ from developers for a smaller scale site, not for the whole cyber 68 acres instead of the full 900 acres. So an initial modest first step for a mixed use plan right at the Gateway. And ultimately, the council entered into an exclusive negotiating agreement with that developer. And this is really the kickoff of that community process, really, at tonight's meeting of let's look at the plans that the developer and that's proposing. And let's this is an initial concept. We're going to get into more detail. We're going to be back here before you every month. So we're looking at site A is 68 acres right here at the Gateway. That is the site we're talking about. We actually at the same time and I don't I know we have limited times. I don't wanna go into too much detail, but I think it's important to understand, as we also did at the same time, an RFQ for a commercial only site for about 82 acres. And through that process, we we got nine responses here. We got four responses for site B and and I'll get into a little bit more about the results of the that the site B process. But the site a RFQ is for six eight acres, a mixed use site, 800 housing units, 200,000 square feet of commercial uses consistent with the zoning, the map and the town center. Plan nine Highly Qualified Responses. We had two finalists that we decided to negotiate with, negotiate a term sheet with. So instead of just selecting one based on their qualifications, we said we're going to narrow it down to the two top developers that have, we believe, have the best qualifications. But at that point, now we want to talk about the financial terms and the other terms to make sure that we're getting the best deal for the city. And so we went into that extensive process. I'm going to talk to you about the results of that, but ultimately decided to recommend two point partners as that preferred developer . The site B process, we went through the exact same process and that process, on the other hand, through that process of negotiating these term sheets with the two commercial developers, neither of them were willing to pay any money for infrastructure. We're willing to commit to any schedule for developing the property, basically willing to weren't willing to provide any commitments to the city in terms of timing or land value or infrastructure commitment. And so the the ultimate decision was to essentially postpone that until this year. We didn't recommend going forward with those those we did not believe it was in the city's best interest to enter into a development agreement with someone that wasn't willing to commit to any milestones or commit to any infrastructure. And so that is essentially on hold, I should say. One of the four developers on in four site B also dropped out even before we got to that point because of concerns over the market for new commercial development and I me to point. Ultimately, we selected our main point partners to it with an exclusive negotiating agreement, which is a partnership of SRM, Ernst Thomson, Dorfman Partners, Madison, Marquette and Tricon Capital. Each of these kind of specialize in a different SRM. IRN specializes in commercial development, although is working on mixed use projects and essentially provides the project management piece of this as well. Thompson Dorfman Partners is the multifamily housing. Madison Marquette, a national retail developer, and then Tricon Capital is the capital funding. They have extensive experience on large scale, mixed use infill development. Joe Ernst, the project manager, lives in Alameda, has successfully implemented high profile commercial projects in Alameda, the VFF outdoors pizza roasting facility. And one of the things we really liked about their approach was a more incremental approach that emphasizes reuse of existing buildings for commercial uses and a truly mixed use developer that has different developers that don't just focus on housing but have the retail experience, have the build to suit commercial. And that were, we believed, were really best positioned to deliver a mixed use project to the city. Site, a term sheet so attached to this exclusive negotiated agreement was a term sheet of these terms that we had negotiated, in fact, with both developers before we selected the finalist. And that resulted in an agreement in this term sheet to provide about $103 million in infrastructure amenities for Alameda Point with an important focus on three things and these were. Staff's focus the entire time was on what is this project going to provide for the rest of Alameda or for for the development of jobs out there? And so we focused on three things. One, transit infrastructure, parks and open space, and then utilities and amenities that create a catalyst for jobs. So transit infrastructure there in the Phase one have agreed to provide a complete gateway, gateway extension of Ralph Bizzaro Memorial Parkway into Alameda Point Point from Main Street all the way to Seaplane Lagoon , including dedicated bus, rapid transit lanes, payment of $10 million for upfront construction of a new ferry terminal to Seaplane Lagoon. And we're going to be able to leverage these funds to actively pursue $25 million in Measure B funds and federal grants for West End transit, bike and pedestrian improvements. So not onsite, but offsite developer being able to leverage these commitments to be able to pursue these other funds for offsite pedestrian multi-modal improvements. Parks and open space 36 and a half million dollars, or about 33% of the total infrastructure they're planning, is going towards parks and open space. That includes an eight acre waterfront park along the northern edge of the seaplane lagoon and neighborhood park, greenway. Flood protection and geotechnical improvements related to the parks, which is it's very expensive. A first phase of development to include 5 million towards a waterfront park, an upfront payment of $5 million towards an initial phase of the sports complex , which is a 44 acre sports complex, actually planned offsite on the northern part of the property. Catalyzing employment uses all the infrastructure amenities that help retain existing jobs and catalyze new jobs and redevelopment were prioritized. So for instance, and I know it's not very interesting, but a sewer line, it's probably one of them. If you ask our engineers, you know, technically, probably the number one thing that needs to get built to be able to catalyze jobs, especially for a new commercial development, which is in the southern part of the property. Because, you know, our luck is that an actual sewer pump stations on the, you know, direct opposite northern part of the property. And so being able to create building that sewer line from the gateway all the way up to the Northern Pump Station now makes it that much more feasible for us to be able to open up that job, the new development job center in the southern part, because you don't have to build the sewer line all the way up to the northern part. It's now built for you. You have to reach up to ramp up basato to grab it. It's a huge benefit, we believe, for not only the adaptive reuse area that it winds through, but ultimately that enterprise area in the southern part of the base. The Ramp Gateway Improvements create an attractive entry into Alameda Point. This is something we've heard. We heard from the commercial developers that we're interested in the site B, they said we need somewhere to bring the executives to tour them, to be able to help them visualize how a new campus here would make sense. And having an attractive gateway is key to that. Parks and Phase zero plans that bring amenities, early amenities to the waterfront to create a sense of place to offer amenities for employees, we believe is crucial to that. And this project has committed through their term sheet to build that. Site a next steps detailed project planning. So this is getting into the details of the site plan, you know, starting with the city council, the city council, as it says, in the end, it will be providing guidance to all these other boards and commissions about what they think of these plans will be taking that feedback from the city council, from all the boards and commissions, and making sure this development plan evolves over time. So respond to those comments and then culminating ultimately. So that's through tonight, really through May of 2015 and then a recommendation for to the city council in May of 2015. What does that mean for the city council? It means we'll be here for you every single month reporting on the status of Site A and the development there, and giving you feedback on all the different refinements that are being made as this process evolves and responds to the community feedback and the city council feedback and the other boards and commissions. I'm happy. I'm happy to answer any questions, but it probably makes sense at this point. I turn it over to our developer. Joe Ernst is here from Endpoint Partners to briefly provide a little of his vision and then turn it over to his planner, urban planner to present their concept. Speaker 0: Good evening, Madam Mayor. Members of the Council. My name is Joe Ernst and with SRM behalf of my partners, we're very happy to here tonight. Be here tonight to give you an update on the project process. You know, as Jennifer mentioned, we continue to bring a very solid team to this project. It's a very local team. And therefore, we bring a lot of local market knowledge and expertize, relationships that I think we'll bear well on this project. We are a mixed use team. We have very strong commercial retail capabilities, which we know is a key goal of the community for the point. And we've heard time and again the community council members talk about transit. We're very committed to working with the council, to working with community on transit solutions and both implementing them and monitoring them, tracking them going forward to make it work. I think with Alameda Point, you know, it means many things to many different people, whether you're for or against. I think many. Speaker 4: Can agree this is a prime priority. Speaker 0: Project for the community. And as a result, you know, that played heavily in the evolution of our plan. You know, we've we've chosen to embrace the base to be a part of it, not to scrap it and start from scratch. And we do have our planners here from bar architects tonight who will give you more of an overview of that. However, a few things I'd like to talk about. You know, we do remain committed to jobs and open space and being a catalyst for that. You know, our preliminary plan you'll see tonight does have about 20% more publicly accessible open space in it than the town center price precise plan. We were able to do that because this plan, you will see, you know, does not contain 68 acres of what I'd call a traditional low density, high car use housing we do. As a result, we do retain ample area for business and for open space. Our retail commercial strategy is not formulaic. And again, we continue to focus on the artisan maker movement, one that's already developing there. We've seen this time and again serve as a catalyst for urban redevelopment and job generation in other markets. The residential component clearly remains critical to, you know, the community's collective end goal, and that's namely jobs in parks. You know, in this era of post redevelopment, the residential is really the only way to generate sufficient capital to do the infrastructure to to develop the parks. But we've done our residential in a way, not just to, you know, fill up the site. We've we've tailored it to leave ample space for business and parks. We've tailored it to attract a demographic that we think that we know more readily embraces transit solutions. You know, the infrastructure that will be undertaking with city does present a minimum scale. We believe, you know, based on our engineering study to date, to really provide some economies to do this right. You know, to do this on a site by site basis, as you know, each prospective owner would come in, would probably rate about 2 to 3 times. You know, just quickly to wrap up, we know that, you know, from our experience what quality companies want, you know, what it takes to attract businesses, the Alameda and the East Bay, you know, these companies always tell us they want mixed use housing, they want amenities, they want transit access. They want these in close proximity without that. And we've seen this in our business parks, that Alameda business parks are often left to compete left to compete on low cost only. And as a result of that, you know, we see our business parks suffer more greatly, the ebbs and flows of strong and weak markets. And these result in lower proper, you know, value propositions that would not support the infrastructure costs at city. So, you know, we need to change the game out there and with, you know, an infrastructure and the type of project proposed for site. So with that, these are the things that guide us. These are the things that, you know, we are thinking about as we develop this plan. And with that, I'd like to turn it over to our team to walk you through the concept. So thank you. Speaker 3: Good evening, Madam Mayor. Members of the council staff. I am here representing a fairly broad design team. I have with me William Duncanson from our office, also April Phillips of April Phillips Design Works Landscape Design Firm. But there are many other people that have participated in this process. As you see on this. Speaker 1: What's your name? Speaker 3: I'm sorry. Your name? My name? David Israel. I'm principal in charge. Would be architects. Speaker 2: And I recognize your picture. Speaker 3: Thank you. So the parcel site A is what you see depicted on the screen here. As we started to look at this, we really started to look in at the site more closely and really try to understand what is it that would make this a place that Alameda deserves? It should. It's a very special site. It's a very special city. It is an island. It is unique in that regard. And the site is very unique. It's got a unique history. It's got a unique sense of place. So how can we create something here that is uniquely about both Alameda and about the history and character of Alameda Point? So as we looked at that, we looked at a concept that's actually described here called palimpsest. And this is a this is the notion of reusing something, but reusing it in a way that still retains the character of its origins. And so what we started to look at was, as Joe said in his presentation, rather than coming in and saying there is nothing here of value, we're going to scrape the entire site and build it in a completely cohesive and uniform way. We felt it would be much better to try and take advantage of some of the natural characteristics you see on the screen here, photos of the existing some of the existing buildings that are adjacent to the site. Obviously, as you come in on ramp, this axial view to San Francisco is like something no other place can really enjoy. So how do we create a place that really, really resonates with this place? And how do we really reinforce some of these important axes and places where people will really be drawn to? So as we as we looked at some of the existing buildings, some of the existing buildings, while they do not necessarily qualify as historic landmarks, they do have a sense of context and they do have a sense of place and they have a sense of unique characteristics that you don't necessarily replicate with new buildings. So what we have done is we looked at the overall site plan and we started to look at how we might be able to integrate some of the existing buildings and some of the existing characteristics that compromise or comprise the existing site. And how we might take a look at reusing and repurposing some of those like you have seen in some places like the French Bakery at Santa Cruz or the House of Air and the Presidio of San Francisco. These were all very humble buildings in their origins, but they all share the benefit of authenticity. They share the benefit of unique structural characteristics and the kind of buildings. And when we started to talk to Madison, Marquette, our retail development partner, started to say, these are things that really can draw commercial enterprise to buildings that are not formulaic. They are unique. They are the kinds of buildings that you don't readily find. So we feel that there's a real great opportunity here to integrate. And it also allows us to, again, as I say, give a sense of place much more quickly because we have some established buildings that have established character. Another example, Granville Island in Vancouver, a fabulous place that is so crude in many ways, but so sophisticated in other ways that it's a place people just love to go to. It still has an active concrete plant on site, and yet it's a very rich tourist. It's actually the, if I remember correctly, it's the highest tourist attraction in the whole country of Canada, which is kind of amazing. So again, examples there where they have taken some of the humble industrial buildings and really turned them into wonderful market places. And again, from an economic perspective, we can offer these buildings because their existing structures, we can offer these buildings to potential commercial developers at a much more attractive point, you know, lease point, because we're not having to build brand new market rate buildings. So we get an economic diversity, we get an architectural diversity, and we get a characteristic, a character diversity that we would not otherwise get. So then we started to look at the precise plan as it was developed and approved. And we think there's a lot of really fabulous stuff in this precise plan. And as as Jennifer mentioned, there's a lot of very precise detail that sets up the character of not just what the buildings might be, but the spaces between the buildings, which are the spaces that the public really inhabits. So the character of those spaces, we absolutely plan to adhere to those characteristics that were well-studied, well conceived and will be following those characteristics. We did, though, look at some of the characteristics and in particular, we looked at the the important area where where ramp comes into the site and that and really. Speaker 2: I'm sorry, before you continue. QUESTION Yes. Speaker 0: On the last slide, I just wanted to I had a note here. Is that the Hornet on Pier One? Speaker 3: I'm sorry. Speaker 2: On the map. Speaker 0: On the map. Speaker 3: I'm sorry. Is that the. Speaker 0: The Hornet. Speaker 3: Aircraft? Yes, it is. Speaker 0: Are you guys going to move the ship? Speaker 3: The Hornet is not part of our. You know, I don't think we have any plans specific to the Hornet that I'm aware of. Joe might be able to. But yeah, this is this actually was in the precise plan. So that was. Speaker 0: When you made the precise plan. Speaker 3: That was. Speaker 4: So yeah. Speaker 6: So there was Skip there was actually a consultant, Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. So him that worked for the city directly and these were just some initial concepts of things. We might be bringing more of visitors, serving aspects of of the base closer in together, but we don't have any current plans of moving the Hornet there. Speaker 0: We mean the city, the developer. Speaker 6: The city. Speaker 0: That's a substantial. Speaker 6: Yeah, no, yeah. That's I wouldn't pay. I mean we are not doing we're not we don't have plans at any point right now to do that. And in fact, there are potential plans in our lease with the Maritime Administration to maybe use that pier, generate revenue from that pier. So I think this was just a little and it's outside of our plan area. I think it was just a little creative license may have gone a little too. Speaker 0: I just want to make sure that that's not real. No. Okay. Thank you. That's another discussion. Sorry. Speaker 3: Sorry. That's okay. It's complete. As as Jennifer mentioned, it's it's certainly outside the area that we've that we've looked at at all. But you're not counting. Speaker 0: On it to attract people to that place, the Hornet. Speaker 3: Correct. So we really did start to look at what is the character of and we may want to flip back and forth between these two slides. And we'll look at this in a lot more detail as we as we move on. But as you came down ramp, the new configured ramp Parkway, the precise plan had that as an what I'll call, for lack of a better term, an engineered roadway that went through this pedestrian node. When we really started to look at the precise plan and what we thought should really take place there, we thought the circulation that the precise plan represents makes sense. What we thought was important, though, was when you got to that important pedestrian zone that we it becomes a much more pedestrian oriented place. So rather than it just being a street that wanders through that pedestrian location, we've reconfigured this to bring active uses, retail, residential and commercial closer to the water and to create a place that obviously it will be very apparent is meant for pedestrians rather than as a primary location for cars. And we'll get into that in a little bit more detail. So if you look at this precise plan or this this plan is illustrative plan, the yellow obviously represents housing the pink buildings, particularly ones with the E designation on them. Those are all actually existing buildings that we are intending to retain. And an important thing to note is that these large commercial buildings that are at the northern end of the project are also being contemplated to be. To be retained initially. Again, going back to my earlier comment, that allows us to have flexibility to bring people into those buildings early in the project's life and and bring them on board as an on an as needed basis rather than waiting to when the market will support new construction. That being said, it's still allows us to transition to new construction at any time that seems beneficial to the community. So again, when we when we did this, the idea was to follow the concepts outlined in the precise plan, but to really take a look at how could we create a place which is even more permeable and more connected, and how we bring people from these residential areas down through this new linear park. And we'll talk about that in a little bit more detail through this kind of more industrial, historic urban park zone and to the waterfront park zone. I sensing a question. Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, I met a mayor I did have a question on the the three park designations you just listed. Can you help us? Speaker 5: Yeah. Speaker 3: And actually, we'll get to that in just one, one or two more slides, and then I can go through them a little bit with a little bit more clarity, I think. So then we started to just look at some of the transportation configurations that were laid out in the precise plan and again evaluated how those fit into this plan. And again, it's a very it's a very direct mesh. And we have started discussions with with the transit district to verify route configurations and preference or bus movements. One of the things we've talked about a lot is the nature of a bus going through this important pedestrian location. And we're actually think we may be moving towards a solution which will bring busses. To that location, but not through that location. So we'll be sharing those as as those plans develop. But it's an exciting opportunity. The phasing then is outlined on this diagram. So phase zero are those things that we can do right away. And again, perfect example, these phase zero are existing buildings that in the precise plan were not there. But here we're retaining those so that we can get sort of instant sense of place right away. They are buildings that well, they may be humble, have great opportunity for unique revitalization and adaptive reuse. So we're excited about that opportunity. And then starting to really develop the waterfront where the where public will really be drawn to areas that they can really use. And the interface between existing buildings and the water will be very important. So now let's go to the to the overall diagram of the of these park districts. And so this is basically this notion that we're developing a waterfront park. The waterfront park is intended to do two things. One, make an active, highly evolving and interactive kind of public park where people can come take advantage of and reinforce the importance of the Pan AMS historic headquarters building, which, while it isn't on our site, is directly contiguous to it. And so reinforcing the importance of that axes out to the water and from the water back to it, so that we can always remember that the sort of the Star Clipper was an important part of the history of this site. And the and that building and its its contribution to the history of this site is always kind of present in your mind. And then these buildings in the waterfront park, as we're currently envisioning those will be highly flexible buildings, which could house a number of both community and or commercial activities. So again, providing a lot of flexibility then that, as you can see, starts to stitch together with what we're calling our Urban Park District, which is a variety of open spaces which meander through these existing buildings, again, giving you exposure to the characteristics of that kind of historic context, and then links you to the Neighborhood Park District , which connects you to both the commercial and to the residential neighborhoods, and allows for people to filter through those to this central link and back through the urban park and then to the Waterfront Park district as well. So this diagram sort of suggests the way that stitches together. So the idea is that there's a strong sense of connectivity, an easy way for people to go through a variety of green spaces that have a variety of characteristics. And as we get into the more detailed planning of the nature of those green spaces, we'll be presenting those to you in a lot more detail. But here are some imagery of some of the ones that are sort of inspiring some of our thinking places where people can sit, places where people can get sheltered from the wind. Places where people can connect with one another and look out at the views of the city of the water and back to the other commercial activities , places where people can gather in a variety of scales. These are some examples. I mean, we even want to take advantage of some of the existing rail lines that are there and integrate those into the landscape so that we don't just, again, strip away all the characteristics that made this place unique, but really try and build off of that character and really create a place that reflects that past. And then providing a variety of different green spaces and places for people to sit and respites where people can either gather in small groups, larger groups, or a very large community get get togethers. So this is a kind of comparison just to go back to the waterfront park. This was the the image on the right is the the image of the precise planned park. And you can see this was a street that came through and then retail was on one side of the street here and then jumped across the street and had retail there. Here we're showing a plaza that will be protected and still provide for movements of vehicles on the left hand side. But we have residential use that has ground floor retail consistent with the precise plan. And then we have a variety of different commercial and retail buildings that work their way around the the Waterfront Parkway. So again, we're at the very early stages of this. We're really excited about the opportunities. We're looking forward to your input and and developing this further and really making it a particularly incredible place for Alameda. I'm happy to answer any questions and I'm sure we'll be chatting quite a bit more as the process moves forward. But there's a lot of really great opportunity here. Speaker 2: And. So thank you very much. Looks like we have approximately ten speakers, just the council square. And if there's clarifying questions, we'll take that now. Speaker 4: Um. I have some questions. I have one on the design, which I think you would certainly be. You're the person another about aspects of, you know, how aspects that might be important to the business deal that we want to get into. So someone else might. And in terms of design. The thing that crosses my mind is the old Nancy Alameda is, in effect, a military town. It was a military town. And in that regard, you know, I remember things from City Planning School, Lewis Mumford talking about medieval cities, basically fortress cities and how there was, you know, an abundance usually of curving, winding roads for whatever reason. When you look at NASA Alameda, you actually see a lot of those and I think in large part to facilitate the movement of of goods through the transit. And so that's why you'll see. And also in the worst case scenario, if if certain aircraft had to be moved from one part of Alameda to another, that's why you have certain roads throughout that curve. Mm hmm. And actually, if you look at the the map of Alameda, you can kind of see the curve kind of extending perhaps to facilitate that. So one of the things that I'm interested in preserving is, is that that sense of, you know, in the built environment that that that sense of what a military town was like. And so. When I look at the residential side, for example, I see it's basically linear and just something to think about is perhaps is that having a because I think I saw in the orange I think I see there between the buildings, I see a walkway in between the buildings. Or perhaps something to think about is to incorporate whatever extent possible. I'm kind of curving feature to add that element of surprise that that Mumford would talk about when it came to these kinds of medieval towns. Speaker 3: I think that's an interesting point. And the the townhouse this as as Joe mentioned in his introductory comments, one of the things that was very important to us was that this not come across as a completely homogenous design exercise. That's why we have a fairly diverse design team. So that will not be the hand of a single architect designing every one of these sites. So these are conceptual sites to test block sizes and potential densities and so forth. They're not really intended at this point to be resolved designs. Now, that being said, we have tried to respect the amount of input that went into the precise plan. And the precise plan was fairly precise about bringing the urban grid that exists through Greater Alameda and the rest of the base through this zone. So I think it's something we'd be happy to chat about, but that is something that was heavily debated. And I think the notion of that urban grid retain. Now, one of the things we thought was important, you know, as you enter the base and you see that jet on the greenway, we really wanted to make sure we could kind of keep that vestigial piece. So you can see we kind of kept the curve around one side of that so that we could keep that that sort of reminder that that origin. But I will say the only other place where the site gets fairly organic is through some of the existing buildings where again, the pathways through there are much more meandering. And that's not to say the character of the landscape won't have a great deal of of organic characteristic to its design. Speaker 2: So this is I'm sorry, I just want to make sure we're sticking to clarifying questions right now. So it sounds like your question may very well have been, are you going to protect the circle? And I want to follow up with that. There are two circles. That sounds like you're not that that you will be taking out half of one of the circles. Speaker 3: The yes, we we are that's what's proposed at this time. Speaker 4: And to as it. Speaker 3: Was in the precise plan. Speaker 4: And to summarize my clarifying question, if it if we are to propose it in terms of clarifying questions, I think the question would be posed as, you know, to what extent, you know, can we have these kind of narrow pedestrian paths that are kind of that you would find in in so-called medieval fortress towns, especially as it relates to, you know, the path that I'm seeing right there? Is it I think it could add a level of mystery and what's at the end of the of that path, whereas the linear line is okay, you can see. Speaker 0: It's. Speaker 3: A completely agree with your sentiment. Speaker 4: Oh, and one less thing. I also recognize, you know, the desire to continue the grid design. So that's no doubt that that's going to happen, especially along the major arterials. I'm just talking about kind of like cute little paths that perhaps are only for the residents, but nonetheless make it a special place like the. Speaker 2: Do we have any other clarifying questions right now? Speaker 0: Yes. So maybe this is for Jennifer. Thanks for the presentation, by the way. So you mentioned that you're going to be reporting back to the council February, March, April and May. So the first question is, can you kind of give us a high level outline of what you're going to be reporting back to us on those four meetings? And what other opportunities will the public have to provide input to the plan, input at the developers, interact with the developers and comment on the plan? Speaker 6: Yeah, sure. Absolutely. So obviously tonight's meeting is a kickoff. The initial concept in February for the council will be coming back with a more complete we're going to kind of take the comments we get from city council. We're going to the planning board on Monday night 26, take those comments, start to prepare more formal development plan application . So an actual application entitlement package. So we'd be coming back in February to give you kind of to provide an update on that application. More detail is going to be a lot more detail on this that's going to start to get fleshed out. So that would be February. March is going to you know, as we go through that process, what we found when we did the entitlement process point is there starts to you start to distill down to a couple of key issues and things that people are grappling with and then have questions about. And so I imagine in March, by then we're going to have kind of distilled down, figured out what those are, start to hone in on those, make sure we bring those to the council, get some feedback, high level policy feedback from the council to start to hone in on how we tweak those, how we deal with those . April would essentially be the last, the according to schedule, the last chance before the planning board hears a recommendation for the council to again weigh in on some of those key issues. The package by then is going to be complete in terms of development plan. So just being able a chance to see that complete package one time before the plan, it goes to the planning board for recommendation and then ultimately to the Council in May in terms of other opportunities will be going to the planning board once a month as well providing workshops for up to. And there's a schedule actually attached to the staff report too for the community, for anyone who's interested. We have a web page now that we've created just related to site so people can find out when the latest meetings are. We have an email list that we send out and notify every time before we have a meeting so people can sign up on that Facebook Twitter page so we can make sure to keep people involved. But we'll be going to the Historic Advisory Board. There'll be a joint planning or Transportation Commission meeting in February, Park and Rec Commission in February. So all, you know, real extensive outreach. And then we have three open houses where, you know, if you if people are kind of intimidated or don't want to engage in this more formal planning process, we'll have three very low key open houses where the developer will have an opportunity to have the renderings. The latest pictures from the concept plan available. I will be there, staff will be available. People can just drop in from 6 to 8, ask questions of the developer, developer team, ask questions for me. And those would be the first one is going to be at Callahan piano and building 14 out at the base right on the waterfront. So people can kind of as they're looking at these renderings, think about the actual space that we're talking about and look at it. Then the second would be the library. And then the third with our concept right now it's still in development is actually have a walking tour. So to start at Main Street and Ralph Bazardo and then stop along the way at key locations along between Main Street and the Seaplane Lagoon so we can stop at a couple of key locations, actually show renderings of some of the ideas of what that space that you're standing on right here is going to look like. And then and that would be on a Saturday, Saturday morning and then end with a barbecue that allow people to actually be on the taxiways, have a barbecue, talk to the developers, talk to me, and just be at the space that we're talking about, because I think it's really important that I'll make point. I think we found this at the bike tour that it's you know, it's one thing to talk about and look at on an aerial. It's just so daunting and huge. But when you actually are there experiencing some of those spaces, I think it's really powerful and it helps people put in context what we're talking about because looking at these drawings, not everyone responds to these drawings and you need to see it and feel it. And that's what we're trying to provide those opportunities for. And that schedule, like I said, we'll probably attach that schedule, you know, in case some of the dates tweak or change these things always tweaking change. We'll have that attached to every council report. So everyone's going to know how to find out what the latest meetings are. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 4: Remember Data and this is a question perhaps for chief operating officer on art in general, but do we have a sense as to the division between owner occupied and ran Iraqi pride units at this point? And I raise that because, you know, Alameda overall we have a we have a 47% homeownership rate and a 53% renter ship rate. And in the west end of town, it's a 30% homeownership rate and a 70% renter ship rate. And these are items that certainly affect the business deal. Speaker 6: So, yeah, we don't have an we don't have a specific break. Yet. Speaker 0: I mean, in thinking of integrating this with jobs and companies. And, you know, we heard tonight one of the companies there who wants to bring 300 employees, renters. You know, we are looking at a project that would be unique to what we've been building over the last several years. And looking at a predominantly rental project, you know, about 75% of our project, including the Affordable, would be rental. 25% ownership. Speaker 2: I have a follow up question in regards to that. So it was my understanding that 25% of this project would be affordable below market rate housing. Speaker 5: That's correct. Speaker 2: And that is going to be apartments. Is that what you're looking at for that? Speaker 0: It'll be a combination. It will be some of it will be apartments, multiple in multifamily. Some of it will be part of our townhome units. So it'll be a combination. Speaker 2: And then do you have. Okay. So I know that's 25%. Is it possible to have that percentage be higher? Speaker 0: So again, please, is. Speaker 2: It possible to have that percentage be higher of the overall housing? Speaker 0: Is it possible to. Oh, no. I mean, we'd have to look at other funding opportunities that might be available, other mechanisms. You know, we have a an affordable housing developer on our team. So we can certainly sit down with them and understand. But, you know, those there's very precise funding mechanisms for those. And so, you know, we need to kind of fit within those rules, but we can report back to you. Okay. Speaker 2: And do you have any numbers in regards to what you plan, whomever is going to be charging rent or the purchase price of the units? Do you have any ranges to present us with at this point? Speaker 0: Not at this point, no. Speaker 2: In the future, do you anticipate that you'll be sharing that with us before making a decision on this? Speaker 0: Yeah, it's all going to be very market based so we can share our market studies, you know, as they continue to develop. Speaker 2: And when you're so when you're looking at this, what I'm hearing is that you're looking for new housing to accommodate employees coming to work at the point as opposed to housing for people that are already here in Alameda, for instance. Speaker 0: We're we're looking I mean, we're looking at a true mixed use project. We're looking at this does present opportunities for people who do already live and work here in Alameda? I think at the in a hearing, we heard from one renter who works at VF Outdoor and we'll hear from more of those. I think that, you know, existing companies, employees want to live here and can't find rental housing. So we're we're targeting those as well as. Providing housing for companies who will want to locate at the base. And, you know, from my. Speaker 4: Experience. Speaker 0: In the many years working in commercial, you know, we hear time and again that companies want, you know, amenities, housing in very close proximity to their place of work. Those are the kind of things that attract, you know, quality jobs, dense jobs, meaning many jobs as opposed to the more traditional, you know, low density, big box logistics types. Speaker 2: So thank you. And I have another follow up question in regards to staff. You had mentioned that part of this proposal is $5 million towards the first phase of the sports complex. What is the total amount of the anticipated cost of the sports complex? Speaker 6: Well, we have the master infrastructure plan now is about $20 million. So this would be about a quarter of what we what we set aside. Speaker 2: All right. Thank you very much. And I believe we have one more question. Speaker 4: Well, more and more of a comment. I for one, I think the data when it comes to friendship in Alameda, I think the data indicates that we have a lot more rental units generally. And in the West End in particular, I think from the West End's point of view, there's been a long held desire for more owner occupied units. Now, that doesn't mean that we have. Speaker 1: I'm sorry. Speaker 4: Sorry. Speaker 2: That's just we're going to be able to discuss later. We just want to have our clarifying questions and then I want to get to our speakers. Any other clarifying questions? It's clarifying. Thanks. So thank you, Ms.. And and the other presenters. Great presentations and the staff report I'm talking about web pages is three. But anyway it says that the planning board. With direction from the city council will approve a development plan after numerous public meetings. Thorough vetting by the community and I and forgive me if I miss this you've said it before, but how does the the city council give the planning board direction regarding the development plan? Does it go to the planning boards, city council, back to planning board or. Speaker 6: Right. So for instance, tonight during the comments, we'd like to hear City Council's initial thoughts about the site plan. Then when, you know, because of the tight timeline and the desire to keep this, you know, moving and moving forward, we will then either city planner Andrew Thomas or I will actually, since I was here tonight, I will actually present that those comments that you have to the planning board orally. If we have time, we'll actually incorporate those comments into the staff report, going to the planning board. So we will incorporate that into our presentation and the planning board. So just like I stood up here tonight, I'll give a similar presentation on Monday night and then append to that essentially. And here are some of the comments that the City Council had in terms of guidance toward regarding that development plan, so that the planning board can hear that, take that into consideration, and then have them react . So we see this essentially as the kickoff. City Council Planning Board. City Council Planning Board. City Council Planning Board. Throughout this entire process, ultimately the planning board approves that development plan in April incorporating or you know, recommends approves it, the planning board or the dwelling plan and recommends any other documents to city council. And the city council approves the DDA in May or the disposition development agreement. And nothing happens without that disposition development agreement. So the buck really stops at the city council. The city council has all of the all the power in terms of determining what the deal is, what the financial terms are. And so that DDA is really what kind of holds the keys to being able to move forward with this project. Speaker 2: Thank you for one last clarifying question. Thank you, Mayor. Speaker 0: With regard to the housing, can you explain if there's a density bonus application that is relevant to this project? Or is the project the 800 homes? Speaker 6: The project. The 800 homes? Correct. And the city council, essentially through its development agreement, disposition development agreement can it's the city council's land, I mean, or the city's land. And so the city council can essentially create a cap on the 800 units for this project. Now, there may be the need for density. There most likely will be a need for a density bonus application in order to receive a waiver of the multi-family housing prohibition in the municipal code. But no density bonus units are contemplated on top of that 800 800. Speaker 0: Okay. So that's very critical with the timeline that we resolve the issues that were brought up at the last meeting. We are on what ordinance says that needs to happen. Speaker 6: So that we are very aware of that. Speaker 0: And. Speaker 2: We'll be discussing that. I think our. Speaker 6: Target is for March 3rd to come to you. Speaker 2: Any other clarifying questions? All right. And we're going to get to my first speaker will be Kari Thompson, then Angela Hawk about and then Ken Peterson. Thank you for being so patient. Speaker 1: Good evening, Madam Mayor. City Council staff. Some of you I saw this morning so I could see you again tonight. My name is Kerry Thompson. I am the immediate past president of the Chamber of Commerce. I am also the current chairperson for the Economic Development, Government Relations and Economic Development Committee for the Chamber. And hopefully at some point in the next couple of months, I will have each of you at one of our meetings so that you can talk with our committee. I would really appreciate that. First of all, I want to thank the staff for all of their time, all of their energy, hard work and dedication to our city . They have been extremely forthcoming with information. They have been very responsive to questions about all of the projects that are currently happening in the city. And I want to recognize them for that and thank them. And especially in regards to site, which is the cornerstone of the development for Alameda Point. Creating a residential community at site A is a critical means to the desired end at Alameda Point. The economics created by housing are the only feasible way to finance parks, amenities and infrastructure in a post redevelopment era. Approximately 75% of the housing at site will be rental. A significant departure from other new developments in alameda. With the island's housing shortage. There is particularly high demand for rental units, mixed use. Communities with the significant arts maker and entrepreneurial cultural are a proven catalyst for successful development. This environment attracts foremost companies that build a more durable and sustainable job, such as right speed that we were at this morning. Site A will create several thousand construction and permanent jobs combined. And I would just like to address Councilmember Desai and point out that we're talking about Alameda as a whole, not just as a West End . I have grown up all over Alameda. I don't just because I currently live on Bay Farm Island identify myself as somebody from Bay Farm Island. And I really think that housing in general, particularly the rental market, is you're going to hear a little bit later is critically important. And I don't think it matters so much as where it is, but that it's available. So I just want to share that. Thank you. Speaker 4: Have a difference of agreement opinions here. Speaker 2: Next speaker, Angela. I'm sorry, Ken. You're after Angela. Let Angela speak first. Thank you. Sorry. That's okay. Speaker 1: Good evening, Madam Speaker, and city council members and staff. As a renter at the Alameda Renters Coalition, we are very excited at the prospect of hundreds of rental units coming on the market in the coming years. We cannot say enough about how few units are on the market right now, not just rental, but available for sale. I think it's nine units or houses that are available for sale. So we're not just talking about renters who will benefit from these houses and rental units. We're talking about people who aren't even able, even with money and resources, to buy a house in Alameda. So these houses, these rental units are vitally important. And in a legal environment where we have no recourse over high rent increases, they represent hope for us in that we could stay in Alameda if more of these units are built. So I appreciate your consideration in studying these these plans. And hopefully, you know, in five years, maybe one of us will be living in one. So thank you very much. Speaker 2: Can Peterson. Speaker 0: Thank you very much. Comments earlier reminded me of some of the traditional arguments that are put forth in these kinds of situations. I reminded of the forums that we had or put on by Ms.. Ott very capably when we were looking at some of the Sun Kil ideas and in the brochure, which is a beautiful brochure. Councilmember Ashcraft was participating in some of those because I remember we were at the same table and there were pictures of examples of what infrastructure and amenities can be built. With the use of housing development money and that how housing development money was necessary in order for us to have those things. None of the examples were built with housing development money. None of them. They were all built by other means. Now, I think that if you look at this structure and think of it maybe in a different way, there is an approach that might to deal with the questions of of financing, of building the infrastructure, of environment, of transportation and probably another other many other things, a commercial development, possibly raising money for the city, but nobody talks about it. The interesting thing is it has to do with energy and is possible to store energy very in it, very efficiently and economically and I think very profitably as well as being environmentally desirable. If you have energy and energy is cheap, which I believe is possible now, you could have the possibility of supplementing the commercial establishments and the industrial interests places and maybe make this area more inviting. It can also be used to supplement the retail outlets and the housing. Now if you have the energy and it's cheap enough, you could possibly set up a desalination plant up in the west end of the island, and that's desirable from the standpoint of the East Bay mode, which needs the water. And in the process of doing that, they would probably contribute the sewage infrastructure and the supply of electricity and other things in there. The the. The State is very interested in energy storage and mandated in 2010 that the consumer owned utilities establish feasibility studies for this. And so that some of that has been done, but done very poorly. So there's a possibility here that very exciting to take care of all of the issues except the traditional mixed use retail housing approach that you take. Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Michael McDonough. Then it'll be Brian Groves and then Casey Sparks. Thank you. Speaker 0: It evening, Madame Mayor and council staff. Thanks for having us here tonight. I just want to say that the chamber I'm the Michael McDonald, president of the Chamber of Commerce. And I want to say that the Chamber fully supports this project as well as the developer. You may know that it's been said earlier today that Mr. EARNEST is very is not only a resident here in town, but been very active in producing previous projects that have created hundreds of jobs. And of course, the chamber's interested in jobs, and we're interested in building commercial facilities out on the base as well, like most people are. But it's been proven that through other rescues that the commercial developers do not want to develop Alameda Point because of the infrastructure issues. So I believe that though there may be other ways to to do that, this is the only way that anyone has come up with that has volunteered to come to Alameda to develop our infrastructure. And one thing that bothers me even more is not only attracting those commercial businesses, but keeping the businesses that are already out there because of the deteriorating infrastructure. We've got a lot of great businesses out there that Alameda is enjoy, like Rockwall Winery, Blaydon Sports Club. I think there's 7000 people a day that go to play them. And just a couple of weeks ago, they lost electricity for three days. There's water main break. It's oh, I don't know, several that I've heard about that can take $50,000 a day to repair. These are issues that if we can't get that repaired, we risk losing the businesses that are already out there and the jobs that they provide. So not only are we concerned about bringing more commercial businesses to the point, but keeping the ones that are there through improving that infrastructure and giving them a reason to stay there. If we do not do that, I would imagine ten years from now that the base will be more vacant than it is now and more rundown than it is now, because there won't be the infrastructure to support the businesses that are there currently, much less bringing new businesses out there. So the chamber is fully behind this project and the developer, and we just want to do what we can to support that. Speaker 2: Q Brian GROSS. Speaker 3: Thank you, Madam Chair. And good evening. And you were very close. My name is Brian Graves, and I come before you tonight to read a letter on behalf of Brad Schuck, co-owner of Palladium. It reads as follows. Dear Mayor Spencer, Alameda City Council. I'm the co-owner operator of Palladium, Sports and Fitness Club at Alameda Point. We moved our business from San Francisco to Alameda over 15 years ago, and I've grown to one of the largest employers at Alameda Point and one of the leading on the island. Our facility hosts thousands of visitors each week and employs over 120 people. We've been proud to operate at Alameda Point and can only continue to do so if significant upgrades come to this part of the island. Saturday promises to be a catalyst for redeveloping the point. We are excited to hear this evening's update the council and see this plan move forward. The proposal for Friday will provide much of much of the infrastructure element a point businesses need to operate. We cannot continue to serve our clients with aging roads and failing internet, phone and other utilities. Say is the minimum needed to provide some economies of scale for the infrastructure development. A bootstrap side by side approach would cost 2 to 3 times as much. Exclamation point. Alameda Point businesses have seen many failed attempts to develop the point. We are encouraged by the city's vision and Alameda Point Partners plan to create a mixed use community that will attract quality companies to build a durable and sustainable jobs. Site promises well-integrated retail and open space amenities, housing and transit. This will attract more companies like Wright Speed. Who's workforce want wants to work where they can live and play alamy the point businesses want to continue to thrive and grow at this location. We support this plan and will work hard to ensure success. Anything less will force us to look at other alternative locations. Sincerely, Brad Schuck, President Blame Sports and Fitness Club. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. Casey Sparks. And I'm going to just read the names of the next speakers Ellen Source, Karen Bay and then William Smith. And you can just follow each other. Speaker 0: It even. Speaker 7: Madam Chair, Mr. Vice Mayor and members of the City Council and City Staff. Thank you for having me speak very briefly. I don't want to repeat the points that have been made earlier, but just briefly, as a way of introduction, I'm not representing any organization. I've been to be a member of the City of Element, a Democratic club, and young Democrats as a board member of each but of the denominator for two years. I'm a millennial, and I think that what is one of the main things that I'm excited about in support of Elemental Point Partners Inside is that I think that this really plans for the future and it's progress for the city of Alameda, for our island, not just for the sake of progress, but because I think it's a major improvement for all the reasons that have been stated. I think that the way that it's been designed for the future is that it takes into account additional housing. So that I think what many people have spoken, their ideal vision for the future is where people can walk to work and take public transit to work. And if you create additional housing on the island in addition to jobs, then people aren't coming from off the island to work here. And conversely, people aren't having to commute off the island from here to work elsewhere, which is another very on paper, simple solution. But I think that as element moves forward into the 21st century, we have to embrace that. We have to embrace that. People are competing differently now. They're not driving everywhere. They are taking transit more. I take the ferry and the bus and go for my work and I think that this is something that being built for the future, being built as a measure of progress that improves across the board the circumstances that are there now, I think that it deserves deserves our full support. And I wanted to offer that as my thought. And I appreciate your time and your consideration. Speaker 1: Evening. You've heard bits of history tonight about now made a point. And I just want to give you a slightly different history that pre-dates the ones we've heard in 1993. Mayor Pizarro convened a group of chairs of commissions and citizens at large, and this was to really look at what had happened when the base closed and how we could restore the vitality of the Naval Air Station. The result of our 45 to 50 meetings of almost five years of work was to produce the community reuse plan that reflected what we had heard in the community. What we had heard from the development community and experts in land use of what we might be able to expect here in our island community. The Community Business Use Plan, which I'm sure most of you have read, was to guide and did guide the changes to the city's general plan for incorporating this one third of the island back into the city. Our initials Brag stood for Base Reuse Advisory Group, and we added the tagline of Brag if you live in Alameda because we were quite proud of the potential that Alameda Point offers to the community. So we fast forward to 2014 and I think the city has said exactly the right thing by not taking on a developer to do the development, by breaking and into chunks that are more manageable and more likely to move forward in tandem than one after the other. We'll also offer choices in architecture that will benefit from. And this first development of the Alameda Point site really reflects sea objectives of the rig, is we channel the development ideas that the community told us into the reuse plan. And I really wanted to say that this first development really includes the elements that we wanted, which were a mixture of uses housing for all incomes and produces uses that will help bring back the badly needed vitality that the city lost. This also will have the huge benefit of starting the infrastructure development, which is currently a real detriment to the city and has the potential of being a sinkhole of money. If we don't find someone, that will make a big start to trigger the development out there. So the Alameda Home Team urges your support for this development, and we feel that it will provide many economic and social benefits to the city. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you, Karen Bay. Speaker 0: Mm hmm. Speaker 5: It had been Mayor Spencer, members of the council and staff. My name is Karen Bay. I am a 37 plus year member of the community and I'm here tonight to support the development of site A at Alameda Point. Excuse me, if my voice is a little scratchy, I'm getting over the flu. So first thing I wanted to mention is I don't know if you read the article in the San Francisco Business Times, one of the most. Speaker 0: Prestigious. Speaker 5: Business journals in the Bay Area. And we were on the front page and I'll read the heading. Tesla co-founder Ian Wright opens Alameda Plant to make electric truck powertrains. And I. I read the San Francisco Business Times almost daily and I can't tell you how proud I am to see Alameda on the front page competing in the marketplace for jobs and moving companies, relocating companies to Alameda. It's pretty amazing. And we've been on the front page, I think, in the last couple of months. We've been there at least three times. So Alameda is making a great name for itself and this project is helping us do that. This we are in the middle of a perfect storm. We've got an improving economy. We've got a great location. We've got a dream team. And I've been in the real estate development business for 15 years. I can tell you this is a dream team and we're very fortunate that we are our own master developer. We get to decide, we get to choose and this is a great project. I want to focus on a couple of other really strong strengths. The construction of infrastructure, backbone infrastructure at Site A is going to lay the groundwork to lay the foundation for site B, and that is going to bring in sewer, storm drain. Speaker 3: Streetlights, roads. Speaker 5: All of the utilities. And it's going to be an a great gateway, by the way. I'm really into gateways. So and I've been looking at this gateway. It's really great. 75% of the residential units are going to be rental and 25% of those are going to be affordable. That speaks volumes to our affordable housing crisis that we're suffering from right now. And we're going to hear from renters tonight. This addresses that issue. And it provides amenities, housing and amenities for businesses that want to relocate and then the ferry terminal. And I'll talk about that next time. But I'm a ten year old ferry terminal writer. So thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. At this point, I have three more slips on this item. William Smith next. That'll be Kurt Petersen and then Barbara Rasmussen. Speaker 3: Good evening, Mayor Spencer. Council members and staff. I'm William Smith, the vice president of Renewed Hope Housing Advocates. And as Helen has mentioned, the planning element of points been going on for a while and renewed hope was founded over 15 years ago. And we were our major reason was to help get housing out of the Naval Air Station. So we're delighted to see that we've got a valid proposal that looks like it's going to go forward. So we're definitely very supportive of it. One of our first things that we did when we formed as a rent hopping organization was we tried to protect and get East housing converted into affordable housing. Back at that time. We didn't succeed there. There's a nice development there now, but it didn't have nearly the amount of affordable housing we thought we'd get in affordable housing . The rest of the base within a few years. Well, few years has turned into a decade now or something like that. So we think it's time for this housing to go to go forward. And a couple other points I wanted to make in terms of your point where there are 25% affordable housing, is is a maximum. No, it's not. It's a minimum. So the city could definitely go higher than that and a percentage out there. But we need to do some things about it to be very creative and very innovative. It's not going to be easy. And one of the things we need to do is really get a bang up transportation plan, because if we get people have that, we need to get more qualify for more very, very competitive, affordable housing grants. For that, we need to have a really world class transportation plan out there. We also need to have business, businesses, retail and shopping where people can get close to the work. We need to have schools, so there's a lot of things we have to work together. And books is delighted that we feel the sense that the business community, the environmental community and the affordable housing community and other communities in Alameda are coming together, the realtors, to to get behind this project and to finally get something started out there at Alameda Point. Thank you. Speaker 0: I promise this be the last time tonight I get in. Kurt Petersen, thank you again for allowing me to address you on this topic as well. One of the things that really kind of concerns me on this whole project, and it did at the very moment that the city council approved as far as Alameda Point Partners, as the exclusive developer for it was one of the claimed pains for the developing portion of this tax credit as far as we're Emeryville. Okay. At the Powell Street, I-80 area. Okay. I don't know if most of you probably gone there. Thank you. I noticed right off the bat, congestion and traffic is an outrageous problem in Emeryville. So again, it falls under the concern that I have as far as development and making sure that traffic is set up properly. Also, I want to mention real quickly up here, if you're going to show us some illustrations like this, you need to get the jet in the correct area because that's not where it's at. It's definitely south of there. So if you're going to give us the illusion that that's the straight view in from our Basato Parkway, that is not because it runs south of where the seaplane lagoon is. So if they're going to present something to you, it should be accurate. Okay. The other situation. They mentioned several things, and I'll try to do it real quickly. The Dredging Seaplane Lagoon. Okay. Since when I first joined the RAB, one of the things that got postponed time and time again was the clean up the seaplane lagoon. It wasn't until the last three years they said, Gosh, we don't know what to do with this horrible site. Then three years ago, the Navy said, Oh, we'll simply dredge it. It'll take care of everything. Okay. Well, you have radioactive material that's come down in both corners. Okay. They did do dredging. They're still implying that there still could be some radioactive materials in the water, especially in the corners. They're talking about dredging it, which could interrupt and disturb that material. ST $10 million. That's great. Got to look at it more carefully. Could be a lot more than that. We're talking millions that the Navy has used to clean up. This is what I was talking about. Open up a can of worms that can come back and bite us all. I don't think we want to do that. We want a beautiful place out there. Not an outrageous expense for myself and the rest of the city. Alameda. The other thing is I couldn't help but also notice these beautiful little islands that are down over on the sea plain lagoon side. That's also area that they found some radioactive material in that park section. So, again, I don't know what they slated as far as clean up of that could be a lot more than they are aware of. And also, I thought it was going to be a lot more as far as industrial or commercial, lot less housing, tons of housing, housing costs, money, as everybody knows, inner structure wise. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. So next to be Barbara and then John Spangler. And then I think we're finished with our public speakers. Speaker 1: Good evening, Mayor Spencer. Speaker 5: Members of the Council. Staff. Happy New Year. Looking at this, I did not intend to speak. But in looking at this, we have a maximum of 800 units currently in this phase plan for housing. My question is, where are these children going to go to school? I'm sure there are going to be some children there. Do we have a plan in any of this for where they're going to go to school? Speaker 2: Thank you. John Spangler. Speaker 0: Thank you very much, mayor spencer. By Syrian Motor City members of the council and staff. I've been to a lot of meetings, that element of point since Lynn and I moved here in 1997. I'm really pleased with the Alameda Point Partners proposal. Overall, obviously, not all the details are in yet. We don't have as got some everyday sug mentioned housing prices and a lot of other things and finding schools is important too. But I like the direction of this. I like the re-use of existing buildings. I like the fact that the housing will be compacted so that it will be more transit friendly. And as Bill Smith mentioned a few minutes ago, transportation is the key and element of point. And we can make it work with the connections we have on and off island. We will have to change our habits, but that's not impossible. We have all learned to not smoke in as many places as we used to drive smaller cars than my parents drove. And otherwise do things differently and we can continue to do that. So I hope this proposal will keep moving forward. And we're going to see some more good news at the next update. Thank you very much. Speaker 2: Thank you. Right. And we're comments. Matt Amir. Yes. Good to hear. For some clarification for a couple of I think major points that were raised on the I know is Mr. Russell still here? Not the missile is not capable. But can you can you talk to the sea plane, lagoon dredging issue? Speaker 0: Sure. Speaker 6: As to the the Navy has they did performed quite a bit of dredging in those two corners that you saw in the presentation before. And significant cubic yards of sediment was removed. It was actually spread out on these drying beds, dried, scanned for for radioactive material and then disposed of appropriately. And so the Navy has clean up those two corners, which were the concentrations of the contamination. And, you know, as I think Peter Russell said earlier, that indications are they haven't you know, the the bow isn't on this yet and not everyone's signed off entirely. But that that those areas are have been sufficiently cleaned up to the standards that were were expected. Um, as we move forward, there are these kind of light fixtures and other things that, that they found that are sparsely about for per acre, for instance. Speaker 2: And not so much light fixtures, but light switches like that. Speaker 6: Which is that had residual luminescent paint on them. And so those as we move forward, the institutional control most likely for site 17, which is a Sea Plan Lagoon and this is all still being worked out to a certain degree will be will say that the dredging has to have a sediment management plan. So just like we have for the rest of the site, here's how we're going to dispose of the sediment because of these like these little devices or kind of light switches. And so that sediment management plan will contemplate essentially the same process we believe that the Navy did, which is dry the sediment, scan it, and then dispose of the spoils appropriately. And so, for instance, when we're looking at the ferry terminal, we will have to we don't we are hopeful. And we've actually had a marine engineer look at the the topography and our what you say the bathymetry. It's called of the Sea Plane Lagoon. We did a scan recently in October that found that most likely with this ferry terminal, we won't have to do any dredging. But if we do do some dredging, we will have to go through this. It'll probably be very minimal and we'll have to go through the same process that the Navy did in terms of disposing of that sediment. Speaker 2: And then when other question or did you ask a question on this topic? Because I was going to hop to another topic. Speaker 0: I just had a note. Ever brought a comment. Okay. Speaker 2: Okay. And if you can, I know this is beyond the scope of CIDA, but I also know that there is some school district property out in Alameda Point. But can you speak to the question that was raised to where do the children go to square with children who live there, go to school? Speaker 6: Yes. So there are a couple of things. I mean, we will we have been and will continue to be in dialog with the school district as we go through these open houses, will be doing stakeholder meetings and the school district will be one of the stakeholder holders that we will meet with to discuss this plan. We've been doing that for the last 24, 24 months, going through the entitlement period, met a number of occasions with the school district staff. We will also the developer will be required to pay capital fees for to the state as part of their project to fund construction of new schools. This there is a 20 acre site that's currently owned by the school district that could be the site of a new school if the school district decided to pursue that. And we have looked at our environmental impact report at impacts to schools and the availability in the different schools around Alameda Point. And so, you know, whether or not there's room at Ruby Bridges or we'll be looking at that and working with the school district to discuss that and address that issue. Speaker 2: Thank you. So at this point, members can make comments of actually, did you want to make comments or you on here for me to do but I'll I'd love to hear from my colleagues thank you. Okay. So you can go ahead. Speaker 0: Remember in your presentation. Thank you. By the way, was excellent presentation. You mentioned that there was a team that was completed and then I heard one or two comments from the public that were putting the cart before the horse. So can you explain to me, are we doing that? And if we're not, then maybe you can explain to the public. So they have the benefit of of your knowledge on why we're not sure. Speaker 6: Absolutely. I do not think we're putting the cart before the horse. I think we before any develop or similar to the zoning to the master infrastructure plan, we decided we didn't want each developer to come in and propose their own team plan, although we do have something that I'll discuss. But what we wanted was a team plan that looked at the entire base. So Transportation Department manager plan was all that means is how do we make sure, how do we get people out of their cars, out of there and onto transit and using other modes of transportation, incentivizing people to walk to work, other things like bike to work, take transit to work. How do you do that? What's the way to address that? And this plan does that. It looks at all of Alameda point. It's very detailed. It actually has a cost to the budget related to all the different programs and incentive incentive programs, transit programs that that are contemplated for Alameda point. And it actually requires every developer that comes in including the city developer and they're working on theirs right now I know because I've talked to them about it is a transportation demand management compliant strategy. So every developer so come in and tell us how they're going to comply with our overarching team plan. And that doesn't just mean check a box here or there, it means telling us in very detail how how are they going to fund some of these things? How are we going to address these issues, what programs are going to get implemented and when? And those programs, just to be clear, are our shuttles. I could be trained, it could be transit with AC transit. But if AC transit, you know, there are some comments made. I've seen, you know, if AC transit doesn't step up to the plate, then private shuttles are going to be there to provide the service. There's going to be direct, fast, convenient service from Alameda Point to 12th Street, BART, within the first 100 units, if not sooner of development out there. So that's part of it. Free bus passes for all employees and all residents at Alameda Point and car share, bike share facilities, all kinds of programs, van pool, ride sharing programs, all kinds of other programs. We have, in fact, have a grant from MTC $150,000 grant for over three years to hire some of the best transportation consultants that specialize in setting these programs up. It's actually the woman that set up the emery go round in Emeryville, which is extremely successful. She'll be working as a contractor for us, paid for by MTC to help us implement this plan over the next three years. Holding our hands, holding developers hand, making sure that every development has a good plan for addressing these issues. And it does it successfully and in a way that was going to, you know, make sure that people use transit. Another approach, honestly, and it was it was interesting to hear one of the speakers that said their millennium is to attract the right type of people to the site not and to make sure that that the development is created in a way that attracts the type of people that don't use cars or you only have one car. And so that's an important part of this. And one of the ways you do that is having convenient transit shuttles, other services there from the moment they move in, sort of wait four or five years and then implement some of these programs. Well, then you've already sold homes or you already rented homes to people that obviously don't use transit because they bought a home here where there wasn't any. And so the important piece of this is creating those day one strategies or having fast, convenient service shuttle programs, bus pass, free bus passes from day one. And every property owner is going to have to pay into that to fund operations so that you have a dedicated funding source for paying for those things, so that if someone if they say, hey, I'm not going to pay this special tax to to pay for transportation, I'd like to drive I'm not going to pay for that if I'm not going to use those services. So the intent is to really attract people that really want to live in a community that uses transit. And what we've heard from some of the consultants that we talked to, transportation consultants, there are very few jurisdictions around here that are actually requiring developers to pay for operations of transportation. It's one thing that they do, you know, infrastructure districts, CFDs, to pay for infrastructure or municipal services, police and fire, but actually require developers to pay for operations. The transportation services is actually very cutting edge. It's not being done in Oakland. It's not being done in Berkeley. So we're we've got a lot of really great, very detailed plans. And I'm going to point to plan. And every developer, including this one, is going to have to tell us how they're complying with that. And that will be part of the package that comes to the planning board, comes to the council, and will ultimately have to be approved by this council. So it's going to have to stand up to it, to your standards as well. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 2: Comments from council members. Speaker 0: The Mayor of a couple of comments. Um, first is probably the easiest one. Um. The people made mention of Gateway to this project. That being the east gate and the gate is gone, but the plane is there. And I'm hoping my colleagues would support retaining the ellipse in which the plane sits, because there are three planes that remind us of the base and Snow High School, Main Street Gate and the East Gate. So that's just my opinion. I think it makes a fine entrance and I would like to see that he lifts. And though we may not have been a medieval fortress, it does evoke the pattern of the base. And I think that's relatively easy. But tying in the more difficult issues, and I think we did it was made mentioned that we learned with buying insurance for remediation that wasn't caught by the sampling in the Navy. And all the agencies have done a great job in sampling and in removing. But sampling is sampling. It's not 100%. And when the backhoes start digging, there may be something found. I want to make sure that in our agreements that the city is not held liable. And as a as an edge to that or a tangent to that is when do the ferry be put in the seaplane lagoon? There will be dredging needed. Because it's not static. It's like all the marinas and shorelines of the city. There will be periodic dredging needed and has to be explored and handled, particularly with the radium issue. Radioactivity is radium paint. I think that needs to be ensured and or anticipated in the course of operations as well as the cost of putting that installation there. Also related to that, there are there are hundreds of feet, if not. A few miles of storm sewer that were exposed to the dumping of radioactive paint. If I remember this, Peter Russell O'Hare, if I remember the meetings when this was first discovered actually quite by accident. Those. I think we need to either make sure we insure or somehow transfer liability to to the new owners. And I'd rather insure it then and and disclose and insure rather than and just hand off liability to somebody else. And then lastly, on the transportation and this would be. Part of that direction to the planning board as well as the Transportation Commission is. Please look at this project. In the envelope of and I know we talk about east and west, and the fact is there's a tube and there's a ferry terminal now. And we need to look at the load on that and and looking at it as a whole with the development. It's already in our general plan. And this is not in in. And that infrastructure. When we look at the northern waterfront with a housing element, only 245 units. Of. That's in our our housing element. And this is not yet and we have to resolve basically that load. When we look at this particular project. Those are my comments. I think that transit plan is. As if they're going to be houses there. That's that's absolutely. Speaker 2: The other member, De Sung. Speaker 4: Thank you very much. Mayor Spencer. You know, there's a variety of ways that we need to look at this project. But Chief and foremost, this is what's before us as a council on behalf of the residents. This is a business deal that we're going to make. And in the context of that business deal, one major context is we have to make sure that of the 550 to $600 million in infrastructure cost or all of the base that parcel a make sure that it pays for its share of that overall 550 to $600 million in infrastructure cost. So in order for it to meet its share, we have to have a clear understanding of what are the fiscal impacts of having whatever arrangement of housing that you have in mind, whether it's 25% homeownership and 75% ownership, or whether it's some other percentage, 50, 50 or 75, 25 the other way because the way in which the the tenure is established might have consequences with regard to how we treat those long term obligations that's going to be associated with the 550 to $600 million. So that's understanding the fiscal impacts in terms of treating Parcel A's share of the overall infrastructure plan. So we need to make sure to understand that the second fiscal impact we need to understand are certainly the services related to ongoing services related to the different tenure and arrangements. So we're going to need to understand on the on the revenue side, you know, how how much in property taxes and how many how much in property taxes? How much in in property transfer taxes? How much in sales taxes are generated under one scenario, whether it's 25% ownership with a 75% apprenticeship versus another scenario, what are the property taxes, transfer taxes, etc., that's generated under, say, a 50% ownership versus a 50% ownership scenario has on the fiscal side, we need to understand how those revenues play out relative to whatever costs, municipal costs are associated with it. When we talk about the municipal service district, for example, you know, the residents in Bayport are paying a MSD of roughly $1,000 a year. I mean, you know how you can put on top of the market rent a municipal service district? As well as other fees. I can put that on and still have a workable project that's 75% rental. I don't know. I'd have to see the details of how that that it's possible. So. We have a serious housing situation, there is no doubt. And it's happened here. Right now in Alameda. When we plan alameda point, especially starting with parcel a while, we certainly don't want to forget the housing crisis that we're dealing with. We also have to make long term decisions for, well, decision for the long term. And when it comes to looking at the housing tenure, I think that's important. For example, one can conceivably argue that if you had a different housing tenure arrangement. Hypothetical 50% ran or 50% townhouses in condo for sale townhouses and condos. One could conceivably argue that young adults can move into the townhouse, can start by living in the apartments and transition into the condos and townhouses once they build up their their down payment. And then as they build up equity in those multifamily units, perhaps then move into historic Alameda. So we need to look at the housing as a set of flow of services over time that deals with the the evolving needs of the residents. We can't just respond to, as important as it is, the housing crisis that we're dealing with right now in 2015. So there are. So there's a range of information that on the business deal slash fiscal side that I'm certainly interested in looking at. In general, I believe that the process established by city manager John Russo, starting when I started in January 2013, at that time he outlined a vision of how that different things are going to happen , how we're going to take we're going to do the master infrastructure plan, how we're going to go about doing the zoning, how we're going to go about doing the waterfront so that we can land, put all our ducks in a row so that we're in a position to find the developer. So I can't say enough. Kudos to the city manager Russo's approach to this that he started and that he implemented to a tee. And it's important to say because that it was in stark contrast to the two failed attempts where we tried to do everything at once. So we learned our lesson out of that process. I do believe that SRM is the right choice as the developer. So let me let me make sure to say that I like their vision in terms of the retail side, looking at, you know, ways to tap into the creative the emerging creative economy, things like, you know, people who who who create things using 3D printers that they can then sell and then generate a sales tax as a result. So making sure to have the retail space or commercial space to accommodate that growing sector. But I will say, though, on the residential side. And let me make sure to say that there are there are no deal killers here. But there are certainly. From my vantage point, I mean, I do think that we have serious concerns about the 2570 5% ratio. I suspect. It might not even pencil out, you know? I mean, we'll have to look and look at the details to see how it does. And from the backdrop, you know, like I said before, the west end of town has a 70% ownership rate. For the longest time, the west end of town has seen Alameda Point as creating a sense of stability. Much needed. I mean, think about it. Think about all the schools that closed in the west end of town. And the closed schools didn't close in the east end of town or the or the central part of town. And all you had Longfellow clothes, you had shipping clothes, and then you had the you know, they were converted to something where you had Woodstock close. I mean, there has been a tremendous amount of social instability in the west end of town. And I am looking in this project much in the way that I looked at Bayport at that time in 1999. 24 hours, a stabilizing force, not just for Alameda in general, but particularly the west end of town. And I and I say that unapologetically. So I think there are some I think we've made great strides. I think we're building off the work that was put in place and especially the town planning that. So I'm put together and the presentation in terms of the built environment done by the SRM and their partners tonight falls within that. There are some things that I. In terms of the built environment I'd certainly like to look at even more particularly. I mean, I am interested in the quality of the building designs. I encourage people to look at the town center plan because there's a whole section in there that that really discusses thoroughly our expectations. So the planning board in that regard I think did a great job and it looks like the SRM is definitely following through on it. But there are some tweaks in here that that in terms of the design and built environment that I'm interested in. But the fiscal impacts with regard to dealing with the long term obligations as well as the fiscal impacts with regard to dealing with ongoing municipal services, certainly are also issues as well as obviously transportation. Speaker 0: I'll try to be brief, but I do want to thank the presenters for the presentation. I think it's an exciting project and I'm I'm kind of excited that we're going to have the opportunity to move forward with this after after decades of planning and decades of talking about it. So somebody said it's a priority project. I think it's a critical project. We heard from the owner of Palladium on the infrastructure issues that are out there. At the point this morning I was on the phone with one of the other tenants out there and they explained to me how they they have intermittent problems with water supply . When they have their sewage, they have to put it into a truck and then have the truck drive over and dump their sewage into a sewer. So if we really want to protect and save the businesses that we have out there, let alone attract more like right speed and others, then I think this is a critical project to keep moving forward. So when I lived on on Bay Farm, I had the opportunity to work with, with with Joe Ernst and SRM because we lived in the neighboring development. And, you know, I found him to be very open, very accessible and very amenable to changes and suggestions from the community. So I encourage the public as we go through, we have four more council meetings, we have planning board meetings, we have historical advisory board meetings. I encourage folks to to go talk to Joe, work with the developers. If if you have issues with the designs, if you have issues with the Ellipse, whether you think it should be there or not be there, talk to them. And I think you'll find a very amenable and very easy to work with. And I think in the end we'll have a project that the community will not only have input in, but we'll be proud of because it'll be our project. I'm not going to go into the extensive comments that Councilmember Daisuke made, but I do want to say that I, I agree with a lot of the concerns he's raised about the the rental owner owner occupied ratio. So I think as we go forward, I'd be interested in hearing more about that and I'd be interested in having the public provide a lot more input on this. But I'm really excited about this. And just one positive point to the reuse. I think that that's a positive part that I think we should continue to do. And I thought somebody said possible reuse, but I hope we can do more definite reuse instead of possible reuse. So thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you to all of our presenters and all of you speakers too. I take copious notes and read them back and it helps inform me. This morning, as I mentioned earlier, I did attend the press event for the opening of the right speed manufacture. This is one of the founders of Tesla motors, has spun off his own company that manufactures these electric drive trains that run motors for trucks, basically to help clean up our environment, because these are especially short haul vehicles like all the garbage trucks that service Marin County in the North Bay Counties. FedEx is starting to use them and they're picking up and moving from San Jose, doubling their workforce and coming to Alameda. And I was struck by a comment our city manager, John Russo, made when he was addressing us this morning. He called it Back to the Future. And I mean, when you looked at what right speed is is doing, but also back to the future, we're bringing back to Alameda Point what was once there. And of course, I do mean in the nice history that was presented through all these wars and conflicts from World War Two through Korea, through Vietnam, the Alameda Point was the Naval Air Station when I was growing up here was both home and business and a work environment. I had friends who lived out there and there were jobs, there were houses, there was retail, the commissary. And I remember the gas station because like I said, I went sometimes with my friend's parents when they go shopping, I'm in the commissary and we're getting back to that. But in a much improved way. That and something I remembered. Helen Sise mentioned this in her remarks in the earlier talks about what the community wanted to see for Alameda Point. They wanted connectivity, they wanted continuity because what I remembered about going to the naval base was it was always a little intimidating for me anyway because you always had to go past the guard post and there was a guard and I don't know if that rifle was loaded or not, but we but what they wanted was streets that went all the way through that invited the public in because after all, this is now our city. It used to be federal property. Some of it still is, but most of it has now been conveyed to the city. So what I saw in the and the plans that were presented. Nice job, David. Israel was a well thought out, well designed, exciting, eclectic mix of jobs, creation, retail, residential, open space. I love that I mentioned. I love the three different types of park spaces that are there and that will connect to each other. And it did bring to mind for me Granville Island in Vancouver, B.C. My dad was Canadian, he was from Vancouver, and I know Granville Island. Well, you get there by water. Taxi. I'm and it also reminded me of what the High Line Park in New York has become. If any of you have walked that amazing, amazingly converted space in the former meatpacking district above the you know, it's it's a former railroad elevated roadway. But they reclaimed this area that was derelict. It was a place that were, you know, criminal elements. You didn't go there ever unless you were transacting something nefarious. But now it is amazing. It's well used. It has increased the property values of all the places around it. And we have all that opportunity here. It's a great opportunity. It's a great opportunity for this council. We have a new council. It's a new year and I think we're starting out with a bang. But on a more sober note and Councilmember Odie mentioned this, we did here tonight, we got a letter from radium from the owner of Radium Palladium, Brad Shook. And then when we heard this item in December, we had a letter from yet another business owner whose water and telephone lines had been out for days. How do you run a business when you have that sort of thing happening, let alone how do you attract new businesses? But now we have SRM Ernst in the team they've put together. It's laid out in these plans of what they're putting into the infrastructure. They're paying their fair share. And then some as well as I mean, another lovely amenity is $5 million for a $20 million recreational center that we've long wanted. But anyway, there's there's lots to be done. Mozart has laid out an ambitious schedule for us on the council for other boards and commissions. And you, the public, please come out, you and the audience, you who are watching come out, attendees, open houses go on the walk the bike ride a year ago was amazing and get involved . And at the same time, for me anyway, I feel I truly believe we picked the right development partners. They know what they're doing. They have experts. That's not to say that we won't give them input and we won't give them guidance. I don't feel the need to micromanage every step of the way because we pick them to make good decisions for us. But at this point in time, I would just say, let's all use our best efforts, get together, get behind this very exciting prospect for a city that really has involved so many people. From all you dedicated volunteers on the RAB who've been making sure that the cleanup is going as it should to all the boards, commissions, our city staff. Jennifer Ord I was thinking about this the other night. We would be lost without you. She is just a fountain of knowledge and an understanding about the most technical details and and never thinks any of my questions are dumb. But anyway, I. I'm really excited about this. I want to get in there and roll up my sleeves and work with with the rest of you, because I think we have a great opportunity for Alameda in front of us. Thank you. Thank you. All right. I'm going to say my comments at this point. First of all, I want to thank the community for coming out and sharing your concerns. I want to thank Steph as well as the developer for doing their presentation. And I appreciate the comments from my my fellow council members. I have. In regards to the jet, I actually support as much of a historical anything historical out there that we can protect. I personally like the circles. I like the Jets. I like the names of the roads as much as we can protect. I think it's actually what is unique about Alameda. So as much as we can do on that, I do support you, the Hornet and the the jet in regards to these depictions. I think it's very important that what is depicted be accurate. So I would appreciate that these drawings be corrected. And and the presentation actually is different from the sequence that was presented online, if that could also be corrected online. My concerns and some of these I personally prefer and I know that this is maybe get into the details, but I prefer and I think that you may be a lead developer as much green as possible reuse of materials is I do I like the natural looks of some of these drawings look to me I'm not sure what materials were being used, but if we can reuse materials, I think as much as possible. Okay. I have concerns about the transportation and I'm hoping that we'll see more information of what that's actually going to look like and the impact, the cumulative impact across the city with all of the current developments that are already online as well as this additional. But that's really going to look like for the impact. The cumulative impact from adding this project to the traffic through the tube. What will that look like in regards to and I appreciate that we're we will be encouraging bus transportation, having shuttles and things like that. And maybe our latest company out there can help us be more green on how to do that. I think that that would be great if we could utilize like a shuttle or something. I'm not sure. But try and keeping in mind that we have a goal as a region to reduce the impact as a state, to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2030. I'm one I really want to know how this can how we are supporting that safety day. There was a letter to the editor recently, and I appreciate whomever wrote it in regards to day to day safety that that the again, the cumulative impact of another development, whether including housing and jobs, resulting in more traffic actually across the island and looking at that. Safety during an emergency. I would like us to know again how we will be evacuating, how we will be addressing a natural disaster. This to me, this is an we will be having more people over there shopping and working, living here. The cumulative impact. The skill analysis I would like to see. So I know we discussed some numbers, but we need a budget for the entire project and and its impact on our services long term. The city services. How we're going to preserve the services long term. In regards to the ratio of the 75% apartments and then the 25% affordable housing. Now, that's not the breakdown. I'd like to see the breakdown of what we're actually talking about. Or are we talking about all the apartments for the below market rate housing? Is that a combination? Where is the 25% below market rate housing from the 75 with the 75% apartments? And then what is the range of those apartments? And as much as I appreciate that we have an issue with rents increasing in this town. When I look at the picture and I'll be looking for staff also to clarify what this looks like, as far as I can discern, the city's ability to control the housing price is through below market rate housing that apartments. Unless somehow they are that below market rate housing can be out of reach for many current aluminum quote unquote market rate. And who will the landlord be? This is city property. If the will this be privately held? In which case I don't know how the city will have any controls over market rate housing. I mean, especially apartments. And when people can buy an entry level, an entry home, at least they have something that they know what the payment will be. And what we're seeing right now is the payments are escalating to uncertain levels. And I think. So I'd I'd like to know how we can big picture look at this as a city. Another concern of mine is that when we have private developers that use private property to develop, then we are limited as a city in regards to the percentage of affordable housing, whether it be or seniors or whatnot. But this is city property and that is my understanding where the city has actually the say of what type of housing and what we want this to look like. Speaker 0: Madam Mayor, I have a question on what you just stated. Yes, my understanding is that properties can be conveyed to become to the from city owned property, to be private property, and they'll develop that against our standards that are laid out. So it's not going to be city property, it's going to be acquired, if I understand it. Can this be verified that I understand this correctly? That this will be city transfer of public property to a private individual. Correct. To develop against the standards that are laid out by the plan. Correct. Right. Speaker 6: To a private company or development. Speaker 0: And is going from public to private land. Speaker 6: Right. Except for the public right away. We will essentially transfer the property to them. They're going to build our infrastructure. Then they'll transfer the public right of ways back to us. So. So there will be portions that will come back to us once they're improved. But the majority that. Speaker 0: Private parts. Speaker 6: Might not be under private. Speaker 0: EMS. Not. But they will. Speaker 6: Be required to develop the property in accordance with the disposition development agreement. And they will be subject to those terms. And so. Speaker 0: So if I may just go for it jumps out of my head is that these pictures and the the plans and and the deliverables basically are exciting to look at it. And but they all have impacts. And are we going to get a briefing on the finances that are going to be hammered out in the development agreement ? Because in past experience, the pictures are pretty. But the deal and I think council member de Saag hit the nail on the head is the word penciled? I haven't heard once in the presentation and that's usually what that's what killed the first two deals. Is that the promised in pencil? Mm hmm. And there are other can other conditions that the city might have when when when private land, a public land becomes private land. And what are the things do we want? Project labor agreements, prevailing wage, sustainable systems that provide that transportation of because there's no free bus passes because someone pays for them and it's the owner that's going to pay for the transportation, not the potentially not the developer, unless the developer remains as the owner. So all those financial type questions. I'm hoping we get another another briefing where we put the pictures aside and talk about the money. Yes. Speaker 6: I can do that. I mean, I think the question is really I mean, for instance, we did a fiscal impact analysis as part of our previous internal efforts. We are in the process of updating that fiscal model for this project. So we'll be looking at that and not just at build out, but over time so that we can see are there initial years before a lot of development has occurred where there might be greater impacts because you don't have the revenue yet from development to cover some of your expenses. Also, what are we looking at over a certain number of years to make till we get to build out of the projects so that you can see the full impact of the project from a municipal services standpoint. We'll look at that. We can, you know, with that model, we can test some of the impacts of the ten year mix. So we can look at that and we can and we can brief you on those results. But that's absolutely part of it because there is a fiscal neutrality policy that the city has, that this project has to be fiscally neutral in the city's municipal general fund budget. And we, our staff, take that very seriously. And we need to actually be we want to prove to ourselves and to you and to the community that this, in fact, will be fiscally neutral. And so we are analyzing that now. And then the question of I think you you're getting at is, you know, you pay for all these different things with special taxes from property owners. And there is kind of a limit as to how much you can burden property owners with that they're going to be willing to pay. And so we need to make sure and we're doing this analysis as well, is that there's enough, you know, burden or enough you know, there's enough room to pay for all these this these things within kind of where we think the market dictates property owners would be willing to pay. So we're analyzing that as well. Some of the financial questions and policy direction may come to the council in closed session under real property negotiations and many other pieces of it that come in open session. We'll have to talk with our developers and and with the city attorney's office. But if their price in terms of payment, you know, we want to protect the city's best interests in terms of negotiating. We don't actually want to negotiate in public with the developer. So there may be aspects that come to you in closed session. We haven't determined that, but we can come back to you in one form or another with with updates to about the fiscal impact analysis and about the final financing plan, which is, I think what you what you're asking about. But those are all analyzes that we're doing. Speaker 2: So sorry. Let me continue, please, regarding the fiscal impact, not just at that site, but cumulative, because people these people will be driving on the road, for instance, Webster to how are we going to address when are the wear and tear on our streets the necessity for more services whether it be fireplace things like that to. So. Yes, go ahead. Speaker 4: Just flesh out a little bit more detail in terms of, you know, what I mean by the fiscal consequences of of, you know, having. Very low rate of ownership. I mean, when you look at owner occupied properties among the range of revenues, property tax revenue, you know, or revenues that could be generated, you've got the property tax . And to the extent that the owner occupied units are resold and therefore reassessed upwards, then over time one unit will generate even more property taxes, even if we use the same 1% ad valorem plus all the other add ons. So in addition to that. When you have these owner occupied, they're sold and resold and that generates another stream of property taxes, all the real estate transfer tax. So in these a variety of revenues we're contemplating, I think, towards paying for a parcel, a share of the overall 550 to $600 million in infrastructure, as well as contemplate towards paying for municipal services. Now, on on the when you have a property that's 75% of which is rental, that, you know, I really doubt that the rental property is going to be sold and resold at an any extensive rate. Therefore, generating the same kind of trigger as the property tax trigger or the or the. And so so that's a little bit more fixed. And then to make the compounded, I, you know, I wonder to what extent you can add on fees to rental properties to recover some of the things that we've discussed about. So those are the fiscal. Speaker 6: Yeah, I wrote those things down. So I've heard you loud and clear. And we will be talking with the developer about that ten year mix and looking at the sensitivity and impacts that ten year mix ratio project. So I we will that'll be something we'll report back to you on. Speaker 2: And I'd like to see currently the type of housing that we already have. And it could be citywide, it could be just the new housing however you want, you know, just so that we have information. And then if you add the apartments and townhomes or whatever these are, the ideas are so that we can look at big picture of what what the different types of housing that's online that isn't out there right now. And then overall, what our city will look like and I am concerned about having 75% of apartments. I think I don't know how you will address the rate rising rent issue and how people will be able to come here and be able to settle. So so I would like to look at that. And also, I'm interested in looking at a higher percentage of affordable housing. It was great. Thank you very much. Any other comments? Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Speaker 4: Thanks mainly. Speaker 2: A next item. Speaker 1: Is a6g public hearing to identify housing and community development needs for the Community Development BLOCK Grant annual five year plans and improve the Community Needs Statement, as recommended by the Social Service Human Relations Board. Good evening. My name is Claudio Young and I'm with the Housing Authority. I'm the Housing Community Development Program Manager. So what is CDBG, CDBG as an entitlement jurisdiction? We receive community development block grant funds from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. These funds are currently used for residential rehab, which you heard my colleague Miriam talk about earlier.

Regular Agenda Item

Presentation on Site A Development at Alameda Point, Including Initial Development Concept. (Base Reuse 819099)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_01202015_2015-1114

Speaker 1: And we also use them for non housing, community development programs in projects for public services, economic development and public facilities and infrastructure. The program. First purpose is to develop a viable urban community, primarily for low and moderate income persons through decent housing, suitable living environment and economic opportunity. In the past five years, CDBG funded programs have served between seven and 8000 individuals per year. The city is required to prepare a five year strategic plan, which outlines a priority needs that will inform the CDBG funding decisions for the upcoming five year period. Also to receive CDBG funding. The city is required to submit to HUD an annual action plan detailing the program's activities and resources to address the housing and community development needs as outlined in the five year strategic plan. These will come before you in May of this year. In addition, there's priorities among the needs of the non housing, community development, social services, the Social Services and Human Relations Board. Shrub provides a refined priority statement to reflect the social services needs in the community, which is included as Exhibit one in your packet. This will be included as a part of the RFP that will be going out specifically for public services. And the RFP is tentatively scheduled to be released this Thursday pending your approval today. So in October of last year, we had an a community outreach meeting. In attendance was three housing authority staff members and 27 community members. Groups that were represented from the City Alameda Department was the Community Development Department, Public Works, Park and Rec and the Fire Department. In addition, there was the Commission on Disabilities, the Mastic Senior Center and Social Services Human Relations Board. Nonprofit providers such as the Food Bank, Building Futures, Family Violence Law, Eden Housing and Alameda Point Collaborative. And also residents. A summary of the discussion of the needs is included as exhibit two. Some of these needs included. Large scale collaboration grant writing for leveraging funds to fill the CDBG gaps. Services for elderly abuse and aging in place. Family Services. Homeless Services. Other housing services such as. Supportive Housing. Transitional housing of. Shelter for the chronically homeless and then economic development needs, such as facade improvements, business loans and job training. Business plans. Exhibit three of your packet includes all of the priority needs that will be included in the five year consolidated plan. Staff received. Staff received comments from the County Housing and Community Development Department and the County Home Consortium, which the city is a part of. So staff would like to make three edits and the original priority needs for affordable housing in order to be parallel with the county. Those three edits include the second point under affordable housing. Rather than reducing the household to sorry, we want to reduce the household from 128 AMI to 80% AMI. Also, we want to combine the third and fourth point to read as reduce housing discrimination, which will automatically cover all who are discriminated against fair housing and tenant landlord services. And we would like to add a point to assist low and moderate income first time homebuyers. So the the process for the needs starts with the Social Services and Human Relations Board, which is which has already happened. On November 20th, 2014, the Social Services Human Relations Board heard all the comments from our community outreach meeting, heard additional public comments at that meeting, and incorporated that into their needs statement, which is included in your packet. The second step is today the city council hears public comment and adopts the needs statements. And the third process for the needs will be that the RFP will be released based on all the priority needs. Exhibit four is scheduled to complete both a five year strategic plan and the annual action plan for the upcoming fiscal year 20 1516. And that concludes my report. And I'm not sure if there's somebody here from Shrub to speak at Amir. Speaker 4: I have a question. I have a question. Speaker 0: Mm hmm. Speaker 4: So one of your recommendations to be aligned with the county is to. Speaker 0: Change. Speaker 4: The target population of who are grantees. Support from 120% of I to 80% of am I. That would be the threshold. So we're looking for anyone who's we're looking for grantees. We're looking to fund grantees who support households who are at 80% or below of am I. Speaker 1: So only for for the second point. The the original point said preserve existing affordable rental housing and ownership for households of below 120%. So we want to reduce that to 80. So for example, a family of four at 120%, they have to make 110,000. So we want to reduce that to 67,000. Speaker 4: So basic. But the key thing is what we're really saying is we want to target our limited CDBG funds away from moderate income families, which is the definition of 80 to 100% of my low income and lower. Speaker 1: Correct. It'll allow us to be more flexible. Speaker 2: Yes. Thank you. Or do we need to do something? I think we need to do something at this time. Then I'll ask my question. That clock's actually a little bit so fast. Didn't 1029 according to my iPad. Did anyone else have clarifying questions on this right now? Well, I did, but you go ahead and do what you need to do. So at this point, I'll just go ahead and do it. We need four votes to consider additional items. Do we have. Does anyone want to move that? We do that. All those in favor. I oppose none. Motion carries. All right. So so my question then, I thank you for your report missing. I'm looking at the and by the way, all of the needs and everything you do and or address in these reports are so well needed. I just wish there was more money to go around, but I applaud you for trying to do the triage here. So I was looking at the exhibit two, which was the summary of the Community Outreach Workshop on October 22nd of 2014. And on page two, there is a discussion about housing and then public services and the homeless. And, and I don't disagree with anything that's on here. It's actually kind of heart rending to, says, domestic violence survivors, elder abuse, homeless shelter. But one of the categories that I don't see, although maybe it's can contain elsewhere in this report, is we hear a lot about young people who age out of the foster care system in the state because at 18 you've aged out of the foster care program. And yet for anyone who's raised children, you know that they do not magically become mature young adults at the age of 18 in a day. Is there anything within these proposals that would catch that group or is the county doing things? Speaker 1: I think it would be under affordable housing and in public services. So we kept the categories in the parades a little bit vague to give us some flexibility to be more specific every year as things come up. So we'll revisit, for example, for public services. We definitely revisit the priorities every single year to see what's happening in our community. The needs are. Speaker 2: Okay, thank you. And then on page three of that same summary, there was a line item about unsheltered and chronic homeless, including homeless veterans. And I had participated and so did the mayor. Before she was the mayor, she was on the school board. Then when do we do that? In the fall or the when we did the walk early in the morning to try to get a count of the homeless on our streets. And one of the things that we were told is that a larger percentage of homeless are homeless veterans. But I think I understand that the VA, the Veterans Administration has some programs because that was one of the referral sources for for us on the walk. Speaker 1: Correct. So there they work with one of our service providers, but we're definitely going to be looking into how we can zone in to the extremely low and the chronically homeless, I think is one of the goals for the county as a whole. Speaker 2: Right. Right. Okay. Thank you. All right. Any other comments. Speaker 0: Request? Yes. I notice that in the groups represented from the city of Alameda, the Alameda Police Department is not mentioned. And I know and in the past they were quite participatory and as a service provider and they're often the first people who come into contact with a homeless person representing the city or are often called upon for service and in some of the public housing units. So my request is that as you go through the process, that if they weren't present there, that you can integrate the service that they do provide in your implementation of of the of the services that are going to be funded by the grants. Speaker 1: So we definitely look at that. When we go through the RFP and look at collaboration. So many of our service providers are actually working with the police department. So for example, Family Violence Law Center Building Features. Speaker 0: Alameda Collaborative, selected the logos and all of them have a connection. There is interaction with the police and I'm hoping that there that they get a seat at the table as you go forward. Thank you. Speaker 2: Yes, I was just going to add and in fact, it was the police department that that organized the walk that we went on. And I will shout out to a particular officer, Elisa Ledbetter. She's an amazing resource of of knowledge and in different services in our city and all over the county for various homeless and other other folks who were just out and down on their luck. And it's not always necessarily a crime, but as the vice mayor noted, that the police are often the first to encounter people in these situations. But, you know, they're definitely there. I don't know if their logo wasn't presented just because they weren't looking for anything. Speaker 1: I just didn't have enough room yet. But we definitely work with them and I'll make sure they're at the table. Speaker 2: And they are great. Thank you. I want to confirm you finished giving your presentation. All right. And we do not have any public speakers. This is the first part of this agenda item is a public hearing. There were no slips turned in. Wait a minute. One is coming up. It. So do I need to open the public hearing then, since we have a speaker now. So. Yeah. So I'm going to open the public hearing for this item. You may proceed. Speaker 1: And then this. Speaker 8: Well, and this, of course, I'm kind of in between. Hi. My name's Jennifer Bolan. Hi, Madam Mayor. And council members. I came from building opportunities and out of your homeless program and am in need of your disabled housing. So this pertains to me, but I currently live in a private housing program or I'm currently privately housed, so we need to maintain the other housing because I may end up back there. So part of the needs thing is to maintain. And when you're developing the rental thing is to have senior and disabled housing. Because I came out of building opportunities and I may end up needing the rental or ending up back on Alameda Point because when I can't afford the other housing, I'm going to need the senior and disabled housing. And that way I don't end up homeless and back on the streets here in Alameda. And because if you keep developing and I can't afford the other housing, I'm going to need the disabled housing. And if they raise that, the rate that you have to make so little money or too much money because I am on SSDI and I don't make a lot of money, but I'm. Too rich for Section eight, but too poor to make rent. So I'd appreciate if you could include those of us that make like $1,000 a month in this needs category. Because I'm 51 and I do go to Mastic and I do go to I came out of building futures and I really appreciate those programs. And, you know, if you keep funding Midway Shelter. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 4: I have a question. Yes. For us. Speaker 2: This is our public hearing, though, right? Speaker 1: You can close the public hearing, go to an. Speaker 2: Audition if there's no more slips on it. I'm going to now close the public hearing on this idea. Thank you, everybody. Speaker 4: Thank you, Madam Mayor. My interpretation, what the resident had just said, was that she is at a certain income that is above the 80% AMI because she cannot she is not eligible for Section eight in section eight, you know, certainly has its income triggers. So to the extent that she is not eligible for Section eight, that tells me that she's above that 80%. Am I? So the implications of what we're doing with regard to housing and change from changing the threshold from 120% of AMI, which is the top bracket for moderate to focusing just on 80% or below the implications of that are tweeters like her would be were would could be affected. So the question is. Is that altogether possible? You have a special continue with the transition from 120 to 80%, am I, as you're suggesting, but have a certain dispensation with regard to age? So whoever because age is a protected category and in special needs housing. So age. So if you're 55 and over and you and you're anywhere between 80 to 120%. Am I then that will be an exception to the. It's something to think about. Speaker 1: So in the in the first point, it actually includes 30% AMI and 50% AMI for rental. But if we want to be more specific, you can make any of these points just a little bit more specific to prioritize seniors or. Anything that you want. But it does include 30% and 50% AMI for rental. Speaker 0: Mm hmm. Speaker 4: Oh, I know, but. But she wouldn't even be eligible for that because she's above 80%. Speaker 2: She's the age was 51. Speaker 0: All over. Speaker 2: The age at this. Speaker 1: We can be. Speaker 4: What she was saying is, though, is she the way that she was framing it is. But she would like he might need it in the future, because the extent that she's 51 now, perhaps in four years and she's just one individual of it, perhaps is altogether illustrative of the dimensions that we need to look at this issue Speaker 1: . So we can make it a more refined priority and add that we want to give priority to senior housing or whatever. Speaker 4: I rely on. Speaker 2: And when do we revisit this item? Would it be in a year from now? You you'd give us an update. This is an annual. Speaker 1: So these are for the five years. And every year I come to you with the needs for that year in case we need to refine every year anything to be more specific to our needs. Speaker 2: So can you keep track of people that are not included that reach out to you for help if we are whose needs we're meeting and who we need to? Really, maybe we do need to reevaluate that. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 2: That would be great. And then on this item. Speaker 4: Madumere, just one more point. And the reason why I'm pushing this like I just did is because I think there has to be something said about someone taking the time to come to a public hearing to talk about this issue. And while I don't know if you know what she has to say is statistically representative of her income and age cohort, I do know that she took the time to come here tonight. So in that respect, I would hope that, you know, she and others see that this city council is trying our best. Speaker 2: So this side and we had the public hearing, but we also need to my understanding, we need to approve. Speaker 1: Approve the priority needs with the changes that I submitted. Speaker 2: Yes, sir. Do we have a motion? So moved all those in favor. I, I oppose and motion carries. Thank you very. Speaker 1: Much. Thank you. Speaker 2: Next item is six H report from a. Speaker 1: Report from the Almeida Rental Housing Community Discussion Group and request for the Council direction concerning various proposal. Speaker 2: Thank you. And if anyone's wondering real quick, we have 14 slips on this item. You may proceed. Speaker 1: Good evening. I'm Debbie Potter. I'm the city's community development director. And I was going to do a brief introduction to this item and then turn it over to Jeff Canberra, who is going to report out on the community process that he's engaged in over the last three or four months.

Regular Agenda Item

Public Hearing to Identify Housing and Community Development Needs for the Community Development Block Grant Annual and Five-Year Plans and Approve the Community Needs Statement as Recommended by the Social Service Human Relations Board. (Housing 236)

AlamedaCC

AlamedaCC_01202015_2015-1209

Speaker 1: Good evening. I'm Debbie Potter. I'm the city's community development director. And I was going to do a brief introduction to this item and then turn it over to Jeff Canberra, who is going to report out on the community process that he's engaged in over the last three or four months. So this issue of examining the impact of rising rents in the city of Alameda came out of the city's process of adopting its housing element in the summer of 2014. And there were a number of groups that were interested in seeing the housing element reflect a policy on the impact of rising rents. And in lieu of including that policy in the housing element, the City Council directed staff in July to to study this issue and come back with a proposal on how to how to respond to the issues that had been raised in the community. And staff did come back to the Council in September of 2014. And at that time, staff made a recommendation that the Council appoint a seven member task force that would be charged with answering four questions. And the four questions that the task force was being recommended to look at were the following What is the state of the residential rental market in Alameda? What have been the impacts on rental rates, supply of rental housing and the physical condition of rental housing in jurisdictions with rent control? Stabilization ordinances? What changes, if any, need to be made to the city's rent review advisory committee? And what changes, if any, need to be made to the Alameda Municipal Code relative to residential rental housing? So those were the questions that staff was recommending. The seven member task force be charged with exploring with a report back to the city council with recommendations based on that analysis. I'm. Staff's recommendation was made to the council. There were representatives from the community that were suggesting and recommending to the council that an alternate process be put together, which was a community engagement process, to bring together the various stakeholders and have a community wide discussion. And ultimately that is what the Council. Determined it would do and it deferred and set aside staff's recommendation in lieu of this community process, which Jeff Canberra had volunteered to lead and has been leading for the last three or four months. And this time he has concluded the community work that he has undertaken and he is prepared to present to the Council the process that that he guided and the recommendations that came out of that process. So with that overview, I would like to turn the podium over to Jeff, who will present to the Council regarding the effort that's been underway these these last several months. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, Miss Potter. Mayor Spencer, members of the City Council and city staff. My name is Jeff Canberra and I am the community facilitator for the Alameda Rental Housing Community Discussion Group on September 16th. I came to the council and asked for the opportunity to to create an interest based community discussion regarding rental housing issues. The objective of this process was to establish a structure where the city's tenants and housing providers could work collaboratively to develop solutions to rental housing issues. Drawing on their own experience, research and resources available from other jurisdictions and organizations. Tonight, the group requests the City Council to direct staff to evaluate six discussion points and work jointly with the group in order to create an accurate and complete data recording process to document unreasonable rent increases and provide a neutral and supportive forum where tenants and housing providers can come together and collaborate and arrive at a mutually beneficial outcome. It is not the intention of this group to in any way have these discussion points be developed into provisions that would function as rent control. Tenants and housing providers have expressed the interest to remain actively involved in all stages of the refinement of these points and to work closely with city staff. Tonight's update will involve three presentations. I will briefly describe the process used to develop the six points Angela Hawk about of the Alameda Renters Coalition will provide a tenant perspective. And Don Lindsay, one of the city's major housing providers who has been actively involved in the Alameda housing market for many years, will provide additional support. We will all return to the podium to respond to questions from the council and then turn it over to the city staff in order to continue. The Community Discussion Project involve three public meetings. The first meeting was a tennis tenant focused event where tenants were allowed to present their concerns to the public. Renewed Hope read comments that were received with requests from the sender to remain anonymous. Comments range from specific examples of tenants experiencing significant rent increase. Two examples of maintenance issues and fear of being priced out of the rental market in Alameda due to rising rents. The city's Rent Review Advisory Committee informally presented six areas they were considering for future discussion. These six points were not recommendations to the community. The second meeting was a housing provider focused meeting, where individual property owners describe the types of expenses that they were facing and that these expenses were increasing due to government regulation and voter approved taxes. Owners and managers of the larger properties indicated that over the 8 to 10 year return figures were very low and at least one housing provider indicated that their practice was to take reasonable rents annually. The RAC again presented six informal areas of inquiry and once again I will emphasize these were not recommendations coming from the RAC . Based on the two public meetings and several individual tenant and housing provider meetings. The most pressing issues involved the need for an accurate and reliable data collection point to identify individual situations where a small number of housing providers were noticing significant rent increases and developing a method for informing tenants of their ability to have a rent increase . Case heard by our Rent Review Advisory Committee. At this point, the project focus its efforts on the community's presenting problem and concentrated its energies on addressing these two issues. In the individual tenant and landlord group meetings, participants focused on improving the existing mediation process offered by the RAC. The suggested suggestions coming from the participants. Improving the city's current mediation process coincided with Iraq's areas of inquiry after getting support from both tenant and housing provider groups. A focus group of tenant and landlord interest was created to vet the six points and get authorization to distribute them to the larger groups and eventually to the community. The six points are discussion. Point one involves the failure of the tenant of a tenant and housing private provider to participate in a hearing in good faith. Discussion point to requires mutual participation in the hearing process. Discussion point three requires that a notice of option to participate in Iraq hearing be given in writing with any notice of a space rent increase over a specific defined percentage. Discussion point four would prohibit retaliation for exercising a legal right to Iraq. Hearing discussion point five provides for an expedient hearing process in cases where that would be necessary. Discussion point six. Would establish a minimum rent increase amount in order to participate in a rack hearing. The focus group unanimously approved points one through four for the release to the larger groups and to the general public. Eight out of nine members approved point number five, and there was no agreement on point number six. And it is my understanding that the parties on their own are continuing to have discussions centered around that point. I think it is important to note that the focus group did not directly represent any individual or group opinion or position. However, the group members were representative of the various tenant and housing interests that we believe we have in the city. The third meeting was held on January 7th involving the presentation of the six discussion points that originated in the public meetings and were reinforced in individual tenant and housing provider point of view meetings held after the public meeting. These six points are not to be considered direct recommendations to the City Council. They are presented to the Council in order to get authorization for staff to continue to refine the six points if authorized. A meeting with staff could be set up in the next several weeks. Ms. may talk about we'll be presenting shortly. I want to make sure that everybody's clear that she'll be presenting and then she will introduce Mr. Lindsey. He will then address the council. We will be able to come back up to address questions and then we will be turning it back to staff. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 1: Good evening, Madam Mayor and City Council. I'm back. My name is Angela Hawk About. And I started the Alameda Renters Coalition last September. Our membership has grown to nearly 400 members, many of whom are afraid that they could be pushed out of their homes by sudden high rent increases at any time in the current legal climate and just have 30 to 60 days to find alternative housing. There isn't enough diverse, affordable housing in Alameda. This limited supply means that some landlords are raising rents as high as they can, and some landlords are using exorbitant increases to push out existing tenants to raise rents even higher. This is unfair to renters who have little recourse under Alameda Law to stay in their homes. Earlier. We did have a lot more renters here, but there were families here. And as it's gotten too late, they've had to leave. But there's some of them represented, right cases where there were 20, 47% and even 30% increases. And over the last year, during 2014, 40 households felt the need that their rent increases were so high that they made the application to the Rent Review Advisory Committee. That sounds like a lot of people to me who feel at risk of losing their homes. Speaker 2: I'm sorry, could I just have you reiterate, did you say last year 40 people made retirement, have filed. Speaker 1: 40 households made applications? Maybe not all of them were heard by the RAC. Maybe some of them were negotiated before there was a meeting. Okay. But there were 40 households that actually approached it and had maybe some of them are also from individual buildings where there are multiple units within a building and they all presented at the same time. But they still represent individual households. Okay. Thank you. We recognize that this doesn't resent represent the majority of housing providers in Alameda who make reasonable rent increases and take good care of their properties. However, these exorbitant, exorbitant rent increases are still a problem that the city must address. Jeff Canberra's rental housing discussions have educated the community on the issues at hand. Renters and housing providers were able to join together and discuss each other's challenges. It turned out that many Alameda landlords disagreed with the exorbitant rent increases that pushed families out of their homes. At the same time, it was clear that renters understood the need for reasonable rent increases. This mutual understanding built a strong foundation for renting and property interests to discuss possible solutions. We hope to continue these discussions in good faith. As a renter and Landlord Alliance organization during this period of discussions, the Rent Review Advisory Committee presented details about this, their process and offered some ideas that they thought might make the rec more effective. We were able to discuss these ideas in several focus groups and exchange different points of view on what was feasible or not. Jeff Canberra has just presented the results, the six points that will strengthen the Rent Review Advisory Committee. We believe that they are a starting point for city staff to explore exorbitant rent increases and study solutions that have already been vetted by a public renter and housing provider. Focus group. We hope that such measures will discourage housing providers from making these 20, 30 and 40% increases. However, still more work needs to be done. More data needs to be collected, and more serious study is needed on how to prevent these increases in the first place. I hope the city will take the time to review how other cities have tackled the problem and find additional ways to ensure fairness in the rental market. A stronger rent review advisory committee will tell renters that they might have a fair chance at staying in their homes and will tell the landlords who make such increases that they will have to answer for them on public record in front of a civic body city council. I hope you will direct city staff to review these proposals and offer a report back to City Council within six months. The Alameda Renters Coalition would be more than happy to work with city staff as a helpful resource. Thank you so much for your time and consideration. Speaker 2: Thank you. And I just want to clarify for everyone, this is still part of the presentation. And that's why she was allowed to speak more than 3 minutes and. Now, Mr. Lynch, you may continue. Speaker 3: Madame Mayor. Members of the City Council and staff. My name is Donna Lindsay, and I've been in the real estate profession in Alameda for a few decades. We'll put it that way. I have been involved really from the beginning of this process with with Jeff and I, I, I have a few comments on it. I have been totally supportive of the process. I think it was wise to. To get people involved that as Jeff did, that are directly involved either as a renter or as a provider or a manager. And I think that was it kind of we kind of got to it in a hurry with with those kinds of interests being involved in the process. They were true stakeholders as. As we're called. And. And I think through the process that we've all become more aware if we haven't been aware of. You know, the problems that exist and some of the. Details as to kind of where we where we are today. We have explained, I think in in great in detail of the the business of owning and managing renting apartments. It's business like anything else. We've been confronted with rising costs, of course, and we've been involved in changing markets. And there are those here that I'll speak to that. So I won't go into a lot of detail on that. Alameda has a lot of diverse housing stock because, as we all know, the owners consist primarily of alum Edens. And I think that's really important. We care about Almeida. We like owning property in Alameda. And we believe in just the. The idea of fairness, and we definitely frown on excessive rent increases. That's that's not what we're about. It's it's not fair. It's it puts a tremendous burden on a resident to get a huge rent increase. And we're we're totally against that concept. We as a community because we care and because we're special, we're different. We can we can work through these issues, through this mediation process. The the process has worked. Generally, there have only been a couple of cases that have been brought before the council in the last couple of years. It generally generally works well. I've gone through the details pretty, pretty carefully, and we've got history that goes back to 2008 or 2007. I think there were years when the rec didn't even have a case because of the market. And you'll hear more about that as we. Continue to talk this evening. The idea of strengthening the RAC is the we feel the best solution. The word should be out there that the RAC is available. And, you know, if if an increased notice is given, there should be information that tells the resident if that if they have a if they have a problem with the increased it, that they can appeal it. That that's one of the main things that the first thing that we agreed upon is the RAC should have a higher profile and there should be no excuse why I didn't know the RAC existed. So that's that's very important. I think it's moving forward. I think it's extremely important that that we continue to talk to and promote the idea of reasonableness with with all property owners in the community. I think we're we're good at that. I think we need to work to. Kind of fact, I talked to and Angela Angela this morning about this of of forming a coalition of owners and managers and renters alike. Let's form a group and continue to work on these issues and head off the issues really before they get to the RAC stage. We've got eco housing that helps and they've been doing a great job in solving some issues before they get to the RAC. Let's let's add an additional layer of people in the community of owners and let's, let's talk to each other if, if increase comes in and, and it can't get resolved right away, there's nothing better than one owner talking to another owner and saying, hey, this is not the way we do things. So I think that's something we can develop and improve upon. We have great resources in our management companies here. We can work with residents who have a particular problem. That's that's what we do for a living. We we rent properties and manage properties so we we can help relocate. Relocate people. Let's let's let's move forward. Let's strengthen the rack and make it more visible. You'll have you'll have a better way. Speaker 0: Of. Speaker 3: Assessing. You know, if if if there's a problem, there'll be no excuse for not knowing about it. It'll be there in a year from now or so. You'll have a better understanding of of what's going on in the rental market. Again, just in closing, we're really good and working together. And let's let's move, move forward doing that. Speaker 2: Thank you. And at this point, I'll need a motion to continue the meeting beyond 11 seconds. All those in favor. I thank you. Now, honestly, past. So. QUESTION So did anyone have clarifying questions? We do have speakers on this item that. If you do plan to speak on this, please submit your slip. You know, do I have any questions? Speaker 0: But I was going to defer to allow me to go first. Speaker 2: I've I've got a couple. So this is probably for both our landlord and tenant representatives, if you would. And I, by the way, I appreciate the your involvement, all of your involvement, the three of you. And I should quickly disclose that I met last week, I think it was with Mr. Lindsay and a group of landlords at his offices. And prior to that, a day or two prior, I met with Laura Thomas of Renewed Hope. So I'm trying to, you know, hear all sides of this issue. Thank you all for your work. I know, Mr. Lindsay, you said that this process generally works well, that the RAC process, it's out there when you can get people to talk to each other, that generally works. But I also read in the comments in the report that Mr. Cameron submitted that and I think it was Laura Thomas of renewed hope, said that she had some tenants who in fact chose to remain anonymous because they were concerned with retaliation. It sounds good to say, well, just talk to your landlord. But I think we could all imagine a situation where you felt that talking to your landlord would be the worst possible thing you could do. So how how would you how would you deal with that? The the the issue where some tenants are just afraid to speak up and talk to their landlord about an increase to try to negotiate on their own. And the other thing, and this was one of the five or six points that are proposed is that well, and also I would just throw out my opinion that it's not exactly a level playing field, because obviously the landlord owns that building and the tenant needs a place to live. But the requirement is the same. Each has to show up or they can't avail themselves of legal processes. But under the proposal, all the landlord has to do is show up at the hearing. And then, as we discussed at Mr. Lindsay's office, they could still impose a 65% rent increase because they showed up at the hearing. So if you could maybe merge those two concerns and Angela, you look ready to. Speaker 1: James so ready. All right. One of the reasons I started the Alameda Renters Coalition was because there wasn't enough support for renters in this marketplace to empower themselves to use the services that are available to them. I myself endured a $450 rent increase in 2013 that forced me out of my home, and I had to move in with my mother in law, where I currently reside at Bay Farm Island. And when that happened to me as someone who was a good renter and had periodic every year $75 rent increases, and I had gotten a $75 rent increase that year to all of a sudden in August, four months after my initial rent increase to get an additional $450 rent increase felt like a slap in the face. I felt little recourse. And when I investigated the rack, investigated eco housing, I really didn't get a lot of support. And I felt that it might not be kind of me to try to air my my problems in public. And fortunately, I found the strength to negotiate with my landlord so that I could afford to stay in my apartment for a few months before we could make the arrangements to move in with my mother in law. But in that process, I was very much alone, and I felt like this was my problem, this was my fault , that I had no one else to help me. And so out of that, after realizing on all the different social media for Alameda that really there wasn't a lot of public support for renters, that an organization needed to be started to provide that support. And so what we are trying to do and in the process of doing we're an infant, we've only been around since September, is to provide education and emotional and practical support to renters. And that is part of a hopefully a larger picture involving Mr. Lindsay and other housing providers in Alameda to work together to. They have an amazing process where they all talk among themselves. They don't like these exorbitant rent increases. And I'm pretty sure that when somebody makes those rent increases, they hear about it. And I think we can all work together to bring renters to the table, to take advantage of the services that they have and make them more educated consumers as well. So I think that if the city staff comes back with some of these recommendations to make a stronger crack, it will be part of a larger ecosystem of rental housing, and especially if we're working together, cooperate. Lee. Where we can try to decrease these exorbitant rent increases. I mean, there are other problems as well. I'm hearing from renters that even 10% rent increases are difficult for them because they're happening that high year after year. And at this point, because rents are so high. 10% can represent represent hundreds of dollars. And so I'm hoping that we can engage the housing provider community to find ways of easing those rent increases, because we recognize and we understand that significant costs are included as part of taxes, as part of improvements to units. But, you know, what does it say about the provider if they raise rents so high that a person can't afford to live there who has made the investment of living there for year after year? And in this market where there are few rentals available, it is nearly impossible to find a replacement housing within 30 to 60 days . And I was just lucky. I was lucky that my mother in law has lived in Alameda since 1967 and that she had a house for me to go to. I was the best case scenario for that housing provider, and there are people who are definitely not as lucky as I am. And that's why I'm here and that's why I'm started this organization. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 0: Two quick questions. Speaker 2: Did you want to respond, Mr. Lindsey? Speaker 0: Sorry, Mr. Lindsey. Yeah. Speaker 3: Let's see my comments. If if if I were a resident here and I got a 25 or 30% increase, I wouldn't keep it a secret. Somebody is going to know about it. That's that's sort of my attitude. And if the racks available, I'm going to go to the rack and get it resolved, or I'm going to sit down with it with the owner and try and get it resolved. I'm going to go to echo housing and try and get it resolved. I can't do that. I'm going to go to Rack. If I can't get it resolved there, I'll go to the council, which has happened, what, two times in the last two years in this whole process. So that's my answer to the first question. I'm not going to keep it a secret and worry about retaliation, which is not legal anyway, and it's not right. But I'm not going to be kept secret. That's the second question. Speaker 2: That the landlord just has to show up and then can raise the rent any percentage. Speaker 3: Yeah, well I don't see those cases at the rack and I've, I've looked through them pretty carefully for the last couple of years and someone comes in with an increase and it gets resolved pretty typically. Speaker 2: Well, remember we discussed the Benton. The Benton. Speaker 3: Well, we we all know about Benton Street and we all know about Park Street. Those were two different cases that they eventually worked out. Okay. But those those are not. Those are not good. But, you know, we have, what, 16,000 rental units here. And I think percentage wise, it's pretty much new. But I'd just like to address one other thing briefly. There was a case last week. No, two weeks ago. Iraq had seven residents who appeared objecting to an 18% increase. And the owner who lives out of town came in and basically said, no, I'm not going to deal with you. And he left. And that was the end of it. I did talk to I did finally get to the owners after the hearing, although I left a message for them before the hearing. And long story short, a couple of days ago, they agreed to go to the 10%. So it peer peer pressure does work and it's just being involved and working on these things. So that's that's a comment I have on that. Speaker 2: Thank you. Any other clarifying questions. Speaker 0: To two brief ones? The recommendation is that we enhance or strengthen the process. Can you briefly tell us what the process is now? As quickly as that. Maybe that's Miss Potter. Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that. Speaker 0: Yeah. Well, just. Just quickly. Speaker 2: I think this doesn't really. Speaker 0: Matter that. Speaker 2: We do have 16 speakers and 3 minutes. That's 48 minutes. I'd like to get to them. Speaker 1: And two and one of the speakers is David Perry, the chair of the RAC and another RAC member this evening. But quickly, we have on the housing authorities website there is a rent increase complaint form. If you feel like you've had a rent increase that you want to have mediated, you fill out that form. Staff will take it in and it will. The RAC meetings are scheduled as there are cases that the RAC meets once a month. It is a voluntary process. The tenant and the property owner are invited to come to the meeting. Both sides present their. They're their side of the story. The rack makes rack members can make suggestions about think of this, think of that. And often times most of the time, they're those recommendations are taken and the two parties agree to to go with what the rack has recommended. And typically the rack encourages rent increases that are 10% or less and encourages folks to increase their rent annually so that you have less likelihood that you're going to get a large one time increase. But Rack does not deal with maintenance issues or fair housing issues or anything else. They deal with rent increases and staff can refer people to echo housing. You've heard mentioned several times and other resources that are available to deal with fair housing and maintenance and other kinds of issues. Speaker 0: And if it's not result at the rack, what happens? Speaker 1: There is an opportunity for if the property owner or the tenant wants to pursue it, to come before the council and staff. Typically the recommendation is to ask council to write a letter to the property owner upholding the recommendation. The council typically votes to uphold the recommendation. A letter is sent and typically those that request to uphold the rack recommendation is not complied with. Because if it's going to be dealt with, it's going to be dealt with. Well, in our experience at the at the RAC or as Mr. Lindsay was just talking about the case that was just heard two weeks ago and following the meeting, the property owner reflected on the recommendations that were being suggested and subsequently decided that they made a lot of sense. Speaker 0: And the other question, maybe this is for Mr. Camera. You know, I see a lot of signs in here with some big numbers. You know, can you can you share with us how many tenants came to you throughout this process and said, my rents were increase like over 10%? And can you elaborate on some of that? Was it three people? Was it ten people? Was it you know, so there were some serious challenges with just getting tenants to contact me. My name, phone number and email address were in the papers multiple times, and when I did get somebody that did actually call me, the very first thing that they said was, Can I be anonymous? How do I even get involved with this process? Because I am fearful of retaliation was the number one reason that people gave for not wanting to be involved. And I think that is part and parcel of a few, very, very few bad examples. Benton being one of them, which was the very rare, I think, situation that the council had to deal with, except it also went everywhere. And so now that sends a message, I think, to tenants that if we don't have a process that's that is effective, then they don't have any recourse. So I will I can guarantee you that was the issue that I had to face, which was why it was difficult to get people together. Fortunately, between MM Renter Renters Coalition and Renewed Hope, there was like a safety area where tenants could go. I wasn't even invited to some of the meetings, but the information that came out of them then did come to me. So how many was there? Six over 10%. Was there five or 25% or was there three? I mean, how many people anonymously or that care to identify themselves? So for the people that came forward at the tenant meeting, there were probably maybe 12 to 14 that actually came and either spoke or sent emails in and their increases were in what was the average. And sometimes they didn't I don't have that statistical data and but I think if you look at the rack records for last year, that will give you some insight into that, some of the types of rent increases that tenants were facing. Speaker 2: I'd like to move on if we can, and start calling on speakers, please. Thank you very much, David Perry. Then I'll be royal Robert. And then Eric Johnson. Thank you. And I really appreciate everyone being so patient. Speaker 0: Good evening, Madam Mayor and council staff. I'm David Perry. I'm the current chairperson of the RAC. This is Royal. Robert's, my colleague is also a member of the RAC. Debbie pretty much answered, you know, the question you had. We both we and staff thought it might be helpful if we gave a very brief overview of what the RAC is and what it does to give context to what is being presented by the task force. Speaker 2: And the only suggestion would be, please don't be redundant. I have a lot of other people. Speaker 0: Consist of five members. We are not advocates. We all we all have a background in legal backgrounds or real estate backgrounds, background in landlord tenant law, a a passion for mediation. I think we all share that. We had, as was stated, we had spoken and given informational presentations at three of the public task force meetings at which we presented ideas we had batted around informally but had not, you know, drilled down into or made formal in any sense. Some of those ideas have been taken up by the task force. So in order not to be right, I won't be redundant. But I will say that we do support the task force's request that the City Council direct staff to further evaluate those proposals. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. One thing I would like to add and thank you for your time is the committee consists of of those five members, two of them are renters. Two of them are landlords and one is an independent homeowner. And those aren't advocacy positions. Those are just to have the balance of the make up of the people that are on the committee anymore. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 0: One further face to this thing, something. I had a 20% rent increase a few months back. Speaker 2: And sorry get you continue. Speaker 0: To give another face to this. I had a 20% increase a few months back and my landlords know I'm on the rack. So there you go. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 0: I did not bring it before the rack. Speaker 4: And Madam Mirror to indicate I've been in discussions with the city attorney about this matters as I do rent out rooms at my place helps pay the mortgage. I inquired as to whether that constitutes a conflict of interest to which the city attorney had indicated it does not. Given that this discussion is a discussion matter that will affect the public generally. So there is no specific effects, positive or negative to me. It's a fact that generally, which I am a member of. Speaker 2: We can share those comments later. Let's continue. The two gentlemen are finish. Thank you very much, Eric Johnson. And then Garfield can cross and then Doyle Saylor. Thank you very much. Speaker 3: Mayor Council Staff Good evening. My name is Eric Johnson and I've been a housing provider in Alameda for about 30 years. I hate to admit that, but I'm responsible for 366 apartment units from one end of the island to the other. They're well-maintained. These are limited partnerships primarily. And so they have many owners. And so I'm a general partner and a managing general partner, and those owners are here in Alameda. And I think that's typical of the dispersion you see of of housing providers here in this town, which is unusual in my experience. A lot of ownership in in in the town. Here in the community. So one of the things I wanted to do is look back ten years and look at the end game on these 366 years. So you get a better picture than just the last 18 months of what's going on here. So I went back and looked at 2004 income and compared it to 2013 and come see actual results or accounting is done outside by third party accounting. DCH Phillips City, a well-known accounting firm. They do the bookkeeping, too, which is unusual. So these numbers are our numbers that I don't have any control over. From 2004 to 2013, we saw a steady and typical fall in the purchasing power of the dollar. So we saw the dollar fall 23.3% in terms of purchasing power. You're well aware of that. Doing your budgets, that affects us. Very starkly as well. So in order for the rents to cover the property's expenses rising at this rate over these ten years, nominal rents would need to be 23% higher ten years later, just to stay even. You know, in theory now our taxes went up higher than that. Water bills went up higher than what's, let's call CPI, a nominal benchmark. So collected income for these 366 units overall has gone up 27% in that time period, barely above the 23% of the CPI. So when corrected for actual dollars after subtracting from inflation and I realize this renters look at it effective real rise was about 4%. Over those ten years, 4% over ten years, so point 4% annually over those ten years. So that's what the rental markets look like to people like me that are trying to do the seismic work, repair the sidewalks that we now have to pay for, that the city no longer pays for fix earthquake damage. It it seemingly never happens. We've adopted the international building code for roofs, so no more flat roofs. We have to pitch our roofs. If we replace roofs, that's going to double the cost. So all of this makes it very difficult to maintain sustainable housing. That's what I'd like you to think about when you think about apartments and in your town, do you want sustainable housing? This stuff is old. It's 50 to 70 years old. It's costing more and more to maintain. My thanks to Jeff. I told him this was going to be like herding cats, you know? Speaker 2: Ex Speaker Ross Garfield. Ken Cross. Speaker 5: Hello, Mayor Spencer. Speaker 0: And City staff and city council members. My name is Garfield Cairncross. I've been in Alameda since the base was open. I worked there ten years. I transferred to the United States Mint in San Francisco as a civilian metal finisher. I'm a federal employee. 30 years. I saw lots of retirement. A ceremony today. And, you know, I'm beginning to wonder if I'm going to be able to retire because of these incremental rent increases that I've received over the past three years. There's a trend of. Receiving 10% increase as the flat rate. Whenever there's a market surge, this becomes an issue here. From what I understand, the RAC was able to provide a one year stay on rent increases after I had received a 20% rent increase. But I didn't know about the rack. And I found out about it through a very ambitious, uh, proactive renter in my complex. About 30 of us showed up that night, and then a rent crisis was publicized. That's what the term was in the press. So, you know, I'm just wondering, you know, is is it going to keep going up? You know, do I have to live in, you know, some small space and pay. Speaker 3: Just as much or. Speaker 0: More and sacrifice, you know, my health needs. You know, I have to pay for transportation, you know, and. I just don't know what's going to happen next. But I feel a little a little safer now that this study has has been put forward and is in the process of evaluation by. I hope that it becomes in the process of evaluation by this committee or excuse me, by the city council. And I can say that I'm very thankful for for having the opportunity to to to stand before you and ask for the implementation of these six measures that were brought together after this. Merging of tenants and landlords. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you, Doyle. Sailor. Speaker 0: Hi there. Speaker 3: Madame Mayor, I want me to city council members. My name is Doyle Saylor, and I'm a Alameda renter. The media likes to tell us the San Francisco Tech workers are pushing up rents, trying to take advantage of lower Alameda rents. I dispute this claim. The National Association of Realtors figures for the year November 2013 to November 2014 for the San Francisco Bay Area. Housing unit sales declined by 20%. Speaker 0: But the prices. Speaker 3: Went up by 27%. That price rise and housing is not tech workers putting pressure on existing sales. It is speculators pushing prices up as sales decline. Recognizing house flipping is coming to a halt. The same speculative groups have switched their recently purchased stocks to rental income and similarly set prices higher. Additionally, informal interviews with individual property managers report as much as 20% of rental units they manage are being held off market to further enhance price gouging. It is speculators, not tenants, raising rents sky. Speaker 0: High. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you, Jason Buckley. And then Jon Sullivan and then Ken Laban. Speaker 3: Hello, Mayor. And Council and staff. You've got me way past my bedtime, so I may be a little cranky, but, boy, a couple of things I wanted to address. One is that, I mean, even with the fact we're looking at 10% increases, which for struggling families whose income is probably pretty stagnant, that's that's a lot. The whole process has kind of been a little frustrating as the Iraq. Really has no teeth. And I don't know what the solution would be, but I mean, I would like to see the RAC get a little bit more reformed. I'd like to see it maybe have some kind of enforcement. Yeah. I'm exhausted. I'm sorry. I'm done. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Speaker 3: And Mayor Spencer and members of the council. Members of the staff. I'm John Sullivan. And I've been. Operating. I'm an owner operator of 200 units here in Alameda for over four over the last 20 years, really back about 15 years ago. And we had a market, general market like we had no where the rents were going up. And I at that time representing the Rental Housing Association and CAA and some others got involved in getting together and getting a good rental mediation program going for different cities. San Leandro, Alameda and the. The unincorporated area of Alameda County served three different jurisdictions through different programs. Really? So. So. Naturally, being involved with that stage event. Stayed involved and witnessed the negatives, the ups and the downs and so forth of the mediation programs, how they worked. And they're all outlined really. They're all captured pretty much on that first document on the top of your your list there. So I would like if you would, you know, peruse through that. Now, today, I really feel we have an excellent opportunity to form a kind of a model mediation program here in Alameda, having the benefit of watching how these other programs work over the last 15 years or so. As you know, as long as we learn from it and make appropriate adjustments to suit, you know, our situation and so forth, and a little back up material that would be. And next, I guess behind your program, they're behind your the initial one. And this would be. We had, you know, we always have the question of why. Why can't we, you know, give 2%, 3%, 4%, whatever every year? Well, it's not possible. And the reason the market really dictates that and this what this came from, not me, from another landlord who wanted to show the fact that there's many years, many years when there's no possibility of giving a rent increase. And it shows that in some of these there if you want to browse through them and and it shows the average rent increase over year 15 and to a ten, ten year period. And they're anywhere from a look here for 3.9 to 2.43 and before this bring it out on an annual basis. So the fact is we have to. To really acknowledge the fact that we there will be highs and lows. So the tenant does benefit one day when they're in the low times. Now, one other item that we haven't really one other item that we haven't really addressed, and that is that there are the extraordinary increases of 15% , 20%, 30%. And that happens when an A sale, generally of sale, a piece of property. I really feel any good mediation program should address that. And that's something we should look into and. A few other items and I'll just finish up and there are two other attachments there. One of them is a caution racing wrench in today's market. That's something that we as landlords put out, distributor members cautioning against and, you know, excessive raises, obviously, and trying to smooth out. So it'll make it at least as palatable as possible to a tenant. And so and I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to speak on this. I hope you would, you know, seriously, take a look and consider these items that I have presenting to you and then. Obviously I would be available going forward to, you know, to put any finishing touches to this program that we're you know, we're all into it together. I'd been at a lot of those meetings and talked to different people, and I'm sure we could still work together with, you know, Angela, Jeff and Don and so forth, and that I hope the loose ends and come up with a good program. Appreciate it. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Ken. Speaker 0: Madam Mayor. Council. Speaker 3: My name is Ken Godliman. I'm a resident here in Alameda. And I would like to thank Jeff for doing such a beautiful job. Thank you, Jeff. It really helped. Bring people together. Speaker 0: As a contractor here in Alameda. Speaker 3: I retrofitted and replaced foundations by the hundreds. And I can tell. Speaker 0: You that in the last. Speaker 3: Ten, 15 years, the cost for that project. Has doubled. Speaker 0: Retrofitting a home. Speaker 3: And putting new foundation in. Is it safe for our community and it's safe for the inhabitants who live in it. I'm afraid that if there's any kind of a rent control or a freeze on price, it will. The. Devastating for our community. It actually keeps the homes and our community from being safe. And that's where it's at. Thank you very much. Speaker 2: Yeah. Bruce Carnes, then Barbara Rasmussen and then Ed Hirshberg. Speaker 0: Mayor Council. I'm a small landlord and I have two Victorians who are terribly expensive to maintain and I've kept my rents down where they're not anywhere near market. And a lot of my friends are this way. And I think that introducing something new, I think the peer pressure is probably the best way to go about this. And all of us, lots and lots of small landlords, we live right here in Alameda. And so we're we're affected by the city. We love the city. And that's what I have to say. Thank you very much. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 5: Mayor. Speaker 1: Council members. Staff. My name is Barbara Rasmussen. I've lived in Alameda for quite a long time. Speaker 5: I've been a housing provider for about 20 years. I want to thank Jeff for the work he's done and say that I support the proposal that he has before you. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. Hirshberg. I don't believe he must have left. Moving on then. Laura Thomas, Marjorie Roach and Angie Watson will be after. And then David Howard. Speaker 1: Good evening, Madam Mayor and council members Laura Thomas from Renewed Hope. First off, I wanted to give you copies of our rent survey updated because I gave you copies back in July. And about 40 more people reached our online survey and answered it in the meantime. I can't say that the results are random because they're self-selected. They're people that, you know, heard about it. Speaker 0: Found their way to our Google. Speaker 1: Site and filled it out. But what I think since there's three of you that weren't on the council six months ago, I thought it would be good to bring an update. So some of the first responders responded back at the beginning of 2014. And so there's 40 new ones. But I think what you might find really enlightening and useful is the 180 comments that are attached. So everybody that responded to the survey had an opportunity to post a comment and we collected them all. So that will be, you know, I think, help quite a bit in understanding some of the anxiety people are feeling. So renewed. Hope greeted the suggestion of that city task force back in September with a certain amount of skepticism because it didn't include tenant representatives. But we also responded to the desires voiced at the time by both the organizing committee of renters that we had convened, and the landlords and property managers. Speaker 0: Who. Speaker 1: Wanted to engage in a discussion of the issues and the problems surrounding rent increases. And we chose this alternative because we hope to bridge the divide and we hope to find common ground. As you know, the progress, I think, was kind of difficult and it underlined the disparity in power between the two groups in particular, because it was very hard for us to get tenants to come. And we ended up with a kind of a small core group that was. Brave enough to just sit down throughout the whole process. But what emerged in the meantime was something that we had hoped for, which was the tenant led group, the Alameda Renters Coalition, whose intent is to continue working with property managers to strengthen the Rent Review Advisory Committee and to continue to organize and support renters in Alameda. We aren't going to ask that for the task force to be convened at this point. We will be throwing our support behind the coalition has it takes the lead in organizing tenants. And we'll hope we'll all be working together to bring stable and affordable housing. De Almeida In pushing for the rent stabilization process to be included in the element, I reminded the Council that part of housing element law requires the city to conserve and improve the condition of existing affordable housing stock. And that means market rate rentals. You are the only ones that can say that the half of Alameda that is renting can turn to to deal with these economic forces that are assaulting them. And I hope you can develop the proper policies that recognizes the value of our community's social and emotional health. So I hope you will give. Speaker 0: Us. Speaker 1: Solutions to these destabilizing housing costs your highest priority. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. Next was Marjorie and Angie from Echo. Are they? Speaker 5: Yes. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Marjorie Roach. I'm from Echo Housing. I'm the executive director. And Echo. Speaker 1: Is currently under. Speaker 5: Contract with the city. Speaker 1: Of Alameda to provide fair housing counseling. Speaker 5: And investigation and tenant landlord counseling and conciliation services. We are the oldest approved fair housing investigation and enforcement organization in the state. Our purpose is to ensure that all renters have access to fair housing regardless of race, gender, national origin, disability, familial or marital status or sexual orientation or identity. As tenant landlord counselors, we are not advocates for either the renter or the housing provider. We advocate for the law to make sure that tenants and landlords are aware of the rights and responsibilities. When I reviewed. Speaker 2: The Alameda. Speaker 5: Rental Housing Community Discussion Group report, specifically discussion point five, it made me aware that some rent increases become effective before they're heard by the rack. In cases such as these, Echo may be able to provide a formal. Speaker 2: Mediation. Speaker 5: Between the renter and the landlord. This type of mediation, which would be provided, includes a face to face meeting at which would be present the disputing parties and at least one mediator who would be a neutral party. The purpose of this type. Speaker 2: Of mediation is to make. Speaker 5: Sure that all sides are heard and all parties understand the issues. The mediator would be responsible for. Speaker 2: Facilitating the meeting and getting the parties. Speaker 5: To speak to each other instead of past each other to come to a mutually agreeable solution. The mediation can. Speaker 2: Take anywhere from. Speaker 5: An hour to several hours, depending on the complexity of the issues. I have another issue that concerned me with regard to the report that Mr. Camber wrote. Tenants were reluctant to come forward to complain about rent increases because of fear of reprisals or retaliation by housing providers. I want every. Speaker 2: Person in this chamber. Speaker 5: To be aware of the fact that a landlord may not legally. Speaker 1: Retaliate. Speaker 5: Against a tenant for exercising his or her rights under the law. This includes exercising First. Speaker 2: Amendment rights. Speaker 5: To assemble and prevent views collectively and. Speaker 1: Joining. Speaker 5: Or organizing a tenants. Speaker 1: Union. I want to make sure that everybody hears it. Speaker 5: If there isn't. Speaker 1: Anybody if there is anyone in. Speaker 5: This room that has been threatened in this. Speaker 1: Way. Speaker 5: Please contact Echo Housing. Our number is 855. Ask Echo or 510 5819380. Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you. David Howard and Dennis Cox and Andrew Barr leaving. Speaker 0: Good evening, Mayor and council and staff members. I'm an Alameda resident and since 1985 have been either a commercial real estate appraiser or a chief underwriter for affordable housing developed development. A lender. My position is that the evidence is pretty strong, that rent control is a right a solution. It has been tried and failed in virtually every case. The main problem with rent control is that there's no means test. So whoever's in there, it's subsidized. And what turns out to be the case is you're more likely to subsidize an investment banker than somebody who needs to be subsidized. For example, I'll be appraising a property tomorrow. That has a stockbroker in the penthouse. At less than 50% of market rent. Running his stock brokerage business. Out with a wide bank of screens. And so this is what happens with rent control. Another unintended consequence would be my family moved to Alameda in the beginning of 2000. We lived next door to a blighted property that was, I think, nine units. The building was built in 18. 90, approximately. So this building would be subject to rent control. It would have never been renovated. It was a vector problem up until a year and a half ago when the rents got strong enough. This what was really looked like the Addams Family house finally got renovated. And then the last thing I would point out from my experience to two things actually in appraisal work is. When there's an apartment complex that's in a lesser neighborhood, those units will never get renovated, that they will be as bad as can possibly be and be inhabitable. So that's one unintended consequence. The other one is this only protects the people who are there right now because. Once somebody moves out and rent controls in place, the landlord will charge the highest possible rent. That is achievable. First of all, there will be very few units because people don't leave rent controlled units. So vacancy goes way down, which will drive the rent up on the remaining units. So the consequences? It's an idea. It seems like it would work, but because mainly because there is no means testing, you get all these bizarre consequences and it affects the upkeep of the properties also. And then finally, new people who want to move in here, no matter how poor they might be, they're out of luck. Speaker 2: Cox. Hey. Of our 11. Rashid Shabazz, Don Spangler. That's our order. Thank you. As far as I know, Dennis Cox is not here. All right. Oh. Okay. The end of our living. Speaker 1: Good evening, Mayor. Speaker 5: Council and staff. My battery is almost out, so I'm glad I was called. Speaker 1: I'm speaking this evening as the immediate past president of the Alameda Association of Realtors. Our current president, Tony Berg, was unable to attend. So I'm speaking on. Speaker 5: His behalf for our board. Speaker 1: The Alameda Association of Realtors is an organization whose members represent both renters and housing providers. We provided information as requested by the facilitator and only attended those meetings where all parties were invited. Speaker 5: We've read the report and we believe the report does not respond to the direction of the city council. The Council has the group to provide. Speaker 1: Information. Speaker 5: Regarding the depth of the problem, as well as. Speaker 1: Demographic information, including the number and type of. Speaker 5: Rental units available in Alameda. Speaker 1: Median rent for each type of unit and average vacancy rates. Speaker 5: What we feel the report does not address the request of the Council. We do feel that it fairly highlights. Speaker 1: The rent review advisory committee. The good work that it does and the need to increase the committee's role in this process. The LME, the Association of Realtors, stands ready to be active in any further committees or. Speaker 5: Assistance as needed. Thank you. Speaker 2: Yeah. Rashid. Speaker 0: Good afternoon or good evening. It is late, like another speaker said and past my bedtime. Council. City staff. Beautiful people of Alameda. My name is Rashid Shabazz and I moved to Alameda in 1987. I moved here along with my mother, the beautiful, intelligent Deborah James or Deborah James. And we moved to a shelter on Concordia Street, which was near what used to be the liquor bar and later Rite Aid and now I think is Westbury. We were able to later move to a one bedroom apartment over on Central, above what's called a Taco Bell here across from what used to be Taco Bell and Elmo Mike's. And we later moved in 1989 to what was then the point of Vista Apartments and later Bridgeport. Now, we were able to move into that apartment complex because there had been a situation similar to what we've seen here, where rents were raised double, doubled in many instances, or threatened to be doubled by a property owner, Gersten Company out of L.A. and people came to the city council meeting, protested and ultimately Section eight vouchers were issued and me and my mother was for the move into the Harbor Island apartments or again it was the post office departments that are Bridgeport Apartments. And many people know the story that in 1996, the 15 group, the Florida Slumlords, bought those apartments and renamed it the Harbor Island Apartments. For about eight years, this out-of-state landlord allowed the apartments to deteriorate. There was a Harbor Island task force in which no residents were involved, and this task force and the city allowed them to continue to operate without forcing enforcing any of the code violations, the multiple. Speaker 4: Code violations that. Speaker 0: Existed. I give some of that history because that was my own experience. And then ultimately in 2004, me, my mother and 400 other families were forced from the Harbor Island Apartments. We know from the USDA or the school district data that nearly two thirds of families were forced from the island because so many children were then placed out of district. So the experience of residential displacement is something I know personally. Our family moved twice after that, and we've been in the same apartment for the last nine years. And fortunately, our landlord, who used to live in that apartment as a resident and now owns it, has not raised our rent for nine years. We are very grateful. That is not a reality for most out of meetings, I'm sure don't have any scientific evidence, but I doubt that the euphemistically speaking housing providers or landlords are able to extend that to everybody. I later with that housing stability was able to go back to school, went to UC Berkeley. I did my housing, my undergrad thesis on. And if I can just wrap up very, very briefly, I did my thesis on housing discrimination against Alameda in black Alameda and it's called Alameda and is our home. And one of the takeaways from that is that this displacement is constant. It's particularly for African-Americans. And so while I spoke out here in September in favor of a task force, I repeat that there needs to be a task force to be able to study this data. I'm grateful for the community process that did exist because it organized people and attempts to engage people. But I'm interested in data. I think that what was proposed, although we had critiques, there were no residents represented by the stakeholders or not residents pardon me, there were not any renters representing I don't know if there is any renters represented on this council or the previous council. And so that doesn't necessarily mean that it is invalid, right? Because if that was the case, then with the housing tenure in Alameda, half of the folks should be renters. Right. So anyway, in conclusion, since you allow me two little extra time to speak. Speaker 4: And I'm grateful. Speaker 0: For that, I would again hope that we can bring up the housing task force to be able to study and get more information about the actual renter market. What is the state of the market? What are some of the demographics of the housing tenure where people being displaced? How does that impact things like the school district, etc.? Because housing is a basis for many other opportunities that us Al-Amin are grateful for. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. The John Spangler and I'll Brian McGuire. And then, Amy, we thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you again, Mayor Spencer. I'll be brief because my line is going off in 5 hours. I've been at it since five. I want to offer start, sir, with a quote from Martin, the Reverend Martin Luther King. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. When we first moved to Alameda in 1997, we bought a house. Linda and I owned the house for about 12 years. We sell it. So since then, we've been since 2009, we've been renting. There is a profound difference in. The potential for intimidation when you're renting than when you're dealing with a mortgage. The comments that Jeff quoted and others have referred to are genuine. They're very real. And I'll bet you none of them. None of those comments came from investment bankers. I've been to three Alameda Renters Coalition meetings. None of the people who shown up have said anything about being in the banking business, never mind being investment bankers. A lot of these people are on fixed incomes. Social Security retirement. And when they're faced on a fixed income with a 10% increase. That means they get to choose when they're going to eat or whether they don't get medication anymore. Instead of paying the rent increase. This is a very real conflict. The landlords you've heard from tonight have very real expenses. I've heard a great deal. I've seen a great deal of can they live and work on foundations? I know what the going market rate was when we were on the gold in the Gold Coast. Those are real expenses. I don't want any landlords to starve either, but I don't think it's fair that people who are faced with a 30% no ifs, no ads, no buts increase without any changes at all in the status of the apartment they're living in and no change in ownership and no improvements and substandard conditions should get away with that. That said, I support the process that Jeff undertook. I am very happy to be part of the group that is now offering some support to my fellow renters. And I hope to God that this mediation process and strengthening the RAC works. It is the Alameda way. It would be wonderful to not pursue stronger measures. But. If this collaborative approach does not work, we have a big problem on our hands and I hope this council will be willing and able and ready to deal with the next step if it has to come. Thank you. Good evening, Council Mayor Staff. I could stand up here and tell personal stories about rent increases past, present and future. Notice to vacate upcoming move from the only home my daughter's ever known. But I think some of that anecdotal grounds been well covered. Council has a bigger responsibility than just dealing with this on a case by case basis. Renter initiated mediation is no substitute for an ordinance governing this relationship between renters and property owners. Smart people can and have already told you more about the types of power imbalances in this relationship. One thing, renters hold almost zero market power over their housing costs in terms of choosing one versus another. They can't dictate to the property owner, so they can just act and choose off the menu. Think if you were a teacher or a cop and had to negotiate your pay and benefits instead of relying on collective bargaining. Angela and Arc HRC have started this process, but you really are our union reps in this type of situation. You need to act accordingly. A lot of property owners have, you know, several property owners in this process and, you know, in the discussions have sort of been crying poor and talking about the costs of maintenance and keeping safe, habitable structures makes it sound like property owning property in Alameda is undesirable. But look at the MLS right now and you can see there's almost zero multifamily rental properties on the market right now available for purchase. If they don't want to be property owners and landlords and it's too much of a hassle, there's a line of people that will be happy to pay double what they inherited, double the value that they inherited, that their parents paid for when they, you know, and that they've now inherited and are are making their living off of. They'll be alright by the grace of God. I think they'll make it. I don't personally advocate for the strictest rent control measures due to some well-documented unintended consequences, but you need to take some of the volatility out of this process. Something like CPI plus X percentage with the ability for capital pass thrus is could be a starting point. There's lots of you know, we can learn from other cities. This process needs to have the city's imprimatur behind it. I was disappointed that the previous council kind of pass the buck on this. And I hope you. Consider this and actually work on an actual ordinance and not just rely on a case by case process to try to negotiate this. Thank you. Speaker 2: What was your name again? Speaker 0: Brian McGuire. Speaker 2: Amy. Speaker 1: Oh. Good evening, everyone. My name is Amy. I'm a renter. I live in Alameda about eight years. And this few years, you know, I'm a renter, a race two times totally about $300. And I enjoying the meeting like a renter meeting staff about six times. And I listen to every people and less than the owner what's reason they entrees rent binary also I ask my friends they are owner you know and then. For me. I know. You know, you're only the owner. They cost the same, you know, and I think. And no reason to raise the rent. And for me, I think you only raise the one times enough. I don't. I want. Don't want. I hope it can stop no normal or raise the rent or you know, for me, I think I or I want to rent a house. I have a renter's lease, you know it just how much money pay, you know that's how much money. You know it is a Y raise next time. And also I hear my friends, he's a renter, a owner. He said, oh, Amy, I will go to raise my raise their house, rent of money as they I say how much money. They say, oh, 100. I say to you know, oh, what's, you know how they think, how they say, I don't know, you know and I know about they they know why is retired one woman another is a picket dog or stuff a woman I feel you know also care about their you know is. My friends, he's the owner, but he's he, you know, have money. You know, he don't want any money. That's the he just think, you know, see another place how much money or to bail on so I thought well going to so for this is all stories I felt no I hope you know is the city council and a study about that you know. And. If I want to raise money, you know, maybe 2%. And from, you know, just a sink of 2%. I know I've already raised money too much, you know. Only one times. I know, actually, you know, is no reason to raise rent. Well, I hope kids think about this. You know, I have good stages and as soon as possible. Speaker 2: Thank thank you. Count that. That was our last speaker everyone. So at this point council comments are actually staff do you want to. Speaker 5: Cause. Speaker 0: Yeah, I guess what Steph is looking for tonight, you've heard a great deal of testimony. I think on behalf of Steph, I want to thank Jeff Canberra for putting together this process with the stakeholders now that they've put forward. Their product we had staff really need direction from the council because this is such a. It's a very human issue, but it's also, from a policy perspective, a very complex issue. There's lots of different ways of looking at data, what data is being considered and not being considered and the way that gets framed. Can determine the outcome. So what data is being collected and analyzed, I believe, is actually in itself a policy decision because we don't have unlimited resources either financially or in terms of staff time. So what I'm hope what what on behalf of staff who are going to actually do the work, what we're looking for is some clear direction and boundaries from the Council about what it is you're looking for us to do here. And then we'll be able to give you a report back on how long that will take. I'll need to think about it for a week. Like how long will it take to put together what you're asking for? But we do need clear direction from the Council. On next steps, please. Speaker 2: I'm willing to jump in. All right. Council members. Who would actually you want me to now? Obviously would like to start. Is anyone else? Speaker 1: You guys go to that? Okay. Speaker 2: Go ahead. Thank you, Mary Spencer. So and it's been said, but thank you to Mr. Cameron, Mr. Lindsay, Angela and all the other people, all the speakers. Very informative. We appreciate it. I am. And it was said by a couple of speakers and I appreciate everything that was done. And I'm really impressed whenever a community group coming from such divergent viewpoints can get together and find middle ground and, you know, not be at each other's throats. I think you did a good job and I think you may be surprised each other with some of the things you found out. I went back, though, and read the the staff report from September when the staff report was recommended, but the majority of the council chose not to do it. And that's that's fine. I think this has been a valuable process, but I am still concerned that we need I believe we need to answer some of the questions that were posed by that staff report before we move move further. These might be great proposals, the 5 to 6 points. But what was asked in in Ms.. Porter went over them in the beginning is the questions that a task force would have been asked to answer was, is what is the state of the residential rental market in Alameda? And I appreciate everything the the community groups did, but I don't think they had the resources or the time or the wherewithal to answer that question. I think there's been some interesting data presented in one of the online news sources, Michelle Allison, at the Alameda meeting. But I know staff is proposing a consultant to gather that sort of data. I feel like we need to know that to have that answered because it was to know what the impacts of tenants of rental increases are. Trends impacts on residents and families, identifying the root causes for recent price increases, existing efforts in other Bay Area cities to combat these increases, and also how these increases impacted different groups, whether it was by age or by racial group or the type of housing. I think we need to know more of that. As far as what have been the impacts of rent control or stabilization ordinances in jurisdictions that adopted them? You know, of all the speakers we heard only a couple and I think there were landlords even touched on rent control and why that wouldn't be a good thing. So that might be premature, quite premature this time. But I do think the question and it was answered in part by the group, what changes, if any, should be made to the R, a c? One thing that I found, I think in investigating a little bit is that in the RC works hard when they get these cases , I don't think it's the same sort of process for joining that board as other boards and commissions, because as I understand it, there's no term limit. So we can look at that tomorrow and. Okay, yes, good. Yes, we're looking at that. And the so we haven't had a study done. I think that I would want to wait to even explore these proposals and whether they should be adopted until we know a little bit more about what the situation is that we're facing. And I think Councilmember Odie tried to elicit that, that, you know, how many ranchers did you hear from? And I'm still troubled by the fact that we're hearing that some people were hesitant to even be heard. So, I mean, there must be some other ways besides coming forward in a in a public forum. But anyway, those are some of my thoughts at this late hour. And if people want to discuss the specific proposals, I'll come back. But I just feel like we need more data. Okay. And I want to say so the people that are watching us when they watch us on feet, again, it is approximately 15 minutes after midnight . So I know everyone wanted to take on the whole agenda tonight and I'm pretty sure we will not be doing that. So at this point. Member Comments. Next. Next. Council Member. Speaker 4: Want to go? Speaker 0: I'll try to pick. And I'll try to cover like general comments on on the issue of rent control and then specifics on the six items. I do want to say thank you to Mr. Camera and the group. I was one of those people that was skeptical in the beginning. I thought that the both the referral process, the referral that the staff came up with was the way to go. But I'm heartened by the fact that you guys have tenants and property owners talking together and collaborating and working together. And we did have that six months. And I think we have a path forward with this group, you know, to form the foundation for, I guess what was called a model mediation process. So I'm encouraged by that and I hope we can keep moving forward on that. And I hope that Mr. Lindsay can continue to be the enforcer and keep keep the bad apples in line. But I you know, there's one thing we're talking about Alameda Point tonight and, you know, there's a connection between, you know, the housing stock shortage and rent control. And if we're going to sit up here and say, well, we don't believe we should have rent control, and at the same time sit up here and say we should also stop building housing. We should have no housing at the point we should have moratoriums, you know, on density bonus applications. No, I don't think we can do that. You know, otherwise we're going to end up having a city that's full of tech people that's going to shut out. You know, people like myself, I'm a tenant. One of the people asked, are there tenants? There's two tenants up here that if the other one wants to say who they are, they can do that. But, you know, I'm a tenant and. If that's what the city wants, then, you know, I guess I'll be for it because that's what the will of the people is. But I don't think we want to turn into downtown San Francisco or South a market where we're the only people that can afford to live here, you know, are people that work in the tech industry. So I do want to just second a little bit of what Councilmember Ashcraft said. I think there's no one short term objective that I like to see, and that's this collection of data. I believe that was the first item on the original staff report State of the residential market, quantitative analysis of rental rates, vacancy rates, and so on. And then I think maybe as a long term, because I don't think we can make a decision on if we're going to implement rent control or if rent control is even necessary until we have that data. So maybe a longer term, it could be six months, it could be eight months, it could be however long. Staff recommends we need to have an adequate amount of data to make that decision. Then we have an analysis of rent control as a tool to maintain stable rents and affordable housing. And. I was a landlord tenant attorney before going into government service. And the thing that I saw in my practice is that. Rent control didn't really help anyone except the attorneys. So if we're going to do something, it has to be something that protects our tenants. It has to be something that, you know, respects the rights of property owners to protect themselves from the rate of inflation and earn a reasonable rate of return. Because actually this is an investment for them, but it cannot be a full employment act for attorneys. So we have to be careful as we put that together. I think the other thing that we haven't looked at and I didn't see it in here, I think some of the tenants mentioned it, some type of just cause eviction. You know, there's no there was no discussion on that. I mean, can you pick somebody who's been there for 15 years and then re rent it out at market rents? So I think that's something that we need to look at as well. So just quickly going over the six points. You know. Again. Jeff, I think you guys did a great job of putting this together. And, you know, I'm impressed with the way you're able to bring people together. And I hope we can we can push forward these six points. And I just have a couple quick comments on one discussion. Point one I think we should consider that is parties only, not attorneys. You guys have developed a rapport between landlords and tenants, and I think it's better if in the mediation process, you know, it's still the landlord and the tenant and not not attorneys going at it . A discussion point to participation. You know, there might be I agree with that recommendation, but I think there might be a valid reason why someone may need a continuance. Maybe they're out of town, maybe, you know, they have childcare issues, you know, in building some mechanism where they can do that. And then if the, you know, if the landlord wants a continuance, then, you know, he or she doesn't get their rent increase for that time period where they have that continuance. Discussion point three. You know, I think it's very important that we have this notice. You know, one of the things I've I've heard is there wasn't a lot of tenant representation there, a lot of tenants. And I found this in my practice. A lot of tenants don't know their rights. So, you know, giving something, making it a requirement as when you get a lease that you get some notice that says, you know, we have this rec and we have this process and if you have a rent increase in the future, you have a remedy if you think it's excessive. And I agree that, you know, every time you get a rent increase, this should be a required notice that that's served with every rent increase. And I'm going to skip 2.6 because that's kind of melded into 2.3. But this this percentage, I think we have to be very careful if we set a percentage because we're basically saying if you if you say anything over 10% has to go to the rack, then you're basically saying anything 9.9% or 9.99% or under is going to be acceptable and there's going to be no recourse. And I encouraged by my discussion with Mr. Lindsay also earlier today that you guys are talking about this. The task force is is trying to come up with a number. I think we have to be careful. You know, right now we have no number. We don't want to be in a situation where we're having de minimis rent increases. You know, going to the rack. So I understand that. But we also want to make sure that, you know, we're not giving license to say, you know, anything under a certain number, you know, is not going to have any review on the retaliation. The point was made, you know, this is the law. I mean, that's in the civil code. I don't know if we need a new ordinance to say you're not allowed to retaliate if it's already state law. But I think if we put that in the notice or we put something in there that says, you know, exercising your rights to mediation under the act is not or is actually considered an exercise of tenant rights and cannot be retaliated. And I think that would be sufficient. And then on point five. I agree with that one. And then I think I discuss point six. So again, I want to thank all the folks here that came out and talked. I have an appreciation for all the tenants. Being a tenant myself, I appreciate for the tenants as someone who fought for tenants. I will say I never had a tenant case in Alameda, so I think our landlords are doing a good job. I don't think that we have a widespread issue of exorbitant rents, but I really would like to see the data and that's my suggestion and a thanks everyone and thank you Jeff for for all your hard work on this. Speaker 2: Member de sac. Speaker 4: Thank you Mayor Spencer for a purpose of tonight. One of the things I wanted to do was review a range of data, largely because that was one of the issues that we had raised way back in November when City Council then discussed how we might approach this matter. So I put together a data table, a presentation, there are just six tables in and the presentation, but I just really want to focus our attention on three of the tables and for what the presentation is about is about, you know, what has been the experience of oh. You want to do this? And then I'll just. What has been the experience of rental households in the city of Alameda? I made comparisons with San Leandro and the city of Oakland as well as Alameda County. But for our purposes tonight, we're just going to focus our discussion on the city of Alameda and perhaps on the website . On our website, I'll post further discussions about comparisons. If we can go to table one. We'll just skip the objectives right here. This is a key table because the data comes from the United States Census American Community Survey, which is a survey of a sample of residents in the city of Alameda over a number of years. So you can see the way that I prepare the data. I look at pre-recession recession and recovery period. Let's just focus on the recovery period. According to the eight U.S. Census acts, the typical health rental household pays 29.4% of their income towards their rent. And the reason why that number is important is because 30% is the threshold for what constitutes affordable housing. Now, bear in mind, this is from samples from the 2011, 2013 period. These could have just jumped way off the charts in 2014. But when you look at the typical that is the median household who rents, they're paying 29.4% of their rent of their income towards rent. So they're just slightly under what the Fed constitutes as unaffordable, which is 30% is the threshold. Next slide. And this is a comparison with other cities, but we're going to skip on table three. I think this this really gets to one of the reasons why we're dealing with with the stresses that we're talking about. Even though the typical rental household pays slightly under the affordable rate, the typical rental household income is $51,700 in Alameda. Relative to the typical household owner occupied household income, which is $113,300. So someone mentioned, for example, that they experienced rents of $450 increase for $50 a month. So multiply that by 12, that's $5,400. So you can imagine 12 times 20, 50 plus 5400. So you can imagine monthly, you know, when you annualize the monthly rent increase for renters, how that really draws down on on persons is constrained incomes. But the important part about looking at the 51,700 is when you look at table for next table. Now, this table comes from an Oakland based outfit that talks about, you know, what is the income that's necessary to lead self-sufficient lives. So in this in Alameda County, if you have one if you're one adult with one child under under five years old, you need $55,700 to eat to lead a self-sufficient life. And that's you know, that's a bare bones income to, you know, that all the frills are not included. Likewise, if you're a single adult with two children in those ages, a roughly $66,300 to who lead what's called what this outfit calls a self-sufficient lives. So you can see that when you look at the typical rental households income in Alameda of $51,700 and compare it against standards like the self-sufficiency standards, that kind of underscores even more how just, you know, slight change in in the rental in the rent upwards as affects disproportionately disproportionately affects renters. So let's go to the next slide. And the other thing, too, is, prior to the recession rent renters in Alameda, the typical renter had $59,700. That was a household income. And then coming out of the recession, the typical household is now as their income has declined by almost $8,000. So you can see that, you know, the rental housing market and the households in it, that there there are special constraints that we need to be cognizant of for the typical renter. But the thing that I get out of this data is that. The typical renter, for the most part, has an affordable rent. But you can't just look at that affordable rent just because it's 29 under 30%. Rent to income ratio, just because it's under what the feds constitute as affordable. You can't say, oh, well, you know, we don't have to do anything because you have to look at not just the rents, but you have to look at their income relative to, you know, what it takes to lead a self-sufficient life in in Alameda County. And also, you have to look at the income in terms of how it's changed in the past six years or so. And so I think what this tells me then is that while the data doesn't speak to any grounds for a generalized approach for dealing with the with a rent issue, generalized approach, meaning rent control, however defined and loosely defined as price controls. I don't think that those data from the households perspective to justify rent control from a generalized perspective. But I think there is enough there to to say that, you know, we do need very particular case by case type of solutions. And I think to me, this data speaks to I actually I think it confirms the six points that were raised through the forum. I still believe that the forum should take those six points and have them vetted more by the Rent Review Advisory Board, but as well as a social service human relations board. And I will say, though, that the six points, in my opinion, need to be strengthened. I think that, for example, if we're going to make the changes that we're contemplating with regard to strengthened rent review advisory board in the relationship with equal housing, that implies that there's going to be a lot more cases involved. And is ECHO or is the rent review advisory board, do they have the capacity to handle the rising expectations that we're creating in doing this? So I think we have to have to strengthen either echo housing our relationship with them or the review when fires report. One specific way of strengthening the rent review advisory board or the echo housing is. We've got the business license fee, you know, property rental property holders of a particular type, hey, into the into the fee. So what we could do is we're always adjusting the fee, you know, for, for, for purposes of inflation or maybe we hadn't adjusted it for for two or three years or so. So, you know, let's just say hypothetically, the fee is $110 or for the for property owners, the business license fee. And independent of this whole matter, we're going to adjust it anyways and we adjust it, let's say, to $125. So what I would propose is we take that increment and we reserve the increment for housing related issues. So and that and so if it's a $10, a $10 incremental change that that we would have made anyways regardless of the issue. But now we're reserving that $10 incremental change. You know, you multiply that $10 times roughly 55,000 buildings that that contain 15,000 rental households, that $10 amounts to ten times 5000, which is what it's $50,000 for. Suddenly, you know, without having added on a new special fee, we would have come up with an amount of money that we can help pay eco housing or rent, rent, review and value board, be able to handle the increased case that's going to come down the pike. And I think it's important to increase the capacity of echo housing is because last year in our Cdhb budget process, we actually took money out of eco housing. You know, it was a interesting discussion that we had, but we ended up taking money out of Eko Housing. But city manager John Russo found ways to backfill that money. So, so, but but the issue though, is the way that we're funding our portion of Eko housing right now, it's, you know, it's subject to the budgetary, you know, things. I think we should continue to fund them via CDBG, but we should also take a look at this kind of approach that I'm talking about with regard to the business license fee when it comes to rental property houses. Now, another specific item to improve the capacity of of of the rent review advisory board or eco housing. I, for example, I believe I don't have to pay a business license fee, though. I live upstairs and I rent out the two houses downstairs. And you look on Craigslist, you know, there's a lot of people, I'm sure, you know, homeowners who are, you know, helping make their mortgage payments, you know, things like that. Well, I think, you know, rent review advisory board, it would be it would be great for them to, you know, to to look at to help us in under in looking at this issue with regard to that particular change that that we might contemplate. So that's that's another way that we might want to take a look at that. Oh, okay. So I do think that we're on the right track. I do think that there are substantive decision points that we can take to strengthen the six points that were were raised. So that and I do think that we can do it in a way that the property residential rental property owners, you know, if they were concerned about an increase in tax. The way that I outlined it well, it increased anyways, but now we're just reserving the increment towards this issue. Like. Speaker 2: Vice Mayor. Speaker 0: I'd also like to echo, thanks to Mr. Canberra and everybody who stepped forward, participate. It's not been easy and. To see the five points to have consensus of. And the six point that is still being worked on, I think, is I'd like to seize the moment. And City Manager Russo asked for some specific direction, and I'd like to. Make a motion to have a staff of bring back an implementation plan for applying those principles to the Review Advisory Board. Because that first part is protecting and, and, and establishing fairness in dealings. It's a mediation process. It makes it stronger. It doesn't substantially change the process except to strengthen it. So I think that we have to we have to take advantage of the hard work that was done and move forward on that. I think there are questions that were asked in the staff report of a September that haven't been answered and the data necessary to answer. Speaker 2: Before you continue. If I heard correctly, you're making a motion. Yes, I will second that motion. Speaker 0: But I wanted to add or. Speaker 2: Continue. Now. Speaker 0: The second part of the motion is to have staff gather the necessary data to answer the questions. It were posed in the. September report. And to use the resources that are. Out here in the coalition, as well as the housing provider group to help gather that information, because that's a group that didn't exist when this was was posed. So that's my motion is to do both. Speaker 2: I shouldn't. Sorry. Speaker 0: I just want to make sure the motion is. Is that. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Speaker 2: Oh, I'm not going to stick it out. Someone else wants me. That's what we're looking for right now. So that we can continue the discussion. Yes. Okay. I'll second. And I would like to and I agree. No, I'm sorry. Not for you to continue discussing. You've had no idea. I see. I know. Yeah, but that I haven't had an opportunity to speak at you. Comes back to you to finish up motion second. It comes back to you if you have any other comments. Okay. And I still have discussion. Speaker 0: Okay. Speaker 2: Okay. Then I get to speak because I've been waiting. You spoke at the beginning? No, but I said that I would if it was more than just a proposal to continue so we could study. They said I had some comments about the proposal. We will get back, but everyone gets a turn. Then we can go round again. Okay. Thank you. That's fair. Okay. I am the other person that rents. I've been renting for 15 years. The same house when we first moved up here 15 years ago. They were my husband and myself and four children. At that point, the renters market was such that we had to pay a fee to have someone help us find a home. However, it changed after that. Our rent decreased. We've actually had a very good relationship with our landlord, who is someone similar to some of the speakers we've had this evening and this. I know some of you have moved here in the last few years and you're experiencing this part of the renters market. However, over the 15 years that I've been renting here, it has gone down and it has now is going back up. And I do appreciate, as a renter not knowing for sure month to month what's going to happen. I personally strongly support the first part of the motion because these are five things that we've had all these people spend all this time on, which started back in September, their house. And for me, I'm very concerned if we're going to have the spend, I don't know how much more time before other people are ready to support the work of the community here. I think it's very important we move along as quickly as possible. On your five points, on the five points that were unanimous, one through four, some of those are law. So there shouldn't be any problem with trying to get us to do those. Eight out of nine, that's I don't expect to get better than that. I do think time is of the essence. And I understand I recognized back when this was sent by prior council to Geoff Cameron, it was to try to get people talking and trying to resolve this. They did their task and now it's our turn to actually take action on what the work that's already been done. So I do strongly support one through four and number five because that was it. They agree. It says no agreement on number six. I would not have that hold up the process. I personally am in favor of 10% to me is too high. When your rents are 2000, 3000, whatever it is, 2500 10% is $200 on a $2,000 rent. And that I think many of us that are renting are paying close to the 2000 or actually higher than that at $200 increase when it's handed to you actually works out to be 20 $400 a year. So for me, 10% is too high to restrict it to that I would entertain. I know there's people think that you need to have a percentage. And I really like the way you guys have all been working on this together, so I don't want to take anything away from this process. But for me, maybe 5%, just not that I'm saying that's the recommendation, but 5% if you're paying $2,100, that's. You know. So for me, that's something to look at. But I would really hope that we could agree to take action on the five things and not complicate, which is why I'd like to break it down. Speaker 0: We have the discussion. So I move that we make the five hour. Amend my motion, make the five consensus points. I'm back with an implementation plan in parallel with taking input from the working group as the recommendation comes back on the six. Or consensus come back on the six or whatever it might be. Speaker 2: So we can have lots of promotions. But for this, I'd like a clean motion. One through five. Hand it to staff. Let them figure out how we can support the community. Speaker 0: Only to second vice mayor's motion. Speaker 2: Is that what that was, though? Speaker 0: No, it's just the five, for sure. Speaker 1: Okay. And then. Speaker 2: Six. Could we just do that part? Speaker 0: Well, I don't want to hold up the train because people are working on that. Have them work on the sixth. If the staff report comes back and said there's no consensus, there's no consensus. We'll keep working on what we've got the five in the implementation. Speaker 2: But the five can move ahead without the six is my point. Speaker 0: Oh, that's okay. Okay. Five. Moving ahead without the six. But don't. But include it in there. So that is the process. Speaker 2: So there's other things we can include. But to make sure we're. I'd like to break it down so we can get our vote on what we can get. Then we can talk about the next thing. So. Okay. But there's a discussion before we vote. Yes. Yes. Speaker 0: Did I get a second for that? Six. Thank you. Speaker 2: Okay. So he has a second on that. So now if we could quickly discuss this motion because I want to get this through. Okay. I might ask you. Okay. So on discussion point too. I, I find the language about the tenets failure to appear unduly harsh. And this is what I mean. If you look at discussion point, too, we see that if the housing provider fails to appear or have a responsible party appear, although I think Vice Mayor would like it just to be the parties it was that, you know, no attorneys, just parties. Speaker 0: That's and I agree with that. That was councilmember member. Speaker 2: I agree. I hold that thought. Okay. So that so if the the housing provider fails to appear, the rent increases is void. If the tenant, on the other hand, fails to appear, the committee will dismiss the case and the tenant will be barred from subsequently challenging such increase before the committee. To my reading, that sounds like forever you can't come back. Whereas the landlord, all the landlord has to do is do another rent increase and show up this time and he or she is able to have the rent increase go through. If I'm reading this correctly, I don't understand why we should subsequently bar a tenant from challenging such increase before the the committee. Or maybe it just means that particular increase. Okay. Okay. So not a future. Not a future bar. Okay. And then in the text of the notice, the suggested text, I, I would like our city attorney's office to work on just making that language as user friendly as possible, because some of the folks who are dealing with these increases might English might not be their second language. We might think about what other languages it should be in. Other people are just challenged by legalese and this is better than some, but it could be better, I think just clearer. And the city attorney is nodding. She gets it. And so then, okay, we're not we're not getting to the the percentage that triggers it. But that's the sort of thing I would probably like staff to study anyway. And then I would also suggest that staff talk with other cities who have these provisions in place to see what their experience has been. There's no need to reinvent the wheel, and we might as well learn from others experiences. Maybe we could do this even better, but I think we are off to a good start. And then finally, should we as a council be asking for this matter to come back within a certain period of time? So we just have a look at how it's how it's working out, how it's been playing out. Um, so before we go on to that, did you want to address this, this motion? Speaker 4: Yes, I did. But that's that was a question that you had. Speaker 2: That that was my last one. Should we just for council consider should we that that's separate that motion right now. So I'd rather. Speaker 4: Interpret it the motion what I'd like to see is a spell out range of possible implementations. I meant I specified two items that I would like, um, staff to take a look at because frankly, you know, if we don't improve the capacity of the review advisory board of Echo Housing to deal with a potential increase in, you know, where we're probably in a worse situation, we've raised expectations, but we haven't improved the operations by which we're going to address those expectations. So I would like us to take a look at the business of those two business license item fees as part of the motion, so that there. Speaker 2: Might be would be a separate and then I. Speaker 4: Do an amendment. Speaker 0: So well, you know, one of the things, if I if I may respond to that is the we give staff direction to to come back with an implementation plan. My assumption is staff is going to refine these, not take verbatim and slap a cover sheet on it and give it to us. I think it's important to have your comment, um, be listened to by staff and incorporated into it is if it's going to be part of the implementation. Just like the point about item number six, is there a percentage there they may come back with saying, well, we could put 5%, but we advise that we don't put any percent because other cities don't have a threshold and the most democratic process allows anybody to challenge any increase. So I think that's the work that I expect staff to do. And I didn't purposely didn't put a due date on because I was going to wait for the manager's response to say, Well, we can do this in 60 days or we can do 40 days. And then we would respond to that accordingly. Speaker 2: Okay. So. Speaker 0: Ah. Oh. Well I said according to that fairly. If you want the answer. Now, I have to talk to Debbie for a minute. Let me. Let me talk. I don't want it. I purposely put it. Not in there to get your reaction after, should it? Speaker 2: So I'm hoping I'm hoping that we can agree here in a manner to support this community work. I actually am very concerned if we take if we if it's going to end, if we make it so complicated, it's going to take 60 days, 90 days to get stuff back. Then it's going to be who knows how many more days before this happens. And this truly to me is a good faith effort. So I'm hoping we can come up with something that's not going to require. Speaker 0: The question that. Speaker 2: And I personally am not concerned about increase any license fee because I'll tell you, as any runner, I think most of us think when a fee gets passed on to the landlord, it's going to get passed on to us. And so for me, I would rather come up with a way that, as far as I know, is volunteers. We have many volunteers in this community that have already stepped up on this issue. And if there's a way I would rather put out the outreach of I need more volunteers to volunteer on rack rather than starting to increase fees that are going to be passed down. But isn't it isn't it fair to at least have staff look at overstocked, unwanted bonds and the suggestion that rate increases do not affect renters? They absolutely increase effect landlords and they affect renters. So it's something to keep in mind. Speaker 4: So here's a question. Are we going to send this back not only to staff, but then the rent review advisory board for their view and input? Or are we sending it back. Speaker 2: To staff. Speaker 4: To give it back to us and then we'll make a decision? Speaker 2: I would think that staff can communicate with them. The our direction is to staff. Um, so we have a motion on. You. Yeah. Speaker 0: The answer is 90 days for publication and not for presentation because we have the two week agenda and we have to look at the data issue and what the data is going to cost and we want to be able to bring back to you and we may be able to do that more quickly. What the cost is to determine whether you want us to retain somebody to do that level of data collection. We'll move forward on the five points. There's no question that's easy. We can do. Speaker 2: That. And so could you explain your comment? Because I want to I do want to address the five points. First, how much time do you need to do that? Speaker 0: 90 days. Speaker 2: To do the five. Speaker 0: Points, to do the five points and to work further with the community group that's already been established 90 days for publication. We'll have something published in that within 90 days. Speaker 2: So when you come back to us in the meantime, then as part of that process. Speaker 0: I was not planning on doing that because then I have to we have to write another report and there's there's a limited resources. It's not this is not a huge staff. We will bring you something comprehensive back in 90 days and we will consult with the folks who were already the stakeholders. We will come back to you before 90 days to let you know after we check with various. We don't want to just go to one consultant. We want to talk to a group of different consultants, and we will come back to you, even though it may be under the threshold number. We'll come back to you with a short report about this to collect data. This is what the proposals we got. What do you want to do? Speaker 2: Okay. What data are you talking about? Speaker 0: Collecting the data that we mentioned in our initial report. Speaker 2: Okay. So that is separate. And I want to I want to speak to the issues separately. Speaker 0: Well, that's that's entirely your right to do that. But I was asked a question by the vice mayor about how long this dissipated these things would take. So I'm just answering his question. Speaker 2: So let's so let's focus on the one through five. Speaker 0: Okay. 90 days. Speaker 2: You still need 90 days for that? Yes. You need the same 90 days to do your data collection. Speaker 0: No, I need to come back to you and give you options on data collection so you know how much it costs. Because if we wanted to, we could do a data collection process that could cost you a half a million dollars. You may not want to spend that kind of money. Speaker 2: But personally, I think that once we the sooner we get this going, we will be collecting our own data moving forward. And that can guide the process and we can see how effective this is. And as opposed to looking backwards, I think that we can look forward. So I'm happy to have that conversation in the meantime. But in regards to these five points, does that satisfy. Well, we have a motion on the floor and it's been seconded and I and it was we've. Speaker 1: Yeah. Speaker 2: Can you repeat the motion please. Speaker 1: The motion that I have down includes all six points. Correct. Not just one through five. It includes all sections. Speaker 0: And that's still 90 days. Speaker 2: And for staff, though, to look at what percentage that number six should what percentage, if any. Speaker 0: Will come with a proposal. But in the end, it's going to be a policy determination by the council. Speaker 2: Right. Okay. And that doesn't slow down your 90 slow down your days. Speaker 0: No. The part that slows me down is the data, because the data is the part that scares me. Speaker 2: So we'll keep that separate. I appreciate that. Okay. So we have a motion and a second digit. I just I do just want to hear the motion back to make sure we've got it all. Speaker 1: Okay. So. We find it. Okay. So it's to take the five consensus points forward to staff to come back with and then on a parallel track input from the working group on six at the same time to keep them working on it and then. That was seconded by member Odie. And then. County Council member as he Ashcraft asked if there would be no attorneys allowed, just the landlords and Councilmember Matt, R-S.C. agreed. Speaker 2: So that was that's not part of the motion. It's my understanding that that would go to staff to look at. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 2: So it's separate. Speaker 1: From a separate statutory. Yes. Okay. I wasn't sure if that. Speaker 0: Was in the my staff will take all our comments. Yeah. Speaker 1: Okay. Yes. So it's basically just that. Okay. Speaker 2: And then to at yeah. Have staff gather the necessary data and that's separate. Speaker 0: I, I, I backed that out so that we can have that discussion separately. Speaker 2: Okay. So thank you. I appreciate that. So we have a motion. Second. All those in favor. Speaker 0: I say. Speaker 2: I. Others oppose. Passes unanimously. So now we do have other. Did you want to revisit your data at this point on this? Because I did want to get that done. Speaker 0: Yes. I think we need to gather the. Hmm. The motion was that we asked staff to prepare a report that answers the questions post September. Staff report. Gathering the necessary data to support those answers. Speaker 2: And the response from staff was that this would be something they would be looking a consultant for. Speaker 1: And. Speaker 2: Also contacting other jurisdictions who have similar ordinances in place to gather data. Speaker 0: So we want I'm sorry, go ahead. And I think hearing the manager's comments, because we can ask how much data do we need to answer, these can rapidly inflate itself. So perhaps having gone through this, we can look at having staff come back with us to us, rather than a report with an estimate of what it might take to answer each question. And great range, and then we can revisit it and refine it so that we get the we get the questions answered that really we could prioritize which question really need to be answered. And. And keep within the budget, but actually accomplish. Speaker 2: Okay. And I think remember detox information actually goes. Speaker 5: To some of this. That he did. Speaker 2: The word helpful. I mean, so we and we have other sources that can help provide this information. So information has been gathered. There is a survey out there that was already taken. So actually, some of you can some of you spoke publicly about your comments. You can also submit those to council and staff to support this work. Speaker 0: Can I? May I? Yes. All right. I want to be crystal clear, because the data that is selected. Will often determine and color the policy decision. Let me give you an example, and I do not mean this in any way. I was very impressed with the work that Councilmember de Saag does, and he's always welcome to stop being a council member and come work with staff and do those kinds of reports, because that was terrific. But well, he is. And the but the point is the data collected as he. As he stated at the outset, was from the point of view of the tenant. There are other policy decisions. I'm not unsympathetic to that. By the way, I started my career as a legal services attorney. So I want to be clear. I'm speaking here intellectually. There are other data that may have to do with things like the cost of whether or not the apartment includes heating or doesn't include heating and what the cost of heating oil is. It may not include what other jurisdictions do in terms of requirements about soft stories. There are so many different things. If you took it from the point of view then of the housing provider and then what the costs of that are to a city if we don't keep the housing stock. I'm not making an argument for any of that. My point is what data you collect may very well drive your decision. And I don't want staff to be stepping into what is essentially a policy choice. What you choose to collect, I feel, is itself a policy decision. That's why I want to bring it back to the council. And perhaps it would be more helpful to get a an analysis of. What we should be discussing, because you brought two points of view to bear. I was on the council when we put the soft story ordinance into effect and an unintended consequence of that. Spun off of it because of cost. And it was mentioned also the pitch roofs versus the flat roofs. Um, there are other requirements that come up and if we could get the landscape of that so we can have a public. Education of what the landscape is. We might be able to make an informed decision about what data we gather. That and that's what we'd like to do for you, is give you the landscape and then have you pick and choose off the menu what you want us to actually go in and buy. Speaker 2: And so I'd like to comment on this in that we have I personally really want to look forward as opposed to backwards and the data that you're going to be collecting, depending upon what it is, is actually data based on a system that we are actually trying to work together and change and make more responsive. And and I am afraid I'm concerned that rather than looking at so so we've had a lot of agreements made and we got behind these agreements. And the data, the relevant data will be, is it working? But we just changed. Is it working? That's that's what we need to know. I actually don't need to know. I think we the reason we're having this conversation is because there did need to be improvement. And now we're hoping moving forward there will be a better relationship that will work. So I'm more focused and I and I really want people to have their energy to focus on how we're going to resolve these cases or this environment that we're working together moving forward. So so that's why that's really my concern. Speaker 0: That I hear that concern and I think we can accomplish that same. And as even looking forward, we have to understand what the landscape is. Speaker 2: But I want to be positive. I really want to stay positive. And I'm afraid that if you spend too much time looking at this other stuff, we know we needed to work together better. That's what this group told me. And they also told me they are going to be doing that. Madam Chair, I want to stay positive, too, but I do think that these four questions are important, and especially number one, and I do think it helps us know what the current state of the residential rental market is, so that we know that the solutions we're hoping to institute are really going to address the the concerns. And that was what is the state of the residential rental market in Alameda. This could I can answer that too. There are next to no rentals available I would if I could just finish because I think staff did a very nice job of putting this together succinctly . This could include a quantitative analysis of rental rates, vacancy rates, absorption trends, and the length of residency, the race, ethnicity of residents and different types of rental units. The answers to this question will help identify the need and define the problem regarding housing costs. And I also and the second question goes to the impact of what impact rent control and stabilization, for instance, has had. And the other the one other category I would just like to add to for consideration is age, because we have had a number of seniors that we've heard from that they have been priced out of the rental market and they especially tend to be on fixed income. So I do think it's important to stay positive, but I do think it's important to note the situation that we're facing and I'm confident that staff can find a way to get that data to us expeditiously. So I'm not I think that they are overburdened. I think that we have a lot of things we're talking about. Do we have is there a motion of someone that wants to make a motion on this issue? Speaker 0: Yes. I'll make a motion that we have staff provide us with an analysis of. The. Of the considerations needed to answer the questions that are in the September. Staff report. Yes. And. The potential costs if they can be identified. Gathering data that might be. Speaker 2: Is there a second? Speaker 0: Second? Speaker 2: All those in favor. Speaker 0: I, I. Speaker 2: Oppose and. Speaker 4: Abstain. And frankly, I'm much clearer as to what maybe. Speaker 2: So if you look at these questions, one of them is what changes have any made to the vote? I get to speak after I vote no, I get to explain my no vote. I thought you usually I voted. Speaker 0: For. Speaker 2: You. You passed. No, that's not correct. Procedure is that. Yes, the motion passed. Actually, there was a change. It was three, three in favor, one abstention and one no, thank you. So when you look at these questions, the reason why I'm voting are the first one. What is the state of the residential rental market now? AMITA I've answered that. I think we've heard there are not very many units. And so for me, I want to have staff focused on things that I think are would be more productive for this issue. Speaker 0: That's very. Speaker 2: Antisocial. I'm sorry. I I'm sorry. You actually as when you vote no, I get to explain my nova. It's not appropriate for you to speak at this time. This could include a quantitative analysis of rental rates, vacancy rates, absorption trends, and the length of residency and races and ethnicity and age was added to this. So I'll be curious to see how how much this cost. But I think it's very time consuming and I'm not. And for me, the focus has got to be moving forward. We have an issue moving forward. What's going to happen with our rents? What have what has what have been the impacts on rental rates, supply of rental housing and the physical condition of rental housing? Again, these are issues that I think will be better raised moving forward. But people this desire to have their just when they have their disputes that it goes direct and I want to support REC and the community to amicably resolve these and we can do the data collection moving forward. What changes have any need to be made to the city's rent review advisory committee rack? I think motion number one address that. Number four, what changes, if any, need to be made to the Alameda Municipal Code relative to residential rental housing? And again, I think that we had already directed staff to look at that as part of the first motion. Thank you. And I really do want to thank everyone for coming this evening, submitting all of your written communication. And I encourage you to continue to email all of us and work with RAC. I mean, really, I support all of you coming out here and Mr. Camara Bell staff and you know, I agree we're going to make this happen. Moving on. Next agenda item is six I. And is this something that needs to be so? Right now we have one, two, three, four plus all of the referrals. It is 1 a.m. and two. Speaker 1: Additional items on the joint. Speaker 2: Okay. And there's two additional items. And I would request that we allow staff to let us know what needs to be done this evening and that we move those to the next item. STAFF Could you let us know what items you need to. Speaker 0: Miss warmer them? Speaker 1: Yes. Thank you, Madam Mayor. The two items that we really need to discuss. One is from the six K, which is the professional services agreement for our audit audit firm. And then also on the SSI, c is the financial report to accept the audit, which is freebie. Okay. And preferably we do three B first because we still have a consultant here from business associates. Speaker 2: All right. So counsel. Speaker 1: And I think. Speaker 2: She's just what would you entertain a motion to? Well, I'm sorry. I had asked earlier about this. So now we are at 1 a.m. address. Let's continue, please. Three B. So to do this procedurally, do we need a motion to move this to the next agenda item? What do we need to do on the next? It's on the next slide. Speaker 1: I think you can just just decide to call three B or six K and then I guess the rest. Speaker 2: Okay, so count. So Council, are you supportive if we just keep moving to the agenda quickly, can't. Speaker 0: We just have a concern about you know, some of the referrals have been on there twice and I know somebody in the audience that waited till late last time to talk about it, and they're still in the audience today to talk about it. So if we want to consider the three or the the referrals that were carried over, I hesitate to want to carry them over to another meeting. In a mirror. Speaker 2: So it's 1 a.m.. I would prefer that we get to the agenda items that need to be addressed this evening. Speaker 4: Go ahead, madam. It's just a procedural slash, technical slash legal question with regard to hauling over items. We do have a city council meeting tomorrow. So is it altogether politics? Speaker 0: Is it altogether. Speaker 4: Possible to not close tonight's city council meeting with regard to those items? And are we still within are we brown at correct. And also Sunshine Ordinance, correct if we keep this open and then continue it, keep those referral items open and continue till tomorrow. City Council meeting is that. Speaker 1: Closure with the I believe that the technical language of the Brown Act and the Sunshine Ordinance would allow you to continue those referral items to tomorrow. It's just a matter of I mean, people are not going to know that and the community might not be very happy about it. But I think you can do that. Speaker 2: Okay. So then do you need us to rule on to have motions on those two items? So could they could everything wait until tomorrow. Speaker 1: Preferably to have those two items done and then the other items can be heard tomorrow? Speaker 2: All right. Speaker 0: So, yeah. Speaker 2: All right. So, Counsel, are you agreeable to moving forward with the. The first one would be three be. Is that correct? Speaker 4: Yes. And then we're going to deal with the referrals tomorrow belonging. Speaker 0: Well, that's a separate. Speaker 2: So right now, could we do three be? It could have motion to proceed with three. I'll move that. We proceed with three B second. Just to keep things moving along. I'll second it. All those in favor. I thank you, sir. We'll be proceeding with three B at this point. Speaker 1: Okay. So you recessing the council meeting and calling to order the meeting. Speaker 2: There you go. So, yes. Speaker 1: Okay. Got it. Yeah. I have a quick PowerPoint. Speaker 2: Quick. Speaker 5: Thank you. Thank you, Madam Mayor. And members of the council. I'm waiting for. Yeah, there we go. So we have a very brief report about the comprehensive annual financial report and. And the audited financial statements and all the compliance reports. State law requires this annual audit. City Charter also requires that the auditor provide the annual provide for annual audits and financing covenants, and granting agencies require annual audits with some special testing requirements. There are several standards which apply. These are generally accepted accounting principles, generally accepted auditing standards, and that the audit must be performed by a licensed firm of licensed certified public accountants. Now. Speaker 2: Find if. Speaker 5: So moving right along. Every financial report, every audited financial statement contains three main sections. Next one to the introductory section, which is just a summary of our organization in the context of the results. The financial section, which first of all contains the independent auditors report, which is their opinion, and we always want to see that they give

Regular Agenda Item

Report from the Alameda Rental Housing Community Discussion Group and Request for Council Direction Concerning Various Proposals.

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Speaker 5: So moving right along. Every financial report, every audited financial statement contains three main sections. Next one to the introductory section, which is just a summary of our organization in the context of the results. The financial section, which first of all contains the independent auditors report, which is their opinion, and we always want to see that they give us a clean opinion, that our statements are fairly presented. And the second part of that is the management discussion and analysis, which is a context for all of the results and then the statements. And they are presented in a variety of formats. And if you've looked at the reports recently, we follow all of the required generally accepted reporting requirements. So it doesn't look like just in the quarterly financial reports that we give you, but it's done in a variety of fashions. Excuse me, government wide is summarizing those funds which operate to provide services and business type, which are the enterprise funds of which we have only one now with their net position, which is assets and sources as well as liabilities and uses the major funds which are the individual funds, including their budget, the actual position with fund balances . So there's a variety of ways that we look at all of our. Financial resources. The next part of it is the notes. Notes to the statement which detail the historic information and provide a narrative description of specific items, including assets and long term liabilities, pensions and OPEB, other post-employment benefit liabilities. So if you really want to know more about those issues, you can read the notes and you'll get a lot of detail. Other funds include the non-major. They're smaller in size. They don't have as much operating impact. Internal service funds, which do have impact in that they operate with the operating funds and fiduciary funds, which are things that we do in trust for other people or other organizations. The final section is the statistical section, which which presents financial trends, revenue capacity, debt capacity. I put debit debt, debt capacity, demographic and economic information and other operating data. It is important to note that this is not audited information in the statistical section. It's what staff, supplies and provides. And we rely on other resources and other agencies to give us information as well. So finally, what are our results for this past fiscal year 2013 and 14? So all funds grew as revenues increased and expenditures were contained. So it's true overall for all of the funds. Some of the financial highlights, our net position is $402 million, $23 million of which or 5.7% is unrestricted and available for use for future uses. Governmental Funds Combined Fund balance of $95,000,000.20 $9 million 30% is available for other uses, the reserve policy has is 20%. It actually came out to be 40% at the year end. Subsequently, five additional percent has been at three and a half million dollars was added to the reserve as an exigency reserve. And in addition, we added another $3 million for deficiencies and other long term obligations. So we've reduced that 40%. Debt increased by only $289,000. This increase due to the fluctuation in debt service schedules. They're not all even in the state, just the same all the time. One of the final pieces that the auditors perform is called the Memorandum of Internal Controls and Required Communications, and this report is required under generally accepted auditing standards. And they reported two significant deficiencies. The first first deficiency was is being worked on. And that has to do with continuing disclosure. We did not fully meet the requirements by not timely filing all of our reports. We have contracted with a company DAC Bond to maintain and maintain timely quality filings. One one deficiency was resolved and that had to do with the administrative access controls to our accounting system. And we with the movement to the cloud system are able to more finely tuned those controls and maintain better internal controls. New pronouncements by the Governmental Accounting Standards Board will require that we present the pension and OPEB data in new formats, and we are working with consultants already in order to begin formatting that so that the auditors will have that information in the format that they need. Finally, we have compliance reports. You see in the exhibits attached to the report that there are a lot of smaller reports. These are compliance reports required by either granting agencies or other parts of the state government. We all of the data comes directly from the Kafir and is presented in the compliance reports and perhaps in a little bit different format as required by the granting agency. And that's why we have these separate compliance reports. All of these reports, the audit, the memorandum of Internal Controls and Required Communications and all the compliance reports are posted on our website and are available for everyone to read and query. I'd like to introduce Ms.. Grace Zang from Mason Associates, who has kindly come and kept kept me company this evening and is available to answer any really technical questions that you might have about the audit report. Speaker 2: Ashton's. Speaker 4: Well, I'm going to ask, is Adam here? I'm going to ask a general catchall question. Is there anything that, however you so define it that's substantially different in the way in which the report was prepared as substantially different from the way in which reports were prepared in the past? Speaker 2: And you need to speak in the microphone up here. Speaker 5: Prepared this year with last year. Speaker 1: Year before. Yeah we have been the auditors for multiple years and I am not the in chief partner. Speaker 2: On a job. I'm just representing Catherine. Speaker 1: Now, based on my knowledge, there is no, um, we have been consistent in our reporting approach. And in other. Speaker 4: Words, except for whatever the state says that you have to report now, the methodology, data sources, the way in which the data is treated for the most part is the same as before. Speaker 1: Yes. Okay. Speaker 4: That's my catch up basket. Speaker 2: Okay. And I'd like to share that. As far as I know, this presentation was not online. I don't think it was part of this packet. Speaker 1: No, the presentation is just a summary of what was in the staff report. So no, the present the the powerpoint was not online. Speaker 2: Okay. So if the PowerPoint could be added to this and some PowerPoints were included, so then we can see them in advance. And that is my preference, if at all possible. And actually it to me it's an aid and I'm sure it is to our community of it's possible to include the PowerPoints in advance. And there was a comment and yes. Speaker 0: Also the there's information in PowerPoint. I think the staff report it. The CAF are the one that jumped off the page to me is the 40% versus 20%. Or if it's not in the staff. Oh, that's the first time I saw. Speaker 5: I think that came about as I was preparing this and Miss Warmer Day and I were looking at the analysis of what what the results were and we said, oh, look at this. This is an interesting fact that we didn't know when we would just have a report. Speaker 0: If you can come back and tell us what that really means. Why? Why is there that disparity? Speaker 1: The disparity? Speaker 0: I mean, why why is it so much more. Speaker 5: Why it grew was because the revenues increased and the expenses didn't. And it it was already at 30 or 35% in prior years. And so what we gained in this particular fiscal year then added it and brought it up to the 40%. Speaker 0: If I may if I may, in a nutshell, we predicted revenue growth of under 3%. We got 3.6% in one year that went into the reserves, the extra. Then last year we closed at 8.1%, having projected about 2.9. That all went in reserve as well. And at the same time the labor contracts began to bite into the employees paychecks by taking more out for health care, taking more out for pensions, all of that. So there was there were cuts and costs happening the same time as unexpected growth in revenue. And hence, you ended up with a, you know, double the policy in terms of where we are, which is, you know, not a bad problem to have, but it shouldn't be confused with the solution to the long term problems that still loom over the city financially. That's why the word unrestricted. Is I mean, it may be true, but it's not. Right. Well. Speaker 5: A a part of that is unrestricted, but a part of it is restricted by the actions that the previous council took to restrict those that. A $3 million. Speaker 0: I mean, it's unrestricted and restricted or technical terms for the for the auditors and the accountants. It doesn't mean that anybody should look at it and say this money to general fund is not the only fund. There's a lot of other funds that we manage. One of the things that is changing, however, over the past several years is that pension and other post-employment benefit obligations now must be characterized, according to Gatsby. In the past, you didn't even have to put those on your balance sheet. Now you do. I think that kind of application is really important for all the people who may be watching of us to understand the budget that's coming at us a year in calendar year to see what our position. I appreciate that, that explanation. Late hours. Speaker 2: And I hope that you will be repeating it that, you know, at another meeting, because I can. Speaker 0: Tell you I have my notes right here. Speaker 2: Lisa, thank you. Speaker 0: Well, there will be a systematic approach to the Council regarding the budget beginning in March and working our way through March, April, May, June to get to a two year budget resolution in early June. So as that happens, these issues will be decanted in significantly greater detail. I like that. Speaker 2: Gather member data just quickly. Speaker 4: Something like a $29 million budget that amounts to 40% of a 40% reserve, I mean, is absolutely great news with Capital G. I think the key thing for purpose of the public is to understand what's the the key components that's driving it. For example, my understanding is from what former Mayor Mary Gilmore told me, is that a key a key component of that tonight, what contributed to the $29 million reserves is a one time sale of property transactions that generated some level of of of extra taxes that we had not initially calculated, though, that that went to the good . So so I think that's what we're getting at is whenever there are these big things that we all want, there are great. But also one other big things that are not so great understand. What are the key driving elements. Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you. Speaker 5: And, and we've already discussed those issues for the budget we have. Speaker 0: Yeah. And it turns out that in the last revenue report when we announced the 8.1%, we broke it down into these are one timers and these are ongoing and thank you for bringing that up because the the one time events can't be counted on for up. And I think that's one of one of my council referrals. Principal I'd like us to discuss. Actually get to that for. Speaker 2: Any other member comments. I'll move. Accepted. And I'd like to make a comment. Oh. So I was at a conference for mayors and new members. Member authority was also there and a slide was presented in regards to Alameda County City's unfunded OPEB liabilities as a percentage of their general fund as of June 30th, 2013. And and I want to share this as part of this discussion that showed Alameda, those cities ranged from 7% to 140%. And the city of Alameda was the 140%. And I think it's very important that we share that as part of this conversation, because we were talking about. I mean, someone paying attention right now on TV could think we're doing actually very well. And then we have this other issue that is very contrary to that that we will be discussing as we're moving forward. I wanted to add that in your motion now. Yeah. I would move recommendation to accept the fiscal year 20 1314 audited financial statements and compliance reports. All those in favor I oppose. Motion unanimously carries. Thank you. Now the next item meeting. So we will now adjourn that so we can hop to the. Yes. I'm sorry. Speaker 1: Madam Chair. Just a point of clarification on the item. Speaker 5: At three A. Speaker 1: Is the joint meeting. And we cannot continue that meeting until tomorrow night's meeting because it wasn't noticed as a joint meeting. So that one will have to be deferred until the next meeting of the joint body. Speaker 2: And is staff that you're okay with that they'll still care. All right. Thank you. So's council. Most of you are okay with that. So then we're going to have that item come back. That was three. We'll come back. We're going to adjourn that meeting and re adjourn go back to that now reopen our general meeting. And the next item was 66. K is the one that you'd like us to address. Six K is. Speaker 1: Recommendation to authorize the city manager to execute a professional services agreement between the city and AFRINIC, Brian Day and Company for two year. Speaker 2: For two years with three one year extensions for a total. Speaker 1: Amount not to exceed $750,400 for independent audit services. Speaker 2: Any questions? Yes, I would just make a comment that not only and I think the point was well stated in the report that it's not that the current auditing firm has done anything wrong, but they've been our independent auditors for 24 consecutive years. And sometimes it's just good to get some fresh thinking and new blood in. And if we do approve this contract, we will actually be saving $32,725 over a five year period compared to the previous fees charged by the previous firm.

Joint Agenda Item

Recommendation to Accept the Fiscal Year 2013-14 Audited Financial Statements and Compliance Reports. (City Council/SACIC) (Finance 2410)

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Speaker 2: And sometimes it's just good to get some fresh thinking and new blood in. And if we do approve this contract, we will actually be saving $32,725 over a five year period compared to the previous fees charged by the previous firm. So. I would certainly move approval or of the recommendation. Speaker 0: I second it especially given the. From a pool of eight candidates. Speaker 2: And a city auditor was on the selection team. Any other comments? All those in favor. I oppose motion unanimously passes. Thank you. Now of. In regards to the other the balance of today's agenda numbers. What would you like us to do? Speaker 4: My opinion? Yes. My opinion is that we continue the matter. Moreau but doing so if if if allowable under Brown Act and and that's an ordinance because no 130 right now and you know you just think that will be fresher and the public would be better served. Speaker 1: So like yes I just make clarify. So just to be sure that what we're saying here, all of the items that are still remaining, you want to continue to tomorrow night's meeting that correct. Speaker 2: It's just technically it's actually tonight because. Speaker 1: We. Speaker 2: Also know but in regards to her question is is the answer yes now staff. If we just if we do all of them, I think the priority is the referrals is what I had heard of, and I guess we can try again to address that tomorrow. So and if there's if there's some items that can wait, then maybe we could get together. We can discuss that to. Speaker 4: Met a mayor asking a question to the city attorney. So is the correct way to proceed and make a motion to recess. And. Speaker 1: Uh, what, what. Speaker 2: You should do. Speaker 5: Is motion to continue. Speaker 1: The specified items to a date certain meeting, which would be today, but later today. Speaker 0: Okay. If I may, I may help you, too. And I'm just. So I'm looking at Mrs. Warmer than item six eyes six J and six L which were not handled tonight. You we do not have to have them handled tomorrow. Those can be those. I would suggest you move those to the meeting of February 3rd so that you can focus on what you're going to be doing tomorrow and getting the referrals done if that's what you're going to do. 66 J and six L do not have to be done tomorrow. They can be done on February 3rd. Speaker 2: Thank you very much. All right. It says that. So our February 3rd agenda is not too crowded already. Speaker 0: No, no, it is not. Speaker 2: All right. Speaker 0: It's pretty light. I just approached him. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 4: So, Madam Chair. Yes, I would move to move it in the manner that the city attorney had indicated. To continue the items, other specified items other than six. I just and AJ and AJ now. So which will be dealt with on February 3rd. Speaker 2: So as we speak in the specificity, are we talking about? Can we specify then is that nine? Speaker 1: Yes. Speaker 2: And then the balance in the referrals, it's those items. Nine are the referrals, nine and ten and ten. Speaker 0: I can second that 1003. Speaker 5: You will pick it up tomorrow. Speaker 2: Okay. And we have a second. Any comments? All right. All those in favor. Speaker 0: I. Speaker 2: Suppose. No motion passes for the one. Speaker 0: Oh. Speaker 5: You can. Speaker 0: Yeah, I know. All right, I think we should. All right. Speaker 2: Thank you. And, uh, the meeting resumes tomorrow. 630, and we are here? Speaker 1: Yes. Speaker 2: So we look forward to seeing you back. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you.

Regular Agenda Item

Recommendation to Authorize the City Manager to Execute a Professional Services Agreement between the City and Vavrinek, Trine, Day and Co., LLP (VTD) for Two Years with Three - One Year Extensions for a Total Amount Not to Exceed $703,460 for Independent Auditing Services. (Finance 2410)

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Speaker 0: You have one speaker on this. Audre Lorde Housman. Item five F. I'm sorry. He's coming. All right. Okay. Wonderful. Speaker 4: Is there just the once? Speaker 2: Mm hmm. Okay. Speaker 0: Hi. Good evening, Mayor and Council Staff. I am delighted you didn't pull it. And this is a redesign for safety measures at Park and Lincoln and Tilden. And I just want to support that type of safe redesign. That's a huge intersection as a pedestrian. It's very scary and unsafe on many, many levels. And I thank you on behalf of anyone who tries to cross that intersection and certainly others in the city that are that big. I like. Speaker 7: To proceed and look at improving those as well. Speaker 0: So thank you very much. You. Rob Trudeau. Speaker 6: I smile, would you please? Rob Browder Executive Director, Park Street Business Association. Actually, I wasn't going to speak, but seeing that it got pulled, I think I should because it does significantly impact a very important intersection of our district, and we are completely in favor of this. We have been working with public works staff for. Speaker 2: Months and months to come up with this plan that is. Speaker 6: Going to improve pedestrian safety at that intersection where pedestrian safety needs to be improved. So we certainly hope that you will all vote in favor of it. And thank you very much. Speaker 4: Madame Mayor, I would move approval. Oh, I'm sorry. Was it discussions? It's just going to move approval. Speaker 5: In a second. Okay. Speaker 0: Others in favor. Speaker 2: Right. Speaker 0: I mean, if the motion passes unanimously. Thank you. So now we go to. Six M. Speaker 1: 6 p.m. introduction of ordinance approving and authorizing the city manager to execute documents necessary to implement the terms of the lease with right speed. A Delaware corporation for the lease of or a lease for seven years for two five year options and an opportunity to purchase building 41 located at 650 West Tower Avenue, Alameda Point.

Consent Calendar Item

Recommendation to Adopt Plans and Specifications and Authorize a Call for Bids for the City of Alameda Park Street Pedestrian Safety Improvements, No. P.W. 06-13-18. (Public Works 310)

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Speaker 1: 6 p.m. introduction of ordinance approving and authorizing the city manager to execute documents necessary to implement the terms of the lease with right speed. A Delaware corporation for the lease of or a lease for seven years for two five year options and an opportunity to purchase building 41 located at 650 West Tower Avenue, Alameda Point. Speaker 0: Good evening, Mayor and Councilmembers. I'm Nanette Mchunu and the Community Development Department. Tonight, you'll be considering a lease for seven years with two five year options and an opportunity to purchase for Building 41, located at 650 West Tower. Before we get into the details of the lease, I'd like to tell you a bit about the leasing program at Alameda Point. Just a little brief overview. We've been doing leasing in Alameda Point since 1997 under the large parcel lease, and now we own a significant portion of the property. And there are still some pieces that are under what we call the life arc, which is the lease in furtherance of convenient. In the early years of the of our leasing program, we generated about one and a half million dollars. That revenue fund has grown to approximately $12 million today. That's the projected revenue. We have approximately 66 commercial tenants. I'm going to show you a little bit just for your visual of the leased spaces, the negotiations, the things that are under negotiation right now and the available spaces. This is this gives you kind of a taste of who what's out there and how much of the property is occupied. And then finally, I just wanted to tell you that we have a 66 commercial tenants with approximately. Speaker 1: 002. Speaker 0: Goodby with approximately 1000 employee employees. And I wanted to just show you some of the logos from the tenants that are out there, and they run from small one office one day games to Google Waterfront users from Ocala, Connie out outrigger canoe to the Department of Transportation and Maritime Administration Ready Reserve Fleet. We've created a significant and diverse tenant mix and hope to add right speed to to that list. Tonight, I want to tell you that we're I'm really excited to bring right speak to you tonight. They found Alameda point by way of conversations with an existing tenant mechanic mechanic power who is now Google developing cluster industry and is a key component of the city's asset management strategy, which was developed in 2010, developed and approved in 2010, and that seeks to build on the foundation of existing businesses and create complementary industry and synergy. Job creation is one of the overarching goals of the asset management plan. Right. Speed will be taking over a building that's been vacant since the base was closed back in the late 1990s. Building 41 was originally part of the Alameda Naval Air Museum's portfolio, but the then art governing body decided that it was a very desirable building, very leasable building, and we took it out of that portfolio and it has sat vacant until hopefully to it tonight when you make a decision to put right speed in there. Because of the significant investment needed to be put in that building, it's pretty much that vacant. But tonight, Ian Wright, who is a principal who will be making a brief presentation for you tonight, will talk to you about the investment that they plan on putting in the building, which is more than $2 million. They say they expect to bring at least 150 new jobs to Alameda Point. And I'm going to turn this over to Ian so he can tell you more specifically about himself, his product and what he hopes. Right. Speaking out for the city of Alameda. Speaker 2: Good evening and welcome to the New City Council. I'm Ian Wright, founder and CEO of Wright Speed. I'm actually a New Zealander and I was out on the bay watching the America's Cup, sadly. But I made my home in Woodside, California, 21 years ago. I'm an engineer and a serial entrepreneur. The last company that I co-founded was Tesla motors, which has turned out pretty well for investors and employees and customers. And they've made their home in Fremont. Right. Speed is located in San Jose in the heart of Silicon Valley. It's a location that some of my employees describe as soul sucking. I actually own two houses in Alameda and I want to move the company here. I signed a lease to that effect and then they'd asked me to explain a little bit about why we want to move to Alameda. And I guess the first reason is that that I love Alameda. I think it's a fantastic city. And I think my people will as well, the employees I have and the employees that I'm going to hire. It's just a wonderful city. We are 23 people today and we're planning to grow to 300, roughly 300 people, 2018, 303 50 people. Right now, we're recruiting as fast as we can, and we're finding that it's difficult to attract people from this area to San Jose. They don't want to drive down at 80. I'd rather come here. I already have three employees that live in this area. This UC Berkeley. Locally, there's a lot of people around here, even people in the city. You go out to 880. The science is 11 minutes to downtown S.F.. Yeah. So that's one reason recruiting people, I think, will be the people that we want will be easier here. Then there's Building 41. It's an iconic building. It's we think it's lovely. We'd love to preserve it the way it is. Use it the way it was designed to be used. We have an unusual requirement. We have a lot of engineers. We have a lot of office staff that work in nice offices with workstations and of the way you can close and a whiteboard. Lovely stuff. Then we have a workshop where we bring in big trucks and we pull them apart and we design electric powertrains for them and we work on those. We need 25 foot ceiling height. We need space. It's very hard to find a building that will do both of these things. Building 41 is perfect for that. And then the last reason that we'd like to move here is that I've actually been working on the steel for a year now, and I've found everyone I've met at the city of Alameda has just been wonderful to deal with, and I'd like to continue doing that. Okay. So the slide show, I'll tell you a little bit about what we do. We're a clean tech company. We make the most advanced fuel saving vehicle technology in the world. So what we actually make is electric powertrains for trucks. We sell them as a repair kit. Alex is the lead customer. We also are selling these our train kits into garbage trucks. And our first customer for that is actually in the North Bay. They do Sonoma and Marin Counties where of course, love to do this for Alameda County as well, besides making them very quiet. And I think that's going to be a big deal. If you ask people at random, what time does your garbage get collected, they can tell you because it wakes them up. You make those trucks electric, that can be very much quieter. But besides that, it reduces the emissions by fantastic amounts to stick particulates by 93%. And of course, they save enough fuel to pay for themselves in less than four years. The average Class eight garbage truck in the US earns $55,000 a year in fuel and $30,000 a year in maintenance. And we can save most of that. Clean tech I think is a good match for Alameda. Social currency for customers, employees. Suppliers. Community. I spend half of the afternoon with the Chamber of Commerce. There's a surprising amount of local industry that matches with what we need, and we need to hire a lot of people. Bringing jobs, restoring the building, which is and then it points out, has been vacant since 97. The roof is leaking. It requires. We're planning to put about $4 million into getting that building to the point where it works for us. That's we want wanted to. Okay. Yep. So these are actually real people in my company doing real work. This is the kind of thing they do. It's what it looks like. These are the kind of jobs we need to add. A lot of engineering work, assembly testing, supply chain, logistics. You know, we are a manufacturer, but we outsource the actual, you know, forging and casting and machining. And we outsource electronics manufacture to contract manufacturers like San Mina. We get all the stuff in, we assemble powertrain kits, we ship them out to where they're going to be installed in a truck. So we don't do that installation process here. We do development work here. We do some testing work here. We do supply chain work. We support customers. But to calibrate it for you, when we're at about 100 million a year revenue, that's about one and a half tractor trailers worth of shipping crates leaving the island . That's $100 million a year. That's how much stuff we're talking about that arrives, gets assembled, software loaded, tested, shipped out. So it's high value, low volume stuff. And those are actual employees arriving at work. Yeah. So that's 109,000 square foot building. We don't need all of that immediately. So in the lease with the city, we can sublease some of that. We can use this as an incubator. We're actually quite well known in the in the community of people who do this kind of thing. And we've already had people approaching us to sublease some of the space for incubators to start other companies. And you've had some success with this in Alameda already. I mean, this company, Ann Arbor Bay, that was 20 people five years ago. And there's now 500 people or something. You've had Makani Power, which has become Google. So I know about it. It's a business. The business thing is not retail, so it generates local sales tax revenue. And of course, people. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: Thank you. Hmm. Actually, do we have speakers on the side besides yourself? All right. Speaker 2: Members of. Speaker 0: Yes. Speaker 8: Thank you, sir, for your concise presentation. I was taking furious notes as to why you wanted to locate here. Okay. And I really appreciate you outlining them for us, because my particular desire is that we repopulate the jobs that left when the Navy lowered the flag at the base. And this provides a new function to the building community out there. And I think the more we can build on that, the better. So I think we should move on this before yesterday. Yes, I because this is very important to us in Alameda. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 4: Thank you, Spencer. And I just want to disclose that back in September, I was invited to a meeting with Mr. Wright, and I was so excited for this project to come before the city council. Back then, you described your workers as a gang of. Speaker 0: Geeks. Speaker 4: And I think Alameda could use more geeks and especially in the number in growth that you're talking about. This company is doing a lot of great, innovative work. They have received a grant from the California California Energy Commission, I think recently, around $5.8 million. They're doing some work that we want to see more of done throughout our state and great for it to be happening here. And I'm so happy that you've chosen to leave the as you describe stories, your employees describe the soul sucking environment of San Jose down near the San Jose Airport. I think because what we can offer you at Alameda Point in what's in the works now is a very vibrant, exciting environment with not only other employment uses, but also restaurants and businesses that are coming that your employees will will want to frequent in. And we hope that many of them will also choose to live in Alameda and just eliminate their commute altogether. Speaker 2: For most, most of them right now are renters. So. Speaker 0: All right. Speaker 4: Come on up. Anyway, I am I am also fully in support of this measure. Speaker 0: MEMBER Doug. Speaker 3: Thank you. I just want to briefly say Mr. Right, thank you very much for bringing jobs to Alameda and creating jobs here. Thank you very much for investing here. Appreciate it. Speaker 2: You're very welcome. Thank you. Speaker 0: Mayor Brody. Speaker 5: I'm going to echo a lot of what my colleagues have said, but also thank you, Mr. Right, for choosing to do business here in Alameda. It's it's an exciting opportunity to have this at the base was 150 you said 350 new jobs I mean your adaptive reuse of that building investing almost $4 million in that building, I mean, that's exciting. And I also think, you know, the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions that that you were at business is going to actually achieve. For California, we have aggressive goals statewide. The governor wants to even be more aggressive about it and the opportunity for you to do that and the opportunity for you to incubate other businesses that can come around you. I think it's exciting for me to point and I'm glad you're here. Thank you. Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Speaker 0: And I concur with my fellow council members. Thank you. We have a motion. Speaker 4: Yes. I would love to move approval of the ordinance authorizing the city manager to execute documents necessary to implement the terms of the lease with Right Speed Inc, a Delaware corporation for a lease of seven years with two five year options and an opportunity to purchase Building 41, located at 650 West Tower Avenue at Alameda Point. Speaker 0: Second and Vice Mayor Seconding and all those in favor. Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. Thank you very much. Passes. Thank you very much. All right. Next item is item six C. Speaker 1: Adoption of resolution. If accepting a grant from the State of California, Department of Parks and Recreation, division of Boating and Waterways in the amount not to exceed 80,000 for the purchase of a patrol boat and patrol trailer. Appropriate up to 80,000 from the general fund for purchase of the boat and authorize the city manager, her or his designee to execute grant funding purchase agreement.

Regular Agenda Item

Introduction of Ordinance Approving and Authorizing the City Manager to Execute Documents Necessary to Implement the Terms of the Lease with Wrightspeed, Inc., a Delaware Corporation for a Lease for Seven Years with Two Five-Year Options and an Opportunity to Purchase Building 41 Located at 650 West Tower Avenue at Alameda Point. (Base Reuse 819099)

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Speaker 0: Okay. Real quickly, let me interrupt. We move these items above so that we could dispose of them quickly. So I'd appreciate your indulgence. Thank you. Speaker 2: No problem. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Members of the council, Paul Larry, chief of police. The staff report is pretty self-explanatory. The state is wordiness or wants to award us the $80,000 up to $80,000 to assist us in purchasing a boat to replace the current vessel that we have. You might be wondering, you know, what did we do to that boat that it needs to be replaced? The answer is really nothing. It's we've had it for almost 15, 14 years and it's just been normal wear and tear. And there's a there's a critical point in the world of the boat that's continuing to open up and seep water into the vessel. And it's just frankly, you know, we keep patching it up and it keeps leaking. So it's time to move on and get it get a different boat. Speaker 0: Thank you. We have questions from council. Speaker 4: So why does the police department need a patrol boat? Speaker 2: Well, there are several reasons why. Aside from, you know, the enforcing the speed zones in the estuary, we have it there for water rescues if we need them. We also are patrolling the marinas and the harbors and trying to do what we can to help abate the derelict vessels that occasionally get the anchor outs, as they call them, that are out in the estuary. There was a lot of work done. As most of you know, in the last year and a half. Cal Recycle spent almost $2 million in cleaning up the estuary. That was a one shot deal. They're not coming back. And so it's really up to us now to do this. And we know that the county lacks the jurisdiction to enforce some of that stuff in the estuary. So it's it's really going to be on the police department. Speaker 8: I swear I did see the comment in a local business letter supporting this, but I also see that the county has a semi-rigid boat that's parked right behind the county cutter. Yes. At Grand Marina. Is there did someone doing an analysis to see if the 80,000 from the general fund. Spent on basically leasing them from the county if they're not patrolling anymore and maintaining that for a certain period of time makes more economic sense then because it's already outfitted then purchasing a new boat for $160,000. Speaker 2: The short answer is no. We didn't do a study and I have not spoken with the sheriff directly about it. However, I am aware of some conversation that was had between Mr. Gallop and Sheriff Ahern, and the initial response was that he wasn't inclined to make that boat available for lease. Okay. Speaker 0: Clarification. Well, that team member decided. Roadie. Speaker 5: I said one question. I wasn't clear the total cost of the boat. Do we have that estimate? Speaker 2: No, we don't. There's a there's a variety. I mean, we could go in a few different directions here. There there is a boat out there that could cost upwards of a half a million dollars. And honestly, I'm not I'm not looking to do that. There's there's another boat that might serve our needs that's closer to $90,000 somewhere. You know, I'm going to shoot for the lower end, to be honest with you. But I need a I need a boat that's safe for the people. I would like to have a boat that allows us to go out in inclement weather because right now we only put our boat out in the summer in the boating season, months between men and when Fleet Week, Fleet Week wraps up. So I'd like to be out there a little more frequently than that, if we can hope that answers your question. I think so, yes. Okay. Speaker 0: Member Ashcraft, thank you. Speaker 4: So my clarification was, are we talking about a $160,000 boat or we're talking about an $82,000 grant and then the city would be reimbursed for the purchase price? Speaker 2: Correct. So we don't have the final purchase price because we don't know what we're going to buy yet. So, yes, we would we would appropriate up to $80,000 out of the general fund. And once we submitted all the documents and signed the paperwork, then we would be entirely reimbursed for that up to $80,000. Speaker 0: Right. Speaker 4: So but as I understand, I mean, the the kind of boat the price range is more in the $80,000 slightly upward than twice that. Speaker 2: Right. I right. I don't know that I'm going to spend twice that much money. I mean, the remainder would be out of the general fund. And I've got to be clearly I've got to be fiscally responsible. And I don't want to over purchase a boat that is, you know, beyond what we need or what would allow us to to work, you know, efficiently in the estuary. So if I can if I can get a boat for closer to $90,000, then I'll do that. But we're still I didn't want to put the cart before the horse and start shopping before I received approval to accept the grant money. Speaker 0: So does the accepting the grant money require the city then at some point to pay a difference? If there is a difference? Speaker 2: Yeah. If there is a difference, then we would have to find that either out of the general fund or or I could seek additional grant funds. Speaker 0: So. And you don't have a range. You're not asking us to approve a dollar range? No, you're just asking us to approve this grant at this point. And then an open ended dollar range may come back to us at some point. Is that correct? Correct. But you would have to you would have to come back, right? Speaker 2: I would have to come back anyway for. Speaker 0: That approval. Speaker 8: Motions as appropriate, $8,000. Speaker 2: So so so let me let me try to explain it again. So the way this works is he goes out and gets a boat. He then submits his he submits his receipt to the state. State looks at and says, oh, you spent $90,000. Here's $80,000. Speaker 0: So my question is then, are we required as a city to pay that extra 10,000? Yes. So then my next question would be, why does not this not come to us with the total amount, with some information, if we're speaking about 160,000 or if we're talking about a $90,000 boat, at least an estimate of what a ballpark figure. Speaker 2: Okay. Well, I guess the short answer to that is that because I don't I couldn't really go shopping for the boat unless I knew that we were going to be able to even accept the grant money. Because, frankly, without it, I'm sort of I'm stuck in the mud here for a little while. Speaker 0: I don't understand that. Speaker 2: I'm sorry. Let me try again. So the way this works is he doesn't go shopping till he has. The acceptance from the state that he can go shopping. He gets acceptance from the state. He presents them with the receipt. Then he doesn't complete the transaction. The state says, okay, that's cool, we're going to send you 18,000. For argument's sake, he's already said that he doesn't want to spend more than $90,000. The $10,000 difference comes back to the council for the council's approval, at which point if the council says we don't want to spend $10,000 to access the other 80, then we walk away from the grant. Speaker 0: Right? So that because that's okay. We're not committing to the difference then. No, you're not. Thank you. That's what I was trying to confirm. Thank you. Speaker 3: Bellamy Yes, Madam Chair. I'm satisfied with the presentation by the Chief of police, Mr. Larry, as well as the city manager. We'd like to see us move forward. Speaker 0: We do have speakers. Speaker 3: Okay, let's hear the speakers. Speaker 0: So we have speakers of Rockdale Lobby. Thank you. Speaker 6: I hope you don't mind. Speaker 1: But I can do it. Speaker 4: Go in the microphone before you accuse me. Speaker 6: My name is Proctor Lap. I'm the harbormaster at the Alameda Marina. Mayor Council. In early 2012, the estuary was plagued with a number of anchor out vessels, derelicts, abandoned vessels. It was a group put together called the Oakland Estuary Coalition. And through this group of harbor masters, police departments, state and federal agencies. A large cleanup program came to be, which ultimately spent close to $8 million to clean up the estuary. At the time that that was done, all of the principals said, without a doubt, we are not going to repeat this again. Cal the State Lands Commission. Cal recycle EPA, Coast Guard, all of whom put in a substantial amount of time and money, said, if you want to keep the estuary clean, it's up to you to maintain it. At that same time, the Oakland Estuary Coalition approached Supervisor Wilma Chan to try to get her to sponsor a new countywide anchor out ordinance. That did not happen. What she ended up doing was going to her legal staff who had the opinion that the Alameda County sheriff does not have jurisdiction on the estuary. The responsibility for law enforcement on the estuary also directly to the Oakland and Alameda Police Department. And so I am here to express my strong support and those of other marine industries on the estuary marina operators that we definitely need a patrol capability on the water and it needs to be a boat that is capable of handling all conditions. We can't outfit our police department with a a minimal capability that won't survive the needs of any kind of weather condition that they may be faced with. You all saw that windstorm we had a couple of days ago. Imagine sending somebody out on the water in that kind of a condition in a marginal boat. So you are trying to develop the island. You have this whole issue with Alameda Point, which includes Seaplane Lagoon. There are law enforcement responsibilities that totally surround our island. And what we know from this past year is that if there is not regular law enforcement on the water activity, these illegal anchor outs will filter back into the estuary. I have to commend the police, Alameda police, they've done a great job in dealing with this over the last year. But it's essential that they maintain regular, vigilant patrols on the Oakland estuary. And I think it's short sighted to be sitting here talking about an extra $10,000. My God. I mean, this is an important piece of equipment. You're asking people to go out and risk their lives. They should have the right equipment to do their job. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Mark, AML, AML. Speaker 2: Good evening. My name is Mark O'Malley. I'm the harbormaster at Ballantyne Marina, and I'm just in support of the grant as well. People's safety, you know, around the island, water and everything is important. So I'm just supporting it. Thank you. Speaker 0: Chris McKay. Speaker 2: Evening. I'm Chris McKay. I grew up here in Alameda. Water skiing and sailing on the estuary. And I'm the harbor master of all the marinas. And I just want to reiterate what Brock said and put a little urgency to it, because what we got cleaned up is starting to creep back and we have two or three boats that have been in our marinas that have been evicted, that are floating around, and there are some criminal elements. So I would say give them a good boat and as soon as possible it would be great. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, Tom. Chair I'm sorry. I don't have that, SHARON. Thank you. Speaker 2: Mayor and council and members of staff and the attorneys and all the members of the Marine community are in the audience this evening. A pleasure to be here. I am a resident of Alameda for about 16 years. Speaker 6: I've had two boats on the water. Speaker 2: I do have a boat on the estuary at the present time. I'm the former port captain of the Alien Yacht Club. Speaker 6: And I'm still a member. Speaker 2: There and I am a member of the Oakland Yacht Club. I will tell you, I don't need to reiterate what Rock Club Locker said or Brock has said. I want to personally thank him and all the members of his committee. We're cleaning up the estuary. If you know what was in that estuary over the last two years or ten years, you'll be surprised what was taken out. I do want you to know that police functions in the estuary are highly important. I live right on the water at at Marina Village Harbor, and I look out from my my home on the water and I hear all the boats that go by. I have a nice crow's nest up there. I'm very fortunate to be there. And I've had I've been on occasion called the police department of Alameda because of speeding boats at night, going probably 35, 45 knots up and down the estuary without any navigation lights. And of course, I call the police department this was a couple of years ago. And they said, well, we don't have the capability to get out there, call Oakland. So I call the Oakland Police Department. And they said we don't have capability to get out there and call the county. So I called the county. County said, well, our boats are down right now and we can't get out there. Call the Coast Guard. So I called the Coast Guard and the Coast Guard said, call the city of Alameda. So so I do want you to know that the issue of who controls the estuary right now. Speaker 8: Is very important. And it does. Speaker 2: Appear that the weight of responsibility has focused on the city and our chief and our police force, as well as the city of Alameda. And I do encourage you to vote yes on this $80,000 grant. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: If. John Spencer. That's our last speaker on this item. Speaker 9: Good evening. I'm Shaun Svenson, owner of Swenson's boat, works on the Alameda Marina. Thank you very much for attending to this issue tonight. I think it's very important that you accept this grant. It would be foolish not to. It's very difficult to get these state grants. And I think the city should actually attempt to get more such grants for different items. The State Department of Boating and Waterways has a fairly robust grant program that has been relatively untapped by this city for a long time. Included in that in the in those grants are spill cleanup kits that can be located along the waterfront as long as they're for communal use and such other items. So I would encourage more grant requests in the future. I've spoken to people at the Department of Boating and Waterways and they often don't receive enough grant requests, believe it or not, to give away the money that they have. And in this day and age, that's very important. The police have a boat. It's falling apart. They need a new boat. You have a substantial source of relatively. Great if you're in a very small residual that you'll have to pay to get a new boat. So I strongly encourage you to pass this. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. You have emotion. Speaker 3: Oh. Speaker 0: I'm sorry, counselor. Speaker 3: I'll make a motion earlier. I'd like to move adoption of the staff recommendation. I think the key phrase here is that we're. We're accepting a grant in the amount of $80,000 and. And I think that's it's it's great that R.J. was able to get that. So I certainly move adoption of staff's recommendation. Speaker 8: I'll second that with a comment that because this is a piece of equipment, just like a patrol car, I'd like to see the appropriation come from a capital fund rather than the general fund so we can begin to manage. Maintaining this service and to maintain that you maintain it just like you maintain patrols with a police vehicle that comes from another fund. General fund. So if if that, if staff can look at that as part of this so that we can maintain the service and not go for years without it. I'm fine with the motion as is to get the process going, but for future we need to plan for the the demise of the boat that's being purchased because it's going to be used just like any other vehicle. Speaker 2: That's the. Speaker 0: Second. Yeah. Speaker 2: Sorry. Speaker 0: Well, all right. All those in favor. All right. That passed unanimously. Now we're going to go on to item 60. Speaker 1: Recommendation to authorize the city manager or his designee negotiate and execute a ten year agreement for temporary assignment of vehicle or equipment with State of California Office of Emergency Services for the type one fire engine to be utilized for statewide mutual aid response.

Regular Agenda Item

Adoption of Resolution Accepting a Grant from the State of California, Department of Parks and Recreation, Division of Boating and Waterways in an Amount Not to Exceed $80,000 for the Purchase of a Patrol Boat and Boat Trailer; Appropriate up to $80,000 from the General Fund to Purchase Said Patrol Boat and Boat Trailer; and Authorize the City Manager, or His Designee to Execute Grant Funding and Purchase Agreements Necessary to Obtain Reimbursement for Both Expenditures. (Police)

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Speaker 1: Warehouse Master Plan and Density Bonus Application for redevelopment and adaptive reuse of the property located at the northwest corner of the intersection of Sherman Street and one of us two Avenue. Speaker 0: Thank you. For those of you that don't know, I requested that this item be added to the agenda this evening. We, as we all know, we have a new mayor. We have two new council members sitting up here as and it's my understanding that this is the vehicle to give all new council members and existing members an opportunity to speak on this issue before it continues to future votes. And so that's why I have requested it be placed on the agenda. This would, as my understanding, be appropriate this time of council members have any questions of staff? We don't we do not have a staff representation. There's questions. Before. And we do have. Speaker 4: We have a lot of speakers. Speaker 0: Multiple speakers. And I don't know if we have more speakers lips on this. I have 42 here. Hold on just a moment. A couple of. Speaker 2: I didn't. Speaker 0: So. Yeah. So at this point, we now have 45 and you can see them coming up here. And so honestly, this goes to why I thought it was important to bring this issue to the newly seated council. So we have a few more speakers slips at this point. I'm going to go ahead and call the speakers and I believe this is the audio they turned in. And is that correct? This is. Okay. So then we're just going to go down the order that we have so that everyone understands that and everyone will have their 3 minutes. If if if you believe that you someone else has already said what you've said, you know, and that's something you can always, you know, say, is that there was an earlier speaker that spoke to your points and be more brief if possible, but you haven't. G or 3 minutes to speak. Eric Strimling. And I'm sorry if I mispronounced names. Speaker 2: She? Good evening, Madam Mayor. The Council. Speaker 6: Congratulations on your elections and the elections. Speaker 2: I believe that it is entirely. Speaker 6: Appropriate for a new city council. Speaker 2: In a democratic process to reexamine the actions of the previous city council. Speaker 6: To see if there was something inappropriate done. We have a very large development. Speaker 2: Was there any problem in the process of approving it? Was there corruption? Was there anything undue? A study not done and if so, is crucial and. Speaker 6: Open to the government that they reexamine that. Bring it to light and. Speaker 2: Repeal it if needed. However, if that did not occur. Then I have to say that it appears to be reneging on a deal and it feels like it's difficult to do business with someone who says yes and then says maybe. So I ask you to take this very, very seriously. I ask that we not repeal this on issues that have been dealt with before? Speaker 6: There has been a year long process. There have been many citizen committees. Speaker 2: Everybody sitting on the dais, every one sitting behind me, an opportunity to go to those committee meetings and to bring up issues such as massing, size, street size, parking, etc. And those issues were hashed and rehashed, discussed here, discussed at planning board meetings, discussed with staff, discussed with the transportation managers, etc., etc. And this very hard fought and hard won compromise was reached. And I don't like every piece of it. No one likes every piece of it. That's why it's a compromise. So before we go back on our compromise before the city of alameda retract its good word. Ask that you truly find substantial grievous problems with it and say that. And if there aren't any, then let's please move forward and move to the next the next development program, the next opportunity to make an even better compromise and an even better deal. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. And I'm going to give the next three names, Don. Share it. And then David Maxey and then Richard Houseman. Speaker 6: Thank you. It's a long way from way back there. Mayor, members of City Council. It's my displeasure of being here again this evening to see an agenda item come back that should not have come back. And I want to talk a little bit about my reasons why. There was a statement made in the paper today. Progress is slow in Alameda. It has been slow and I hope it doesn't stop. I hate to see the Del Monte project in jeopardy. I can say that a few passes harebrained proposal out of Alameda will be known as a town of no progress. I hope that you read or did read John Pizzi his article in the paper. There is an experienced person talking about a subject that you all should be well aware of, and also listen to Nick Cabral and all the community people around that project. Majority of citizens are in favor of this project, and I hope we make an intelligence decision tonight. If you vote again against the staff, if you vote again against the public, who's had a chance to have hearings, that doesn't really sound like democracy for me, that this mayor step forward said and we're going to be doing era in this in the city it should be easy. Again. Council member de SOG. You're a community person. You get out there, you talk to people, you know, the pulse of people. I've always appreciated the fact that that's how you operate. I hope you've done that on this issue. Councilman Odie, you're a new person to this. But, you know, processes and you should be well aware of this process that was followed and was brought to merit and was voted on. Again, Council member Ashcroft. You know what? Through the planning, you know what the process went on. And again, appreciate your understanding of that. That process. Vice Mayor Matarese, you've been there, too. You've sat on the council. You've seen the processes. You've supported the staff. Let's not not support them again. It doesn't look good if you become a puppet or somebody who can't think for themselves. Speaker 2: They are. Spencer, again. Democracy was your push. This is democracy in action. Speaker 6: People have been listened to. Reports were made, process were made. And it's something I think that you should be well aware of. So. Do not slam a democratic process. Do not slam public and public comment. Do not throw out a lot of work that your staff went through to produce all these documents, go through all the hearings and take some confidence in this process and the staff. Nick, you owe me another dinner. Thank you. Speaker 0: Next speaker, David Maxey. Speaker 6: Good evening, Madam Mayor. Council members. In all of. Speaker 2: The. Speaker 6: Information that I have read about this. Project. And there's been many, many articles in the newspapers. I don't remember ever seeing anything about any environmental report on traffic. Now, I know for a fact that in talking to some of the people that live in that area, they are very, very disappointed with the amount of traffic that this unit is going to. Increase their ability to get around the city. I do not believe that this should go forward at this time in its present condition. From what I've read, I see that that the Planning Commission has pretty much given the developer everything that he asked for and got very little in return. I don't appreciate that. There's nothing been said to the developer about providing anything for schools. There's a lot more development coming down the pike and in the near future, as I understand it. 4311 new units, including Alameda Point and this red brick building and some others. And where are these kids going to go to school? Because most of the schools are full now. So in my estimation, when you deal with a developer, you deal with all aspects of the city, including the schools and most particularly the schools. We just floated a bond issue for schools. Half that money is not even earmarked for a specific job. So I think that we we need to really take a look at what the whole city needs and what direction we're going in. Anybody that's out there on the streets in the morning and the evening commute hours will find very congested traffic. And you don't want to dump another 4000 some cars on the street during those hours and expect to get to a place. So my recommendation is that you go back to the drawing board on this and renegotiate this with me, with the developer. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: Yeah. Richard Houseman. Speaker 6: Me sometime. Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker 6: Madam Mayor. Members of the council and staff. Speaker 2: My concern about this potential rescission. Speaker 6: Is that it raises the question as to whether the city of Alameda can be trusted to honor its commitments. Rescission shouts a message that our city government can't be taken at its word, which clearly will discourage future investments in our community, however much they might be needed. After a dozen public hearings, meetings and negotiations between the developer and community neighborhood groups. Speaker 2: Along with hundreds of hours of staff time. The Del Monte Project. Speaker 6: Was approved by the City Council. While there are some valid concerns about the TDM plan and the actual location of the affordable units, rescission does not provide solutions to them. Speaker 2: Everyone on both sides of this project professed. Speaker 6: A desire to save this building. For those of you who might remember the struggle to save the Bethlehem red brick building. Speaker 2: Similar disagreements led to that building's destruction. By voting to rescind this project, you similarly threaten to jeopardize the Del Monte building. Speaker 6: And then where are we? Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speakers, Paul Foreman, Bruce Canola, and then Kathy Morey. Speaker 6: Give me a minute here. At the last meeting and at and in subsequent emails, I informed Council that the Del Monte Master Plan was legally insufficient because it contains no preliminary site plan showing structure, locations, floorplans and elevations with regard to the low income housing structure to be constructed adjacent to the warehouse. Section four of the Alameda. The Density Bonus Ordinance requires the development application submitted to the Planning Department. Provide every one of those design items. Andrew Thomas has admitted to me that none of this preliminary design was required by him from the developer, but states that there is no harm done because prior to the issuance of a building permit for the warehouse, the law requires the developer and council to enter into an affordable housing agreement that will provide all of the design detail. My response to that is this First, we are a government of laws, not people, and we can't choose to ignore any law. Second, the density bonus origins is not some ancient, outmoded law. It was adopted in 2009 by the unanimous vote of the Planning Board, including Marilyn Ashcraft. And Council, including Frank Materazzi. Third, there are at least two good reasons for the requirement. One being that the planning board and council cannot and did not make an informed judgment on the merits of the plan without preliminary design information on this very important building. And two being the risk that after years of planning and meetings, council and the developer. Speaker 2: Will not reach. Speaker 6: An affordable housing agreement. Because Council's concept of this ghost building may differ from the developers leaving the entire project under threat of litigation, much more so than if we repeal now before the development agreement is signed. Therefore, the Del Monte ordinance must be repealed as urgency ordinances effective immediately and remand into the planning staff to obtain all the documentation required by law. When this meeting is over, I still may not know any more about this ghost building than I do now, but I will. Speaker 2: Know which council members. Speaker 6: Are truly committed to the rule of law. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 6: Thank you, mayor and council members. My name is Bruce Chernoff. I live at 1808 Nason Street, about three doors away from Buena Vista. At the beginning of the meeting, it was suggested by the mayor that there are future votes by this council to be taken and that there should be an opportunity for the council to be able to talk about those just those decisions that are upcoming. To my knowledge, the master plan has been approved, the development agreement has been approved. And so I wonder what decisions will be coming before the board. The Council. I urge you to reject this proposal to rescind the approvals for the DOMANI Building. The City Charter requires that the city exercise its police and legislative powers and afford all property owners and residents due process. The Del Monte Master Plan, the Northern Waterfront Plan that was approved almost seven years ago and the Dole Money Agreement were reviewed and approved after completion of many such processes and many such opportunities for people to participate. Perhaps one of the commenters is didn't participate in all of those hearings, but I know that there was a 253 page mitigated negative declaration that was published in April of this year that summarized the impacts and the potential and the measures being taken to mitigate those potential impacts. The sudden proposal to rescind the dole money approvals with no publication for the of the rationale for such a drastic action violates the principle of due process. And I think the principle that the Sunshine Ordinance is founded upon, if not some of its provisions. As a resident that lives near the Del Monte building, I'm excited about the approved project and I'm tired of it's being used as a trucking warehouse. And with your indulgence, I'd like to show you a brief 22nd video. I thought that the city was on a successful path. Speaker 2: Which is absolutely re-used as well as been engaged in a process of relocating. Speaker 6: Existing cookware. You can hear the piece talking about the city's efforts over many, many years to relocate the truck route along Buena Vista. Avoiding also the trucking uses that generate trucks and neighbors. There's a picture of a tire that fell off a truck and ran into a neighbor's house right at the corner of right on Buena Vista . But if you want a continuation of the current trucking use, by all means rescind the property owners approved project. But you'd better buy a stock of traffic light poles because the one at Sherman and Bueno Vista gets knocked down by either a car or a truck. And I think it's most likely a truck several times a year. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Good evening, Mayor. City Council Staff. My name is Cathy Moring, and I too, live not far from. This project down Bueno Vista Avenue. But first, I would like to congratulate you on your unanimous vote to approve. Right. Speed. And there are 300 proposed new employees here in Alameda. My question to you is, where will they be housed? The project that is before you tonight has been through due process. The public has shown its approval for this. I daresay that most of us, in fact, all of us lived in a development that at some point was not wanted by someone else in this community. Every housing development, no matter how old, is a development. This is a re-use of a fabulous old building. And I also might remind everyone that this is not being built for you specifically. This is being built for those new employees of Right Speed. These people who want to get to the city, who don't want two cars, who want to use public transportation. As somebody who lives in that community, I would much rather see people who are invested in our community living down the street from me than to continue to see the knock down street light and deal with semi-trucks up and down the streets. I don't want that's what I don't want. I want people who invest in our community, who participate, who don't want to drive their cars, who want to bike, who want to walk, who want to car share. Who want to use. The city car share who want electric cars. They think differently than we do. We can't make this decision as if we are the ones moving into that structure. Look at the greater area. Look at the neighbors there. Who? Don't want semis and giant tires flying off of trucks riding up on their front lawns. That's dangerous. That's not good for the community. People are good for this community. Thank you so much. Yeah. Our next speaker is Michael McDonald. Donna, Helen Soares and then Diane Lichtenstein. Lichtenstein. Speaker 2: Good evening, Madam Mayor, and congratulations to the rest of you and council members and staff. I'm Michael McDonagh, president of the Alameda Chamber of Commerce. I'm here representing over 400 business owners and probably thousands, literally thousands of their employees that live and work right here in Alameda. I've also been a resident here and a homeowner for over 20 years. I live here, I work here, I shop here. And I, too, have the same concerns as all the other residents. I don't want more traffic any more than anyone else wants. But I think there's more here at stake than just traffic. If you resend the Del Monte project, there are a lot of other moving parts that must be considered. When taking such a drastic step. So. I have concerns like keeping and creating jobs in Alameda, providing employees with local businesses with affordable housing so they don't have to spend a large part of their wages on gas as they commute from off island residences, which, by the way, cost more will cause more traffic on our bridges and tunnel. I have concerns of restoration of a blighted property that has been an eyesore in our community for over 40 years. A fragile city budget that currently has a deficit I'm sorry of surplus, but is projected to have a deficit. And that budget must maintain infrastructure and safety services of fire and police. And the fees that we would lose from the businesses and the taxes that we would lose that our residents will have to bear, and more likely , higher taxes. More importantly, I think the bigger issue at this point is a message is the message that rescission. We'll send to the greater business community. The chamber has already heard from the financier of a future project. We're very concerned. With a process that's proceeding. There's also the issue of opening up the city and its budget to future lawsuits that will surely come if this is. Rescinded. And I do believe there may be violation of the sunshine or ordinance. There's no such thing as a plan that's going to satisfy every person. But this is a great plan. The Del Monte plan deals with the community concerns in many ways. But you also have to realize you will have an opportunity to influence the outcome of this project without having to sacrifice your values and objectives. Will you disregard the countless hours of staff's work and waste the resources of the city? Will you brush aside the dozen community meetings and all the input that we've heard in the last three council sessions? Finally, I'll just say that a decision to truly put Alameda first and trust that your staff has developed an effective plan to deal with the city's challenges sends the message that Alameda remains a great place to live and do business. Speaker 0: Thank you, Helen. Source. Council members. It's rather puzzling to be here tonight, really, considering the approved El Monte building development, which provides so many benefits for the community, particularly when its approval was in keeping with the law and after repeated public meetings and the officially required hearings since there were so many opportunities for public comment during the lengthy approval process. The chief problem seems to be stemming from the outgoing council taking action after the new council was elected. I believe our council on most organizations required to continue fulfilling their responsibilities until replaced by newly sworn in members. So this seems like a non-issue. The Mello del Monte property provides Alameda with a huge number of benefits. It preserves a unique, historic building. It provides badly needed housing for only incomes. It will have a major boost for all will meet its budget. It will pioneer new transit measures to reduce the impact of the additional units. And in addition, it contributes millions in actual benefits to the city that will jumpstart the Sweeny Park, open up a major portion of Clement Street and assist public schools and more. One could go on about the benefits that will result from this excellent development. But for months, many of us have been here repeatedly enumerating these contributions to Alameda in our advocacy for this project to move forward. So the question tonight is really, what is the problem? Why is this thoroughly examined, evaluated and appropriately approved project being challenged? I haven't heard a reason to question the development or how its recession would benefit the city. Please reaffirm this opportunity offered to Alameda to have a development that addresses so many of our needs. Please move this development forward. In accordance with the appropriate approved agreement, leaving this historic building to rot or who knows how many more years will not accomplish anything but put a new black mark on the city's ability to work constructively to achieve good development. And it will be a blemish as one of your first actions snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Please be bold enough to benefit the city I the action taken by your predecessors. Thank you for your consideration. You. Good evening. I'm Dianne Lichtenstein, speaking on behalf of the Alameda Home Team. And I wonder to what purpose is the delay for this proposal? I really believe that moving forward now outweighs any perceived advantage of a delay. What perception must others outside Alameda have of this attempt to undo an agreement made in good faith with the developer and with the community? I find it embarrassing, actually. There have been months to analyze, confer and negotiate with a developer as well as many, many, many Tim Lewis presentations to every club and organization that they could find. Everyone has had ample opportunity to speak with them, to negotiate with them, to ask their questions. On this point, for the past many, many, many months, certainly the developer has been open, transparent and willing to work with the community or with any individual who has any questions or which wish to ask. So why is this repeal coming up now? Think of how this looks to those who may have an interest in future development in this city. Will we be a laughing stock? Thank you. Next speakers. Nick the Asia. And I'm sorry. Then Harry Hartman. And then Art Lenhart. Speaker 2: Good evening, Mayor Spencer and council members. My name is Nikita Hager, the proud resident. Of Alameda. I moved my family here three years ago. But tonight, I'm a disgusted resident. I'm disgusted by the fact that this decision is before us. It was thoroughly reviewed and approved. And now many are watching, not just in this room, across the blogs, across all the newspapers. In San Francisco is Alameda, the place that we want to invest? What does an approval mean when three weeks later, Mayor Spencer, with all due respect, that this is coming before us again and council members Odean matter. S.E., you are on the hot seat here tonight. The project was reviewed. The project was vetted by the community. It was supported by the community. And those who don't support it probably don't support anything. The project met every damn hurdle. It. The procedures were followed. And it was approved twice by this council. But apparently that's not enough. And here we are three weeks later. With this decision odd to try to overturn a project that was approved. This is the wrong action that is being taken tonight. And if it is taken, you are all making a mistake. You're sending the wrong message to everybody that a deal in Alameda is not a deal. What does that say? Let's move forward and not be fearful of change. Your focus should be on new projects, not creating fear, which what this is doing and your action potentially is doing, not creating fear of investment in Alameda for that will have long term damage beyond any decision that happens here and over the next several years. We can have our paradise. I moved here because of this wonderful community. But we have to move forward and we have to have progress as well. Thank you. Even in council. Congratulations on those that were elected, those who were here before, and those that experienced all the stuff that happened last year. My name is Harry Hartman. I am a business owner and a homeowner. I've lived in Alameda on a consistent basis since 1970. That's a long time ago. I've seen a lot of things that happened. But one of the things that that that I've been at this Mike for for other projects is we. We acknowledge truly that that something happened were for real. Meaning that ice was busy over the weekend because of all the holidays. And, well, I sent all of you a message about how you felt about, you know, this project, meaning that a a planning board meeting had happened. It was agenda ized. There was all the speakers came up. There was a vote. I mean, a motion first. I'm sorry. You follow the procedure. And unanimously it was voted out. And we do that once in a while when we think a developer. Like these guys came to Alameda in many ways. As as a hero because no one had been around in a long, long time. And I don't mean to, you know, kind of go here. I lost my dog this morning. So I'm you know, I wanted to just say this and borrow it from an old movie. I'm mad as hell, and I don't want to take it anymore. Well, hold on. But what does that get you? What does that get you? I love this city. I love Alameda. I love all the quality of life benefits. I like the theater and what it meant. And you, the knockdown drag out that went for the theater mayor and council was really something. Probably one of the biggest one was you ever had. You know, I'm a big fan of what I call perspectives when you have a legal and business process that people can respect. Then we move forward. We have a good community rhythm and momentum in this city. And if you don't acknowledge that, then you haven't been awake. I know there's traffic challenges here in Alameda. We can pull our sleeves up, work together, collaborate with the developer. I just have to ask this question. I mean, is this back to the future? Weren't there times during all the discussion since last April for people to sit down with Mr. Meeks, with any of the staff persons and say, I have concerns? So I don't buy it. I don't I don't buy it. The idea that the current council members did not have a chance to weigh in on the The Del Monte project before the actual vote. It's specious. So my comment is this acknowledge the vote. It happened. It was real and do the right thing. Good evening. My name's Arlen Hart and Mayor Spencer, members of the council staff and members of the council. Welcome back or welcome aboard, whichever it happens to be for you. Everything pretty much has been said. Except about affordable housing being provided by this project. But John Spangler said. But Don Sherrod said with the gentleman from right power train said that's all been reiterated. I want to hash over it again. I just think it's a shame that I'm celebrating an anniversary here. Now. It's 47 years I've been waiting for the Del Monte building to be rehabilitated. I don't want and as I said last year, I can't wait 46 years more. I don't want to wait another 47 years before the building goes beyond dereliction and into trash like the red brick building did. So you've have an opportunity to vote against this rescission. All the work has been done. Anything that goes ahead forward would be something like spending a lot more of taxpayer dollars to, in my mind, do the same things all over again. I'm not an expert on any of this, just a citizen. I live here. Raise my family here. I'm a substitute teacher. That's why I'll have to leave after this, because I've got a class in the morning. But one thing that has been pointed out several times, and I'll paraphrase Mark Anthony speech. At the funeral of Caesar. We don't want to see domestic fury and fierce civil strife covering all the parts of Alameda, do we? So thank you for your time. Please consider voting against the rescission. That's my heartfelt belief. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Next, speakers Carey Thompson, Robert Byrne and then Kurt Peterson. Good evening, everyone. City Council Mayor Staff My name is Kerry Thompson. I am the current Chairperson of the Government Relations and Economic Development Committee for the Alameda Chamber of Commerce. I also have a business here in Alameda. I have grown up here. My mother grew up here. I raised my children here. My husband is from here. We are alameda. It's first and foremost. One of the things i want to mention is that businesses as well as individuals need to have integrity. Integrity is regarded by many as the honesty and truthfulness of one's actions. One of the things that I love about Alameda is its integrity. It has always had integrity. Until this moment. Why are we even revisiting this decision? Integrity builds trust, it builds businesses, it fosters relationships. And technical integrity should not be undermined by fear of change. Fear of change is not a reason to go back on our word or compromise our integrity. Fear of change is not a reason to stop a project that will ultimately bring jobs, affordable housing. Improve a blighted neighborhood. Fear accomplishes nothing. Our options are to accept that fear and do nothing. Or we can face it in acknowledgment and decide to move forward and work with the changes for a positive outcome. I request that you honor the commitment that has been made and work proactively to create the desired outcome that is desired by the majority. I also agree with several of the other speakers that have spoken before Dianne Lichtenstein, Helen South, Michael McDonough, Don Sharrett. They all have said what I have felt. Thank you. Speaker 6: Hello yet again. My name's Robert Byrne. I live at 1423 Lincoln, right at the corner of Benton. And first thing I would ask is. Well, first thing I would say is that, you know, I am for slow growth. But you got to understand, it's a very different situation. While Alameda was building things over the last couple of years, like a target on land that was pretty empty. It wasn't in the middle of a neighborhood. This was being ignored. This has been going on with me for 15 years and a lot of the stuff that also is being dismissed here is a lot of conclusions in pathways of thought that happened over that 15 years, not just within the last year. A lot of that having to do with blight. And I have a lot of pictures here. I'll quickly hand around. Speaker 4: You can go back to the microphone so we can hear you. Speaker 6: I would also like to say that many of the neighbors, including myself, are responsible for cleaning that up every year at the cost of hundreds of dollars. I also have stated in the past that that Benton is way too narrow of a street, have semi trucks coming down. Now, you know that it's not Lincoln is not a truck route. The truck ers do not know that they Google it. They try to turn down it at 2:00 in the morning. They've broken my stop sign. They've been painted a couple of times. They've broken an eight inch branch off a tree. They've hit multiple. Speaker 2: Cars. Speaker 6: Ah, my other neighbor who I just found, that was my neighbors describing the truck. Also in the in the tire, in the road. That's not unusual. It's very common. And the other thing I would say is, if you're really, really concerned about the traffic and you knew this was a botched truck route to begin with, why were you allowing multiple truck routes and truck companies to come in there year after year? It got so much worse from 27 on. And if you were really concerned about the traffic flow there, you wouldn't have let the trucks go in there. And there's so much worse. I bet triple the cars wouldn't be that bad. You know, we breathe those fumes inside our house. There's dust everywhere. We can't even keep our houses clean. And when we went to. Speaker 2: Complain, usually the next day, it got a lot worse. Speaker 6: They would shine us on and be very friendly. So I started getting the police to come in there and hand out something to them and say, Hey, you know, here's the truck route. But regardless, that same week, it would get worse. And this time it happened time and time again. There was nothing we could do. And and so I would say, you know, here here's here's the city developing other areas, talking about low growth. Here's an area. Speaker 2: That's stagnant because it's got. Speaker 6: This old great building in it that was actually built after much of the neighborhood in 1927. My house is 1915, I think, and it also blocks our path to the beautiful Water and Sweeney Development Park. There's a lot it's just a it's it's it's just a roadblock to the whole community. And it really needs to be fixed. I'm ashamed that you're even considering going back on this. Thank you for your time. Speaker 0: Thank you, Kurt Petersen. Speaker 2: Yes, Madam Mayor. City Council. It's good to see a group that I hope will be more open and working with the public more than what we're working with right here. And first of all, I want to say the city council right here has every right whatsoever to bring this issue up. Okay. Contrary to what a lot of people are emotionally saying and everything I hear about this is all emotional. Oh, gosh. Could make gosh alameda look bad. I'd rather Alameda do what's right then look bad. You know, that's horrible. Looking bad. No. Do what's right. That's the key thing. Only one individual that's gotten up here to speak as said about how the legal. Problems there is with this, and it comes down to affordable housing and you know about it. Ms.. ASHCROFT Because you were involved with it, as you stated, as far as all seven points, as far as that need to be fulfilled to change the density clause. And one is an extreme, detailed, accurate floor plan and layout of the low cost housing. This does not have it. And to say you're going to have it in the future doesn't answer that requirement. We have measure A that was voted in as far as low density for a reason for the people of this fine city. I want to see that upheld. I want even if you don't want to repeal this, as far as with this ordinance, I want you to be wise staff to look at it more carefully. I want the planning department to look at it more carefully to make sure that they meet every layout and every demanded it before it's brought up at the last second. Bolted in within minutes before we have a new city council. I mean. You know, if it's such a great plan. This board, which I think is intelligent, would go with it, but obviously it's not that good. Or they would have said, let's let the new people come in. No. It was rushed through. Might have had a a year as far as preliminary working. But the planning, the planning board and our planner needed to look more carefully as far as traffic as Mr. De Saag brought up before. We need a detailed master plan when it comes to traffic in this city, which he wants to say there is. There isn't. We continue to build more and more homes with no plan. And it's it's only 250 here. It's only 350 here. It's only 414 here. It all adds up. It all presents congestion. And I would hope that you would repeal it and look at it. At a better light in the future. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speakers. Next features Mike O'Hara, Allison Green and then Heather Little. Mike O'Hara. I'm sorry. Mike O'Hara. And he. He could hear me. I think he's coming. Speaker 6: There's Spencer, a member of the city council. I'm Mike O'Hara here from Tim Lewis communities. And I think you've heard from a number of people talking about 12 public hearings, ten months of countless meetings and a wide cross-section of community, both supporting, questioning, working with us, coming up with solutions. All of that led to the approvals that happened last month. This housing development project will, as it's been stated, replace blight with the beginning of a restored waterfront by saving an historic monument. They'll create over 900 jobs during build out. It'll create sorely needed housing, including 55 affordable housing units that we are committed to build. It completes a vital segment of Clement Avenue and in so doing removes trucking users from an otherwise residential neighborhood. It creates neighborhoods serving shops and restaurants and implements a transportation plan that allows residents affordable and convenient commute options. On day one of occupancy and will attract other new transit. Not only that, but it can be expanded. It's designed to be expanded to the entirety of the northern waterfront and to other areas, including Alameda Landing. It lastly generates about $20 million in fees, contributions, subsidies and public benefits, including about $1.1 million directly to the school district . We're disappointed you've chosen to take this unusual step of of considering rescission of the city's approval of the master plan, of the development agreement. And we delivered a letter to you this afternoon that outlines our objection to the to the action. At this time, I feel like I need to to correct some statements that have been made, both in prior council meetings and again here tonight with respect to the density bonus ordinance and our compliance there with the Density Bonus Ordinance, which is Section 30.17, Dash eight, the Alameda Municipal Code provides that affordable housing units may be constructed in phases pursuant to a plan approved by the city, which in this case would be the master plan. The master plan outlines in great detail all of the future submittals and the timing thereof, because the affordable housing project has not yet been designed for the later phases of the master plan. The DE Money Density Bonus application included for plans for the Domani Building, which were included in the development plan for the Del Monte building and illustrative conceptual elevations included in the Master Plan, which are on page 25, if you care to look, which were to be representative of the product type contemplated for the later phases because of the phasing. It was our understanding the city would rely on these four plans and illustrative renderings as part of its review of the application. This approach is consistent with the master plan and the density bonus ordinance because the subsequent phases will be required to comply with the applicable development standards. We ask you to to. This plan was extensively and carefully studied and vetted and approved by the Historical Advisory Board, the planning board, and thus by the City Council. The approval should stand. This project creates so many benefits to the city of Alameda. And we look forward to we look forward to keeping our promise to the community to revitalize the waterfront and revitalize this first important piece of L.A., this northern waterfront and its history. We hope you plan to keep this promise as well. Speaker 2: Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, Alison Green. And then Heather a little. Speaker 1: Good evening. I'm Alison Green with Plan Alameda and I'm also a Del Monte neighbor. And I have to tell you that when I covered myself and Del Monte logos for Halloween, my friends and family teased me that I wasn't going to be able to do these things much longer. And you can just imagine our joy when on December 23rd, we opened the mail and found the notice of repeal because we'd been wondering how we were going to spend that holiday vacation time. My first thought. Speaker 0: My second thought. Speaker 1: Was that what does this mean? Are all of our hard won actions here at risk? Now, the timing wasn't great for speaking with all of you so that I could get some insight into this repeal action. You know, answer your questions about, you know, what plan had done and to review our accomplishments. So as a quick reminder, some of them, but not all of the key wins are the 1 to 1 bundled parking for each unit that comes with Tim Lewis's responsibility to build Clement all the way out to Atlantic, the robust multiyear parking study plan that starts with the baseline and 2015. And a neighborhood representative on the Northern Waterfront Transportation Management Authority to act as a watchdog. Now. I did not get a chance to meet with Mayor Herrera Spencer. I also didn't talk to Councilman De Saag. We'd already discussed El Monte a couple of times prior to the City Council approval, but I'm comfortable that I know its concerns . The irony being that I think Councilman de SAC and I agree that the transportation plan needs strengthening. Where we differ is in how we can leverage the robust traffic study plans and neighborhood representative. And, you know, in the neighborhood representative to make our money, our demonstration project, we can use these data to refine future traffic plans before we do more building on the northern waterfront. And, Councilman, I'm hoping that you'll reconsider this opportunity. Councilman woman as he Ashcraft made sure that the approved ordinances included the neighborhood representative on the transit on the Transportation Authority when it went to council in December. And I thank you for that because staff and planning board didn't do it. Vice Mayor R.C. Matter, S.E., I'm sorry, was very patient as I walked him through plans, organizational structure and all the work we've done to influence the development agreement. The developer and the city councilman, Odie and I didn't get a chance to speak very long, but I asked him if he was unclear on anything. That plan had been doing our work and he'd heard our comments from attending prior planning board meetings and council meetings and expressed confidence that we've been thorough in our research and actions . This is where I'm supposed to conclude with either support for the repeal or urge you to vote against it. And I'll be honest, the problem is that I'm not sure what this council's issues are or what it is. The development agreement about it that's so egregious that it means it should be repealed. There's no documents to review laying out the problems. There's no specific actions when when these ordinances were discussed and ultimately approved in the prior, almost every community speaker to a person supported the project, even though some wanted to work on it a little bit. But everybody wants to see that building, you know, rehabilitated. So if you do repeal, what's the process now? What's Andrew supposed to do when it comes to work tomorrow morning? All in all, we plan ourselves on not making judgments without thorough research and knowledge. So without any specific information, I have to urge you not to repeal these ordinances and keep going with the continued neighborhood involvement that's been working. Speaker 0: Thank you. Red weather rather l Peter Wang. And then. And. Rocky. Rocky, I'm sorry. Yes. Continue. Okay. Good evening and happy New Year. I can't believe that we're back here again, but we are. I'm speaking tonight to express my concerns about the consequences of repealing the Del Monte Plan as they have already been pre-approved. Plan Alameda started in June 2014 as a small group of neighbors who were concerned about having a successful Del Monte project in our backyard. As we grew, we pulled in Alameda with a diversity of development experience. We became a new kind of grassroots movement seeking advice from experts in our community and continuously walking the neighborhood and Little John Park meeting people and getting direct feedback about our work and new and innovative ideas for how we could approach this development. This combination of having a working group and boots on the ground approach has enabled plan to work directly with the city staff, the developer, TLC and the Littlejohn del Monte community to ensure that this development takes into account concerns that were not addressed in the original proposals placed before the Planning Board. It hasn't always been easy to resolve the seemingly incompatible goals to see this project move forward while mitigating the potential for negative impact that a development of such size and scope could have on our neighborhood. Because our goal was to find a solution, we were able to successfully embed ourselves in the formal process and paused the movement forward while we sought out professional advice. Educated ourselves, gather community input and established lines of open communication that would ensure a more successful project through a partnership of stakeholders. As part of this, we have worked very hard to help find a balance between the neighborhood, citywide wishes and the developers. I am very proud of those accomplishments, particularly the ones that my partner has listed here previous to me and what this will mean for our community. As I mentioned in the December meeting, we have an opportunity here to use this project as a study upon which we can formulate a more comprehensive policy and procedure that the city can then use as its criteria for all future developments, particularly along the waterfront. Since we approached them, TLC has demonstrated a willingness to not only to listen to our community's concerns, but to be responsive to them as well. Further supporting the unusual opportunity that we have here with the developer, not just to sign off on a project, but to really be collaborative in our efforts to see a success that's in our neighborhood. That's it. Thank you. Thank you. Speaker 2: But America's council members. I'm not sure whether I should congratulate or commiserate with you on censorship that evening. For quotations, I should like to quote a little line from Oscar Wilde. When people agree with me, I think I must be mistaken. 60 years ago, I became an architect and I'm still working in architectural projects. It's a key issue that one often gets a design project and one looks at the whole thing, not bits and pieces of the whole thing, because it goes out as a contract, as a rule, and you have, after all, all the pieces together and you get a price for that whole building. And that's what I'm used to working with, and that's what I'm looking for here. I are at the council meetings three weeks ago. I asked the then council not to pass this measure because I thought it was incomplete. And I still believe that there's a great disparity between the housing issues around this town, not just this one, but a whole bunch of them, and the infrastructure that is trying to support it and is not doing a very good job. They need to be brought into step. And I would strongly recommend that you defer this decision of going ahead until there's some decent match between infrastructure and the buildings you're going to put in. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 4: Peter Ryan. Speaker 0: Well. Speaker 4: You wouldn't know that. Speaker 0: I'm sorry. Peter Wong. Speaker 2: Good evening, New Year and older. A Queensland and new council. Frank and Tony and other members of. Console. It's very emotional. I heard all the speakers said many things. One thing I can assure you is that I trust this developer. And especially Jim Lewis, Jim Mink and Tin Voice. They all kept their promises to me. And. And officially, I have sold my project to them. But I agree. If they agreed, I definitely would continue working with them. Every investment, you know, Arthur Miller, I would not take money away. I found some projects. I can work with them if they would. Allow me to work together. But then I think the would. And I think. All I can say is all the years I spent on friends and just harmless knows I spent $20 million on the monkey warehouse. I only built two roofs and some glass in the building. This project is very difficult and I'm 72 years old. I cannot spend another 40 years like I did when I first came to Alameda to do this to Monte Warehouse. I don't have time. Took about 40 years of my life to be involved. But I strongly urge you. To another is sent. There all are this and please approve this project because so so many things depends on this project. Sweeney's Open Space Park commensurate. And Northern waterfront development entranceway. Entranceway is a part of this owned by the Munch Warehouse, owned by me at this moment. So it's very important for you to approve this project to enable other project to. For Phil to proceed. And thank you very much. Thanks very much for your time. Thanks, John. Speaker 0: Thank you. And Prachi. Mayor Spencer, members of the City Council. Thank you for your service. I'm an Iraqi. I'm a resident of the West End. I live only a few blocks from the Del Monte development also. I speak in opposition to repealing the Del Murray approval. Over the past year or so, most of the neighbors and many people in town have attended a meeting after meeting hearings, working sessions, working groups where we had spent a lot of time giving our opinions, our ideas, our theories. Some of them weren't very good, but we had lots of ideas which were all considered on what we would like to see happen to the site. We don't always agree 100%. I know we never do. But at some point, decisions need to be made so we can start finally to see some progress and move forward. The project has been studied to death. We have lots of reports that go on shelves. And it's time to move forward. I walk beside in front of around behind the project almost every day. It is an eyesore, but the building is cool. Please defeat this item and move forward with the project as it was approved. I'd love to see the project completed in my lifetime. Thank you for moving this project forward in my neighborhood. Police then, says Aaron Paul and then Patricia Young. Nobody gets censorious correctly. Thank you, Mayor. That was terrific. One out of 100 try. Yeah. No, that was a good one. My name is Fully Sanchez, and I come to you today as co-president of the Alameda League of Women Voters. So I am speaking for the league. Last time I saw most of you was at one of our forums, and that's what we do. We're not here to be emotional. We are here to be educational. So therefore, we are not taking a position for or against the Del Monte Project. We haven't studied it and we don't have a position on it. What we do stand for, and you all know this, is we stand for open government and transparency, and that's what you all stand for. I've heard it many, many times, and it's more than just a phrase. It needs to be implemented and implemented properly at certain times. I think this is one of those times and so does the league. We found that the specifically that the Sunshine Ordinance with this particular ordinance to repeal the original one we are not in compliance with. We are strictly not in compliance with our own ordinance. I'm going to quote you from section two, dash 91.5 of the Alameda Sunshine Ordinance. It requires that all documents material to an agenda item must accompany the agenda. What we have had before the public in the last week and a half or so since this has come out is basically your agenda. And the ordinance has been no staff work. There has been no purposeful disagreement. There is no specific staff reports. So our question from the league is. Who made this referral on what factual information? Is the rescission even based on? What are the impacts of the rescission? This is all staff work that would have to come through so that people could make intelligent decisions about whether they want to support where you're headed or they don't want to support it. But we have nothing to go on. Somebody else mentioned how would we replace or what would replace the loss of funds to improve the Jean Sweeney open space so it could be used by the public? Will this action likely result in a lawsuit from TLC? We know you met with them in closed session. We don't know. Of course, know what's happened. That's up to you. But we anticipate that won't be such good news. But all of this should be revealed so the public can appropriately comment on it. This is seriously lacking. We have been in touch with your city council and we had a little back and forth, you know, through email. We had another concern that she corrected us on. Speaker 4: You might have meant to say, with the city attorney rather than the city council. Speaker 0: I'm sorry, city attorney. Sorry, Janet. So once again, at this point, we are not taking any position on the Del Monte project itself. You all campaigned on transparency and open government, and the above issues are all serious concerns to a very involved public. You can see how involved everybody is out here, one side or the other. I'm glad nobody's meeting each other in alleys in the on behind the city council here. But everyone here has been working on both sides of this issue, not for ten meetings or a year, five years this has been going on that I remember seeing it in the paper. So once again, we're asking you to look forward. We're looking forward to working with you. We'd like you to vote against the proposed ordinances which repeal the violation of your own sunshine law. It would to repeal this ordinance. And we will be happy and excited to work with you on different parts of this as we go down this road. Thank you very much. Thank you. Speaker 9: Hi. My name's Aaron Paul. I haven't spoken to counsel for a while, but I did come to one of the planning meetings this fall and. I want to welcome the new council. I don't look at the possible repeal tonight as a stop of the project or anything. I look at it more as like putting things where they should be. I felt very unhappy with that last minute vote at 5:00 when I couldn't come here from work right before the new council took their seats. I also feel that the election spoke so loudly and it it's talking about development. The whole development of the island needs to be looked at cohesively. There's there's been a lot of progress with the Del Monte, with the citizens groups input. And I know the staff has worked hard and I really appreciate that Mr. Wang is here because having been in Alameda, I've been a tenant at Portman Marina next to the Del Monte building since 1995. I've lived a block and a half away for ten years now and I know he went through a lot chain development, but where we are now, we're making progress, but we're not there yet. I don't think it's a good marriage with the current plan as it is. I think there needs to be a little bit more work. We need to look at the long term impact on alameda. We are an island and issues of safety have come up. I like what i heard with the new council members as far as a focus on jobs and and I'd like all that to be encompassed in any changes to the plan. And I'd also like to see a little bit more commercial business at that site so that more people are able to use that beautiful building, not just tenants in the building. And I've got a lot more opinions on this, but I'll save them for future meetings where I hope we can express our opinions again in the future. But I encourage you if if it's legal and I don't even know if that last minute vote was legal, but I would like to see this repeal go forward so that the current council can put the proper input, because we're all going to live with this for a long time. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Patricia Young. Good evening, Madam Mayor. A city council, city staff and community members. My name is Patricia. I'm with the Alameda Home Team, and I've appeared before regarding this issue. And I'm not even going to address the issues about the Del Monte plan or the project or whether whatever this is. My concern is how this item was posted on the agenda. There is a lot of emotion on the island. Obviously, there's a lot of community input that has happened for two years before this. But this item has been put on the agenda with four pages that all it said was two ordinances that are repealing another ordinance. That is it. This the whole community citizens are left guessing whether what the problem is, is the master plan is the transportation. Is that the number of units? What is happening and for you you know the bottom line that this is to ordinances you're passing on no information at all and this is a major issue where you have the eyes of the community on you. What is. I mean, this is just a bad precedent for this new city council. I mean, the expectation for me as a concerned citizen is that you have an open government, that you do things, you know, with due process and with transparency. So if you don't do this now with this open process where there is there should be an exhibit, a rationale given. I didn't find out until tonight that it was Madam Mayor who put this on the agenda. And I'm not arguing that you cannot. I'm saying there's only four pages and you're going to vote yes or no on this item. And this is with the eyes of the community on you. I am very concerned that this is the trend that the new city council is going to take, because I expected more. And I believe that concerned citizens expected more. And so did a previous city council that voted items such as the Sunshine Ordinance. And I believe that you should ask, you know, you should expect more from yourselves and from each other that you're going to do this with transparency. So I believe that you can reach under this item and come up with a rationale for it. And if there is no timing for that, because I have no idea. And certainly there's you know, we have an excellent city attorney and she can give you legal advice. Then you vote no. But I see that that those are the only two choices, because otherwise then you're sending a very clear message to the rest of us that we need to watch you if you're willing to to vote on an ordinance on two ordinances with no exhibits, no rationale, no staff report, what else is going to happen? And honestly, you know, we're all busy working people, but if, you know, we need to watch you closely, then please send us that clear message and vote yes. Otherwise, if you are open, you know, if you're all for open government and transparency, then vote no or vote to gender one or the other. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Our next speakers, Ken Peterson and Cook and then Ron Lamar. Speaker 2: At American Council. Again. Good evening. I'm going to seem to pick on the city attorney a little bit that I don't intend to regard this current. But I recall a circumstance of the council meeting a few years ago in which a zoning issue came up and come through from the planning board and on appeal. And the Council must have talked about this for 45 minutes. All kinds of different issues came up, opinions and so forth, and they kind of wound down and and Lena Tamm hadn't said anything. And so. It was kind of quiet. And she leaned forward. She said. What is the law? The council backed up her call and the mayor looked to the city attorney. What is the law? And the city attorney said it is illegal. And so they approved the appeal and rejected the planning board's illegal action. It's really nice to understand about the law. The other thing I understand is that the city attorney gave an opinion about this process earlier. And her opinion was, this is characteristic of the way the city operates. I agree this particular situation with its associated matters appears to be incomplete. Irregular. Incorrect. Improper and illegal on the face of it, for no other reason. You have to look at the state statute requiring that ordinances be taken up in regular sessions. This was not taken up in a regular session. It appears on its face that the measure that was voted on December 16th is void and the contract would be invalid and that the city manager would be improperly would be improper if he signed it. Thank you. Speaker 0: And cook. Good evening, Madam Mayor and members of the City Council. My name is Anne Cook, and it's a pleasure to be here this evening. Well, actually, perhaps not a pleasure. I'm probably shouldn't be counted in the 40 some people who think we still need to talk about this. But I did want to have a chance to to just share my views about this project with you. I agree with a lot of the other speakers about all the reasons why this project should go forward. I think it's a fantastic project, but I'd like to focus on three perhaps somewhat different aspects of the project because I think they haven't really been touched on. One is waterfront planning what is good waterfront planning. The second is regional planning and the responsibilities that we have to look at regional planning issues. And the third is what many people have touched on, just the long range planning and development process and why it's important that a decision be final at a certain point with respect to waterfront planning. It's my background. It's my passion. I was on the planning board and I think I probably voted down as many waterfront projects as I voted yes for, which was really hard for me. But I just felt like many of them weren't good enough, that we deserved better, and that the waterfront is a really poor, important asset and a resource that we have and that we don't really value enough in the city. I feel like this project is an amazing waterfront project. It it has the ability to bring both residents to the waterfront and to activate the waterfront, have retail uses in the waterfront. And that's really hard to do in the world of waterfront planning. There's so many restrictions on how you use the shoreline, whether it's from the state lands or bccdc. And it's really just trust me when I say it is such a great thing to be able to go. And we have a historic building on the waterfront with residential uses. It's just really hard to do and it's a wonderful opportunity and it's a great use for this building. And I think that I just really wanted you to know that I felt strongly about that. Residential uses on the waterfront make it a safe place for people of all ages to be day and night. And it's really hard if you don't have residential use on the waterfront to make waterfront truly accessible to everybody. The second issue that I really want to focus on is regional planning. I think in some ways it's great that the last five days have been spared the air days, because as you're sitting here and wondering why your lungs hurt, why your children's lungs hurt. I think it is because we don't do a good job of balancing jobs and housing, and we don't, as individual cities, meet our regional, affordable housing goals. And we don't provide new types of housing to the people that want to use them. In my work, where I work with other planners, I'm the Neanderthal that drives a minivan around with two kids in it. Everybody else that has kids that's younger than me, which is just about everybody in my office, they're all on their bike with their kids. They're walking. They don't care whether they can park in front of their building because they know that if they walk a couple of blocks, it's actually better for them from a health perspective. And I now am working in a very poor community. I'm usually at their city council on Tuesday evenings, and what we're trying to do is get people out of their cars and to get them to walk their kids to school. And I think this is the sort of project that allows people to do that. I had a lot of other things I want to talk about. There were so many, but I know I'm out of town, out of time. I think it's really important to respect the end of a process, and it's important that developers know with some certainty at some point whether they have a yes or a no so that they can get their financing and move forward. Thank you. Thank you. Speaker 6: Good evening. I'm Ron Lemos. I was here a couple of months ago to speak to most of you about Mastic Senior Center. I'm the president of the Master Senior Center Advisory Board, and I'm here tonight in a couple of other roles. One is, as a founding member of Alameda Backyard Growers, we harvest and glean fruit and produce from yards all over Alameda Island and make it available to the recipient at the food bank. Last year we donated just over two and a half tons of food to the food bank from unused trees and produce in the community. That has led to a role as the coordinator of the steering committee or the community garden in Jean Sweeney Open Space Park. That committee of about a dozen scientists, teachers, recreation people and master gardeners has been for the last seven months meeting monthly to try to develop the best possible community garden that we can in having credible space that we have. And we've talked about policies and procedures. We've talked about implementation. We've talked about how much of the produce can be sent directly to the food bank to alleviate the food shortages on the island. And recently we've begun talking about fundraising. Fundraising not only for the community garden, but that is a part of the entire Jean Sweeny open space fundraising. Before retiring, I spent 40 years raising money. I will tell you one simple truth about fundraising. You need a big gift to kick it off. If we looking at $10 million. For the gene 20 open space park and Community Garden. We very much need the accelerator the Tim Lewis communities has provided as a part of this project. So without any emotion whatsoever, contrary to the previous speaker, I'm simply telling you a fact there will be a very serious unintended consequence should you move forward with this rescission. And that consequence will have enormous impact on that 22 acres sitting over there waiting for development. Please keep that in mind. Thank you. Speaker 0: Next speakers, Lois. Lois Pryor, William Smith and then Jay Ingram. Yes. Hello. I'm Lois Pryor and I have been working on fair housing and affordable housing issues since 1965, and I have never seen a time when there was enough affordable housing in Alameda for the people that need it. And I think this this proposal will go a long ways toward beginning to ease that problem. If if we go if if you decide to go ahead with the project, the people that will benefit the most will be the the people who need affordable housing, places to live. If you don't go ahead with it. If you if you repeal it, the losers the biggest losers will be the people that would have had a dwelling or an apartment in one of the units there. And it's a variety of of housing units, which is what Alameda needs, too. It's not all the same kind of housing, but all the way from studios, two, three bedrooms. I think it's an excellent project and I hope you decide to go through with it. It's not only the housing, but it's as the last speaker mentioned for for the the park. And if if you don't go ahead with this, there will really be repercussions by the. Not no money for the park and and also the extension of Clement Avenue. And I really think to to repeal this would be, you might say, the height of insanity. Thank you. Speaker 6: And even in council members and staff. I'm William Smith, speaking on behalf of hip hope as vice president. And we're, of course, a poet. We are opposed to the ascension of this ordinance. On their hand, we also recognize that there are many problems that accompany large developments like traffic and so on. So we are we do think that we do want to address those separately. But before I get to that, I want to cover some of the issues that we are concerned about with this rescission notice. First of all, it would appear that generally the decision of this ordinance would likely violate the city and the state housing element and also the potentially bonus ordinances that we have here. And give you one example of that. Basically, the housing element appears to require and the housing law period require 30 units per acre and there's 11 acres out there that's about 330 units. And then you apply a density bonus of about 15%. You come up with about 300 units. That's the minimum number of units that could be required to stay. And that's possibly that's that's the first reading of it, this complicated law. And as the League of Women Voters pointed out, we really need to see these types of issues outlined in writing before they go up. And so that's one issue. Then there are some less direct ways that this has negative implications for the housing element. Lot one we need density to promote transportation, unbundled parking spaces and alternatives to automobiles make housing cheaper or affordable housing people, they make it less expensive. They give them options to drive, to get to work, to get to play, to get to school. All of these things and reducing the density of that goes against that and also makes it harder to fund that housing as well. And I think that it's not stated in any written report, but from gathering from the comments here in the audience, a big object, a big objective of those who want to rescind this is to bring the proposal back with fewer housing units, and I'm not sure that that's possible and to still remain within state law. But yeah, the real. And then the other issue is. Is the fashion of the dusty bazaar that's given to allow the developer to finance the housing and produce a number of market rate housing that gives them less ability to finance the housing. We haven't heard from the developer whether or not reducing the number of units would still enable them to finance the affordable housing portion of this as well. And we worked very hard to write Reno housing advocates and these housing organizations and our attorneys worked very hard to make sure that language was in that development agreement. And that master plan commits the developer to fund the final fund of affordable housing, not the housing authority, but the developer. If the Housing Authority contributes in other people, Caribbean, great, but it's the developer in the land who's responsible for that. Now what light seen, I think, is the big problem really is trans is transportation and the cars that come in. And for that, I think Tony De Stark has a great idea to do a separate city wide transportation plan. And I'd be glad to talk about that later. Speaker 0: Thank you. Speaker 2: Oh. Good evening, Mayor. Vice Mayor. Speaker 6: Members of the council. Excuse me. I'm going to read because I think I have a lot of stuff here and don't know if I can fit it in in 3 minutes. I've been cut off before. Speaker 2: Jay Ingram. I live in 1300 block of Pacific Avenue. I'm probably one. Speaker 6: Of the closest, if not the closest neighbors to the Del Monte property. I can throw a rock from my backyard over to the Del Monte property. Speaker 2: Not that I've tried, but in that close I'm a neighbor of the project and I don't mind the truck traffic. I personally think the pessimism me says that around Thanksgiving time, the city kind of organized. Speaker 6: That to get the trucks to be rolling in through there. Speaker 2: And but that's that's another story. Let's talk about due process for a second. As one of an. Speaker 6: Engaged neighbor vendor planning board meetings. Speaker 2: Their initial meeting at Mastic Senior Center looked at a lot of glossed over ties with the planning board members and the council members as well. So I appreciate this opportunity. Speaker 6: I do support the repeal. Speaker 2: I repeat, I support the repeal. And I am one of those neighbors that's not really concerned about the truck traffic at this point. Allow me to point or status quo is okay with me for now. Allen told me the point is on his third master developer right now. And so why rush this process? The first developer, for the point, didn't sue. From what I remember, the second developer, Sun Cao, did sue. But I think the city settled. Speaker 6: So don't be scared. Speaker 2: By the legal advice that you may have received in closed session. And I play it through a little bit, talk it out a little bit more and discuss more of the issues. A lot of issues are coming up tonight. Alameda point is prime property. The fact that if tim lewis community partners leaves and the scare tactic that nobody else is going to come back. Speaker 6: I just I don't, I don't believe it for a minute. Mm. Prime property, the 300 foot notice message. Speaker 2: I wonder how many houses that is. I'd be interested to find out. And we're talking about 15 houses. I got some notices. I didn't get other notices. Some didn't have dates on it, didn't have times on it. So the news messages were kind of sketchy. Again. There's no need to rush this project. Project started in. Speaker 6: February or March. It was approved in December. Speaker 2: That's City of Fremont Speed Development. I don't think Alameda is similar to Fremont in developing that things that quickly. The July Mastec Center meeting was an eye opening experience. Speaker 6: Felt like it wasn't. Listen to the community as. Speaker 2: Some of you may have been there. The community wasn't listening. Tim Lewis Community Partners has changed, in my opinion, very few things. There's a looks like what a metal appendage coming out of the. Speaker 6: Historic beautiful building. Speaker 2: Now hasn't changed from the Mastic Senior Center building. There's a lot of nice design concepts, but I think the basic metal structure with the four or five stories going up is just ugly. Speaker 6: It could be improved. Speaker 2: Ten worst many partners hasn't done anything density in that particular area versus the density. Alameda point 1500 homes in that particular area. I believe in 1400 homes in 700 acres at alameda point doesn't pencil out to me. There's been a lot of public meetings, 12 one city council meeting for 5 hours and the public comment started at 1030 in the evening and went to 1:00 in the morning, repeal this hastily formulated ordinance and discuss it more. There's a lot of unanswered questions on the development that I don't know if the. Speaker 6: Planning board can handle at this point. And I think it's going to go back. Speaker 2: To the planning board and I don't know if they're set up to handle it. Thank you for your time. Speaker 0: Thank you. Next speaker Ray Graber, then Jim Smallman and then Melinda Hays. Ray Graber. Good evening. I'm asking the City Council to seriously consider repealing the Del Monte Ordinance or make a declaration that this ordinance is invalid and must be corrected before moving forward. Why? Because we need to preserve the city's integrity and to observe the rule of law. This ordinance was rushed through by the prior city council, whose members were largely termed out or voted out by a dissatisfied city's citizenry. I find this entire process sort of an embarrassment to us as a city. And this ordinance has some serious defects. Although the public has been told there are penalties for the developer, for the developer, if the TDS or traffic demand managements do not work. There are in reality no penalties under this ordinance. If the teams fail, the city and the residents will be left in with the negative repercussions of failed TDs. This is what happens. Again as a result of rushing through the Del Monte ordinance. After the fact, we learned that information was left out of this ordinance regarding the density bonus units, their size, their placement, their design. This is in direct violation of our Alameda Municipal Codes regarding density bonus. Therefore, this ordinance, as passed, appears defective. I ask the City Council tonight to vote for a repeal of this defective ordinance. I also asked the Council that the in lieu of a repeal, that the Council make a declaration that this ordinance is invalid and must be corrected before moving forward. Thank you. Speaker 2: That's good. Speaker 6: Yeah, that's fine. Thank you. I'm Jim Smallman, and I'm here representing the Alameda Preservation Society, and we have generally supported this project. It's tempting, of course, to find flaws in any proposal. And and there are flaws in this one. We feel it's too big, too dense. The traffic measures, which have been talked about considerably tonight are are trailing the development of the design. But most of our input has been in design suggestions. And I've distributed or we've distributed a letter that we wrote in June of last year. And there's been distributed to all of you. I have extra copies of you if you need them of making some suggestions for mitigating the design. One of the concerns that we have is that the central portion, the new construction, is taller than we feel it really needs to be. The ceiling height inside the dwelling units is nine feet three inches as the design sits today. And I would guess that most of the people in this audience are living with eight foot ceilings. So nine foot three is unnecessary. And with the number of stories that are in this building, we could lower that that what the picture shows is the storyboard and it's been enhanced. So you can see it. It's hard to hard to see the actual storyboard, but that shows how high the center portion will be. And we feel that it's higher than it has to be as a preservation item. The new construction should be subordinate to the basic building, and we feel it's not as subordinate as it should be. But we need to compare in, in our own minds this with the alternatives. We one of the things that preservationists know is that if a building is unused or underused, it tends to go away. And there was an example with the brought up earlier of we're not comparing this against perfection here, that the trucking and the traffic and the things that are going on with this building now and the appearance of it is certainly far from perfection. So we have to have some balance. We'd like to see this building saved. We'd like to see this project. Go ahead. But we'd like to see still and it's not too late to see some design changes made that would mitigate some of the visual aspects. Thank you. Speaker 0: Linda Hayes. Then Joe Corcoran and then Virginia Bergström. Happy New Year. My name is Melinda Hayes. I have been a resident of Alameda for almost 50 years. I've lived in four different locations. I've taught school at and Snell. Speaker 2: At the. Speaker 0: Alameda High School and High School. I've been very involved in this community. I. I was stunned to read that this ordinance was up for a repeal. Didn't know the reason because it was not given. Madam Mayor, you introduced this as saying you were the one who put it on here because you wanted to have a say. You wanted the new council to have a say. There have been so many meetings on this. I believe you have had your say. You have spoken to it. Everyone had a chance. All of the council members had an opportunity to talk about this and to bring forth your concerns. Why now? Are you now saying, you know, I want to be I want to repeal it. I want to look at it again. It has been studied and studied and studied. It is time to to go forward with this project. I remember this Del Monte building when you could tell what season it was because of the smell of the tomatoes being processed. I've driven past this very many, many times. It is an eyesore. It needs to be restored. We need the 30,000 feet of commercial space that's available. We need the housing. We need the affordable housing. By delay by if you vote council members to look at it again, you are putting it off further and further and further. We Armenians need to know we can trust our our city council members and to trust them to do the right thing and. What it sounds like is that it is two petulant decision. I didn't get my way. I'm going to do it my way and bring it up again. That is that is not what we want from our counsel. We want to be able to know that when a council makes a decision, that decision is, in fact, held. Please do the right thing. Speaker 2: Hi. My name is Joe Lauren. I'd like to thank Trish for running for mayor. Congratulations on winning. The people in this town elected you because we were tired of being. Speaker 6: Railroaded by the past. Speaker 2: Administration. Speaker 6: Having meetings shoved down our throat, like in December. Short notice, insufficient notice. The list goes on. Thank you for running. Thank you for being our mayor. Congratulations. I would like to say everybody in this room has a great. Reason to thank the theater opposition group. The theater opposition group gave us a better theater. If we didn't have the theater opposition group, we would have settled for second best. The same is true here with Del Monte. The Del Monte project has plenty of flaws. We all know that, and even the city planners are willing to admit it. It's been rushed. Speaker 2: In a way that it's questionable whether it's even legal. Speaker 6: And so I say before we move ahead, we need to stop and pause and think about this a little bit. Speaker 2: And there's nothing wrong with that. Speaker 6: All we're going to get is a better project, not second best. And so I don't have a problem with slowing this process down. We were railroaded in December. Everybody knows that you were elected by a majority and. Speaker 2: So you have to consider the community. Speaker 6: I have one last comment I'd like to share. This is my opinion. I think the Del Monte project is nothing more than a four storey trailer park. Alameda deserves better. It's not really the asset. Speaker 2: Everybody believes, and the only thing it guarantees are traffic problems. So slow this process down. There's no hurry. And congratulations on becoming the new mayor. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Virginia Bergstrom. Hello. I'm Virginia Bergstrom. Thank you for letting me speak. Congratulations, Mayor and City Council. I'm hearing all these things. I'm not a political person, but I'm a voting resident of Alameda. And I know that you were voted in to slow down a lot of building and process that was going on in Alameda because we have to maintain the quality of life here. We're an island. I'm hearing people say I'm right next door to Del Monte. I'm right here. We're well, it's only two miles by four miles. Every one of us is impacted by improper growth. I'm hearing a lot about this project. It doesn't sound like it's complete. It doesn't sound like it's been 100% thought through. And I'm really welcome that you re looking at this again and making sure that you have a building with quality. Thank you. Next speakers Nancy Gordon and John Spangler and then Mike Hanna Barry. John Spangler. Speaker 6: Thank you, Mayor Spencer, members of the council and staff. I've been keeping track so far. I have nine speakers in favor of the motion. The audience before you tonight. I have I have 24 opposed just four grins and I have no idea what the results will be with people behind me who are against this ordinance. Please raise your hands. Speaker 2: Against the ordinance before us tonight in favor of the Devil Del Monte. Okay. Speaker 0: Hey, right. Speaker 2: Here again for the Del Monte. Speaker 0: Addresses your race. I'm sorry. Let's. Okay. Speaker 6: Okay. Never mind. Speaker 0: I'm sorry. Speaker 6: I knew it would be confusing because the ordinance itself that is before you tonight, which is to rescind the Del Monte development, is confusing. There is no staff report as well-documented by the league women voters and anybody who looks at the agenda for tonight. There are no links to a staff report. There are no reasons that have been presented by the mayor or by staff. On the merits of the proposal other than the one mentioned for the first time in public tonight by the mayor herself. No advantages to rescinding the project as rescinding the project. There is there's something really wrong with that. When there's a big project underway like this that has been fully vetted as. Speaker 2: Legally been processed, reviewed by hundreds of us. Over a dozen meetings. Speaker 6: Last. Speaker 2: Year. In the almost. Speaker 6: 20 years I've been in Alameda, Peter Wong came up with several proposals. Nothing made it to the city council even even a couple of times to the planning board for a preliminary review. But nothing as far as the Tim Lewis community project got. Stimulus Communities wants to put $128 million of economic investment into this community and worse by this ordinance that is before you to stop the development. Telling him to go away. That is crazy making. I'm sorry I sent you all an email earlier. Speaker 2: Like I believe this last night. About this project. You all know. Speaker 6: I'm in favor of the Del Monte. I'm glad to see something finally getting done with that derelict property. And I don't mean acting as a warehouse for a big box retailer. I support the previous comments and legal and voters and the comments that you may hear yet from the only two renters coalition representatives from Individual Haven whose remarks they supported last month also, and from Hill and Sasse and other supporters of this project. It's time to go ahead with it. It will get taken care of. All the concerns. We're all not going away. We're going to be here to help solve those problems. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: I Canterbury. Speaker 6: Good evening, Madam Mayor. Members of the City Council staff. My name is Mike Canterbury. I'm a lifelong Alameda resident and president of the Planning Board. I come before you tonight to whom I feel, and I better put these on. I come before you tonight to urge you not to rescind the decision of the City Council to proceed on the development of the Del Monte property. Let me tell you why. The decision process, which led to the vote to approve Del Monte by the previous council was lengthy, sound and fully transparent. 11 public meetings were held by the Historic Advisory Board, the Planning Board and the City Council. Many of the meetings stretched late into the night, and I know that because I was there, the length of the meetings show the amount of interest, participation and at times angst in the process. Matters of scale, parking, low income, housing, transportation were looked at and dealt with. It's my opinion that this process resulted in real dialog among the state, hold all the stakeholders and resulted in a fully vetted project exactly where you want to be at the end of a planning process on such an important matter. That is how the process went that resulted in the approval of the Del Monte project. To reiterate, it was exhaustive, transparent, and just the way it should go to achieve consensus on such a thorny issue. That brings us to tonight's discussion. To rescind the approval of the project after approval by the historic advisory board, the planning board and the previous council. If a vote is taken tonight to reverse the previous council's approval of Del Monte, it cannot be done by blaming the process. The process was not flawed, was done by the books. Speaker 2: Such a decision to rescind this can only be laid at the foot of politics. Speaker 6: Elections have consequences. I get that. I'm a union official. I run for election every three years. But let's face it, this is about politics. There's a small minority of Alabamians. Speaker 2: Who will always believe. Speaker 6: There is a hidden agenda behind every bush, a shady developer around every corner. And just because the facts are the facts, it doesn't mean they're true. They oppose all residential development. If you reject Del Monte, it will satisfy them. But it will throw all of Alameda renters under the bus because we're putting a cap on our housing stock. Speaker 2: And that is going to lead to higher rents. Speaker 6: The city council is free to take whatever position you want on this. I urge you to uphold the approval should you choose not to allow the project. You should be honest as to why you're making that decision. Speaker 2: It's about politics, not about the process. Thank you. Speaker 10: Yes. Laura Thomas. Speaker 0: Jamie Harrell and Andy Balaban. Let's try again. Laura, Thomas, Jeanne, Meryl, and then Andy of our leaving. Yes. Thank you. Oh. They didn't. Speaker 7: Oh, my goodness. Good evening, Madam Mayor, members of the council. And congratulations on your election. And let's see here. I'm Laura Thomas. I represent Renewed Hope housing advocates, which has been working to get affordable housing built since 1999, when the last tech boom forced a lot of people out of Alameda. And over the years, many aluminums have learned, I think, a lot through our work and our advocacy that a healthy community. We're all kinds of people can. It's it's good to have a healthy community where all kinds of people can live and have stable lives. That's why it's kind of disheartening to hear people question the affordable housing portion of the Del Monte project and call it inadequate. We have the developer's guarantee that the housing will be financed and built. The phasing for the affordable housing is clearly spelled out. The the developer can't even get a building permit for any of the market rate units until they've signed an affordable housing agreement. The city with an approved development plan and design review. For the affordable housing, and they can't occupy any of the market rate unions until the affordable housing has a building permit, which means it's got the construction plans and the financing in place. Now, if people are worried about what the design of the standalone affordable housing is going to look like, they could look at the four standalone projects we've already built in Alameda for low income people, and they're all fine projects. They're called Jacques Upon Vila, the Islander, Shinsei Gardens and the Breakers. Okay. And if if we didn't think a beautiful, safe, habitable, habitable project would come out of this development agreement, we wouldn't have supported it. To be second guessed by critics who haven't been involved at all is pretty disconcerting. Anyone concerned with how affordable housing gets built, whom it gets built for, how it's financed, and who the people are that deserve to be in it can always come and work with us. We're a totally open group and we've been around for ten years. As I said at a previous hearing, these 55 affordable units, as well as the market rate units, will provide needed housing in the city. Suggestions to lower the number of market rate units while insisting the affordable can be preserved may seem like some sort of a noble stance. But it will make it very difficult to finance the whole project and in the end it'll doom it and we'll get nothing. We're hoping you don't vote for this appeal. If you reject this project, it will be inconsistent with the city's housing element density bonus. And it'll impact. The impact will fall disproportionately on people who need affordable housing in this town. There seems to be a divide in this town between the haves and the have nots, the haves own homes, or are part of a techno meritocracy who can afford the high rents and the have nots or renters of normal decent means who happen to number over half the population? And I think appealing this project will just make the divide worse. Hope you don't do it. Thank you. Speaker 0: Yeah. Jean Mayor. Hello. My name is Judy Merrill and I live with my family on Sherman Street, a directly across from the Demko trucking facility in the Del Monte Warehouse. The project before you is both neighborhood friendly and environmentally smart. It'll bring, as we've already discussed, affordable housing, alternative transportation, including a water shuttle, increased AC transit bus passes for new residents, along with millions of dollars for Jean Sweeny Park and the much needed Clement Street extension. And the project is consistent with a green, urban vision for the city of Alameda. Mayor Spencer, I wanted to remind you that the Green Party platform supports the kind of development considered today. The platform calls for, quote, promoting urban infill with affordable housing, mass transit and more. The platform also calls for restoring damaged urban ecosystems and supporting policies that give communities a voice in planning future development with the goal of preventing concentration of polluting industries. For too long, our Northside neighborhood has been promised a vibrant new vision for our community that would end our exposure to toxic trucking and bring us housing, parks and alternative transportation. And that's exactly what their proposed and approved Del Monte project puts in place. I urge you to support this neighborhood friendly and environmentally smart project. We hope that you act today as the Green Council. We elected and turned down the ordinance to put a stop to the demand to project and let our neighborhood breathe. A clean air sign of relief. Thanks. Good evening, Mayor. Council Staff. My name is Andy Balaban and I'm a resident of Alameda and unfortunately I wasn't surprised, but I was disappointed when I found out that straight out of the gate, the first ordinance we'd be hearing was on a rescission, on a decision that had been made through a very distinct and long vetting of this project. It became a level of frustration to see that there was really nothing there to understand why. Speaker 7: This decision has been brought forward. I've heard ideas. Speaker 0: From people from the public side. Well, it could be this or we think it's that or what, but there's no information here whatsoever. And I'm left to draw the conclusion that the reason there is no information is because perhaps staff either was not given guidance or could not provide a report. Speaker 2: To. Speaker 0: Support. Speaker 7: The ordinates that's being brought forward. Speaker 0: The only thing that we have heard this evening is that this is the tool for the for the new council to speak. And I completely disagree with that. Speaker 7: Everyone here was an alum, even when this is going through the process. Speaker 0: Everyone here had the opportunity to attend those meetings to hear what the community was saying. And I believe almost everyone here attended both public meetings where a vast majority of this community spoke in favor of the Del Monte plant. So I don't find it necessary to add anything new to those in support. And I understand that there are many that are disappointed that it did. But from what I can gather, there is nothing that has been provided. Speaker 2: To. Speaker 7: Support this decision. So I strongly hope that you will oppose. Speaker 0: And vote no on this ordinance and you will still have the opportunity to speak as this project moves forward. And of course, in that process, things can be improved and these decisions and concerns can be addressed. So please, a no vote. Speaker 7: On the rescission of the Domani project. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Doug Looney, Kevin Gorham, and then Lynnette Lee. Speaker 2: Evening. My name is Doug. Lenny and. Today is June six, 2015. That day is important because 30 years ago this day, coincidentally, I moved to Alameda. It was six days after I got married. My parents were living here and we decided to move to. Alameda is a great place to raise our kids that we saw somewhere in the future there. And in the 30 years I've lived here, much has changed. Much has changed in Alameda. I did have two kids. They were now grown and out of the house. But one thing has not changed in those 30 years. And that's the Del Monte warehouse. It's an awfully long time to wait for something to happen and to to turn an eyesore into something that's really useful and contributes to this community. I'm here again tonight to support this project, as I did in December. And I want to reiterate the reasons that I'm here, spending the time that everyone else is on this. And that is because I think that the project represents exactly the kind of housing and the kind of people that we want to attract to Alameda. It's a transit oriented development. It emphasizes public transit. It is a place for people who don't like to take a car everywhere. Like me and many others. And it caters to those people. And I think that's the kind of people that we want to attract here and that we want to to keep here. I do not support every housing development in Alameda. In fact, I adamantly opposed the Crown Point project at Crab Cove. I didn't think it was an appropriate development for that location. And while it was far, far from being fully planned and vetted, the development did not look like something Alameda needs more of. The Del Monte project, on the other hand, is completely different. Sited at the right place, reusing a building that's currently obviously underutilized and an eyesore and provides an appropriate mix of commercial and residential, large and small housing. Very, very affordable and some not so affordable. This is a project that has many benefits to all of Alameda. We heard those tonight. I won't repeat them. And I don't have a problem with the city council bringing this back. The new city council bringing this back for a discussion, as the mayor suggested at the beginning of this. But I do have a problem with trying to change this project or delay this project. I think it would be a waste of time. I think it would be inappropriate appropriation of resources. And frankly, I don't want to wait another 30 years to get the benefits that we can get from this project. Thank you very much. Good evening, City Council. My name is Kevin Gorham, and I'm a 20 plus year resident on the 1500 block of Pacific Avenue. One block away from the Del Monte building. I, too, can throw a stone at the building. I care not to. I'm also the assistant principal at Internal High School. I also work in the city as well. I must admit that I'm dismayed and embarrassed that we are here once again tonight to rehash the already approved El Monte project. While other newly elected city councils and mayors in surrounding areas are today working with city agencies, building relationships and reports with city constituents. We have a new council wasting our time and taxpayer money. To try to derail a already approved project to enhance a blighted area of Alameda. To the naysayers who continuously point to traffic and parking as attempts to derail innovative projects. I point to the library and the theater as projects that were attacked by the same old Alameda arguments. And I ask those naysayers to think of our downtown area without a theater and without our incredible library. So I asked the city council tonight to not rescind the Del Monte project. Let's move forward with this innovative project that is going to benefit all aspects of our city. Thank you. Speaker 0: At the meeting. Mayor spencer and members of the city council. I'm lynette lee and a member of renewed hope and also the alameda home team. I continue to support the del monte project and its progress forward. I speak against tonight's proposal or ordinance proposed ordinance to repeal that, the previous approvals. I agree with Patricia Young of the League of Women Voters and others who spoke that there was no background information or reasons specifically for the repeal. I at both December meetings, the previous mayor gave Mayor Spencer. Councilman Miller SC Councilman elect Morrissey and also Councilman Jim Odie the first opportunity to speak on the project both times and to express your concerns. And what I heard primarily from tonight from the mayor, Mayor Spencer, was, wait, don't vote. Speaker 7: Let us. Speaker 0: Vote. But we didn't hear your specific concerns about what your concerns about the project. And I still don't know what those are. I did hear from councilman literacy that you were concerned about jobs. What I heard the developers say tonight is that there would be 900 jobs. But also, other speakers said people who have jobs here in Alameda also need housing opportunity. And there are so many renters here in Alameda are desperately trying to stay in Alameda. They've lived in Alameda for many years. They want their children to finish school here. And there are hanging by a thread because they cannot they are getting priced out of the housing here. Please give an opportunity to have more affordable housing. Even market rate housing is sorely needed here, along with all the other benefits. And Councilman Odie, thank you for your respect of the process, as you stated earlier. Thank. Lester, Carol, Gail, Jason, and then Doug, Don. Speaker 2: Good evening, Madam Mayor. City Council. Lester Cabral, resident of Alameda. I do own property down on Pacific. Born and raised on a north side. We do need to look at this. I'm in favor of opening this up. There's no doubt. And I've heard from a lot of speakers here about some real gray areas that we don't have answers to. And of course, the number one is transportation. We need some guarantees that AC transit or whoever is going to provide some service down there because there is none. And we need to address that. And I believe with the new council here that we could get some definite good answers there so we can make this thing right. The other issues, of course, is parking down there. We you know, the parking is going to be tough. We need to address that. We need more parking. There's also going to be some commercial businesses down there. That part needs to be addressed a little better to really know exactly if we're going to put a 7-Eleven in there or what you're going to have and what type of operations are going to be going on. This stuff all needs to be addressed, and I think those issues should go before city council here and get some direct answers. I've heard a lot of people here tonight complaining about, you know, different aspects of what the developer's going to do in this and that. Well, I noticed on quite a few pictures, there's still some for sale signs on that building. My understanding is the developer does not own this property. I know he's been after it. And I'm sure I'm sure you'll probably follow through with what he's going to do. But in the meantime, he hasn't put any money on the table and the place has not gotten any better. And I think those things are something that we need to get with the developer on and say, hey, let's let's show a little faith here and let's start doing something instead of just talking about it. Thank you. Speaker 0: Good evening, Madam Mayor. And Council with or without. I'm kind of shocked to find out. I lived in a blighted area, and I think my family's going to be kind of shocked. They live in a blighted area. I don't think we're here to count on our fingers. Who in this room is nay or yay against? For or against the Del Monte Project? There's 70,000 people in this city, and that's. Who? Who you're working for. And the Del Monte development doesn't just affect the neighborhood. It affects everybody in this city. And I want to thank you for doing this tonight, for your openness, your transparency, transparency and your integrity. Otherwise, if you didn't have that, we wouldn't be here tonight. Domain is the first development of many to come. And I've I've not heard from really anyone that says don't do it. But what we're asking is to do it right. Let's do it right. Because we only have one time to do it. Let's also keep in mind that we'll have almost. A thousand units within three blocks when this is done. We've got. It's now terminals behind this to come and down the street. We've got another one happening. Traffic and transportation for all the upcoming developments must be addressed now. I'm concerned why the inclusive, low income housing, why there has not been a replacement for this and why it hasn't been determined. If anyone thinks that people are going to give their cars up and they're going to take water, taxis and things. Take a ride down to Alameda Point. Where the where you catch the ferry, you will be astounded at the amount of cars they are parked anywhere and everywhere they can to take the water taxi. Speaker 7: It's. Speaker 0: It's not going to happen. It's. And as I stated before, the developer. Is working for us. All of us. Ask or demand. And you will receive. Ask for the best. And I'm not a betting person, but I would say if we had an earthquake. Bomani would be standing, and that, too, would be floating down the estuary. Before. He continues. My understanding as we approached 1030 and that's like 1026 right now that we need for votes if we're planning to continue to consider any other items after this. And there are we still have, I think, probably about ten speaker sets here. And the. Speaker 4: So at. Speaker 0: Least seven speaker slips. Speaker 4: That a mayor? Speaker 0: Yes. Speaker 4: Are the other items still to come? Ones that could be continued to another meeting. Speaker 0: So that we can discuss that. I think the majority of the items are the referrals list and I think we moved other things up. The other public items up already. So then we have city manager communications or communications on non agenda items and then council referrals and there's one, two, three, four or five council referrals. Of pleasure of council. Speaker 2: Adama, if I. If I may. Yes. The, the oral communication and the city manager communications are not action items, so they don't count. The council referrals are. Speaker 0: Thank you. So it's my understanding then the other items remaining would be all the referrals. Speaker 3: And I would like to move to. Be able to take new items after 1030. Speaker 0: Second that all those other comments. We have a second. Speaker 4: We have a discussion. Yes. So I actually haven't spoken directly to the mayor, but I've heard it said that you prefer not to have meetings, go to 11 or past 11. So I was trying to be deferential to you. Speaker 0: And if so, I would have a question. So and I also want to respect the people here. That is a concern of mine. When we have meetings go on. Honestly, from for me, when we have meetings that go to 230, you know, 1230, I don't know how many of you have jobs, but I really prefer unless we have items that we really that we feel like it makes it time matters if you look at it and also than how much time these will take to address. Speaker 3: Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you. Council member Izzy Ashcraft. I think the points that you're raising are are certainly worthy of being considered. But the thing to think about, though, is one can't really speculate what's going to happen at the next meeting. So it's altogether possible that we might find ourselves in the same situation. So I think maybe we should play it by ear as the thing and then as at when when the item does come. Can we at that point in time, request for it to be postponed till later? Speaker 0: Yes, we can do that. And also at 11:00, Q will take another vote to go beyond 11:00. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 8: Let's move on and see what happens. Speaker 0: So we have a motion in a second. All those in favor. I oppose, but motion passes. Speaker 4: 41. I guess. I'm sorry I didn't vote. Okay. I will vote yes because we'll reconsidered 11 whether to go past 11. But I appreciate paying attention to what you've said. Speaker 0: Thank you. You're welcome. All right. So at this point, we can continue with our speakers. Dr. Hahn, thank you. Speaker 2: Dr. Hahn. I've heard a lot of real. Overtures that are people are extremely upset and things are going to change. I believe and I haven't heard your discussion yet. If you take this off the table, I'm sure you you are not canning the whole program. You're looking for information and I'm looking for that discussion. Some of the things that we're going out here with, we're only fair tactics. We talk about the trucks over there. We've been past that. The council has moved past that point. This has been zoned and it has multiple family overlay. When we talk about affordable housing, we put that to rest. Back in 2006 or so. There will be a 15% redevelopment area. There'll be 25% in alameda point. We made that known. For people to keep on going forward and saying that these things are going to be taken away or not. And I think that one of the things I see is the same concerns that were expressed to the old council about the transparency and how this moved in a quick fashion within a council area of council, particularly when it was during the Thanksgiving period of time and then during a special meeting. And actually that meeting was delayed by a half hour and actually was two of the speakers were only allowed 2 minutes to talk to. And I trust that because the newly elected officials had 2 minutes or 3 minutes to express their. That is not how we run this. Transparency is. It means that we do exactly that. I hear this other says you have no staff report. I had the unfortunate. Oh. Obligation to sort through a couple of your council meeting recently and there was absence of council of staff reports on a couple of agenda items are incomplete ones . So these arguments are, yes, they're valid to a certain extent, but is something that you will have to work on and make sure that that occurs addressed to you. You are the council that we will be working with for the next four years and most likely for the next eight years. You deserve all the background information understanding. I'm sure you're not going to cancel the Del Monte project. It's something we've been looking forward to for an awful long time. So I encourage you to take that effort to research it further. Understand the impact of all redevelopment in an. Speaker 0: Thank you, John. Physically. Nicholas Cabral and the care of God. Sting. Speaker 6: They are Spencer Council members. And I have to read this. Well, I had hoped for a better start to the new year. Call my bifocals don't work here. Only I hope for a better start to the New Year than the way this meeting is beginning. First agenda item rescind. Prior Council vote. This Council. Hasn't even discussed. Whether there was some way to sit and sit down and talk to the developer at this point just to see if anything could have been worked out. At least that way you could have come tonight and said that you you tried before you go into litigation this past election. Voters seem to be divided on the issue of development. So instead of. So instead of trying to see if you could bring the two sides together, it seems you've decided to drive them further apart. I understand that some of you want to go in a different direction. That's fine. You have four years to put your stamp on the direction you'd like to see the city move toward. There will be many issues coming down that you can have an effect on. This is such a negative way to start your tenure, you're going to lose a lot of support that you'll need down the road. Is Del Monte really the tipping point? And is this really the last chance we have to get the thing right? I can understand that some of you are not pleased with the development. But go back over all of the past year. But I'm sorry to go back over all the past year and re here and have the same battle all over again or worse, go to court. Are you really going to win in the long run? I don't think you will. Thank you. Speaker 2: Good evening, Mayor Spencer and the council. My name is Nick Cabral, and I want to tell you, it's you know, I try to be a moderate guy, but this is really appalling. I'm really upset that you are insulting Andrew and the staff, our city staff. You're insulting the planning board. And I think it's terrible. You guys have talked about everything tonight, but you never talked about the people that lived on University Avenue. And they're live. You're going to vote on their lives and put them on hold by. You go home to your little neighborhoods and sleep in your nice little streets and then look like you did The Brady Bunch. Why? We have to listen to trucks and every day. I think it's appalling and I think it's appalling that you're going to do this. And I you know. I hope you all your luck with your new councilman and the mayor. And I want to be supportive of my city. This is wrong. The developer have done everything and these people talking about your rushing. I had the privilege of working with the Wang family 40 years ago at the Del Monte Project, and we're still here, and that's not long enough. And you know, Mr. de South Councilman de SA, I've always been proud because you're a west ender. They don't understand. We've been the stepchild of Alameda all my life, and I see the West End growing and moving forward into the future, given us a residential area that we could be proud of. And I really hope you got our back, because this is going to be the most important vote you'll ever make in your tenure . Tonight, it's going to be important. And I think it's terrible that you're doing this to us. We have gone I've never seen any one of you at those meetings we had over the year. And and and Andrew, with his staff going to those meetings and putting in hours, an hour, and you're going to tell them it's no good. Where do you come with that stuff? I think you started your administration on your left foot. We want to help. We want to make our town grow. I voted for almost everybody on this board. I never thought it'd backfire on me. It's heartbreaking. We've been waiting 40 years for a neighborhood. Give us a neighborhood, please. Thank you. Speaker 0: Hello. Speaker 7: Carol Gladstone. I live on Grand Street. More or less. I've lived here almost 60 years now. I'm for the Del Monte project. I just wish I knew what it was. I, I couldn't find a rendering of the Del Monte online with the middle part that rises up. If you Google the word Del Monte and Alameda, you get the 2010 design, and that doesn't look much like what's planned for it now. So although there's been a lot of people speak with a lot of emotions against repealing the ordinance. They're short on their facts. Yes, there's been a lot of meetings, but the devil's in the details because the number of housing units in the building itself keeps changing from meeting to meeting and it keeps going up. It even changed with in the December 16th meeting itself. So if you went to meetings last year, you're looking at a different project in this on December 16th. It's my understanding that repealing the ordinance isn't stopping the development. I mean, I believe Mr. Meek, when he says he loves the building, I want to see a development there. But. What I think what bothers me the most is I live on Grand Street and the way out of town is Grand Buena Vista. Make a left go down, boy, to Vista, to Sherman, make a right and you exit to the two. Nobody seems very bothered by the utter lack of a plan for the Sherman sub area area B Eagle Sub Area Area C, if you approve the fact that the audiences were approved without any plan for those two areas which border the length of Sherman and are key determinants of the traffic at the Sherman Buena Vista Comment Composite intersection. I think that needs to be in the actual plan. Before it is submitted for final approval by the city council and it isn't in there. And that's why I think you're doing the right thing by considering repealing the ordinance. It's not that anybody wants to kick the developer out of town. We're not thinking of Tim Lewis as Suncor. We're not trying to get rid of the developer. We would just like the whole thing planned to the edges, to the borders. And that needs to be done before you hand the developer the right to just start building. Anyway. That's my opinion. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: At this point. We have two more speakers. If you have a speaker slip on this issue, please turn it in. Our next speaker, Irma Garcia. And then Linda WINESTOCK. Speaker 1: First of all, I want to say congratulations. Speaker 0: Madame Mayor and. Speaker 1: Jim Oti and Frank literacy and thank you. City council members as they and Tony de saag and staff for being here so late and patient with us. Speaker 0: I've been living. Speaker 1: Here in Alameda since 1988, and I'm also a part of a congresswoman, Barbara Lee. So affordable. Speaker 0: Housing movement. Speaker 1: And with her for a long, long time. Though I do question on how affordable these housing is going to be. Speaker 0: And I'm I'm I'm really happy with the. Speaker 1: Support that's been given to. Speaker 0: Jean Sweeney part. She was a. Speaker 1: Very close friend of mine and I. Speaker 0: Supported her throughout the years, and I really love. Speaker 1: That promised funding. Speaker 0: I'm also a big supporter of. Speaker 1: Todd, which is transit oriented development, and it would. Speaker 0: Be. Speaker 1: Wonderful if we could use an ultra light rail system like Cyber Tram International. Which was part of a. Proposal back in 2007. A lot of people know about that airport and made a point of. Speaker 0: And I'm I'm I'm kind of like, you know, support. Speaker 1: I support a lot of sentiments. Speaker 0: Uh, of speakers on both sides. So, um. Speaker 7: You know, I. Speaker 1: I trust that you will do the right thing, and thank you so much. Speaker 0: Linda WINESTOCK. All right. Do we have any other speakers? All right then let's proceed with council comments. Speaker 4: S.M. Thank you, Madam Mayor, and thank you again to an overflow crowd at times for coming out and helping inform us. I know the question before us tonight is whether or not we vote to repeal these two ordinances concerning the DOMINY project. But I want to just start out by well, there's one thing I want to just say right off the bat. I want to defend planning staff, our city attorneys, the planning board. We have heard lots of criticism tonight, and I've had emails and phone calls from people criticizing the city attorneys, the planning director, Andrew Thomas, saying they don't know what they're talking about. They do know what they're talking about. We've actually patiently sat down and explained with some of the folks even who spoke here tonight what they were missing about the density bonus ordinance. And yes, I was vice president of the planning board when we passed it. I know it well, and I know why it's properly applied here. It could be that the speaker we met with just yesterday has perhaps forgotten since yesterday what it was we explained to him, but he agreed with it at the time. Other I'm not going to speculate on motivation, but what I do think is important for this this council and for all of you our citizens, is to ask three questions. And the three questions are, what would we gain from moving forward with the Del Monte development? What would we lose if we rescind or repeal the ordinance and don't move forward? And are there less draconian measures that would address the concerns, legitimate concerns that some of the speakers have raised, some of the council members have raised besides torpedoing this proposal. And I want to just amplify a little on it, on all of those quickly. What we would gain from going forward with the DOMINY project is removing the blight in this neighborhood. And again, I give great weight and credence to the neighbors who live there. The they breathe this day in, day out. They have young families. The removing the diesel truck traffic from the northern waterfront would be huge to the suggestion that we engineered the Thanksgiving truck traffic. Those of you who follow the news would know that there was a labor stoppage up and down the West Coast. In the West Coast ports, Oakland was still functioning. And so all that ship traffic that was trying to get here for Black Friday, which is that Friday shopping day after Thanksgiving, was offloading at the Port of Oakland and the trucks were coming and going from D'Amico. And yes, we feel that some complaints from neighborhood residents but now we are powers don't extend quite that far. We would also gain housing opportunities. And we had a very interesting a related topic tonight and that was the right speed lease an option to purchase at Alameda Point. They're starting out with 150 employees. They plan to grow that to 350 by the year 2018. And these are young techie types. They call themselves the Geek Squad. I spoke to real estate group before the holidays and I said, these folks are going to be looking for housing to rent and eventually buy. You are all going to be busy with that. We need to provide that kind of workforce housing. Those are the kind of workers in the kind of businesses we say we want to we want to attract. And so let's also remember traffic. Traffic is big. Traffic is always an issue with a development. Not every resident of the Del Monte development is going to drive to the tube to go to work in the morning. Some of them might stay and work in Alameda and not leave the island at all, and they will have a free shuttle to get them to BART if they want to go to BART. I am working with the developer. Just had a conversation today. I want that free shuttle to go to the ferry terminal. By the way, I'm really familiar with ferry commuters. I'm married to one. Yes, that ferry parking lot fills up. He my husband rides his bike every morning that he can so he doesn't have to park. But if we had even more ferries or free shuttle or AC transit stopping there again, even more people would take advantage of the ferries. This is a good thing. Someone mentioned the five spare the air days. This is the winter and we've had five solid spare the air days. Think about that. It affects us all. The Clement Avenue extension would take Clement Avenue all the way through providing a. Other east west thoroughfare for our city, which we could very well need. And then back when I was on the planning board, we determined that Clementine, not Buena Vista, should be the designated truck road in that area because there are far more residential areas on Buena Vista than there aren't Clement, which is much more industrial commercial. And let's talk about the money for the Jean Sweeney Open Space Park and the money for other city parks. It's just 2 million for Jean Sweeney, but I believe another 5 million to parks all over the city, which benefits us all. And just tonight, I learned from our city manager that we are actually in line to receive a state matching grant. That means matching that $2 million that would go towards Jean Sweeney. Our fabulous Rec and Parks Director Amy Wooldridge has a sick child. She cannot stay late tonight, but she would have addressed that to you. So stop and think about what we would be leaving on the table there and what would we lose if we rescind this deal and don't go forward. And it's not that we would look bad. Yeah, I'm not concerned with appearances as much as I am concerned with doing the right thing, which is why I think going forward is doing the right thing. We would send a message to future businesses thinking of coming here to do business in the city with the city, investors, developers . At a time when we say we want to attract more business, we want to create a jobs housing balance. Some people want more of a jobs job balance, but those people could live somewhere. And if they lived in the same city where they work, they're not going to be clogging the tube at commute hour. And no less important is what is the message we're sending to the neighbors in this area. And I do mean the plan. Folks who have organized themselves, who have worked with the developers, who have brought in actual professional experts on these different topics that we talked about, who have gained concessions regarding the parking, regarding furthering the traffic study, and regarding getting a seat on the advisory board that is going to inform the northern waterfront. And going forward, this group in many ways reminds me of a group called Library 2000 that the council member, the vice mayor I'm sitting next to and I met when we co-chaired it for four years and the results are across the street. I'm in our new library and what message would we be sending to these people who have taken their own time and resources, who have come before us, who have organized meetings, who have gained concessions with the developer that the city hadn't gained. If we just tell him, never mind, we're a new council, we're going to just, you know, start over and look at this. What would we be saying to other neighborhood groups? And trust me, it is to the advantage of this city to have active, involved neighborhood groups. And so then I come to and I just want to do a little shout out than it always does my heart good when someone who I think opposes me on things actually agrees. Because Joe Corcoran made the reference to the theater opposition group, made the Army the theater a better project and plan has made the domain project a better project. And then I come to are there less draconian measures that would address the concerns that were raised, especially about traffic? And if we hear it tonight or we hear it soon? Councilmember de SAC has put on a very detailed council referral about how to look at citywide traffic planning. But does that mean we throw this project that is so close to fruition and bring so many benefits aside? Are we are we can we move forward on two fronts? And so finally, I would just implore my fellow council members to think carefully about all the implications, I mean, the least of which and we heard it in closed session. And so I can't really go into it, but people have raised it. The possibility of litigation, we could make something very positive out of all this or we could go down a deep hole that we've been down before. And this is an opportunity to take a step back, look at the big picture and move us forward, not backward. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. At 11:00, which is enough. I believe that we need to make a motion to of the three votes to continue past the meeting. As to the past 11. Our second. All those in favor i. I. I. This vote unanimously passed. Thank you. You make it to the next member that would like to speak on the issue. Speaker 5: You know, I'd like to speak on this, but I know that there's a history of deference to the mayor going last. But, I mean, it's difficult for me to speak in public on your rationale for putting this on the agenda and your rationale for rescinding without hearing from you. And I'd really like to hear that first, before now. Or will we have an opportunity to speak again after after you speak, or are we done once we speak? Speaker 0: I think it normally we go there is an opportunity to speak after the mayors. But I've always seen. I mean. Yes. Yes. We're having discussion right now so we can go back. I'm. Speaker 2: Oh. Madam Mayor. Yes? Speaker 8: I'd like to jump in here. And just for the record, I think we're all getting to know each other quite well, because it's been three times since this group has gathered. My biggest concern that I mentioned at both meetings is to look at this project in the context of the inventory of available land that's on the northern waterfront and how it's zoned and what has multiple multifamily overlays. And then what would happen if density bonuses that have been granted to this project are granted across those? And when you have 2245 units, which is our realistic capacity as documented in our housing element. A certified housing element. That number, just for those with mixed use multifamily overlay goes up to 3736 units, 3736 units immediately across the new Clement Avenue extension is the Arsenal terminal, which goes from a realistic capacity of 234 units to 400 I'm sorry, two or 398 units. So when you. When you. Make make that granting. Of a density bonus. The numbers get bigger and this doesn't count. Alameda point. So pursuant to. Making sure that we don't gridlock the whole west end of the island because most of these projects. Beat into the West End and the island. I think we have to look forward. And looking forward to me means I'd like to ask my colleagues to have staff look at putting a moratorium in place to not accept any new density bonuses until such time as we all understand these numbers, that we give the public a chance to understand these numbers and to adjust them so that we're not gridlock in the west end of the island. And with sight a at Alameda point, i think it's critical that we do this. The second point that I had concern over. And I've spent it from the 16th which was swearing in to today, which is swearing at. I've spent a lot of time studying every document that's been produced. And every requirement that we have. And I know I've heard I've heard explanations from planning. Who has done a yeoman's job at this. I've heard explanations from our city attorney, which has been concise and and forthright. But I still when I read the density bonus ordinance, it still says that these things have to be in place. And there's a list of things, list of evidence, and the word is there. It says that these things have to be in place before the bonus is granted. And. I understand how these things work. But I was there when this bonus density bonus ordinance was approved. And part of the reason was it was to protect the city to make sure that. The affordable housing that the project promises is delivered in a configuration that meets the best and highest need of the most needy in Alameda. So that was I was looking at that as there's something wrong here and I've heard it from people in the audience. It was brought up a couple of times during this meeting as well as in both of the previous meetings. That being said. It was also explained to me, which is not following the ordinance, but it it's essentially the same outcome is that no permits are going to be issued until the affordable housing agreement. Is signed. I think it puts the city of a disadvantage. So the second request I have with this council is to direct staff. To come back to us with analysis of these the two ordinances that are referenced. One is the density bonus ordinance and the other one is the the planned development ordinance and get the language to a point that it's understandable and that it's workable and that the council can discuss it to see if we truly want that information up front. Which, again, in my opinion, where I'm sitting right now is, yes, it gives us a good advantage of having up front because it guarantees we know what things are going to look like. Now. I've spent a lot of time thinking about the tools that are needed to accomplish what I want and. Not necessarily what I want, but what I think is best for Alameda. And the notion of a repeal. From a technical side does place a hold. Doesn't stop everything however. And understanding the the legal constraints of noticing. Of the type of meetings that it takes to have a repeal and a second reading of these ordinances. It puts. In a position of doing the same legal gymnastics as I thought, a 5:00 meeting the day of swearing in a week before Christmas. And I'm not going to play that game, so I'm not going to support a repeal. But I am asking my counsel, my colleagues on the council to. Look at the gate. Of the next projects coming down. Not the ones that are in the pipeline now that have applications in now, but those future ones, because this one is 380 units out of a potential 2245. But that number grows. And if we don't do something now, we have no control over that growth because the next development will come, will be looked at separately. And I think Councilmember de SOG has a council referral, which I'd like to hear first. Speaker 2: That. Speaker 8: I think takes the one big advantage of letting this thing go forward. But I'd also like to have it apply to what's happening over there at Alameda Planning, because those are going to come out of the ground and be occupied first so that we can actually get real Alameda data. On what works for managing demand. Because, you know, I talked to I talked to everybody on this from all sides. I talked to the developer and I made a comment that this is an experiment and I was quickly corrected. This has been done elsewhere. And I didn't have the presence of mind saying that it wasn't done on an island and it wasn't an island, a place populated by aluminum. So we need to generate real time data here. And I think there are provisions that can be adjusted. There are people who are willing to do the work. And I think we can we can resolve that issue there. And because we've done this backwards, in my opinion, as far as getting the affordable housing locked down, we are going to have to go through this again and again. There are going to be many votes on this project because it's going to it's phased. And I understand that part. The last thing I say is I have big concern over grand plans or the assessment dollars that are going to be used to hire the shuttle and pay for the shuttle and be run by essentially a homeowners association. Because I think we need a transition plan because anybody who lives in a condominium knows the pleasure of trying to get dues raised to meet the increasing costs. And what happens when. The employees who drive the shuttles need health care. It is increasing at a rate faster than what's being assessed. The equipment and the fuel. Go beyond what's cheap today at $50 a barrel of oil, which when it goes back up to $100 a barrel, we're going to have a problem. Maintaining this. These are all big unanswered questions that. We don't have permits issued, so we do have a chance to work on those. But I truly hate to to lose $2 million over all the impact fees. Jane Sweeney Park. Clementi Avenue extension. You know, this is a piece of it. I think the most important part of the piece is getting the shore shored up on this section and combined extension because not going to get the trucks off until we get the entire climate extended. And Pennzoil stands in the way of that and that's outside the scope of this. So I think I think we need to move on those issues that take care of this. And it's after studying this and you know, I've had people e-mail say, you know, I hope I hope you're carefully considering this. Well, one thing I learned with eight years on the council, two years on the planning board before this is I didn't consider things well enough and I sure put my time into this. Because it's not as simple as is. Has made out to be. And I do think we need to to use this project as as as data. And we need to have it go forward. But. I do think we need to get all of the others before we get some answers, particularly on what is our direction with granting density bonuses, because that's what inflates the numbers and that's what strains our infrastructure. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Days. I remember already. Speaker 5: Okay. I'll go then. I do want to thank everyone for coming out today and expressing an opinion. I'm going to kind of share my tentative thoughts. I really want to hear what the mayor has to say and what her you know, what her rationale was behind this before finalizing it. But, you know, tentatively, I have a lot of concerns with with the proposal one. And I want to echo what Patricia Young mentioned, is that, you know, we really didn't we really don't know why we're doing this. The public doesn't know why we're doing this. I had people ask me, why are we having this vote? What's the basis? What's the grounds, what's the rationale? So I'm left to at least tentatively rely on the public. And today I know Mr. Spangler may be off, he may be different, but I kind of th4 people that said don't repeal a 14 that said due to that I weren't quite sure of and in the comments that I received from the public in my email, I had 21 people tell me, well, 21 emails, some of them representing multiple people, including folks that, you know, whose opinions I respect. Bill Delaney at Kauffman. Mr. McDonough, you know, they said no repeal 21 and two said repeal. And one I was not quite sure of either. So, I mean, that's an overwhelming number of people. I think if if I've heard 14 people today and two people in email, that's only 16 people. And I think this is a really if we do this, this is a big deal. I mean, this subjects the city to a lot of risk. It subjects us to. Damage to our reputation. And I would think if we were going to take this step, I'd feel more comfortable doing it. If I had more than 14 people here or 14 people telling me that we should do it. I'm concerned that, you know, investors want certainty. Corporations want certainty. If there is a corporation that wants to cover, let's not even talk about development. Let's not even talk about houses. If you want to come here and move your business here, build a campus retrofit or reuse a building at Alameda Point. What does this say to you? It says Alameda can't be depended on to be counted on to keep its word. It says we can't be trusted, that we're fickle and that will change our mind. I a second in Maryland, Councilmember Ashcroft's motion earlier to hear the lease first, because I didn't want Mr. Right to sit here and listen to this debate and listen to this discussion and say, wait a minute, I don't want to come here to Alameda. This is how they're going to be. And I can't be I can't depend on them to keep their word. And I don't want to come here. So, I mean, that's probably the most important issue to me as far as weighing in on the public process. You know, I think I did have an opportunity to weigh in on the public process. I was at one of the planning board meetings. I was at one of the the council meetings here. And it was a process that that's gone through, I think, 11, 11 different meetings. And the public has been involved with it all along. I mean, we've heard that it's been effective as one of the the neighbors said today. And I think this resonated with me. The neighborhood is not willing to brush aside all of the hard work that they've done. So this is my first meeting to really delve into some things. So maybe I need to get a better, bigger ego, but I don't really think I need to have a special second bite at the apple that we haven't already had. So I'm not convinced that that the case has been made that we need to open this up and go back and look at it again. I also think that, you know, there's a lot of concerns that people have, and I share a lot of those concerns, especially with traffic. I think we do have some reasonable alternatives. One of the reasons why I voted to keep the meeting going after 11, because I'm really interested in discussing Councilmember de SAC referral. I think that is a very positive step towards the Council taking responsibility for the issue of traffic, and I'm really interested in hearing the discussion on that . And lastly, I want to talk too much about this, but I think the risks of a repeal or rescission do not outweigh the possible benefits. And I really can't talk much about that without revealing classified or confidential information. So know I will give the mayor an opportunity to convince me otherwise. But at this point I am leaning towards voting no on these two ordinances. Speaker 3: Thank you, Madam Mayor. Thank you, everybody, for coming out tonight. Also thank you to the many people who sent emails and also who took the time to discuss matters with me in coffee shops and in offices and over the phone. I truly appreciate all of your involvement. I think that's what makes our city really special. And I do think that many of you who are here tonight. Many of you who are here tonight are rightfully upset about how the Dalmeny decision of December 16th was reached. Many here tonight are right to be upset with making a controversial decision as important as Del Monte is. On a special meeting basis right before one council and mayor were leaving and another was coming in. I know for sure that the how of the December 16th decision would not have met the test that the late Mayor, Ralph Pizarro, used to say to me over and over again. Speaker 2: Only, whatever you do, just make sure you do the right thing. Speaker 3: Do the right thing. Many are also right to raise the fine point they've raised tonight, particularly with respect to whether the environmental effects of the affordable housing portion was fully evaluated, fully vetted. We're also right to hear more about a better city wide traffic and transit plan. There's a lot of details around which community questions, community concerns persist. Mayor Spencer has rightfully raised the repeal in an effort to get at those questions. Let me repeat, I believe Mayor Spencer has rightfully raised the matter for discussion because it brings to the forefront what's really on the minds of a good number of residents. Going into tonight's meeting. In which we discussed the rescind whether to rescind the Council del money decision of December 16th. There's really a bigger concern that for me. My real concern about this issue is that I do think that there we need to fully discuss and understand the possibilities of litigation. Particularly in the context of having reached an agreed upon development agreement on developed on December 16th. This isn't the first time that I've raised the need to be clear when it comes to reaching development agreements and dealing with potential risks are raised. When we selected SRM in our DNA process. When I referenced the Mammoth Lakes. I know for sure. By the way, let me make sure to say that I know our game is going to be a great developer. So I'm not saying what I was just saying at that time was just to make sure that the city staff does everything that it can to protect us from a Mammoth Lakes situation. Is when you enter into a contract, and that's what a development agreement is when you enter a new contract with a developer. This is incredibly high stakes stuff. We're not just talking about any kinds of litigation, the likes of which that he Attorney Kern, deals with or the likes of which city manager Russo dealt with previously as city attorney in Oakland. I mean, this is really high stakes stuff. So when I indicated to the reporter from the Internet news, the Almeida that I need to evaluate any upside benefits. To the motion in front of us versus downside risks. What I was really getting at was saying, look. At best, if you stymie this project, what do you get out of that? I mean, what what are the benefits of rescinding? Involvement of new council members. Maybe even a reduction in the number of housing. But you have to contrast those upside benefits from rescission versus what are the possible downside risks. And the downside risks that concerns me the most is a lawsuit, the outcome of which is similar to what happened in Mammoth Lakes. And what happened in Mammoth Lakes is a town had reached the development agreement and for one reason or another it didn't follow through on it. And the court's going all the way up to the Supreme Court, which the California Supreme Court was declined to listen in on. It, agreed with the developer at the town of Mammoth Lakes, where owed the developer a lot of money such that it went bankrupt. These are high stakes risks. That's not to say that, you know, TLC has us in a bind right now. I mean, whether, you know, what happens in a lawsuit is speculative at best. What are the dollar values of any potential lawsuit would be speculative at best, but it's not speculative to say that these are high stakes contracts that we're dealing with. It is not speculative to say that certain cities in not following through on its agreements and incredibly high risks. So as I look at this, the matter in front of me, the way that I'm framing it is I'm seeing that for now a situation where the downside risks of rescinding the December six decision far are far out of proportion in an unfavorable manner to the city relative to the possible benefits coming out of rescinding. I do think that Mayor Chris Spencer Herrera is correct in raising this to the public. I do think that we need to take stock of how we're doing, our transit planning, how we're doing our housing along the northern waterfront. But we're going to have to do that outside of the context of this project because. While many of us have raised good questions and concerns about details of the project, whether on the affordable housing side, whether on the the way that things were noticed. I do think, though, that the process was served at the process worked. It worked for many for for the many months. The outcome, unfortunately, didn't come out the way that we had hoped, where the December 16th, this decision would not have been made on December 16th, but would have been made perhaps sometime in January. But we can't. I in my opinion, we can't argue that the process was not served. And for that reason, I do have to be concerned about risks, and I can't take that lightly. And those are my comments. Speaker 0: Thank you. Council members, community members that came out here and spoke this evening. And those of you that are watching at home and I really appreciate the participation and the comments of all of you procedurally. And I, I want to take this opportunity to explain procedurally, there is only a short window for the new council to hear the total project that we have just had that opportunity to do in regards to where are we going to go in the future moving forward. One thing that the other council members have spoken to, I think that they've raised many points, including bringing the referral items to how are we going to do this and moving forward. And I think all of us would agree. That we as alameda can do it better. Having the 230 or 1:30 a.m.. Decisions, changing of motions, having special meetings, notices in the meeting so that people know that we're having meetings. There are raised issues raised like that. I personally, but i in regards to what is the expectation of what what is the application supposed to look like in order to obtain the density bonus ordinance? I think there have been good questions raised. Was that satisfied? It specifically says a set of preliminary project plans that include a site plan showing all building and structure, footprints or locations, drive aisles and parking lot, a layout floor plans of all structures and buildings and architectural elevations of all buildings and structures all drawn to scale. I would agree with the speakers that have said we did not do all of that. I think that's why we do have a referral in regards to looking at this and making it make sense. I also think it's very important. That that we as a council move forward as as as much as possible. Together, we will be asked to. We have multiple projects, actually. We have multiple projects that have already been built that are not yet occupied. We will have more projects coming to us in regards to this density bonus, and I think it's very important that we clarify. Going into it. What will that look like? I am going to. And I truly thought that it was important to give member de Saag an opportunity to explain his concerns and have this opportunity to work with this council. Because I think he did raise legitimate concerns. I think he has raised legitimate concerns. I think our community members have raised concerns in regards to the transportation plan. Is it sufficient? We I think as a community recognize we we are being told by the state to build X number of units. We have these layers of what that actually looks like. And how are we going to move forward so that we feel comfortable with what it's going to look like after it's built out? I'm very happy to have heard this evening in regards to the matching or additional grant moneys for Jean Jean Sweeney's park. I know that's something all of us value that hard work. And so I, I will respect all of all of these concerns of working together and support this project without going backwards. And I and I look forward to working on these issues so that we can do it better. And I recognize that we have people that say, well, we don't we haven't done it that way in the past. I think it is very important that we then do it that way in the future. And I think that's what we're hearing. And. When it says an ordinance will require X, Y, Z. Or to get a I'm sorry to get the density bonus that it needs to clearly say X, Y or Z. Well, then I think that this counsel through this through this and these discussions is going to ensure that when you look at a project in totality. And and that's what I think I'm hearing here this evening. And also in regards to so and and we have heard you have heard there will be votes coming back to us. So I think it is critical that we understand how we plan to do that and also to protect and to continue to protect us from further litigation. That when when that agreement when that vote took place on December 16th. There was there are legal ramifications. And then how do we proceed with that to best protect us in regards to when a future vote comes to us attached to this project? Are we going to support in good faith or do we have unanswered questions that we haven't had the opportunity to to to determine among ourselves how we plan to address this? And what I have heard tonight is how we will plan to address it is by looking at these referral items and then working with staff. To our I's and cross our cheese more completely to support our community members so that we can all move forward better and doing it better. And I and I appreciate member Izzy Ashcraft speaking to my concern of having very late night meetings. I would really like to have this discussion in regards to I am much more willing to have a meeting on another night to continue it, to have meetings on the weekend, to have workshops. Everyone knows I'm coming from the school board. We do workshops on a Saturday morning. We do them at different venues. And rather than going until 230, I personally I don't think I've ever been at a school board meeting where we've got until 230 or three in the morning. And I think it's that's there is ways that I want to work better and and I agree with the members from the League of Women Voters. I think that's another thing where we'll all continue to try to be more transparent. And I'm confident that all of us do want to do that. And part of transparency to me is not having decisions at 230 and three and 330 in the morning. To me, that that is not transparent. I think it is so that there are areas where we can improve our sunshine ordinance. And I do want to respect the time of all of us here. And I. Yes. So. You're more than happy. I don't know if anyone else want to speak at this point, Mr. Brody. Speaker 4: I think the Vice Mayor's ready to make a motion. Speaker 2: And. Speaker 8: Yes, I'd like to make a motion to not repeal the decision of December 16th. And also asked staff to within. 45 days to return a an evaluation of the density bonus ordinance relative to the. A planned development. And associated ordinances. And present that to the Council so that we can debate and provide direction on what those ordinance should read. And I'd also ask within the same timeframe that staff bring us back a. The mechanism for a moratorium on. Any new density bonus applications until the rules of the ordinances are clear and the implications related to the available land inventory is listed in our housing element are discussed in context of. Additional developments across the city. Speaker 4: Are second on the Tunis. Speaker 0: Mayors number data data. Speaker 3: Several issues. One is the. Practice. If it's okay, practice. You have motions and the negative. Because the motion is framed in the negative, we move to not. Speaker 2: But it can be done. Speaker 3: Okay. The second issue is and this is more a matter of comment. I need to have clarity that we are not, per say, directing us into doing a moratorium, but that we are rather having a discussion much in the way that whether we should have we should do that. And what are the issues regarding that? And as the sponsor of that, you bring for those issues much in the way that in the Council communications portion of the things we bring forward issues for council to discuss. Speaker 2: So if I may, Madam Mayor, two items regarding the motion. One is we understand that the city attorney and I understand the motion to be to bring the council those options and perform the research. It's impossible to vote on a motion on a moratorium tonight because it's not noticed. And so just to be clear, I addressing through the chair to Councilmember De Saag, I did not interpret Vice Mayor Madras, whose motion to be other than to tee it up, if you will, for the council's. Speaker 8: Consideration because it's not agenda. Right. Speaker 2: And then second is we can have that work prepared in 45 days, but we can't have it on a council agenda in 45 days. We can have it on a council agenda in 60 days. We have to publish 12 days in advance. We cannot do that level of integration of those different ordinances and get the help we need to work that while running the rest of this machine in 30 days. And that's that's just for my brief consultation with my colleague to my left here. So if you change the vote, if you say, have the materials ready for publication in 45 days, that we can do, if you ask us to have it at a council meeting within 45 days, that we can be. Speaker 8: Ready for publication in 45 days. Yeah, we can do that. Yeah, we can do it. Give us time. Give the community time also to absorb. What the options are. And we have a real discussion about this. Speaker 2: Mm hmm. Okay. Just one. Speaker 8: Why we're doomed to repeat. Speaker 2: Well, regardless of the characterization. 45 days we can do, and we can have it ready for the public to review in 45 days. Speaker 0: So we have a motion. Speaker 4: Our second with the. Instruction to staff from Vice Mayor Matter SC and Council member de. Speaker 0: SAC staff clear on the motion or as members? Speaker 3: And just just for further clarification, I just want to reiterate that what we're entering into is a discussion that have a further discussion because why we have to do that, we have to lay out the pros and cons issues. There are conceivably cons issues that then once discussed will further frame how we want staff to further proceed. For example, would there be impacts to whatever agreements that we made with regard to the housing element we need? So it's a discussion to have further discussion. Speaker 0: Is that your motion? Speaker 8: I appreciate Councilmember De Suggs framing a framing of it. That is my motion. And I think, oh, I'd like to do this in in a timely fashion because I don't want to shut off things, but I do want to have reasonable limits on what we do. And I think that's the place where we'll have the discussion will be able to figure out what reasonable limits can be applied to this land inventory so we don't gridlock and. Speaker 3: And just. Speaker 2: I think that's. Speaker 8: Been the same thing that I want to time certain gun. Speaker 0: Any other discussion? I want to call the question. All those in favor. Speaker 4: I it is this is in favor of rejecting. Speaker 2: That was the first. Speaker 0: Okay. Yes. Do you want us to repeat the motion? I'm right. So. My understanding it was unanimously passed. Is that correct. All those in favor. I, I yes. Those passed unanimously. We. We have? Yes. Speaker 4: So if I could make a suggestion and by the way, Madam Mayor, really nice job running your first meeting with really complicated issues, I might say. Speaker 0: And I really do want to thank all of. Speaker 4: But I if I could make if I could make this suggestion that could we perhaps continue these council referrals to the next meeting? And I think we could agenda them at the top of the agenda because I think these are such important topics we really don't want to be. Speaker 0: So do we have a motion base to hold them over? Yes. Mayoral committee member, just as the Ashcroft's motion because of the noise. I do want to continue. I mean, I'm sorry if everyone could be really quiet, because I think I'm going to be able to wind up our meeting really quickly. So thank you very much. I really appreciate it. And so are we can the member as the Ashcroft. Speaker 4: So I was making a motion to continue the. The balance. Well, no, actually, just the city council. Speaker 0: Refers, which is the balance. Speaker 4: Of appointment. Speaker 0: Assuming we don't have 20th. Speaker 4: The next meeting is January, the correct. Speaker 5: As council referrals or as agenda items that have some staff. Speaker 0: As council? Speaker 2: No, I would presume it's still a council referral. Yes, because we have. Speaker 0: Still. Speaker 4: Council referrals. But I was just asking them if I mean, the city clerk maybe would weigh when can. Speaker 0: We see. Speaker 1: The order of business as set by resolution that you can at the meeting, choose to take it out of order just as you changed the order tonight. Speaker 2: Okay, so we take them out of order now, but they can do that at the meeting. Speaker 0: All right. So then is that so? Then the motion is to continue these referrals, to.

Regular Agenda Item

Introduction of Ordinance Repealing Ordinance No. 3116 which Approved Development Agreement by and Between the City of Alameda and TL Partners, I, LP Governing the Del Monte Warehouse Project for Real Property Located at the Northeast Corner of the Intersection of Sherman Street and Buena Vista Avenue; AND Introduction of Ordinance Repealing Ordinance No. 3115 which Adopted the Del Monte Warehouse Master Plan and Density Bonus Application for Redevelopment and Adaptive Reuse of the Property Located at the Northeast Corner of the Intersection of Sherman Street and Buena Vista Avenue.

AlamedaCC

BostonCC_08102022_2022-0938

Speaker 0: Thank you. Docket 093530937 will be referred to the Committee on Public Safety. Criminal Justice. Mr. Clerk, can you please read docket 09380938 message? Speaker 1: An order authorizing the city of Boston to accept and expand the amount of $39,155 in the form of a grant for the recording risk grant awarded by the Council on Library and Information of Information Resources to be administered by the Office of the City Clerk. The grant will fund the preserving Boston's voice, this project digitizing the Boston 200 Community Oral History Collection. Speaker 0: Thank you. The Chair recognizes Council BLOCK Chair of the Committee on City Services and Innovation Technology Council of Barking of the Floor. Speaker 4: Thank you so much, Mr. President. On behalf of the committee, I'm seeking a suspension of passage of this docket today. It's obviously less than $40,000. But I wanted to inform the the council about what it's really for. So this project, it was described in the brief description as preserving Boston's voices, digitizing the Boston Community Oral History collection . But the details on that is actually that the city archives that they want to provide digital and public access to this community. Oral history recordings, which were created by the Boston Bicentennial Commission between 1974 and 1976, in which period the Commission recorded oral histories with a wide cross-section of Boston's residents, including members of Boston's black and immigrant communities. Due to their age and over a decade of storage and poor environmental conditions, these tapes are at serious risk of degradation and cannot currently be accessed. Transcripts and partial transcripts exist for approximately half of the recordings and show the interview. Content includes immigration, the African-American experience in Boston, Boston's social movements, urban renewal and a wide variety of local history topics. This project will preserve the recordings through digital reformatting, produce descriptive metadata for the recordings and make the recordings available to the public in the Boston City Archives Digital Access Portal. So I think it's a really important, vital project. It's also exciting because it's the type of thing that we'd like to do 50 years on today, doing a bunch of oral interviews with Bostonians in the coming years. So it's a it's a nice model for us. I've had the chance to read a few of the transcripts from these, and they're just like so full of detail of kind of Bostonians perspective on their lives back in the seventies. And I just want to commend our archival staff has done an exceptional job applying for grants. They really hold a really precious treasure trove together a little bit too much with duct tape and chewing gum. And I'm hoping that a design process that we're currently in is going to give them some better facilities overall. But in the meantime, they've secured this obviously relatively small grant, and we wouldn't want to lose any of those tapes. And so I hope that the council can support this motion for suspension passage. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel. BLOCK each seek suspension of the roles and passage of docket 0938. All those in favor say I oppose. Same day the ayes have it. Docket zero 948 has passed. Mr. Clerk, can you please read docket. Speaker 1: 09390939 message in order for your approval, in order to fully authorize the creation of a sheltered market program during the pilot, which ended on June 2022, we learned that this is a powerful and necessary tool to advance our administration's mission to foster equity in city contracting.

Mayor Order

Message and order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expend the amount of Thirty Nine Thousand One Hundred Fifty Five Dollars ($39,155.00) in the form of a grant for the Recording Risk Grant, awarded by the Council on Library and Information Resources to be administered by the Office of the City Clerk. The grant will fund the Preserving Boston’s Voices project: Digitizing the Boston 200 Community Oral History collection.

BostonCC

BostonCC_08102022_2022-0351

Speaker 0: opposed, say nay talk in 0349 has passed counsel clarity six acceptance of the Committee report and passage of docket 0375 All those in favor say I. Our policy document 0375 has passed. Mr. Clerk, please read. Speaker 1: Dawkins 0351 Duncan Hunter 0351. The Committee on Civil Rights and Immigration Immigrant Advancement, to which was referred on March 9th, 2020, to talk a number 0351 message in order authorizing the city of Boston to accept and expand the amount of $36,250 in the form of a grant for the dialog to action awarded by the Boston Redevelopment Authority to be administered by the Office of Resiliency and Racial Equity. The grant will fund four program from programmatic activities to deepen participants understanding of racism in historical and present day forms and foster a sense of agency to change the system through actions that individual, interpersonal or systemic levels. Submits a report recommending that the order ought to pass. Speaker 0: Thank you. The Chair recognizes counsel and chair of the Committee on Civil Rights, Immigration Advancement Counselors and your support. Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. Chair. This matter was sponsored by Mayor Michelle Wu and referred to the Committee on March nine, 2022. The committee held a hearing on July 21st, 2022, where public comment was taken and where President Flynn was present. This grant will allow the Office of Resiliency and Racial Equity to use these funds through the dialog to action for programs to provide education and understanding of racism in historical and present day forms. The grant will seek to develop ways to make changes through action. Lori Nelson, Chief Resilience Officer from the Mayor's Office of Resilience and Racial Equity, attended the hearing and has provided support of the grant. Ms. Nelson explained that the grant will be used for community impact projects, which will examine how the community looks at reality and race matters to collectively move forward. I inquired about the Dialog Action Initiative, which is a pilot program, and Nelson explained that Dialog Action provides education on race matters, has two staffers and also uses fellows, as Nelson reviewed some of the external partners, which include King Boston. Many of us are familiar. Ms.. Nelson described the takeaways from the initial pilot program, which included the following the importance of having historical place places of race in Boston and supporting cultural differences through an inclusionary approach. Unifying the community around difficult topics and creating safe spaces so that people have a place for their voices to be heard . And I asked her specific neighborhoods were targeted in these pilot programs. Ms.. Nelson explained that the goal in the initial framework was to target every neighborhood and that through coalition building, the objective is to target neighborhoods that may not have had these types of conversations. And I asked if any barriers existed to execution in the programing and the programs or discussions will be in person. And we had a robust and really interesting conversation about the work that trying to do around having those citywide conversations. The committee discussed the information and education are key components of dialog to action initiative and comment from the public to discuss civil rights matters in general. Passage of this order will allow the office to use these funds to support the continuing pilot for dialog action objectives. Having these funds will allow for expansion and continuation of programs and resources to help better understand racism historically in present day and to implement personal and systemic changes. The Chair of the Committee on Civil Rights and Immigrant Advancement, to which this following is referred, I submit a report recommending that this docket ought to pass. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Speaker 0: Thank you. Consultation. Consultation seeks acceptance of the committee report and passage of docket 0351. All those in favor say I am opposed. Say no. Docket 0351 is passed. Mr. Court, can you please read docket.

Committee Reports

On the message and order, referred on March 9, 2022, Docket #0351, authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expend the amount of Thirty Six Thousand Two Hundred Fifty Dollars ($36,250.00) in the form of a grant, for the Dialogue to Action, awarded by the Boston Redevelopment Authority to be administered by the Office of Resiliency & Racial Equity. The grant will fund programmatic activities to deepen participants’ understanding of racism, in historical and present day forms and foster a sense of agency to change the system through actions at individual, interpersonal or systemic levels, the committee submitted a report recommending that the order ought to pass. The report was accepted; the order was passed.

BostonCC

BostonCC_08102022_2022-0682

Speaker 0: Thank you. Consultation. Consultation seeks acceptance of the committee report and passage of docket 0351. All those in favor say I am opposed. Say no. Docket 0351 is passed. Mr. Court, can you please read docket. Speaker 1: 0682068 to the Committee on Government Operations, to which was referred on May 25th, 2022, docket number 0682. Or for a home rule petition regarding electronic application and transmission of absentee ballots for absent uniformed service services voters submits a report recommending that the home rule petition are to pass in a new draft. Speaker 0: Thank you. The Chair recognizes Counsel Arroyo, chair of the Committee on Government Operations Counsel. Arroyo You have the floor. Speaker 3: Thank you. Counsel President Flynn The Committee on Government Operations had a working session on July 14, 2022, on Docket 0682, a petition for a special law relative to an act on electronic application and transmission of absentee ballots for absent uniformed uniformed services voters, which was sponsored by Councilor Evan Murphy. And at Flynn, I would like to thank my council colleagues for attending Counsel Murphy and Counsel Louie ten. I'd also like to thank members of the administration Robert Santiago, Commissioner of the Mayor's Office of Veteran Services. Anita Tavares, Commissioner of the Boston Election Department. And Sabino Piemonte, head assistant Registrar of Voters for the Boston Elections Department for their participation, as well as the law department for reviewing and providing language suggestions in preparation for the working session. This home rule petition would authorize the city of Boston to allow absent uniform services voters defined as those located outside of their voting district. For absentee ballots electronically. During the working session, we heard from the administration on the limitations of snail mail when sending ballots to uniformed services voters, including the amount of time and the potential changes in assignments and locations. Additionally, to ensure we included all branches of our armed forces, the Air National Guard and the Army National Guard were added to the second whereas clause as well as including overseas citizens. So the title to the title as did not exclude similarly situated individuals protected under the federal law the Uniformed and Overseas Citizen Absentee Voting Act. Lastly, the Committee reviewed the changes by the law department, which was only adding the phrase a secure electronic voting system. In the second section of the second sentence of section one before the word email. As Chair of the Committee on Government Operations, I recommend that this docket ought to pass in a new draft. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel Royal. The chair recognizes counsel and Murphy. Counsel. Murphy. You have the floor. Speaker 2: Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you, Chair Arroyo, for your leadership. And I won't repeat what you said. We did have a great session to work through the language and make sure that, as you know, Massachusetts citizens have a right to vote in all elections, even if they're deployed or stationed overseas. And this is going to help those who are overseas make sure they're able to vote. So the uniformed and Overseas Citizen Absentee Voting Act is a federal law that guarantees voting rights for the United States military, who are known as uniformed service voters. So I am also urging our my colleagues that we pass this home rule petition so that we are allowing our military to vote when they're out of their district. So thank you very much. Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilor Murphy. I will speak very briefly on this. I just want to echo what Counsel Murphy, Counselor Arroyo, highlighted the importance of making sure that military personnel serving overseas have the same rights as anyone else does in the state. So this would be a tremendous opportunity accomplishment for service members so that they can vote electronically while they're in various other locations outside of the United States. I want to thank my city council colleagues for supporting this. I want to say thank you to my city council colleagues for supporting veterans issues. I want to say thank you also to may as well as well and Commissioner Santiago for their important work as well. Counsel Arroyo seeks acceptance of the committee report and a new draft and passage of Docket 068. To all those in favor, say I like you. Mr. Clerk, can we take a roll call? Vote, please. Speaker 1: Roll Call vote on docket 0682. Councilor Arroyo. Yes. Councilor Arroyo. Yes. Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker. A council book. Councilor book. Councilor Brady. Councilor Brady. Councilor Coletta. Councilor Coletta. Yes. Councilor Fernando Sanderson. Councilor for an sense. And yes. Council 30. Yes. Council three. Yes. Councilor Flynn. Yes. Councilor Flynn. Yes. Council Lara. Lara yes. Council Illusion Councilors and yes. Council. Let me here. Councilor Murphy. Councilor Murphy. Yes. And Council. World. Yes. Council. World. Yes. You. Speaker 0: Thank you, Doctor. 0682 has passed and a new draft. Mr. Clark, can you please. 3086240685 together, please. Speaker 1: Economy 060862 The Canadian Suit City Services Innovation Technology, to which was referred on July 13, 2022. Docket number 086 to message in order for your approval in order to reduce the fiscal year 22 appropriation for the reserve for collective bargaining by $145,115.

Committee Reports

On the Home Rule Petition, referred on May 25, 2022, Docket #0682, regarding Electronic Application and Transmission of Absentee Ballots for Absent Uniformed Services Voters, the committee submitted a report recommending that the petition ought to pass in a new draft. The report was accepted; the petition was passed in a new draft; yeas 12 (Absent Mejia).

BostonCC

BostonCC_08102022_2022-0865

Speaker 1: NPA submits a report recommending that the report ought to pass in docket number 0865, the Committee on City Services and Innovation Technology, to which was referred on July 13, 2020 to Lucky Number 0865. Message In order for a supplemental appropriation order for the Property Management Department for fiscal year 23 in the amount of 108,005 $158 to cover the fiscal year. 23 costs contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the city of Boston and the Municipal Police Patrolmen's Association and PPA. The terms of the contract include base wage increases of 2%, 1.5% and 2% to be given in each of in October of each fiscal year of the contract term filed in the Office of the City Clerk on July 11, 2022, submits a report recommending that the report ought to pass. Speaker 0: Thank you. The Chair recognizes Council BLOCK Chair of the Committee on City Services Innovation Technology Council. You have the floor. Speaker 4: So much, Mr. President. As is mentioned in the committee report, we held a hearing on this on July 18th, 2022. All four of these dockets per usual with collective bargaining pairs of dockets where we both would take the money out of the existing reserve and then attribute it to the appropriate department. The two ones up for consideration here are the school traffic supervisors who manage folks what crossing the street are kids when they go to veeps. And then the municipal police officers who folks so well. One of their main stations obviously is city hall and we pass them every day. Both contracts follow the pattern of the recent round of contracts of 2%, 1.5% and 2% raises over the three years of the contract. Remind the Council that because these have been out of contract for a while, most of those are retroactive payments. And the last one is effective this September. And obviously a number of these will be up in the near future. And so one thing that's come up with many of these is sort of the question of does that really reflect the inflation and the competitiveness of our labor situation right now? And I think one of things the administration said is, you know, we've got another round that are coming up soon enough with that are, you know, about the kind of years going forward. Both of them have a one time lump sum payment, non precedent setting kind of. It's something that's been done for a bunch of our civil unions to kind of just acknowledge the difficulty of this work over the last few years. So in the case of the municipal officers, it's a $1,000, one time lump sum payment minus standard deductions. And then for the traffic supervisor to which is a part time role, it's 375 minus standard deductions. The agreement also updated the military leave policy for in the same way that some other prior ones had. And it was basically just realigning us with the way that the feds had rewritten that and making it a little bit more supportive and generous to our our members who might be doing military service. And then the the traffic supervisors one codifies the COVID vaccine policy. That's not. Part of it on the municipal one because it had already been done without union prior to this agreement. And then the municipal officers. Speaker 6: Also. Speaker 4: The city of Boston, paid parental leave policy and the addition of Juneteenth as a as a holiday for them were both formalized. Again, neither of those provisions are in with the traffic supervisors because it's part time work, not a full time. I think we were joined by Councilors Murphy, Brayton and Flynn at the hearing. Thank you to my colleagues for joining. And I think just a kind of overall theme on both of these fronts was that, you know, the council councilors in attendance certainly felt like the municipal police officers and the traffic supervisors are not paid enough. And that with traffic supervisors, you know, obviously, if those positions go unfilled, we see you know, we don't we don't have folks supervising those crossings to school. And it's really important to us that they be safe. And then our municipal police officers, we have a substantial number of vacancies right now. And so there's also a small increase to the the base rate for them on details that they do, which are somewhat different from the details that the D does. But I think the basic view that their their jobs have changed a bit with the passage of the Police Reform Act last year. And and that also has caused cause a lot of turnover. And so thinking about in the same way that we are with the park Rangers, how we make those really competitive, appealing jobs going forward and making sure that they're doing the things that the city wants, wants those roles to be doing is, as I said, they're really important folks that welcome here in the building. So that was sort of all kind of on the table for future conversation and just wanted to raise it here. But my recommendation today would be that all four of these dockets pass through council. Again, they're very much in line with the other ones that we've been considering and passing, and that does leave our collective bargaining reserve overall at 4.7 million for FY 22 and 75.3 million for FY 23. So thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you, counsel. BLOCK Would anyone else like to speak on these matters before we take a vote? I just I just wanted to highlight and thank Council BLOCK for having these hearings. We have a lot of municipal workers that are low paid workers. We expect them to live in the city with the residency. Municipal police officers, I believe, are making like $16 or $17 an hour. We had we hired several recently and they they left they quit at the at the first day because because the salary is so low. This is this is certainly something we support a pay raise for those dedicated workers. But it's really it's really not enough. It's almost it's almost embarrassing. And in my opinion, we need to do a better job of paying our municipal police officers. They protect us here in this building. Most of them, I think 60% of them are officers of color. And we owe it to these workers to give them a decent wage and treat them fairly and treat them with respect, but giving them 15, $16 an hour and making them live in the city. That's a recipe for disaster. Let me recognize Councilman Murphy. Councilor Murphy, you have the floor. Speaker 2: To President Flynn, and thank you, Councilor Buck. I just want to go on record to say that I hope that the administration and us as a council will have more conversations. And this will prompt us to highly consider raising wages for the lowest paid workers who are struggling to live here in the city. The salary structure we have is just not enough to attract talent, especially with such high inflation, skyrocketing gas prices and a booming real estate market. Many departments are struggling to find new hires and keep them. And we need to give back to our council workers, our city workers. We are running a city government and we need all hands on deck and we have to provide fair wages to our hardworking staff so that we can continue to succeed together. And I assume it will. But when we have the working session on our own raises and the mayor's raisers raised, I hope that we talk about all of the city employees. And I know I was there one day, and I know the mayor and other councilors have showed up to Starbucks and other youth workers across the city that we do want to advocate for and make sure that they have a living wage. But if we're fighting for our baristas at the coffee shops across the city, I do believe we should also be standing up and fighting for our municipal police and the workers that are here in city hall and across the city keeping our city running just like we are. So I just want to go on record and say that. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Councilor Murphy. The chair recognizes Councilor Baker. Council Baker. Thank you all just. Well. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just want to kind of reinforce what you had said and what Councilor Murphy had said. We need to look at the structure and the way we pay it. And we're just talking about the security guards now. It's across the board in the city. I come from a city city department background and the step raises are out of line. The entrance isn't enough at $16, I think we said then when someone goes through on the steps, they're still only at 23 or $24. So we need to and we are on a level unable or not allowed to have those discussions. So however we however we communicate that this is important to us, that we need to look at step raises and increasing those, especially in this time when we talk about needing to attract talent at at higher levels. And I totally agree with that. We need to pay more at the higher, higher level to be able to attract real talent here. And our raises are a little kind of separate from that. But to be able to attract talent, it needs to start at the bottom increases all the way up. We've we've had a pretty good run as far as taxes in our in our income coming in to the city of bonds. So it's time for us to to start using some of that on our on our employees that are better lower paid. So thank you. It is a little off topic of of these union contracts here, but it's whenever we get a chance to talk about something like this, we need to talk about it. So thank you, Mr. Chair. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel Baker. The Chair recognizes Councilor Borg. COUNSEL Buck, do you have the floor? Speaker 4: I apologize, Mr. President, just to seek our acceptance of the committee report. Speaker 0: It's okay. Thank you. Council BLOCK. Council BLOCK seeks acceptance of the committee report and passage of Docket zero 682. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Opposing 8.0682 has passed Council BLOCK six acceptance of the Committee Report and passage of docket 0863. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Our policy nay docket zero 683 has passed Council BLOCK six acceptance of the Committee report and passage of Docket 0684. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Our policy nay docket 0684 has passed Council BLOCK six acceptance of the Committee Report and passage of 20865. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Our policy nay docket 0865 has passed. We're on to motions, orders and resolutions. Mr. Clerk, please read docketed 095530960 together. Speaker 1: Lucky number 0955 Councilor Murphy offer the following order for home rule petition regarding the disability pension call. Matthew Maurice Duncan Number 0956. Councilor Murphy offer the following order for a home rule petition regarding the disability pension for Henry Jean Duncan.

Mayor Order

On the message and order, referred on July 13, 2022, Docket #0865 for a supplemental appropriation Order for the Property Management Department for FY23 in the amount of One Hundred Eight Thousand One Hundred Fifty-Eight Dollars ($108,158.00) to cover the FY23 cost contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the City of Boston and the Municipal Police Patrolmen's Association (MPPA). The terms of the contract include base wage increases of 2%, 1.5% and 2%, to be given in October of each Fiscal year of the contract term. Filed in the Office of the City Clerk on July 11, 2022, the committee submitted a report recommending that the order ought to pass. The report was accepted; the order was passed.

BostonCC

BostonCC_08102022_2022-0960

Speaker 1: Number 0959 Councilor Murphy offered the following order for a home rule petition regarding and disability pension for Scott O'Brien and Duncan. Number 0960. Councilor Murphy offer the following order for a home rule petition regarding the disability pension for Richards until. Speaker 0: Thank you. The chair recognizes Counsel Murphy of the floor. So take action. Speaker 2: On these petitions today and we keep them in committee so we can hold a working session before our next council meeting, so we can get the language correct before we vote and send them back up to the State House for approval. As many of you remember, these six police officers who were injured in the line of duty was brought forward by Councilor Sabby George last session and were all unanimously passed. And I have been working with the police union and the State House because the state initially rejected these home rule petitions due to the Public Employee Retirement Administration Commission not supporting the language the council in the Mayor previously approved. We have the proper language now, so we can add that in our working session. And I also know that we have the home rule petitions for Kurt Stokes and Elaina McAllister that are still in committee, and we will have working sessions to also include the proper language in their home rule petition so we can vote on their disability and retirement at our next council meeting and get them all up to the State House for passage before their next door session. So thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel Murphy The Chair to Counsel Murphy. Um, Counsel Murphy Well, will stoke and Curt, Stockholder and Elaine also be added to the other police officers that are going up. Speaker 2: So the chair. Arroyo may know better, but I know talking with Councilor McMahon that they're still in committee. So I didn't need to put them back. But because the state house rejected them, I filed so that they'll stay in the committee so we don't have to refile them and we could have working sessions. Maybe we'll have all eight together. We may need to have two separate, but I think Chair Arroyo would know better on that. And then we could vote on all eight of them at the next council meeting in the state House said if we have them up to them by then, they will be able to pass before next session. Next session. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counselor Murphy, for the important work that you're doing on this. The chair recognizes Counselor Arroyo. Counsel Arroyo, you have the floor. Thank you. Speaker 3: There you go. Thank you. President Flynn. Thank you, Counselor Murphy. So we already had a hearing for Curtis Duncan Jr. And what will end up happening is we will have a working session with the ones that we've already had hearings on and we will go forward with those by. The goal is to get these before this body on August 31st. Don't see anything stopping us from that. The one thing I will note is that I am fairly certain that last year, when the council voted on this, they actually voted on three of these names. And so I have to go look back and make sure that some of these folks have actually had their hearings and have provided medical records. Because if I remember correctly, the initial drop from an SS, Abby George had these names on it, but the final one that we voted on had Harry Jean, Terry, Cotton and Ryan the name. And so I have to make sure that all of these names have actually been vetted with medical records and hearings. But the ones that already have which are the names I just said for certain, I have to go look and make sure that I'm accurate on these other ones. And the ones that we've already done that have already been filed will be going up before August 31st, so or on the August 31st. So I will make sure that as a committee we send out to folks those videos of their hearings so that folks can familiarize with familiarize themselves with it, as well as the actual working session date. When we schedule it, it will be this month so that folks can come in and speak to the changes that the State House is asking for, for uniformity. I think it is a good sign that the State House is asking for uniformity on that because it indicates to me that they are looking towards passage of these and so we will do all of that in that session. I have to make sure that all of these names have already had a hearing. I'm not certain that they have. If they haven't, then I can't guarantee those names will go up on the 31st. But the other ones will we won't hold them back for that. And so I just have to double check on that before the 31st. Speaker 0: Thank you and thank you, Counsel Arroyo. I'm just wondering if I'm just wondering from the chair to Council Royal. I'm just wondering if if we're able to determine if we're able to do a little bit of research now to determine if the actual hearing was held on those. Three individuals, maybe. Maybe legal counsel can check while we're still we're still meeting them. We just need to confirm. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, counselor. We'll take a brief recess. We are in the process of reviewing dockets 095520960. We are seeking some follow up information from. Legal counsel, but at this time, could I recognize counsel? ARROYO Counsel. Arroyo, you have the floor. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Chair. It does seem that we did. Now, I remember we did two votes. We had one set, and then we the second set later in that year, the pandemic and all the zooms blur together. But these all went up together, so they'll go all together as one unit. And then we will add Kirk's Stoneking, Jerry and our AMS on there. I was told by our our counsel that there's one edit that may come from the state that we don't have yet, but that we should have it by the 31st. So what we will do is schedule that meeting and give ourselves time to actually get that at it. But once that happens, we'll have a working session and do that and then we will send out all of these committee hearings that happen so that folks can get familiar with them who were not here last year. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel Arroyo. So dark at zero nine, 552.0960 will be referred to the Committee on Government Operations. They'll stay in committee, basically. Mr. Clarke, please read. Dawkins 0961909. Each year.

Committee Reports

On the Home Rule Petition, referred on August 10, 2022, Docket #0960, Re: An Act Regarding the Disability Pension for Richard Cintolo, the committee submitted a report recommending that the petition ought to pass in a new draft.

BostonCC

BostonCC_08102022_2022-0961

Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel Arroyo. So dark at zero nine, 552.0960 will be referred to the Committee on Government Operations. They'll stay in committee, basically. Mr. Clarke, please read. Dawkins 0961909. Each year. Speaker 1: Policy regarding the display of flags on City Hall Plaza. Speaker 0: The Chair recognizes this council blocking of the floor council block. Speaker 4: Thank you so much, Mr. President. Mr. President, if I could suspend Rule 12 and add you to this docket. Speaker 0: Sitting in here. No. Objection. So order. Speaker 4: Excellent. And a. Well, I'll also be speaking through the chair of government operations essentially and passage, but I'll leave that to the chair. So, you know, I think I. Many of us have the experience of walking out of government center to stop and looking up and seeing the three city flagpoles and then seeing behind them city hall . And if you walked out, if you weren't a city councilor, you were just a resident of the city of Austin, and you walked out and you looked up at the flagpole and you saw a flag you didn't happen to know of flying on the third pole. You might well say to the person with you, Oh, I wonder why the city's flying that flag today. I wonder what flag that is. And I think the reality of the situation is that when people see our three flagpoles, they're with the the US flag, the state flag, and often, but not always the city of Boston flag and city hall behind it, they identify those flagpoles with city hall. And that has been the kind of history of that site. What the Supreme Court basically said to us and the decision that came down a couple of months ago was, yes, that's true. And it clearly looks like these flagpoles should be operated as kind of an extension of city hall and express in the city's messages. But the way you guys were running your program to manage the third flagpole opened you up to a different interpretation because we were running a, um, a program where people could basically just fill out an application and say, Hey, I want my flag up there. And we would raise it. And in the context in which we're doing that, taking all comers, it's that not acceptable under the First Amendment to pick out one entity and in this case can't and say you can't raise your flag. And I think, you know, the court gave us a thoughtful and reasonable judgment on that front. And fortunately, it also laid out a roadmap in the decision by Justice Breyer for how the council could and really the city could reassert the fact that those flagpoles are an extension of city hall and are a place where we express the messages of the city of Boston. And the way I would think about this from a kind of First Amendment perspective is that you could have any sign you wanted and walk down Cambridge Street in protest. And your First Amendment right is to have that sign in your hands saying whatever you want to say. If you want to hang that sign up on City Hall, our property management department would be within its rights to take it down and saying, Oh, that's not something that the mayor of the council put up on the building. And so basically what this is about is identifying the flagpoles as a site of government speech in the same way that what we do with the lights or with anything hanging from city hall, etc., is a site, a government speech expected expressing the messages of the city of Boston. And I think that's important because I think that our residents, when they see the flagpoles, they do expect those messages to be coming from us. And obviously, both this body and the mayor are the duly elected representatives of the people of Boston. And so the ordinance that's before you today would basically follow the Supreme Court's recommendations. And it's been reviewed by the city's Supreme Court legal counsel and to set up a policy that would follow what the court suggested, which is that we clearly be making a kind of codified city decision when we raise a flag on that third flagpole that isn't the city of Boston swag. And so this creates to pass for that one runs through this body by through a resolution and the other runs through a mayoral proclamation that said either side of the fifth floor can do that and. And you know, I think there's a couple of reasons to seek suspension of passage today. One is that it? Having been told, hey, you need to have a different policy on this if you want to operate a flag raising program. I think that it makes sense for the city to have that policy in place as soon as possible and kind of end this interregnum. And also know that, you know, there are communities that we often on this council wanted to support and raise flags for. I think there's a lot of folks who would love to see a mayoral proclamation enabling us to raise the Dominican flag next week on Restoration Day. I heard recently from Councilor Flaherty that, you know, there might be an opportunity later in the month to support Ukraine with the flag raising. These are all decisions that would, under this new policy, have to be made by other council resolution or a proclamation of the mayor. But none of that can happen unless we actually codified this new policy in statute. So I think it gives us an opportunity to follow the law. Be clear, based on the Supreme Court decision that we got and go back to a mode and sort of on better footing this time where we as the represented city of Boston Express, you know, all of the all of the cultures and messages that we'd like to include and celebrate using that flagpole as an extension of that . So I'm really grateful to my colleagues that Councilor Councilor Lujan, who's one of the one of the legal minds of the council and to President Flynn. And I can also say that, as I mentioned before, both the Supreme Court council that the city retains for Supreme Court advice and also the law department has reviewed this legislation in detail. So thank you, Mr. President. And as I mentioned, it's, I think, the business of the chair since of the current operations, but we are seeking through him suspension of passage today. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel. BLOCK. The chair recognizes Constitution. Constitution. You have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I won't speak long because I think Counsel Robert covered most of it. But, you know, we as a city city council, we love our flag raisings. For too long now, too many of our communities haven't had the opportunity to raise a flag because of this outstanding Supreme Court litigation that has been costly and time and has taken a lot of our time and attention. Justice Breyer gave us good guidelines on which we could have flag raisings that really our speech that we endorse here as a body or endorsed by the mayor, both in terms of celebrating the diversity of our city and the richness of our cultures and the causes that we support. And I think the language in the ordinances was reviewed and edited and made as inclusive as possible. So I think this is a good path forward so that we can start raising flags. Council said next week the Dominican flag. There are many flags that, you know, celebrations that we have for the remainder of the year, for next year that we want to start getting started on. So I think this is a fair ordinance in response to the Supreme Court's decision, and it allows us to get back to the business that we're doing in supporting the speech that we want to support on City Hall Plaza. Thank you. Speaker 3: Thank you, Councilor Lui. Jen. I recognize Council President Ed Flynn. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counselor Arroyo, and glad to partner with my my colleagues. And, you know, when city council is in with Mayor Wu's team as well, I think flying a flag on city hall. Has the opportunity to bring us together as a city. We celebrate various countries. We celebrate their contributions and sacrifices to the United States, whether it's whether it's Mexico, whether it's Ireland, whether it's. Um, another country. But it's about bringing people together. It's about recognizing the sacrifice that immigrants have made to our city and to our country and the other. The other aspect I'd like to highlight, too, was I always love looking up when I see a flag and seeing the P.O.W. and my flag, which is often in many city and state buildings, and that's the prisoner of war missing in action. And that's to remember service members that are unaccounted for. Still to this day serving serving overseas. But that flag is also a reminder to. They are family, that our city did not forget them or our country did not forget them. So when I see that, when I see that flag, I have a smile on my face because I know that those military families are being thought of by our city government or by our federal government. Thank you, councilor. Speaker 3: Thank you. Council President Clinton. In order for me to speak on it, I. Speaker 0: The chair recognizes. Counsel Baker. Counsel Baker. You have the floor. You sure? Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just had a question. So through you to either one of the the the lead sponsors, every flag raising will have to have a resolution come through here. What is the mayor's if so, if the mayor wants a flag raising, that will have to be a resolution that comes through here and a vote on it. Speaker 0: But the chair recognizes counsel, board counsel. What can you respond to that question? Speaker 4: Yes, thank you. No, it's it's either a mayoral proclamation or a city council resolution. So the idea being that the way that the council expresses sort of the sense of the body formally is by resolution. The way the mayor expresses is through proclamation. I think folks have often seen folks receiving know their equivalent on the mayoral side with that folder in the proclamation. And so it's basically the idea that either body the key thing from the court's decisions perspective was that we needed to kind of express it as officially our message, like from the city of Boston. So the idea is we we use either the council's way of sort of expressing official things or the for the mayor's way. Speaker 3: And one more question. Would the what the mayor's proclamation have to be voted in this body here. Speaker 0: Which the chair recognizes council? Look. Speaker 4: No, it would follow the same the current path by which the mayor promulgates proclamations, which is unilateral on her side. Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I, I think I'm a little concerned about taking votes on up or down on different flags. I'm going to support this here today. But I think where we potentially can be the brunt of the joke on this one here, because I think the I think what will come in front of us all the time will be those really controversial ones. And we'll have to vote on them and we'll be in the paper when it comes to Satanic Temple and whatever other sort of fringe groups come in front of us, that that that want to have their flag sewn. I'm trying as I'm trying to see around that. So again, I'm feeling like I'm going to support this. But I do think there is potential in the future for. Ask to be in the middle of a Supreme Court fight that we don't necessarily want to be in or should be in. So I do have some concerns and. I'll figure out the vote when I. When it's in front of me. Speaker 0: Thank you, Castle Baker. I'm going to go to council break, and then I'm going to go back to council. Council balked at. You need to say something immediately. I was just hoping. Speaker 4: Because it's directly on Councilor Baker. Speaker 0: That she recognizes council. Speaker 4: So so just because it's another point of clarification, part of what's shifting here is that whereas for before there was like an intake form for people to raise their hand and say, hey, I want my flag raised because these are expressions of the, of the city. Like there there is not an intake form type thing. So basically like there's only going to be a resolution to even be voted on. That could lead to a flag raising by the city council. If a member of this body introduces said resolution. So to Councilor Baker's point about sort of like people putting things up for to kind of force draw votes like it would only be if somebody on this council move such a resolution that it could be voted on. I just want to clarify that. Speaker 0: Thanks. Thank you, Councilor BLOCK. The chair recognizes Councilor Braid and council bread. You of the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. President. And thank you to Councilors Barclay Vision and yourself, President Flynn, for initiating the formal codification of the city policy regarding regulating our city. Manage public spaces for government speech. I think one of the things that we basically didn't have, we didn't have a formal codification of a policy to or over oversee the flag raising issue. So that got us into trouble. And it begs the question, you know, as we think one of the issues that we've been working on, as in offices, is to review the re qualification of our ordinances. And I think this is an opportune time to, uh, to look at all of these issues. I know this is a slight sort of segway or a sidebar to the conversation about specifically to the flag raising issue. In Chapter eight of the Ordinance of 1975, the city established a uniform procedure for the adaptation and probably promulgation of forms and regulations by the city departments adopting the State of Massachusetts, Massachusetts State Administrative Procedures Act . So, you know, after 50 years, I think the Supreme Court has, in the case of the flag raising issue, has given us a timely reminder that we need to maybe initiate a review of how all of our department regulations are adopted and promulgated. And, you know, in the context of reviewing our codification of our ordinances, I look forward to digging deeper into that and trying to get some consistency. You know, with this an issue with clarification of the flag raising issue, I'm sure there's other issues that we need to attend to as well. Just do it in a matter of Good Housekeeping and putting everything in order. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel. Brady in the chair recognizes counsel. Royal counsel. Royal, do you have the floor? Speaker 3: Thank you, counsel. President Flynn, as chair of government operations, I will be seeking suspension of Rule 33 so that this matter can be adopted today. I think much of sort of the nuance on the new legal sort of findings as well as why it's important, have already been discussed. So I'm going to keep it very short just to say that this ordinance doesn't conflict with any city of Boston code or ordinances. And I'd also like to thank the original co-sponsors of the ordinance councilor back in the region for bringing this to the floor so that we can clearly establish guidelines for the display of flags by the city of Boston. And I think it's already been said, but this has already been vetted by both our law department and our council that we use for Supreme Court cases. All right. And so I think this is ready to go today, which is why I'm offering it up as a suspended passed. Thank you to the makers. Thank you as well to you as an original co-sponsor present one. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Counsel Royall the chair recognizes counsel Murphy. Counsel Murphy, you have the ball. Speaker 2: Thank you. Counsel. President So I did have some concerns when I first saw this that this would be a violation of free speech. And I do have to say thank you to Counselor Bach for using my concerns there. When you talked to me through that, the one question that I still have and if one of the original sponsors could reply, why does the mayor need us also? Why can't it just be a decision by the mayor? Why are we the council also weighing in on the flagpoles, which I thought were the mayor's flagpoles, because I know in the past we have this balcony out here and maybe that's a different conversation the council can have on if we want to hang flags off our council back balcony. But if someone could just clear that up, that would be helpful. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Councilor Murphy, the chair recognizes Councilor Bourque to respond to that question from counsel. Speaker 4: Murphy Thank you so much, Mr. President. I think so. First of all, obviously, there's no requirement that the Council ever take resolution action to lead to it to a flag raising. And so certainly it could become the pattern and practice that we ceded that to the mayor. I think that that said, I'll be a little bit of an institutionalist here. I think that this council represents the city of Boston just as much as the mayor does. And so when we're talking about an ordinance that we would codify into our municipal code, I think it would be it would sort of be a shame for the council to kind of cede its right to also establish a message of the city of Boston, even if in practice, we end up deciding that it's it makes more sense to let the mayoral proclamations become the default or something. I think that it would sort of be a a seeding of sort of like. Are kind of like rights and prerogatives to also express messages on behalf of the city of Boston, which I take us to be doing every time we file a resolution on something. So I think that's the that's the reason. And that said, obviously, like, you know, when you think about even just timing things, right, like if this were to pass today and we're talking about the the being able to raise the flag as the city for the Dominican Restoration Day on Tuesday because we don't have a resolution before us here. Obviously, that would be done by mayoral proclamation. So and I think obviously there will often be times where the council's Wednesday meeting schedule is such that it makes more sense to do it by proclamation. But I will just say that I would feel queasy about giving up our prerogative as a duly elected body representing Boston to also be a decision maker on this. So thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 6: Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. Does anyone else have any questions or comments on this? Um. Would anyone like to add their name? Please raise your hand. The Mr. Kirkland, please add counsel of Royal Counsel and counsel of Colorado, counsel in front of his name as Andersen. Please have counsel. Varro counsel. Clarity. Please. Please. Council world. Council is blocking motion and are seeking suspension of the rules and passage of docket 0961. All those in favor say aye. I opposed say no. The ayes have it. Docket 0961 has passed. She wanted to be a spy, so. Speaker 2: Sorry. It was. It's okay. Thank you. Speaker 1: DAWKINS 0962 lucky numbers 0962 consoles turn off at the following order for a hearing to discuss safety concerns associated with double decker sightseeing busses and reclaiming a double decker bus. Public safety measures in the city of Boston.

Council Ordinance

Ordinance Amending City of Boston Code, Ordinances, Section 1, to Codify City Policy Regarding the Display of Flags on City Hall Plaza. On motion of Councilors Bok and Louijeune, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilor Flynn as co-sponsor. On motion of Councilors Bok, Louijeune and Flynn, the rules were suspended; the ordinance was passed. Councilor Arroyo in the Chair.

BostonCC

BostonCC_08102022_2022-0962

Speaker 1: DAWKINS 0962 lucky numbers 0962 consoles turn off at the following order for a hearing to discuss safety concerns associated with double decker sightseeing busses and reclaiming a double decker bus. Public safety measures in the city of Boston. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The chair recognizes Council President Flynn. Council President. Fine. You have the floor. Speaker 0: Thank you, Tom Silver. And. This would be a hearing to discuss the process of double decker sightseeing bus. But it's really an opportunity for us to learn more about safety challenges a double decker bus has in the city. This is not to stop the operation of a double decker bus, but it's to get some clarification on making sure that everybody is safe. Tourists, the driver, pedestrians. When there is a double decker bus, a lot of them, we see them around. We see tourists in downtown Boston on a lot of sightseeing busses. But I'm just I just want to make sure that we present and provide the best safety for everybody. And that includes those that go on double decker busses. It's an issue we haven't focused much attention on. So this is something that's important to make sure that double decker busses are safe. And I'm looking forward to learning more about the process of keeping everybody safe. That would use the double decker bus. Thank you, Mr. Councilor. Speaker 3: Thank you. Council President Flynn, would anyone else speak on this matter? Chair recognizes Councilor Coletta. Speaker 6: Thank you. Please add my name. I just want to thank the baker for sponsoring this and calling attention to this issue. My district sees over 2 million people, visitors to the North End in Charlestown. So there's no doubt in my mind that these types of vehicles would follow the Freedom Trail to see some of our historic treasures , like the Power of Your House and the Bunker Hill Monument. And I'm just now finding out about these busses to victory honors. So. And their safety concerns. So I look forward to the hearing, and I thank you for your oversight and leadership on this. Speaker 3: Thank you. Thank you. Councilor Clare, would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Seeing no hands. Would anyone else like to sign on? Mr. Clarke, please add Councilor Baker, please that councilor back please. That Councilor Braden, please add Councilor Coletta, please add Councilor Fernandez Anderson please add councilor clarity please add Councilor Lara please add Councilor Lui Jan please add Councilor Murphy to is that Councilor Will Rowland please add my name. Docket 0962 will be referred to the Committee on Planning, Development and Transportation. Mr. Clarke, can you please read. Docket 963. Speaker 1: Duncan number 0963 Council a block off of the following order for a hearing regarding enhancing Boston's COVID recovery via grants provided by the bipartisan infrastructure law.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing to discuss safety concerns associated with Double-Decker Sightseeing Buses and requirement of Double Decker Bus Public Safety Measures in the City Of Boston.

BostonCC

BostonCC_08102022_2022-0965

Speaker 0: Mr. Kirk, please. RE Docket 0965. Speaker 1: Duncan, Emma 0965 Council of Biochar for the following order for a hearing on increasing green stormwater infrastructure capacity at Boston Water and Sewer in the city of Boston. Speaker 0: But she recognizes Counselor Bork. Counsel Bork, you have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you so much, Mr. President. Mr. President. I'd like to seek to suspend Rule 12 and add councilors Braden and Colette as original co-sponsors. Speaker 0: Seeing and hearing. No objection. Both are out. Speaker 4: Great. Thank you. And I also want to acknowledge we and I think there are many fans of green infrastructure in the council house. So if we could add more people, I would also be adding Councilor and Councilor Laura. But it's I'm glad that there's such a caucus of support. I also want to start by offering a shout out to Alaskans and other one of our summer fellows who worked on this hearing order for us and has been doing a tremendous amount of research to back it up. So Boston, as some folks may know, but others may not, we maintain actually one of the oldest and largest traditional gray storm water systems in the country. And unfortunately, you know, it really it right now can only deal with several inches of rain in a 24 hour period. We've got, you know, storms that are projected more and more often to overwhelm the systems. BWC, our Boston Water and Sewer has expressed the need to expand its capacity. We're under a federal order not to let too much phosphorus go into the Charles River, which again involves having a greater capacity system. But unfortunately, the ways in which we have pursued greater capacity in the city of Boston have really been kind of gray in the sense of concrete and not looking enough. I feel at greenest green stormwater system solutions. And, you know, we've even set forward a plan for stormwater management, carbon neutrality and assess GSI in various places in the city. But in terms of our actual implementation, we are lagging behind cities like New York, Philadelphia, Seattle, which have developed plans and models and have hundreds of GSI developments across their city. And I saw this firsthand when I went to Philadelphia, actually looking at their Power four program. They've done so much green stormwater infrastructure that they have a whole division of their water department now, which is their water and sewer that just maintains green stormwater infrastructure. And it's been a great source of jobs for the power for folks who have trained up on the maintenance for these green stormwater installations and have become experts in it. And, you know, it's one of those things where I think the way that we've been thinking about it often in the city of Boston is, oh, green infrastructure, which might mean putting in a rain garden or a bio swale or just, you know, anything where you've got a kind of nature based solution. We look at that sometimes and we say, Oh, well, those porous pavers, they might need a little bit more maintenance, they might need to be vacuumed or they might need to be swept. And we don't have that capacity today. And so it sort of makes sense in a kind of immediate sense, oh, let's go with the set and forget it concrete. But in the long run, Philadelphia's run the numbers and found that this would save an enormous amount of money if you put the green infrastructure in first just because of how much better it handles the water. And and I feel proud of the fact that Boston's one of the first cities in America to really do to scale green stormwater infrastructure. We did it more than 100 years ago with The Mighty River, which is just a giant green stormwater initiative in the middle of the city. And it's time for us to do it again more and more. And I think that there's an opportunity to create great jobs for our young people doing this opportunity to engage our communities. But engaging our communities shouldn't look like a world where because we haven't come up with a real system for green stormwater maintenance, we're saying we're only going to put green stormwater in where some community group agrees to maintain the installation, because the reality is that creates a city of haves and have nots and place in it and the opposite of an environmental justice approach. So I was really excited to see the mayor announce England coming in as our first director of Green and infrastructure last week. And I think there's a huge opportunity to work with Boston Water and sewer and also public works and all of our departments to kind of put in infrastructure to make our standards green and then also to have a real maintenance plan attached to all those that's going to serve our communities well. But I think it's something that the council should be paying close attention to. And I'm thrilled to be joined by my co-sponsors, Brian. And. So thank you, Mr. President. And thank you again to Alice. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel. The next original co-sponsor was Counsel Braden and Counsel Braden. You have the floor. Speaker 6: Mr. President, and thank you, Councilor Bochum, Councilor Collado, for co-sponsoring this. You know, the green stormwater infrastructure capacity, the green stormwater is sort of a pet, a pet project for me. Many years ago we had a persistent problem with it was a big rainstorm. We had incidents of of one instance of having 18 inches of water in our basement. And we discovered that in an extreme, after a lot of weather rain, that the rainwater was just accumulating in the. And we were just coming in to our basement. And then we went to a presentation that was hosted by the Awesome Brian CDC, and it was a presentation by the Charles River Watershed Association, and they presented a presentation on Rain Gardens and Bio Swales. And we, we went home and we, we, we worked, we got some help and we, we created our own rain garden in the backyard. And all of the rainwater that hits our roof goes into our yard. So it we don't have a flooding problem in our basement and any longer. So this is just sort of a micro project that we have we've used in our in our family to manage stormwater. But when you scale that up, we had a someone from the the Boston Water and sewer came by recently and we showed him our rain garden and he was like, wow, if we could more get more people to do this, it would take so much of the stormwater out of our system and and and help alleviate some of the flooding issues that we have. So and I feel that, you know, not only do we need to do this on a on a on a on a city level in our city departments, and think about new but new neighborhoods that have been developed and in East Boston and Allston that we need to be thinking about stormwater management in a very proactive and very strategic way. But I also think that we need to engage with our residents of the city to try and encourage, you know, sort of this micro approach of of individuals, households having having a rain garden in their yard to to try and alleviate the the increased threats of stormwater, increased weather events with very heavy, precipitous rain is is a very real threat, especially we're not going to have sea water in a square, but we are going to have problems with stormwater. And I really welcome this hearing and I hope to learn more about this issue and to also help educate our residents across the city. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Council grade and the chair recognizes council, cholera council. Quite a few of the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you. Council. President Flynn. I want to thank the maker and including me as a co-sponsor as well as my co-sponsor, Councilor Braden. A Forgotten Crisis and tangential issue two flooding due to sea level rise is mitigating stormwater runoff and the unprecedented levels of precipitation seen in recent years. Mitigation measures have been implemented to protect our coastline from flooding, but we do not account for the water that comes through our sewer systems below our streets. New development is typically built on elevated platforms, just like they are in. Speaker 4: In East. Speaker 6: Boston, which has helped somewhat. But when there are major storms like the bumble genesis that took place in 2018. Council President Flynn, I know you remember this quite well as on day three of your tenure, but water not only went up and over these elevated platforms, but they went underneath through our drainage system. And so it really was the main reason why Jeffrey's point was flooded. And so the frequency of severe storms is increasing. And our stormwater infrastructure, mostly built in the mid-century, is not equipped to handle the volume of water that we're seeing at this present day. So in this conversation, I'd like to understand how the EPA is looking at this and what standards for any new development taking place and how folks are contributing to green stormwater infrastructure in their own buildings. Copenhagen planners are thinking about the rain too and have required a certain percentage of green spaces. Council Brayton mentioned rain gardens, etc., which could be which could supplement strategies of what we're doing. So I look forward to the hearing and again, grateful to be added as co-sponsor. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel. The chair recognizes council. Borough Council are you have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you to the makers and councilor. Councilor, Councilor Brading and Councilor Coletta for moving this forward. This is something that I'm really incredibly excited about as the chair of the Environmental Justice Committee. Part of the work that we did during the conversation about ARPA was to earmark two and a half million dollars to build new infrastructure around waste and compost. And I think that this is moving us in the same direction. Ultimately, if we want to be a city that is climate resilient and we want to make sure that we are looking at environmental justice with an equity lens, we're going to have to build our own infrastructure and we're going to have to build our infrastructure not at the cost of the, you know, economic empowerment of the people here in our neighborhoods. And so I think that this is not only an opportunity to further create jobs, but I think it's an opportunity for us to really realize the dream that we have for Powercor, right? That it's kind of like a hub that continues to grow and provide jobs for young people, particularly in green infrastructure, so that we are a climate resilient city, but we're also providing economic opportunity and well-paying jobs to the people here in the city of Boston. So I'm really excited to support it. I thank you so much for putting it on the floor. And I am happy to steward it through the Environmental Justice Committee. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Laura, that she recognizes counselors and counselors. And you have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you. President Flynn, I also want to thank the sponsors. I want to thank counselor back for introducing introducing this hearing order. We hear a lot from folks in the city wide issue. So I hear from folks in all of our neighborhoods about the issue of flooding, whether on Mercy Boulevard or in different areas. The city has about 666 miles of underground stormwater pipes that are, as everyone has said, are quite old that we need to update. One of the really great things about the city is our fiscal strength and our ability to bond for infrastructure and to bond for projects. In 2020, the city bonded for the first time green social bonds in the amount of $25 million to update our municipal infrastructure and make them climate resilient. And $35 million for affordable housing projects. We can do that here with green stormwater infrastructure. And it should be continued to be a key component of the Green New Deal for the city. There have been discussions already about looking at four point channel as a way to create more flood gates and to create flood gates around the city. So I'm really excited for this conversation, and I think that we should be leaning into our city's fiscal strength and making sure that we are putting our resources to bear on this really important issue and protecting our communities, especially our most vulnerable communities that our communities as well. So thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, counselors. And. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Or sign on. Please raise your hand. Mr. Kirklees. Council. Royal Council Councilor Baker. Counsel Fernandez Innocent Counsel Florida Counsel Lara. Counsel and counsel Murphy and the Chair. Before I assign it to a committee, let me. Let me recognize Counselor Bork. Counsel Bork. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. President. I think we had been thinking because my committee, City Services and Innovation Technology, oversees space and water and sewer that we would be seeking for it to come to my committee. But I also it's obviously been an environmental issue, and cancer is the Environmental Justice Committee. So I don't know if we could potentially, like have it have it come to us and have a joint hearing or have a go at her and have a joint hearing. I just I want to make sure that the water and sewer piece is there. And obviously, my committee has got jurisdiction over them within the council. But I also would love to be partnering on this. So whatever you think is okay. Speaker 0: The this will be the this this would be the first time I was assigned to two committees at the same time because it does overlap both committees. So I will, um, I will place it in both both committees. Um. So we in the Committee of City Services innovation in technology in. In the the Committee on Environmental Justice. Mr. Clarke, can you please read?

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing on increasing Green Stormwater Infrastructure Capacity at Boston Water & Sewer and the City of Boston. On motion of Councilor Bok, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilors Breadon and Coletta as co-sponsors. Referred to the Committee on Environmental Justice, Resiliency, and Parks.

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Speaker 0: Um. So we in the Committee of City Services innovation in technology in. In the the Committee on Environmental Justice. Mr. Clarke, can you please read? Speaker 1: Dawkins 0966 Duncan members 0966 Councilors Coletta and Flynn offered the following order for a hearing regarding the coordination of construction and utility permits. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The Chair recognizes Councilor Coletta. Speaker 6: Thank you. Vice President Arroyo. So I never know how. Sorry. Vice President Arroyo We love nuts and bolts in District one. I'm pleased to present this hearing order regarding the issuance and coordination of construction and utility permits in the city of Boston. This city is growing exponentially, and for the densest neighborhoods like East Boston, North and like like South Boston, there's a lot of activity when it comes to roadwork and development projects that require digging and the temporary loss of parking on our city streets. What I'm seeing and these Boston and have for the last three years is that somehow all of the roadwork that could happen at any given time takes place at the same time in two block radius. And it's it's a nightmare. In Eagle Hill in 2019, Boston, water and Sewer was digging up 100 year old pipes while Eversource and National Grid were replacing their infrastructure, while numerous development projects shut down streets and sidewalks while the city also repaved streets. This exact thing happened a day square a couple of months later, and today it's happening in Jeffries Point. The problem is not the work. Digging up streets to improve our infrastructure clearly needs to happen. The problem is a lack of coordination and notice to residents about what is happening. And I'm sure District city councilors have heard this numerous times and the lack of consideration for the number of projects and how it will impact residents quality of life. To be able to traverse their streets and go through their neighborhood without conflicting detours, which is happening right now in Boston, where because Boston water and sewer has no idea that National Grid is digging up another street, the detours point to each other and it's just extremely frustrating. I've already been in contact with Public Works, the Bus, Transportation Department and Special Services to better understand the behind the scenes machinations of the permitting approval process in the city of Boston. I'm thankful for their participation in a neighborhood walk through tomorrow just to see how impactful this is for those who would love to be in the weeds of nuts and bolts. I'd be happy to describe the callback system to you all, which is something that was described to me by Public Works, and it is what governs these approvals. And my goal with this hearing is to identify the obvious low hanging fruit, which is to allocate resources both time and money to implementing a better system or supplementing the kobuk system with with something that provides better coordination. So thank you again to my co-sponsor, Councilor Quinn, for this, and I look forward to the hearing. Speaker 3: Thank you, Councilor Coletta. The chair recognizes Council President Flynn. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counselor Arroyo, and thank you, Counsel Collado, for including me and counsel for the important work that you're doing on this, as well as all of our colleagues that are especially district councils, but certainly at large as well. But district counselors are often the ones that receive the call from concerned residents about a street being dug up. And they're asking, why is the street being dug up? Because six months ago it was dug up previously. And, you know, residents are asking, why can't we coordinate digging up streets almost at the same time or at least know what the schedule is? So if there is a street that needs to be dug up, maybe water and sewer could be in there and then keep the street open and then. Maybe, you know, another utility company might have to do some work there as well. But I think the council, of course, summed it up best. It's about communication. It's about working together. It's about working with our district city councilors. It's about working with our large city councilors. It's about working with owners as well and everybody working together, especially on communication. So we all know what schedules of construction are taking place in our neighborhoods because it is our job as district councilors to communicate a message effectively to our residents why a street is being closed, and what the other options are when that street is closed. You know, you can't drive on this street, but you can drive on several streets later. Council also pointed out parking. If we're closing a street down for two weeks and three weeks is the recommendation on where to park a vehicle. So these are all important issues. These are all important questions that this this hearing will highlight. So I just want to say thank you to our council for the important work and for my colleagues that they're doing on this issue. Thank you. Speaker 3: Councilor. Thank you. Council President. Alan, would anyone else like to speak on this issue? Would anyone else like to add their name? Mr. Clarke. Please add Councilor Baker. Councilor Barker. Councilor Brading Councilor Tanya Fernandez Anderson Councilor Flag City Councilor Laura Councilor Louis Chan Councilor Murphy Council. Overall and please add my name. Docket 0966 will be referred to the Committee on City Services and Innovation Technology. Mr. Clarke, can you please read dockets? Speaker 1: 0967 Duncan 0967. Councilors Flynn and Murphy offer the following resolution recognizing National Purple Heart Day 2022.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing regarding the coordination of the Construction and Utility Permits. Councilor Arroyo in the Chair.

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Speaker 1: 0967 Duncan 0967. Councilors Flynn and Murphy offer the following resolution recognizing National Purple Heart Day 2022. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The Chair recognizes Council President Flynn. Council President Flynn, the floor is yours. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Arroyo. And thank you, Councilor Murphy, as chair of Veterans Services as well. August 7th just passed to his national Purple Heart Day. And that day is a national day that we honor. We remember we recognize the service and sacrifice of a Purple Heart recipient. And that is a person that was wounded. In service to our country or it's a person that was killed in service to our country that that person shed blood shed blood for our country. So it's a it's an important day for us to remember, to think about those disabled veterans that were wounded, those veterans that were killed in action also. And to remember their family and to remember their sacrifice and their heartache and their pain. Losing a loved one, losing a son, losing losing a daughter. That veterans coming home that might be a Purple Heart recipient might be still suffering from. Various wounds that he or she received in combat. And it might be having a terrible impact on that person's family, their spouse or their parents. They might be engaged in the VA medical system, in mental health counseling for the rest of their life. So it's important for us to remember the incredible sacrifice and service of our Purple Heart recipients on this day and honored to partner with Counselor Murphy. But I also would like to suspend and pass this resolution today so that we can recognize those that are recipients of the Purple Heart in their family. Thank you, Counselor. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. President. Flynn. Counselor Murphy. The floor is yours. Speaker 2: Thank you, Counselor Arroyo. And thank you, President Flynn. And as the chair of Veteran Military Families and Military Affairs, I fully support this resolution in declaring August 7th as a national Purple Heart Day. President Flynn already quite nicely summed up the importance of this resolution. But still to know this day offers Americans a special opportunity to say thank you to the nearly 2 million brave men and women who fought for our nation's freedom and bear the physical scars of war. It is the ultimate sacrifice for our country. And I applaud such recipients of the Purple Heart Award and just want to say thank you that we suspend and pass. I hope our colleagues join us in that. Thank you very much. Speaker 3: Thank you, Counselor Murphy. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Seeing no one else. Would anyone else like to add their name? Mr. Clarke. Please add. Councilor Baker. Councilor. Councilor Braden. Councilor Fernandez. Anderson. Councilor. Clarity. Councilor. Laura. Councilor Lui. Gen. Councilor. Rail. And please add my name. Oh, hold on 1/2. Councilors Flynn and Murphy seek suspension of the rules and adoption of Docket 0967. All those in favor say I post, they make. The ayes have it. Docket 0967 has been adopted. Mr. Clarke, if you would, please read in to the record docket 09680968.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution Recognizing National Purple Heart Day 2022. On motion of Councilors Flynn, the rules were suspended; the resolution was adopted.

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Speaker 3: Docket 0967 has been adopted. Mr. Clarke, if you would, please read in to the record docket 09680968. Speaker 1: Councilor Murphy offer the following resolution recognizing August 7th through the 13th as National Community Health Center Week. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Clarke, and thank you to Counsel Arroyo. The Chair recognizes Counsel Murphy. Counsel Murphy. You have the full. Speaker 2: I do. Council President Flynn. So August 7th through the 13th of this year marks the annual celebration of the National Community Health Center Week, honoring the extraordinary contributions our community health centers provide to every community across the nation. And here in Boston, we have 22 community health centers that serve one third of our residents in the city, including myself and my children. So the community health centers serve as a beacon of strength, service and care in their communities. And this National Health Center Week honors those frontline providers, staff and beloved patients who lost their lives during the ongoing COVID 19 pandemic. From the very beginning of the crisis, community health centers began finding groundbreaking ways to provide preventative and primary care to their patients. And we know the incredible work they did in trying to get the vaccines out. And all of the health centers do great work that I know many in East Boston and the Mattapan Health Center really came together and did great work trying to make sure that the residents were educated and had access to that. And each day of the National Community Health Center Week celebrates the work and services of health centers provide to the unique populations within their communities, and highlights the innovative solutions they produce to address the most pressing health care issues that our residents face. So I hope it be resolved that the Boston City Council recognizes August 7th through the 13th as National Community Health Centers Week, which will honor our critically important health care centers that keep our communities healthy and thriving. So I do ask that we suspend and pass this, please. Council President Flynn. Thank you. Speaker 0: And thank you. Counsel Murphy. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Would anyone else like to add their name? Mr. Clarke, please add counsel. Royal Counsel Baker. Counsel Blair Counsel Braden Counselor Fernandez Andersen. Counsel Farrelly Counsel. Lara mara Constitution. Council were all employees at the chair. Counsel Murphy seeks suspension of the rules and adoption of Docket 0968. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Opposing nay. The issue of Advocate 0964 has been adopted. Mr. Clarke, we're on to personnel orders. Can you please read the docket? 0969.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution Recognizing August 7 - 13 As National Community Health Center Week. On motion of Councilor Murphy, the rules were suspended; the resolution was adopted. President Flynn in the Chair.

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Speaker 0: Let me here she has suspension of the rules and passage of docket 0984. All those in favor say aye. I opposed say no. The ayes have it. The docket is passed. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 098 Fast. Speaker 1: Talking number 0985 Counsel send for counsel. Speaker 0: To seek suspension of the rules of House have been docket 0985. All those in favor say aye. I also say nay. The ayes have it. The docket is passed. We're moving on to late files. We have we have full rate files. One. One is a personnel order and the others are in removal. Hearing orders and resolutions. The late file matters should be on everyone's desk. We'll take a vote to add these into the agenda. All those in favor of adding the late financial matters into the agenda say thank you. Matters have been added to the agenda. Mr. Clerk, can you please read the first file into the record? It's. It's the. It's the resolution, right? The person. What are the personnel on first? Look.

Personnel Orders

Councilor Flynn for Councilor Mejia offered the following: Order for the appointment of temporary employee Asli Ercem in City Council, effective September 3, 2022.

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Speaker 3: The grant will fund a comprehensive inter-agency agency strategy that connects law enforcement, employment, education, public health and youth development agencies to reduce youth violence in the Commonwealth and Dr. Number 0802 message in order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expand the amount of $15,000 in the form of a grant for two charitable donations awarded by Frank R and Elizabeth Simone Foundation, Inc. to be administered by the police department. The grant will fund training initiatives for the Homicide and Youth Violence Strike Task Force Strike Strikeforce units. Speaker 0: Thank you. The Chair recognizes counsel, Florida Chair of the Committee on Public Safety, Criminal Justice Counsel. Clarity. You have the floor. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. President. The Safe and Successful Youth Initiative is a Youth Violence Prevention and Intervention Initiative that is funded annually by the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services. The council has already passed the annual grant program, which was used to complement the grant funding distributed through COVID Recovery Violence Intervention Grant last October as sueh a lead agency, the Boston Public Health Commission coordinates referrals through community organizations to provide transitional services following outreach and intensive case management. They're also able to offer a behavioral health counseling plus education and employment services. Each year, the case managers enroll over 120 young adults to this program, and they also arrange supports for partnering organizations. The docket in front of us today is a $50,000 supplemental grant, to which 26,500 was distributed to the program's partnership. Community organizations. An additional 10,000 was dedicated to individuals assistance for jobs in the form of work, boots and tools plus transportation to and from behavioral health and medical health appointments throughout the city. The four case managers were budgeted for approximately 11,500 increase in personnel, along with charges of 2000 were committed towards purchasing air purification devices and PPE. Since the award period ends tomorrow, June 30th, I'm asking this body to suspend in pass doc in 0801 as it pertains to zero. Docket 080. This docket has grant funding from two charitable donations that were awarded by the Frank R and Elizabeth Simone Foundation to be administered by the Boston Police Department. This grant would fund training initiatives for the Homicide and Youth Violence Strike Force. As chair of Public Safety, I'm asking the stock to be suspended and passed so we can expeditiously spend this one $15,000 grant. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. Firing. Mr. Clarke, before we. Before we vote. Please let the record reflect that counsel and O'Hara's present counsel of clarity seek suspension of the roles and passage of Docket 0801. All those in favor say I am opposed. Say no. The ayes have it. Docket 0801 is passed. Council five receives suspension of the roles. Passage of docket 0802. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed say no. The ayes have it. Docket 0802 has passed. Mr. Clerk, can you please read Docket 0803, please? Speaker 3: I can. Number 0803 message an order authorizing the city of Boston to accept and expend the amount of $6,460 in the form of a grant for the federal fiscal year 22 senior companion program awarded by the Corporation for National and Community Service to be administered by the Eight Strong Commission.

Mayor Order

Message and order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expend the amount of Fifteen Thousand Dollars ($15,000.00) in the form of a grant for two charitable donations, awarded by the Frank R and Elizabeth Simoni Foundation Inc. to be administered by the Police Department. The grant will fund training initiatives for the Homicide and Youth Violence Strike Force Units.

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Speaker 3: I can. Number 0803 message an order authorizing the city of Boston to accept and expend the amount of $6,460 in the form of a grant for the federal fiscal year 22 senior companion program awarded by the Corporation for National and Community Service to be administered by the Eight Strong Commission. The grant will fund reimbursement for travel and meals plus stipends. The supplemental award represents a mandatory increase in the stipend from $3 to $3.15 per hour, effective July 1st, 2022. Speaker 0: Thank you. The thank you. The chair recognizes counsel and chair of the committee and Strong Women Families Communities Council. And you have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. President. I think this this grant is a small grant. It's pretty self-explanatory. And on behalf of the Committee for a Strong Women Families Community to recommend the to suspend and pass this docket. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel Braden six suspension of the rules. Positive Docket 0803. All those in favor say I hope our policy nay the ayes have it. Docket 0803 has passed reports of public officers in others. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 0804.0804.

Mayor Order

Message and order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expend the amount of Six Thousand Four Hundred Sixty Dollars ($6,460.00) in the form of a grant for the Federal FY22 Senior Companion Program, awarded by the Corporation for National and Community Service to be administered by the Age Strong Commission. The grant will fund reimbursement for travel and meals, plus stipends. The supplemental award represents a mandatory increase in the stipend from $3.00 to $3.15 per hour, effective July 1, 2022.

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Speaker 3: Dawkins 0259 Ducky Number 0259 The Committee on Government Operations, to which was referred on February 9th, 2020 to Dr. Number 0259 in ordinance amending City of Boston Code Ordinance Chapter 15, Section ten in establishing the Boston Fair Chance, he submits a report recommending that the ordinance ought to pass in a new draft. Speaker 0: Thank you. The Chair recognizes Council Royal Chair of Government Operations Council. Royal, do you have the floor? Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. President. The Committee on Government Operations held a hearing on March eight, 2022, and a working session on April 12, 2022. On Docket Number 259. An ordinance amending City of Boston Code Ordinances Chapter 15, Section ten and establishing the Boston Fair Chance Act, which was sponsored by Councilor Julie McGee and myself. I'd like to thank my council colleagues for attending. That would be counsel to the councilor. Do him here. Councilor Rossi and Councilor Candelaria. Councilor Kenzie Bok. Council President Flynn. I think Chief Solace SEVERA Chief McKenna from the human rights commission. The advocates for their participation. Did I miss any councilors maybe have in either one of those sessions. This ordinance would amend existing language in the Boston City Code and establish a Chief Diversity Officer who would provide oversight over the city's nondiscrimination, equal opportunity diversity equity inclusion plan policies. Based upon information gathered at the hearing and the working session, the docket is amended to include consistent language, as well as jurisdiction and coordination under the Office of Human Resources. The amended docket allows for more flexibility regarding who is in charge of diversity and brings the position to a cabinet level. Also requiring regular updates on progress made regarding diverse hiring and promotions, and will require that the Chief Diversity Officer work with officers to ensure there are fair hiring policies in place for family members of current employees. To be clear, this ordinance does not supersede any collective bargaining agreements. However, the ordinance establishes procedures for developing processes and plans through the Chief Diversity Officer, an Office of Human Resources to implement fair recruitment and employment practices as well as a uniform complaint procedure. Additionally, this ordinance goes further to provide a transparent hiring process for disclosures, notifications and recusal practices are required when family relationships exist as required by state ethics law, and will eliminate conflicts of interest in hiring and promotional practices in the city by establishing standards to ensure fairness and opportunity in the hiring of promotional practices of the city. As Chair of the Government Operations Committee, I recommend that this docket ought to pass in a new draft. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel Arroyo. Counsel Arroyo, the chair of the Committee on Government Operations, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of Docket 0259 in a new draft. All those in favor say aye. Aye. I oppose say nay. The ayes have it. Docket 0259 has passed in a new draft. Mr. Kirklees redacted. Speaker 3: 04350435 the committee in government operations, to which was referred on March 30th, 2020 to Duncan, number 0435 petition for a special law regarding an act authorizing the city of Boston to grant four additional license licenses for the sale of alcoholic beverages to be drunk on the specified premises, submits a report recommending that the home will petition to

Council Ordinance

On the message and Ordinance, referred on February 9, 2022, Docket #0259, Amending City of Boston Code, Ordinances, Chapter XV, Section X and Establishing the Boston Fair Chance Act, the committee submitted a report recommending the Ordinance ought to pass in a new draft. The report was accepted; the Ordinance was passed in a new draft.

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Speaker 3: 04350435 the committee in government operations, to which was referred on March 30th, 2020 to Duncan, number 0435 petition for a special law regarding an act authorizing the city of Boston to grant four additional license licenses for the sale of alcoholic beverages to be drunk on the specified premises, submits a report recommending that the home will petition to pass in a new draft. Speaker 0: Thank you. The chair recognizes the chair recognizes council royal chair of Government Operations Council. Royal U of the floor. Thank you. Speaker 1: And the Committee on Government Operations held a hearing on June 16, 2022, on docket number 465, a petition for special law relative to an act authorizing additional licenses for the sale of alcoholic beverages to be drunk on the premises in Boston, which was sponsored by Councilor Ruth C Lui Gen and Councilor Julie McKee. I'd like to thank my council colleagues for attending Council President Flynn, Councilor Lui, Jane Council Wirral, Councilor Baker, Councilor Maria, Councilor Coletta, Councilor Murphy and Councilor Clarity. I'd also like to thank members of the administration Kathleen Joyce, the Executive Directors of the Mayor's Office of Consumer Affairs and Licensing, and Chairwoman of the Licensing Board for the City of Boston. Danny Green, Executive Secretary of the Licensing Board for the City of Boston. And Alisha Masina, Director of Small Business for the City of Boston and the advocates for their participation. During the hearing, we heard from the administration on the support for this home rule petition, as well as industry representatives on the value of liquor licenses to restaurants and its impact on profits. Passages of passage of this docket will allow the Licensing Board to grant five additional licenses for the sale of alcoholic beverages for specified premises. Four of the licenses are for the bowling building. One of the licenses is for the Strand Theater. Both locations are in the Roxbury neighborhood of Boston. All of these licenses are not transferable and are restricted to the specific location. Passage of this home rule petition and its amended draft will provide equity, improve the quality of life in the surrounding communities, and allow the entities to attract businesses and events. As Chair of Government Operations Committee, I recommend that this docket ought to pass in its new draft. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilor. I would anyone like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes Councilman here constantly on the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, President Flynn. For a moment there, I thought we were not going to be able to speak on anything because I had my light for the last one. So I'm up here for the last one. Just want to thank my colleagues for the passage of that. And I'm not going to hang up the mic because I know we have a lot of work to get through. But I'm just I'm buzzing up. I'm encouraging my colleagues to vote in favor so that we can get to business. That's it. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Councilman. Here, the chair recognizes council's and constitution. Speaker 4: Thank you. Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you to Councilor Arroyo, a chair of government ops, for holding a hearing on this matter that was joined with another another Hormel petition sponsored by Council Oral and of course by myself about how do we get more liquor licenses into our neighborhoods, specifically Roxbury, Dorchester, Mattapan. These are targeted liquor licenses for football and building one for Strand Theater will all be about getting more business, spur more economy in our neighborhoods. We know that there's a lot of inequity baked into how liquor licenses are given out. The cost of them on the open market is exorbitant. And so with these four restricted liquor licenses, the bowling building, we're hoping to really help to spur economic activity in the Nubian Square area, anchored in a city owned building like the Strand Theater. So just asking my colleagues to support this one more petition and get this up to the state House so that we can get some really great businesses that have been looking for liquor licenses, that opportunity to really grow and develop their business in Nubian Square at the bowling building. Thank you very much. Speaker 0: Mr. President. Thank you, counsel. And the chair recognizes counsel. Clarity. Counsel, clarity. You have the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 1: I rise to support. Obviously, this petition in the amended draft will provide equity, improve quality of life in the surrounding communities, and will allow the licensees to attract businesses and events which would be great for the community. I would just note obviously the importance that they are these are nontransferable. So that means that if the license is granted and if it's either canceled or revoked or no longer in use, the licenses shall be returned physically with all rights and privileges back to the city's licensing board. The licensing board then may grant that license to new applicants in the same location under the same conditions as the specified act. And that's a key component. So for those that are putting their best foot forward to obtain these licenses, making sure that they've got, you know, the front of the house in the back of the house in order, whether it's investment opportunities and or a particular cuisine or an event for them to, you know, the onus is on them, obviously, to have to perform in the event that they don't perform. The city has the ability to try to pull that back into granted to someone else. So it's a it's a privilege, I think, that we're granting on the nontransferable side. It's going to lend, particularly in the food desert side of the house. It will add tremendous value. But there is it's sort of a two way street cities granting these. But the entities also need to work with the community. They need to be responsive to the community. They need to add value to the community. They need to continue to be good neighbors or else the city has the ability to pull back on it. And I just think that's an important factor that needs to be mentioned, but I look forward to support it. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. Florida Constitution. English president. Speaker 4: Has. This had a big impact on their lives. The Restaurant Association, the Black Hospitality Coalition in Your Grace marches, restaurants, United Prefects, accountants, offsite consulting. There are a lot of folks on this on this. When we when we held this hearing and a lot of them expressed it was unanimous support for these restricted place based liquor licenses that will stay with the BOLLING Building for the entirety of the existence of the Bowling Building and will stay with the Strand Theater for the entirety of the existence of the Strand Theater. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counselor Johnson, for that clarification and the update as well. Castle Royal, the chair of the Committee on Government Operations, seeks acceptance of the committee report passage of Docket 0435 and a new draft. All those in favor say I don't know. Mr. Karp, would you please take a roll call? Vote, please. Speaker 3: Roll call vote on docket 0435. Counsel Arroyo. Counsel Arroyo. Yes. Counsel the Baker Council. The Baker High Council. The Bar Council. The BLOCK Yes. Counselor Brain Counselor Brain Council IT Coletta. Counsel Coletta. Yes. Counsel for Ananda Sanderson. Yes. Counsel for Ananda Sanderson. Yes. Counsel Serving Yes. Counsel of Clarity Yes. Counsel Flynn. Yes. Counsel of Flynn. Yes. Counsel. Lara. Yes. Cancellara, yes. Cox. Allusion yes. Counsel. Region Yes. Counsel Let me hear. Yes. Counsel Let me hear you. Yes. Counsel to Murphy. Counsel Murphy Yes. And Counsel. World Yes. Counsel World Yes. Stuck in numbers 0435 has received a unanimous vote in the affirmative. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Corrupt Caucus 0435 has passed in a new draft. Mr. Carr, please read docket 05360537 in Dawkins 06708 Together Police.

Committee Reports

On the message and order, referred on March 30, 2022, Docket #0435, Petition for a Special Law re: An act authorizing the City of Boston to grant four additional licenses for the sale of alcoholic beverages to be drunk on the specified premises, the committee submitted a report recommending the petition ought to pass in a new draft. The report was accepted; the petition was passed in a new draft; yeas 13.

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BostonCC_06292022_2022-0626

Speaker 3: 22 increases contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the Boston Public Health Commission. And Ask Me Council 93 submits a report recommending that this man are to pass docket number 0626, the Committee on City Services and Innovation Technology, to which was referred on May 18, 2022. Docket number 0626 Message In order for the supplemental appropriation order for the Boston Public Health Commission for fiscal year 22 in the amount of $123,291 to cover the fiscal year 22 cost items contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the Boston Public Health Commission. And ask me Council 93. The terms of the contract contracts are October 1st, 2020 through September 30th, 2023. The major provisions of the contract include base wage increases of 2%, 1.5% and 2% to be given in January of each fiscal year of the contract term submits a report recommending that the matter are to pass filed in the Office of the City Clerk on May 16, 2022. I can have a zero 6 to 7. The Committee on City Services and Innovation Technology, to which was referred on May 18, 2022, so I could 0627 message in order for your approval in order to reduce fiscal year 22 appropriation for the reserve for collective bargaining between $94,113 to

Mayor Order

On the message and order, referred May 18, 2022, Docket 0626, for the supplemental appropriation Order for the Boston Public Health Commission for FY22 in the amount of One Hundred Twenty Three Thousand Two Hundred and Ninety One Dollars ($123,291.00) to cover the FY22 cost items contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the Boston Public Health Commission and AFSCME, Council 93. The terms of the contracts are October 1, 2020 through September 30, 2023. The major provisions of the contract include base wage increases of 2%, 1.5% and 2% percent to be given in January of each fiscal year of the contact term, the committee submitted a report recommending the order ought to pass. The report was accepted; the order was passed.

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BostonCC_06292022_2022-0628

Speaker 3: provide funding for the Inspection Services Department for fiscal year 22. Increases contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the City of Boston and the Office and Professional Employees International Union. Local six OPI You submits a report recommending that this matter ought to pass in talking members zero 6 to 8, the Committee on City Services and Innovation Technology , to which was referred May 18, 2022. Docket number 062a message in order for the supplemental appropriation order for the Inspectional Services Department for fiscal year 22 in the amount of $94,113 to cover the fiscal 22 costs contained within the collective cost items contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the City of Boston and the Office of Professional Employee and to National Union. Local six OPI you the terms of the contract set July. First 2020 through June 30 is 2023. The major provisions of the contract include base wage increases of 2%, 1.5% and 2% given to be given in October of each fiscal year of the contract term submits a report recommending that this matter ought to pass. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The chair recognizes counsel, board chair of the Committee on City Services, Innovation Technology Council. Bach, you have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you so much, Mr. President. And thank you to yourself and my colleague, Councilor Murphy, for joining me for this hearing on last Friday, June 17th. These are both relatively small units, one of the Boston Public Health Commission, and then the other are here in our esteemed department. And the proposals for these contracts really tracked. And we're the ones that we've been hearing in other units. So in the case of the C one App City Council 93 represents a large number of city workers. And we've actually already approved a very similar contract for the units here in City Hall. But this is the unit that works with PHC. And we heard testimony from our Budget Director, Jim Williamson, the Director of Labor Relations, Rene Ritchie, and then also from the PHC, their chief labor and employment counsel, David Sausage. And it was a good opportunity to get a sense of the overall Labor context lay of the land for the PHC. They have eight bargaining units and most of them are also up for contract negotiation. This is the first one I think to come in, but it's the same as the 93 deal on this side in terms of the pattern. So it's a 2% raise coming back effective January 2021. Their cycles are slightly different than ours, so most of are like September, but this is January at 1.5 and 2%. Again, Juneteenth was added to the contract as a recognized holiday and it was the vaccination requirement was added. There's also a one time lump sum of $1,000 per member that will be paid in FY 22, obviously of what, 22 ends tomorrow. So I know that the folks who are waiting for this money to come through are eager for us to approve it. It's not a huge number of people. It's 52 members. And the total number here at stake is $123,000. And per usual, there's two dockets, one to pull it out of the collective bargaining reserve and another to actually appropriate it to the health commission. And then the API you have, one is for $94,000, and those are some members of that unit in in our city department. And besides the same pattern of 2%, 1.5% and 2%, the only real substantive change was this a military leave policy update. And so we actually did ask them to send along to us the military leave policy with the kind of red line changes just so we could know it was tracking a change that had happened on the federal level. But, you know, obviously, I think both President Flynn and Councilor Murphy expressed the desire for the city of Boston to be making it as easy as possible for workers in the city who go on military weeks to access benefits in that way. So we discussed that as well. And my recommendation as Chair is that, again, we have a pair of dockets, one to take it out of the collective bargaining reserve and one to pay folks. And my recommendation is that all four of these dockets, Mr. President, off pass. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. We will now take a vote on each of these dockets separately. Council. Bork, the chair of the Committee on City Services Innovation Technology, seeks acceptance of the committee report and passage of the docket 0625. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Opposed. Nay, the ayes have it. The docket. His house counsel block. The chair of the Committee on City Services Innovation Technology seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of docket 0626. All those in favor say aye. Aye. I oppose same nay. The ayes have it. The docket is passed. Council of Off the chair of the Committee on City Services Innovation Technology seeks acceptance of the Committee report passage of Docket 0627. All those in favor say aye. I oppose saying the ayes have it. The docket has passed council. But the chair of the Committee on City Services Innovation Technology seeks acceptance of the committee report passage of docket 0628. All those in favor say I. I opposed say now the ayes have it. The docket has passed. Matters recently heard for possible action. Mr. Clerk, please read docket 0762 and 0763 together, please.

Mayor Order

On the message and order, referred on May 18, 2022, Docket 0628, for the supplemental appropriation Order for the Inspectional Services Department for FY22 in the amount of Ninety Four Thousand One Hundred Thirteen Dollars ($94,113.00) to cover the FY22 cost contained within the collective cost items contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the City of Boston and the Office and Professional Employee International Union Local 6 (OPEIU). The terms of the contracts are July 1, 2020 through June 30, 2023. The major provisions of the contract include base wage increases of 2%, 1.5% and 2% percent to be given in October of each fiscal year of the contact term, the committee submitted a report recommending the order ought to pass. The report was accepted; the order was passed.

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BostonCC_06292022_2022-0503

Speaker 0: Thank you. Back in session. Mr. Clerk, please read your 05030504 together, please. Document the 0503 method for. Speaker 3: Authorizing the city of Boston. Speaker 2: To accept. 49. Speaker 3: State Treasury to be administered by the city of Boston as chief financial officer. Collect Treasurer. This grant payment is made from the coronavirus state and local fiscal recovery from fund in the Treasury of the United States, established by Section 9901 of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, also known as a RPA. Pursuant to the requirements of the AARP, the grant payment would fund COVID 19 response and recovery efforts and accelerate a Green New Deal for Boston through a once in a generation transformative investments that address the systemic health and economic challenges in the areas of affordable housing, economic opportunity and inclusion, behavioral health, climate and mobility. Arts and culture and early childhood stalking numbers 0504 Message In honor authorizing the city of Boston to accept and expand the amount of $40 million in the form of a grant awarded by the United States Department of the Treasury to be administered by the city of Boston's Chief Financial Officer.

Mayor Order

Message and order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expend the amount of Three Hundred Forty Nine Million Five Hundred Thousand Dollars ($349,500,000.00) in the form of a grant, awarded by the United States Department of Treasury, to be administered by the City of Boston’s Chief Financial Officer/Collector Treasurer. This grant payment is made from the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund (SLFRF) in the Treasury of the United States established by Section 9901 of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) Pursuant to the requirements of the ARPA, the grant payment would fund COVID-19 response and recovery efforts and accelerate a Green New Deal for Boston through once-in-a-generation, transformative investments that address the systemic health and economic challenges in the areas of affordable housing, economic opportunity and inclusion, behavioral health, climate and mobility, arts and culture and early childhood. Councilor Baker offered a motion to Amend Docket #0503 by reducing the Mayor's Office of Housing by $5,000,000.00 and adding $5,000,000.00 for the

BostonCC

BostonCC_06292022_2022-0504

Speaker 3: Arts and culture and early childhood stalking numbers 0504 Message In honor authorizing the city of Boston to accept and expand the amount of $40 million in the form of a grant awarded by the United States Department of the Treasury to be administered by the city of Boston's Chief Financial Officer. Collect the Treasury. This grant payment is made from the coronavirus, state and Local Fiscal Fiscal Recovery Fund. CEO f r. F in the Treasury of the United States, established by Section 9901 of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 A are paid pursuant to the requirements of a pay. The grant payment would fund provisions of government services to the extent of the reduction in revenue of such state territorial tribal government due to the COVID 19 Public Health Emergency Relief relative to revenues collected in the most recent full fiscal fiscal year of the state territorial tribal government prior to the emergency. Speaker 0: Thank you. The Chair recognizes Council Board Chair of the Committee on Boston's COVID 19 Recovery Council. BLOCK You have the floor. Speaker 7: So much, Mr. President, and I'm going to speak to these dockets in reverse order just because 504 is a little bit simpler. 504 is a docket. The American Rescue Plan Act makes provision for local governments to receive this funding directly, as Boston did, and to use some of it to just replace government revenues in places where revenues went down because of the pandemic. In Boston, that happened in particular in our departmental revenues and things like hotel excise taxes, meals, taxes, etc. there there's also a series of deferral provisions for a lot of those. So in in but in the budget books in the city produce, there's is sort of documentation of the ways in which those resources are off where they would have been without the pandemic. And so related to that provision, the city the mayor proposed this $40 million docket, which is actually there to balance on the revenue side, the budget that we were just discussing and voting on. And so it is it is an important docket to making sure that we actually meet the Commonwealth's obligation for the city of Boston to have a balanced budget for the fiscal year that starts in two days. And so because of that, I'm going to be moving out of committee and recommending passage. Um, and so I know we'll get to that vote in a moment. The other docket, it's 503 is the proposal from Mayor Wu for the expenditure of the rest of the ARPA. Funds that were sent to the city is general revenue and it's first 349.5 million. And as folks know, it came in at the same time as the budget. And the investments that are focused in this docket have been the subject of a lot of conversation, both in the budget process in which they came up again and again as, Oh, what, we're not doing our budget, but we're able to do that on our budget, etc. And then within our committee we've had eight hearings and five working sessions to hear from the public. My colleagues in the administration on this proposal, the largest part of the proposal, 206 of the $349.5 million is for housing and is then is subdivided into a number of sub dockets related to supportive housing to homeownership , a record 60 million investment in this docket, along with some other city funds in homeownership, creating housing on public land, something that's very near dear to me and just like a large number of things. And then another 150 is split between these categories of climate, arts and culture, economic inclusion, child care, a $15 million investment, and really having the city lead a real renovation of our child care system with an eye to trying to drive better reimbursement rates and policies in the state as the state takes that up in the coming session. Um, and so a lot of good things in here and as the council's held. Hearings on that. I think there's been a lot of things that have come to the fore that we've been talking about. At the same time, the feeling of the body, I think it's safe to say, was a sense of frustration that we had not had the opportunity as a council to formally talk about things that we'd like to do with this transformative money. Ahead of the proposal by the mayor side to utilize all 249.5. And so there were a lot of great ideas that councilors were also bringing to the table that were not included in the proposal as files. And so that's something that at our committee we've tried to make space for along the way. We started we in late April suggested that folks start filing dockets related to things that they'd like to see us talk about for ARPA. We noticed those dockets with a series of hearings on different topic areas. So, you know, a number of those were noticed and discussed. And then more recently, we also we also invited folks to file amendments and discuss those and in recent working sessions. Well doing that as the chair was also sort of talking to the administration about the question of whether the revenue support docket that they had kind of reserved for next fiscal year. So not the one that we're discussing that starts in two days, but the one a year from now, whether they really needed to be holding quite as much as they had proposed, not least because of sort of the the trends. When you look at how those departmental revenues and excise revenues have been recovering, I think that we're all super, super mindful of the fact that this recovery money is meant to be spent to help the people of Boston recover and help the city recover in a more equitable way and that the need is urgent. So throughout this ARPA process, we've really been balancing the fact that this the need is urgent. And now and all of these things are things that we should have spent money on yesterday. It feels like. And also, even though it's a lot of money, we've all spent it over ten times in our head. And at the same time, because it's a once in a generation kind of amount of money, we want to make sure that we're spending it well and that the that ten years from now we'll be talking about the things that we achieved because of ARPA. And so. Basically the administration ultimately said that they were willing to put most of that money that the 19.7 that they had saved for next year's revenue support in to collaboration with the council. And so there's a $17.7 million docket, which I'm not formally speaking to yet because the late file. So it will come. But I think folks have it on their desks already, which is which demonstrates their willingness to be collaborative with the council and include a huge number of council priorities in the city's ARPA proposal. Additionally, within the committee report, which I filed, there are a number of amendments to their proposal which spell out $12.3 million worth of funds within the three 49.5 that are going to be dedicated to specific council priorities that came up in the process, that sort of aligned with the subject areas that they had already, that they had already highlighted. And so the description of those changes for this docket is in the summary of legislation and amendments is on page two if people look at the committee report. But I'm just going to read them aloud so that people are aware it will be within this docket, dedicating at least $8 million in category affordable housing to creating a pathway to four to affordable homeownership for low and moderate income residents, including a new partnership with the Boston Housing Authority, dedicating at least 1.1 million within the category of affordable housing to support a new pilot model in the style of rapid rehousing to help returning citizens secure housing opportunities. So that's another exciting new pilot, 100,000 for the to expand the Peace Institute's work and sort of emergency housing for families for families victims of violence. A million. And here is for a study to figure out if there's somewhere to be land in south Boston to say veterans housing $1,000,000 within the category of behavioral health to support further behavioral health, capacity building and training for CBOs and city departments. $1,000,000 for supporting the recovery of restaurants and bars in disadvantaged neighborhoods. The city particularly focused on sort of folks who kind of missed the opportunities in a number of the programs that were available at the height of the pandemic. And then another million split between 350 in economic opportunity and inclusion. And 650 in arts and culture to support investment in and activation of an arts corridor in Roxbury. Those things collectively add up to the 12.3. That is within this three $49.5 million docket for council priorities. There's then, as I just mentioned, another 17.7 million folks have on their desk. And I'll speak to that when it's formally the right time, when it's the late file. But those two things collectively, obviously add up to $30 million that that reflect council priorities and integrating those into the proposal of how to use the remainder of ARPA . I just also want to draw folks quick attention to at the last page, the committee report. It says. Additionally, the amended version of the order adds language to specify the shared intention to support both worker cooperatives and sustainable pay increases in the childcare sector. Those are some of the kind of qualitative things that have come up in the discussion about this transformative $15 million investment in child care. And then and then just raising, you know, worker standards and making sure that we've got good, good standards across the board and in the areas that are being funded by that order. So that is the document for us. I know as Chair that it's a hard thing to figure out how to take action on something that feels as momentous as this does. And I have definitely felt acutely the fact that it is both too ambitious to do wrong and also too much to do slowly. Because the reality is that the lion's share of the funding is proposed for housing. People know that I come out of the affordable housing world working for the VHA. Unfortunately, housing development and especially building units as for example, 45 million of the 60 million in the homeownership will be doing takes time and has extended timelines. And this money all needs to be under contract by December 2024, which may seem soon, but is not on that type of timeline. And one of the things we heard was that the the annual kind of RFP process that kicks out our our housing resources and helps us let people know what's available. Usually hits in July. And so for for me as chair, it's been a fine balance of trying to figure out how to make sure that councilors have real fingerprints on this, which I think in this $30 million we do, recognizing also a lot of alignment with the other things of the administration have proposed and also making sure that we get these dollars out to our our communities and to all. The urgent needs in our communities because we hear about those every day. I want to acknowledge before you, the Florida colleagues, that, you know, the administration ended up taking a firm position that they did not want to use ARPA dollars to fund nonprofit infrastructure projects . So infrastructure that's going to be owned by private, nonprofit entities. And certainly as chair, that was not something that I'd heard from them early in this process. And I think a number of councilors and organizations brought really meritorious proposals forward to us. And those are not ultimately included in this, unlike the process that the public just was watching, the appropriation accept and expand orders cannot be overridden by the council. So this is a place where we and the mayor have to reach a point of agreement and collaboration. And I think with these two dockets, not completely, but in large part we're doing that today. And so I ask my colleagues to support passage of this. I'm grateful to the administration for filing the the late supplemental order. And I'll also be moving passage of that later in the meeting. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you. Council balked that she recognizes. Councilman here. Councilman, here. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Chair. I just need some clarity before I vote on anything. If you're saying that you're going to talk about something else later, I just. I'm just curious about. I know we spent a lot of time talking about very specific things. And and for the record, I'd like to make sure that the things that we have agreed upon are read into the record and that there is some sort of agreement on some of the things that we've been pushing for, because there tends to be this, you know, we didn't know that this was going to be the way it was when we were dealing with the interdepartmental conversation that the administration. So we you know, now it's like the administration switched it up, but we can't support nonprofits or like all of these, you know, changes, you know, give people a sense of kind of pause. So I just need some clarity and to get on the record that the things that I'm going to be voting on include the things that we talked about and we fought for. And I just need some assurance around that. And where where does that fall in this? Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you, Councilman. Here. There's a question on the floor from council here. Council block, would you like to respond to this? Speaker 7: I guess the question I have for you and the clerk is that if if it were acceptable to take out of order, the first lady file matter and have it formally read into the record, I would be delighted to do that. The only reason that I wasn't able to do that is because of the. Speaker 4: Order of our. Speaker 7: Procedure in that meeting. So I don't know if you. Speaker 4: Not only. Speaker 0: Was. I went to the hospital. 420. We'll do it after. Speaker 7: Sorry. Mr. President, can I also clarify? I received from the messenger city messenger the committee report of the late file. Or do other people not have that on their table? You don't have your. Yeah. The $17.7 million docket. It's in the triple packet of late files. Speaker 2: I haven't. Say that. Speaker 0: We'll take a brief recess. Speaker 2: Thank you, Mr.. Speaker 0: That she recognizes. Counsel Bork. Counsel Bork, you have the floor and then I'll go back to counsel here. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President, just now that I think everybody has both items. I just want to clarify one more time, because we I know we discussed in the working session yesterday when we were talking about those two columns. Right. There's some so maybe it's procedurally helpful to know we're not allowed to amend the mayor's appropriation orders to be higher than the original number that was proposed. So the way that the 30 million is split is 12.3 of it is out of the 349.5 order that stock at 503 and 17.7 is out of this new late filed supplemental order. So the various council priorities are split between those two things. So if you're looking for something, you may find it in the list that I just read into the record from 503, or you may find it stipulated in the 17.7 order. So I just wanted to specify that for councilors, just to be clear that that's where everything is. So thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. Look, the chair recognizes Councilor Baker was next. Counsel Baker, you have the floor. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. President. Still some more than somewhat uncomfortable voting on this here today, after the day we've had still not totally square clear where a lot of things are going. I believe we could split this up into smaller buckets. Whatever, whatever has a priority, if it's a housing for our priority. We could be passed in 50 or 100 million today without a problem and be able to have this be a working sort of relationship here. With all that being said, I would like to offer an amendment to an amendment to trademark at 503 by reducing on what the only way that I could identify was on the Google document that came to me, which was line 20, massing cars, temporary low threshold shelter sites by 5 million, and adding 5 million in for the Georgia Tech field house. Just to be clear, that low threshold housing, that 16 million, we've already given them at least 5 million. Now for the low threshold housing, I think the number is is much higher than that. But what they've what they agree to is 5 million. And also the temporary low threshold housing is something that that community down there doesn't want. When we talk about we talk about decentralization and this this low threshold housing en masse. And Cass, make sure that that that issue that's going on down there is centralized down there for our entire lives. And in just for clarity, 5 million coming off the 206 million in housing brings that down to 201 million. A little bit of math. We just we just approved 70 million earlier in this mail, in this meeting, 70 million in grants from the feds for housing. So the 70 million plus the 201 million minus my 5 million, we're talking about $271 million here that that can potentially go through here today. So I'm going to and you all have the amendment in front of you pretty straightforward. 5 million from the low threshold that housing down on en masse and gas and replace that with 5 million for the Dorchester Field House, which we all had a hearing on. I know the administration says they don't want to build infrastructure for nonprofits but will just pound money into them. That'll be that'll be gone. And we'll say we're talking about in ten years, it's all going to be a distant memory. The only thing we're going to be able to look at is going to be this. I was so I'm looking for a second on that as the president. Speaker 0: Thank thank you. Counsel Baker. Um. Mr. Clarke, do you want to read it into the record first or should we? Yeah, we're going to read it into the record. Yeah. Mr. Clarke, please read that into the record of. Speaker 3: Councilor Frank David. Speaker 2: Until they come to an end. Speaker 1: 05033. Speaker 3: NASCAR's temporary, so special, so to say, $5 million and $5 million for the Dorchester Fieldhouse. Speaker 0: Is there a second? There is a second counsel firing second to Mr.. Speaker 1: President, based on the people that are in the room here, I mean, we're going to should we wait till people come back in the room for this photo? Because one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Speaker 0: Yeah. We'll wait for them to. Speaker 1: Call somebody for. Speaker 0: Us. We'll take we'll take a brief recess. Back in session. Please take your seat, everybody. Please take your seats, everybody. The the motion is properly before the body. And it has been second in at this time. Would anyone like to speak on this matter? Okay. The chair recognizes Councilor Borg Council book you of the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, President Flynn. If I could. Get city funding. Through the proper process to council Bakersfield house. I would I chaired the hearing that many folks attended. I thought it was compelling. I think despite the disagreement between people about the history of how the field house land was transferred or whatever, that there a really incredible vision there . And personally, as a private citizen, I hope to find opportunities to support it. I have received the clearest communication, including an informal letter which I read to the Council on Monday, that the mayor is not willing to support nonprofit infrastructure, including the field house. If this amendment goes on the three 49.5 docket, then that docket will be vetoed by the mayor. And also the mayor will not be signing the 17.7 supplemental. I if I sound tired, it's not actually because of the length of this meeting. It's because I've only slept between one and five in the morning the last two nights trying to get everybody stuff into these combined dockets. If people want to go back to the drawing board, and I understand that from Councilor Baker's perspective, it makes sense both because this item is not in it and because he doesn't think we should be moving on this money all at once. Anyways, if folks agree, fine. But I think people need to be aware of what that amendment vote is. And I also think and I say this with with due respect and affection for my colleague here, that there is a difference between supporting the field House and backing an amendment for the field House that is effectively a poison pill to the effort to try to achieve council and mayoral collaboration on ARPA. So that's where I am as the chair and I'll be voting in opposition to the amendment. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Council chair recognizes Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker, you have the floor. Speaker 1: I don't understand. Poison pill here. So if my 5 million gets in, it automatically gets gets vetoed from across the hall for no reason other than it's mine. So what am I supposed to do? People ask me to withdraw this here. You know, I've been disrespected through this thing here. In my opinion, a letter. A letter is. Is is read into the record, an informal record, because they say we can't build stuff. Speaker 4: Without the money. Speaker 1: You can't build stuff, put up the money. It's all going to be contracts. Not right. Not fair. I don't see us doing enough for our kids, for our teens, for people to get healthy after this after this pandemic. This is going to do that. Speaker 2: There's three housing developments right around it. What are you waiting for? MAN Whoa! What are you waiting for? Veto it. I want to go put it over there and have her veto it. That's what I want. Speaker 1: Veto the 350, because you're two stuck up. Thank you, Mr. President, for allowing me to have the floor. Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilor Baker. Wanna take a brief recess? We're back in session. Speaker 1: Right. So. I mean. Speaker 0: Okay. We're back in session. The chair at this time. The chair recognizes. Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker, thank you. You have the floor. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. President. I would like to withdraw the current motion and replace it. New language, please. And Alex has a new language called Castle. Speaker 0: Baker is seeking to withdraw the previous amendment. Previous motion. He also provided a another motion that everyone should have now on their on their desk. Mr. Clarke, will you read that into the record, please? Speaker 3: Motion of Councilor Frank Baker. Councilor Baker moves to amend Docket 0503 by reducing the Mayor's Office of Housing by $5 million and adding $5 million for the Dorchester Field House. Speaker 0: The chair recognizes counsel Baker. Counsel Baker. You have the floor. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Chair. And if this if this passes with this amendment in here, we would have still, as a body passed, $271 million that will go towards housing. Just today. That's with my $5 million amendment. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilor Baker. Any discussion on this matter for my colleagues. Speaker 1: We need a second on new. I'm sorry. We need a second on the language. Speaker 0: Second on no language. The second is by Councilor Murphy. The chair recognizes Councilor Murphy. I mean, I'm sorry. The Chair recognizes Councilman. Here. Councilman, here. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. President. I just think it's important for those who are watching for us to get some clarity in terms of my kind of what does that play here? Because I keep hearing if we do this, then this will happen. And if we don't do this, this will happen. So I need to have it really clearly laid out about what is at play and what is the impact of what is at play. Just so that we can all be clear, because there's a lot of fear tactics, there's a lot of uncertainty. There's a lot of ways you can do this and you can't do that. I need it all laid out and I need the truth. On the floor. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Councilman here. There's a question on the floor from councilman here on if we can explain the process a little. A little bit. Can I call on the chair council block? If you're able to give us a little bit of background information that might might be helpful to our colleagues. Speaker 7: Sure. Well, I would just say I'm not a lawyer. And, you know, I think that the the question on the table, like in terms of what that's what's at stake. Council over here depends a little bit on how you read Section 17 of the charter, it appears. So if Section 17 of the charter applies, then it's possible for the mayor to to receive this and to disapprove in part of the appropriation and approve the rest of it. So that that would sort of that would allow the council to indicate support for Councilor Baker's idea and then send it across the fifth floor and see what happens. If you don't read 17 DE as applying to this and the reason that there's a question is because it's. It's a question of whether it discounts enough of that appropriation or if it's going to accept and expand because it's federal money. And I just don't I'm not legally able to answer that question. I think I think lawyers on both sides have been looking at that in the last 20 minutes. If it if 17 days doesn't apply, then we're in the situation that I described a minute ago, which is that there's no way except to do in like a rejection at whole. So I think that's like there's just genuine uncertainty. But I think that our council and the council is taking the position that that we could make this amendment from Councilor Baker and then the mayor's office would be able to the mayor would be able to to make, you know, any selected vetoes. I will say. It's I don't think. I yeah. I'm pretty confident that we haven't had any selective like vetoing of appropriations in the time that I've been on the council. I don't know Councilor Flaherty, who would have a considerably longer record. So so I would just say that this is not been a general practice. And to be honest, it isn't it's not really something that I love the idea of just bringing into practice, because I think as a council we like the idea that when we vote for an appropriation, sort of we're voting for the whole package and that the mayor that signs or doesn't sign the whole package. But I can't answer the question and I don't think anyone on the floor is going to be able to definitively answer the legal question of the interpretation of 17 D, but it's certainly possible the 17 D applies here and that therefore we could pass Councilor Baker's amendment and then the mayor could make a decision on that and the rest of the appropriation could go through. But I can't give you certainty. I'm not equipped to. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Does anybody else have any questions or comments? The chair recognizes Counsel Baker at this time. Counsel Baker you have the floor. Speaker 1: So what was said to me, councilman here sounded like a threat, was it? If my 5 million get in there, the mayor across the hall was going to veto the 350. That doesn't seem like leadership to me. You're going to because I get something in this 350 million. And to speak to this point over here, we're never going to have this opportunity ever again. So we're never going to have 350 million in front of us ever again. This is our only time right here. We're looking to pass it like as quick as we possibly can. There's no rush to pass this here today. We could have cut this up into 100 million and housing 50 million in this. And we're dumping money into into into nonprofits all over the place. So I was threatened with this mayor going to veto 350 million because I got 5 million in there. And now the discussion is, Oh yeah, well, she'll be able to just veto it anyway. Should I feel happy today? Should I feel like I've been uplifted today? Should I feel like I'm part of this body or part of this city today? No. And this fieldhouse isn't for me. I'm not going to go there. This fieldhouse is for the kids that you all met here. You all met them. You all fell in love with them. Speaker 4: That's who was. Speaker 1: On the board to make sure that they had what they wanted in the fieldhouse sway. It cost $55 million. That's why we should be building this sort of infrastructure all around the city. Build this one here, and then you'll see what we need to build for infrastructure. Let's stop giving away contracts. 350 million basically in contracts all out the door. We're not building any city infrastructure. We're not we're not doing anything with it. That's a strong statement. We're not doing anything. We're doing plenty with it. But we're not going to be able to, like we say, look, back in ten years and look at the good we did. Nobody's going to remember anything. They don't pay attention to legislation. Don't pay attention where money goes. They pay attention to good services. We're looking to give good services to door Chisholm. Three housing developments around it. All black and brown kids in an opportunity zone. What's your problem? Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilor Baker, the chair. Recognize this council? Our council, where you have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, President Flynn. I would just. I just rise to chair in both the chair and Councilor Baker's frustration about the process. I think that Councilor Baker did an incredible amount of work, held hearings where young people came and spoke to the council, gave similarly impassioned speeches about the impact that this feedback was going to have in his neighborhood and effectively moved a lot of the council that wasn't supportive of getting the field house to be supportive of the field house because of the incredible amount of work that he did to get last minute word that the mayor wasn't going to be supporting. That is incredibly is incredibly frustrating. And so I share in that frustration in terms of the process. With that said, I do think that it's disingenuous to say that this is for the young people after we. Councilor Baker effectively just took a vote to help kill an amendment that was supposed to be for youth jobs. And so, although I admire his spirit and I share his frustration with the process, we have had plenty of opportunities here to make sure that we're giving investing in young people. And Councilor Baker has not taken them. And so I think that that stance is a little bit disingenuous. However, that is not the reason why I won't be supporting this amendment. I won't be supporting this amendment because as the Chair of Housing and Community Development, I cannot make a case for removing $5 million from housing or the ARPA funds. We're in the middle of a housing crisis. We need all of this money. Low threshold housing is a proven evidence based practice that's going to help people move through addiction and into permanent housing. And so I just want to I just want to say that I'm not going to be supporting this. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Counsel to the chair recognizes counsel royal counsel of Royal U of the for you. Speaker 1: President Flynn, I have a question which is mostly around the timing of. I know why we have a deadline for the city budget because at a certain point it goes into a 112. I have a question about whether or not there's an urgency to pass this today when we still don't have that, at least what I'm hearing concrete sort of legal analysis as to what this will do or if this can get sort of put off until the next meeting, when we can have a further analysis on this from corporation counsel, from our own counsel and do that. I don't know if there's an urgency that I'm not aware of, which I'm happy to hear sort of the details, too, as to why this has to go through today when I think a lot of folks here are trying to figure out exactly what is happening from a legal standpoint. So I think that's for the chair that. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. Very fair question, but I don't have the answer to that. COUNSEL Royal, if any of my colleagues have any information on that, that might be helpful to the body. The chair recognizes a block. Speaker 7: Sure. Thank you, Mr. President. So on that, I mean, one of the reasons that. One of the reasons that we're moving this today is because of the fact that the. That Council. Sorry, guys, I really am very tired. We're doing this today in part because, as I mentioned, a huge amount of the housing. Money. Money is housing. And there is a. Mayor's Office of Housing Annual RFP that goes out in July. And it's the way that they start the process of making housing funds available. And one of the reasons why the timeline of that is important, as opposed to just like, oh, it's up to August, etc., is because of the way that for affordable housing projects like local funds line up with state funds and federal funds and there's like a whole kind of cycle process. And if you miss a level, then you often have to wait a year because of how the timing is done. And so again, because the money has to be spent by 2024, like all the contracts have to be signed by then, has to be totally spent by 2026, but you have to have obligated every dollar by 24 . It's that that was one of the things that precipitated the ask. I know there are also some specific things because councilors have reached out to me about particular council priorities where the urgent need is now. I do just also want to say I like. I, I totally feel the impassioned, like sense for Councilor Baker about the field house. What I reject is the idea that the field house is the only real thing that we are talking about with the three, with the 349.5 and then the 17.7. I mean, we're talking about everything from the extension of the green jobs program that has just launched for us to, as I mentioned before, the creation of $45 million worth of home ownership units. The building of housing on public land actually adds a whole nother level from a time perspective to acquiring. I think you have to go through the whole process, right, of RFP and public process, etc. and then you try to spend the money to build housing. I just think like the child care, I mean, to me, child care is one of those things where there's of course something left at the end because every kid who gets touched by an investment in child care and every family where someone's able to hold a job because they're able to put their kid in affordable child care or off hours. Child care like council over here, champion is package like. That's all real. So I don't buy the idea that the field house is real and everything else is imaginary. And I just want to be really clear that the reason that we had to go to. Speaker 4: The. Speaker 7: Mayor's office and and ask them to reconsider making the harbor funds that are being held for next year's budget available to the council was because, frankly, there were so many real things in the original proposal that there wasn't sufficient appetite to get rid of them. And so what we've added are more real priorities, which again, I've just spent the last week hearing from all of you colleagues about the importance of and so I just it's I just want to say there are an enormous number of things that when we talk about a Green New Deal and we talk about, you know, transforming the city of Boston for the better after COVID, like the things that people get excited about, they want to see them become real. And what it's going to take is the money to actually be appropriated and start getting spent. And, you know, so I feel very strongly as well about the reality of the things in the appropriation today. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you, counsel Buck. Councilman here. Did you have your chair? Speaker 4: Because those on. Speaker 0: The chair recognize this council. I'm here. And let me just say, before councilman here speaks, I can only have one person speaking at a time. And if you want to speak, raise your hand or hit the button and I will call on you. The chair recognizes. Councilman here. Councilman, here. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you. He realized my light was still on. But since you called on me, I'll use the time to just say something really quick. I think there's a lesson for us to learn in this entire process that I have come to see a reoccurring pattern. And for me, oftentimes I move on principle and process. And I think these two things. What I continue to see is we have a lot to grow from and learn from. As it relates to not just this conversation just overall. So I'm just going to consider this as fits and starts. Like we're all figuring things out and assuming the best intentions, right? Because it is what it is. But to what is the most frustrating for me and I'll just speak for myself is the the last minute switch ups and information that comes trickle down. And it seems like. It just makes it really hard for us to make informed decisions when we don't have all of the facts in front of us. And I hope that we can all learn from from this journey. And I still say that while I do appreciate the explanation, it doesn't. I'm still stuck on how we got here to begin with. But I you don't have to go belabor the point. I just want to say for the record that I it still feels to me that this whole entire journey since we've entered this budgeting process , whether it be through the operating or whether it be through this, it just feels like the administration and the council. We've done our due diligence to find common ground. And it feels like sometimes when we get there the. Things switch up at the last minute, and that's frustrating and that's hard to build trust when you never know what you're walking into. So I just think as we continue to move forward in our journey here that, you know, either I ask better questions so I can be better informed, so I'll take ownership for that. But then I think that there's some work that everybody needs to do, including the administration, so that we can be set up for success in the next go round. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilman. Somebody here, the chair recognizes counsel. Clarity. Counsel, clarity. You have the floor. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. President. And obviously, through the through the chair to the original question, there's no time since sensitivity on it with respect to other than the the fees that go out. And we do have up until I think the 24th but through the chair, I just want to state has done tremendous work on it. I've served in that capacity the last two years and just to try to herd and pull things together and deal with the different priorities and personalities and also dealing with the administration. It's it's tough stuff. So she's done tremendous work, I believe, obviously, in in the field house and the generations of of young people and families that that will serve. And I do believe that that that that should be, I guess, serviced and funded and supported by ARPA funds. I think that's exactly what they're for and getting to a position of having things be shovel ready and to get those services, those support and wraparound services around kids and families is, is really what makes this job an exciting thing to do when you can transform lives, children, families, neighborhoods and so this field how speaks to that and I think that that was sort of the spirit the intense behind ARPA that said through the chair to the original question is I guess was the question is it possible to table this I guess is the question. And I think that that is true. And but I would also, as a courtesy through the chair to the to and through the President to the chair, given the time and effort that has gone into her work here. Just want to make sure that we sort of we're not disrespecting her in that process. But it is a fair ask. We meet again back here on July the 13th. There seems to be some concerns about this issue and some tension and uneasiness about whether they're supporting or not supporting and what does it mean and what does it mean? And then the lawyers, I don't want to see Adam stop doing the shifty swerving again. And clearly, I want Christine, our attorney, in the room, frankly, just so that we're getting a sort of a full focus on it. But if this is a situation where we need to maybe get the legal interpretation, that's a good purpose potentially for a table. Or if there's a push and pull of this, where as a legislative branch of city government, we do believe that the field house should be included in ARPA funding and we need some additional time to convince folks that that's appropriate. Or if folks just because we've been here now since noon and folks just want to kind of, you know, vote your conscience for all that. But I think the initial question was, is it time sensitive? The question is no, but there are some RFP dates that through the through the presence of the chair need to be need to be adhered to. But also the other question I thought I heard was, can we table this? Which was not sort of answered, but I don't want to speak for you, Mr. President, or the chair or the maker of the amendment. It's kind of not my space. We've got a measure of an amendment that's been seconded. You as the president, obviously as the chief parliamentarian here. And then we also have the chair of the committee, and then we actually have a legitimate ask from one of our colleagues. And so within that sort of happy to just offer advice on it, but I want to defer it to the folks that have spent the time and have put the effort into this process yet. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel. Clarity. And it's a it's a fair question. It's a fair question that Counsel Arroyo also brought up as well is what what is the time frame of this? There was a question from you, counsel, clarity as to what would counsel a bake a table this until we get more advice, we get a better opinion , we get more information from our central staff, also from legal counsel, probably at the at the mayor's office. That was the question I believe you asked, counsel, clarity and counsel Arroyo asked. I'm going to call on counsel Counsel Baker But before I do that, I would like to call on counsel BORK if you want to address that , because I think you might have some information that might be helpful to the body. Speaker 4: So that is. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. What I would say is, in terms of order of operations, I think that Counselor Baker has an active and seconded amendment on the docket that I've been speaking to. I think we need to take a vote on that docket. I think that is depending on whether the amendment fails or passes. I could address the question of tabling, but I can't I don't feel like I can address the question of tabling a docket where. The. Where where it's not clear yet what docket we're talking about. It's either the one that was originally proposed or the one modified as by Councilor Baker. Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you, Counsel. BLOCK I know I'm going to call on counsel. Baker Then I'm going to call on counsel. Arroyo After counsel. Baker You were next. Speaker 1: I have no right to withdraw this. To withdraw this. I want to see a vote on this. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel and Counsel Arroyo. Speaker 1: That sort of answers the question. I was going to say if it was withdrawn to the table, but it sounds like that's been answered. Speaker 0: So thank you, counsel. No further comments. No further questions. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. The chair recognizes counsel to counsel. You have the floor. Speaker 4: I withdraw my question. It was answered. Speaker 0: Okay. The chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Counsel Fernandez. Innocent. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. Madam Chair, are you able to answer about tabling this at all? Speaker 0: I'm sorry. Speaker 7: I just. Yeah, I just want to. Speaker 0: Give counsel back. Speaker 7: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So if Councilor Baker's amendment were to fail, then the docket would not face this legal question. So obviously, I would not be looking to table it if Counselor Baker's amendment were to succeed. Then the legal question would be on the table and then, like, you know, like consider tabling it. You might want to have further conversation the body. But but yes, that's why that's why I said it matters, because if the amendment fails, then there wouldn't be a legal reason to table it for two weeks. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. It's it's my understanding in talking to the clerk that the only way it could be tabled is if Counsel Baker agreed to table it. Speaker 7: His amendment. Yes. Speaker 0: Yes. Speaker 1: I saw that. No. Speaker 0: You have the full council back? Speaker 1: Yeah, I can see this. Speaker 4: This doesn't get any. Speaker 1: Better if this goes longer. This is my time right here. I want to see a vote on this. I've asked, you know, we should have had some sort of expression of of support on this. I had the hearing we had the hearing back in April. Four people have known this for four months. So this if this goes two weeks or whatever, it doesn't get any better from me. 5 million doesn't get in there. 2 million doesn't get in there. Nothing gets in there for me. So this is my time right here. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel Baker. Counsel Carter is next. Counsel Cleta. And then I'm going to cut it off and we're going to we're going to take a vote. Counsel Clarity of the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you. Council President Flynn Those that know me know that I love to prep and I love legal analysis. And so I would like to see a written response and interpretation from the mayor on Section 17. It sounds like Councilor Baker does not want that to happen. So with the information that is in front of me and the urgency of. The things that I have fought for. I love you, friends. I'm going to vote no. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you, Counsel Carter. Um, we're going to take. We're going to take a vote. I think we've done enough discussing of the matter. We're going to take a vote. Mr. Clerk. We're taking a vote on council. A baker's amendment, although all those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Opposed. Well, Mr. Clarke, would you take a roll call vote, please? Speaker 3: Roll call vote on amendment offered by Councilor Frank Baker. Councilor Arroyo. Yes. Councilor Arroyo. Yes. Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker. Councilor Buck. Councilor Buck. Now. Councilor Braden. Councilor Braden. No. Councilor Coletta. No. Council Leader No. Councilor Fernandes. Sanderson. Yes. Councilor Fernandes Hanson. Yes. Council 30. Council for clarity. Yes. Council Flynn. Yes. Councilor Flynn. Yes. Councilor. No Council and no council. Illusion Council. The Regional Council and me here. Yeah. Council on me here. Yes. Councilor Murphy? Yes. Councilor Murphy. Yes. Council world? Speaker 1: Yes. Speaker 3: Council World. Yes. The amendment of council. Baker has passed eight in the affirmative and five in the negative. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. Speaker 1: Thank you. Speaker 3: So I get. Speaker 0: We're honored to be here to. So what I. Did the chair recognize this council by our council? BLOCK you of the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. Mr. President, at this time, given the fact that my committee report has been amended, I am no longer seeking passage today. I will ask you to keep docket 503 in committee, and I just will note that I will also be seeking that the late file matter referred to earlier goes to the Committee on Boston's COVID 19 recovery. Thank you. Speaker 0: So Council balked. We're not taking action on 0503 at this time. Is that right, Mr. Carter? Speaker 7: Of. No, no, no. Not tried before as well as I have before. I'm still seeking. Speaker 0: Passage. 00503. We'll be back in committee. Speaker 1: Yes, for the clarification. Speaker 0: Next president council take. Speaker 1: Does so meaning when this comes back my amendments in there. Speaker 3: Yes. Speaker 0: The Council. Baker has a question that I'd like to ask the clerk if he would respond to. Speaker 3: Well since the committee report was amended, but it will go back to committee and as amended to add the $5 million. Speaker 1: So it's in now. Speaker 3: Because it was voted 8 to 5. Speaker 1: Look. Speaker 0: The Chair recognizes counsel by counsel of the four. Speaker 7: I would still like to seek passage of Docket 050 for seeing as as was mentioned earlier, that's the that's the 40 million that supports the budget that's already been passed and goes into effect on Friday. Speaker 0: Counsel Bork is seeking passage of 0504 in a new draft. All those in favor say I'm. Speaker 7: Sorry, Mr. President. Not in a new draft. Speaker 0: Original draft? Counsel Bork is seeking passage docket 0504. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed nay. Mr. Carr, can you please take a roll call vote on docket 050 for roll call. Speaker 3: Vote on docket 050 for Counsel Arroyo. Speaker 1: Yes. Speaker 3: Counsel Arroyo. Yes. Counsel Baker. I counsel Baker. I counsel. Yes. Yes. Counsel. Brief. Yes. Counsel Braden. Yes. Counselor Coletta. Counsel Coletta. Yes. Counsel Fernandez Sanderson. Yes. Counsel Fernandez Sanderson Yes. Counsel Clarity. Yes, of course. I heard it. Yes. Counsel thing. Yes. Counsel Flynn. Yes. Counsel of Counsel. Ah, yes. Counsel. Louisiana. Counsel who's in? Yes. Counsel me here. Counselor me here? Yes. Counselor Murphy. Counselor Murphy? Yes. And Counsel World? Yes. Counsel. Well, yes. Talking number 0504 has received a unanimous vote. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Carr. We're on to motions, orders and resolutions at this time. Docket 0503 will be sent back to the committee along with the motion that was passed. We're on slow motion orders and resolutions. Docket 0815 was withdrawn.

Mayor Order

Om the message and order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expend the amount of Forty Million Dollars ($40,000,000.00) in the form of a grant, awarded by the United States Department of the Treasury to be administered by the City of Boston’s Chief Financial Officer/Collector Treasurer. This grant payment is made from the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund (CLFRF) in the Treasury of the United States established by Section 9901 of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA). Pursuant to the requirements of ARPA, the grant payment would fund provisions of government services to the extent of the reduction in revenue of such State, territory, or Tribal government due to the COVID-19 public health emergency relative to revenues collected in the most recent full fiscal year of the State, territory or Tribal government prior to the emergency, the committee submitted a report recommending that the order ought to pass. The report was accepted; the order was passed; yeas 12.

BostonCC

BostonCC_06292022_2022-0817

Speaker 3: Docketed 08170817 Counsels Lara and Flynn offer the following resolution calling for the announcement of a public health crisis related to traffic, safety and injuries and implementation of some prevention policies. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The Chair recognizes Councilor Laura Cancellara. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Chair. Mike. There we go. I rise today to present this resolution alongside Councilor Flynn in the hopes that we'll be able to see the moment for what it is and meet it with the necessary systemic changes. When it comes to road safety here in the city of Boston, in the US, motor vehicle crashes are one of the leading causes of death and they are the leading cause of death for children and adolescents. The State of Massachusetts Department of Transportation's traffic related fatality data data shows that 408 people died in Massachusetts roads in 2021 . These 408 deaths are a 19% spike from 2020 and represent more crash fatalities than any year since 2009. In Boston, EMS has already responded to 1248 car crashes in just 2022, 157 of them, which involved pedestrians in 2016. Magalie Santos Acevedo My nephew's grandmother, was hit and killed by a truck in Eggleston Square while crossing the street. In 2019, Marilyn Wentworth, a lifelong West Roxbury resident, was struck and killed by a car on Center Street. Last year on that same road, West Roxbury resident and City Hall employee James Erni was hit and killed while riding his motorcycle on his way to work. The issue of traffic violence has real consequences. And although on their face, these are accidents, as a city, we have made systemic design and investment decisions that continue to put drivers, cyclists and pedestrians at risk on our streets. I'm often reminded of these systemic failures. When I encountered ghost bikes while on the road and doing my first three months as counselor to pedestrians was struck by vehicles in as many weeks at the same intersection of Center Street and Hastings in West Roxbury. This is a public health emergency that requires planning and financial investment to correct mayor, who has already made a commitment to road safety. And I urge this honorable body to do the same by passing this resolution. To that end, I hope to suspend the rules so that the city council can take a vote today. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilor Lara. Chair now recognizes Councilor Council President Flint. Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilor Royle. And thank you, Councilor, for asking me to be part of this and appreciate the working relationship I've had with you council over on this on this issue and working with my colleagues as well on this issue, it's probably the issue I spent the most amount of time with since I came onto the council . One of the first hearings I had was with Councilor Baker on trying to reduce the speed limit from 25 to 20 miles an hour. And I reference that because going 25 miles an hour on a residential street residential neighborhood in Boston is is reckless. It's outrageous. There's no reason that anyone should be driving 25 miles to a residential street. Our streets are narrow. I grew up on a narrow street in south Boston called Gold Street. And cars are going up that street 40, 50 miles an hour. And there's children and elderly people there. And it's not just my street. It's the streets across the city of Boston. Many, many people know my parents. They're elderly and they walk everywhere with with with their special needs, a grand grandson who stays with them several days a week. And even when they're walking up to the library in South Boston or to the supermarket on a Saturday. They'll be in the crosswalk. Two elderly people and a special needs little boy. And cars will go speeding by in 40 miles an hour. And there's a complete disregard for elderly in crosswalks for children with special needs. I see a lot of mothers and fathers taking their little kids to, um, to school as well, to the playground, and people won't let them cross the street in cars. So I agree with the Laura. This is a public health emergency of focus on this, as I mentioned, with Councilor Baker as well. And we also need to educate people about. Being respectful drivers and being and being considerate to others. We also need to do major infrastructure improvements that will address pedestrian safety issues throughout the city of Boston Council and mentioned several people that were were killed because of these these accidents or crashes. I've had several in my neighborhood as well, including a young woman on the corner of Summer Street and Belcher Street a while back. And I had a I had a young a young boy who was five years old, Colin McGrath, who was who was struck and killed. On on Elm Street. But it's an issue that we need to continue to focus on. We're never going to solve the issue, never going to solve the problem. But we have to stay on top of pedestrian safety related issues. And that's our job as city council, as is making sure that we provide the safest, the safest neighborhood for our children, for our families, but especially but especially our seniors and persons with disabilities . Thank you, Mr.. Thank you, Councilor. I'll and thank you, Councilor Lara. Speaker 1: Thank you. Council President Flynn. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Seeing no one raise their hand. Would anyone else like to add their name to this? Mr. Clarke, please add Councilor Baker, please add Councilor Bok, please add Councilor Braden, please add Councilor Anderson. Is that Councilor Flaherty. Please add Councilor Louis Jan please at Councilor Coletta please add Councilor me here please add Councilor Murphy. I am pleased that my name councilors Lara and Flynn seek suspension of the rules and adoption of Docket 0817. All those in favor say i, i. All the polls say nay. Thank you, Mr. Clerk. Docket 817 also adopted, I believe. Mr. Clerk, can you please read Docket 0818 into the record?

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution calling for the announcement of a public health crisis related to traffic safety and injuries and implementation of sound prevention policies. Councilor Arroyo in the Chair.

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Speaker 1: All those in favor say i, i. All the polls say nay. Thank you, Mr. Clerk. Docket 817 also adopted, I believe. Mr. Clerk, can you please read Docket 0818 into the record? Speaker 3: I can have a0818 Council sign off of the following resolution recognizing June 27 as National PTSD Awareness Day. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The Chair recognizes Council President Flynn. Council President Flynn, you have the floor. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel. Counselor And may I add Counselor Murphy has an original co-sponsor. Speaker 1: Counsel Murphy So thank you. Speaker 0: Counsel Arroyo I. I wanted to discuss PTSD Awareness Day. It's something I do every year recognizing National PTSD Day, but also Jonas PTSD Awareness Month as well. One of the reasons I focus on this issue is I do a lot of work in my my neighborhood in South Boston on helping veterans and helping military families, returning returning home from from active duty and. I offer this because there are a lot of returning veterans that don't receive the care that they have earned, the medical care they don't access the services. They don't seek assistance at times. And maybe it's also the VA doesn't provide the right the right resources to to veterans and to military families. And the fastest growing group of veterans is women veterans. I had the opportunity to serve in the military for 24 years and. I understand and recognize the importance of the VA medical community and the services that they provide in May, and they provided other returning veterans as well. I went to the Red Sox game with my my wife the other day, and I was walking across the bridge there and there was a sign. Since September. 2001. There's 100,000 U.S. veterans that completed suicide. From 2001 to the present, 100,000 veterans across the country. But what we're trying to do here today is provide. As much services and care as we can to returning veterans and military families, making sure that they have the right services at the right time. I'd also like to highlight the incredible role the City of Boston Veterans Affairs Department plays under my friend Commissioner Rob Santiago. They do an excellent job there reaching me, reaching many veterans. But I just want to say thank you to all of my colleagues and Mayor Will as well for her support and for your support of veterans and military families across our city. Thank you, Councilor. Speaker 1: Thank you. Council President Flynn. The chair recognizes Councilor Murphy. Councilor Murphy. You now have before. Speaker 8: And thank you, President Flynn. So there are about 8 million people in the United States with PTSD. And most people who have this do not get the help they need. This is why I am in full support of President Flynn's resolution to recognize June 27th as PTSD Awareness Day. Everyone with PTSD, whether they are veterans or civilian survivors of sexual assault, serious accidents, natural disasters or other traumatic events need to know that treatments genuinely do work and can lead to a better quality of life. PTSD Awareness Day is a time to talk about post-traumatic stress disorder, focusing on what is in urging people to seek help for themselves or someone they feel is suffering from it. So I do believe now more than ever, mental illnesses is at an all time high catalyzed by the COVID 19 pandemic, and it is crucial to spread awareness and help those struggling, especially those who do so silently. National PTSD Day aims to raise public awareness about the disorder and provide people affected by this access to the proper treatment. And as the Chair of Public Health and Mental Wellness. I am definitely in support of this and helping those who need the mental health supports they need to get them. So thank you very much. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilor Murphy, would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Councilor Fernandez Anderson. The floor is yours. Speaker 5: Thank you. Councilor Arroyo, I support and thank you Council President Flynn for offering this resolution as well as thank you. Councilor Murphy, so many people have served our country in the military and the military and unfortunately have suffered PTSD because of what they experienced. We must educate ourselves as to what PTSD is and to always advocate that each and every one of our veterans get the health care that they need to assist them in living their best lives. All too often we support the troops while a war is going on, but don't really want to think about those same folks once they return home and need housing and work, education and health care. Therefore, I appreciate this offer by being aware of what PTSD is. We can better serve and acknowledge those who need resources and support that they so richly are entitled to. As you know, my son, his dad and a host of my family members are actually in the Marines, in the Army, in the Navy. So I come from a family with a list of military men and women and of course, have worked in the behavioral health and mental health field and deeply. And appreciate you offering this. President Flynn and in interpreters. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, counselor, for names. Anderson, would anyone else like to speak on this matter? When anyone else like to add their name, Mr. Clarke, please add Counselor Baker. Please add Counselor Barclay's. Add Counselor Braden, please. And Counselor Coletta, please. That Counselor Fernandez Anderson. Please add counselor clarity please add counselor Laura please add Counselor Lui Jen De that counselor here please add counselor Murphy please add counselor where I am. Please add my name. Counselors Flynn and Murphy seek suspension of the rules and adoption of Docket 0818. All those in favor say I, I all oppose they. Nay, the ayes have it. Docket 0818 has been adopted. Thank you, Mr. Clarke. Uh, Mr. Clarke, I think we're moving on to late. Fast. So accurate. Personally. Which one is it? If we can move to personalities. Speaker 3: Talking about zero 8 to 0 council and council on.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution Recognizing June 27 As National PTSD Awareness Day Councilor Arroyo in the Chair.

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Speaker 4: Dawson 0185.0185 Petition for a special law regarding an act granting the City of Boston the authority to provide legal voting rights in municipal elections for city of Boston residents age 16 and 17 years old. Speaker 1: Thank you. The Chair Recognize this council? Arroyo Chair of the Committee on Government Operations Counsel, Royal U of the four. Speaker 3: Thank you, counsel. President Flynn. The Committee how the working session on June 13, 2020 to this home rule petition to authorize the City of Boston to allow any individual age 16 or 17 who is a resident of Boston to be able to vote as long as they are eligible under state law for all other qualifications other than age, and to be clear, to vote in municipal elections. These individuals would be added to a list of voters established maintained by the Board of Election Commissioners and would be allowed to vote for local offices and ballot questions. This would be done by having them fill out an alternative registration form. The Board of Elections would be responsible for the associated costs. The petition would also grant the board the authority to implement regulations associated with this Act when the individual turns 18. They would be removed from the separate list and informed that they must register to vote in accordance with state law. We were informed during this process that they can pre-register, and so it's possible that we can make that one smooth process. I would like to thank Councilor Maria and Councilor Brock for sponsoring this matter, as well as my council colleagues who joined us, Council President Flint and Councilors Murphy, Flaherty and Lui Gen. I'd also like to thank members of the administration. Anita Tavares, Commissioner of the Election Department, and Marta Crilly, archivist for reference and outreach at Boston City Archives. During this working session, we were able to gain clarity around the pre-registration process. For 16 and 17 years old, residents in the city of Boston and efforts of having a simplified process that would limit a burdensome effort on the elections department. The committee also discussed specific language changes that would ensure a more gender neutral version of this formal petition, as well as ensuring terms such as local voter were consistent with language already written by the Commonwealth. As we await more specific language changes from the original sponsors of this home roll petition, I recommend that this docket ought to remain in committee. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. While. Dr. zero 25 will remain in committee. Motions, orders and resolutions. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 0767 Police.

Council Home Rule Petition

Petition for a Special Law re: An Act Granting the City of Boston the Authority to Provide Legal Voting Rights in Municipal Elections for City of Boston Residents Aged 16 and 17 Years Old.

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Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. While. Dr. zero 25 will remain in committee. Motions, orders and resolutions. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 0767 Police. Speaker 4: Duck Enema 0767. Councilors Lara and Baker offer the following order for a hearing to utilize the American Rescue Plan Act, Federal and State COVID Recovery Funds to buy back Hackney Carriage Medallions. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. The chair recognizes counsel. Our counsel. Laura. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, President Flynn. I would like to move to replace Doug in number 0767 with the amended version, which I read into everybody's desk. This amended version reflects just small changes and updated updates on data. And I think the statement also has. Speaker 1: Let me just confirm, everybody have the updated Dr.. You may continue, counsel. Speaker 5: Thank you, President Flynn. I would also like to suspend the rules and add Councilor Flaherty as one of the original co-sponsors. Speaker 1: Hearing no objection, council clarity is awarded. Speaker 5: Thank you. I am really excited to put this on the floor with both Councilor Baker and Councilor Flaherty. Just a few weeks ago. This body voted unanimously to support a resolution that would. Ultimately strike down or asking the state house to strike down Uber and Lyft's overreach in their ballot question, which has now been voted down and been identified as not moving forward by the Supreme Court justice. And I think that in conversations about big tech's overreach and the impact of Uber and Lyft on our on our city and the possible future impact that they could have. My office has done a lot of reflection in terms of the impact that big tech has already had on the constituents here in the city of Boston. And so in ultimately the introduction of Uber and Lyft and these kind of rideshare companies for. Lack of a better word has decimated our local taxi industry. And I think that I'm one to explore what it would look like to use ARPA funds to really give some relief to these families. Most of the folks, actually more than half of the people who own taxi medallions here in the city of Boston own 1 to 4 of them. So we're talking about families who run their small businesses, who use this as their source of income and have ultimately, because of Uber and Lyft or these rideshare companies are underwater and in debt. And with COVID 19, you know, just kind of turning our economy upside down, it's really added more pressure, financial pressure for these families. The ARPA funds have really been identified for us to also be able to give one time support to small business owners. And Councilor Baker oftentimes talks about how are we going to make sure that we use ARPA funds to have a lasting impact? And I think that creating a grant program that would help these families get into get out of the red and into the black and really give them the financial support that they need is going to have a huge impact economically on our city. We didn't do enough for the taxi industry when Uber and Lyft was coming into the city of Boston. And I think that with ARPA funds, we really have an opportunity to make some corrective legislation here in the city to support these families. Councilor Baker has been a leader and incredibly vocal about his support for the taxi companies. I found out that Councilor Farrow's father was a taxi driver, and so I'm really excited to work on this issue with the both of them. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Ira. The chair recognizes Counselor Baker. Counselor Baker. You have the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. First, I'd really like to thank Counsel Larry for including me in on this. This is an issue that I worked a lot on. We watched the whole industry slip away in front of us. Classic, classic. You know, get rid of a get rid of a service that is provided. And then once that service is gone, you come in, you see, you saw with over and Lyft, the prices go up, all those all those sorts of things. But even more than further than just going after off of dollars dollars, this is a good time to talk about the taxi industry possibility to maybe rebuild that that industry with more more of a local focus. You know, in in in whatever it is that taxi industry needs to do to to come back, you know, we should be able to talk about it. I know there was money available. The state had had you know, we got we got to I think it was a dollar per ride. Speaker 3: We added that money go. Speaker 1: That's maybe a good place to start the discussion also. So thank you, Cancellara, for including me. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Counsel. Baker, the chair recognizes. Counsel. Clarity. Counsel, clarity. You have the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. And take the lead sponsor for including me. As I mentioned, my grandfather actually owned and drove a cab, as did my father. And his older brother is just helping out the family, raising ten kids. So taxi medallions have helped folks raise families, educate their children and also been able to borrow on them and upgrade their fleet. So the taxi medallion industry, the values have been decimated in obviously large part to the ride shares, but also because of the onerous requirements of the Hackney division. So while we're talking about this, we may want to bring the Hackney Division in just to see what, if anything, they can do to kind of make things easier for those that are still trying to compete in the taxi industry. And maybe we could sort of have a rebirth, if you will, of the taxi industry, which at one point flourished here in Boston, taking advantage of close proximity to Logan, as well as all of our tourist attractions, our hotels, our convention center. There is no reason why our taxi industry cannot flourish in the city, and unfortunately, it's off the rails right now. But I think that this hearing will be very timely and bring in the appropriate parties to try to one assist in that, whether it's the buy back medallion provision law, finding ways that the division could be less onerous and more cooperative and helpful with existing current cab drivers and owners to try to help them in their business to survive. Thank, Mr. President. Thank you, counsel. Fire to the chair. Recognizes counsel and cholera. Counsel Cholera. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Chair. I just rise to commend the makers. Speaker 7: We are in a humanitarian crisis with this. We are seeing it across the country. Speaker 5: Folks have lost their. Speaker 7: Life savings and the. Speaker 6: Suicide. Speaker 7: Rate in New York City alone is just appalling. Speaker 5: So I love the fact that we're we're looking into this. So thank you. Again, this doctor reminds me of a proposal. Speaker 7: That we put forth in 2020 during the height of the pandemic to buy back liquor. Speaker 5: Licenses from restaurants as a as a means of relief. Speaker 7: And back then, the administration was not open to it. Hopefully they will be open to it this time around. Speaker 5: And I just want to flag that in New York City, they went. Speaker 7: After predatory lenders and they also wrote. Speaker 5: Legislation that. Speaker 7: Forgave debt and provided additional relief. So I would just respectfully, through the chair, encourage the makers to review New York City's model. Speaker 5: And I just look forward. Speaker 7: To the conversation ahead on this. So thank you. Speaker 1: Then. Thank you, counsel. I also wanted to ask a question to the to the to the chair to the to the author of this the the taxi industry now is under the and is being supervised under the Hackney. Division of the Boston Police Department. I don't think that under Hoover unless that's that's the case. There's console firing reference. Would we be able to have a discussion on the differences between supervision under the Boston police with the taxes and what supervision, if any, Boston police has under under a over and left? But just wanted to ask Councilor Lara her thoughts on that. Speaker 5: Thank you, President Flynn. First, I wanted to add two things. One of them is that we're researching New York City's model, and New York City's model inspired a lot of the writing and the thought behind looking at this hearing order specifically, because we've seen a lot of creative approaches. I think that we have to have a specific conversation about what works in the city of Boston, how our program works, and how we can be inspired by some of the work that other cities have done. I also want to say that we cannot solve this problem alone. My hope is that having this hearing order, creating a city program is going to signal to the state that they also have to kind of pitch in and help us and help the people in the state. So I think that those are two, two responses that I wanted to give to, um, to what I heard from my colleagues this question and the lack of liability from Uber and Lyft and specifically these big tech companies are part of what we've been fighting with this ballot initiative is that Uber and Lyft wants to continue to consider their employees independent contractors so that they also don't have any liability for things that happen in the Uber and during the rides. And so I think that this is part of this bigger statewide fight to make sure that we are considering these drivers as employees of these companies so that we can ensure that these companies have liability. And so similarly, the Boston Police Department has oversight of the hacking program. There is no oversight with Uber and Lyft. And not only is there not any oversight, they are currently because they consider their drivers independent contractors. There is no liability, so there's no level of consumer protection. And as part of my fight against big tech here in the state and in the city of Boston, I definitely want to look more about how we make sure that Uber and Lyft are liable for the well-being, and we're really increasing consumer protections for these big tech companies. So, yes, I would love to have a conversation. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. Consul Lara. Is anyone else looking to speak on this matter? Would anyone else like to add their name? Please raise your hand. Mr. Clarke, please. Please put down council Royal Baker Mark Braden matter. Counsel, Fernandez Anderson. Console and console me here, console Murphy in the chair as well. And talk of 0767 will be assigned to the committee in Boston's COVID 19 recovery. Mr. Clarke please read 0768, please.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing to utilize American Rescue Plan Act federal and state COVID recovery funds to buy-back Hackney Carriage Medallions. On motion of Councilors Lara and Baker, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilor Flaherty as a co-sponsor. Councilor Lara moved for substitution of the language. Motion prevailed.

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Speaker 1: Console and console me here, console Murphy in the chair as well. And talk of 0767 will be assigned to the committee in Boston's COVID 19 recovery. Mr. Clarke please read 0768, please. Speaker 4: Duncan 0768 Council is me here in Arroyo for the following quarter for a hearing on expanding access for minority business enterprises into high volume commercial centers. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes. Counsel me here. Counsel me here. You have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. President. And thank you to my co-sponsor for joining me on this re file. Actually, we hosted a hearing last year in regards to the fact that a lot of businesses across the city of Boston, primarily in places like the Seaport, Newbury Street, Faneuil Hall, we don't have a lot of presence of black and Brown owned businesses. And we felt we had an opportunity to not just call that out, but to really as a city, lean into that conversation because you can't say that we're about economic empowerment and then shut out all of the different ways that people can actually be about that. So most recently, this past weekend, I got wind of an incident that happened in the seaport venues in Boston, such as society on High in the financial district were recently issued a cease and desist letter on the grounds of optics and that negatively impacting the clientele of color of color and the service providers of color and its employees. In fact, over 50 employees were impacted as a result of this. And so one thing is to create opportunities for businesses of color to thrive throughout the city. But then the other piece of it is what are we going to do to address the racial discrepancies that continue to manifest? So we want to file this here in order to give an opportunity to talk about what we can do as a city, to not only create more opportunities to build economic prosperity for communities of color, but more importantly, what are we going to do to ensure that that we are holding ourselves? To a standard of what it looks like when we create space and are super intentional about that space and also recognizing that here in the city of Boston. And we I know I always bring this into the chamber. You know, we have a history here. We have a history here, and that history lies in an opportunity, I believe, for us to really repair the harm and lean into this conversation. So it is my hope that with this refile, we can not only just have a conversation but actually put some thought into what are we going to do in regards to that through legislation. So and I just want to thank my co-sponsor for also bringing this up and in championing this alongside me. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 1: Thank you. Constantly hear the chair recognizes counsel of royal counsel of royal view of the floor. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to counsel me here for sponsoring this with me. I think it's important for everybody on the council that Boston reflect. It's values in that those values include making sure that people of color, specifically black people within the city of Boston, are able to open and manage businesses in all places within this city. And that clientele of color, specifically black clientele, are able to go and enjoy these spaces without feeling unwelcome or unaware, disinvited, or as if somehow they are a burden. And, you know, I think these kinds of conversations can be difficult to have, but is important to understand that history of this country and in the ways in which black talent and culture have been invited into these spaces, while black clientele have not. And making sure that we are creating these spaces where if you are profiting off of the talent of individuals of color, you are also making it a welcoming environment for individuals of color and that we are continuing to do the work to raise those things where we see it flare up, where there are problems, where black talent is welcome, the black clientele is welcome. We will not stand for that. We will not tolerate that where there are issues, where businesses are making it harder for people to succeed in an area. And on those kinds of grounds, I think it's incredibly important that we stand up with one voice and push back against this. So making that more welcome is is incredibly important, I think, to the continuing success of the city. And, you know, I want to applaud it where it happens. We do have restaurants like Sabor Restaurant and Lounge, which is the only black owned restaurant and lounge in the downtown area of Boston. And so making sure that we go from just having one place to multiple places, I think is incredibly important for all of us in making sure where places aren't necessarily owned by people of color, but they are hiring talent of color that when that talent attracts people from all over the city, as it should, that all of them are welcome in these spaces and feel welcome in these spaces. So with that, I thank the the original sponsor councilman here. I look forward to a hearing on this to make sure that we are doing everything in our power to to live our values. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel Arroyo, the chair recognizes counsel, clarity. Counsel, clarity of the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. Please add my name. And as you know, we've been working very closely, along with Congressman Lynch, Senator College and Representative Deal with some of the major stakeholders down on the South Boston waterfront. And one that comes to mind is the West Company that's done phenomenal work in the space at our prodding and I believe probably a model for other destinations here in our city, but also other business districts that in and out through all across the city that could benefit. So at the appropriate time when this hearing takes place, that may be a good opportunity for them to come in and share with us the model that we have been working with them in. They've put in place down south by some waterfront that seems to be paying dividends, if you will. There's a lot of excitement about it. A number of different businesses have benefited from it, and I think there's a real opportunity to expand that model throughout other parts of our city. Thank you, Mr. President, and please have my name and thank the maker of the makers of your deck. Thank you, Counsel. Clarity. What? Anyone else like to speak on it or the name? I would also like to highlight that Councilor Warrell has also been fully engaged and active on this issue. In fact, he called me over the weekend about the high street location. I had a discussion with council where also I know this issue is very important to him as well. So just wanted to highlight the work of our colleague Councilor Brian. Well, Mr. Clarke, please add. Councilor Baker. Councilor Borg Councilor Braden. Council Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Councilor Fiery Cancellara. Councilor John. Please. Out the chair, please. Councilor Murphy. Dawkins. Dawkins 0768 will be assigned to the Committee on Small Business and Professional License. Mr. Kirkby, please read 07690769.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing on Expanding Access for Minority Business Enterprises into High Volume Commercial Centers.

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Speaker 1: Council Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Councilor Fiery Cancellara. Councilor John. Please. Out the chair, please. Councilor Murphy. Dawkins. Dawkins 0768 will be assigned to the Committee on Small Business and Professional License. Mr. Kirkby, please read 07690769. Speaker 4: Councilor Baker offer the following resolution dedicating the intersection of seven Hill Ave in Sydney Street as a hero square on behalf of Donald Vincent Baker's service and ultimate sacrifice for the United States of America in the Vietnam War. Speaker 1: Thank you. The Chair recognizes. Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker. Thank you, Mr. President. Can you please add Councilor Aaron Murphy to this? Mr. Clarke, please. That council, Murphy. So, Adam, the chair recognizes Counselor Baker. Thank you, Mr. President. Normally, hero squares are designated for men and women who who die in service. My Uncle Don came back while he, in 1968 was wounded and nearly, nearly didn't come back. And the miracle about him was and I kind of learned this from hanging with his friends. And, you know, you have conversations at the funeral about about veterans. And the special thing about him was they had they had projected that he probably would have only lived another two or three years based on his injuries. He was hit with shrapnel in the back and the arms practically hanging off and wasn't expected to really live. So this is a way for for me and and my family to honor him in a in a hero square. It it'll be different will be the it'll be the blue side. But my my Uncle Don was pretty special. He was someone that at 13 left his family to go travel with the carnival. The world of mirth. He was. He was. He was a heavy equipment operator, was in Vietnam. Building bases and airfields and that sort of stuff. He was older when he when he went over. And it was kind of a shock to to his family. That was. I was six months old at the time. But you can imagine what it's like for a family. In our family. We grew up spring on grandparents around the corner. Everyone right there. So you shared the pain, you shared the trauma of the whole experience. And so I appreciate just being able to do this and just be able to talk about about him and what. What a good person he was, the way his affect on other people and the impact that that he and his brothers and his friend and friends, his crew had in my neighborhood and by extension, Dorchester and other places. So thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Counsel Baker. The chair recognizes counsel. Murphy. Counselor Murphy, you have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you. So I stand to support Counselor Baker's dedication of the intersection of Seven Hill, AV and Sydney Street as Heroes Square on behalf of your Uncle Donald Baker's service and sacrifice in the Vietnam War. So I definitely want to thank your family for that. The Hero Square program started in 1898 with the mission to educate communities about the history of service in their own neighborhoods. We want everyone to learn about the sacrifices made by service members and our communities. And Commissioner Santiago in the Boston Veterans Services Office does a wonderful job with these heroes squares that where we've been spending the last few years rededicating. So this dedication in Seven Hill is a great way to engage Dorchester residents with community members like Donald Baker. To learn more about the story that Councilor Baker just started to share with us, whose courageous acts of service led to the ultimate sacrifice with a spinal cord injury. So I do believe that this will ensure that the name Donald Baker will always be recognized not just in that neighborhood in Dorchester, but across the city of Boston, which he deserves. So I stand in support and thank you, Councilor Baker, for letting me join you on this. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilor Murphy. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes counsel for Larry. Would anyone like to have their name added? Please raise your hand please at council for Charity Council. Royal Council. Bar Council. Brighton Council. Councilor Fernandez Innocent Council of our Constitution. Council. Me here, please. The chair. Mr. President have. The chair recognizes counsel. I'm sorry. I should have said it at the beginning, but I would like to suspend in pass if possible, and if I want it to read. Can I just read this also here? This is this is the letter that the Navy sent my Aunt Dot when he was hit with concerns. I confirm on behalf of the United States Navy that your husband, Donald Vincent Baker, was U.S. Navy was critically wounded in action. On May 14th, 1968, at Donghai, Vietnam, he sustained shrapnel wounds of the back arms, face and legs in sections of the spinal cord. Six During the enemy artillery attack. During the enemy attack, his prognosis is poor. Your husband is presently hospitalized and they go on to say that he'll receive the best care. So. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you. Thank you, Counselor Baker. And I know the incredible sacrifices and contributions your family have made to our city and into our country as well. Counsel Baker I know what Counselor Flattery and Murphy know it, but I'm glad you were able to highlight the incredible, incredible sacrifice and service of your family counsel. BAKER And we we appreciate that. Counsel Baker is seeking suspension of the rules and adoption of Docket 0769. All those in favor say I. I also say need to vote. Mr. Carr, can you please take a roll call vote? Speaker 4: Roll call vote on docket 0769 Council. Arroyo Yes. Counsel Arroyo. Yes. Counsel Baker. I counseled. Baker I counselor book counsel advocate counselor. Brady Counsel Braden I counsel Coletta. Counsel Coletta yes. Counsel Fernandez Anderson Yes. Counsel Fernandez Sanderson Yes. Counsel Flaherty. Counsel 30 years counsel Flynn yes. Counsel Flynn Yes. Counsel Lara. Counsel Larry Yes. Counsel Who's in? Counsel Who's in? Yes. Counsel to me here. Counsel Media yes. And Counsel to Murphy. Yes. Counsel to Murphy. Yes, sir, I can. Number 0769 has received a unanimous vote. Speaker 1: The resolution has been adopted. Mr. Kirk. Please read of 0770. Speaker 4: Dr. Numbers 0770. Councilor Fernandes Anderson offer the following resolution to acknowledge, condemn and apologize for the role played by the city of Boston in the transatlantic slave trade and the ongoing detrimental impacts experienced by the black people of Boston.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution dedicating the intersection of Savin Hill Avenue and Sydney Street as Hero Square on behalf of Donald Vincent Baker's service and ultimate sacrifice for the United States of America in the Vietnam War. On motion of Councilor Baker, the rules were suspended, the resolution was adopted; yeas 12.

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BostonCC_06152022_2022-0770

Speaker 4: Dr. Numbers 0770. Councilor Fernandes Anderson offer the following resolution to acknowledge, condemn and apologize for the role played by the city of Boston in the transatlantic slave trade and the ongoing detrimental impacts experienced by the black people of Boston. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes counsel Fernandez innocent. Counsel Fernandez innocent. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. I'd like to add a couple of counselors as original co-sponsors as well. Counselor Rosie Lujan and Counselor Kendra Laura. Speaker 1: Councilor Fernandez Anderson is seeking to add council illusion in council. Lara seeing a hearing? No objection. Both councilors are out. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. I offer this because I think that it's imperative that we apologize for the heinous historical criminality of slavery and its modern day manifestations. When a harm is done, the first step is to acknowledge the harm and to apologize for it. The fact that this hasn't been done and yet yet at the municipal level is stunning to me. Let's just look at the facts for a moment. Slavery likely began in Boston in 1638 and was legalized in Massachusetts in 1641. Massachusetts Bay Colony slave codes were authored by the state's first governor, John Winthrop. These codes legalized and formalize a set of incredibly harsh and humanizing conditions. The local economy grew exponentially, largely on the backs of unpaid enslaved laborers. The enslaved African population of Boston increased 350% over the first half of the 18th century. Many famous and wealthy Bostonians of the era, including Peter Faneuil, who rich from the buying and selling of enslaved Africans, when he when he died, he still owned five human beings. As of estate inventory of all white Bostonians taken between 1717 75, around 25% of them possessed enslaved Africans. The legacy of this dastardly crime manifests today in generational trauma and in various disparities in realm of politics, economics and social indicators. We've heard it often, but it is said it is such an astounding stat that it bears repeating. The average net worth of white family in Boston is 2200 $50,000, while the average net worth of black family is still $8. In terms of businesses that are tained contracts with the city between 2014 and 2019, a dismal 0.4% of them were black owned. In short, the political and economy power brokers of Boston have a lot to apologize for, and I say now is a good time to do so. I file this and a lot of, of course, vitriol from Twitter, our favorite platform and calls and emails and even people stopped me in events. There are a lot of people that said, you know, we didn't do that. My ancestors did. But still yet there are. I recognize that there are poor white families or individuals that feel that they are not responsible because they don't have the privilege of their white brothers and sisters that do have money or wealth. And so this is not necessarily to target one individual. And I believe that as a black woman, I shouldn't have to stand here and apologize and educate. It's not the burden shouldn't be on me to educate, but it is incumbent on me if I have. Speaker 7: This. Speaker 5: Knowledge or information that I am patient and graceful with my white brothers and sisters to extend more grace and say there should be a platform for reconciliation. There should be a platform where we treat each other as though we are equal to do so. Before we begin the process of reconciliation, we must speak the truth. In order for us to talk about the truth. We have to begin with intentions. If you don't have the. Speaker 7: Courage. Speaker 5: To actually act on your intention, then at least that you feel it in your heart that this is wrong. That there has been no time in history in municipal government, where the city of Boston has actually taken responsibility and apologized for the harm and the perpetual harm that still continues today. We can go on and on and speak about where we lynch redlining, bussing, mass incarceration. Now systemic racism. And even today, all of the departments in the city of Boston, excluding maybe one I found in the budget process to be highly still systemically racist. We do not hire according to the demographics, or at least that people that are hired in city departments do not reflect the population of the city of Boston. I know that this council at least wants to do right. I also know that this council works very hard to create, to the best of their purview, our ability or courage to create racial justice in the city of Boston. But politics is a funny thing where we get sponsored by unions or nurses and officers and people of high, upper middle class people that donate to our campaigns, people that speak about the good in the greater good of working class. Yet we have to somehow respond to everyone in our responsibilities to consolidate our community, those that are invested in politics and those who are not, and those who don't have access. This is a hard task, but I believe that in the midst of all of that conflict, in the midst of all of that balancing act between those who have and those who don't, the status quo and those who don't have access. The poor and the rich that we are all interconnected. White, black, that we can do better, that we can be more intentional. And to do so, we must speak truth. And without truth, there is no reconciliation. If we are intentional, if we are sincere. I implore you to at least pray or ask the universe to give you some sort of motivation to act upon it. And those who don't know better yet will follow. Today, I'm asking you to give your heart and your courage to vote to suspend and pass this resolution today. So that we can actually act upon our intention and hopefully acknowledge the harm and begin discussions about what it means to truly undo the harm that has been done to the African-American people in the city of Boston. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilor Fernandez Anderson, the the chair recognizes Constitution. Constitution. You have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. President, and you accountable for bringing this forward. We as a city, we have a lot of work to do to reckon with our past. We are talking about the work that we need to do to build a better, more just more equitable. Boston For me, when we think about the word equity that we talk about a lot baked into, the very idea of equity is about the corrective action that we need to take for our policy harms and and the policy wrongs that we've done in the past. When we look at the brilliance that that really culminated in decades, centuries long work on making the case for reparations in China. As Coates talks about the foundation of the wealth building in this country, in the foundation of capitalism, really being the slave trade, and that really serving as a model of wealth building and profit. And when we think about our city and the wealth of our city, which I talk about quite often, that wealth is really built on the back of blacks in the city and around the country. So we have a lot of work to do when it comes to acknowledging the harm and really repairing. But it's one of the frustrations that I experience when we talk about equity because it is now the word du jour and baked into that word is corrective action. Baked into the word equity is an acknowledgment of our history and where we have gone wrong and what we need to do to make it all right. A second thing that I wanted to mention is that Boston has this really rich. And I think because when I spoke to this as well, it. The idea that Boston is it has a very rich history of abolitionism and we talk about it. But when we do that, we ignore the fact that we also played a very active role in the slave trade. I think about the Fugitive Slave Act and something that I have up in my office that I got from the Museum of African History about a decade ago is this advertisement that was put out by I think his name was Theodore Parker, a prominent abolitionist at the time, to warn black folks in the city of Boston about potential capture. Now, just read it so that everyone sees it. It says Caution colored people of Boston, one and all. You are hereby respectfully cautioned and advised to avoid conversing with watchmen and police officers of Boston. Four. Since the recent order of the mayor and aldermen, they are empowered to act as kidnapers and slave catchers, and they have already been actually employed in kidnaping, catching and keeping slaves. Therefore, if you value your liberty and the welfare of the fugitives among you shall them in every way possible, in every possible manner, as so many hands on the track of the most unfortunate of your race, keep a sharp lookout for kidnapers and have top eye open. This was April 24th, 1851, when slavery was outlawed in 1783. And when we talk about evolution of discrimination and racism and bias, it's a continuum, right? These these these racist structures don't just disappear. They're really ingrained in a lot of the work that we have to undo here in city hall in the city. So. And my last point will be also to something Councilperson Andre Anderson said. This is not about individual blame. When I went to college, I remember I met someone who a really good friend of mine who introduced me to this singer songwriter named Ben Folds, who has a song called Rock in the Suburbs. And in that song, he talks about coming up to a stoplight and he's a white guy and how a black man in a car next to him pulls up and looks at him and darts his eyes at him and this thing. And Ben Folds of the song was like, He's glaring at me because, you know, my great, great, great, great granddad made somewhat and maybe his great great granddad, his slave. And he says, But it wasn't my idea. Not at all my idea. Never my idea. And this isn't about today whether or not slavery was an individual person's idea. Right? It's not about whether it was your idea. It's about acknowledging that profit, that wealth in this country, in this city, in Boston was able to tout this triple-A bond rating, these very strong fiscal resources that we have in this city . But a lot of that is rooted in an unjust systems that really start where we start with indigenous folks who are coming here in the Mass Bay Colony, but it continued with slavery. And so we have a lot of work to do to atone for that, to repair the harm and to do the work together, to really be honest about our history, to do the work of repairing. And I think the idea of having a citywide conversations about truth and reconciliation are really important part of that process. So I just want to thank Councilor Fernanda Anderson and all the activists and active advocates, a lot of them who are here who have really been doing the work to really center this conversation in the city of Boston. So thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel on the chair recognizes counsel. Lara. Counsel Lara, you have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, President Flynn And I would like to extend my gratitude to Councilor Fernandez Anderson for including me as one of the original co-sponsors in this resolution. I don't have much more to say. We've heard from Councilor Fernandez Anderson about the importance of this. We've gotten an incredible amount of historical context from Councilor Region. And so I think for for my remarks, I would just like to quote Alhaji Malik al-Shabab or Malcolm X as folks know him. Brother Malcolm said that if you stick a knife in my back nine inches and pull it out six inches, that is not progress. If you pull the knife out completely, that is still not progress. That progress is ultimately healing the wound that was made by pulling putting the knife in my back in the first place. And to paraphrase. Not only have we not taken the knife out, we haven't even admitted that the knife is there. And so some people will say that we have taken the knife out six inches. Some people might even argue that we've taken the knife out completely and that we are doing work to start healing that wound. And I'm not here today to argue the merit of either of those arguments, but this resolution is specifically about not skipping the critical step of admitting that the knife is there. And so my hope is that my council colleagues will vote in favor of passing this resolution today because we can't get to pulling it out six inches. We can't get to pulling it out completely. And we definitely cannot heal the wound if we don't first admit that the knife was there in the first place. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank and thank you. Council are the chair. This council, I mean, here, council me. Here you have the floor. Speaker 8: And that's how it was for us. But, Mr. President, I'll go first. Thank you. So I just want to thank the MCA. I am so incredibly just grateful for your leadership and to the co-sponsors for rising up. I do think that this moment here in the city of Boston, I do know how difficult it is to stand up and call things out, because Twitter is terrible at letting you know about yourself. And I think that this city has an amazing opportunity to really right the wrong. And we can't do that if we're not allowing ourselves to recognize the harm that has been done. And I think as a council right this moment calls for us to have that courage and to recognize that if we're really serious about restorative justice, if we're really serious about the things that we talk about in terms of equity, we can't miss out on this opportunity in passing this resolution and saying that this is how we begin that process. So, Councilor Anderson, I just want to say thank you, because I remember when I first files just a hearing order and reparations. How? How much backlash I got from folks as a result of that. And then when we entered the conversation about an ordinance here in the city of Boston, how that backlash continued. But despite that backlash, we have to keep showing up and pushing the envelope. So that is what courage is all about. So I am grateful for you and to the advocates for continuing to sound the alarm of what this moment calls for. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman. Here, the chair recognizes Council of Royal. Council. Royal. You have the floor. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to extend my gratitude to the maker. I thank my council colleagues of color, understand. And those not of color who have stood up on racial justice issues. I don't think I've ever received vitriol the way I do on anything that I stand up on to speak in support of or in favor of. Like I do when that thing is black lives or race in this city, in this country, that is usually when the worst vitriol comes my way. And so, you know, I appreciate the courage. I think this is an important part for the city to acknowledge their role in this, the ways in which we have profited as a city over time, by this trade and by the ways in which we have excluded and or subjugated entire people. And so, you know, I think the biggest part for me about this in an act like this and the importance of an act like this, is admitting that the harm was done and taking accountability for that part of it so that we can move on to the healing and the restauration that comes after. But nothing comes until you do that part. And so I'm grateful to you for putting this on table. I'm grateful for the folks and the advocates in the room with push for this. This is not a a new matter. And I hope that the passage of this, which I am going to vote in favor of this and I look forward to vote in favor of this, that the passage of this begins us on a track towards having real conversations about how we do that healing, how we address some of those those harms that have been done in the ways in which our neighborhoods have have sort of borne the brunt of them over decades. And so I look forward to this. Thank you. Thank you. To those on the council push for this. Thank you to the advocates in the room will push for this. And I'm grateful to you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel Arroyo, the chair recognizes counsel. BLOCK Council. BLOCK view of the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you so much, Mr. President. And I just wanted to thank the makers and to add my voice along with my vote in support of this, please add my name. I think I said this when Councilor Mickey and I introduced the reparations hearing order last session. But the reality is, is that we live inside of institutions in the city of Boston many and celebrate them and talk about them, many of which have a legacy that goes back to before the slave trade and certainly the profiting off of the slave after slavery was banned in this city. So I just I want to say that it hasn't been that long and that so many of the things that shape the architecture of this city date to the same period. And so I think it's very important we can't go and talk about our institutions that we're so proud of, been around. They're the oldest in the country because they've been around 1600s of the 1700s without saying the Boston of the 1617 hundreds where Africans were enslaved in this city also still lives with us. And so I just want to thank the makers and say that I'll be voting in support. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel. BLOCK The chair recognizes counsel BAKER Counsel. Baker, thank for thank you, Mr. President. Thank you for your words. They were great. There's three pieces here. Acknowledge, condemn and apologize. Acknowledge and condemn. I'm all in. Apologize. I'm a little uneasy about if we can be honest enough, we're going to have conversations. You know, I feel so far removed from John Winthrop and Peter Faneuil and Harvard University. I grew up a little rough and tumble. We grew up poor. So the apologize part is is difficult for me. But I think if my words can help. Your community heal and our community in Boston heal. And I'm absolutely ready to do this and sign on to this and vote for this for you. Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Baker. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? I'm going to I'm going to Counsel Fernandez to just speak on this a second time. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. I first thank you for all the kind words and encouragement. And yes, thank you. I'm here for filing for the hearing order for the Commission on Reparations and as well as Council for your efforts in the previous year. I would first like to acknowledge Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker. It is that this level of work and sincerity that will take us to reconciliation will take us to healing. If you had said anything else, if you had been pretentious about it, I would have said he's not ready. But the fact that you got up and you said, This is how I feel, I will be honest with you. But in support, in the effort or in the spirit of healing, if this helps, then so be it. I'm I'm with you. I appreciate that. And I think that is where we start. I thank you for your open heart. I look forward to doing my part, hopefully to bringing you to understand. And as far as the advocates, I like to just recognize quickly, not quickly, but I have to do it quickly. Reverend Kevin Peterson, I thank you so much for your blood, sweat and tears in this work. Of course, all of the every single advocate here, Sister Aziza Robinson. Good night. I see a lot of Johann and all of the beautiful people in the room, Pablo Barros. And I can't name all of you because of time, but there are people in the community in the city of Boston that have been fighting for this, people before us and people today and those who will come after us. And I want to thank you. I want to thank all of my black brothers and sisters and allies that are here that has taken the time to understand that this is important. And I apologize that city council meetings are at 12:00 for those at home. And I thank all of those who are watching in that spirit. And I and I look forward to working with you. I appreciate you. I serve you. And I love you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilor Fernandez. Anderson. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? I'd like to take this opportunity to to thank the makers for their. Important message in. And how we move forward as a city. Want to acknowledge the the importance of this resolution over the weekend. I had a I had several calls as well from my colleagues, but also from Reverend Kevin Peterson. Also from my friend and in the podium in the stands there, Bill. Right. As well. And just want to acknowledge their commitment to bringing this city together. But I also want to acknowledge the important words of of council at Baker as well. You know, it's important that we have a strong and positive message of inclusion and of addressing our past history, even though it's hurtful and painful. But that's exactly what Council Baker did today. And that's what. That's what this body is all about, is is dealing with tough, difficult issues, even if it. Even if it hurts you in your own community. But I just want to acknowledge the incredible the incredible resolution that's before us. And I was talking to another another advocate over the weekend about this about this hearing order and. There's a congressman that that's I believe it's Seth Moulton in the North Shore. He's asking for. Veterans that served in World War II. Most of them, unfortunately, are dead now, but they didn't get their VA benefits. African-American veterans. But there is a proposal before Congress that would recognize the family, families of African-American veterans that were excluded from VA benefits so that their family could could get those that might be housing support, that might be a job training support. That might be that might be financial assistance. But here you have African-American veterans that served in World War Two. Many of them were wounded. Many of them were killed, unfortunately. But many of them many of them were wounded. And they came back to cities like Boston and Chicago and Cleveland and New York City, and they weren't able to get a VA home loan, which most World War Two veterans. That's how they bought their. That's how they bought their homes was through the VA home program, but not African-American veterans. So I was I had a long discussion with an activist over the weekend, as I mentioned. But the. Here is a community. Here's some this man and woman, they're ready to and willing to die for our country, which they did and wounded for our country. Which they did. But they came back here and they they weren't treated with the respect and dignity that they've earned. So it's a somewhat it's a somewhat similar story, but I'm certainly supportive of this of this declaration because it's an important it's important matter. But it also puts Boston on a path where we can address. Our our terrible mistakes of the past, but to try to come together as a city and improve improve race relations for all. So I just want to acknowledge the. This proposal by by our colleagues council and council of Laura. And Council of a royal. Yeah. Yeah. Council for an emergency. So. Would anyone else like to add their name? Please raise your hand. The pleas that Counsel Baker, counsel counsel Brad and Counsel Calata Counsel of Clarity. Counselor here counsel Tim Murphy, please. You are the chief. Oh, please. That council rail. Um, Counsel Fernandez Enerson. Counsel, Elvira. And Councilor Lujan. Six suspension. Of the rules and adoption of docket 0770. All those in favor say I am opposed saying, Hey, Mr. Clark, we're going to have a roll call vote. Could you please call the roll. Speaker 4: Roll call vote on docket 0770? Counsel Arroyo Yes. Counselor Arroyo. Yes. Counselor Baker. Counselor Baker. Yes. Counselor Book. Counselor. Book Yes. Counselor. Counselor Breeden. Yes. Counselor Calello. Counselor. Falletta. Yes. Counsel for Ananda Sanderson. Counsel for Ananda Sanderson. Yes. Counsel. Clarity. Counsel. So yes. Counsel Flynn. Yes. Counselor Flynn. Yes. Counsel. Laura. Counsel. Lara. Yes. Counsel. Louisiana. Counsel. Louisiana. Yes. Counselor. Me here. Counselor. Me here? Yes. Counselor Murphy. Counselor Murphy. Yes. Talking number 0770 has received a unanimous vote. Yes. Speaker 1: Thank you. See the resolution has been adopted. We're going to take a brief recess for 2 minutes and. Mr. Clarke. Yes. Mr. Clarke, please read your code. Speaker 4: 07710771. Councilors Braden and Barr call for the following resolution commemorating the 50th anniversary anniversary of the hotel burned on fire on June 17, 1972, and memorializing the lives of nine firefighters lost in the line of duty.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution to Acknowledge, Condemn and Apologize for the Role Played by the City of Boston in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and the Ongoing Detrimental Impacts Experienced by the Black People of Boston. On motion of Councilor Fernandes Anderson, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilors Louijeune and Lara as co-sponsors. On motion of Councilors Fernandes Anderson, Louijeune and Lara, the rules were suspended, the resolution was adopted; yeas 12.

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BostonCC_06082022_2022-0707

Speaker 1: All those in favor of approving the meetings from the last meeting say I opposed. Say nay. Thank you at the meeting. The minutes of the last meeting stand as approved. Communications from the Toronto the mayor. Mr. Kirk, can you please read docket. Speaker 2: 07070707 message in order for your approval? A Home Rule petition to the General Court entitled Petition for a Special Law enacted relative to certain affordable housing in the South Boston section of the City of Boston. Speaker 1: The chair recognizes Council Arroyo, Chair of the Committee on Government Ops Counsel. Arroyo You have the floor and you can present Flynn. Speaker 8: As chair of the committee. Could 0707 today. This Home Rule petition seeks to allow the Boston Housing Authority to take part in the redevelopment of the Mary Ellen McCormick developments using federal funds. Previous reforms to the Commonwealth contracts and procurement and award laws do not allow a path forward for the VHA to participate in this redevelopment effort . Without the development, this project could be struck with an overly structured bid process, meaning would have a separate general contract and subcontractor selection. And I believe this would not be a fair and transparent process for the city. In the past, the VHA has filed similar legislation, namely for the Whittier Street, Bunker Hill, Orchard Gardens, Mildred C, Haley Aurion Heights and Franklin Hill. Family Developments. The passage of this docket today would ensure the residents of Marilyn McCormick, a fair and transparent process, will revitalize in the current development. Due to the matter of urgency with the state legislature ending their sessions in July as chair of Government Operations Committee, I seek suspension of the rules to pass 0707 today so that we can get it up there before they end their session in July. But I am more than happy to, and I've been told by the administration they're more than happy to once we get to the procurement process. Part of this is to have a hearing to discuss that path forward. But this allows them to do that. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel. Royal counsel. Royal seek suspension of the rules. Okay. The chair recognizes counsel, clarity. Counsel for the office support the chair in this effort. I served as Chair of Government Operations and led the effort to do the previous ones that he had mentioned also was born in the old have a project which is the Mary Ellen McCormick. And that development is in dire need of a rehab and revitalization as well as the opportunity to build additional housing there. So look forward to having this expedited and obviously get the briefing as soon as possible to get the update as to where they stand. Thank you. Mr.. THAT Thank you, Counsel. Clarity. The Chair recognizes counsel and counsel. You have the floor. Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. President. I also wanted to rise in support of the Chair's recommendation. When I worked at the Housing Authority to chase these specific types of home rule petitions through the State House, and they are totally critical to the revitalization of public housing. It has to do with the fact that the law is written in a way where if you're paving a road, great, and it's designed to help us get the lowest price on paving the road. But the kind of iterative process that we do with our housing communities around exactly how we want them to take shape, basically, this fails the bid process prevents the kind of the kind of adjusting of the program over time that we want to see. So it's important for the housing authority to have the flexibility that the home rule petition creates. And I would say that it tends to take a little while to get them through the state legislature. So I think time is of the essence. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel. The chair recognizes Counselor Baker. Counsel Baker, you have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. President. I just rise in support of this. As you know, Marilyn McCormack is in my district. We've been talking about the the redo of Mary Ellen McCormack for a couple of years now. This this actually makes it real. So we just wanted to show my support. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel Baker. I'd also. Echo what Councilor Baker and. Council clarity and my colleagues council and council Bach as well. Council royal and but especially thanking council baker and council of clarity for the work you do with the residents. And Mary Ellen McCormack. It's an important development that wonderful people. So I want to say thank you to Councilor Baker council floury and the team for the important work that you're doing. Councilor Royal. Seek suspension of the rolls and passage of docket 0707. All those in favor say I am opposed. Say they have it. The docket has passed. Mr. Carr, can you please read Dawkins 07080708.

Mayor Home Rule Petition

Message and order for your approval a Home Rule Petition to the General Court entitled “Petition for a Special Law Re: An Act Relative to Certain Affordable Housing in the South Boston Section of the City of Boston.”

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BostonCC_06082022_2022-0709

Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. Docket 0708 will be assigned to the Committee on Housing and Community Development. Mr. Clarke, can you please retarget. Speaker 2: 0709.0709 message in order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expand the amount of $34,309 in the form of a grant for the Federal Fiscal Year 21. All Coverdell Forensic Science Improvement Formula Allocation awarded by the United States Department of Justice. Please pass through Massachusetts State Police and crime lab battery to be administered by the police department. The grant will fund training and continuing education for forensic examiners, criminalist and laboratory personnel. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes Counsel Flaherty, chair of the Committee on Public Safety, Criminal Justice Counsel. Flaherty. You have the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. Somewhat of a minus grant for the forensics division and looking forward to suspension and passage to get these very necessary funds over to the lab. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you. Counsel. Clarity. Counsel, clarity. Seek suspension of the rules and passage of docket 0709. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposing. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Mr. Carr, can you please read docket 0710 and 0711 together, please?

Mayor Order

Message and order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expend the amount of Thirty Four Thousand Three Hundred Nine Dollars ($34,309.00) in the form of a grant, for the Federal FY21 Paul Coverdell Forensic Science Improvement formula allocation, awarded by the United States Department of Justice, passed through Massachusetts State Police/Crime Laboratory, to be administered by the Police Department. The grant will fund training and continuing education for forensic examiners, criminalists and laboratory personnel.

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Speaker 2: Lucky number 0497. The Committee on Ways and Means on Ways and Means to which was referred on April 13, 2020 to Dr. Number 0497. Message in order authorizing and limit for the Distributed Energy Resource Revolving Fund for fiscal year 2023 to facilitate the purchase of US offsets of greenhouse gas emissions, which shall be associated with a portion of the electricity consumed by the city. Speaker 8: Annually. Speaker 2: And to operate, maintain, monitor and expand the city's existing solar arrays. In Boston, public schools combined heat and power facilities. This revolving fund shall be credited with any and all receipts from the sale of renewable and alternative energy certificates and demand response program revenues produced by combined heat and power units located at Boston Public School sites and solar renewable energy certificates produced by the city's photovoltaic arrays. Receipts and resulting expenditures from this fund shall not exceed $150,000, cements a report recommending that the order of the pass doc number zero 490, the Commission Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred on April 13, 2020 to number 049, a message in honor of the raising

Mayor Order

On the message and order, referred on April 13, 2022 Docket #0497, authorizing a limit for the Distributed Energy Resource Revolving Fund for Fiscal Year 2023 to facilitate the purchase of offsets of greenhouse gas emissions which shall be associated with a portion of the electricity consumed by the City annually; and to operate, maintain, monitor and expand the City's existing solar arrays and Boston Public Schools' combined heat and power facilities. This revolving fund shall be credited with any and all receipts from the sale of renewable and alternative energy certificates and demand response program revenues produced by combined heat and power units located at Boston Public Schools sites and solar renewable energy certificates produced by the City's photovoltaic arrays. Receipts and resulting expenditures from this fund shall not exceed One Hundred Fifty Thousand Dollars ($150,000.00), the committee submitted a report recommending the order ought to pass.

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BostonCC_06082022_2022-0498

Speaker 2: solar renewable energy certificates produced by the city's photovoltaic arrays. Receipts and resulting expenditures from this fund shall not exceed $150,000, cements a report recommending that the order of the pass doc number zero 490, the Commission Committee on Ways and Means, to which was referred on April 13, 2020 to number 049, a message in honor of the raising and limit for the Environment Conservation Commission Revolving Fund for fiscal year 2023, for the purpose of securing outside consultants including engineers, wetlands, scientists, wildlife biologist and other experts, in order to in to aid in the review of proposed projects to the Commission. Per the city's ordinance protecting local wetlands and promoting climate change adaptation, the revolving fund shall be funded by receipts from the fees imposed by the Commission for the purpose of securing outside consultants. The Environment Department Department will be the only department authorized to expend from the fund, and such expenditures shall be capped at $50,000. Submits a report recommending that the order or surpass the numbers 0499 The Canadian Ways and Means to which was referred on April 13, 2022. Docket number 0499 Message in order approving an appropriation of $500,000 from the city's Boston Equity Fund to create a special revenue project grant in order to support equity applicants and licensees as defined by

Mayor Order

On the message and order, referred on April 13, 2022 Docket #0498, authorizing a limit for the Environment Conservation Commission revolving fund for the Fiscal Year 2023 for the purpose of securing outside consultants including engineers, wetlands scientist, wildlife biologists or other experts in order to aid in the review of proposed projects to the Commission, per the city’s ordinance protecting local wetland and promoting climate change adaptation. The revolving fund shall be funded by receipts from fees imposed by the Commission for the purpose of securing outside consultants. The Environment Department will be the only department authorized to expend from the fund and such expenditures shall be capped at Fifty Thousand Dollars ($50,000.00), the committee submitted a report recommending the order ought to pass.

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BostonCC_06082022_2022-0500

Speaker 2: Chapter eight, Section 13 Establishing the equitable regulation of the cannabis industry in the City of Boston Submits a report recommending the order to pass docket numbers 0500 the Committee and Ways and Means, to which was referred on April 13, 2020 to number 0500 message in order approving an appropriation of $4,560,000 from the 21st Century Fund, also known as the public, educational or government. Pig Access and cable related fund pursuant to section 53 of three quarters of Chapter 44 of the General Laws to the PEG Access and cable related grant for cable related purposes, consistent with the franchise agreement between the cable operator and the city, including but not limited to one supporting public educational governmental access cable television services to monitoring complaints of cable operator with the franchise agreement. Three Preparation of renewal of the franchise license. Submits a report recommending the order pass and docking numbers 0501 The Committee and Ways and Means to which was referred on April 13, 2022.

Loan Order

On the message and order, referred on April 13, 2022 Docket #0500, approving an appropriation of Four Million Five Hundred Sixty Thousand Dollars ($4,560,000.00) from the 21st Century Fund, also known as the Public Educational, or Governmental (PEG) Access and Cable Related Fund, pursuant to Section 53F 3/4 of Chapter 44 of the General Laws, to the PEG Access and Cable Related Grant for cable related purposes consistent with the franchise agreement between the cable operator and the city including but not limited to: (i) supporting public, educational or governmental access cable television services; (ii) monitoring compliance of cable operator with the franchise agreement; or (iii) preparation of renewal of the franchise license, the committee submitted a report recommending the order ought to pass.

BostonCC

BostonCC_06082022_2022-0501

Speaker 2: access cable television services to monitoring complaints of cable operator with the franchise agreement. Three Preparation of renewal of the franchise license. Submits a report recommending the order pass and docking numbers 0501 The Committee and Ways and Means to which was referred on April 13, 2022. Numbers 0501 message in order authorizing the appropriation of $1,400,000 from the income of the George Francis Parkman Fund, the funds are to be expended under the direction of the Commissioner of Parks and Recreation for the maintenance and improvement of Boston Common in Parks in existence since January 12, 1887, submits a report recommending that the order ought to pass. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Kirk. You're welcome. The chair recognizes Counselor Fernandez and a chair of the Committee on Ways and Means Counsel Fernandez Anderson. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you. Mr. President, these dockets represent revolving funds and other annual appropriations that are related to the city's budget, including the apartment fund, peg access fund and the equity fund. We heard some of these funds together with relevant departments and received testimony on all of them. These are standard annual appropriations and our sources of external external funding that don't come from the city's tax dollars. So I recommend passage of all 15 dockets. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilor Fernandez Anderson. We will now take a vote on each of these dockets separately. Councilor Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report and passage of Docket 0487. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed say no. The ayes have it. The docket is passed. Counsel Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of Docket 0488. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Councilor Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report and passage of Docket 0489. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Counsel Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of Docket 0490. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Opposed. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Council Fernandez Anderson, a chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report, the opposite of Docket 0491. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed say no. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Counsel Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of Dawkins 0492. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed nay. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Council Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of Docket 0493. All those in favor say aye. Opposed Nay. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Council Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report passage docket 0494. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed Nay. The ayes have it. The docket is passed. Council Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means six six acceptance of the Committee Report Passage of Docket 0495. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Council Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Garcia 0496 All those in favor say aye aye opposed. And the ayes have it. The docket has passed. Counsel Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of Docket 0497. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed May the ayes have it. The docket has passed. Council Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the committee and weighs main seeks acceptance of the committee report passage of Docket 0498. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Council Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the committee Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of Docket 0499. All those in favor say aye. All opposed nay. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Council Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passage of Docket 0500. All those in favor say aye. Aye, all opposed. And the ayes have it. The docket has passed. Counsel Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report passage docket 0501. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed nay. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. The docket has passed. Before we go on to matters recently heard from possible action, which are the budget which are the budget votes? I want to take talking zero 7 to 2 out of order, which is a hearing order from Councilor Carter, and she will be making her maiden speech. Yeah. Mr. Clarke, please read docket zero 7 to 2 and to the record.

Committee Reports

On the message and order, referred on April 13, 2022 Docket #0501, authorizing the appropriation of One Million Four Hundred Thousand Dollars ($1,400,000.00) from the income of the George Francis Parkman Fund. The funds are to be expended under the direction of the Commissioner of Parks and Recreation for the maintenance and improvement of Boston Common and Parks in existence since January 12, 1887, the committee submitted a report recommending the order ought to pass.

BostonCC

BostonCC_06082022_2022-0485

Speaker 2: Motor vehicles and trailers. Ambulances. Firefighting equipment. Office equipment. Telecommunications equipment. Photocopying equipment. Medical equipment. School and educational equipment. School busses, parking meters. Street lighting, installation, traffic signal equipment and equipment functionally related to and components of the foregoing. Filed in the office of the City Clerk on April 11th, 2022, and docket numbers 0485. Message in order approving an appropriation of 500 $550,370,000 for the acquisition of interest in land or the acquisition of assets or the landscaping, alteration, remediation, rehabilitation, improvement of public land, the construction reconstruction, rehabilitation improvement, alteration, remodeling, enlargement, demolition removal or extra ordinary repairs of public buildings, facilities, assets, works, or infrastructure for the cost of feasibility studies or engineering or architectural services for plans and specifications for the development, design, purchase and installation of computer hardware or software and computer assisted. Integrated Financial Management and accounting systems. In any and all cost incidental or related to the above described projects for the purposes of various city departments, including Boston Center for Youth and Families, Department of Innovation and Technology, Environment, Fire, Neighborhood Development, Office for Arts and Culture. Parks and Recreation. Police. Property Department. Property Management. Public Works and Transportation Departments. Boston Public Library. Boston Redevelopment Authority and Public Health Commission filed in the Office of the City Clerk on April 11, 2020 20486.

Mayor Order

Councilor Fernandes Anderson called Docket #00485, message and order, referred on April 13, 2022 Docket #0488, approving an appropriation of Five Hundred Fifty Million Three Hundred Seventy Thousand Dollars ($550,370,000.00) for the acquisition of interests in land or the acquisition of assets, or the landscaping, alteration, remediation, rehabilitation improvement of public land, the construction, reconstruction, rehabilitation, improvement, alteration, remodeling, enlargement, demolition, removal or extraordinary repairs of public buildings, facilities, assets, works or infrastructure; for the cost of feasibility studies or engineering or architectural services for plans and specifications; for the development, design, purchase and installation of computer hardware or software and computer-assisted integrated financial management and accounting systems; and any and all cost incidental or related to the above described projects; for the purposes of various city departments included Boston Center for Youth and Families, Department of Innovation and Technology, Environment, Fire, Neig

BostonCC

BostonCC_06082022_2022-0486

Speaker 2: Technology, Environment, Fire, Neighborhood Development, Office for Arts and Culture. Parks and Recreation. Police. Property Department. Property Management. Public Works and Transportation Departments. Boston Public Library. Boston Redevelopment Authority and Public Health Commission filed in the Office of the City Clerk on April 11, 2020 20486. Message in order approving an appropriation of $138,535,000 for the acquisition of interest in land or the acquisition of assets or the landscaping, alteration, remediation, rehabilitation or improvement of public land for the construction, reconstruction, rehabilitation, improvement, alteration, remodeling, enlargement, demolition removal or extra ordinary repairs of public buildings, facilities, assets, works, or infrastructure for the cost of fees, feasibility studies or engineering or architectural services for plans and specifications for the development design, purchase and installation of computer hardware or software and computer assisted integrated financial management and accounting systems and any and all costs into incidental or related to the above described projects for the purposes of the Boston Public Schools filed in the Office of the City Clerk on April 11th, 2022. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez Arneson, chair of the Committee on Ways and Means. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Q Counselor. President Flynn. Mr. President. I'd like to request that we move Docket 0480 to the end of the list and take docket 048120486. First, with the counsel indulgence. I will speak on all dockets collectively and then return to remarks on individual docket. You should have all of you should have five committee reports at your desks. Speaker 1: Yes, that's. That's. That's fine. Thank you, Counselor Fernandez. And sent you over the phone. Speaker 5: Thank you. Well, it's been quite a budget process, but here we are with some daylight before us. We have all done a lot of work over the last couple of months, and I salute all of you and your passion and patience. Before I go any further, I want to shout out to my team to whom who are integral to getting us to this point. My sincere gratitude to Amena, Scott, Joshua McFadden, Arlene Mercury and Colombo for working so hard behind the scenes, which allowed me to properly out face with you guys. A huge thank you to Michelle Goldberg with Michelle. Yes. It's. For her efficiency, tenacity, humility and professionalism. Thank you to Carrie Jordan, Juan Lopez, Lorraine Schettino, Ashley Purcell, Candice Morales, Ron Cobb, Christine, Megan, Joe, Lady, and of course, especially Miss Quorum on Tron for all that they do in keeping us informed and making this process work. And now for Boston Public Schools. For our Boston Public Schools. I feel they need to continue in order to continue in order for us to or our support in order for them to continue. Yes, there are improvements to be made and discussions to be had. But our students have a variety of needs and you don't meet these needs by reducing a budget, and yet there is surely work to be done. We need to continue to diversify our teachers workforce. Our schools are predominantly students of color, while our teachers are still largely white. It is imperative that our black and brown youth see more pedagogies and who look like them and who have lived in the experiences that are integral integral to their lives. Additionally, all of our youth need more mental health support, more addiction counselors, more librarians, more teachers, more music teachers, more afterschool programs, and more athletic opportunities. So let us support our most precious resource, our young, by funding and supporting the schools they attend in appropriate manner. I realize that some of my council colleagues and historically have rejected without prejudice and I welcome conversations and comments. Again, I re-emphasize that we have much work to do in order to for BPC to bring their services up to standards, the standards that our young deserve. And again, welcome your comments. Docket 0481. Is one of the several dockets that comprise the city's total operating budget and is a prop and appropriation order for BEPS for FY 23 in the amount of 1.33 billion. This FY 23 budget includes a 400 million increase in funding over our FY 22 to exceed a third year of three to exceed the year of three year 100 million. Commitment made to Boston schools in 2020. Investments in FY 23 operating budget include 6.6 million, four new social workers, school psychologists and guidance counselors to build out coordinated, multi-tiered systems of support for students and their families. 26.7 million directly to schools to ensure equitable access to vital student programs and services. 5.5 million to expand access to libraries and invest in inclusive library collections and materials. 6.8 million and operations. Improvements and expanded organizational capacity for transportation, food and nutrition services and facilities maintenance repairs. 3.8 million to increase access to mass core at the secondary level and access to more physical education, art, music, and academic enrichment. Creating high quality, rigorous and ethically and culturally responsive curriculum and instruction. And. 2.6 million. To expand language access with transition translations and interpretations for school meeting and materials. The FY 23 operating budget also includes a proposed $16 million increase for charter school students totaling public education funding for FY 23 at $1.6 billion. Public education spending remains over 40% of the city's budget, and per pupil spending at veeps will reach $27.20 sorry, $27,100, an increase of $3,600 over last year. And so as Chair of Ways and Means, I recommend that this docket ought to pass. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Would anyone else like to speak on this stock? And this is docket 0481. The chair recognizes. Counselor, me here. Counsel me here. No, that's okay. I'm going to go to counseling here. Counsel me here. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, President Flynn. And a thank you to the chair for shepherding us through such a whirlwind of budget conversations. And one of the things that I always kept saying in the budget hearings is don't bring me any more PowerPoint, and you hold them accountable to making sure that they talked about the return on investment. So I really do appreciate your leadership in that space. And I'm not here just only as the chair of education, but also a graduate and a parrot. And everyone in politics likes to talk about what, you know, the critical moment that we happen to find ourselves in or major turning points. And it tends to get overused. But when it comes to BEPS, it's really true. Think about all of the upcoming changes going on in our Boston Public Schools. We're working towards creating a an elected school committee. We're expecting a new superintendent. And of course, the issues of state receivership still looms over our heads. So all eyes are on us at this moment. And while the chaos and the politics happens at the top, it's the people at the bottom who are experiencing the ripple effects of our decisions. I know this because our office has visited and spoken with educators and students from across the district. We have seen firsthand how our educators are working their magic in classrooms to mold a generation of compassionate, curious and well-rounded students to go from those schools. Seeing educational excellence at work to go into administration budget hearings can give you a little bit of whiplash because there always seems to be a disconnect between the decisions that are being made at the top and the impact that they'll decisions have on everyone, not just overall. What we are spending our tax dollars on this year and BEPS is in alignment with the goals that we have for our students. We're seeing more money for ELL students, more money for special education. Fewer schools are seeking a decrease, are seeing a decrease in funding. And when we went out and spoke to educators and students across the district, many of their concerns from mental health to other support services are seeing an increase in funding this year. With that being said, there's still a number of areas that are of concern to me when it comes to capital planning. We need to see greater strategic vision in cases like the Shaw School. We still don't have a just a decided upon plan on how to support the sixth grade option there. I'm also not satisfied with how we're using our equity and opportunity gap tools to make decisions for our district. There are lots of areas that we can do better. The funding is there, but it's never a matter of how much money we're spending. I want to stand up here and say that we need to see more investments in this or that. But at this point, it's not a matter of investments. So I want to be clear that I'm planning on voting in favor of the budget. Absolutely. But I don't think it's fair to say that someone who votes against the budget is opposing public education and someone who votes in favor of the budget is in favor of doing business as usual. So I just think it's really important for us to to recognize, you know, that this moment is crucial. And as the chair of education, I take that role to heart. And I'm looking forward to this year really looking at how we can support our Boston public schools to get to where they need to be . But it's going to take all of us working together to make that happen. And so I am supporting the passage of the budget with the caveat of knowing that I'm going to be watching it as a hawk for the next year, but also holding myself accountable to what we need to do as a council to support them in achieving their goals. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman. Here, the chair recognizes Counselor Murphy. Counsel Murphy over the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you, Councilor Flynn. So I stand, as you all know, as a former teacher, student and parent. But I don't have many good reasons to pass this $1.33 billion school budget. Our return on investment is low, with declining enrollment, poor reading levels, an increase in violence, and the inability year after year to properly service our most vulnerable students who are on IEPs and receive ESL services. Those were my students for many years. We even struggle with the basic operations such as transportation and food services. And we all know how I feel about the dismal amount we invest in our school athletics, which, if properly funded, can provide the opportunity for so many of our children to participate in team sports and build the physical and mental health that in strength that we know they need. And you mentioned, Councilor Anderson, that they've increased to $27,000 per student, more than that. And we're still spending less than $100 per student on athletics. I also struggle with the lack of transparency apps. I've asked questions time and time again in the six months I've been here on the council. In most time, those questions are half fancied or ignored entirely. Moving forward, there is a need for accountability, transparency and oversight in our Boston public school system. I will continue to always advocate for our teachers who I know show up every day and work so hard in many of the administrators. I'll always advocate for our families and always put our children first. Every child in the city of Boston deserves a quality education. And there are so many moving parts right now in beeps that make this more challenging. There's the possibility of receivership. Council meetings are happening now around switching to an elected school committee. And we have an outgoing superintendent who's leaving in a few weeks. The finalists will be announced next week and possibly a vote on June 22nd. And we'll know who our new superintendent is going to be. And that superintendent is going to be tied to this budget. And we know that Superintendent Cecilia's and her staff who are leading these budget proposals will not be there on July 1st. So the timing of this budget would be more reasonable, I believe, if we named the superintendent first. But I know that we have time constraints here on the council. So I wanted to share my concerns and hear from any other council councilors. So thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counselor Murphy, the chair recognizes counsel. We're all counsel. We're all you off the floor. Speaker 10: Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you to counsel, Anderson, for leading us through this budget process. Student enrollment is declining. I'm encouraged with the new initiatives and the investments EPS will be making to our students this year. While we have heard about all the great programs and new investments. We have not heard data on literacy rate, postsecondary success or how our students do in the job market. As a counselor, we do not have a clear understanding of BP's goals for our students what our students outcome, what student outcomes we are driving towards. Do we know the academic baseline of our students? With so many high school graduations taking place this time of year, it is important for us to ask how BP is preparing our students for success after high school. What data shows that our children are ready for college, a trade, a certificate program, or a job. We are spending $1.33 billion dollars without the ability to evaluate and validate the curriculum, programs and initiatives to ensure we are preparing our students for life after high school. How many of our students graduate college? How many our students go to go into trades? What is the what is a BP educating worth in the real world? Do we know the average salaries of our high school graduates in 2016? So data graduates, average salary was around 35, $37,000 a year. This is the most recent data I found, and it is old data, but that's the issue. We can't change the outcome. We cannot change the outcome, but we do not have the information readily available. Making a livable wage is important. We need to be tracking that information, making the necessary changes and beeps to prepare students for college or career. We do not need to wait for Superintendent Tenet to tell us that our students need to prepare for life after high school. We can start that infrastructure building right now by being transparent with our student data set and benchmarks, identifying metrics and working with trusted partners for evaluating and validating student data. Although there is still work to be done, I'm grateful for and confident in the collaboration and creation when it comes to data. So I will be voting yes for the studio for the DPS budget. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Earl. You know, we'd also like to speak on this matter. Councilor Fernandez Anderson, the chair of the council. I'm sorry. I'm sorry to say the chair recognizes. Councilor Coletta. Councilor Coletta, you have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you. Council President. I just wanted to go on record to give a statement. So we all know the world is faced by peace right now due to generational divestments and mismanagement, but I won't repeat them. What I will say is that as a BHP's graduate, I know how strong our kids, families and teachers are, especially with what they've gone through the past couple of years during the pandemic. I believe that BHP's community is resilient and I believe in what public education can do to transform the lives of our children. I will also say that I do not support any top down approach and I still have yet to see the receipts. So given this, I still have great concerns about adequate supports for English language learners and children with special needs. I also want to see an investment in my O'Donnell school playground in Boston that serves 88% of Latin kids who do not otherwise have access to open space in their community. I also believe that increases in central office budget should be reallocated to go directly to our classrooms to recruit and retain excellent teachers and paraprofessionals, enhance healthy learning environments, and improve and modernize our curriculums to give our kids the best shot at success in the 21st century. And despite this, I'm going to support the Chair's recommendation to pass the DPS budget. We as a family, including the mayor, the school committee, and the new superintendent, whoever she may be, can get this done. So I will go on record in support of passing this budget and look forward to the conversations I. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilor. The Chair recognizes Councilor Braden. Councilor Braden, you have the floor. Speaker 3: Mr. President, this morning I had the very great pleasure of visiting the Baldwin Early Learning Pilot Academy in Brighton, a diverse inclusion school providing our youngest students with a solid foundation for their future learning within Boston Public Schools. I am so impressed and grateful to all the teachers and staff who work every day to support our students and a school community across the city for their tenacity, their resilience, and their stick to it ness. Our public schools are in a competitive market to attract and retain students, and it is vitally important that we. Speaker 5: In. Speaker 3: And as and so I stand to appeal a stand and ask us that we invest in early learning and literacy to ensure that our youngest students get the foundation that they need to succeed right from the very start. If students begin an early, early education in our school system, they will. And the system they will continue. And those families will be engaged and invested in our and our public school system in Boston. I want to echo my colleague, Councilor Wales, concerned about outcomes. How prepared are students to enter the 21st century workforce? I also want to raise up the issue of access to athletics. I firmly believe that athletic programing in schools is a mental health support that our students vitally need. Having weathered this unprecedented pandemic that we've just come through for the last two years as the Council for Alston Brighton District nine, I also want to stand up and advocate for a robust and planning process for the fair and a new Jackson Elementary School and for a new Horace Mann School for the Deaf, which is a regional school for the Deaf for 150 year history of excellence. And I hope that we can continue to support our special ed students across the city and our English language learners also. It's it's so inspiring. When I visit a classroom and see the work of our students and our teachers every day. And although I have very grave concerns about the state of things in the Boston Public Schools, I will be voting to support this budget today, but I do realize that we have a lot of work to do. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilor Bright. And the chair recognizes Counselor Arroyo. Counsel Arroyo, you have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you. Counsel President Flynn, I want to take a second to thank Counselor Fernandez Anderson for her inaugural budget and shepherding us through this the first time for everybody with the amendments and all the changes that we've done to the budget process in the last year. So thank you very much for your leadership and for putting in the hours to get us here. I just want to take a moment to thank our educators. It has been an incredibly difficult two years for our teachers. My sister is a teacher right now teaching in a Boston public school, and my mother did so for 35 years. And so I got a first hand seat at watching her grade papers and correct papers until the wee hours of the morning and just sort of the dedication that it requires. And when we added sort of the virtual learning and all the challenges of this pandemic, that job got incredibly difficult, incredibly fast, and our teachers responded. And so I just want to thank them for that. I know that beeps. I, as a former student myself, often gets a bad rap in how they are discussed or talked about. But I know that in each and every single individual school, we have educators and teachers and nurses and social workers and guidance counselors who are doing their very best to educate and prepare our children and are sometimes facing surmountable odds when insurmountable odds when we talk about the requirements that we are placing upon them and or the lack of resources and funding that we are giving them to reach and meet these goals and frankly, the lack of supports they receive when we are talking about things like housing or outside of the classroom, problems that impact inside the classroom. And so I am very heartened by the fact that this budget maintains the progress we made last year with a school nurse in every school. I am grateful that it adds one social worker at minimum per school full time. I think that's one of the places I would like to see our budget continue to go, which is addressing the mental health of our students. And so in that sense, I'm grateful that this adds 26 school psychologists. I would like to get us to a place where we have one per school as well, because we already had issues with making sure that our kids were receiving the social and emotional supports that they need at school. The pandemic only is going to continue to sort of make that a much more dire and pressing need. And I think we are seeing sort of the impact of that on educators and on students. And so I'm grateful that this budget adds 26 school psychologists. I'm grateful it adds one full time social worker per school. And I hope that as we continue to work on these things, that we continue to take into account not just their performance academically, but their actual social and mental health and well-being, which includes also athletics, as Counselor Murphy has brought up in making sure that we are teaching and reaching the whole child. Right. I'm grateful to the strides that this budget makes towards creating curriculum and materials that are inclusive and diverse in who and what kids are learning and seeing, and that they are seeing themselves reflected in both what is available to them in their library, but also in the curriculum. And so I will be voting yes on this. There are places where I think we can do better. I would hope am still pushing for ARPA funding to go towards infrastructure changes so that we can actually address some of the real infrastructure problems that we have within our schools that we've had for decades and frankly are long overdue and that we continue to build upon things that we have not done well and we continue to sort of ensure that we are giving funding to those issues and addressing those issues with staffing and making sure that we get to a place where our teachers are reflective of our populations. But this budget, as it's currently written, does address one of my major issues, which is social and emotional health for our students. And so in that way I'm grateful. And in that way I support this budget. I will be voting yes. Thank you. Council President. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel Royal. The chair recognizes counselors and counselors. And you have the floor. Speaker 7: And and I. Speaker 5: Want to thank Counselor Fernanda Anderson for all the work you've done in really getting us here. A lot of it was late nights and by yourself and and doing a lot of work with Michelle. So thank you so much on that. You know, as many people who are here, I am also a graduate and DPS is our biggest expense as it should be, as if we maintain public education as a public good and we need to support it with our resources. So I'm encouraged by this budget. I'm encouraged especially by the $2 billion commitment to a Green New Deal for our schools. Our school buildings need to reflect the dignity and affirm the dignity that we have for each and every one that each and every one of our students has. And so I'm encouraged by that. And one of the things that was really that struck me at the hearing on state receivership that I spoke in opposition to and so many others spoke in opposition to, there was a guidance counselor of the year was present and a lot of the members asked her, what can we do to better support our students? And she said, we can have more guidance counselors, more and more and more guidance counselors, even more than meeting what the state minimums are and what the national standards are. Our students are facing an unprecedented, unprecedented mental health crisis. When we talk about what's been happening not only with the pandemic, but, you know, the racial reckoning and issues going unaddressed. And so I think that we have a lot more work to do when it comes to providing more guidance counselors for our students, when it comes to supporting our English language learners, our students with interrupted learning in our slide program who have faced a number of challenges but are still trying to either learn English or maintain going to school despite life challenges, we need to support our principals and support greater teacher diversity to reflect what the classrooms look like, because we know that there's incredible value in that. I talk about these issues because they're also the issues that were important to me. My guidance counselor really helped me navigate processes that I wasn't familiar with, that my family wasn't familiar with. And we know that guidance counselors can really change lives. So and I hope that in that the work that our new superintendent does and the work that a lot of folks have been talking about, that we continue to support our students as they navigate issues both in school and out of school. And also, there's something that I've said a lot. There are a lot of good things happening at BP's, and Bebe's just needs to do a better job of communicating what's working. Like the availability of more kids are our kids are in k onesies that parents don't know about, students graduating with associates degrees, including from Madison Park. So a lot of our ability to attract students from charter schools, although we need to be able to track that data better. So there's a lot of things that are working in that we just need to do a better job of communicating that. So I'm going to support the chair here and her recommendation to pass that BEPS budget with the understanding that our role here as city counselors is to hold BP accountable, to really make sure that BP's central office is is doing the work, to make sure our busses are arriving on time, to make sure that students are getting the teachers that they need, that we are that when we see graduates crossing the stage, as I was seeing yesterday, that we can look into their eyes and say that we've done everything we can to prepare you and set you up for a good life. I'm not sure we can do that 1% now, but our role is to make sure that that happens. So thank you. And thank you, Madam Chair, for all of your work. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel. The chair recognizes counsel. Have clarity. Counsel. Clarity. You have the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. And thanks to the respective chair of the Chair, ways of beans and Chair of Education for me. As it stands right now. I'm a no. We have children who do not feel safe in school. We have children who are not arriving to school on time and some not arriving at all. We have we don't have the bona fide vocational tech school. I'm talking best in the country. Not enough of our kids are getting into some of the greatest schools in the world that call Boston their home. We boast of the best colleges and universities in the world. Not enough of our kids are getting into those schools and the ones that do and are fortunate to get in. Most of them are home at the Thanksgiving break, not to return because of the curriculum. And so as it stands, let's forget about facilities. And we're talking about, obviously, lack of sporting programs and lack of attention to to school psychologists and things like that. So, yeah, we're continuing to make strides. And, you know, I've never not supported our Boston Public Schools and our Boston Public School students. But the time has come with this legislative branch has to say, we have seen and heard enough. And whether it's the bullying that takes place in the schools or whether it's the violence that's taking place in the schools, or whether we continue to hear story after story after story of late arrivals or children actually being left on the street at the curb, not getting picked up at all. Enough is enough. And I think our leverage is right now. We have an opportunity to send the message back to Boston Public Schools that we you know, we're obviously tired of of the spin. We're tired of ducking and dodging. We're tired of no accountability. And then our leverage now is that we send it back, that we're not prepared to pass this right now. They need to do better. They need to make assurances to this body, to the student body and to their families that their schools will be safe, that their children will get to school on time, and that with respect to teaching. Speaker 8: And learning and. Speaker 1: In addition to the extra efforts that need to be made, obviously, for our English language learners and students with disabilities who are completely being left behind, all of that, some in substance says, hey, we shouldn't just pass this right now. We ought to send the message back to them that they need to do better, that we're going to hold them accountable. And this isn't about our teachers who do great work. Our colleague spent tremendous amount of time on the front lines, taught my children. There are some good news stories happening in the Boston Public Schools. We don't hear enough of them in its in. Speaker 8: The classroom with. Speaker 1: Teaching and learning. So my issue with this budget is not with our teachers and not with the teaching and learning. It's with Central. It's bloated. It's a morass. They don't listen. They're not responsive. And they're not accountable. No matter what, superintendent comes in. And as a result of which, we're seeing the results of decades of neglect. So for me, I'm a no. I'm encouraging my colleagues to be a no. Let's send a message back to them that we're not there yet. They need to sharpen the pencils. They need to come back to us with all of the things that we've just discussed. Our colleagues, through you, Mr. Chair, have raised some very important, critical issues. And my suggestion through you to them is if if what you've raised is not in this budget, then we need to say no right now, and let's see if we can get them in the budget over the next three weeks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Counsel. Clarity. The chair recognizes counsel. Baker That I'll recognize counsel. BLOCK After counsel. BAKER You have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. President. I don't want to delay belabor a lot of this here. We've talked about safety, transportation, vocational, vocational education, certain curriculums. I believe that we're not giving our children the best what we should give them. This is not an issue. 50 plus years. And we think something is going to change. A vote here, a yes vote here today is a vote for status quo because we think you're doing good enough. I don't think we're doing good enough. And I will be voting no today to echo a counselor or a well warrior who was was eloquent in in the way he spoke about what are they doing after school? What is the value of a veep's education? I'd be. I'd be very interested to see what that is. Multiple people have talked about great concerns that way. We will speak to grave concerns if it's if it's a no. And we send it back and it becomes a 1/12 budget. And they come in front of us every month to talk to us about what they're doing. I don't feel that this was a oh, and also think I want to do from the beginning, I should have thanked Counselor Anderson for her work and all this yeoman's work. But yes, I think there's a saying in AA, if nothing changes, nothing changes. This vote is to throw more money at it. But we're not getting it through that. We're not changing some things. We need to change transportation, school safety, vacation, what we're doing around inclusion, the one inclusion school that I had in my in my, I think, council role and I share that chair the area has been decimated. They were a national model. They're not anymore. And that was because of decisions made from on high that they implemented in a school that was that was doing very well. We can't say that today with a straight face. So I will be a no here today. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel. Baker, the chair recognizes counsel. BLOCK Counsel of the fall. Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. President. And I also want to thank Counselor Fernando Sanders, and I know firsthand how much work this all is. And I want to offer more thanks to some of the other dockets, but definitely on DPS. It's about a third of the hearings and and really quite a lot of information to process for the council so we can be here today. I think what I want to say is it's very much to agree with colleagues about many of the great challenges that we face ups. But to disagree with councilors. Baker and clarity about sort of what the logical move at this juncture is. I think we recognize that the Boston Public Schools face tremendous challenges. I was here a year ago saying that obviously enrollment declines. Seems like in certain ways the biggest one, if only because it drives the challenges for everything else in terms of giving our students these quality schools and and attracting everyone to the system. And then, as I've mentioned before, the early literacy rates continue to concern me deeply, although I think the the administration has in the intervening years been quite aggressive about rolling out new standards across and so on the academic front. I'm encouraged both by that and by the commitment to those core. But with huge challenges and we all know that the, you know, the building commitment is great, but gosh, is it needed? And and, you know, the thought about, okay, we want to have a quality schools commitment is great but how are we going to get there? I just think that when, you know, when you're in a storm and then you're about to appoint the sort of captain of the new ship, it's not the time to also kind of court martial them. And my sense is that, you know, that this is really a moment where we need deep partnership in the city. And that means that we need the council to be in partnership with the new mayor and the imminently very new superintendent to really to really steer the ship in a better direction. And I can't see starting that out instead of being from a place of partnership, sort of being show up your first day and maybe before us on your budget. I mean, to me, there's already enough swords hanging over this system when we talk about sort of the state apparatus recently, and it just feels to me like we're reaching out to all of our partners. We want our you know, we want our private partners, our universities, all our community partners to really, like, come in and all wrap our arms around us and make it the best system it can possibly be and a system of choice that attracts people and get those enrollment numbers back up . And it's hard for me to imagine that we would start that virtuous cycle by saying by signaling, you know, an unwillingness to pass this budget. So I guess the way I feel is that although these challenges are before us, there are challenges that we have to take collectively and that the steps that the council can take in good faith today for an incoming superintendent facing a lot of uncertainty and headwinds is to give them the certainty of a passed budget. So I'll be voting in the affirmative. Thank you so much. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. Anyone else like to. Speak on this. Council. Fernandez Enerson, the chair of the Committee of Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report and passage of Docket 0481. Mr. Clarke, can you please take the roll call? Speaker 2: Roll call on docket 0481 Council or Royal Council? A Royal Yes Council. A Baker Council. A Baker and eight Council. The Board Yes. Council. The Board. Yes. Council agreed. Yes. Council Aberavon. Yes. Councilor Coletta. Coletta yes. Councilor Fernandez Edison. Yes. Councilor Fernandez Sanderson yes. Council three The Council of Phil, everybody. No. Council Flynn. Yes. Council of Flynn. Yes. Council Laura. Council. Areas Council. Louisiana Council. Louisiana is council on me here. Councilor, me here? Yes, Councilor Murphy. Councilor Murphy know and council well? Yes. Council world? Yes. Docket zero 41 has received the majority. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Carter. I'm so. The chair recognizes counsel FERNANDEZ Innocent. Counsel Fernandez innocent of the full. Speaker 5: Is it okay if we take a five minute break? I have to tinkle. Speaker 1: This body will be in recess for 5 minutes. And then. We're back in session. Counsel Fernandez Anderson will speak on docket 048 to this is the next matter we'll take up. The chair recognizes Counselor Fernandez Anderson. Counsel Fernandez Anderson, you have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. Docket 0482 represents the operating budget allocation to funds excuse me, to fund the city's liability for other post-employment benefits. OPEB While the city is required by law to make an annual contribution toward reducing its unfunded pension liability, there is no such requirement for retiree health and life insurance benefits. In FY oh eight, the city was required to follow new Governmental Accounting Standards Board Gas, GASB required requirements to identify and disclose this estimated liability. At the same time, the city also voluntarily began to annually allocate funds to reduce to OPEB liability. Annual allocations are retained in an irrevocable trust fund authorized through the city's acceptance of Massachusetts General Laws. Chapter 32 V. Section 20 as added by Chapter 479 of the Acts of 2008, the city has been contributing $40 million to this fund each year since f y 13. And so as Chair of Ways and Means, I recommend that this docket ought to pass. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel Fernandez innocent. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Council. Fernandez Andersson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report. Passes passage of Docket 048 to Mr. Clark. Can we do a roll call vote, please? Speaker 2: Roll call on docket number 0482. Consuelo Arroyo. Yes. Councilor Arroyo. Yes. Counsel The Baker High Council of Baker High Council. Book Counsel of Buckeye Counsel. Brady Counsel Very nice counsel. Collette Coletta Oh yes. Counsel Coletta, yes. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Speaker 5: Yes. Speaker 2: Counsel Fernandez Henderson Yes. Counsel Clarity. Yes. Counsel Clarity. Yes. Counsel of Flynn Yes. Counsel of Flynn yes. Counsel Yes. Counselor Yes. Counsel. Louisiana counsel. Louisiana Yes. Counsel Let me hear. Counselor me here. Yes. Counselor Murphy. Counsel. Murphy Yes. And Counsel Warrell Yes. Counsel We're talking of 0482 has received a unanimous vote. Speaker 1: The docket has passed. Mr. Holmes counsel Fernandez Anderson will speak now on docket 0483. The chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez Anderson Thank. Speaker 5: You again, Mr. President. Now moving to docket 0483 ten, Docket 043 involves an appropriation of $1,600,000 from the city's Capital Grant Fund to address the impact of transportation network services on municipal roads, bridges and other transportation infrastructure, or to be used for any other public purpose sustainability related to the operations of transportation network companies. Taxes in the city. Under Chapter 187 of the Acts of 2016, certain transportation network companies must submit to the Department of Public Utilities dpu the number of rides from the previous calendar year that originated within each city or town. And for a ride assessment which are credited to the Commonwealth Transportation Infrastructure Fund. And then half of the fee is distributed by the Department of Public Utilities dpu proportionately to each city and town. Based on the number of rides that originated in the city or town, the funds are collected and deposited to the city as special revenue and must be included in must be appropriated to be spent. These funds are earmarked for TNC related purposes, including investments into way into into ways of mitigating the impact of taxes and alternate modes of transportation. And so as chair on Ways and Means, I recommend that this docket ought to pass. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Mr. Clarke, can you please call the roll. Speaker 2: Roll call on Duncan Number zero 43. Councilor Royal Yes. Council Royal Yes. Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker I Council the book council the Book of Celebrity Council The Great Knight Council Collective Council Collective Yes. Council Fernandez Anderson. Speaker 5: Yes. Speaker 2: Councilor Fernandez Sanderson Yes. Council Third yes. Council Clarity yes Council Flynn yes. Council of Flynn yes. Council Lara yes. Council ah yes. Council Louisiana yes. Council Louisiana yes. Council Let me hear. Council on me yes. Council the Murphy Council and Murphy yes and council overall. Yes. Council overall. Yes. Lucky number 0483 has received unanimous vote. Speaker 1: The docket has passed. The chair recognizes council Fernandez Anderson on docket 0484. Speaker 5: Thank you. Now moving on to docket 048420486 capital. We come together as a collective today to put forth a budget that will work for the masses of the residents and citizens of our city. And it isn't just for the matter of total amount of money that will be spent. Rather, it's who the money will be spent on and who gets to decide how the money will be spent. That we acknowledged today. We speak often of equity, but we don't practice it nearly as often. And when it comes to the proposed capital budget, I see much of much to approve of. But I can't help but to note that the plethora of projects that are being proposed are in predominantly affluent communities. It has been said that in the capitalist country, when there is a struggle between a rich person and a poor person, the rich person usually emerges victoriously. I humbly propose to you that we should put our shoulder to the wheel in an effort to reverse this to the best of our ability. So for those who do not have access to power, for those who aren't listened to when they speak, and for those who are food insecure, rent burton burdened, homeless, suffering from addiction, victims of an untreated mental illness. Simply put, for the masses of black, brown, immigrant and working class communities throughout our city, we must say to them clearly and unequivocally that we are with them and that this budget will begin a process by which they can thrive and not merely survive. The resources are there. Of that, there is no doubt and we support that the significant funds be utilized via the capital budget, but we must ensure that our support is rooted in guaranteeing that our communities most in need of resources and services get what they need. This is essential both as repair for histories of racism and class inequality. And for the ongoing manifestations of inequity that are prevalent across a spectrum of socio economic concerns. And so with all of that being said, I will recommend that as Chair Ways and Means. I recommend that these dockets be read for the first time and assigned for further. Further action. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Mr. Kirk. Well, before we do that, would anyone else like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes counsel. We're all counsel. We're all. You have the floor. Speaker 10: Thank you. President Clinton would like to thank the administration for working in collaboration with our office to bring in expanding capital investments in District four. And when I walk the streets of my district, a constant theme I hear in the black and brown neighborhoods in Boston is it's kind of sad to hear it is that nothing, nothing changes and government doesn't work. The truth in their statements is visible. When you walk on main streets and neighborhoods and see the legacy of generations of investments vacant lots, unused buildings, broken sidewalks and repair schools and playgrounds disproportionately in my district. Last September, many of our residents went to the polls, hopeful that after two years of protests against systemic racism in a historic mayoral field, they will finally be served in a way that understands the urgency of the moment. We all were sworn in knowing that business as usual was not working for too many people. The word equity we use often came to the forefront, and in that time we all understood going back to systems and practice. The practices that historically contributed to disinvestment of black and brown neighborhoods was clearly out of the question. If not now, then when? And what other moment is needed in the last five years? District four has received the least in the capital plan by dollar amount in percentage of any neighborhood. It is not. It is the only neighborhood whose capital budget has not surpassed $200 million during that time frame, while other districts have surpassed over $1 billion. We need corrective, equitable investments that are constructive with urgency. I want to I want to thank Mayor Wu that in this capital plan, we are inching towards making those investments and righting past wrongs with line items like a steady for town field, improvements to streets and upgrades to Banka, along with commitments for future investments. Our communities, who have strictly not seen infrastructure investments, will now see more the state of our environment. The state of your environment affects your behavior and how as a city, the role we play in eradicating the ongoing issues facing black and brown communities and directly it is directly correlated with the investments that are made in the capital plan. New and increased investment investments will not only be perceived as transformative leadership, but will heal past trauma and restore faith that local government can and will work in underserved communities. I am looking forward to the urgency around current and future future equitable investments to correct the wrongs of years of disinvestment in black and brown neighborhoods and making our capital plan more equitable. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Council World. The chair recognizes council board counsel Bach. You have the floor. Speaker 9: Thank you so much, Mr. President. And also rise to support the capital plan. But to say that, you know, I think I'm I'm glad to hear about studies and such that have been added to achieve greater equity. I think as we've often seen in the capital budget and a small study in the first year can turn into a major expenditure. And I hope that as some of the things that counsel were, I'll just reference that sort of bloom that that really adjusts some of these totals that he was just talking about. And I also just want to say that I am. Just as hopeful and also impatient that by the time we're here again in a year, we will really be seeing the the progress from the administration adding these positions in PFG that they that are promised in this budget. Because I think, as folks have heard me say before, one of my frustrations is not only that. There's the question of what what is the equity and frankly, just the level of commitment that we're rising to in the actual capital budget. But then it's like, how quickly is that commitment actually realized? And, you know, so many of us see projects that just kind of languish year after year. And so I'm really hopeful. I know there's a significant number of us on the council. I know Councilor, the Madam Chair, Councilor Fernandez Henderson shares this view. Cats are legion, but that we could be just doing more in the capital budget. And the reality is even under our 7% limit, we're only hitting an effective 5.3 because we're just not getting these projects out the door. So I just I want to emphasize that I'm excited about a number of things in this capital budget, but particularly excited about the idea that we could just be building more infrastructure more quickly for the residents of Boston, because I really don't think there's a better bet investment wise than public infrastructure in this country. Often, you know, we we talk about it like it's 30 year stuff, but we tend to build a hundred year stuff and it just has such a huge impact on the kind of public goods of the city that all of our residents get to enjoy. And I just wanted to flag I meant to say this, but it's more appropriate here that for me, one of my focuses in the next six months is going to be, as we talk about this, BHP's $2 billion capital plan. How do we really make sure that that specifically is being pursued with the urgency? That doesn't sort of put us in the traditional capital timeline, but actually really make sure that those new schools are going to be delivered for our students on an expedited schedule, because I think that will make all the difference for it really fulfilling its promise. So with all that said, proud to support the capital budget today. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. Berkeley Chair recognizes counsel and counsel and you have the floor. Speaker 5: Mr. President, I will belabor the moment. I just wanted to thank the Chair Ways and Means Councilor for Andre Anderson and Council World for all their work. You know that we've done really an uplifting, how inequitable we can sometimes be when we're planning for our future, when we're planning, when we're looking at the capital budget. So I just when we're looking at our poorest districts, we're looking at our districts that have a concentration of black and brown folks. And when we're thinking about equity being the corrective action that we need to take, we really need to be leaning in and making sure that our capital budget really reflects that council back up. You know, we are we are very wealthy city. We have a lot of money. And it's just that wealth is not shared, that prosperity that we experience as a city that is often built on the backs of working class folks, black and brown folks, that is not shared. And I think our capital budget is a way for us to really think about how we're using our fiscal strength and think about how we're bonding and how we're using our triple-A bond rating to really invest in the public infrastructure in the way that Castro Brock was talking about. So I just want to thank you, Madam Chair, for the work that you've done here, because all the data and the research you've done to show how much you've disinvested in neighborhoods like before, and hopefully we can get it right continuing in the future. So thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. Lewis And the chair recognizes Councilor Murphy. Counsel Murphy you have the floor. Speaker 6: And thank you, chair, vice chair for all your work. So I definitely have high hopes for this $3.6 billion capital plan. And I want to thank Mayor Woo and the administration for this. It includes improvements to our schools, open spaces, community centers, streets and bridges. Although I am in support of the project, I want to highlight a few that I'm especially excited about the improvements to our community centers, especially the Curley Matter Hunt in North End centers and the Paris Street Pool, improvements to the East Boston Police Station, the preservation of the Long Island facility in Woods, Mullins shelter and the resiliency improvements in the harbor walk and open space construction, which I know will make our oceanfront more equitable and accessible to all. In the improvements to the Boston Public Schools facilities, especially when I see athletic facility upgrades, I'm very excited. So the amount of money, this amount of money has the ability to transform our city and jumpstart projects that have been overshadowed in the past. And I do want to thank you, counsel world for bringing that to us to light with your data of d for and as an at large city councilor, I'm here to support and advocate your efforts in that district, so I will be voting in support of the capital budget. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counselor Murphy. The chair recognizes. Counselor. Me here, Counselor. Me here. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. This is a new day, right? The way we normally do business is we either when it comes to the capital budget, and we usually have a tradition to just, you know, vote without prejudice. And so I wasn't prepared to speak on the capital budget, but now I have been inspired to do so. Just really quick, again, I want to thank the chair and the vice chair and actually all of my colleagues who have been uplifting the importance of recognizing that we have a responsibility as a citywide councilor. You know, I spent a lot of time across the city, and I see who has and who has not. And I think as we continue to move through these processes, I think it's really important from a process standpoint, is that when it comes to the capital budget, I don't see a lot of conversations that are happening in the community about what it is that they need. And I think that that's an opportunity where we have to be able to lean in to create more opportunities for those who are living in in different neighborhoods, to speak for themselves around the things that that they want to see. Oftentimes, a lot of these conversations around the budget usually just falls on the operating budget, which I appreciate and I understand there's a lot at risk. But at the same time, I think capital should be another space where we start leaning in a little bit more if we're really serious about building equity here in the city of Boston and more importantly, creating space for those who actually pay for our salaries to be informing how we spend their capital dollars. So with that, I just wanted to uplift the importance of voice and look forward to moving the conversation along. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilmember here, the chair recognizes council, president, council. And you have the floor. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. President. I'm excited to see this broad ranging capital budget. One, two concerns I want to flag up. One is, you know, in terms of we appropriate funds for capital projects. But but in the in the past, I echo my colleague, Constable Cox, concerned about sometimes the glacial pace of progress, but very often that boils down to the need to have a project managers in place and all the folks that manage a project and and shepherded through the process. And we have a human resources challenge here, and I hope that we can address that aggressively in the next year to make sure that we have the infrastructure in place to help shepherd these projects to their completion. As a district councilor for Allston, Brighton District nine, I applaud the inclusion of a study for a new elementary school in Alston and the new school, the Horace Mann Regional School for the Deaf and Hard of hearing. One of my biggest concern is the urgency of addressing the imminent closure of the BCA f community center at the Jackson Man Complex in Union Square. It is the only community center, busy wife community center we have in our neighborhood. We're the second largest neighborhood in the city with a population of over 75,000. And this is our only. Community center. It is a it is an emergency, FEMA emergency, central heating and cooling center. It is the polling place for five precincts. It is it is adult education, early education and child care. It is an absolutely essential piece of our community infrastructure. We cannot afford to have it shuttered and closed and have nothing in its place for for the time that it will take to build a new center. So I am appealing for urgency, and I will be continuing to advocate strongly to have this this project expedited in the near future. So I will be voting in support of this capital budget, but I also want to hold up these concerns with regard to Brighton. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. But anyone else like to speak on this matter? Mr. Clarke, can you please call the roll. Speaker 2: Roll call on docket 0484? Councilor Arroyo. Yes. Councilor Arroyo. Yes. Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker. Councilor Bug. Councilor BLOCK. Councilor Brady. I have been a Councilor Coletta. Councilor Colette. I guess. Councilor Fernandez. The interest a. Counsel for Ananda Sanderson. Yes. Counsel. Clarity. Counsel Clarity. Yes. Counsel Flynn. Yes. Counselor Flynn. Yes. Counselor. Counsel. Lara Yes. Counsel Louisiana. Counsel. Allusion Yes. Counselor Me here. Counsel Let me here. Yes. Counselor Murphy. Counselor Murphy. Yes. And counsel. World Yes. Counsel World. Yes. Talking number zero 44 has received a unanimous vote. Speaker 1: The docket has received its first reading and will be assigned for further action. The chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez Enerson on Docket 0485. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. Typically I like to talk and I have jokes, but today I didn't want to talk so much. Moving on now, returning to docket 0480 departmental operations. No. Speaker 1: They recognized. Speaker 5: What? Oh, sorry. Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right. The chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez. Innocent Docket 0485. Speaker 5: Yeah. I've already spoken on them. Say it again. Speaker 1: The. We'll take a brief recess. Yeah. We're back in session. We're continuing 0485. Speaker 2: Roll call vote on docket 0485. Counsel Arroyo. Speaker 5: Yes. Speaker 2: Counsel Arroyo. Yes. Counsel Baker. High Counsel Baker Uh, Counsel of Counsel by Counsel Brady And so Braden. Counsel Coletta. Counsel Coletta yes. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Speaker 5: Yes. Speaker 2: Counsel for Ananda Sanderson Yes. Counsel Flaherty. Counsel Clarity Yes. Counsel Flynn yes. Counsel Flynn Yes. Counsel Yes. Council Area Counsel. Louisiana. Intrusion yes. Counsel here. Counsel Murphy. Counsel Murphy Yes. And Counsel. World Yes. Counsel Well, yes. Lucky number zero 45 has received a unanimous vote. Speaker 1: The docket has received its first reading and will be assigned for further action. Mr. Clark, would you do a roll call vote on. Speaker 2: Dockers 0486 Roll Call on Docket 0486 Councilor Royal Council Overview. Yes Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker High Council of Full Council of Book Council. Green Council. Green Council Calera Council. Calera Yes. Council Fernandez Sanderson. Speaker 5: Yes. Speaker 2: Council Fernandez Sanderson Yes. Council Florida. Yes. Council Clarity. Yes. Council Flynn. Yes. Council Flynn. Yes. Council Area. Council area yes. Council Allusion. Council Louisiana. Council me here. Council meeting. Yes. Council Murphy. Yes. Councilor Murphy. Yes. Council world yes. Council. Well, yes. Talking numbers 0486 has received a unanimous vote. Speaker 1: The docket has received its first reading. Will be aside for further action. We will go back to docket 0480, which is the operating budget as amended by the Council pursuant to our new authority under the Charter Amendment. Amendment. The Chair recognizes Council. Fernandez innocent. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. And now the moment we've all been waiting for. Now returning to docket 0480 Department of Operations. Finally, I want to take this time to first thank our dear clerk, Alex and team. Appreciate all the work that you do. Thank you. I'd like to thank my incredible colleagues who this could not have been possible without. Counselor me here. I thank you for standing firmly. Feet planted. As you speak, your truths with an epic strength and passion. Councilor Murphy. I applaud you for your fundamental decency, your career in education, and for your ongoing concern and advocacy for our city. Councilor. President Flynn. I deeply appreciate your kindness and consistency in the face of ups and downs in seemingly second nature to this work. Councilor Morrow, I warmly acknowledge your quiet, quiet strength and steadfastness and your willingness to collaborate. Councilor Lara, I salute you for your for being an eternal soldier on behalf of these disenfranchized and marginalized. And for bringing your fighting spirit into this chamber each and every day. Councilor Braden. I greatly appreciate your thoughtful, intuitive and quietly strong demeanor. There have been times. In this chamber when I may not have heard or seen you, but I felt your presence. Councilor Bach. I am incredibly, incredibly grateful for your intelligence and for the hard work you put in. Your ability to selflessly do the work of five people is nothing short of mind boggling. Councilor Baker. You're my guy. I love your big heart and powerful passion. In truth, because of those traits. I would rather disagree with you. Then agree with most of the people I've known. Councilor Lucien. You have become my sister. You combine equal parts, brilliance and boldness. And getting to know you has been a highlight of this journey for me. I care for you deeply while learning to love you. Counsel clarity. I so appreciate your acts of kindness to me personally. And for your great professionalism, class and class that you demonstrate daily. Counselor Arroyo. I wouldn't have this experience without you. And you know what I mean. This was not possible without you. I am grateful for your skill and your, well, your passion for justice in your quiet but firm leadership that you exercise so eloquently. And finally, Councilor Coletta. So gentle. I salute you for jumping in right into this process. With the confidence, knowledge and presence of a ten year old veteran, and it has been a marvel to behold. I am happy to have all of you as my colleagues, and I am happy to say that we have put forth a budget that can begin. Might I say that again, begin to function toward a betterment of all Bostonians? On this day, I state with confidence our proposed policies have begun to match our jargon and our actions have inched closer to our words. Let us continue on this path together until we collectively craft and create the conditions that will assist in producing a city that we can all be proud of. Pursuant of the 2021 Charter amendment, the city council has worked as budget season to put forward an amendment draft rather than our typical rejection on the second Wednesday in June. The committee conducted a robust process to review the mayor's proposal beginning in April and running through June through this week . This process has included 30 public hearings on departmental budgets and associated capital projects, including two sessions dedicated to public participation and has received written testimony from all city departments as well as written recorded testimony from the public. The committee also held four working sessions for council deliberation to put forward amendments to the mayor's proposal. The Council's proposed amendments to Docket 0480 fall into two categories intra departmental and inter departmental. It's for inter. I'm sorry. For intra departmental amendments include additional environmental health inspectors, for pest control, for other rodent abatement materials, including traps, baiting and dry ice. Additional funding for senior home repair programs. Two additional part time cross guards for the Winship and Baldwin schools. Funding to contract a tour bus company for the artery in District seven. Tourism contracts dedicated to African culture events such as festivals and parades. Additional addition of an EMS supervisor in the Community. Initiatives Division. Initiatives Division. Mental Health Response. Crisis Training to be provided to the City Council and 311 staff. Additional youth and senior programing at the Nazario Community Center. Grant opportunities along the artery in District seven. Two additional parking enforcement officers in East Boston. A pilot home ownership voucher program for the BHF. Funding for Historic Preservation of an African-American Arts Museum in Roxbury. Maintenance of the Grant to the Smart from the START program. Funding for acquisition of land to preserve natural wild. Funding for a college youth academic partnership program that will pay students for participating in tutoring. Funding for experiential learning. Opportunities for youth. Funding to expedite pedestrian safety measures. Funding to build capacity. And linguistically appropriate. Technical assistance for immigrant businesses. Grant opportunities for immigrant owned small businesses. A Jackson Man Transition Coordinator Position. Jackson Man Transition Resources. Addition of an early literacy specialist position. A pilot for housing stipends for young people age 19 to 29. 20 for my apologies. Housing stipends for municipal employees struggling to pay rent. Or own a home payments. Now moving on to an intro. So Interior Department to amendments totaling $8,832,000 or 0.53% of the budget of the appropriation order. Now, moving on to entire department or amendments. The addition of 15 Hokies two for Allston, Brighton four want one for Chinatown, two for East Boston, two for District four, two for Roxbury, two for Fenway Mission Hill. Beacon Hill two four District two and two City Wide District three. My apologies. The addition of a director of waterfront planning position funding for BHO for the city housing voucher program, which set aside for project based basing at IDP units to buy deeper affordability. Returning citizens and VHA Home Ownership Pilot Launch funding to accelerate waste reduction programs with additional staff positions. Funding to provide a subsidy for expanded Mission. Hill Link Service. Additional staff for tree maintenance. An increase to the annual allocation to the Boston Groundwater Trusts to $200,000. Full funding for 6000 youths jobs and 1500 year round jobs. Additional personnel for general support in a city clerk's office. Increase capacity for black male advancement. Funding for erstwhile courses. Increase capacity in the Office of Returning Citizens. Small grant opportunities for graffiti busters. Increase to city council personnel services to right size staff wages. And add central positions to support the Council with its new budgetary authority. Funding for LGBTQ Events. Additional Funding to support immigrants. Lead Boston. Personnel funding to bolster already budgeted for upgrades to the legacy 311 system to reform Boston 311. Funding to provide technical assistance for all 20 Main Street districts. Funding I'm sorry additional staff for Saw Charlestown funding for burial assistance, funding for senior programing at the Veronica Smith Center in Brighton and commissioning of a citywide life insurance study. Funding for BFD Carr five Boston Fire Department. Carr five. Funding for the Clerk's Office to provide. Procure clarification services for the review and. Sorry. Record ification of the City of Boston Code Ordinances and special acts relating to the City of Boston, including the city charter youth workers to support programing for youth residents of VHA, Commonwealth Apartments and the Boston Public Housing Authority. Public Housing Authority. Faneuil Garden's Programmatic Support for citizenship day salary increases for employees at Boston Youth Development Network. Interdepartmental amendments total $17,006,618 in $18 in fund transfers across various departments, which represents just over 1% of the docket appropriation order. The amended draft being proposed is net neutral. Pursuant of our responsibilities under the Charter and reflects the Council's priorities for FY 23 in working toward a better, safer, more equitable city that takes care of its residents and employees. And so, as Chair of Ways and Means, I recommend that this docket ought to pass in an amended draft. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. Counsel Fernandez Emerson. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes counsel. Our counsel, LRA. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, President Flynn, and thank you to Counselor. Speaker 5: Fernandez Anderson for stewarding us through this very long and tedious process in the budget. I rise today to show my support for this amended budget. I think that. The budget that was presented to us by Mayor Woo did an amazing job at what she calls getting the small things right so that we can do the big things . And this budget that has been presented by the City Council in its amended version goes one step further, not only to reaffirm the mayor's vision of doing the small things right, but to do it in a way that is collaborative. And that includes not only our personal vision for the big things that the city of Boston needs, but the very specific needs that our constituents has that have asked us to represent here on the city council. I think that this amended version of this budget is a beautiful amalgamation of both the mayor's vision and the needs of all of our districts. And I'm excited to send it to the mayor for her approval. I want to rise today to speak specifically about the amendment that I included here in the committee report. The amendment for a just under $7 million for youth jobs in the city of Boston is representative of the largest line item amendment made to the city of Boston budget. And it's something that's very near and dear to my heart because I got my start organizing here in the city of Boston, asking for the city of Boston to increase the city's budget. At that time, I was 15 years old. I am almost 33 now. And so it's been a long fight of almost, if not already, two decades of the young people of the city of Boston asking for the city council and the mayor to ensure that the resources that were set aside for the young people in the city of Boston were up to par with the needs that we would be investing in young people, investing in their well-being and investing in the safety and the well-being of our communities as well. But today, I don't just want to talk about myself. I want to talk about Michael Brown. Eyeball. Brown was a 17 year old young man from Mattapan. Cool. At a very young age as a juvenile. Spent his time with the wrong crowd. And became getting involved very early. At the age of 15, I came across a youth worker who offered him a youth job during the summer. Speaker 7: And that was the catalyst for eyeballs transformation. Speaker 5: I've always spent the next three years becoming what I consider one of the most prolific youth organizers received. An eyeball spike of choice with the UV job spike. Year after year. Eyeball came. Speaker 7: And testified before the City Council to ask that the. Speaker 5: Boston City Council increase the budget for the youth jobs. Sometimes we won. Sometimes we lost. Sometimes we made concessions. But never did the mayor or the city council meet the requests that the young people in the city of Boston were making. I got the incredible pleasure of being eyeballs youth worker at 31 Heath Street. Youth in Boston, a family service of Greater Boston. I got to watch Eyeball Blossom into an incredible young. Speaker 7: Man. Speaker 5: Who committed all. Speaker 7: Of his time. Speaker 5: Not only into maintaining his own youth job, but into ensuring that all of the young people in his neighborhood who were currently or previously getting involved had an opportunity to get out. On Memorial Day as I was sitting on his front steps waiting for his mother to bring him to one. Speaker 7: Of our actions. I've always stopped and killed. Speaker 5: Now I know that to a lot of people this may sound like maybe it's not a success story. Because Eyeball didn't make it. But my advocacy for these $6.9 million. Comes from a place of considering. The shooting. Speaker 7: That didn't happen. And the young person that didn't. Speaker 5: Have to lose their life like I will. Because they weren't at the wrong place at the wrong time. The young person who decided to change their life. And go back to school or attend college. Because of the redirection that was given to them by being a part of a youth jobs. I know that we talk about this budget in frame of numbers and in frame of balance and in frame. Speaker 7: Of the financial health of the city of. Speaker 5: Boston. But I am incredibly, incredibly heartened by the support that has come for this specific amendment from my council colleagues. I am excited about what we're going to be able to do with this level of resource. And I just wanted to lift up what the human cost is. We don't always win. Speaker 7: We don't always get these amazing young people that we can save. Speaker 5: But if $6.9 million means that maybe we lose 15 less young people somewhere, then I think that that is an incredibly worthwhile investment. And I am so incredibly happy to support it and I'm incredibly happy to have the support of my council colleagues. Thank you, Chair, for including this here. And I'm thankful for all of the youth organizers that almost 20 years later continue to show up here to tell us that they need resources and that the vision for the city of Boston that they have is one that's not only inclusive, but meets every single need of every single young person in the city of Boston. I am a product of the youth justice movement here in the city of Boston. I'm elected here to the city council because the youth justice movement in Boston got behind me and made sure that I got elected. And it is my honor to steward this amendment on the city council. So I just wanted to thank my colleagues and I wanted to lift up the voices of all of the young people in the city. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Laura. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? The Chair recognizes. Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker, you have the floor. Speaker 8: Mr. Chair, just a quick point of of of. Of interest, I guess so we're voting on this is where all of our and this is for much is the people at home as it is for us here we are voting on our amendments now, which is different from the way it used to be. Correct. Okay. So. I'm not necessarily in agreement where with some of the direction of the city and in particular down at Mass and Cass, I think that that's going to be basically a money dump for the next 20 years, and I don't think we're ever going to get in front of them. The problem I think the people that are down there, the way they're handling with them, we're putting them on a treadmill. And I think it's I don't think it's going to get any better. That doesn't say I hope I don't hope it gets cut. I do hope gets better because my ass in cash now is leaking into every neighborhood around it. My neighborhood. Your neighborhood, lower Roxbury. Your neighborhood. Not going to get any better. So. With that being said. This budget's different in a sense, where we you guys, more than me, I think, have been able to add in things that are important to you and important to help your neighborhoods, your districts, and you be able to do your job. So I think that being said is good news. So I will be voting in favor of this operating budget here. Anxiously looking at how it comes back, how much of what we did yesterday, in the previous days, how much is actually going to come back to us? How much are we going to be able to say we made a difference? We were there. And quite honestly, I wish that what we did yesterday, we did with ARPA because the Apple Money is where we can bring things into into District four, where we can help out. Everybody knows what I'm looking to do. I'm looking to do the fieldhouse. The fieldhouse is going to be generational change for people. Generational. There's three housing developments that within walking distance, yet unable to get any kind of back and forth with this administration on that issue. That would make me want to vote against an operating budget. That would make me want to vote against a capital budget just because of the lack of. Someone coming and asking me who I am, what I, what I want, what you know, what do you think? What are your thoughts? It hasn't happened in this in this budget season. For me, $800 billion, $800 million has gone through this floor right here. We haven't had a say on it. None of you have had a say on. So that to me is problematic, is problematic of what may what the future looks like with an administration that's not really going to pay attention to us. You know, they're paying attention now because we had those budgetary amendments and we were able to we'll see what happens with it. I think the process, because a lot of what we did yesterday, I thought if I one opportunity without the money being that we could have filled a lot of those holes with the money. I hope what we did didn't go in and read budgets of city departments because I consider myself first and I've said this a thousand times, I consider myself a city worker first, a good 35 years in the city. I started in real property. I went over the printing department and every year around the budget season I was like, Oh, I hope our boss, the the head of the department, is fighting for us, getting us the money we need, getting us, you know, whether it fits, whether it's, you know, cleaning products we needed at the printing department, whether it was whether it was, you know. An extra person to come in and be an extra hand. I hope. I hope we didn't go in and just raid city departments and now they're all going to scramble for figuring out how they make that work happen, where they thought the budget was there. Now we went in and are shifting it around. We'll see what happens. I'm interested in seeing what happens, but just wanted to make a couple of points, especially about ARPA. This offer here is is a missed, missed, missed opportunity. We're just being told where it's going to be spent. You'll be good with it. Just trust us. Trust, but verify. We haven't had a chance to verify here. His three 350 million. You guys are okay with that, right? Yeah. Just improve at the. Send it along. That's a problem. Thank you, Mr. President. I will be voting in favor of this because. Not because of the budget that came from across the hall. Because it's the budget that you guys helped to put together. And you guys are going to be able to do things in your districts and in your neighborhoods that are going to help you, because we know as counselors in a smaller, more refined way, I think what our neighborhoods need more than maybe people are a little bit removed. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, Counselor Baker. The chair recognizes. Councilman. Here, Councilman. Here, you have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. This budget season has definitely been a learning experience. Two years ago when I stood up and voiced my opposition to was then referred to as the mayor's budget. We made it clear that we can't be doing business as usual because this isn't the mayor's budget, it is the people's budget. And with that, since then, the city council, the city councilors have been working and more importantly, the people. We are now in a position to reflect the voices of the people in our budget process. This first year was a proving ground. It was an opportunity to test the waters of these new powers. Because of that, we have been bowled. And we have been sitting through at least. The last few working sessions 7 hours to get to where we needed to be under the leadership. Of this powerhouse over here. I feel I'm 6 hours, 16 total, but 7 hours each. It felt like maybe 24 hours roundtrip. But I feel really confident in our ability to fight for things that the people have been demanding. A little bit in our process. Every year, our office holds a series of budget pop ups in our community spaces across the city, in barbershops, hair salons, restaurants, schools, you name it. We're there, people. We're there to listen. This year, we were able to hear firsthand from residents from across the city about what their priorities are. And through our amendment process, we were able to make those priorities a reality. And I also want to shout out the advocates who have been working fiercely around youth jobs. And I am so incredibly happy that Councilor Lotta, as someone who has been in deep community with young people, has been able to deliver on these promises. And there's still so much more to do on that front. And I look forward to working alongside her to get some more money next year. And one of our pop ups. We heard firsthand from immigrant business owners about the struggles that they have getting their businesses off the ground. And because of that, we managed to secure. You know, $500,000 to do two things. First. We're using some of the funds to create two positions. We will serve as case managers for immigrant businesses. The rest of the funds will be available to small immigrant owned businesses to access resources like web design, logos, banners and other technical assistance that immigrant businesses have. I'm not going to go through the whole line item of all the things that we were managed to secure, because I think you all will get the memo. And this is not just about the things that we were able to do as office, but I do want to just take a moment to really highlight that this can't be politics as usual and if the council has been given the power. To make amendments. It is really important for the administration. Right. To recognize that power and give us the power to do just that, which is to send back the budget with the needs and wants of this council. Right. Anything other than that would be completely unacceptable. And I want to go on the record that what this council has approved is what I will be supporting. Periods and end story and you could rewind. Because this is not the moment for us to say that we want to be collaborative. And then send us something that we're going to have to compromise on. And this should not be about The Hunger Games either. Where there is a will, there is a way. And this is an opportunity for us to find the dollars to make it happen. And I want to be really clear. As I stand here in support of passing this operating budget. That's, I think. This is our responsibility and our in our opportunity. To rise up and give the people. At the very least, the belief that government is working for them. And one last thing that I'll say is that I've been echoing this alongside my other colleagues about the opera funding. Yeah. I am not going to when it comes to that budget approved things that we have not really had a real say because there's a lot of money on the table right now. And we need more processes. And protocols and procedures in place to make sure that we get a piece of that pie, too. So with that, I just want to go in favor of supporting this operating budget in a better come back as is. Thank you very much. And Madam Chair and Madam Chair, like what you did so masterfully. Masterfully. Right. It is not easy to work with 13 multiple personalities because we all have the. And get us to where we need to be. And I just want you to know that the work that you did to get us here, given that this was the first time that we were all doing this. Thank you. And thank you to Florida and Flint for feeding us along the way to really do appreciate that. Because, you know, I'm a grub, but not seriously. Let's just make sure that we lean in and we recognize this moment as a collective. Thank you, Madam Chair, for your hard work. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. Here the chair recognizes counsel of counsel book. Thank you on the floor. Speaker 9: Thank you, Mr. President. And with your indulgence, I just want to spend 2 minutes addressing off topic the ARPA question and then turn back to the docket at hand. I want to emphasize to counselors that, you know, when the administration filed this ARPA docket, their original hope was that we would also be having an ARPA vote today . That's why it was introduced with the budget. And we are not having an ARPA vote today precisely because my committee is focused on making sure that council is going to saying that. Now, folks may have noticed that there hasn't been a lot of legislative time because we have been going through five major dockets that the Chair has just spoken about today. And so we have grabbed every possible hearing slot that was available to consider this, the proposal that the administration proposed. Now, I think it's fair to the administration to have gone through in a series of hearings the proposals they put before us, much like Councilor Anderson sat over 30 hearings on the department budgets before we got into working sessions. So it is my hope as the chair of COVID 19 recovery that with hopefully results from today that the Ways and Means Committee is going to be able to release a few holds over to the COVID 19 Recovery Committee so that we can hold some of these working sessions that councilors are clamoring for. But I do not, frankly, think it is fair to the committee or to myself as Chair to suggest that the problem mid process is that we haven't gotten where we got at the end of a process with budget. So I just I would really appreciate if councilors would maybe pursue their challenges on this differently. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, Councilor. Speaker 9: And then on Councilor Anderson's docket, and I really do want to congratulate her. I just think. You know, Councilor McInnes referenced the fact that a number of us who are sort of, you know, here together, we were actually not here. We were on Zoom two years ago talking about the budget in 2020 and feeling tremendously frustrated by the by the tools that the council had at our disposal, the tools that we discussed. And at that point, we embarked on this process led by Councilor Edwards. Now Senator Edwards, to propose. Yes. On one this charter change and. I, I always thought to myself that, you know, I don't know if the council fully knows what we're getting ourselves into because what the yes on one charter change did was yes, it gave the council more power in the budget, but it also gave the Council tremendously more responsibility. It is much easier to say, no, no, I don't like not good enough than it is to say, here's what would make this better and actually put your vote on the line to support something that would make it better. And it's harder because we live in a world that's a work in progress and nothing is ever perfect. Right. And so I think that, you know, it's a it is a big responsibility for the council to have take it on. And I also think that once we passed it and we started looking at it, you know, one of the things that you realize is that so much of how we do the business of government, it's not just in the written legal language, it's also in the norms and the institutions. And the reality is that in this budget process, we have been doing something that the Council has no prior norms or institutions for. And I just think that in that context, that Council for understand and has shown tremendous grace in trying to piece that new process together and really saying, hey, we need to use this like we need to step into this responsibility. Yes, it's going to be a little bit awkward and it's going to involve all of us saying more directly to each other the different hopes and dreams we have, as opposed to everybody kind of going off and saying it to the mayor's side and hoping that they're the ones who are heard . And I think that that is harder work for this body and that it is the work of really the democratic representative governance. And so I'm just I'm really grateful to Council for Number Sanderson for leading that and for leading us to a point where, as Councilor Baker said today, we have an omnibus amendment that's being proposed by the chair, one which I intend to support. And I a couple of things that are particularly exciting for me about that. Councilor Laura is not here, but I'll just echo her remarks on, you know, I think the youth jobs are probably marginally one of the most impactful things we do with city dollars. And so I think the call for us to to meet that commitment in the budget with more further funds was important. Um, I also was really pleased that council that colleagues saw fit to include this 2.5 million further increase in addition to the 2.5 that the administration is putting forward for housing vouchers. I think we found that these city housing vouchers are a really great source of sort of flexibility for us to help particular vulnerable populations that aren't well served by the feds in the state. And whether we're talking about, you know, the really project facing and IDP, we're talking about our returning citizens, we're talking about undocumented folks. We're talking about how to pilot a new homeownership voucher approach that council has been working on. I think that getting that line item increased in the operating budget is really important. And I think folks know that if if I have had a secret mission, not that secret for the last six years, um, since really coming back to Boston, it's been to increase the total amount of housing resources and particularly the total number of resources from the city going to housing. And I think this is another step in that important direction. And then, you know, we've been talking a lot under the mayor's leadership about a Green New Deal. I think there's some amazing amendments in the council's proposal here that are part about making that real. So I'm really excited about the idea of these like eight additional people for parks on the tree, that sort of tree maintenance and urban wilds maintenance front. Um, I think that's a constant. Speaking to Councilor Vega's point issue for us in our districts. And I also think that as we support the green jobs program of the city is launching, we need permanent parks jobs for folks to land in and not for nothing. You know, the Parks Department once set up at like 400 people and now it's that sort of 200 odd. And I just think when we talk about our when we talk about our commitment to being a Green New Deal city and all that infrastructure, it needs maintenance, it needs city workers. That stuff that we should be doing here in house in the city, not contracting out. And so I feel like this is a really substantial step in that direction. Similarly, the support for waste reduction work which the city really needs to accelerate. Um, another person working on open streets the some a little bit more support for the groundwater trust which sewer is a really important natural resource in my district these and across a number of other districts these just they feel like really important things and that's why I'm hopeful that and I think we have reason to be hopeful that this law of across the net by the council will be met with collaboration in the mayor's office. I think that what the slightly different tone I would take from councilman here is just, you know, I do think that there are places here where we can go back and forth collaboratively. What I mean by that is, for instance, we proposed that the tree maintenance for people are. In a specific there are specific like job description. If if the arborist and the parks commissioner were to come back to the council and say, actually, for the right kind of tree pruning, we need this different description, like I as a councilor be open to that. I think what's nice is that this process has moved that whole conversation into the light, into the public, has let us all kind of like learn along the way about the whys and wherefores. Why is this money available and why is it not? And and I'm excited about that process and and not for nothing. The last two years. Each budget season, the argument has been. Between like the concept of the perfect budget and no budget at all. And I think that's always set us up with a really crummy false choice where we're kind of hanging out over a cliff, looking at the 112 and saying, is it worth it? And I think that's put everybody in a difficult position. And I like the fact that, you know, with the mayor proposing a budget, with us proposing back this amended budget today, which I hope we will in support of the chair and with the mayor then responding, and then an opportunity for the council to respond. I think the hope would be that we are working together on perfecting a budget. And so I very much look forward to that work ahead and plan to vote in the affirmative. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counselor. The chair. The chair recognizes counsel, allusion and counsel. The and you have the floor. Speaker 5: This president says this budget represents stark investments in opportunities to reimagine our city and what city services look like. Kudos to mayor. This is our first budget. She's a mayor committed to transforming, redesigning and rethinking how city hall works to make it work for the people and for all people, from affordable housing to investments in early childhood education and child care. The mayor has been recognizing the urgency of this moment. I commend her and her team, including Jim Williamson, budget director, for all their efforts and also especially for your willingness to listen. I commend Chair for John Anderson. I think if nothing, this process has shown how brilliant you are and how you are willing to pour your entire self into this work, not for you, but for the people of Boston and for the people who have often been silenced by our budget and ignored by our budget and whose backs the city has been built. So thank you for that. This has definitely been historic. This is our first time in the city council being able to weigh in. And I, I as a new city council wasn't part of the moment where we started thinking about how do we have an influence and impact. So I also think all of my colleagues who were here before me really did the fight to make us have this shared power that the people have given us on these amendments to the city budget, help us achieve that shared power, which hopefully will translate to more shared prosperity on some things like investing in the Office of Returning Citizens, which we've heard from numerous times, both here and in opera hearings, is important to those who are formerly incarcerated, because that's an officer has never been invested in it was created and never given the power or the or the capacity to really lean into the work of making sure that our returning citizens and formerly incarcerated folks have space in this city to really thrive. And so investing in that is sending a signal to the administration that we need to look at all of our city departments and fund them holistically. The budget with the council amendments are fiscally sound and will lead to transforming how our government shows up for people. It's saying, you know, we need to rein in overtime. And when Vpd tells us, I was just but went back and looked at their responses to an RFI where I asked, you know, what are the efficiencies? And they talk about all of the things that they're doing to improve that expenditure. We should believe them and really hold them to task there. You know, every day is another chance for us to get it right as a city and for us to continue the fight. And so we must continue to push for a budget that invests in building strong communities. And this is a start. I don't know. Someone said that this is just the beginning and and there are so many great things that we were able to do as a result of these amendment powers. You know, we're still learning, so making mistakes as we go. But I think this is a really great start from funding things like Smart from the start to the quarter to more Hokies, so that all of our neighborhoods, including Dorchester and Mattapan, can look as good as all of our other neighborhoods. So supporting a lot of 13 and car five, you know, to supporting immigrant businesses, to supporting our citizens who are immigrant communities, who have faced so many stumbling blocks when it comes to becoming citizens. And so providing them with the resources to legal assistance and has been something that I care deeply about so that they can become citizens and making sure that we are not forgetting our immigrant communities when we're doing this work. So I'm just really thankful for this shared power that we now are experiencing alongside a mayor committed to the work, thankful again to chair Fernanda Anderson. I will be supporting these amendments and seeing looking forward to the work that will continue to do here. So thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Constable. The chair recognizes Councilor Carter. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Council President. I'll start my remarks just by saying that I'm extremely excited that we are now utilizing our new power. I want to thank the mayor and her team for a great first budget. I want to commend my colleagues for welcoming me, welcoming me into this process with patience as I dove right into the thick of it the last three weeks. I especially want to thank you, Madam Chair, for shepherding us through this new found power with grace, authority and humor at the appropriate times. I think on that point, I am grateful to everybody to have been given four, to have the opportunity to articulate my priorities and to showcase the power of targeted investments as a statement of our values. And I especially want to uplift in honor now, Senator Edwards, who said, let's break this down and change the system. She leaned in to the work with Armani White. And those who involved and those who were involved in. Yes, on one for a better budget. So I just want to uplift them in this work. What we are voting on today is historic. Let us not forget the time and energy it took to get us all here and what we've proposed. We do know that some of what's in here is a work in progress. There is still relevant information that needs to be obtained by the administration, and I look forward to working with Mayor Wu and members of our team to iron out the details, especially as it pertains to funds allocated to youth employment and engagement. I do believe that that amendment is needed right now in this moment and I think council are for introducing it. What I am most proud of are the significant investments in specific departments and programs that will positively impact East Boston, Charlestown and the North End. I'm not going to get into them, but I do hope that I hope and pray that the odds are in my favor and they will remain. So I do plan to vote in the affirmative on this, and I look forward to collaborative conversations in the months ahead with the mayor's office. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel Carter. The chair recognizes. Counselor Murphy. Counselor Murphy, you have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you, President. Yes. So as this was for many of us, our first budget season and the first for all of us with the new council powers, I do want to recognize the chair and all of us for the hard work and effort over these past few months. We powered through and I am pleased with the amendments that we are presenting to the mayor. Increased funding for senior programing and standalone senior centers, increase programing at our community centers for our youth and teens. A big investment in youth jobs, which is very necessary. Addressing the road and problems throughout the city that many businesses and residents deal with in all of our offices, not just council, operate and get lots of calls on them. We all we all get them. We know supporting public safety by bringing back car five, which we know will increase diversity at the top of the department and also returning Ladder 13, which will bring quicker responses to ourselves and residents and also bring more supports to those struggling at mass and casts. As a chair of Veterans in Public Health, I am pleased. I'm most pleased with the increased funding for recovery and mental health services, especially for our veterans and young adults who are struggling not only with mental health emergencies, but also with the opioid crisis. So I will be voting in support of these amendments today. But I do hope the mayor finds other ways than taking from public safety to support these important amendments. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Murphy. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? I want to take this take this opportunity. To thank the chair of Ways and Means Council, Fernandez Anderson, for the incredible hard work and professionalism that she has shown during this budget process. She has worked with our colleagues, with the mayor's administration in a professional manner. In an inclusive manner and making sure our voices are heard and respected in the process. She also has included the public. In a robust discussion to make sure the public voice is heard during the budget process as well. It's a difficult job of being the Ways and Means chair, but counsel for them is. Anderson You've done an exceptional job leading. Leading our strongest budget budget process in budget debate. So I want to acknowledge our. Incredible work during this. During this time. During this time. Is it as a district councilor? From district to. I'm also concerned about what Councilor Baker has highlighted about the Mouse and Cass area as well. And it certainly impacts my area because I represent the South End in South Boston and Chinatown, and it certainly impacts Councilor Fernandez Anderson, her district as well . Councilor Baker actually Council Councilor Bach also we share the same area down towards the the Boston Garden, which has some challenges, major challenges. So as I would I would like to see over the next several weeks, too, as we vote for the final budget, I would like to see. What services, what programs, what assistance we can provide the area in and around mass and CAS. Because we know that residents are calling us daily about quality of life issues and as district city council councilors. We don't pass the buck and we deal with these constituent calls and constituent requests. Every day. And I want to I want to work with the mayor's administration and team on what services, what programs, what assistance we can further provide to the residents in and around mass and chaos. And that's certainly. Roxbury. The South End. Dorchester. South Boston. Chinatown. Is further out, but it's impacted. So I'm going to. Hopefully coordinate and work closely with the. With our colleagues, but also with the mayor's office. As we as we continue this debate about what services are are critical in the mountain house area. The the quality of life issues that were mentioned already in this budget, including pest control, including inspectors for licenses related issues, whether it's Airbnb, whether it's after hours work, construction, whether it is. Other quality of life issues. But it's the nuts and bolts of of city government is what's important. To two district councils in At-Large councils. But we want to make sure that these nuts and bolts issues, these basic city services in this budget are protected because the quality of life for residents is what's really important for for all of us. And as we go forward over the next several weeks, I want to make sure that we continue having a meaningful conversation about quality of life issues nuts and bolts, city government issues, city government related issues. So, again, just want to say thank you to Councilor Fernandez innocent during this period of time. And also I want to highlight my district council is particularly certainly my At-Large colleagues, but the district city district council has played a critical role during during this budget. And we listened to residents. We have the calls, as did large councilors. But we want to continue to focus on basic city services. I just want to acknowledge one of our one of our colleagues as Councilor Council. We're all for the important work that you've demonstrated during this period of time. So thank you, Council. We're all for bringing a lot of these political issues to the forefront and for your important work and leadership on the. On the budget as well. But anyone else like to speak on this matter? Council. Fernandez Andersson, the chair of the Committee on Ways and Means, seeks acceptance of the committee report and passage of Dorking 0480 in an amended draft. Mr. Korra, can you please call the roll. Speaker 2: Roll call on docket 0480 as amended? Councilor Arroyo Council. Arroyo Yes Council. A Baker Council. The Baker High Council The Book Council A Book Councilor Brain Council. Brain Council Coletta. Councilor Coletta. Yes. Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Counsel for Ananda Sanderson. Yes. Counsel for. Counsel 30 years. Counsel Flynn Yes. Counsel of Flynn Yes. Counsel Lara. Counsel Ah, yes. Counsel Allusion. Counsel Allusion, yes. Counsel Let me hear. Counselor me here? Yes. Counselor Murphy. Yes. Counselor Murphy. Yes. And. Counsel Well, yes. Counsel. Well, yes. Dark in number. All 480, as amended, has received a unanimous vote. Speaker 1: Thank you. 0480 has passed and an amended draft. We're on to something. Yeah. The chair recognizes counsel FERNANDEZ Innocent. COUNSEL You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. I didn't want to close that chapter of this meeting without thanking the administration for their participation in public hearings and for their crucial work behind the scenes, particularly Jim and Joanna and the rest of the budget team. Thank you. I am exceptionally grateful for the IG team. I'd like to thank Claire Kelly, Neil Doherty and a very special thank you to Shantel Barbosa. We didn't move any money out of ADR so that you can get a big raise. I think you three were you incredible patients for your incredible humility, professionalism. You were there every step of the way. You did your work, you came, you showed up, you never complained. And you really supported my first year as chair on Ways and Means. And I thank you. And I think we all here thank you and thank you to my council colleagues for believing in me and for us doing this work together. I really, truly believe that whatever we submitted here for the amendments we all today submitted, all of these amendments we all have passed, or at least for now have passed the recommended budget. So I thank you so much and I look forward to my work. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel Fernandez Anderson Well-stated. And I also would like to echo especially the comments you mentioned about the Intergovernmental Affairs Team. They've been exceptionally professionalism and very responsive. So I want to echo what you said in thanking the Intergovernmental Affairs Team. Um. We're on to motions, orders and resolutions. However, I would like to take one, one docket out of out of order at this time for scheduling issues. So, Mr.. Mr.. Clark, can we go to. Can we go? 20726. Speaker 2: .0726 Council Operate in Louisiana offer the following resolution designating June 2022 as LGBTQ Plus Pride Month.

Mayor Order

Councilor Fernandes Anderson called Docket #0486, message and order, referred on April 13, 2022 Docket #0486, approving an appropriation One Hundred Thirty Eight Million Five Hundred Thirty Five Thousand Dollars ($138,535,000.00) for the acquisition of interests in land or the acquisition of assets, or the landscaping, alteration, remediation, rehabilitation, or improvement of public land, the construction, reconstruction, rehabilitation, improvement, alteration, remodeling, enlargement, demolition, removal or extraordinary repairs of public buildings, facilities, assets, works or infrastructure; for the cost of feasibility studies or engineering or architectural services for plans and specifications; for the development, design, purchase and installation of computer hardware or software and computer-assisted integrated financial management and accounting systems; and any and all cost incidental or related to the above described projects; for the purposes of the Boston Public Schools, from the Committee on Ways and Means. Hearing no objection, the matter was before the body. On mot

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Speaker 1: The resolution has been adopted. Congratulations. Mr. Clarke, we're going we're going to 0723. Mr. Couric, please read Dr.. Speaker 2: 0723.0723 Counsel allusion and Flurry offered the following order for a hearing on fire and emergency disaster relief services in the city of Boston. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes counsel Lewis and counsel to adjourn. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. I'd like to ask that we suspend rule 12 so that I can add a rate as a third and a co-sponsor. Speaker 1: The hearing. No objection. Counsel. Braden is so, so adamant. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. I believe with you, Mr. President. We just spoke about getting the the nuts and bolts of city government. Right. And so this hearing water really is about that. I'm sorry. I'm not speaking. I passed it. So this hearing water really is about getting that right, you know, every day. You know, too often in the city of Boston, we have our residents who are displaced because of fire. You know, one of my early cases as an attorney was helping a family navigate the experience of losing their home to a fire and really working with the city departments to get that client shelter. Really taught me a lot. But not just shelter, access to resources, making sure that they were close enough to the hospital that one of our children went to so that he could receive dialysis. There was so much involved in once a family is displaced from a fire, oftentimes landlords that are required to maintain insurance don't do that. And they're supposed to be able to provide relocation benefits to their tenants. But that doesn't always happen. And so this hearing order is about figuring out how we get it right. How do we show up for our vulnerable residents who face fires, you know, analyze Boston's fire incident reporting system? Does it have any quantifiable, quantifiable data on the injuries or displacement numbers? And we know the city of Boston has an emergency assistance fund for victims of fire, that we need to do more work to make sure that we're supporting all of our residents. There were recently there's recently a fire in Mattapan, and there were young leaders from the Mattapan teen center that held a bake sale because we were falling short as a city in providing for this family. There have been multiple occasions where families who had nowhere to go showed up in our office. Shout out to my chief of staff, Emily, who is, you know, does a great job at triaging that issues. But we have to do better at providing the basic city services to our residents who are experiencing fires. So this hearing order is about bringing our different city departments together to make sure that we're providing adequate city services, that we are using this emergency assistance fund that we have. And looking at the modeling, Cambridge, Cambridge has a fund that sort of Cambridge has a fire relief fund that residents, public and private entities and others can donate into in order to assist those facing displacement and fire. This is not by no means to supplant the work has done in community, to really help those who are who who face violence, really, to try to bring all those resources together and so that we maximize our impact on our families that experienced fires, especially for our tenants who are renting and renting in subpar units, often feel this the most. So thank you so much to my co-sponsors, Councilor Flaherty and Councilor Reading, and I look forward to this hearing. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. Again, the chair recognizes counsel, clarity, counsel, clarity of the floor. And I'll be brief, obviously, that I appreciate the lead sponsors inclusion of me on this as a co-sponsor. It's done a lot of work in this space and not quite sure whether or not it's quiet because folks that I give folks my name a number or if it's the board of companies that do it. But nonetheless, we are oftentimes in the middle of this working either with the landlords or more particularly the tenants, particularly those that don't have tenant insurance. So more needs to be done, I think in the space, any time an incident like this happens, more often than not , individuals or families, they lose everything in a fire and they're starting from scratch. And so anything that we can do, assisting them with housing, working closely with neighborhood services, working closely with Inspectional services, all of those different agencies and organizations and resources, we have a responsibility to do that for residents. And so with that, I look forward to an expert adhering to find ways that we as a council can continue to help individuals who are displaced due to fire and or those that have lost everything in an effort to help them get back on their feet and find resources so they can keep a roof over their head and start to get back to life as they knew it prior to the fire. Thank you, Mr. President, and look forward to work with my colleagues next to counsel religion. Thank you. Counsel Florida. The chair recognizes counsel Baker. Counsel Baker, you have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you, Mr. President. Just please sign me on here as a district city council. This is unfortunately something that we come across too often. We only offer these families that are displaced in the street one week worth of housing. We need to offer more than that. But also, counsel already had mentioned the board of the boarding up companies just a heads up two people that our district city council has the at large for that matter they are the pariah in this here. If you go to a if I see them all standing with their clipboards, they use that as an opportunity to to put a lean on those properties. So just so people know what, when you're on the scene and you see the guys with the clipboards, they're they're looking to steal the house most of the time looking to steal the house from the people that are watching it burn right now. So just so people put in the back of their minds and please sign my name. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel Baker. Is anyone else stopping to speak on this matter? Would anyone like to add their name? If you could raise your hand. Mr. Kirklees Council. Royal Council. Bacup Council. Borough Council. Fernandez Innocent Council. Borough Council. Me here. Council. Murphy please have the chair originally. Originally I was going to place this docket into the into the Committee on Public Safety and Criminal Justice. But after further discussion and consideration, I'm going to place this in city services and innovation technology. Thank you. Mr. Clerk, please read docket. 07240724.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing on fire and emergency disaster relief services in the City of Boston. Councilors Louijuene and Flaherty rule 12 was invoked to include Councilor Breadon as co-sponsors.

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Speaker 1: Thank you. Mr. Clerk, please read docket. 07240724. Speaker 2: Council on Me offer the following order for a hearing on an audit for Boston Public Schools Special Education Services and return on investment. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes. Councilman. Here, Councilman. Here. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Yes, counselor. President Flynn, I know that my colleague has. What have I co-sponsors? Also has a time commitment. So, given the fact that I've done a lot today, I would like to ask if you would be willing and my co-sponsors who are going to be joining me would be willing to allow us to bring up give my colleague an opportunity to talk about both. I know I said no at the beginning, and I'm switching it up just because of time. I didn't know that we would be here until 4:00 today. So with that said. Speaker 1: Mr. Clerk, please read the the added docket, please. Speaker 2: Talking about 0725 Council on Me here offer the following order for a hearing regarding the Boston Public Schools Transportation System.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing on an Audit for Boston Public Schools Special Education services and return on investment. Councilor Mejia rule 12 was invoked to include Councilors Lara and Fernandes Anderson as co-sponsors.

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Speaker 2: Talking about 0725 Council on Me here offer the following order for a hearing regarding the Boston Public Schools Transportation System. Speaker 1: The chair recognizes. Counsel me here. Speaker 7: President Council, President Flynn. You see why you're so dope. Thank you. I appreciate Your Grace. Thank you. And I want to thank my colleagues. But well, let me first read this, because I need to know who my co-sponsors are. Right. So thank you, Mr. President. I'd like to suspend the rules and ask an ad counselor, Laura and Counselor Anderson to join me as co-sponsors for the Special Education 144.07. Speaker 1: OC 40724. Counsel Vara and counsel Fernandez Andersen are are added hearing no objections. Speaker 7: Okay. Thank you. I'm going to read the second one that I am 40725. I would like to suspend the rules and add Councilor Lara and Murphy as co-sponsors. Speaker 1: Hearing. No objection. Counsel O'Hara and Counsel Murphy are so out of it. Speaker 7: Okay, great. Okay. I'm trying to figure out how I'm going to do this with both. I'm going to have a little bit of technical assistance here. But really quick with the audit for the Boston Public Schools Education Services and return on investment. This is where I believe the moment in time that we've been talking about as it relates to Boston Public Schools. This is where we have an opportunity to really lean in and support through real, meaningful partnerships with the council and our in our ability to help support and hold ourselves and the district accountable to providing oversight that will ensure that the money that we are proving to be spent are going to be spent and that we're going to see the return on those investments as it relates specifically to the budget and the supports for special education services. You know, according to BEPS as of October 2020, there are about 11,350 students aged 3 to 21 with disabilities, 21% of our total enrollment enrolled in special education programs and BEPS. The f y 23 recommendations budget for special education was over 351 million. Many advocates and administrators agree. At this point, it's not a question of resources. We are a resource rich, poor, coordination, poor. And students across the district are not having many are not having their IEP met and IEP needs met. Staffing rates making it difficult to provide a full range of services. Transitions at the top. Making it a bigger challenge to provide strategic vision to help support and provide care and services to our students. And so we're failing this hearing already because the conversation on how we support our special education students cannot begin and end with a budget. Like, really, this is where I oftentimes believe that we fall short. I look forward to this conversation and to working alongside my colleagues who both have been fierce advocate in the education space. And then the last thing that I'll say in terms of transportation, I myself, as a parent have gotten over 25. Notifications between January to me that my daughter's school bus was either going to be delayed or not going to show up at all. Luckily, I have the resources and a village that helps support me, but I also have received countless of communication from other parents with their frustration and their level of just. A contempt for the way we are doing business as it relates to the transportation situation. We spend roughly 10% of our entire budget on transportation and over 110 million and a half Y 23 alone. That's over 4 million that we spent last year. And we're bussing fewer students than we did last year. The Boston Public Transportation team has struggled with hiring bus driver retention problems, which have led to bussing being late or not arriving at all. And we also have seen how this has impacted our out of school athletic events. It is clear that we need to take a deeper dove into the transportation without all the flashy PowerPoint presentation and jargon. This conversation needs to be live beyond the budget season, and I believe that if we could really do this work and lean in and figure out how we can be partners and being able to help hold BP accountable, but also hold ourselves accountable to their success, then only then will we really be able to move the needle. So I look forward to joining my colleagues in this robust conversation, and I look forward to the President's recommendation on what happens after I speak because I choose to that point. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, Councilman. Here on docket 0724, the chair recognizes counsel Lara. Counsel Lara, you have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, President Flynn. And in the. Speaker 5: Interest of time, I'm only going to be speaking once on both dockets. So at this point, everybody here on the council and people across the city have heard me speak in support of not only our Boston public schools but. Speaker 7: Against specifically state receivership. Speaker 5: Naming specifically that I believe that Mayor Wu. Speaker 7: The city council, the incoming superintendent, and soon. Speaker 5: The elected school committee should be given the opportunity to fix the problems. Speaker 7: That we have. Speaker 5: In our schools and really do the work to make them joyful places of learning that we know that they can be. This is a moment for the Council to be in solidarity not only with the parents, the students, the teachers and the administrators and VIPs, but also with the mayor's office and stand against state takeover of our public schools. And for me, solidarity is a verb. So I consider this to be an all hands on deck project. And, you know, my colleague. Speaker 7: Council, Flaherty often. Speaker 5: Says that we need to have both hands on the wheel. And this is the moment where we need to have both hands on the wheel that if we're going to pass this budget and we're going to make sure we're asking to be given the opportunity to do the work that we have to do, the work that we have to make sure that our schools are functioning at the level that they're supposed to, that our investments are going in the places that they need to, and that we, not the state, have the opportunity to come up with the solutions that are going to be necessary for our children. My son Xavier is autistic. He's a special needs student at BIPs. He's six years old going into first grade and similar to my co-sponsor, Councilor Mejia. Oftentimes the bus is late or it doesn't show up. And I'm grateful that I have a car that I can drive to school. But everybody here has had to pay the price of me being late to a hearing or not being able to show up at all because of it. And so I am in support of our public schools, not because I think that they're perfect, but because I know that we are going to be able to come up with the best solutions possible to fix those issues. As one of, I think only two people on the council that have students who are currently in the decisions that we make here very, very much directly impact me and my family. And so I want us to be thoughtful and I want us to be gracious, but I also want us to put both hands on the wheel, which is why I'm excited to do this work with Councilor Me. He has the chair of the Education Committee at the helm. Thank. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. Laura, the chair recognizes on docket 0722 for counsel Fernandez Anderson. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. You have the floor. Speaker 5: And thank you to the original co-sponsor on this docket and my co-sponsor, Cancellara, as well. It is incredibly vital that we provide first class, high quality special education services. However, for us to know the nature of these problems, whether the money being put towards said programs and services is being well spent, we need more information. We all have anecdotal story stories that great of great successes or horrific failures in this area, and those are not to be dismissed. But what is needed is a comprehensive, concrete breakdown of services, provided the costs of services provided and the positive impact or lack thereof, and that the student acquired by accessing the services. And I say this knowing that we cannot analyze this data in a vacuum, for there are a variety of socioeconomic issues that are influencing and impacting our youth. But it is imperative that we gain a better understanding of what services our youth are being offered. I thank you again, the original co-sponsor, and thank you and look forward to this work. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank. Thank you, Counsel Fernandez Anderson. The chair recognizes Counselor Murphy. Counsel Murphy. Speaker 4: You can call President Flynn. Speaker 6: So our office gets countless calls and emails from concerned parents that their children are being stranded at bus stops. We get these calls several times a week. We have 22,000 students on busses each day. Yet on average, 2% of these students, around 442 children are not picked up, forcing them to arrive late or miss school entirely. That may seem like a small number, but one child is too many to be left at a bus stop. To make matters worse, most of our students that are on busses and have 1 to 1 monitors are on IEPs in our ESL students. These vulnerable students benefit the most from our schools, but with our transportation problems, we fail these students and the families. This is why I am happy to co-sponsor this motion for a hearing in regards to the Boston Public Schools Transportation System in hopes that this ongoing problem is not only addressed but also starts to get solved so that our students and families don't have to lose out. I also want to mention that we also have heard in the news and many calls our office also gets about the busses in the afternoon that are stranding our very few students who participate in athletics and they're missing sports. And other teams also have to forfeit games because we're unable to get our student athletes to events. So thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Murphy. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? I would like to briefly state that. I think this is an important fold. Both are important hearings, especially services for special education. In our public school system. You know, I wanted to highlight my sister's. My sister's son also has a special needs child. Out of, out of out of Burning Tree. And I know the critical role. That special education plays in the lives of families. And I also know Counsel Laura has been exceptional. On this issue as as all my colleagues, including Councilor Murphy, to educating, educating so many children. Um, and I highlight my, my nephew because my, my parents have watched him for about three or four days a week, usually when my sister's working, but they're not able to do it anymore just because of their. My my parents have not been feeling well, but I, I do know the incredible role that parents and grandparents play in educating our special needs children. And our parents and parents like console are they're really unsung heroes in our city of of the love and compassion they provide. So many, so many children recording, including all of Boston Public School teachers as well. So I just want to highlight the incredible role families play on this issue. So. On Docket 0724. Would anyone would anyone like to add the name on 1.0724? Please raise your hand, please. At Council of Royal Park and Religion Media Murphy to cheer Dawkins 0724 will now be added to the Committee on Education. Mr. Clarke, we're going on 20725. Speaker 7: But I. Speaker 2: Think. Speaker 1: It's a. Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. And on talking 0725. Please raise your hand. If you'd like to be added to. Speaker 7: The. Speaker 1: Council BLOCK Council, Royal Council. Fernandez Anderson Councilors and Council Councilor Murphy in the Chair. Councilman here. The chair recognizes. Councilman here. Councilman here? Yes. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you. President, I have to stand up and thank you. I just wanted to ask if it's possible to put it into the Government Accountability and Transparency Committee. Because what I really want to do is start moving a lot of the conversations that we're having about the budget and supports and BEPS to the post audit. And that is what the committee is set up for is to do to talk about post auditing and transparency. And so I just would like to advocate that that specific these to dockets are more in regards to transparency and accountability, even though they're education related items. So I just want to ask if that would be possible. Speaker 1: Okay. Thank. Thank you, Councilman, here. We did discuss earlier that it could go to either committee. But having heard the recommendation, we will assign it to your committee. Councilman here. So government. Mr. Chair, please assign it to Government Accountability and Transparency Committee on seven. On on the docket 0724 in on docket 0725. Speaker 2: Okay. Speaker 1: We are. We are on. Okay. We're on. We're on two personalities. Mr. Clerk, please read docket 0727. Speaker 2: Duncan number 70727 Council of Flint Full Councilor for an end of.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing Regarding the Boston Public Schools Transportation System. Councilor Mejia rule 12 was invoked to include Councilors Lara and Murphy as co-sponsors.

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Speaker 1: Mr. Clarke, would you please read to 0505 and to the record, as Councilor Royal mentioned, it should be on page 12. Yes. Speaker 2: Page ten from the Committee on Government Operations, Duncan Number 0505 message in order for your approval, a home rule petition to the General Court entitled Petition for a Special Law regarding an Act relative to creation of a branch of the Boston Public Library within an affordable housing development at Paracel or Dash one in the South Cove Urban Renewal Area in the Chinatown section of the city of Boston. Speaker 1: Mr.. Mr. Clarke, can you please poll the committee members to see if if they would allow the doctor to come before the body? Speaker 2: Members of the Government Operations Committee. Counsel Arroyo. Speaker 8: Yes. Speaker 2: Counsel Luis Yen. Sorry. Country Council, the Royal Council, the Media Council, the Book Council for Clarity and Council a color collective. Speaker 1: The Docket 0505 is now properly before the body. Councilor Roy, you have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you. Council President Flynn, this home rule petition will allow the Boston Redevelopment Authority doing business as the Boston Planning and Development Agency to ground lease the BPA owned vacant land to a developer selected by a RFP process using state and federal funds to fund the development of affordable housing. Because of the limited buildable land in Chinatown, this project would create a space that would be conveyed to the Boston Public Library, creating the much awaited Chinatown Branch Library within this development. The passage of this docket relies on very much the same issues that were faced by Docket 0707. You might remember that from like 4 hours ago regarding an extremely structured sub bid process. However, also constructing a library within a nonprofit development requires exceptions from the Commonwealth contract procurement and award laws. So due to the matter of urgency with the state legislature ending their sessions in July as chair of the Government Operations Committee and suspension of the rules to pass 505, which will hopefully with passage and with passage to the State House. Bring us the Chinatown Branch Library. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel Royal Counsel. Royal moves for passage of docket 0505. All those in favor say I. I say nay. The ayes have it. Docket 0505 has passed. The chair recognizes. Speaker 8: Oh, no. Sorry. Speaker 1: Okay. Okay. Anyone else like to remove anything from the green sheets? We're on to the consensus consent agenda. I have been informed by the clerk that there are no additions to the consent agenda. The Chair moves for the adoption of the consent agenda as presented.

Mayor Order

Councilor Arroyo called Docket #0505 Message and order for your approval a Home Rule petition to the General Court entitled “Petition for a Special Law Re: An Act Relative to Creation of a Branch of the Boston Public Library (BPL) within an Affordable Housing Development at Parcel R-1 in the South Cove Urban Renewal Area in the Chinatown Section of the City of Boston, from the Committee of the Government Operation. No objection being heard, the matter was before the body. On motion of Councilor Arroyo, the petition was passed.

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Speaker 1: expiring January 15, 2025, submits a report that the appointment ought to be confirmed and Dr. Numbers 0578 The Committee on Public Health, Homelessness and Recovery, to which was referred on May four, 2020 to docket number 0578 message in order for the confirmation of the appointment of Sandro Iliya as a member of the Boston Public Health Commission's Board of Health for a term expiring January six, 2024, submits a report that the appointment ought to be confirmed. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The Chair now recognizes Councilor Murphy. Councilor Murphy is Chair of Public Health, Homelessness and Recovery. Councilor Murphy, you have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you and thank you for reading all of those. So I do. For docket 035 for I motion to substitute the language in the original docket. By adding Philomene, Baptiste will be appointed as an at large member of the Boston Public Health Commission based on an order from the mayor's office. The original docket listed did not listed as an at large member, so I did want to change the language there. Motion to substitute that these matters are sponsored by the Mayor and the Committee on Public Health, Homelessness and Recovery. Should I? Take a look. Speaker 7: All those in favor, say. Speaker 0: Oh, okay. And just. Mr. Clarke. You don't have to do a motion for it to be seconded. All those in favor of the motion to substitute. Please say. Speaker 6: Thank you. Thank you. So these matters are sponsored by the mayor and the Committee on Public Health, Homelessness and Recovery. And we held a public hearing here in the chamber on May 20th, 2022 to take testimony and consider these appointments. In attendance was myself as the chair of the committee, and I was joined by President Flynn and Councilor Baker. Dr. Ojukwu to Executive Director of the Boston Health Commission, and PJ McCann, deputy director for policy and planning at the Boston Public Health Commission, attended the hearing, presented testimony and responded to questions from the chair and councilors. The presentation included an overview of the mission, jurisdiction and composition of the board and the duties and responsibility of the appointed members of the Boston Public Health Commission's Board of Health. In testimony in full support of these appointments, in re appointments to the Boston Public Health Commission's Board of Health under the Enabling Act, the Board of the Boston Public Health Commission serves as the Board of Health for the City of Boston. This act creates one seat on the board for the Chief Executive Officer of the Boston Medical Center. Two for representatives of community health centers affiliated with the BMC. In one to represent organized labor. Aside from the BMC, ex-officio seat members serve three year terms in. The Chairperson of the board is selected by the Mayor. The Enabling Act grants the Board the powers and duties of boards of health under Massachusetts law, except certain powers and duties previously assumed by other agencies. The powers of the Commission are exercised by or under supervision of a board of seven members appointed by the Mayor and may adopt, amend and repeal reasonable health regulations. The board's meetings are public meetings subject to open meeting law, and their records are subject to public health record law. The committee reviewed the resumes and credentials of the appointees. The appointees responded to questions from the chair and other councilors regarding their qualifications, relevant experience, background and areas of expertize. Based on these testimonies and information presented at the hearing and having considered the same, I respectfully report that these appointments in re appointments ought to be confirmed. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilor Murphy will not take a vote on each of these docket separately. Councilor Murphy, the chair of the Committee on Public Health, Homelessness and Recovery, seeks acceptance of the committee report and confirmation of Docket 353. All those in favor say I. I would say the ayes have it. The appointment has been confirmed. Councilor Murphy, the Chair and Committee of Public Health, Homelessness and Recovery, seeks acceptance of the consent of the Committee report as amended and confirmation of docket number 354. All those in favor say I. I are those opposed. They may. The ayes have it. The appointment has been confirmed. Councilor Murphy, the chair on Committee on the Committee of Public Health and Public Health Homelessness Recovery seeks acceptance of the Committee Report and confirmation of docket number 377. All those in favor say I am opposed. Nay, the ayes have it. Five, seven, seven. Sorry, guys have it. The appointment has been confirmed. We have to do it again. Are we good? Are we good with just that? Perfect. Uh, and, Mr. Clarke, would you please amend the attendance report to indicate Mr. Will, by counsel, will present his. Councilor Murphy, the chair of the Committee on Public Health, Homelessness and Recovery, seeks acceptance of the committee report and confirmation of Docket five, seven, eight. All those in favor say I. All those opposing this have it. The appointment has been confirmed. So see, we're going to move to motions already and resolutions. Thank you. Counsel filed for divorce. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Chair, I. You did see my light. I just had a question through the chair to the maker or to the chair. And I do get in conflict. It precluded me from attending the hearing. But when we strengthen the residence requirements, several years ago, we did get a commitment from the advice of Public Health Commission that they would adhere to that. And I just notice that we've got an address of Framingham and we've got an address of Brookline. And I know we've got some of the brightest minds right here in Boston, and I don't see Framingham or Brookline stepping up to the plate to help us siting detox facilities and halfway houses and recovery homes. So I just threw the chair to the maker. Want to know whether or not they had any response to that? Unless it's a specific seat designed to go to a specific person, say an executive director of a community health center. But I'd just like to sort of get that on the record and let the Boston Public Health Commission know that they committed to this body several years ago during during the period. So when we strengthen the residence requirement that they would be sending us, their representative would be from from the neighborhoods of Boston. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Councilor Flaherty. Councilor Murphy, the floor is yours. Speaker 6: So I did check with that and we asked them both because they weren't hiding that they live in Brookline. In Framingham. And I was told that the enabling act says lives or works in and they both work closely in the city of Boston. But as you recall, we can check to see if. The cast of. Speaker 3: So at this point, I want us to finish and remind them that they made a commitment to this body, that they would obviously make best efforts to when they're doing boards and commissions, that they be residents of the city of Boston. So I know they know that they have folks that work for the Boston Public Health Commission that are from the neighborhoods of Boston that would be most suitable, obviously, to serve in that capacity. So willing to, I guess, withdraw the inquiry to not block this. But they need to know loud and clear that the Boston City Council expects them to honor their word as it pertains to the residency requirement in the city of Boston. Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilor. She removed two motions, orders and resolutions. Mr. Clarke, can you please read docket number six eight to. So we still have time to solve. Speaker 7: We still have. Speaker 0: Without speaking. Perfect. So before we do that, we're going to stay on matters of most recently heard. If we can please read Mr. Clarke Docket 04802482 Dockets 483. Docket 4842486. Dockets 4932496 in docket 499 together.

Committee Reports

On the motion and order, referred on May 4, 2022 Docket #0578, for the confirmation of the appointment of Sandro Galea as a member of the Boston Public Health Commission's Board of Health, for a term expiring January 6, 2024, the committee submitted a report recommending that the appointment ought to be confirmed. The report was accepted; the appointment was confirmed.

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BostonCC_05252022_2022-0499

Speaker 1: The law firm will be the only unit authorized to expend from the fund, and such expenditures shall be capped at $300,000 in docket number 0499. Message in order approving an appropriation of $500,000 from the City Cities Boston Equity Fund to create a special revenue project grant in order to support equity applicants in licenses as defined by the equity program and to establish and operate a cannabis business in the city of Boston. The fund shall be credited to the Special Revenue Grant Fund from the Boston Equity Fund, established pursuant to the City of Boston Ordinances. Chapter eight, Section 13 establishing the equitable regulation of the cannabis industry in the City of Boston. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. 2080480204820483204842048604933049620499 will remain in committee. Mr. Clarke, please let the record reflect that the chair is present. Yes. We're on to motions, orders and resolutions. Speaker 1: Lucky Number 068 to Council on Murphy and Flynn on for the following order for a home rule petition regarding electronic application and transmission of absentee ballots for absent uniform services voters.

Loan Order

On the message and order, referred on April 13, 2022 Docket #0499, approving an appropriation of Five Hundred Thousand Dollars ($500,000.00) from the City’s Boston Equity Fund to create a special revenue project grant in order to support equity applicants and licensees, as defined by the Equity Program and to established and operate a cannabis business in the City of Boston. The fund shall be credited to the special Revenue Grant Fund from the Boston Equity Fund established pursuant City of Boston Ordinances Chapter 8 Section 13: Establishing the Equitable Regulation of the Cannabis Industry in the City of Boston, the committee submitted a report recommending the order ought to pass.

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BostonCC_05252022_2022-0682

Speaker 1: Lucky Number 068 to Council on Murphy and Flynn on for the following order for a home rule petition regarding electronic application and transmission of absentee ballots for absent uniform services voters. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Clerk. The Chair recognizes Councilor Murphy. Councilor Murphy has the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, Counsel. Speaker 6: So I, along with President Flynn here with for your approval, a home rule petition to the General Court entitled A Petition for a Special Law regarding an Act relative to the authorization of an electronic absentee ballot application in electronic transmission of ballots for absent uniformed service voters. Massachusetts citizens have a right to vote in all elections, even if deployed or stationed overseas. The Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act is a federal law that guarantees voting rights for the United States military, who are known as uniformed service voters. By the federal laws definition, eligible uniformed service voters strictly include those on active duty in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, including Reservists, Space Force, and the Merchant Marine members, as well as their spouses. Independents, more specifically, absent uniformed services voters are located outside of their voting districts. In Massachusetts, absent uniform service voters are exempt from voter registration requirements, but instead must mail an absentee ballot application to their local election office in order to obtain their ballot for municipal elections. In Massachusetts, a blank ballot will only be delivered through the mail and must also be returned through the mail. However, for federal elections, a ballot can be emailed, faxed or mailed based on preference, and the voted ballot may be mailed back or electronically returned through email or fax. This is a more modern approach for absent uniformed services voters to participate in elections. Mail in ballots have already caused problems in some elections nationwide. We know in Wisconsin, 9000 requested ballots were never sent and thousands were postmarked too late to count. In New Jersey, 9.6 of mail ballots cast in the state's local elections were rejected because signatures didn't match the ones on file or arrive too late. And in Pennsylvania, tens of thousands of votes were either not cast or not counted due to deadline. Confusion through this act's electronic application for an absentee ballot for municipal elections will streamlined the absentee ballot application process by eliminating the shipping time required to receive and deliver an application. Also through this Act, electronically delivering and returning the ballots itself through email or fax will help better guarantee voting rights for absent uniformed services voters by streamlining the voting process, ensuring each ballot is counted in reducing the number of rejected ballots. So in short, I urge my fellow colleagues in this body to support this special act so that we can better help guarantee voting rights for absent uniformed service voters in accordance with the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, as well as modernize the voting process in this bill, elections like they do in elections, federal elections. So thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilor Murphy. The chair now recognizes Council President Flynn. Speaker 3: Thank you, Councilor Arroyo. And I want to say thank you to Councilor Murphy for taking the lead on this important this important piece of policy change that we're going to make here. And I know I have talked with the mayor's team and with the election department, and they've always been strong supporters of voting for veterans and for military families and veterans overseas especially. So I'm looking forward to the next step and making sure that all active duty or reserves reservist serving overseas have the opportunity to vote in elections. It's a critical part of our democracy. Just as an example, I was I was in a small country in Bahrain, in the Persian Gulf, requested an absentee ballot. And the day my ballot was supposed to arrive to me, I was flown to another country. And what? That ballot never reached me. And it could reach me about several months later after the voting. But for military people, it's not as simple as just just getting a piece of mail delivered to you, to your home, or to to your office. It's very challenging when you're overseas. But again, I want to say thank you to Counsel Murphy and to all of my colleagues who have was advocated for veterans in military families, whether they were on the council or prior to their job on the council. But I know you've always been strong supporters of military families, so I just want to say thank you for all of the city workers that do tremendous work and helping helping our veterans. Thank you, counsel. Speaker 0: Thank you. Council President Flynn, would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Seeing no further discussion with anyone else. Like to add their name. Mr. Clarke. Please add. Councilor Baker. Councilor Box. Councilor Cullen. Councilor. Clarity. Councilor Laura. Councilor. I'm here. Councilor Braiden and Councilor morale. And also please have my name. Docket number 682 will be assigned to the Committee on Government Operations. Thank you, Mr. Clarke. Miss Clark, please read Docket. Speaker 1: 06830683 Council of the Marine and Louisiana offered the following order for a hearing to discuss solutions to historic and disproportionate state disinvestment in the city of Boston.

Committee Reports

On the Home Rule Petition, referred on May 25, 2022, Docket #0682, regarding Electronic Application and Transmission of Absentee Ballots for Absent Uniformed Services Voters, the committee submitted a report recommending that the petition ought to pass in a new draft. The report was accepted; the petition was passed in a new draft; yeas 12 (Absent Mejia).

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BostonCC_05252022_2022-0683

Speaker 1: 06830683 Council of the Marine and Louisiana offered the following order for a hearing to discuss solutions to historic and disproportionate state disinvestment in the city of Boston. Speaker 3: The chair recognizes counsel Braden and counsel Braden. You have the full. Speaker 2: Where's my notes? Thank you, Mr. President. I want to extend my appreciation to cancer Louisiana for her willingness to lead on this issue with me. Despite her absence today through this year's budget process, we dug deeper into to get a better understanding not just of the figures and numbers from each individual department, but the Office of Budget Management's narrative analyzing trends in the city's fiscal condition over the span of several years. A couple of weeks ago, I filed orders related to city personnel and the state of the public sector workforce. After reviewing 20 years of staffing level data, revealing some striking trends, only looking at the current year and the past couple of years didn't show the historic trends. The same is the case for Boston's relationship with the state. We have to look at the long view to understand the big picture. Over the past 20 years, the city's net revenue in state aid has been reduced by over 300 million per year or a 70% reduction. Our state aid has been dropping, but but year over year, our state assessments for charter school tuition and the MTA climb exponentially. The result is in our budget, year after year is increased reliance on property taxes for a revenue source. 20 years ago, the property tax accounted for 55% of our revenue. Now, 20 years later, it's expected to reach 75% of our revenue. This relationship is unsustainable for the city and our residents. In 2006, Mayor Menino commissioned the BRT research department to conduct a report called Boston Gives More Than It Gets from the Rest of Massachusetts. It found that we generate more than our fair share of state instead jobs, state tax revenue, state income, corporate excise, and business tax revenue, visitor revenue, and state hotel tax revenue. But we do not get our fair share. It was a problem then, and it is a problem now. We have an opportunity to forge transformative partnerships with our colleagues at the state level. We have a mayor and city council whose policies at times require state approval that move at a glacial pace. We know our home rule petitions take forever. Like the CBA reforms reform bills submitted in 2019, which is still hasn't moved anywhere. If the state is going to pursue targeted scrutiny and oversight of the city of Boston, we should we should assess what is and isn't working from the current relationship for the interests of the city. Looking ahead, I believe we need a more proactive collaboration with this with the Boston delegation members, including those in leadership roles such as the leaders from my district and those chairing committees like Ways and Means at the State House. We also are looking at the possibility of a governor from the city sitting in the corner office in less than a year from now. This the council, the mayor's administration and members of the Boston delegation should be strategizing a game plan for the city to achieve real, tangible results and receive its fair share. To to right the many wrongs that have been done to us over the past several decades. Another swap this hearing order is about. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 3: Thank you, Counsel Brennan. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Would anyone like to add their name, please? Raise your hand, Mr. Kirk. Please add Councilor Royal Councilor Borg. Councilor Coletta called Councilor Maria. Councilor, we are all counsel of clarity. Please add the chair. 20683 will be signed to the Committee on Ways and Means. Mr. Clarke, please read 0684, please.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing to discuss solutions to historic and disproportionate state disinvestment in the City of Boston. President Flynn in the Chair.

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BostonCC_05252022_2022-0686

Speaker 3: Borough Council. Murphy Council. All. Docket 0684 will be assigned to the Committee on Government Accountability, Transparency and Accessibility. Mr. Clarke, docket 0685 has been withdrawn. Mr.. Couric, please read. Dr.. 0686, please. Speaker 1: Duncan Number 0686 councilors Lara and Louisiana offered a following resolution urging the Massachusetts legislature to oppose Pulse one, two, three, four and the proposed 2022 state ballot initiative. Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The Chair recognizes counsel. LRA counsel. Laura. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, President Flynn. I would like to suspend the rules and add Counselor Arroyo as one of the original co-sponsors. Speaker 3: Counsel Arroyo is so, so added as an original co-sponsor counsel. Larry of the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you so much, President Flynn. Today we had a couple of dozen app based drivers and workers downstairs with us and elected officials, city councilors and labor leaders from all across the state coming together in support for this resolution. App based companies such as Uber, Lyft and DoorDash are proposing a disruptive ballot question that's going to deny employees vital workplace protections, such as minimum wage, equal pay, paid leave, retirement, workplace safeguards against sexual and racial harassment, unemployment and worker's compensation. Essentially, they're denying all hope of a workplace where people feel respected, protected and well-paid. Undeniably, we've seen that technology has given workers more flexibility through the gig economy. But the price that working people in Boston are paying for those flexible hours is incredibly steep. We are currently in a pivotal moment where the future of work as digital tycoons are building empires on the backs of underpaid workers who are facing escalating housing, food and fuel costs daily. During the pandemic, women accounted for more than 68% of the nation's 2.1 million job losses. And as a result, many of our friends and families turn to the gig economy in record numbers, especially women of color. At Uber, women drivers increased by 80% in the last year. At Uber Eats, the number of women delivery drivers doubled from April 2020 to January 2022. And at Instacart, over 70% of the company's 600,000 drivers are women. So when app based companies like Uber, Lyft and DoorDash propose a disruptive ballot question that would deny employees vital workplace protections, we take it as a direct attack on working women, especially women of color and especially immigrants. Many of our friends and loved ones have turned to these jobs out of necessity to care for their own families and to earn extra cash. And it's been to all of our benefit app based services, help us get dinner on the table, travel home from the doctor's office, and have groceries delivered. At the end of the day, they provide ease and convenience, particularly for working class people, the elderly and disabled who have who heavily rely on these services. They are an asset, but this asset is made possible exclusively by the workers whose rights are going to be put at risk by Proposition 22. The statewide measure is being bankrolled by app based companies, and it's an attempted end run around labor law that would create a permanent underclass of underpaid workers of all ages in every community, but especially in black, brown immigrant communities. Big Tech has already spent 224 million on Proposition 22 in California in a successful attempt to exclude rideshare and other app based workers from workplace protections that are afforded to them under the law. And they plan on spending another 100 million here in Massachusetts. If House Bill 1224 passed is going to create a permanent underclass of low wage, mostly black, brown and immigrant workers, by allowing these companies to pay their workers less than minimum wage and provide few, if any, benefits. The numbers that we're currently looking at range from $4.82 an hour to $6.35 an hour. I'm filing this resolution because I believe that the Boston City Council has a responsibility to prioritize workers over corporate profits, to protect our consumers and oppose any measure that's going to facilitate wage theft and undermine the rights and benefits of the working class people who keep our city running. I'm requesting that we suspend the rules and move for a passage of this resolution today. Thank you. Speaker 3: Thank you. Counsel. Lara, the chair recognizes counsel. Royal counsel, royal blue of the floor. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. President Flynn And thank you, counsel Lara, for your leadership here to 2020 to state ballot referendum is essentially asking mass legislators and voters to grant special exemptions from our labor, civil rights and consumer protection laws that are anti-worker, that are anti the rights of our Massachusetts residents who are working in these places, in these gig economies, Uber, Lyft and the different ones that that are partaking. We know that people depend on this work. We know that the current advertising campaign, frankly, to call it what it is, is calling into question that the idea that if we give folks these rights, if we give folks the dignity that they respect as workers, that they should get as workers and the respect they deserve as workers, that we are harming them by removing their flexibility. And I just want to be clear that nothing prevents any of these places from offering flexible schedules or flexible working hours. They are fully able to do that and to continue to provide that flexibility to their workers. The only thing this does is ensure that they're paying into Social Security, that they're paying into unemployment, that they're providing civil rights protections and sexual harassment protections, that they are treating their workers with respect and dignity that they deserve. And so I'm in full throated support for this. It is incredibly important that we stand up for our workers, for folks who are holding it together during much of COVID. Folks were quarantined and ordering their groceries and ordering different things through these apps and relying, frankly, on workers who are putting themselves at risk for very little money and for very little respect from the organizations that they have made very wealthy. And it's important that we change that, that we make sure that that's not the case any longer here in Massachusetts. And so I thank counsel for her leadership here. I think other council colleagues who have stood up on this and have been very loud on this. And I think counsel President Flynn for this moment to share my thoughts. Thank you. Speaker 3: Thank you, counselor. L Would anyone like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes counsel. BLOCK. Counsel, block. You have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you so much, Mr. President. And thank you to Counselor Laura for leading on this. And Counselor Arroyo and I think many counselors are united on this front. It was moving to see so many folks, labor allies from across the state outside in front of the building earlier. And I just really want to briefly emphasize that what Counselor Arroyo said about how there's nothing that prevents these big businesses from providing their workers with flexibility within existing Massachusetts labor law. Where they don't like about existing Massachusetts labor law is that we have some of the best protections for workers in the country, and they're trying to undermine those because they know that these are not outside contractors, that they're dictating far too much of people's workday for that to be the case. And they don't like the idea of having to fund all of those protections. So I just want to emphasize, you know, I think, unfortunately, if if we allow this third category to be created in the name of flexibility, when in fact it's just letting people be workers without all of their workers rights, it's going to hugely hurt our rideshare drivers first. And then it's going to be a category that any number of workers in the Commonwealth could then become shunted into and lose a lot of their rights. So I think it's just a super, super important thing for worker power, for all of us to be pushing back on this and and making sure that Massachusetts voters know what it's really about. It's about the rich getting richer. It's about companies that have already basically set public transit and all kinds of other things in their sights and sort of like captured this big transportation market. And now they're trying to have as much of the profit from that as possible go their way and not to the workers who are, in fact, not even just the ones driving, but also the ones bringing the cars and paying the fuel and stuck in terrible leases for a lot of these cars. It's just it's a really exploitative industry. And this question would make it even more exploitative. And it's just something we can't allow. So thank you so much to my colleague and please. Hi, my name. Speaker 3: Thank you, Counsel. BLOCK The chair recognizes Counselor Baker. Counselor Baker, you have the floor. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Counselor, for putting this on. Speaker 3: Putting this forth over and left. Speaker 0: This is not our first fight with them, and I don't think it will be our last state. They have been around for a little while and I was involved pretty heavily in with the taxi drivers. We totally crushed that industry there. And that was mostly an immigrant driven. Speaker 3: You know, sort of good American story where you could get it, you could legitimately get a taxi. Speaker 0: And earn a living in that in that taxi or one or two of them. So we we lost that battle here. Now, they coming after Kensi was eloquent in what she talked about in in taking away the workers rights. So let's keep an eye on them, because I think ultimately it's about it's about getting rid of those workers and replacing them all with automatic automated vehicles. Speaker 3: So but thank you for putting this forward and please. And thank you, Counselor Baker. Anyone else like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes. And anyone else like to add their name. Mr. Clarke, please. I'd. Councilor Baker Council Bar Council President Council of Kolkata Council of Clarity Council, Media Council. Murphy Council were all and pleased that the chair. Councilors Lara and Arroyo seek suspension of the rules and adoption of darkened 0486. All those in favor say aye. All right. All oppose. Say nay. The ayes have it. The resolution has been adopted. We're onto personal orders. Mr. Clerk, please read docket 0687. Speaker 1: Duncan Smith 0687. Council of Flynn for Council.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution urging the Massachusetts Legislature to oppose H.1234 and the proposed 2022 state ballot initiative. On motion of Councilor Lara, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilor Arroyo as an original co-sponsor. On motion of Councilors Lara and Arroyo, the rules were suspended; the resolution was adopted.

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BostonCC_05182022_2022-0632

Speaker 3: 06320632 communication was received by the city clerk from Anita Tovar as chair of the Boston Election Commissioners, certifying the results of the May 3rd, 2022 election held for the office of District one city councilor. From the city election department to Alex Durant, interim clerk city of Boston from Anita Tovar as Chair Boston Election Department May 16, 2022 . Regarding May three, 2022 Special Municipal Election for your records. Listed below is the candidate elected to the office of District One City Councilor held on May three, 2022 at the special municipal election in Boston. District City Council elected for a two year term to fill vacancy. Gabriella Coletta, 99 Trenton Street District one Certified results are attached. Sincerely, Anita Tovar as Chair Board of Election Commissioners. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Clerk. All those in favor of accepting Docket 063 to say I oppose say nay. The ayes have it. Docket 063 to has been accepted and will be placed on file. At this time I would like to invite mayoral and councilor like Coletta to come up and begin the swearing in. Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. President. First, I want to say it's always wonderful to be back. Old habits kind of stick. I accidentally voted to accept and approve the minutes killed off in this last vote. I also want to invite the Coletta family to please come up and be present and stand with us during the ceremony. So as. Speaker 4: The. Speaker 6: Terrorist family is coming up here, I'll just comment that here we have someone who is stepping. Speaker 4: Into this role. Speaker 6: Who has been doing the work for a long time. Did. You knows every part of this building. Having served alongside giants in this role before and at other levels of government. And more importantly, she knows every part of the district already, in addition to a very brief, quick special election campaign. She has been serving in these roles and serving the community for many, many years. So I'm incredibly honored to. Speaker 4: See her step into this role. Speaker 6: And for all of the work. Speaker 4: That is ahead. Speaker 6: And all of the incredible leadership that I know you. Speaker 4: Will continue to demonstrate and. Speaker 6: To bring into fruition. I want to recognize that as part of that journey, there are many others who serve in office now and have served who are so proud and cheering you on as well. Of course. Speaker 4: The documentary filmmaker Lydia Edwards. Speaker 6: Who is capturing every moment of this state senator. State Representatives Adrian Monroe and Aaron Mikovits are here. Former City Councilor Anita Savvy George is here. Former former city councilor Selin martinez is here. Speaker 4: Oh, and I see former former former city councilor Dan Monica. Speaker 0: Is here as. Did I miss anyone? Speaker 6: No. And of course, we see community leaders from East Boston, from Charlestown, from the North End all gathered here as well. Okay. So first, would you like to introduce your family and then all of us? Speaker 4: So I'm incredibly lucky to be surrounded by amazing individuals who showed me the way. So I just want to introduce my sister, Angela. She's seven months pregnant. She's still here. She's amazing. Sebastian Zapata, my partner, my grandmother, Helen Coletta is here. The matriarch of the family. My father, Edmund Coletta. And my mom, Nina. Get a koala. Speaker 6: Okay. So we're going to administer three separate oaths to the commonwealth, to the city and to the United States of America. Speaker 4: I. Gabriella Coletta. Do solemnly swear. But I will bear true faith and allegiance to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and support the Constitution thereof and will support the Constitution thereof. So help me God. So help me God. I. Gabriella Coletta. Do solemnly swear. That I will faithfully and impartially discharge in. Discharge and perform. All the duties incumbent upon me as a member of the City Council of the City of Boston. As a member of the City Council of the City of Boston, according to the best of my ability, understanding according to the best of my ability and understanding agreeably, agreeably to the rules and regulations. The rules and regulations. The Constitution and the laws of this. Of the Constitution and the laws of this Commonwealth. So help me God. I. Gabriella Coletta. Do solemnly swear. That I will support the Constitution of the United States. So help me God. Congratulations. She's signing the official book. First woman. Speaker 1: Excellent. Speaker 4: Thank you. So I'm very lucky. Boston City Council President Ed Flynn had told me I'm able to give some brief remarks that doesn't count as my maiden speech, so I will certainly take advantage of that. But I promise I will be brief because I know we have a packed agenda. I just want to say thank you, Mayor Wu, distinguished guests and now my colleagues on the council and everyone for being here to share this incredible day with me as a former city council staffer. I have a unique appreciation and reverence for these chambers from being an Easter kid coming in here with my mom to advocate for our community. To my first day here as a staffer. I stand before you now deeply honored and humbled to be Boston City Councilor for District One. I'm in full acknowledgment and awareness of who and what it took to bring us here together today. So in this moment, I want to create and share this space in gratitude with you all. There are some special people in my life who I will recognize first, and that is my family. I mentioned them briefly, but I just want to first recognize the matriarch of my family, Helen Coletta. So happy you could be here today, Grandma. I'd also like to recognize my grandparents who are here watching over us. The late Edmond Colette, a senior, the late Alessandra argueta, and the late Celia Trujillo. Please watch over me and guide me on this journey. My parents, Edmund Calata and Nita Gaita to letter. Dad, thank you for instilling the values of kindness, humility and service to the community. Thank you, Mom. If I say if I. If I have sharp elbows, she's the one to thank. Thank you for my activist spirit and how to not only break the ceiling, but how to swing the hammer. Thank you. My sister and hype woman, Angela Colette Acevedo. My brother and political strategist Chris couldn't make it here today. He lives in Baltimore, but I know he's here with me today. And my incredible partner, Sebastian Zapata. I could not have done this without you first. I could not have done. Speaker 6: This without you. Speaker 4: Of course, to the incredible elected officials who are here. Mayor Woo, thank you for already pushing us to aim higher and to be bold. You're already making history and I so look forward to working with you. Thank you. Other elected officials who are here. Diane, Monica. I'm here because you did everything. I stand on your shoulders. You were the first. So thank you. I also sell a martini here. And thank you, Sal. And I believe Paul Skripochka will be joining us in just a little bit. And then also the state delegation. State Rep Aaron Markowitz. Thank you so much for everything. State Rep Dan Ryan, he's not here, but thank you, Dan and State Rep Adrian Monroe. It only took seven years to go from little sister to colleague, but I'm so happy to do this work with you. State Senator Lydia Edwards. It's Lydia with a Y. I told you. To the moon and back. Always. Thank you for teaching me to shine my brightest light. And a special recognition to the Boston City Council and President Ed Flynn, his staff and central staff for accommodating and welcoming me on my first day and to my colleagues on the Boston City Council. What an impressive group of powerhouse individuals. I look out at all of you and I realize that this is Boston. And I'm happy to be here. And I'm just in on every single one of you and what you've accomplished as a body this year. We are here because we believe in the power of municipal government and how it can better the lives of residents. We are here to ensure a vibrant, resilient, resilient and equitable city for everybody. We are here to bring the voices of those in our communities to the halls of power. And I look forward to learning from each and every single one of you and what your lived perspective is. And ensuring that we can build a brighter Boston for everyone. The work literally starts today. We have a working session at 3 p.m., so I will see you there. And I know that we will not agree on everything and there will be some tough conversations ahead of us. But I promise to be collaborative. To work towards consensus and compromise and to let the work be the motivation and not the politics. I want to be sure to recognize the district that raised me. They gave me everything and elected to elected me to represent them on the city council. Charlestown, East Boston in the North End. I love you. You have my heart always. Each is uniquely beautiful and each has its own set of challenges. But I know looking at this room and those in the community, there's nothing too big for us to tackle together. For my neighbors and constituents. You have my commitment to be bold, to speak truth, to power, to fight for your interests, to be inclusive and welcoming of all people, no matter who you are or where you come from, especially our immigrant brothers and sisters. I promise to be accessible and responsive, and you have my commitment that I will center your voice in every conversation and action. I promise to serve with empathy, with compassion, and with a little bit of that grit that I got from my mama. I won't be perfect, but I ask for Your Grace and for your partnership in this work to learn, grow and mobilize with me. The work starts today and I cannot wait to get started. Thank you, everybody. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, Mayor Wolf, for being with us today. And we're proud of you. And you're welcome to the council any time. And thank you to some of the city employees that are here with us as well to experience today's day. The mayor mentioned the former elected officials that are that are here. I was going to do that, but I don't think they need to be recognized twice. Mr. Clark, can you can you have the record reflect that Counsel Fernandez Anderson is here? Speaker 3: Yes. Speaker 1: And Counselor Carter is here. We're going to we're going to go back to the original start of the agenda. And we do have several, several groups that are here with us today. So we wanted to take this opportunity to to recognize them. So one of the groups that we have, counselor inclusion already already mentioned was a poet and performer. And we also have another special guest from Counselor Murphy. As you can see, our dedicated and professional M.S. staff is here as well. She. So at this time, I'm going to I'm going to ask Council Jen to please introduce our perform before today. We usually have one performer each week, but this was a special exception. So we are having to choose today. Come up and come on up, counselor. Speaker 4: Thank you, President Flynn, and welcome to our new colleague, Councilor Gigi Carrera. Looking forward to working with you. So in continuation today is Haitian Flag Day. Last Friday, many of you joined us for our wonderful breakfast that we had out on City Hall Plaza. And but I wanted to bring a bit of that spirit into the chamber today, given that today is the day of the Flag Day. And with me, I have originations founded in 1994 by artistic director Samba de Banga. Origination is a nonprofit that produces innovative and dynamic performing arts programs which motivate, challenge and inspire you to be the best they can be. They offer quality dance, theater, arts and African history education. And I have friends who've been in originations, and I'm so glad that we can have them here today. Performing for us will be ninth grader, ninth grader Alana Laforest, who herself is Haitian-American resident of Rosendale, ninth grader, all star. And to those of you who were here last Friday and saw the Manhunt School perform there, a dual immersion school, a dual immersion school in Mattapan, where they take classes in Haitian Creole and in English. She works with them. So she's just an all around, all star ninth grader at Basilan Academy who's here to sing for us and read us a poem. So, without further ado, Alana. I just want to thank counsel there, John, for that beautiful introduction. So to begin, I will be singing the Haitian anthem so I can can I ask that all rise for the. Why did they send us information? Men. Other men. Not me. 10%. Speaker 0: But against, let's say, fat Sal. Speaker 4: Matt said. No, no. I say mandala means nothing. Speaker 0: I mean, be bad. I know. I know. My dad wants. Speaker 4: For. I see all known tombstones. But no. Speaker 7: Next I will be reciting a poem written by. Speaker 4: Somebody in Gita Banga, and then I will translate it into Haitian Creole for it in honor of Haitians like that. So. I love myself. I love my brown skin, the bend of my hair, my dark brown eyes and the way that I stare. I love my physique. The way that I walk, the way that I smile and the way that I talk. Speaker 7: I am unique. I am one of a kind. Speaker 4: There is no one like me in this world so divine. I'm an original. Can't ask for more than that. When I was created, the whole world jumped back. I'm proud to be me. These hips and these lips. The fullness of my nose. And the fall of my twist. I am me. And I love myself. Speaker 7: And now for the Haitian translation. Well, I may sit and wait. Men. Women, men. Formal wear Cuban now shave in. Jane Wyman when Joe MacPherson went on it, when I met Physique, my advice on where my shit went unique. Speaker 4: We say you. Speaker 7: Non-Euclidean. Speaker 4: By ken akin lots tom. Speaker 7: We're not lemo went Oh, easy now we're back. Come on, de. Speaker 4: Poo, please. Possessor. LIM We're. Speaker 6: Clear. Speaker 7: LIM One idea followed to Lim. When you. Speaker 4: Did sit with was the boost that Mensa at severe to. Speaker 7: A desire. Once it went. And William sent me. So just want to say. Speaker 4: Thank you to Alana. Thank you to Shonda. How you reached out and were like, How can I help? And I'm glad to have you here. I know there's so many of us here are so big fans of yours. I know Cancelmi has been a longtime fan, so just thank you for all you do for our young kids and making them know their history and being able to celebrate Haitian flag. And thank you to President Flynn for allowing this moment to happen. So thank you, Steve. I think they. Speaker 1: Thank you, counselor. Joan. And that performance was was excellent. The poem was excellent in the song. The national anthem was excellent. Our next presentation is by Councilor Murphy and I. I'd like to ask Councilor Murphy to please come up. At this time. Speaker 6: Thank you, President Flynn. So and thank you and congratulations. It's nice to see that someone sitting in the seat again. Welcome. It's wonderful. So dating Boston EMS professionals provide lifesaving services every day and risked their lives each time they answer the call of service for our city. Boston Emergency Medical Services is one of three public safety agencies that respond to 911 calls in the city of Boston. Their department cares for patients with clinical proficiency, professionalism and compassion. They have been frontline leaders in helping our communities combat the COVID 19 pandemic, the opioid epidemic, and citywide emergencies in turn in 2021 alone. EMS professionals have answered the call for over 126,000 clinical incidences 160,577 life support responses, and 79,210 transports serving residents across the city in every neighborhood. In addition, regarding COVID 19, the Boston EMS have cared for tens of thousands of suspected COVID 19 patients. Over 7800 confirmed positive residents. And they have administered more than 2300 COVID 19 vaccinations. This year's National EMS Week theme is rising to the challenge, something members of the Boston EMS have exemplified during the COVID 19 pandemic and always before that also. Earlier this week, I attended the graduation ceremony alongside EMS Chief James Hooley and Councilor Baker and Bach, and celebrated the graduation of the largest class, the graduating class of 30 M TS. This class was the largest in over a decade, and we saw the next classes already started there. Two weeks in, we will give the. This will give the EMS a boost to continue their service to our Boston community and residents. In short, I asked that the Boston City Council join me in honoring the contributions of the Boston Emergency Medical Service Department and EMS Chief Hooley and all of his workers his and recognize that May 15 through May 21st as Boston Emergency Medical Service Week. Speaker 0: So thank. Two speeches. Speaker 6: And thank you also yesterday for being here for the budget hearing. That was wonderful. Yes. Speaker 2: No. Speaker 5: Thank you. I know you got a busy day. Thank you for thinking of us this week. Speaker 1: This body's has been terrific as long as I can remember. The City Council has done something like this for us. Speaker 5: We typically try to get a little bit bigger group, but everyone's kind of. Speaker 1: Busy today too as well. Deputy Alexander, who met yesterday at the hearing. Speaker 5: Today, is working a grill at Shirley Street in Roxbury as we're attempting to. Speaker 1: Feed people on all three shifts, delivering food out to them so that we, the command staff, we're able to take turns at it today. So she's busy and one of our other deputies unfortunate injured in the minor accident yesterday and she couldn't make it today. But anyway, thank you all very much. Rising to the occasion as the theme this year and rising is the council was saying and you know, we want to be there. We want you all to be able to count on us, depend on us, and thank you for all the support that you give us every day that makes that possible. Thank you. Thank you. I'd like to ask my colleagues to please join us for a photo. And then the second photo, I'm going to ask the Haitian delegation if we can do a second second group photo as well. So if my council colleagues could please join us and then please stay up here, and then we'll ask the Haitian delegation if they could come up immediately thereafter. Speaker 0: The United States. But I'd like. Yes. We? Speaker 5: And now we see to say that we have a six. Speaker 6: Arms sort of. Speaker 5: Space theory with. Speaker 2: All things. Speaker 6: And while we're waiting for the second photo, I do just want to thank Councilor Braden for co-sponsoring this with me. I did not mention that. Speaker 0: Sorry. It was nice to see you. Speaker 1: We're going to do the second. We're going to do the second photo now. Speaker 2: Which I'm not. I will come back. Yes. I think thinking was. Speaker 1: Thank you. Communications from her honor the mayor. Mr. Kirk, can you please read docketed 062520628 together, please.

Report of Public Officer

Communication was received by the City Clerk from Eneida D. Travares, Chair, Boston Election Commissioners certifying the results of the May 3, 2022 election held for the office of District 1 City Councilor.

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Speaker 3: for collective bargaining by $5,473 to provide funding for the Boston Police Department for the fiscal year 22 increases contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the city of Boston and the New York typographical union. Miss docket number 0630. Message In order for the supplemental appropriation order for the Boston Police Department for fiscal year 22 in the amount of $5,473 to cover fiscal year 22 cost items contained within the collective bargaining agreements between the Boston Police Department and the New York typographical union. The terms of the contracts are until the first 2020 to September 30th, 2023. The major provisions of the contract include base wage increases of 2%, 1.5% and 2% to be given in September of each fiscal year. The contract term filed in the office of the City Clerk on May 16, 2022. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Kirk. So Ducats 062520628 will be referred to the Committee on City Services Innovation Technology on Docket 0629. 0630. The chair recognizes counsel Bork. Counsel Bork as the Chair of the Committee on City Services Innovation Technology Council book. You have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you so much, Mr. President. We, for the four prior dockets, will have a hearing to discuss the particulars. But with this specific the $5,000 appropriation in oh six to 900, that's really for just two workers. And it's it's exactly the same as the agreement that the council already approved for asked me 93. So it's the identical deal. And I think in the interest of letting those two workers get their backpay and because there's no further information that the council hasn't already heard from the administration, I wanted to move for suspension and passage of dockets 0629 and 0630. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel. BLOCK Counsel seek suspension of the roles and passage of Docket 0629. All those in favor say aye. I am opposed. Say no. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Council BLOCK six suspension of the rules and passage of docket 0630. All those in favor say aye. I opposed say no. The ayes have it. The docket has passed. Mr. Clerk, please read docket. Speaker 3: 06310631 message transmitting certain information under section 17 of regarding the Mission Hill K through eight school docket number 0591, passed by the Council on May 4th, 2022.

Mayor Order

Message and order for the supplemental appropriation Order for the Boston Police Department for FY22 in the amount of Five Thousand Four Hundred and Seventy Three Dollars ($5,473.00) to cover the FY22 cost items contained within the Collective Bargaining agreements between the Boston Police Department and the New York Typographical Union. The terms of the contracts are October 1, 2020 through September 30, 2023. The major provisions of the contract include base wage increases of 2%, 1.5% and 2% percent to be given in September of each fiscal year of the contact term. Filed in the Office of the City Clerk on May 16, 2022.

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Speaker 3: Orders for the capital budget, including loan orders and lease purchase agreements. And docket number 0492 message in order authorizing a limit for the Boston Service for Youth and Families. DC Way of work revolving fund for fiscal year 2023 to pay salaries and benefits of employees and to purchase supplies and equipment necessary to operate the City Hall. Child Care. This revolving fund shall be credited with any and all receipts from tuition paid by parents and or guardians for children enrolled at the center. Receipts and resulting expenditures from this fund should not exceed more than $900,000. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The chair recognizes Councilor Fernandez Andersson, chair of the Committee and Ways and Means Counselor Fernandez Innocent. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you. President Flynn, the Committee on Ways and Means continues to hold hearings for to review the FBI 23 budget docket under a048020486. And on Thursday, we heard from what we've heard. We've held six public hearings so far this week with at least all of my counsel colleagues in attendance, alternating in attendance. On Thursday, we heard from Boston Public Boston Police Department. At 10 a.m. we heard from Boston Commissioner's office, the Bureau of Professional Development, the Bureau of Professional Standards, Bureau of Community Engagement and Bureau of Field Services. At 2 p.m.. Then we heard from Bureau of Admin and Technology, Bureau of Investigative Investigative Services and the Bureau of Intelligence and Analysis. Then on Monday, we were joined in the chamber at 10 a.m. by the Boston Center for Youth and Families, where we discussed their budget and revolving funds at 4 p.m. on Monday. Also on Monday, we hosted Youth Employment and Engagement Hawaii. Yesterday, we were joined for two sessions by the Boston Public Health Commission, 10 a.m. We heard from child, adolescent and Family Health, community initiatives and infectious diseases. Later at 2 p.m., we heard from emergency medical services, homeless services and Recovery Recovery Services. So. And tomorrow we'll be hosting the Office of Equity Resiliency and Racial Equity at 10 a.m. And then to we will hold we will have in attendance the Boston of the Office of Immigrant Advancement and the Office of Women's Advancement. And this afternoon, we will have our second working session to discuss FY 23 budget at 3 p.m. and 2 p.m. On to your room. Over the next weeks, we will continue to review the FBI 23 budget and with additional departments and also counsel working sessions. I recommend that these matters remain in committee. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Docket 048020482.0483.0484204862049. To remain in committee motions, orders and Resolutions. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket. Speaker 3: 06340634 Counsel letter of the following order for a hearing to discuss the creation of a civilian construction details program.

Mayor Order

On the message and order, referred on April 13, 2022 Docket #0492, Message and order authorizing a limit for the Boston Centers for Youth and Families (BCYF) revolving fund for Fiscal Year 2023 to pay salaries and benefits of employees and to purchase supplies and equipment necessary to operate the City Hall Child Care. This revolving fund shall be credited with any and all receipts from tuition paid by parents or guardians for children enrolled at the center. Receipts and resulting expenditures from this fund shall not exceed Nine Hundred Thousand Dollars ($900,000.00), the committee submitted a report recommending the order ought to pass.

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Speaker 1: Council. Royal Council. Meet here. Council. Anyone else. Okay. Docket 0634 will be assigned to the Committee on City Services in Innovation Technology. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 0635.0635. Speaker 3: Councilor Fernandes Sanderson offer the following order for a hearing to discuss ways of creating a partnership between colleges and high schools that will create jobs and academic supports for students. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes Counselor Fernandez Anderson. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you. Earlier, I just so you know, I forgot to do my slogan when you said Councilor Fernandez Anderson aways, it means I was going to be like where the money resides, where the money resides. But then I forgot and then it's just too late. So I'll just go on to talking about this one now. So I think that, you know, the possibility of getting academic support to our high school youth via partnering between area colleges and high school is super exciting. I wonder if we can discuss at this opportunity in terms of how we can hold colleges accountable by way of some sort of community benefit or pilot program where they can compensate lower socioeconomic class or lower income students to tutor high school students and then create and also creating jobs to our high school or stipends as a compensation. So creating this incentive to get high schools. The two would get compensated of consequence compensated and the tutor would also be employed. And so a partnership between the city and area colleges and high schools to get academic supports to our high schools is important and vital. And I hope you guys can support this idea. Thank you. Oh, and I'd also like to add Councilor Resolution and Councilor Mickey to this order. Thank you. Speaker 1: Hearing, hearing. No objection. Council illusion and councilman here. So, so added. Is anyone else looking to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes Constitution. Constitution. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you, Councilor Fernandez, and for offering this. Many of the students in our city have no choice but to work and sometimes have to choose work over school because of family situations, especially for our black and brown students, especially for immigrant families. And so it's whether, you know, and we see this all the time, and sometimes it's just because of spending money. A lot of us here started early. I started as soon as I was able to work, I was working. That is why I think this is a really great idea, so that we can provide stipends. I'm a big fan of learning and earning give jobs to folks who are young kids, where they are able to learn and able to put some money in their pocket. That was a big benefit for me and all of my sisters who started working when we were 14. Um, so we know that a lot of our students are dropping out. They're not finishing school as the rate of at the rate of their white peers. And we know that a lot of them suffer from entrenched poverty that's rooted in cycles of structural racism. And so they can't afford to test for test. And we know that all of our wonderful and really wealthy colleges have the capacity to give back more and be better neighbors here in Boston to our students who need it the most. A stipend for studying program, as the counselor has offered, would be a win win win for our students, for our schools and for our local colleges. And universities would pay dividends for the students who need resources to move and motivation to continue their academic pursuits and choose learning over, you know, a just a regular job if every college students take a leadership role and to really be invested in the city of Boston. So I think this is a really great idea and I'm looking forward to partnering with Councilor Fernando Anderson on this to make sure that we are incentivizing our young kids and really doing the work of making, giving, giving them money so that they can so that they can learn. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel. Again, the chair recognizes councilman here. Councilman, here you have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. And thank you to my colleague for adding me. What a beautiful surprise. So I just thank you. And I just would offer that, you know, I always talk about the fact that I had three jobs when I was in high school. So working wasn't something that I felt was a privilege. It was really more about survival. And I think the more opportunities that we can create for young people to earn while they learn and also create a pipeline of being able to give back is important. So I'm I'm happy to support this and look forward to having this involved in any of my committees, both as the Chair of Education and Workforce Development. This is a nice intersection of both. I really do appreciate your leadership and your creativity about thinking outside the box. So thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, councilman here. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? What? Anyone else like to sign on to this? Please raise your hand. Mr. Kirklees. Council. Royal Council of Balk Council. Brighton Council. Councilor Fernandez Innocent Council. Florida Councilor Laura. Councilor Murphy, please add the chair. Docket 0635 will be assigned to the Committee on Pilot Agreements, Institutional and Intergovernmental Inter-Governmental Relations. At this time. I just want to acknowledge the former colleague, Boston City Councilor Paul Skippy Serpico. Paul, thank you for being with us today. Mr. Quirk, please read docketed. Speaker 3: 06360636. Councilor Fernandes Sanderson offered the following order for a hearing to discuss the initiation of a study that assesses life insurance needs for low income residents.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing to discuss ways of creating a partnership between colleges and high schools that will create jobs and academic supports for students. On motion of Councilor Fernandes Anderson, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilors Louijeune and Mejia as co-sponsors.

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Speaker 3: 06360636. Councilor Fernandes Sanderson offered the following order for a hearing to discuss the initiation of a study that assesses life insurance needs for low income residents. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez and to send Counsel Fernandez Anderson. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Hello again. Thank you, counselor. President Flynn. So I'm getting a little bit chatty this afternoon, and I know it's going to. It's going to settle down, so I offer you this order. Due to both historic discrimination, merit out of perspective, black and brown holders of life insurance, and ongoing disparities in those who have coverage today. So black people have often been charged higher insurance rates for the same policies that others receive at lesser price. Due to this ongoing legacy of discrimination and a degree of distrust has developed. And many in the in the black community or black and brown community tend to overestimate the cost of life insurance. Black women are least likely or at least likely group to be insured, despite being largely responsible for raising a good percentage of the family units that they are a part of. Life insurance is an important financial resource to pass down. Those without it are in distinct disadvantage in terms of generational wealth. For these reasons and more, I offer this order to initiate a discussion in regards to the life insurance needs of poor and working class communities. And I guess I'd just like to say that, you know, it's also a really good idea to have to set up as a family to set up your financial portfolio. And for poor families, they often face this challenge of not being prepared. Unfortunately, we've all, I think, quoted the research here that black and brown people die in Roxbury 30 years sooner than their counterparts in Back Bay. And so oftentimes you see a lot of like sort of fund raisers, last minute go fund me to bury their loved ones. I think that this is it would be a really good idea to just do a study just to sort of assess the need in Boston and how we can support our poor and working class families . Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Is anyone else looking to speak on this matter? Would anyone else like to sign on to this matter? Please raise your hand. Mr. Kirk, please add Council of Royal Council. Book Council. Braddon Council. Kolkata Council. Flaherty. Consultation Council here. Councilor Murphy, please have the chair. Dawkins 0636 will be assigned to the Committee on City Services and Innovation Technology. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 06370637.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing to discuss the initiation of a study that assesses life insurance need for low-income residents.

BostonCC

BostonCC_05182022_2022-0637

Speaker 1: Kolkata Council. Flaherty. Consultation Council here. Councilor Murphy, please have the chair. Dawkins 0636 will be assigned to the Committee on City Services and Innovation Technology. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 06370637. Speaker 3: Councilor Fernandes Sanderson offer the following order for a hearing to discuss reinforcing fines or implementing funding for distressed, distressed, privately owned buildings in vacant lots. Speaker 1: Thank you. The chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. You have the floor. Speaker 4: So I just got a note from my count, my colleagues it to read it. I'm kidding. Here we go. Listen. Look. How did I end up talking so much today? So I've been talking with Ice-T in different departments and really looking into this issue in Roxbury and particularly. And we you guys hear me talk a lot about the decrepit sort of, you know, abandoned looking and neglected properties in Roxbury. Right. And seriously, as we all know, there are dozens of lots around the city, particularly 87 and in surrounding predominantly black and brown working class communities. These lots offer space where exciting and innovative ideas could be occurring. And so also, you know, with a lot of these buildings to some some of it some of the issue is we know that of from poor families, they're not able to actually afford to repair their property and some of them fall in different category and there's different technicalities that prevent them from repairing their property. So I think it's it would be a good idea for us to start talking about what programs already in place funding that is left or not left. From what I'm hearing from different departments is that the funding is actually very low at this point and the program is always at almost at its end. So if we can actually discuss bringing in back reinforcing fines to those who can afford it without disproportionately impacting black and brown or poor families, obviously. And I would like to also add, as an original co-sponsor, Councilor Laurel, I know he's not here, know how that applies, but in council allusion to this order. Thank you. Speaker 1: The chair recognizes. Speaker 3: Counsel. Speaker 1: Counsel Eugene at this time. Speaker 4: President. Thank you, President Flynn, and thank you to Councilman Dennison for offering this. We know that we have an incredibly impossible real estate market right now. But still, Boston finds itself with a lot of buildings that are vacant or abandoned or blighted. And this has happened. This has been going on for years and years and years. Sometimes the reason is in part because speculators are land making and they're holding on to land and letting the prices rise while investing nothing and forcing neighbors to live next to properties that are in desperate need of repair. Many times, however, there are times when it's because the owner just doesn't have the money to keep up. It's really expensive to get work done. The cost of labor is increasing, so we need to continue to find ways to tell the difference between those opposed to the land making by the investors and the homeowner who just can't afford to make the improvements necessary. The other category of land owners who can't afford you should be supported with resources that Catherine Anderson was talking about. We need to make sure that we're uplifting, uplifting and supporting the neighbors in the neighborhoods to be able to do something about the property that everyone can be proud of. I was on the phone yesterday and today with a constituent who is dealing with this very issue. Banks, grants, consulting and programs all play a role in revitalization. And I know that there is a problem task force, problem property task force here. But how they work with community groups, neighborhood associations, see programs and grants still leave a lot to be desired. We, the city can do better to help connect the resource, connect resources and create them where necessary, especially in neighborhoods that have been historically disinvested. To make sure that each neighborhood is somewhere where, you know, we have we're building thriving neighborhoods where we all feel like our neighborhoods affirm our dignity. So thank you for having me as original co-sponsor and I look forward to the work. Speaker 1: That you council. Mr. Kirk, please add Council John as an original co-sponsor. Unfortunately, we're not going to be able to add council. Where else, since he's not here. The chair recognizes Council of Bach. Council? Bach. You have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you so much, Mr. President. Thank you to the sponsors. And I just wanted to strongly say, please add my name. I was out walking with property management in Mission Hill yesterday, talking about graffiti and just in general, all these places where we see buildings that, you know, again and again, residents are reporting them. And it's coming back with that answer of either an investor owner who's absentee and can't be reached or in some cases a small business owner or a residential order that just the owner that just doesn't have the money. So I totally agree with the sponsors that we have to we need a program that better distinguishes between those folks and that is providing support for the folks who need the resources and I think is providing more substantial penalties and penalties that really bite for folks who are intentionally leaving their properties until an investment like a development opportunity arises and letting everyone else live with it. In the meantime, I just wanted to strongly second this and please I mean my. Speaker 1: Thank you counsel block that she recognizes counselor Brad and counsel Brad and you have the. Speaker 4: Floor. Thank you, Mr. President. Please add my name. I thank you so much for bringing this issue forward. Councilor Fernandez Anderson, the the business. The other issue that I know, my predecessor and councilor, Madam Ali, raised the issue about vacant shopfronts and storefronts in our business districts and our main streets. It's a similar sort of issue that may or may not be rolled into this conversation, but it's very detrimental to our Main Street districts to have vacant shopfronts and premises left vacant for long periods of time, years in some cases in our district, because an absentee landlord, landlord is just waiting for a more. Profitable opportunity, then perhaps a small local business that might use the premises. So please have my name. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. Anyone else like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes. Counsel me here. Counsel me here. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. And thank you to the sponsors. Please add my name. I'm really super enthusiastic about this, and I'd like to echo my colleague's sentiments, Councilor Breeden. And last year I believe it was council and I embarked on another journey to really address the commercial vacancies that are happening in our community. Those are all often distressed as well, and I think we have an opportunity to open up those storefronts and allow small businesses to incubate in those spaces. So I think that there's some room in this discussion if the chair allows through the chair to also add commercial vacancies into this conversation, because I think that is part of the whole community. So I wanted to just offer that as something that we can include. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, councilman. Here. Would anyone else like to what? Anyone like to sign on? Please raise your hand. Mr. Carter, please had council. A Royal Council. A Baker Council. A council. Brighton Council. A council. A celebrity. Council may hear. Councilor Murphy, please have a chair. Docket 0637 will be assigned to the Committee on City Services, Innovation Technology. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 0638.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing to discuss reinforcing fines or implementing funding for distressed privately owned buildings and vacant lots.

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Speaker 1: Councilor Murphy, please have a chair. Docket 0637 will be assigned to the Committee on City Services, Innovation Technology. Mr. Clerk, please read Docket 0638. Speaker 3: Duncan 0638 Council of Flynn offered the following quarter for a hearing to discuss the possibility of allocating our full fund funds for the expansion of South Boston Community Health Center. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. Clark. The Chair now recognizes Council President. Flint Council. President Flint Clause. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel Arroyo. May I add? Counselor Murphy in council as well as the original co-sponsors, please. Speaker 5: Seeing no objections there. So added Councilor Flynn, the floor is yours. Speaker 1: Thank you. The South Boston Community Health Center plays a critical role in our community. It provides many seniors with quality and compassionate medical care. We also have a strong behavioral and mental health component to it. We represent a large number of residents living in public housing and on some type of assistance. Many of the residents are from Mary Ellen McCormick. Many residents are from West Broadway Development. All the old colony, which is in Lynch as well. West Ninth Street. Which is another BP facility. Many of the patients that are at the South Boston Community Health Center, Health Center are communities of color. As I mentioned, 60% of the patients rely on some for some part of assistance. Many are living below the poverty line. During the height of the pandemic, the health center vaccinated over 35,000 people. There's also a vast increased demand, as I mentioned earlier, on behavioral health. I had the opportunity to visit recently and. The number of young people in students seeking mental health counseling or behavioral counseling is increasing dramatically. There is a proposed $20 million. For the continued COVID response another 8 million to augment behavioral health services. The expansion of the South Boston Community Health Center would would serve to fulfill both of these proposed uses under ARPA funding. They're expanding right next door. And again, part of that expansion is to the is to work on mental health counseling behavioral health counseling. I hope to have a hearing on this matter that it would be in the appropriate committee. But listen to residents, listen to the health center staff. Listen to patients, community activists, partners on on this proposal. Thank you, Councilor Rail. Speaker 5: Thank you, Councilor Flynn. Councilor Flaherty. The floor is now yours. Thank you. Just to echo. Speaker 1: The comments of my colleague and our council president, Cybersecurity Health Center does a phenomenal job, as do all of our community health centers. We are blessed. Not only do we talk about this all the time, we boast of some of the best hospitals in the world. We also have a network of community health centers that just provide front line care to some of our most vulnerable residents. And during COVID, I would argue that I believe it is the South Boston Community Health Center that stepped up and got right into so that COVID action, if you will council put in they were able to connect folks in our community particularly we have a Somali community that they service as well as the Dominican community and both of our local public housing developments. And as a result of that, they were able to expand the care and support other agencies like a local nursing home that was under siege at the time. So hats off not just to the South Boston Community Health Center, but to all of the community health centers, all the leaders, all those frontline workers that went to work every day helping all of our residents. And they're in need of some additional facilities and expansions and they want to expand their programs as to a sort of a lot of our other community health centers. So I wholeheartedly support this and look forward to an expedited hearing. Speaker 5: Thank you, Councilor. Clarity. Councilor Murphy, the floor is yours. Speaker 6: Thank you. So I'd like to start off by saying I am a patient at the South Boston Health Center, as is my family, and I'm also a board member on their fundraising committee. So I definitely know firsthand the great work they do and the strong role they play in that community. So not only is the South Boston Health Center the sole provider of primary and preventive care in South Boston, but it is also the first major health care provider located in the ever expanding South Boston waterfront. Funds would help the center prepare and expand this growing population. These funds would also combat inflation, especially with medical equipment supplies in their food pantry, which has seen a 50% increase in the amount of food distributed since the pandemic. They have done an amazing job feeding the people in the community. And in recent news, the health center has proven that the health center successfully rises to extraordinary challenges day to day in find safe ways to deliver care for their people. They did this especially during the pandemic. In 2021, the Massachusetts Health Quality Partners awarded South Boston Community Health Center for being one of the top practices in Massachusetts for patient experience in pediatric primary care. And in 2020, the Health Resources and Service Administration recognized them as the Health Center Quality Leader. This award is given to health centers that exemplify the best overall clinical performance among all health centers. And also lastly, in 2020, the health centers, overall clinical quality was in the top 30% of health centers nationwide. We know they're an amazing health care provider. They're also a great partner in the community and in the neighborhood. So with that being said, these funds would greatly benefit the health center and continue allow them to continue to deliver valuable care and services to their growing community. Speaker 5: Thank you, Councilor Murphy. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Seeing no one? Would anyone else like to add their name? Mr. Clark, please add Councilor Bok. Councilor Baker. Councilor Bok. Councilor Braden. Councilor Coletta. Councilor Fernandez Anderson Councilor Lara, Councilor Emily and Councilor me here and please add my name. Mr. Clark, can you please read docket 063900. Sorry, I got to refer that to a committee. Docket 0638 will be referred to the Committee on Boston's COVID 19 recovery. Thank you, Ms.. Clark. Mr. Clark, can you please read Docket 0639.0639?

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing to discuss the possibility of allocating ARPA fund for the expansion of South Boston Community Health Center. On motion of Councilor Flynn and Murphy, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilors Murphy and Flaherty as co-sponsors. Councilor Arroyo in the Chair.

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Speaker 5: Mr. Clark, can you please read docket 063900. Sorry, I got to refer that to a committee. Docket 0638 will be referred to the Committee on Boston's COVID 19 recovery. Thank you, Ms.. Clark. Mr. Clark, can you please read Docket 0639.0639? Speaker 3: Councilors Bach and Flynn offered the following the petition for a special law regarding an act to make certain changes in the law relative to the historic Beacon Hill District. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. Clark. The chair now recognizes Councilor Bach. Councilor Bach, you have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you so much, Mr. Chair. And thank you to Councilor Flynn for joining me in this. I'm going to speak on both of our behalf. Councilor Flynn and I have the benefit of sharing together the representation of Beacon Hill, and we'll have more working sessions under your remit, Mr. Chair, and opportunity to talk in greater detail. I'll be brief. Basically, when the Beacon Hill historic district extended down the North Slope in 1963, the city was poised to build our fire station on Cambridge Street, and people didn't want it to interfere. And so a very narrow strip of the last sort of 40 feet before Cambridge Street was excluded from the district in order to not have that complication. Now, there is the big project going on up on the other side of Cambridge Street and concern about some of the historic buildings, including the pepper building that's mentioned here from the 1890s that run on the Beacon Hill brick side of Cambridge Street. So the main thrust of this docket, and it's come to us from the Beacon, also the association and residents in the neighborhood is just to complete that last 40 feet of the district, which is something that I think most people assume is already in place, but actually technically isn't. So it's that and then a couple of other technical fixes to that. This is a home rule petition because the Beacon Hill historic district is in state statute. And so the first step would be amending it here at the council and then it would have to go up to the state. So just to say that this is something that has been discussed for a while and the Beacon Hill community and so folks have asked us to bring it forward. And I'm really pleased to be joining the council president and bring it forward today. So thank. Speaker 5: You. Thank you. Councilor Bracken. Anyone else like to speak on this matter? What anyone else like to add their name would add their name. I would. Okay. Chair Now recognized Councilor Fernandes Anderson. Speaker 4: I think you know what else can I say? There's nothing to say here except that this offer is a beacon of hope. And as long as we hope, we will never be over the hill. No, it's just. Come on, you guys are relying on me. Speaker 5: So it's tough on. Speaker 4: It's all right thing. Speaker 5: The U.S. electorate heads when anyone else likes to speak on this matter. Seeing no one would anyone else like to add their name. Mr. Clarke, please add Councilor Braden, please add Councilor Coletta, please add Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Please add Councilor Flaherty, please that Councilor Lara please add Councilor Lui Jen please ad councilor me here please add Councilor Murphy and please add my name as well. Docket 0639 will be referred to the Committee on Government Operations. Thank you, Ms.. Clarke. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilor Royal. At this time, I'd also like to acknowledge a friend of the council, Suffolk County Sheriff Steve Tompkins. Thank you for being with us. Mr. Clerk, please read dockets. 0640 in 0641 together please.

Council Home Rule Petition

Petition for a special law regarding an Act to make certain changes in the law relative to the Historic Beacon Hill District.

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Speaker 3: Numbers 0640 Council of Reading off of the following order for a hearing on appropriating federal relief funds to stabilize and expand public sector personnel capacity beyond pre-pandemic levels in dark number 0641 Council of after the following order requesting certain information under Section 17 F relative to the Personnel Review Committee and personnel vacancies. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr.. But she recognizes counselor Brad. And Counselor Brad. And you have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. President. These are two dockets related to our personnel capacity across city departments. As we work our way through the budgeting process, we hear from departments across the city about their personnel and their difficulties with vacancies within their departments, etc.. The first docket is a hearing order on the use of ARPA funds for pandemic recovery. And the second docket is a 17 F information request related to the Personnel Review Committee and Human Resources Practices for posting and filling vacancies. For generations, public sector jobs have been a lifeline for working families in our city, providing secure employment for women and workers of color with better and better benefits, greater job security and opportunities for nonunion from union representation and full time work. Across the country, local government public sector employment did not recover from the Great Recession of 2008 and until 2019. And then we were hit by. Since the onset of the pandemic, the private sector has regained 93% of their jobs lost since 2020, while the public sector has only recovered 53% of the jobs. Looking at our city's recovery since the recession over the past 15 years, not all departments gained back their personnel full time equivalent levels of 2008, supported by the General Fund. Inspectional Services has not fully reached their 22,000 needed staffing levels yet. Year after year, they took on more responsibilities and when the council and mayor passed new ordinances. And we're pretty good at that. We've added a lot of work to their workload. In the last past past few years, public facilities and property management are staffed below 2008 levels, while facilities, maintenance and capital projects are stalled without without needed project managers. B Cyf has more than 60 permanent full time equivalent positions below their 2008 levels, and Public Works has 80 full time equivalent position deficit compared to 2008 permanent staffing. All of these departments are front lines for city services and meeting residents needs. An excerpt from the Municipal Research Bureau's 2014 Transition Report spells it out Through the Great Recession of 2008, the personnel reductions of the three largest departments of school, police and fire have been less than proportional to their share of the total city employees. The greater burden experienced by the other 42 departments and the reduction of employees over 11 years is also evidenced by the fact that the police, school and Fire Department represents 77% of city funded payroll in 2013, but experienced 36% of the employee layoffs since 2002. The remaining 44 departments are 22% of the workforce, but have had a 63% reduction. The US Treasury Department determined that ARPA fund relief may be used to bolster local public sector personnel capacity to restore pre-pandemic 2020 staffing levels or expand up to 7.5% beyond the pre-pandemic baseline. I hope to explore this in the the committee hearing. We have heard throughout the budget hearings that department after department is struggling to hire and fill vacancies. It's an incredibly competitive job market at the moment. The Position Review Committee manages the approval process for posting and filling vacancies since 2017 financial year 17. The city has also eliminated 190 long term vacant positions. But we must understand why those positions were left vacant for so long. What functions they served were the essential and are they currently being contracted out? The 17 f order is intended to provide the counsel insight into the personnel processes in the context of fiscal management and recovery policies over the span of multiple mayoral administrations going back to 2008. Not just what is in front of us right now. And in this moment, we have a responsibility to look at the human resources situation holistically and use any and all tools at our disposal to help recruit and retain personnel for our city workforce so that we can continue to sustain and deliver good quality constituent services across all departments and unleash the power of municipal government. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 1: Thank you, counselor Braden. On on docket 0640. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes Councilor Bach. Council. Bach. You have the floor. Thank you. Speaker 8: And thank you to counsel Braden for filing this. And please add my name. I think it's been the most frustrating thing for, I think many of us about budget season. But for those of us who are here last year, the number of things where we approved new positions last year and they haven't been filled because of this hiring situation. I mean, if you think about like Whitey, which we had up, we had approved them for for new people and said they lost people with the speed humps. We had approved a whole second team so we could parallel process. Instead, public works is down to one engineer. I was working with property management around graffiti busters yesterday and they've got to like a third of the team's vacant. So I just think like again and again, this council is seeing the limitations of like the appropriation power is nice, but if we don't have the staff in place, then the money doesn't move and the work isn't done on behalf of the residents, the city. And so I have appreciated the administration's references to their plan to kind of do comp and class analysis and try to raise salaries appropriately to be competitive. But I just think this is a critical issue and it's becoming critical in every department. And so I really appreciate Councilor Great. And bring it forward. Thank you, Mr. President. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counsel Buck. The chair recognizes. Councilman here. Councilman, here. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. And thank you to Councilor Reinhardt, even though I wasn't here for the hearing. I did hear that a line item that we fought for and approved last year, which was workforce development for 19 to 24 year olds, that a position wasn't filled. And as a result of that, that that line item has yet to be tapped. So when we fight for things on the council to serve our constituents and then we don't have the personnel to do the work, it impacts all of us. And so I really do appreciate you bringing this hearing and this request to the council, and I look forward to the conversation. Please add my name. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilman here. The chair recognizes Councilor Baker. Councilor Baker. Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. Being someone that was laid off during that. I was laid off in 2010. Department people know about it still would never be able to figure out how much we're spending in the city on printing that department had to go away with. But what I wanted to focus on was what Kensi had spoke about. It's the people that are doing the work. If you look in the policy rooms, they're all full. All the nerds are all clicking away on their computers. All the policy rooms are filled. But the people that are doing the work, that are filling the potholes, that are mowing the grass, we don't have them there. We need to focus on that. The people that are actually doing the work, our constituent service sort of stuff. So I just wanted to add my $0.02. Thank you. And please add my name. Thank you to both. Speaker 1: Doggett. Yeah, thank you. Councilor Parker. Anyone else looking to speak on the matter? The chair recognizes Council Fernandez Anderson. Council Fernandez Anderson. Do you have the floor? Speaker 4: I rise in support to my council colleague. And to quote my angel, still I rise. That's the last what I promise. So I think this idea is genius. And speaking of nerds, thanks, Wayne. Now we've got a lot of work to do. I wholeheartedly support this. I think it's brilliant. Looking forward to it. Speaker 1: Thank you. Council Fernandez Anderson. Anyone else like. Would you like to add your name? Please raise your hand. Mr. Clarke, please. Council and Royal Council of Baker, Councilor Bach, Council of Britain. Council of Fire City Council Council Fernandez Anderson Council at Lara Council Region Council me here. Councilor Murphy, please add the chair. Dakar 0640 besides the Committee on Boston's COVID 19 recovery. Councilor Braden also seeks suspension of the rules and passage of dockets. 0641. All those in favor say I am opposed to any this have it docket zero six for one has been passed. We're on 2.0642. Mr. Clark, please read that. Speaker 3: Docket number 064 to cancel on me here or for the following order for a hearing on government accountability, transparency and accessibility of decision making protocols in city government.

Council 17F Order

Order requesting certain information under Section 17F relative to the Personnel Review Committee and personnel vacancies.

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Speaker 3: Docket number 064 to cancel on me here or for the following order for a hearing on government accountability, transparency and accessibility of decision making protocols in city government. Speaker 1: Did she ever recognize this councilman? Here, Councilman. Here you have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. And I'd like to add Councilor Tanya Fernandez Anderson as an original co-sponsor. Speaker 1: Council Fernandez Anderson is so supportive. Speaker 7: Thank you. If you've heard me speak before, you know that you've heard me say nothing about us. Without us is for us. And it's something that I said a lot when I was first running for office. And it and it was meant to remind people that we can't let the people who are in power close the door on us when it comes to decisions and choices that they make every day that impact our daily lives and lived experiences. I thought as a city councilor that I'd be able to get in here and learn that the decision making protocols and bringing that knowledge to the people. But even now, as a councilor, I struggle to grapple with how decisions are being made. And I'm often notified that something in the administration is happening after it has occurred. Cabinet Appointments Department hires are made without consulting US. COVID ARPA dollars are being spent with little community interaction. KBA decisions are being made in opposition to popular support for certain projects, and in one study conducted in collaboration with our office, we found that nearly a quarter, a quarter of respondents said that they strongly disagree that their voice was heard to represent it and policy decisions. This is a problem, but it's not a problem that's unique to one mayor or one city council or one department. We have systems and structures in place in our cities that pre-date all of us, that determine how we make decisions and how we must collaborate in order to make those decisions. But those systems routinely leave the voices of the people out. And so that is why we're filing this hearing today. We need to get to the bottom of how decisions are being made here in the city of Boston, what systems and structures are in place that force us to make decisions that way, and what structural changes or even changes to the charter need to be made in order to ensure that the voices of the people and that's all people are being heard. I look forward to this conversation and learning more alongside my colleagues. I really do appreciate my favorite nerd in the policymaking space, Jacob Blake Hawk, for his relentless advocacy in getting us to this point. I really do believe if we're really serious about changing the way we do business, that's going to require us to look at how we are functioning. I know that I have been incredibly disappointed by the number of things that have come across this council, and I've been forced to vote yes or no on things that I haven't had much of a voice in. And I have a responsibility to my constituents to making sure that we're creating the type of structure that allows us for us to really. Represent them in their voices. So I look forward to the hearing and my colleagues to participate. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel me here. The chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez innocent. Counsel Fernandez innocent. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you so much, counselor. President Flynn and my original co-sponsor, counselor. Me here. Thank you so much for partnering or adding me to your. Yeah. That the. So the councilor. So the council needs access to all relevant information eminent from the city government. Right. And the issue here, I think, is that if there's no if there's not one streamlined process, then things are can get, you know, sort of contrived or we lose trust in this paranoia. And we talk about this, these processes that include us, we talk about I've heard my council colleagues talk about equity and being what being that we know that certain thing or certain moneys affect a certain population and pulling on our heartstrings, beautiful presentations and all of that should be followed with good intentions and of course implementation of action. However, if we're not working on a transparent platform, if we're not if we're not doing that together as as my council colleague, Sister Maria said, if it doesn't if it's not with us, then it's not for us. So I strongly, of course, agree and support this and look forward to the work. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, Counsel Fernandez. Innocent. But anyone else like to speak or or sign onto this matter. Please raise your hand, Mr. Kirk. Please add Counselor Arroyo, Counsel of Brad and Counsel Coletta Counsel Fernandez Andersen Counsel Clarity Counsel Elara Counsel and Counsel Murphy. Please add the chair. 2:00 064 Cho will be assigned to the Committee on Government Accountability, Transparency and Accessibility. Mr. Clarke. Please read docketed. Speaker 3: 06430643 Council and me here for the following resolution Opposing State Receivership for Boston Public Schools.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing on Government Accountability, Transparency, and Accessibility of Decision-Making Protocols in City Government.

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Speaker 3: 06430643 Council and me here for the following resolution Opposing State Receivership for Boston Public Schools. Speaker 1: The Chair recognizes. Councilman here. Councilman, here. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. I also like to add Counselor Arroyo as an original co-sponsor, as well as Counselor Lucia. Speaker 1: So no objection. Council, Royal and Council Genocide Order. Speaker 7: So last month, the Committee on Education held a hearing on Docket 0199 in order for a hearing on state receivership for Boston Public Schools. As you all may remember, I tried to pass this resolution on the floor, and I was encouraged by my colleagues that we needed a hearing and we did just that. The goal of the hearing was to educate the public and the council around what receivership is and how it impacts our school communities. The hearing was insightful because we heard time and time again from the administration advocates, family members, students and members of the community. That receivership is wrong is the wrong move for state receivership is wrong, is the wrong move for Boston for many reasons, not least of which is that D.C. has a miserable track record of improving schools it has taken into receivership. VSC has voted to place three districts in receivership. Lawrence in 2021. Holyoke in 2015, which I opposed back then as a parent advocate and Southbridge in 2016. Southbridge and Holyoke are now the worst performing and second worst performing school districts in the state. According to Ducey's most district ranking. Following an initial uptick, Lawrence has been on the decline, and it's now back on the lowest of 6% of districts. A Boston Globe analysis of test scores, graduation rates, college enrollment and a dozen other metrics Lawrence, Holyoke and Southbridge published on Sunday show that the state has failed to meet almost all of its stated goals for the district. BP's is not without its problems, and we all know that because we sit in these budget hearings every day. But these are problems that can be solved by turning to the community, not by initiating yet another executive leadership retooling. That kind of thinking lacks innovation and intentional. We avoid the core problems a BP is facing. You can swap out the players at the top all you want, but the instability created through that process trickles down to parents, students and teachers. And we're left exactly where we started. Only less engaged and less hopeful for the future. This resolution has been a long time coming. We filed it back in 2021, and there was a desire from the council to learn more about the receivership, which we did, which includes our school community. We followed through on that request and created space for community members and counselors to come forward and learn more. Since then, there have been several articles, op ads, personal testimonies on social media from people across the district urging the city to fight back against any threat of receivership. Receivership is opposed by members of this body and has received opposition from the mayor, even her in her children, who is a former D.C. board member, and came out and said that her vote to place Lawrence under receivership was the wrong choice. It simply does not work well when if we can't risk doing further damage to our school district by handling by handing over it to the board with no clear track record for improvement, it is time that we as the Boston City Council and the representatives of the people listen to their voice and join them in opposing any third of state receivership for Boston Public Schools. And I move and I move that we suspend the rules and urge my colleagues to vote in favor of this resolution. I will say, you know, everything is always political theatrics. And, you know, we have an opportunity here as a council to hold the district accountable. And it is our I would say it is in our best interest to make sure that we support this resolution, because it gives us the ability to hold the district more accountable instead of allowing outsiders to tell us what is right for our people. So I encourage our colleagues to rise up and vote in favor of this resolution today. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, councilman. Here. The chair recognizes Councilor Arroyo council royal. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you. Council President Flynn. And thank you, Counselor Maria, for your leadership. I voice my strongest opposition to taking our Boston Public Schools into receivership. I'm very aware of Desi's track record. I think the Boston Globe recently published that record, but we've heard it from advocates and we've seen it on the ground. They have not done really any commendable work in their turnarounds to date in smaller school districts. At the very beginning of my career, I worked in Lawrence, and so I commuted from Boston to Lawrence, and I got to see firsthand what that takeover did to that community and the parents and the lack of parenting. Isn't in the way in which that community has been fighting since to take back control of their schools so that they can have a voice in the decisions that are being made with their children. And as councilman here has noted, the academic improvements have really gone down. And that initial uptick, frankly, came from injection of resources, a small injection of resources into the actual facilities. If you actually saw the Lawrence facilities, they had put a lot of money into improving them and making them modern and standard. But now, as we sit here today, we've seen repeatedly that Disney does not have the ability or the resources or frankly, the skill level to come in and take these schools over. And so I am voicing my strongest opposition to receivership. I do believe that this is something that we can handle with Boston Public Schools. I do know that there are places where, frankly, we would like to see them do better. But I know adamantly that state receivership is not a solution to those things and that those are the kinds of things that we have better control of , frankly, as a body here with parents engagement with the school committee and with the superintendent. I know that Councilor. Council President Flint is sort of raised up the specter of what receivership is doing to our current efforts to improve by selecting and hiring a new superintendent. And I think the fact of the matter is, having this over our Boston Public Schools heads is actually stopping us from getting and moving forward in a way that is productive. And so I would like to see this this pursue ended or at least the conversation around it ended because we know that they don't have the ability to really do this well. And so with that, I add my voice to this and I hope to see this passed today. Thank you. Speaker 1: The chit. Thank you, counsel. The chair recognizes counsel, illusion, counsel, vision. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you to Catherine here for this resolution. I also rise in very strong opposition to any notion that there should be any state intervention into our schools for a lot of the reasons that have been said. There's no track record of success. We are in a pivotal moment as a city with a largely new city council, a new mayor with a new vision for our schools. A lot of change. We're hiring a new superintendent. So for this to be thrown in as a distraction is unnecessary. And I also just I'm cautious that the state should always be cautious when the state is taking its cues from a free market think tank that really doesn't believe in the public good. Right. We're talking about what we need in our public schools, and that's deeper investment to make up for a lot of intentional policy failures and policy harms that have been done towards our schools. So I think, you know that the state is taking cues from a think tank that believes that the model should always be privatization, should be everything that we need to know about why this is not the right approach for our schools and for our students. I was with a teacher just last evening from the Denver school and the Denver has been in receivership since 2014 with almost nothing to show for that. And so I think we have the tools that we need here to really help transform our schools. The state does not. And so I am in strong support of this resolution, and I am glad that it was filed. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Constitution. The chair recognizes counsel. Clarity. Counsel, clarity. You have the floor. Thank you, Mr. President. And obviously thank you to our colleagues, counsel here and the co-sponsors. And I appreciate the spirit by which this is filed. I understand legitimate concerns about total state receivership, and I do not support total state receivership. With that said, I will not be signing on to the resolution but will not stand in the way. Pursuant to Rule 33 to allow the motion to be adopted, i. I just want to be perfectly clear that for me, this has nothing to do with our teachers, our beloved BTU, our students, or the countless individuals who work hard every day on behalf of our students. For me. It has to do with the systemic failures of our central office and the a proven inability to consistently support our schools, our teachers and our school communities. Our school district is consistently failing our most vulnerable students and violating the law, particularly as it pertains to our English language learners and our special education students. For us students that require IEPs, there are many cases where students do not have adequate accommodations or plans in place for our English language learners. There are documented failures to provide students with equitable access to ELA teachers inappropriate support. We also have significant operational issues. Whether it's our transportation system, our data reporting system, our facilities, our safety policies or mechanisms consistently tracking parental and community concerns, we don't have one. We don't have a system that tracks parental community concerns, despite the fact that we're talking about all the investments that we've made over the last several years. Look no further than this past January. 16,000 kids. 16,000 kids were left stranded. Didn't get picked up. That's never happened. I'm here almost 20 years. It's. I've never seen it this bad. You all know, I have been a fierce advocate for public education, a fight to support all of the critical investments in our district. I believe in those investments and I will continue to support them. I also believe that it may be time to talk about a strategic partnership or targeted interventions may be appropriate. Whether that's what the state or frankly, the federal government, if anyone here doesn't think that the Department of Justice is looking at this very issue. You are sadly mistaken. And I would rather come to the table and identify those three or four or five areas and partner or have targeted interventions with the state or the federal government as opposed to having them come in and taking the whole thing over. Which, again, as I referenced in the beginning of this, I do not support that. I think targeted partnerships in these areas where we've failed to consistently make progress year in, year out, year in, year out. Same old, same old. As we continue to do is keep increasing the budget. We continue to give them more money. We're actually educating less kids than we've ever educated in the city. 7000 less than the last couple of years. And I just think that the time has come to call it what it is, which is we need to call out the central office. It's not about calling out our teachers. It's not about the students. There are dedicated professionals, passionate, committed to our children, to making a difference in their lives, to closing those gaps has nothing to do with them. For me, this is about the central office. It's the buck stops with the superintendent in the central office. They are thwarting progress. They are getting in the way of good instruction, good support. And for me, I just think that the time has come that. We call them out. And whether it's a targeted intervention or it's a strategic partnership, I think now is the time between now and Tuesday to negotiate what that is. I understand it's a difficult time because we're trying to attract a new superintendent. This probably isn't the timing on this is horrendous. I know that we've got 31 applicants. I believe in the mail and are planning a visit to turn the schools around. I want to work with the new superintendent, allow him or her to get the legs underneath them to move forward. This may be an opportunity for them as well. We potentially could make an argument that if we allow those three or four critical areas where we've chronically and systemically underperformed, maybe we could negotiate that our new superintendent can be the receiver. What do they think about that idea? And so these are the things that I'm sort of thinking about. But again, I appreciate the efforts of our colleagues to lead sponsor for work on the Education Committee and the hearing that she hosted. And again, as I referenced, I wanted to state my objection for the record and again, state that it has nothing to do with our teachers. This is all about the central office and calling them out. And as I mentioned, Mr. President, I will not stand in the way with Rule 33. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, counsel. Clarity. The Chair recognizes Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Counsel Fernandez Enerson. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. President. I strongly support my colleagues. Offer a receivership has been shown to actually not improve quality of schools in the districts that have utilized that approach. And local districts that have gone under receivership are much smaller than Boston, and then in that process is ineffective for them. So that begs the question, like, if this policy cannot work on small district, and why would it work on a district as big or the biggest district in the state? Additionally, receivership is often used to counteract school districts that are struggling for a number of socio economic reasons that often transcend to school themselves, ensure our students need food, housing, language support and mental health counseling and so forth. So how does putting the schools that they attend and receivership into receivership help them actually get the resources and services that they need? The state is really far removed from our youth. They don't see our youth as individuals. They don't know our youth. And so because of this, I heartily endorse this offer from counsel over here and oppose BP schools being placed under receivership. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel Fernandez Anderson, the chair recognizes Counselor Baker. Counsel Baker, do you have the floor? Speaker 5: Thank you, Mr. President. If this resolution defends and protects the status quo for a system that can't even keep our students, teachers and staff safe, graduation rates and and academic progress is astoundingly poor. So we want to double down on a system that's failing our children and our families. In a city where enrollment plummets alongside morale, we need fundamental change, and this resolution does the opposite. It's time for the City Council to illuminate the facts of what's going on in our schools, not to cover up the misdeeds and failures. We're pretending as if status quo is okay because it's not. Let's get a range of people in here and have a hearing. Let's get DeSean here. Let's not have the echo chamber that we're used to. Everybody saying we don't want we don't want receivership. Let's get some opposing views. The single sided. The single sided. Hearings don't work. Needs to be true to differing opposing views here, which we are not providing here in this chamber. I agree with counsel. Clarity with with the targeted interventions doesn't need to be a total takeover. Wildly unsafe. Kids unable to read. Speaker 4: Buildings failing. Spending. Speaker 5: I think it's 160 million. This year on transportation will be another 10 million next year. Another 10 million after that. We spend 40 to 50 million every year. Three times what the police budget is. We're looking to defund the police, but we're looking to double down on something that's failing. I just don't get it. I don't understand it. And you're either. Now it's going to be either receivership or not. There's someplace in the middle there which I think Counsel Clarity spoke to pretty well. So and that's where I am. Do I want the state to come in and take over? No, but I think there's definitely areas where we can be in it being improved. And you know as well as I know that safety is one of them. If we don't have safety in our schools, just like if we don't have safety on our streets, if we don't have safety in our transportation system, we can kiss it all goodbye. The schools are unsafe right now. That's a huge problem. Kids aren't able to read. That's a huge problem. So that's my $0.02. I will be voting no on this. And again, I won't block it if other people don't don't want to. But I think it warrants another hearing, a balanced hearing, if we're able to to do a balanced hearing. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Counsel Baker. The chair recognizes council ora. Council ora. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, President Flynn. Speaker 4: First, I want to say that I am in support of this resolution and I am against Massachusetts State Receivership for keeps. I attended the hearing that was chaired by Councilor me here, and I think it really did a good job at illuminating all of the issues that state receivership would cause for our school district. I was only going to vote in support and was not going to rise to speak. But after the show of political theater for my colleagues, I think that it's incredibly important that we really have an honest conversation about what we're talking about here. First, did not show up to the hearing after they were invited. So if through the chair, if my colleague, Councilor Baker, has any connections to get them to come and speak up for themselves, then we would love to have them there. Secondly, Boston Public Schools and DC have been under a memorandum of understanding that outlined what we would do to improve the issue areas that DC identified and what DC would do to support us to meet those areas. Boston Public Schools showed up, talked about all of the work that they have been doing on their side of the memorandum of Understanding. DC did not show up and to my knowledge and everybody that was there to testify could not prove that they had met any of the commitments that they made on the menu to us. Not only that, they sped up the review process so they didn't even give us the necessary time to really reflect back on on the review process and the promises that were made in value, which included supporting all of the issues that were outlined by Council priority and VIPs and DC has done nothing. So even during the process of the MOU, you with BPC and DC, they have been completely unable to provide not only results but any kind of support to us. Does what do Boston Public Schools have issues? Yes, absolutely. And we should be able to talk about those issues earnestly and we should be able to talk about those issues collectively. But it's absolutely no surprise that the State Department wants to come in here when the people of the city of Boston just voted to move to an elected school committee. And we have a mayor that is committed to hiring a superintendent that's really going to transform our schools. We're moving towards more democratic governance. We're moving towards a different vision for us. And now the state wants to come in and try to take over. This is an affront to the voters of the city. It's a slap in the face to the parents who have worked so hard to make sure that they can have a voice in the schooling and what happens in the schools where their students are attending. So the voters are going to tell us that they want one thing and we're going to stand up here and say that we care about students, that we care about teachers, but we're going to tell the voters where they can shove it and that we're going to support the State Department to come in here and tell us what we need to be doing with our schools. When the voters of this city has told it, have told us the opposite. You want to talk about having balanced hearings. The people of this city elected every single one of the councilors that are standing around here. So the people of the city have decided what voice they want here in the city council chambers. And every single one of us here is representing what the voters have asked us to come and represent so we can do one or two things. We can have an honest conversation about peace. We can file the resolution. We can say that, yes, we have problems, that we want to have an opportunity to fix those issues ourselves. We all just got here. The mayor just got here. We have so many problems to fix and we need to be given an opportunity to fix those issues so we can either say, give us a chance to do right by our families or we can say no. Let's let a failed model coming to our city and see if we can roll the dice on our children's education and roll the dice on what the voters of the city have already told us that they want. I, I, I appreciate the fire that i've seen from my colleagues. I get it. You got to stand up. There are people that want them to say what they need to say. But at some point we have to make decisions as the city council of one of the largest 25 cities in this country that are based on fact and that are based on data and not just political rhetoric. And that is why I'm in support of this resolution and I'll be voting yes. Speaker 7: Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. Counsel The Chair recognizes Councilor Murphy. COUNSEL Murphy, you have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you. President Flynn. So as the only educator on this body. Someone who has dedicated my entire career to teaching and nurturing the children of Boston, I am standing up today to say this is devastating. I was a student in BHP's in 1974. I put my son on a bus in 1992. I've been in the system as a mother. I've been in the system as a student and also as a teacher for over 20 years. Yes, the state in D.C. has a really bad track record. But Boston Public Schools has not shown us much better year after year, decade after decade. Transportation, food services, even basic services like getting our children to school, feeding our children. Never mind that so many special education students and students, which I was both the teacher of. Do not get the proper services they need. So, yes, the state will come in. Yes, the federal government will probably come in. But I'm just standing today to say I'm not standing up because there are voters out there or constituents who want me to say something. I'm standing up to say when asked, Where do I stand on receivership? I will always unapologetically say, I. Speaker 4: Stand on the side of the children. We have failed them. Speaker 6: And it breaks my heart. I've seen it as a mother who's had to pull her kids out of under-performing schools. I've seen it as a neighbor who listens to parents. It. It burns me that we spend so much money and so many families feel that you either get into a school and that's considered a got me hell . You get the golden ticket. Every child in the city of Boston deserves to get a seat at a quality school. Every child in the city of Boston deserves to get that golden ticket. Not just a few of our families. I also stand in support of our teachers. The teachers. I know I was one of them for 24 years and I have been touring schools since I got here. On the other side now is a city councilor and yes, you will see amazing things. I was blown away by the play at the Warren Prescott. I was at the Elliott this morning. I was at East Boston High last week. Go to any school at any moment and you will see amazing things happening. That is true. But something has to change. And I don't know what the answer is. Is it received Seaver ship or not? But it absolutely has to change. We can't just keep throwing money at a system that is not showing up for our children. So I believe we need to stand together. And just fight for our children. Speaker 7: So thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilman Murphy. The chair recognizes Councilor Bach. Councilor Bach, you have the floor. Speaker 8: Thank you so much, Mr. President. And similarly to Councilor Laura. I wasn't going to speak today, but I just. I wanted to state my support for the resolution. I think that the it is true that we are facing deep challenges and BP's. But the problem is, is that every one of them are things that take deep collaborative partnership work. I mean, when you talk about literacy, like we we have to do like deep literacy curriculum roll out across the district. Like that's something that like it it takes kind of that like line level time. It isn't something that gets better by people's like pounding their fists on the table. And it's I can't see it getting better through the sort of state city theatrics and the same thing, you know, when you think about rolling out pre-K, when you think about reforming special ed, like I think the thing this district needs is an empowered superintendent who is backed by both the mayor and the council to do things that take time, that take longer than one news cycle to actually really dig in. And I think that a path towards receivership is a path into further news cycle governing of the VP's system. And I can't see that. As a as an educator on the on the college side, when I think about what makes good curriculum, when I think about like what really changes, like students experience, I just I can't see it coming through state receivership. And as a number of colleagues have said, there's pretty strong evidence that state receivership is not delivering those results for any school district. So I do think, like I value colleagues point that like there's a lot of places that where we have to say as a body where BP has been is now is not acceptable. Um, but I think when I think about the kind of like slow and complicated and really committed work that we need to be doing, it's work that we need to be doing as a city with partners. And I think that the state can bring resources to the table and private entities can bring resources to the table. Everybody can throw in orange, but but that doesn't require something like receivership. So I just I really feel strongly that this is something where we need a great superintendent and the mayor and the council need to back them. And it is going to take leadership from everyone at the city. But I, I, I don't think desy has the capacity to help through a receivership lens, and I think that it would set us back considerably. And I agree. I think it was council, but it might have been councilor me here who said that in a lot of ways the fact that what we're fighting about is receivership today is a distraction from a lot of the core issues that we need to be focused on. So I just wanted to say, please add my name and I'll be supporting the resolution. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. But the chair recognizes. Counsel I'm here. Counselor me here. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. And I really do appreciate all of my colleagues who rose up to speak in regards to this issue. I'll just say that I was appointed by DC to be on their accountability task force. And while I was there, I was there to serve the parent voice. And I was one of very few people of color in that space. And the way that Jesse normally measures accountability is by giving themselves a pass in terms of the things that they were supposed to rise up and do. So I really do appreciate counsel, a lot of calling that out because I saw it for myself firsthand as someone who was appointed to one of their committees. I also think that it's really important for us to acknowledge that as a council we are also held responsible. We approve the Boston Public Schools budget every year so we can talk about accountability without seeing the role that we have played. And particularly my council colleague Clarity, who's not here to hear this, but I'm sure he'll watch the tape and rewind. But he's been on this council for 20 years. And year after year we keep having the same conversation and not much changes. And so if we're really serious about leaning into this work, we also need to call ourselves into this process and recognize that in many ways, the council has failed. Boston Public Schools as well. And so this is a call for us to recognize the role that we have played or not in this process. And while I do appreciate my colleagues, you know, comments around the children, I'm a Boston public school graduate and a Boston public school parent who worked in the Boston public school space. And so for me, this is really about an opportunity for us to finally do right by the parents and the students and the educators and bring in someone else from the outside, especially in Boston as well. We're so worried about outsiders. If we're really worried about outsiders, that's what we're doing right now, is allowing outsiders to come into our city and telling us how we should be. So in the interest of protecting our Boston public schools, I am going to ask my colleagues to vote in favor of this resolution and look forward to continuing the work and holding all of ourselves accountable to ensure that accountability is 3060 and that includes us. Thank you. Speaker 1: Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Would anyone else like to have their names? Mr. Clarke. Please add. Councilor. Councilor Braden. Councilor Carter. Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Councilor Alvaro. Councilor Murphy, please. Out the chair. Council on the Council of Rail Consultation. Seek suspension of the rules and adoption of 0643. All those in favor say I oppose any. Speaker 7: Doubt the vote. Speaker 1: Mr. Clark, could you please call a vote for a vote? Speaker 3: Roll call vote on docket number 0643 Council or Oil Gas Council or U.S. Council of Baker. Speaker 1: Nay. Speaker 3: Council a Baker and No Council The Bar Council of Gas Council. Breedon Council. Breedon years council a Coletta Council letter yes. Council for an end to end? Yes. Council for an end to sense and yes. Council 30. Council of Flint yes. Council of Flint. Yes. Council Borough Council LRA Yes Council Louisiana yes. Council Louisiana yes. Council let me here yes. Council A me here. Yes. Council a murphy. Council a murphy. Yes. Speaker 1: Resolution. Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The resolution. The resolution has passed. Um, Mr. Clarke, we're going on to talk at 0644.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution Opposing State Receivership for Boston Public Schools. On motion of Councilor Mejia, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilors Arroyo and Louijeune as co-sponsors. On motion of Councilor Mejia, the rules were suspended; the resolution was adopted; yeas 10, nays 1(Baker), absent 1(Flaherty).

BostonCC

BostonCC_05182022_2022-0645

Speaker 1: Please read Target 0645. Speaker 4: Don't you love me? You really love me. Speaker 3: Doug Number 0645 Councilor Murphy offer the following resolution recognizing the contributions of African-American military veterans and recognize African-American military Heritage Month. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The chair recognizes. Counsel Murphy. Counsel Murphy, you have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you. I'd like to suspend the rules and add Counselor Anderson and President Flynn, please. Speaker 1: Seeing no objection. Council Fernandez Enerson in the chair also ordered. Thank you, Counselor Murphy. Speaker 6: So thank you. So I want to thank Commissioner Santiago from Boston Veterans Services and Mr. Finnell, who are here in the audience. And thank you, Mr. Finnell, for your sacrifice and commitment and service during the Vietnam War and in Okinawa. And thank you also for your continued community service in your educational endeavors as a poet and founder of the Oscar Micheaux Family Theater program. So thank you for that. And I stand to offer this resolution today to recognize Saturday, May 21st, 2022, as African-American Military Heritage Day. Each year at the General Edward O. Gordon Veterans Memorial Park, the Organization of Afro-American Veterans and other military veteran organizations gather to memorialize the history and contributions of African-American military veterans. Here they honor African-American military and civil service by conversating with one another and sharing their experiences. In general, 43% of the 1.3 million men and women on active duty in the United States military are people of color. Yet only two of the 41 most senior commanders in the military are black. Most, more specifically, in 2020, black soldiers compromised approximately 21% of active duty army, 15% of the Army National Guard, and 21% of the Army Reserve. It should be noted that black Americans serve in the Army at a higher rate than their representation rate in the U.S. population, which is 13.4. So the purpose of annually celebrating African military Heritage Day in Boston is to recognize and commemorate the service of African American veterans in every war. The history will not be forgotten, and I'm happy to say that Veterans Memorial Park in Roxbury plays a part in this commemoration. With that said, Boston will continue to support the United States African-American military and veterans to show that our city strongly embraces diversity, to create a system that maximizes individual talents and increases morale regardless of race , color or gender. So in short, I ask that my colleagues on the Boston Council pass this resolution to acknowledge Saturday, May 21st, 2022, as African American Military Heritage Day. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. Councilor Murphy, the chair recognizes Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you. Councilor Flynn. Council President Flynn. Thank you, Councilor Murphy, for offering this resolution to recognize the African-American military veterans who have served in the U.S. armed forces throughout this nation's history. They have served despite often being the victims of blatant racism and discrimination. During civil war, they fought to help free their enslaved brethren and themselves during World War II, and they served bravely only to come back to this country to be lynched and beaten, often in uniform immediately after the war. During World War Two, they fought courageously to defeat fascism while continuing to be victimized by Jim Crow and legalized segregation at home. The army itself was not segregated until 1950, meaning that in all the wars I've described above, the black soldiers were in separate fighting units, often led by segregationist commanders. During the Vietnam War, while black people were rising up for their freedom in this country. Many others were drafted into or chose to serve in the army. They fought bravely, even if they weren't always in full agreement with the objectives or if their main goals was to come home in one piece. And so it goes. So the present day where black men and women continue to serve our country via their service in the military. One of them being my son. Luis Miguel. Let me just say, Luis Miguel, Freddy Rocha, who is a marine who I am extremely proud of, who? Induces anxiety every time I talk with him because he is so dear and dear to my heart, I'm extremely proud of him. This young man is so beautiful in and out. Not because I'm his mother, obviously, but I am so extremely proud of my son for making his own decision, for being someone who wants to serve his country. And I am just I can't say how how happy I am that he has taken his own path to serve our country and how much I love him for it. And I pray for his protection and guidance. Guidance always. Amen. So thanks again to my colleagues and for offering us a solution and I am gladly to the second. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilor Fernandez Anderson. I would like to echo. The comments of Councilor Fernandez innocent and Councilor Murphy. Exceptional heroism of African-American men and women in their role. Is part of the US military. They fought bravely. They fought under very difficult conditions. They came back to the States and weren't treated with the respect and dignity that they've earned. I've had a good friend Will assigned, as well as Saunders, who's passed away. It's an older gentleman. He was a Tuskegee Airman, superintendent of the Boston Police. And I heard him tell stories about the incredible sacrifices and contributions of African-American men and women in the military to our country. So I just want to say thank you to my colleagues, but the entire body for for supporting African-American veterans. I'd also like to. Thank my friend who's the Commissioner of Veterans Services, Rob Santiago, for always being there in support of African-American veterans and making sure that they have the services and programs that they've earned. So thank you, Commissioner Santiago. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter, or would anyone else like the chair recognize this Council of Borough Council? Laura, you have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you. President Flynn. I just wanted to rise to extend my. Speaker 4: Gratitude and thanks to the veterans that are here with us today. I think it's incredibly honorable to fight for your country when so many times we have failed to fight for them in the same way. I am excited to support this resolution in honor of black veterans, in honor of the Black Veteran War tax resisters, in honor of the Black Veteran Vietnam War veterans and the people, the black veterans who fought against the war here and abroad. And on behalf of my best friend, Kaleo Goodwin, who is a Navy veteran herself. So I wanted to say thank you to you have been very happy to support us with this resolution thinking. Speaker 1: Thank you, counsel. Would anyone like to sign on? Please raise your hand. Mr. Kirklees Council. A Royal Council. The Bar Council. A Brighton Council. A Cardiff Council. A Lara Council Council me. Councilor Murphy, Councilor Fernandez. Innocent in Flynn. Six suspension of the rules and passage. An adoption of Typekit 0645. All those in favor say aye. Aye, all those opposed. Same day. The ayes have it. The docket has been adopted. We're actually files. I am informed by the court that there are there are two way file matters or that three three they found that a hearing order from counsel Bork a personnel order. Oh, yeah. You know, in a letter from Council World, let me go to the hearing order for council. Book council. You have the floor. We? Mr. Clarke, please read the documents that I can. Exactly. Oh, okay. So you should. Okay. So the late files should be on everyone's desk. We will take a vote to add these three into the agenda. As I mentioned, the hearing order from Councilor Bork, a personnel order in a letter from counsel counsel world. We will take a vote to add these items into the agenda. All those in favor of adding the late file matters into the agenda. Please say hi. The ayes have it. Thank you. The late file matters have been added to the agenda. Mr. Clerk, please read the first file, madam.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution recognizing the contributions of African American Military Veterans and recognize African American Military Heritage Day. On motion of Councilor Murphy, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilors Fernandes Anderson and Flynn as co-sponsors. On motion of Councilors Murphy, Fernandes Anderson and Flynn, the rules were suspended, the resolution was adopted.

BostonCC

BostonCC_05112022_2022-0610

Speaker 3: In order for the confirmation of the appointment of new constables authorized to serve civil process upon the filing of their bonds for the period commencing May 1st, 2022 and ending April 30th, 2025, and docket number 0610. Message In order for the confirmation of the appointment of renewal Inspectional Services Constables authorized to serve civil process upon the filing of their bonds for the period commencing May 1st, 2022 and ending April 30th, 2025. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The Chair recognizes Counsel Flaherty, Chair of the Committee on Public Safety and Criminal Justice Counsel. Flaherty. View of the floor. We are going to move for suspension. Speaker 1: And passage on that. Speaker 0: Which president? Council 36 suspension of the rules and passage of confirmation of dockets. You're doing all the dockets correctly. 06060706080609906 ten. They play a vital function in our city, and it's important that we move those along eight, eight, nine and ten, 89, eight, nine and ten. Correct. Okay. Council already seeks suspension of the roles and confirmation of Dawkins 0608. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye, aye. Opposing the ayes have it. The appointment has been confirmed. Council 46 suspension of the rules and confirmation of Docket 0609. All those in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Oppose any. The ayes have it. The appointment has been confirmed console finally six suspension of the rules and confirmation of docket 0610. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed say no. The ayes have it. The appointment has been confirmed. Reports of public offices in others. Mr. Clerk, can you please read docket 0611206140611.

Mayor Order

Message and order for confirmation of the appointment of renewal Inspectional Services constables authorized to serve civil process upon the filing of their bonds for the period commencing May 1, 2022 and ending April 30, 2025.

BostonCC

BostonCC_05112022_2022-0616

Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel Fernandez. Innocent Docket 048020482.0483.804842. Docket 0486 will remain in committee motions, orders and resolutions. Mr. Clerk, please read docket 06160616. Speaker 3: Counsel is me here, and Laura offered the following order for a hearing on workforce development housing for City of Boston employees. Speaker 0: Thank you. Look, the chair recognizes. Councilman here. Councilman here. You have the fourth. And so. Council, City Council, which. Speaker 7: One of several. Speaker 0: Supported council were added as the third co-sponsor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President, and thank you to Council a lot for co-sponsoring this hearing order alongside our office, as well as Councilor Burrell for joining us. The city of Boston employs close to 20,000 workers, and most of them are required to live in the city. But as housing prices continue to rise, wages remain where they have been for decades. And we have to start asking ourselves, how is it possible that our city employees are able to afford to live here in our office? Many of our staff have had to live in subsidized, subsidized housing or live with two, three and even four roommates just to be able to afford the rent at the end of the month. The federal poverty poverty level for a family of four in the United States is 27,750. And in Boston, a 70% AMI, which is the cap for most affordable housing for a family of four, is 84,550. Looking through Boston's payroll, we found that there are over 7500 employees who are making just below the poverty level, but not enough to be able to support themselves or their families without the help of subsidized housing. This is unacceptable. It is not fair for us to require City of Boston employees to live in the city and not provide adequate means to achieve housing security. Now, I personally don't think that we should do away with housing requirement. I think it's important for us to live in the city that you are tasked to serve. But we clearly need to be doing better to boost wages and include and increase housing affordability for everyone, but especially those who are legally required to live here. This is a housing issue and it's also a workforce development issue, and it's also a mental health issue. Nobody should ever have to make the choice between food or housing or heat or or medical bills or housing. We have to do better. I look forward to this conversation and to working alongside council a lot on all things housing. I just I just wanted to just quickly also uplifts the fact that, you know, we we hear from a lot of our city employees about all of the discrepancies that exist here in the city of Boston. But at some point, we have to lean into it and say, what are we going to do about it? And I think this is an opportunity for us to really have a conversation and figure out what more can we do than just have a hearing, right? Where the investments and how we are going to lean into this conversation in a way that is going to uplift the voices that we've been hearing. This was really inspired by this conversation in particular. A few years ago, I had someone on my Instagram live who was a who is still a city of Boston employee and has to work. 2 to 2 jobs just to be able to stay here. And she loves her job. And we should not be creating financial hardships for those who are serving our community. We need to really hold ourselves accountable to to addressing this issue in a way that it's going to invest in workforce development housing. So I look forward to working alongside my colleagues and to doing just that. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, counselor. Here, the chair recognizes counsel. Our counsel. Laura, do you have the floor? Speaker 5: Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you to my co-sponsors on this matter, a fact that will surprise absolutely no one. The city of Boston sits among the top 1% most expensive cities globally and ranks 26 as the most expensive city in this country. We are not currently paying all of our employees an equitable rate that aligns with their needs and the cost of living in the city, which presents an issue for not only securing but retaining talent that can meet our city's residency requirement. It impacts the diversity of our workforce and by extension, the quality of the services that we provide our constituents. I'm really excited to work on this issue because I think that we need to get creative around solving the issues that we have. And short of requiring that the city pay a living wage that is in alignment with the cost of living in Boston to every employee. Where's the camera, wink? We have to explore other solutions ultimately, and I'm really excited to work on this issue with council and we're all in council over here and I hope that we can follow the example of other cities in securing affordable housing for everyone who works for the city of Boston. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. Laura. The chair recognizes counsel. We're counsel. You have the floor. Speaker 1: Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you to my co-sponsors. As we all know, housing is one of the top priorities here in Boston, and we see that reflected in our work on the council. From ideas on increasing IDP rent to own in a homeownership voucher program, we are working on some significant support to increase affordability and access to housing for our residents. But it's important that we continue to be intentional and equipping our residents with tools to assist our friends, families, neighbors and colleagues who are stuck in the middle with a lack of affordable options or real pathways to homeownership. But who are making too much for housing assistance to attract and retain talent for our economy? And short, long time residents do not become displace. You must act to make home ownership a reality and housing affordable to all. I think it's important for us to explore how we can use local options and work with fair housing to see how we can create equity and priority app applicants in our housing process. I'm encouraged by our mutual mutual partnership, creativity and attention to housing. I'm looking forward to working with all of us on this important matter. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel world. The chair recognizes Counselor Fernandez innocent. Counsel Fernandez innocent. You have the floor. Speaker 6: Thank you. And thank you, Mr. President. Thank you to my colleagues. Counsel me here, counselor counsel Arroyo, for creating this dope ass idea I will be applying. And this is ridiculous. Second of all, we need to teach those crazy chairs. How are your backs, colleagues? My people like it's bad. Everybody's back hurts on those chairs and we are just not helping our employees and they're awesome and they're the best. And I support this. I had a pretty fancy speech. But you don't need you don't need all that. Please put my name on this. I support it. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you. Counsel Fernandez Emerson. The chair recognizes Counselor Baker. Counsel Baker, you have the floor. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Chair. First sign signed my name on and thank the sponsors for for this legislation. This is good legislation. A couple of suggestions. We need to invite the unions because I believe this could be in grants to the unions that they're able to trickle down to the to their membership and also invite the credit union and the firefighters credit union. I bought my first house about 30 years ago in 1994, and of course, that was when nobody wanted to be in Boston. I think we had two or three abandoned houses on my street that I grew up on. I bought an abandoned house with money from the credit union, rehabbed it myself, and lived in there for a while with roommates. But that was that was what basically allowed me to. Subsequently, you know, by the House, I mean, now that I raised my family. But I think there are some some good ideas. The firefighters credit union just did some some creative packaging where they come up with a new product. I don't know if it's a I don't want to speak about it too much, but it may be a 40 year, 40 year term. But basically what I found the most difficult thing in home ownership is that initial that initial down payment. You really want to get 10%, 20% to avoid EMI, which is which is insurance, which adds to you to your monthly payment. We have to be able to get people to a point where they can get that initial payment and then realize that even though the House may cost five, 50, six, 50, whatever it is, the monthly payment might only be 2500 bucks or something like that. And we have to educate, educate people on that. But I think, again, not to keep hammering up some of this up housing money should go towards the unions where we demand that people that are making 30 grand stay in the city. How do they do it? How did I buy a house when I was only making 50 grand? And I don't know how I did it, but I did it probably because of sheer stupidity and didn't realize that I could have put myself in the in the in the poor house my whole life, which I kind of did . But anyways, I've got I've gone on, I've gone on long enough. But this is this is good legislation. But I think it has to happen with real money that goes for the unions to be able to give to their rent and to give to their membership. He has his 25,000 for a down payment. 50,000 for a down payment. Those are the that's the type of money that we're going to need to give to down payments. And that's not even talking about the supply. That's a whole nother conversation. But thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for the lead sponsor in the sign on sponsors. Speaker 0: Thank. Thank you, counsel Baker. The Chair recognizes counsel. Counsel, you have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you so much, Mr. Chair, and thanks again to the sponsors. I think this is great legislation and I would act to me it feels like as Counselor Baker saying something that actually links a housing benefit to the city of Boston employment and also I think looks for ways to leverage our public lands better. I know that the administration's doing a survey of sort of all the land we hold, but I know it's something that's come up a few times is, you know, are there opportunities with some of the access spaces like land and parking lots that BP owns to maybe put housing for teachers on site? I think thinking creatively about places where we could actually not only provide cash benefits, but also actually like create workforce housing for our city. Workforce is a direction I hope this will go. So please sign my name and thank you again to the sponsors. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel Balk The chair recognizes counsel and consultation. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Mr. President, and thank you to the makers for this legislation. I think it's a great idea and workforce development. I also think that we also just need to be paying our employees a lot more money. I have been, you know, having so many conversations with folks, offering them positions that I know that I'm like they I know that they want to move to Boston and I tell them what the potential salary is and they're like, Do you think I can make it? And I honestly know and I don't and I can't in good conscience tell you to come work in my office. Right. So we have a lot of work to do to make sure that we are we are respecting the incredible work that my staff does and I know everyone else of staff does by making sure they can find housing in this very ridiculously expensive city. So add my name and I look forward to supporting this legislation. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel who's on the chair recognizes counsel for charity. Counsel for charity. You have the ball. Thank you, Mr. President. Please add my name to the makers. Just. We had a hearing on residency. This was several years ago, and the law department came down saying that we couldn't do it, but they didn't have any case law to support it. So threw the chair to the makers if they could during the course of. Speaker 1: This hearing, bring the law department. Speaker 0: Down so they can't give us the swerve. And it's a great idea. Long overdue. We've got city employees that are the unsung heroes of our city, scratching, inquiring, in some instance, working two or three jobs just to be able to stay in the city. We know a lot of those folks are our constituents, our neighbors, our friends. Speaker 1: Some of our staff members. Speaker 0: And so that long overdue. But we need obviously to get clarity because we raise this very issue during the residency hearing a few years ago and kind of got a. Speaker 1: Little stiffer from a lot of and so I would ask that a lot of time and be required to attend that hearing. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Clarity and I will speak on this as well. I also think that's a great proposal. I just want to echo what counsel, clarity and counsel Baker mentioned just just a side story. I was visiting a friend up at the Galvin house yesterday. It's a it's a residential program for for for people. With substance use challenges. And one of the one of the men that was living there said to me, Counselor Flynn, you you proposed that the office of returning citizens should be able to get a fair shot at working in the city that public works. The city should be more career friendly. And I said, yes, I, I did say that I think would be a great idea. He said, Well, that would mean that we would have to live in the city of Boston for ten years making a salary of I don't know what they start out at 30, $35,000. So, you know, we can say that we want to help returning citizens. We can help them with courtroom Corey reform. But then we're going to make them live in Boston on a salary of 30 or $40,000 a year. It the math just doesn't add up. So just wanted to highlight that maybe that's an issue we can also focus on. But again, I want to say thank you to my colleagues, the makers for their their important work on this. This is this will be a great hearing. Thank you. Would anyone else like to speak or add their name? Please raise your hand. Mr. Clarke, please add Councilor Royal please that Councilor Baker Council BLOCK Councilor Great and Council Fernandez Innocent Council for Charity. Councilor Region Councilor Murphy. In the chair. Docket 0616 will be assigned to the Committee on Housing and Community Development. Mr. Kirk, please read Docket 0617, please. Speaker 3: Dr. Number 0617 Council member here offered the following order for a hearing on government transparency and accountability towards service provision and spending on e-health students.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing on Workforce Development Housing for City of Boston Employees. On motion of Councilors Mejia and Lara, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilor Worrell as a co-sponsor.

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Speaker 3: Dr. Number 0617 Council member here offered the following order for a hearing on government transparency and accountability towards service provision and spending on e-health students. Speaker 0: The chair. The chair recognizes. Counsel me here. Counsel me here. You have the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you, Mr. President. And I would like to add Councilor Arroyo as an original co-sponsor. Speaker 0: So what if Counsel Arroyo is added? Yes. Speaker 7: Thank you. And before I dove into my my speech, I just want to thank all of my colleagues for your enthusiasm and your support. And I really do look forward to bringing all of your voices and all of the feedback. I took notes in regards to the previous hearing order, and I'm really grateful for it. And I also wanted to just quickly acknowledge that, you know, in this chamber, I've learned a lot. And one thing that I have learned more recently is really the need for transparency. And I think one of the things that I always admire and appreciate from Councilor Baker is his ability to really hold the city accountable and to demand transparency. And I think that's a lesson that we can all learn here as we continue to navigate. So in the spirit of accountability and transparency, I think that we all need to do a better job at making sure that we're holding ourselves to that standard. And so the committee that we created for this term was designed to do just that, is to really look at the services, the accessibility of some of our resources, how people navigate city services, accountability. Are we holding ourselves accountable to the promises that we've made? What is the transparency around the dollars that we're spending here in this city? And I think that the committee that we've created, we hope to be able to put it to good use around some of the issues that we all have been here fighting on. And one in particular for me is around the issues around Ells, which which are English language learners. I myself am an English language learner. I learned how to speak English watching Sesame Street, um, and had to be the official translator for my entire block. And so we're here today to talk about and I was also appointed to the Yellow Task Force when I was doing advocacy in the education space. So when we talk about English language learner students, we tend to view it as from the lens of education. But today I want to look at how we as a city are providing care for our students from the lens of government accountability and transparency. Because we're in this budget season and we're seeing all of these numbers come in about how much we're spending to support English language learner students or students with disabilities. But how that money really impacts our students is often a lot harder to impact, especially when we have so much talk about this in our budget hearings. Let's talk about some facts. A December report and 2021 report it report submitted to the Department of Justice from Boston Public Schools, found that more than 11,000 English language learners in Boston Public Schools, 30%, are not receiving enough of the right instruction with a certified teacher surrounded by the right group of students. And in Boston, there are roughly 4000 English learners with disabilities who who often have to choose between receiving support for their disability or their language needs. This is important because, as we know, there's so much siloing of issues in our city, but we need to be intentional about breaking down those silos to support the whole child. And it's clear that we need to be doing more to support our English language students from an accountability and accessibility perspective. So I'm hoping that we can have a worthwhile conversation with the administration and from advocates to learn about how we can move beyond just the conversation around funding and really look at the social and emotional supports of our students, especially ELL students with disabilities. And I just want to give a shout out to John Mudd, who has been a fierce advocate in the entire El Al task force for meeting with our office and bringing this issue to light. We hope that during this year we will uncover what we need to do and how we need to move accordingly to support our most vulnerable students. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilman. Here, the chair recognizes counsel of Royal Council. Royal. You have the floor. Speaker 1: Thank you, President Flynn. Thank you, Councilman. Here for your years of work for English language learners and continuing that work here on the council. I myself began my political activism around English language learning. My mother was an English language teacher, English language learning teacher, and BP's In the Hands initiative came to town when I was a child . But it's a truth that we weren't doing right by English language learners even before ENS lines just devastated. The way in which we continue to do that work. Now, since 2017, since the LOOK Act has passed, it's really important that we make up ground. As recently as the last five, six years, we ranked as a state 49th out of 50 states when it came to English language learners. And 30% of BEPS is made up of English language learners. It's also traditionally, though, COVID has impacted this. Traditionally, English language learners had been the largest growth part of BEPS in terms of new enrollment. And so making sure that we do right by English language learners, making sure that we're on top of it. We've seen the instability at the Office of English Language Learners at DPS. We've sort of seen how in the budget it's been difficult for them to pin down exactly where and how this money specifically impacts that 30%. And so this kind of a hearing, I think, is appropriate considering the urgency of the issue, the size of the population for our schools and the fact that we really do need to do a lot of work to get this right and to do right by our kids in Boston public schools who are learning a second language, that second language being English and getting getting through our testing and the things that we have. We know that there's conversations about increasing the passing rate or the rather the score required to pass for CAS. And we know that that would have devastating results on a lot of our English language learners already. And so these are the kinds of things that we have to make sure we're preparing children today to be able to perform the way we would like them to perform in our schools with the supports and stabilization they need, while also making sure we advocate to protect them in other ways in which our systems are dealing with them. So I look forward to this hearing. I think, again, Councilmember here and other members of this council have stood up for English language learners throughout their time. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Castle Royal. Would anyone else like to speak in this matter? The chair recognizes Councilor Fernandez innocent council. Fernandez innocent of this law. Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. President. Unlike my council colleagues here, I came when I was ten, so I did not learn English through Sesame Street. It was The Honeymooners and Three's Company that taught me English. But for me, English is my fourth language, and I don't know that people know that. So it's I mean, I was just talking to my colleague yesterday about the difficulty of students and just the spirit of representing all the CV. I am Cape Verdean and my my first language is Cape Verde and Creole. And understanding that I had to learn Portuguese, you know, as a second language and then coming to America in adapting and not going to school for an entire year. I had to learn Spanish to make friends and then eventually learned English in school and then took French in school and then became Muslim and learned Arabic. So all of this, you know, transitional stuff really does not interpret the nuances and the feeling of one's emotions or cultural context when you're speaking a different language. So I was telling I was complimenting somebody here yesterday and saying, you are you're doing math, right? So you are calculating and multiplying and dividing and subtracting when you're speaking. And I really appreciate you that you stand here and you are really being wholeheartedly yourself and being a true self and always, you know, even when you explain let me say it this way or my English this or my English that, I actually connect with you on the same wave because I feel your heart. And I'm also doing a lot of math and interpreting things in multiple languages before I can actually get it out. So in the spirit of that, for the first time here in this chamber, I like to say this in my language, if you guys would allow me, you know, I mean, tiny Financial Times and I mean a couple of the items in the Africa mountains representing us, you know, saving me a couple of piano and silly animals. Masti sing out of me here. Come on, conciliator. The one smile is still representing all summer Sorry many of us Keystone of Sudan being a scholar to lingua e them their importance detail closeness deed article up to ratify London mausoleum with a map to the visas put in a scholar in the Philippines go to Lingua so we took the guy to see those missing forget issue Daniel still mangling office in the common municipal dining for the non gentlemen thank you so much for this. Speaker 0: Thank you counsel Fernandez innocent. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes counselors and counselors on the floor. Speaker 7: Thank you. I just rise in support. You know, it's really important for us to really understand what our English language learners bring to the table and that what they bring is a really big asset. Right. We're talking about folks who can speak another language. You know, that's bringing diversity to a classroom, into a different setting. When we look at our schools that have dual immersion programs, they are very long waitlists because parents recognize that as an asset. If we have a population that is 30% of our public school system, they should be receiving equivalent, if not more resources. And so just rise in support of the transparency around the numbers. You know, we're going to have a breakfast here on Friday to celebrate Haitian Flag Day, and we're going to have students from the dual immersion classroom come and show us what it looks like to live in and be in a classroom where those assets are really celebrated. And so it's important that as we have this conversation, we realize why native language instruction is important and we realize why we need to support our students with interrupted learning and make sure that they're able to access resources and that we need to put our money into the programs for our most vulnerable students, whether it's in language classes or in the facilities that they have. And we're just not doing enough. And so support this hearing order just so that we can get better numbers on what we are and are doing. So thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counselors and anyone else like to speak on this or add their name. Please raise your hand. Mr. Clarke, please add Counselor Baker. Counsel, counsel and counsel. Clarity. Counsel our Constitution. Council Rules Council. Murphy Please add the chair as well. DAWKINS 0617 will be assigned to the committee. Well, let me step back. Originally, I was going to assign it to the Committee on Education since the hearing discussed in English language learners. But after listening to council me here, I changed my mind and I'm putting it in the Committee on Government Accountability, Transparency and Accessibility. Mr. Clerk, please read docket 0618, please.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing on Government Transparency and Accountability Towards Service Provision and Spending on ELL Students.

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Speaker 3: Lucky number 0618 Council are for the following resolution calling for an end to the U.S. embargo against Cuba and opening up new travel and collaborative cultural, medical and academic opportunities between the two countries. Speaker 0: Thank you. The chair recognizes counsel of our counsel. Ira. You have the floor. Speaker 5: Thank you, President Flynn. I'm excited to present this resolution here today. I'm going to give a little background on February 3rd, and I'm sure that most people know this. On February 3rd. In 1962, President John F Kennedy imposed the U.S. embargo on Cuba, the 60th anniversary of the embargo as a stark reminder of the United States policy failures and one of the longest lasting series of sanctions in its foreign policy history. Today, more than half a century since the embargo was put in place, the Biden administration continues to uphold what is ultimately a symbol of hostility between the U.S. and Cuba amid the most challenging humanitarian crisis on the island since the 1980s. In 2009, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce estimated that the embargo cost the United States economy 1.2 billion per year in lost sales and exports. The Cuban government estimates that the embargo has cost the island 144 billion as of 2021. In 2014, the Obama administration lifted restrictions for Cuban-Americans to travel and send family donors, donate remittances. Excuse me, English is not my first language, so sometimes I put the wrong emphasis on the wrong syllables. Reestablish the U.S. Embassy in Havana. Remove Cuba from the state sponsors of terrorism list. It also expanded access to the Internet. It licenses a range of trade opportunities for US companies and beyond these specific policies. The shift in discourse by US presidential by U.S. president excuse me, really signaled what we consider to be the most significant change in U.S. Cuba policy in 60 years. It also led to 23 bilateral accords on issues that the United States and the government of Cuba consider of mutual interest. Of course, the Trump administration with a like with a lot of other things, undid all of that progress and imposed new restrictions. I am filing this resolution today because this embargo particularly complicates humanitarian assistance to Cuba. The complex licensing requirements effectively prevent food, medicine and medical equipment from reaching Cubans, and it discourages medical equipment sales to the islands. One particularly egregious example of this is that Cuba had a cancelation of ventilator sales by a Swiss company during the pandemic . These restrictive policies make it extremely difficult to send aid to Cuba, and it has damaged the Cuban health care system's ability to respond effectively to the COVID 19 pandemic and ultimately has had a toll on human lives. Although their development, including the research, production and rollout, was delayed because purchases of necessary supplies shipping were complicated by the embargo, Cuba managed to develop its own COVID 19 vaccines. The Biden administration's show of empathy with other countries during the pandemic led them to issue exemptions to certain sanctions that were already interfering with public health responses in Iran, Syria and Venezuela. But these same efforts were notably absent with Cuba. Despite all of these obstacles. Cuba has achieved a 90% vaccination rate with the vaccines that it developed. The city of Boston is home to some of the leading medical, public health and academic institutions in the entire country. And I think we would greatly benefit from the restoration of trade with Cuba by permitting the scientific, biopharmaceutical, medical and public collaboration and exchange, including the importation of Cuban products useful to Boston, such as lifesaving medicines like Herb Report PE, which is a medicine that treats diabetic foot ulcers and Simo backs, which is the Cuban developed vaccine against lung cancer. I think this is an incredible learning opportunity for the city council and our constituents. I think that there is an opportunity here to work towards dispelling myths about Cuba, about the embargo, about socialism, and which is why I am not requesting a suspension of the rules today for this resolution. And I would like to hold a hearing instead. I look forward to ongoing collaboration with my colleagues on this matter and to further building solidarity with the Cuban people. Thank you, President Trump. Speaker 0: Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Is anyone else looking to speak on this matter? The chair recognizes. Counsel Fernandez innocent. Counsel Fernandez innocent. You have the floor. Speaker 6: Alex, I'm so happy that you sit right across, Mr. Clarke, because I enjoy you, too. So, Counselor, you know, Laura's offering this resolution, and at the risk of sounding ridiculous, let me say that the true city counselor is guided by great feelings of love for this offer to put forward by counselor. I know those who have visited my office understand what I'm saying. It is past time that we end the embargo on Cuba. The embargo does no good while causing great harm to the people of Cuba. The idea that the embargo is maintained to support human rights is preposterous. As the federal government has supported far more brutal regimes over the years, including Suharto in Indonesia, Pinochet in Chile, Mobutu in Zaire, Congo and many others. Additionally, Cuba has world class health, education, sports, tourism that could mutually benefit to both of our countries. In short, I support my counselor Laura in bringing this forth and end the embargo on Cuba. Additionally, I just want to say Cuba actually offers way more supports to the tiny little archipelago archipelago of ten islands in Cape Verde and west coast of Africa than any other country in the world. And it is the reason why Cape Verde actually has doctors and teachers and professors and lawyers. So out of all the countries, Cuba, tiny little Cuba, it's a reason why keyboard actually has doctors and hospitals. So, again, I support this 100%. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel Fernandez Anderson. Anyone else like to speak on the matter or sign on to the matter if you raise your hand, please. Um. Mr. Clarke, please. Please add Council of Royal Councilor Baker. Councilor Borg. Councilor Braden. Council of Florida Councilors and Council here council. Murphy Council. Were all pleas out the chair. This docket will be assigned to the Committee on Labor, Workforce and Economic Development. Mr. Clarke, please read your code. Speaker 3: 06190619 Council. As Brendan Murphy offered the following resolution, recognizing May six through 12, 2022 as National Nurses Week.

Council Legislative Resolution

On the motion and order, referred on May 11, 2022, Docket #0618, resolution calling for an end to the U.S. embargo against Cuba and opening up of new travel and collaborative cultural, medical and academic opportunities between the two countries,” the committee submitted a report recommending the resolution ought to pass in a new draft. The report was accepted; the resolution was passed in a new draft; yeas 9, nays 3 (Flaherty, Flynn and Murphy), present 1 (Coletta).

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Speaker 3: 06190619 Council. As Brendan Murphy offered the following resolution, recognizing May six through 12, 2022 as National Nurses Week. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Clarke. The Chair now recognizes Councilor Brady. Councilor, right before. Speaker 4: I move to for suspension of the rules and to add Councilor Flynn as an original co-sponsor, please. Speaker 1: Councilor Flynn. And so additionally. Speaker 4: I offer this resolution today with Councilors Murphy and Flynn and recognize to recognize May 6 to 12 as National Nurses Week. Some of you may know that I come from a family of nurses. My mum was a nurse, her two sisters were nurses, and I spent my professional career as a physical therapist working alongside incredible caring, dedicated nurses in hospitals, in the community and in schools. And in 1982, President Reagan proclaimed May 6th as National Nurses Day. And since 1990, National Nurses Week has run from May 6th through May 12th, the birthday of Florence Nightingale, who is regarded as the founder of modern nursing. In addition, May 8th is designated as National Student Nurses Day, and today, Wednesday of National Nurses Week as National School Nurse Day. So nurses are everywhere. I also want to recognize and appreciate Constable Murphy's leadership and bringing us to recognize Emergency Medical Services Week, which is coming up. Nurses are public health heroes working to make our communities safer and healthier day in and day out. But certainly they are on the frontlines of the pandemic as well. They they have been in the trenches for the last two years working and dealing with incredible stress and delivering care to those most in need during our pandemic. Over 10,000 nurses provide compassionate care and healing in hospitals and medical centers located in the city of Boston, many of which are charitable, a nonprofit hospitals making contributions to our communities while others have been converted to from nonprofit status to nonprofit entities, for profit entities. I want to recognize members of the Massachusetts Nurses Nurses Association. I was expecting some, but they don't seem to have missed. They're not here today, but I want to recognize them and for all their great work in advocating for nurses in all of our hospitals. As we celebrate and celebrate National Nurses Week and recognize the contributions of those in the nursing profession. We must also call on hospital executives to provide safe working conditions and safe staffing levels for nurses and their patients. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilor Braden. The chair now recognizes Councilor Murphy. Speaker 5: Thank you. So I am honored to call many nurses, family and friends nurses and as a Boston public school kindergarten teacher. You can just imagine that we spent many times in the nurse's office and it was oftentimes for a Band-Aid, but also a hug and a kiss. And they offer so much more than just the medical support they give. So definitely want to shout out to all the school nurses and the nurses around the city, around the world. So this year's theme is nurses make a difference to honor the varying roles our nurses play in the health care field and the positive impact nurses have in our lives. I think we would all agree that we should celebrate our nurses every day and recognize the sacrifices they make. We know that they showed up on the front line throughout the global pandemic, risked their own lives to keep us alive, and they continue to show up. So I hope you all support this resolution recognizing May six through 12th as National Nurses Week because they deserve it. So thank you very much. Speaker 1: Thank you, Councilor Murphy. The chair now recognizes council President Flint. Speaker 0: Thank you, Counsel Arroyo. And thank you to the. Sponsors. Thank you to counsel Brady and counsel Murphy for including me. I just want to echo what both of my colleagues mentioned the incredible role nurses play in our city and our society and our country, especially during this pandemic. They've been on the front lines of the health care and providing exceptional support to so many people in need. All of my colleagues here in this body have been strong supporters of helping nurses across our city. Most recently, I was with Council of Louisiana at the Tufts Medical Center, where they their clothes closing believe this, believe this or not that closing the pediatric hospital at Tufts Medical Center. It's moved from Tufts over to Children's Children's. But it's going to be a huge loss of jobs for our nurses. But the Nurses Mass Nurses Association played a critical role in making sure that nurses are treated with respect, that they have safe working conditions. It's a tough job and they do a tremendous job at it. So I just want to say thank you to the nurses, say thank you to the nurses in our public school system as well. And I'm honored to be honored to be part of this. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you, Counselor Flynn. Would anyone else like to speak on this matter? Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Speaker 6: I'm on fire today for every battle you need diplomats and warriors. And in my humble opinion, I think teachers are the diplomats, the guardian angels of this world, and nurses are certainly the warriors. And shout out to Jennifer Cavallo, my auntie and my uncle, all the nurses in my family, Kim and Yellow, all of them today. But shout out to all the nurses in my family and you guys are lifesavers. I personally have worked with nurses overnight in the hospital setting and they are they're like robots. They're like not even human. They just save lives. They keep their heads down. They work hard, they're sleep deprived. They just do it humbly without complaining and just keep going. And I thank you for all of your hard work in saving lives and keeping our city safe. I strongly support this resolution and thank you so much to Councilor Murphy, Councilor Flynn and Councilor Brady for filing this. Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilor Fernandez Anderson, would anyone else like to speak on this matter, seeing nobody? Would anyone else like to add their name? Mr. Clarke P please. And Councilor Baker, please add Councilor Bach, please add Councilor Fernandez Anderson. Please add Councilor Farideh, please add Councilor Lara, please add Councilor Louise and please add Councilor me here. Please add Councilor Allen, please add my name. Councilors Braydon, murphy and Flynn seek suspension of the rules and passage of docket 0618619. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed say nay. The ayes have it. Docket 0619 has been adopted. Score. Thank you. Speaker 0: Mr. Clarke, please read your code. Speaker 3: 06200620 Councilor Murphy offer the following resolution recognizing the contributions of the Boston Emergency Medical Services and recognize Boston Emergency Medical Services Week.

Council Legislative Resolution

Resolution recognizing May 6-12, 2022 as "National Nurses Week". On motion of Councilors Breadon and Murphy, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilor Flynn as a co-sponsor. On motion of Councilors Breadon, Murphy and Flynn, the rules were suspended; the resolution was adopted.

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BostonCC_05112022_2022-0622

Speaker 3: 0622.0622 Council of for Council Session. Speaker 0: Six Suspension of the rules and passage of Docket 0622. All those in favor say aye. Aye, sir. Nay, the ayes have it. The docket, his past. We're on to leave files. I am informed by the correct that there is one late file matter. Delayed file matter includes a 17 or a 70 F order from Counsel Baker. The late file should be on everyone's desk when it's not on everyone's desk. Speaker 7: Yeah. Speaker 0: It's okay. Speaker 1: You can see. Speaker 0: The file is now on everyone's desk. We will take a vote to add the site into the agenda. All those in favor of adding the late file matter into the agenda say I just have it. The file matter has been added into the agenda that she recognizes. Council Flaherty. At this time. The chair is the clerk is going to read the 17 F into the record. And Mr. Clerk.

Personnel Orders

Councilor Flynn for Councilor Flaherty offered the following: Order for the appointment of temporary employee Claire Brooks in City Council, effective May 14, 2022.

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BostonCC_05042022_2022-0503

Speaker 1: Lucky number 0503 message. In order authorizing the city of Boston to accept and expand the amount of $349,500,000 in the form of a grant awarded by the United States Department of Treasury to be administered by the City of Boston. Chief Financial Officer. Collector. Treasurer. This grant payment is made from the coronavirus state and local fiscal recovery from fund sl f r f in the Treasury of the United States, established by Section 9901 of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 a. R. P. Pursuant to the requirements of the ERP, the grant payment would fund COVID 19 response and recovery efforts and accelerate a Green New Deal for Boston through a once in a generation transformative investments that address the systemic health and economic challenges in the areas of affordable housing, economic opportunity and inclusion. Behavioral health, climate and mobility. Arts and culture and early childhood. 0504 Message. In order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expand the amount of $40 million in the form of a grant awarded by the United States Department of the Treasury to be administered by the City of Boston as Chief Financial Officer.

Mayor Order

Message and order authorizing the City of Boston to accept and expend the amount of Three Hundred Forty Nine Million Five Hundred Thousand Dollars ($349,500,000.00) in the form of a grant, awarded by the United States Department of Treasury, to be administered by the City of Boston’s Chief Financial Officer/Collector Treasurer. This grant payment is made from the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund (SLFRF) in the Treasury of the United States established by Section 9901 of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) Pursuant to the requirements of the ARPA, the grant payment would fund COVID-19 response and recovery efforts and accelerate a Green New Deal for Boston through once-in-a-generation, transformative investments that address the systemic health and economic challenges in the areas of affordable housing, economic opportunity and inclusion, behavioral health, climate and mobility, arts and culture and early childhood. Councilor Baker offered a motion to Amend Docket #0503 by reducing the Mayor's Office of Housing by $5,000,000.00 and adding $5,000,000.00 for the

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BostonCC_05042022_2022-0436

Speaker 1: Pursuant to the requirements of the RPA, the grant payment would fund provisions of government services to the extent of the reduction in revenue of such state territory tribal government due to the COVID 19 Public Health Emergency relative to revenues collected in the most recent full fiscal year of the state territorial tribal government prior to the emergency and docket numbers. 0436. Order for a hearing on the state of Boston's non governmental nonprofit social sector and chart charting a post-pandemic recovery. Speaker 0: Thank you, Mr. Craft. The chair recognizes counsel, a chair of the Committee on Boston's COVID 19 Recovery Council. You have the floor. Speaker 5: So much, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to all the councilors who came to our hearing yesterday afternoon, including Councilor Flynn, Reid and Baker, Murphy, Flaherty, Fernandes, Henderson were all here, and it was a good first introduction to the administration's proposal on the American Rescue Plan funds 350 million. So Casey Brock Wilson and Jim Williams set up the Budget Office and she magically sought several. All joined us from the administration. As we discussed at that hearing. It was really just a kind of first overview of what they're proposing. And then, as I've mentioned a few times, my intention is to have a series of more kind of topic focused ones where we both talk about the details of their proposals in different categories like housing, public health, etc., but also put next to it the things that councilors have been filing and talk about the details of those and kind of hash out what makes sense from this body's perspective, since this really is this transformational one time funding that we're getting. And it's got to be an agreement between the council and the mayor as to what the most impactful way to spend it is. So that was the first hearing in a process. We also noticed it, as the clerk mentioned, on the $40 million revenue replacement docket that's really supporting the budget that's in Councilor Furniture, Edison's committee. And then as well, I've heard from a number of nonprofit leaders on the docket that Councilor Braden had proposed about sort of what the role of the nonprofit ecosystem should be in this space. And in particular, thinking about what are the ways that our funding and the program that we set up could could really strengthen the nonprofit sector as it recovers. And I think there was some really good conversation about that, recognizing that the city doesn't have money to bail out the nonprofit sector here. But are there ways that in our contracting with the nonprofit sector in terms of like making things intentionally available to smaller nonprofits, and then that really like thinking about how the quality of the jobs that we have, um, that we're supporting with these contracts and agreements look like could we help transform that sector to one that's more sustainable for the people who work in it and the people that it serves. So I think it was a really robust, good conversation. And it was and I want to thank in particular Councilor Brayton is she was the sponsor of that third docket. Um, but it was very much the beginning of the conversation. My, my office will have out today or tomorrow morning. Our draft information requests from questions that councilors asked. But as councilors have any questions that you'd like to add on to that? You can write back to our office with that. So we're going to try to wrangle that all by the end of the day, Friday, so that we can send it over, so that we can make sure that we've got the right information in hand in advance of the next hearing with the administration. We're also in the midst of nailing down and we'll hopefully have nailed down by Friday the exact schedule of those upcoming hearings so that people can know. But what I would encourage in the meantime is that colleagues continue to do what folks have been doing, I think, including in the agenda today, which is if there's something that you want put alongside the proposal and to talk about as a use of ARPA funds. File it in the council docket. With that mention of ARPA funds in the title so that we know that that's a conversation we're trying to participate in. And and we'll definitely be figuring out how to make sure that the time in those subsequent hearings is not just about the administration's proposals. It really is about what councilors are proposing. And I'm excited to keep hashing that out together. So thank you so much, Mr. Chair. I will ask that the dockets, all three, remain in committee. Speaker 0: Thank you. Council Docket 0503. I'm sorry. The chair recognizes Counselor Baker. Counsel Baker. You have the floor. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. And I would like to thank the chair of the. Of the the committee for holding this in and to. Speaker 5: Listen to us. Speaker 0: And our concerns. I made mine quite clear yesterday. I don't really see anything in here that speaks to mental health other than what's happening down in mass. And Cass and I believe we do need investments down there, but I don't think we need to invest in. Speaker 2: Buying things like the Roundhouse. Speaker 0: Hotel and things like that. I think we should be investing in. Speaker 2: Our young. Speaker 0: Kids that are going to bear the brunt of this, of this what's happened to us the last two years. Everything that's happened there, it's young kids. Just look at what's going on in our schools, the violence and the misbehaviors that are happening in our schools. It's all mental health driven. And I don't see one thing in this $350 million that speaks to that to speaks to youth development. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Counsel Baker. The Chair recognizes Councilor Braden. Councilor Braden, you have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Mr. President. I also want to thank the Commissioner for her leadership and chairing the committee hearing yesterday and allowing us to add our docket to the hearing to look at Boston's non-governmental, nonprofit social sector and how they and hear from representatives of that sector and how their fared during the pandemic. It's really it was a timely reminder that our nonprofit sector are essential partners for the city in delivering essential services in the sphere of housing and mental health. And so health and human services all across the board, we have 200,000 residents of Boston are actually employed in this sector, and very many of our smaller nonprofits dug into their financial reserves. And in the early days of COVID, to meet the and to meet the need thinking, it would be a short term challenge. It wasn't a sprint. It turned out to be a marathon, actually, probably a super marathon longer than the 26 miles. So, you know, I think it was a timely conversation. And I do hope that we will continue to consider how we might support the nonprofit sector as we consider how we might expend our ARPA funds going forward and targeted and mindful of expenditure in certain things will actually give us a lot more benefit going forward. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you, counsel. And the chair recognizes counselor. Me here, counselor. Me here. You have the floor. Speaker 6: Yes, thank you to the chair and to the sponsors for bringing this very important conversation to our chamber yesterday. I just would like to go on the record and echo the importance of making sure that we as councilors understand and recognize the important role that we play in determining how these dollars are going to get allocated and used. I always say that nothing about us without us is for us, and when we get presented things that we need to react to, it always feels like an afterthought. And in the spirit of the new administration and in the spirit of collaboration, I think that we have an opportunity to change the way we do business and making sure that we're listening directly, not to not only to our our council colleagues, but also to those who put us in this position. So I look forward to the continued conversation and being a loud voice in this process. Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel me here. The chair recognizes Counselor Fernandez innocent. Counsel Fernandez, innocent. You have the floor. Speaker 4: Thank you, Council President. I thank you, Madam Chair, for holding the hearing and to my colleagues for their express concerns. And I think that, you know, we have a long way to go in terms of like procurement and quantity contracts in managing BJP and ensuring that these processes or how we're contracting, employing people in the city of Boston is or not equitable. So I did hear that there was a plan for specific allocation to ensure to fulfill some assessments thereafter or some sort of metrics in monitoring how we're going to be equitable or how the implementation of these programs would be equitable. I did appreciate the ideas that the administration had. I think they're I think most of them for for are wonderful ideas. But I also think that councilors have 1 to 4 ideas. I also think that councilors have been planning and organizing and meeting and working and galvanizing and spending a lot of time and organizing toward their own projects or consolidation of community efforts. So I believe that we should probably go into conversations about how we are expanding on the proposal to include us. And so I look forward to that and I won't belabor this any further, but to say that again, when we look at our contracts and our records, we're not doing a good job. So allocating such a large amount to projects and say, okay, here's 5 million to ensure that it is equitable, I think it's concerning. And I think that historically, you know, the pattern so thus far historically and I and I know this is speak to the administration currently, but because there is a lack of trust, because the relationship has not built upon where we as people of color or counselors of color believe or feel that the equity has truly been solidified in city government, then the honest and sincere conversation should roll out where we are included. So lead by example to speak to council me here point. So I look forward to doing that and having those open conversations without without insult, without judgment. But to say, how are we doing this in the way that we say that we're supposed to be? Thank you. Speaker 0: Thank you. Counsel Fernandez Anderson, would anyone else like to speak? Docket 0503050404364 Women in Committee Motions Orders in resolutions. Mr. Kirk, please read Daugherty. Speaker 1: 05870587 counsel as Lara and Fernandes, Sanderson offered the following order for a hearing to discuss the impact of inequitable housing code enforcement. In Boston's proactive rental inspection program.

Council Hearing Order

Order for a hearing on the state of Boston's non-governmental, nonprofit social sector and charting a post-pandemic recovery.

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