Read the May 21 meeting.

O nation, under God, in his will, with liberty and justice for all.

You can remain standing. We'll have our Police Chaplain, Jack Al-Ling, proceed with the invocation.

Shall I, would you join me in prayer, please? Father, how thankful we are today that we're in a city that cares about its people. And we do pray, Lord, this evening for all of the council, for our police, for those that are watching over us, that you would continue to keep your hand upon them, give them wisdom and safety, and may you give great wisdom to the meeting here tonight, that we would have your heart in mind and that you would go before us and provide for the needs of your people. Thank you, Lord, for being here and for loving us in Jesus' name. Amen.

Thank you. Please be seated. We're going to start with the ceremonial presentations. We're going to have Council Member Sarmiento step forward.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem, and good evening to everybody. If I could have Gannon Burks, the assistant principal at Santa Ana High School, Tiffany Vuong from Santa Ana High School, Alicia Booth from the Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce, Marco upon from Chavita Juice, Angel Lorea from the Mobile Food Truck Association, Yahaira Ortiz, Healthy Schools Program Manager at OC United Way come and join me up here. This talented group of folks are on a road show tonight that's why I want to thank my colleagues for allowing them to go first because they're going to be taking this on the road to the school district and they're going to be

presenting or be presented over there and I want to introduce them here at the Council and I'm very very proud to have them I'm very proud to make this presentation tonight and these this is for the contributions to the community and the participation in the National Forensics Forensics Association 2019

tournament you know a lot of us when I read the title of National Forensics Association I thought it was a group of medical students or medical professionals but actually these are speech and debate college-age students and it's a very very prestigious tournament it it goes around the country it's very well recognized and it brought to us over a thousand college students and over 90 universities were represented here in town it was a great event that had been worked on for a couple of years and I am going to be talking about and giving this microphone and the floor to a former colleague of

mine somebody who you all know well and love and miss my former colleague Sal Tinajero who is the somebody who worked on this who is now with the school district in Santa Ana but served on this council since 2006 to 2018 and we were We're very privileged and honored to have him represent the city because he's a product of the public school system here, and he's gone on to do great things, both in his personal life and in his professional life as well, but one of his loves has been speech and debate. And I know that he brought honor and prestige to the campus

that he represented in Fullerton, Fullerton Union High. What he did is he brought a lot of students that were,

underrepresented, low income, and taught them the skill and the art of debate. And that's something very, very, you know, difficult to do because they travel around to campuses like Harvard, Berkeley, all over the country. And again, the Harvard of the Midwest, Bradley, right? So, which is Sal's alma mater, so he always reminds me, it's the Harvard of the Midwest, so remember to say that. But he, you know, when he asked me to go visit, and I know the mayor pro tem went to go give the opening remarks, and I gave the closing remarks, the stadium, or excuse me, the auditorium over at Santa Ana High School was full,

and it was an incredible sight to see that many college students, you know, so many campuses represented, but that tournament brought so many folks, in addition to the staff, to come here to town, because they could have gone all over anywhere in the country, but they decided to come here, and I think that was to Sal's advocacy, to bring them here. And just on hotel, you know, just on the hotel cost because they all stayed here for a week, they all ate here, they all visited all our venues and all our businesses, there was over

half a million dollars spent on just hotel stay alone. So that alone deserves a big round of applause to let them know how much.

That was a big injection of funds. People fell in love with the city, so what happens when these university students graduate, and they have families, and they grow up, and they have kids, they're going to say, you know what, I remember this town that I went to go compete in. Let's go back there because I had a great time. It's close to Disneyland, it's close to the beach, it's close to all these great places, so we know those folks are going to be coming back. And we certainly made a big impression, thanks to all these folks behind me and their sponsors of the event. And it was such a great thing to have the city,

and I don't know if Julie is here. In any event, Julie Castro, who worked, I know, very closely with Sal, she was part of our city manager staff, now is with our economic development team, but she worked very hard to bring this together and I know worked side by side with Sal to go ahead and make this. But this was a historic event. This is something that had never been brought to the city. I don't even know if the school district had a speech and debate program before Sal got here. So he not only brought this tournament, but he founded a program for our students to be taken advantage of

and to be developing these skills. So I want to thank Sal for his tireless efforts over the past two years. But I also dearly want to thank the Santa Unified School District, the Chamber of Commerce, Chevita Juice, the Mobile Food Truck Association, OC United Way, and all the volunteers who have helped make this a reality. And I want to turn this over, stop talking. I want to turn it over to Sal to have him speak a little bit about what they experienced here in this week that the tournament was here. I know it ended a few weeks ago, but look, it's still fresh. We're still invigorated.

We're still, you know, excited about what happened here with all those students and with that event being held here. So Sal, the floor is yours. Go ahead and address this. Please, Sal Tinajero.

So we have the individuals, just to give you an idea, this tournament had never been held at a high school. It has always been held at a university. University of Alabama, University of Texas and Austin, James Madison University. It's always been at a university, never at a high school. Two years ago, I had taken my team to Harvard, or let me say it right, to Harvard, and I was having a lobster roll, and I thought, huh, whenever I come out here I want clam chowder or a lobster roll. So then the family went out on a little vacation to Boston, and we went to the same hotel that I stayed at.

I took them to the same restaurants that I've been to. See, everything that was familiar, when I brought my family, that's where we went. And we spent money there again. That's where the idea came in. And I talked to Councilman Sarmiento at that time and other colleagues in the back, and I said, you know what, if we bring college students, these students are all going to graduate, they're going to earn money, a good salary, if we bring them here and introduce them to what we have, and it's a great experience, they're going to come back. Not just once, but multiple times.

Instead of getting a hotel near Disneyland, they'll get the hotel here in Santa Ana knowing that it's only a five minute drive. So that was the game plan. Game plan number two was that I already know about of the 71 universities that compete in speech, I know about 30 of the coaches. But if they come here, have a great experience, now we know everyone. And all that does is when our students are ready to go to the four year university, we can get them scholarships as well. So this served a lot of different layers, a lot of different areas, and we put in the bid.

They trusted us with the bid, and thanks to the individuals that are behind me, Mr. Burke, Alicia, Finney, and the whole SPART team, and I'm going to tell you a little bit about the SPART team because I'm very proud of these guys, we were able to put this together. this was a true partnership between the Santa Ana Unified School District, the City of Santa Ana's leadership, the Chamber of Commerce, and the college. Our SPART team that's standing right here, they're what you call, I know our police chief is out here, they're like our SWAT, they're our SWAT team. So they rotate

through different schools to beautify the schools but whenever we have a major event they're the ones that come in, they get the campus ready, and they're there on call the entire time. But let me tell you what's special about them. The president of the National Forensics Association came to me two days before the tournament was over and she said, Sal, I've never received this type of treatment and at all the different universities we've been to I've never received the type of treatment that you guys get. She says, your SPART team comes in here, they have a great attitude, you could tell that they take pride in what

they do and after we need something they get it done they come back to us and they ask is this okay for you and if it's not they go fix it with a smile on their face this is a class act and also mr. Burke who's also the assistant principal at Santa Ana high school was there the entire time this was a week long ordeal where we were going to sleep at midnight waking up at 5 and getting right back to campus so I just want to thank the city of Santa Ana we did bring over a hundred thousand dollars in tax revenue and you know every little bit counts especially in these days when we're stretching dollar bills right so

I'm just very proud of what we did so much so that the organization has asked us to do it again next year so it's another it's another bolt to our economy

and till this day it's still going out on Twitter that this was the best NFA they've ever had so I'm very proud thank you so much for this recognition and And thank you so much for your leadership in allowing us to do this. Thank you. So we're going to go ahead and present these to all of our folks that were involved with this one. And this is signed by every council member and the city council. I'll start with from Chavita Juice. If you could just state your name and let them know what you do here in our city. My name is Mark Apun. I'm representing Chavitas Yuzan Bagel, and we basically served the whole tournament

for three days, and I mean, we did the best we could. And they love their food, so if you wanna go, I gave you the wrong one, I apologize.

And from the Senate Unified School District, Mr. Gannenberg.

I'm Gannon Burks, I'm the assistant principal, and I want to thank Sal Tenerro for bringing this wonderful tournament to our school, putting us on the map nationally, and letting people know that Santa Ana actually is the center of the United States now.

And from the Chamber of Commerce, Ms. Alicia Booth.

I am Alicia Booth, I'm the communications manager at the Chamber. We just helped with the fundraising of the event.

And so we have other certificates that we'll go ahead and head out because they have a lot of things to do today but thank you so much. Let's continue to shop in Santa Ana and show people, oh by the way, we talked about the lobster rolls, they loved our tacos. So let's make that a staple. Thank you.

Up next we have Councilmember Jose Solorio stepping in for Mayor Pulido.

Good evening. As you know, we typically, you know, celebrate people, you know, young people, neighborhood leaders, business leaders, but when you have a city, you know, really part of what there is to celebrate, if you do it well, is you celebrate your infrastructure, you celebrate your building, you celebrate the physical aspects of the neighborhood, you know, the beautiful trees, the water, the good tasting water, because we keep getting awards for that and here in America as you might know there are designations for every week of the year so I really placed on behalf of Mayor Polito recognize National

Public Works Week I know we have some yes round of applause I know we have various public works managers staffers I see some of me here so don't be shy I need a few you to come up so as you are coming up okay here we have our our our city engineer and our public works director. Great timing. It's an honor for us to recognize these two individuals and everybody else in the division. The public works of professionals in our city focus on infrastructure, facilities, and services that are vital to sustaining our

communities. A big piece of it is water and I professionally work for a water district. and so obviously water is very vital for human life and we have a great water system here. We actually import very little of our water because our groundwater basin underneath is so robust and the quality is good and the cost is good, much less than imported water, so maintaining that is very important. And our council member, Vince Sarmiento, he's on the board of directors for the Orange County Water District and is in fact the president of their board this year. So we're really pleased in our to have him up with us

We have services in our division in public works that are headed up by engineers managers General service employees and again all this contributes to public health livability movement and together, you know helps us have a high quality of life here in Santa Ana today specifically the divisions that I want to recognize again in totality and these two gentlemen you know work with these folks in these divisions we have a water resource division a construction engineering division maintenance services engineering services administrative services and they do it in a way almost like the private sector

would do in that they have you know these in the city we have these centralized group of individuals and then they'll help different departments as they have needs. So an engineer may be working on water stuff, there may be another engineer working on transportation stuff, and then we just address all the city public works needs as we need to. Additionally, through partnerships with the county, with regional governments, nonprofits, the private sector, the federal government, they also help get us grants in other programs. So, you know, literally every year we get tens of millions

of dollars in grants for all those infrastructure programs in conjunction with our parks division, you know, a lot of grants for parks as well. We here today are recognizing May 19th through May 25th as National Public Works Week and recognize the City of Santa Ana's Public Works Agency and its people, most importantly, for the outstanding work that they do on behalf of the residents and businesses of Santa Ana. Let's give them a big round of applause.

Our Public Works Director, Fred Suisse. Thank you, Councilmember Solorio, and thanks to the Mayor and City Council, and of course our new City Manager, for recognizing Public Works Week. You covered it all. I was going to say some about Public Works, but we really are the lifeline of any city. Our staff work 24-7 to make sure everyone in this city receives the best service, clean streets, water when you turn the tap, whether you want to use water or flush a toilet or anything. People work seamlessly 24-7 to make sure all these services are delivered to everyone here.

I've been in public service for over 30 years and I tell you our Public Works Department Santa Ana Public Works Department are the best and one of the people we have are the finest and I'm so proud to be part of this organization thank you for recognizing us and Public Works Week thank you

well our city engineer you're gonna do that main engineering charge once you

Well, thank you very much. I think as a public works professional also for 30 years, I take pride in the work that I do. I'm so very happy to be of service to Santa Ana. And one thing that I wanted to make sure that in addition to everything that's been said, we aggressively pursue grants. And we are number one in Orange County in bringing outside dollars to fund capital projects in the city. So we're successful at that. We take a lot of pride and we will continue fighting for bringing outside dollars That's federal and state dollars into the city. Thank you very much

Just a couple more things to leave you with and you know We'll commemorate this with a nice Paca for them. This team also Oversees most of the my Senate Anna app Work and requests which is you know on the whole a very popular service where by your phone you can take a photo and send that directly to the city to address you know sidewalk issue you know a tree issue a pothole or whatever it might be so so that's a big deal. Later tonight we're having a budget workshop and so we'll be discussing you know a lot of our capital improvement priorities and on that topic

I know the one street that I get the most requests for you got to fix that street is Wright Street particularly in the center part of town and that's with our Public Works director one they said keep we got advanced it more they've been saving it because with the OCT streetcar they're gonna do some work on right but I'm all well they have them advance that work and so we actually in the next coming months are gonna start working on on on rate Street they've identified the funding and so that's a big deal thank you so much Fred and our new city manager for allowing that. So on behalf of our mayor and city council, it's

my honor to recognize National Public Works Week here in Santa Ana. Congratulations and thank you.

If I can have Chief Espinoza from the Orange County Fire Authority join me up here please.

Welcome Chief, thank you for joining us. We are here recognizing Wildfire Awareness Week and I just can't say enough about the brave men and women from the Orange County Fire Authority who risk their lives every day going out and protecting us here in the city of Santa Ana. Orange County Fire Authority is very very large so they serve in many areas but there's one thing very special about the firefighters and all firefighters in general. They're one big family they work hard together and when there's wildfires and I know here in Santa Ana we don't we don't have that but we're

surrounded by mountains and hills and they all have to pull together to put these fires out and it is just a lot of work is dangerous I represent the city of Santa Ana on the Orange County Fire Authority Board and I have the honor of being there and seeing the good work that they do and all the skills that they have and all the training all the hard work can't say enough about them And I've seen photos and film of how these brave men and women fight these fires. It's just incredible. And you ought to see these folks there. Many times you get shipped up north, correct?

There's a lot of, you know, fires up north. We also had the Canyon 1 fire. We had the Canyon 2 fire here locally. We know Laguna area also has a lot of fires out in those hills. but they can go as far as you know out of state so it's just incredible work and I want to thank the chief and if you can come and say a little bit a few words about the wildfire awareness week for the public thank you chief mayor

council members thank you very much as a very kind word then I'd like to add a couple of streets to public works I just want to say it's councilmember Vegas was right. You look around us, we have concrete, metal infrastructure. We're in the middle of a metropolitan city. However, who would have ever thought that an entire city of Paradise, California would have been wiped off the map? The loss of life, you know, incredible. Fire is relentless. It's devastating, and we have to take it serious. The most important thing you can do is when the order is given to evacuate, we have a very robust system here in Orange County. We're

very blessed and alert OC. If you get those orders, adhere to them, please. It may save your life. Never take them for granted. We live in and around these areas, so make sure you maintain that brush clearance and always respect Mother Nature. This year we have a high volume of grass, so you always want to keep that in mind. But thank you very much,

sir be safe thank you chief and on behalf of the Ameris City Council I want to present this proclamation to you for wildfire awareness week thank you to the brave men and women of the Orange County Fire Authority

Next up we have Councilmember Penaloza.

David PenalozaItem —

Hello everyone. Can I have the folks from Crown Castle, they're on their way up here, come up here please? I'd like to recognize as a thank you on behalf of the Mayor and the City Council to Crown Castle for their contributions to the community. Since 1994, Crown Castle has worked around the country to build and maintain the infrastructure behind the world's most revolutionary technologies consisting of towers, small cells, and fiber giving communities access to data, technology, and wireless services. Through the Connected by Good program, Crown Castle employees participate in

David PenalozaItem —

voluntary projects in local communities and on May 8th across the country, Crown Castle held their annual Connected by Good Day of Service and selected the City of Santa Ana as one of the 21 parks chosen for revitalization efforts through the removal of trash, cleanup of foliage, overgrowth, and tree planting. Crown Castle provided over 70 volunteers for a day of service at Memorial Park. The volunteers painted bleachers and the shower area, planted new flowers and succulents, and shifted sand in the park's playground. The Connected by Good program goes beyond one day of community service.

David PenalozaItem —

It revitalizes spaces where people connect, helps to improve everyday safety, and promotes access to education and technology. Today, we thank Crown Castle for their attention to our community and acknowledge them for their efforts in making Santa Ana a safer and more beautiful city. And in regards to Memorial Park, I was present that day to welcome them and give them a thank you. And it meant a lot to me personally because Memorial Park is a park that I learned to swim in. I played Little League in. My brothers played Little League in. I chipped a tooth on the bleachers as a five-year-old kid.

David PenalozaItem —

so it's a park that I walk through daily with my dog so I was very happy to to be there and see the improvements and it looks great the plants look awesome thank you and the the bleachers look nice ready for the summer to start so thank you gentlemen you guys would like to say any words please so mayor and

council thank you I just want to say on behalf of Crown Castle how thrilled Tim and I are to be here and represent Crown Castle and it's important for us we feel strongly about giving back to the communities in which we serve and we live and work in these communities daily so we're happy to do it and we really appreciate it. Thank you.

We're going to go ahead and continue with the meeting. Assistant City Attorney, do we have any reporting out from the closed session?

Good evening Mayor Potem and counsel. So there are no reportable actions from tonight's closed session.

Thank you, sir. Madam City Attorney, do we have, Madam City Clerk, do we have any speaker cards at this time?

No speaker cards for the closed session items.

Okay, thank you very much. We're going to continue with the meeting and we're going with the consent calendar. Is there any items that the Council members would like to pull? Let the Clerk know, please.

Yes. Well, I have a few items, so I don't know if you want to, do we want to go before with the individuals who are being recognized?

Okay, that sounds great. We're going to go ahead and move with the Measure X committee members, which is items 13A, B, C, D, and G. We can have them come forward.

Yeah.

Madam Clerk. Let's take action first, if you may. On those, a motion to approve the appointments.

Very good. I'll move it. I'll second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed, motion carries. You can have the candidates come forward.

Thank you.

all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all of all

California I take this obligation freely without any mental that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties

I feel bad because I know this by heart.

Thank you.

see madam clerk we're going to go ahead and take things out of order we're going to listen we're going to start with item 65 a since we have a lot of speakers I have 41 speaking cards here so can I have Renee Rowley come forward start the clock for three minutes

Followed by Wyn Trin. Trin. Wyn Trin.

Go ahead, ma'am. Welcome.

I've lived in Konakai Mobile Home Park for 20 years.

and they used to put the rent up by 3% most of the time. Last year they put it up by 4% and this year they put it up by 6%.

I would say 95% of the people are elderly, and it is a senior park. We're living on a fixed income, and if this carries on, we won't have anywhere to live, because we won't be able to afford the rent. And not only that, they're now putting in new pipes for the electric and the gas. We're woken up at 7 o'clock in the morning with drills drilling into the ground.

And the ground is uneven because they dig it up three times a day to put the pipes down. We've already had one lady that fell on the uneven ground and now for the next year she has to wear a sling in her shoulder, for her shoulder on her right hand. and there's going to be far more falls. The owners of the park will not make that ground even after, they won't pay for it to be made even after the pipes are put in

and this is a very sorry state of affairs. And we also would like to have rent control in Santa Ana. We really, really need it. And they have rent control in Beverly Hills, so I really don't see why we can't have rent control in Santa Ana, where we really need it. We have so many people that are on a fixed income. Thank you for listening. Thank you very much, ma'am.

So I just want to make sure I inform the public that today is a receive-and-file item, so it's just an update that we're receiving from the staff. So if you choose not to, even though you submitted a card, if you choose not to speak, that's okay. Just let us know. And we're gonna go ahead and continue with Mr. Wintran.

Followed by Kwok Pham.

Hi, my name is Wintran. I'm a board member of the Konakai Mobile Home Home Association, and I'm here speaking on behalf of our elderly resident who has been in the park for more for 10 years or more. They're now in the 70s, 80s and 90s with frail health and limited income. Many of them live alone, some without any family or all the relatives hang on to each other as long as they can. Since the recession

of 2008, their income, their pension, their social security check barely budged. Their savings has been depleted due to the zero interest environment that we went through the last 11 years. They tried to make do with less food and have to cream for their medicine.

All they simply wish for is to live the rest of their life in peace and dignity.

But their golden year dream is now becoming a nightmare. The excess and continuous space rent increase of the past 11 years crossed the line of abuse, if not predatory gouging. It caused tremendous stress that pushed our elderly residents one step closer to the abyss of homeless. Last year in August, LA County protected their residents with an ordinance limiting space rent increase

to 3%. I'm appealing to the elected officials of the City of Santa Ana to be pioneers in Orange County and to protect our most fragile and vulnerable elderly population from excess rent increase abuse. Please help us limit space rent increase, especially in elderly parks, to the lesser of 3% of consumer price Index. And please, again, make it retroactive to the beginning of 2019. Thank you very much.

Thank you sir. Mr. Kwok Pham followed by Robert Trung.

Good evening. My name is Kwok Pham. I am also on the board of executive from the Konakai Mobile Home Park.

We are here today to ask for your help to stop that notion, rent increase on top of the notion that they make in the park now unbelievable. We are mostly retiree with limited income and last year we have the raise of 3%. But out of the 3%, we have to pay more for health insurance, we have to pay more for gas, we have to pay more for food.

we barely have enough money to spend on other things. We have to give up on kind of entertainment, but now mostly we are on the verge of being homeless, because we can't afford that kind of housing rent anymore. So please help us to be living in the condition we like it now, we like to call Santa Ana our home. We don't want to be kicked out and be homeless. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Robert, Robert Krum.

No Robert. Okay, Hipp Nguyen.

Followed by Brian Lee.

Good evening. My name is Hib Nguyen, the resident of Konakai Mobile Home Park, that the park say for the senior citizens. I'm here today to inform you and to ask for your help because the rents keep increasing every year and very soon those who have limited incomes cannot afford it. And without your help I think that the senior citizen like us will be in big trouble. Thank you very much for your consideration.

Thank you. Brian Lee. No Brian Lee. Alan Soper.

I live in the Gables Mobile Home Park, and last year we had a 10% increase, and again, in February we were informed that we were going to have another 10% increase in our rent. I can see a cost of living increase, but I cannot see up to 10%, and limited to at least 3%. Up until that time the rent increases were reasonable and we've been living there

since 2000 and it's just getting out of hand. And if the rent increases were going to improve the parks or the park, then we are forced to pay an entirely asphalting of the entire park and they added $55 onto the rent on that because I guess the rent increases didn't

take care of it, of the park improvement.

And I just think, I wonder how many have read the report that the commission gave to you today. Anybody had a chance to read it?

I guess not. It's just, you want to file it away somewhere. I hope not.

This is your, not discussion, this is your comments, sir, so we're not gonna interrupt.

Yes. These are something that I think you guys ought to discuss tonight due to the turnout here. And besides our input, I think we ought to hear from what you guys are recommending tonight. Thank you.

Thank you. Alan, let's see, Mary Lang Lee.

Mary Lee. Kai Vu. You Mary?

Mary?

Mary. Mary, great.

And then it'll be Kai Vu, followed by Terry Bo.

Xin kính chào. Tôi là Lang Lê. Tôi cư ngụ ở Bali Hai. Tôi ở đó được sáu năm. 3 years before the rent only came up 3% But 3 years later it came up very much And since the 6th, it was 799$ And then the income of my only has more than 800$ So I'm not worried about how I live Because I don't have enough money to pay for my home I don't have enough money to pay for my home

So I came here to help all the young people who are young and young to have a place and never been thrown away from the house we are in. Thank you very much.

My name is Lam Lee. I stayed at Bali High for six years. First year the rent increased 3%, but the last three years it's increased a lot and since June it's will increase at $799 and my income is only over 800. I worry a lot about finance and how to survive. Please help us for the accommodation so we don't be kicked out of our place. Thank you very much.

Kai Bu. Followed by Terry Bo.

Good evening, Mayor, City Council. Hi, my name is Kai Vu. I'm 65 in two months and I live in Bali High for nine years. And today I'd like to have a chance to tell you my perspective. They are always on the argument. Everybody says, yeah, he says, he says that. But the fact, the fact that the history of rent in Crete was sent to your office a couple of days ago, I don't know if you received that. So you know that's the fact.

It's not like hearsay anymore. so like if you you have to vote so I just ask you to vote with your clear conscience to help us and that's all we can say to you tonight now thank you

thank you Terry Bo followed by Mary Jo

My name is Terry LeBeau. I live in another city. I live in Western District and right now we're looking into getting the city to get rent stabilization. Right now I live in Driftwood and six months ago they wanted to increase our rent by $300 a month. Can you imagine $300 a month? We've rebelled against that and went to the newspapers and everything like that and we were able

to renegotiate that at 5.5%. I personally been involved trying to get rent for the last three years. I've been to San Juan Compostrano. That's the only city in Orange County that has rent stabilization and they have had it for 20 years and not one of their owners have lost their park. and if you'd like to please make a call to them and see why they've been

stayed for 20 years of that I've been in San Juan in San Jose who's one of the seventh largest cities in California that has French stabilization for their mobile parks. So I would recommend the city of Santa Ana with 29 parks in this city to get some control on rent. Thank you for listening to me and if you have any questions please be free to question me. Thank you very much. Thank you, sir.

Mary Jo followed by Cynthia Guerra.

Hello, good evening Mayor and City Council Members. My name is Mary Jo Beretic. I'm the Zone C Vice President for the Golden State Manufacturers Homeowners League, that's GSMOL. And we are the largest advocacy in the state of California that helps to pass the bills into laws to protect the mobile home homeowners in the state. And we work very hard at doing that. We have a legislative advocate, lobbyist, who is excellent, works right with the senators and the assembly people and the governor.

So we work hard to do that, and we also then go into all the parks that we can. And my area is L.A. County, Orange County, and San Bernardino counties. and I go between seven to 14 parks a month trying to educate the people as to what their rights are, listening to their concerns, mediating with the management if it's at all possible. If it's not possible, then we help them with court situations. But it's one of the things that we've been trying to do throughout the whole state, of course, is getting rent stabilization.

And I applaud you for your forethought to research the parks in the city and the various rent stabilization ordinances in the state. Your, a very thorough job was well done. Your work group did an excellent job of writing up everything, doing the research, and it's fantastic. I do look forward to working with your group when they fine tune the ordinance. Our corporate attorney Bruce Stanton who has written numerous RSOs will be also available for consultation.

By taking on this task you've shown compassion and respect for those vulnerable citizens of Santa Ana. I'm currently working with three other cities on the same subject. And you are setting a fantastic example for everybody. And thank you very much.

Thank you. Cynthia Guerra, followed by Crystal. Can I make out the last name?

All right. Hi. Good evening, Councilmembers. So I'm Cynthia Guerra and I work with the Kennedy Commission and while we did provide a letter that presented further detail, I do want to speak to you personally to urge you to do something about the rent increases that the Bali High residents are facing that go into effect on June 1st. And I think that in the city staff report, they presented as a potential solution the emergency ordinance as well as a regular ordinance. And I'd really like you to consider those two options because like I said, these rent increases are going to effect on June 1st.

So these people are being affected by this right now in a couple of weeks. So the seniors of Bali High, it's a senior in each restricted park. that means that they are all mostly on a fixed income. Like they mentioned, Social Security, it doesn't go beyond $800, right? And management wants to increase the rents up to $799. So I don't know if you guys can make the math, but I don't think that's going to work out for them, right? So we'd really encourage you to look that over. Similar situations are being experienced in other mobile home parks where there's a lot of low-income families or other seniors

because mobile home parks were seen as the last affordable option for people and there no longer being that, right? So regarding the subsidy program that I think was mentioned in the report, as the report mentions, it only allows for 10% of the rents to be paid. Only 10% of the residents in the parks can receive it and it's temporary, it's not guaranteed every year. So that's not a viable or a sustainable solution in any way. The other thing to note is to situate this within within the homeless crisis that we have right now in Orange County. The point in time count came out recently, and from 2017 to 2019 in Orange County,

that increased with 2,000 people. So there's 2,000 more people now homeless. And if we don't do something about this now, there will be more people that are homeless. So it's in your hands. You can do something about this right now. So if you can do that, please. Thank you.

Thank you. Crystal Edmonds, and followed by Dow Tran.

Welcome.

Yeah, my name is Crystal Ianyu. I'm from Kornakai Mobile Home Park. I'm also a caretaker for my mom.

I have lived in Kornakai for over 30 years.

We need to get the rent space separatized because this increase isn't going to work for the people that are on fixed incomes like everybody else has been saying, Social Security. My mom's on Social Security Disability and it's not going to work. She's got to pay for her medications. She's diabetic.

And it's not going to work for the people that have medical problems. And we just need to get it to where they can actually stabilize this so they don't increase it as much as they are. When I first moved into the park when my grandmother was there, it wasn't this bad. Last year it went up 3%. This year it's up to six. When is it going to end?

Well, thank you very much for your time.

Thank you. Dao Tran, followed by Phuong Mung.

Hi, my name is Dao Tran, 69 years old. I am the resident of Bali Hai Mobile Park. In 1978, I escaped from Vietnam on a small fishing boat. After a difficult journey, my family and I arrived in Thailand where we spent almost a year in the refugee camp before coming to the United States. Three days after I arrived in the United States, I went to work for almost 40 years. I worked very hard almost every day to support my family and me.

After retirement, I decided to buy a mobile home in Bali High for one reason only, because it was affordable and would allow me to enjoy my old age. However, Bali High is no longer affordable, and I now fear for the future of me and my husband. Both of us are retired senior citizens, supporting ourselves through our social security. From 2008 to 2015, when Bali High was still being managed by fancy property management,

my rent increased by about $15 per year by under 3%. However, since 2016, since J&X asset property management took over for fancy property management, My rent has increased by 7%. Given my financial situation, I cannot afford the increasing prices. My husband and I are now very worried about our future and are scared we will become homeless. Please, Howard, this situation is unfair. It is wrong.

I do not want to lose my house. Please stop the practices of J&X asset property management. Thank you for listening.

Thank you. Huang Luong, followed by Min Tam Nguyen.

Excuse me. Good evening, Mayor and City and Council. My name is Huang Luang. I am 71 years old. First of all, I thank you for serving in Santa Ana, serving us. I very appreciate your job. And I come here today. I have one reason.

Right now I'm retired and depend on my security check, that's the under $925. And the rents right now go up to $850.

I live in the mobile home valley high over 15 years. And I look at the future, it's very difficult for me. and maybe I end up being homeless. That's the most scary. Please help us. Thank you.

Thank you. Min Thang Nguyen, followed by Ding Pham.

Good evening, Santa Ana City Council. My name is Min Tham Nguyen, and I work for the Orange County. By my own will, today I come to talk on behalf of my uncle and for myself and for the president of the Bali Hai Mobile Home Park Senior Park.

I live with my 91-year-old retired priest uncle at the Bali High Senior Park since 2010.

I'm planning to retire because my uncle, 91-year-old retired priest, he had a gout problem. He had a diabetes. But it seems like it won't be working with the thing about right now, with the people in the mobile home with the fixed income. And we are facing housing rental

now. I afraid I cannot retire. I afraid I cannot take care of my own uncle. The housing you know that it goes far beyond the consumer price index. You know for the December 2018,

the price, the consumer price index is 1.9. So we afraid many, many of us will be forced out of the senior park and even worse, maybe we will be the homeless next. Maybe we will be homeless. So we, the Santa Ana president, the one whom you represented, we are asking

you to use your legal power, the one the city attorney outlined by the city attorney. And it's already exercised by several other cities. We asking you, we beg you, please use your power to help us, to help your own people, to help the Santa Ana city.

Thank you very much. Your light is right. If you could conclude, please.

To help us, we, the people, don't want to cause any problem. We just simply want to to stay inside our own home and to live our own age. Thank you very much. Thank you. God bless you.

God bless you. Ding Pham.

Ding Pham followed by Chen Huin.

Ding Pham.

Chen Huin.

Thank you. and followed by Vee Nguyen.

Good evening, Mayor. Xin chào quý vị. Tôi là Chiang Quỳnh ở Bally High, Santa Ana. Tôi ở đó đã 10 năm rồi. Nhưng mà từ năm nay đó là cái rent nó lên tới không có thể tưởng tượng được. With the amount of money I have to pay for my retirement, I have to pay for 90% Compared to the amount of money I have to pay for my retirement Like I have to pay for my retirement, I have to pay for my retirement It's about 80%-90%

Because we are very worried and scared sợ hãi và bởi vậy cũng như là rất là stress và xin quý vị giúp đỡ cho chúng tôi để mà làm sao đó, để mà cái tiền rent đó đừng có lên cao quá để cho mà chúng tôi đó chúng tôi đã cũng như là đã lớn tuổi rồi đã qua tới 2 đời cũng như là 2 phần 3 of the family.

Please help us only one part of our family that we can still be able to live in peace. Thank you.

My name is Chuyen Heng. I stayed at the Bali High for 10 years. But this year, the rent is increasing dramatically. The rent is a text of 90% of my income and average income of retired people around 800 to 900 per month. That makes us worry very much and also very scared and stressed. Please help us for rent control. We already spend two-thirds of our lives,

and please help us for one-third of our life, peaceful Tuesday. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Li Nguyen.

Li Nguyen, followed by Quat Mai.

Welcome. Good evening. I see you already say hi and thank you everybody in this meeting. Now I talk about me. I am PNL. I will be President Michael Konakai Mobile Home Senior Park from 2001, 2002.

to. That time I had job, I paid money about 485. But now, different all. I had to pay

900. And so I think for my life for us. You know, I know money, I know money for food, I know money for insurance car, I know money for art or something.

Okay, thank you. Thank you.

followed by Bernice Howard.

Honor Mayor and all 60 council members. My name is Stuart Mai. I'm 72 years old. I have been living in Barnard High for 10 years. The first seven years, everything fine. Each year the rent increases $15, which is around 2.2% to 2.6%.

There is one year even no increase to 2010.

But the last three years, since the new property management come in, the J&H company, they come and start to cut our benefits and terrible gouging our rent money. The rents increase, always unjust, unfair to all people in Barney High. This is the second time I come here to beg you for help. This is a big problem for us, for your Santa Ana

resident. Just look at the people here and there are a lot more people they really want to come here and ask for help but they cannot come probably because are old and may be sick. I believe this is not a difficult thing for you to help. If you are willing to help us, we put our trust in you. Please do not look away from this

problem. Again, we beg you for help. If you do, we will remember you for many years to come. We appreciate it. God bless America. God bless all of us. Thank you.

Thank you, Bernice and Ray Howard, followed by Anna Dang, and then followed by James Osborne.

My name is Raymond Howard. I live in Valley High, and please, I want to talk for everyone in this whole entire place, for everyone that owns a mobile home, that we all need some help.

Please, in God's word, help us all.

I don't think I'm going to say anything else. That's what we need is help, desperately. Let's just stop this, let's do some type of rent stabilization so we can stay in our homes. If not, we will be homeless. Thank you.

Thank you. Anna Deng, followed by James Osborne.

Anna Deng. James Osborne is next, followed by Lin Bien.

Hello, I'm 84 years old, and I know that if the rent keeps going up, I'll be homeless just like everybody else is, and that's the complaint I have is the fact is that the pay raises we get as a senior, we don't get enough to pay the rent when they would keep raising it every year to $75, $80 every year. So that's the reason I'm here tonight, is just to ask you to think about us whenever you go to your meetings.

Thank you, sir. Lynn? Lynn? Lynn? Okay.

I am the first one. If I have income, I don't know how to live like that now. I would like to help all of us. I would like to thank you for the time. Thank you.

Anna Deng. Anna? Just want to make sure I got the right...

My name is Anna Deng. I stay at Bali High at the number 42 with my father. I have an unstable job. And I also need two incomes to pay for the rent. That's why I'm so worried that if one income, how can we afford to pay the rent? Please help for the poor people like us. Thank you.

Thank you. Lynn Bien followed by Jarrell Arten.

Good evening, City Council members. My name is Lynn Bien. I've lived at Valley High for 23 years. I'm here tonight and have no intention of offending anyone. I'm up here talking in my own free will. no one has coached me. My fellow residents and I are experienced elder injustice. My rent has been raised to $140 next month. So are a lot of patriotic Americans across this nation. I pay $660

a month, they want to raise my rent and other people's rent to $800 a month.

That's senior rent gouging. My best friend and neighbor had cancer last year. And since last year, her husband has terminal cancer.

What do you think they can do? Pick up their lives and move? With what money?

It's up to you.

You are the members that have our future in your hands. You have the choice between creating a black plague of elderly homelessness and making all of us Bally High residents across our great country suffer the darkest days of our life or you could stabilize our rent at existing rates. I pray tonight this snapshot in time will be an eye-opener for you and our City Council

members. Elder abuse matters. Does it start in Santa Ana? What do I buy? My medication or do I pay my rent? Thank you for listening to me.

Thank you. Viorel Artin followed by Valentina Monfredi.

Good evening. My name is Viorel Artin. I'm living in Bali High Space 104 for 12 years this year. First year was rent only 3, 2.5, 3% raise every year. For three years, they start to raise 4% for two years. Now, for me, I'm speaking in my behalf, for me, now

raise 7%. What means this 3% for me? Is the bread for two weeks. This 3% for me and my family. Look at us. We are at the end of our lives. Why somebody try to take advantage of us? Why?

Why the people who can help us can refuse this help? I think you cannot refuse to help us. We don't ask for rent control and I don't ask for rent control, stabilization because

We know this year, from June will be 7%, but next year 10-15% will be here.

Our Social Security sometimes is 1-2%. Last time they raised up 2% Social Security for me and took all those raised for Medicare. They raised the Medicare. In fact, I remain with the same like two years ago.

This is the problem for us. We are in fixed income.

We cannot afford to spend more money for nothing, in fact. Please, help us.

Thank you, sir. Valentina Monfredi followed by Pedro Correa.

Valentina?

Pedro Correa?

Followed by Manuel Barrera.

Good evening, Council Members. My name is Pedro Correa and I am 60 years old. I have been living in Valley High Mobile Home Park for almost five years. I am saying this on my own and nobody is coaching me or telling me what to say. I beg the council members for help. The A&H management or the owner are increasing the rent. For some of my brothers and sisters here, in the park is going to be really hard or impossible to pay.

Some might be forced to leave the park. Please help the older people to stay in their houses and stop the high increase on rent.

My wife and I moved to this park because we could afford the rent. In the future, I don't know.

I was laid off last February and I am looking for another job.

I don't plan to retire any soon and I beg the Council Members to please help and stop the abuse and harassment on their grandparents.

Ovalihai, thank you for your help.

Thank you sir. Manuel Barrera, followed by Roseanne Clark.

Manuel Barrera, followed by Roseanne Clark, followed by Julie Pauly.

because with these changes that they have made, I don't know in my life what can happen. Thank you. Good evening.

Thank you.

My name is Manuel Barrera. I'm 74 years old. I've been living for nine years at Valley High, and I have been seeing what's going to happen in the future with all the things that has been happening. Thank you.

Roseanne Clark, followed by Julie Paul, followed by Clay Hage.

Hello, I'm Roseanne Clark. I'm 77 years old and I have lived in Bali High for 13 and a half years. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk to you once again. I want to add a couple of additional things that I didn't say last time and I'm speaking on my own behalf no one has prompted me to do this but I have a lot invested in my home. I also have a mortgage. If any of you have mortgages or have had you know that in the beginning a lot goes to interest and that's how it has been for me. So I've paid a lot into my mortgage and I still

owe a lot on my mortgage. I love my home. I don't want to have to leave because the rent is so high that I can't pay both that and my mortgage. Please help us. We need rent stabilization. Please stop the rent gouging. We need your help. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Julie, followed by Clay Hage.

Good evening. My name is Julie Pauly. I'm the regional representative for Western Manufactured Housing Communities Association and we represent mobile home park owners throughout the state of California. And it's probably not a surprise to learn that we're always against rent control. It's a horrible housing policy that destroys harmony, erodes affordable housing, and it should be soundly rejected and alternatives identified. I have to commend your staff report on a very thorough report. This study has overwhelmingly showed that Santa Ana has beautiful, affordable mobile

home parks that are well maintained and well managed and rents are stable. Residents are happy with their housing selection and this never would have been the case under a rent control scheme. There are a lot of, there's been a lot of activities surrounding mobile home rent control in Orange County in the last few months since a noticed increase at a park that was located in both Fullerton and Anaheim Rancho La Paz. The new owner of this park noticed a $400 increase, and after a great backlash, he rescinded the increase to work out with his residents HOA to find an accessible rent increase schedule

that will meet his business needs and the residents' needs. The overwhelming message from both the Fullerton and the Anaheim City Councils were that they understood the business then the businesses need to correct well below market rents but just not all at once. Here in Santa Ana the park owner has opted to correct below market rents slowly gradually with an average of a six percent increase with tenant protection such as a rental assistance program and it's suggested by some that this isn't appropriate either and I would suggest it just can't be both ways. Rent control is not the answer and you

do have an alternative. I would suggest the answer for Santa Ana is long-term leases. Both parks of concern have indicated that they would be willing to offer long-term leases to their residents and started that process. Long-term leases provide a low predictable increase for residents while at the same time allows the park owner to keep up with the pace of inflation, market rents, on turnover, and maintain their community. And you might find the best part of this is that it will cost the city of Santa Ana zero. Finally, I'd like to suggest what's

happening here is an exploited opportunity by Gizmo. And while it was mentioned at the April meeting that the motives of the residents were sincere, I feel they've been coached and manipulated by using fear by Gizmo. Ever since the Rancho La Paz, their tactics have become downright cruel and it's reported that one of their organizing activists was telling residents that they were going to be sleeping in their cars and women's raped. This is terrible and it has to come to an end. At Bally High, the park owner has given every resident and the city

every assurance that no one will lose their home for inability to pay and he has done so in writing and it is a lost...

Now if you...

Quiet down, quiet down. If you could conclude, you have a red light, please. If you could conclude...

It isn't lost on anyone that if he doesn't uphold his promise, you, the council, you have the ability to pass a citywide ordinance in two meetings.

Mr. Clay-Hage.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Everybody's got a... They need some order in the house.

Go ahead, sir. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and members of the council. My name is Clay Haig. I represent the ownership of Liberty Mobile Home Park on Harbor Boulevard and Bitahome Mobile Home Park on McFadden. We've been in the business for over 30 years. I've been in the mobile home business myself for over 30 years, beginning in 1986. and since then I've participated in many of these rent control debates at City Council meetings and County Board of Supervisor meetings. And the script is pretty much the same on both sides, whether you're a park owner or a resident representative.

But I can tell you from personal experience, where we've had mobile home parks that are under rent control and those that don't, the rent control scheme just does not work. in Yucaipa, where there are 39 mobile home parks, the tenants pay for it. The tenants pay for the administration of that ordinance, but they don't pay for the legal costs whenever the ordinance is not applied properly. And when it's not applied properly, that's when we see these things go into court. and many times the cheers that you hear at the City Council meeting when a rent control

ordinance is adopted turn to tears and jeers when a court says there's a rent increase that's due this park owner for $100 and it so the the whole balance is tipped one way or the other because of a rent ordinance I would caution the city from moving in that direction there must be other alternatives. If there is assistance to be rendered to residents, there must be a way to find that, outside of having a mobile home park owner bear that responsibility.

One has to remember that in a rent control ordinance, it has certain rules that a city must apply in order for it to be constitutional. And it's those rules that bring the tears to residents later on. It's not a winning combination. Thank you for allowing me to share my concerns and my experiences with you.

Thank you. May I remind the public that we please need to be respectful of all the speakers. Chad Kastenheiser followed by John Yendel.

Good evening, Council. Thank you for your time tonight. My name is Chad Kastenheiser. I am a property manager with Becerin Kastenheiser and we represent Warren Park Mobile Home Estates in the City of Santa Ana. I have been doing this for about 14 years. We manage properties throughout the state in many of the jurisdictions that do have rent control and as mr hagg and miss polly have mentioned we have not seen them to be a viable option we understand the people's desire to have low rents however what happens with low rents is often that the maintenance of the parks is then sacrificed low rents no turnover rents increases

it's just not a winning combination to have quality properties as uh as noted your staff report was wonderful it was very thorough and it pointed out pointed out the quality of the communities that you have in Santa Ana and I think that's something that people are proud of and I think that if we were to go this way with the rent control ordinance it's going to be sacrificed and that the quality of the communities will be jeopardized I urge you to look at the other options that have been presented I urge the residents to communicate with ownership and the organizations out there that provide those alternatives

They are good alternatives and the park owners are willing to work with people and to communicate for the benefit of all involved. Thank you.

Thank you sir. John Yendel followed by Greg Wilson followed by Jim Jaffe.

Good evening. My name is John Yendel. I represent the Lake Park communities which there are two in Santa Ana. We have approximately 407 residents. We've been in business for 45 years. I'm saddened to hear some of the things I've heard tonight, but rent control is not the answer. I've worked with parks and rent control and non-rent control, and it always comes down to sacrificing the residents in the rent control communities. The solution are long-term leases. They protect the residents. There's no doubt about it. Our residents, all 405 of them, excuse me, have long-term leases, and we have very, very

little problems with any kind of rent increases. They all know what it is. They have the lease and they understand them. So I would commit to saying that long-term rents, leases are the option to go with. Thank you.

Thank you. Mr. Greg Wilson followed by Jim Jaffe followed by Sal Ortiz.

Greg Wilson, Inc. Good evening, counsel. My name is Greg Wilson. I represent the property manager for Continental Mobile Home Park in St. Anna, among other properties located within the state of California. At Continental there are 257 spaces, 98% of which are occupied, and 95% of those occupants are on long-term leases. We believe that we offer a high quality of living at an affordable price. We are opposed to rent control and a moratorium on rent increases.

We also offer a rental assistance program and work with our residents to the best of our ability to offer solutions to the issues that they have. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Next up, Jim Jaffe, Sal Ortiz, and then Lisa Sybil.

Yeah, I'm Jim Jaffe. I'm the J&H asset property management. And you know, we've got a lot of facts here. The reality is all but 14 residents are only paying $7.99 a month. Some people are getting bigger increases because we're trying to even it out to make it so that most people are paying close to about the same rent to make it fair and equitable. And I could give you more, but you know what occurs to me is, you know, we're talking about real people here, and I understand that.

And it's obvious from a group of people that came up here that a lot of people are truly fearful. Some people are, you know, being dramatic and mean, but most people weren't mean-spirited that came up here, and I think because they're people. and you know we talked about heard about people with cancer and I wish actually I don't wish it was a year ago a year ago I didn't have any hair I was 35 pounds thinner and you know I almost died from cancer myself I'm 69 years old and nobody should feel sorry for me because I'm real fortunate I own J&H asset property management and I'm doing really well and my family doesn't have

to worry about I'm not worried about paying my mortgage or rent or anything else so I understand I understand that there are people that are worried but But you know, the one thing that strikes me tonight is talk about rent control and the dialogue that's going back and forth is once you have people stop talking to each other, it really doesn't work. And I think encouraging us and the residents to get together and talk about long-term leases can work. If that doesn't work, then let's be back here maybe next year and talk about maybe you guys need to take this out of our hands because we're not capable.

But I think you're getting a display tonight of what happens to a community when you have or are in control. We don't talk to each other. We're not people anymore. I'm a seventh generation Californian on Dominguez's side. And I can just tell you that that's not the California way. It's obviously not the Santa Ana way. Let's sit down and talk about long-term leases. let's dispel their true fears because they are people and no matter how they treat me I'm going to remember that you know any meanness that they displayed tonight is really out of fear so let's sit down and talk to them because I'm a

person too and they can talk to me and honestly it hurts my heart I've got a this company J&H for 35 years and I don't like it disparaged

Thank you, sir. Mr. Sal Ortiz, please be respectful. No one interrupted you.

No, please. Go ahead, sir.

All right. Good evening. My name is Sal Ortiz. I'm a regional supervisor for a property management company that manages two mobile home parks with a total of 151 spaces in Santa Ana. Helping serve the mobile home owners and mobile home park owners, I strongly oppose rent control. I feel rent control forces park owners to subsidize attendance housing costs regardless of income, which often leads to a reduction in park amenities and, in some cases, lawsuits when rents do not cover a park operational's costs. Unlike a traditional rental property, mobile home parks operate like small cities.

Rents often cover property taxes and fund essential neighborhood services, services such as park management, utilities, roads, landscaping, security, recreation and more. When rent control ordinances reduce rents at below market rates, services are reduced like the city facing budget deficits. Rent control regulations have been approved to cost local governments millions of dollars to administer and illegally defend, all at the expense of other government services and programs. It can also be passed through to the residents who the regulations are supposed to be benefiting.

Millionaires are eligible for rent-controlled housing in California. Rent-controlled mobile homes are not means tested. This is why some mobile homes are selling for over $4 million in the rent-controlled city of Malibu. As a consequence, park owners are required to subsidize the housing cost of tenants regardless of their need. This really underscores how misdirected some public policy can be when trying to find real solutions to the housing crisis. When manufactured homes offer all the quality and comfort of a stick-built house and prices 30% less, a compelling case can be made that they are

part of the solution and not the problem. There are many property owners that offer and support long-term lease agreements and direct rental assistance programs, which provide bona fide rental protection and help to those mobile home park residents in need. California has created a regulatory environment where existing parks are threatened by rent control ordinances that undermine a park's economic sustainability and cost-prohibitive building regulations and fees that have stifled the construction of new parks and or programs that help residents. As a consequence, it's been decades since the new mobile home park

has been built. Despite the very good intentions behind rent control laws, it is time for the government regulators to abandon the current course of driving up the cost of housing, Streamlining the permitting, zoning, and environmental processes for new residential construction may prove to be the best strategy for addressing unaffordable housing. Strong demand and low supply drives up prices.

Intervening in the market to manipulate prices rarely yields the most effective results, and in the case of rent control, the data certainly supports this view.

Thank you, sir. Your time is up here.

Expand the apartment and mobile home stock, not introduce price ceilings. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Lisa Sybil, followed by Vicki Talley, followed by Rosa Pizarro.

Good evening. I'm Lisa Sybil. I'm Director of Property Management for JR Enterprises. JR Enterprises owns and operates the Sands Mobile Estates. In fact, they built the park 50 years ago. We have great relationship with our residents and what other speakers have mentioned about long-term leases, I believe that that is a really great idea. Eighty-five percent of our residents are on long-term leases. They understand them. They're fully, they're, you know, well aware of what the rent increases are going to be. They can plan, we can plan for maintenance projects and such.

We also have our own form of rental assistance through the Manufactured Housing Educational Trust membership. So we voluntarily provide assistance to our residents who apply and who qualify. So it's good. Thank you.

Thank you. Vicki Talley followed by Rosa Pizarro, followed by Cesar Medina.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem, Villegas, and members of the Council. Thank you for your patience this evening, for allowing us to be heard, and I know you're listening very carefully to everyone, as are we. And I again want to remind you, Vicki Talley, the Executive Director of the Manufactured Housing Educational Trust. Representing the mobile home community owners, we take that responsibility very seriously. As you have heard, we provide a rental assistance program, and I want to just clarify a couple things that were said this evening.

Although our material says we will subsidize up to 10% in a community, we've never hit 10% but if it came to the point where we did we would absolutely consider and go beyond servicing and providing a subsidy to above 10%. The same goes for the amount of the subsidy. We really do provide a subsidy based on need so I want to thank you for remembering those considerations. You've heard quite a bit tonight people saying they're going to be homeless and I want to remind you that

the people living in the mobile home communities in the city of Santa Ana all own their homes. They have an invested interest in their home and we want to keep them as residents of those parks and we're going to do that.

I also just to clarify one additional thing. I think that there's been some misleading information in terms of whether or not the rent can be withdrawn or whatever. But those rent increased notices in Valley High were legally noticed and will go into effect June 1st. Thank you very much again for your time and patience. Really appreciate it. And we look forward to working with all of the residents of all of the parks and the communities in the City of Santa Ana. Thank you.

Thank you. Rosa Pizarro followed by Cesar Medina, followed by Cuivon.

Thank you.

A pressure of managers, a verbal abuse, a high cost of rent. We have two years that we are paying 35%, but for 19 years, we have already paid 50 dollars each month, for 12 months. So, we asked that this already freeze, it is already a lot of abuse for our pocket.

I just did a trip to New York, to Albany, to the capital of New York, and we presented more than 2,000 people with the same problem. and they were afraid of me representing California. They said, I said, I said to the assemblyman, we have a lot of problems. We are hurting our rent. Our money can't be more. So, I would like to help us. Thank you. Thank you.

Muchas gracias. Cesar Medina, Cui Vaughn.

Dear members of the council, I know you very well in Santa Ana. I have 155 family members, friends, I'm sorry, friends that are happening through the same thing. There's a lot of oppression, a lot of abuse. For 19 years I've been living there and they have been increasing $50 per year every single year. And I am asking that this could be freezed, this increment. And

it's an abuse for our money, our pockets. I made a trip to New York and there was 2,000 people that went to New York with the same problem, some were afraid that I was representing Santa Ana, and I've been asking that we cannot afford no more, and we're asking for your help. Thank you. Thank you.

defendernos del abuso de los ricos propietarios de los parques.

Hemos estudiado el caso y no hemos encontrado una razón técnica, económica y social para que en unos casos se incremente el 10% y el otro el 35% en una sociedad de mercado.

That is inconceivable. And they are taking people to desperate. What do they want? They want suicide. When they lose their house and they don't have where to go.

They are beating people with fixed salaries, unique. And the class worker, who lives with a single salary.

They are listening to people with desperate salaries.

There are people angustiados who don't know how to react. And here they come.

So, ladies, we ask that we put our hands on our hearts. We ask that our problem has increased in this decade as we never before. We know that this fight is long, we know that this fight is hard, but we will finally win.

Good night members of the Council. My name is Cesar Reina. I am representing Country Club and we are here like the fingers but also together as a fist. And we've been studying this case and there's no reason or technical, social for the increases, 10% increase. It's inconceivable. And what do you want, like people that are getting these increases, they will be committing a suicide. We have money that is fixed and it's only one income.

And we ask that you listen to us. There's people here that are desperate and they come in here for you. Please put your hands on your heart. We know that the fight is going to be long, but at the end we will succeed. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Kui Vong. Kui Vong followed by Kayla Levitt.

Good evening, council members. My name is Kui Vong. I live at Valley High. I'm probably the junior most youngest person in that senior park. What I want to address to you today is about the emergency rescue of Bally High with other senior mobile homes, parks in Santa Ana from predatory rent gouging.

If you refer to your package, I've put two charts together that describe a very unique and telling perspective. if Valley High is a prime example of successful rent optimization,

over 35 years of no more than 3% raise per year. And ever since J&H Corporation took over the management of the park, everything goes downhill and all the rent goes upward. And what we are asking is why is it that J&H out of Yorba Linda, California can justify this kind of rent increase when the owner belongs to a three generation with a sterling record of supporting and harboring vulnerable seniors, low income, who wants to live out the rest of their lives.

The only thing that we can think that that causes is that they are trying to convert our park from a senior park into a family park so that the economics will allow them to continue to go higher. Do you have a copy of that chart in front of you? Did you see that across all the years, you have over 20 years of just flatness at 3%? And then you have 5, 6, 7, 8% and sometimes we have up to 35%. People cannot afford to live earning $900 and having to pay $800 out of parking space rent.

What do they do with their food? What do they do with their medicine? What do they do with their insurance? What do they do with their mortgage? So you have to step in and stop obsessing about this rent control. Rent control, this is not about rent control. And all these people over here are giving you propaganda about rent control. This is about rent patrol. Rent patrol of excessive predatory gouging. This is rent patrol of rent gouging.

Okay, so what you need to do today is consider how you as elected officials can put a stop to rent gauging and help a lot of these poor people from eventually going homeless. You can't say, oh, nobody's gonna go homeless. Oh, nobody's gonna lose their home. These people know exactly how much they can afford to pay and they know they can't make the next

month rent. Thank you sir. Your time is up. Last speaker of this evening, Kayla Levitt.

Hello council members. Thank you for your time tonight. So I would like to speak on behalf of specifically the residents of Bali High because of the rent increase that said to go into effect on June 1st. So with long term leases, the problem with that is that it locks residents into permanent rent increases, which residents have already stated that they would have the inability to afford. So I would really like to direct the council towards the alternatives mentioned in the report,

which would be considering an emergency moratorium on rent increases, as well as the

locking them into something that just adjusts for inflation. It's really great to see all the residents organize on behalf of their safety and I just think it's great that everyone came out tonight and told their story because clearly that took a lot of initiative on their part and I think that we should listen to them. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Madam City Clerk. I'm going to close the public comment for 65 a and move on over to our city manager for a report

Thank You mayor pro tem So this item was can you hear me working?

Just speak a little louder. Please appreciate it

Thank you so during the April 16 19 council meeting staff was directed to assess the existing conditions and explore options in response to public comments from mobile home residents concerning increase in rent space. The staff has done a tremendous job and I know it was probably a lot of reading for you but they put together a very comprehensive report and it was a multi-department effort. It was led by city manager's office, city attorney's office, planning department, public works department and even our IT department was involved in it. So it presents to you a very good look at the state of the mobile home parks within

our city and they actually did drive-bys through them they did surveys they looked at what other cities did they present you a wide range of options and it's a receive and file so there is not any action required of you tonight however should you choose to you can provide staff additional direction if there is anything that you want us to follow up on and bring back to you

thank you madam city manager is there any comments from the council members Councilmember Sarmiento.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. And I want to thank you for accelerating this and putting this at the front of the agenda. We have folks who are here who are elderly, want to get home, and I know last time you were before us, it was a very long agenda item, and it was at the very tail end of the meeting. So thank you for doing that and showing consideration for everybody's time. We try to do that as much as possible. Thank you.

And I do want to thank our staff as well, because I know it's a robust report. It's a lot of information that needed to be gathered, but it's important. You know, I think that, and I want to thank the mobile home park owners for being here as well, because it's important to have both sides of the issue, right? And it's very difficult to make a decision when you're only listening to one side. And that was a purpose of having staff sit down with both representatives of this issue, just so we could get a better assessment of what is happening.

So I think we know a little bit better today rather than the first time this matter came before us. And so I know from the discussion from the last time, obviously, you know, my hope was to have a temporary moratorium just so we could discuss how we can address whether it's an issue specific to one park, whether it's industry-wide, whether it's all the parks in Santa Ana, and that obviously wasn't supported by the majority of the council, and I respect my colleagues, and I respect the majority will, but at the same time, I think nobody advocated for rent control at that point,

and I don't think there was ever any request for that from the staff or from my colleagues. I think that for me, the best argument against or the best way to sort of not go down the path of rent control is to be reasonable. And I think that's what I've heard tonight from residents that are coming to us genuinely. I don't think these folks are coached. I mean, I heard three different languages spoken up here, so it would be very difficult to coach the same group of folks in multiple languages. I think we're listening to sincere folks that were fearful. they had cause to be concerned, but maybe you as mobile home park owners

and as representatives of the industry can kind of put yourselves in their shoes and they can put themselves in your shoes where the private sector, you know, we aren't here to dictate what market forces do or where you should go, but at the same time, we want to instill a sense of fairness, and I think you as an industry want to do that as well. You want folks who reside in your parks to be happy, to have good things to say about the condition of your parks, the condition of your environment. And I think this makes sense that we all sit down and try to figure this out.

I know other cities have tried to take draconian steps, and I have seen that those have backfired. So I wanted us to be thoughtful because it really pains me to see people that are elderly, that are scared of what I see as some increases that are on the unreasonable side. So to the extent that we could maybe smooth out this curve, and I saw this, and what alarmed me is that in my 12 years on the council, I've never had this issue before. You've all been very, very responsible, good mobile home park owners. These folks, they've never come before us. I haven't seen them here in the 12 years that I've been here. What does that say?

that says that you guys have been managing your parks responsibly. That says good things about you, right?

So, you know, my goal tonight, I think, was met, or in the process of being met by staff trying to serve as an arbiter, trying to serve to mediate this position, because I think that what we don't want is for this to become a problem at one park, Then it kind of goes off to another park and then we just start seeing all the parks in the city going the same way because there are pressures on I understand you make improvements at your parks you ownership changes Property management teams change and these increases start ballooning and we're gonna have this scene every meeting

Right, we're gonna be here together every Tuesday every other Tuesday of the month and that's not what we want That's not a good way for us to conduct city business. That's a good not a good way for you to spend your your time So I hope that we could come to some understanding

where maybe those increases that you all are entitled to have as owners, maybe there's a way to gradually increment them. Working with staff, working with representatives of the Mobile Home Park Residence Association or residents and figuring out a way how those things can be arrived at. I heard tonight from some folks who talked about gradual increases, smoothing out that spike in increases. I heard a rental assistance fund for folks who are eligible. I heard maybe going down the path of long-term leases, if that's possible and reasonable and feasible for folks. There's a number of things that can be done.

But my hope was that we could do those before the increase was introduced. And I know it's right around the corner on the 1st. That's not where this council wanted to go. I understand. I have to respect my colleagues' will. I mean, this isn't a dictatorship. I can't do this thing alone. But I do compel my colleagues to see how we can continue working with you all to try to figure this out, because the last thing we want is to be unfair to folks who've lived here all their lives, who want to continue living in retirement and just not having this burden on their minds and in their hearts.

So to the extent, Madam City Manager, you're able to continue to work. And I heard genuine commitment by the industry and by the mobile home park owners to sit down and maybe find ways to solve this problem. And that's my only ask of this. And I think that's one of the options made available because as we see, somebody mentioned there was only a four to four and a half percent increase on 14 units, specifically in Valley High, but that was only for, you know, that was at the high end of the spectrum. It went from 912 to 964,

and then we had some increases for 105 units from seven to 12%, and then for a number, 34 additional units had 15 to 34% increases. I know we can do better. I know we can still get you where you need to be as park owners, but let's see how we can try to figure it out. Let's see how we can try to maybe gradually make those numbers not hurt and make such a profound impact on folks' lives. That would be my only reasonable request, not talking about rent control, but being genuine in the way we try to figure this problem out.

because it's a problem that we have here, but it's a problem that you have as well. All mobile home park or any property owners that use their properties for lease or for rent have this issue, so we have to talk to one another, as somebody said, so that would be my only request and direction to the city staff, thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Sarmiento. Councilmember Pinalosa.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. I just want to thank the residents for coming out and speaking tonight and the industry and and Councilmember Sarmiento for putting this, bringing this item before us because it's important conversation to have and just to maintain that that relationship and dialogue amongst the residents and the mobile parks that they live in and it's important that again we we work together in this effort to be responsible about any rent increases that might take place in the future or and just want to thank you guys for coming

Councilmember Iglesias I just I just want to thank all of you guys for taking your time in coming expressing your concerns and also I just want to thank to the mobile home park representatives too for sharing their perspective on the issue and how we're going to address it. One of the things that I know that they mentioned was the rental assistance. What I want to know is how many of the residents are receiving that rental assistance and who is eligible. Is there a criteria that goes along with helping

them out because you know when rent increases come it does hurt somebody's budget. So I'm wondering if the, I guess the foundation has criteria of how to assess who's eligible for that rental assistance supplement. Then also one thing I would like to see is what does a long term lease look like? That would be something that personally I would like to see just so I could get myself, I guess, educated and also up to date with how that works because if it's working for one of the mobile home parks, I'm sure it could, you know, that could be a model of how it's going to work for the others.

So if you could provide me with something like that so I can, like, get it, definitely give me an opportunity to understand how the process works. And, yes, we should continue to have these conversations between the owners and also the property owners and also the homeowners because it's time for us to have those discussions because it does affect the quality of life of our residents. And I know if we have those conversations, I know there's some things that could be mitigated without them coming to us here at the council is something that between them they can resolve.

So if you could help me understand more of what the long-term lease looks like,

that would really help me. Certainly, Councilmember Iglesias. Included in the report, it does mention how many individuals within the mobile home parks are receiving assistance and what kind of assistance, but we can compile that for you and also give you some sample lease agreements in the future.

I'm wondering if there's like a cap, is there a limit, how many can receive this? So that's the kind of information I would like to know.

If you would like, Judson Brown, our housing manager, could probably answer a few of those questions right now or if you would like us to supply those in the future to you

it's your decision I think it'll be yeah if you could I think give us a more in depth presentation like in the future would be good okay yes thank you all the

folks that came out to speak today I want to thank councilmember Sarmiento for bringing this item up very important to have conversation about it tonight's item is a receive and file and update report so that's what we're going to vote on and I also want to thank the rest of the council members who are up here for their comments and I agree with them and I also would like to see a copy of councilmember Iglesias that is asking for for the entire council that I have and if I can receive a if I can have a motion to approve so we can move

on with the meeting so you're Stephen file a second second by being a Losa all

those in favor say aye aye those opposed motion carries I'm gonna move on with the consent calendar

moving on to the consent calendar

any items that the council members would like to pull you must leave let the clerk know at this time

it's 19 c 22 a 23 a 23 b 25 a and 25 c

David PenalozaItem —

I have the same ones aside from 19c.

Mr. Mayor Pro Tem if we could add 19e as an Edward to that list.

Very good Councilmember Solorio is there any items from him, no items from me. If I could get a motion to move the balance.

Is there a motion to move the balance? Second. I'll second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed, motion carries. So the first item, Madam Clerk.

That would be 19 C.

19 C.

Approved destruction of obsolete community

I can barely hear you, Madam Clerk. You can speak up.

19 C approved destruction of obsolete community development city records, pulled by Council Member Iglesias.

Very good. Council Member Iglesias.

So my question for this is just for me just to understand the process of what it means to approve destruction of obsolete community development city records. And this is coming from the Community Development Agency. So I want, and I know it may be in the staff report but I want to know what's the timeline of keeping the the retention for retention of the records and then there's this last sentence that really concerns me because it says each department makes discretionary decisions

on whether to retain records records past the minimum requirements so what

does that mean councilmember Iglesias the length of time that the city has to

retain records. The length of time that the city is required to retain records is governed under the Public Records Act and in accordance with that the City of Santa Ana has adopted a resolution which sets forth a record retention schedule and it is a different requirement for the records based upon the nature of the records so under the watchful eye of the City Clerk's Office they ensure that every department depending on what type of a record there is is held until the length of time required by our record retention program it then is up to the individual departments to purge the records that have exceeded the required

time for them to keep in addition to that part of our resolution and process does require the city attorney's office to look through all of the records that they are placing up for destruction for your approval to ensure that there aren't any records that could have any pending litigation associated with them. But it is a routine practice of all governmental agencies to have adopted record retention schedules and to destroy the records after they have been retained for the required length of time. As you can imagine a city that's a hundred and fifty year olds if they kept, if we kept every single record we would

run out of storage space. But do we have a system that has like a backup to the files just in case if somebody comes back so what is you know do we keep them like in well before was like microfiche right so in a way that we can have them electronically is that something that is a process or practice here or no and are

you asking if we could store them forever in a different format huh I'll defer to the city clerk on the method in which we do retain them for the required

period of time currently we don't have a destruction date for electronic file folders that has not been captured in the 2013 resolution that 2013-014 resolution we do not have electronic termination date but that is something that we can consider in the future we do use laser fish to capture records and we do have a period of time for various records that are based on the public

apologies the different codes that are referencing would be there the government code we've identified files and basically what we've done is as it's going through a citywide process having all the agencies identify their records based on the government code that also via the city attorney's office we review all our records and we will be going through this process again to identify new records that perhaps are not current resolution but the the records that have been identified in the Community Development Agency RFCA that you have

are identified in the resolution that has passed by council and do meet these a certain period of time that they should retain and thereafter the retention time can be taken.

So is that something then that we can consider for future of adding that language of extending it instead of like five years, extending it more? Because I just feel like five years is not...

I don't get amount of time to keep records and then just make them obsolete.

I believe the length of time that the records are retained, it varies by the nature of the records, so not all records are just held for five years. There are records that are held indefinitely, there are records that are held for longer than five years, which is all set forth in our record retention policy. Thank you.

Council Member Piñalosa?

David PenalozaItem —

No, I just wanted to just kind of follow up with Council Member Iglesias' question. I think the question that's being asked is a clear definition of what exactly obsolete are we talking about, just because it's kind of very vague. I understand just working at the private sector, I know we have like a seven year retention rate, and then once they're obsolete, we destroy everything, but critical records and information is kept, like you said, indefinitely.

David PenalozaItem —

So I think if that was maybe presented in a more clear, just for us that are newer, a clearer defined of what exactly that means, what we keep, what we destroy, just for future items.

Certainly, Council Member, we can do that.

Thank you. Council Member Salorio. Thank you. Just some thoughts.

I know from having looked at this issue in different roles, the cost for storage, whether it be paper boxes, like a company like Iron Mountain or Digital File Storage Place, for larger and older organization, literally sometimes the cost to maintain some of these records are in the tens or hundreds of thousands per year. So you kind of do got to find that balance of how long to keep it and what time. like some of these records are retained in multiple areas. So some of these items, and they talk about things like CDBG, what not, some of those items are retained either in the contracts

or in city council agendas, there's other records.

And then finally just on visual policy, I think things like privacy and retention and elimination. It is something that's more top of mind for the general public. It seems to me from this document about 2006 is when that was last reviewed. Maybe we might want to reconsider that ordinance to see if we need to lengthen the time period for certain type of documents and then we can see kind of what different criteria points or something in that item. And that way we have a policy that guides all of this rather than having situations where we're taking circumstances,

but we don't even know what the guiding principles are, and that way we fix this once, and then feel comfortable moving forward with it because, again, we haven't seen this. So for tonight, I'm not okay with this, because it's pretty limited, I mean, really about just a couple of boxes here and there, but, you know, longer term, I know there's continued interest and concern, especially on the police department record. So we wanna be sensitive and I do appreciate Councilwoman . Because these are all important points. Thank you.

Madam Chair, just for clarification, there's no police records in this .

No, it's actually all records associated with the federal wheel program, so it's Community Development Department.

Thank you very much. Is there a motion?

I'll second. Those in favor say aye. No. One no. Motion passes. What's the next item, Madam Clerk?

Next item, 22A, where the blanket order contract amount of $100,000 to $100,000 capital services for online marketplace purchase.

Madam City Clerk, I think I called out 19 . If I'm not mistaken, that might be.

We're going to move on to the agenda, right? So thank you for that and thank you Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. I just briefly want to report out, I know I see Neil Savas out there. Neil Savas out there and Nabil, if you want to be on stand, just in case any of the council members have any comments, simply to update the council on a well that was taken offline recently because there was a detection of some concomitants groundwater basin. So, as your representative from the water district, you might be able to pronounce this a little bit better, but it's a polyfluoro substance, better known as PFAS,

a group of chemicals that were used in firefighting food paper wrappings carved in upholstery. But it's a chemical that doesn't break down easily. And so we detected it up in the watershed upstream and it's impacted some of the wells in the county. And one of our wells is in proximity to another well that was taken offline. And even though there's not a level, a maximum enforceable limit on that, there are certain indicia where when it exceeds a certain level we have to notify and notify that. And one of the wells, Well 38, it exceeds the notification level.

So studies are being done by the Orange County Water District, which is the agency invested with the right to go ahead and see the chemicals more in detail.

Specifically, OCWD has the only lab in the state that's certified to go ahead and detect this chemical. So, Nabil, is there anything you want to add to this?

Just in case I didn't cover anything, I think that's what my understanding is that one of the things that we're doing is that we're doing. working on at OCWD back in Washington DC. I testified and met with some of our representatives there. We're requesting that the EPA set a national standard that we'll have some limit that all states can abide by. Because right now, some states like Michigan have a really serious problem with this, right? It's impacting communities, it's impacting regions that are much larger than ours. And so they want to set limits really low. What that does to us, they start setting a low limit,

and then our states are setting low limits as well. Many wells like ours could be taken offline and it affects our water supply. So we want to be judicious about our decisions, but we want to be more than anything, let the science determine the politics because sometimes you have folks trying to get in front of this and they want to set really low limits. It just makes things very confusing. So go ahead if there's anything.

The only thing that I would like to add is that initial test was an initial test and it will be confirmed. So early June, we will be taking an example just to confirm the exceedance. Again, once we learned of the exceedance, the well was immediately taken out of service and we need to be out of service until something will happen, either provide blood treatment or some treatment for that . Or if the public health establishes an MCL, Once that happens, then we know where we stand in terms of the use of the world.

But I guess what I wanted you to mention, just so we don't create an alarm in the community, because look, our water supply is fine. It's high quality. It's tested often. But it's parts per trillion that we're talking about.

Per trillion, yes. And in the staff report, it's equal to four grains of sugar in an Olympic swimming pool. That's the situation that we're talking about.

So, you know, we'll continue to keep this all updated. I'll make sure that if anything changes, I'll bring it back here, but there is a bill that's circulating through the legislature that's setting the MCL at a very low amount. That's correct.

If the second sample comes back positive, then we'll do a formal notification to you of the exceedance and help with it. Again, we will allow the service and we'll appreciate it for now. Thank you. With that, I'll move the other.

David PenalozaItem —

Mr. Member, can I just comment really quick on the water? I just wanted to, when this water is from the tap, we tell our residents that, and I do as well, and we do here in the city, where exactly is the water tested from, are we testing straight from the well? Or are we testing from, because I, the reason I ask is because I've seen the water, you know my faucets at home in the backyard or so it's not just my and it's very sometimes it is

David PenalozaItem —

so i just i just wanted to make sure we could some of those maybe in the future

David PenalozaItem —

but just put it on your i've had those questions and they brought up to me my family hey fill up the tap it's good you don't need water waters and the audience see how the water looks when it comes out of the tap and it's pretty cloudy

so just have that uh that uh sure i'll be more than happy to help just let me know and you know we take quality complaints really seriously so if you call us we'll respond immediately to any complaint means air in the water that's kind of typical sometimes if you let the water a little bit then the air will come out and it will clear but again let us know and

David PenalozaItem —

It clears after you let it sit for, I noticed it on my dog's water bowl, but I'm sure it's coming out great from our well, but all those long old pipes that go from the well to our homes, how are we certain that those pipes aren't adding something else to our water that we're not aware of?

Some of these pipelines need to be replaced. They're really old. Some of them were built in the early 50s, and some are built yesterday. So there's a huge range of age of the power infrastructure that we need to pay attention to and replace so

David PenalozaItem —

Okay, so Miss City manager if you could work with Nabil and Public Works to probably get us some kind of a Memo on what causes that in our water and whatnot certainly sir. Thank you. I appreciate it

One one comment and I believe I made it to our Parks and Rec's director is that we may have great water, it's one of the best I would believe in here in Orange County, but at our city facilities and our drinking the water fountains, I mean the water may be good, but like Council Member Piñalosa was saying, it's just not really, it doesn't look appealing for me to go into a water faucet or like a drinking water fountain, because the fountain the fountain itself, it's like it's deteriorating and it's not even in good condition.

It's pretty much gross if you go into, you know, and to try to put your, you know, close to your mouth to that water faucet. So it's, you know, even though we have great quality water, but then if our, you know, the fountains are not in good condition, it really defeats the purpose. So, you know, it would be something that we should look at because even at our parks and stuff, the water, sometimes the fountains are not even working so that's I mean it just kind of tells you like a lot of people doubt that there's quality in our water because you know the water fountains in our facilities are not adequate and for the record my water

thank you just just one quick comment I know that you know and I do think this is a more robust discussion we want to have it and maybe what we do Nabil as we we bring some staff from OCWV here as well just to talk about waters that we get not only from the agency, but we also get about 25% from the Metropolitan Water District that Councilman Solorio represents us on. So we think, well we know that the quality is high. I think the problem with some of the water that comes out of a fountain or a faucet is the conveyance system, right? And some of those are very old.

That has nothing to do with the quality of water. It's where you know the water is being transported through So we do have some issues with those just because you're right where finally ends up the end User whether it's at a fountain at a park or at a school or someplace else or a faucet It really doesn't it impacts the quality But it's it's more that the transit of the water that's causing a problem So we want to make sure that that's obviously quality or there's a distinction between water quality and the you know, conveyance system. So maybe that's something we can speak to when you bring staff

and this issue comes before us again. Sure will. Because I know that this water, this tap water, has actually won a contest of being the best tasting water in the country for the past two or three years, I forget. But in that sense, I think the water is good. We just need to work on making sure our infrastructure is quality as well.

So we have a motion approved from Sarmiento. Is there a second?

Second.

All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Those opposed, motion carries. Madam Clerk, next item.

Yes, now we proceed to item 22A, the blanket order contract for online marketplace purchase of goods, pulled by Council Member Iglesias.

So my question for this is in the wording of the item. It says the water blanket order contract in the amount of 100,000 to Amazon Capital Services. And then in the recommended action, you have it to be, let me see, it says, award blanket order contract to Amazon Capital Services for online marketplace purchases of goods for a one year period expiring March 31st, 2020, with provisions for four one year renewals exercisable by the city manager in an annual amount not to exceed 100,000.

So is it 100,000 or is it, do they use the entire amount? or is it something that that's the cap and they could use 60,000, 50,000?

Councilmember Iglesias, it's the latter, so it's a not to exceed of 100,000. It's based on the items that they need to purchase that they use this vehicle to do so. So some years it could be greater than other years, but in no case would an annual amount exceed 100,000.

And then, so I know for the limit for, I guess, that was granted to the city manager, to approve contracts or MOUs or anything that has to do with in a financial perspective. I thought it was like $50,000. Wasn't it the authority that was given to the city manager?

That is correct. So these are multiple small dollar purchases that are made on Amazon. And I did find out, to give you an example of what the finance department is using Amazon for, It's items mainly related to IT, such as an external hard drive. They're able to access the Amazon marketplace and instantly see competitive pricing for multiple vendors and select the most competitive price to do the purchase. So they're not going onto Amazon in a single time making a $100,000 purchase of an item.

No, no, and I get that part, but it's more of it's giving you the authority of $200,000 versus what we passed, I think it was, giving you the authority for 50,000.

You have built into your purchasing municipal code the ability for the city to piggyback on cooperative agreements that other government entities have in order to do purchases such as this. So it's under that section of the municipal code and that's included in the latter part of the staff report as to what the actual ordinance is that authorizes us to do these types of purchases. So it's under a different code policy than what you granted to me as far as my level of signing contracts that are under $50,000.

Okay, so what happens to that money? Say they don't spend the $48,000, I mean they don't spend the $100,000, they spend less. Then it goes back to the general fund?

They would program the $100,000 into the departments that are expected to spend it. If they don't use it, it would remain there. It could certainly be used for another line item within the department. but if not used there would be an excess in that particular budget line item.

Okay, well thank you.

Any other comments? Councilmember Salone? Yeah, just a brief comment. I do feel comfortable moving with Amazon and these kinds of purchases since I think it's by a mix of different court actions at the federal level and state level that we're getting more online companies to pay cities in the state for their share of sales taxes for purchase being made in the state, so that's getting incrementally better. So, you know, cities now and the future won't be hurt as much from online shopping because we're getting better about collecting it and

having that be a legally possible way of doing it. So, with that, you know, I'm feeling

I want to raise a really good point, Councilmember Solario. So with the addition of collecting sales tax on companies that sell online that don't particularly have a physical nexus in our state, we will start to receive allocation of sales tax dollars. The Department of Tax and Fee Administration at the state is going to do the allocation through the pool, which fares well for the City of Santa Ana because the pool is distributed based on your pro-rata share of your direct sales tax allocation. in comparison to the total pie.

So that's good. So that's another protection by going with Amazon. Thank you so much. Is there a motion?

A comment?

No, I'm good. Is there a motion?

Move the item.

Is there a second? I'll second it. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye.

Those opposed?

One.

We're missing a council member, maybe we can bring it back a little bit later.

We'll bring it back. Can we move on to the next item, Madam Clerk?

Sure. Item 23A, award construction contract for the residential street repair and alley improvement project, pulled by Council Member Iglesias.

David PenalozaItem —

I just was I noticed that the staff report stated that when we put up the RFP there was a couple of Santa Ana vendors that have downloaded it and filled it out and the number two was a Santa vendor but it was about a hundred thousand dollars more than the corona vendor and we ended up from what it looks like the staff report going with the corona vendor to save that money but I'm just what I want to know is if there's a is it are there tax savings involved that could I guess replenish

David PenalozaItem —

that $100,000 that we would save if we were to go with a Santa Ana vendor versus a Corona one? The city manager? Does that make sense?

It does, and Councilman, I might have to pull our finance director up here. For this being a construction project, I don't believe it would come into play with the 1% advantage as far as using a Santa Ana vendor, but I can certainly ask Catherine to clarify that.

David PenalozaItem —

Please, because I know $100,000 is a lot of money and it's good that we're saving that but you know I noticed that it's now a corona vendor right what would be the the advantages of in in I'm thinking tax revenue with the local vendor and whatnot the city manager is

absolutely correct the local preference provision that we have in the code does not apply to the public works contracts so it does not apply to the public works

David PenalozaItem —

contracts. Thank you that that answers that and just on a side note with this thank you staff for this I know that that the streets in this item are in Henninger Park and Madison Park and Madison Park I've had a lot of resident emails and concerns about their the streets that are very old a lot of concrete streets still in that area so I appreciate to see this effort in in fixing these streets. Thank you.

Any other council member comments?

Yeah. I have a question, and I believe this was a question I had last time too, and I do appreciate it's, we are going to be fixing our streets, but when it comes to, like I said in the recommended action, number two, it says approve the project cost analysis is for a total estimated construction delivery cost of a million 92, 874,

which includes the 874 for the contract and it includes 87,430, which is 10% of the project contingency. And I believe that's for staff, right? 459 goes into, no, I'm sorry. So that's the contingency. and then the 59,000 goes to contract administration and the other goes to inspection and testing 72,000 so my question is the contract administration and inspection and testing that's staff right who's doing that it could be

performed by staff or it could be performed by contractors so who's but okay right here doesn't say who's doing this okay I can ask our Public Works Director to clarify on this project, if it's going to be done in-house or if they will use consultants.

Good evening. Fouad Swayze, Public Works Director. These allocations or funds are assigned for services, some for our staff and some for some of the contractors that we already have on board that they do testing for materials. So it's as needed. This is like not to exceed or this is an estimate based on previous projects.

Yeah, but who's doing it? It's not clear on the staff report, it's not clear who's providing the service for construction administration and for inspection testing.

Construction administration is done by our own staff. We have a unit in charge of construction management and administration, but the testing is done through private testing labs that we already have contracts with and we pull them on an as needed basis. But we allocate these funds based on the size of the project and based on previous experience.

For me it's not clear, it's not transparent on where the money's going to, so I'm not comfortable with that and also with the construction administration. So just to understand, so you're $59,000, so are you putting a staff that we've already allocated money to for the department to be able to provide this service, and then we're on top of that bringing in 59,000 to pay them?

Yeah, if I may. Public Works is mainly dependent on special funds, grants, and not on general fund. So our own staff, we pay them from projects and from the funds and from the grants that we always seek and get approved for these projects. So we have to allocate money from every project to cover staff cost. That's what it is. And with regard to testing, we have to hire, we don't have a full testing lab, so we have to go out to private firms that have specialized equipment, whether to do nuclear, some they

have nuclear gauge, test the density of soil. That's a very expensive item. We don't have it. and, you know, or do other testing to make sure that the work that is completed by the contractor is built up to our standards and specs. We don't come back for, you know.

Yeah, and I guess I understand the process, but it's more when the financing of it and how the, what the revenue is. It's not, not even the staff report, in my opinion, is clear and transparent on where it's coming from. and another one which says that it's going to be paid by community development block grant and measure M2 local fair share funds, but it doesn't say how much from each.

Actually, it does, Councilwoman, on 23A-3. So to explain it in another way, it's a construction project that we have revenue streams that we can use for this particular construction project, And we want to make sure that we allocate all the expenses associated with that construction project to those special revenue sources because we're allowed to use them for that. So in this case, and my apologies, we actually tried to make this staff report clear based on your input on a similar staff report that was before you at the last meeting.

In this case, he has existing staff, but his staff time has to be charged out to the individual construction projects because we're entitled to use these types of funding for that. So the largest component obviously is the construction contract, which is the amount that was competitively bid. The contingency is only there if needed. So that's if they encounter something in the street as they're doing the street work that was unanticipated that may raise the cost of the construction component. And then the construction administration, that's just construction.

You need to monitor the contractor and ensure that they're complying and performing all of the scope of work that we hired them to do. and then inspection and testing in simple terms, and my apologies to the Public Works Director because I won't state it right, but making sure that they're even put down the appropriate inch level of whether it's a slurry seal or asphalt on it. So that's all related to this single construction project, and those are the three sources of funds, and it does indicate the amount that's being utilized from each one of those three sources that totals the $1 million.

dollars okay so then at the beginning then when you put the one and two then and other ones you put like exhibit a or exhibit whatever it'd be for me just more clear especially for the public if we're looking for that information put 2383 or something like that a reference or because it doesn't at the beginning

we can do that council members to load you yes a couple things first First, I know the staff report speaks a little bit about some areas that have concrete streets.

Yes.

And we don't have too many neighborhoods that have concrete streets. I'm glad that some of these neighborhoods like Henninger, Madison, and Eastside that might have ports that concrete streets are going to get concrete street repair. We have other parts of the city including in Ward 5 where we have concrete streets. And I think for a variety of reasons, there's been a lot of deference to make sure we fix up other parts of our city. But, you know, for some of these areas up there, it's literally been decades since we fixed some of those concrete areas.

We've been doing patch repair in certain areas, but it really is time that public works staff develop a plan for modernizing and improving many of those areas. and I know we very recently spoke about this as well and you indicated a willingness to begin moving in that direction, so I do appreciate that. Second, I think just to answer the previous questions, really I think the main action today is we're approving this construction contract, but it kind of as a best practice, it's good for us to tell our council and the public that we have the entirety of all the dollars, not just to do the construction,

but the testing and other aspects of it and also based on best practices, we have independent companies make sure that the work was done correctly, which is why you don't just give the contractor all the money to do all these things, because you wanna have independent inspectors review the work, and then city staff administration as well, and oftentimes, too, this process is dictated through strings attached from CDBG or Measure M, so this is pretty customary, as a lot of cities do it, but for transparency, it's always good to try to be a little bit clearer because government talk is a little bit different than regular talk,

and so I do appreciate the questions we've had.

Thank you. Councilmember Sarmiento. Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem, and thank you, FWOD and staff, for doing this. I know both neighborhoods and all the areas that the improvements are gonna touch, especially because I'm a little bit more familiar with Madison Park and their requests and the condition of their area. this is very well received by them. So thank you for that. I just had a couple of questions. Number one on the bid criteria, were you selecting the firm or the prevailing bidder based upon the base bid or the?

Usually the selection of contractors for construction work has to follow city and state code, which is the lowest bidder. So whoever gives us the lowest price, we check their qualifications to make sure they have the required license and certification and insurance, all that stuff. If they have it, then the contract has to go to them. Unless certain cities have preferential points that they give to their local contractors, which is what Council Member Penelosa asked before. We don't have that. that the 1% that we have does not apply on construction contracts.

But if the city, if council chooses to look into, consider maybe adding certain percentage for local businesses, maybe that could be a factor in determining who gets the project.

Well, look, I guess I was referring to the fact that these are all Southern California firms and companies, So I'm glad about that, and I'm glad that one of the firms, I guess, that came in second on the criteria was a Santa Ana company. So to the extent that you look at things other than just cost, cost obviously usually is the prevailing element of a criteria, but it's not the only element. If they have litigation and bad business practices, that's not a good thing. if they have a whole litany of violations or if they've done bad work performance.

I mean, even if they come in as a low bidder, and I've seen that in many cities where you give it to the lowest bidder, that they have tons of faulty work and construction defect lawsuits against them. So I hope that was looked into when this was done because I would hate for somebody to have outbid one of our local companies based upon a bad work history. So that's one thing. And sometimes even if you take a haircut on the bid, the money that they spend for hiring people are usually people in our city. And the monies that they spend for equipment and for materials, if they purchase it from local vendors, look, it's a win-win.

It becomes a multiplier effect. So just something for us to consider as we move forward on that. And finally, so I was asked by a certain standpoint, so I might as well make a plug for that. there's a part of the street in Sandpoint that I guess was, you know, it was a slurry seal, I don't think it was emulsified, but I think one of the utilities came in and ground it up again after we laid it down really nicely and kind of messed it up a little bit. So if there's any residual monies on this, see if you can carve some out for one of those neighborhoods in Sandpoint.

I am fully aware of that location and we'd be glad to look into it one more time. You know, that street in particular scores high on our PCI, and it doesn't make sense to spend more money on it when other streets need the money badly. But we'll definitely promise to look at it, and if there's need for work and more extra money available, we'll definitely take that into consideration.

David PenalozaItem —

Council Member Peñalosa. Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Temp. Just looking over the map closer, Henninger Park and Madison Park, very needed areas, but I also noticed that my alley is on here I say my alley because it's on the east side by first and standard but I've called over this alley every day for like the last three months I've sent emails to the chief Christine Steven Mendoza back when he was our city manager about this dirt alley it's a public alley and there's a lot of homeless encampments that have just popped up and so hopefully this could help alleviate that by fixing that

David PenalozaItem —

alley and paving it or adding whatever the other type slurry and with that if this project moves forward I would like or with any project I would like to see maybe a timeline of completion because I feel like we've we've oftentimes seen things approved, but I don't personally see them

David PenalozaItem —

roll out very quickly, it takes a while, even after this, so maybe for future reference, just add some kind of potential timeline to the staff reports and saying, hey, if this is approved tonight, you'll see this work completed by October 2019, or I don't know, I'm just giving an example, but that would be helpful.

If I may, usually anytime we advertise for a contract, we say this is the scope of work and this is the time that we want the contractor to complete it by two months, three months, whatever. But for your request we can add like a schedule, this is how long it will take to issue the notice to proceed, this is when the work starts, this is when the notice of completion is estimated to be issued.

David PenalozaItem —

Appreciate it, Fouadou.

We'll be glad to do that.

All right, thank you. Is there a motion?

David PenalozaItem —

I'll move it.

All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries. Assistant City Attorney, do we have to take a motion to reconsider item 22A? Is that, if we want to have a do over on that?

It's the council's pleasure to make a motion for reconsideration. That motion usually must be made in the person who by the member who may wish to change their vote.

Very good. Is there a motion to reconsider item 22A?

Yeah, or the member that was missing from the vote, I may add, or the member that was missing from the vote. Okay, very good.

That's what I thought, because normally when you make a motion to reconsider, it's usually from the prevailing side, they have to move the item to have it reconsidered, and I apologize, I stepped out, I normally don't step out to go get a bite, but I took a cookie, my blood sugar was dropping, and so I'll make a motion to reconsider the item for not being present.

Is there a second?

No, no.

All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? No. No. Okay, motion passes. So we're going to now reconsider item 22A. Is there a motion for approval?

I just had a quick question on that, if I could, Mr. Mayor. Absolutely. So does this, this doesn't change the purchasing range that the city manager has the discretion over without the authority of the council, right? I know I said that clumsily, but you know what I'm getting at.

No sir, it's under the purchasing code for purchases under like $5,000 that they would use the Amazon account for. And it doesn't, it's a different part of the municipal code than the code that I think you're referring to, which was my increase for $50,000.

Okay, so it doesn't adjust that at all. And so this is more the intent and purposes for convenience?

It's not to exceed and it's a good vehicle and a tool for the purchasing office if they need. And it's usually IT supplies. Then they might need an external hard drive. They can go to the Amazon marketplace. They can easily see competitive pricing and select the vendor with the best competitive pricing.

So I see Jack nodding his head. So does that mean yes?

Jack's approval on there. I'll move you. Is there a second? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? One no. Motion passes. Madam Clerk, next item. Item 23B, amend fiscal year 2017-18 and 18-19 capital improvement programs for traffic signal operations pulled by Councilmember Iglesias.

Councilwoman Iglesias.

I'll defer to, then I'll go after you.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you Mayor Potem and Councilwoman Iglesias. I also pulled this item just because I don't understand some of the language that was in there. In the staff report it says that it makes reference to the significant reductions in gas tax revenue that are expected. I just wasn't sure why those are being expected from our city staff. Just this morning on the news, I saw a report that Californians are expected to see a record miles in traveling by car this weekend, Memorial Day weekend. And this morning, I spent $55 to fill up a Honda Accord.

David PenalozaItem —

So I don't see why that's in the report. I don't know if you could explain that to me, Ms. Ridge.

I will defer to our Public Works Director as to why during this particular time period that's being referenced the tax revenues were declined.

Thank you.

Any other comments?

I'll defer to answer this question to our city engineer, William. Thank you. Yes, good evening, Mayor Pro Temm and members of the Council. The reduction in gas tax, we will look at first quarter, second quarter, and what the forecast is. We have received a forecast from the state of the gas tax to close out the year. So because we were having a reduction in gas tax that was going to be impacting traffic signal operations, we had to basically move some money from equipment over to gas. The reason why we're paying more at the gas pump, that's SB1, and that's a different pot,

it's a different color of gas tax, if you will. So we're getting additional SB1 money for different projects. This is regular gas tax, this is the original gas tax, and that has been going down. So what we're requesting authorization from the Council is for us to defer $200,000 in traffic signal equipment purchases. we were going to be using Measure M money to pay for that and we want to substitute that Measure M money which qualifies for signal operations we have 300 signals throughout the city and we do use a contract to oversee the maintenance and whenever a signal goes on flash and then just routine maintenance

we need that two hundred thousand dollars to close out the year and that would be coming from the the measure measure M measure M right and then the capital equipment that we were gonna do we will have to defer it so we will again budget for next year and the year after namely fiscal year 1920 and 2021 so that we can go ahead and upgrade the equipment that we originally wanted to

do this year thank you councilmember Iglesias so for this one we had we have

$200,000 that it's unspent from measure M right for it for this for the traffic signal equipment replacement correct why is there a reason why that money wasn't

used in 2017-2018? The signal equipment that we wanted to purchase costs around $200,000 and so the set aside that we had looked at in 17-18 and 18-19 was about a hundred thousand so we basically saved up a hundred thousand in our savings account for that over a two-year period. Now that we see that we have a shortfall in gas tax we want to use that measure M which qualifies for signal operations. So we will again have to save $100,000 this coming fiscal year, 1920 and 2021 so that we can again do that equipment to upgrade in two years.

Okay, so I guess my concern is that we're saying we're going to do something and we've, I believe that came before the council, right, when we gave you that authority for the $100,000 to use it? Yes. And then it doesn't get used. So then why not in 2017, 2018 did you not tell the council that that money, you didn't use it? Why are we waiting almost two years to let us know

that this money wasn't spent? So the issue is that the traffic signal operations, that the maintenance of the traffic signals is based and we're going to be paying for that using gas tax. So now that three quarters of the year, and actually this staff report's a little bit old, but three quarters through the fiscal year, we realized that the gas tax forecast to close out the year was going to be $200,000 less than we anticipated.

And so we can't finish the year in traffic signal operations unless we were able to transfer some money that qualifies for signal operations. So to answer your question, we didn't know. We still thought early this year that we could put a RFP out so that we can switch out our equipment. A month or so ago, we realized that gas tax revenues have been falling, and in order to close out the year, we needed to look at some other funding source so that we can have the signals operate. We figured that's a safety issue.

It's probably a higher priority, and we will still replace the equipment. We'll just have to defer it for two years.

Okay. Thank you.

Is there any other comments? Is there a motion?

I will second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? No. 1-0. Motion passes. Next item. Madam Clerk. Next item

pulled by Council Member Iglesias.

Can you just go ahead? Yeah. Approved purchase and sell

agreement in the amount of $4,000 for the seller portions of city-owned real property at 2501 North Flower Street.

Is there a comment? I have questions. Thank you.

Okay. So for this item, my question is, okay, how did we arrive to the amount of $4,000 for the appraisal of this land? because according to the staff report, it shows that the number of square feet that's being, I guess, either sold or to the individual is about 4,000. Let me see, what does it say here?

Council member Iglesias, we do have a short presentation. If you would like us to give that or just answer questions, it's up to you.

How long is the presentation? It's very short and it will probably cover all of your questions. It's only four.

It's six slides. Okay. Thank you. Okay.

Good evening, Mayor Pro Tem and members of the council. I'm Teg Higgins, Public Works. The item before you is a sale of 4,283 square foot parcel to an adjacent private property. The subject piece of land is adjacent to Santiago Creek in between the I-5 freeway and Flower Street. As a quick background, five years ago, So staff commissioned a survey of that segment of the creek determined that there were some encroachments of private property into the city's portion

of the creek property. City staff met with the private property owners, discussed a resolution and determined that a recommended course of action would be to sell the property containing the encroachments.

Previous direction from council was to determine a fair market value for the property. A real quick timeline on the property that is, that we will be selling the land to. This is at 2467 North Riverside Drive. The encroachments that are within the city's property, the garage was permitted in 1926 and constructed at that time. Based on some of the slides I'll show you later,

there's a good portion of the garage that actually encroaches into the city's property. In 1985, a pool was permitted, also encroaching and constructed at that time. Finally, there's a tennis court that's also encroaching into the city's property. It was constructed in 1985 and no permit is required for a tennis court.

The slide there shows the two properties, I'm sorry, it shows the 2467 North Riverside Drive and its existing configuration and proposed with the property sale. It's a little tough to see on those slides, but on the existing one on the left, you can maybe make out the tennis court that encroaches into the property, into the city's property, the pool, and then the garage at the upper right of the existing photo.

As a reference, you can also look at sheet 25A-13. It also, I think, clearly depicts where the encroachments go into the city's ownership. So again, the proposal would extend that property line closer to the wall. that is that dashed yellow and white line that's the the Santiago Creek wall

I'll skip that slide and come back to it I think this gives an idea of where the parcel is that we would convey the one on the left is standing on the above the bank of the on the above the Santiago Creek on the conveyed property the the view on the right shows from the creek floor towards the towards the wall just to to note the the new property line would go roughly adjacent to where that

fence is on the on the left view and and let me just get back to the to the one again as I mentioned the city the City Council had asked us to to determine the fair market value city did that with a got an opinion of value and based on the lack of any reasonable access to the property. The only access to the property would be from the creek if you climbed up the wall. And so other than through the private parcel,

you cannot get to the property. And then there is no development potential or independent marketability of the property other than as nuisance value to somebody else. and our code, it's referenced in the staff report, 2-706.1, allows direct negotiation to an adjacent property owner. Again, if it's only of nuisance value to somebody other than that property. So based on the opinions, staff and the homeowner discussed a price of $4,000.

dollars and so the the benefits to the city would be city receives the four thousand dollars and the the buyer would pay a lot or did pay a lot line adjustment fee to the city for review of a associated lot line adjustment the buyer prepared the maps and legal descriptions and all the documentation etc the city will reserve a 10-foot wide easement to maintain the retaining wall that will that will be within the city's property but in order to maintain it we

are requiring that 10-foot wide easement and then the city's liability and maintenance responsibility will be reduced so that is the end of that presentation and I'm here for questions and if I may I just wanted to clarify that this came to our attention after we conducted a survey of the the creek at the Santiago Creek so we discovered that the encroachment had occurred if you are on their their property on the private property it's not apparent that there's

any encroachment because all of the improvements have been built on the private property side of the retaining wall which is approximately six to eight foot tall so we only discovered it after we did the survey we've also discovered that there are some other irregularities in the creek area but generally those are just fences and this these are for improvements like the pool and the

tennis court. So then just based on your number of square foot that was referenced I think it was like 4300 I think it was and then how many square foot?

It's about 4200 square feet. We hired an appraiser and the first time he came up back to us with a value of zero and we disagreed with that. The way they looked at it is that this is landlocked, it doesn't have access, it has no use for anyone, like Teig said, it cannot be developed. So basically, it has no value. So basically, we asked the appraiser to look again at what is the value of the property with this land and compare it to the value of the property without this additional land, try to find the difference between them and assign a value to the land, and that's the price that he came up with.

It's also important to mention that the property has been improved and it has a higher base value than without the tennis court and the pool and most likely they've been paying higher property tax for many years. So the city has benefited from this, although it was done by mistake over the years. But definitely it took us a while to determine the value and negotiate with the property owner and come up with a resolution for this problem.

David PenalozaItem —

Councilman Peñalosa. Thank you Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you Fuad for that. It's interesting that you mention the property taxes because I went ahead and took the property tax bill for this resident off the county's website and and they're actually paying about 10% of what I pay for my house, that's 2,500 square feet in Central Santa Ana. So I just wanna know, Ms. City Manager, so this property has gone on 30 years using 4,283 square feet of city property for free. That's what I understand.

And the two of the improvements were approved by the city via a permit.

David PenalozaItem —

Okay. But they've been using that 4,000 square foot for free?

Correct.

David PenalozaItem —

And they haven't paid property taxes on that land?

No, actually they would. I'm guessing that the property tax bill, obviously the homeowners may have been in the house for an extremely long time, and you know how there is, I think it's Prop 13, that freezes your growth of your property taxes. However, when you do an improvement to your property, that information does get passed on to the assessors, and it does increase the assessed value of the property. So some of those structures, particularly the garage structure, would have increased their assessed value. But I'm guessing it's low because they've owned that home for a substantial amount of time.

David PenalozaItem —

That parcel number is not reflected on the tax bill. So the only parcel number that's reflected on the tax bill is what their property was, their original property line landed at.

David PenalozaItem —

So, I don't understand how they have been paying property taxes on this additional 4,283 square feet when it was never really assessed onto their parcel that they're paying property taxes on. And again, just to put into perspective of how, I know this is an elongated piece of land, It's not a perfect 4,000 square foot square, but again, my house is half the size of the square footage of city property that they've been using for free. Just to give an example as well, in the city of Orange, my boss lives in Orange Park Acres up against a creek.

David PenalozaItem —

and he built a 10-foot wall, cinder block, beautiful wall with a grill, patio, $200,000 swimming pool, beautiful backyard. Great. The City of Orange came knocking on his door and was like, Hey, you've encroached about five feet into the creek that is behind his house. He was like, Okay, what do I need to do?

David PenalozaItem —

They were like, tear down your wall and tear down your barbecue pit and tear down your grill and tear down the planners that his wife's been using for two years that was all along this piece of the creek that he took. So I just want to know why the city of Orange could do this and the city of Santa Ana can't. I have no problem with telling the resident, hey, you know what, rip up your pool and rip up your tennis court because this is property that you've been using for free.

David PenalozaItem —

So how do you answer that, Ms. City Manager?

Well, I'm not sure of the example that you provided. I would maybe venture that at that home they didn't pull permits for those approvals because it would have been inspected. Here, I know it went all the way back to 1926 for the first permit that they pulled, but they did come to the city and they pulled permits for at least two of those improvements. So they do have that. That makes it a little unusual circumstances. And obviously, I mean, it's been a long period of time.

David PenalozaItem —

So how can we reach out since these permits were—these licenses were permitted? they should pay 30 years of back property taxes on this land that hasn't been assessed on the property tax bill, which I have right here, for $1,553 on, according to Zillow, $2.9 million home.

Okay, what I mentioned about the property tax is that the property owner was not necessarily paying property tax on this little piece of land that's owned by the city, but paying property tax for a house or a property that has a higher value because of a tennis court and a pool. They were not necessarily paying property tax on the city portion. So that's one thing. The second is the city attorney was involved in this case for a while, and there was some kind of threat of litigation.

And in order to minimize or keep our costs low, we realize that the best way is to find the solution and move forward with it. So maybe John can elaborate on this.

David PenalozaItem —

And you guys mentioned that that was done and it comes out, like Hanswoman Iglesias said, to a dollar a square foot, which is, I mean, shoot, if I could buy 4,200 square feet in Santa Ana for a buck a square foot, I'll do it. and I'll give 10 grand, I'll double the price because I need a place to live, move out of my mom's house.

David PenalozaItem —

So it's just, I mean I don't understand how we could just allow this to happen for such a low price. If this person were to now add this 4,200 square feet to their property line, that's gonna increase their property value substantially. When they sell it, they're not gonna sell it for $4,000 more than they would've if this square footage wouldn't be included in the lot size when it's assessed by an appraiser. They, I doubt it's only gonna go up $4,000. Adding 4,000 square feet, regardless of the dimensions

David PenalozaItem —

of it to a lot, when you sell that house, I mean, that's a lot of money from a real estate side. So how can we only say, hey, you owe us $4,000 for this land, but, I mean, they're just...to me, it's the city's getting milked.

If I can. So land value is determined on a number of things. A parcel of land that has absolutely no ingress or egress to it really doesn't have a substantial amount of value. A odd-shaped parcel of land that can't be developed even has less of a value. So even though it is 4,200 square feet, you have to scramble a retaining wall to get up to it from a creek bed. The only other entrance to it is through the private property. there is nothing that could be developed on that odd shape of property based on its location and we are by municipal code permitted to deal directly with

adjacent property owners on parcels such as this I understand that the city

David PenalozaItem —

manager but when this person sells the house they're not gonna say hey 10,000 square foot of the house is zoned residential and 4,200 square feet of the lot is zoned open space and it has no use so we can't include that in the property value this is gonna be included I'm not talking about what it's on now but adding it to their property lot it's gonna get rezoned to residential and that's gonna increase the value of that 4,000 square foot regardless of how big or how wide or narrow the lot is by a lot it's not gonna be four thousand dollars it's gonna be I mean I'm no no appraiser but easily over a hundred

grant I may add councilmember Penelosa as as flawed indicates this this matter does have a longer history at the city and when it was originally learned by the city that there was some encroachment into the city property a discussion was begun with the property owners under our prior public works director there were arrangements that were tentatively agreed upon condition that is upon approval by the council negotiations ensued over the course of some months I know was the council's pleasure that an appraisal be done of the property before any finalization of those arrangements were made under flawed's direction such

an appraisal was made therefore that's why the number the number was determined to be the selling price of the property here for four thousand dollars I just wanted to emphasize that the direction to obtain an appraisal of the fair market value was done to the council's earlier pleasure.

David PenalozaItem —

So I'm just for an example, if I have an aunt that lives up against Thorin Park, if I advise you tomorrow and say hey build that pool you've been wanting, go 4,000 square feet into Thorin Park, could she buy that land for a dollar a square foot? Fits the same zoning?

Well I would hope your aunt would come to the city to take a permit and at that time city staff would identify that the improvements are outside of her parcel line which would be the right way for it to happen. And unfortunately whoever was

David PenalozaItem —

in charge at the time they didn't do that in 1985. I think originally in 1926. So so what happens if this is I mean do if this is denied do we take the land back or how does that what's the what's the point of this is or is this just asking them for change, for pocket change, for what they took?

I would defer to the city attorney on what the recourse would be if we don't proceed with this.

There were different options presented to the city to resolve this situation. The one that was elected was the sale of the property. Another option would perhaps be an easement over the land that was considered to be less viable.

The property owners here had at some point in time entertained the option of litigation as well. Certainly it's not the time and place to speculate upon any potential litigation, but that had been entertained at one point in time. The city made a holistic evaluation of the matter and elected, you know, based upon some of the concerns that you saw in the slides earlier, that a purchase was the most viable route at fair market value. I THINK THAT'S A GOOD QUESTION.

THANK YOU.

THANK YOU.

COUNCIL MEMBER SOLODIO. THANK YOU. THIS SITEM HERE CAN BE FRUSTRATING AND HARD TO EXPLAIN, PARTICULARLY TO THE PUBLIC. AND THERE ARE DIFFERENT WAYS OF LOOKING AT IT. JUST A FEW INSIGHTS OR POINTS FOR ME. NUMBER ONE, IF WE DON'T SELL THIS, WE WON'T EVER GENERATE ADDITIONAL PROPERTY TAX or any other financial benefit via the owner of the property or a sale. So down the road, this is going to generate money for us that we wouldn't have otherwise. Also, because it is near the creek and we've had fires and a number of other things there, if we don't deal with this, it's a big liability issue.

And one problem there will easily be way in excess of $4,000. It's unfortunate, really, because we're trying to correct the problem that the city was involved with. almost 100 years ago. I mean, if I did the quick math correct here, it's about 93 years ago. And so it was really not an heir of the property owners at the time, it was the city. So back then and even the current owners, they've tried to play by the rules all along. You know, even here and this council, last year or two, because there were similar concerns, we said, go back out and do another appraisal. And because it's landlocked and other people,

when even the city can't really get back there, unless you wanna climb the wall to just see that little sliver, it's not usable or accessible. I think we did have an easement part still on this, and in addition to the 4,000, they're also responsible for preparing and filing a lot of the documents that cost dollars and other aspects to processing this. And then also, attending these meetings, and I know Mr. Andres was here earlier, I don't know if he's still here or not. They've attended now probably like five or six of these meetings and just quietly kinda listened in, so they've been respectful.

I think we have just a situation here now where you have the private party in the city that have come to the most reasonable resolution possible, and we've done appraisals, and so we also can't charge more than, And it's kind of like one of those fee-for-services things. You know, it's also not necessarily, you know, righteous to charge more than what the thing is worth. So again, it does, you know, raise some questions. It's awkward indeed, but I think, you know, both parties are just trying to make it right based off of, you know, the city's three errors.

I mean, the city two, three times reviewed these things and essentially legitimized that it's okay and all the rest. And worst case, if we were to take it back, they'd say, okay, well then pay us to tear down our tennis court and make it the way it used to be because it was on the city's error that they built that thing. And I can guarantee you that tearing that thing down, removing the concrete and making it the way it used to be is also going to cost you a little bit more money. And one or both of the hundredies are attorneys as well, so believe me, they know the laws and they know kind of what's reasonable or not.

and again they've been extremely patient I think on the whole given everything this is you know pretty reasonable situation again still very awkward but it's I'm not sure how much better could get this miracle time I

David PenalozaItem —

have a question for the attorney I have a council member can we just what's up the possibility of just leaving it as is if it's been like this for 96 years we

what's in good what's another hundred years that's a possibility but I would I would add to that that the a that also brings continued liability to the city because these structures now exist on on what is city property one of these structures for example consists of a swimming pool and there's some some some built-in liability there, if you will. So that is one of the more salient concerns about leaving this property as is. And the maintenance as well, because we are, this is technically city property, so the maintenance obligations follow the property owner customarily.

Liability, like. Maintenance. So liability and maintenance, in short, to answer your question, Councilmember.

David PenalozaItem —

I don't, we never made, aside from this last weekend, in which thank you Councilwoman Iglesias and Councilman Salorio for being out there doing that maintenance on the creek. I mean, this creek is, for the most part, never really maintained.

Well, this property itself has improvements on it, and it's the city property that is adjoining the creek, and so therefore that property would typically be, the maintenance requirements would fall to the city because the ownership is with the city.

Well, what kind of maintenance? Well, their maintenance would be, well, with these improvements, you have the pool and you have the garage, and so those types of structures require maintenance. Those are on city property. Again, the maintenance obligations typically inured to the property owner himself or herself, and in this case, it's the city. Now, understood that they are not approaching the city, expecting the city to maintain those, but ordinarily those maintenance obligations do fall to the owner, and I think more important is the liability concerns.

Are you talking like maintenance of the swimming pool, like resurfacing of the swimming pool? Correct. And the land itself that falls into there, the land that is encroaching upon, or the land that itself falls into what is now the city's property. That property would ordinarily be our responsibility to maintain. And again, there are issues of liability, whether they be arising from trees or built-in structures like pools like there is here.

David PenalozaItem —

So in the last 96 years have there been any cases where the city is liable for something on that property? Not that I'm aware of. I'll take my chances. Thank you.

But just as a follow up to that point on that logic, if a lot of the pull is on essentially city property, they're going to say it becomes a public pull, but people can't get to it. But they may say then, we properly paid for permits, did the grading, did everything, reimburse us to take down the pool and to move it onto our property line. And that cost to the city is probably on the order of $50,000 to $200,000 to then properly move the pool onto their property. Because they probably have space. It's a pretty big property. And so that's another liability that hasn't been discussed. then I mean is it foreseeable that they can say,

hey you are, it becomes a taking? Yes. You know, of many sorts and all of a sudden they can sue us for taking some of their enjoyment on something that they properly processed, paid permit fees for, and so if we wanna make them whole, that's gonna be very expensive.

Yes, that is a possibility, Council Member Solario.

Council Member Sarmiento. Thank you Mr. Mayor Pro Tem, and I'm gonna call for the question with just a brief comment because I think we could talk about this all night. I appreciate the fairness and equity discussion, but don't we do this with remnant parcels often when highways get built and they get expanded and there's sometimes triangular pieces that don't really benefit anybody except the adjacent property owner, and we sometimes even give it away for a dollar? We do when those properties are ridiculous. And so this is very similar because, again, it's the value of a property to who, right?

this is if this were 4,000 square feet or whatever it is 4,200 square feet if it were on a corner of a busy arterial or intersection yeah different value but this is one that can't be accessed and you know I guess the the issue that I have as an attorney that it's very clear to me we don't want somebody having something like a tennis court or a pool on public property because if they fall if they hurt themselves, if they get injured, that's our responsibility to cure that problem.

Yes, that's the liability component.

And so there's a thing that these attorneys probably know and that they have in their back pocket, which is called constructive notice, number one, and adverse possession. So they've held this property for more than 30 years and it's been open and notorious, it's been continuous, it meets all the elements of that, so that principle in the law may give them a legal right to hold this property by now. So in any event, that's an arguable case, but I think I would take that case. All I'm saying is at this point, look, I'm not happy about them taking this property for $4,000 either because it's our oversight. It's our not intentional.

It's an inadvertent oversight on our part that took place over time. But look, this is the only resolution that would relieve us of some liability and continued problems with this property. The only thing I would say is that let's make sure that we recover all our staff costs that have been involved on this. That's my only thing, right? It's not something that is only limited to what we perceive as the value of this parcel. It's how much has been expended on this in attorney's fees, in staff fees and time, all that. So I think that would be my only request if we're going to adjust anything.

Let's make sure that we recover all our costs and time that's been involved in and what's a what's which is a conundrum for a lot of us

So it's really to that point. I would add that the a the buyers are being required to to pay the fees the administrative fees and whatnot for their lot line adjustment and all the survey fees as well So there are there has been more minimal time I would venture to say on the staff, but your point is well taken

Were you going to make a motion?

I was going to make a motion with that adjustment. If there are any additional fees that staff finds or uncovers or has, then I would make sure that we don't get the short end of this. So that's my motion.

Alright, well thank you for the motion. I would like to make a comment on this. So nothing, this thing has been a nightmare for a while. And I wish I had a time machine to go back 1985 to see who issued these permits for the pool.

And I also believe that by them receiving, my thinking, I'm not an attorney, but my thinking is that, hey, if they received permission to make the pool and all that, there was expressed consent from the city. And they can argue that. And then we're going to get tied up in court. It's going to cost a lot of money. And we're going to lose because this thing's been going on for over 30 years from those permits and it was on us another is this piece of land that's there it's really hard to get to it's a worthless piece of land I understand that you know you want a dollar amount but you know to use it is zero because

you can't get to it now if you had my aunt's house backed up to Thornton Park and I was trying to take a piece of Thornton Park well guess what you can get to that piece of land and you can use that piece of land but how do we use this so you got to kind of see through the fog that you know and weigh things out a little bit and say hey look this thing right here nothing's perfect and this thing's been a mess for a long time and I think the city has some responsibility on this and we should just fix it as best we can and move forward is there a second on the motion all those in favor say aye aye no as

opposed I wasn't here a hundred years ago and this doesn't make sense to me well

well it has to be a no a yes or no is correct there is that she can abstain

David PenalozaItem —

okay very good can we do a continuance yeah exactly I mean I don't I don't know any of that or no more information I'd like more information I'd like to see

David PenalozaItem —

what the property value would be assessed to with this added 4,000 square feet, because it's not gonna be $4,000, and I'd like to possibly tour the property.

And maybe an analysis of the liability issues too, just so we can see both sides of it.

So as a maker of the motion, I'll withdraw, because I think your sense of fairness and equity, again, is important right here. I think it kind of rubs us the wrong way, but again, there are these dilemmas, right, that how do we resolve this? can't just let it go on forever so after all that discussion I think we should have made that continue that motion to continue originally but I'll go ahead and withdraw my motion and and convert it to a motion to continue this matter for

two weeks and by then we'll have by hopefully you know mr. mayor will also join us and we'll be you know one additional person stronger yeah I'd like

David PenalozaItem —

more information on this and possibly tour the place, what would you need to do to tour a place? I'm assuming we don't need permission since we own 4,000 square feet of the lot? We need to get on the lot though, so I think we can kindly arrange.

I think you will be able to climb the retaining wall.

Is there a second for the motion?

So there's a motion.

There's a motion by Councilor Sonia.

A motion and a second by Solorio. for a continuous. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries.

Madam Clerk. Next item is 25C. Approve the exercise of the last one-year extension with video engineering services and approve an increase of 15,000 in the total amount not to exceed 359,375 for both current fiscal year and requested extension, pulled by Council Member Iglesias.

Council Member Iglesias, 25C.

Okay, so my question for this one, it states here that it's to approve the extension of the video engineering services, so it's the gentleman that's back there, yeah, filming us, right? Okay, why is it coming out of Parks and Recs and Community Services Agency, the budget?

That's a very good question, I wondered that myself. But if you watch the council meetings, you actually see on the rolling credits that the videos of these meetings are produced by the Parks and Rec Department.

That's money that we could get it from somewhere else, right?

Like from? It's general fund money, so if it was paid for out of, let's say, my department, it would also be general fund money.

David PenalozaItem —

Councilwoman, just because I've watched these meetings at home, I think it's important to note that a lot of the advertisements that are constantly playing almost 24-7 are for our pool hours, our park hours, our library hours, our community events, our fairs, our book clubs at the library, you know, children's preschool, whatever you name it, and community centers. So I think it's also a nice, because I questioned it too, but then I thought well you know it serves as an advertising outlet for outreach for the community with all the different events going on in the Parks

David PenalozaItem —

and Rec Department, which I didn't see a problem with. So that's how kind of I

I guess balanced it in my head. So then it's going to be coming then from the general fund money? Is that from the, I guess, the fund balance that we have?

Well it's, so the general fund has a number of revenue sources and Parks and Rec charges a number of expenses directly to the general fund and this expense as you can see in the staff report is charged to the general fund under that department.

Okay, but then, because I know that Parks and Rec has like a limited amount of funds, so now we're going to be using 15,000 more, but is it coming from our general fund balance, or is it, I guess that's what I'm not getting, where the money's coming from.

It wouldn't be coming from the general fund balance. It would be a part of the adopted budget for the Parks and Rec Department that you approved for the current fiscal year, and this is increasing it by 15,000 out of general fund revenues. Okay.

Sir, Councilman Salota.

Yeah, and the reason why I feel supportive is that's just where this department is housed. It's kind of always been there. And they do get other matching funds from time to time, like from the cable companies, et cetera. And if they didn't pay for advertising via this outlet, as Council Member Piniello is suggesting, they'd have to pay for private sector TV ads or social media ads or print. So, you know, because they're in charge, they're able to market their stuff, and that saves them dollars elsewhere so on the whole this seems reasonable. Any further

comments or questions? Seeing none I'll entertain a motion. Move the item. I'll second. The motion is second. All those in favor? Aye. Motion carries moving on to?

Council Member Sarmiento if I may respectfully request the excuse of the

absence of Mayor Polito. I will move that excuse absence. Is there a second? I'll second. All those in favor?

He did attend the closed session. Does he still need to be excused or does that not count?

Well, maybe we go in and if it's not necessary, then don't note it, but I do feel like he did attend and he had a reason.

There's a motion and a second. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed, motion carries. Madam Clerk, the next item.

Next item is 60A, approve a density bonus agreement to allow a 552 unit affordable rental project at 2110, 2114, and 2020 East First Street. Thank you.

Sarah, I think this is a continued item, so we already received a presentation from staff, so I'll go ahead and bring it back to the council unless there's any additional comments from staff, any changes from the last report that was provided to the city council?

No, sir, no changes.

Thank you. Councilman Soloray?

Yes, I've still been waiting for additional information from our staff and the applicant about parking and related issues. I know that there's some movement in addressing some outstanding questions that I and others have, but I'd like to suggest a two week continuance with support of my colleagues to do that because I am not prepared to support this item tonight for a variety of reasons.

Thank you, there's a motion to continue that. I see one of the applicants. Would you like to address the council?

Thank you, council members. Laura Archuleta, President and CEO of Jamboree Housing Corporation. Thank you for giving me some time to speak tonight. I just wanted to support what Councilmember Solorio mentioned. I think we have been making some good progress. There's been quite a bit of information turned into staff on our parking plan. As you know, this project's been in the works for over two years. It was a year ago that our density bonus agreement was actually approved by the Planning commission so it's taking quite some time to get here to the City Council. It's costing us right now a hundred thousand dollars a month in carrying

costs. We've already as you know also done all of the preliminary work on the site and we're now in a situation where we really are at a halt on the project so we're going to be working as quickly as possible to get that density bonus agreement in a form that the council members feel that you can support. We would like to request if there's any way to move forward with the precise grading permit, the public improvement permit, and the foundation only permit. We have discussed this with staff. They are open to that if we provide an indemnification should the council feel comfortable directing staff to do that. That way we

can at least keep moving over the next two weeks as we finalize the parking

plan for the project thank you I'll bring it back councilman

David PenalozaItem —

yeah thank you councilmember Salmiento I just had a question for our staff and I guess the applicant have any what's so far what's the status on the parking arrangements I know I have some discussions with the applicant and and the consultant about my parking concerns because this is you know again these are three four bedroom apartments with one parking spot per apartment which is just seems ridiculous to me and it will cause a huge concern and and parking issue in

David PenalozaItem —

that area like we've seen in other projects throughout the city so I just want to make sure that these plans you know that there are plans in place and you know I know that just you know communicating with the local businesses nearby about potentially using their lots their security issues that arise about these shuttles in the valley are these shuttles only gonna operate from you know 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. while people are getting home from work or in the morning when they're leaving what if you know one of the residents has an emergency at 2 in the morning and needs to get up and leave is there gonna be a

David PenalozaItem —

valet guy waiting outside to take him to his car you know four blocks down the the street to the Xerox building or whatever lot you guys have assigned so I know I had that that I requested of your office to supply us with the the sites located sites where this management plan is going to take place, hours of operation on any shuttles and ballets, actual agreements with the nearby businesses because that, you know, again, all these parking management plans sound fantastic, but are they going to come into fruitation at the end of the, when the project's completed?

David PenalozaItem —

And I know there was also a conversation about adding parking lifts in the garage and adding, leaving space in the parking structure and the electrical work for these parking lifts to come in to be installed easily if needed but I would like to see those implemented and installed from the get-go from construction and you know at the end of the day if they're not used well then you know guests have an extra parking spot to park in if they visit their family that's living in a four apartment again with one parking spot have any of these concerns that are

brought up to the applicant are they yeah the actual parking plans on the shuttle the valet agreement all of that was submitted to staff in May of 2018 including the site identification for the off-site parking so that has not been wrapped up I guess in a way that has made it to council for you to see where those sites are so we I think what we need to do is work with staff to pull out what was submitted back in 2018 along with anything current that you've asked for I know with the lifts we've talked about that the project as

approved under state density bonus law is approved at one-to-one one a little bit more than one-to-one that is the requirement per state law for this project we definitely want to make sure that we are meeting the demand and the needs out there and so that's why we agreed to when the density bonus was approved by Planning Commission to do this parking management plan and so parts of that have already like I said a year ago been submitted to staff and we'll just keep working to get you what we can to get you satisfied and and that

David PenalozaItem —

state law that you mentioned, I know that in that same state law that you know if the findings that may be used to deny concessions or waive any bonus density agreements, the concession or incentive, this is straight from the law, the concession or incentive is not required in order to provide for affordable housing costs as defined in section 552.5 of the Health and Safety Code or for or rents for the targeted units to be set as specified in subdivision C. The concession or incentive would have specific adverse impacts as defined in paragraph two of subdivision of section blah blah blah

David PenalozaItem —

upon public health and safety or the physical environment. So yes, it's state law, but that state law also says that we could deny this bonus density agreement if we find that there is public and safety concern to the surrounding areas and the public which comes into play how could in an emergency this if the residents need to access or cars that are you know three blocks away in the middle of the night I mean those are safety concerns and and and concerns to the public that I believe have merit to deny this because

David PenalozaItem —

again the parking is is it's very under parked and and any any parking arrangements that you guys make with the nearby businesses aren't permanent the the businesses could sell you know or move and the person whoever buys it's not gonna say oh yeah you know this is part of the purchase I have to to you park cars from the development, you know, five streets over. So I mean, just know that the same California law that you also states that.

That's correct, and that's what was considered by the Planning Commission a year ago, and not appealed under the due process time. And I don't know if the city attorney has anything else to add on that.

David PenalozaItem —

Was there an environmental impact report done on this project?

No, I would defer to our, our Council Member Pendelosa, I would defer to our planning department for the answers to those questions. Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor Pro Tem and members of the council. The project was exempt under state law as part of the CEQA exemption that they qualify for, so no EIR was conducted.

David PenalozaItem —

So if it was exempt, how would we as a city find or make these findings that there's a public

David PenalozaItem —

and safety concern, public health and safety concern to the residents that would live here or the nearby areas?

So the state law allows the projects that provide affordable housing latitude from the standard development requirements that we would normally apply to, you know, like a market rate project. So those things, those options, those tools are available to the applicant when they are proposing an affordable housing development. So that's what we have to work with.

Often time when those exemptions are activated, we have to basically use those exemptions unless we can prove otherwise.

And they have activated the request for the density bonus, the waivers, as well as the exemption under the state law.

Thank you.

Council Member Sarmiento. Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. So I'm going to second the motion to continue, so I didn't want us to get into too much of a discussion because it's gonna be brought back to us, I think, within the next couple of weeks. I'm not sure what the length of the continuance is that's requested. The only thing I would remind my colleagues as some thought between now and the next hearing is that this isn't the first time we've adopted a project with the ratio of one to one. So many cities have that. It's to incentivize especially this type of housing, affordable housing that we need. And let's recall where it is.

We're not impacting a neighborhood. There are no single family homes. There are no neighborhoods to the north, south, east, or west of this site. It's near all commercial property. So we don't have the same dilemma that we have with other projects that are built right up against neighborhoods where you have saturation into those into those neighborhood streets. So the last thing I would say is is mr City attorney or assistant city attorney if you can Make sure you remind us what our scope and authority is as a governing body of the City Council once this bit once this has been before

the Planning Commission the Planning Commission has and we have specific authority on this. There was no appeal within a certain right, so I'm very nervous about what our scope of discretion is on this approval. So we can, if we do find something that is a public safety concern, but look, that's a pretty high standard for us to be able to say this is gonna create some public harm or some potential distress to the public. So the way I read Code Section 41-645B, we're pretty limited in what we can do.

Essentially that is correct, Councilmember Sarmiento. The conditions under which this type of concession, a parking concession, maybe denied by a body are somewhat very limited, I should say, quite limited. And Councilmember Penaloza, you summed them up well. There has to be a public health or safety problem or an environmental problem. I would only add to that that has to be supported by substantial evidence, which is a bit of a higher standard. It would normally require findings by the council and the council to go on record with the type of evidence that it deemed substantial to support why exactly

there was a public health or safety or an environmental problem that justified the denial of this concession.

Good enough. So with that, I think we have some homework to do between now and the next meeting, so as the applicant as well. So I'll go ahead and support that motion to continue.

councilmember Iglesias and we also have one of the staff that would like to come

up okay so my my concern is and I know I met with the applicant last week regarding the parking and I agree with what councilmember Pena Loza is asking

when you have two or three bedroom apartments or I don't know if this um this project's gonna have four bedroom apartments I just think it's three right to just have one car it's significantly going to impact the surrounding area and one one question that I brought up to the applicant was and I know you guys are trying to see like a parking plan and all that but what happens in most of these low-income housing or even just market rate apartments, even in other sites of the cities,

is that, yeah, you may have one or two that are allowed under the contract to be in the apartment complex or the project, but then what happens is these individuals that live there, they'll do their own transportation. So what they do is they'll drive whoever it is to a neighboring to a neighborhood that's close by, they'll park their cars, and then they'll have someone transport them back, the one who has the permit to park within the project. And I know that happens a lot,

because I see it and it impacts the neighborhood. So the neighborhood that I see that's close to this, I think it's Cabrillo Park, I think close to the Cabrillo Park area, because I don't think they'll go into Teston, even though Teston is closer, but I don't think Teston allows half of the stuff that we allow here in Santa Ana. So I know they're going to go into Cabrillo Park and they're gonna be parking there and they'll be shuttling themselves over because if just one parking spot, it is going to significantly impact. So I know under the law, if it's significantly impact to a neighborhood,

then it could be considered a negative impact to that community. So I'm just not comfortable. And I know we have in the past approved the one-on-one, and I know I've been one vote on that one, which was the one on, I think it's the one on Spurgeon and Civic Center, the one with the church. But I know that they're planned too, but that's because we also have the city parking structure. And I believe that was part of the request that, you know, if we have like a shuttle or we have some type of valet,

that we may be able to use our parking structure which is across the street and it's not going to affect French Park Neighborhood Association. So with this one I'm just, I am not comfortable either because why do we have to have 522 units? Even though it's affordable housing, you know someone's making a profit.

So why is it 522? Why can't it be less so this way you have more parking for the individuals? because I believe if we do one thing for one person, we should do it for another. This comes back to the project on 2525. Remember that was a whole thing with the parking and so why is it good for one, not good for another? So I think across the board we have to be fair. So with this one, even though it's affordable housing and another thing with affordable housing that I have an issue with is that it's not only open to Santa Ana residents, that it's open to other people that can come And even though the priority, my understanding,

the priority is for Santa Ana residents, but that's not guaranteed. So I do have an issue with one parking, and so I am in agreement with what Council Member Piniello says saying, and I know it's gonna come back, but if that's not addressed in the next, I guess, presentation or the staff report, we're just gonna go back to square one, and I guess we're gonna have to deal with it.

Councilmember Iglesias, I would just clarify that federal law does prohibit us from making these available only to Santa Ana residents, however, the way, my understanding is the way our staff has developed policies, the wording of those policies or the implementation of those policies serves to achieve that outcome quite frequently, but the law itself does prohibit us from limiting these units to Santa Ana residents only.

No, and I get that, but why Santa Ana? It just goes back to everything, like why Santa Ana, the homeless, why Santa Ana? You know, income housing, why Santa Ana? I mean, like I said, if we had maybe 300 units of low-income housing instead of 522, you would have your two-to-one ratio of the parking spot.

Councilmember Solorio.

Just a couple things. First, we obviously still have a lot of questions, including on parking, and we haven't gotten the responses and information that we'd like, but I really agree with Councilwoman Iglesias as well that for precedent and for treating everybody equal, we just gotta, for example, like with the parking management plan, have a template that we're comfortable with and that fully mitigates cars that leave, that you may think don't leave, but we all know from the real world that they won't tell you they have four cars when they really do because they'll park them somewhere else.

And so who's going to monitor that, follow up on complaints, if there are penalties, as it says, who's going to collect the money, what's our share, what's your share, but again, for precedent and for equalness, we got to get that down because we always mention this parking management plan, but I probably have yet to see one, even though I've asked for one, either a final one or a template or a draft. And so until I get that and feel comfortable with it, I'm not gonna approve any more projects like this. I do think that in this city and in other cities, we need more housing, and that's part of what increases the cost of housing.

So we do have demand for affordable housing. We had some here earlier today. Affordable housing, market rates, students, senior, et cetera, but we just gotta make sure that the parking and the infrastructure's there. And I think that's where the frustration is is that we don't as much mind the housing and the folks in town, but it's under-parked. And it's been error after error, and if we don't correct it, we'll be like that easement where we'll be here 96 years later or whatever, and somebody approved something wrong because no one looked at the documents. That's what happened with the Olson project

that we inherited on, or I inherited on First and Pacific where it's severely under-parked, day one, very nice condominiums, and people don't fit on the site. And it's embarrassing that they're saying, why did the city of Santa Ana approve this if there's not enough parking given that people park the way they do? And so if we don't correct this on the front end, we'll be with that situation where, yeah, we kind of have a little bit of oversight, but we can't control it now, because it's built, it's there, they have property rights, et cetera. So getting this thing down for this project and others

is very important and if it isn't ready in two weeks,

stronger so we can have a real discussion with real facts and information and promises that are complete, not empty with a lot of loopholes, don't bring it back. Let's get this right. I mean, we mentioned the shuttle and the valet and the valet I like it because it's a dignified way of doing that but again, like Councilman Piniello said, what are the hours, what are the procedures, when is it triggered that you gotta do this, when do you stop, there's a number of questions not answered already, and we need to take our time to do this right, so with that, I think that's why we need a continuous, thank you.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you Mr. Mayor Pro Tem, and I understand that this area of town, there aren't any residences nearby aside from 1901 across the street, which has their own parking issues, but what I'm worried about is the impact with the residents that will live in this affordable housing unit. You know, it's their quality of life as well. Absolutely. And these are going to be low-income families, and they're going to have that parking issue, which brings me back to the public health of the California Code. If it's affecting the public health and it has an adverse effect, we could deny this because,

David PenalozaItem —

and I'm thinking public health again it's opened up for interpretation of whatever attorney sees it. I could see public health as saying you know what this person this poor old lady her kids can't visit her because they have nowhere to park. They can't you know families can't visit each other because they have nowhere to park. They can't have any gatherings at home because there's nowhere to park. That that affects quality of life and someone's public health whether it's mental whether it's people that affects somebody it stresses people out because you can't find parking and those are issues that

David PenalozaItem —

need to get addressed before any of these things could get I feel approved so it's a you know it's I'd like to see I even mentioned to the applicant and the meeting that I had with them last a week that I would be even be open to seeing making 25% of this complex market rate to offset the cost of adding another floor or two to the parking structure or whatever. I mean, I don't know what, I know there was some legal obstacles and hurdles with the financing because of that.

Well, we're also a nonprofit, so we can't do much market rate in our developments. But can you do any? We can do some, but this project is already way too far, I mean this project has already closed on its financing based on the Planning Commission approval and so to program, to make the changes here now. We two, three years ago met with council and changed it from as I think my team explained from seniors, have seniors to family. So it's rolling, you know.

David PenalozaItem —

Just to remind everybody out there that the Planning Commission serves as a recommending body, not any approving body. So they make a recommendation to the city council, and us as the city council, I know I mentioned it two weeks ago, Councilwoman Iglesias and I had been up here six months, and no one ever approached me with this project. I hadn't heard of it, I knew nothing about it, until last council meeting. So these are conversations that I feel, I wish we could have moving forward with yourself. I'm sure there'll be more projects along the way

David PenalozaItem —

in Santa Ana with Jamboree and any other applicant out there or developer for that matter so I mean that that's just something that always remember that the Planning Commission serves as a recommending body not a not approving body or anything and the City Council has final discretion on what we should allow in any you know parking or unit construction we have a motion and a second

for continuous all those in favor say aye aye those opposed motion carries thank

you item 60 where are we 60 B item 60 B that's correct item 60 B mr. mayor pro tem I did I had asked for this to be continued because we need to do more in in terms of security citywide, there's a related but separate project later in the agenda. For right now, because this is a minimal amount, I'm fine supporting it, but we do need to continue to improve and clean up the rest of our city.

So is there a motion, so what you're asking is to continue or approve today?

I'm fine supporting it, but I don't want us to lose sight of the fact that there are many other security and cleanup issues that we have in town.

Agreed, agreed. Is there a second? Question, Council Member Iglesias?

Okay, so the amount that you're asking us to increase by is 53,000. What does that bring to us? Is it 24 hour service? How many security guards? How many, I know it's Monday through Friday, is it?

Okay. I will defer to the Director of Parks and Rec on the specific scope for it, but it is for security services at the Santa Ana Work Center, which does need some attention right now. But I don't know the exact hours of a deployment by the security guards.

Is it the Community Development Agency, no? Yes, Community Development.

Good evening, it's Monday through Friday, 8 to 5, for security services at our job center, the Santa Ana Work Center.

Then what happens on the weekends?

We're closed.

You state your name for the record. My name's Carlos de la Riva, City of Santa Ana employee.

Very good, is there any other questions?

So the $1,002,000 is just for Monday through Friday, what are the hours?

No, the $1.5 million is to secure other city sites.

Okay, so then for the work center, what's the total amount that we're allocating?

$53,428.

For May and June?

No, the contract goes through May 31, 2020.

So what's the monthly amount then that you're asking us?

Our city manager is so well calculated. Let me also say that it is partially grant funded as well, so it's not all city.

For just doing 12 months, which would be to May 31st, 2020, it's roughly $4,400 a month.

$4,400 a month? Yes. If I did my math correctly. So it's just like to pay for a security guard, then just one person?

Right.

Thank you.

I'm attending the board meetings as an alternate and she has expressed to be the primary representative

is that okay I've enjoyed representing the city I'm learning so much on what can go into this

David PenalozaItem —

Is there a second? Isn't there an alternate that we need to appoint? I'd like to volunteer.

With alternate?

David PenalozaItem —

Yeah. In the moment that, in the case that Cecilia Iglesias can attend. Okay, so that's the motion.

Second. All those in favor? Aye. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion passes.

May your presentation, who motioned?

That's the motion and the second one's from Salonio.

Thank you. Before they change their minds.

Before they change their minds, exactly. We're moving on to 85A, is that correct? I have one speaker card here. Mr. Dale Helvick.

Good evening, Mayor Pro Tem and council members and city staff. The discussion is on Senate Bill 50, and you may not be aware, you may be aware that Chairman

Portatino never allowed that bill to get out of committee. So you may think that it's not an issue anymore, but it really is. It could be resurrected by him changing his mind. It could be gutted and amended and resurfaced in a different format. but all the discussion you guys had tonight on 60A, you wouldn't have anymore if Senate Bill 50 passes. It would essentially say, we don't need the Planning Commission to approve these projects if they're all affordable housing. They won't come to you guys anymore. You'll have no say.

So the one-on-one parking, done deal. You guys would have to do it. if you approve an all affordable housing project, they get all those density bonus agreements, they get all the parking variances, they get all the setbacks without your approval. So hopefully you guys take a look, a serious look at this and voice your opposition to this Senate bill, whether it's now or when it gets resurrected, you know, because it'll probably come back in January 2020 when Senator Wiener reintroduces it. It's a terrible thing to do.

These density bonus agreements would also take that project on 60A and allow it to go to eight stories because they get an additional three stories under the new requirements of Senate Bill 50. So you talk about high density, you're really gonna see high density in projects that are all affordable housing. So we gotta be careful on these types of projects. You know if they have market rate in there, then you have some wiggle room to start arguing with the parking spaces and everything. So I don't know why we're even discussing

these parking spaces issue on 6EA anyway, because my understanding, they have those exemptions. They don't have to change it from the 1.02 that they're currently at. They already have those density bonus agreements for this project, they're being nice if they go up to 1.5 or whatever, but we're stuck with this. You know, it's a terrible thing, so thanks.

Thank you, Mr. Helvick. Councilmember Iglesias, this is your item?

So I understand that the bill has been shelved, and then, but like Mr. Dale, the speaker just before me, he mentioned that it could be brought up at any time. So one of the things, you know, we belong to the League of California Cities, and I know they sent us an action alert that states that specifically what Senate Bill would do, Senate Bill 50 would do, it would greatly undermine locally adopted general plans, housing elements, and sustainable community strategies. Yeah, so it would allow developers

to override state approved housing plans and SB 50 would seriously call to question the need for cities to develop these community-based plans and the justification for spending millions of state and local funds on the planning process also what it does Senate bill 50 gives away planning and zoning decisions to the developers and the transit agencies so what this means is housing developers and transit agencies would have the power to determine housing densities, heights up to 55 feet, parking requirements, and design review standards for transit-rich housing projects within one-half mile of the major transit stop.

So for those transit-rich housing projects within one-quarter mile radius of a stop on a high-quality bus corridor, developers would be able to determine housing density and parking requirements above 0.5 spots per unit. It also creates a difficult to define the terms. So as presently drafted, the way it's been shelved, it's very difficult to determine what constitutes a jobs rich area since the Department of Housing and Community Development and the Office of Planning and Research are largely tasked with making that decision. So what it's going to do also is going to provide greater density and no transportation solutions.

So SB 50 would require cities to allow greater density in communities that are high opportunity and jobs rich but may lack access to public transit. So this seems at odds with many state policies that encourage and incentivize more dense housing near transit so that individuals may become less dependent on automobiles. And another thing is it creates arbitrary and unfair exemptions because what SB 50 allows some communities to be exempt if they develop their own plan that is consistent with the objectives of the bill. And SB 50 also allows small cities and small

counties to be exempt from the most extreme provisions. So one of the things that the Leagues of Cities are advising us is shouldn't all jurisdictions have the ability to have a community-led planning process that takes into account local needs and input as long as the state objectives are still met. So instead of arbitrarily establishing a population metric, it would be much more appropriate to consider the full range of community characteristics when determining which areas of the state SB 50 should apply. But like you know, like what's shared, it's been

shelved so no action was taken in the Appropriations Committee. But with your permission, I would like to ask staff if we could still consider sending a letter of opposition to this bill that was authorized by Senator Wiener.

And then also, you know, so it's sending this letter of opposition and also watching it with, you know, with the League of the California Cities for us to still be alerted on what's happening with this bill because it could come up at any time.

Thank you. Is there any other comments? Council Member Salorio?

Yeah, just a few brief points. You know, it was shelved, but, you know, very quickly, the Senate leader authorized that that if he wanted to bring it back in the second year, in the same form he could. I mean, we're gonna see a variety of changes to this bill, because obviously they know that they have issues with it, but I do think just to send the message that there's a lot of broad opposition to this. I'm supportive of sending a letter and encouraging them to be more mindful, particularly of cities that are trying to do the right thing. And finally, with policy, you also gotta look at unintended consequences.

One of the things I worry about this bill if it goes forward in places like Orange County and even Santa Ana, guess what, all of a sudden you may have cities or transportation agencies say, let's take out those bus lines because those bus lines that right now go, you know, 10 minute intervals are causing this requirement. So if you remove the bus line, no more requirements you know, per this bill. Same with something like a streetcar. You know, if we don't like this bill because of what it's gonna do for our density with lack of infrastructure, maybe we don't need a streetcar

because it's gonna authorize and create a lot of problems. So, you know, I have a variety of worries with this bill because, believe me, in places like Orange County, people would very quickly say, you know what, the bus line in South Orange County THAT GOES TOO FREQUENTLY. LET'S TAKE IT OUT. OR LET'S MAKE IT NOT SO FREQUENT. AND THAT HURTS A LOT OF FOLKS INCLUDING PEOPLE FROM SANTA ANA THAT GO DOWN THERE FOR WORK OR PLEASURE WHATEVER IT MIGHT BE. THERE ARE A LOT OF ISSUES WITH IT. NOT THAT IT CAN'T BE IMPROVED. IT'S GOOD FOR US TO WEIGH IN.

IS THERE A MOTION?

I will.

Make a motion to approve?

Yeah, make a motion to approve.

Is there a second?

David PenalozaItem —

Oh, I'll second it. Okay.

All those in favor say aye. Aye.

And I'm going to abstain on this one just because I, well, again I think that the bill is procedurally dead. If it comes back we can always send it back to committee, we can always come up with a response then, and that's normally what we did when I chaired the committee, so I'm going to abstain on procedural reasons. Very good.

Councilmember Francis, I think it may be helpful for you to clarify the motion. I think I understand it, but I think it would be helpful for the record to clarify the motion and to confirm the direction of the council.

So the motion is to direct staff to send a letter in opposition of Senate Bill 50.

Thank you.

I'd like to include some of the concerns and comments that you've heard tonight, consistent with the position.

ITEM 85B, WE HAVE TWO SPEAKERS. VIRGINIA BERNAL, AND MAKE THAT THREE SPEAKERS. AND SUMAN BASHIN, COME FORWARD. AND KAYLA LEVITT.

Welcome. Good evening, members of City Council.

We'll talk about something a little bit that seems more distant, but actually we'll hit home soon enough. It has a little bit to this far. We recommend that you, the City Council, seriously consider a city resolution urging our U.S. Congress to pass the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act, H.R. 763.

Santa Ana's Climate Action Plan of 2015 is evidence of the City Council's vision, yet its full implementation has been difficult to fund. Federal enactment of H.R. 763 would ease the city's task. As important as local action is, we still need national action because climate change is a global phenomenon. I have been a resident of Santa Ana 41 years, where I have raised my two sons. I now have three grandchildren. I am an immigrant and naturalized citizen.

The future climate extremes and consequent social disruption for our young people concerns me very much. As does that of our country and of my countries of origin, we're already experiencing unusual extreme weather events. Our own climate experts and those of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, warn us of increasing and catastrophic risk if we

do not reduce our emissions to net zero by 2050. A Congress of the highest caliber recommend a policy of carbon fee and dividend as the most effective to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Over 100 municipalities around the country passed resolutions asking Congress to transition our country to clean energy via this policy, which is now incorporated in the Energy Innovation Act. Even our California legislators did so in 2016, with Assembly Joint Resolution number 43

relative to greenhouse gases.

Consider also that the dividend, what the dividend will mean to our local economy. Our city will benefit in that the dividend will be a significant economic stimulus for the city. I have submitted some handouts that speak to some of the comments I'm making.

Thank you, thank you very much. Your time is up, so we're going to, thank you Virginia.

Thank you.

Next speaker.

Good evening, and thank you for giving me this time. I'm Suman, resident of Santa Ana. I'm a member of Citizens Climate Lobby. and a concerned human being. Over a decade, our volunteers have asked their Congress to work together to solve climate change. Now we have Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act of 2019, which is HR 763 in the House. This bill is effective. that can reduce America's emission by 40% in the first 12 years.

It is good for people and good for our economy. This bill is revenue neutral. It does not grow. The government rather helps American people. I am passionate about this bill because it is a bipartisan bill. It is a policy that interests both Democrats and Republicans as well. The majority of Americans support Congress taking action on climate change, including more than half Republicans.

In the current divisive politics, we must address climate change as a bridge issue, not a wedge issue. HR 763 is a shovel-ready project that is separate but very compatible with the Green New Deal. I hope and wish our City Council will consider this as a resolution and pressure on Congress to move this policy into law. Thank you.

Thank you. Ms. Kayla Levitt.

Hello again. Thank you for your time. I am a member of Citizens Climate Lobby, and I think that this bill is one of the most effective climate policies that I've seen. It's great that it was introduced bipartisan in Congress because many environmental policies are very polarizing. So the things that I really like about this bill is that it corrects for a market failure because polluting our atmosphere should not be free. And all of the carbon

taxes get returned equally per person. And so economists have proven that it actually brings out the lower and middle class so that they come out ahead with this dividend. And And it doesn't grow government because it uses existing tax and refund infrastructure, so it's not complicated like other climate policies we've seen, such as cap and trade. So I urge the council to write a letter of support endorsing this bill and to look further into it. Thank you.

Thank you very much. That's the last speaker. Councilmember Sarmiento, this is your item.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. And in the interest of time, I think the request really is on the 85A simply for this to be brought back to the council for its full consideration of a resolution and support. So tonight would be simply giving direction so that resolution could be drafted and be considered at the next meeting. Given the information that was provided, the only background I would add is that four members of our congressional delegation from this county have signed on to this bill. Congressman Ruda, Congressman Cisneros, Congressman Levin, and Congresswoman Porter.

So and I should mention that my Commissioner Larry Hitterdale who's also my neighbor brought this forward and he wasn't able to be here tonight But then sent these lovely ladies to go ahead and speak on behalf of his support So that would be my request of the City Council and staff to simply bring it back so we can consider it in a more full-throated discussion Thank you Councilmember Iglesias

My question is, you mentioned the four congressional representatives, but you didn't mention our congressional representative, Congressman Correa.

As of our last time I checked, he had not signed on yet, unless you have any more recent information.

Well, he can bring it back, and then we'll maybe know if he signed on or not. Just going to give the staff direction of putting this together and bringing it back for our consideration.

Okay, I just feel it's more like a, I would feel more comfortable if we even had our congressman backing this before we even gave you directions. So, and I understand the intent of the resolution, but just me, myself, I'm not comfortable in moving forward, something that I haven't heard from our congressman, you know, where he stands on it. So for this purpose I'm not gonna vote no on it, but I'll just abstain.

Actually we don't need a vote on this. What I'll do is I will prepare a resolution and it will come back before you to make a decision on.

Just direction to go prepare something.

Mayor Patten. Just a couple things. I'm supportive. I mean I do think we have a climate change crisis on our earth, and we do need to take substantial meaningful actions to address it. With respect to kind of the order of, do we follow our congress member or vice versa, really for the people it's better when it goes the other way, where we suggest to our congress members or other legislators to do the right thing on those things that we might value. I'm fine with it coming back in a couple of weeks. I just don't know really whether it should be a resolution or just a letter.

Sometimes doing a reso can complicate things, as well as bills do change. And so I would just leave that as a thought for the council member that brought this forward and the staff, but just another thought, just because also in terms of preparing, getting colleagues and others to better understand it, And then at the end of the day, all the people just see are organizations for and organizations against, and unfortunately people don't go into the minutia of reading word for word, other people's results or letters. So, but I appreciate.

Sure, I'd be willing to amend the direction to say prepare both, maybe a letter and a resolution for our consideration.

Okay, we can do that.

Council Member Peñalosa.

David PenalozaItem —

Thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. I just wanted again, thank Council Member Sarmiento. appreciate the thought on this. It's something that we definitely need to have been doing 60 years ago. This is something that's very, you know, it's impacting everyone around the world, literally, and so just thank you for that. But I would like to hear, like Councilwoman Iglesias said, from our congressman's, local congressman's office, see what he thinks on this bill as well but I am supportive in moving that direction. Great thanks so

there's no vote which is direction. I received direction to return with a letter and a

resolution for your consideration. Excellent we're gonna move on to item 85C

David PenalozaItem —

Councilmember Solorio. Is this a sub resolution that we'll see two weeks from now?

I believe the request was to return in two weeks with the item.

David PenalozaItem —

Okay, good.

Thank you Mayor Portima, Villegas. This item informally has been discussed in different settings, including our budget committee. This is really just more of a concept. You know, I am open to any suggestions that any of my colleagues have. I just think it's timely given that we're gonna start working on our budget, measure acts. I do worry that if we're not mindful of prioritizing homeless services as we are thinking about spending Measure X, if we don't dedicate resource to things like this, all that Measure X money's gonna vanish, and the community's not gonna see much benefit on the homeless services side.

So I've been, as the rest of us, wrestling on what can we do to make a meaningful difference. I think given the city attorney's office, PD, and code enforcement on railroads, we've made some meaningful headways, and I know we'll be hearing more about that, and we've got a memo on that, so I think there we're making progress. But our parks, and what I envision is that five parks in each ward, we could see what are most worthy based on calls for service, encampments, issues, closeness to children,

the more sensitive areas and true metrics. And then we have other city assets or areas that we are responsible for like the creek, Santiago Park, city-owned bike trails that also are, you know, routes to school and not to be safe routes to school, and between some very unfortunate incidents that have occurred in all parts of town, including North Santana, and just a day or two ago, there was a very frightening situation with the ring camera, somebody caught, you know, a naked man high on drugs,

making threats and obscenities in the south part of town, you know, there's more and more of these stories, and there's a lot of trauma going on. Whether you're, you know, a single man, or an elderly man, or a single woman, or a child, you know, situations like that, if you're a child, it's going to be traumatic for a long time, and there'll be that continued worry. So we really need to do something in terms of starting something quick and ramping up, but also ramping down, because we don't want to lock in a lot of staff costs and pension costs through hiring, as well as it would take us a long time to hire,

and we literally have no real park ranger program, because we do have a supervisor, but no park rangers. This is the only way I see that we can make any kind of meaningful dent, and the idea is to negotiate with our current provider, Allied Universal Services, to secure these. The idea would be, you know, So if we give proper direction that staff would negotiate something and bring back some proposals that then would go into the budget. This contract, as we heard earlier too, it goes originally through about 2020, as we discussed earlier.

So that will give us time to provide oversight on is it worth it, do we change it, do we need a separate RFP, but we have to do something. and again I'm open to suggestions, thoughts. We just have to do something because the city is desperate for solutions on this and Measure X dollars, we're already taxing people. So we're already getting people saying, where's our money? We're taxing people to the tune of $60 million and even for this last quarter in the fiscal year, we could collect upwards of 15 million bucks and where the homeless services that were

the main reason that we passed this and how it was marketed I appreciate that we can use it for a wide variety of things but this is you know I think top priority for for our community and in my colleagues and very open to you know thoughts and direction from my remaining colleagues thank you councilmember

Mayor Iglesias.

I thank you Council Member Solorio for bringing things up for us to discuss. I agree with most of what you said about providing the services to our constituents and making sure that the Measure X money is allocated and spent on the issues and items that the voters voted on to ensure that the money was spent on services for the city and not on raises for our police department.

And I know that this is an issue that brings a lot of debate on where the money's going to go to. and I know that we have right now and correct me if I'm wrong Christine I'm Madam City Manager are we going out for an RFP because I believe that's something that we talked about in our edit meeting that we and also I think and maybe in your safety committee with the with you know I think that's where Penia

Councilmember Peña-Los and Mayor Pro Tem Villegas sit on for us to provide security, I guess, security guards or security officers at our parks.

You're correct, Councilmember Iglesias. Some time ago there was discussion on contracting for security in the parks, and so the police department along with the parks and rec department, they started to draft a scope of services. At that time they were really looking at a scope of services that included just an individual opening and closing gates and opening and closing restrooms and the RFP was never released and based on the request from Councilmember Solario to have this item on I view this as actually an expansion So we're going to need to take some time to do the scope of services to determine

You know how many which parks what number of hours do we want them armed? Do we want them working in pairs? We want them individual? there's a lot that we're going to research to get the scope of services. We could certainly procure those services by either negotiating with the current contract with Allied Universal, or we could do an RFP.

Just for my purposes, I would just so the process can be clear and transparent, because right here we don't even know how much money we're going to be allocating. So for me, it would be going through the RFP process, Because I know there's just more than one security service company out there that may want to apply for this service, to provide the service to our city. And also, how much money have you received from Measure X, do we know?

We anticipated to receive for the current fiscal year approximately $15 million. We have not received all of that to date.

So then we would be, if we go now and provide it to allied services then it's kind of like where would that money come from?

When I would return for you with the contract for your approval I would identify where the funding source would be at that time after I determine what the amount is and then I'd be able to determine where I can obtain those funds.

Because right now just looking at the money that we just gave them, you know, an authorization for them to provide at the Santiago, I guess, for the work center. I mean, they're up to like 1.4 million already. So I'm wondering how much would it cost to provide these services here? And then do we even have that money in the general fund balance?

Since this is a priority and it is one of the issues that several of you have expressed concerns with, we would make it a priority and we would find the funding to achieve this. I think the challenge is going to be once we determine the scope of services, meeting with Allied Universal or any other company to determine if they have the means to provide that. And then I also know that timeliness is important. You would rather they were deployed yesterday as opposed to two months down the road. Yeah.

No, and I know that it's needed service, but I mean I want it to be done because this is something that I've been asking from the beginning that we need securities at our park because I know our police department can't provide this this service as much as they would want to but they're limited with with police officers so it's something that I've always asked is like why can't we have security I mean the public really doesn't care where the safety service comes from as long as that they feel safe in their parks and their neighborhoods so but my concern is with the process because you know we do have

this and you know this company already but the money I guess it hasn't been allocated yet so it would be something that we would have to put in for this

fiscal year right no you know since it's my purple let me say a couple of things on the bus and how I envisioned it number one is going to take time to talk to this vendor or others, get a scope, get a sense of cost. Really it'd be something that would roll into the next fiscal year so that in June when we're approving the budget, hopefully there'll be something like this that then would take an effect at the following of fiscal year like everything else. Process wise, I'm open to maybe having a couple of vendors, because it might take that also just to staff up, or partial this in a new RFP.

My worry just about doing only a brand new RFP, believe us, and the trash country is a good example, some of these RFPs can take two, three years, or even on a quick process with a brand new RFP. I envision something like this taking three to six months easy, and so that then is three to six months that we're not providing these kinds of services to our residents, so maybe it's a hybrid where we do some via an existing contract

and some other process, but I just worry that

three, six months, nine months is a long time to wait.

To go back on your timeline,

so what would be the time, because I remember when I was in contracts administration, if something was a priority, we could do it within 90 days. So we have to have a project schedule. Okay, we want it done by this time. then we gotta start now and then we could have like you know the the different I guess processes that went into place though we could do it within 90 days if that's a priority what's the fastest that we could do it here with the city

are you referring to doing an RFP process? an RFP correct so we could do an expedited RFP process we get to establish the deadline as to when the responses come in if you shorten it too much you you do limit the number of responses that you will be receiving, and it also is dependent upon the complexity of the scope of services. But we can establish a deadline for an RFP, you know, 30 days, 45 days, 60 days, we could set that to ourselves.

So if it's a priority and then it would be for next fiscal year, then it would be July 1st, right?

It would be pretty hard to have that completed by June 30th to be in place July 1st. So then we could, so what's the fastest, 90 days?

I, we could, yeah 90 days we would be able to get it done.

And with council approvals and stuff, and that's the other thing in notice, I mean it's pretty much a month just a council process and then noticing there for the general public is about another month in noticing and timeline, so it's just two months right there. So three, four months expedited, and maybe they could come back with a timeline

CONSIDERALLY GOING OVER TO THIS. IF WE GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS GO OVER TO THIS

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David PenalozaItem —

I agree. I would like to see information on this if we were to move in this direction because it's needed. I would like to see the type of service we would be getting at these parks. I would want to see, I know that that security guards and security companies have that stigma of not really being the most at the core of the quality. I would like to see quality security company patrolling our parks and with that said I know I mentioned this at the Public Safety Committee I would if we were to go down this this direction I would like to see branding on the security guards at these parks I know that even just me

David PenalozaItem —

personally thinking of my teenage years I just you know really not care for for a a security guard chasing me out of a mall after hours or whatnot, but if I saw a security guard with a Santa Ana branded, kind of like our code enforcement officers or our volunteers, Santa Ana branded, Santa Ana badge, I would have more respect for them at a park. It would be more of an authority figure and kind of official versus having an outside company. We could go that route, but say, hey,

David PenalozaItem —

but you gotta use our uniform and our badge. So that's something that I would like if we do go this direction. So just to bring back those options whenever that comes before us, I'd appreciate that. Because that would also look better and resonate with the community more if I'm at the park and I see somebody that's representing my city. and and Santa Ana that I would also make me feel better as a resident we can

certainly consider that and another thing would be to look to other cities that have done this I have been told that Anaheim recently deployed private security within their parks so we can learn from their lessons as well thank

you so the staff is clear on direction and that person that sent us that video I ran into that person today. And yeah, it's heartbreaking and it's frustrating to hear all that information. We do need to address this. So, okay, so we're gonna move on with the meeting. Just wanna thank my colleagues on that and we all look forward to working with the staff. Thank you. Thank you for bringing it up, Councilmember Salorio.

Regarding the work study session.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Mayor Pro Tem. I was simply gonna suggest, you know, it's 11 o'clock. I'm gonna have to duck out pretty soon. This is a really important substantive discussion that we need to have. The mayor isn't here. I understand his father wasn't feeling well, so he had to leave for the meeting. I don't know how long we have before approval is. I think we have two additional meetings. I just wanna know whether we're gonna be as awake and alert right now at this time to be able to ask the relevant questions and be as engaged as we possibly could, but do we have an estimate on time for the presentation?

We did keep it fairly brief. It does go over just the proposed budget and the capital improvement program and then the strategic plan recommendation. We could move through it rather quickly and then at least maybe get some preliminary feedback because we are by law, obviously, we have to have an approved budget for the start of the fiscal year, which is July. So we were attempting to, and maybe it's too tight of a timeline, to bring back for you the first meeting in June, the introduction of the ordinance to approve the budget.

I mean, I'll go ahead and defer to the majority will of the council, but just something to consider, I know again, it's tough to tackle something so important again.

Because I'm sure there's gonna be a lot of questions. Right.

It's sometimes not even the presentation, it's what it evokes, right, from up here. So unless we all say we're gonna limit our questions.

No, we have questions.

We will follow whatever direction you choose.

Well, I'm comfortable with moving forward, but if you give us a five-minute bathroom break.

Give us a five-minute presentation.

No, no, a bathroom break.

Oh, a five-minute bathroom break. Okay, well, let's take a five-minute break real quick.

Five minutes.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

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Okay, let's go ahead and restart the meeting. We have staff for the presentation.

Okay.

I know we're short a council member or two, but we can begin.

You want me to begin? All right, so before you, Ann, I'm going to ask the finance director as well as the public and the public works director to move very stealthily through these items so that we can respect the late hour of the night. Please. But it is a pleasure to introduce this work study session. We did a draft operating budget, a draft capital improvement plan, and then we need to touch on the strategic plan just a bit because that is something that is expiring with the current fiscal year. As they move through, I hope you will see that we have allocated a lot of dollars to some of the priorities that we have learned.

We have a more than a balanced budget and our draft capital improvement program invests nearly 60 million dollars in improvements to our city. So with that I will turn it over to the finance director and once again ask that you move stealthily.

I will do that. Thank you. Okay we have an agenda here. I'm sure you can read that yourself in the agenda packet but it gives you an idea of what the topics that we're going to cover. Just quickly, we did do the community outreach and input in compliance with the Sunshine Ordinance. We held five community meetings with a total of 153 participants. We tried to summarize the input that we received from those participants on slide four.

We heard things like that the residents wanted a strategic plan for youth, new programs for for youth, clean and safe parks, enhancing the security at parks. They had some ideas for new revenue, that was nice. And they were interested in seeing more library services, improving pedestrian and traffic safety, among other things. We threw out five different survey questions from the departments. And so this is not a scientific survey, but on slide five you'll see the results of those survey questions, what the top average answers were.

On slide number, I guess that would be slide number six, there's a very, very detailed slide with the specific comments that we received via orally and comment cards, so you can read that at your leisure later on. Our draft general fund budget for the revenue side of things we think is going to be about 316.7 million this does include your new measure X money and the S our initial estimate of 60 million as well as your other traditional revenue sources and we do have a total estimate in there for

the cannabis revenue of 10.8 million that does include all three sources being medical retail and the commercial the other pie slice there looks rather large but it includes things like permit fees for six million dollars plan checks three million dollars fine revenue for six million dollars paramedic service charge for four million dollars so it gives you an idea of the variety of things that are in that other pie slice and you can see that the majority of our revenue really does come from property tax and sales tax then we have our draft fiscal year 1920 general fund expenditure budget,

which right now is sitting at 315 million. This is a draft budget. Per usual, our primary expenditures are for the public safety. We also, let's see, we received 43 million dollars in supplemental budget requests from the departments, but we did not have that much to work with. And so the city manager conducted hearings and listened to all of the supplemental budget requests and has made some recommendations for what might go in the draft general fund budget. I would like to point out that we also have

in this expenditure pie the transfer of two-thirds of our expected cannabis revenue. Just the retail and commercial portion of that cannabis revenue is estimated to be 9.3 million. So two thirds of that would be 6.2 million that we'd be transferring to that new fund that has been established by ordinance of the city council. And let's see, is there anything else? So this budget, the supplemental budget requests that were added, they do address to maintain effective 911 response,

address homelessness, and maintain parks. So we tried to prefer supplemental budget requests that met the spirit of Measure X. Some of the enhancements that have been included in the draft general fund budget include creation of a library department to increase youth programming. This would be with a library services director at the helm to be able to do that. funding to provide maintenance and repairs of parks and facilities, addition of two code enforcement officers, a dedicated public works budget to enhance homelessness efforts.

This includes four full-time positions as part of the quality of life team. The addition of two full-time positions and other improvements at the zoo, and then dedicated funding to address deferred maintenance at various city facilities.

In addition to the general fund, which is our primary operating fund of the city, we also have restricted funds that we need to adopt budgets for. Restricted money, of course, means that it comes from somewhere else with strings attached, spending restrictions, if you will. And so we have a variety of restricted revenue sources, and this is just a summary of what our budget is shaping up to be for those funds. The large green piece there is for our enterprise funds, which of course includes our water and sewer, parking operations, those kinds of things. We have our grant funds in here, our capital expenditures,

and then so all of our restricted monies are represented in this pie.

On slide number 11, we have a preview of what some of our anticipated changes to our fees are. So our fees are adjusted each year, generally by CPI. This last year, that was a 3.92% increase. However, we do check to make sure that we are not exceeding the city's actual cost. So we'd expect to bring the reso to you on June 4th at the next meeting for the details on these fee modifications.

On the next slide here, we have proposed workforce changes. Again, this resolution would also come to you on June 4th. So our largest staffing increases, as you can see in this pie, or in this bar chart, is with the police department, 14 being charged to the general fund, public works, and parks and rec, again to maintain the effective 911 response, address homelessness and infrastructure, and then to expand parks and recreation services.

And with that, we're at the CIP portion of the presentation. Is that quick enough?

Okay. Go ahead.

So when do we ask the questions? Is it now or is it later?

I would defer to Mayor Pro Tem if he wants us to finish and do the questions at the end or take questions as we go along.

Let's go ahead and do the math.

Go ahead, Mr. Pro Tem.

I'll try to move faster than our finance director. So let's see here.

So basically our CIP is critical to keep our infrastructure functioning and in a state of good repair. It includes a variety of projects from street improvements, utilities, parks, and facilities. Funding comes from different sources, mostly grants and special funds and enterprise funds. As you can see from this pie chart, our dependence on the general fund is almost 0.3%. So most of the money comes from other sources.

We have in our CIP, we have a one-inch thick binder that has detailed lists of project by project. We try to group the projects in four different categories. Street improvements, we have allocated about 15.2 million. For traffic improvements, about 9.7 million. Utility, drainage, lighting, that includes sewer, water, all these projects, about 28 million. and for city facilities, 5.6 million. As I said, we have details on every project, on every program. For example, for street improvements, the 15.2 million,

we divide it into several, in three categories. Some projects are in planning and design phase, and then we have roadway improvements. We have about 12 projects worth about 10.5 million, and another two projects on sidewalk and streetscape, worth about $4 million.

On the traffic improvement side, we have four projects in the planning, worth about $725,000. Four projects on traffic signals, and then almost $8.5 million to be spent on mobility, safety, active transportation projects.

On the public utility drainage improvements, we've allocated about $28.5 million. And as I said earlier, those are projects that are invested in improving our infrastructure and keep it in a good state of repair.

Sewer improvements are about $9.6 million. Water, equal amount, about $9.3 million. Facilities drainage, that includes storm drainage, about 9.3 million. And then street light improvements. We have one project, almost $200,000. And that's to spend money on maintaining the street lights that we acquired from Edison recently. And the last group is the city facilities with about 5.6 million worth of projects. Some are recreation improvements. We have six projects worth about 190,000, such as pool enhancements, Santa Anita Park synthetic turf,

and Windsor Park site furnishings. And then we have 22 projects worth about 5.4 million on various facilities and parks within the city.

David PenalozaItem —

I know we're trying to speed through, but with that number under the recreation improvements with pool enhancements, El Salvador, Memorial, Salgado, It says 190,000, and I know we approved this in February, March, and it was about 300 and something thousand. Is this, oh, never mind, I already read the title, 1920. Carry on.

Actually, that was the last slide in my presentation. I'd be glad to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you. Is there any questions or comments from the council for either presentation? There's one more? The third one. Okay, I'm getting ahead of myself here.

Okay, and this one will be very brief. So as you all know that in 2014 you adopted a strategic plan. That strategic plan does expire the end of this current fiscal year. The strategic plan did create a mission statement, seven goals, 33 objectives, and 147 strategies. And as you know, staff has been reporting on that over the past four and a half years on the progress made on it. And to date, 79% of the strategies of that five-year strategic plan have been completed. We do have details on the website where you can go and you can look at each one of the initiatives

and the strategies that have been completed. What I am suggesting and will be bringing for you in June is that we extend the strategic plan by one fiscal year. That will allow us time to continue making progress on those remaining strategies. And then it will also allow us to start next fiscal year to engage the community and the council to develop a comprehensive strategy for addressing our pressing needs and our desired results for a go-forward basis into the future. And that does conclude the three combined presentations. Oh, I'm sorry. I went too soon.

The last remaining slide, I promised Mayor Pro Tem, It's just next step. So this was the timetable that we were attempting to adhere to with the first reading on the fourth The second reading on the 18th and then being able to start the fiscal year with an illegal appropriated budget

Very good questions from the council

So I have questions for

Thank you for the presentation. I know that this is a very rushed and it's not even as complete as the budget that we discussed in our Edibet committee meeting. In our Edibet committee meeting you went into more detail of where we're at with the projected budget and where we're at with next year, 19-20. And I don't see anything here that

helps me understand where we're at with this budget. It's just a pie chart that has 3.16 million of general fund revenue and it doesn't really go into detail in your presentation, you didn't either so I'm quite disappointed that you didn't do that for us because I believe this is the platform where you should be providing more information because it's more of transparency and where the where the public would want to see more of your more of your expertise on where we're at

with the city so I really don't get this budget of you know how you are you broke it down on the pie chart but I do have questions for you with when you talked about the the expenditures at the from here on slide number eight you're talking about the police department being at a hundred and thirty one point eight million okay so I guess that's just for their salaries nothing for their benefits because I see that you have another section it says unfunded pension

liability payment so right there I would want to know what the break breakdown is is it for our police department is it for management is it for which labor group is it the 37.2 million if you could share that with me yeah we can we can

certainly provide that in generalities I can tell you that the the unfunded liability payments between both public safety and miscellaneous are over 40 million dollars but some of that is allocated to other funds the the public safety plan required contribution for unfunded liability is about 23 million and then I believe the miscellaneous plan contribution is about 21 or 22 $22 million right in there.

So $23 million for the police department?

Police and fire. We still have a residual unfunded liability for the former fire department.

Okay, so what's the police department pension liability?

Let's see, the police department out of that $23 million was $15 million and some change, and the fire department is $7 million and some change.

If I may point out, Council Member Iglesias, so this is the pie chart of expenditures for the general fund only. So the 131.8 million under police, that's their entire department expenditures that are charged to the general fund. The pie slice that's the unfunded pension liability, we have two obligated payments for our pensions. We have the normal cost that is paid and then we have the unfunded piece. So the sliver that you're talking about is only the unfunded piece.

Okay, so then out of the 131 million, and then how much is it for the funded liability for the pensions? How much are we paying to benefits?

The normal cost percentage? For the miscellaneous folks, it's 10% of salaries. And then for public safety, the normal cost, I believe, is about 20%, maybe about 21%.

How much? 20% or 29%?

20% or 21% off the top of my head.

It's 22? Okay, thank you. My staff told me it's 22.

22%?

Mm-hmm.

22% of the 131?

No.

No. 22% of what?

That 131 million includes salary, benefits as far as like a contribution to health insurance, those kinds of things. the normal cost of the pension, it also includes contractuals, commodities, such as ammunition, supplies, those kinds of things, so that $131 million budget includes all of that.

Okay, so how much is it, maybe you don't have that with you, but I would hope that you do, the 20% into the pension, how much is that?

As far as the dollar figure, I can't give that to you off the top of my head, But we do have the entire breakdown of that. The purpose of this work session was to give you a high level preview of the draft budget that we've put together, hear your initial feedback, and then work that feedback into the draft that we would bring back to you on June 4th.

But is there a reason why you made it so simple for this presentation rather than at at the Edibit you went into more in detail of where the money was going. And one of the things that really struck me was that you had the original budget, you had the amended budget, of what you're presenting to staff.

That was for fiscal year 18-19. At the Edibit committee we gave you an update, a third quarter update for fiscal year 18-19. This presentation is only about the draft budget for 19-20. It does not include any information about fiscal year 18-19.

So then you have, right, so then I guess that's where my confusion is because you have police being at $131.8 million, so you're saying that's for next year.

Correct.

But for the amended budget that you presented to us, it was $132 million. So then how could you say for next year it's going to be $131.8 if you're already saying the amended for 18-19 is already at $132. So that makes no sense to me.

The fiscal year 18-19 police department budget included their allocation of unfunded liability. We have separated that out for fiscal year 19-20 draft budget so that it's much more transparent. The unfunded liability is the legacy cost, so it must be paid no matter what you do to your operations. If you were to shut off the lights at City Hall and walk away, you would still be on the hook for the legacy cost. So we thought it was important to separate that out and show it as a separate line item.

So then for the original budget of 131.8, this year includes the unfunded liability. And then for next year, you're taking it out. Separating it out, yes. Separating it out. So then that's, in a way, the way I see it is very sneaky because you should be telling us exactly per department how much it is that you're allocating. Because if, so what you're telling me, you told me there was about 15 million that went into the unfunded pension liability for? For police. Police, so then actually the budget

for police department is 146 million?

That's about right. And council member, it wasn't meant at all to be sneaky. It is consistent with how CalPERS changed a few years ago. Cities used to pay the unfunded liability as a percentage of pay. it's been changed to a flat dollar amount that's amortized that we make the payment for. And before you have, you also have, as Catherine mentioned, fire associated unfunded liability in there. So including fire in the police department, is that transparent?

So then how much is it for fire? So you said it was? About seven million. So then seven million plus 15, so you said it was like 22 million an unfunded pension liability.

For the safety plan. Mm-hmm.

So in actuality then that's 22 million that we're waiting for Measure X money, right? Because we wouldn't have this money to cover our bills for next year. Because now you're separating them but before they were together.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. This pie is all general fund dollars So there's a number of revenue sources that fund general fund expenses.

Yeah, but okay, so just because I'm like, I'm just comparing it to the, to the Edibit presentation that you gave us last week.

So you're, you're mixing the current fiscal year with the workshop, which is on next year's proposed budget.

Correct. But you have here the original budget, and this is where I'm having an issue. the original budget of 1819 which is one we're finishing now right you have for the police department you have a hundred and thirty one seven point five okay so that's the original budget for this year you had the fire and seeing the fire I can see the difference because the fire you have it with this pie thing here you have for next year you have 45 million but on the on the presentation that you

gave us for edit bid you had 52 million so I can see where the 7 million went I can totally see that but for the police department it still stayed the same 131 so then what you're doing is you're not really being truthful and saying that at the police department in actuality, it went up 15 million to cover their raises.

Help me understand it then, help me understand it.

Well, if you wish, we can change it back to being into the department, but I'm not sure how you're saying that measure X dollars, because we've separated out and chose to report unfunded liability separated out of the department, how that somehow triggers that we funded.

I have this presentation, Christine, that you gave to us at the end of it. Okay, I can see the police department budget. It says $131.8. That's for next year. And in this one, for this fiscal year, you have the same amount of money, $131,000. Okay, so then you're saying you took out the pension liability, which is $15 million, so that in actuality for the police department, we're allocating 145. I can see that. So there's an increase, right?

Oh, absolutely, there's an increase in the department. We can put the 15 back in there, and the department would show that total for its expenditures.

Because the fire department shows this, I mean, I can see the difference where you take the seven, but the other one, it just seems like it's the same amount of money that you put from, ironically is the same budget that you had last year that you're putting in here. So it's very misleading.

And that just is a component of the factors of the amounts but you can tell us you don't like the separate pie and in future presentations you want the unfunded liability back into the police department total. It's not gonna change the nature of the expenses.

Correct. If I might, quite a few other cities moved to reporting the separate unfunded liability payment a number of years ago. This was something that we tried to do this year to kind of catch up with best practices, if you will, because that unfunded liability payment doesn't represent your cost to provide a service. So when we look at the police department budget, a draft budget for 19-20 of $131.8 million, that represents the cost to provide the service. The unfunded liability payment has nothing to do with providing the service.

If we didn't provide the service at all, we'd still have to make that payment.

So for this, for last year, then the $131, it included the unfunded pension liability in there? Yes, correct. And how much was that?

I don't have that number off the top of my head.

I just, okay, just go outside.

Okay.

Did the staff have the number?

Maybe they could do a bit monitors.

I have some questions.

Might as well just answer the question right now.

Yeah, but that was the required contribution. 19.4 million was the required contribution for 1819 unfunded liability. 19.1? 19.4 million. It was 19367,000.

Was that for the entire public safety contract? It was. so that includes fire and police mm-hmm how much is police we don't have that

breakdown we have to get that information specifically from CalPERS because our actuarial valuation lumps it all together

any further questions okay councilmember Solorio thank you just a few quick

I think it's a good point because I know it's late and we have others that may want to comment. First on this last point of questions, maybe we could just see it reflected both ways, the old way and the new way. I'll say this in particular because I work more often now in South Orange County, conservative folks tend to like it this way because before agencies would hide what your unfunded pension liability is. very clear what it is percentage wise and dollar wise so that we can attack the problem, but no downside to doing it both ways.

And then in terms of how much percentage particularly, for any department including PD, these are staff's recommendations. Doesn't mean we need to agree with them. For example, PD is essentially requesting with staff's overall initial set of recommendations, they want to increase the number of positions from 584 to 598, so that's an extra 14 positions. So there's a lot of other assumptions and choices in here that get to those figures, and we're the policy folks up here, so if we want to spend more or less in any of these areas, it's up to us.

So I just wanted to share that. in terms of just general feedback at this time, because that's the main purpose of this meeting, on the CIP stuff, these items are citywide, but as we will continue to move more and more towards this ward-based world, we gotta begin thinking of, on particularly smaller things like parks or lighting or sidewalks or whatever, concrete repair, to spread that around a little bit more and be transparent in it. With some things, you know, like we're gonna make major improvements on Harbor or some other street,

that obviously is grant funded or one thing at a time, very expensive that you can't do projects like that citywide, but on smaller quality of life things that are visible and quick, let's try to do better with that. Also with lighting and camera at parks, for example. In terms of Measure X and just overall spending, because the public's really watching this and we wanna do it well and hopefully in the future, if the council wants to continue it, we ought to pay attention to what we promised voters. I'd really like to see a call from the council and the city manager to department head saying,

we have this new Measure X money. We told the public a big focus on it was going to be homeless services reducing 911 response time. I'd like to see new thinking and write-ups on how we're going to do that. You know, which elements, how much, so that we can save what it is. I think this city always knew that we had a structural deficit. That's in part, in large part, why we sought revenue because we knew that for existing operations, as well as just inflation that just to keep pace with status quo that we needed that revenue

source. So I think the, you know, we were transparent or the council was transparent even though I voted against it that that was the need and the reason. Finally on the library department, two things there. Number one, I'm looking at, you know, the proposed staffing levels and it says we have 24 now and we're going to have 24 next year. Yet, you know, we have other priorities that say we're going to create a department and I think I heard department director for library. I'd rather spend it on real services and librarians because, you know, we have some libraries like

New Hope that don't have an official librarian, and I think that would be important. So if we're gonna say we're gonna increase the library department, we need to show it rather than just suggesting that sound like we're doing quite a bit more, and maybe there's more in addition to that, but I'd like to see more invested just in services and staff rather than more bureaucracy or something that sounds good but maybe doesn't do as much. And again, if there's more clarification on that, I would love to know about that. Right now, I think that's it, but I agree with the sentiment

to a lot of the community members that to focus on youth services, parks, public safety and infrastructure, those are the big areas. I think people generally do view that we invest a lot already in public safety. I think we just gotta manage it a little bit better and prioritize and modernize the police department, both with staffing as well as technology. But those are my comments for now, and I know we'll have more sessions down the road. Thank you.

May I speak to one of your comments?

Sure.

The library position, it's a lower position that is being converted to a library director, and that's why you don't see the change in the head count. but the library director would provide more leadership to be able to develop the programs that's that's for example if that's the whole thing we're saying

we're creating a department and increasing library things for kids but yet we actually will have less people at the counter etc I see that actually is the delivery of less services because thank you focusing more more services in time direct contact is better and again I'd like to see at least one certificate a librarian at a brain at every library that we have council

member Sarmiento thank you mayor pro tem and I guess you know this is sort of a high-level view and what we're what we've done in the past is a lot of times we somehow always have work studies on these at the very tail end of the council meeting and we're all pretty worn out what I suggest from my colleagues and what I plan to do is maybe meet with you in in the room before we bring this back for first reading and look at it a little closer and if we have specific questions. Just some things that I think were helpful. I did take a look at the presentation that was given at the Edivet Committee and it was helpful.

It did, I think, explain a little bit more in detail in a more user-friendly way where we were, where we are. So I think that's helpful. It does reflect that we did have some decreases in some forecasted monies, right? So on the commercial cannabis side, it looks like we had a forecast of about $7 million and change. And I guess what the actual is is about $600,000, given that not many of them are online. And then the, I always forget the Bradley.

Bradley Burns allocation. Bradley Burns allocation. Your original sales tax.

So it looks like there was an offset of $3 million that went up there that we didn't expect. So bottom line, what we had forecasted back in prior to November I guess was was us having to dig into our reserves to the tune of about 10 million correct and now given that some of you know measure X funds are available which were intended to be used for general fund general purpose efforts having to do with homelessness public safety it was fairly broad as well it was worded that that way and I think the voters adopted it

that way and so you know I think the premise here is I guess making sure that we understand those bigger pictures I'd like to have maybe a mention of where we are with the reserves when it comes back to us for first reading so I know that we had set initially a 20% set aside for our reserve balance fund and of course it fluctuates and it's proportional to what the budget that we adopt is and I think what the what the legal standard is is about 16 point something right that we're supposed to have so it looks like we're gonna make it because I think

we're right around six million you establish a policy of sixteen point six seven in your reserves and then you added another one percent just for economic uncertainties you are well in excess of that so as you had mentioned before for the current year you had anticipated using ten point two million of the general fund balance, even utilizing that amount, you were still above your reserve levels.

So presuming the, I guess the,

sort of what we're expecting to use from Measure X, 15 million is I guess what's come in in this first quarter and what's gonna be applied. Are we using it consistent with what the mandate from the voters was for that, for those monies?

We were able to demonstrate during the Edibit meeting, and we could demonstrate that to the council as well at our next meeting, is that we have spent on those initiatives far in excess of $15 million. But just as a reminder to everybody, including the public, the Measure X sales tax layover is indeed general fund money.

Okay. So my last point is on the public safety and police having additional resources, whether it's equipment, whether it's anything else that the department needs to make improvements. I'm supportive of those, but I think one element that is missing in addition to just infrastructure and equipment is training, counseling, different ways to equip our officers, because I know in the past what we've had is we've had excessive force cases, we've had wrongful death cases that I know come from a liability fund, but those funds originate from the general fund,

and those have totaled into millions if we aggregate years of payouts for those in settlements and verdicts and whatever we want to do. These monies are meant to not only enhance our department with equipment, but enhance them with training. There's departments that are very, very efficient about how they train their officers, and we've got a great department of officers. To the extent we can make them even better, and we have cost savings from less litigation and payouts and settlements, those are monies that we can realize for the future as well. So to the extent that number can maybe be brought back to us

when you bring it back for the first reading, doesn't have to be an exact amount, but I know trying to see what that what it what it has been that we've had to pay out for those for those Liabilities if we can reduce that we're gonna realize some positive funds here as well Which I think is what the intent is right? I mean to make sure that we continue improving being a more solid department And I think you know a lot of cities are moving in that direction where it's not just equipping our officers to protect themselves but it's equipping them to protect themselves and protect the public and

when that happens you know these these litigation costs go way down and so those are monies that we can realize so those are my comments for tonight

councilmember Iglesias

I'm looking at the workforce changes that you stated here on page 12

When you talk about public works, I see they're going up like 22 staff. Yes. Okay. And then for the, and I agree with Council Member Solorio about the library. That's something that is very important and something that the community members have asked for. So I'm hoping that Lisa, that you've provided Christine with, you know, with a, I'll call it a wish list of things that the community, because I know a lot of community members come to you and they ask, this is the things that we want in our parks and in our libraries. And just to keep it the same amount of staff,

it just doesn't make sense. Because most of the money that is the new fund money that's coming through Measure X was intended for services at parks and libraries. so like Councilmember Solori was saying we need more staff for for our libraries there and for parks and recs and it comes up to 13 since at the last meeting I believe it was the the chief that mentioned that the park rangers or security comes out of the department from from the budget from parks and recs

What's that? It's in the police department. It was in the police department or is it in the Parks and Recs department? Park Rangers is in the police department. Okay. So, and then, so, safety, are you sure? Because I think last time they said that the budget comes from the Parks and Recs.

No, the Park Rangers do come from the police department budget. There was a potential discussion, or there was a discussion about a potential move of the park rangers to the Parks and Recreation Department. But after further discussion with both department heads, the city manager, the decision was for right now to keep it in the police department. But we are certainly open to suggestions from the city council. That's why we're here looking for direction from you and we can reconsider. So then the 13 added staff, it's not for park rangers? No. No.

That's to expand your youth and senior programming.

Okay. So then I see going to the police department, you have 584 current, right? If I'm looking at the 584? Yes, and these are funded positions. And then it's going to go to 598.

Mm-hm.

So is that the funded position with the officers officers that we can't fill those vacancies?

Or I don't get where the 14's coming from?

We're adding 14 funded positions to the draft budget. I mean, the city council can certainly, you know, give us some different instruction, but as we've pulled together the draft budget, that's what we've added. So it would take, you know, we'd go from 584 funded positions, Not all of those are filled, but funded positions, up to 598 funded positions.

But why are we funding more if we're not even filling the ones that are already funded?

Because the, we, you might, well let's see, it's in here, yes it is. On human resources, you'll notice that the head count goes from 25 to 27. Those two additional HR analysts would be used to aggressively recruit for the police department which is how it's part of their plan to aggressively recruit and and bring in more police officers. But right now we have how many funded

positions do we have 61? Funded vacant positions is that what you're do you Do you have the as of April?