Read the June 2 meeting.

Mayor, we have a quorum. Everybody's logged in, so whenever you want to start the meeting.

The gentleman who was speaking earlier, Steven Mendoza. There is no relationship. I don't know the gentleman, so I wanted to clarify that. There is no conflict of interest on my part. I do not know him and we're not related.

i i i don't think you have to say anything i don't believe he'll be as active in in the rest of the meetings but uh if we can ask the city attorney um mayor we're live all right all right okay um madam city attorney just a quick question uh stephen mendoza is a city employee um uh you know council member mendoza nalita mendoza just joined the council there is no relation there's no neptism no nothing should she make a statement to that effect or not needed I don't think it's

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

necessary mayor and councilmember Mendoza unless you feel this necessary but you just can declare

that there's no relationship at what point do I need to do that or shall we just say it right now yes just say it right now if you want all right yes for the record with the city of Santa Ana three council there is no relationship between the three employees stephen mendoza and myself we are not related we do not have any kind of relationship and i don't think i even even met these gentlemen so i just want to declare that there is no conflict of interest with stephen

mendoza and myself so you guys don't even know each other and if you did you may not even like

each other correct oh absolutely i think that could be a problem i'm kidding i'm kidding about

the latter part you might like him you might not but you don't even know all right with that let me call this meeting to order and um madam clerk i think we're going to stand for the pledge of

So wherever you are, please stand and place your hand over your heart. Ready? Begin. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible. with liberty and justice for all.

Amen.

Okay, I believe we have an invocation. Madam McClure, is the chaplain present?

Yes, chaplain Jerry Hill.

Yes, I'm here.

Let's go ahead and pray together. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day, Lord, and we also recognize that as we come together, We are in unusual and certainly difficult times, Lord. And so tonight we would just like to ask for strength, for patience, for wisdom, for understanding, Lord. And I would personally, Lord, like to lift up our council members and our mayor, our city manager, our police chief, as they're dealing with difficult, difficult questions, Lord, and again, trying times.

I pray for them, Lord. I pray that you would not only bless them, but keep them healthy, and that you would watch over their families and bless their families as well, Lord. And for our residents here in Santa Ana, Lord, who have lost jobs because of quarantine and lost businesses and lost income, Lord, we lift them up to you as well. and we pray that you would bless them, Lord, that you would help them get through this, that you would give them the strength that's necessary, Lord, in these trying times. And Lord, most of all, as we gather tonight, that you would bless this meeting and the decisions that have to be made, Lord.

In your holy name we pray. Amen. Amen.

Mary would you like me to go ahead and take roll call

Mayor, are you there?

Yes, I am. Please call the roll.

Councilmember Becerra?

Here.

Councilmember Mendoza? Here. Councilmember Peñalosa?

Here.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

Here.

Councilmember Solorio?

Here.

Mayor Potembe-Viegas?

Here.

Mayor Pulido?

Here.

So we have a quorum, and now let's go on to the next item. Madam City Attorney, do you have anything to report out of closed session, please?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Mayor, we had three closed session discussions this evening. We do not have reportable action, but I would like to notify our City Clerk for the record that you did not participate in the conversation regarding the item of Orange County worker due to a conflict.

Thank you. So with that, let's go on to the consent calendar. Do any council members wish to pull any items?

Yes, Mayor Pulido. I have several items to pull.

Okay.

Go ahead. it's item 10a item 22a through e and 55a

wait a minute you're not council member iglesias right

i'm kidding it was a joke i'm a kidding but uh any other items by council members

David PenalozaItem —

yep mr. mayor this is council member Penaloza I'd like to pull item 25a and that's it

any other items council members if not I would entertain a motion on the balance

David PenalozaItem —

the sarissa move mr. mayor I'm sorry I misspoke it was a 25f not 25a please note that madam clerk

okay I'll amend my motion I'm gonna say I will say and then roll let's do a roll call vote unless

you have something before that mayor pro-tem no after the roll call please okay roll call vote

please mayor I do have two virtual hands raised to speak on all consent items would you like to

hear it at this time before the vote yeah yeah let's speak to hear them let's hear them now go

ahead okay you will receive a notification that you have been unmuted when it is your turn to speak for the record please clearly state your name whether you're in support or an opposition to an item and why you have three minutes from the time that you've been unmuted please proceed with your

comments yes hello my name is Michelle and I'm calling the Santa Ana City Council on submitting public comment for agenda item 65B in support of the renewal of the deportation defense fund at its current level of $200,000 or more to continue providing protection to Santa Ana residents facing detention and deportation. Thank you.

go ahead madam clerk you will receive a notification that you have been unmuted once your turn to speak for the record please clearly state your name whether you're in support or an opposition to the item and why you have three minutes from the time that you have been unmuted please proceed with your comment

This is Claudio Gallegos speaking on behalf of Congressman Lou Correa. I are calling to speak on support of 65B and the continuation of the Legal Defense Fund. We have submitted a letter in support as well as an editorial to the Orange County Register in support of continuance of the fund. We ask that the Santa Ana City Council continue the legal defense fund for the City of Santa Ana and for their residents. Thank you. We have no other

callers, Mayor. All right. So I believe we had a motion and a second on the consent calendar, the balance of it. Roll call vote, please. Councilmember Becerra?

Yes. Councilmember Mendoza? Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa? Yes. Councilmember Sarmiento?

Yes.

Councilmember Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Plotem-Viegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries.

Let's go on to the first item that was pulled, please, Madam Clerk.

10A, the minutes from the regular meeting of May 19, 2020.

Yes, and I pulled that item because I would like to abstain as I was not present for the meeting of May 19th.

Let's entertain a motion of that effect, please. Motion to approve.

Second.

Roll call, roll, please.

Councilmember Becerra?

Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza, I captured your abstention. Councilmember Peñalosa?

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento? Yes. Councilmember Solorio? Mayor Pro Tempegas? Yes. Mayor Pulido? Yes. Next item. 22A.

yes and that was um councilwoman mendoza i pulled 22a through e because i i noted that these are contracts that were awarded to outside uh of the city uh vendors and i am sure that staff was able to obtain the best possible pricing for the city of santa anna but i just wanted to see if there is a way that we could um and get more of uh santa ana businesses to participate in the rsp process so that we can leave the business here locally in santa ana rather than contract it out that was uh

i am in support of these items as well why don't we entertain a motion that says yes on these items but know that request from Council Member Mendoza. And maybe later, Madam City Manager, you can tell her all the things we've been trying to do to encourage contracts going out to local businesses.

David PenalozaItem —

Mr. Mayor, this is Council Member Pinaloza. If I can add to it, I just want to thank Council Member Mendoza for bringing that up. I've, over the last year, I've brought that issue up a couple times when we're purchasing, usually, vehicles. and I still yet to see a kind of report of what we're doing to really you know incentives incentivize Santa Ana dealerships to to bidding on these on these different RFPs to make sure that those dollars stay in our city so I agree and that would would be my comment

Mr. Mayor? You may come. Go ahead. Somebody make a motion at some point, but go ahead.

I just want to echo the sentiments of my colleagues. I really would like to see us do more to be proactive in reaching out to local businesses to get them on board. I know that our staff does a great job of trying to get us the best deal, but whatever we can do, especially in these times, to really shop local, buy local, would be appreciated. Mayor, if I may?

This is Christine.

Yes, go ahead. Go ahead, Madam City Manager.

So on items 22A through 22E, with the exception of 22E, there were six Santa Ana vendors notified of the invitation to bid, and we did receive zero bids from them. But certainly we can brainstorm among staff to determine if we can do additional reach-up for those local vendors.

Yes, that would be greatly appreciated, Madam City Manager. Thank you.

David PenalozaItem —

Mr. Mayor may I again all right this is council member Penalozzi go ahead go ahead and I I uh I fully understand that madam city manager and thank you for that information but I think of the the times when I've been fortunate enough to to buy a car and I mean they they're on you like a hawk the second you get out of your your your car that you're going to trade in in the parking lot you know and they they fight over you and um I'm pretty sure that if we you know personally knocked on a Santa Ana dealership's door. I know that, I don't know why they're not bidding. Maybe it's not, you know, their price,

David PenalozaItem —

their cars aren't as within the price range that we're proposing or whatnot. I'm not sure exactly the details on the RFP. But, you know, if we made sure to put effort into really calling them, and again, this is me not being so familiar with the RFP process when it comes to purchasing of vehicles, but I don't understand how they wouldn't want to bid or why they wouldn't. Do we reach out to dealerships and say, hey, do we follow up? Do we ask why they didn't bid? Do we ever get that kind of feedback?

So, Council Member, it's not an RFP process. It's an actual invitation to bid, so we're required to accept the low bid. And we notify over 300 vendors, including vendors in Santa Ana, that have that type of a vehicle. Santa Ana dealers that do choose to respond, we do give them a preference. So I can look into other ways we can reach out to them. We certainly don't want to interfere with the competitive process of the invitation to bid, but I think there's other measures we can take based on your request.

David PenalozaItem —

That makes sense. Okay. Thank you, Madam City Manager.

With that being said, Mr. May, I'd like to make a motion to approve items 22A through 22E. I'll second.

Second, Bessera. All right. Roll call vote, Madam Clerk.

Councilmember Becerra?

Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza? Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa?

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

He stepped out for a moment.

Councilmember Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Potem-Viegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes. 6-1. That kind of, Madam Clerk?

that is 25 F I councilmember thank you I councilmember please thank you mr. mayor and madam

David PenalozaItem —

city clerk 25 F for the public listening was just authorize the city manager to execute an agreement for the use of certain city facilities with new singular wireless basically just approving municipal facility license agreements with with singular wireless and crown castle to use our utility poles in different neighborhoods in the city for cell towers just wanted to take the opportunity to thank Public Works for setting that that zoom virtual meeting with the Wilshire Square neighborhood earlier this week or last week wanted to bring up a couple issues that were

David PenalozaItem —

brought up and and I'm not sure if this is the appropriate time to do it but just in regards to the notification of the public I know that one of the issues that without arose was that we when it comes to cell phone antennas we only notify within 150 feet of the cell phone tower neighborhoods like Wilshire Square found that problematic because of how old and and the character that that makes up these neighborhoods and how you know that limits it to you know five or six homes distance radius around that pool and they showed interest in wanting to to involve more of the of the neighborhood and more of a distance

David PenalozaItem —

surrounding the pool and wanted to see Nabil or madam city manager what we could do if that would be something that would be added to this agreement I know that that probably wouldn't be the way but we're changing the way we do things the ordinance or design guidelines that we have put forward I'll defer to our

Public Works director to see where that requirement is is found and to determine what we would need to change to expand the distance good evening mayor good

evening council members maybe El Sabah executive director of Public Works the hundred and fifty feet standard is is written in our design guidelines and but we not only we not only notify the hundred and foot radius neighbors around the pool but we also notified the neighborhood association themselves and we get them involved so it's more than just 150 so we add to that that 150 we can expand on it that there is rules in the FCC that may prohibit us from expanding the notification radius but we will look into that that's something we

are looking at right now as a result of our meeting yesterday it was not it's not in this agreement that to answer your question it's not in this agreement this agreement here is really to allow the providers to use our street lights for antennas what we discussed yesterday it was for the utility pool which is

David PenalozaItem —

completely different okay well because it's related that's why I wanted to make sure I comment it. The notification process is the same. Okay. And design guidelines and whatnot. So that would, I know we have design guidelines via an ordinance, if I'm not mistaken. So that would require that to be brought to council if we want to change things. Of course, compliant to FCC, right? Sure. Okay. All right. Those are my comments. Thank you, Nabil. Would you like to make a motion yeah I'll make a motion to approve second second all right roll

call vote please madam clerk when councilmember Becerra yes councilmember Mendoza yes councilmember Pena Loza yes councilmember Sarmiento yes Council Member Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Potem-Vegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries 7-0.

Our next item, Madam Clerk.

55A, pulled by Council Member Mendoza.

Yes, I support...

Go ahead, Council Member Mendoza. Go ahead.

I support item 55A, and the reason I pulled it is because it's my understanding that the increase in the fee has been about 41 percent so that is significant and I wanted to commend staff for their efforts in saving the city of Santa Ana such an incredible amount of money that's a 41 percent reduction in the fee to administer this so thank you very much and I approve I make a motion to accept to approve item 55A. Second. Roll call, roll please.

Councilmember Becerra?

Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza? Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

David PenalozaItem —

Yes.

Councilmember Soloria? Yes. Mayor Potem-Viegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries.

Our next item?

65A it's a report item all righty I'll refer to staff

actually this is the item the ad hoc committee

recommendations writer or their summary of you know things for us to consider

mayor I can clarify for you if you'd like okay so we do have a brief presentation but the purpose of this item is for the rest of the call the council to see the recommendations that the ad hoc committee had been working on we do have a presentation that can walk you through them real fast but it's really for you to discuss with your colleagues and for the ad hoc members to talk about the rationale behind some of the changes and why they would like to see them done that's the purpose of it you you aren't actually approving anything tonight with regard to the Charter amendments so

if you'd like I just have not had a I mean I guess I don't mind listening but I'm not ready to you know give direction to staff to come back with anything because I personally have not you know looked at them or studied them um I don't know if others have or have not and I was talking of one of the committee members anyways requesting possibly a two-week continues to at least look at what they are maybe formulate questions and be able to have a more uh informed uh discussion But how do other colleagues feel? Anybody else have a thought on this?

Mr. Mayor, I'd like to speak on this.

Go ahead, please.

I, too, haven't had a chance to thoroughly go through all this. When did the committee end up finishing all this work up? How long ago has this been?

In other words, when was this document finished, what was presented here? Is there staff on that?

So, Daniel, can you speak to the last meeting that you held with the ad hoc?

Mayor and City Council, the ad hoc Charter Review Committee last met on Thursday, May 28th. The documents were finalized that day and were published with the City Council meeting agenda for tonight's meeting.

I can't tell with your mask on. What was that?

The last ad hoc Charter Review Committee was on Thursday, May 28th, and the meeting materials were published that same day for tonight's City Council meeting. Very good.

So I haven't had a chance to review everything because there seems to be quite a bit of changes on here. I got the red line copy recently. I just got that yesterday. But with all the demonstrations going on throughout the city, it's kind of hard to go through all this and speak with our city attorney about it and our city clerk. So I'm comfortable with a two-week continuance. That's my comment, Mr. Mayor.

David PenalozaItem —

Mr. Mayor, this is Council Member Penaloza. May I make a comment? Go ahead. I just want to say that it's very irresponsible of you and the Mayor Pro Tem to say that we didn't have enough time. The red line version has been attached to the staff report since Thursday night when the agenda was posted and made available to the public. So I don't understand how we could sit here and approve 500 page environmental impact reports, million dollar contracts with three days of the staff report being available to the public, but we can't even consider a presentation from the Charter Review Committee and staff.

David PenalozaItem —

So this is a presentation for discussion. That is why the PowerPoint is before us. I think that with this presentation, you'll be more informed of what these Charter Review potential changes are about, and then we can go from there with discussion and possible changes.

And I take offense to your comment.

Mr. Mayor, this is Councilman Sarmiento. Yeah, Councilman Sarmiento. Go ahead, please. Thank you. So I did have a chance to review the charter amendments.

But, you know, my comment was going to be that, look, I think that we can give some direction, but I'd like a little bit more time because there have been things that have happened just within the last week that may change my opinion on the inclusion, exclusion of some of the amendments that have been proposed. I want to thank the committee because I know that they've done a lot of hard work, but I don't think that even they, you know, envisioned that we'd be proposing changes to the charter under a pandemic and under these conditions and unfortunately under some very,

very significant impacts that the city and really the country have had. And I think that it's prudent to maybe consider those, consider the context in which we're living under right now, and maybe introduce some additional amendments that might be important. So I would just say, you know, I think the work has been done, but there may be some augments or some supplements to what's been proposed already, given where we are.

Because I know that, you know, my concerns have been people have been questioning, you know, authority by the director of the Emergency Operating Center, which is the city manager. You know, issues having to deal with issuing citywide curfews. different authorities that we don't even think we were going to be dealing with just a few weeks ago or a few months ago. And just living under a pandemic has really made me reflect on powers that we extend and how sometimes we have to move so quickly that we may need to reconsider just some of that language and some of those parts of the charter that we may need to now look at

because these are certainly irregular times and we certainly want to be very thorough in our in our analysis so those are my comments uh additional comments yes thank you i just i think that that is

the whole purpose of this discussion if there are items that we want to include let's put them forward uh part of the reason for this item being before us today was because we want to make sure that we provide the community the public the council enough time to flush through what we've done as an ad hoc committee and i'm very appreciative to my colleagues council members panaloza and council members solario for uh the work that we put into this and so i'm very proud of what we've done and i know that if you read through it you'll see that we do have some strong

recommendations and we have some other items that i think among the three of us we felt that it would probably be more productive to carry that discussion over to the full council. I welcome any additions that my colleagues may have as far as what we could consider. And I think that, you know, Council Member Sarmiento is correct. I mean, you know, with the pandemic, there's a lot of policies that we need to really think about as we go forward. And if there's any way to strengthen our charter, I think we should try to do that. Now, we don't want to take these

amendments to the voters you know after the fact where we you know miss an opportunity so i think you know we have a general election coming up in november i think the ad hoc committee's intent was to make sure that these items were considered thoroughly not just rushed onto the um ballot but rather had a chance for both the council and the community to read them provide insight and comment i'd like to believe that the ad hoc committee did a fantastic job in going through these items but i know there's always going to be room for improvement so i hope that we will have a

productive discussion both at this meeting and the subsequent meeting thank you

uh council member mendoza did you want to comment on this yes as a newest council member i would

certainly appreciate um two weeks to review the post amendment my question however is does this delay cause or risk that these amendments or this change, charter change, does this need to go before the voters on a certain date?

Yes, it does. But Madam Clerk, can you talk about the dates, please?

Yes. So the last date to present this to Council to consider this in the presence of the voters to add this as a ballot measure to the election will be July 21st on July 7th the City Council will have in front of them to consider calling the election and that's primarily because the nomination periods opens at July 13th so the July the following July meeting July 17th will be the next opportunity for the council to address the charter amendment.

Okay so there is enough time if we have a two-week review period there is enough time to review and vote on it and then put it on the before the voters. Yeah okay

anybody else who hasn't commented go ahead yes mr. mayor that this is a councilmember Jose Soler was a member of the ad hoc committee first I want to thank councilmembers up in your Losa and but Sarah I think we probably did maybe like 10 you know meeting so 11 I was only it was only one off and yes during this COVID period and doing a lot of these other things and so it was a little bit hard but I think it speaks to the dedication of the council members and the staff from the staff I want to thank Sony and Laura from the city attorney's office Daisy from the city clerk's office Daniel from the city

manager's office and then I know there was other staff that would help from time to time some of these items are councilmember initiated but many are staff department initiated so we do want our colleagues to be mindful that some of these items are just to make the government function better we wanted to at least begin the conversation today just because we do think it's important especially if it's gonna go before the public we know that in the past that they all don't get approved to to move forward but the sooner we begin vetting the better and you know I agree with council members are me into if there's

additional suggestions that makes sense so we have to begin to look at those and tonight's a good start and it where he got one idea from him so that that would be good finally at least some level of report today by staff or my other colleagues and I know I said a few things already and there's a staff report but really is extra time is also just for the public to know what we're thinking about because they may have suggestions or thoughts for the council or the staff so if nothing else you know they began to hear a little bit about what we're trying to do with these verbal comments and you know just here

trying to share with the public that's all thank you mr. mayor if I if I will

David PenalozaItem —

yes go ahead comes from painelosa go ahead this is councilman pinelo's I just wanted to remind my colleagues that the reason we're here is to have the discussion and have the PowerPoint that was put together by staff presented to us so that we could see the discussions that we've been having the last three months about the the charter review and potential charter changes the the amount of of time that staff has put into this to present this to us to review the reason why we're holding this today so that we could have like councilman bacero said enough time in the next two months to really dissect this really go

David PenalozaItem —

through it add things remove them gut them this isn't a final document this is an informative presentation that we put together for our colleagues and the public to see and it's been available for you know four days now and it would I would prefer that we start having the conversation today because you know if we don't we all know where how this is gonna go just from the sound of it so and if that doesn't happen I want to apologize to staff for wasting your time uh with this because that's what what clearly where we're heading so with that said those are

my comments mr mayor all right mr mayor lord mr mayor yeah one final comment then i want to comment

go ahead councilman vicera thank you i i would just prefer that staff go ahead and at least show us the presentation i to tackle councilmember pillows's comments i mean they put the time into it let's go ahead and put that out there if not for anybody on the dais at least for the community to see what work has been done I hope that as much as I want to hear what my colleagues have to say about the out-hoc committee's work I really welcome input from the community I want to know what they think about it I think there's been a lot of thought put into these ideas and you know I hope we've covered

many of the concerns of the community but maybe we haven't and maybe those are things that they can bring to us but let's go ahead and put this out there for public consumption and obviously we'll discuss this at subsequent meetings

all right let me speak if i may my concern about doing the presentation is that the committee members uh and by virtue of all the work that you've done and nobody uh you know diminishes that effort uh have a big advantage uh as always over other council members but in this case we're talking about charter amendments and we're trying to give staff some direction i mean the whole intent is to kind of sort of tell staff come back in two weeks we kind of like this we don't know if we like that etc etc and i think it puts us uh especially you know councilman mendoza

that just joined the council uh and i know four days is a long time but not really not when you're talking about these many amendments and you guys have met for 11 times and and only last thursday does it come out in a form for us to begin to to consider them so i think it'd be best let's see where we're at but i would i would say look we can all look at what the recommendations are we can study up on them we can potentially suggest changes we can put it on the internet

we can have the you know community look at everything they want and then when we're prepared to have a more educated discussion we can have it so right now what i'd like to move is just move for a two-week continuance taking into account everything that everybody has said if there's a vote to continue we continue and we get you know councilor sarmiento's comments and potential amendments we get everybody that hasn't been up to speed i i'm guilty i'm one of the ones

that have been you know working on on curfews and covid and riots and everything else that you guys have been working on but i i've not done this work so i'd like to move for a two-week continuance if there's a second let's see if there's support for that and then we'll go from

there I will second the two-week continuance mr. mayor and I'd like to advise or comment that the charter is the footprint and the ordinances and the resolutions are the fine print we need to remember that and that that's my

David PenalozaItem —

second and comment and you're limiting discussion on it great yeah for today

only correct yeah madam clerk can you call the vote please mr mayor can we have the presentation for today well that's what i'm saying my motion is not to my motion is to hold the presentation hold the whole thing for two weeks so that when it's presented we have some ability to understand more about it um if we're going to have a you know questions and thoughts i'd rather have be more up the speed. I just don't think since last Thursday till now, plus one you, Council Mayor is sufficient. So let's see where the council is on this. So Mr. Mayor, I'd like to make a

David PenalozaItem —

substitute motion to hear the presentation of the Charter Review Ad Hoc Committee today.

Second. Becerra. All right, let's do a roll call. We'll now make a substitute. If it fails, we'll go back to the original motion. Madam Clerk. Council Member Becerra.

Yep Councilmember Mendoza Yes

Councilmember Peñalosa

Yes

Councilmember Sarmiento

Yes with comment. The only amendment I would add to that is that this comes back to us in two weeks so if anybody does want to make an adjustment to it after this, after we've had the presentation, there probably won't be much direction so to the extent the first and the second are willing to incorporate that into the motion, I'd be supportive

David PenalozaItem —

Yep, that's well incorporated. So hear the presentation and then just bring, yeah, that's fine.

And just to add, Council Member Sarmiento, I think that's always been the intention not to rush this through, but if we need multiple meetings, always happy to oblige.

Thank you.

Council Member Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tempe Vegas?

No.

Mayor Pulido?

No.

Okay, motion passes 5-2.

All right, let's go ahead and see the presentation.

Okay, Honorable Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, and Council Members, the presentation will present the proposed charter amendments from your ad hoc. I'd like to start with just a little introduction on the item. Our current charter was adopted in 1952. It has been amended several times since then, and most recently in 2018. In January 2022, this body formed an ad hoc committee to review it and make recommendations. We also solicited recommendations from all of your executive managers. Council members Becerra, Penelosa, and Solario served on the ad hoc committee, and as Council member Solario mentioned, this committee met 11 different times.

They have 17 recommended charter amendments, and then additionally, there are about five areas that they were looking for a discussion with their colleagues on. So the proposed charter amendments, I'll just run through them very briefly. You certainly can return and discuss any item and would be able to put it up on the slide. But Charter Amendment 1 is Section 400, and the change would just be to clarify when new council members are sworn in. Charter Amendment 2 is making a modification to the Code of Ethics and Conducts, and it would clarify the applicability of the code, and it would include elected officials,

the city attorney the city manager the clerk of the council the police chief and all the other executive managers that head up city departments charter

David PenalozaItem —

amendment three madam see manager I believe there was a typo on that page because I believe that language should have included appointed officials I'm not sure why that wasn't on there okay okay well because elected officials was

was uh was in there but so that's why I was asking because because we included

David PenalozaItem —

elected officials but we included appointed officials that's correct so we would cover up both of those okay let's just make sure it's added for for next

time it comes around okay item charter amendment number three this is section 404 and it would move term limit provisions from this section to a new section charter amendment number four is section 405 and it's the mayor pro tem and it clarifies when the selection of the mayor pro tem shall occur Charter amendment number five is section 406 and its council judge of elections and qualifications of members and this would add the phrase or at a special meeting Charter amendment 6 section 413 and this has to do with the

adoptions of ordinate ordinances it adds resolutions to the titles and it clarifies effective dates who can sign them and provides that ordinances amended after the first reading must be reintroduced to be consistent with state law Charter Amendment number seven is section 609 budget appropriations and it removes the two-third vote requirement for budget appropriations Charter Amendment number eight section 613 deals with claims and staff recommends revising this section to streamline the process for paying invoices and the charter provisions currently are quite outdated Charter Amendment number nine

deals with the civil service system and it revises equal opportunity provisions and adds concurrence with concurrence of the City Council relating to any recommended changes to civil service rules by the personnel board Charter Amendment 10 is section 1002 it deals with civil service again and it provides for administrative cleanup and revisions to ensure that our Charter is compliant with the CalPERS rules and other applicable laws and regulations Charter amendment 11 is section 1010 and it updates the anti-discrimination provision and adds a provision requiring that the City Council adopt an anti nepotism

policy Charter amendment 13 is section 1011 and it's concerning contracts for performance of administrative functions and it's simply I'm so just a you skip 12 Oh charter amendment no I did 11 and this is charter amendment 12 contract for performance of administrative functions section 1011 and it changes just the term personnel to human resources charter amendment number 13 deals with work stoppages section 1014 and it removes the section in its entirety to

comply with state law Charter Amendment 14 section 1208 is enforcement and it allows the city to contract with a state or county entity to enforce the campaign contribution provisions of the Charter Charter Amendment 15 is section 1400 deals with the retirement system and it makes revisions to be consistent with the changes in section 1002 charter amendment 16 covers various ones and it's just replacing gender specific language with gender-neutral language and the final charter amendment number 17 is also various and it replaces clerk of the council with the terminology that we use currently

of city clerk in addition to those 17 there are five areas that the ad hoc wanted to discuss with the full council and so the first topic topic a is a proposed charter amendment with section 401 for the qualification of the members and the reason for this is to revise the residency requirements for mayor and council member and add procedures to confirm residency and move term limit provisions to this section as well and the ad hoc charter review recommends that this item including the attached red line changes would be discussed by the full council topic B is

section 401 and this deals with term limits and the purpose or reason for amendment is to restate the term limits for mayor and council members already set forth in sections 401 and 404 the three issues to analyze and discuss would be whether to impose a lifetime ban whether to remove the term consecutive and whether to remove the cooling-off period. The ad hoc Charter Review Committee members individually provided their recommendations regarding these issues and is asking if the City Council supports these recommendations. Topic C for discussion is Section 1206, Camping Contribution Limitation,

and the purpose is to revise provisions to increase transparency. and the ad hoc Charter Review Committee added this provision that would apply to developers, their principals, or owners with pending significant planning entitlements and a definition of person that's consistent with the Political Reform Act. Topic D, Section 1206, deals with required disclosures, and the purpose for amendment would be to add campaign finance disclosure requirements in addition to those that are required by the FPPC. This purpose of this section would be to supplement the required disclosures pursuant to the Public Reform Act

and to increase transparency regarding campaign contributions to city elected officials, candidates for city elective office, their campaign committees, and other committees formed to support or oppose ballot measures or candidates. The final topic that the ad hoc wanted to discuss with the entire body is a proposed charter amendment for public works. And this is Public Works recommends that the following topics be incorporated into the charter. That is local preference, exemption from the state's public contract code, updating the definition of Public Works construction,

changing the lowest and best bidder to the lowest responsible bidder, and allow for alternate project delivery systems such as a design build. This did come out of the Public Works Department as noted on the item. We already really talked about the timeline. Your pressing timeline would be that the adoption of the resolution to send it out to the voters would just have to take place before July 21st.

So with that, I am going to turn it over for the ad hoc members. We can certainly put any one of the slides up if you want to talk about a specific charter amendment or go straight to the topics to discuss with your colleagues.

Go ahead, committee members.

David PenalozaItem —

so mr. mayor colleagues this is a councilman Penaloza and you know we've worked on this as we've we've heard for over three months now we've we met 11 times with staff city the city attorney's office finance CDA the clerk's office it's been a community effort to look at the charter and bring new changes we've even we looked at the at the charter amendments that were proposed from the last time the charter was looked at the Charter ad hoc committee

David PenalozaItem —

which was in 2018 I believe we looked at that we looked at new ones we we worked with staff department heads look through their sections of the charter and brought that stuff forward to us what could best work in their departments I'm happy of the work we've done of course this isn't final the reason for us wanting to bring it forward to you guys is so we could all look at it dissect it cross things out you know add things if we need to and remember that at the end of the day regardless of whatever we want this still needs to go to the voters and to for them to make the ultimate decision I'm happy that we're having this

David PenalozaItem —

presentation tonight that way and like I've seen the last year and a half we can't say two weeks from now that we don't have enough information and we haven't heard what staff has to say so a lot of these changes were very simple going through our outdated charter that's over 70 years old you know you you look at the language that says referring to the city manager as he referring to the city attorney as he the city clerk I think is referred to as she very outdated language very some are simple some are simple as to just making

David PenalozaItem —

it gender-neutral all our three appointed officials are women and I'm proud of that and that that should be reflected on the charter instead of our charter referring to as he that's one of the minor ones then it gets it gets into the deeper ones as you know everything from public works contracts to to elections and qualifications of mayor one of the things that I campaigned on and and when when I was running for office and saying that we don't you know as a elected body we shouldn't you know sit out eight years and then be allowed to come back

David PenalozaItem —

when somebody's turned out you know whether it's me whether this isn't to you know single out any one individual or any particular person but i'll use me as an example let's say this is where i'm turned out ain't nobody want to hear from me again after after you know eight years you know i served my time god bless you thank you we'll welcome new blood new new ideas new leadership and that's what democracy is all about and that's what my intention was to bringing that forward is that i'm not comfortable with having an eight-year cooling off period where somebody could turn out and come back and run for office again um i think

David PenalozaItem —

you you you did your work and and thank you and and time for new leadership and that uh lifetime ban is something that i had in mind and i know that that's very popular with the public the public agrees likes it and um i know there's some legal questions with with uh with our city attorney of how we could and and and that's even the the question that we brought up can we apply retroactively and a lot of times it was like oh possibly not there isn't any case law to it I believe but that's not even the point if it only applies to me then so be it you know moving forward we'd be we'd be a changed better

David PenalozaItem —

community and better democracy at our city hall if we did it and I and could care less if it just applied to me so those are the the big ones that I was pushing forward at one point I even considered reducing our terms as council members going from from three you know four-year terms back to two but I looked at the history of why we added a third one which was I was fine with and code of ethics we've had this come up again over the last year with ethics complaints and how we have no real process to look through them and address

David PenalozaItem —

any ethics complaints submitted by the public against any of us and that's something that we also want to you know change a little bit to benefit the public and the way we do business and those are my comments you know my push for having this presentation tonight is so that we can't we don't have that we won't be able to come back in two weeks and say we haven't had this conversation we need more this is it is the blueprint of our city and we need to have multiple conversations and that's why we're having it tonight and that's why I'm happy that we were able to have it tonight and see this presentation so

David PenalozaItem —

staff again thank you so much for all the work you guys put forward to this I've you know took taking the temperature of the public with a lot of these charter amendments and they're very popular and people like them and it's an outdated charter that needs change and upgrades to our current you know it's 2020 and and I'm happy with them but of course you know this is where a full body council and if whoever has more you know amendments to it or changes or if something isn't popular with the council then you know that's that's how it works but um those are my comments mr. mayor thanks for allowing me to speak and

that's it absolutely can we uh but madam please start the clock is I think it's I'm fair to allow way more time than one councilman versus another. So just remind us when we're at four minutes and then let's try to limit the five minutes, please, colleagues.

Well, Mr. Mayor.

Yes, Mr. Mayor. Go ahead.

Thank you. You know, I just want to start off with, you know, being an elected official is a public service. It's an opportunity for us to give back to our community in these leadership roles. and I want to echo the sentiments already stated that, you know, our intentions with the term limits was not as I believe previous councils have tried to do to play games and figure out ways to add terms or figure out a way to sneak back onto the council or do the kinds of games that have helped make the public, the community lose faith, lose hope, and lose trust in City Hall. And so I think

that what i really appreciate about this exercise with this ad hoc committee is that i believe we all are growing in the same direction we wanted to see changes that you know people would scratch their heads and go really that's really what they want to do yes absolutely the lifetime ban i think is something that should have been done a long time ago and you know we just had folks that wanted to play games and i'm glad that this um these ideas are are rising to the surface and that hopefully my colleagues will agree to them and we'll put them before the voters and hopefully they'll enact them especially as we have our next for

subsequent meetings that we talk about some of these other items for discussions like the campaign contribution limitations and the required disclosures I don't think I need to rehash all that's happened over the last couple of years and the dark money that has just infected our processes infected our system and you know you hear certain people in the community talk about certain groups there are individuals as well that are doing this and they are playing the games all you need to do is search online and you can read about it what we're trying to do here may not solve everything

but it is i would what i like to believe a good faith effort to try to mitigate that we need to shine the light on these folks because there's a lot of talk in the community of maybe one entity that's really moving the needle on how this council goes and who gets elected and who doesn't but I can assure you from my own experiences it isn't just one entity there are multiple entities out there playing very sinister games and what we are trying to do through these ideas these amendments is to hopefully again we probably will not be able to stop all of it but we're

going to do our best to try to provide as many regulations and rules that will will prevent that sort of activity from taking place. So I just wanna thank my colleagues that served with me on the ad hoc. As the presentation indicated, we went through 11 meetings and hashed it out. And I'm very proud of the fact that we had so many proposals that we all agreed on. And there's just literally a handful left that I think with the guidance of the rest of the council, we can provide a very healthy package for the, healthy package of amendments for our community to vote on. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Mr. Mayor, this is Sarmiento. Yeah. This is just a question for the city attorney. Wasn't the motion to just simply hear the presentation, not provide comment? I think that's what we agreed on. That's what we voted on. That's what the amendment was. These comments, I think, the summary that Councilmember Peñalosa did, I think, was sufficient. Look, now we're going beyond the scope of what the motion and the amended motion was about. actually the substitute motion with the amendment so I have noted here that

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

substitute motion was made to have the presentation and then it was noted and was requested by the mover and the second to just have the staff report only so that the items were introduced to the public but not to get into a discussion

got it so I just wanted to keep us on track and be consistent with the motion and the the amended language so to the extent that we can certainly editorialize and make more comments. We certainly can, but I think the whole purpose was just to bring it to the public and have the presentation so we could bring it back at the next meeting and have a more deliberative discussion.

Thank you, Council Member. And I noted and understood that to be your motion, and I think we are now in danger of going beyond it. So given that, if there's no additional comment, I'll just move on to the next item. Are there additional comment? If not, I'll just move to the next item.

I just want to make a note, Mr. Mayor, for the entire council. Okay. It's not discussion. It's just a note. Look, meeting 11 times in four months and us giving four days, big difference. I would caution the council that they're looking at 17 different changes. And every time you're going to take this to the voters, and unless you put them all in one lump sum, which is not transparent, but if you take it to the voters, it's $65,000 every time you put it on the ballot. And you've got to understand it. And if you did half of these, we're looking at half a million dollars. You think this is the time to make these changes,

especially with our finance presentation coming here pretty soon? I just caution everyone.

David PenalozaItem —

Madam City Attorney, can you correct that? I don't think that's accurate in regards to cost of each individual ballot change.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

I'm not aware of that. Maybe the city clerk can speak to the cost.

Yes, so the county had provided to me a cost estimate for the general municipal election, and they indicated with the mayoral race and then the wards 1, 3, and 5, with two ballot measure questions, it would be up to $250,000. And any ballot measure that's added after that is $65,000. So I do stand correct.

Thank you.

Just to add that I think there's truth to both sides. You know, it's $65,000 per. But like last year, we were able to put a number of the amendments into one item. So as we continue to see which items has support, we'll see whether is it one item or multiple items And again, that's why we're having this conversation early so we can begin to think about the financial piece too. I'm just saying we'd be careful with the money.

David PenalozaItem —

That was the point.

Alright, let's take a presentation. So at this point, I think we've had enough presentation and some discussion. Let's go ahead and go on to the next item. Madam Clerk, that would be 65B? That's correct and Mayor just so you're aware

we do have four virtual hands raised five now and so just want to let you know

for a public comment. Well right now I want to move on is it on 65B or on what? Yes it's on 65B. All right let's go ahead and take them and then we'll let staff

make a presentation go ahead please down nine to request to speak star nine to request to speak you will receive a notification that you've been unmuted when it's your turn to speak for the record clearly state your name whether you're in support or in opposition to an item and why you have three minutes from the moment that you're unmuted please proceed with your comments okay my name

is kelly 11 war 3 in santa anna and i wanted to note that the police department union is pursuing a 9.7 million dollar raise while we are anticipating a 12 million dollar loss this fiscal year a 25.6 million dollar loss in the next fiscal year and they currently take up 43 of the city's general fund in light of recent events i think it would be appropriate to eliminate that 9.7 million raise and to subject them to the cuts and furloughs that the rest of the departments are in solidarity with the people of Santa Ana, with the Black Lives Matter movement, and also just as an ethical policy.

This would be common sense, but I worry that members of City Council will allow the police to continue to receive a rapacious proportion of the city's budget. Will you agree to these guidelines? Thank you.

Thank you. You have been unmuted, and if you would please clearly state your name for the record. If you're in support or in opposition to the item and why you have three minutes, please proceed.

Hi, my name is Tai Fan, and I'm here in my personal capacity as a homeowner and long-time Santa Ana resident to speak in support of adopting the 2020-21 budget with $200,000 of funding for the city's universal representation program in Agenda Item 65B. I am a first-generation immigrant and refugee, and I have seen firsthand the obstacles that new immigrants face in navigating a new country, speaking without English, without education, without trade skills, and without resources. Santa Ana is an incredibly diverse city with people from all backgrounds.

But with the COVID-19 crisis and even long before that, providing support for our immigrant community is more important than ever. Many of our immigrant residents are disproportionately affected by the economic and health crisis and are not receiving financial support. As an attorney, I know how convoluted and complex the legal system is. In fact, as a law student and now as a practicing attorney, I have provided many hours of pro bono legal services on immigration matters because I know how hard it is to navigate a system that is set up to make you fail.

You know, in Santa Ana, we're all connected to each other by an invisible thread of community, whether we know it or not. But, you know, federal law just doesn't guarantee the right to an attorney when an immigrant, a Santa Ana resident, faces deportation proceedings. But we know, we know for a fact that having an attorney drastically increases a person's likelihood of winning their case, particularly when that person does not speak English. A deportation affects not just the individual's life, it separates families, it rips apart neighborhoods, and it destroys our communities.

The Universal Representation Program not only protects the Santa Ana residents who qualify for its services, it keeps the lifeblood of our community together. It keeps the city of Santa Ana thriving. I really hope that we not only keep the funding for the program, but we increase it to $2,000. I know that as a sanctuary city, as a city that fought against a public charge rule by the President and the White House, we are willing and able to stand up even during this time of crisis with our immigrant community and say, we have your back, we support you, we are one family, and I really hope that you support this item

and protect our universal representation program. Thank you.

please state your name for the record whether you're in support or in opposition to the item and why you have three minutes you have been unmuted

please proceed to speak

they may not be there madam clerk okay proceed with the next if you would please state your name

for the record and if you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes you have been unmuted please proceed with your comment okay next speaker please state your name for the record if you're in support or in opposition to the item and why you have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted please proceed with your comments okay proceeding with with the next speaker. Please state your name for the record whether you're in

support or in opposition to the item and why. You have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted. Please proceed with your comments. Hello my name is Hector

Bustos and I'm a writing senior at the University of San Francisco and also a proud product of Santa Ana. I'm here to address some of the concerns I have regarding the lack of action being taken by the City Council to address one of the city's most pressing issues. Over the course of the weekend thousands of people organized and practiced our First Amendment right here in Santa Ana, and I'm disappointed by the rhetoric used to describe our community. My people are not animals. It is disappointing to hear these words come from the social media of our city council member. Our community is hurting.

We are mourning the death of George Floyd and so many others who have fallen victims to police brutality and murder. The simple fact that you can speak on the destruction of property of big businesses before the murder of an individual whose life was taken because of racist police is very telling. Why does our black community have to fight for the right to breathe? I'm calling on our city council to take action once and for all. We've been asking you to establish a police oversight committee with subpoena power and your lack of action has brought us here today. We are

no longer asking you. We're demanding that you do your due diligence as elected officials and carry out the needs of your constituents. Our police officers need to be held accountable for their actions the police officer association in santa ana has a monopoly of power and it is no surprise to any of you or any of us in the community our city needs to be led by people who truly care about the future of santa ana in addition to that i now would like to bring your attention back to item 65b the city's proposed budget is not reflective of the needs of our city we cannot

afford to raise public safety spending by tens of millions this city cannot be bought and run by an institution known for their abuse of power and systemic racism. Every single one of you up on the diet loves to include community safety as part of your platform when running for office, but if you really want to keep our community safe, protect us from the racist police that are killing us every single day. The youth are listening. We are watching your every move. We will continue to hold you accountable, and we will fight until we finally have a city council and a mayor that listens to our demands.

You have one minute left.

Santa Ana needs elected officials who will do what they say they will do. Thank you.

Thank you. Your time is up. Next speaker, please, madam. Clerk.

Please state your name for the record, whether you're in support and opposition to the item, and why you have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted. Please proceed with your comments.

Okay, next speaker. For the record, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or in opposition to the item and why. You have three minutes from the time you have

been unmuted. Please proceed with your comments. Hi, my name is Indigo Vu. I'm a resident of Ward one in santa anna and i'm an educator in orange county um i am um well again and again elected officials in the city have raised concerns about budget deficits even prior to covet 19 and santa anna has been at the brink of bankruptcy for years all of the residents of the city feel the impacts of that on a daily basis from underfunded public school system to streets with potholes and cracks that never get fixed to libraries aren't funded enough to serve the public the way they should

to poor maintenance of the few parks we have in our city and so much more. According to the budget summary documents, this year there's an expected $21 million deficit in Santa Ana. We have the funds already in our city to do all that the residents need and more, including the universal representation program for $200,000 and to allow undocumented residents in our community to get access to lawyers. While I understand that COVID-19 has hit Santa Ana hard, There's no justification for continuing to deprive the residents of resources and services they desperately need and deserve

Or for filing over 100 part-time city staff just a few weeks ago The answer to the budget deficits is simple Defund the police We're set to receive 43% of the budget That's over $140 million going to the police department that could be used to service the people directly There are countless books, articles, essays, studies out there That show that when people's basic needs are met, crime goes down Increasing policing does not reproduce crime But the studies are beside the point. Your people, your residents, your community members, your constituents are calling on you to allocate money on services we need.

We as Santa Ana residents are witness to your silence and complicity in police violence. As none of you have commented on the police's brutal attack on young people and protesters in the last week, and to even publicly proclaim that at least black lives matter. As I'm sure you've all seen, there's been national calls to action to defund police departments, and Santa Ana is no exception. I'm calling on you as the elected officials of Santa Ana to protect your citizens and align yourself with the police, with the people, with your actions, not just before work.

The least you could do is to form a police oversight commission with subpoena powers. I assure you a police oversight commission is the compromise, especially if you spent any time today listening and paying attention to the public comments that the L.A. Police Commission received. again I urge you to review and reject the proposed the current proposed budget to make the necessary changes to help the residents and to pass a budget that goes back into our communities more than it funds police thank you please state

your name for the record whether you're in support or opposition to the item and why you have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted please proceed with

your comments good evening mayor mayor pro tem and council and welcome to our newest city council member ms nalita mendoza congratulations my name is monica studer and i'm the chapter president of our service employees international union local 721 santa ana chapter board representing 800 employees we do not concur with rushing any kind of vote on this budget and request that it be postponed until absolutely necessary with regard to the proposed workforce changes proposed budget staffing decisions and reduction in part-time

budget savings our comments tonight pertain to public comments and this business agenda item the item 65b and requested this budget not be voted on until absolutely required given this very chaotic time we appreciate the mayor's work to obtain fiscal relief from california's governor and additionally SEIU, our union, and the House of Labor have participated in the team effort to successfully obtain the $28 million of the state funding. And also we have been advocating for the Federal Hero Act of 2020 for additional fiscal relief given the COVID-19. We will continue to

partner in these efforts best we can to assist. We are glad that many of our full-time and part-time staff are returned to work in the latter part of may early june to serve our community a soft opening with the public begin and we appreciate the meetings held through the middle of may and we had the original expectation that all employees would be returned to back would be returned back to work the only question was when prior to covet 19 we represented 400 part-time and 400 full-time and and also some part-time civil service in the number of magnitude

of five when deemed non-essential several had to file for unemployment including full-time and part-time and 300 to 350 part-time employees were sent home in the phase one back in march now it turns out that the furloughed status of 176 of the part-time workers has continued and been changed on May 22nd effective to an actual termination of our parks and rec library very dedicated employees and the city was not actually paying them back beginning early April so we were

surprised to learn on May 13th as an aside to the return to work meeting with our thank you that 161 of the part-time members instead it was 176 would be separated we did not have adequate notice on this um they are dedicated part-time servants of public servants who make only 15 to 20 000 per year and do a tremendous amount of work it affects all of our employees and we see them now as line item as a part-time budget savings which was is listed in the fiscal year 2021 budget yet those are people and those are families in santa anna and we urge that the city's hr department

immediately recall and that the city council direct them to recall 176 employees and rescind the actions taken to separate them from the city and direct them to follow the proper processes to make these kinds of decisions going forward in a proper

manner thank you thank you for the record if you could please clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item and why you have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted please proceed with your comments

hello good night um city council my name is erica gonzalez i am a life long from paniera small business owner parent educator and grassroots organizer i would also like to say a prayer a tolteca prayer uh before i say my uh what i have to say plazo camati and i would also like to remind you that we are on stolen land the tango territory so plazo camati uya yokulani Thank you for this day to live here on this earth among your beautiful creations. Tlazo Kamati for another day to get it right. Tlazo Kamati for all my relatives, the earth, the fire, the water, and the wind, which give us form and to the animal and plant relatives,

that bless us with beautiful friendships, medicines, and nourishment. Tlazo Kamati to all the ancestral spirits with me on this earth, guiding me in ways that I sometimes may not see or understand, which leads me to where I am today. Shame on you, city council. Shame, shame, shame. I am in opposition of the increase in police funding. I would like to express my utmost disappointment in the lack of leadership from this council from over the weekend. Your actions spoke volumes of where you stand in regards to the Black Lives Matter movement and how little you value your youth.

The SATB receives more funding than any other department, more than 60% of our annual budget. It's the eighth most violent police department in all the nation. Eight, okay? It was clear in the community forums, and it is clear when you speak to residents all over the city, they prioritize our youth. Stop criminalizing them. This weekend, police officers shot rubber-coated steel bullets at peaceful protesters. Peaceful. They tackled two youths in downtown Santa Ana. There is video. You have been silent. Crickets. They tackled them for existing, okay? enforcing a curfew in order to protect property but failing to enforce a curfew

in order to protect our community from the pandemic which may I remind you we have the leading causes we are leading in the cases okay we have more cases in any other city but failing to enforce the curfew to protect our community just shows us where you are and shame on you can I will start an elected official before speaking derogatory about you ask yourself this is helpful is this purple if this is necessary and we are going to remember in please clearly

state your name please clearly state your name for the record if you're in support or opposition to the item and why you have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted please proceed with your comments good evening members of

the council mayor my name is Carlos Perea I'm a Santa and a resident and also a member of the city's measure x emergency oversight committee and speaking here on my individual capacity i'm calling to address a couple of items as you consider the adoption of this year's fiscal budget one i'm calling in support of the renewal of the deportation defense fund at its current level of 200 000 to continue providing protection to santa and a resident facing detention and deportation i have provided critical support to families and residents of the city facing detention deportation the city has taken really good leadership in the last three

years ensuring this fund exists so please ask you to continue that commitment the second item i'm calling off the consent as a concerned resident but also member of the measure x oversight committee again on my individual capacity as a member to raise concerns on the amount of funding that is being considered to public safety during the fiscal year allocation from the general fund specifically to the police department the city should not be considering increasing 13.5 million dollars for public safety during a pandemic that has hit the city economically and massive

scrutiny of police in the wake of the last incidents with the police incident specifically uh believe the committee we sent your report in the previous council meeting regarding how the city needs to change the status quo of budget allocation so i please ask you to take a look at a report to consider meaningfully consider those recommendations as well additionally i have concerns about the allocation of funds for youth services under the cannabis tax and under the measure x funding for youth services again the police department gets a sizable piece of the

tie for both revenues 28 million dollars under the measure x funds compared to less than a million dollars for youth services that is not acceptable in the wake of the recent tragedy of murder of George Floyd, a black man, by a white police officer. It is important that the city would think the way it states its values and tangible ways. Yeah, one minute left. That is Poges. Poges are moral. Thank you.

Caller, please state your name for the record, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comments.

My name is Karina Gutierrez. in favor of allocating $200,000 to the Universal Representation Fund, along with other items in support to protecting your Santa Ana constituents. I make this comment as the Orange County Justice Bard Wember, an attorney who represents Santa Ana residents, and is an undocumented member of this community who understands and knows not only the fear that comes with the threat of deportation, but through direct family members who continue to face detrimental consequences of not having access to counsel when deportations are initiated. As council members grapple with the budget during this pandemic,

I urge you to consider the immigrant essential workers who hold Santana City together. I urge you to take direct action to protect them through allocating $200,000 in full. Immigrants are not only necessary to the city to execute essential jobs, but they are the main breadwinners of their family. Many families that are mixed status with an overwhelmingly amount of U.S. citizen and legal permanent resident children. There are long-lasting economic benefits to the city. with a universal representation program that allocates proper amounts of funding. It reduces the need for public use, promotes mental and physical health,

stabilizes children through public pursuit of education, and quite frankly, it makes Santa Ana City's economic growth continue. This is not the program to be cutting during challenging times of crisis. And on my personal capacity, I would like to indicate that resources to the enforcement and weapons to confront a hurt community is not the answer. It is a problem. I want to hear from people in power, positions, who are you members of Congress, right, or members of council, sitting that you have an obligation to hear the real issue and to act on line action items that have a direct impact for your constituents in our community,

a community that feels not only unheard and pushed aside but unprotected. the santa ana city council has an opportunity to continue to foster and protect the rights of their constituents setting the example not only for your constituents but for other cities to proud to follow it is practically impossible to isolate undocumented immigrants for those who are undoc that are documented because human lives naturally collide without prejudice until we are made aware of the man-made categories therefore i urge you to support the universal representation allocation

of $200,000 to send a message of equity, unity, and support for the most vulnerable members of your community. Thank you.

Caller, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item and why. You have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Hi, mayors and council members. My name is Luis LeMond. I am a resident of Santa Ana in Ward 3. And speaking of the budget, I just want to speak in favor of continuing the $250,000 for the Immigrant Defense Fund. As a sanctuary city, we can't argue that we are a sanctuary if we don't provide some sort of protection for undocumented brothers and sisters. So I wholeheartedly agree with that. Secondly, on item 65B, as Residence Indiana, a proud union member, and a partial recreation commissioner, I'm speaking out against that.

and I'm speaking out against the elimination of 176 jobs as a cost-cutting measure that will be detrimental to our city. Our city's employees take pride in the work they do to keep our community running. Parks and Recreation employees work hard to make sure our students and seniors have safe and clean parks, after-school and summer city programs, warm meals, renovated city pools, and an amazing public library, and much more. This COVID-19 epidemic has shown how vital public services are at keeping our community running and thriving. we cannot balance our budgets on the back of hard-working city employees and

the programs are working class families use permanently cutting 176 jobs means 176 families losing their source of income and it means thousand sent out of residents losing access to vital city services so the recovery of the Great Recession we have made we have asked city employees in the community at large to bear the brunt of budget cuts and reduced services we cannot continue down that road these employees are not expendable they are the lifeline of our city and the most and they work in the working perform on a day-to-day basis shows how much

they love santa and up our budgets must be an extension of our values when we talk about public safety we have to remember that parks libraries polls and mobile hotspot programs community school programs other city services contribute to a safe community let's rise to the occasion roll up our sleeves and make sure we don't put livelihoods and the health of our community to the side and leave a budget cuts and as a commissioner myself if it means us not taking a $50 stipend a month, I'm more than willing to contribute to that to make sure that every penny we save is a job we save for our community. Thank you.

Excuse me. Caller, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes. From the time you've been unmuted, please proceed with your comment.

Hi. Hello, everyone. My name is Trovesto. I'm a director of community engagement with resilience orange county and i prepared my statements uh while santana youth continue to take to the street to show their frustration and anger the santana police department continues to violently punish and suppress their valid emotions what is happening around the country around police brutality and the disproportionate impact and death of black life in the united states has a direct connection to orange county we cannot stay silent during these times as an as an organization that works primarily with youth and undocumented community members,

we have a duty to speak up and speak against these injustices. In Santana and across Orange County, police departments and police unions have had a grip on city budgets and general fund resources. This has a direct impact on the outcomes of our youth to thrive in our city. Suppression is not the answer, and we will not solve anything by arresting our way out of this situation. Time and time again, our organization has called for proper investments and use to thrive in our city. And time and time again, the city council fails and ignores these calls, opting instead to invest in policing.

Decades of neglect on our youth have led many of them to be criminalized and folded into our local criminal justice system. Everyone is to blame for what we are witnessing today. The police are looting resources from our youth. The district attorneys are not prosecuting the cops. and judges reinforce and lock up our people and to the white supremacists who take, and also allows white supremacists to take violent actions into their own hands. Youth need resources to thrive and the systems around us are failing them. Time has got, this has got to stop. We ask for the following. Listen to the youth. Defund the police.

We need police oversight now with subpoena power. There needs to be zero arrests during this pandemic. of youth. Denounce white supremacist violence. Invest in youth. And for housing specifically, there's currently ties that is tied to federal funding, so the immigrant community is not able to access that funding. Invest local city resources so local immigrant communities can access and have money to pay for rent. And support the universal representation program. over the last three years our organization has been pushing for the

city and the creation of this program we need to continue that the current funding levels and I currently am part of the Orange County rapid response network we've made several referrals to this legal defense fund and I'm so happy when community members tell me they're from Santana because I know that the city is looking out for them thank you so much

caller please clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you are unmuted please proceed with your comment

hi my name is felicity figueroa and i am absolutely in support of the full um 250 000 for um the universal representation i'm part of um the friends of orange county detainees and i've I've been visiting people in immigration detention for the better part of eight years now. And the kind of desperation I saw with people, many of whom are longtime residents of Santa Ana, was just heart-wrenching. These are people whose families were left often destitute because they were the main breadwinners in the family.

and when they were locked up in detention there was no way that they could help support their families and they were also not allowed to look on the internet to find their own lawyers we got so many pleas from people who are asking us if we had suggestions of lawyers if we knew any way that lawyers could be afforded and unfortunately we're not lawyers and we aren't able to give that kind of advice and it was just made us feel so helpless to listen to their pleas and their

kind of hopelessness as far as being able to find a way to come back to their families. I think you've heard from the other speakers the statistical realities that people who have lawyers have such a much better chance of having a positive resolution of their cases, whereas those who don't have lawyers, there's the language issue. They don't know any of the legal terminology. They often don't, the translators that they have are often not very

fluent in the language themselves. And it's just, I mean, I can't understand how our system can allow that to happen but that but the reality is they do and that's why it's so important that city governments can step up and help fill the gaps pardon you have 49 seconds left okay and help fill the gaps that our federal government has left empty and especially in santa anna i mean santa anna has such a wonderful reputation of holding up immigrants it's a city of immigrants and

And I think that it's something that is expected of Santa Ana just because Santa Ana is a sanctuary city and we really want Santa Ana to live up to that image and provide for the people who don't have the means to provide for themselves to be back with their families by getting legal representation. Thank you.

Caller, please clearly state your name for the record. Whether you're in support or opposition to the item, you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please proceed with your comment hi my name is Tracy law and

I'm a resident in Ward 1 I am also the executive director of their eyes a Vinnie Meade community organization that promotes social justice civic engagement and immigrant rights in Orange County many of the people we work with are Vinnie's residents in Santa Ana I'm speaking in my personal capacity and on behalf of my organization on agenda item 65 B around seven points Firstly, I am in support of the city's Deportation Defense Fund and its current level of funding of $200,000 or more in the city's proposed 2020-2021 budget.

This is an important program that should be continued to ensure legal representation for families facing detention and deportation. Secondly, in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and countless black people by police officers across this country, including the murders of residents and police brutality against youth and residents in the city that have been committed by the Santa Ana Police Department for years, I oppose increasing any police spending in the city budget.

Instead, I urge the city council to use any funding that has been designated to increase police funding toward youth programs, employment programs, rental assistance, for residents impacted by COVID-19, and other programs that would actually directly benefit the city's residents. Given the continued systematic trend of police abuse of power and lack of accountability in this city and across the country, Santa Ana should establish a long overdue community police oversight commission with subpoena power, investigatory authority and disciplinary authority.

Over the last few days alone, I have seen the Santa Ana police throw tear gas and shoot young people and residents with rubber bullets for rightfully protesting the injustice against black people in this country. This is shameful and important and the city's residents deserve better than the City Council's silence and lack of action holding the police accountable. I look forward to meaningful action from the City Council. Thank you.

Caller, please clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

please proceed with your comment you have three minutes my name is annie karen cardenas i'm a

resident of san anna and ward one and i'm calling in opposition of item 65b the proposed budget for the fiscal year 2020-21 specifically the 13.5 million dollar increase to police spending under the guise of public safety. I understand that the city council won't be taking action on this item tonight, but I'm asking that you provide direction to staff to revise the proposal and allocate funds to community resources that can help put a stock to the over-criminalization of our city. I'd actually also like to make a comment to Councilmember Peñalosa, and I want you to understand that a few positive posts on Facebook

do not erase the pain and harm you inflict on our constituent, on our city, by calling them animals, instead of trying to understand the grief and pain that incited this violence. Thank you.

Caller, please clearly state your name, whether you're a supporter or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Hello, good evening. My name is Jessie Lopez. Today I'm speaking on item 65B. I'm a lifelong resident and taxpayer in Santa Ana. I reside in war three. I believe that our budget must be an extension of our values. I reject the proposed budget to increase public safety spending by $13.5 million. The city laid off 176 essential workers from the library and the parks and rec department. Yes, they are essential because they provide some of the most basic and urgent support that our youth need.

Now more than ever, it is crucial that our city's leadership prioritize the well-being of our working families by making sure that we have the support we need, like staff libraries and staff community gardens, to help us have a better quality of life. As someone who has benefited from these resources, I ask you to rehire our workers. I ask you to not rush the budget vote, because there may be future FEMA, federal, and state funding that may come to the city. The city has 60 days after July 1st, 2020 to approve a budget.

And under such serious circumstances, the city council should not rush any important decisions without the community's awareness and input. We know what it is like to grow up in a city that is parkour. We know what it's like to grow up in neighborhoods that are underfunded. And we also know the positive impact that healthy communities can have on our youth and families. Our budgets need to prioritize them. I also ask you to continue funding the city's deportation defense funds at the current level lastly I urge you to take a moment to listen to what we are again

asking you for which is an investment in the people of Santa Ana thank you

caller please clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted please

proceed with your comment. Hello City Council members and Mr. Mayor. I'm Jairo Cortez. I'm the executive director of CHIPSPA. I want to make a comment regarding the city budget and the city spending priorities. I understand that COVID-19 and the during pandemic has had a very direct and a very deep impact on the city's tax database and the city's tax revenues. But if COVID-19 related cuts are to be made,

they must come first and foremost from the Santa Ana Police Department budget. The Santa Ana City Council has increased the police department's budget year after year, most egregiously in the form of the $25 million Police Officers Association contract of 2018. Residents should not make sacrifices while the police force continues to receive unjust and exorbitant rewards. Instead, the city should make cuts to protect other vital city programs like libraries, parks, housing, and yes, the immigrant defense fund, which positively impact the community and contribute to a healthier city.

These services do far more for public safety than policing and enforcement ever have. We asked for the following actions from the City Council in order to challenge systemic racism, champion police accountability, and end police violence for our residents. Try to take these budgets and use the savings to preserve and prop up city programs like libraries, parks, and housing. Grant genuine community oversight of the police departments through the creation of a civilian and review board with subpoena power, investigatory power, disciplinary authority, and the ability to hire and fire officers, including the chief of police.

Renegotiate POA contracts with respect to the handling of police misconduct, and include community stakeholders in the bargaining process.

We have one minute left.

All future POA contracts. Thank you.

Caller, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Good evening. My name is Abigail Alamor. I'm speaking against the item 65B. I am very disappointed that the city is cutting jobs. We have the highest taxes in Orange County, so where is our money actually going? We need to be investing in our community, especially for our kids. We need parks, you know, libraries. I'm also a city employee for a city of Orange County, and I know how hard we have been working, especially during this hard time during COVID-19. And I'm fully aware that some people haven't been working,

and it's just, it'll be heartbreaking for some people to lose their job. Our city employees take pride in the work that we do. so I also would like to know like where our money is actually going because how how do we keep you know proposing higher taxes and doing all these amendments and stuff when we don't even have the money to provide other stuff for our communities Santa Ana Police Department needs to have an oversight committee and I'm hearing that where they have the highest and we're fully aware that they

have the highest budget and it shouldn't be that way especially now during this hard time we'll be seeing a lot of police brutality so we need to really invest in our community especially our kids so have a good night thanks

caller please clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please proceed

with your comment. Hi, my name is I'm a Santa Etta attorney and I'm a homeowner and I wanted to speak in support of the continued funding for item 65B. I have had a good deal of experience witnessing both privileged and underprivileged people reach out for legal help. And even the people who are in the know very frequently don't seem to really understand what's going on. So I think it's imperative that we continue funding

this program for those who are picked up for deportation, because they are definitely even less advantaged in such a situation. I think the majority of the citizens are overwhelmingly in support of not just sanctuary city status, but also of having a properly funded legal platform to help these underprivileged individuals. I think that if need be, there are definitely other areas of the budget that are far lower priority than taking care of the lifeblood of our citizens and of the country.

You know, we all know that undocumented individuals do quite a bit, and I don't think that's properly appreciated, and I don't think that we've done right by DACA. So I would strongly urge to definitely continue at the level that has been funded in the past. Thank you.

Caller, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Hi, good evening. My name is Carla Juarez. I am a long-time resident of Santa Ana. I am in support, but I would like to also request that you defund the police. I also request an oversight committee with a subpoena power. And also, I would like for you to support a super sorry a universal representation um i also want to express my disappointment on how the police department handled the protest and i also want you guys to acknowledge the violence that were

put against our youth before curfew i wanted to let you guys know that i am a homeowner i live in Santa Ana. I have for all my life. My brother and sister are U.S. citizens, and they're not going anywhere. I'm not going anywhere. And what you guys do and how you guys vote and how you move forward is going to represent you, but we will also be watching. And I have been very disappointed and I hope I hope and pray that you guys do the right thing and stop the violence against our youth

purposely support Black Lives Matter and put the money and investment in youth in our community and not the police this is why we came to this point and this is why our city is burning because of civil unrest it didn't build up in a week or over one incident. It's been here. I remember for years since I've been here, since late 1980s and before then. So it is up to you to do the right thing. And we're

watching. We're not the only ones that are watching. Our kids are watching. My brother and sister our citizens are watching you. And we're not going to take you mistreating us and you mistreating our city and continuing to oppress us. It is not okay for you to shoot rubber bullets,

steel cover rubber bullets and tear gas way before curfew at a peaceful protest. That is disgusting and you should be ashamed. You don't do that to your kids.

Thank you.

Caller, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Comments, comments, comments.

Hello. Yeah, my name is Dr. Bustos. I spoke earlier and I still had a minute left to speak, but was really interrupted by the mayor. so I'd like to finish my comment since I didn't have the opportunity to. And Mr. Mayor, if you don't like what you're hearing, that must say a lot about your leadership. And I just want to finish by saying that the youth are listening. We're watching your every move. We will continue to hold you accountable and we will fight until we finally have a city council and a mayor that listens to our demands. Santana needs elected officials who will do what they say they will do.

We don't want politicians who claim to be one of us but are being bought by the police officers association. Come election season, the youth of our city will vote those in power who act on the needs of our community. Never underestimate the power of the youth in our city. Remember that you are here to represent us, but you are all failing us. You're letting the police kill us, and we will not stand for any longer. Do your job and bring forward a budget that puts Santa Ana residents first. Council Member Sarmiento and Council Member Solorio, we are watching you

and what you will do for the youth as you roll out this budget and run for mayor this November.

Caller, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Hi, my name is Kaylee, and I am a resident of Santana, and I am just calling to speak on behalf of the additional funding for the police department. Like everyone who's spoken here who's just been horrified by how the police has responded to the protests, I would just like to speak in solidarity for them because it really is a different world for people of color to interact with police. And we're just tired of seeing this, you know. We're tired of the hashtags. We're tired of the continued funding.

There's already, I believe, about $145 million that go to maintain the police department in Santa Ana each year. And it's just one way that you guys can stand in solidarity with Black Lives Matter is to not continue to increase this funding. So thank you.

Caller, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

my voice against the money they want to give to the police department especially with the need of COVID-19. We have a lot of people, many young people who need help and we are doing the things very bad. I want to give the opportunity to the citizens of this area to look at the but the past otra vez para hacer un cambio y estoy hablando en español porque hay muchas personas que no tienen la capacidad de poder hablar y entender lo que está pasando muchas gracias buenas noches y espero un cambio hasta luego

it was down Luis Cachua and I'm here to ask not to fund the police there's a lot of people are here a lot of youth who need help and have needs and we need to do these things and we want the citizens to see what's going on take another look at the budget and see what changes need need to be made caller please clearly

state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please proceed with your comment

hi my name is Maria Seja and I am a lot I was born and raised in Santana and I'm a I'm an opposition of increasing the budget for the police in Santana I know that almost half of the budget goes towards the police department and I believe that that budget should be that should be redirected to public resources like the library parks and services and more investment into our youth as a person in the city that grew up in the city and watching the violence go towards my own father and brother and watch them being criminalized in front of my face growing up, I experienced how

the people that I love closest to me have been brutalized by the police. And I strongly believe in defunding the police and I also am very angry in the city council's response to how the protests went down. Also, I just really believe in defending the police and I hope that you take everything that's been said tonight into account. You are responsible and act that way. Thank you.

We have no more callers raising their hands virtually but I did want to take this time to announce that today we did have a glitch in our email system and that went that went out to the e-comment at sienna-anna.org the error message that you may have received clearly indicated that only one recipient out of the multiple recipients did not receive the message to the email group e-comment at sienna-anna.org rest assured that all your public comments have been received and will be part of the official record for today's City Council meeting to verify that the email was received you may go to our agenda or

public document portal located at santa-ana.org forward slash city hyphen meetings thank you for your ongoing civic engagement we greatly value your input in continuing to improve our city in addition to that i do want to state for the record that the emails were that were received up to 5 p.m was 181 that were in opposition to funding the public safety one was in support of funding the public safety. Nine were in opposition of laying off part-timers. One was in had indicated support in increasing towards senior center. 21 were

support of the legal defense and then one was just a question on the prison to

employment program. And that is all we have. Thank you madam. City Manager, would you like to proceed at this time and yes sir thank you mayor so the item before you just to clarify

you're not being asked to take any action right now as we discussed at the work study session on the budget it is still a moving flexible budget as we are still waiting to hear what level of assistance we're going to receive either from the federal level or the state level or the county level so there are some moving parts that we don't have solidified yet but we wanted to keep the budget in front of you the agenda materials include a seven page staff report a detailed budget a budget summary along with the CIP so we're hoping that over the next two weeks we can answer any questions you can provide

any further directions for us for tonight we do have a brief presentation for you we want to talk about we heard your comments and direction from the workshop and so we incorporated those in there we still have measures that we are searching so that we can present to you hopefully in the second meeting of June a budget that we will be recommending for your adoption with that I'm going to turn it over to our finance director and she will walk you through the presentation and talk about next steps and things that you know are still under review so with that Thank You Catherine Downs Thank You madam city manager mayor

mayor pro tem and council members for allowing us to present your updated draft budget the sorry just get myself a little situated here the purpose of tonight's budget is to or tonight's presentation is to review the detailed draft budget that includes the council's direction from May 19th tonight we're seeking additional direction and today our budget process has included a live community input in March with ongoing input received by email as you just heard

from the city clerk department budget hearings that were done in April and reports to City Council on both April 21st and May 19th

the we heard what you the direction that you gave us on May 19th and so we just wanted to give you the status of each of those items we have submitted a FEMA application for reimbursement of some of our COVID related costs we are monitoring the state budget action for care a cares Act allocation directly to Santa Ana we are also in process of finalizing an agreement with the county for a cares Act allocation from them as well we have some preliminary labor discussions in process the city did separate 178 part-time employees and we

have updated the draft budget assuming of the hiring freeze that we spoke about on May 19th fee increases were included in the May 19th agenda item and on your June 16th agenda will bring you a proposed resolution to adopt the fee changes the budget adoption has been delayed to July 7th to afford us more time we hope to present the pension analysis to the City Council in July with some options for reducing our costs related to that on May 28th the city

manager signed executive order number five to allow use of downtown sidewalks and parking spaces and off-site parking citywide for dining and retail operations the draft budget includes a five hundred thousand dollar increase for the debris removal contract as well as seventy five thousand for homeless outreach both items are included in your draft budget as recurring items the draft general fund budget includes five million of one-time spending your draft CIP document CIP budget includes 3.4 million of additional funding for park

amenities there's funding for a one-time parks master plan included in the draft budget the draft budget that if her citywide not just general fund includes 10.4 million dollars for senior services which have been outlined on page 4 of the staff report on your agenda item there's one-time funding included in the draft budget for a citywide parking plan staff is in process of developing a proposed ordinance amendments to improve business equability when it comes to the business license ordinance and exhibit four to your agenda item lists

all existing CIP appropriations

apologize I haven't been keeping up there this is a snapshot of the current version of the draft general fund budget the this before it is presented for adoption on June 16th it will be adjusted to ensure that the operating reserve remains intact

the there as the city manager mentioned we still have some moving pieces some things that we have not been able to finalize because we're waiting for information from both of state and county agencies the draft budget is not ready for adoption some of our employees are responding to COVID-19 issues and the compensation for those employees may be eligible for CARES Act funding as they are providing substantially different duties than originally budgeted if the state adopts the governor's proposed budget the city would receive a CARES Act allocation from the state and the county plans to

allocate CARES Act money to the city the county is finalizing an agreement for the city to receive its allocation a backfill for city revenue losses may be included in the pending federal phase 4 assistance package but we don't know that yet that it's a possibility and labor negotiations could result in up to six million dollars of savings depending on of course on what is agreed to we're certainly open to any other mitigation strategies from the council

our next steps we will provide you an updated version of the draft budget on June 16th for your public hearing with planned budgeted option on July 7th it's imperative for us to carefully monitor the budget on a monthly basis and we will provide a quarterly update to City Council no later than October after we have actual sales tax data for April through June so then we'll have more solid information for you at that point that concludes my oral presentation and we're ready to take direction from the council

that city manager are you done or is there more I know that was the

presentation and if you have any questions we're here to answer them or if you want to provide any further direction if not it does not require an

action for you tonight comments by council members please

madam city manager I have a quick question mr. mayor so regarding the the employees that were furloughed and now are no longer with us and the reason for that was because of COVID and we ended up having to close the parks and we don't have anything going on at the moment with the parks, correct? That is correct, sir. Yeah, and we did keep some library folks, but there were some also that were let go, and it breaks my heart

for these people. I was getting correspondence from them. I was getting text messages from a few of them. You know, there's a city employees. There are families, like I said, they're, they're, you know, it's our city family. And a lot of them are from the community. And they have good ties. They have relationships. They've been there for years. And it's a shame. But I mean, what I mean, I'm almost, I don't even know what else to say. It's just a bad situation. It's just, that's what it is. And it's a, it's a bad reality. and I like I said I'm hopeful that they come back but is there any idea when we

might be able to be calling people back in the future or was that still unknown

certainly sir you know I echo your sentiments too it is it is very sad they they've served the city very well and they are hard-working individuals and stellar employees what first happened is when the governor did the shelter in order we had to shut down all services that he didn't consider essential that That resulted in 600 of our employees being sent home. As things have started to slowly open up, there still is a prohibition on providing certain services. And for those individuals that we can't, you know, we don't have rec classes, we aren't

having parades, we aren't having concerts in the park, and those are the positions which, you know, serve the community very well that we're unable to have right now. So we did separate the employees. It actually was 178 part-time employees. We are looking at every opportunity possible if we can bring them back in a different capacity. They're going to be the first ones on a callback list. So it was initially the central service part. They weren't included, so we couldn't conduct those services. And then, of course, we're now seeing the impact from our budget as a result of the pandemic.

So I hope the recovery of our revenue expedites. And we see, I know the finance director and I, we argue about it, whether it's going to be a V recovery or whether it's going to be a slow growth. but if we recover our revenues I certainly hope to bring back every employee that we let go and we don't even know Santa

madam city manager we don't even know if this if there'll be a spike in the you know the kovat situation here and then the parks will continue to be closed in the rec centers and that's kind of like on the on the back end of a lot of things you know like just like the movie theaters and the concerts and all you can't do it and that is um it's tough it's it's sad i i really hope the best i hope things change regarding um the covid situation and i hope that we can bring back our our folks very soon those are my comments mr mayor

David PenalozaItem —

mr mayor thank you other comments council members yeah this is council member penaloza i have a comments I basically wanted to echo what a mayor pretend viegas and madam city manager you know it's troubling to think of all our part-time workers in the library and our rec centers and our pools you know Memorial Pool we had just approved to have it a year-round pool which was the first time in ever that we had full-time year-round programming at our pool which is something that's much needed in our community you know Memorial Pool alone is where I personally

David PenalozaItem —

learned to swim so I you know that was excited for that and I'm sad to to have all these part-timers at our different community centers let go with that you know just early last week I I went to try out our library curbside service which is great so kudos to the library staff for that and as I was using it you I was trying to film a little video to get the word out to the public about our library service and make sure they know that it's there. And I was having a hard time getting shots because there was cars coming in often, frequently.

David PenalozaItem —

So people were frequently using it, which was great. And so I said, you know, I'll do this when it's closed to the public. That way I could just quickly do it. And while I was trying to do it, I pulled up to get my book. and one of the library staff members out there was running in and out, running in and out with a little cart. And I had a face mask. I had glasses on. I had a hat. Nobody knew it was me. He had no idea it was me. And I asked, how are you guys doing with the curbside service? And he was red. He was sweaty. He was like, oh, man. He's like, we're going to need those part-timers back.

David PenalozaItem —

we're gonna need that staff you know sooner than later because we're busy and and people are using and that's just with the curbside service so as we move forward and our libraries open up again you know there's gonna be an increased need I you know it's it's it's a sad situation definitely was nobody was expecting this pandemic and then in regards to the different cost savings that we could potentially have I know that at the last council meeting when we had the budget workshop I was the one that brought up the labor concessions

David PenalozaItem —

and possibly looking at the different bargaining unions not as CIU because that's who who covers the part-time workers but POA and looking at possible concessions that they're willing to make or have that conversation at the table to be able to offset the losses and that we're seeing have we had those conversations madam city manager have we had any are we are we meeting with with the labor groups and having these talks about possible concessions I have engaged

concession bargaining with one of our largest unions to date okay that happened today and there'll be more I'm guessing depending on as the revenue scenario changes and as more information comes in I would approach as needed to the other labor groups but certainly I approach the largest one that would should they agree to concessions create that the greatest savings to the general fund

David PenalozaItem —

okay and that's good to know because you know when when many of these contracts were approved you know they were done in in multiple year contracts so it's you know these aren't new increases that we're bringing forward but it's unfortunate because again nobody had a new that a pandemic was going to happen and completely you know cause a shortfall in in revenue and in regards to the the income tax or the sales tax I'm sorry a sales tax revenue so are we

David PenalozaItem —

getting this might be for the finance director Catherine are we getting daily updates on how much money is coming in? Is that how it works? Because I know you mentioned October for sales tax from April through June. That's when you get the final actual estimate or number of how much money came in? That's right. So

there's two different pieces of information, actuals and estimates. We don't receive any information on a daily basis for sales tax specifically. We have been working with our sales tax consultant to provide us up-to-date estimates as they receive more data. Our sales tax consultant just received the data for first quarter, January through March, the actual data that included the first couple of weeks of the pandemic. They just received that last week. So they've been working through it because when they receive the data from the state, they have to work through quite a bit of analysis and number crunching to make sense of it.

and so we hope to hear from them any day now. I was actually hoping to hear from them in time for this meeting, but we've been reaching out with them on a daily basis. Where's our information? Where's our information? So we hope to hear very soon that they will have completed their analysis and we will be able to make sense of our most recent payment, which was very low, and that's the cleanup payment for January through March quarter. And so we believe that there's been some businesses that have taken advantage of the state's deferral program.

And so if that's the case, it's a timing issue for us. It means that we will get the revenue eventually. It's just that we may have to wait a little while for it. But other than that, the next set of actual data that we'll receive for the April through June time frame is in September. And then, of course, it'll be at the end of September, and then it takes that time to crunch through and analyze that data. So we do receive monthly payments from the state, but every quarter the first two payments are advances only. So you get an advance and advance, and they're just random numbers that the state develops to send you a check,

whatever the state is comfortable with. and then it's that third cleanup payment that becomes your actual number for the for the full quarter so that's how the information comes in I know it's very frustrating for all of you it's frustrating for us but that that's what we have to rely on from the state and so we're gonna provide as much up-to-date

David PenalozaItem —

information as we possibly can thank you Catherine and another question this I guess this would be more for for the city manager Christine Ridge with approximately 26 million from the cares act that that we're hoping that the governor approves his budget June 15th right is a date and we receive that money I know it's it's earmarked and specific to COVID-19 related losses or expenses I I mean and and this is me just thinking of all the the and all the numerous

David PenalozaItem —

contracts we come across here in open session and in closed session and always looking through the language and and always you know the city city attorney you know always you know reminds me it's like well yeah it says that but you know this one little word here I'm not a lawyer and I know Council members are my until would probably say the same thing it's like yeah that gives you the the you know loophole to apply it to this I'm thinking our part-time employees that that have been let go because of of COVID-19 I mean to me that is a is a you know we've we've seen losses in revenue we couldn't we couldn't we're

David PenalozaItem —

not not even the loss in revenue but just the the fact that we can't open our community centers because of gatherings or we couldn't and our you know parks and recs programming our library we couldn't have gatherings so we had to shut down because of covid would that be money that we could possibly use for those programmings that we had to shut down because of covid i mean is that because all i hear is it has to be spent on covid 19 related losses which would to me it would be a loss and i'm just again thinking out loud here and trying to see if there's any way there to save these jobs and bring back our

programming for the summer no councilmember your questions are very good ones the cares Act does come with guidelines that's issued by the US Department of Treasury and they have been modifying them most recently as a week ago on what you could spend the dollars for so the one thing that the cares Act does not include is revenue recovery so right now there is not any dollars of cares money that we received that we could replace lost revenue but they are issuing a lot more guidance so some of the costs that we believe are eligible include when we had to send 600 employees home and we gave them two

weeks of pay that we could seek reimbursement for the pay for the part timers that were sent home and they they had the opportunity to apply for unemployment which many of them did we're self-insured for unemployment so we're paying their unemployment benefits we believe that that's another item that we would be able to seek reimbursement for to the extent that we have existing city staff and we substantially change their duties to switch over to work on kovat related things we believe we can get reimbursement for their regular pay on it certainly with the public safety

professionals anything related to kovat whether it's the overtime whether it's operations of the EOC whether it's manning the traffic controls at a food distribution event we believe those are all reimbursable and also all of the equipment that we've had to acquire as a result of COVID is certainly reimbursable so we have FEMA dollars we are expecting a lot more cares dollars we're really holding out hope for the federal legislation which it was a HEROES Act now it's morphed into a SMART Act that's the only legislation that even contemplates revenue recovery if we were to reap revenue recovery you

would be looking at a much different starting fund balance for this next fiscal year which we could probably add back a lot of programs so I know that was a long answer but hopefully I answered your question no you did that

David PenalozaItem —

was a very good and answered it all of my questions for now but I just personally want to make sure that we're aggressively seeking labor concessions with our bargaining units and and making sure that we have all our ducks in a row for when we do receive these cares funding we could appropriately make sure that we're filling in the holes where where we've been affected and those are my comments members manager

alrighty any other comments council members yes mr. mayor go ahead

council members there please thank you mr. mayor I've said before and I'll say it again I do not envy what staff has to do to present this budget to us in these times. I appreciate that you're keeping all the options on the table, but please remember that our residents, they're already paying the highest sales tax rate in Orange County as you're considering these fee increases. I also want to echo the sentiments from my colleagues regarding the layoffs of our part-time employees. They provide such heavily used services, much needed services, and I hope that we're able to bring them back soon to serve our residents. I also want to

thank staff for maintaining funds towards planning such as the parks master plan and the parking master plan uh we can't be disciplined with our spending if we don't have a plan so i want to thank our parks executive director lisa rodloff for her leadership on championing the parks master plan and i want to thank min thai for uh his continued uh championing of the parking master plan parking i don't think i have to say but i'll say it is something that is has such a huge impact in our city and I think that we just can't keep turning a blind eye or having this Hunger Games approach to parking so I'm looking forward to the

results of this parking master plan I'm thankful that it's still included and that's my comments right now Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor it's Councilwoman Mendoza.

go ahead council member

yes i i i would like to express my concern as well for the recent layoffs and understand that because of the coveted restrictions that we had to lay off some of our members and listening to the staff reports in our budget i am hopeful that we can continue to work in our efforts to bring these services back and to re-employ our workers because they do provide services that are essential to our community.

And hopefully once the nation returns to more of a concrete and restrictive COVID phase that maybe we could phase our workers back into the positions and appreciate the hard work on the budget. It's a very difficult area. We need to balance it and there are so many services that are required. But rest assured to the public that when we are looking at this budget that we look at

everything now we don't give any anyone or any group special preference that we look at it as the need and so when the budget is approved it is with all of our constituents constituents in mind and for the greater good of the community thank you mr mayor that is all my comments

Thank you. Any other council member comments? Yeah Mr. Mayor this is a council member. Go ahead please. Yeah and so I don't want to repeat a lot of what was said and you know I want to thank staff obviously for continuing to bring this back and refining it. We know it's a moving target and this is sort of a moment in time image of what we're looking at and maybe when we see this in 15 days at the next council meeting it'll be a completely different one right depending on whether or not we're successful with federal and state monies. So I certainly appreciate that.

I don't want to belabor the whole discussion on our employees that we've separated with, just to kind of maybe just dig in a little deeper on just specifics that I didn't hear.

As we separated with these part-time employees, I just want to make sure that we did it in a surgical way. And by that, I mean there are some employees that probably or could have been or can be sort of repurposed for other things. And I've always looked at some of the contracts that we've had with vendors, such as, just for example, graffiti removal. I know that we contract with GPC, I believe. and you know madam city attorney if you could maybe take a look at some of those outside vendors that we have contracts with and see if there's any way we can

you know pause those and maybe toll those contracts and in the interim as we're trying to absorb folks during this time maybe we could repurpose them for for those things you know we you know to councilmember penialos that's point yeah I try to be creative in my interpretations as well So we'll leave it at that adjective. But, yeah, I think there are ways we can try to use this. We know other cities are doing this. They're trying to absorb their folks. But I just think as we separate and maybe when we separated, we needed to do it in a very compassionate way

and in a very, again, surgical and methodical way to make sure that, you know, we have many folks that are residents of the city, many folks that have been here with us for a very, very long time, and have tenure and seniority and just longevity with the organization. So I just wanted to make sure that we are thoughtful as we're going through that. But I also think that some of the things that I know our public works director has done to try to absorb some of those folks and being creative with his personnel and staffing, those things are very helpful. So let's just keep on looking at that.

You know, the other thing I wanted to talk about were, I think it was mentioned, the fee increases. So what's interesting is I know that we're, you know, looking at increasing some fees here as a way to offset some of the revenue losses. But later on in the agenda, we're going to be looking at an item that is going to try to put a pause on some fees that I think serve a very important purpose for our low-income community. So I think that that's a little bit of a contradiction in my point of view. So you can't argue for one and then support something else that just does exactly the opposite.

So, you know, another thing I know that the city manager had spoken to me about was the incidents that we had over the weekend. I'm sure changed the numbers a little bit, but Madam City Manager, I think we'll be able to recover those funds that we may have had to expend for additional overtime, some other costs that we experienced because the governor declared a state of emergency for Southern California. So that won't be an additional burden that we're going to have. And the last thing I'd like to say is that you please incorporate the comments that were made tonight by folks who spoke from the public.

Obviously, we're not able to have community gatherings any longer. We can't have folks come and speak their opinion. So those 200-plus emails that were sent, those numerous speakers that were before us, at least by audio, they were speaking to specific items. One thing I heard was that we need to invest in our youth, especially in light of what's been happening throughout the country. And just like a pandemic that we're experiencing, we're also experiencing just incredible despair. and we saw it in our city, we saw it in our county, in our state and all across the country. So we have to acknowledge it. It's real.

It's not something that's made up. There were hundreds of people that I saw over the weekend very, very disillusioned. And so maybe there's a way we can marry these things and we can increase the trust that folks need to have in their police department and law enforcement and maybe increasing engagement with the youth program better and maybe it's the department that does that maybe there's a way that we can marry those two things where we can increase that that level of trust and confidence that we have when a person sees a person another person in uniform and they don't sense fear but they sense love

and they sense trust and I think there's a moment in time that you know what I see is that we've been doing the same thing for years. I've been on this council now close to 14 years. And somebody told me the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result. And this is a time maybe where we can step back and say, let's be creative. Let's be, you know, let's be thoughtful. Let's be intelligent. And we obviously are, have gotten, you know, our attention's been gathered by folks that have been not only protesting here, not only decrying and just crying for their voices to be heard.

So let's see if we can incorporate that maybe into our budget. And I know it's going to be difficult because we're facing a tremendous burden of just cost. But that doesn't mean we can't work with these numbers and see if we can impact people's lives, make them better their conditions. But that's what we're here to do, to be responsive. And I remember just a few months ago, we were talking about a development over on North Main 2525, and we had a number of people come to us, and that was one development. This is talking about systemic changes that really affect our entire community,

so we need to make sure we proportion these things, balance these things. We have an incredible police department. I think that they'll rise to the challenge, but you know, maybe you know, I certainly think that concessions from our Largest bargaining unit madam city attorney. I'm really glad that you've engaged that I echo Councilmember Penalosa's point. I think that this is a time to make sure that we You know we take a we take a moment to reconsider some of those Obligations that we have just to make sure we get through this budget cycle. Thank you. Those are my comments

additional comments council members yes mr. mayor I think an alphabetic order it's my turn that this is Jose Solorio I'm proud of the progress the city has made over the past three years you know definitely we've hit a you know a big bump in the road with kovat and the economic fallout from it but what we've seen in the past three years community safety improve you know really you know minus you know petty theft kind of stuff last year we had one of the safest years ever for our residents we had less gang violence which really at the end of the day means less you

know young people of color dying at the you know hands of guns of other people of color and I'm proud of things like that and across the board of island crime is down and that's good on the youth services side we've done some incredible things that most other cities have not done you know we have a youth fund today with over three million dollars and a budget here that's gonna invest more that is something to be proud about we are working with our Youth Commission to use it well and we will we also saw starting about three years ago we about doubled if not tripled and it's been

a few years now but we at least doubled the amount of money from CDBG that we put towards youth services I think we got upwards of eight hundred thousand dollars that's very good not many other cities especially in Orange County I'm not aware of any that spends more than eight hundred thousand dollars on youth oriented services we did sanctuary which was fantastic we also starting yes last year before it was popular started a pretty substantial rental assistance program for our community last year to prevent homelessness this time to deal with a kovat situation hunt

five hundred thousand dollars for that that I'm very proud of and you know last year we had or you know you know the last lecture cycle the passage of measure X and measure X does you know have us put most of money towards homeless services and reducing 911 so I think because the voters asked us to put dollars in those areas that's why last year and this year you still see a focus on community safety and I think that's important and I know across the board last year even though there was concern for the safety of protesters and you know by and large we had very

safe protests we had numerous individuals in town that were very happy with the response so we didn't have any major structural fire we didn't have any you know major violence or injuries that was a good thing is because of you know how we fund our services here in town with the youth fund I would like to see how we can use more of those dollars sooner for this summer's programs in particular in partnership with our school districts of San Unified Garden Grove and Tustin because we do have there like I said three or four million dollars today and this plan would put another you know several million dollars in there and so

I think we could use it same with for high tech for them for mobile hotspots to other things summer jobs whatever that might be for the rest of it and these are my last points here you know and I mentioned to the city manager you know having seen government at different levels until the state budget is finalize and the feds kind of say what they're doing we don't really know how much we need a cut so I do think we need to kind of pause on firing people we need a pause on you know doing bad things for employees with our SCU part timers one of the suggestions I would make to our mayor city manager and SCI

you as well is other industries they've been very aggressive about working with the state to develop guidelines to open things up I'd like our city I like our mayors I like our parks and soccer people to for example come up early with guidelines on soccer I mean you know in soccer you know don't tell we can't figure out how to you know have some separation maybe no no no audiences to watch many opportunities there also we still have a homelessness problem and again I spoke of measure X and the money for homelessness maybe we can have some of these you know staffers help us with homelessness outreach education etc

that would be good as well I know that this year is going to be tough quite frankly next year's budget will probably be harder I do think that this year won't be as bad as as we think and I also remain very supportive of the legal assistance fund for immigrants I'm inspect I'm especially proud and thankful that that the group took to some of the suggestions that councilmember Villegas and I made some years ago to try to focus it on Santa Ana residents and dreamers and veterans and folks in town rather than people from out of town and they've been running the program very responsibly I am proud of it and those

are my comments and I look forward to continue to work with the staff on making our city better and keeping our employees intact and safe thank you mr.

Mr. Mayor, this is Member Tenby.

Yes, go ahead, council member. One last comment real quick. Go ahead.

A couple of things. I forgot about this. So I had the finance director run some numbers, a chart for me, and our city compared to other neighboring cities that are our size, we have about $31 million in the general fund that is towards our youth, parks and we have 22 million from the parks. We have 3 million from cannabis that we put in there that Councilmember Solorio and I were working on. We also have $5 million that

go to the library. In comparison to this chart that I have, Irvine is the one that beats us, but Irvine doesn't pay out of their general fund for our library. I don't know where they get their funds from but we outrank all the other ones and we're at about 31 million and yes we want to add some more money on that speaking of money so all these emails I received regarding the 13 million dollars that's going to law enforcement you know Miss Downs can you clear that up for us that is in the budget because that is part of the contract that we have to honor is that

correct that's correct that I believe that some of the speakers are referring to the wage increases that were granted to the Police Association for fiscal years 1819 and 1920 wage increases that have already been given so that those were negotiated and they've already been processed so this is not like a surprise

or anything this was calculated in the budget I didn't vote on that but but I have to honor the contract and I intend to do so and I just wanted to clear that up for folks to understand that this is not a surprise or anything this was actually in there I know a lot of people are concerned and you know we we have to honor contracts that's all I can say not just that contract but all contracts and is there anything else miss downs regarding for us to balance this budget what the plan is i know you're asking for direction from the council and we're have some ideas but if

if the staff could come back to us with um some contracts that we can look at that we need to maybe figure out if we're going to lower them i know uh we have quite a few those those are the tough conversations that we have and i know i stepped out for a minute now i'm back and did we discuss that by any chance earlier no well you know and like the council members uh were saying there's some tough conversation coming and you know I'd like to see something whether it's the contracts being reduced or renegotiated or and I'm talking I'm not talking about the contracts we have now regarding you know like the 13

million not that but I understand the city managers in conversation with with the unions right now but we need to look at what's on the table I mean I think everything's on the table at this point because like council member Solorio said the following year that's the tough year that's the bad one and I guess we'll discuss that in the future so if we can if you can show us a picture of what's on the table you know then we can discuss it and something that we can think about for the next couple of weeks thank you Mr. Mayor

thank you any other comment if not I'd like to comment any other comments

okay seeing none uh let me make a comment please um uh this is mainly uh you know directed towards the city manager and it's simply a a suggestion of potentially an approach um i believe every single council member has made you know very good and appropriate uh comments but but there might be an area that we can think of differently and what I'm talking about is that I'm very certain that in the near future we're going to be getting about 28 million dollars from really from Governor Newsom he has put that

earmarked in the budget for Santa Ana and you know I've been talking to the pro tem and the speaker and of course the governor and if that money should come it's got to be used for covid related uses but why couldn't we take potentially some of the employees that that we've had to lay off maybe potentially you know you know community groups if there's interest and maybe do our own covid related activities i i know i'm talking about a real

complicated effort but look we need contact tracing you know we we need people that can find people in the community that are infected and figure out who else do they know who else have they infected Right now, I believe we're over 1,300 cases here in the city. Now, fortunately, the mortality rate is not as high as maybe one initially thought when the whole coronavirus issue began. But it's still taking its toll. and my fear is that if we're at 1,300 now

what happens if we're at 3,000 or 5,000 or 10,000 in the not too distant future and the county as much as they're doing I believe they're not doing nearly enough to slow this down you know our only defense is telling people to stay home you know wear masks and watch the numbers go up that's not enough that $28 million, again, city managers have to really think about this, but if we could use some of it in COVID-related activities,

maybe we can help the city reduce the level of infection and employ some people. It's not a forever job. It's not something that we can say, okay, we're putting a budget for the next three years. It's not going to work that way. But the emergency is now. The economic emergency, I think there's two pandemics, a biological one and an economic one. And the economic might even be worse in terms of the negative impact it's having on people. And the sooner we do things well, the better.

I think we could also train some employees to potentially help encourage good behavior. Go to restaurants, for example, kind of like the way we've done with code enforcement, but this could be pandemic encouragement of good behavior. Also, I mean, soccer was mentioned earlier by Council Member Solari, I believe. You know, we could, again, train people, pay them to figure out, you know, how can we do certain activities earlier. And I'll tell you, if we come up with good, innovative programs, everybody's pulling for us.

I mean, the governor, you know, the state health care official, if they think that we're doing things in such fashion that when I can increase the infection rate, I think there'll be support for activities. And, you know, we could take, for example, the pool. I've been working on trying to get pools and beaches and activities throughout the county opened up. Why not our own pools? Of course, you have to have rules, you know, et cetera. It takes people and time and effort to do that. But I think we can do that. And I think right now is the time to be creative. It's the time to think out of the box.

it's a time to try to come up with superior solutions that have multiple facets to them and are able to help our community in different ways. So if this $28 million comes in, we ought to be planning right now. What are some of the potential uses? How quickly could we deploy it? How do we maximize the benefits of the community at large?

and what systems and decisions are we going to have in place in order to implement it. The other monies I'm not so optimistic about. I don't think we're going to get anything from the county. We ought to be pressuring our own supervisor because they have $554 million and they're going to be doing some things with that money. But, you know, we should, again, have our activists and community and others understand what's going on there because it's not enough and it's not being helpful in many cases.

And the federal government, I think we need to keep pushing, but I think it's going to be tough. I think Congress is starting to bog down, and the discussions are becoming more and more philosophical, and I don't know what happens. I'm trying to get Republican mayors here in the state and across the country to try to contact their friends in the Senate because they're the ones that are going to have to make a decision as to where to compromise. and if we are successful there that money would potentially be able to come into the budget and

make a direct benefit in terms of some of these you know labor related expenses that that we're incurring and be able to balance the budget then i do think we can say okay now we're in good shape at least for a year maybe longer so we need to track that one and do whatever we can here in the next few days because that's when these decisions are going to be made but as a minimum you know i think it's 50 50 maybe more i like to think it's more that we're going to get this 28 million from the state um and i really have to thank you know the council for all your

you know support over the years but also thank the the mayors across the state because uh you know that's the group that's working very aggressively to move these dollars across the state to help cities like Santa Ana because frankly we have a lot of need, a lot of potential, and a lot of ability to execute along those lines. So as we look at the budget in the near future, Madam City manager maybe one of the options because i know you're going to have options to consider it could

be what do we do with that 28 million how does it integrate into the budget and what impact might it have to some of our uh our employee groups in particular so with that um if there's no more comments I'd like to take a moment right now and ask I believe our chief of police and our fire chief if you would like to say a few words I know I was supposed to call you earlier I apologize we kind of got off on different subjects but if it's appropriate madam city manager well why don't I turn things

over to you at this time thank you mayor and our police chief and our fire chief are present so I know they want to talk about just I mean the give you an update on all of the events that have transpired across our city over the last

three days so I'll turn it over to our chief mr. mayor say council madam city manager thank you for the opportunity to speak very briefly on what occurred over this last weekend and really the last week nationally before I get into again just a brief summary I want to share with you that one as your police chief and two on behalf of everyone in the police department we do not condone what

we saw occur in Minneapolis it is not within the law it is not within contemporary policing practices and use of force de-escalation practices either and so we take what occurred that led up to the death of mr. George Floyd very serious and I want to be on record number one to reassure you and the public that we stand very firm really with the community that is upset by this

as they should be the actions that we saw were not as I said appropriate and within policing practices it tarnishes all of our badges that we work very hard to represent we're entrusted to provide defensible policing services to our community and that's we can intend to continue to do in this city with that what occurred is protests began across the nation we had information that on Friday that there would be a protest here in our city we had less than 24

hours to prepare for that mining open source information social media intelligence and we put our plan together and really what's important also to know is what is the philosophical perspective and approach on how to handle these incidents I think it's important for the men and women of the police department to hear directly from their police chief and that's exactly what occurred each and every day before each deployment they need to understand clearly what my perspective is and what my expectations are and so we did that to begin each evening and each day of deployment so our mission was to

facilitate a safe opportunity for folks to share their perspective on what occurred and keep them safe both folks that showed up to to protest and demonstrate and the police officers that were there to provide for their safety so that was our goal on the first day starting at Bristol McFadden that group grew to about 500 to 600 people I will share directly from my own experience in 30 years and from officers that have been in the field all 30 years including SWAT team members that have been on the team for 25 years a lot of experience

there and handling some very very tense situations they will tell you and I will tell you that Saturday night was one of the most aggressive and violent incidents that we had in this city I'm talking about Saturday night at nightfall late into the evening it began peaceful but into the evening very very aggressive and violent actions that folks took it is my opinion that a lot of the people involved in those acts weren't from our city and so outsiders coming in and engaging and inciting this behavior which is very

unfortunate to see again I and my officers stand in solidarity with folks that want to simply express themselves when people target others for violence and target property that is what we can't stand so that's what our focus was there was really three missions and that is to ensure that we kept the community and police officers safe that that they did not suffer any major injuries and then also ensure that no structures were burnt we saw what occurred across Southern California in the nation that was important to us and then the other

piece from a symbolic standpoint to see police cars burnt to the ground that was that would be problematic in terms of kind of a loss of control messaging and that and so those were our three goals very clear and we stuck to those we did have to call mutual aid on Friday that provided us in excess of 450 police officers and sheriff's deputies from across Orange County I believe I had every law enforcement agency represented Saturday night we did not make any arrests that night because it was really about restoring order that evening late

into the evening our officers were taking rocks and bottles you hear that phrase a lot it's really sometimes it turns into police vernacular I'm concerned with mortars fire missiles and big large items thrown at our officers everyone's wearing helmets shields and they're still getting pelted when officers came back into the station house into our command post deputies officers from throughout the county cuts and bruises and scrapes that's part of this physical job when you see burn marks throughout the police officers uniforms because of all the fire they were taking that's that's it that's a

problem it paints a picture for what we were doing with Saturday tonight in spite of that the feedback that I have received and many many of you have received because you shared it with me is that our community our businesses our business owners and I've heard from other police chiefs very impressed with the manner in which officers were disciplined in conducting their work they didn't immediately engage people they were very disciplined and ordered and how they approached this this situation again we had to make certain decisions at certain point to be proactive and respond to what we were

faced with to regain order of the city the next night on Sunday May 31st that event the core of it was targeted in our downtown business district and so throughout the day with officers I patrolled the city and actually spoke to various business owners who knew what occurred the day before and they could not say enough about the really genuine appreciation that they had for the police department and everyone that came to help Saturday they knew what it took

to maintain order with that it was a bit surreal I will tell you to drive through the downtown and see I would say 50% of the businesses boarding up their their storefronts it was as though they were preparing for a hurricane so but they did that for good order and so we again deployed had to once again call for mutual aid what started off I have to point this out and again I think the underlying reason for the cause of these demonstrations that's something that we need to examine really as a society but as it evolved throughout the day after

five hours a very peaceful very peaceful demonstration and people saying their peace as night fell the crowd turned different their focus was different and not all of them everyone that came that was part of that initial crowd left and that wasn't the issue the issue was folks that came late into the evening with really one purpose to take advantage of the situation and to target innocent people target police officers target property when I see mortars and

and fire held missiles that are thrown directly at police officers that's not by mistake that's intentional when I see that same effort in an attempt to burn down our credit union or target our federal courthouse etc that's intentional and so that's what we're dealing with as a byproduct of that one of the protesters one of the violent protesters that was seen throwing mortars directly at our officers also had a gun and so that led to the seizure of various

assault rifles handguns additional mortars a significant cache of ammunition body armor heavy body armor this was from someone originating in that protest Sunday night so this is what officers are facing unfortunately from a very small element that are involved in this in this good cause across the nation we've seen officers shot and killed as they're doing their jobs and trying to provide for a safe environment to voice people's concerns we did have a deputy

suffer a minor injury Saturday night I went and saw him at the hospital he was released Sunday night we had a Santa Ana officer suffer an injury and an Anaheim police officer suffer another injury both hospitalized visit with them they were released as well that's a summary of the weekend since then as everyone knows we do have a mutual aid agreement in place in the county and other agencies have experienced demonstrations as well yesterday we assisted the Anaheim Police Department with a variety of different squads of

officers as they did to us and we are on notice to help other police departments as well and so what I want the public to hear is that we are focused on providing for the safety of the community we take these incidents very serious our first and foremost goal is to keep people safe but we will respond assertively when incidents do not support a safe event and so we'll continue to do that with that I can pass it on to the fire chief if there's any questions for me before

we go to the fire chief if you could speak a little bit more about the level of enforcement I know we were speaking uh you know through the day and on into the night um i was on the phone uh tech talking texting uh trying to get cities to up their uh mutual aid uh contribution i.e get more officers here and they kept arriving and arriving i think at one point we had about 450 from other law enforcement agencies can you speak about that

because I think it's a level we had never seen before and I think especially Saturday night that additional level of support was very very helpful can you

speak to that please yes as I said there on Saturday night we did have approximately 450 police officers and sheriff's deputies arrived to assist us and that was needed with those reinforcements we were able to regain control on Saturday night the number of arrests were low simply because our number one focus was to regain control of the violent crowd that was present and then also ensure that no structures were burnt if you set the fire chief is here you set structure on fire initially and it just takes off we've

seen that throughout the nation so that was that was critical for us the next night we did make 29 arrests again we had some 300 officers from throughout Orange County come in to assist us and that included recalling every Santa Ana police officer that was available so if you were you know not in the hospital or not you were in town you were coming to work and and that was irrespective of rank everybody was on deck as as we need it and I appreciate mr. mayor your your

support in making those calls city manager her support and making calls to her colleagues as well we certainly appreciate it thank you fire chief

please

good evening I just wanted to let you guys know that we received a notification earlier in the week that there was a protest being planned and I have to say that our ability to work with the police department and work collaboratively and collectively together is second to none in addition to the 48 members that we have on duty in the 12 units we also brought in additional resources of another 8 to 10 units and additional 32 people as well as supporting the mission of taking care of any injured officers we also

responded to numerous calls for service including some protesters and bystanders that were injured as well as numerous fires that we responded to that night luckily again with law enforcement's ability to provide force protection and to control the crowd no structures were damaged and so we're very grateful of that on top of everything that's going on here we also expanded our dispatch center and had a number of resources in command and control including having some of our chief officers up on the hill and monitoring other areas in the

County as you know there's been protests in in all parts of the county and other communities that we serve as well as this week including San Clemente Yorba Linda and planned events in Garden Grove in different places so we've been very busy I can't tell you enough about the professionalism that I witnessed firsthand and the ability of the officers to deal with such you know extreme circumstances I'm still amazed that we had very few injuries so hats off to the police department you have an outstanding agency and I'm not just

talking about now I've had the privilege of being in this city since 1984 and I've always been impressed I'm available for any questions chief what was the number

of

emergencies that you responded to?

The first night, I think we had about a total of 26 calls for service in the impact areas. Most of it was dumpster fires, tree fires, things like that. We did respond to the deputy that was injured and some other medical aid type calls. But other than that, that was it. And then the next night, a little less and so don't have those exact numbers but Saturday night I think tested everybody's limits

tested everyone's limits I see 26 related to the demonstration and then you also had other medical regular medical calls that calls for service also in the city we average about

anywhere from 150 to 200 calls a day in the city so we had a structure fire that afternoon prior to the demonstration but the calls for service that we had were in the identified impact areas when we have situations like this what we do is we identify an impact area and then we coordinate responses from our dispatch center with our local law enforcement to ensure the appropriate routes to be safe as well as to ensure that our people are going to be able to effectively do their job safely. And so, again, that takes resources from the law enforcement agencies who are not available now to continue to deal with the protesters

when they have to ensure they are able to come into that impact area and be safe to do our jobs.

Thank you, Chief.

Have a good night.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Mayor Pro Tem? Is Mayor Polito on the line still?

Yeah, other comments, council members?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Mayor, this is City Attorney Carvalho. I just wanted to ask the City Council at this time, as you just heard from Chief Valentin, on May 31st, based on the facts that were present at that time, there was an imminent threat here in the City of Santa Ana. And so pursuant to state emergency laws in the Santa Ana Municipal Code, the city manager acting as the director of emergency services did declare the existence of a local emergency related to the civil unrest, and she imposed a nighttime curfew.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Because the police department used the curfew order in limited cases to enforce order in the city, the city council is now requested under the Emergency Services Act to affirm that action that was taken. so I'd like to ask the City Council if you would permit me to walk before you an emergency item I would need there to be a finding that this occurred after the posting of the agenda which it did because we posted the agenda on Thursday I would need a supermajority vote to walk it on then I would ask the City Council in a separate action to adopt emergency resolution of the City Council

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

ratifying the executive order and and affirming that there was a local emergency in your community this action would could allow the city to recover and to be reimbursed for any cost should they need to do so go ahead please I would need a motion first to add the item

is there such a motion i'll make a motion second is there a second go ahead roll call vote

go ahead go ahead yes uh thank you mr mayor uh before before we proceed with the vote i just wanted to you know thank both our police and fire departments for the work that they did that evening But what I'd like to ask our police chief, just because I know all of us have been asked this question by the community, and as we're about to take action on this curfew item, I would like the chief to, you know, I guess answer to the community. many have asked me and others why we haven't had a curfew imposed last night and why we don't have

one tonight and you know i'm not the law enforcement professional you are and i would just ask if you could just give an explanation so that we understand as we're about to vote on this item what folks should um how what they should understand as far as your actions and uh what to

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

expect. And if I may, Council Member Becerra, if I could ask the Council to please take action on adding the item to the agenda, that would make it lawful for the Chief to respond to your questions and engage in that conversation.

All right. So the roll call is added.

Council Member Becerra?

Yes.

Council Member Mendoza? Yes. Council Member Peñalosa?

Yes.

Council Member Sarmiento?

Yes.

councilmember Solorio yes mayor pro tem Vegas yes mayor polido yeah this item

has been added to our agenda okay councilmember Becerra thank you for the question it's it's a great question so the curfew is a good tool for us to have in law enforcement but I think it's it's really about understanding the expectations of a curfew particularly under these circumstances so you really need to have the resources available and necessary to enforce that curfew and so what you saw in communities throughout Southern California is those

jurisdictions that went to a curfew very quickly and very early you saw that they did not have the resources to enforce that provision so what we wanted to do is is really from the intelligence that we had and and confirming the information impose asks that the curfew be implemented and then we also look at the intelligence and the information that changes really you know hour by hour in terms of when it's most appropriate as we proceed and this is something we're doing daily so it's a good question some folks may have it

beyond you and others that have approached you but it really has to do with how we can apply it can we be effective with it we just assisted another agency here in the county they imposed early and didn't have enough resources to affect that the city of Los Angeles is a good example they went with a curfew early on you really did not have the resources to do much with it until the National Guard arrived of course and were able to protect assets and then their police officers were able to go out into the community and enforce that curfew and it wasn't unilateral either it was really incident

driven I hope that answered the question thank you chief I appreciate that

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

thanks sir we can I don't action on the motion on the adoption of the emergency

motion I'll move the second time that the city attorney requested I'll second

councilmember sir mr. mayor that this is Jose I just wanted to make a suggestion you know you all know this area much more than we do and fortunately and we don't need to do curfews too often, you know, year to year. I do think that the logic is sound, but we can do a better job of communicating more information to our residents. I know in some of the conversations I've had with you, our city manager and mayor, it's also other things that you're doing. I mean, we're coordinating with other city police departments and monitoring things there. We are doing a lot of outreach in our city to see where there might be hot spots.

and if there is a dangerous situation an unlawful assembly you can declare something non-lawful assembly and I think that is a very useful tool and then I know just a little bit earlier today you were speaking about you know how effective the our helicopter services and how those eyes have been in your incredibly beneficial I think our community addition to just do we have a curfew or not they want to feel assured that it's that we're safe and then clarity for the businesses rather is if they're going to and from work do they

need a close early or not where it might be etc I do know that yesterday you did you know put out a post conveying you know some of that information but even on days like this maybe there isn't a need but what happened in this era of social media folks see reports from other cities and so they're seeing that Anaheim for example I think tonight has a curfew Costa Mesa might as well in others and so the question is well why don't we and maybe we don't care or understand and if anything I think we're a little bit more sophisticated have more tools and we just need to communicate with our residents you know how

every single day we get that we're in this type of crisis that you have all those things that your department is doing and doing well because as you asserted that we had very little you know crime very little injury our officers you know did well fire did well we coordinated very well with the other cities I know you know mayor Katrina Foley from Costa Mesa I've spoke with her yesterday and this morning she was very happy with the mutual aid and I'm sure Anaheim is as well so thank you for all the good work that you're doing thank you thank you

for those comments, Council Member.

Mr. Mayor, just a point of order. Are we going to vote on this and can we continue comments? Because I would like to respond to some of the comments that were made by both chiefs.

What would be appropriate, Madam City Attorney? I'm just trying to follow your lead.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Because the item is now officially on the agenda, you may engage in a conversation and then I would ask for a vote on the resolution that's before you.

So let's do more conversation, then why don't we vote at the end and give everybody a chance to comment prior to that. Is that okay?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Yes. Yes.

Go ahead, Council Member Sarmiento, please.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and I want to thank the comments by both chiefs before us, and I want to thank the city manager for her action over the weekend. I think, you know, curfews are always tricky. We have to be very judicious with the way we use those. And so, you know, I want to thank you for showing good judgment because, you know, sometimes it's easy just to say let's shut down the city. And then what happens is, you know, you sometimes, you know, strike fear into folks. And sometimes we can't have coverage the way we'd like to.

And if in an emergency we have all our officers deployed someplace, they're unable to respond to some of our day-to-day emergencies that people have all the time. So it is a very difficult judgment to make, but I think the judgments were sound, obviously. Sunday, as a result of what happened on Saturday, we didn't know how things were going to go, so I think it was appropriate. The one thing I did see is I did see a videotape that circulated about, and I sent it to the chief, somebody on a bicycle who was tackled or pushed off his bicycle as they were riding.

I don't think it was somebody, it was one of our officers, and I think it was somebody from another department. But I guess the idea is that those things sometimes happen in curfews because they're not supposed to be out there, and maybe they didn't have notice of it. But I guess I want to speak to some of what I saw on Sunday, because my family and I, my wife and I and our three kids were marching with folks through the downtown, and I advised both the city manager and the police chief. And thank you both for checking in with me as we went, as the chief said, for those five hours.

And I think even Councilmember Peñalosa was there, I think I saw. But during that time, I saw people behaving really, really well and kind of almost, to use the term, self-policing and just saying, hey, don't damage businesses that are in town. I saw mothers and grandmothers handing bottles of water to people as they were walking by. So it was, I think, a healing moment after a very difficult night, after a very difficult week. and my first reaction was when I saw that videotape, look, I got very sad, almost broke down in tears, and then I got very angry.

And then in the end, I became very hopeful after Sunday. And that's kind of the range of emotions that we're seeing a lot of our families have and a lot of our youth have. So I think we have to step back from this moment. There is obviously some serious, serious anxiety as a result of that, and I think we're just seeing it displayed. Some in a very constructive way, like we saw on Sunday during the day, and some in not a constructive way. When we see people cause harm to small businesses, people that we know don't have safety nets,

people that we're looking forward to this weekend of being open and maybe getting a little back to normalcy, you know, that was really disheartening to see that, you know, these two things converged because it was a moment after we've all been locked in, you know, and sheltered home. And I think there was a little bit of cabin fever from all of us just wanting to get out. And it was just a very unsafe environment just to be that close to one another. So a lot of things, you know, just weren't working in our favor. But I want to thank, you know, the chief for during Sunday during that march,

and there was hundreds, close to maybe 1,000 or 1,500 people, I think was the count. There was restraint. You sat back, your officers sat back and gave people space in order to kind of vent their frustration and basically exhaust their First Amendment rights. And that's what we're supposed to do is create a safe space for that because those are the liberties that we've all fought for. And obviously this is a moment that we see that there's some very important things on people's minds. One of the things I think that I would like to see done is that, you know, I don't want the underlying cause to get away from us. I

don't want us to talk about crime and violence and looting and, you know, you know, things like that because it goes, it takes us away from the underlying issue which is there is a sense of desperation from folks. And I think what can help is just communication. I saw some folks that were marching get really close to some officers, and the officers were engaging in a real positive way. They were having an exchange. They were having a conversation. And people were voicing their opinions, and the officers were smiling and talking back to them in a constructive way. I think that's what we need. I think

that's what I think our community deserves. I think that's what our officers deserve, which is to, you know, I think what people get lost here is that people can support, we can support law enforcement and condemn the acts of those that abuse their authority. And I think that those that abuse their authority just tarnish everything and all the work that your officers do, Chief. I mean, it's incredible how 99% of folks can do the right thing and carry out their authority in a real responsible, prudent way, and then you just have one or two people that really destroy

and damage those relationships and that trust that's so hard to build. I want to see if City Manager can add something to your budget review as you bring it back to us. And I know that we have commissions that oversee parks and recs. I know that we have commissions that oversee arts and culture. Important things. But we spend 75% of our general fund on public safety. And we don't have a way to oversee that and work with our department. Hand in hand.

Not to be punitive, not to be in contradiction, but to work hand in hand with them. And maybe have that dialogue. and maybe that's the forum, that we're able to reach better relationships, but I think that that's warranted, and I think that that's something that we should consider in light of what's going on. Again, we had hundreds, over thousands of people walking and marching, and I think that we can't turn a deaf ear to that. That is not the right thing to do. That is not the responsible thing to do.

Our sister city in Anaheim has a commission that I think, again, works well. I think that could be a forum where we speak to one another. It's not the same as having council committees. These are residents whose tax dollars, whose public funds go towards these expenses. And if three-quarters of our general fund is spent on something, I think they have a right to say, hey, this is what we think works. This is what we think isn't working. but I think it's something at least to consider. And if we can learn something from this experience that we're all living through, look, it's a positive thing.

I think it's a step in the right direction. I think that the trust that we can gain is incredibly important. So I just want to thank everything that the Chief has done to get us to this point where your officers can have that conversation with the public because they, I think, deserve it. Your officers deserve the respect mutually. And I certainly support just having these ongoing conversations and ongoing dialogues because we do have a very unsettled, nervous community, and I want them to feel like there is trust here and they're in a safe place. So those are my comments. Thank you.

Mr. Mayor, can I say a comment? Yes, you may. Go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And thank you, Councilmember Sarmiento, for bringing that up. And I think that the chief is open to having a chief's advisory board where he can actually hear from the communities that we've had dog on the past. And I'm sure we'll have to have this discussion later because, you know, this is not what's on the agenda, but just for comment. And you're right. Our officers were doing a great, fantastic job protecting our residents.

I want to thank all the people that came out to have their voices heard. And that's important. This is America. You can speak your mind on these things. But the officers were there to make sure that everything was peaceful. And for these individuals that come here and try to disrupt all that and hurt our city, that is not acceptable. We won't stand for that.

And I also want to thank Chief Henry and the OCFA for responding and making sure they take care of the protesters that were injured and the officers that, and it's very unfortunate that happened. but you know fire and medical is very important and also our our officers but also first and foremost for the residents and for the people who wanted to come out and be heard that's important but yes I'm also I'm with you councilmember regarding the Sarmiento regarding a commission or a board that

and have a dialogue with our chiefs and he could hear from them and and I think it's important to have that and you know you can count on my support for that and and thank you again to everyone in the outside agencies that that helped protect our city and our residents thank them all those are my comments mr. mayor thank

David PenalozaItem —

you any other comments council members mr. mayor mayor this is a councilman Penaloza thank you I just also wanted to echo a lot of what councilmember Sarmiento said in regards to to the events over the weekend I want to thank our police chief and our fire chief for the work they did out there and you know just for protecting you know everybody everybody involved I was out there both nights and definitely saw the the contrast between the two nights Sunday you know was was beautiful and what it was all of what it was about you know

David PenalozaItem —

black lives matter and the movement that that you know people are marching and trying to convey you know it's an important movement that we can't lose sight of in regards you know given all the events that that are happening a accounts or her mental sort of the looting the violence you know there's a bigger picture and a majority 99% are there for the right reasons and and peacefully protesting man in regards to to the Commission I'm also you know supportive to have that conversation and and look at it and and not sure if that

David PenalozaItem —

was in a substitute motion council members are mental to the two at that consideration I'm you know also supportive of that so I'm happy you brought it up and yeah you know that it's we need to repair that that relationship you know why I have it was a very you know was very proud of our officers on Sunday afternoon and it and very proud of the people protesting and marching in peace and you know seen the along the the at one point in the March

David PenalozaItem —

on 4th and Broadway I believe it was when there were officers lined up and I noticed a couple of them from there that that you know I know our our Santa residents grew up here Santa Ana youth and I know they're they're they're good-hearted people and and and you know have every good intention to protect our community and seeing that you know was was really eye-opening to see that contrast so I'm supportive of having the conversation and considering a commission and those are my thoughts

mayor believe other comments uh yes councilwoman mendoza here please go ahead councilwoman uh i would like to do the comments of gratitude from my colleagues to our fire chief and our and police chief and we we understand the um the strategy that that go into keeping a resident safe and at the same time trying to curb the protesters who were here specifically to injure

and destroy property and i understand that they are not part of the peaceful protest but never done this um you have to deal with that kind of stuff and my question to both of you is um what is um what actions or what is being planned for the upcoming protest i know there's one being planned for saturday on bristol and 17th and i'm wondering whether we're going to have a large scale um police and fire activity as well

councilwoman mendoza thank you for the question uh we are aware of some information regarding an event for this Saturday and really ongoing assessment of information that that they're looking at so if if that information does pan out we certainly will prepare a contingency for a response thank you very much thank you

additional comments council members

Seeing none, I think we were about to have a roll call vote.

Yes. Councilmember Becerra?

Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza? Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa?

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

Yes.

Councilmember Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Plotin-Viegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes. motion carries 7-0 next item madam clerk is that 75 a or where are we yes public hearing 75 a okay this is time and place for a public hearing item 75 a as I open up the public hearing is there any comments from staff first of all

presentation yes mayor we have a brief presentation that Christy kindig from the Public Works Department is going to present

thank you mayor mayor pro tem and City Council I'm here to discuss the public hearing for the refuse cart rate increases I wanted to start out with the outreach that we did the very first thing that we did was sent out public notices to all the property owners on April 17th as required by proposition 218 in addition we established a hotline where we received over a hundred calls and responded to all of them we also sent notices via social media of an April 30 community meeting so that we could address any questions presented by

the community we did that and then we actually did do the meeting on April 30th

just to step back for a moment I want to just give you a little bit of history of course we contract for solid waste services with waste management and what they've done in the past is they have taken our green waste and used it as what is called alternative daily cover at the landfills and this has provided us diversion credit with our goals that the state sets us AB 1594 has discontinued the ability to take that as diversion credit so we had to look to a new process to deal with the green waste and what we did was we went back to

negotiate with waste management came up with a an ability to compost which will continue our diversion credit but came at a higher cost on March 17th you approved a one-year extension of the waste management agreement which addresses the 1594 issue and also authorized a prop 218 process again we're guided by these California legislative mandates that you know there's a very an active agenda at the state to make sure that we recycle and as much as possible and divert things from the landfill and so this is what

we're doing AB 1594 was just the most recent briefly just a reminder what is alternative daily cover every day the county of warrants who owns the landfill system must cover the waste that they put down for the day and in the past up until AB 1594 we the green waste that was collected from these residential programs was allowed to be put down which also saved some life of the landfill made them last longer so this is a discussion of the proposed service

rate increases if you just going from the top to the bottom quickly our new cost per ton to process as compost is $90 and 13 cents our previous cost was thirty three dollars and thirteen cents so there's that increase of fifty seven dollars multiplied by the total number of tons which creates the cost per year if you divide that by the number of residential units you come up with the cost per year and if you divide that by 12 you have a monthly increase of three dollars and forty four cents we did negotiate a couple of items with waste

management one was they have been providing the compost service for at no cost to residents from January through June 30th the second item is that they reduced the cost to us by four cents in addition the third item is they negotiated a tiered increase so that all of that three dollars and forty cents wouldn't be effective immediately but it would be in two incremental increases one in July of 2020 which is coming up and then that's a dollar 90 per month and then the second increase would be effective July 1 2021 and it's a dollar 50 per

month so why are we here now we are at the end of the prop 218 process if we allow the rate increase to go into effect we'll stay in compliance with our state mandates and avoid potential fines when comparing two neighboring cities our solid waste service rates are very much in line and finally the action that we're looking for tonight is to following this public hearing is to adopt a resolution to increase these rates by these amounts do i have any questions

any questions council members yeah mr mayor go ahead

thank you mr mayor my my question is uh when i heard staff say that we are in line with neighboring cities what does that mean I mean are we are charging more than with this tax increase are we going to be in the middle are we the lowest end can you elaborate on that comment please yes just a comparison to a couple of our neighboring rates right now let's see let me make sure that I have both pages okay so I'm going to compare current rates current rates in

Santa Ana are $21.90 per month effective July one day will become 2426 that will be the $21.90 plus the standard annual CPI increase of 46 cents plus a dollar 90 that will put us at 24 26 if you compare that to some of the other rates in Orange County of our similar cities close by Garden Grove is currently at 26.18% Brea is it I mean sorry 28 618 Brea is at 22 66 Fullerton is at 22 53

and Yorba Linda's at 2442 every city is having to address this loss of the ADC and they're doing it at different times so not all the city has cities have made that adjustment yet okay thank you

Other questions?

Yeah, Mr. Mayor, this is Councilmember Sarmiento.

Please.

Thank you. Christy, so is there a reason why we're doing the 190 first and then doing the 150 afterwards? I guess my hope is that maybe we can smooth this out during this time and maybe do the 150 and maybe do the 190 later, given where folks are right now and the relief that we've been trying to provide them. is there a reason why that sequence is the way it is that was the way that it was negotiated and

so in the process before COVID-19 I mean that was the results of the negotiation so and it was done in a tiered rate in order to make it gentle rather than doing 340 all at once

no understood I mean I guess in hindsight had we known where we would be just to smooth that curve and maybe do the lower amount on the front end and on the back end do maybe the larger increase. But if that was already something that was negotiated and we can't adjust that, then my hope is that as we do others and as you negotiate any other adjustments, please, and I think I've had this conversation with the Director of Public Works, we got tired of this term, flattening the curve,

but you know kind of having the front end of that curve as low as we can because we know that right now just things are compressed and folks are feeling pressured so thank you for answering that question

other questions council members

seeing no other questions madam video clerk do we have members of the public that wish to

addresses on this item yes we do go ahead please you will receive a notification that you've been unmuted when it is your turn to speak for the record clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're

unmuted please proceed with your comment hi my name is Carter photos I am a Santa long-time residents and I oppose the increase especially right now during this corporate global pandemic it is not a sense that I want our city to take with those who are already not being able to afford where they live.

I am also a tenant counselor that receives many calls on a daily where people are struggling to pay their rent, and that is of April and also May. And even though that the city provided some funds, it was not able to help all. You guys approved as a 300 cases with a lottery base because there is way too many people applying for assistance during this global pandemic. Where they can't go to work, and even though the places are opening up and they can begin to work, they still have to pay April, some have to pay from March, April, May, June,

and they're going to have to start paying July. So people are just trying to make up all the months that they've missed out on paying rent. And without any tenant protection, they're going to be left out in the curb. And right now you guys are wanting to approve a rate increase. The water bill just went up not that long ago. Our sales tax just went up not that long ago. and our city has one of the highest self-packs. So what does that say about us? Not only do we support police brutality

by allowing the police to use violent force against our citizens, but now we also want to increase their rape increase.

I am definitely opposed and hopefully you guys are too. Thank you.

If you would please state your name for the record, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Good evening. Buenas noches. Blessings to our city council members and mayor. I wanted to mention in regards to this proposition. My name is Carmen Granados Espinosa and reside and raised in Santa Ana. We're also homeowners. Joining me is my husband, Gabriel Espinosa, and my father, Antonio Granados. And all three of us are in complete opposition of this proposition. um as council member Sarmiento mentioned and you know we are um also speaking on behalf of several

families around us who either were who don't receive these notices because they are not homeowners uh they but they still have to pay for this this bill this increase that is being proposed so they were not aware of it and so we are speaking on behalf of their and them of them as well. We are in opposition of this proposition. As you are aware, our community is filled with hardworking people. Many people were laid off and remain without pay. It is never the right time, especially right at this moment, not the right time to raise prices as many

families are struggling to pay the current basic necessities they already do have. We see it as unfair of many homeowners within certain communities or and renters who do need to pay for this um for this bill that we also have to remember you're mentioning that it's uh the of the compost but it in the same bill it includes water and it includes the sweeper and our high very high increase of taxes that we already have in sanana so um as homeowners as we are individuals in our households who have been without working since March due to as many families due to COVID.

Thank you. More than half of the adults residing within our duplex contribute towards the mortgage, utility bills, groceries, and other necessities. We have to prioritize besides food which bill to pay first.

and going a little bit in behalf of the previous mentioning of the looting. I know it's not in the same one, but it came after. But in what happened this weekend, the community came together to clean up our city the next day. So this was not the city. It was the actual city, I'm sorry, the people, the residents, given the kind donations and work that they made for free out of the goodness of their heart at 6.30 in the morning plus, that the pending money that is being mentioned, I strongly suggest and recommend that some of this be granted to these families

that got up at 5, 6.30 in the morning to go clean down Bristol McFarland. That should be rededicated to these people instead of asking for money to pay for more money for a police department. Thank you very much for your consideration.

if you would please clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted

please proceed with your comment yes my name is Jarvis Jennings I'm also here with my wife Lupe Jennings my brother-in-law Bernie Miranda my mother in-law Maria Miranda and we oppose this proposition that you're presenting tonight um the main reason we're against it is it's not so much that you know our earth and you know the planet needs to be more green but it's the timing of your increase um you're saying that you put this out on social media you got over 100 phone calls you know in return but that is

less than one percent of your populace here in san anna you've got over 40 000 residents and units but you only receive calls from 100 you're less than one percent so thinking that you've reached the community you really haven't reached the community at all um i granted we are in the pandemic for covid19 a lot of people are not working i'm one of the fortunate ones but my company allows us to work from home but there are so many people in our community that cannot work and are unable to work can't find employment uh and they're struggling and for this

increase to becoming now I think one it's a matter of bad timing to not I am opposed to it right now I don't understand everything about it you know that that was with the one bill that was talked about you know where you have to cover it up you know all your compost and everything which is which is a good idea which I'm not disagreeing with but the timing of this and how it's being presented to a community i'm very unsatisfied it's verified that this this city council um does this numerous times with different measures that they think that that are worthy or not worthy to the public

but it seems like the timing of it and how it's brought out to the community is just not done in in a good fashion uh you guys will try to do the best you can i understand that right now with everything that's going on but some of these measures you know it may not seem like a dollar 50s a lot or dollar 90s not a lot but for some people that is a turn for them that they can't afford you know people are struggling they have to do whatever they can to make ends meet right now you know some are getting stimulus checks some are not you know but I just think that this is not the

right time to vote on this and move forward with it I understand that you is still being compliant but i'm pretty sure that using the pandemic and what's going on this issue can be pushed back to a later date and revisit it and ensure that your community hears about it before you revisit it more than just you know 0.02 percent you know of of your

populace you know here in san hannah thank you we have no other callers um however i did want to tell mayor and council members that we did receive 46 emails in opposition to the

curbside cart rate increase thank you for that so I will now close the public hearing and bring it back to City Council for our thoughts mr. mayor go Go ahead, Council Member Serra.

Thank you. You know, what we see a lot, and we've seen this over quite a few years now, Sacramento has a great idea, and we all listen to it, and we think, wow, that's wonderful. Then the implementation comes, and it becomes very much a burden of the cities. It becomes very much a burden of the city's residents, whether it has been when it comes to when Governor Brown had to clear out folks from prisons so they got pushed down to the counties and then out onto our streets now here we are we're talking about an environmental measure which I appreciate I definitely want to see

whatever we could do to help the environment but in this particular instance we have a service or an item that was at one point provided as part of our overall contract that now because of state mandates we are now going to be asked to vote to pass it on to our residents and especially given this time this council is supportive of moratorium on evictions rent freezes of temporary nature and now we're just going to turn around and pass on another expense to them i won't be supporting this i just can't i just don't think this is the right thing at this time and i just i think the

whole principle i'm not going to continue to support these sorts of sort of unfunded mandates that keep coming down and who has to pass it on to the residents we do the state says this is a great idea but let's see them actually pass on the rate increase themselves but no they ask us local mayors and council members to do it and i for one will not be supporting this one thank you

additional comments council members mr. mayor this is a councilman slur I have similar concerns

it's it I'm not too interested in supporting that this item tonight I do feel that maybe we could take another two weeks to a month to see if we can get some timing relief either from the state through our lobbyists or through the county or through waste management or a partial investment from our reserve program but I just feel the timing's bad and I know staff didn't admit didn't mean to you know have the community have this imposed on them during COVID because we

about kovat coming like this and then similarly with these these other you know public safety issues that we've been having so I think at a minimum we could do is consider postponing this two weeks or a month to see if we can't negotiate better with waste management or as I mentioned that the county or terra verde or or the state I'm sure a lot of cities are on the same predicament and the state is also giving, as I think one of the people on the phone also mentioned, a lot of extra opportunities to extend things out.

And even the governor on certain things, he didn't think he would do so, but whether it be things like property taxes or sales taxes or other things, the governor and the legislature have found a way in many of those cases, and I think at a minimum that's the kind of thing that we should be exploring as well. We do have many, many low-income people in our community, many working class folks, and unfortunately too many out of work or not working sufficient hours, and so this is not a good time to be doing this at least without trying a little bit harder. And those are my comments. Thank you.

additional comments or not i'd like to make a comment and and maybe we can continue to take

more comments um i have a question go ahead my question is if this um item fails to obtain the supportive council does the city of santa ana absorb the cost

Councilmember Madam City Manager yes certainly mayor and councilmember so how this would impact us is if we are under a mandate to meet a certain diversion requirement if we don't divert from the landfill we won't meet the required percentages Cal recycle has the ability to then have a public hearing do a compliance order over us they also can find local jurisdictions that aren't meeting that diversion rate up to $10,000 a day. I don't know if they would do it in these times. It is bad timing for everyone. What would happen is we would then have to direct, if you choose to not implement it, waste management certainly, I don't

think we can expect them to eat cost associated with it. So they would be taking these materials to the landfill, which would then greatly decrease your diversion rate under another state law.

Would it be a possibility to split the cost with waste management between the city and waste management?

I'm sorry, Councilwoman, I didn't hear that last comment.

Would it be a possibility to split the fee with waste management?

What's before you tonight is what was negotiated with them so that they could recoup their cost for not being able to take that to the to the dump so it would be most likely if we delay on this waste management would then take the materials to the dump which then impacts our

diversion i see okay okay i um my um my support would be to continue the item as well so we could have a couple more weeks to get a little more details on this before i can fully support it at this point my inclination is not to support it either

what i was going to suggest um really would be to table the item um and to have the city manager or bring it back to council whenever either it's better timing or we have a better deal or we engage our our lobbyists in sacramento and see if we can't get an extension or some relief uh i think with the uh the pandemic and what it's doing to the economy um even though these

requirements are part of the laws and they're in the books um it's just terrible timing i mean we you know we're struggling obviously with our own budget we're doing rent freezes we're uh laying up uh or you know furloughing employees and all this um and it just uh goes contrary to all those efforts so i i don't want to say two weeks or 30 days maybe it's longer maybe it's quicker um let's just try to work on it harder and see if we can bring something else back right now

to me it's just um it's just not the right time for for this type of uh of an action under these

circumstances so mr mayor if that's a motion i'll second it yeah that that is a motion so but just

to be clear for council members i'm i'm saying tabling i'm not saying contain i'm saying tabling it give the city manager the discretion if she says look i've got a new idea or a different approach i want to put on the next agenda i want her to have the ability to do that um but um it just i just think it just doesn't work um at this time uh so with that uh if there's not other comments or are there other comments i'll ask for a roll call vote i have one question mr

juan viegas yes sir uh quick question for city manager or staff if the city were to absorb this cost what does that amount look like seriously i just is there a guesstimation on there

christy do you know the number of cart side pickups that we have curbside out of curiosity

Yes, it's on the breakdown. It's about $1.7 million.

About $1.7 million, okay.

Wait, $1.7 million carts that do curbside pickup?

$1.738,000 per year for us to do that.

Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

David PenalozaItem —

Mr. Mayor, I have a question.

Go ahead.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you, sir. just why can't waste management absorb the the cost they could we should

negotiate with them as well we certainly tried to do that for a while and they write this I don't believe it's is it a hundred percent cost recovery Christy that they're getting because of they are starting to do it already they have been eating the cost I don't know for how long now Christy can you tell more

information on yes so waste management has been doing the process and paying for it starting January 1 to make sure that we remained in compliance and they are paying for that through June 30 they also have reduced the cost recovery which is cost recovery I want you to know this is just a direct pass-through because they are having to have the third party do the processing there is no up charge for waste management so it's a complete pass-through so not only are they charging us four cents per unit per month less than the actual cost but then they're also delaying implementation on that dollar fifty per

month for another year so they've they've given six months for free four cents per per household per month over the whole the remainder of the contract and then they've also done this tiered implementation and that was the result

of the negotiations that took place.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you.

And thanks for that question, Councilmember. These are all good questions. I'm just suggesting we look at this harder and that right now is just not the right time.

That's a good idea, Mr. Mayor. And with your mayor's group, I think you might find quite a bit of interest there.

Others are going to be in a similar situation. and I want to bring it up.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

The state might give us some relief. They could delay the requirement because we're not going to be the only city in this predicament.

So with that, roll call vote, please.

Councilmember Becerra?

Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza?

Yes. Yes. Councilmember Peña Losa yes councilmember Sarmiento yes councilmember Soloria mayor pretend Vegas yes mayor Pulido yes

motion carries 7-0 our next item madam clerk 75 B public hearing item okay this time and place for the public change 575 B is I open up the public chain is there a staff rec presentation please yes Thank You mayor community

development director Steven Mendoza has a brief presentation good evening mr.

mayor and members of the council the permanent local housing allocation plan is required in order to be in compliance with SB 2 SB 2 establishes 75 dollar fee on real estate transactions when we refire sell our homes and or real estate in the county in the state of California what this plan requires us is to allocate how we're going to use these funds were predicted to get about one 2.8 million a year and all of our funding is going to be for a permanent homeless shelter that replaces the link with that that summarizes and completes

my report thank you for that madam city clerk do we have members of the public

they want to speak on this item yes we do have if you would please come any just so we know currently we have to okay for the record please clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please proceed with your comment I am

sorry I was waiting for the public comment on a non itemized agenda okay

I'm not even thank you okay thank you we'll meet you until that item comes up

if you would please clearly state your name for item 75 B public hearing item whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're being unmuted please proceed with your comment

hi my name is Luis I'm the political director for UA local 582 especially dealing with coronavirus obviously multiple cities have been decimated in terms of our budget moving forward in type of this actual type of policy is something that can really revitalize not only how we look at housing as a whole but also how we affect our budgets from a city perspective. More than anything, in incorporation to how we view affordable housing, I think the discussion needs to move forward in how we view it as attainable housing. And what I mean by that is making sure we have development without displacement,

and more specifically, having development with placement and ensuring that residents within our cities, and specifically that we've already had a project labor agreement with the city as a whole, that we could attain that our workforce, our community members who are already doing this work, can build housing within their city and continue a systemic, positive, cyclical relationship in which if the housing that they are building, they may also incorporate that and be able to attain that housing. Looking into the San Antonio Unified School District, we already have an agreement there as well.

and as incorporation to our GATC, which is our joint apprenticeship training committee. And essentially, we have high school members down at Century High School who are already getting prepared for our pre-apprenticeship programs so that they're able to join our community workforce. Because we're looking as a whole and we're discussing not only schools to prison pipelines, we also have to understand that folks are not going to be wanting to go and get a public education through Cal State University or UC. And more than anything, when we look at how we talk about the future of our city,

we also have to see how we are changing the concepts of attainable wealth. And not just from a perspective that affects just the small minority groups of people, but looking at it as a complete holistic viewpoint and making sure that our skill-trained workforce, and more importantly, our members of our community that have already facilitated into these programs can move forward by attaining, you know, healthcare costs, pension plans, 401ks, and really give it a whole holistic viewpoint than we haven't seen in the past. Making sure that we have a skill-trained workforce into the language of any type of development

or developmental housing that we have in the city also ensures that our community members are the ones that are getting paid for the work and not just members or folks who are coming from outside our communities. So as we look towards housing, specifically affordable housing, we should look to making sure that we are getting attainable housing. Thank you guys for your time. Have a good night.

Thank you. Any other speakers? I think that was there, right, Madam Clerk?

That's correct. There's no other speakers, and we did not receive any comments by email.

Okay, I bring it back to the City Council. Is there a motion?

Move the item. Second.

Roll call vote please.

Councilmember Becerra?

Yes.

Councilmember Mendoza? Yes. Councilmember Peñalosa?

Yes.

Councilmember Sarmiento?

Yes.

Councilmember Solorio?

Yes.

Mayor Potem-Viegas?

Yes.

Mayor Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries 7-0. We're on 85A now.

okay um we have three uh council members uh that brought this to the council let me at this time i'm going to call in councilmember phil becerra please uh thank you mr mayor before this pandemic

there was a need to provide quality housing options for our community whether it was housing for young families in one of the nation's youngest cities housing for recent college graduates moving back to Santa Ana about to embark on their careers and looking to start their own families we saw some housing providers apply to build that housing but not as much as our city needs when I spoke to housing providers that were not currently looking to build in Santa Ana I asked them why the overwhelming response was that complying with the housing opportunity ordinance or the who was too

difficult and that it was easier to build in other neighboring cities now before the pandemic I wasn't really too worried about the current impacts of the who because I knew that our council was going to review the effectiveness of the ordinance as was required in the mini code for the who Santa Ana has seen 1021 affordable housing units built between 2014 and 2021 which is 907 more affordable housing units than the 114 units required by our state's planning officials The city of Santa Ana saw nine times more affordable housing units built than what the state's planning officials determined was needed to be built in our city.

Since the adoption of the WHO back in 2015, it's only been responsible for the construction of 33 affordable housing units. In 2021, during the upcoming cycle, the requirements for building affordable housing in Santa Ana is going to be 1486 units over an eight-year period given our city's track record and with state legislation such as the state density bonus law that allows for variances in our development standards for the provision of affordable housing I'm confident that we will not only meet but we'll

see that we will exceed our affordable housing requirements during that upcoming arena cycle so So today with our collective efforts to limit the spread of COVID-19, we face unprecedented impacts to our economy. Unemployment rates in the 25% range, experts are projecting a 20% decline in residential buildings. Those statistics alone are significantly going to impact Santa Ana residents and veterans, especially those who are skilled and trained to build housing. So that the need to provide quality housing for our young families and college graduates

and our need to do our part to help keep Santa Ana residents employed in construction, especially during these unprecedented times, I would like to ask my colleagues to help encourage housing construction in Santa Ana by directing staff to bring recommended revisions to the WHO to the City Council in the next 60 to 90 days and to also temporarily suspend the implementation of the WHO for the next one to two years. now I would not be comfortable suggesting this action if we did not have all the other legislative tools in place to help our city continue to meet and anticipate demands that we have for affordable

housing especially in regards to what the state has asked us via their requirements that's all

I have to say Mr. Mayor okay um uh Councilman Juan Villegas Mayor Potem I know you're on the

committee as well any thoughts i had some thoughts mr mayor regarding uh this every time we keep building uh affordable housing we have you know we our intentions are to help the people and the residents who already live here who could go into one of these homes but um there is no control over that every time we we build one of those things you know it's against the law for us to forbid other folks to come into our city and apply or to move into those locations. Even though we have a preference, it's still, we cannot deny folks from moving in.

So I feel that I would rather use some money to refurbish some apartments that are here because there's a lot of units that could use some work. and I would like to fund that and see that type of program. I know we have a first-time homebuyers type of program. It's been a little difficult with that, so maybe we should move forward with refurbishing what we have now to clean it up and make it look better. Those are my comments, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you. before I make comment I'm aware or reminded that I believe we have some speakers I'd like to afford them a chance to speak as well and then you know bring it back to council for more comment is madam clerk are there any

speakers on this item yes we do have several go ahead thank you caller please speak on item 85 I I mean I'm sorry 85 a for the record please clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition of the item you have three minutes from the time you are unmuted please proceed with your comment thank

you it sounds like me mayor city council members thank you for allowing me to speak tonight my name is people not the executive officer for the building industry Association of Orange County by way of background we're a nonprofit trade association representing over a hundred thousand individuals within the home building industry. First, I just want to thank the council members who proposed this discussion item tonight. The past several months have seen, as everyone's been saying, unprecedented impacts to the local and global economy. The state and federal directives to

remain home were nearly unimaginable until they became a reality. And the economic impact cannot be overstated. It's important to realize that before COVID-19, we were in a housing crisis a housing supply crisis and the orders to shelter in your homes have only made that more yeah it's really only brought it to the forefront uh california needs more homes to meet the demand what we can't forget is that when this crisis is over we're still going to be in a housing crisis in fact it could possibly get worse developers and builders are like any other business they're

susceptible to the same market fluctuations that come with anomalies like pandemics there will be slowdowns possibly due to business reasons this will affect supply this will affect prices and just like the many other cities right now that are looking at policies to help stimulate economic activity we are encouraged to see sanana bring up the discussion of housing construction i've spoken many times on this item in that chamber going back even 2015. And I recently just commented by letter in May. But it is our belief that the city should focus on the housing opportunity ordinance,

otherwise known as inclusionary zoning, if they want to spur development. And more specifically, as was discussed earlier, a pause on the HOO for a period that we would think is as good as two years for projects in the pipeline and during the next two years would be would be a huge step for the city to build that attainable housing that was also just mentioned on the previous item. We're not just asking your city for delays on major policies. Just recently we asked SCAG to delay their RTPSES vote due to the pandemic and we're currently asking the governor to delay BMT implementation at this point which we are gaining bipartisan

You have 30 seconds left.

Thank you. It is our understanding that since 2015, no project has paid the higher $15 per square foot fee, even though there are entitled units. I could be wrong on that. Maybe that's a question for staff. And then, as mentioned, the city has been meeting their RENA numbers for the current cycle. We need supply. We need housing for the masses, if you will, the younger residents, the local residents, those coming back from college, the millennials. There is a need for all types of housing and the city has the opportunity right now. Thank you.

Caller, please speak on item 85A. For the record, please clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition of the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comments.

Caller, you may proceed with your comment.

okay next caller please clearly state your name and whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please proceed with your comment

on item 85a I'm John Hanna representing the Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters including many members who are residents of Santa Ana. And I would speak in support of the theme of 85A and recommend that Santa Ana look at options that would encourage both residential and commercial construction, not only to overcome the negative impacts of the pandemic on our economy, but to provide long-term revenue to help fund essential city services, especially for our youth in the city many needs which were discussed tonight while many options

exist such as the building industry suggestion of a two-year halt of the housing opportunity program there's probably not one silver bullet that will start a stampede to the Planning Department nor avoiding enriching some of the developers who would have developed their projects without more incentives but it's certainly worth exploring the opportunities for construction and I applaud the council for doing this we work with the BIA on that delay and the skagg rulings and we are committed to more construction of residential housing as well as commercial if the council decides to go

for a two-year halt in the housing opportunity ordinance or creation of another incentive Santa Ana should demand more than just the hope that there will be a significant increase in construction one benefit the city should link to any inducement for developers would be to require the use of a skilled and trained workforce for construction. This would ensure that a certain percentage of construction workers on these projects would be apprentices in a state-certified apprenticeship program or journeymen who are graduates of those programs. The requirement

would avoid having Santa Ana attracting a poorly trained workforce subject to more accidents. You can tell a skilled and trained workforce often by their adherence to COVID-19 safety measures, such as work distancing and the use a face mask. By requiring a skilled and trained workforce, when an inducement is given to developers, opportunities open up for Santa Ana residents, and especially young men and women who can earn while they learn, many of whom will be getting college credits in their apprenticeship program, getting them halfway to an associate's degree. With unemployment expected to skyrocket

in the construction industry, Santa Ana needs to always find ways to keep our people employed. Now, this is a critical time for the city to look at ways to increase revenue without burdening Santa Ana taxpayers. It's also a critical time to try and provide for employment opportunities for Santa Ana residents. We encourage you to look at various options, including the ones that were discussed tonight. But make sure Santa Ana gets the value of prioritizing its residents in the construction workforce. Thank you.

caller please speak on item 85a for the record to clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please

proceed with your comment good evening mr. mayor members of the city council my name is eric nelson and i'm a member of the bia and i currently serve on the executive board of the orange county chapter during the day i oversee community development for a very small family-run home builder located here in orange county named trumark homes let me start off by commending you for taking a look at the current situation and opening up the discussion on how and what the city and its partners can do to deal with the current cost of housing i think the good news here 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've also had the wonderful opportunity of building in this great city and we would love to have the opportunity to come back and do another project but as discussed earlier changes to the who in the recent years have made it most made most of it if not all projects impossible i recognize that inclusionary zoning is a complicated and sometimes controversial topic but it is 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 anna but due to the existing policy the projects were unviable to give you a quick example the last project we built in santa anna included a fee for inclusionary housing of 1.475 million dollars roughly seven dollars per square foot or 13 000 per unit for inclusionary housing today that same project will be required to pay 3.175 million dollars or 30 000 per unit

and to be clear this is this does not include the addition of 36 000 and other impact fees such as traffic parks schools and so on today that project under the current policy ends up paying upwards of 52 000 per year in impact fees effectively killing opportunity for new housing There are options and there are wonderful opportunities that are worth exploring. Options that can harness a free 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.

I know that our industry and all of our members would welcome the opportunity to work collectively with this council and staff as you discuss and potentially implement new or revised policies. There are a host of tools and options that work, such as incentives, fee waivers, density bonus, parking reductions, coupled with certainty around timing approvals, all would help to produce more attainable housing. And while I think, or I don't think anything can get done quickly, pausing those policies that impact housing production negatively makes sense more now than ever.

I want to thank you for your time tonight and for your commitment to your community.

caller please speak on item 85a for the record clearly state your name whether your support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you've been unmuted please proceed

with your comment all right good evening mr. and city council members this is Kim O'Brien and I'm with Legacy Partners. I'm calling to speak in favor of this discussion. I think that this is completely an appropriate discussion to encourage housing, especially at this time during the COVID crisis. I would ask while you're considering the matter and the reduction of the freeze of the WHO fee

that you consider the application of this to projects that are in plan check as well as in the entitlement process the the covid crisis has created a serious impact on on any kind of proposed project in in our case the sunflower apartment project which was supported by your city council last summer this is a project that is ready to go and it's been rendered infeasible by the by the

covid and the economic conditions that we currently see with with a freeze or reduction of the food this would help make this project feasible and and be able to start at a time that it's most critical to start jobs we need now and this is a project that you know that is supported and provides community support to the Santa Fe is 10 and a district standpoint neighborhood as well as

provides Union jobs through the local 652 I appreciate your consideration of matter and

have a nice evening. Thank you. Caller, please speak on item 85A. For the record, clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment. Hello, can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you

clearly. Thank you. My name is Nate Greensides, and I'm in favor of this. I wish to bring up the fact that community land trusts exist here in Santa Ana and for those of you who are unaware thank you for joining us tonight Nelly Mendoza a community land trust ensures permanent affordability whereas quote-unquote affordable housing has an expiration date and is only available to those who are not undocumented with community land trusts the land is owned by a nonprofit community-driven organization and the structure of the home or the or the building itself can be

owned by individuals in this manner both entities the clt and the individual can ensure community success and stability housing affordability in relation to income here in santa anna even for those who have degrees is increasingly becoming unattainable especially for those whose parents or predecessors offer no assistance with down payments, for example. CLTs offer really powerful means of community ownership and individual attainment of home ownership. They do this in

two ways, by ensuring that there is permanent affordability of the land. They also support community enterprises and also allow for low-income residents who may or may not be documented to attain home ownership and control of their housing in the communities where they have contributed to the success attaining attainable housing as someone else previously commented needs to include those who have been here and contributed to the success of santa anna and to this extent i urge that the City Council not only consider institutional housing builders and providers but also the

tenants and families which make those institutions so wealthy and continue to ensure our success here in Santa Ana. My ask is that City Council please ensure that any ordinance or program instituted to mitigate the effects of COVID on the housing supply in Santa Ana also take into consideration CLTs. Thank you.

Caller, please speak on item 85A. For the record, clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition of the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Yes, good evening. Mr. Mayor, members of the City Council, my name is Ernesto Medrano with the the LA Orange County Building and Construction Trades Council. Congratulations, Council Member Mendoza. It's clearly very positive to see you there. First of all, we're going to have to build ourselves out of this recession. It's very clear. But we have to be very careful and have a worker perspective. Latino immigrants dominate the residential sector, comprising two-thirds of the workforce. They're more likely to be uninsured and struggle with the housing costs themselves.

70% or more of the workers in the LA residential sector have experienced nonpayment of overtime and wage theft. In the residential sector construction workers earn an average of 24% less per year than other jobs. Obviously there's less training offered and there's increasing unsafe working conditions. But it doesn't have to be that way. This city has already established values in terms of working with the trades with having skilled and trained workforce in the joint labor management programs. you have programs that you have apprenticeship readiness programs for the Santa and the College

at Century High School folks that are in line to get into our apprenticeship programs you have an opportunity to do local and veteran hire it takes no sense to attempt to start your economy if you look higher doesn't make sense to have a worker from outside counties or outside of the state if they're not spending their money locally and remember for every one construction job it probably has a multiplier effect of three others within their local community. So you cannot disconnect the conversation of wages, benefits, working conditions, and affordable housing. It has to go

hand in hand. And so with that, I support the item and I wholeheartedly support the conversation in terms of wages, benefits, working conditions, and housing. Thank you.

Caller, please speak on item 85A. For the record, clearly state your name, whether your support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please proceed with your comment caller you have been unmuted please proceed with your comment good evening mayor and council my name

is senti come Jim thank you for allowing me to provide input this evening I am the president for the building industry associations orange County chapter and And for my day job, I work for a residential development company. We currently have about 2,000 multifamily units under construction throughout the state, which were all started last year. Normally, I would also tell you how many units we have in our pipeline, but the extraordinary times we are facing has resulted in many developments stalling. The fact is, it is exceedingly difficult to get housing built right now.

market conditions have cast a huge shadow of uncertainty on the financial viability of moving housing forward if you truly want to facilitate housing construction you have to look at removing as many burdens as possible well I would encourage the city to look at everything from fee structures to project approval timelines I would suggest at a minimum the city consider a minimum two-year pause to the housing opportunity ordinance more after called inclusionary zoning everyone acknowledges the lack of affordable housing but when we burden market rate housing

with the hopes of adding affordable housing units it effectively decreases the amount of housing that gets built and makes the problem worse if you want to drive down the cost of housing provide more of it if you want to increase the price of housing provide less of it thank

you caller please speak on item 85a for the record clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you are muted please proceed with your comment hi this is Carla

Juarez, I'm a long-time resident and also a tenant counselor. I am in support, but I would like to know more of it. So I would like to see reports on how it will affect our community. I am also in support of the community land trust, and I am more concerned on how developers would take advantage of this opportunity and then end up paying the in-lue fees to create housing that our people in Santa Ana cannot afford, which will bring people from outside of Santa Ana that could

afford and increase the rent around that area, which will cause our people to end up leaving or kicked out, evicted, or homeless. So that is my biggest concern, which also brings me to my next point, which is keeping people in their houses. So this is a good opportunity, but let's not lose focus on keeping people in their homes by extending the protection of rent-free and also extending the protection for them not to be able to be kicked out, especially not at this time.

So I am in support, but I also don't want developers to take advantage of this. And I am in support of community land trusts. I don't support in-do fees, and I don't support housing that is not affordable to people that live in Santa Ana now. Thank you.

Caller, please speak on item 85A. Clearly state your name for the record, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Good evening. My name is Brian Jermaine, a Santa Ana resident in Northern Santa Ana, Ward 3. I'm a member of Smart Local Union 105. Smart Local Union 105. And I'm going to speak on my encouragement of conversation of construction housing in Santa Ana and how important it is to have good conditions for those workers on that site. and i can speak of many of my friends within the city who attempted to um you know go work on several projects one being across street from norms on 17th and main but turned away um this

is a project in his own backyard um wish to you know wish to uh you know be part of those projects and and implement uh you know some of the skills where he has safety training you know gone through apprenticeship program I guess what I'm getting that is that our own residents here in the city aren't getting the opportunities to work on many of these housing projects that are taking place and in the future is moving forward it would be great to establish that those relationships where a developer and

general contractor subcontractors and workers are able to come to an agreement and compose safe and sane housing projects for our community to live in. Thank you. Have a good night.

Caller, please speak on item 85. For the record, clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Hello again. My name is Luis Andres-Perez. I'm the UA Local 582 Political Director. I spoke a little bit earlier, but to the point, the median age in San Andes, 31 years old, meaning you have a growing age population, meaning you have a housing situation that's going to burst really in 20 years. you have 54% of your city residents are renters and only 46% are homeowners. Overall as a whole, we need to look to, as I said earlier, towards attainable housing. And we've already established to make sure that not only that we're building enough units,

but making sure that the workforce on top of that are folks from San Antonio and that could acquire that work through local hiring aspects, whether it be through pre-apprenticeship programs or having folks in which we're already supporting our youth through our JATC programs. We need to make sure that more than anything that we're building enough units, and on top of that, we're supporting our workers from within the city so that we can create a streamlined service in which the city as a whole can be a supplier not only of jobs but of housing.

and as we look towards uh towards the future really we need to make sure as multiple callers have said uh we look at housing right now most folks cannot afford a six hundred thousand dollar home that that is really realistically not attainable for them and as we see towards the future we have to make sure that not only are we providing the workforce towards it making sure that we look at how we revitalize and we necessarily move away from not just gentrification but having development without displacement and making sure that housing as a whole is attainable

through means that folks can actually attain, whether that be through inclusionary zoning or other aspects of attached housing or joint use housing. Multiple facets can be used and really, as speakers have said, by investing in more housing you're investing back into the city because you're creating more property taxes you're making sure that individuals are growing within this city in more ways than one and as early as i said with your median age of being 31 that means majority of your population within the city are in your k-12 system right now they're not even old enough to take out a loan or

let alone be on their be on their own and this is a cycle that instead of being a systemic negative could be a systemic positive thank you guys for your time caller please speak

on item 85a for the record clearly state your name whether you're in support or opposition to the item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted

please proceed with your comment good evening mr. mayor council members my name is Doug Mangione and I represent 2400 members of the Brotherhood of electrical workers here in Orange County we support this with recommendations IBW has been providing skilled and trained electricians to the Orange County construction industry since our founding right here in the city of Santa Ana in 1928 tonight you're considering developing options to encourage much needed housing development in Santa Ana our members in Orange County well understand the need to develop affordable workforce housing that would

help them buy a home and raise their families locally. But when considering this, you should also consider the workers that will build this housing. You cannot allow low wages with little or no benefits to accomplish your housing needs, which will further exacerbate poverty, will not lift workers up, nor help us get out of this COVID recession. IBW's state apprenticeship program here in Santa Ana under the Rancho Santiago College banner provides pathways into the middle class with a career, not just a temporary job. Our training and certification gives our workers skills that last a lifetime and are recognized nationwide.

As you consider this tonight, remember pathways to a good career with good pay, good health care for their families, and pensions for the future. Consider having local hire provisions and especially veteran preference hiring and disadvantaged community preferences. I myself was a product of veteran preference hiring after the Vietnam War, and it gave me a 43-year career as an IBW electrician living and working here in Orange County. Thank you for consideration of our recommendations, and let's all hope for better days ahead for all people. Thank you.

Last caller, please speak on item 85A. For the record, clearly state your name, whether you're in support or opposition to the item. You have three minutes from the time you are muted. please unmuted please proceed with your comment hello mayor and council this is

Manny Escamilla a resident over here in Central City congratulations to Nalila and your your election you're welcome on board so I just wanted to say that I'm supportive of the overall idea of kind of boosting our local housing construction it's definitely a major need I think that the point that were brought up regarding the housing opportunity ordinances uh it wasn't really mentioned in the item so you know i guess a few folks from the bia had the inside track that that item was going to be discussed tonight uh so a little concerned about that just for transparency purposes um overall

uh i do kind of see that we have this missing middle uh that we're looking at for residential construction so you know the idea that it's only going to be these very large projects um that are the ones most directly impacted by the home as the only way to kind of build our way out, I think is a little bit short-sighted. I do think that there's still opportunities as we update the general plan to look for townhouse models, quadplexes, things that are a little bit more kind of fitting with our residential character here in different parts of the city as the way that we move forward with housing construction

and also making affordability for ownership still available in the 21st century. So I think it's something worth considering. But I would just caution against completely rewriting the who, because quite honestly, a lot of the reasons why we haven't done the units there or constructed units on site is because it's so easy to get out of. So I think that that should be part of the discussion as well. And I agree with a lot of the other colleagues as far as local hire and making sure that we have a trained workforce that they'll be able to actually buy into the units that are being constructed. Thank you.

Mayor, that was all the callers we had, and we did not receive any communication by email.

All right. If I may, colleagues, I was about to make a comment before I broke, and we said let's let some of the folks that were waiting speak. so i'd like to make a comment and then maybe uh you know give a staff uh direction and go from there um i think council member sarah made a an excellent uh uh you know prep you know presentation initially when you know he kind of framed the whole issue and why we kind of want to bring this forward at this time um i i know that you know we have the economic pandemic for certain and we have

to do as much as we can to you know get things going again uh so what i wanted to suggest was that we probably do this in two phases one uh you know direct staff to come back uh and tell us in two weeks if the council wants to consider uh and approve uh moratorium on the who um you know what that looks like. I would suggest, you know, considering probably a two-year hiatus, I think that'll give the economy hopefully enough time to, you know, figure out where the bottom is

and maybe have a sense of direction, seeing where the markets are going, and at the same time just make sure everything doesn't stop in town, you know, for a long, long time. And look, we might do this moratorium. I'm suggesting, again, you know, a hiatus, take the, you know, $15 a foot, take it to zero for a two-year period, and hope that there's some construction. Maybe there won't be. It's a possibility. But, you know, we can't do any more than that. I think that would be, you know, the most we could possibly do.

and then as a is a follow-up I know council member Sarah talked about 60 or 90 days I'd want to talk to all of you and see who's interested but possibly doing a follow-up to the who you know we said councilmember Iglesias on there she's no longer on the council and there's now new issues and a new reality so if there are other things we want to consider for the future I think it's not a bad time to possibly set up a committee and ad hoc come back in three months or two months or whatever and see what other suggestions we could come up with. So

what I'd like to do is see if there's a second. I'd like to make that into a motion and hopefully there's a second and maybe we can have a discussion here.

We'll second that, Mr. Mayor.

Is there a second for second brian salario okay thank you um comments uh council member of the sarah i know you started things off councilor sarmiento hasn't spoken yet i want to give everybody a chance to comment here

yes councilor vince or vince whoever wants to go sure well i think i think the the three sponsors of the um item already spoke so thank you for that um i just wanted to turn it over to first the city manager and then the city attorney just to see if we can't even take action on this thank

you council member mayor you wouldn't need to make a motion since this is a discussion only item an 85 item so what staff would be if we would just be listening to the direction that we receive and if there is majority support we would proceed forward understood understood so so it's not a formal vote

but obviously I have to say my piece, and I think maybe Council Member Solario kind of said his piece a little bit because he seconded the very, very fleeting motion. But additional comments, please.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yeah, so yeah, the Councilman did definitely show where he was on this, so that's good. I think that a lot of the comments were well said. I certainly appreciated the comments from Tim O'Brien over at The Legacy regarding review of this and seeing how we can provide some relief and how projects like his could be realized. And I did have an exchange with local labor 652 and how this is important that we do provide some relief. And let me put this into context.

We've provided relief for tenants for a while as this pandemic has hit us. and we've done things in the form of rent freezes, relaxation of citations for street sweeping, obviously on rental evictions as well. So I believe that this is a discussion that we should have. It's a good one to see how we can provide some relief to those in the construction industry and especially those that represent skilled labor and all the folks who spoke on local hire,

well, that's something that is very, very important, and I think that's something I can be supportive of. But if I could, as I'm speaking, if the director of planning could come before us and just answer a couple of questions that I have, I wanted to just get a sense from him on just some data that I think I need. And as he's coming forward, I also do agree with what Mayor Pro Tem Villegas said about improving the inventory of stock that we have that is in very poor condition. So obviously with that, we need funds.

But some questions, Mr. Tai. can you tell me whether or not there's been an increase or decrease since the who was adoptive of applications to develop here in the city so based on the

information that we have on permit issuance data since 2011 to date this the city has issued approximately 3,400 permits or approval for units that would be Apple under the hoop of those 3,400 units approximately 2,700 units trigger the who and about six and fifty did not trigger the hoop of those that we looked at between 2011 and 2015 which is when the fee were still the original fee and

wasn't changed approximately 11 and 100 units were approved and entitled and issue permit and between 2016 and 2019 we have approximately an over doubling of that about 29 units but those units haven't paid yet so understood but I

guess I'm speaking to the interest of investing here in the city and and and developing units in the city has there been a disincentive in your

opinion based on the times I've been here in terms of the apartment units I believe there's still a high level of interest but there has been expressed expressed concerns about the who fee for the whole ownership type products I have not seen a major development comes in and the feedback I receive from that has also been that since the change in 2015 it certainly made the for sell product much more challenging to build in this city because of the fee.

Understood, but I guess what we're talking about is multifamily development right now, so we're not talking about single-family homes. So what I guess I'm trying to get to is,

do you see a need for affordability in our community, given what our average median income is of our residents?

I think affordable housing is, I would rather put it in a term, attainable housing is needed everywhere. As you can see with the housing crisis is that there is a growing cost for housing and affordability is challenging for families. So attainable housing is certainly something that is needed everywhere throughout the state and throughout the nation.

And here in Santa Ana, what's the average median income of a family?

I believe the average is around $58,000.

Okay, $58,000.

That's what I recall, but I can look it up.

What's the average cost of a one-bedroom apartment market rate?

The most recent data I have range anywhere between $9,000 to $1,200 for a one-bedroom.

Of a new market rate, one-bedroom?

For the new market rate, it's a little bit beyond that. but it's just correct. The newer unit, probably more like $1,400, $1,500.

Okay, and that's on the low end if you look at a spectrum. So that type of data, if you could bring back in your staff report and make sure we understand, number one, what's the average median income of a family here in Santa Ana? What the cost is for a one-, two-, and three-bedroom multifamily unit? And also, can you also provide for us how many families are still living, two and three families to a unit, and the level of overcrowding that we have in the city?

again these are realities that this community has to deal with that's different than the other 33 communities in the county and very very different than some of the affluent areas in the state so the rena numbers that are applied to us don't always apply equally to other cities our conditions are much, much more severe for our working families. So again, I'm completely open, and I'm glad the discussion is going to be had because we knew we were going to have it. But let's provide some options. I think one was mentioned about

completely placing a moratorium for two years. That could be an option that's on the table. I'm definitely not supportive of that. But I think providing relief for development it and reducing that fee and adjusting it, especially given the conditions that we're in, well, that's a conversation we can have. And where we land is something that is open for discussion. But I think that we do need to be very careful about this because, again, this looks like we're doing two things. We're pitting labor against working families, and they're one and the same. Because labor are working families.

Labor, we don't want them living outside our community. We want them to be able to afford, whether it's a home, whether it's a multifamily unit here, where they don't have to travel two and three hours just to get to work and do a construction job. That's one. And two, we're also pitting market rate developments versus affordable developments. And we need both. Because remember, when we adopted the who, there were three options in that who. One was to build on-site units. The other was to build off-site units. And the third was the in-lieu fee, which was the opt-out.

This was the most cost-effective way for a developer to be able to develop housing here in the city, market rate housing. And another analysis I'd like you to do is to see what the ratio is, whether market rate housing will increase our density here in the city or decrease it. So what I see with market rate housing, we bring in people from other communities to come live in these new units because our families can't afford them. And that's something that I remember we went through this discussion during 2525.

We talked about how do we not increase our density and provide opportunities to families that already reside here. And I made a vow then when I changed my consideration of that project to say that I'm going to try to advocate and champion for families that live here in the city. So please have that data available when this comes back to us. I think that somebody who initially spoke said bringing it back to us in 60 or 90 days. I don't think this is something that's ready to come back in two weeks. Thank you.

other comments council members mr mayor mr mayor this is uh

uh mr lawyer uh i just wanted just a couple things uh number one as far as the person who actually asked to have it come back in 60 to 90 days that was council member becerra just so they're clear number one number two it's really disingenuous to bring up the boogeyman of outside people coming in. It really is because we talk about for affordable, we say, well, we got to keep things affordable because if all these outsiders come in and they move into the city, they're going to raise the rents and it's going to price everybody else. But it's a false

hope when the units that are being built that are deemed affordable aren't guaranteed for Santa Ana residents. The only way that the WHO truly benefits Santa Ana residents is when that in luffy is used for existing units for rehabilitation for restoration we talk about overcrowding exactly let's improve the quality of these housing units to have dignified housing so i just wanted to make those two points of clarification mr mayor thank you

thank you council member uh jose solario please thank you mr mayor uh as you know uh uh council member viegas iglesias and i were an ad hoc committee looking at recommendations of changes to the overall who i know that staff was about ready to present that but i know along the way i and others got a lot of insight that given covet and given you know civil unrest and given the economy that more relief was needed and i did hear about you know thoughts and ideas of you know one or two year delays and I'm not sure what the right amount is but I think at

a minimum one with an with an option for a second year or just two years just for certainty I think is good I also do feel like we've done a lot of work on the affordable affordable housing side you know we've had upwards of 1500 affordable housing units in the pipeline I've supported each and every one of those projects so I don't think a pause would hurt too much as well as a pause in terms of new fees yes but we have a lot of of these parts going to construction right now you know you look at you

know 17th and in Maine you have a very nice project there you have several on these first Street you have some on 17th Street tiny Tim you know in the central part of town closer by a tzp are a lot of good projects and so there will continue to be new affordable housing projects so that's positive but I do think this is an opportunity to create a stimulus for our local economy and I also think too that guess what if you're not building any housing neither neighbor nor the community benefits so I do believe anything we could do to continue to have these

projects on track is is important I also agree with some of the speakers that I even some of the projects that I've already incomplete or partially went through the process the finances have changed in this world banking has changed a lot of things have changed I also understand because I know I've been talking to our housing community development people we have other housing dollars that we could put towards the projects that I know I'm a reprint Vegas and I also support things like you know rehab rental assistance first-time homebuyers in addition I you know I've also talked about community benefit whether it be

trees or more space the labor provision is very important I'm very glad that various labor leaders from the carpenters and the plumbers labors and smart local 105 all came out because we can do things with students with our local workers and local hire and that keeps money here and that feeds their families, the restaurants, the dry cleaners, everybody. We ought to give this a chance. And I think we will need more time to amend the who, but I do think that in as little as two weeks to just put a pause on it, I think that is doable and would be helpful to the entirety of our community. Thank you.

A comment, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem.

A quick, short comment. So, you know, we need a balancing approach here. yes our residents here it's very dense they could use some housing definitely I'm totally against apartment owners who run who are slumlords I that is one thing that I grew up that way and that's one thing that I won't stand for it's very very tough some of these living conditions and that's why I want to help those folks but at the same time you know we have council members up here that want to hold other cities accountable, that when it comes down to the homeless issue, that they need to build their shelters and so on and so forth,

that we can't take the brunt. Yet we keep building affordable housing here. You know we can't control who comes here, and yet it gets very dense, and these people can come here. So I guess so, we can't stop anyone, but how come we're not holding these other cities accountable and tell them that they need to build workforce housing or affordable housing? So it's just not fair. This thing is touchy, but there needs to be, you got to look at both sides of the issue. And so with the present pandemic situation going on, I say we take a look at this.

And, you know, we're doing all these things for our residents, but what are we doing for our businesses? That's what, you know, my thoughts are. And I'd like to take a good look at this. And that's my comment, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Mayor Pro Tem. Mayor Briscoe.

yes go ahead please yes i i concur with the majority of um the comments that are going on and being the newest council member i would like to take a little time to learn more however i do support this um item because i see that it will bring in businesses into our cities, more housing, and more revenue to our conferences. So I am in favor of that. I would like to explore a little more, though, on the moratorium and the reduction of the fees.

And so I do want to give that break because it's my understanding that what we're currently charging is one of the highest which um we should align with other cities you know in our county and i would also like to see if i may be appointed to the ad hoc committee in replacement of the other person who i had previously did there

yes um look let me give that thought i'll talk to you and and council members will decide very very quickly two weeks I think here's enough for staff to come back with some of the basic issues that have been discussed today and and we will have more discussions at this point I think staff have you heard from enough folks

are we ready for the next item yes sir I believe I have direction all right

what's the next item madam clerk mayor now we are where we can enter into the

housing authority meeting all right so so now I'm gonna go ahead and convene the housing authority and I may we just combine the items into one motion I guess we have the minutes uh items one two three and four is that appropriate i'd entertain a motion

the only thing is that i would need to abstain from item one item number one because i was not

present at the major can we um just note that she'll vote yes down summer mendoza wrote yes but make sure that the record states that she abstained from the minutes because she was not present.

Yes, I will do that.

Thank you. So I believe we have a motion and a second.

Yes. And Authority Member Becerra?

Yes.

Authority Member Mendoza? Abstain. Authority Member Peñalosa? Yes. Authority Member Sarmiento?

Yes.

Authority Member Solorio?

Yes.

Vice Chair Villegas?

Yes.

Chair Pulido?

Yes.

Motion carries. 6-1 with one abstention.

Okay, so go ahead, Madam Clerk.

I was just going to state that we don't have any public comment for this item, but we do have for the general public comment period all right well why don't

we reconvene adjourn this agenda reconvene the regular meeting and go

ahead let's take public comment caller please speak on items within the city's jurisdiction and items not listed on the agenda please clearly state your name whether you're in support or in opposition to any item you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please proceed with your comment hello

my name is Kaylee and I am a resident of Ward 5 and I'm just calling to speak on two policies that were passed in other cities that I think would be beneficial for our city to adopt. So one would be LA just passed a law to encourage landlords to follow tenant protection laws. So if they're found illegally evicting a tenant who is affected by COVID-19, they would actually incur fines beginning at $10,000 and fines would be larger if they're violating the rights of the elderly

or those with disabilities. And I'm a tenant counselor in the city. And so a lot of the stories that I've been encountering, this would be enormously helpful because it would give consequences to the landlords violating the law and help make these protections enforceable. And even just having that would discourage landlords from breaking the law. whereas right now many landlords haven't been concerned about the repercussions and there's localized state judicial order and previously there was the governor's order so

even with all of that there's been a lot of self-help evictions unfortunately so it would be great if the city could encourage landlords to follow the law by passing something similar And then also, Buena Park mirrored Santa Ana's freeze on rent increases language as it is currently written. And they extended it for six months, so it matches their eviction moratorium timeline. Santa Ana can and should do the same. and if the council needed more time to review this then I would ask that you

at least consider extending the rent freeze to match the current moratorium on eviction so extending it to the 30th of June so those are my comments thank

you thank you caller please speak on items within the city's jurisdiction and items that are not listed on the agenda you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please proceed with your comment

hi good evening this is part of what I am a long time and a resident and also attending counselor I like to speak on two items two items one is in regards to the in-lue fees which I also want to put it out there for people that do not understand or do not know that in-luf fees are gathered from a developer who does not want to provide affordable housing in their development and it's based on 15% of affordable housing so that's 100 homes minus 15 so they pay those in-luf fees instead of providing affordable housing

So that's not, I don't believe that is the answer. I think we also have to focus on keeping people in their homes. Please check out the Newsom order, the N6620, which extended the protections for tenants for July 28. I would like to ask for the council to please extend the protections for the moratorium or just basically not allow people to evict people, even though that they are evicting them, they're self-help evicting, and also the rent increase. So if we didn't increase a couple of dollars now,

then why would we allow landlords to increase rent by the 100th? So that does not make sense. You guys also need to protect them so they stay in their homes and not become homeless during a pandemic. I also want to point out that there is affordable housing that is focused in Santa Ana residents and it's the senior housing apartments and they just recently became available the Metro East senior parks there so if you could do that there why wouldn't be be able to do that everywhere and I also want to show support for the Community Land Trust which

is the way like to go to keep our residents here in Santa Ana and for them to become homeowners instead of continually writing the living in fear thank you for your time

thank you caller please speak on items within the city's jurisdiction and items not listed on the agenda you have three minutes from the time you're muted

please proceed with your comment hello my name is buddy I said hi I'm a senator resident I just assume and I'm also a tenant counselor here in the city I I just want to advocate for the extension of the rent freeze and that the city of Santa Ana follows the footsteps of Buena Park just like they followed ours. I really do not understand the logic of allowing a rent increase in the middle of a pandemic that is evidently not going away anytime soon. I do not understand the logic of allowing a rent increase when tenants are expected

to pay the rent back when they were unable to pay because they lost their job, they lost income, or were unable to work because they were sick. And I'm sure you are all aware that San Andes is the prime city of the large number of cases we have in this city. I also, as a tenant counselor, I've had the honor of listening to tenant experiences, and I've been trying to support them as much as I can. And I have seen a lack of accountability of the harmful actions of landlords. And if we could follow the example of LA with mechanisms to hold these landlords accountable

and cite them for their wrongful actions in the middle of a pandemic, that would be grateful. So I would really appreciate if you guys take this into consideration. Thank you.

Caller, please speak on items within the city's jurisdiction. and items not listed on the agenda. You have three minutes from the time you are unmuted. Please proceed with your comment.

Hello, can you hear me?

Yes, we can hear you clearly.

Thank you. My name is Nathaniel Greensides, also known as Nate Greensides, Ward 5. I want to make a quick note that the phrase investing in youth should never be equated with parks and rec funds and programs. In my opinion, that's a sad way to, quote, unquote, invest in the youth. One, because everyone, whether they're a youth or not, enjoys the services and spaces offered by the Parks and Rec Department. It does disservice to both youths as well as the Parks and Rec Department. Also, I just want to offer that if this idea of investing in youth, by somehow investing in Parks and Rec should really be exercised in that idea,

then why are the police always harassing youth who hang out in the parks? The idea completely conflicts itself in this regard. Also, I want to note that there won't be any youth to invest in if you allow for their families to get evicted because the landlord keeps raising the rent. Some other folks have offered what possibilities exist, such as enacting policies which incentivize that landlords should follow the law, such as in L.A., where fines against bad landlords, in addition to the right for tenants to sue bad landlords, exist.

Aligning our eviction moratorium with the rent-increased moratoriums like they did in Buena Park will also be beneficial. At minimum, maintaining the rent increase moratorium until at least June 30th will provide the ability for community members to get securely and stably back on their feet as they're able to return to work. More importantly, I have noticed that a lot of people who have made comments tonight have tried to assert that by, quote-unquote, investing in youth, we can somehow curb the fact that police disproportionately kill black people.

black men with university degrees and even well-paying jobs are still at higher risk of being disproportionately targeted by police regardless of the skin color of the police officer themselves solely quote-unquote investing in youth won't stop police killings brutality and targeting of black people people of color people with disability or homeless people which has and continues to occur in our nation being not white in america as well as here in santa Ana means remaining fearful that what should otherwise be an inconvenient exchange with law

enforcement officers may result in death for someone who is black or who is a person of color. George Floyd was unemployed because of coronavirus. And Stephon Clark in Sacramento was a youth who was being invested in by his grandparents and he was shot dead in his grandparents' yard. These two folks hold this almost exactly the same exact life circumstances for many community members here in Santa Ana. Police accountability in Santa Ana and oversight is poor. This is the reason that the city is finding itself in a lawsuit where police vehicle transport parked at the court

left some individuals locked in the back of the police vehicle in the heat almost to die. This past Sunday night before the curfew came into effect, police without any provocation whatsoever shot tear gas and verbal bullets at leftover protesters at Ronald Reagan building. I urge the council at minimum to establish a citizen oversight committee and make all police activity 100% transparent and publicly available. Otherwise, the growing call to defund the police

becomes the only alternative. Thank you. Thank you. Caller, please speak on items within the city's jurisdiction and items not listed on the agenda. You have three minutes from the time

you're unmuted. Please proceed with your comment. Hi, good evening, everyone. My name is Meshtri Lopez, and I'm calling tonight as somebody who volunteers for a tenant rights hub. And I want to echo the comments made by Kaylee and Maria, who spoke prior to me about the need for us to follow suit in the policy that was enacted in LA that allows tenants the right to sue their landlord if the landlord has been skirting the law during the pandemic.

i think this is very important for us to do because um in enacting it it could serve as a as a way to defer bad behavior and bad landlords we've been seeing cases that are just completely despicable and heart and soul-breaking like um families being illegally evicted even though they've like paid the rent for that current month but the landlord wants to get them out um in another edition moratorium and in place and even though like this specific family that i'm

talking about um one of them was in a wheelchair and they had nowhere else to go no family to turn to we're still working with them to try to find them alternative housing um we've heard cases of people being harassed by their landlords specifically mothers and just like so many other terrible things that I could go on and on about but basically landlords are being frivolous and they're ignoring the laws and they're

taking advantage of their power in this situation and I think the city the least that we could do as a city to protect our tenants is an active law that would allow for a case in court for tenants to seek justice and some remedies. And hopefully also by attaching money to the situation, landlords that are just acting out of greed would think twice before being abusive. And then I also want to echo the comments that were made about considering extending the rent fee to match the one in Buena Park since I've

heard a lot of you say that the reason why you couldn't extend it here in Santana because it was not possible it was possible in Buena Park thank you

caller please speak on items within the city's jurisdiction and items not listed on the agenda you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted please

proceed with your comment. Hi I'm Olga Rodriguez Lau and I'm from Ward 3 of Santa Ana. I'm calling upon the City Council to take a stance against the unjust murders of countless black lives by police officers and do so by defunding the police department and allocating these funds to create an independent unit that would be in charge of investigating misconduct in the Santa Ana Police Department or a citizen oversight committee to ensure our voices are heard. Officers under investigation should not be allowed to have paid leave, and those with a history of excessive force should be terminated and not have the option

to retire with pension. To ensure accountability, I demand that you become proactive in abolishing the doctrine of qualified immunity for police officers. I would also like to state that I am disappointed in the unnecessarily large police presence during the peaceful protest in Santa Anna on May 31st. While there, many times we were corralled by officers, and we feared that they would incite violence to spice the peaceful efforts of the protesters. Councilman Sarmiento, I wonder, did you and your family run away alongside me from the cops multiple times for fear of violence? I'm also disgusted by the rumors of ICE presence.

I don't know if they were there or not, but allowing such rumors to circulate is irresponsible. We are a sanctuary city, and many of our residents are undocumented. How are they supposed to show up for the black community when doing so can risk their livelihood? Latinos want to come out in solidarity for the black community and our undocumented residents should not have to fear the risk of deportation or detainment while doing so I'm asking you all to do better people's lives are at stake I'm 21 and I've spent 17 years of my life in Santa Ana and I do not plan on leaving anytime soon just like the people before me said the youth are

watching you thank you caller please speak on items within the city's jurisdiction and items not listed on the agenda you have three minutes from the time you're unmuted

please proceed with your comment hi this is Carl Benninger and as you know I'm a member of ETAC and vice president of comlink I first of all I want to welcome councilwoman Mendoza to the council looking forward to look working with you and also looking forward to tan fan running again in November for Ward 1 I I think her and you and the council make a dynamic team. I also want to thank the Santa Ana police and those that helped us. I've heard a lot of comments against them. But when you're standing in front of a crowd and they're yelling and screaming and throwing rocks and stones and fire extinguisher and damaging you,

it's very hard to keep your calm. And they did a professional job with that. And also, I'm with those that are protesting. I'm sick of the killing of George Floyd, the gentleman that was jogging down in North Carolina, and even my beloved state of Michigan coming out with the good, bitter flags and guns to protest. It's just not called for it. That is just not right. And so I'm with you. Where I'm not with you is when we can start repeating, breaking windows, and destroying property. The deaths of these gentlemen does not give us the right to do that. and it doesn't do any good for their honor.

What will help is that I think we need to have some open meetings and suggestions. I've heard some good things tonight. Vince, I very much support you with what you suggested, and I think that would come a long way. And in closing, I really want to thank those in Santa Ana who got up Sunday morning and helped clean up the city. Voluntary, their help was just very impressive. Thank you. Good night. Thank you.

Mayor and Councilmembers, that was the last caller. Although I do want to mention that we did receive email correspondence. We received four that were against police abuse, two that requested in support of increasing the curfew days and police, and then one against fireworks. And that is all we have.

Thank you very much. We lost the mayor, so I will be assuming the responsibility of running the meeting. and Madam City Manager we're going to move on with your comments thank you

mayor Pro Tem so just a brief one for city services I want to let everybody know that we opened up City Hall yesterday starting Monday June 1st for the services that we are able to provide and provide them in a matter that's consistent with what the guidelines are required by the state we have safety measures that have been put in place including plexiglass shields at service counters limiting the number of people inside and requiring visitors to wear face coverings and to have their temperature taken most of services now require appointments which can be made online or by phone information is

located at the top of our webpage at Santa Santa hyphen Anna org or folks can call 714-647-5491 and the cashier counter doesn't require an appointment and is open for walk-ins. And that's all, sir.

Thank you very much. We're going to move on to Councilmember Comments. I'll just call on the two that are not here with us. So, Councilmember Becerra.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. I want to congratulate Councilmember Mendoza on being sworn in this evening. Welcome to the Council. I would also like to invite our community to participate in my monthly office hours. We took a brief break during the height of the pandemic, but as we're all acclimating and have managed to meet and communicate through other means other than getting together in person, I'm going to be holding my monthly office hours on Zoom this Saturday at 10 a.m. On Monday, it was the 134th anniversary of the incorporation of our city's government way, way back in 1886.

instead of our police officers watching residents take part in a celebration of that anniversary on Monday our police were hard at work attempting to provide a safe environment for people to come to the capital of Orange County to express their feelings about the tragic death of George Floyd it was horrific to watch that video of Mr. Floyd being murdered and I'd like to send our heartfelt condolences to his family and I pray that justice is served now as that relates to Sania and I want to say that our city's resident or to our city's residents excuse me that i will help facilitate constant improvement in communication and relations

between our city's police and other city departments and our community so that we can work together to continuously improve how our city serves and protects our residents i hope to do that while working with my colleagues here on this council and i also want to state very simply and very clearly black lives matter saying that all lives matter is a lie if we can't say and believe that black lives matter. Mr. Mayor Pro Tem, I would like to ask that we close tonight's meeting in honor of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Sean Reed, and Tony McDade, along with other black Americans who have died as a

result of the violent racism that continues to plague our country today. I would like to conclude my comments this evening expressing my appreciation and pride in our city's residents as many of them got up out of bed early this past sunday morning to come out and clean up after those who didn't come out on saturday evening to peacefully express themselves but rather to loot and destroy businesses in our city and cause havoc so many residents came together to clean storefronts of broken glass and trash and paint over graffiti and i'd like to give special thanks to one gentleman that i came across over at uh bristol

Nettinger and also at Bristol McFadden on that Sunday morning and that was a gentleman from Orange County Car Wash and Detailing who came out, had his vehicle out there with his power washing equipment and was just asking people where he can get to work and start helping. He at one point started on a street light and then started working his way in onto some of the storefronts. So I just wanted to acknowledge him. His actions to me were very inspiring and they embody the spirit of Santa Ana.

With that, I want to thank you and have a good night. Thank you very much. Council Member Mendoza, any comments for this evening?

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem Villegas. I would like to thank my colleagues for your support and your welcoming gestures. It's quite an extensive meeting. I hope that we have shorter ones in the future. but I know I understand that there was a lot of items on the agenda and so I too believe we have a tremendous wealth of staff police and fire and that the services that they provided in the during

the weekend and keeping property and personnel safe was that the best that they said they could do and it was successful because as you saw we didn't have the the escalation of violence and property destruction as other cities and and those youth if there were youth who were hurt it's my understanding that they were not here for the peaceful um protest they were actually here for the intent is to loot and steal and destroy property.

So I am very proud that the way our police and other law enforcement agencies conducted themselves and that they truly do not condone the type of violence that was experienced in Minneapolis and that we should maintain respect for our law enforcement agencies and our fire authority and for all property.

And that if we do see individuals who are here for other purposes, that we discourage them, as one of our callers mentioned, that this is strictly a peaceful protest. and not something that we are here to destroy our very own city and and i would like to thank the young people who stayed up late for their comments and it's always um refreshing to see the young people being involved because they are going to be our future leaders and

And there is no offense in saying that our young people in the park services, as one caller mentioned, what we mean is that we want our youth to be successful in whatever it is that they want to do whatever career they choose. And that the city of Santa Ana is here to provide a pathway in services to make their path a little easier. and to provide resources and to know that we are here to help and not to hinder

and to live a prosperous and safe life in our communities. So to all my colleagues and staff, thank you for getting my feet wet, and I actually enjoyed listening to and learning from you, learning all of the items that are before us today. I got a bit of information on it from my agenda review, but it was even more learning hearing it directly from you.

And I see why you were chosen and elected as representatives of your respective wards. is because we have true dedication, and I see that you are truly interested in working together as a council to benefit our city and to continue to unite in those areas where there has been conflict in the past. So thank you very much to everyone. I appreciate it, and good night to staff.

Thank you very much, Council Member. The latest I got out in a council meeting was 2.10 in the morning. So, you know, we're just getting started. And I forgot to do the three-minute thing on here, so just kidding. It is late. It's almost midnight. Council Member Solorio.

Thank you, Mayor Patem. Welcome back, I should say, Council Member Mendoza. I know you were a redevelopment housing commissioner some years ago, and I think maybe even a staff member at some point so welcome back we all look forward to working with you I know we're still dealing obviously with the kovat situation and we continue to want people to try to be home as much as possible I know there's a lot of confusion about the mass and the reality I think at the end of the day is that you know the sheriff's departments and others they're not gonna you know look out after everybody as they leave their home but

But masks are important for our own personal health and the health of those around you. So please, please do use them until we hear from the governor and others that it's not necessary. I know, too, as I mentioned earlier, there are industries that are trying to open up quicker. And here, because we do have so many young people and they've been sitting at home for a long time, we got to get him out to be able to at least exercise in our parks maybe play soccer maybe swimming other things to the extent that you city manager or American can help but that would be fantastic with respect to the the

protests over the weekend I was very proud and pleased with the way that our residents behaved as well as our local officers I think we saw with our residents that they were very patient and supportive you know we have many people of color in our community many working-class residents and so they understand how you know many people of color across the country feel choked just by the economy and by the situation and unfortunately in a few cases a police brutality that no one wants to see we also saw a lot of support for our officers and keeping

property safe and yeah we had you know some issues on on Bristol but you know turn on the TV and I'm sure many of you have you know look at Long Beach look at LA and many other areas we did okay here and we want to keep staying okay I also saw and do want to show that I think our residents are cool with the protests if they're nonviolent but if it's about looting or destroying property we're not cool with that so please if you see protesters from out of the area or people that are being aggressive just trying to tell them to be nonviolent and I know our officers are doing that the best they can I know because of the

ongoing questions about curfews you know I've been encouraging that people you know sign up to Nixle I know the city is as well again and the more we can communicate on the safety of this overall situation plus kovat I think is good and then finally I do think it is appropriate to adjourn in the memory of of George Floyd and others that have unfortunately you know fall into the same unfortunate death at the hands of police brutality and we all hurt for

that thank you councilmember Sarmiento thank you mr. mayor pro tem and yeah I'll I'll welcome newly minted Councilmember Mendoza. I know her as Nellie. We were young commissioners way back when on redevelopment and housing. So it's great to have you with us, Nellie. I know that I certainly look forward to working with you, and I know you're going to represent your ward very well. So thank you for bearing with us. Boy, this was quite a meeting. your first voyage to have with us. It's almost midnight, and we're still here.

So I did want to talk a little bit about what happened this weekend. I think we did kind of chronicle what took place, and I'm glad that there were reports made by both the chief of police and the fire chief.

but I did want to say the day after I think Sunday morning I saw both Councilmember Peñalosa and Becerra over at the McFadden in Bristol sort of epicenter of where everything took place and you know I think they were helping clean up and I know I brought some water for some of the volunteers and by the time I got there and I thought I was early but it was like 8 or 8.30 and things were already cleaned up and I did see former Council Member Iglesias there too. I want to acknowledge that, that her presence was, you know, she was present there.

But, you know, a lot of us were kind of still kind of dumbstruck by what everything, what had happened the night before and what was happening and the days in advance of that all over the country. And I know that some of us were speaking with raw emotion still at that time. And I do want to acknowledge that I put up a Facebook post about the image that was really burned and embedded in my mind, which was about Mr. Floyd and the officer with his knee on his neck. And to me, it depicted a moment that haunted me. It brought me to tears.

It brought me to rage. and eventually to hope. But I did put it up and somebody pointed out, hey, that was not right because I didn't have the consent of the family and that was insensitive to people who were close to Mr. Floyd. And I did take it down and replaced it with another image of hope. But nonetheless, I think that it's important that we don't normalize that sort of behavior and that sort of conduct. And I think it gives all officers who do go out every day and do a good job,

it really does smudge their image because I think those good officers work so hard to change the narrative. And unfortunately, all it takes is an incident like that and others to change that. I do want to also thank and commend Council Member Peñalosa because he, as I did, was speaking from emotion and made some comments that I know he publicly regretted, and he explained to everybody that he was speaking from a place, a good place, and maybe he could have used a different choice of words,

but it takes courage to come back and admit when you did something wrong. And I respect that, Council Member, And I think that the public should as well, because the last thing we should do is try to, you know, just focus on somebody who makes a mistake, because none of us are perfect. Believe me, I know I'm not. And to be able to understand when you've made a misstep or something that offends others, and then you retract and you change and you own up to it, and you take ownership of it, speaks volumes of your character. So I certainly appreciate that, and I just wanted to make sure that didn't go overlooked.

My final comment is to all those that spent time over the weekend and are going to continue to protest and march and exercise their First Amendment right. Well, what now? What's the endgame here? What are we all looking for? Well, to those of you who are out there marching and protesting and having your voices heard, look, I hope that you all show up at the polls in just a few months. You're going to have an opportunity to define your future. You're going to have an opportunity to have your voices heard.

And the criticism that the youth always receive is that you're big on words, but you're short on action. And that was President Obama's message. He said, where will you be in November? And so I hope that you conserve some of the energy that you have now, some of the anger and some of the rage, and ask candidates that are running here locally. Because it doesn't matter who's in the White House, how shameful that person is or how good that person is. The people who determine your fate are local leaders. And those are the ones who determine what your daily lives are going to be like.

So make sure you ask those tough questions of people who are running for office. Make all of us feel uncomfortable and make us answer and be responsive. That's your right and that's our obligation. So all I can say is save some of that energy, let it extend for the next five months because it's important. This is going to be a very, very transformative time in all our lives. So with that, I bid you all well, and Black Lives Matter.

Council Member Pena-Losa.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem, and thank you, Council Member Sarmento, for that. Appreciate it. I first just want to thank our city manager, our chief of police, our fire chief, our public works director. I mean, on Saturday night, I believe, into Sunday morning, I was getting emails at midnight, 1, 2, 3 in the morning. I think as late or early, I guess, as 4 in the morning from our public works director and our chief of police, you know, giving us updates and making sure that things were, you know, as controlled as they possibly can. I was out there both days.

David PenalozaItem —

I want to thank the many that were out there, you know, peacefully protesting and marching for the movement. and, you know, unfortunately there were the, like we, you know, like the dialogue that's happening right now, there are the bad ones that ruin it for everybody, whether that's the police department or whether that's people that are out there marching and protesting for a good cause. There were a few that, you know, took advantage of the situation and I, you know, let my anger of seeing that, you know, get the best of me

David PenalozaItem —

And I made a comment to the people out there looting, and that was a mistake. I shouldn't have said it, and I'm deeply, deeply sorry. I regret it. We're human. I make mistakes, and I realize that. And like I mentioned on social media, it's like one thing that I'm definitely not used to is the way and power my voice has as an elected official. and what I want to take from this is that I hope that other local elected officials, as Council Member Sarmiento was mentioning, how much power we have and influence over people's day-to-day lives,

David PenalozaItem —

see the consequences of your actions and words and take that as a lesson because I absolutely did and I know what's in my heart and I know how deeply, deeply I care about my community and our residents and I know that it didn't come from a bad place. And again, I apologize and definitely not going to happen again. And I know I can't make it go away, but like I said, it's a lesson for me and I hope other local elected officials watching and listening

David PenalozaItem —

and even candidates hoping to run for office. your voice has weight and it has consequences. And with that said, I also want to say that for those out there that keep saying all lives matter, just know that all lives do not matter until black lives matter. And that is as accurate as it can be. So with that said, good night, everybody.

Thank you, everyone. A quick comment. I guess I beat everyone to McFadden or to Ettinger in Bristol because I was there at 6.50 in the morning. I saw all of you folks later on. I saw it on Facebook. I was driving around assessing all the areas. I wanted to make sure we didn't lose anything, which places were vandalized and which weren't. But I did make contact with the folks who were there cleaning. Channel 7 was already there. So big shout out to all them folks that came out to help clean. That was very, very big of you. Those people really, really love the city.

And we are going to adjourn this meeting in honor of George Floyd, Tony McDade, Sean Reed, and Breonna Taylor. May they rest in peace and may justice be served. Meeting adjourned.