Read the August 18 meeting.

Mayor Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento, President of Peter Sarmiento,

One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, everybody. Is there an invocation, Madam Clerk?

Yes, there is. He's on the line.

Please go ahead.

Yes.

Doug Harden are you there?

Chaplain Doug Harden if you could please dial star six

Hello? Yes we could hear you. Go ahead please

Chaplain. Alright great let's pray father god we come before you tonight lord and uh father we're just a grateful people god for what you've done for us lord we thank you for sending your son to to be our sacrifice and our our salvation lord father to pay the price for our sins and and to make a place for us in heaven and and truthfully father if if that was all you've done for us lord be more than grateful but Lord you promised us so much more God you you promised to walk with us as we seek you out Lord to guide and direct our steps as we live this life Lord to help us to live lives that

they're not only pleasing to you Lord but Father that are are ones that bless others so Lord we we come to you with our needs Lord and certainly at this time we're a people with great needs and great challenges but again God you're the one who can do anything Lord You're all powerful. So, Lord, we come and we lay our requests before you, Lord, knowing that your perfect will is going to be done. So, Lord, we pray for this meeting tonight, Lord, that you'd be with the council members, God, that you'd give them a heart not only after you, Lord, but one that seeks to bless your people in the city, God.

Father, we pray, God, that you'd be with those who will be speaking tonight, Father, that you would, Father, guide and direct their words, Lord, that they'd be done with humility lord and and grace father they would seek the great good for the people god and lord we ask father for for healing from your hand for this pandemic lord for for the issues that divide us lord father we know that you have the answers and then the only answer lord really is you father you're the one who can heal you're the one who can bring us together and unite so lord we give you this evening lord we ask you would be with us god

watch over us our city our families Lord protect us father and we thank you for all you've done for us you're a great and wonderful God and we thank you for sending your son Jesus it's in his name that we pray amen amen thank you very

much chaplain let me now ask the clerk to call the roll for the city council Council please. Madam Clerk.

Councilmember Becerra.

Here.

Councilmember Mendoza. Here. Councilmember Peñalosa.

Here.

Councilmember Sarmiento.

Here.

Councilmember Solorio. Mayor Pro Tem Vegas. Here. Mayor Pulido.

Here. So with that, if I may, I believe we have three presentations. Why don't we go ahead and start with Justin Bernardino, please.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Mayor, if I may, I do have reportable action from closed session at our last special meeting. All right, go ahead.

Go ahead, Madam City Attorney.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

At our last special meeting as well, we did not take a moment to report out from closed session. This evening we have reportable action on filing a lawsuit under civil nuisance abatement. This would be to the property held by the Axelson Trust. It's adjacent to the Stater Brothers Market. I'd like to also report out from our last special council meeting, the city council, by a unanimous vote as well, authorize the filing of litigation against the Red Roof Inn and nuisance abatement conditions on that property as well. We do not have any other reportable action.

Thank you, Madam City Attorney. Go ahead, Madam Clerk. I believe we have three presentations. Yes. Let's start with Mr. Bernardino.

Yes, you have been unmuted. Justin, if you want to proceed.

Thank you, council members, for having me here to speak to you today. I'd like to start by thanking you for the support and collaboration which was provided in recent weeks.

And by the way, this is Justin Berardino with the registrar voters office.

With your help, I believe we are now at a place where we wanted to be together. So if we go to the first slide, I can give an update on where we are with drop boxes throughout the city of Santa Ana. So the first map shows you some updates to where the drop boxes are installed or going to be installed. Actually yesterday,

Salgado and Memorial Park were installed yesterday. So those are currently in place. Also Centennial and Bomo Corral, those agreements are pending final signatures. And I don't see any issue with that being closed. So those should be installed shortly. And there's actually some changes since this map was submitted. An additional location we have sent to the city for approval, which is a Carl Thornton Park, which is just Southwest of the Warner and Bristol intersection.

And there's another drop box near Main and 14th, which was previously plated to be removed, but is going to remain there.

So eight ballot drop boxes are required for the city. We were previously at nine and now we'll be at 12 and that should complete the drop boxes for Santa Ana. If we go to the next slide, you can see we put the drop boxes and the proposed vote centers.

So you can get a sense of all the voting locations throughout the city. Remember, vote centers are also locations

that voters can drop off their ballot. SB 423, it was only signed by the governor on August 6th. So we are off on running. We've sent some of these vote center agreements to the city. We've already received some back with some modifications. So although these are not all confirmed yet, we're making good progress on preparing during the vote centers throughout Santa Ana. If you go to the next slide,

it's the same map, I just took out the label so you can get a clean view of where the drop boxes and vote centers are gonna be. And again, it's not shown on this map because it was just a recent development, but we submitted that drop box for Carl Thornton, Southwest of the Warner Bristol intersection.

So that should give a pretty good view of where we are with drop boxes and both centers in Santa Ana. And again, I thank you for all the support and help that you've provided to help us get to where we are now. So with that, I will-

any questions by council members? Yeah, Mr. Mayor, this is Council Member Pinaloso.

Council Member Becerra. Go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just wanted to thank Justin and the ROV for taking this council's input and working with our city clerk and our parks and rec director to locate more of these drop box locations and vote centers, you know, throughout the city, especially south of First Street, that map that we saw the last time Justin visited us and gave us that presentation this is a dramatic improvement so I just want to thank you for that and you know it's kind of fitting to have this presentation tonight on the 100th anniversary of the adoption of the 19th amendment which as we know expanded the right

to vote for women and prohibited the ability to deny that right on the basis of one's gender now while citizens south of first street have had the right to vote prior to tonight it is important especially during these trying times that we work to ensure that voters throughout our city have easy access to these vote centers and drop box locations so i just want to say thank you for

David PenalozaItem —

making that happen thank you mr becerra go ahead well thank you mr mayor this is a council member penelosa uh also justin justin thank you so much for this this is a huge improvement to what we saw the last time you presented. You know, also fitting is the fact that, you know, these are gonna be a lot of mail ballot drop-off boxes, and as we've been seeing, how the United States Postal Service is at risk and under attack due to other federal and political reasons.

David PenalozaItem —

So it's important that we allow access and opportunities for our residents to submit their ballots at a drop-off location to not really have to rely on the mail the US Postal Service so thank you for that I do want to point out that there's a big chunk of central Santa Ana that is still well from what it looks like from the map still being ignored so if there's still time to work closely with our department heads and our city manager I'd really you know I'm talking between standard and Ettinger but standard and Bristol north of Ettinger that's a highly highly dense

David PenalozaItem —

area of the city and and you know a lot of the people that don't own cars live in this area and so it'd be important to see if we could prioritize a an additional not a relocation an additional ballot drop-off location in this part of town I know there aren't any public spaces available from what I'm trying to think off the top of my head but maybe if we could work with with any private I know you've reached use you mentioned you reached out to private property owners there if we could do that again I know that there's a city-owned parking lot

David PenalozaItem —

You know along Bristol between McFadden and an integer that maybe we could potentially use Let's get creative, but thank you so much for this. It's a huge improvement and look forward to Having a continued dialogue

Yeah, thank you Go ahead. Yeah, this is council member Sarmiento. So Justin, thank you. This map is a much better looking map than the one that we saw when you were with us last. So we appreciate all the work that you've done. So I think, you know, we're better on that end. I think what I'd like to do is just, we were fairly successful in helping you identify some sites and maybe working through those agreements a little bit easier. So the second part of our task now is to make sure that the public is aware that these new sites are available because it won't do us any good to have new sites if nobody knows where they are.

So to the extent that you continue to work closely with our clerk staff to make sure that we message these new sites together, when they're going to be accessible, how best to get there, and maybe just channels of communication that we could both share and use together is real helpful. and you know time is always our enemy because sometimes we can't get this information out early enough but to the extent that we showed success in identifying sites and working with with you and your office let's do the same on outreaching and obviously and you know are in

a multilingual way in a way that is going to be you know making sure that our folks that are monolingual spanish speakers monolingual vietnamese speakers are able to go ahead and make sure and know that these are available for them. So thank you with that. Those are my comments. Thanks, Mr. Mayor.

Mr. Mayor. Thank you very much, council members. Very good comments. Mr. Mayor. Any additional comments? Yeah.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This is a council member Jose Solorio. I wanted to thank you also for this. I want to thank you also for this great presentation. I saw the need from the last time of equity and distribution, but really given the past 10 days, what's happened at the federal level, I think there's a lot of worry in every city across the country about where they're gonna put in their ballots either to mail it in or drop it off and whether there's gonna be more mailboxes out there or less and so I think there's gonna be a lot of trust in these boxes and now that we kinda are almost done with saying,

I want to make sure that there's equal consideration for other cities throughout the county because I want them to do well. But also, our residents, they work in other cities. And so if there are opportunities for them to drop off their ballots in other cities safely, I think it's important as well. But again, thank you very much overall. And let's hope that other cities have similar successes. Thank you so much.

Mr. Mayor, I have a question. It's Member Tom Villegas.

Please go ahead, Council Member. Mayor Potem, go ahead.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Bernardino, how often will these boxes be emptied?

I'm worried about that.

At a minimum, it's going to be every other day, beginning when the ballots get mailed out. That could change as we get closer to the election. or if the volume warrants it. And then as it hits 11 days, the last 11 days of voting, they will definitely be picked up every day.

Thank you very much because I was just concerned about theft. So I appreciate the answer. Thank you, sir. Yes.

Anybody else? Well, let me just, on behalf of the council, thank you. you know, please keep working. This is very important. And we just want to make sure, you know, folks, as Council Member Sarmiento said, that folks understand where the sites are. Because I know from a recent election that occurred, I got a lot of calls on election day. People just had no idea where to go. And a lot of them just never voted. Because you make, you know, you've set up enough obstacles for people. they just don't have time and they just don't vote.

So that education effort is imperative. But thank you, Justin. Let's go on to the next presentation. I believe we have a council member Mendoza, you wish to make a presentation, please go ahead.

Yes, I do. If you would permit me just a moment. Let me grab my notes here.

Yes. No worries. Take your time.

I got them right here. And today we are awarding a proclamation to Lydia Romero Cruz. And Lydia was born and raised in the city of Santa Ana. She came from a small but very cohesive community named Logan. She attended Santa Ana schools and belonged to several Santa Ana community associations. Lydia was deeply immersed in her community and in her culture. After graduating from college, Lydia returned to Santa Ana to teach and to bring her talents back to the community

in which she was raised and loved with passion. Lydia was a beloved teacher, a wife, a mother, a daughter, and her unexpected illness and her sudden passing brought much sorrow to all who knew her. In 2000, the Santa Ana Unified School District named a school after Lydia Romero Cruz to honor her legacy and to recognize the educational benefits and gifts that she brought to her community. Proud of her Latina heritage, Lydia utilized her ability to speak English and Spanish and with a passion effectively

communicated with the students and their families. Described as a patient yet determined young woman, Lydia Romero Cruz sought to leave a positive impact on those she encountered. She wanted her students to experience success as she has through the means of educational opportunities. Her goal was to bring the American dream within reach to her students and to those future leaders. She strived to teach model and to mentor that through hard work, perseverance, and dedication, they too will live the American dream.

Lydia worked for Santa Ana Unified School District as a teacher and as administrator. And up until the time of her passing, she gave back to her community each day. Lydia Romero Cruz was and always will be an inspiration to the Santa Ana community. And she will be remembered for her dedication and commitment to the place she called home. And for bringing the American dream within reach to many students. It is with tremendous pride that I present this proclamation post, if you must me, to honor a fellow educator for her unselfish commitment.

It is extra special that Lydia Romero Cruz is honored on this very day, the 18th day of August, which is the exact day of the official ratification of the women's suffrage, which today marks 100 years. On behalf of the mayor, the council and the entire city of Santa Ana, we present this proclamation proudly to the Romero and to the Cruz family to preserve her memory in our beautiful city forever. And Mr. Romero is not feeling well today, but he emailed and the city clerk has some comments for the public. Are you able to read those for us, Daisy?

Yes, I have them with me. Thank you, Councilmember Mendoza. Good evening, members of the City Council. I'm unable to participate this evening, but wish to thank Councilwoman Nelida Mendoza and the other members of the City Council for their proclamation honoring my daughter, Lidia Romero Cruz. The Romero and Cruz families are grateful for this opportunity to share the life and work of our beloved family member. In closing, I would like to ask City Council continue its support for low-income housing for those in our community who need quality and affordable accommodations. Thank you Sam Romero. Thank

you very much for that. Thank you very much

Councillor Mendoza. Now Madam Clerk there's a third presentation correct? Yes

we do this is from planning and building agency on the general plan update and Vince for gross those coming up to speak on this item

Good evening, Mr. Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, members of the City Council. Vince Fergoso, the Planning Manager with the Planning Division, here to provide you with an update on the City's General Plan.

First, I want to kind of give you a quick overview of what a general plan is. It's basically our long-range blueprint for development in the city. It's also called our Constitution, and it's a guide for future development in the city. State law requires us to have seven elements in the general plan. What you'll see here is we have a list of seven elements that are required by state law. We've also got an eighth topic there, environmental justice, which I will go over briefly for you there, since it's a key component of our new general plan.

Where we're at today, while we've got a general plan that's currently in place, it was last updated comprehensively in 1982, so almost 40 years ago. So obviously many things have changed in the last 40 years. That general plan right now has 16 different elements. Most of them are very thin and don't have a lot of context to them. And when you put together a general plan, you've also got to provide an EIR, which studies the impacts of that general plan. that EIR and General Plan were done, again both in 1980s.

So basically it's time for us to update this document, which you have been gracious and provided some funding for us to do that work.

The General Plan is proposed here, that you'll see in the next few months here, has a 25-year horizon, so we're looking out to about 2045 for our vision here. It's going to be a document with 12 elements instead of 16. It's also currently in place, we have a general plan EIR that's currently out for review. That EIR is going to study all these current growth assumptions and impact associated with all these different policies and goals that we have here. What you see there is a list of the 12 different elements. Again, it contains the seven mandatory elements plus five additional elements.

You can see below there in the bottom there, those are our five core values that we've heard from the very beginning, from day one. that's what's important to the community and those are culture sustainability health education and equity so everything that we've done here has been uh revolving around those five core values we've always kept them in mind as we move forward start putting our goals and policies together one of the items i spoke about a few minutes ago was environmental justice that is required by a state law that was approved a couple years ago in 2018 and it basically says that when you do

general plan update you have to implement these environmental justice goals and policies in your document there's two ways of doing it there's one is to set aside a separate element and the other way is to kind of integrate them and weave them into your your proposed elements and that's the path that we've taken we follow that these 12 elements are so critical and so important that these core values for the environmental justice should be blended in throughout the entire document so what you'll see here is a total of 42 different environmental justice topics and goals and

policies in our general plan and they cover everything from items such as how we're going to reduce impacts air pollution impacts particulate impacts to our community how we're going to provide access to healthy foods in our especially in our underserved areas maintaining increasing our public engagement as we go to this document safe and sanitary housing land uses how they would have conflicting incompatible land uses for instance industrial uses are noxious next to residential. So what we've done here with health as our core value is created

a new community element that kind of implements all those different goals, keeps our core values in place, and we use this environmental justice topic throughout the entire document.

What we've been doing since day one is outreaching. This general plan is not the staff's document, it's a community document. And with that we need to go out the community and gather as much input and feedback as possible so starting back in december 2015 we created a general plan advisory group a list of 17 key players in the city that covered a wide range of interest from the affordable housing group to some commissioners some youth and we take all those there and help to start to generate our goals and policies we also use common link as a tool to go out there and do outreach

we've been to the neighborhood associations these are 21 that listed environmental justice areas we've hit the youth again it's a 25 year plan I won't be around 25 years but who will be the youth of Santa Ana so it was very critical we outreach to them as well and get their feedback on how this document had to be shaped and formed

we've hit the business you're gonna be around another 50 that's why try to be

like mr. Oh no yeah many business groups and also committee based organizations that we've already set up with it there's 44 different groups we've reached over the last five years in this document so some of the key topics that we've heard and key key themes that through Jennifer on outreach as a our cultural historic and community assets are special we need to protect them enhance them wherever we can land use obviously very critical part of the document we're sure that it also in addition to creating a land-use plan or we can get some growth in the city but also address healthy and active

lifestyles. The resources we have, be sure they're equitably distributed throughout the city, be sure we're sustainable in a livable city, and that education and economic prosperity are key and critical to this document as well. As I mentioned, one of the key focuses in any general plan element is the land use element. It's our plan for growth. So what you see here in the blue is our list of all of our different plans that we have right now that are in place. everything from Harbor to Bristol to our transit zoning code on downtown and what we did here we took made an effort here to take a look at some focus areas

areas I needed some reinvestment and some new consideration for development and we try to tie these into our current plans here and what you can see here in the red or the maroon is our five key focus groups that you've all been updated at one time or another on in the past on these things so you can see all All these plans are trying to link it and trying to get a unified development proposal and plan through the city here. So this will be more detailed. If we come back and meet with you in the future, you'll get a little more detail on these focus plans here.

So this is our next steps. So we recently released the EIR for the general plan as well as actual 12 elements themselves. Those were released about two weeks ago. And you'll be getting a copy of those shortly. you'll be sending you an email link as well as getting you a digital version as well through a flash drive but that was out for review the eir takes 45 days for review which means in mid september the public comment period will close and then we'll go back and analyze all the comments and put together all the responses to comments so during that time we're going to be reaching out to

the planning commission and city council and anybody else that wants to be heard by us in order to give them some briefings on where we're at and where we're going those are all targeted again for august and september and what we're hoping to do is get this before this body here fall in 2020 for your review and approval

i discussed outreach a few minutes ago uh if you may realize that we had a couple of community workshops end of july early august had over 120 participants out there some of their feedback is listed below there which included environmental justice the impacts the time amount up due to covid committee engagement be sure we do this in multiple languages transparency and as well as arts and culture open space and displacement all those are kind of key feedback topics that we got based upon that feedback we're having another meeting it has

to be virtual due to the covert environment we're having that at the end of this month there so part of that feedback from that group was let's meet again and which we are doing so we'll have another follow-up meeting with the community in a couple of weeks so that's kind of a big picture overview of the general plan update process there's our webpage email phone number if you ever need to reach us of course you've got min's number he's you got him 24 7 he'll answer any questions you have day or night he's there for you to answer your questions so and with that uh that is my

presentation thank you very much uh here to answer any questions that that you may have

council members uh questions mr mayor mr mayor yes go ahead comes with serum thank you mr mayor

Vence, thank you for that presentation. And I didn't quite hear that. Is Vernie still the project manager on this update? That is correct, yes. Okay, and so the residents and stakeholders that they want to reach him, is the 714-667-2781 number the way to get a hold of him? That's one way email as well, yes, sir. Okay, perfect. And my only request, you know, I know you guys are going to bring a lot for the public and for everybody to look at and you know planning commission and council I would just ask that as we get closer to the hearings that staff

takes the time to meet with the individual planning commissioners and the council members so that you know because I know you guys have done a fantastic job meeting with the community and you know I know Hassan when Hassan was with us I know that he was very big on all it took with it was a less and a handful of people and him or staff would be there to meet. So I know you guys have really been doing the outreach over the life of this project, but I would just ask that as we get closer to really set up meetings individually with the council members and the planning commissioners. Thank you. Got it.

Mr. Mayor, this is Council Member Solorio. A couple things.

Yeah, just go ahead.

Thank you. First, I want to commend Vince for the presentation. I know when I think of Mr. Fregosa, I think of who else kind of could do a good job on this, and he was perfect because you can look, I think, 25 years back, or I don't know how many years you've been here now, but about that almost, and you can look 25 years forward. And I've seen you in many of these committees. I've seen you in many aspects, And I appreciate seeing your work in here. I know before a general plan, all these changes would need to be project by project.

And many of these past years, you've been doing it the harder way. Whereas now I think you and the community can look forward and work on a vision plan about how things ought to be so that for residents and businesses moving forward, things will be easier and better. So first, big kudos on that. For me, when I look at this general plan, I also look at what follow-up projects should follow after this. And I know that I've learned a little bit more about environmental justice in terms of how a city can include it in a plan like this. But I don't want to have it just sit there on the shelf in the future that it's in the general plan.

I think that we've learned some things as staff and as community leaders about what that means in our areas. and let's figure out how we might be able to move some of those issues forward rather than just let it sit there the other area is the economic prosperity piece that's always been important but now you add on top of that COVID and what rebuilding from it means and then there are you know many other opportunities for the city in that way up for the EJ piece environmental just talk a little bit about what you feel the value is for the city because again we haven't

really looked at this from a general plan standpoint what's the value for us today and

how is it going to help us out 10 20 years yeah the thank you for the question there and then it's a team effort by the way uh yeah environment justice something that we kind of learned on the go as well as i mentioned just took effect in 2018 so we've been now reaching the community and picking up all the different key points that they're looking on everything from

pollution control and land use compatibility. All those kind of things we're looking at and many other ones are looking at now to how we're going to weave it in there in the document to make sure it's usable. As you mentioned, we took the effort to put all the policies within the document so it doesn't get to sit in the shelf. That's a separate element. So that was a concerted effort on Bernie's part and his team was to take this document and weave them in there so we don't forget what they are. So the value is more community outreach, more community feedback, but also a better relationship with the community as well because we're taking all

these things very serious we've done a lot of these community outreach and environmental justice items in the past through Scott Kutner's team neighborhood initiatives they've been our eyes and ears in the streets out there and all these different types of issues that come up so we see this as just a continuing effort of what we've already been doing in the past yeah and I think

a key piece is continuing these relationships I think sometimes we'll make a big effort when we're planning for a certain thing and then we do our meetings we do our emails and then you know they stop if we could find ways of continue to involve them in city efforts and plan efforts that'd be awesome thank you and thank you and the rest of the team I know men was here and I know your predecessors also put time into this but I know that you've been here long enough to know that the needs of the cities thank you mr. mayor this is a

David PenalozaItem —

councilman pin alosa

David PenalozaItem —

Mr. Mayor, are you there? Well, I'll acknowledge myself.

I'm right here.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you. I just also just wanted to thank you guys for this presentation. I want to kind of disagree a little bit with my colleagues. I want to caution us and to not pat ourselves on the back too much when it comes to the outreach being done. just because we're and I had a very good conversation last week with the with the director of planning and building minti and we have addressed some of the my concerns via the website but just because we've had you know community meetings and whatnot you know it's not I don't think it's it's something to be

David PenalozaItem —

proud of when you look at the the amount of people were reaching you know 70 people over the two meetings that we had on July 31st to August 1st in a city of nearly half a million and you know what we I asked the executive director where where do we where did we publish this general plan update we had an Excel we had a Facebook post and I pointed out that we had six engagements on the city's Facebook page on the posts of the general plan update which you know and one of them was my colleague so again that's five people that we reached via of Facebook, in a city of half a million, and in a Facebook page of over 16,000 likes

David PenalozaItem —

that follow the page. So the concerns that I've heard from residents at these different neighborhood meetings is that it's always been a presentation, and not so much an ongoing dialogue and conversation of what is happening and what's going on with the general plan update. I want to make sure that we're proactive and not wait until we hear the backlash from the community, that there isn't enough engagement going on with the community after the two meetings.

David PenalozaItem —

We should realize as a planning department, August 2nd on Sunday, be like, you know what, there was only 50 people there yesterday. I'm going to make sure I schedule another one in the next couple of weeks. be proactive in the in these efforts because you know the more that we could get this out there for the public to see the easier it's going to be for all of us I am you know and a lot some of it's been addressed but you know I clicked on the general plan draft and updates on the city's website and that's another thing I as a sitting council member could barely understand what's going on

David PenalozaItem —

because there's so much information on the website it's been fixed a little bit. Thank you Mr. Mintai for addressing some of the concerns with how the information is laid out and how accessible it is but again we could still work on this constant engagement with with the public and pushing this information out there is always gonna make us do better versus just doing the bare minimum which is what we often do so thank you for the presentation I know it's a lot of work and it's long overdue and we're in the right direction but the community engagement and just putting this information out there is where we really got

David PenalozaItem —

to push it and double down on it so thank you thank you appreciate it yes mr mayor this is uh

council go ahead counselor ventramiento go ahead please thank you and uh thanks uh tokayo for that for that presentation vince tokayo is a is a friendly word in spanish that says uh you call that with a person with the same first name uh listen i know that you and bernie and men and and everybody else in planning and building have done good work. And I was part of the council that helped fund this, fund the efforts to update and revise the general plan years ago. I'm not sure even how far back it goes. It must go back to 2015 or 16. In any event, I know it's been, it's certainly a gargantuan effort.

And I know you said it well, it's the city's constitution. So what's kind of troubling to me are a couple of things. One of them is even under the best of conditions, outreach and public engagement are really challenging, anywhere, but especially in our town, because as we're struggling with the census and getting information out to people on that, we're realizing what a hard to reach community we have and to get them involved in participating on discussions with respect to a general plan update, it's even more challenging. So look, doing it under these conditions of a pandemic

just seems that it is even more and more difficult. So I'm not sure how the quality of that feedback is. And I would agree with Council Member Peñalosa. I think that most people I speak with, look, they don't even know how to get ahold of anybody on this and how to connect. And I think that the value of this document, especially since it's not gonna be looked at after it's approved for a very long time. We're looking at this document almost four years after it was adopted. I think it's worth doing a good job and these conditions right now just don't lend themselves to good community input.

There's another issue that I'm also troubled with is that there's something in the law called debt and control. And what that means is that, you know, when right before folks leave, they want to, you know, sort of define or put their fingerprints on a long-term long lasting document. And here it's probable that three of the seven council members won't be here beyond November. Yet we're going to be deciding on a document that is going to be lasting for the next couple of decades, at least. So I don't know if it's an intelligent thing to accelerate this and just ram it through and approve it with such little engagement from the public

because the value of the public's engagement is not listening to presentation. It's actually commenting on what the product is and saying, we don't agree and we want to adjust certain elements of it. So I think that's where the real value is. And I think SB 1000 that was adopted, that triggered the environmental justice question is relatively new. So that's something we haven't lived with for very long. So I think we should take a step back and maybe slow it down, not just for that, but for another reason as well. A slide earlier Vince, you had showed that there are certain items that, you know, the public has talked about.

Let me make sure you have another bullet point on something that's very important that people have spoken to me about is the affordable housing element here that we're dealing with in this proposed update to the general plan. You know, it is very alarming to know that the entire housing opportunity ordinance, the affordable housing effort could be gutted by the way we're updating this general plan. So that is extremely troubling. You know, whether or not we revise the WHO, which I think we will tonight because there is majority support for it. This general plan update can just eviscerate all the efforts that we've made

to make sure we provide housing affordable to our residents that are low income. So this is a huge departure. I think it would violate the housing element. I think this is going way, way too fast under conditions that are just extremely challenging for us to have our public comment and for us to produce a document that's going to be uh long-lasting and valuable and going to be able to guide us into the next 20 30 years so um look i would just say let's consider taking a step back let's consider slowing this down we're going to be uh we're going to be under these conditions

for a while let's rethink some of these really challenging questions and see uh what we can do to make sure to allow for better engagement once conditions improve these are not the conditions to be adopting such a such an important document for the future of the city those are my comments mr

mayor yeah mayor pro tem go ahead mr mayor some of the uh council members earlier were saying that we should uh we have a lot of speakers so we're going to limit the council member comments to

three minutes also. Is that okay with you? I'm trying to. I've asked the clerk, I've texted her to try to do that and she's let me know when people go over three minutes, but yes. All right. Please go ahead, Mayor Pro Tem. No, thank you. That was just my comment. Thank you. Thank you for that. Any additional comments? Okay, I know we have a very heavy agenda so thank you to Vince and the staff for that update. I now want to turn things over to

our city clerk. Can you read the proper information out to the callers and let's all give them three minutes. Right now how many do we have? Let me just ask you that question first please Madam

clerk. Yes, council member, mayor and council members, we have 43 callers. All

right, let's give everybody three minutes. I think that's appropriate. Why don't we go ahead and let's begin, madam clerk. Go ahead. Okay, thank you. And before I begin, I do

want to inform everyone that we have been notified by the state power authority and electric company that we may experience an outage so that everyone's aware. There are speakers that we have currently on hold. Want to make sure that you're aware, caller, that once you've been unmuted, please dial star six to speak. There's been a Zoom update and we want to make sure that you're aware of this new change. On your phone you'll see a star and a six. For those Spanish speakers, por favor marque

asterisco 6 para reactivar su llamada después le, después que la, perdón, le hayamos desactivado.

Okay, and caller with the last three numbers, 298, you've been unmuted. Please dial star 6 in order for you to speak. You have three minutes.

Hi, my name is Janine. I live in ward one. I am opposed to item 22B, the armored police vehicle.

We don't need it. We should have police that are less militarized, not more. City police departments don't need military equipment. Police and military serve different functions. We have better uses for this money, especially right now.

I also would like to encourage the council to consider changes to the municipal code related to the council's prior conversation on the proposed charter amendments from several meetings back in particular, proposed charter amendment section 1206 regarding campaign contribution limitations. Thank you, that's all.

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Hello, I'd like to speak on two agenda items. Please proceed.

First, I'd like to speak on item 85B, which is about the extension for petitioners. And I would like the council to please support granting petitioners and the extension. I am a volunteer with tenants United Santana and we lost 133 days due to the shelter in place orders, which explicitly prohibited us from signature gathering. Alternatively, we asked that the city council place our ordinance on the ballot, putting the question to voters and honoring the fact that we have demonstrated public interest

both in 2018 and now, and directly placing the rent control and just cause eviction ordinance would most effectively address the impending eviction and housing instability crisis. as many people are rent burdened and putting their lives at risk to work through this pandemic as essential workers, real safety comes from renters protections. And I would also like to state that in many other cities, courts have ruled in favor of petitioners understanding that the shelter in place orders prohibited them from days they were legally entitled to in the democratic process. Thank you. Thank you, caller.

Thank you, caller. And caller with the last three numbers, 167. You have been unmuted. Please dial star six in order for you to speak. You have three minutes.

Hi. My name is David Carvajal, and I'm a resident of Ward 2. I'm calling in in support of item 85B. I'm a volunteer with Tenancy United Santana. And due to the global pandemic, we lost 133 days of signature gathering out of the 180 days that we were legally entitled to for gathering signatures for rent control and the ballot for Santana.

As the caller before mentioned, the shelter in place orders explicitly prohibited us from being able to go door to door, but we demonstrated massive public interest in our campaign and people right now as all of you know by by the the cares act and the money that's being given to renters for relief to my dad's house like so many of you

people are receiving public people are receiving increases even during the pandemic and need protection is not more than ever. So we need real permanent rent control now and we need you to support 85B. Thank you.

Thank you, caller. Caller with the last three numbers, 813. You have been unmuted. Please dial star six in order for you to proceed to speak. You have three minutes.

Hello, my name is Kelly Crousley. On the new map, I'm a resident of Ward 6. I'm calling to comment on three items. So the first one is 25A. The proposed hotel includes a gym, a basketball court, and a pool for hotel guests. And since we have such a lack of recreation spaces in our city, and so many people are against the project because of that why don't we make it so that we'll approve the sale and they can build a hotel but those amenities must be available to residents free of charge that way

we can kill two birds with one stone on 85b i am in support again like the previous callers mentioned the shelter-in-place orders explicitly prohibited door-to-door signature gathering i myself didn't even have a chance to sign for the rent control because of the shelter-in-place orders. Finally, 25 or 22B, we really don't need another militarized vehicle in the police department. I think earlier this year, we all heard from the many public commenters who were against further militarization of the police and more investment in community programs.

I looked into this RFP and it also allows for purchasing of items such as health and medical items, communication needs, and energy. We're in the middle of a pandemic with rolling blackouts while our city's students are trying to start a new school year entirely online. So surely we could find a way to use the grant money to invest in something that's more in line with our pressing needs. And then one final comment is that the police officers are not wearing masks as they're walking around my neighborhood and interacting with residents. Could you please ask the police officers to wear masks when they're outside of their car?

Because they're just further endangering my zip code, which is the hardest hit in the city. Thank you.

Thank you, caller. With the last three numbers, 068, please proceed with your comment. make sure you dial star six so we may hear you.

Caller, you have been unmuted. Please dial star six and you may proceed to speak.

Hello, can you hear me? Oh, yes, we could hear you now. Hello, can you hear me?

Yes, we could hear you now. Thank you.

Sorry, I was not aware that you have to press star six in order to be unmuted. Thank you. My name is Carla Juarez. I'm a long-time resident in Santa Ana. I know this is a public comment. I don't believe it's fair that you want us to do a public comment for all the items that we want to speak on in three minutes because every single comment and every single item is very important and they anyways I am in support of 85B you should put the rent control ballot in for the voters to vote this coming election you shouldn't put your residents out there in the risk of getting

COVID and also injuring their families. I am against 22B which is spending more money on police just in general. We could use that money for better things. Also I cannot hear you mention anything in regards to the justice, environmental justice which is basically 20 communities out of of the 60s are living in endangered of air pollution, land pollution, water pollution, rent burden. And you guys haven't mentioned this in the general plan. I just thought just as a heading, it requires a lot more attention because we do live with asthma. Both of us live in those affected areas

and we're still being affected by this. And there is so much more, but I don't want to go over my time. I thank you for your time.

Thank you, caller. Caller with the last three numbers, 689, you have been unmuted. Please dial star six and you may begin to speak. You have three minutes.

Hello. My name is Tanya Navarro. I am calling in to vehemently oppose agenda item 22B. you want to approve the purchase of a specialized response vehicle for $353,653. I think that's ridiculous. We are currently in a pandemic. Our streets are full of people who are houseless. There's a lot of families who are struggling with hunger. There's a lot of families that are struggling to find help. Right now, our families are starting virtual online schooling. They need a lot more help when it comes to mobile hotspots, when it comes to laptops,

when it comes to supplies in general. And we're focusing on spending a ridiculous amount of money on another armored vehicle for the police. I don't understand where this priority comes from, and I do not understand why we continue to make the mistake to spend so much money on militarizing the police instead of helping out our communities. I would also like to oppose agenda item number 25A, the sale agreement with Caribou Industries, another developer in our community. So for 25A, I do not believe

that we should be selling this property for the price of $500,000 to Caribou Industries. I don't think that that's gonna be the best use of that land. The community has been begging you for a community center or for anything for the Santa Ana residents to benefit and to have more youth programs. But again, we are giving this land to a developer to continue to take advantage of our labor and not bring in any-I know, it's amazing.

It's amazing.

Not really.

I'm not sure if the mayor's taking attention. And then, so we have agenda Ida 75B, which I also would like to oppose. we are thinking of decreasing the fee from developers to develop in our community. So this fee has generated at least in the past three years, the fee has generated 10 million in affordable housing funds. And by decreasing it, we're going to decrease those funds for our city and increase developers and increase the profit for them. I don't understand again, and the priorities of these agenda items that I mentioned, and I hope that they can be revisited.

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Caller with the last three numbers.

362, please unmute your line by dialing star six.

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Caller, you may begin to speak. You have three minutes.

Caller with the last three numbers, 362, you may speak now.

Caller with the last three numbers, 362, you've been unmuted. Please speak.

Can I speak Spanish? Oh, okay. Gracias. Thank you.

Disculpe, señora, no le podemos oír bien. Por favor, si se puede remover la máscara para oírte mejor. Y hable más despacio. Y más fuerte.

Ok, ¿ya me escucha mejor?

Sí, un poquito mejor.

Hola, ¿ya me escucha mejor?

No le podemos oír bien.

Okay, okay.

Señora no le podemos entender si no sé si tenga una mascarilla puesta o algo así o está en la bocina si está en la bocina quita la bocina porque no le entendemos nada señora. Ya me entiendo doctora? Un muy poquito, si puede hablar más fuerte y más pronunciado por favor. Ok, mi nombre es Alejandra Luciano y la verdad nos gustaría que nos ayudaran con

At the tone, please record your message. When you've finished recording, you may hang up or press 1 for more options.

I would like some help with rent control. It's very hard with the current situation. It's hard to pay. We have to pay many things, pay the bills, and there's not enough work, not a lot of work available. So please help us with rent control. Thank you.

Okay, caller with the next three numbers, 668. You have been unmuted. Please dial star six to speak.

Callers with the last three numbers, 668. You have been unmuted. Please dial star six.

You may begin to speak. You have three minutes.

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They're not muted on my end. Caller, you have been unmuted on our end, and it looks like you've unmuted yourself. You may begin to speak.

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and proceed to speak. Call her with the last three numbers 335 you may begin to speak. Dial star 6 and proceed with your comment.

Por favor marque asterisco 6 para reactivar su llamada.

Caller with the last three numbers 268. You have been unmuted. Please dial star six and proceed to speak.

Hi everyone. Perfect. Thank you.

Hi everyone. My name is Jacelinda and I'm a resident of Ward 2. I'm calling in support of agenda item 85B to extend signature gathering for petitions circulating in Santa Ana. I'm a volunteer for Tennessee United Santa Ana and we started the rent control campaign in February 2020, which included door to door signature gathering to get the ballot initiative in November. And as others have previously mentioned, we collected a large amount of signatures during a short window, but unfortunately signature gathering had to be halted due to shelter in place orders. So we are asking for you all to extend

our signature gathering to recognize the major impacts the pandemic has had in our signature gathering. And to also honor the immense support we had from the community during the short window of signature gathering. Rent control is very much needed in the city. As you all are aware, the majority of residents in Santana are renters and experience extreme burdens in rent. And these very same folks experience ridiculous rent increases that make it impossible to keep up with rent. And we cannot expect people to meet rent, experience rent increases and simultaneously meet other basic needs such as food.

No one should have to choose between being housed and having food. And this pandemic has only heightened the precarity in housing for many residents in Santana. Many have been financially impacted by the pandemic, leaving them unable to pay rent and let alone catch up with rent increases. Family members of my own who have battled the virus were more worried about finances and their very own well-being and health, and that is just absolutely cruel. And you have the power to change this by supporting the extension of the rent control campaign, and rent control in Santa Ana would alleviate financial insecurity. Thank you so much.

Thank you, caller.

Caller, with the last three numbers, 335, you have been unmuted. Please dial star six and begin to speak.

my name is sarah pero hello if we can hear yes my name is sarah but I work for latino jocces I'm a promoter and organization community I'm talking about the control of rent in the last four months we have been asisting families with the house that's my family have been collecting firm for being able to control rent in Santana. I consider that it is unjust that in this moment of pandemic, in this moment where we have to be resguardated at home

and have to be careful of our families and to be careful of ourselves,

people have to collect firm. Minimally, we are asking that we are going to pass those 133 days that were left to keep collecting the firm. It is the duty of the city council to protect the residents of Santana. It is its obligation to keep us in the house without having to worry about the increases in the rent. 8.3% of increase in the rent. This is a huge increase for the families of Santana in these moments and in all the moments.

We also ask that the city council consider putting the referendum in the bill, because that would be your work. Even with all this situation, families have been committed to collect these signatures and carry out the referendum in November. Pedimos, por favor, que se extienda esos 33 días. Exigimos, por favor, que las familias se sigan protegiendo en casa para poder detener esta pandemia. Las consejerías de vivienda, ahorita por este momento, no solamente es no para que los desalojen de sus casas,

para que permanezcan en casa sin tener el miedo de tener que sufrir un incremento de las rentas sobre el dinero que ya están pagando. Más de la mitad de los salarios que nosotros percibimos es injusto que se vayan solamente en las rentas. Estamos medio comiendo, medio viviendo para poder salir adelante. Entonces, estoy a favor y estoy pidiéndole a los concejales que por favor apoyen y extiendan con 133 días para seguir, pero en su totalidad que moralmente se hagan responsables y nosotros podamos llevar este referendo. I hope without having to go out and collect the files. We are putting in danger.

Our families are putting in danger. The community is putting in danger. Thank you.

I am a community organizer and work for the community and I am here to speak on rent control. For the last four months, we've been helping families with counseling, gathering signatures to invoke a rent control in Santa Ana. I don't think it's fair that during this pandemic, we have to stay at home. Our families have to stay at home and ourselves have to be protected staying at home. We have to go out and collect signatures. We'd like to get back these 33 days to collect the firms that we haven't been able to go out. As a city council, it is your duty to protect us. It is your duty to protect the people in your city.

And we need to stay at home. 8.3% increase in rent is too much for Santa Ana residents now and ever. The city council needs to help us to put this referendum on the ballot. It's your job to do this. It's your job to help us. So we need the help in gathering signatures. to put this referendum in November. We need to extend those 33 days that we have lost, that the community counselors, the housing counselors have been out.

So it's not fair that we have to spend more than half of our income for rent. We have to choose between, we have to just half eat and half live to have this going on. So we ask for you to extend those 33 days that we've lost and to help us put this help for rent control.

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You may proceed to speak. Thank you.

Okay. I'm sorry. We're bringing you system today. So I mean, thank you all, the mayor and council for, you know, working through this situation with everyone. I know they're all kind of stretched our limits and, you know, in a historic time, right? So this is a, of a moment in which we're all going to look back and really kind of question is to what we're doing in this moment seeing the resolve of our community the organization and really you know what type of future we want to build with our so you know with that said you know just a little bit more

um you know on the philosophy as to why we do know this thing called local government I just wanted to kind of let you know what my questions are against the item or the purchase of the, this is item 22B, as it relates to the purchase of the TerraDine response vehicle. So I understand that the grant itself is gonna come from the federal government to combat a bioterrorism and other kinds of acts of terrorism.

do with the money. But I do want you to ask yourself the question of, you know, whether or not the police are adequately equipped with the, any actual breaks that have the ability to clean or at least react, you know, going to add to local capacity there. So it seems like we're just kind of spending the money to have a deep control. And it's something that I don't necessarily think is gonna make us any safer. Again, I defer to the, but I do think a reasonable concern

as to a case of the unspeakable. So, as it relates to 25A, I understand that the cost of-Colin, I'm sorry, you keep getting cut off

and I wanna make sure you're aware that you keep getting cut off. You may proceed.

I am not a... Oh, okay. Sorry about that. Other item was, you know, as it relates to the who's... You know, with this new general, whether or not, you know, any of the stuff to apply...

Okay. Again, if this is bad, but I want to, you know, voice my opposition against the WHO

and, you know, make sure that you take the extra timing for the control initiative. So I'll read it back in . I don't know why am I, I'm just following right now, but, you know, thank you for your time. And again, protect WHO, and realize that, you know, this historic moment, to what we do now will be basically a decision to have a viable future. So I hope you're all safe.

Thank you. Caller with the last three numbers, 010. You have been unmuted. Please dial star six in order for you to be unmuted on your end.

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Oh, hi. Sorry about that. I was on mute.

Yes, my name is Valeria. I'm calling about item 22B. I think that the funds that are going to be used to purchase a military vehicle is critically needed in other areas to build the preventative and responsive approaches to threats that the funding that the initiative the grants funding comes from says the funders to be used for they could those funds can be effectively allocated to support emergency communication systems preparing for or recovering from a disaster like covid or earthquakes it can be enhanced it can be used to enhance cyber security and fund projects that enable continuous operation

of critical business and government functions including those related to human health safety and economic security. I think police chief David Valentin exaggerates when he says there's a large need for a vehicle in Santana like this but what we what is visibly needed is accessible and affordable housing expanded health care services and child care services. I'd also like to comment on item 85B. I am in support of the extension of the rent control signature gathering period. I recommend that you guys place the rent control initiative directly on the ballot so that we avoid exposing more people in door to door signature collecting.

I suggest that you give the Senate and the voters a chance to put their voice in their vote to decide whether they want this in their city or not. This may increase voter engagement in the upcoming November election. And I'd like to reiterate that the rent control position should be extended, the signature gathering period should be extended. Thank you.

Thank you, caller. With the last three numbers, 081, you have been unmuted. Please dial star six to unmute your call. You may proceed to speak. Thank you. Bueno. Bueno. Usted puede hablar.

Mi nombre es Araceli Robles. Soy residente de la ciudad de Santana. Yo estoy hablando para apoyar el punto 75B de la ordenanza de vivienda. ¿Cómo quisiera estar ahí para poder verlos a la cara a los cuatro concejales que en estos momentos de esta pandemia se atreven a pedir esos cambios? ¿Habla de la doble moral que tienen ustedes en vez de estar cuidando a su comunidad? ¿Están protegiendo sus intereses personales? ¿Dónde queda la comunidad que representan? Why do you want to have more vehicles of police? Because they receive a favor of them.

That is unacceptable. If you want to pass these points so important to our community in these times of pandemic, when people can't even be there and say, what do you have to do with moral? that you have? Our community needs resources, housing of low cost, support in mental health. How many people are with a mental health so sensitive? People who have fallen in our community, our friends, and they are worried about protecting their interests.

That's a shame that the Commission of the recommendation of reducing the cost after we pass the whole night and we're going to be able to increase if you want to do it from the night to the morning without that community is not present that is unacceptable that is completely unacceptable and we have talked about what kind of people we have in our council that in times of pandemic their community doesn't import their interests and their interests. How would you like to see them there? Concejal Solorio, Concejal Villegas, Nélida, Filbert Serra,

who are proposing these changes? And you, Mr. Pulido, who is your last year, your last year, who doesn't even protect your community?

He has to protect the community. And we don't let them, that we will not let us rob us without a gun, lowering the price of what the developers have to pay for the housing that our community needs. Thank you.

My name is Araceli Robles from Santa Ana, and I'm here to support the housing ordinance. And it's unbelievable what is happening, that this is happening during the pandemic. You're approving this during the pandemic where we can't be there. This is duplicitous of you. You're here to protect only your personal interests. You need to represent the community. This is very important. The people can't be there to see your faces. You're there supporting the police because the police is there to support you.

And you're doing this behind closed doors. This is very duplicitous. you're two-faced. People are suffering with low-income people, mental health issues. People are suffering because they're burying people, they're burying friends because of what's going on and you're there only looking for your interests. We advocated for this for months and overnight you're going to do this because the community is not there. This is unacceptable. the people in the city council do not care for the community

but we wish we could be there to see you in person to see your faces Mr. Solorio, Ms. Vince Nerida, Mr. Becerra, all these changes that you're making Mr. Polido, this is your last year there and you should be there protecting your community you must work for the community and not steal from us without a gun when you are lowering the developer's fees.

Caller with the last three numbers, 614, you have been unmuted. Please dial star six for you to unmute yourself on your end, and you may begin to speak.

Hi, I'm Mr. Comren. I wanted to bring in awareness that the VRA 920 excluded people of color, It wasn't until the voting rights act 1965 that people of color were able to vote. I just wanted everyone on the call able to know that. Also, I have a lot of opposition to a lot of items, so I emailed you all in detail. So today, right now, I'm going to review you as a summary of it. So I propose any item that perpetuates the ID of the police department as a system can be reformed. People who are specialized in mental illness or disorder should be the one interacting with people with the illness or disorder, not the police.

uh we should be creating a hotline or a program that have uh people who are specialized in mental illness and for uh who can probably to actually people who have disorders or illnesses that's where the money should be going to uh secondly secondly i oppose 22b that would uh militarize sapd as an ipd uh thirdly i oppose 25b i oppose the gentrification center ana in the name of profit why mca should be turned into affordable housing or wellness center um as proposed previously the only reason why this proposal couldn't come to fruition is because of the cost

we should have allocated money from the general plan for this since we since private council members neglected the property when they bought it um three million increase should have went through this uh because it's what investments to the community uh to know the history of ymca is to know that it is grounded in relationship people who people in need to do anything other than that it's an aggressive historical value of that property uh fourth i oppose plane b which will be just taking people uh just to ride in the streets create a bike lane i don't believe that

anybody would sell their home just for that unless forced to do so uh fifth i oppose 60b that will limit joining the youth commission that will limit the joining of the youth commission just to high school medical students um they do not know the city council and they are in college you will be limiting the voices of those who have been impacted by the lack of programs who already graduated i do think we need to um do more outreach to all the high schools to get more representation um because that is needed uh lastly i oppose the endorsement of anything that would increase the

amount of people incarcerated as i have emails to all you guys before the problem is not those who are being criminalized or perceived as criminals is a research lack of if the policies put in place that sub-gay so income people to act in a matter that to seek to act in a matter that is perceived criminal to those who have means to survive or die in a capitalist country so say yes to prop 17 and say no to prop 20. like Emily Kennedy said individual behavior shapes the success of individuals so policies determine the success of groups the success of this community relies on the policy you all enact 15 seconds left.

We vote for anything that gentrifies, criminalizes, widest, opportunity gaps, militarizes, or displaces is to hold the perspective of the oppressor. The budget, the general plan, these items, the wanting to endorse top 20 are not in relation to the residents or censoring the people. Invest in the community. If not, don't blame the people most oppressed and marginalized when you aren't the vehicles of society you expect. I just feel uncomfortable with fear of privilege. Thank you.

Thank you. Caller with the last three numbers 703, you have been unmuted. Please dial star nine and you may proceed to speak.

Caller, you may proceed.

Hello, my name is Hector. My name is Hector, a Santa Ana resident, and I hope Mayor Pulido is listening because from the sound of it, it seems as if he has better things to do. Please give your attention and respect to the callers taking hours out of our day to simply give a three minute public comment. I'm here today to urge every single one of you to vote no on item 22B. We do not need more vehicles of war, destruction, criminalization, systemic racism roaming our city. We have enough police cars already. In fact, we have even more because of the city council, because for some reason, a majority of this council

thinks it's necessary to allocate funds and for multiple luxury SUV patrol cars. Why would you even consider giving the Santana police department more access to continue to terrorize, hunt, hurt, and criminalize our youth and the people of our community? If the city council really wanted to respond to complex coordinated attacks, active shooter events, hazardous materials, tactical operations, and weapons of mass destruction, all of the scenarios this vehicle of war is used for, then you should have defunded the SAPD a long time ago because they are guilty. They are guilty of every single one of those scenarios

you are supposedly trying to protect us from. And to be accepting funds from the Department of Homeland Security, a federal department that has continuously targeted and terrorized immigrant communities like the one we have here in Santana, a department with an agency that separates mothers and fathers from your children, an agency that separated a hardworking and loving father from his family just yesterday here in Santana. Have you no morals? Wake up and do good for your community. Stand with your community, serve your community. This vehicle of war will only do harm. And I'll say it again, this vehicle of war will only do harm.

It's simply a fact. Look at what's happening in cities all across the country and cities like Portland, where excessive force is being used upon peaceful protesters. This vehicle of war will hurt our black, indigenous and communities of color. And we do not need this roaming around our city. over $350,000 to continue to criminalize our youth, $350,000 to reinforce the idea that Santa Ana is a city that needs to be policed. We are not animals as one reference to one of our city council members. We are taking to the streets because black lives matter, because without justice, there is no peace, because we have a first amendment right

that protects our ability to protest the system that is systemically racist. Stop buying into the system. Stop reinforcing the idea that Santa Ana is full of criminals because it is simply untrue. Vote no on item 22B. Thank you.

Thank you. Caller with the last three numbers, 469.

You have been unmuted. Please dial star six for you to unmute yourself on your end.

Caller with the last three numbers, 469. Please dial star six in order for you to proceed to speak. Thank you.

I'm going to be here to hear you and make it better for the residents of Santa Ana, especially with the 75B. I know that you can do the best to help all the citizens of here, of Santa Ana. santana y pues yo sé que ustedes lo pueden hacer nada más es cuestión de que se decidan hacerlo pensar en los demás y pues no nada más pensar en uno mismo verdad pero pensar en el prójimo para que pues todos podamos vivir de una manera mejor más felices gozando verdad de la vida que dios

nuestro señor nos da y referente al 85B pues yo soy voluntario del Latino Health Access y pues mi meta era ayudar a lo máximo para juntar firmas para que se pueda aprobar el control sobre la renta y pues con orgullo yo les digo a ustedes que puse mucho esfuerzo y en menos de una semana

I was able to get 50 firms and if it had been for the pandemic, I would say that I would have only got more than 300 firms. But unfortunately, the pandemic has been a lot of times, economic and social media. because they can't visit family, they have to be in a house. And that was what I was trying to do to be successful in terms of the firmas.

So I would like you to think more about those 133 days to be able to gather time to gather the firmas. and I would like to thank you for your heart and help us all of the residents of Santa Ana. Thank you very much for your attention.

Good evening Mayor, good evening Council Members. Thank you for taking the time to listen to me, to the needs that we have here in Santa Ana. I am a Santa Ana resident, and I'm calling for you to listen because we are doing our best here. I'm calling about 65B. I know that you can help us, and this will help all the citizens in Santa Ana. And I know that you can help us with this. And you need to think about others, not just thinking of yourselves. and this will so we can have a better life so we can enjoy life as God intended for us.

Also 85B, I volunteered, I'm a volunteer with Latino Health Access and I helped to gather signatures and gathered a lot of signatures regarding this issue of rent control and I'm proud to say that in through my efforts in less than a week I gathered 50 signatures and if it were not for the pandemic, I would have gathered over 300 signatures. And this is this pandemic has hit us very hard economically and socially. We cannot go visit families. We have to stay at home. And this blocked me in my efforts of signature gathering. So please consider those 133 days that we can continue gathering signatures.

Thank you for all your help that you're doing in Santa.

caller with the last three numbers, 887. Please dial star six, and you may proceed to speak.

Los tres últimos números.

Hi, my name is Steve Diego. I'm asking that you vote no on item 22B for the purchase of a $353,000 military grade vehicle for the police. Chief Valentin has reasoned that it, and I quote, fulfills a large need for such vehicles that in the event of civil unrest, These are some of the other threats that this people can combat besides protesters. Rockets of grenade launchers, mines, artillery shell fragments, chemical, biological, or in the air contaminants in the air. The FEMA preparedness guidelines will show you immediately how else this money can be used.

We're talking disaster preparedness, community exercises, emergency responses, life-saving equipment like portable water, medications, decontamination solutions, and so much more. The expense must take a whole community approach, which is also defined in those guidelines, to feel that this vehicle would benefit the entire community to the stretch. FEMA currently designated our situation as a disaster. The disaster mimics a biological attack. Because of that, the plans, responses, and recoveries we take against COVID will align with the dual function requirement that the urban area security initiative mandates.

Remember that we have not dealt with the combination of a fall winter season, flu season, and COVID. We don't know what that looks like, but we must be prepared for a possible catastrophe. These preparations will also allow us to prepare in the event of a different disaster. We have seen across the world that simply because we are dealing with COVID does not mean that life will stop throwing difficult situations at us. A 2011 earthquake in Japan caused earthquake damage, a tsunami and a nuclear meltdown at the same time. They are considered the most earthquake prepared nation in the world because throughout the years,

they have had the plan exercises with hospitals, law enforcement firefighters community members etc and they act immediately onto those plans essentially they knew exactly what to do this pandemic has shown us very clearly that santa ana has no plans to prevent mitigate or recover from something like a biological attack allowable expenses include preparedness of community-based organizations that serve as a critical safety net like food banks homeless shelters school readiness and after-school centers adult daycare centers with job training centers, legal assistance centers and cultural centers.

They include whole community exercises, trainings and activities focused on staff preparedness, information sharing with clients and government and continuity of essential functions in the event of an emergency. They include youth preparedness resources. The list goes on and on. I encourage all the Santa Ana residents to please Google the FEMA, that's S-E-M-A, preparedness manual. You can search the name UASI within the document so that it can show you what are allowable expenses. This is a disaster that has had major physical and financial dents to Santa Ana and its residents. And unfortunately, some have paid the ultimate price.

So instead of using $353,000 to buy a military grade war zone truck just to combat protesters, let's instead bring relief to the residents, organizations, and youth projects. But most importantly, let's have a plan for the next time the disaster occurs. Also as a side note, I want to let you guys know that you guys should have let the residents know that they were gonna be locked out of the meeting on the phone call if they didn't call by a certain time. I think it's great. I think it's wonderful what the county clerk has done to elevate this whole calling system. But you guys really need to let them know

that if they don't call by a certain time, they're gonna be locked out. I have dozens of people that are trying to get through and said you're locked out. So what if they don't have access to a computer?

Thank you. Caller with the last three numbers, 239. You have been unmuted. Please dial star six and proceed to speak.

Caller with the last three numbers, 239. You may proceed to speak after you dial star six.

Los tres últimos números, dos, tres, nueve. Por favor marque asterisco seis para reactivar su llamada.

Los tres últimos números, dos, tres, nueve. Por favor marque asterisco seis para reactivar su llamada.

The last three numbers 239, please dial star 6 and proceed to speak.

Caller with the last three numbers 239, please dial star 6 to unmute yourself from your phone.

Los tres últimos números, 239, por favor marque asterisco 6 para reactivar su llamada.

The last three numbers, 251, you have been unmuted. Please dial star 6 to unmute yourself from your phone, and you may proceed to speak.

a collaborative inquilinos en Santa Ana. Hemos trabajado mucho y la razón de mi llamada, estoy hablando del punto 85B, les vengo a pedir

que pongan un control de renta en la boleta de elecciones del día 3 de noviembre

porque en los últimos meses tuvimos que parar la recolección de firmas. En un mes recolectamos 800 firmas and we had to complete the budget of the election of this November. But for the pandemic, we didn't want to be able to respond to our participants. We were ready to go. And I want to remind you that the council and the council is to defend the interests of the community in Santana. and more than 51% of residents who live in the city are inquilinos so the petition is a

part of the half of this city I remember that my job is to defend the interests and so I would like that they could put in the 3rd of November but with the pandemic for like have said many colleagues can live in a city more equitative and that it can make the families happy. That is a work of all of us and mainly of you. Remember that history will condemn us if you don't listen to your community. Thank you.

Good evening, my name is Pantoja and I work for Latino Health Access. I'm a housing advocate and for the last three years we've tried to put a rent control position, get rent control here in Santa Ana. This is the second time bringing it up. and we've worked in a tenant cooperative and we've worked a lot, speaking specifically about 85B and we need to put a rent control issue on the ballot for the November 3rd election. And the last time we were out, we were gathering signatures but we had to stop because of the pandemic

and one month we collected about 800 signatures to put this on the ballot, but due to the pandemic, we had to stop. We need to remind you that the council members and the mayor, you work for the citizens of Santa Ana, and over 51% of Santa Ana people are renters, Santa residents are residents, so this action will help over half of your city. So please put this on the November ballot so that we can live, like people said before, with equity for our city to have a better situation for our families. This is our job.

It is also your job. And history will condemn you if you don't listen to your community.

Caller, with the last three numbers, 239, once you've been unmuted, you may dial star six and proceed to speak.

Caller with the last three numbers, 239, please dial star 6 from your phone to unmute yourself and you may proceed to speak.

Caller with the last three numbers, 239, please dial star 6.

Okay, we'll proceed with the next caller. Caller with the last three numbers, 683. You have been unmuted. Please dial star six in order for you to speak.

Hi. My name is Maria Ceja and I am a volunteer with the Tenants United States. in support of 85A. This is to support citizen initiative petitions to receive an extension for the time lost due to the pandemic. Tenantina Santana lost 133 days of our campaign because of the stay at home orders. This prevented us from going door to door knocking and engaging with residents to learn so that they can learn more about what rent control is in our community. The need for rent control in the city is reflected by the support that we've received in our 2018 campaign and in the present state.

Over half of the Santa Ana population are renters and many have expressed abusive rent increases, leaving them having to spend a majority of their income on rental loans and to have to live in multiple families living in one unit. And this leads to overcrowding, as we know that the population density in Santa Ana is three times higher than the county average, the county median. And this is because of how out of reach affordable rents are and the landlord's ability to increase the rent whenever they choose. And this will only exacerbate as we continue to face

the impacts of COVID-19 and how it will impact our socioeconomic climate after the emergency is lifted. Even in the middle of a global pandemic, tenants are facing hostile rent increases when many have lost their only sources of income. I ask that you consider the option of putting the initiative on the ballot itself so that voters can decide whether rent control is right for us to be. And this in itself will honor the democratic process of the voting system. I also would like to state that Tenancy United Santana, along with the community organizations involved,

were able to collect 2,405 signatures in the short amount of time that we were able to collect signatures. So I ask that you give us the extension or to even consider putting the initiative on the ballot. Thank you.

Thank you. Caller with the last three numbers, 239. You have been unmuted. Please dial star 6 from your phone and proceed to speak.

Caller with the last three numbers 239, please dial star 6 to unmute yourself.

Caller with the last three numbers 239, please proceed to dial star 6 from your phone and proceed to speak. and proceed to speak.

The last three numbers, 239, please dial star six to unmute yourself.

Caller with the last three numbers, 174, please dial star six to unmute yourself.

Hi, my name is Jonah Breslau. I'm calling from the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy Lane. We work across Southern California to ensure inclusive, responsible, and accessible development that prioritizes the needs of community members above all else. And more recently, we have been particularly concerned with how cities across the region are utilizing their public land. And so I'm here to comment on item 25A. Santana's valuable public land should be used to generate long-term revenues for the community. Please do not sell the city's public land at the YMCA site.

Instead, you should enter into a revenue-based lease agreement. The sale of this land would be short-sighted, especially during one of the most difficult periods of economic recovery we will ever experience. Please keep Santana's public lands in public hands. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Caller with the last three numbers, 032, please dial star six and proceed with your comment.

Caller with the last three numbers, 032, please dial star six and proceed with your comment.

Los tres ultimo numeros, cero tres dos. You may proceed with your comment. Can you agree? Yes, we can hear you.

Hi, my name is Nathaniel Greensides, Ward 5 resident. Thank you, Council Member Villegas, for responding to my email today. It was nice to hear from you. I will start with one non-agenda item regarding the fact that parks in Santa Ana closed at sundown. I believe this should be changed so as to allow residents to be able to enjoy the city parks after dark without being criminalized by an arbitrary ordinance requiring parks to close at sundown. Surrounding cities don't have this type of ordinance and it would be nice to be able to enjoy our city parks after sunset. Next, I am not in support of Mike Harrah purchasing the old

YMCA building on Civic Center so he can turn it into a boutique hotel. He also had two items on the agenda tonight, one of which was for a closed session meeting with a negotiator and the other item is 25A. While I understand that the city has had a difficult time finding a developer or buyer for the building due to the fact that it is very old and needs seismic retrofitting. I don't support further gentrification by Mr. Hera and his company, Caribou Industries. I encourage the council to find community-based solutions such as community land trust, which may be better suited to develop our city according to the needs of residents,

not the desires of corporate bottom line. I am in favor of item 28. And in fact, I think that more money should be given to the idea of mobile libraries during, especially during the pandemic. I am wholeheartedly against item 22B because I don't believe that Senate Anna needs armored vehicles on our streets. I am in support of item 85B as in boy. Voter initiatives and signature gathering efforts are a coveted aspect of our democracy worldwide. And just like everything else, signature gathering efforts were halted due to the pandemic. Those who are against this item

are opposed to it because they are afraid of the rank control initiative, which Tenants United Santa Ana had been circulating. Tenants United Santa Ana is only one group of residents who are circulating a voter initiative only to have to halt their efforts through the pandemic. The current antiquated signature gathering laws of California rendered initiatives unable to gather signatures online nor by mail because the process requires a circulator of any initiative to witness in person the voter signing the initiative.

Tenant United Santa Ana has consulted with various attorneys on the matter and has the support of many groups statewide and nationwide in pursuing an extension of signature gathering efforts. Alternatively, the council can put our initiative on the ballot themselves. So please utilize any city resources necessary to grant an extension of time for voter initiatives, which were negatively affected by COVID-19. Thank you.

Thank you, caller. Caller, with the last three numbers, 209, please dial star six, and you may proceed to speak.

Good evening, Madam Clerk and the Honorable City Council. I'm actually here today. My name is Dan Schamel. I'm here to provide comments to a public hearing matter 75C. I do want to have a public comment at this time, but thank you for your time.

Thank you. We will unmute you when we get to that item.

Caller with the last three numbers, 493. You have been unmuted. please dial star six for you to unmute yourself on your line so we may hear you.

Hi, good evening. This is Garrett Carrera, Orange County resident for 42 years and I'm calling in supported the Bowery Redhill Warner initiative. Largo Concrete the company I work for has been selected as the concrete subcontractor for the project. Largo is a union contractor we employ union carpenters laborers finishers and shotcrete employees. The duration of the job is approximately 24 months. It will employ up to 150 people and that is just for Largo Concrete's scope of work.

work has been slow in Orange County due to COVID-19 and this job would be a great shot in the arm for both Largo and a number of other subcontractors besides Largo we have worked for our subcontractors for ready mix, formwork, rebar, hoisting, excavation and numerous other vendors and suppliers and overall I think this would be a great project for the city of Santa Ana and also for Orange County Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Caller, with the last three numbers, 477, please dial star six and proceed to speak.

Los tres ultimo numeros, cuatro nueve tres.

Yes, this is Dale Helwig, a 30-year resident of Santa Ana. I'm calling about the general plan update presentation. the last 10% of any project is always the hardest and we're reaching the last 10%. I thank the city for getting the draft elements out and also the comments by a couple council members about making sure that we take our time to get the city and the residents to participate in this last round of activity. What was disappointing though is the elements have been put out for draft comment,

but almost all of the draft elements do not have a complete document. The implementation section is blank, will be provided on a future draft copy. And also the master park plan is not completed. Here we've gone a few years to try and get to this point for a comprehensive update. and we're at a point where we don't have a comprehensive update we're missing sections of 11 out of 12 elements we don't have the master park plan in place and in fact the housing element is not even published yet so I'm hoping that we

can get that taken care of before it goes too far down the road again the environmental justice element which is going to be incorporated into all the other elements i'm hoping that that can be clearly identified in the other elements right now i don't know where environmental justice is that in any of the elements i i'm not that familiar with all the nuances of it so i'm hoping that when you go through it again you can clearly identify what makes up the environmental justice feature of all that

The document has been reduced down from 930 pages to 286. It's got a lot of pictures in it. I would hope to see a little bit more substance in future drafts. Thank you very much.

Thank you. So caller with the last three numbers, 1-2-1, please dial star 6 to unmute yourself, and you may begin to speak.

The last three numbers, 477, please mark asterisk 6 to reactivate your call.

Good evening, Madam Clerk, Mr. Mayor and members of the council. My name is Barbara Lichman and I'm actually here for the discussion of Item 75C, the Bowery Project. But thank you for the opportunity.

Thank you. We'll unmute you at that time.

Caller with an unknown number, please dial star six to unmute yourself on your end, and you may begin to speak.

Hello, yes, my name is Manuel Torres. And I just wanted to comment on item 75C in regards to the Largo, in regards to Largo and the opportunity that is received for union workers and the job. And I was born and raised as a Santa Ana resident myself. and I just wanted to say that the project is very exciting as it grants not only myself but many other people the opportunity to be closer to their family and give back to their community. And personally working with Largo, I know that we'll develop a safe, clean and high quality structure.

And I just wanted to thank all of you guys for your time and for the approval. And I look forward to giving back to the community. Thank you.

Thank you. Numbers with the last three numbers, 999.

You have been unmuted. Please dial star six to unmute yourself on your end, and you may proceed to speak.

Good evening, council members. My name is Danielle Wilson, and I'm speaking on behalf of UniteCare Local 11. We represent 30,000 hospitality workers, thousands of who live here in Santa Ana. please do not sell our land at the YMCA site. Instead, you should enter into a revenue-based lease agreement as has been done at sites across the entire county, including here in Santa Ana. City-owned property should be seen as a means of generating long-term revenues for our community and of sharing in the success of profitable business ventures. As you consider various agreements related to this project,

please prioritize the tools that can generate ongoing revenue for the city and its communities rather than a short-sighted sale of valuable public land. Thank you.

Los tres último números, 493. Por favor, marque asterisco 6 en su teléfono para reactivar su llamada.

Navor, si me puede oír, por favor, marque en su teléfono asterisco 6 para reactivar su llamada.

Bueno, sí.

Sí, ahora le podemos oír.

Sí, hola, buenas noches. Mi nombre es Navor Palomino y participo por la Terna 25A.

I have been living more than 20 years here in Santana.

Ladies and gentlemen, with all respect, I am going to sell our public lands in the city of the Inca, because I think it should be arrendated so that the city can get income at long term. and so support people with escasos resources.

Ladies and gentlemen, it's time to support our brothers who live in the street, who live in the car,

because in this city the rents are very high in their cost, and apart from that, very reduced. It's why I make this call for us to make sure that we have people suffering from very important needs to be in our lives.

I hope that they have a good decision for the residents of Santana and that they also have a good conscience of that one is participating and that this day has many people participating because we want to preserve those lands for Santana and give them a good future. to our children.

Thank you very much for letting me participate.

I have participated three or four times in this topic, and the last two have been cut off my time. Please take into account the time you have to wait here. Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor and Councilmembers. That was the last caller, but I do want to announce how many. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead and translate, please.

Hi, good evening. My name is Navor Palomino and I'm here to speak about 25A. I've been living in Santa Ana for over 20 years. So Councilmembers, with all due respect, I'm opposed to the sale of public land. This is very important. you should rent the land to gather the city, to garner the city some long-term income. This is to help and support our low-income people. This is supposed to support the people, support our brothers who are living in the streets, who are living in cars. In this city, the rents are too high and there's too few places to rent.

So I call on you to know that we are suffering. We are suffering great needs that we have in our life. So I hope that you make a decision that's best for the residents of Santa Ana. And now many people are here, participating here, because we want to keep public land for Santa Ana, for the good, have a better future for our children. Thank you. I've been speaking on this issue, coming here to speak on this issue three or four times before. and the last couple of times my time was cut off. So we are here. We're waiting for your decision. Thank you.

I'm sorry. I did have one more caller. Mike Herra was on hold here. I didn't realize that he was waiting to speak.

If you would please dial star nine. I'm sorry, star six so that you can unmute yourself. And you may proceed to speak.

Mike, if you would please. Yes, we can hear you.

Okay, great. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem and honorable city council members. Mike Haram, I'd be honored to add to the city of Santa Ana another project that we've been doing over years, to the gorgeous fabric of the community by bringing back life after 30 years of this historic YMCA building, creating it to be a incredible project for everyone to enjoy and to bring work to many, many people. The hotel people that are calling in, this is gonna be a hotel

and it will put hotel workers to work. So I think that's really great. Also the first 180 days after receiving a building permit from the city, we're going to beautify the entire exterior by cleaning it up, painting it architecturally, lighting the building, landscaping the building to make it the same look as the old courthouse across the street. This has been a blighted building for so long and we own several properties around it and we're constantly asked, Why doesn't somebody do something about it? I have been trying to move forward on this for the last 11 years.

It's gone in front of numerous nonprofit companies and organizations. And each one of them after reviewing it have backed out because it's somewhere between eight and 13 million just to do the seismic retrofit. So the moving forward and making good things happen for this After that, after we do the exterior, excuse me, we're going to go through the entitlement process. And once we get the entitlements and the building permits, we're going to build an incredible first class 2026 room boutique hotel with restaurants and wellness center club

that we are going to be adding bed tax, TOT, retail tax, sales tax, property tax. And for many years, none of these taxes have ever been paid back to the city. We're also gonna purchase the building and where everybody else has asked the city to give money into the millions of dollars and not give them any money for the building. So I believe it's gonna be an incredible asset to the community. I'm honored to move forward with this as I have with the Masonic Temple, original Mike's, the Twist Basler House, of the Bank of America building,

the Heinz County High School of the Arts, numerous other buildings and stuff over the past 30 years that I've been here to add to the fabric of this incredibly beautiful city. And I just wanna say that I am glad that we're all here hopefully to work together to really do great things for our city together.

And I am thankful for this opportunity. Have a blessed evening. Thank you.

Thank you. And that was the last caller. And I do want to announce the emails we received today. As of 4.01 PM, staff was able to count at least 676 emails. We did our best to try to go through them and summarize them. So the gist of it is we had 20A, for item 20A, we had two Santa Ana residents in support. 20B, we had one unopposed. 20D, we had one unopposed Santa Ana resident. 22B, we had 11 Santa Ana residents opposed and then five residency not disclosed.

For 25A, we had six Santa Ana residents in support, six businesses. We had 141 Santa Ana residents opposed, 12 Santa Ana residents, non-Santa Ana residents, and then two residency not disclosed. And then we had one comment from a Santa Ana resident. 25B, we had three Santa Ana residents opposed. 60B we had one Santa Ana resident provide a comment and then we had 85A Santa Ana resident with one comment and then 85B we had eight residents Santa

Ana in support 14 residency not disclosed and then one Santa Ana property owner in opposition for 85B and that is only did have three non agenda items one on revision to campaign contributions, the other on law enforcement officers not wearing masks when interacting with Hello Will. And then we had one Santa Ana resident spoke on extending park hours. And that is all I have.

Thank you, Madam Clerk. I'm now going to move our attention to the consent calendar. Are there any items that council members wish to either pull or abstain on?

David PenalozaItem —

Yeah, Mr. Mayor, this is Council Member Penaloza. I'd like to pull items 20A and 23A.

Please note that, Madam Clerk. Any other items by Council Members?

Yes, Mr. Mayor, this is Council Member Sarmiento.

Yes, sir.

Can you please pull item number 22B as in boy, 25A as in apple, 25E as in Edward, and I'd like to abstain on 25F. I have a real property interest in close proximity to that site and that's it.

Thank you for that. Any other items by council members?

Hearing all others, is there a motion on the balance of the consent calendar?

Make a motion to approve the balance. Council Member Becerra, motion to move the balance.

I'll take a second. Is there a second? I'll second that, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor Pro Temp seconds. Roll call vote, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Becerra?

Yes.

Council Member Mendoza?

Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa? Yes. Councilmember Sarmiento? Yes. Councilmember Solorio? Yes. Mayor Potem-Viegas? Yes. Mayor Pulido? Yes. Motion carries 7-0.

Thank you. Now let's go on to the first item. Was that Councilmember Peñalosa or who had the first item?

28.

David PenalozaItem —

Yes, sir, that was me. Councilman Peñalosa, thank you. 20A is a proven appropriation adjustment and an agreement accepting U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Assistance, fiscal year 20, coronavirus emergency supplemental funding program grant funds in the amount of 300 and, I believe I just read the wrong item. No, 368,000 items.

David PenalozaItem —

I'm looking at the wrong region let him give me two seconds I believe you pulled 20 a sir I don't know what I opened up yes and I've had like eight cups of coffee okay approve a grant agreement accepting grant funds from the California State Library for the knowledge mobile no mo bringing mobile library services back to San Ana program in the amount of $80,000 and approve an appropriation adjustment and a memorandum of understanding with the San Ana Unified School District. 28, the reason I pulled it Madam City Manager

David PenalozaItem —

maybe the director of the library wants to answer this. First off I want to thank you for for going after this grant and securing these funds definitely needed in our library system. However, as we previously discussed with staff, the staff report fails to mention that this is a trial period with SAUSD from what I understand and that if it were to work we will be looking at options to work with select GGUSD schools as well. Is that still the case Madam City Manager or if the director of library wants to take over? No that's correct sir. This is

a pilot program starting with this first school district and if successful we would roll it out to the other school districts and private schools that serve

David PenalozaItem —

our our city residents okay thank you for that and and I think it's important for us to include this that language in the staff report because there are 10 thousand plus give or take students Santa Ana residents that attend GG Unified School District and we want to make sure that they're aware that we're not you know forgetting about them and we're not leaving them out you know to dry without access to this program this is a really good program that that is going to benefit both our Santa Ana unified school district and the city in regards to just giving easier access to our library catalog and system to to

David PenalozaItem —

students but what can the director of library answer if what the plan is for

this please just to detail more information library director Brian hi

good evening mayor members of City Council just to go back to the staff report the staff report does talk a little bit about that this is in fact a pilot project in a couple of different locations under the discussion the fourth paragraph it does say the student success library card will begin as a private project with SA USD and based upon the success of the partnership it will then roll out to GGUSD and other schools, charter schools, wherever we see fit. The good thing about this program is that it's kind of two-fold. It's providing both library cards to every student at Santa Ana Unified School District.

So they don't ever have to come into the library. It's based upon enrollment. So that's the really good thing about it. As soon as a child enrolls in school, Santa Ana Unified shares that basic information with the library. We import it into our ILS, our integrated library system software, and they automatically get a library card that is their student ID. So they don't have to come in, they don't have to get another library card. Their student ID number becomes their library card. They can check out books, they can go online, they can take advantage of curbside pickup, they can do all these great things.

The second part of it is the MOU then for the bookmobile services, which just basically establishes a good working relationship between us and Santa Ana Unified. in terms of developing curriculum for how we will program Bookmobile services. That means, you know,

we're interested in finding out where the gaps are with Santa Ana Unified and their learning, and then we'll try to fill that in. So whether it's additional STEM learning, whether it's additional mathematics, whatever it might be that their needs are, we're gonna try to come in and support their services. So it's a really great program. It's a pilot. So we're gonna start off there because it was a part of the grant process that I did need to choose one partner in order to be awarded this grant. So it made sense that Santa Ana Unified, I believe, serves about 45,000 of our residents who are students. So it's a good first place to go.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you for that. That's perfect. One last thing in regards to the funds. I know this is, from the way I see it, it's a one-time grant. moving forward is this something that we're going to be applying for annually or is it something that we're going to have to eventually you know find funding for within the

general fund so the california state library does put out lots of grants annually there is a renewed interest in putting out grants that are related to mobile services and wi-fi and things like that just because of the pandemic so i think there will be more like this um in the future i can't say for sure what the california state library may or may not put out in terms of a grant but me and my staff were always looking at these types of things and we'll we will definitely be exploring um these types of grants in the future thank you thank you director that's it thank you

David PenalozaItem —

With that, I will make a motion to approve item 28.

Second. Is there a second?

Second, Mr. Mayor.

Second. All second. All right, Solario, roll call vote, please.

Council Member Becerra? Yes. Council Member Mendoza? Yes. Council Member Peñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Council Member Sarmiento?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Council Member Solario?

Yes.

Mayor Potem-Viegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries 7-0.

Next item, Madam Clerk.

22B, Council Member Sarmiento requested for this one.

Yes, thank you, Madam Clerk. I just had a couple of comments and questions on this. This is an item that involves a purchase of a police vehicle in the amount of $353,000. And question for the city manager, and I know we had a chance to speak about this briefly. These aren't general fund monies that we're using for this, correct?

Correct, sir.

And so these funds that we receive from the federal government are probably restricted funds that can only be used on anti-terrorist equipment, if I recall, with WASI funds, correct?

Yes, the intent is to prepare for terrorism preparedness, and it's a grant through the Department of Homeland Security.

Right. So, you know, I guess what, you know, in looking at the staff report and the recommended action, it looks like this isn't the only purpose that these funds could be used for. Is that also correct?

I believe that's correct. If I may ask our police chief to comment on that, he's available on the line.

Sure. And we had a chance to speak. And I think this, the purpose of this was to replace a vehicle that's been, I guess, in bad shape, that's real similar to what we would be purchasing here. I guess my concern is that, you know, a couple of things. Number one, the timing is very, very tough, given that we've had some civil unrest as a result of what happened in Minneapolis and the George Floyd case and people really questioning, you know, how we should be policing and whether or not there are better ways to do it. I think this, you know, when I looked it up, it seems like

a very, very, you know, large piece of equipment that is, you know, in a way, maybe almost not intended for streets, but intended for some place in, you know, in Afghanistan or some war-torn country. Look, I don't want to misjudge or be critical of what, when this was requested, because I think this may have been requested a couple of years ago, because that's when the previous vehicle was failing, starting to fail. But I just don't see that, you know, given what happened in Anaheim, I saw what they did over there with the vehicle that they had acquired

and had just some type of sort of a provocative presence. And I don't know about these going through our neighborhoods and making people feel safer, if anything. Something like this really does cause a lot of unsettling feelings, I think. And I know that we've heard that loud and clear from many of our residents who spoke. And it is just a very ominous vehicle to look at. I know that these vehicles and these pieces of equipment are also multi-jurisdictional. So I know that we share these pieces of equipment, especially with Anaheim, those two cities,

our two cities being the ones that mostly get funded with UOSC monies. And we've been able to put our UOSC monies to good use with respect to cameras in the downtown, other technical equipment. So I just think there's, you know, if there is another way to spend this money other than this, I think maybe we can revisit this and bring this back and see what the options are. I just don't know if this is the only and best way to spend this money, given the climate that we're living in right now, where we're trying to see how we can be more accessible to the public and sort of de-escalate and regain that trust.

This vehicle doesn't show me, you know, how we can engage better with the public and do better community policing. So I am not going to be supportive of this item. I don't want to be, again, critical of the chief. I think this is just bad timing. I think his intentions were good when he put in for the request a couple of years ago and the funds came in just recently or maybe made themselves available. But I just think that we have to remember what times we're living in and look at what the other options are to best spend this money. So I will be opposed to this item.

Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a comment.

Yes, go ahead, Mayor Pro Tem.

If the chief can come on the line and we can discuss this item, it'd be great. Chief Valentin?

Yes, I'm here, Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you, Chief, for coming on the line. So can you explain a little bit what this vehicle is used for? I think the public has a misunderstanding of what we use this type of vehicle for, and they don't have any background, so I understand that they're a little hesitant. So can you clarify that for us, please?

Yes, I appreciate the opportunity, Mr. Mayor and Council, City Manager, and the public. This item is acquired through the OASI Grant Fund. It represents an operational area. Our operational area covers the entire county of Orange. So although this asset would sit within the Senate and the Police Department, it is made available to any police department that requests the vehicle itself for any defensible operation that's necessary. If I can also comment on a couple of,

I think I counted 11 people that called in that were not supported. And then there are the additional 11 emails that were opposed. So 22 people in total. And it is important for folks to educate themselves on the FEMA provisions. The vast majority of these grant funds are earmarked to either existing programs and assets. The council member Sarmento mentioned the, our cameras, for example, in our downtown, a portion of that is covered through this grant and a variety of different initiatives across, across the County. So already incorporated is a whole host of extensive

preparedness pods that are established to our, our city and the County in the event of major disasters, those are in place. The ability to use these funds are very restricted. This one vehicle asset that is being requested through the grant is just that it's one vehicle that does fall within the provisions of the grant itself. The vehicle that we are replacing is 41 years old, 41 years old. It's served its purpose, but it's simply, when we have a situation in the city

where I have to authorize a particular deployment and I can't rely on critical assets and infrastructure. That's a problem for the safety of our officers and our public. This vehicle would be used in an extremely high risk incidents, potentially barricaded suspects, armed suspects. So this would in no way be the frontline response at a peaceful disturbance, for example.

In fact, I must point out that the Santa Ana Police Department was noted repeatedly during this most recent civil unrest period as an example of self-discipline and how police officers responded to these incidents. And again, this would not be their first course of response. So having this asset though, to respond to these high risk incidents does in fact, fall in line with our police departments emphasis on deescalation. We wanna use the lowest level of force necessary to resolve whatever incident that we're dealing with.

And so that's important to point out as well. This is not a vehicle of war. it is not a vehicle that is intended to criminalize anyone in our city for that matter. I want everyone listening to know that I critically evaluate all of these requests. And in fact, as been pointed out, that is correct. This request came in, was submitted nearly three years ago, in fact. So it has to do with funding cycles. The monies were actually allocated and are made available This was not in response to what occurred in Minneapolis, recent unrest.

This request was put in place because what we currently have is grossly inadequate.

So once again, it's a regional asset. It's made available not only to our police department, but to any police department that requested in the county. As it stands right now, I have to have command staff and personnel look to other cities and the county to see if they have this asset when we need it, if our current vehicle is non-operational, which is quite frequent.

Thank you, Chief. So three years we've been asking for a vehicle. This thing is 40-plus years old. It's my understanding that the vehicle that we're going to purchase is even smaller than the one that we have currently. And it's made for rescue operations and such. And my understanding, the turret that's on top of the vehicle is used to spray water in case you have to use the vehicle to go in and do a rescue and the location is burning. So this is actually about safety. This is not about, you know, anything else.

It's more to protect the officers, like you said, and protect the people that we are responding to go help. And so with that, I would like to make a motion. Thank you, Chief. I would like to make a motion or approve this item. And I hope the council, you know, supports this. And that is my comment. Thank you, Chief. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you.

Mayor Pelludo, I have questions after the second is made.

Would you like to make the second?

Yes, I will make the second and then I have some questions for the chief.

Go ahead, answer questions. Go ahead, Councillor Mendoza. Go ahead.

All right. Thank you. Chief, I'm wondering what's the timeline? Are there other things that the police department can buy with these money?

So again, what's earmarked for the entire county, you know, is already pre-designated. And again, it has to do with disaster preparedness, also tabletop exercises, a variety of different requirements that are met. This request, like I said, has been in for over two years, nearly three years. and so it's something that we really need to acquire. We continue through the grant as required through the provisions

to prepare, mitigate, and be really in a state of readiness to recover in the event there is a major incident, got a bit of terrorist attack, et cetera. So to answer your question, can these monies be used for something else?

Certainly. But then we would be right back in the same situation that we are in today, right? We're looking again to replace, if I can reemphasize, a current vehicle that's 41 years old that is used for these high-risk situations. Something, an aspect that we need to rely on. When we put the key in the ignition, it's got to turn on. and we're responding with critical time element restraint and we need to be able to get to a scene and deescalate and mitigate and resolve the situation as quickly as possible. If we have to step back and then try and figure out where I acquire this vehicle,

there's a couple of other departments that have the vehicle. I have to now determine whether that vehicle is available. Is it local? Is it available? Or are they using it for another high risk warrant service for example, with, you know, weapon traffickers, for example. You're going to want to protect the officers that are conducting that operation and the public as well.

Yes, I understand that. Seeing the timing of this request due to the civil unrest, I understand that the public is quite sensitive on this issue, but I'd like to ask if this is not approved today, will that money be lost if it's not used for this vehicle?

Yes.

It'll be reality and well, I don't know when we would see another opportunity here. Again, this has nothing to do with the recent, you know, incident and then subsequent civil unrest that occurred over the last few months. I know the timing is from an optic standpoint, maybe a bit problematic, but it's not in response to that incident. This is about continued preparedness and strategic planning, short-term and long-term.

Well, I want to thank you, chief, you and the officers, our entire Santa Ana Police Department, because you've been working together with other cities in times of emergency. And my question on that sense is, do we benefit from other cities' equipment as well? So in this sense, can our contribution to Orange County for other law enforcement agencies, since they help us, then can we use this vehicle to use in times of emergency in other cities?

Yes, under mutual aid response, that is long in place. and we very much rely on that during large-scale incidents so whether it's in personnel or in assets

that qualifies for both yes all right that was my last question thank you chief thank you

David PenalozaItem —

mr mayor comments council members this is councilman penaloz i just have a couple questions yes go ahead is on the line uh chief valentine are you still there yes sir uh okay i just had a couple questions kind of following what councilman mendoza said um in regards to the amount uh three hundred and fifty three thousand six hundred and fifty three dollars was this a one a specific grant for this amount or was this part of a larger a grant that was awarded to our city

so uh thank you for the question um this past year's um grant uh funding in in total uh was was nearly $6 million. And so that's for the entire County of Orange. And then from that, as we've heard, a large portion of that is already pre-designated for existing infrastructure and ongoing efforts, right? Mitigation, preparedness for major incidents, et cetera. So what's really left in the balance is for, and then not just for the Sanana Police Department,

but for the entire county is approximately 800 000 that that is it so from that you have uh different uh pieces of equipment that are requested and uh they go through a very rigorous um approval process locally uh at the state level uh and then and then after that at the federal level um and so that's that's uh that's the process and that's uh the total i can get you the exact amount I have my commander who's in charge of the OASI Division, the Urban Area Security Initiative, Homeland Security essentially. I have him on the line as well if you need

that level of detail. But those are essentially the realm numbers.

David PenalozaItem —

The detail would be appreciated if it's available, if that information is available. I'd like to hear it. So out of the close to $6 million awarded to the Anaheim, San Ana region how much of that is approximately allocated for I know it's a it's a regional effort that we're that we're doing among Anaheim and Santa Ana because of the high terrorism risk that we carry with our federal courthouses and and Disney just up the north north north of the five or north of us so of

David PenalozaItem —

that amount what what else have we purchased or prepared for to use that funds out of the the entire grant okay and before I bring him up on the line

again just a reminder it's the operational area oversight is Santa Anna Anaheim but the all of the preparedness and infrastructure is in in support of the entire County of Orange. So this is not a Santa Ana, Anaheim centric piece. This is representatives and supportive. And we have representatives at the table from every agency in the County represented. So, and it goes to also through a committee in terms of approval, is this an appropriate asset to be purchased at this time in support of current and ongoing efforts. So with that, Commander Claiborne, if you're on the line,

what's the total amount of the grant for this past year and then expenditure?

Can you guys hear me? Yes, Mike, is that you? Okay. Yes. Okay. This is the man of Michael.

Granted by the time it ends up passing through the state roughly ends up being just over $4 million for our operational area. And I've heard some of the concerns that have been brought up by various callers or council members that I wanted to kind of, Maybe I can create a better picture for you. So these are not funds that are sitting somewhere waiting for us to be spent in areas that we want to. When we talk about the fact that this project has developed over the past three years, I can give you a quick Reader's Digest version of how a project ends up from beginning to the end. And that this concept gets presented

to an urban area working group, which consists of law, fire and emergency managers from all over Orange County. Every project that needs, that wants to be funded by the grant has to be presented to all of the disciplines and it is voted on to get approved or not approved. And that process from that date to where we are today has been years. And if I could try to have everyone remember back three years ago, we were on the heels of the San Bernardino shooting and the pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida. And these were the terrorist events that were causing agencies to ascertain these types

of assets to be able to respond to those types of incidents not the current incidents that we are dealing with here today thanks mike

councilman salario i know has a comment as well go ahead let's do councilman salario then we'll

come right back mr mayor mr mayor i'd like to defer to to uh council member mendos if you don't mind

David PenalozaItem —

All right, go ahead. Really quick. Mr. Mayor, before we move on to Council Member Mendoza, Chief Valentin, the answer from your Commander Claiborne wasn't really clear on the expenditures, specific expenditures versus just why we're seeing this. Can we go back to Commander Claiborne on the actual expenditures that we've had here in the city?

So this is Commander Claiborne. I'm sorry. If that question was for me, your volume broke out during your last message. Could you repeat it, please?

David PenalozaItem —

Okay. Well, my original question to Chief Valentin was out of the, you know, roughly $5.5 million that has been allocated by the Department of Homeland Security to the Santa Ana-Anaheim region, I understand your response about why we have the San Bernardino shooting, the Orlando nightclub shooting, and these are type of instances that have pushed agencies to demand these, ask for these kinds of funding. But specifically here in the city, what have we used the rest of the grant for?

So other items that I can think about the top of my head that we have used for funds for are the infrastructure for what is the most comprehensive camera system in the entire county which covers our Civic Center area to include the county buildings federal buildings it is by far the most comprehensive in the entire county and there are ongoing costs reoccurring costs and maintenance agreements with Siemens that cover those costs so we also have training courses that are put on the city of santa ana is is at the forefront of teaching the tactile emergency

casualty care courses which are basically advanced first aid techniques that are being taught to officers uh from san clemente all the way up to la habra and the city of santa ana is is where those classes are taught by our instructors so all those instruction the

David PenalozaItem —

instructors and classes and preparedness? Are we talking infrastructure, electronics, cyber security? What exactly is that purchasing?

So the funds can purchase training exercises

David PenalozaItem —

and equipment and it has to be-Commander Claiborne, I know that the funds can purchase these things, but what have we in the city have receipts for that we've purchased with this grant money specific I mean I'm talking large items if we're talking you know five and a half million dollars what what where can can I pull up a receipt and what specifically have we spent this money on not just what we can and what broad terms you know security and yeah I get that but specifically in the city what have we use these funds for

So it's not that the funds can be spent on those things. The funds have to be spent and can only be spent on those type of items. And as far as each grant cycle, we have an entire matrix that is created for every fiscal year of projects that cover everywhere from cybersecurity to infrastructure to training to exercises, various types of equipment. And that equipment also includes the fire discipline, which has not been brought up much in this conversation. So this equipment purchases stuff for OCFA and for Anaheim Fire and other fire departments around the county as well.

I could, if you would like one, I can send you over a copy of a matrix so that you can see each of the categories that are broken down as to what the grant funds are being used to spend on. But it is a very comprehensive list.

David PenalozaItem —

So, and I understand it's comprehensive. I know we can we use it for various things but specifically are there other things within our city and police department that we've used this grant for?

We have used it for protective equipment for anti-terrorism biological response. We have used it for gas masks, gas mask filters, training courses. We ourselves have been through exercises. The city of Santa Ana also partakes in an active shooter response course that we teach through the city. We have the, as I've mentioned already, the largest scale camera system in the entire county. We also fund things such as the FLIR cameras that are used by Anaheim TDS helicopters. I mean, we have a radiation detector for OCFA that we've purchased.

It's just not, it's difficult to answer a question when you say just for Santa Ana, because this grant has absolutely no nexus to the city of Santa Ana. The nexus is to the Orange County operational area and every single thing that is purchased by piece of equipment that's purchased by the grant, anybody in the entire county can make a phone call and get that asset delivered to them.

Okay. If, if I may. Go ahead, Chief. If I can bring it back, if it's helpful, we certainly can, will, and should make available to you and the public what the expenditure is for the entire grant. And as Commander Claiborne said, it's not a matter of if or should or can. It's an obligation and it's all public information. Every last dollar and penny. We will certainly make that available.

Mr. Mayor, comment? My last comment? Yes, I just want to encourage my colleagues to support.

David PenalozaItem —

Madam City Manager, can you answer to that?

We are, this has been approved and we should not take, we should not risk losing this funding, this money. I mean, we should not be throwing out the baby with the bathwater. So I think it is a good thing that we need to keep the public protected, and this is ultimately for them. And the other thing that's very important is that we overlooked to mention is that we cannot put our officers in danger. If this 41-year-old vehicle breaks down in the middle of a high-risk operation, it would be fatal for our police officers. So we need to keep them in mind as well.

Since we have the approval, I recommend that we support it and that we go ahead with it. There'll be other funds that we could apply for and get other safety equipment that the public would be protected as well. But this is critical. We need to have such a vehicle. That's my comment. Thank you. Mr. Mayor, this is

Yes sir, go ahead, Councilor Becerra.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So this money, do we have a timeline on it? Do we need to spend it by next week? Or is this, do we have a little more time to look at this?

Mike, what's the-I'm all just at the one.

Sorry, I'm trying to-Excuse me, well, go ahead. I'm trying to unmute the phone, sorry. Go ahead, Mike. So the funds that we have, it's taken us two years to get to the point we have, we don't have the time to sit and wait and say, well, do we want to spend it on this? Or can we spend it on something else? It cannot be spent on anything else at all. Cause this has every single dollar that gets spent by the grant has to be approved by the urban. If we do not to obtain this resource, it will absolutely be lost because it takes a couple years to get to the point

where we're at and this not one single bolt has been put together to build this piece of equipment which is going to take months to actually complete. So what is the timeline though? I understand that you guys have worked hard and to secure this money but I guess you know kind of to kind of the tone some of my colleagues have expressed you know I'm looking at a two-page staff report for a $353,000 vehicle and well granted I don't need the specs and I don't need the blueprint but I think that my colleagues have asked a couple of questions that warrant a little more I guess review of and two pages really

at least for me personally doesn't suffice and especially for a vehicle that you know is used in very extreme circumstances it's something that our city is you know I mean it's always good for us to be the leader but we're quarterbacking the procurement of this vehicle that I mean I have to agree in times like this when we're looking at our our police and we want to see them really be more in a public service role and again public safety of course but I I guess for me I'm just kind of wrestling with this because I want to have a little more confidence to support this but I mean two pages for something

like this that has really evoked a lot of emotion and a lot of good questions from my colleagues so So I'm just really curious that if we were, I'm not saying we would, but just if we were to want to continue the site into the next meeting, is that going to jeopardize the ability to potentially purchase this vehicle if we end up going that direction?

So you're asking me to predict whether or not the builder themselves were running for roadblocks. This is exactly why in the grant, we try not to push things up to the 11th hour because we are required under grant guidelines to take possession of this vehicle before that fiscal year will come to an end and i imagine that's when your next question is going to be which is going to be uh march april-ish of the following of the subsequent year of 2021 so we don't the longer we delay this we're pushing into that window of time for us to actually take possession if they run into any issues with the

with the building of this equipment or any supplies that they're running into things that we can't foresee down the road we do run the risk of losing this piece of equipment and so why why are we under the gun at this point i mean i i guess i understand it's taken a while to get to this point but i mean i i think for us it's just it's never to me i i don't ever have a good feeling when something's thrown on our lap at the last second to to push forward you know without having seen it before i mean there's things that you know we kind of run out the clock

and then we finally go oh my goodness we need to do something but i mean this is the first time I've seen it. I don't know if my colleagues have, but this is the first time I've seen it. And again, I just feel like this is very, very thin information for us to really make a decision on given the amount of concern that folks have expressed this evening.

Any other comments? Yes, Mr. Mayor. Any other comments? Mr. Mayor, I'll make my comments now. I'm leaning towards a continuation as well if possible and this is why I'm all in support of maintaining our public safety system. So if we really do need this, it does need to be replaced. We don't wanna be the weak link in the chain. But having said that, I think City Manager and Chief, what you're hearing is this council, this community, we're concerned about what can be perceived as the over militarization of our police force.

And we also, I think from a little bit that we heard tonight, this vehicle, if it's lasted four years, probably because it hasn't been used very much. And so I'd also like to know how often we or other agencies use it, or if we do need it for some big event, why can't we rely on the sheriff's equipment? And so I'd like to know what their capacity is. And then finally, I think what you're hearing, city manager and chief is that we like the gang unit in the metropolitan division but there are other newer elements in that division where there's a perceived over militarization and all

black uniforms and other characteristics that are different than other elements in the rest of the police department and there's growing concern about that i as you know city manager in chief I'm concerned that from the last big civil unrest we had the situation of some of these members allegedly from the video that we've seen push over a child and that internal investigation even though it doesn't appear to be a complex one we haven't heard what the findings are from that so we we need more information I do feel like we're going too fast on some of this stuff and

I don't necessarily want to lose the money because if we really do need it I don't want replace it with general fund money but i think there's uh you know more questions than answers and uh you know growing concern at this time about actions like this mayor it's the city manager

christine may i make a comment yeah i've got some questions i've not spoken go ahead

so i just wanted to go back to council member panaloza he was asking for some pretty specific information on what we've used the money before on and i'm assuming you want to know that we have Possession in our police department for the area we can provide you a report of that information if you would like that

David PenalozaItem —

That would be good and do you know a timeline madam city manager how long that will take

I'm sure commander Clayborne could probably whip it up within a week

David PenalozaItem —

Okay, if we could do by the end of this week, that'd be great. Okay, we'll do

All right a question I've got How long Chief, if you could come back please. How long have you been working on this project? I know this is very hard money to get. It's very competitive. There's people around the country applying for it. How long has it been when you first decided you wanted to compete for this and see if you were granted the money?

So year one, the request was through general fund. that was not approved. The last two years has been in pursuit of this Uwasi funding. And so you're absolutely right. We're just one operational area of many across the country. And so like any grant, if monies aren't spent, they're reallocated. And so this is, as was said before, looking to replace the 41 year old vehicle and so yeah so you've been at

this almost over three years now would that be fair to say sure three years and we use the vehicle here in the county for Santa Ana once a year or several

times a year how often do we use it no i i would i would in santa ana it's several times a year high-risk incidents barricaded suspects armed suspects that call for this type of asset and then across the county i would i would we certainly aren't lending the current vehicle we have to anyone because oftentimes it's inoperable so we can get data on just how many times it's deployed across the county certainly so it's inoperable just because it's 41 years old and

no matter how well you try to maintain it sometimes it just it doesn't work well enough for you to take it on the streets, correct?

Correct.

So, look, council members, I would, you know, suggest that, you know, this is used if there's a terrorism or a terrorist issue, you know, something very dangerous, and to have our police out there going out there with a vehicle that's not operable, What do you do when it's not operable chief and you still have an incident? You just go without it, you know, put people in patrol cars or what do you do?

So that's a great question. And the scenario would unfold by calling other departments. And if in fact they have a vehicle similar and it's available, then we could acquire it. If not, we could be in a situation we would have to delay an operation if it's a life and death situation we're we're we're simply going to have to figure something out right talk about deploying patrol cars they are not equipped with you know body armor to protect officers and so that's what this asset is for as well so

So currently I would call to see who has a vehicle that's available. Not only that it's a part of their resources, but is it in fact available? Other departments don't sit around and wait for our call. They're conducting police work as well.

But when you have a need, I mean, it's not like you can say, I think I'm going to have an emergency next Tuesday. Can I try to arrange for a vehicle next Tuesday? When you have a problem, you have a problem.

That's correct.

Well, look, we have a motion and a second. I would try to compel my fellow council members to say, I believe this is really a no brainer. It's for, you know, very, you know, of difficult, dangerous situations that sometimes occur. And if we continue it, there is a chance another committee says we'll take it. And then we're sitting around with a vehicle that may or may not start. When somebody, when this grant, obviously we had to apply for the grant.

I'm sure it was reviewed by a lot of people and our officers did a good job in winning the contest, if you will, and getting the grant approved.

Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a comment, Mr. Mayor.

If it doesn't pass, it doesn't pass. I'd like to make a quick comment. I'd like to vote. Yes, Mr. Mayor.

I'd like to make a comment. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. A quick comment and then we can call for the question. You know, police work changed back in the early 90s after the North Hollywood shooting. So that's why you see officers having to use different types of weapon and equipment because, you know, frankly, the criminals have changed how they operate and what they're doing. And now you have, you know, other elements in organized crime doing a lot more, using a lot different equipment. So, you know, our officers cannot be out, you know, gunned and, you know, be caught off guard like they did in North Hollywood.

And they just didn't have the equipment. It took a while for their LAPD SWAT to show up to respond. And here in Anaheim, you know, the terrorism, regarding the terrorism in Anaheim, that's the number one target in Orange County. And second is Santa Ana because we're the county seat. And that's why you see so many Homeland Security cameras here. So, you know, our officers, everyone understands that Santa Ana is a very active city. And, you know, how many times this past year have we responded or has our agency responded to a barricaded suspect? You've got to just think about that. I mean, all of the council, we all get the memos.

And we understand that sometimes we're called upon to help outside agencies. So, you know, I'm very appreciative of all the outside agencies helping us. but when you've got a vehicle that's 41 years old and it doesn't work, I mean, we don't even drive cars that are 41 years old. I mean, most of us don't, you know, we don't use that. So, you know, it's very, you know, it's very interesting how this council is starting to think. It's not like we're going to have two vehicles. We're just replacing one vehicle. And that's my comment, Mr. Mayor. I'd like to ask for the question.

All right, please, if it doesn't pass, obviously it will come back, but let's do a roll call vote, please, Madam Clerk.

Madam Clerk, could you read the motion, please?

So the motion, there's only one motion. Did you think there was more than one?

Oh, so it's just a motion to approve?

Correct, yeah. That's all I captured. Okay. Yes. And I have it motioned by Mayor Pro Tem Villegas and seconded by Councilmember Mendoza. Councilmember Becerra?

Yes, correct. Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza? Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

No.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

No.

Councilmember Solorio?

Yes, but I still want those answers to the questions.

Mayor Pro Tem Vegas.

Yes.

And Mayor Pulido.

Mayor?

It looks like we lost the mayor.

We will try to raise the mayor.

Okay.

Mr. Mayor, are you there, sir?

It looks like we lost the mayor. We could... I can clarify his vote.

Or take a recess.

Yes, we can take a recess for a moment. Is he at his dad's house? If that's okay with everyone. There's no objection. Oh, he's back on.

Stand by. I just texted the mayor. I told him to get online.

He's back on.

He's online?

Yes. Okay.

Mr. Mayor, are you there with us? Can you hear me?

Yes, we can hear you. Thank you, Mayor.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Yeah, I'm a yes. I'm a yes.

Thank you, Mayor. Motion carries 5-2 with Council Members Peñalosa and Sarmiento dissenting.

Okay, the next item, Madam Clerk.

23a called by council member penalosa which item madam c 23a 23a thank you for that

David PenalozaItem —

23a is to authorize a budget reallocation of 92 084 dollars an award construction contract in the amount of seven hundred eleven thousand six hundred eighty two to elect nor Belco electric Inc for the grant funded flower Street bikeway project the reason I pulled this madam city manager and maybe the executive director of public works and a BOS Abba could could answer these questions I just is there any way that we can include as part of the project scope the area between Warner Avenue and Segerstrom that that piece of bike trail you know the bike trails in

David PenalozaItem —

extreme need of repair I'm talking you know pieces of pavement and trail that are uprooted with the trees along the ditch I'm talking big you know six inches to a foot and a half lumps and and bumps throughout the entire thing and the cracks are about two three inches wide it's a very very bad and dangerous bike trail i see a lot of people jogging and walking and and riding their bikes along that bike trail and kids you know walk it to to school to and from saddleback high school and washington elementary just right

David PenalozaItem —

down the corner so i'm i'm thinking if we're gonna invest this money in in moving forward with the construction of this bike trail or bike lane along flower street that one piece it's it's it's about i want to say a quarter of a mile maybe less of bike trail that just needs a lot of repair so is there a way where we could find some some money and kind of include that as part of the

project mr saba good evening mayor mayor pretend members of the council nabil saba executive director of Public Works. We can look at that but we really cannot include it in this project because it's it's grant funded and we just found the matching fund for the project. We can take a look at the section of the bike trail from Warner to Segerstern on flower and we'll get back to you. We probably look for funding to fix that for you but not in this project. Okay if you can that'll be important

David PenalozaItem —

because I'm assuming this bike lane is going to connect to this bike trail that's part of the and I figured if it's going all the way to Civic Center if we could get a bike path from Segerstrom I mean I'm sorry from Sunflower I know there's already one from Sunflower along the creek and it stops right now at Warner and now we're continuing but that piece of bike trail between Warner and Sigelstrom is needs a lot of repair and just you know that would almost almost be you know the entire city from south to north if we

David PenalozaItem —

would have a smooth bike trail up including into the bike lane just

something to look at we can look at that for you and as we move forward I

David PenalozaItem —

I know it's one little piece of a lot of sidewalk and street that needs a lot of repair in our city. But, you know, moving forward with projects like this, it's important that we kind of include the already existing infrastructure. Obviously not part of the same grant dollars, but when we're getting these contractors, make sure that we can...

We'll take a look at it and get back to you and see what the funding is looking like. and if we can find funds we'll execute the project and do the fixing otherwise we'll probably for next year we could look for a specific funds to to do the fixing and get it going and we'll look at the connectivity between both perfect

David PenalozaItem —

thank you sir with that I'll make a motion to approve 23a which is a flower Street Bikeway Project.

Roll call vote, Madam Clerk.

Council Member Becerra?

Yes.

Council Member Mendoza?

Yes. Yes. Council Member Peñalosa?

Council Member Peñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Council Member Sarmiento?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Council Member Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tempe-Viegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries 7-0.

Next item, Madam Clerk.

25A, pulled by Council Member Sarmiento.

Yes, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. You know, I wanted to just comment on this item because I know we've had several members of the public also comment publicly, but also send us some correspondence on this. And it's really not so much to speak ill of the applicant. I think my concern is that, you know, when we first started with the procurement of this site, I know that we were looking at trying to maximize the use. And I think at that time we had four really competitive bidders on that. And I think there was even the high school of the arts that was bidding

on it and I believe it even scored 20 points higher than the applicant himself. So I think we tried to marry the two and see if they could work together and have a hotel that would also serve the purposes of the high school of the arts. And that's the way I justified the community benefit that was going to be coming from this public land. The problem I guess I'm having right now is that selling off an asset, no matter how underwater it is and no matter how much work needs to be done on it because of the seismic retrofitting that needs to be done once it's sold it's no longer ours we can no longer

control any level of it we can't control who's going to do the work who's going to do the remediation what sort of use it's going to have whether it's going to have access for our residents to enjoy because this really is their asset it's not our asset so to the extent that you know I'm kind of analogizing this to you know one's own property when a person has a piece of you know real estate the one thing you don't want to do is let go of it if you can hold it and maybe lease it out even if it's on a long-term basis because you will at some point have some reversion

of that property back to you. And it can serve the purpose of the applicant for a long period of time, but yet there is a consistent revenue stream that comes back to the public. And that's something that I think I'm struggling with that I know that the city has very few remaining planned and public assets like this that we can use and leverage for the benefit of our community. To the extent that the only community benefit on this is going to be a revenue stream from a hotel tax, a TOT, you know, that's a good thing, I guess, you know, but it shouldn't be the only thing that drives a community benefit.

A community benefit should also be, again, something that could be enjoyed by the public. I think somebody mentioned, you know, some of the, you know, amenities that would be part of this hotel, like a swimming pool or other things that could be enjoyed by the public. that's not as realistic and i know that one of the things i believe i've spoken and i i have great respect for the applicant i just think we you know i have sort of a principled or premise problem with this is that you know when when we spoke about this there was uh an idea that this

was going to be configured with a larger hotel on broadway that was going to connect through a breezeway and it was just a much different site than what it seems to be now and what i was hoping would be sort of the trade-off is that there was going to be some level of maybe you know convention space or some you know small conference or conference space that the public could use for gatherings for you know non-profits different things that I think could serve a public purpose so you know to the extent that I think that we have to be a little bit more careful and judicious

with the few public assets that we have remaining to the extent that we can extend a leasehold interest which has plenty of value and it's done in many cities when you know they have public lands or public you know assets they're able to negotiate long-term leasehold interests for applicants for developers that can develop those sites and yet there's a recurring return on that investment to the city and so that's something I'd like us to explore it's the 11th hour but then again we've been working with with Mr. Harrah for quite a while I know that we

took first action sometime in September of 2019 and it's been almost a year and you know we still see the building in blighted conditions I'm sure that there's probably fault on both sides not just the applicant but you know the city as well but I certainly hope that we could revisit this and I I am not prepared to support a purchase or a sale, excuse me, of this land. I would much rather negotiate some sort of long-term, long-term leasehold interest that both parties could agree to. And those are my comments. Thank you.

Thank you. Additional comments? Mr. Mayor. If not, I would entertain a motion.

Mr. Mayor, I'd like to move the item, but I do have some.

I'll be happy to second it. I think it's a good project we've been working on for decades. Go ahead. Council Member Solora, do you have a comment?

Yes, just briefly. Yeah, I agree, Mr. Mayor. As you know, this city's been working on this for, wow, 10, 14 years. And right now, we're the ones that have to maintain it. And it's a cost, and it's an entryway. And we have many issues in drug use and all kinds of problems. We also have the air sacral said nearby some schools nearby and so it really needs to maintain and be fixed up And we shouldn't tolerate having buildings like this Out like that so much we also learn from a very nearby property that these buildings can burn and these are gorgeous historic buildings

And we just lost one just you know literally like about a couple months ago So we don't want to lose this one and then I know we did receive a number of calls and emails I think a lot of folks don't know that this is a very old and historical building that for seismic another reason The the appraisal and the city was part of an appraisal for this. It has a significant negative value It starts at like negative five million dollars And we have put out bids before a number of times I think at least three formal times and this really still is the best offer that we have and so for that reason

and I support it, and I think it will get a lot of community benefit and use because our residents are looking for places for banquets and swimming pools and a lot of the other amenities, and it will bring in substantial TOT that will help pay for all the services that our community deserves. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Other comments?

I'd like to make a quick comment, Mr. Mayor. I too agree that this is a good deal for us. I appreciate Mr. Herrick coming down and staying the course on trying to get this property. It is about $5 million for retrofit, and then there's a few other million dollars between $8 and $13, I imagine, because of the asbestos problem that they have there. It's very, very expensive to fix that. And I remember when St. Joseph's tried to,

they went and looked at the property, and they were very interested, and we were hoping that they would continue, but they estimated about $13 million to clean up and to fix it just to get started. So just to go in there and clean that property is very, very tough, very, very expensive. I'm looking forward for Mr. Harrod to do something with the property. There is a timeline on it, and I'm looking forward for it to have some progress. Right now, it's very, very tough for the city of Santa Ana. We don't have that kind of money to put into that location, and then after, you know, you spend so many millions of dollars

just to get it right to then fix it, fix it up. and then you have to maintain it. So, you know, I want to thank Mr. Harrow for staying the course. And those are my comments, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you.

Any other comments? If not, I've got a comment. And I just want to say, I know Council Member Solario said maybe it's been, you know, 15 years. It was actually longer than that. When I first came onto the council, 34 years ago, Dan Young was working with Dave Ream and the Y and they were acquiring it. And it went through so many different efforts. We almost pulled it off at one point with UC Irvine and Rancho Central Community College District

where they're gonna do an idea institute, do multimedia and animation and all that. And we got close, but it didn't happen. And over the years, the building really has deteriorated. And I don't know that the value is only $5 million into the negative. I think it's going to take more than that just to get it seismically improved and up the code so you can go forward. And I believe with everything else that we're doing in the area, you look at the county across the street, you know that's improving you've got the streetcar coming in you know the high

school of the arts has done a wonderful job and and across the street you have the you know the old county courthouse which also is beautiful and then and then you've got you know the why where all you can get are stories from the old-timers telling you how these either play racquetball there or swim or use a the gymnasium. So I think it's time to move forward. I think this will be a good use and I'm ready to call for the question. So let's do a roll call vote, please, Madam Clerk.

Mayor Pulido, may I just make one quick?

Yes, Councillor Mendoza, go ahead, please.

Yes, I was just looking for my notes on this project. I wanted to let the public knowing that I realized is that they want something else done. They wanna a leasing, a long-term lease for the city. However, the first thing is that there is no bank in the world who is going to do a finance of a project in this magnitude in millions for a lease project. And also that it would take millions to retrofit the building

as my colleagues have mentioned to earthquake safety. And in addition, it's gonna take even more significant amount of millions to renovate the inside. And so one of the concerns that the public was talking talking to me about was that, that it's not going to be that the city needs housing, that the city needs jobs, that the city needs money. Well, this project and approving this project is gonna be precisely that. It's going to bring revenue to the city in sales tax,

in bed tax, and additionally, because we're gonna have a very fine boutique hotel here, we're gonna be taking tourism away from the Disneyland area. Tourists will be coming to stay here and it's gonna create more business for our downtown vendors. So it's going to generate revenue for them. And in addition, those sales tax taxes that would be coming in from this project will benefit our community because we can use that extra revenue for more services for our residents.

And the second very important thing is that the project is going to create incredible amount of jobs. So our community is going to be benefiting incredibly. We're going to have revenue and we're going to have permanent jobs where our hotel, our union, the lady who called earlier about the hotel service job, there's gonna be employment, permanent employment for these union workers. So we are going to benefit from the approval of this project. And it has been over 30 years.

So we cannot allow this opportunity to get away from us. And I think my colleagues and I agree that we are, when we vote and approve this project, we are voting with the best interest of our community Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

You're welcome. Thanks for the comments. Roll call vote, please.

And just for clarification, I have Council Member Solorio as motion and Mayor Potem-Villegas seconded.

No, I think I made the second.

Oh. Okay. Thank you, Mayor.

Council Member Becerra?

Yes.

Council Member Mendoza? Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

David PenalozaItem —

No.

Councilmember Soloria?

Yes.

Mayor Potem-Vegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries, set 6-1 with Councilmember Sarmiento dissenting.

item 25 next item madam clerk item 25e pulled by council member sarmiento

please go ahead council member yeah thank you mr mayor i think this is my last one i just had a clear a question on this i know that um it appears that um there was some additional fees and costs to this contract that were made to us. And I think it was a 23% increase for services and it was negotiated down to a 5.5% increase. So that's good negotiating on our part. My only question was, are any of these increases that we're going to have to now expend, are they going to lead to any rate changes

for parking services or any additional increase in citations to members of the public?

No, sir. None of those planned. It was just adding a year agreement onto the existing provider because they did a great job under their two-year contract. So it's giving them a third year.

And I just wanted to thank you for negotiating, again, good terms based upon what was initially requested. And it looks like the training that, or the cost that was incurred was for additional training and customer service, which includes contract resolution or conflict resolution. And really just working with some of our customers, not just residents here, but people that come and visit the city and have a good experience. I know that in the past we have had, and I have received some complaints empirically just from people who've been visiting the town, residents and people who work all over the place

who say that sometimes, you know, we're kind of quick on the trigger and, you know, some of these service employees or circle employees are a little bit, you know, uneasy and difficult to speak with. So I think the additional training will serve them well. So I'll go ahead and based upon that move the item.

Is there a second? Second.

Roll call vote, please.

Councilmember Becerra?

Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza?

Yes. Thank you. Councilmember Piñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Potem-Viegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Okay, motion carries 7-0.

We are on item 60. Was that it for consent? That's correct, Mayor. We are on item 60A.

All right. I would like to direct our attention to 60A. It's a business item. Any staff thoughts or presentation? If not, I'll bring it to council for consideration. Madam City Manager.

Certainly, Mayor. The item before you is just doing a first amendment to the COVID-19 response funding plan. This is the additional COVID dollars that we received as part of the emergency solutions grant fund. And there's two recommended actions. I'm sorry. It's actually three recommended actions before you to amend the response funding plan for the allocation and administration of the federal and state funding by adding $11.5 million emergency solution grant dedicated coronavirus funds and directing the city attorney to finalize and authorize the city manager to enter into negotiations

and execute the agreements with the service providers and the subrecipients who will implement the COVID-19 response funding plan. And the third item is doing the necessary appropriation adjustment. We can provide more information if need be, but that's the item before you.

Move the item, Mr. Mayor. Madam City Manager, would we be bringing back other items as more money comes in?

Certainly, I hope we receive more money and we can come back before you to add additional items.

Right, but isn't it, I mean, this part of the $28 million or?

No, sir, this is other money. So this is a spending plan that you adopted a few months ago. With some of the existing state and federal grants that we received, they provided additional dollars relative to COVID-19. Got it.

And you're cobbling that together separate from the 28th. That's what I want to know. Thank you. Councilman Peñaloso?

I have no comments, no. I thought you had a question. Anybody had a question? I thought I interrupted somebody who was trying to speak.

I move the item, Mr. Mayor. Councilman Salorio moved the item. Thank you.

Is there a second?

Second. I'll second. Peñalosa second.

Any questions?

If not, roll call vote, please.

Council Member Becerra?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Council Member Mendoza? Yes. Council Member Peñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Council Member Sarmiento?

Yes.

Council Member Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Potembeas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes. Motion carries 7-0. So now I'm going to direct our attention to item 60B. Is there any presentation or should I just bring to council Madam City Manager?

Certainly, Mayor. The item is the first reading of an ordinance which amends our Santa Ana Municipal Code and it's all sections that are relative to certain boards and commissions. A large amount of the changes are cleanup that was left over after the 2018 charter modernization initiative that was approved by the voters. There is a very robust staff report that has a table that contains information on all of the changes. The more substantive changes deal with the ETAC commission and the youth commission. So we do have the director of public works and the director of parks and rec if you have any detailed questions.

Move the item. Councilor Mackins, do you have any questions?

David PenalozaItem —

Yeah, Mr. Mayor, this is Councilman Peñaloza. I just want to ask the city manager if the substantial changes could be described, presented, please.

Certainly.

So on the Youth Commission, it is actually changing the makeup of the individuals that serve it. It is eliminating the alternates and removing the alternates and the associate members and just having the seven youth commissioners and then adding the requirement that they actually are youth that are attending a school in Santa Ana in the seventh to twelfth grade. And the ETAC, I may have to defer to the director of public works, I believe it's modifying the actual title of the ETAC and taking out some of the requirements to have them incorporated in bylaws as opposed to the municipal code. Did I forget anything, Director Nabil?

We are limiting the term for those elected by the Chamber of Commerce and the Hispanic Chambers to four-year maximum term, and changing the name of the commission from ETAC being the Environmental and Transportation Advisory Committee to Environmental and Transportation

David PenalozaItem —

advisory commission. Thank you, Mr. Saba. Sure. And I was wanted I just wanted to be mindful of when we're writing these staff reports that we're careful to not include sentences that could just be you know grabbed by a member of the public or member of the community or screenshot I mean the first one of the first couple line says the voters approve certain sections regarding the personnel board parks and recreation with the intent that these sections would be relocated to the uh santa and municipal code

David PenalozaItem —

where the bulk of the provisions regarding the city's boarding commissions were already located but right above that it says the voters approved removing certain sections regarding the personnel board and parks and rec board and planning commission that i got some text messages earlier the day from residents saying are they removing the personnel board and the plant and the planning commission like are they are we and and i you know i always feel word time hey read the entire staff report it's in there but um it's uh just be mindful moving forward of staff reports not just in this

David PenalozaItem —

department but across every city department um when we're writing these and making sure that they're clear and and and simple for someone understand but thank you with that I'll make a moat I think there was a motion I'll second all right roll call

vote please councilmember Becerra yes councilmember Mendoza yeah council Councilmember Peñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tem Vegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries 7-0.

So now we're on a public hearing 75A. this assigned place for a public hearing to adopt a resolution amending Chapter A, Article 10 of the San Amnestyles Code. And what I'm going to do now is open up the public hearing and ask the clerk if there are any written communications or does anybody want to speak on this item?

Thank you, Mayor and Council. I do have emails that we received. we had one in support from preserve Orange County for 75 a and that is all I have by email and then we do have some on the call list let me look and see which ones are for 75 a it doesn't look like we have any for 75 a the number of

them we have is for 75 B and C. Is there a staff presentation? If not, I'll close a public hearing.

But is there a staff presentation? Yes, Mayor, we do have a brief presentation if you would like. Go ahead, please. Go ahead. Director of Planning, Min Tai.

Thank you, Mayor and members of the City Council. This ordinance is being proposed in front of you tonight for first reading and the ordinance is a as a result of the leadership of the City Council back in May when we had an incident regarding the destruction and the loss of a historical building that stood vacant for many years and that building was actually mentioned earlier today is a church on Santa and Bush the City Council based on that incident and the

concerns of the residents about protecting vacant buildings in the city as well historical buildings direct the staff to come back with an ordinance that helped protect and require the maintenance of those properties currently we have about 175 properties that are vacant in the city, some without proper security, and oftentimes those lead to vandalism, arson, and potential destruction. The recommendation that we have in front of you tonight is for the City Council to consider

a registration program that is based on our current registration program that was adopted by the City Council back in 2017. The proposed Dress Distration Program will provide for additional tools for the city to enforce and hold vacant property owners responsible for maintaining and securing their properties, provide the city with the required posting bonds, and also requiring property owners for additional private security as necessary.

The proposed change is adding the program to an existing program that is being addressed through abandoned vacant properties. The current fee on the program is $513, and what that does is that it covers the cost of registration as well as the cost for initial inspections. As part of this ordinance, we're looking at increasing our inspection regiment to at least once a month.

And based on our estimate, we're looking at an additional cost of approximately $800 in order for the city to recover the cost of the inspection. So overall, we anticipate that the registration fee, if approved by the council tonight, could be anywhere between $1,300 to $1,500 annually. and that would cover the cost of the registration program and the cost of the inspection. If approved tonight, we will prepare a few resolutions for the City Council to adopt at the time of the second reading.

This is an example of vacant property that is while currently under construction process, but it sat vacant for many years. Through the work of code enforcement, we're able to require a security guard for this building and I believe it's currently under remodeling for a potential new use. But this is a historical building that, if this ordinance is passed, would be protecting. Here it also will be protecting vacant lots. This is also an issue that we have. While these vacant lots do not have actual structures on them, they could still be a nuisance.

And this ordinance would help the city staff to provide and have proactive enforcement. And here's an extreme situation, and this is not something that we'd like to see, but we saw in May what happened to a building that basically was destroyed because of the lack of proper maintenance. So with that concludes my staff report, and we recommend that you conduct your first reading of this ordinance.

Thank you. Thank you. So with that, let me go ahead and close the public hearing and bring the council for questions or consideration.

Mr. Mayor.

Yes, councilor Becerra, go ahead.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to thank Min and Sonia for their work on this ordinance. And after the loss of the 107 year old United Presbyterian Church over there on Bush and Santa Ana Boulevard, it was important for us to take action. And we've let vacant properties in our city become neglected. They end up devolving into nuisances. And many of these properties that are vacant are owned by folks that don't even live in our city. These owners probably don't even care what condition that these properties end up in. So I want to thank my colleagues for supporting the action, you know, a couple months ago to have

staff work on this and bring this to us so overall I really think that this ordinance is great it provides staff with the tools that they need to make sure that these properties are better secured and maintained and with that I would like to move the recommended action but I'd like to ask to make changes to two sections section 8-1987 b I would like to change the last sentence to to have the words on site. So it would say the provision of onsite security guard services, because unfortunately a lot of times we have just some security guards that just do drive-bys, but they're not stationed onsite.

And I think some of our properties need that. And then section 8-1987F, I would like the section to read, the local property management company shall inspect the property on a weekly basis or more frequently to determine if the property is in compliance with the requirements of this division. If it is determined that the property is not in compliance, it is the company's responsibility to bring the property into compliance. And I want to strike the words the property management company because I don't think it's up to the property management company to tell the city whether they're in compliance or not. We'll let them know.

David PenalozaItem —

I'll second. This is Councilman Penaloza with those added changes. And were you done with your comments, Councilmember Becerra?

I am, yes.

David PenalozaItem —

Okay.

Go ahead, Gals Peña-Lota, go ahead.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you, sir. I just wanted to also thank Min and the City Attorney's Office for the work on this ordinance. It's something that's needed in our city. but I want to also be mindful to you know one of one of the the bullet points in this in the presentation was that code enforcement surveyed surveyed found an approximately 175 properties that have been abandoned they're allowed to remain vacant I want to remind our my colleagues that we took a lot of action

David PenalozaItem —

in closed session as a result of the work of code enforcement staff and the city attorney's office and we're doing a lot for code enforcement, using code enforcement resources and I want to put it out to that. We'll eventually have to look at our code enforcement department and see how we can increase it with more code enforcement officers because of all the work that we're trying to address and tackle. one of the things that I you know wanted to point out as well is that and I wanted to ask this Madam City Manager you know we're saying that with this

David PenalozaItem —

you know city staff will be able to enforce and hold property owners of vacant properties responsible and accountable using code enforcement PD whatever it takes but this ordinance is great it's fantastic but are we going to to enforce it. I mean there's a lot of ordinances that we've passed in the last year and a half two years that are great, but I don't see any enforcement behind it. Just off the top of my head, I'm thinking RV overnight ordinances. We passed it with teeth, aggressive, but I see RVs

David PenalozaItem —

camping overnight in every neighborhood of the city and it's something that we I hear from the community that we pass and do all these things, but there's never any visible effort to enforce our laws and address the issue at hand. I just wanted to make that note so that we're mindful when we're doing these things that it's not just voting and approving something and filing it away. it's we got to follow up follow through and enforce these laws that we constantly are are approving and just wanted to make sure we're all clear of

David PenalozaItem —

that madam city manager executive director of mint I code enforcement city attorney's office these things are important and those aren't my comments for this item but thank you for this this is great and I hope we were able to address the numerous vacant properties throughout the city because

there's a lot of it thank you councilman and thank you for mentioning that as part of your authorization tonight you'll be authorizing us to work with our current contractor on enforcement of the abandoned property to also help us with the tracking and monitoring of the vacant properties

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

so that will be something that's going to be done and if I may may or I just make one comment yeah go ahead and looking at the pictures that are in the staff report particularly the vacant structure picture in which clearly a property has been burned out. These are exactly the kind of properties which are key for receivership actions and I've informed my staff that if we cannot handle all hundred plus properties ourselves that I'd like to get a plan of action from them and see if we might not get creative in using outside attorneys. We recover every penny in receivership actions.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Sometimes this is just a matter of us fronting the money and so it's a great investment. So I've asked them for a plan I'd like to take at least 25 of these as soon as we possibly can because receivership actions can move quite quickly when they look like this one there's just no excuse for having a property in that

David PenalozaItem —

condition in our city that that that's something that that I'd be comfortable with madam city attorney one of the properties that I could think off the top of my head is that old boxing gym off fourth and Garfield there's one resident he reminds me of mr. Fedrickson from the movie up one little old man in between all this industrial area he constantly reaches out to me and and this property has caught on fire and he called fire department so they could come put it out and then afterwards because it's been vacant for so many years and the nuisance it causes to his neighborhood he finally told me you know

David PenalozaItem —

I wish I would have just let it burn because it would have been better off than the nuisance that it's causing here and it's sitting there vacant boarded up half burnt and it's we see this throughout so thank you I mean I'd be

supportive of that. Mr. Mayor. Thank you. Other comments? Council members. Mr. Mayor, this is Council

Member Solor. I have a comment and a question. I think this program is great. I've been an advocate of programs like this for some time. My overall concern that I have is unless if we really fix the financing side of this, all we're doing is adding another what they call up in Sacramento unfunded life unfunded mandate to code enforcement and the city attorney's office to make this a priority do all this work and they get no money for staffing and I know in the pro in the past and I think we did this maybe when

we were on the council I think councilman VH you and I got back I think we started saying that for the fee revenue to go into code enforcement and the city attorney's office and we passed it with those conditions and the fund never got created the money never moved and that has to stop you know when we do stuff like this these are hard votes that are our obligations it is extra work for our staff and if we don't fund our employees in our departments we just create more work and stress and again the resources are there I mean we're even hearing there's extra resources if we are organized about this so that's a general

comment but my comment is and maybe this is something that when it comes back now that there's a little bit of direction when it comes back if there can be a little bit discussion about where the revenue would go and you know ideally that some of it go to code enforcement and city attorney's office at a minimum but i'd like to see how we kind of institutionalize these things when we take actions like that the people preparing our budgets our staffing everybody they remember because I see these like legal commitments. You know, we're increasing fees on property owners, rate payers, other things in exchange for services

and we then got to staff it and fund it appropriately. It's the same with parking enforcement and control. You know, that service largely pays for itself and I get constant complaints that we aren't doing enough enforcement in some areas and we've got to make the same old calls when you know we're not institutionalizing it and some of these situations actually can be revenue generating on the whole but if we don't do them well they end up just being draining mentally and financially to all the above so hopefully in some direction

you can think about thank you council members so long for bringing that up and we are increasing the fee to help cover the cost of the program and we are depositing those funds into the foreclosure abandoned and vacant property registration program so we are segregating them so they go right back

into the program okay but let's again even another step that I've seen sometimes we create funds like a youth fund or we create other funds to do things and then we don't authorize the staff to actually hire the employees or to spend the money in that fund so I'm just saying we got to be a little bit but more diligent so that we put staffing out there to support these programs. I agree. Thank you.

So Mr. Mayor.

All right, any additional comments?

Yeah, Mr. Mayor.

Yes, Councilor Sarmiento, go ahead.

Yeah, thank you. So Mr. Tai, I think we've had this conversation before and I know that when we had this exchange when this was brought up as an 85 item. And it was to talk about, you know, this whole idea of an absentee owner or maybe a property owner that abandons his or her property. So that is a term of art that basically describes somebody who has let their property go uninhabitable and turned it into an attractive nuisance and basically a dangerous condition.

Now there's a difference, I think, to distinguish between somebody who is trying to diligently pursue permitting and improvements on their property and somebody who's just completely ignored and neglected their responsibility as a property owner. So where in this section do you refer to the distinguishing of somebody who's actively pursuing permitting and somebody who's just completely abandoned it? And my worry is this, is that we may be punitive or overly onerous on somebody who's trying to pursue permitting and improvements for their property,

but because of the delays caused on behalf of city staff, or maybe consultants that city staff has hired, has caused that property to sit vacant. So if anything, if something happens while that property is dormant, vacant or abandoned, and they're trying to process applications for a demo permit, you know, mechanical engineering or any other sort of building permit. And we're part and we're causing that delay. Look, I can see an action being brought against the city. So, you know, where is that distinction? Because I think what we have to do, and Sonia said it well, there's a lot of properties out there

that are in, you know, that are right for this type of action, this type of receivership action. But we also have to distinguish which between those that aren't pursuing improvement and rehabilitation of those properties and those that have just been out of contact with us and just basically said they're no longer interested. So can you refer me to that part of the municipal code section? I was looking for it and I just couldn't find it. So councilman, at its most basic element, this proposed ordinance is a registration ordinance.

What it does is that it requires a property when it becomes vacant and has no occupancy that there is a restoration required so that the city can work with property owner to provide information and share the requirements of the city about maintenance, security, ongoing, you know, looking at ongoing maintenance of the landscaping of the building and ensuring that it's secure and safe. So for the 90% of property owners who are responsible and are actively working to get a development in place,

it's simply a registration program. The ordinance where it goes further is that for those property owners that, as you mentioned, are, you know, to put it in layman term, it's bad actors, those are the ones that the city, when we are unable to solicit compliance, when we're unable to solicit voluntary maintenance, that's when this ordinance will allow the city to take the requirements and make them enforceable, whereas currently today we don't have a proactive requirement and we have to react to a nuisance situation before we can enforce.

this ordinance allows the city to take action should a property owner fails to maintain their property it doesn't penalize property owners for a well maintained property that is vacant or is in process of development okay so you'll be able to add in this registration be able to separate or segregate between those that are actively pursuing permitting with you and those that have completely just fallen out of contact with you and just let their properties be um uh you know grow uh vacant dormant and and become dangerous conditions correct so the test for that is the

registration as i mentioned as the the benchmark of notifying the city when a property becomes a nuisance it's through observation of the city where the property owner has allowed the maintenance of the property to not be maintained per city standards such as allowing grass to grow and and you know not properly maintaining security and fencing so those are violations yeah i i get that um uh where you know the registration is sort of the threshold i guess i'm saying going beyond that so let's just say property owners that can register their property and say okay here you were part of your now list of properties

that are abandoned or are vacant right now. But even that's a difference. There's even a difference there between those property owners and those that are actively seeking permitting. I guess that's what I'm trying to distinguish because look, we can obligate everybody to register, even those property owners that have abandoned properties that aren't pursuing or actively pursuing any permitting. So I guess, you know, some properties become dormant because property owners allow them to. They're sort of a volitional decision to like not do anything with them. And I think somebody described out-of-state owners

or, you know, even out-of-country owners and they could care less. They pay their fees and they, you know, keep them vacant. And others that are vacant because they can't get their permits approved. So do you see what I'm saying? Those that are being delayed in making improvements to their property because the approvals from city staff are causing that delay. That's where I guess I'm trying to make sure that we're not punitive on those that are actively pursuing and those that have completely ignored that and just let their properties go without any sort of improvement efforts.

Understood.

So you'll be able to distinguish that with your registration program? We have the mechanism in there to make that distinction because really the issue becomes a property maintenance. You can still have a developer that is going through the city's process. And I think, you know, in looking at the history of development that we have, oftentimes developers are responsible for their property maintenance, but we do have certain cases that properties are not maintained and they're led to become a nuisance issue and it becomes an enforcement issue. and that's when this tool becomes effective.

As I want to reiterate, this is not a punitive ordinance where it places the burden on the owner to provide the security and the city only takes action when it becomes a nuisance. So as a development project, we won't simply go out and tell them that you need to do a certain thing because you're vacant. we would enforce if the property becomes out of maintenance. So property maintenance...

That's why I'm making it. The distinction is that it doesn't become a situation of enforcement until the property is in the conditions that becomes a maintenance issue, that becomes a nuisance issue. It's left for trespassing. the property owner is not actively maintaining the property. So the pursuing of a development of the property or the pursuing of ongoing leasing doesn't really cause the ordinance to have a punitive impact. All it does is that it requires registration.

Well, you know what? Maybe take a look at adding an independent recital or an independent section in the recital. that maybe clarifies that just because it seems like it's a broad brush that we're you know we're impacting folks by and i think you want to be you know you want to use your resources smartly especially you know because they are limited to making sure you're going after those that are you know um you know again being intentionally um unwilling to to you know cure some of the problems that they've had but with that i appreciate the effort thank you mr time thank

Thank you. And we can certainly work on that with the city attorney's office for the second reading.

Thanks.

Thank you for that. Additional questions, council members?

Seeing none, I believe it's a public hearing, so it's now closed. I believe we have a motion, correct, Madam Clerk?

Yes, we have a motion and a second. Council member Becerra.

So roll call vote?

And Councilmember Peñalosa second. Councilmember Becerra?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza? Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Potembegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries 7-0.

Now let's go on to the next item. I believe that is 75B. This is otherwise known as the WHO. What I'd like to do is open up the public hearing.

and before we do anything else, if we have any speakers, let's listen to them. Then I'd like to continue the public hearing. Oh, not continue it, but stay in the public hearing and go to staff presentation and then close it and come to the council. So with that, do we have any speakers, Madam City Clerk?

Yes, we do.

Caller with the last three numbers, 451. Please dial star six to unmute yourself and you may proceed to comment.

Caller with the last three numbers, 451, please dial. Hi, can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you now.

Hi, good evening, Mayor and members of the council. My name is Isuri Ramos. Today I'm speaking as a Santana resident and former chairwoman of the community redevelopment and housing commission. And I say this because I understand the housing opportunity ordinance and how valuable the inclusionary housing funds that the NUPI generates are to increasing the supply of affordable housing and providing housing assistance. This is why I am opposed to the proposed amendments to the housing opportunity ordinance. There's strong opposition to the amendments that would lower the in-luffy that would allow

for housing monies to be used for public safety programs and the removal of cooperative housing programs as an eligible use for these dollars. And there is strong opposition. So when this was considered by the planning commission, there were over 90 letters of opposition submitted. Today you are received various emails. I know that your inbox was filled at one point and couldn't receive anymore. And I want to name a few of the organizations that submitted letters of opposition to you today.

So those who are Chief Spot, Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice, Community Action Partnership, Orange County, Community Legal Aid, Southern California, Cooperación Santana, Crece, El Centro Cultural de México, Latino Health Access, Madison Park Neighborhood Association, Green, multi-ethnic collaborative for community agencies, National Alliance on Mental Illness, Orange County, New Song Church, Public Law Center, Resilience Orange County, Rise Up Willoway Coalition, Santa Ana Active Streets, Santa Ana Building Healthy Communities, Santa Ana United Methodist Church, St. Joseph Hospital, Sullivan and Acción,

Tayer San Jose Hope Builders, The Cambodian Family, The Kennedy Commission, Thrive Santana CLT, the community land trust, you're not here local 11, United way and the scenario Lacey and action. These are 27 organizations that work with Santa Ana residents and serve Santa Ana residents that are opposed to these amendments. There were also over a hundred emails received that you received by residents that are also in opposition to these amendments. And I say this because it's important that you all understand where the community is on this issue. So we are in strong opposition. And right now during a pandemic

is really the worst possible time for you all to consider lowering this in loose fees. I would then mean that the city will have less money to work with. So I really want you all to contemplate this, especially as we're unaware of how long this pandemic will last and what that'll mean for the city fiscally as we move forward. So thank you.

thank you caller with the last three numbers five zero zero please dial star six to unmute yourself and then proceed with your comment

hi good evening council members and everyone that's still on the call my name is jesse lopez i want to say that our housing opportunity ordinance is a good thing it allows us to have have the opportunity at affordable housing that meets our unique needs. However, we have people at the diet that prioritize developers over the people they were elected to represent. Why are the concerns of developers being prioritized over the needs of our families? Real estate developers are bottom line oriented. They care about profits, not about the wellbeing of our communities or the character of our neighborhood.

The who shouldn't be a controversial policy and it shouldn't be weakened to favor political donors. And to see who funds your current representative, this is a Santa Ana City election website. And even if you don't care about affordable housing or curbing homelessness or making sure families stay together, you should be concerned about the power and leniency developers will obtain if these amendments are passed. And overdevelopment impacts us all. Our traffic, our parking, our air, how much longer you will have to wait on the red light to make the left turn. So why are council members motivated to weaken the current mandate?

This was not a good plan. And again, the removal of these policies leaves behind our workforce and low income households. I think it's great that we have met our regional numbers, but the need doesn't magically go away because those numbers have been met. The creation of housing at all income levels is vital to our recovery and creating new affordable housing needs to continue to be a top housing priority in Santa Ana. keep the in-lu fee at $15, do not lower it, allow affordable housing money to be used for cooperative housing programs and prohibit funding public safety programs with affordable housing money.

I urge you to vote against the proposed amendments to the housing opportunity ordinance. The proposed amendments are not consistent with the intent of the ordinance and do not advance the goals. Thank you, have a good night.

Thank you. Caller with the last three numbers.

Manny Escamilla, you have been unmuted. Please dial star six to unmute yourself.

Thank you.

Hello again. This is Manny. I just wanted to confirm that my audio was working this time around.

It is. Thank you.

Okay. Okay, perfect. Well, thank you all very much, mayor and council. You know, apologies for earlier with the bad phone quality, but we're all working through this pandemic. And as, you know, we kind of decide what the future of the city looks like. You know, we have an issue here before you that is kind of at the intersection of a lot of different concerns, right? We have about a, what is it? 20% of the folks here locally that are at the cusp being evicted from their homes, not being able to make the rent for next month. People that have, you know, over the last 10 to 20 years

been systematically squeezed and have moved over to the Inland Empire, you know, other parts of California, moving over to Texas and really under the idea or under the main issue that housing has now become unaffordable in the city of Indiana. You know, the opportunities that were present for you myself and an entire generation of people that came to Santa Ana that had the opportunity to buy a home, to raise a family in the community that had its struggles, but at the same time was welcoming in that it was affordable. This is basically the kind of social justice question of our time is whether or not working class people

are able to live in coastal California. And the who's not perfect by any stretch of the imagination. I don't quite honestly think it goes far enough as it's written currently. But what we're doing here is starting to weaken the idea that everybody deserves an affordable shot at housing, that working class people are deserving of living in great communities, that they are in fact the ones that built these communities. And the removal of requiring any form of affordable housing is essentially kind of what's on the table right now. So, you know, the way that we have this written, you know, very much in the urban planning speakers,

we're striking section 41-1902B, which would basically be the sections that maybe applied to the transit zoning code, Metro East and maybe the Harbor specific plan, along with section 41-902B4, sorry, it's B2 and B4, which would probably mostly apply to the transit code overlay zone. So, you know, what essentially it is, is that all of our current plans will not require any sort of affordable housing. So if it's the view of this council and the mayor that basically the main place project with its thousands of units coming in should not contribute any money at all to our affordable housing pipeline,

either in the form of in lieu fees or in the form of onsite inclusionary housing, that is, you're right. You were elected by the people of Santa Ana, but again, you were elected by the people of Santa Ana. And if that's your prerogative and your choice and how you wish to see the development future of the city occur, that's entirely your choice. But then you also have to be able to publicly defend that decision and not skirt around the issue at hand. So we are in a pandemic and we want to encourage construction, but I think that there's other ways in completely dismantling the one imperfect,

but at least the one way that we've been starting to contribute to affordable housing construction in the city and with that I yield the rest of my time

thank you and then the next number the last three number 252 if you could please dial star six to unmute yourself and you may begin speaking hello good

Good evening Mayor Polillo, City Council members. My name is Christopher Forden. I'm the project director of Santa Ana Active Streets and I'm calling on all of you to pose this agenda item. As a transportation and active transportation advocacy organization, mobility concerns don't just end on the street. We know the way people move is also defined in how we use our land and the kind of housing we want to build. We also know that our active transportation infrastructure investments were designed and planned for our current residents not you know

residents that are out there in the future the ones we have today and the ho is one of those policies that serves our residents who repeatedly tell us of their fear of struggling to pay rent of being priced out of the community when we're getting the kind of pedestrian bicycle infrastructure that we're getting into our city now which is wonderful for our community we want to make sure that our residents also continue to be able to use that infrastructure that was designed for them and actually take care of those kind of fears that they have around housing instability. And

HO does provide that benefit of that affordable housing. So as working families continue to face economic uncertainty during COVID, it's really crucial for us to preserve the housing opportunity ordinance. It's a vital funding source for creating new affordable housing, which is essential for all income levels and also good for our active transportation infrastructure.

So the proposed amendments further incentivize housing units with market, so these amendments that we're actually considering today, they further incentivize housing units with market rents and are not affordable to the majority of the city residents. The proposed amendments do not address the city's needs and create further inequity for the city's residents with the greatest housing need. As such, our organization opposes the following amendments to the Housing Opportunity Ordinance and Affordable Housing Funds Policies and Procedures. We are due to vote against these proposed amendments to the HOO and, yeah, vote against it.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Caller with the last three numbers, 614.

Caller with the last three numbers 614 please dial star six to unmute yourself to speak. Thank you.

Okay. So I oppose, this is Melissa of Comeran. I oppose 75B. The logic behind this item is not built on the lived experience of residents. We need more affordable housing. By decreasing the fee that will intensify the constructors to build affordable housing opposes the very reason why we need the fee. This may incentivize people to get the building permit, right, just to build up, just to build the building. However, this will not have full pressure to build the affordable housing needed. The physical impact shows that by reducing the end of the fee by two thirds, 6.6 million will be lost. Then by applying the $15 fee

for the inclusionary housing fund. Section one, eight states that Santa Ana has a deficit in needing housing, that there's a general in supplying these housing needs. The difficulty lies in the lack of urgency to be experienced within the state, local, and federal government with the meeting of housing for people of color and low-income people. We know that production of affordable housing is capable. One just need to learn about the de-ditor-set immigration that occurred during the late 19th century and throughout the 20th century to know that affordable housing is possible. Another incentive you all will be voting on

and taking out is the density bonus. I have been doing some research and I found out that the density bonus is a state mandate. if developers meet the requirements that are entitled to the bonus. Before I would be taking out, take away an incentive that would entice developers to create more affordable housing, contradicts the mission of this committee and the council. In regards to using the exclusionary housing fund to pay for one-time programs, especially for the ambiguous wording like quality of life and safety issues, I find very concerning.

With measure X, we had the same ambiguous wording and the majority of the funds went to SAPD. As the council wants to use the funds for this program, there needs to be worrying that, worrying within these amendments, that there won't be any funds will be going to law enforcement or any affiliation with the law enforcement. As we've been converting non-residential property into multi-family rental units. This I assume also includes industrial property. I want to make sure when the construction of these houses are taking place, they are not in poor neighborhoods or overly populated neighborhoods

because this will also exacerbate the needs of the people already living in these areas. Affordable housing should be near market, transit, jobs and schools and open space. We need to build these affordable housing areas like the urban neighborhoods that we do have in Santa Ana like the at the station. We can make sure that these housing are inside in communities, not industrialized areas, nor with areas with high concentration of pollutants. We need to also incentivize more tenants to accept section Vouchers. As I emailed you guys previously, the opportunity gap is widening Santa Ana because we're not

setting the needs of the people. We just need to look at our urban to see the disparities in Santa Ana. Urban has the most affordable housing in Orange County as well as the most open space. And in Santa Ana, we are in critical need of affordable housing and only 4% of the land in Santa Ana is open space. As I said earlier today, invest in community. Your time is up. If not, don't blame the people most oppressed and marginalized when they are instead of equal to the side you expect as you stay on the comfortable seat of privilege. Thank you.

Thank you. The last three numbers, 403, please dial star six to unmute your phone, and you may proceed to speak.

Buenas noches.

Hello, can you hear me?

Hello?

Can you hear me?

Yes, hi. Yes, I can hear you now.

Okay. Thank you.

You may proceed to speak. Hello?

Hello, can you hear me?

Yes, you may proceed to speak.

All right. Buenas noches. My name is Albert Colar Delgado. I've been a lifelong resident of Santana. I'm fortunate to own a home in our city, but I know that many members do not have that privilege. My comment tonight is to urge the council to not make any changes to the housing opportunity ordinance. Please put our community over profits of developers. If developers can't support our community and only prioritize profits, we shouldn't welcome their business. Let's look out for our community and please vote against 75B. Thank you.

Thank you, caller. With the last three numbers, 313, please dial star six to unmute your call.

Hello, do you hear me? Yes, we can hear you.

Hi, I just wanted to say to vote against 75B. I'm actually, my name is Tommy. I'm from Ward 1, and I believe that there should be affordable housing all over Orange County, including the city of Santa Ana. A lot of marginalized communities are going to be attacked, especially now that we're in the pandemic.

EDD is starting to unqualify people for their weekly checks, and that is going to affect us by far.

Basically, the homeless population is going to become really, really bad. and we're gonna need more housing opportunities than ever. I speak this from experience and for my friend's experience that if this were to change the opportunities for those who are at most risk is going to be worse than before. And Orange County is already known for having one of the highest cases for sadly for COVID-19. If none of us has a shelter in place,

there's no way that we can have a defense against something as difficult as this pandemic and the death toll will only become higher. As someone whose family has been actually immediately affected by a death of a family member because of COVID, it is up to our council members to choose what's best for us, our lives are in your hands and if this ends up affecting any of the wards I can only say that there will be an uprising against that just like how there was an uprising in Santa Ana

the first couple days of injustices thank you very much

thank you caller caller with the last three numbers three six one please dial star six to unmute yourself and proceed to speak.

Hi, this is John Hanna. I reside in the city of Orange but lived in Santa Ana for 35 years. Tonight I'm representing the Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters and our members who reside in Santa Ana. While we support having a required in Luffy that can be utilized for the construction or refurbishing of affordable housing, some believe the current amount may discourage some developers from coming to Santa Ana to build, reducing the amount in the fund. And I would note that there's one thing that I see that sometimes developers and affordable housing advocates have in common. None of them are working to try to ensure

that the actual workforce, the people who build the buildings are being paid a livable wage. So while we appreciate and support the planning commission's language that anyone benefiting from a reduction in the fee must use a skilled and trained workforce.

In an effort to compromise, because some of the council have some difficulty in wanting to do that, the carpenters would support retaining the staff aspirational language, encouraging but not mandating a Santa Ana-focused, skilled, and trained workforce for non-entitled projects for a short one- or two-year period, simply to assess the results of lowering the fee, its impact on the affordable housing fund, and whether developers paid any attention to the council's request to prioritize hiring skilled and trained workers from Santa Ana or its school systems.

However, for the four projects that are entitled, have more than 20 units, have not had a lower rate already negotiated, or are not requesting a reduction and will have a skilled and trained workforce, we urge the council to adopt the Planning Commission's unanimous recommendation that the skilled and trained workforce language should be mandatory. These four stipulated to pay the $15 a foot fee and needed no incentive to come to Santa Ana. Reducing the fee, whether to $10 or $5, without some additional community benefit, would be tantamount to a gift of public funds.

If the fee is reduced to $5, it means a $10 million total benefit for these four developers. Christmas in August. If they want the fee lowered to $5 a square foot, they should be required to use a skilled and trained workforce with a priority for hiring Santa Ana residents or graduates and certificate holders from the Santa Ana and Garden Grove Unified School Districts and the Rancho Santiago Community College Districts. A skilled and trained workforce is not a PLA as some have claimed. A skilled and trained workforce does not have to be union. They do need to hire apprentices

from state certified programs or journeymen who have certificates. There are non-union state certified programs right here in Orange County. The scare tactics and wildly inflated claims are not relevant to the proposal before you tonight. They will pay more, maybe 10 to 15 percent more, but you're giving them a windfall to help pay this and your constituents will benefit as well as Santa Ana Business. Most of you on this council have told me you support what I'm asking. This is exactly the right time to take a very small but significant step toward that goal.

At no other time will you have money to ease the transition into a skilled and trained Santa Ana workforce. If not now, when? This is an opportunity to do the right thing while using a very big spoonful to make the medicine go down. Please support ensuring that this is just a temporary reduction while you study and that make sure that a skilled and trained workforce is a priority. And for those people who have their entitlements, those four companies who haven't otherwise qualified, they should be required to have a skilled and trained workforce. And thank you very much.

Thank you. The last three numbers, 053, please dial star six to unmute your phone. And then you may proceed.

Call her with the last three numbers, 053, please dial star six to unmute your phone and proceed to speak.

caller with the last three numbers 281 please dial star six and you may proceed to speak

hi good evening can you hear me yes we could hear you okay good a good evening mr. mayor and honorable members of the City Council my name is the coach Anna Baron-Nicholson and the directing and attorney for the Affordable Housing and Homelessness Prevention Unit at Public Law Center. Thank you for the opportunity to speak related to Stoning Ordinance Amendment Number 2020-03. We speak in opposition of this ordinance. I join in solidarity with the many speakers that have asked this council to ensure that the residents of the city of Santa Ana receive the ability to obtain

affordable housing opportunity, especially in the midst of a global pandemic. We defer to the balance of our comments in our submitted letter from this afternoon, but we focus on the major points that this is a long time to amend the WHO. We're concerned about the inconsistencies presented with the housing element program and the desire to amend the WHO, which we believe would throw it into inconsistency with the housing element program 29 specifically and resulting in a constructive elimination of the housing opportunity ordinance. Furthermore, we believe that the amendment

to the housing opportunity ordinance would undermine the goal of the city accomplished goal number two within its housing element to provide diversified choice and opportunity for all individuals in the city, regardless of their stature and life and income and income and further and finally,

the ordinance inexplicably seeks to remove the cooperative housing program from the affordable housing opportunities, policies and procedures. And for those reasons, we oppose the desire of the city to amend the WHO and we would stand up, stand in solidarity with our colleagues to recommend the city not amend the who at this time. Thank you.

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Good evening Mr. Mayor and members of the council. the title for test executive director at Chispa. And I am calling to oppose the proposed amendment to the housing opportunity ordinance. I think a lot of the previous speakers have really, you know, have really had a lot of the points about why this is the wrong step to take for the city, not just right now, but really like at any time. We know that Panayana is and has been facing an affordable housing crisis.

We know that as we've seen multiple development projects go up over the last couple of years, the number of affordable housing units even included within them has been very minimal. It has been insufficient. And so to make amendments to the ordinance tonight, to lower the in-loop fees, to lower, you know, like some of the very, like some of like the few, one of like the few funding streams that the city has for affordable housing, you know,

it's taking us in completely the wrong direction. And so I would urge you to vote against these amendments tonight and maintain the housing opportunity ordinance after this and actually look to strengthening it and to expanding it. Thank you.

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Hi, can you hear me?

Yes, we can hear you.

Thank you. Good evening. This is Carla Juarez, long-time resident of Santana. I am calling in regards to the item 75B. and I'm calling in opposition.

Now, development, affordable housing is not really affordable housing for your residents in Santa Ana. This is something that we've told all y'all multiple times. It's to give you an example, the Metro East Senior Park, which is an affordable housing, is providing a studio for seniors that start off at 1,148. This is affordable housing and it's a senior, meaning that they should, they have a fixed income. For a studio, 1,148 is out of their budget.

For a one bedroom, it's 1,256. So if you will put yourself in their position and say fixed income, and you actually have to make more than that, Most of the time you can only provide a 30% of your income in order to qualify, meaning that they at least have to make 3,400 a month. It's out of their reach. You guys are trying to modify the who, which pretty much is asking for the 15% of affordable housing not to be required for any units below 20,

meaning that any developer that wants to make any units less than 20 don't even have to make any affordable housing which is really sad like you're protecting the pockets of developers which they make millions and not protecting your residents when we increase our sales test your residents and took it and are paying it. And this thing money is the same money that funds your positions as the public service. And we're using their money, our money to run them out of their city. The general plan says that to protect,

enhance our cultural, historic and community assets. What bigger assets, if not the humans that live in our city, the humans that have been putting it in for more than 30 years, 50 years, generations. And we're tossing them out, running them out because they can't afford to live in this luxury home. 15% of 20 units is only three units, means three families. And we can't even provide that protection to our residents. It's only three units, there's only 15% of 20 units,

which is three units and we're still allowing them we're trying to protect the developers and saying that okay you don't have to pay that you don't have to pay them lucy and you don't have to build the affordable housing so we're not even getting anything out of that i believe that it's even better to not make the development at all and provide that space as green space for our youth and our seniors to be able to enjoy. Because luxury homes don't bring...

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Mayor and City Council, my name is Diego, and I live in Santa Ana. I'm calling to support the Lower Housing Opportunity

Caller, we can barely hear you

Hi, my name is Diego and I live in San Ana I'm calling to support the Lower Housing Opportunity Ordinance fee for all projects in the city especially those so close to building We can't forget that we're in the middle of a pandemic and the data clearly showing that no one has paid the fee as it currently stands now and probably won't do to the horrific economic times. This means we're losing out on jobs and we're losing out on affordable housing money.

And I think this part is important. We won't get any money for affordable housing if we don't build. The argument that we'll lose our money if we lower the fees seems flawed. If no one is building, then we're not getting any money. If people build, we'll get money. You have builders saying they'll build if we lower this fee. Let's get to Indiana building again and we'll receive money for affordable housing. If we lower the fees, we'll also start seeing jobs from Sanana.

I can't think of anything more important right now than that.

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Thank you. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, members of City Council. My name is Brian Hendricks. I am speaking in support of an amended item 75B to see the WHO in Luffy temporarily adjusts to $5 per square foot for currently approved projects that have not yet began construction. In this case, as it specifically relates to the Tom's Truck Center development. I'm a strong proponent of affordable housing in the city of Santa Ana, and have been fortunate to bring a number of different affordable housing projects to the city over the last few years. I'm also supportive of the WHO

and some level of an inclusionary housing fees. I've been working with Casey Heidler on the Tom's Truck Center site for a few years now. This project will provide much needed accessible housing to families in and around Santa Ana. Unit types and sizes were purposefully designed to provide for sale housing units that will be accessible to many families in the area. The $15 per square foot inclusionary fee is proven to be very difficult to underwrite. And one of the main reasons the project has been approved but not built for over two years. Casey Heidler and his family have owned this property

for 40 plus years, operating their businesses and being thoughtful members of the community. They've been contributing to the city of Santa Ana and the community for generations, providing hundreds of jobs to residents and are no way a developer that is dropping into town just to make a buck. Over the last 10 plus years, even the city has encouraged them to redevelop the site to include housing. The Heidler family was happy to cooperate with the city's wishes, but attaching such a large fee to the project has been discouraging and has impacted project feasibility. A $5 per square foot fee would hopefully allow this project

to move forward quickly, providing 117 new accessible housing units, while at the same time providing a substantial in-loop fee that would further create additional affordable housing units in the city. It's important to remember that a $5 per foot fee on a project that actually gets built provides much more funding for affordable housing than a $15 per foot fee for a project that never gets built does. Thank you for your consideration.

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Hello? Can you hear me?

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Hi. My name is Lionel Flores. I'm a lifelong resident of Santa Ana, and I am here to oppose measure 75B. The reason I'm here to oppose 75B is because cutting affordable housing actually will contribute to a higher rent burden in the city. Currently the city is discussing the general plan. And one of the things that it has to address is environmental injustice going on in this city. There are 21 communities affected by environmental injustice in this city, and that includes high rent burden.

By cutting affordable housing, you are contributing to those higher rent burdens in these 21 neighborhoods in your city. And because of that, I have to oppose measure 75B. Cutting the affordable housing and increasing the rent burden will go against state bill 1000, a law created here in the state of California in 2018. So because of that, I have to urge you to vote against 75B. Thank you.

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Good evening. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of the City Council. My name is Ernesto Medrano. I represent the Los Angeles and Orange County Building and Construction Trades Council. We have 49 local unions and district councils out of the 14 trades. And I'm calling today, I think we've really understood the importance of the housing needs where the governor has established a goal of 350,000 units over the next decade per year. It's important to understand the city of Santa Ana, the transfer, a city that going to the transformation as a majority Latino urban community. It has a population of 30% of its folks are under age of 18.

Keeping that in mind, we decided to invest and we met with leaders that had vision at the Santana Unified School District and the Rancho Santiago Community College District to invest and partner in an apprenticeship readiness curriculum, a curriculum that will prepare young men and women in your city so they can come to work, enter our apprenticeship and go make careers within the construction industry. We can no longer detach the concept of workforce development, wages, benefits, working conditions, and housing. It has to go hand in hand. We have some of the best joint labor management training programs that are self-funded.

We graduate over 93% of the apprentices in the state of California. And out of those 68,000 apprentices that we have right now in the pipeline, 20% of them come from disadvantaged workforce workers. The residential home building sector does not have a systematic training for apprenticeship. It provides for low wages and poor labor standards that does not attract new workers. And Latinos dominate the residential sector. It comprises two thirds of the workforce, yet they only make 70 cents on the dollar. And very few of them have insurance. So there's patterns of racial inequality here.

I think it's important also to challenge the myths that were established in some documents that were sent to you that are ridiculously over inflate the costs. I don't understand how people could say that labor costs will increase the construction overall cost by 40% when the wages are only 15% of the total construction cost. I don't know what people got those numbers from but also the assumption that there's project labor agreements and this policy is also false. So I just want to make sure we clear the record and you understand what that really is.

I think I want to be critical a little bit of the process when we started this there was a conversation of this was only temporary for the COVID-19 to incentivize business. there was a new ad hoc committee, then it changed. And then by the time it arrived to the planning commission, the ad hoc committee, as I say, had changed and the document was different and I was establishing a permanent policy here. We had to play catch up. We had to go by the rules and as the rules were changing, we still had to try to keep up with this. So with that said, I think we support wholeheartedly

what John Hanna presented in terms of a compromise there, the language that came out that was voted unanimously from the planning commission, which we think that mandates apprenticeship. Your time is up. Thank you for your call. You either believe in apprenticeship or you don't believe in apprenticeship.

Thank you.

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hello council members can you hear me yes we can hear you okay perfect thank you my name is luis andres-peres i represent ua local 582 plumbers and steam fitters here in the city of orange overall i'm here to call on behalf of supporting the amending language for 75b overall using a the skill trained workforce are, it's not necessarily union workers or union contracts, which is essentially saying with skill trained labor, we have folks who have gone to certified apprentices,

apprenticeships that have been certified by the state of California. In addition to what Ernesto said previously, labor costs in terms of construction development projects will never exceed 16%. And anytime we ever hear of a developer saying labor costs will continue to increase the developmental project costs and it's going to incur onto the potential homeowners or the home market itself, that's clearly language developers are telling you that their profit margins are decreasing because they don't want to entice local revenue and local benefits. and ultimately at the end of the day,

I just want you guys to realize and focus on this whole aspect of having local hire of Santa Ana residents also then perpetuates local buyers from Santa Ana residents into becoming Santa Ana homeowners. Majority of your population in the city are renters. Majority of your population are currently in your K through 12 system. If you think you have a housing crisis right now, in 10 years, your city's gonna, you know, there's gonna be nowhere else, not only just to build, but to buy. So again, I am asking for the council members to be in support of the amended language. Thank you.

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273, dial star six to unmute your call, and you may proceed to speak.

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Hi, my name is Steve Gallegos. I am calling about the item on 75C. I'm not sure if you guys should vote for it or against it, but I was just thinking of maybe coming up with a different idea. Do you guys, right now, do you guys actually require these people to have a, you know, affordable housing on their properties? Like what if temporarily you can say, hey, you guys have to, right now the in lieu of fee, you don't have to pay it, but you do have to, it's mandated now that you actually have it. that there is no like in Lua sea per se.

The other thing that really was kind of concerning is, you know, I've been on the phone right now for six and a half hours. And you guys have mentioned before that there's a lot of times that you guys don't want to move on something because you guys want community input, you know, like this being one of them. You know, I remember there was an item that I think Flambiegas and I think Mayor Pulido that we're talking about, that they wanted community input on the charter. And once we gave it to you guys, nothing came up. You guys also wanted community input on the general plan and really just hearing it today, just kind of the update,

it seems like a lot of things that were voiced, nothing came of it. So when you guys talk about how we wonder why the community does not get involved, here are your opportunities. You know, here are your opportunities, is whatever you guys do in closed session, that's, you know, obviously we're not privy to that, but it's like you guys make a decision right then and there of how you guys are gonna vote despite whatever the community says. So even though right now I'm voicing my opinion for 75B, you guys have already made that decision within yourself. And that's not the point of public comment.

The point of public comment is so that you guys can hear or realize something that you guys maybe didn't realize in the closed session, you know, you guys just talking about even, you know, about the UASI funds. If you look at them, they last three years. I mean, they last 36 months. So just hearing like the police chief give you a different number. You guys have the city attorney, you guys have the city manager who can tell you exactly what these kind of funds that you guys have or what they're available to. I mean, you guys have so many people who can actually give you this information,

or if you just look at the budgets, you can see how something is being spent correctly or incorrectly, you know? So again, I think that the reason why you guys don't have more community input is because you guys make the decisions in your heads. Once you guys get tons of people to wait like me, who have waited for six and a half hours to speak, it doesn't matter. So what hope can you get from trying to get community input when it is an item that you really do want to have us move forward in? So it's really disappointing how I've been hearing not just this meeting, but the past few meetings.

So, like I said, there's a lot of disconnect.

It reminds me a lot of the current administration

and then the way the Senate is it's like so many people complaining and voicing their concerns and you guys still are gonna do it up thank you next caller

with the last three numbers 048 please dial star six and unmute to unmute your

call thank you you may proceed to speak hi my name is Lindsay Anderson I live in Huntington Beach I don't even live in Santa Ana and it is so very clear that you guys are abusing your power and I wanted to come on here and say that housing is a human right and you guys you're abusing your power And I can't believe that you guys are trying to put so many prohibit prohibitions on rent and whatnot in the middle of a pandemic. When people are hungry and people are working multiple jobs in order to support their family.

At the same time, it's trying to stay safe and trying to keep their families and protect their families and keep everyone safe and healthy. And you're just adding more problems on top of that. Homelessness is growing so fast in Santa Ana. And you guys live in such a position of privilege to be able to turn the other way completely unaffected.

It's just ridiculous. It's just ridiculous. Housing is a human right, and water is a human right.

Thank you.

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Casey Heidler with Tom's Truck Center, Mayor, council members, and everybody listening in. Good evening. Tom's Truck Center has been located on the third and fourth street area of downtown Santa Ana since 1949. And Tom's Truck Center has never had any intentions of moving or leaving the city. It would be difficult without proper fees that are the right amount for Tom's to move. And it would not be a good thing to have an eight acre commercial truck center located to a downtown set standing

and it's turning into the new streetcars, development down there. So, you know, what is important is we're really no different than a developer. If a fee was too high, it doesn't encourage or motivate any development and you know being in Santa Ana from my whole life you know there's been things called the Renaissance zone probably Miguel remembers that the transit zone now which are great things but there's codes and and he's preventing it so you know the fee we're

I'm not against the fee. I think affordable housing is great, but the fee needs to be reasonable. You know, if you look at Anaheim, Anaheim doesn't have a fee, but $5 a square foot, that's reasonable. You know, it's been said in public comments here that, you know, money will be lost. Well, there hasn't been any money gained because no one's paid the fee at $15 a square foot. So, you know, this is the right thing. This will create companies like Tom's Truck Center and other developers to start to build and to take a chance in Santa Ana because it's still, unfortunately, not the most desirable city.

And I would like to see that change, and I know everybody listening in would too. So, you know, this is the right thing. We need to get this done, get it developed. Developers and property owners like ourselves need time to do it. And you know, as we employ tons of employees,

unfortunately we had to furlough employees during the pandemic. Unfortunately brought majority of them back. And if I had to select, hey, an unemployed person, you can only come back if you're a skilled laborer or a union laborer, that's not fair. So anyhow, we're proud, the partners of this city. we always will be and you know I would appreciate modifications to the who at five dollars a square foot for entitled projects and unentitled and also be

open to who we can hire so thank you thank you caller the next caller with With the last three numbers, 868, please dial star six to unmute your call and you may proceed to speak.

Hi, can you hear me?

Yes, we can hear you.

Thank you. Good evening, Mayor and Councilmembers. My name is Hilda Ortiz and I'm speaking on behalf of Latino Health Access in strong opposition to the proposed amendment to the Housing Opportunity Ordinance. The ordinance has been one of the city's biggest advancements in addressing the shortage of affordable housing for our residents. The proposed changes weakened the ordinance and come at the worst possible time. If COVID has highlighted one thing, it's that we can't talk about health without also talking about housing. They're interconnected. Our residents are having to choose between staying safe and making ends meet.

Thankfully, the city has responded by providing relief with temporary tenant protections, which has been helpful. However, residents are experiencing economic uncertainty and will continue to experience it for months into recovery. We needed more affordable housing prior to COVID and we will continue to need it after. According to a recent poll, excuse me, a recent report by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, residents living in the 92701 zip code must earn $35.68 per hour in order to afford a two bedroom apartment. And this is the zip code considered the most affordable in the city.

This is one of the reasons our community's living in overcrowded conditions. Sharing a unit is the only way to afford housing for most in Santa Ana. Overcrowding has been one of the reasons that has contributed to 9-2-7-0-1 having one of the highest number of COVID cases in the county. And this is happening throughout our entire city.

There is no valid reason to reduce the in-luffy or to redirect funds from housing to public safety when it is absolutely clear that we need affordable housing for our residents. We must secure this funding source at its current rate. Please prioritize the needs of Santa and our residents. I urge you to vote against this item and preserve the housing opportunity ordinance as it. Thank you.

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Caller, please dial star 6 to unmute your call. Thank you. You may proceed. Hello, can you hear me? Yes, I can hear you now.

Great, thank you. Good evening, Mayor Polito and council members. My name is Tim O'Brien and I'm with Legacy Partners, the developer for the Sunflower Project. As you know, our project was unanimously approved by both Planning Commission and City Council last summer after nearly two years of earning community support. You know, we were so close to starting construction this spring until the COVID crisis caused our financial to put the project on hold. The COVID crisis has had a terrible impact on our industry and has driven rents and values down in excess of 10%.

Fortunately, our financial partner is now committed to close on the land and move forward on the project if we can get the cost down and make the underwriting work. I'd like to thank the city council for considering a reduction of the HOOFI at this time. As you know, the planning commission discussed the merits of applying a $5 fee to entitled projects since it would serve as a true stimulus for projects that are ready to go during this most difficult time. A $5 fee applied to Sunflower would have a direct impact on our project and allow us to close and start construction this fall.

The project would result in immediate construction jobs, including union jobs, payment of municipal fees and increase property tax revenue. In fairness to all projects, I think the flat fee, $5 fee should be adopted to ensure housing, continued housing in the city. You know, I also want to caution the city council about mandated skilled labor, which is really code for union labor across the board. You know, we understand firsthand that this increased costs will render residential development totally infeasible in the city.

With that said, the city has traditionally encouraged union labor on proposed projects where possible and do consider their support when evaluating the merits of a project. And I think we serve as a great example of a project that worked with union labor and voluntarily entered into an agreement for limited elements in the project. However, the union component alone on sunflowers costing in excess of $1.2 million, which I believe warrants further consideration for a flat $5 fee for our project. In addition to union jobs, we're implementing a responsible contractor program on

the project. This program promotes contractors and subcontractors that provide fair wages and training in addition to minority-owned and women-owned businesses. Project also provides other valuable community benefits to the Sandpoint neighborhood, the Santa Ana Unified School District, and if approved at $5, will pay over $900,000 to food food fund this year. Thank you again for your consideration and good night.

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Good evening, Mayor and Council members. My name is Santi Khomejian and I'm not Santa Ana resident. I'm speaking on behalf of the Building Industry Association as the Orange County's chapter president. I also work for a multi-family apartment developer and we currently have about 2000 units under construction or development throughout the state. The simple fact is that housing supply in our state, our county and your city is broken. There are not enough homes, both for rent and for sale, to meet the demands and needs of our population. Quite frankly, the fix to the housing shortfall is simple.

Remove the burdens that restrict the supply. What can you specifically do tonight? Reduce the fees that burden new development. Reducing fees is not contrary to a common perception, just putting more money in the developer's pocket. It is however, helping to get projects to meet minimum financial hurdles to get homes built for your city. With that, I commend you for considering reducing the housing opportunity ordinance fee from $15 to $5 per square foot. As each of you know, not a single permit has been pulled under the $15 per square foot fee amount. That has to tell you something.

If you truly want to increase the housing supply in your city, you know how you need to vote. I'm also compelled to caution you against mandating any type of labor in connection with a reduced fee. While the BIA wholeheartedly supports fair and equitable wages and safe working conditions for all workers, I will warn you that mandating labor on market rate and privately funded projects will have dire consequences to the housing supply that you are looking to increase.

As an example, a project labor agreement on a high density apartment project will easily add at least $30 per square foot in construction costs. That is a real number based upon bidding out projects both with and without PLAs. This will even with reducing the housing opportunity fee, stop all new development under the ordinance. I realize there are complicated social and political issues in addition decisions like these, but if you believe that your city would benefit from more housing and from actually collecting some funds under the program, the decision should be clear.

On behalf of the building and association, I thank you for bringing this topic forward and considering the positive impacts that reducing this regulation will have. Thank you for your time and thank you for serving your community. Good luck and good night.

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Good evening, Mayor, Council Members. or Cesar Covarrubias, executive director of Kennedy Commission. Kennedy Commission is a broad coalition of residents and community organization that advocates for the production of affordable homes for very low and low income families in Orange County. I want to thank the speakers that have brought some excellent points out. I also want to just express that the County Commission is opposed to any changes to the affordable housing ordinance, the housing opportunity ordinance as it's called. And I want to also just paint a clear picture of what Santa Ana is and what Santa Ana is envisioned

to be by developers and some council members. I think we are hearing a lot of that, that we need more housing, that we need housing for Santana. And we agree that we need housing. We need housing that is affordable to families in Santana. And I'll just recite from your own general plan, housing element, page 14, which states that 80% of Santana renters are moderate, low, very low, and extremely low income renters. On top of that, you have about 80% of all renters that fall into the moderate and low and very low income category,

along with 84% of those renters holding jobs that paid less than $53,000 a year. So truly what we are saying is that that the housing that is being proposed to be built here is not gonna be affordable to your population in Santana. So who are we building housing for? The current rents in most of the newer apartment developments that have been developed at the market rent are $2,000 to $4,000 a month. Clearly unaffordable to families making $53,000 a year. Clearly unaffordable to working families, even our trade folks who are on these calls cannot afford to live in these units.

So we clearly need a solution and that solution is to keep the affordable housing ordinance the way it is and encourage affordable housing that is balanced along with market rate development so that we can meet the needs of the community. It's a situation where we should meet the needs of the community today, what we have in Santana versus what some council members and also some developers envision for Santana in the future, having higher income families in the neighborhood, which is not bad, but that's not our reality today. And we should be addressing all housing needs at all income levels.

Quick comments, just my colleagues from PLC outlined some of the issues that we have with the specific proposal. We don't think there should be an amendment. We think that there's some real issues in contradiction with your general plan and also with your housing element. And further than that, I think the changes that are being proposed are gonna trigger some environmental review under CEQA that needs to be analyzed. And I think that that's very important to address since I think a lot of these numbers that we're hearing today about the fee, where it should go, where it go, we don't know where these numbers are coming from.

We have other jurisdictions across the Southern California area, like Pasadena and Long Beach, who have recently enacted affordable housing provisions for affordable housing during the pandemic to address the need of affordable housing. and they have higher consultants to tell them exactly what those numbers are and should be. And we are not hearing those numbers from any of the staff here in Santana or the elected officials. These are members that are being tossed out of the air or maybe developers, market rate developers are suggesting these numbers as you're hearing in the calls. And it's great that, you know,

the developers want to move forward with development. It's just not development that is responsive to the needs of the community in Santana. And if those developments that we're gonna move forward, they need to make sure they're also addressing the needs that are here today in the city of Santana for residents who are low income and are working families, because most of our families, 80%, make about $53,000 a year. And these are numbers from your housing elements that your staff can verify. Again, these are numbers also on the rents are current numbers from apartment complexes like the Marquis, the Exus Skyline,

and Broadstone Arden. So with that, I think I also wanna make sure that you pay attention to the comments in our comment letter that have more extensive and expansive comments on the different areas that we are concerned about. Specifically also pointing out that there are some recommendations that the WHO office just be focused on the acquisition rehab. And I think that's very dangerous since I think we have an over-concentration of poverty in many areas, and we don't want to further exacerbate that issue, along with having these families not have opportunities elsewhere,

which I think creates affirmative action.

Last three numbers with 361. Please dial star six to unmute your call, and you may proceed to comment.

Last three numbers, 361, please dial star 6 and you may proceed to comment.

last three numbers 070 please dial star six to unmute your call and you may proceed to comment

good evening mr. mayor members of the city council my name is Eric Nelson I'm a member of the BIA and currently serve on our executive board with the Orange County chapter during the day oversee community development for a builder located here in Orange County let me start off by commending you for taking a look at the current situation and opening up the discussion on how and what city and its partners can do to deal with the current cost of housing the good news is that we can all agree something has to be done and as a policy issue we want you to get it right getting

it right has a cascading impact as does getting it wrong I recognize that inclusionary zoning is a complicated and sometimes controversial topic but worth discussing. The current policy aspires to harness the ever-changing dynamics of a private market with a fixed one-size-fits-all policy objective. In the past few years, I've had the opportunity to look at several projects in Santa Ana, but due to the existing policy, the projects were unviable. As an example, the last project we built in Santa Ana included an inclusionary fee totaling $1.475 million. It went directly towards

subsidizing affordable housing this amounts to roughly seven dollars per square foot or thirteen thousand dollars per unit for inclusionary housing based on the current who a similar project would be required to pay almost double that amount to satisfy the fifteen dollar per square foot requirement and just to be clear that does not include the additional thirty six thousand dollars in other impact fees such as traffics parks uh drainage and so forth if you're keeping To track the amounts mentioned total over $50,000 or roughly $40 per square foot for an average size unit. I've heard that there are considerations

for adding a requirement for a trained and skilled workforce in connection with the reduced fee that you are considering. Based on my experience, this would render any reduction you make tonight useless. In fact, it would result in a cost per square foot increase totaling more than $38. That is $23 per square foot more than the current clue. To be clear, this additional requirement increases the overall cost of housing above the current fee that you are now considering reducing, effectively killing any and all opportunities for new housing.

It guarantees that approved projects remain shelved and new projects, if there are any, are not built. An approval tonight will harness a pre-dynamic market with meaningful incentives such that it could solve the ultimate policy objective of building more homes that are more attainable for more people. Money received under the WHO would go towards public housing projects that would be subject to prevailing wage, thus guaranteeing that all the interested parties prevail tonight.

It means more money that can help subsidize affordable housing, built with state-mandated prevailing wage and market rate development with a fee structure that's sustainable. As a reminder, any policy that requires market rate developers as the primary means of funding must work financially, or the result ends up eliminating all housing development and critical funding sources that are desperately needed. I urge you to support the proposed reduction without any strings or additional requirements. Your approval tonight will ensure that there are housing opportunities in Santa Ana. And I thank you for your time, consideration.

Thank you, caller. The next caller with the last three numbers.

032. Please dial star six and you may proceed to speak.

Hi, I'm Nathaniel Greensides, Ward 5 resident, and I am not in support of this item. I believe that the requirements for developers to either construct or fund affordable housing in the city should actually be increased. Of the options which proposed projects can choose under the Housing Opportunity Ordinance, many developers have been opting for the in-lieu fees, which funds affordable housing in Santa Ana. Approving the reduction of in-lieu fees will create immediate destabilization of the housing market in our city. speculation and development devoured many urban and suburban cities in California in 2008.

A report from 2018 explains why this is a bad thing. One, when properties are sold to cash-carrying investors for conversion into rentals, prospective homeowners as well as mom-and-pop landlords are crowded out of the market and communities suffer, particularly communities of color. Two, tenants are negatively impacted with large annual rent increases, fee gouging, a high rate of evictions, and rampant habitability issues. Three, developers and huge corporate landlords now lobby all levels of government to advance their own pursuit of profit and not the interest of long-term residents and community stability.

The proposed amendments will serve only to allow corporate landlords and developers, even bigger than my CARA, to turn quick profits on properties here in Santa Ana at the expense of our community members. Our residents were already housing cost burdened before the pandemic and now even more so with loss of income due to the pandemic. Additionally, adding in stipulations for skills and trained workforce will not result in permanent jobs for unionized laborers who may not be past or current residents of our city. The BIA's attempt to confuse the public about this was apparent to me in their sponsored Facebook ad.

They argued that the WHO makes projects unviable without offering any substance or evidence. The WHO is and was never a one size fits all solution for development. It is based on the individual merits of each development proposal. Reducing in lieu fees and applicability to projects in our city, subject to the WHO, which would be subject to the WHO, will open the floodgates to outside investors who want to destabilize our city because they care more about profits than people. The notion that $15 per square foot is too expensive for a large developer is questionable, seeing as other cities in the state and nation

charge more with similar ordinances. Financially solvent developers who would be subject to the $15 per square foot fee actually do have the money, but it seems that they would rather prioritize profit over people and for up to five years at that, apparently with some of the currently pending projects, it is a shame that these projects would rather let families continue to live in cramped quarters or go homeless instead of funding affordable housing or constructing affordable housing. To solve this issue, the city could work with community-based entities, such as community land trust,

which do exist in Santa Ana and serve as the best means against outside developers to destabilizing our city. I sincerely ask the council to not vote in favor of destabilization of our communities and cities. I sincerely ask that the council not participate in prioritizing profit over people. And I'm talking about you, Mr. Solorio.

Thank you for your comment.

Caller, with the last three numbers, 008,

please dial star six to unmute your call and proceed with your comment.

I'm here. Can you?

Yes. Please proceed with your comment.

Mayor, City Council Member Steve Lamott, Executive Officer for the Building Industry Association of Orange County. I am calling first this evening just to say thank you to city staff as well as the ad hoc committee for bringing this forward. We did submit a letter on behalf of the BIA, the Association of Orange County Business Talent, Orange County Association, Automobile Dealer Association, Orange County Apartment Association, Manufactured Housing Educational Trust, Commercial Real Estate Development Association, the Orange County Realtors, Pacific West Realtors, and the Apartment Association for Orange County.

And I just wanted to reiterate this is exactly what the business community needs right now. Our letter goes on to say that housing remains a critical issue. I know that you're aware of this. Studies show we need over 180,000 new units per year. We are producing about 80,000, and the governor wants about 500,000 per year. So this has caused the spike in home prices across the region. On top of this, I don't think I need to say it, but we're in the middle of the pandemic. And when this pandemic is over, we are still in a housing crisis. We have stated on this issue multiple times, builders have also called in, added fees on

development are only going to stifle development and ultimately just raise the cost of housing, risking the loss of units in your city. And this is seemingly clear in the city of Santa Ana. staff have stated that not one builder has pulled the fee or pulled a permit to pay the fee under the current $15 who fee since it was raised in 2015. Yet thousands of units have been approved. So the city, and on top of this, the city has also met their current RHNA requirement for the cycle. So because of this, because of the pandemic, staff lays out a very clear picture in the staff report

as to why the city will benefit, why your affordable housing fund will benefit, and why the Santa Ana economy on top of the business and development community will benefit if you lower the fee to five dollars square foot and we cannot agree more with it. However we are asking that those projects in the pipeline, the entitled projects that have been approved that have not yet pulled permits also be given the five dollar fee. This pandemic the economic factors laid out by staff do not just affect those that have not yet applied to the city. Those affect greatly those projects that are so close to building.

One thing I heard a lot throughout this process is that we're losing out on money, but that's just not true. If the money is not showing up, the money is not there. If we're not building, the money is not coming in. And additionally, we ask that these entitled projects be given a year. I think right now it's scheduled at April, 2021 to be eligible for this fee. We are looking for a year on that as well, which was recommended by the Planning Commission. I do want to add caution. I know it was mentioned, adding any specific type of labor to projects can be detrimental.

Quite frankly, I'm not sure what the proposal is recommending today, but again, it's been said mandating any type of labor can be a problem. If it's a blanket policy, let the applicants, let the, you know, certain unions or certain skilled labor force, let them negotiate this at the table. Please do not make a blanket policy to this effect. Thank you.

Thank you. Caller with the last three, or actually it's an unidentified number. If you would please dial star six from your phone to unmute your call, and then you may proceed to speak.

Okay.

Caller with the last three numbers, 361, please dial star six to unmute your call and proceed with your comment.

Caller, you may proceed with your comment.

Okay, Mayor, that is all the callers we have. I do want to also announce that we did get emails, and we received 10 Santa Ana residents or businesses in support, two non-Santa Ana residents and four residency not disclosed. In opposition we received 88 Santa Ana residents, five non-Santa Ana residents and three not disclosed and then we just received one general comment and that's all I have.

Thank you for that. I was, or am a member of the ad hoc on this. So my colleagues indulged me at the right moment. I'd like to make a motion, but prior to that, I've had several people text me who want to speak. So let's start with council member Phil Becerra, please.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to thank my colleagues on the ad hoc committee, you Mr. Mayor and Council Member Mendoza for working with staff to bring forward these proposed changes to the WHO this evening. But before I commence with my comments I would like to ask for clarification from staff regarding the claims that we heard a couple of times this evening about funds being collected through the WHO that would go to fund any police activities. So I just want to confirm with staff. Is that true at all? No, council member, that is not true.

Okay. And so when we talk about anything that remotely sounds like it, my understanding, I'll say it for myself has always been that this would go towards code enforcement activities, nothing to do with the police department at all. Your understanding is correct.

Thank you, Madam State Manager. You know, the intentions behind the WHO were, I believe, were good. But the WHO has failed to deliver on its promises. Since 2011, there's been only a total of 33 inclusionary affordable units that are actually required by the WHO that have actually been developed on a project site. And as you've heard from various callers this evening, no in lieu fees at the $15 per square foot rate have been collected in the last fiscal year. And since the WHO's inception way back nine years ago, you've seen only 17 million collected.

So without being required by the WHO, our city has seen the construction of over 1,000 affordable units, which is eight times more than the state mandated arena goals for providing affordable units for our residents. Other cities in Orange County have not met or exceeded their state mandated arena allocations, at least not at the level that Santa Ana has. And those cities need to step up, like we have the caller from Huntington Beach, who should stop expecting Santa Ana to shoulder her city's responsibility and advocate for who's in their cities and level the playing field across Orange County.

Now, I believe that the proposed revisions to the WHO tonight will do much more to help generate revenue for our inclusionary housing fund. Those funds can go towards addressing displacement by renewing affordable covenants currently in place before they expire. Believe it or not, we have covenants on the books today that are set to expire. and all we keep talking about is building more affordable units but we're gonna see folks that are gonna see covenants that hold them in place ripped out from under them unless we're able to go back in and sustain them we also

need to take those funds and provide down payment assistance to actually help increase the rate of home ownership again neighborhood stability for our Santa Ana residents and of course with the renewing of these affordable covenants we can also improve the quality of existing units you know in the willard neighborhood we've seen a lot of apartment buildings that they were on the cusp of their covenants expiring and with agreements with the city to use some of these funds they've been able to restore a lot of those units and maintain stability for those residents that relied on those affordable covenants now i

think that the language that encourages housing builders to use skilled and trained workers to to build housing projects in our city is encouraging, but I would like to hear from my colleagues as far as their thoughts on the sufficiency of that language. But the proposed revisions to the WHO will also encourage the building of housing units at all income levels that our city's college graduates and young workforce can move into rather than being forced to look for contemporary housing options being made in neighboring cities like Anaheim or Costa Mesa or Irvine.

It makes no sense for our residents to tax ourselves to build high quality school facilities here in Santa Ana and then not provide new market rate housing units right here in Santa Ana. We have these young scholars who are excelling in their careers and we're forcing them to look elsewhere rather than to be able to have that opportunity to live in their own hometown. So the who without these revisions is not helping housing affordability in Santa Ana. It is limiting our ability to address the underlying cause of high cost housing, which is, as some callers mentioned, a housing shortage. Those are my comments right now, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you for that. Just for formality, I want to make sure the record shows that we have closed the public hearing after the last speaker. and right now we're just listening to a comment and thoughts from council members. And again, in a moment, I'd like to make a motion, but is there any comment prior to that? I mean, we can still talk more about the who after I make a motion, but if anybody's very eager to speak right now, I'll call on you.

Yes, Mr. Mayor, I would like to make a few comments.

Please, Councilor Mendoza, go ahead, please.

Thank you. I am concerned just as my colleague, Councilmember Becerra, is that, you know, it's concerning and a little disappointing that our labor unions did not have a fair opportunity to hash out the proposed mandated language with the skilled workforce early on. We have been, it is my understanding that we've been doing this revision for a year now, and we didn't have any union concern until two weeks ago.

So I was just wondering how no one contacted labor about this issue, which involved them significantly. significantly so I was I got appointed to the committee two months ago and we've only had two meetings since then however I I would like to see about having some kind of compromise and maybe we could do some kind of a mandated language for certain categories we seem to be throwing

language but just using the word encourage and should but that is non committal language let's make it happen where we could come together in in compromise because the public the developers the the unions everyone has some really good points and we just need to come together because I would like to we very much see a real commitment to housing and jobs. We need to change the language referencing skilled and trained workforce to SHALP.

And I know that there's been numbers thrown out that it would run, increase the expenses from $15 square footage to $60 square footage. But these are rumors that this has not been penciled out. So I'm interested in knowing where the numbers came from and whether staff has factual numbers that we can rely on. So otherwise we really don't know what the cost is of having mandated workforce language.

And I understand that people need housing. However, they also need jobs and the use of skilled and trained workforce with a local hire component will produce a quality project and get our community much needed jobs. So there has to be a solution where both can be achieved at reasonable cost without stopping developers from taking interest in our city.

I think we could have a project that has been entitled to be required to use skilled and trained workforce, and we could use this as a compromise. It would still attract others that are yet not entitled, and holding those entitled to help us create skilled, trained workforce, and then we can put the local hire component into it. This means jobs in our community and continued working with existing developers and new developers. Santa Ana is prime land.

I know that we will continue to have developers, but we want to be able to make it a smooth process. We don't want to make it any more difficult. We need jobs in our communities. This is not a windfall and it's not as much money for housing then we need to we need everyone to help us to find employment for the unemployed in our city and that's one one great way to do it and the other alternative we can maybe we can not change it until the numbers are crunched so that the reasonable compromise can be made

and we can get the information and have a much more detail so that we can make very informed decisions. And we want change. Some people want change. Others want it all changed. Some want it to stay at 15%. And I believe that a compromise decision where we can incorporate the union language and the developers in mind, I think it's possible we could reach a compromise.

So that is what I'm suggesting tonight.

Thank you, Councilor Mendoza. I think just so we can get deeper into the conversation, what I'd like to do is move the recommendation that came from the committee with the amendment that we would take it from six months for those projects in the pipeline and give them a year. and if there's a second to that motion I'm I'm I'd be I'd like to make additional comment

is there a second second Mr. Mayor second thank you the additional comment I'd like to make is that you know we're in this pandemic right now and so I think it's fundamental to try to figure out how to lower the threshold to entry into construction here in town.

And right now, I think, is not the moment to add additional requirements of any type because it'll discourage construction. We already know that there's been zero construction under the current ordinance, not a single project in multiple years now. It's been, I think maybe three possibly more, but it's been a substantial period of time and nothing has occurred. There hasn't been any job, anybody,

because there's no construction whatsoever. So I would think for now it would be most prudent to try to stimulate things. And look, this may not do it. We might take this action, and if the economy really, really, really goes upside down, it could be that nobody's going to build anyways. but they're certainly not going to build something that they couldn't build in good times. Even in the last few years where we've had good times, nobody has built at that other level. So anyways, additional thoughts, please.

Mr. Mayor, this is—Anybody else come speak?