Read the March 6 meeting.

If you all please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Is Gabriela Muñiz here from MacArthur Fundamental? Please go ahead and lead us in the pledge.

Good evening, Mayor, City Council members, and members of the public. My name is Gabriela Muñiz and this time I would like to invite you to join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. please rise and place your right hand over your heart. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, Gabriela. What grade are you in? Eighth grade. Eighth grade. Remain standing. We're now going to do our invocation. Jerry Hill. Thank you, Gabriela.

let's go ahead and pray together heavenly father we just thank you for what an amazing day you've given us such a beautiful day lord we pray tonight that you would bless this council meeting lord we thank you for our mayor for our council members and and for our city manager and for the amazing job that they do and we pray that you would bless them and their families and just bless each and every resident of Santa Ana and Lord we thank you for our new chief of police Lord and pray that you would bless Chief Valentin and his family as well in your holy name we pray amen thank you may be seated

mayor pro tem Martinez followed by councilmember Solario and then council Cortinajero followed by Councilman Villegas. Let's go ahead and start with our presentations.

National Women's History Month.

Please go ahead, Mayor Pro Tem, you have the floor.

Can you call the ladies up, Mr. Mayor?

Yeah, can the members of the National Women's History Month that are here to be recognized come on down, please?

great we could please have the ladies please come on up

so as all the ladies are coming on up come on around every year since i've been elected to this city council i have the great opportunity and last year actually oh it's a year ago yeah they our council member angie amezco was here we did it together but the the month of march is recognition of national women's history and actually on March 8th it will actually be international women's history which Councilman Salorio will also be doing a presentation right after me and so I want before I go into the whereas and some declaration points I just wanted just to highlight the

amazing women that are up here and I'm actually gonna ask each one of them to come up for 30 seconds so that I don't have to do this and just give your name and what you and and what your profession is or what you do in the community so I'll start off with this beautiful lovely woman who's the president of Santa Ana College yes I know but yeah so but I didn't say your name I'm not going to say your guys's name so go ahead good evening everyone my name is Linda

Rose and I am the president of Santa Ana College. Good evening my name is Connie Hamilton and I do various things around the community including connect to Council where we do incredible things for the people bringing them hooking them up to the council candidate debates etc so anyway thank you for coming.

Erica Benavides, I work at New Song Church and I also oversee Love San Ana initiative.

Buenas noches, Ines Gonzalez. I'm the director of the Latino Communications Institute at Cal State Fullerton.

Hello, my name is Paula Garcia-Arsenal and I'm currently working for Habitat for Humanity and I'm also the past chairwoman for the Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce.

Good evening. My name is Francine Harris. I do community service. I go out praying for the outdoor people, which I elect to say instead of homeless. I'm very supportive of my church, New Spirit Baptist Church, and also helping with Dr. Maka and also the...

Francine, you do a lot. Thank you. She'll be up here all day.

Good evening. My name is Ana Gonzalez. I am the Public Affairs Director for your local Planned Parenthood here in Orange and San Bernardino counties. Thank you.

Hello, thank you. My name is Laura Cantor. I'm the Director of Policy, Advocacy, and Youth Services at the Orange County Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Services Center here in Santa Ana. Thanks.

Thank you. I'm Delilah Snell. I own Alta Baja Market in downtown Santa Ana and Patchwork Show and Creative Arts and Crafts Festival in Santa Ana for a decade and Craftcation Conference, a Creative Business and Makers Conference.

Good evening, everyone. I'm Adriana Goldemez. I'm the Public Affairs Specialist for State Farm Insurance. Just want to say thank you to my friends and my family for being here. the murals? Yeah, part of our work with philanthropy at State Farm, we help support murals here in Santa Ana to really make an impact on lowering auto accidents and pedestrian accidents. So it's a pleasure to do that kind of work here. So, thank you.

Buenas noches. Mi nombre es Yanely Matute y pertenezco al Grupo Vela.

Hello, good evening. My name is Marisela Castro and I represent the group of the Vela Vecindario Leysia in Acción.

Hello, good evening. My name is Dionisia Gabriel and I belong to the group of Vela Vecindario Leysia in Acción. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Erika and I belong to the group of Vela Vecindario Leysia in Acción.

MUCHOS selling

MUCHOS selling

MUCHOS

MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS

MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS MUCHOS

And there's another member that's not here because she has a school board meeting, but our current president of the San Diego Fife School District, Valerie Amesqua, would be honored here today. And so as we honor National History Month here in this community, it's with great pride that I'm able to bring up these ladies and the amazing work that they are doing in this community, whether it is a passion to give back through their church or their passion to bring people together to do, you know, I Love Santa Ana, the Santa Ana initiative that Councilman Benavides put together.

and now his beautiful wife is leading the way and I think she's doing a better job than you when you first started because I see a lot of people everywhere when I have yet to be able to go because every time you guys have had it I've been out of town and so hopefully this year or next year we'll be able to coordinate but the amazing work and when I'm able to see some of these women whether you're from Santa Ana College and the amazing work that you all are doing or Connie would connect to council and bringing neighborhoods together to interact with this city council or it's

from Cal State Fullerton and the work that you are you're doing with our kids most people don't realize that most of the students from Cal State Fullerton come from two major cities here in Orange County from Santana and the city of Anaheim you know literally Cal State Fullerton has over 45,000 students and so that's just to say the amazing work that they're doing for our students here and the chamber of commerce to lead the way as a woman of that center and the chamber and the tremendous work that you did Paula and then you know our worker cooperatives these women day day

in and day out they continue to want to give back not only to this community but they're helping themselves with upward mobility and creating new businesses so that they can make sure that they can help support their families and then we have another organization called Vela that is out there of moms encouraging each other to work together to improve their neighborhoods and to improve their lives and their children's and holding city council accountable and then as I go down the list and you look at Laura Cantor who is really being a champion and a fighter for those students and we have many

of our students here in the San Francisco School District and through all our city who are LGBT and need a voice and she's been able to be that fighter and that voice and then we look at Delilah Snell and you look at her her tenacity to start a business knowing and we all know that when you start a business sometimes you succeed and you don't but this woman is working day early in the morning to late hours and is committed but more importantly she has been doing something for over a decade and giving back and really the creative class and i have to say that we wouldn't have this

creative class and what we're seeing here and the momentum in this community if it wasn't for your idea 10 plus years ago delilah and really wanting to make sure that we brought patch here and how many folks you have been able to bring to this community every single year to see what really Santana is really about and then when I look at it with State Farm and working with our police departments working with our schools to making sure that we're able to to promote safety and work with our community and our seniors we did an amazing mural at our senior center taught them

how to paint and create and created a lot of ownership and then and you look at our seniors and you look at Ms. Francine Harris, who continues every single day of her life to wanting to give back and to helping those at, you know, who are at the Senior Center to have a voice. She has been that person that has been representing our seniors here in this community for many years, and she continues to do that. And so as I talk about all these amazing women, we have a lot more women in this community who continue to lead, whether it's in small business, whether it's making sure

they're able to help their families, but more importantly, that they're doing it in a united front. And so I want to thank all of them and give them a round of applause for the amazing work that you all have done for Santa Ana.

I just want to end with this and then we'll go ahead and get out their certificates.

In 1987, Congress declared March as National Women's History Month. National Women's History Month celebrates the many economic, social, cultural, and political contributions that women have made in the United States. Women of every race, class, and ethnic backgrounds have played a key role in securing the growth and prosperity of the United States. And definitely these women behind me definitely represent that every single day. And so it's an honor to recognize them. I'm going to call their name and then just give them and then we're going to take a picture so the next person of our city council can come up. So let me do that.

So of course, we don't, uh, Valerie Amesco, we'll go ahead and get that to her later, but Reyna Artero, Reyna.

Erika Benavides.

Marcella Castro.

Adriana Galdamez.

Paula Garcia Astronaut did I pronounce that right? No one probably does right? Yeah it's not easy. Donika Gabriel.

Ana Gonzalez. And I forgot to mention this woman helped with various others put the woman March together and so I want to thank her and Planned Parenthood for having an amazing amazing partnership with our city to have something that was very safe and something that was really historical not just year one but year two that we just had. Thank you Ana for your leadership.

Ines Gonzalez.

Connie Hamilton.

Of course. Francine Harris.

Erica Heras, Veronica Juarez, Laura Cantor, Isabella Lopez, Yanely Matute,

Isri Ramos, no. Dr. Linda Rose. And I love the campus, amazing work. The rock star Delilah Snell. Maria Quesada. Maria. There we go. And I think that is it. The rest of them are not here. And so let's just give these ladies another round of applause and let's take a

picture

thank you thank you of course thank you guys thank you thank you

I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and then I'll just go ahead and

I'll go ahead and start because I know our mayor's talking with staff. In that same vein, and the mayor, Pro Tem, already spoke a lot about International Women's Day. I won't give you as much history on that background, but I have another exciting group that I want to come up. Mujeres Migrantes en Progreso, por favor, vengan señoritas. We have many outstanding groups, formal and informal, in our community, and I've been really pleased and honored this past year to have found some outstanding leaders, immigrant women that wanted to begin to form and help one another.

And so we have them coming on up. Some of the members that are here from this group are Dolores Almaraz, Ana Tutila, Mireya Castrejón, Maria Merlan, Heidi Navarrete, Marta Martinez, y Carime Calisto. The mission of this group, Mujeres Migrantes en Progreso, is to empower women and mothers to fully participate in social, economic, and community life. Their mission is based on the principles of equity, respect, and woman rights. By providing resources and tools to the women they serve, Mujeres Migrantes en Progreso help transform and improve

their lives. Today I'm pleased to recognize them for their phenomenal and outstanding contributions to our community. They've been helping with small business development programs both with the city as well as with the Mexican Consulate's office. They've been promoting personal and personal health including mental health. They've been helping individuals in need here in California but also in Mexico. They've been helping particularly with the earthquake that occurred in Mexico de Efe. They've been helpful with that. And overall, they help their fellow women and men and are making a valuable contribution to our community.

In honor of International Women's Day, I would like to recognize Mujeres Migrantes en Progreso and all of their staff and volunteers for their dedication to the city of Santa Ana and those who reside here. Our main leader, Dolores, speaks in Spanish. So she's going to speak in Spanish, but Cesar is going to translate for her. Cesar le va a traducir, Dolores. But let's give these lovely letters a big round of applause for everything they do.

I introduce you to Mujeres Migrantes en Progreso.

Buenas tardes a todos.

Thank you very much. en progreso fortalece la capacidad del desarrollo integral de la mujer con las dificultades sociales económicas capacitándolas y desarrollando en ellas diversas habilidades destrezas y talentos y valores y pues mujeres migrantes en progreso hemos tenido la bendición de poder tener el apoyo del señor José Solorio, en el cual nos ha apoyado a nosotros como mujeres. Cuando muchas personas nos dijeron que no se podía, que no creían en nosotros en nuestro proyecto, él nos dijo, sí, creo en ustedes.

Y gracias a ese apoyo hemos sido autosuficientes, hemos aprendido diferentes habilidades, con el apoyo de parques y recreaciones también, con el apoyo del condado en salud mental, We have been able to train more women to get their certificate of first aid in health. We motivated women to keep participating in the schools, and support their children, so that they can have more knowledge about what is the academic achievement of their children. And so, with different resources that we have the community,

MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MUCH MU MUCH MU MUCH MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU MU

Migrant women, progressing migrant women strengthens the capacity of women and the comprehensive development of women with difficulties developing economically, socially and in their own development and to promote different abilities and talents and their values. and we've been blessed by the support of Mr. Solorio. He supported us women. When many people said no, he believed in us, he believed in our project to be to make self-sufficient women to build on skills. Also thanks to the Parks and Recreation Department for the support. We've developed on mental health issues and

first and they had certificates in mental mental health first aid and the parents, the moms are more involved in school district activities. They learn about academic achievement of their students and from different resources, how to empower women to be self-sufficient, to learn more, to be more independent, to be at 100% because we know that when the woman is fine, the family is fine as well.

And on that beautiful note, on behalf of our mayor and city council, I present this certificate recognition to Mijeres Migrantes en Progreso here today in recognition of International Women's Day. Felicidades.

Thank you.

You know, some of us love our hair, right? And that's not, you know, it's International Women's Day and, you know, women love their hair and like to make it look nice. But men do as well, and so do as well as teenagers, you know, on all sides. And so today it's a real honor to recognize Santa Ana Bay's company for their amazing work in the community, their amazing commercial contributions, and that is Suavecito Inc. We have some great representatives, our project manager, Denise Aguilar, Sandra Gonzalez, Rachel Dinsdale, Janelle Valencia,

Brianna Calderon, and Lydia Bailey. Please come on up. Let's give them a big round of applause.

And they have some other company reps as well. And I hope you've seen the logo of, you know, the skeletal individual with the big hair and the pomade. Some of you might know Suavecito Inc. started in 2009 by the Adame brothers. After five years of experimenting with pomade recipes in the family breakfast nook, the brothers had a company with 13 employees. and a hair product that sold for $10 a can in thousands of barber shops as far away as the Netherlands, Thailand, and very, very far across the border in Mexico. They do very well in Mexico as well.

The name translating in English as smooth is credited to a friend's aunt who, on their way out of their house one day, you know with their hair all nicely done the aunt playfully said you all got look at look at you guys looking all suavecito look at you guys all looking suavecito suavecito prides itself in making amazing hair pomades that are water water soluble but hold like wax and a fine line of shaving and grooming products. They started off as a men's line of products, but I was excited when I heard they

had a woman's line because I thought, you know, this great company needs to share their work and their value with women, and they created a woman's line, Suavecita, and it has taken off, as you can imagine, as well. They first launched their hair color for mermaids and brush tip eyeliner pins that launched a year ago on January 2017. Suavecito continues to travel weekend after weekend to shows all over the country. They have a beautiful booth, and they do haircutting and styling and all sorts of things. They go all over, and not really just for profit, although that's always nice,

but to live in the culture that inspired them, and above all, in support of their fans and followers. They currently have over 580,000 Facebook followers. Pretty amazing. Probably nobody here has that many, 580,000. And they have on Instagram, which is the biggest thing going, 200,000 followers on Instagram. They are proud to have their roots here in Santa Ana and are true Santaneros and Santaneras. Thank you for your contribution. Let's give them a big round of applause.

Hi, my name is Tony Adame. I'm actually one of the founders of Suavecito. There's two other founders, Pedro and Jason, who couldn't be here today, but I'm sure they're looking down on us somewhere, smiling. Probably via satellite, maybe, through the Internet there. But Suavecito started here in Santa Ana. I was born here in Santa Ana about 10 years ago or so. and since then we're in the same space and actually competing for the same shelf space with the likes of Unilever, Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble and so within 10 years then we've been growing pretty fast and pretty

incredibly much to the support of our friends, family and of course our community. About three years ago now much the encouragement of the women behind us or behind me and we started a female cosmetic line called Suavecita naturally and actually since then the brand's been growing a lot faster than our men's grooming line has grown and so we're very proud of that and for one of the one of the girls come up here I guess I can finish with this about 20 years ago or so the city of Santa Ana through Parks and Recreation took three boys, underprivileged boys from Santa Ana, and taught them how to fish.

And since then, those three boys have been continuing to use those skills to try to feed that same community. We try to use those skills to also empower people around us, including these women, try to teach them how to fish. And so I just hope that our city council today shares the same values that Suavecito does and the same commitment to our neighborhoods and our community so that we can continue to teach people how to fish and keep this pattern going. So now I'll see if one of the ladies wants to come up here and say a few things. Thank you.

Hello, everybody. My name is Denise Aguilar. I manage the Suavecita brand along with all these lovely ladies back here. So like you mentioned, Suavecita started in 2014. and I think when the guys kind of you know started it they they almost thought of it as like you know women shop a lot more than guys so if there's a women's line the woman will pick up the product and see oh hey there's a you know there's a guy's line so in the hopes that like you know the brand can grow in that aspect but like he mentioned it kind of took a life of its own in the sense that we were we all got really excited and we were really involved into trying

to make you know a lot of you know stuff that's available for us and yeah we're we're really blessed to I think be a part of this company a lot everybody that works you know works with us it's very cliche to say but we really all do treat each other as family and a lot of us still hang out you know outside of work and it's a really good really good bond that we have so I want to thank you guys for giving us this opportunity to come and share a little bit of the company Thank you.

So it's an amazing story. So everybody, ladies and gentlemen, go out and buy your Suavecito or Suavecita products. The other connection that I want to make, and Council Member Benavides made the case a little bit stronger, Parks and Rec reaches a lot of youth in our community. And some of the people they reached was the three original Adame brothers that started this program, and they were part of many Parks and Rec programs. So Parks and Rec helped nurture them, and it's turned into this amazing success. So thank you, Parks and Rec Director Gerardo Moet and the rest of the Parks and Rec team.

On behalf of our mayor and city council, a certificate on behalf of the City of Santa Ana. Felicidades.

Felicidades.

Thank you.

up Mr. David Hill and Dr. Robert Hill if you can come up front. I think was it councilmember Benavides who said that his nickname in college was Suavecito? They used to call him Suavecito in college? What'd you used to do? Was it your dancing moves? Come on up come on up all the way up here.

It's an honor tonight, it's also a bittersweet honor, to talk about this individual that I'm going to, we're going to be creating a proclamation for and naming March 6th after her name here in the city of Santa Ana. This individual was a lady by the name of Barbara Ann Lawrence Hill. She was born on December 26 in 1935 in Virginia. Shortly after her birth, her family moved to New York where they spend the majority of her youth living there, and then she moved to California. She was educated, education being the cornerstone of her aspirations.

She enrolled at Santa Ana College and graduated in the class of 1953. She also went on to Cal State Los Angeles and graduated there as well and then began to teach here in the Santa Ana Unified School District in 1962. So why do I bring this up to you today? She was the first African American teacher to ever be hired in the county, in Orange County. And she taught for many, many years. The reason why it's a special day for me, she was my second grade teacher. And I don't want you to just tell you that she was my second grade teacher.

I'm going to tell you a story. So I was in second grade. Back then, in the 1970s, Santa Ana looked different. I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm a little darker than most Latinos, right? And that's all right. I'm good. But back then, I would be made fun of. and this is why I've talked about having diversity and teacher hiring because she caught on to that she saw the kids making fun of me and so she came over and said Salvador she used to call me Salvador she said Salvador come here so I walked up to her and she says look at me and look at you

I'm darker than you I said uh-huh she says and I look good don't let those kids tease you like that and I said okay and I walked out but she noticed that it didn't resonate so she said to me the next day she said Sal here's what Salvador here's what I want you to do I'm gonna bring my records from home we have a record player here in the classroom invite four or five of your friends and you guys can come and eat lunch here and listen to records so I invited four or five friends after a while we started having a little dance contest after a while we started telling other kids what we were

show up. So they asked Ms. Hill, Ms. Hill, can we come in at lunch with all the other kids? And Ms. Hill said, no, you need to ask Salvador if permission to come in, because this is his club at lunch. So kids would come up to me and they'd say, hey, can I come in? I'd say, you know what, you're making fun of me today, man. I can't have that. But if you're cool, I'll let you come in tomorrow. Before we knew it, more than half of the class was there in lunchtime. Other kids from other classes were in lunchtime. We were dancing, having a good old time, doing the worm, doing the

robot. You know how we did it back in the 1970s. What I didn't know, and later I reflected on, was she spent every lunch in her classroom because when she would go to Diamond Elementary to go have lunch at the cafeteria, other white teachers would get up and leave. So she created her own space in her own classroom. But it didn't just stop there. She knew that there were things that I was going through. So every day, it didn't matter. But somewhere during the day, she'd always say, Salvador, you just look so handsome today. And I can't tell you how much that did for me.

I've spoken about her to my kids. I've spoken about her to other students. I've spoken to her about her to other classmates while I was getting my teaching credential and One day I'll never forget this. I saw this lady We connected eyes and I said I need to go talk to her and I went to go talk to her and I said I know you She says no, I know you I said well, where do you know? We start going through names and she says do you know Barbara? Road her heel and I said whoa timeout Which did she teach at Diamond Elementary? She said yes. Is she still alive? She said yes I said well, can you give me her phone number?

She says no, because she had to change her name because she was being harassed for being the first African-American teacher in Orange County. So she's very private. But she goes to the Baptist church on 2nd and Bristol. So I told my young sons and my wife, we're going. And I'll never forget my kids. This is how much I've talked about her. I'll never forget my kids saying, where are we going? I said, we're going to church. And they said, which one? I said, we're going to church because we're going to find my second grade teacher. You know, the one that let me have the little club at lunch. And they knew.

So I get there and we go to the church. The pastor says is there anybody here who's visiting? So I raised my hand and I get up and I told the pastor the reason I'm here Is because I've been trying to find my second grade teacher for 20 years And my kids know about her my wife knows about her and I want to be able to say thank you Because what she did for me changed me forever And I said miss Barbara Hill, are you here? And I was looking over here and she stood up over here and we walked towards each other we hugged, we cried, and it was just a wonderful moment. The second most amazing moment with her

was I'm on the 55 freeway and something tells me it's right before like three days before election night in 2008 and I knew I heard that was when Barack Obama was running for office and I heard there was going to be long lines at the voting booth and something said get off the freeway. I get off the freeway to go vote early. I'm at the registrar of voters and I'm filling out my card and I get a little tap on the shoulder and it's Miss Barbara Hill. And I said, Miss Hill, what's going on? And so we start talking. I said, isn't this exciting? And she says, yeah,

you know, Sal, it's exciting. She says, enjoy this history. I said, the only thing that worries me, Miss Hill, is I'm worried that someone might hurt him. And she says, Sal, let me tell you something. I've been through the civil rights movement. It wasn't my generation nor your generation that's electing this president. It's the youth. And they're the ones that are saying this is the change we want and a bullet can't stop that and I told it once again here I am in my 40s and she's still teaching and I said Miss Hill I'm gonna tell you this it is an absolute honor for me to cast my vote for the first African American

president the United States alongside with you and then finally we were both inducted to the International Teachers Hall of Fame together so this woman has

She has touched so many lives, but she was incredibly powerful in my life. And she's received numerous awards and recognitions, including being named one of the most influential people in Orange County. She taught me that building a student's belief in themselves is just as important as teaching the course curriculum. May Hill has made a huge, huge impression in the lives of many here in the city of Santa Ana, and for that we are forever grateful.

And that is why today I present this proclamation, whereas Barbara Ann Lawrence Hill has won many awards, recognitions have been given to Barbara over the years. She has been featured in numerous newspaper articles and magazines and was named as one of the most 50 most influential people in Orange County. And whereas Barbara was married to Major Irvin Seahill, who served in the United States Marine Corps together, they had two sons, David and Robert, and six grandchildren.

Now therefore, we, the mayor and city council of the city of Santa Ana, do hereby declare March 6, 2018, as Barbara Ann Lawrence Hilday. Thank you so much for touching so many students.

Well, on behalf of our family, Salvador, sorry. So we want to say thank you to the city of Santa Ana. We would like to say thank you. It's, you know, we lost our mother on January 26th. But understanding that she has touched so many lives, it's a little bit easier to deal with the pain. It's a little bit harder to deal with the legacy and trying to uphold that legacy and the tradition in terms of education. One thing I'll say before I leave, education matters and teachers count. Thank you very much. Thank you.

If I could have the folks from Relampago del Cielo, please come join me up here. And Council Member Benavides.

David Benavides.

This is a very, very special ballet flocorico that's been in the region for a very, very long time. Founded in 1975. Very well known here. They have performed in many areas, in many venues. They've also performed at California Adventure and for the movie Coco.

and of course they're here every year at the Santa Ana High School for their annual program that they have regarding the Ballet Flucorico de Mexico. So I would like to have Lucy, if Lucy could come forward. Join me up here everyone. Lucy can come forward and speak a little bit about the program and what they do for the community. Great. Thank you. Thank you Councilman

Villegas and the city of Santa Ana. I'd also like to invite Marlene to come up here with me, but it is our great pleasure to be here today. Relampago del Cielo has been in the Santa Ana community since 1974, so we have a long history of really providing cultural arts, entertainment, dance, music, folklore, and we're really proud of the work that we do. We have our roots that started here in Santa Ana. Marlene Peña-Marine is our artistic director, and the founder of Relampago was her mother but we are truly grateful for the partnership that not only have we continued to have in the city of Santa Ana but as we grow and we grow in the

number of students that we have dancing with us so I want to let Marlene share a little bit more about the group and what we're doing thank you Lucy first I want to thank mr. Benavidez and mr. Viegas and the city council members for this wonderful recognition Rolampago was born and raised here in Santa Ana it It was a group of college students taking classes at Santa Ana High School. Or not Santa Ana High School, I'm sorry, Santa Ana College. So in our lessons and what we're sharing with the students is even at a young age, your passion, your dreams matter, and you can make something out of them.

We never dreamed that we would be here 40-some-plus years later, but we're thrilled and excited that we've been able to grow our program and expand our program, that we're reaching hundreds of students within the community, within Orange County, Riverside, San Bernardino Counties, L.A. County. Come in, drive in here to take classes within our studio. So we're super proud. As Mr. Viegas said, we also never thought that we would grow to a level where we would be invited to be part of shows at Disneyland Resorts and California Adventure with their Viva Navidad and now the new Coco show.

We were thrilled to see Coco win the Academy Award on Sunday and to see folklorico dancers on that stage. It was huge for our art and our dance form. But more importantly, the message is what we're teaching the youth in our community about the importance of carrying on your tradition, about your culture, about your heritage. I often say, if you don't know where you came from, how do you know where you're going? When I talk to my students and we're working with the students, and the work that they do and how they're growing in the community and many are coming back and giving back in this community

is testament to the work that's being done, not just by our organization, but many youth organizations here in Santana. So we accept this recognition humbly for our organization and for all the organizations that represent the youth in our community. So thank you very much.

Thank you very much. You know, a few weeks ago, they had the program over at Santa Ana High School, and I run into Council Member Benavides and I said, hey, how are you? You here for the program? He says, well, yes, my children participate. So I wanted to have him say a few words if you could.

Thank you. Thank you Juan and thank you for the opportunity and Marlene and the whole team for what you do. In reality it is that instilling some of that history, that culture, that richness of just family roots. A number of years ago, my daughter who's now 15 and a half participates and it was her first time performing for the clorico and it was just such a heartwarming experience for me as her dad. A number of years back, when she was much younger, I was trying to encourage her to dance, and we put her in some classes, and she did, I think, like a month or so. She just wasn't quite up to it,

and she decided she didn't want to continue. I was bummed about that. And about a few months ago, about six, seven months ago, she decided that she was wanting to... She was now intrigued, now again as a teenager, and was wanting to take some classes. So we naturally, Relampa del Cielo is where we went to to meet here at OSHA every Saturday. And she loves it. She's enjoying it. There's so much there from a fitness standpoint too, the health and wellness piece, because it's pretty intense. But then just, again, the beauty of the expression of the art and dance and the richness of culture.

And one of the things that was really special to me is I drove that morning, that Saturday, out to East LA to pick up my mom, who's now in her 70s, so she could come and see her granddaughter performing. And it was just so, again, just special, just a shared memory where my mom was sitting next to me. And when she was a teenager, when she was young, she was sharing stories about when she was dancing back in Mexico, in Culiacan. And so it was just this connection, this generation, intergenerational connection of my daughter, myself, my mom, and it was a whole family experience. And so I just want to thank you for that.

I want to thank you for creating those spaces for so many hundreds of families and kids and parents and grandparents. To the point that my wife and I are actually toying with the idea of maybe signing up for some beginner classes, because it just was such a neat, the showcase is phenomenal. it's annually at Santana High School and would encourage everybody to come out sign up your kids come out and enjoy the show and just support Relampago del Cielo they do phenomenal phenomenal work and I just want to thank you again for what

you do. Thank you councilmember Benavides it is my pleasure on behalf of the mayor and city council to offer this recognition for Relampago del Cielo and and for all the contribution that you do for our families here in the community. Thank you so much. Thank you.

Here comes our mayor. If we can please have our city attorney please join us. Thank you. As our mayor is coming up, Mr. Mayor, I'm not sure what you want to do. Do you want to get input from our city attorney as she's walking in?

Yeah, let me ask city attorney if there's anything to report out of closed session, please.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Mayor and council members, the only reportable action we have under the anticipated litigation item on the agenda is that the city council has authorized us by unanimous vote to pursue negotiations with the county of Orange regarding homeless issues and to file a motion to intervene in the existing

lawsuit if necessary. Thank you. With that let me move on to the consent calendar. Mayor Pro Tem any items you want to? It's the interest of time Mayor I have no items to pull. Mr. Mayor 25C. 25C okay but can the city clerk note in the minutes that Mayor Pro Tem had no items to pull. It's because she has to catch an

early flight tomorrow morning I know there's a we should schedule. Can we get

her more flights? May I please make a motion to move on the balance of the calendar? Second. Yes so we we have a motion and a second on the on the balance well actually it's the entire other than the one item that was pulled so those in favor please say aye aye aye those opposed motion carries unanimously council member vince armiento

please thank you mr mayor this is item 25c it's to approve the update to the home buyer down payment assistance loan program i just want to thank the chair of the is it called the edbit so okay the edbit committee which uh is responsible for overseeing some of the economic issues that we're dealing with. This home buyer down payment assistance program was adopted by us and approved back in 2013. We've had a very low performing number of folks apply. We haven't really been successful with the program so in order to make it more available, more accessible, and to reach the people who

really do need the assistance, there's been some adjustments in some of the provisions so we are trying to go after those families who can qualify who are very low income and low income residents so hopefully we'll be able to see some movement on this but you know i'm just glad that we were able to tackle this and thank you mayor pro tem for agendizing this on that subcommittee agenda because i know that i had been approached by many homeowner advocates who said that look this has been just an underperforming fund so So with that, I will gladly move this item.

Second.

Okay, those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye, those opposed, motion carries unanimously. So with that, I'm going to go on to the business calendar. I would entertain a motion on smart water meters.

So moved, Mr. Mayor.

55A. We have a motion and a second. Those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye, those opposed, motion carries unanimously. 55B as in void. I would entertain a motion. So moved. This is a motion of second. It's a car wash on 2402 South Bristol Street. We have a motion of second. Those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Those opposed, motion carries. Item 55C is a resolution on compensation plan for the unrepresented executive management workers here in the city.

I would entertain a motion to adopt a resolution. Move the aye. We have a motion. Do we have a second?

No, I'm a no.

Is there a second, Mr. Villegas?

Second.

All right. Those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Those opposed? One no from Mayor Pro Tem Martinez.

Now, we have a presentation and then a consideration of the zoo master plan and we have some speakers let's listen to the speakers first mr. moat and then we'll we'll have you make the presentation Armando Armenta followed by Kathy Decker and then after Kathy we have Michelle Now, Lervison, please go ahead. Hi, good afternoon, council members and honorable mayor. My name is Armando Armenta.

I'm here as part of the Friends of Santa Ana Zoo board member for the past 10-plus years. I'm here to show support and hopefully adoption of the Master Zoo plan. A short note here, Friends of Santa Ana Zoo has donated over $8 million to the zoo. This includes significant funds for Amazon's Edge, the Children's Zoo, Tierra de las Pampas, Giant River Otter, Pavement Thatching, and other zoo improvements. In addition to that, the Friends donate half a million in cash each year.

So again, here helping represent for adoption and approval of the master plan, but more importantly, really as somebody who has lived in the city of Santa Ana for 30 plus years, I know as many of you know who have visited the zoo, it is a gem here, not only in Santa Ana, but the county of Orange, Riverside, L.A. County. as I'm out speaking with friends and families, telling them about the zoo. A lot of people don't know too much of the San Antonio Zoo. My wife, Leticia, and I have been members off and on since 1996.

I've been a board member, as I mentioned, for about 10 years, and the tremendous improvements that have gone on at the zoo since I've been there, absolutely fabulous. I know a few of you have been to Zoufari, our gala, annual event in August, one of our biggest fundraising events. And again, hopefully you'll be out there soon to see one of our newest exhibits, the Ferris Wheel. And again, you'll see what a true gem that this is. And again, we want to thank you for your partnership over these past several years in getting the zoo to where it is now.

again a true gem here in the city of Santa Ana thank you

hi I'm Kathy Decker the executive director for the Friends of Santa Ana Zoo I know many of you I've been at the zoo for over 20 years I live in Santa Ana I love the community and I'm very grateful to this council in particular for putting together the vote to go ahead and approve the master plan and the strategic plan to put into play and I really appreciate the fact that you guys started that and we've been waiting for that for a long time. Love Santa Ana, love the zoo. Hope you guys vote for it. Thank you so much. Thank you Kathy. Michelle

followed by Lauren.

Good evening. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay. My name is Michelle Levison. I've been two years on the board. My family came from the city of Orange, where they had owned Citrus Ranch in the 20s through the 1940s. And I just want to say, FOSAS is so appreciative to be included in the process of the master strategic plan as a non-city advocate, myself, and some of the board members. FOSAS is excited about the collaboration energy to support the city of Santa Ana and the Santa Ana Zoo.

The FOSAS board is made up of a community of nine men, ten women members from Orange County with diverse backgrounds. We have a few members that are Santa Ana locals, and we hope to vote in a new member on Tuesday's next board meeting as another Santa Ana local. The FOZAS board committees are made up of many Santa Ana locals, and 50% of the FOZAS staff live in Santa Ana. The FOZAS board members and the FOZAS staff have been able to be part of the master strategic plan process through the following. The consultants have presented status updates at board meetings and through VISTA and other committees.

The City Zoo Director and FOZAS are working with the AZA mentor to help facilitate the reapplication process for accreditation and are also working with a zoo advisor for the Giant River Otter and Master Strategic Plan.

foz as executive director and the executive foz as president and vice president are working with the city of Santa Ana director and the city of Santa Ana parks and recreation director to coordinate efforts regarding the master plan and the strategic plan implementation and includes accreditation and sustainability as a municipal zoo this team's focus is to collaborate and look externally within our community to leverage different resources for the zoo and will not be redundant in efforts by the FOSAS and VISTA committee, but a level above. FOSAS is committed to the future success of the city of Santa Ana

and our collaborative efforts to empower the zoo. The Santa Ana Zoo at Prentiss Park is a city treasure and has a valuable impact on the community, the animals, and all the visitors

who get to spend time outdoors. Michelle, if you could please wrap up. Thank you.

Sure. Anyway, we're appreciated to be part of the process. Thank you.

Thank you. Lauren?

Good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, and members of the Council, as well as the community. I stand here today before you not only as a person who came to the Santa Ana Zoo when I was a small child, brought my grandparents who live locally, but also now as a current resident of the city of Santa Ana and as a proud staff member as the zoo education specialist at the Santa Ana Zoo.

I just wanted to kind of give a little picture into the community that I'm seeing that comes regularly to the zoo. We have a community that either recognizes and loves the zoo and has for the past 60 plus years Or a community who has not heard that we have existed for the past 60 plus years And to me that's a trying shame It was a pleasure to come and a joy to come to the little zoo with all of the monkeys brought by my grandparents when I was little And now it's a joy and a pleasure to be an employee at the Santa Ana Zoo as the education specialist

I have the pleasure of reaching out personally to local teachers, local students, and those parents that are coming and bringing their children to the zoo. I've attended many community events and love our invitation as our part of the city of Santa Ana to events like the Dia de los Ninos that takes place at the library, as well as Cinco de Mayo festivities. and it's a pleasure to be able to say that the third Sunday of every month is our gift to the residents as free admission to the Santa Ana Zoo. Looking forward, I really do appreciate and I hope that you will vote in favor of approval of the master plan

as well as the strategic plan. It comes from the big cooperation between the friends and the city and we look forward to your support for another 60 plus years.

Thank you, Lauren. Brian. Brian Solis followed by Rip. And I see Rip here. Welcome.

Thank you.

Hi, good evening. My name is Brian Solis. I live in Santa Ana, born, raised, very excited to be here tonight. I went to Santa Ana School District Schools and I'm a very proud product of Santa Ana. I've been now working at the Santa Ana Zoo for almost five years in April will be my five-year anniversary. Thank you. Before that I was a volunteer for four years working with and alongside our volunteers and event staff making sure that our guests have a wonderful time when they come into the zoo. Before that of course living in Santa Ana my family, my parents, my grandparents, we made sure

that we had a membership to the zoo and we visited as frequently as possible. We made sure that we came to see the zoo, we came to see the monkeys, and we had a great time. Now fortunately, being in my position, I help oversee our membership program and membership sales each and every day, and I see our members who come back once a month, two times a month, five times a week, whatever the case may be. They're excited. They're happy to bring their families. And some of the really great notes that I really hear from some of our members, they often say that they can bring their children to the Santa Ana Zoo.

Toddlers, young children who are excited about their adventures, and they feel safe that they are excited for this bigger, bolder, better plan for the Santa Ana Zoo. So with that, thank you for your audience tip this evening. and I hope that you look favorably upon our Zoo Master Plan and Strategic Plan. Thank you, Brian. Thank you.

Followed by Rip Ripple.

And I say welcome back to Rip because Rip used to work here for our Parks and Rec, and so it's always glad. I hear from him once a month when I send my newsletter, but I haven't seen you in many years, so it's good to see you, and you look fabulous, Rip.

Well, thank you. Yeah, you look good. Thank you. Good to be back again.

You look good.

Well, welcome. I'd like to say hello. I know most of you and I've worked with most of you for 19 years. I was here in the city of Santa Ana in a leadership role, first as the assistant director and then as the executive director of Parks and Rec.

When I retired nearly 14 years ago, I was asked to join the Friends, Friends of the Santa Ana Zoo, and I've participated on the board ever since. I've been in leadership roles and president, vice president, and so forth, but every Tuesday it's been Engineer Rip at the zoo. driving the Zufari Express train. I'm proud to be one of the people that's giving back to the community. I love Santa Ana and I've really had some great, great experiences here. I can't emphasize tonight enough about how fortunate we are to have the zoo. It's really one of our three special treasures here in Santa Ana.

When you look at the Discovery Science Center and Bowers Museum. But the zoo has the animals, the things that are moving around that are alive. And we're also very, very fortunate to have FOZAS, the organization made up mostly of volunteers that work so hard to support the zoo. And they're working directly with the city in raising the funds that are necessary to support the zoo. Tonight's approval of the new master plan is extremely important. It's long overdue. It's a breath of fresh air. and it lays out the groundwork and the teamwork on how we can progressively, over the next decade or so,

turn the zoo into an Orange County designation for thousands and thousands of children, parents, grandparents, everybody alike. I believe the new master plan will also help us quickly regain our AZA accreditation. That's extremely important. It allows us to trade and acquire animals from other AZA institutions, to participate in conservation programs, endangered breed survival programs, continuing education for our staff, and instill confidence in those that come to the zoo. The new master plan will also allow us to diversify our animal collection.

I know the mayor has told me I don't know how many times we need a bear. Well, that's part of the plan. We'll have a bear, probably some colorful wild dogs. It's taking the property that we have into an amazing designation for everyone that loves and enjoys the educational experience. I think we all love the zoo, but I think we all would like to see more different animals, a unique way of presenting our animals in a more natural-looking setting. So as the former Executive Director of Parks and Rec, I can't tell you how important this is, and I appreciate the opportunity to see all of you folks.

By the way, did you know that the RIAs have their knees on backwards? I learned that from a child going through our summer zoo camp. Thank you.

Awesome. Thank you, Rib. I'm going to ask our executive director, Mr. Mouet, to please join us. I think that was it of our speakers.

Mr. Mouet, did you provide the verbal presentation or you have not yet? Did we allow for speakers to speak first? I don't recall.

I haven't. You have not?

Okay, yes, please come back. So now we're going to do the presentation.

The Santa Ana Zoo will turn 65 years old this Thursday. And it will be its anniversary. In 1990, the City Council approved the old master plan for the zoo. That was 28 years ago, and in the last five years, it became evident that there was a need to produce a new master plan. After conducting an RFP process to select a consultant to develop the zoo master plan, this council approved the contract with CLR Design on April 4, 2017 for $200,000 to produce this plan you have here before you.

Our new zoo manager, Ethan Fisher, has done an outstanding job in facilitating the process that resulted in this plan. He presented an update on the master plan twice to the Youth, Education, and Community Services Council Committee and twice to the Board of Recreation and Parks. Let me turn it over to Ethan, who will provide you with some more context on this project and introduce the lead consultant who will be making the presentation. Thank you. Well, thank you. So this is a special moment in the history of the Santa Ana Zoo. On March 8, 1952, Prentice Park opened.

There was no fence around the park, and there were only four species of monkeys, but the park did something special. The park inspired people to learn about nature, spend quality time together, and appreciate the world that surrounds us. Those ideas continue to this day, and a key component of this master planning process was evaluating our mission, the core of why the zoo exists, and the purpose it serves in the community. There were many people involved in developing this plan, including the consulting team, city staff, friends of the Santa Ana Zoo staff, and community zoo supporters.

Developing this plan, we recreated the mission to something we feel will inspire many. So the mission we're proposing is the Santa Ana Zoo, through fun, adventure, and learning, empowers the community to save wildlife and wild spaces. This mission is integral to the design of the plan and is necessary to stay relevant as an organization in the future. The plan is ambitious and will excite Sioux guests and members. There is a lot of work ahead implementing the plan, but I think it can be achieved with the forward-thinking leadership of our zoo staff and city leaders, and with the support of residents and community leaders.

Looking back at the humble beginnings of the zoo and where it stands today, the past is an indicator of the future. I think great things are in store for our zoo, and will continue to provide superior animal care, improve the services we offer visitors, and be a source of pride in the community. I thank the city leadership for continued support of the zoo and want to recognize a special partner here tonight, friends of the Santa Ana Zoo. I work very closely with their staff and volunteers, and the support they provide the zoo in so many ways is just incredible. So I want to recognize Kathy Decker, the executive director.

We also have Michelle Levison, the vice president, Armando Armenta, the secretary, and Rip Ribble, who's one of the board members. We also have FOZAS staff and city staff and community zoo supporters here tonight. and we have Greg representing our consultants from CLR Design and Zoo Advisors, which have led us through the entire eight-month planning process, and Greg is going to share a brief presentation on the master plan process.

Thank you, Ethan. Is this a presentation?

Oh, it's nice. Yeah, thank you.

Okay, thanks again, Ethan. On behalf of the zoo, the city, and the friends of the Santa Ana Zoo, it's a privilege to be here tonight and to present a brief overview of the master plan process. As part of this brief presentation, I'll give you a brief introduction to the team, some of the strategic goals and trends that help drive the plan, both from a business standpoint and a physical facility standpoint, and then talk a little bit about some of the new ideas. Again, my name is Greg Lester. I'm a principal with CLR Design. We're architects and zoological planners based out of Orange County in Philadelphia.

we partnered with a company called Zoo Advisors that focuses exclusively on business modeling for zoos and aquariums.

We started with a really strong backbone, and we've talked quite a bit about this so far tonight. The zoo has some great aspects of it that have been built over the last 60 years, including the grasslands, the rides and farm, Amazon's Edge, and certainly the primates and the legacy behind that. All of those, again, have served as a strong backbone for the new directions of the campus, and we're happy to present some of the new ideas as well. So what is a master plan? Well, I'll say this. As Ethan said, it's been an eight-month process of a collaborative approach with consultants, city members, and the zoo.

it's more than just a concept plan this is a 50 page plus document that layers in lots of thinking and we always say that zoos have three clients the animals the staff and the visitors and it's important with every new project that's considered that we're addressing those three clients all of these strategic goals and themes have been absolutely critical to driving both the business plan as well as the physical aspects of the facilities master plan. I won't go through every one of these but certainly animal welfare is at the top of the list.

What the plan proposes is to go well beyond just providing the best in animal care and the best facilities but really showcasing that to our community through demonstrations, through education programs and we'll elaborate a bit more on that as well. The process really was a three-part process inventory analysis carefully looked at the existing site everything from parking to guest flow to the mature trees to the edges of the site the context within the community all had a very strong aspect to the new concepts discussed and developed for the plan.

Several permutations of ideas again looking at all the key aspects of a zoo from flow to parking to entry to safety and obviously the animals all along while testing various schemes always held true to the strategic goals of maximizing animal land use and creating dynamic spaces for animals and guests. Task three really started to look at some zoological trends layering together a concept we're seeing being implemented throughout the US in the world is this notion of adventure education so it's breaking the mold of traditional classroom learning

using this beautiful campus here at the zoo to create in situ learning environments whether you're in a river's edge in South America or grasslands in Africa students will have the ability to have these authentic experiences throughout the campus activity-based habitats again another zoological trend that the Santana Zoo is testing and utilizing with a number of the new projects. It's simply the notion of allowing animals to be animals, for them to make choices 24 hours a day, seven days a week,

and creating flexible habitats that animals can utilize and quite often share. One interesting fact is the current land use for the zoo has roughly 10% of its overall land area devoted to animals. We are more than doubling that in the proposed direction for the plan. A brief overview of the different zones. So again, parking and entry is a huge part of the campus. The zoo is taking a unique pass at how to organize the campus, looking at really four major organizing zones of the River's Edge,

the grasslands the forest zone as well as the the farm that's asset of the campus today and we'll summarize with this this graphic here up on the screen again it's been a comprehensive effort with many team members all departments of the zoo including operations the animal department administrative staff have helped to create this vision and again we see this as a as a really a framework for how to develop the zoo over the next 15-20 years thank you great

thank you so very much for the presentation we're really excited and now I'm going to bring this back to the City Council the recommendation action one is to receive and follow the presentation and then to adopt the zoo master plan and through my peripheral I can see Councilman Sarmiento waving and certainly this is his ward and honestly I think it was five plus years ago we started having that conversation that we wanted to move in this direction with our executive director and just wanting to thank Councilman Sarmiento for continuous to push us and to do this master plan so I'll pass it off to you

Councilman Sarmiento. Thank You Mayor Pro Tem and I wanted to thank you know our our director of Parks and Recs Ethan thank you for your new leadership how long have you been on as director now because I know Kent Yamaguchi was with January 16th. All right, so you're very, very...

Well, I liked hearing the young man's comments, who was a product of Santa Ana. He came back and now is working with the zoo, so that's a great comment. And thank you to FOZAS and all your help that you've given the zoo and how you've embraced it for so many years. A lot of the assets that we have there are thanks to your really hard work and efforts. So I know Dave Exline is still the president, right, of FOZAS, and I know he's still working hard, but I remember his vision that he gave years ago when he drew, because he's an architect as well, he drew a conceptual rendering of what he thought the zoo would one day become.

So we're inching closer to that, right? One of the things I know that he spoke about was also maybe, you know, sort of identifying the zoo a little better off the main arterial, which is First Street, because it's a great asset, but the front of it doesn't really appear to be on 1st Street, right? It's on chestnut behind it, so it's a little difficult to find. So one of the things I would say, and I've always been an advocate of this, is just trying to identify and brand the zoo a little bit better for folks coming off the 5, coming off the 55, and maybe using that 1st Street. But I really like the work that's been done.

I think tightening it up, I know we're going to lose a little bit of the open space. that we have on the, I guess that would be the east side of the park. And we're going to be introducing, I guess, parking that's closer and maybe more spaces there. So I think it'll make it a little bit, you know, warmer as well because it's kind of spread out. But I do really want us to look at doing maybe that archway on First Street, which is sort of the gateway in there and identifies the park to folks that are driving by. So it could be I always thought like one of those things if you guys have seen Jurassic Park

It's sort of those gates and it shows that you're entering into a you know into a sort of a Land reserve there that would be helpful. The other one is You know I know that we've been doing a lot of work with our exhibits with respect to the monkeys that are on the north end right and I know some of the exhibits are sort of chain link they're not the most attractive and I know we have a lot of good partners in the city many other zoos and many other places use naming rights to get support from maybe some of the stakeholders there and I know we've had this conversation with mr. Mowett look we've got a lot of great

partners like AT&T Edison others that would be that would love to maybe adopt one of our exhibits and say you know here's this type of monkey brought to you by AT&T, you know, or Edison or something. But it's a way to kind of augment maybe the support that we have and for those stakeholders to become part of that support network for the zoo. And it would be a great augment. Hopefully it will help FOSAS in their fundraising efforts. But, yeah, if you haven't seen the new Ferris wheel, the carousel, the train, and I think those three assets are a real, real benefit to the zoo because you're going there and

you're seeing the animals but you can also bring your children to you know be on rides and to sort of stimulate them that way so I think there's been a lot of hard work done here I appreciate I'm looking forward to Amazon's edge I saw the conceptual rendering on that where people are going to be able to see you know these the otter underground and underwater and above water and thank you to Fozaz again for helping to fundraise the balance I think the city we dedicated about a million and a half so we've got about 600 to go and finally to thank the what's the water district that contributed 25,000 so I wrote a

letter on behalf of the council to the San Bernardino water district because they contributed 25,000 to that effort so thank you all for all the hard work and you know I'd be proud to move the item with the support of my colleagues

Thank you, Councilman. Second, any more comments? Councilman Solorio.

First, excellent presentation and excellent work. I know the same presentation was made to the youth committee some months ago. One thing that I don't think I heard enough of, but you're probably working on, I just want to highlight. I know for accreditation purposes, the quality of the care and the space for monkeys is important, and we need to enhance that. But I just want to make sure that as part of this effort we're going to address that concern.

With Ethan's leadership, and I actually joined, there's a special task force that meets weekly on Wednesdays and before EMT, and I'm always there at the zoo to directly respond to that issue to increase the standards. Excellent. Thank you so much. Good work.

Mr. Mayor, just have a real quick comment. Go ahead. Mr. Mouet, just very quickly, in regards to, you know, I know we have space in the back, and maybe bypass the site plan where we have the dirt parking lot. Could I just ask, will that remain parking or are we going to extend our zoo?

Ethan will do a better job because I probably will get it wrong. But it is in the master plan. It is in the thing. There is a really good concept.

Okay, great.

So the concept is actually shifting the entry slightly to the east. And it changes the geometry as you go into the park, and it creates sort of a letter C that encapsulates the new proposed entry, which would be where we currently have a grass lawn. And the grass lawn, the event space that is so popular for community events, for fundraising events, that would shift to the west where the existing entry is right now. So there's a shift to moving things around, but I think it creates a warmer, more intimate entry as people can park closer.

Fantastic. That's great. And that's one of the issues every time that I've gone to the zoo. That's always been one of the problems, you know, the on-street parking and, you know, folks trying to get to the zoo. And it's kind of a long commute. There's a lot of folks driving very fast. And we have obviously small children with their parents trying to, you know, get to the zoo safely. So I appreciate that configuration. Thank you. And with that, Mr. Mayor, I think there's a comment here.

Go ahead, Councilman Benavides. Just to say I'm thrilled about the master plan, all the hard work. I want to thank and appreciate both staff and the friends. My family and I have been longtime fans of the zoo. And I was, as part of the committee as well, had an opportunity to have a thorough presentation. And very much supportive. i just want to say thank you for all your work thank you for that any more comments if not just keep up the great work um i think every time any of us go with out to the zoo with our kids or friends kids or whatever it's always just so much fun um we still have the monkey

requirement right yes just for those of you at home we have to have 50 monkeys at any one time otherwise the land goes back to the Prentiss family. So we have a few insurance monkeys, right, in case somebody dies or something happens? How many insurance monkeys do we have? Five. Five insurance monkeys? Around that, yes. Do we have young monkeys as well? We do our best, especially during the spring season. How many monkeys this year? How many? Yeah. How many?

Right now, I don't know off the top of my head, but we have about 62 primates. So that's a pretty good margin. It is. It is. We have every anthropology student in Orange County come and visit the zoo, and they quite often set up lawn chairs in front of the exhibits to do their observations for their homework. Beautiful. Well, let's make sure we have way more than 50. Thank you. Thank you. Good work.

Thank you. Thank you. Good work.

You know we have not voted. All those in favor indicate aye. Those opposed? Motion carries unanimously.

65B, we have some speakers.

Arnufo Montero, and he's going to require translation.

Arnulfo followed by Caitlin Ogawa

and Arnulfo is from Tustin, Caitlin is from Santa Ana. Please go ahead.

OCO.

Nuestra comunidad necesita equidad en cuanto a las elecciones. Representación más justa en el momento de votar. Es por eso que creemos que las elecciones por distrito le darán a la comunidad unas elecciones más justas.

Nosotros apoyamos para que a todos los votantes de Santana se les escuche su voz a la hora de votar con equidad y justicia. Por eso apoyamos a tener un sistema de elecciones por distrito.

Por lo tanto, ustedes como Concilio de Santana pueden y tienen el poder de tomar una decisión sin gastar dinero de nuestros impuestos, evitando una demanda. That money can be used in the benefits of education and community services. We are here to support the elections for district as possible.

And if possible, it is valid the redundancy that we have established before the elections of June. union. También estamos aquí para apoyar a la comunidad vietnamita que no tiene representación. Muchas gracias y buenas noches.

A respectable city councilman, I'm Anulfo Montero. I'm a leader for the OCO organization And I'm here to bring this, the community needs to have equal and fair elections and election process. So I believe that the election by district would achieve this process. And I'm here to support, and this would support all of Santa Ana voters and ensure that their voices are heard. This would create a more equal and justice system to have district elections.

And I'm here to ask the city council and to tell you that you have the power to make this decision without spending any money. And you can use this money for education and community services and you can avoid any lawsuits by doing this. And you can do this as soon as possible and especially you can do this before the primary election in June. and I'm also here to support our Vietnamese community that does not have currently does not have representation.

Good evening Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem and fellow City Council members. My name is Caitlin O'Gala with Asian Americans Advancing Justice and I'm here tonight to move the City Council to move forward with special elections on June 5th 2008 and to approve the actions that are following on the agenda. An individual has retained Asian Americans Advancing Justice Los Angeles and the Sidley Austin LLP to bring a civil lawsuit under the California Voting Rights Act, if necessary, to challenge the city's at-large voting election method for city council members. We conducted a racial polarized voting analysis

and had determined that there is racial polarized voting here in Santa Ana. We are working with a coalition of Latino and Asian Americans here in Santa Ana, and our organization has also had already filed a similar CVRA lawsuit with Fullerton. And so just here tonight to implore our city council members to move forward with the special elections on June 5th, 2018. Thank you.

thank you Paul Gonzalez followed by Teresa Lee followed by uncle fam

good evening my name is Paul Gonzalez I'm here as a proud Santa Ana resident and homeowner and I respectfully ask the council to take no action on item 65 B tonight reading the staff report I I learned that the catalyst for this recommendation by an ad hoc committee was the Council's receipt of a letter last June asserting that our current system of electing Council members may be biased against a protected class of voters. To be clear, such an assertion is concerning, and it is a compelling reason for this Council to launch a thorough and public study of the issue.

At the same time, I'm concerned that the ad hoc committee has acted with undue haste in this matter. The council should not take action on this matter tonight, and instead should provide the people of Santa Ana an opportunity to better understand this issue and participate in discourse before it is rushed to a ballot. The staff report suggests that tonight's action supports the city's priority of engaging the public, but that is not the way this matter is playing out. This action was recommended by a committee created in secret, which spent less than two weeks privately studying the matter. The public was not engaged.

Furthermore, the proposal is to put this issue in front of voters in an election that is bound to have low turnout. A midterm primary is not the appropriate venue to ask Santa Ana voters to make such a drastic change to our charter.

Again, I ask that the Council take no action on item 65B at this time and instead move forward with this matter in a deliberate, open manner that the public deserves. Thank you.

Thank you, Teresa.

And after Teresa Angofam, and then Miguel Hernandez.

I live in the same direction. I live in the same direction. I live in the same direction. I live in the same direction. I live in the same direction.

I live in the same direction.

I live in the same direction. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I've lived in Santana for a couple of years. I'm a living in Santana. I'm a living in Santana. I'm a living in Santana. I'm a living in Santana. The campaign will be changed the faster and faster, if it will be on 6th of 2018. Thank you.

the city of Santa Ana to change the election system the sooner the better but hopefully before the June 5th elections. Thank you. Thank you. And followed by Miguel Hernandez. Hi my name is Anhu Afan. I'm actually a citizen of Garden Grove but I'm here today to support friends and family who actually really believe in changing the election system. Again I'm just here to support people that are here and those who did not make it but wish they were here. Thank you very much. Thank you. Miguel Hernandez followed by Susana Sandoval followed by Laura Cantor.

Good evening council members. My name is Miguel Hernandez. First I want to thank the council for being proactive about bringing up the issue of district elections in today's agenda. It really shows leadership on your part. I have lived in Santa Ana all my life, and as a father of two beautiful girls and a husband of a wonderful wife, I really applaud your effort to bring this up. I currently live in the Delhi neighborhood and would love nothing more to get back tonight and let my daughters know that this council is supporting district elections so that every vote counts in Santa Ana.

I am also executive director of OCWA, the Orange County Congregation Community Organization, a faith-based community organization that fights for justice in our community. In the last several years, OCWA has worked with its partner organizations for district elections in several cities in Orange County. In each case, the CBRA plaintiffs or proponents have worked with the city or jurisdiction to implement district elections. And in each case, the community has supported district elections because of the simple fact that it strengthens the democracy for all.

In the last year, the Santa Ana District Election Coalition, which is a coalition of organizations and residents, have been meeting with community members to discuss district elections. We have also discussed the issue with most of the council members. The response of the community has always been enthusiastically positive in favor of district elections. People in Santa Ana understand that this will strengthen their voice. By voting yes to put district elections on the ballot in June, you can prevent a costly lawsuit to the city and move towards strengthening democracy in Santa Ana.

Let's work together to make sure every vote counts in Santa Ana instead of spending our tax dollars defending a CVRE lawsuit that plaintiffs have won in every time in California. District elections is not only an investment in my daughters, but an investment in all children in Santa Ana. Thank you.

Susana followed by Laura Cantor followed by Claudio Gallegos. I have been a resident of Santa Ana for 28 years and engaged in community service, specifically working with partnerships on initiatives focused on education, health and safety for a better Santa Ana. I support the voters to make the decision regarding ward-based elections on June 5, 2018. The ward-based elections has been in discussion for some time now. This is not something new. A concern by some has been that this resolution will include changing term limits. I do not see this proposed in the request for council action documents provided.

I do not support any changes in the current policy on term limits. I believe that ward-based elections will provide the opportunity for citizens to run for office who are committed to public service, but feel that they do not have the financial resources to fund an effective and successful campaign. I believe that new leadership across generations can surface who will provide creative new ways of thinking and leadership who are focused on continuing to build our great city.

Ward-based elections will allow candidates to focus on connecting with the residents in their ward, and fundraising is more manageable compared to the exorbitant amounts of money needed to run a citywide campaign. Regarding any redistricting of boundaries, there must be a process that is equitable and includes resident participation in the leadership. Certainly, our community, our great community, merits the projected cost of $202,000 for the June elections. Let the voters decide. This is democracy.

Laura Cantor followed by Claudia Gallegos followed by Dave Hohen. Hi, good evening. Laura Cantor. Thank you for this time. I am a resident of Santa Ana. I work in Santa Ana. I live with a beautiful wife, so I'm the wife of a beautiful wife in Santa Ana. And I am very much in support of the district elections. and I think that it is about time that Santa Ana arises to the occasion of democracy in this sense. What I would like to make sure of is that our council members are not going to add in something about changing term limits into that language around the proposal.

I think that would be a shame, and I would not support that. But I do think that we need to support district elections here in Santa Ana, and as some of you may know I am running for City Council here and I understand that redistricting of the the wards may result in my not being in the same ward anymore and I think that democracy is more important than anything and I think we need to let the people speak so we need to have district elections but we also need to hear from you that you are not going to change the term limits thank you

gladio followed by dave hohen followed by saki syed thank you good evening mayor and council before i begin i do have a request if we could um close the meeting in the honor of robert banuelos who is a staffer of ours and a staffer former staffer of loretta sanchez who passed away from respiratory failure earlier this morning. We will close the name in Robert's honor. Thank you. Good evening, Council and Mayor. I come here tonight on behalf of Congressman Correa, who eight months ago submitted a letter in response to the original letter

submitted by San Andro residents asking that we immediately begin a switch to ward elections. This was done out of a concern being represented in this area of the cost to the city. Already two other cities in the Congressman's District have had to shell out well over $3 million to put together in an attempt to fight these lawsuits. Let's save the money. Let's put it towards a real effort and finally bring true

and fair elections. Now, there are arguments being made out there that this will take a Latino away from the city council. In other cities, Garden Grove, Anaheim, Fullerton, school districts like Anaheim Union High School District or Garden Grove Unified School District, Latinos were not represented. They demanded a seat at the table and they brought their own chair. Who are we to tell the Vietnamese community that they can't have a seat at the table and they can't even bring their own chair? It's

time. The congressman feels that this is the time to do this. Let's save the city some money that could be put towards community programs, that could be put towards after-school programs that could even be put towards hiring another police officer to keep our streets safe and let's not dish out money that we could have saved please put this on the ballot for this June thank you

good evening council I'm going for the jet ski I'm gonna keep it short

I have Dave Hohen, longtime resident of Santa Ana, longtime disenchanted voter of Santa Ana. I encourage you to go for 65B, keep it simple, let's get this done before the courts do. Thank you.

My name is Shaquille Sayyad, Executive Director for Accord. Pleasure and honor to be with all of you this evening and thank you so much for your leadership and for your service. The district elections is to me is a no-brainer. We have seen in several cities throughout Orange County and I think it's about time that Santa Ana embraces this model as well. My brother who is a physician gives me an analogy that democracy dies not by heart attack but by cancer. It dies slow. It erodes the society. Before we know it, it dies.

I think it's our duty, collective duty, to keep it alive, keep it blossom, keep it healthy and inclusive for every single voting member in the city. And I hope and pray that you all will consider this in favor of district elections in Santa Ana and give an opportunity to every citizen in the city to make this a representative and inclusive democracy for all. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thank you. My win, followed by Jeff Letourneau, followed by Jose Hernandez.

Hello, and thank you so much for allowing me to be here today. My name is Mai Nguyen, and I am a citizenship organizer with Accord. And on behalf of Accord, we would like to thank you for your consideration of district election. I am here in support of district election as to give my community, the Vietnamese community, an opportunity and a voice. Our current hybrid election system is outdated and had marginalized our voters, the Vietnamese voters, for far too long.

Santa Ana City Council have been devoid of my face, the faces like mine, those who speak my language, those who understand my issues.

by having Vietnamese representation on City Council Santa Ana can finally reflect and promote a diverse population that we represent 20,000 Vietnamese residents are finally able to feel and represented that in turn provides us a closer specific process and have in create an inclusive

atmosphere. We do believe that it is best to work together and to be proactive. And instead of wasting millions of dollars to fight against this lawsuit that have proven to lose within other cities, we can promote these into our infrastructure or the issues that we are currently facing.

I urge you to vote in favor of putting this district election on the ballot and to let the voters decide. I ask you today to stand with my community, the Vietnamese community, to stand for democracy, to stand for voting rights and better representation, and also have a letter, if I can give to the clerk, to show on record from an organization called BP SOS, Both People SOS, in support of this. And I would like to once again thank you all for this. Thank you. Jeff, followed by Joseph, followed by Dr. Long Pham.

Before we start the clock, can I ask a procedural question? What if one wanted to speak to two different issues during, do you share your time? You can either do it now under the same limit, or you can apply later and speak when that other issue comes up. The other issue is a non-agendized item on the middle exchange. Then it would be public comment at the end of the council meeting. The end of the meeting. Okay. All right. All right, start him again on the light. Go ahead, Jeff. Okay, very good. My name is Jeff Letourneau, and thank you, Mr. Mayor and members of the council.

Four or five of you I've been with since before you even ran for the first thing that you ran with, so it's nice to be here tonight. I am the Northern Vice Chair of the Orange County Democratic Party, representing 865,000 registered Democrats. I want to go on record as saying both the California State Democratic Party and the Orange County Democratic Party strongly supports in all instances a move toward district elections. In the city of Santa Ana, we have a unique system with your sort of hybrid, you have to live in different districts but vote citywide. It has, in effect, whether by design or not, created an obvious problem.

Number one, the city is so large that for anybody to run effectively, they have to raise huge amounts of money, which lends itself toward going after the people with huge amounts of money and ties people's hands in terms of being able to represent their neighborhood because they are now beholding to people who feed their coffers. The second is that the API community has been politically excluded, once again, whether by design or not, you decide. But when I looked at the figures last night, it seems that as it stands right now, the API community has been divided into three wards, almost a third, a third, and a third.

And in a city that is approximately 70 to 80 percent Latino, it makes it almost impossible for them to have a voice. So on behalf of registered Democrats in the county and the state of California, I urge you to move to district elections, eliminate some of the financial restraints, and finally give the API community the voice they've long been denied. Thank you. Thank you, Jose. Followed by Dr. Long Pham, followed by Fat Mui.

Good evening, Mayor, City Council members. My name is Jose Hernandez. I come here on behalf of Accord. and the many community residents here in Santana, from the Asian American community, from the Latino community, that are standing in support of the Vietnamese community's right to have real representation and have somebody that reflects their community, their culture, their values here. So I hear a lot of things about why we shouldn't do this, that it's been a secretive process. The fact of the matter is we've been talking about this for a long time. Santa Ana, and folks I think have said it and will say it,

is the largest city to still not have a real district election process. This is about democracy. This is about being able to give every voter a chance. When I explain it to folks, and this was the same issue in Anaheim, it was about saying, you, the person that wants to be engaged in this, you can knock on every door, talk to your neighbors, get to know them, You know, have that accountability from them and not have to be in the pockets of special interests in order to, like, really have a chance to be in this. This is about giving every chance, every person that has ever wanted to be involved in this process, a voice.

So, you know, and frankly, like, this is the fiscally conservative choice, the fiscally conservative way to go about this. You know, you don't want to take this to a lawsuit. It has been proven in Anaheim and other cities. You will lose. and why go through that. Let the voters decide. Let the community decide. Give the Vietnamese people a voice here on this dais. Do the right thing. Support and vote for district elections in Santana. Finally. Dr. Long Pham followed by Fat Buoy. Followed by Ken Nguyen.

Good evening, Mr. Mayor and member of the City Council. My name is Long Pham, I'm a resident of Farron Valley and I had the privilege to represent the city of Santa Ana on the Orange County Board of Education one time. I'm also a co-founder of the Vietnamese American Voter Coalition. I'm here this evening to thank you, all of you, for considering the district election. I believe that district election not only saves the city, the lawsuit and all the trouble, but also allow the council member to work more closely with the people in the district.

And I'm also a candidate for the 72nd Assembly District. I'm looking forward to work closely with each one of you when I take office on December 3rd of this year, just like Mr. Jose Solorio one time did. Thank you so much.

Welcome, Fat Bui. Mayor Polito, Mayor Pro Tem Martinez, and Council members, it's such a great pleasure to be here today in this beautiful chamber of the City of Santa Ana. I would like to also take this opportunity to extend my greeting to the residents of Santa Ana. Again, my name is Phat Bui, and I'm the Chairman of the Vietnamese American Federation of Southern California. I was voted by 13,000 votes in 2015 to represent the Vietnamese Americans in this beautiful state of California in the Southern part.

Today I come to you in support for the resolution on item 65B. You know, the Vietnamese American came here some 44, 45 years ago and began our humble life right here in this beautiful city of Santa Ana. In fact, most of us who came out of Camp Pendleton as refugees settled here in Santa Ana, and we have the first, the ever first Buddhist temple right here on First Street in Sullivan.

and we set up business and residents here and we, like the Hispanic community, immigrants, we take pride in our heritage, we work very hard to rebuild our life, and we take great pride in the democracy and the opportunity that this nation offers. And like the Hispanic communities, we are longing to have a fair representation. Understanding that, we have the Vietnamese-American always support fair representation. We support the voter right.

And in fact, as mayor of Garden Grove, I did support Garden Grove to move to district representation. as well as district vote. And I believe that voting by district is not just to help the... I will wrap up very quickly if you allow me a couple more minutes. I believe voter by district is not designed to help the candidates

or to help the elected official to have an easier campaign, but it is to help the resident in that district being well represented in that district. Having said that, this moving to the district is not only helping the Vietnamese-American in the district that we have more residents, but it's also to be fair to the Hispanic residents in other words. Why?

Because they would be able to vote for the people that they truly believe would be representing their interests and not being subject to someone who was voted by CDY, by the residents of other districts. So it's not only it benefit the Vietnamese American in a resident of Santa Ana, but it also would be very helpful to the Hispanic resident in the district that they are mostly consecrated.

And therefore, I urge you, Mayor Polito, Mayor Pro Tem Martini, and distinguished council members to please vote yes and support this legislation 65B to go to the world election as early as you can. Thank you. Thank you, Ken.

Good evening Mayor and Council Member. My name is Ken Nguyen. I'm 39 years resident of Santa Ana. I'm currently served on the Plain Commission of our great city. I'm here to speak in support of the vote change that of current vote system to voting by district. As you know, it's well known that the majority are residents in Santa Ana are Latino, but we are many Asian-American as well, especially in the west side of Santa Ana. Unfortunately, many of us in our Asian-American community believe our voting power is diluted and our current voting system may not be complying

with the California Voting Rights Act. I believe by war election will be beneficial because the war election will give our ethnic group a better chance for electing candidates for their choice. Council member, we have better understanding of the need and the unique problem of the constituent and the neighborhood which they are representing. Voting participation will improve because the voter will know they have a more meaningful chance for success. And we thank you for placing this item for the agenda and urge you to vote for this item into the June ballot. Let's work together and lead together. Thank you very much for your time.

Thank you. With that, that was our last speaker, so let me bring it to Council for discussion.

Anybody like to make comments first? Councilman Benavides? Sure. Thank you, Mayor. I thank all the speakers who came in and addressed us. And I was learning even tonight, as people were sharing their perspectives. For a long time, I've felt that the city of Santa Ana has had the best of both worlds, where you have a representative elected resident of a specific ward, but you had the whole city be able to have a voice in that election.

And when this idea of ward-specific elections came up, and it's been something that has been coming up for pretty much as long as I've been sitting on the council, almost 12 years, but I think probably even some time before then. But again, I was more in the thought that we should leave things as they are. As I've seen more and more cities go towards district-specific elections, I've started talking to people more and trying to understand more the value, the importance, and why there's merit and why people fail as strongly.

And what I've come fairly recently in the last year or so, come around to take the position, find the position that City of Santa Ana's current system is a good system, but what I'm realizing is that it's a good system because we're halfway there. And what I do think, and actually one of the speakers tonight addressed, is that it's not about helping the candidate, but it's about helping the resident so that their vote could be more significant and not be diluted.

So that was something that did stand out to me. At this point, you vote and you vote, and your vote is basically shared or put into a pool, if you will, with voters throughout the whole city. And by going to district elections, it would allow your vote to be able to have a more significant impact there within your section of the city, the ward that you live in. So all that says, I think that there is very significant merit to this.

And a question that I do have for the city attorney is, you know, this has been a discussion for several years. This has been brought before council, even here, at least on one occasion, if not on several occasions. Ultimately, more recently in the last few months, we studied this because we had received a letter. There was some research done that expressed that there might be some concerns.

And more recently, we have received more correspondence. Today, in fact, here on the dais, there were two letters that came before us. One of them that specifically cited some information with regard to the California Voting Rights Act And if you can speak to what the significance of the letter, particularly from the advancing justice. And there was a speaker here tonight where I think now there are some implications, I believe, out of this letter. If you can speak to that, I think that would help because this is new to us.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Councilmember, we had received a letter, I believe, last June from an individual who basically wrote to the city saying, I believe that there could be an issue with the California Voting Rights Act. And we did look into that. We responded by saying that we would take a look at it, that we would engage with a demographer and find out whether, in fact, there were any issues. That letter is different from the letter you have before you this evening. the letter that you have before you this evening and I and I must also say I just received this like right before the council meeting began but it is a formal

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

notice basically of litigation under AB 350 of the elections code and what that elections code allows the city to do is once you receive this notice it's kind of like a strict liability reaction that the city has to respond to it and one One of the options the city has to reducing liability is to take action. It also has the option within 45 days of receiving it under the elections code to adopt a resolution outlining your intention to transition to by-district elections, outlining how you're going to do that, the specific steps that you'll take, and also the time frame for doing so.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

So it is a very official letter under the elections code, 1010. and the options that you have are limited to what's outlined in the elections code. Meaning that you have to make a decision to go to by district or adopt a resolution of intention to go to by district.

There have been a number of cities that have taken a position to try to defend their current system. Have any of them been successful? Have there been expenses that those cities have incurred? and do we have a general idea as to what the expensive cost would be to try to defend or not take action?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Prior to the passage of this particular bill, there were cities who, in the early days of this type of litigation, did make attempts to fight. Some cities in the very early days spent hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars. More recently, we advise cities that if you do get into some type of litigation over this, you're looking at $50,000 to $150,000 to fight this. If that's something that you want to do, that is an option to take a look at. Under the statute here, however, if you adopt the resolution as notified in the statute, liability is capped at $30,000 in accordance with this statute.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

But that's only if you take those specific actions, which say that you intend to go to by district.

Thank you.

Other comments? Council Member Sarmiento. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I want to begin by thanking all those who came and spoke before us. Fat Buoy, not only is the president of the Vietnamese American Federation, but he's obviously a member of the council in Garden Grove. And we know how diverse that council has become. And it looks like you guys are doing good work together. So I couldn't be prouder of the speakers that came before us tonight because it really does reflect the diversity of our community. We had members of the Latino community, Anglo members, Vietnamese Americans. And that's what we've always said.

Santa Ana is a very diverse body, and it's a very diverse city. And we, I think, have an opportunity tonight to support something that's going to further that effort and further our commitment to diversity. I want to begin by thanking as well some of my colleagues who sat on the ad hoc committee. This was an ad hoc committee that was convened by the mayor and we met. And there is a sensitivity of time because there is a deadline for us to submit the resolutions and the documents that are before us tonight to the registrar voters before March 9th, I believe.

At 5 p.m. is a deadline for it to qualify for the June ballot. You know, one of the things I think that for me, as the only attorney up here, is to basically advise everybody, all we're doing is trying to follow the law. The California Voting Rights Act was adopted in 2001 as an extension of the Federal Voting Rights Act. And basically what it says is that at-large elections dilute minority votes. That's, in essence, basically what it's saying. And what the Voting Rights Act has done is to try to address that.

And so we've seen that most cities our size, and of the Big Ten, Big Eleven cities in the state, we're the only outlier city that hasn't gone to district elections. So it shows that one of the things that Mayor Pro Tem Martinez and I always tell our colleagues in other cities that are much smaller, we say some of our wards are larger than their cities altogether. and they vote their folks in by district elections. So, you know, I think that here all we're trying to do is simply put this question to the voters. That's all. We want the voters and the public to decide, the residents to decide this question.

It's an important, compelling enough question that we need to make sure that we don't make this decision alone in a vacuum or for the wrong reasons. This isn't supposed to be hostile towards one group or any other. If anything, we're trying to make sure that there's equity, there's balance, and there's fairness. And there's plenty of case law that shows that if somebody were to challenge our voting system, our election system, we'd lose. And we'd lose big. To defend those lawsuits, I think the only city right now that's defending Madam City Attorney, a challenge to their elections is Huntington Beach, from what I understand.

But, you know, all the other cities that have challenged have failed. And so it is a very difficult challenge to overcome. And, again, it's millions of dollars that we would be subjecting the voters and the residents of the city to have to expend. I think, you know, I recall working with one of the pioneers in this area, Joaquin Avila, who was a champion in the Voting Rights Act community.

And he's unfortunately very ill, but he was one of the forefathers in challenging many cities and many counties that had these polarized voting approaches. And he did a lot to change those. So I think for those of us who realize Santa Ana is one of those communities that is faced with that, we can't truly say that we're being equitable because this Voting Rights Act has helped to address Latino concerns in other cities. The reason why there are Latino elected officials in other cities has been because of this law.

For us to say we don't want to invite that same electoral process here to invite others from other communities, other protected classes, would be very hypocritical of us to do. And so I certainly appreciate all the comments. I believe that this isn't a new issue. I think Council Member Tinajero, Council Member Benavides, before this council was impaneled, we started talking about this in 2016. And so it's not a novel issue. It's not something that was just randomly selected. It's something that we realize is an imperative. And many of our residents have come before us and said that they want us to at least address it.

And more than anything, they want to be the arbiters of whether or not we should proceed. So that's all we're simply asking is that we want our residents and our voters to make that decision. We think it's an important enough decision that they deserve the right to go ahead and make that decision.

Any other comments, Council Member Tinajero or Solorio?

As I sit here, I like to dissect arguments and see where we're going and really to try to make the best possible decision I can. There was a speaker who came up and talked about, made an argument about the committee that was created and how it was created in secret. You always have to meet. You have to meet to know what kind of a product you're going to introduce to the community. I mean, that's just simple.

Being done in secret is voting in secret and then pushing a policy in secret onto the residents. But I think what is being proposed here is to allow the residents of Santa Ana to make a decision on how they want their democratic process to take place. that's a very difficult vote for me to not favor when we are talking about the democratic system and how we can make it equitable for all groups so that there is true representation. One of the things that occurred a while back was in the 1980s.

This was brought up. And at that time, the council was a much more conservative council. I believe there might have been like one Democrat. I know this is nonpartisan, but I mean, people still know that this is a pretty progressive council. And the word elections were brought up, and they said absolutely no. Little did they know, because obviously they didn't have a crystal ball, to see that the demographics were going to change significantly here in the city of Santa Ana. And because the demographics changed significantly, you had a council that looked very different from the councils of the 1980s.

One of the things that you all have to take a look at, and I think we have to take a look at as a council, it's not to have the fear of what our council will look like as far as their ethnic demographics, but to take a look at are we bringing the best people with the best ideas that are responsible and have to answer to the constituents that they live near on a daily basis. I know that when I go to the grocery store, my wife typically says to me, send one of the kids, because if I'm just going to go to the store to get some butter, it's going to take me about a good 45 minutes

because somebody's going to stop me and tell me about a pothole, a tree that's going down, or just how they really didn't like the way the conversation went. And that's okay, because that's what you signed up for. So in Ward Elections, it's even more concentrated, which makes you more accessible to your elected officials. So I just think that it's going to be a heavy lift because there will be opposition. and one of the things that as a community, it's really one of the things that I've noticed, and I'm being very honest, is when things like this happen,

many times people get excited and they say, let's make this happen, let's put it on the ballot. But once it's on the ballot, then it's kind of like, okay, I've done my job. And the reality is, no, the job just started because there are other folks who will probably be investing a lot of resources to make sure that this doesn't come to fruition. And so those are the things that you all have to look at as you move forward because this is something that the community, if this is what they want, you need to go out and run with it. And if this is something that the community does not want,

you have that same level playing field right now going forward if we do take this up for a vote. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you.

Juan Villegas, please. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, everyone who came out and spoke. Your voice is heard. Mr. Afat, we thank you for coming out, sir. He's a good friend of ours here, our neighbor over at Garden Grove. So this is a very interesting topic, district elections. You know, there's 19 different ways to do district elections. I don't know if you know that. 19 different ways and we haven't talked about any of them. We haven't had any public hearings. We haven't had a meeting out in public to talk about it, maybe up here a little bit, but that's about it. So I have a big concern about that.

I'm not saying I'm against it about district elections, but you need to do the homework. We might have a mess on our hands. Let's say we do put it on the ballot and it does pass. How are you going to do it? Now you're going to be rushing. And then people are going to be unhappy. Well, I didn't want it that way. Or I want it this way. You've got 19 different ways of doing it. So it's very, very tough. And these myths about, well, you know, it'll help a person that doesn't have a lot of money. Well, you know, it can. If you have money behind you, that doesn't mean you're going to win.

And when I was running, I remember someone saying, it doesn't matter how many signs you have out there. That doesn't guarantee you a win. You've got to go out there and knock on doors and talk to people and earn it. There's also instances where council members that were here previously who only spent $200 on flyers. And they went out and knocked on doors and they're in. Some council members up here haven't even been challenged. Nobody stepped up. So go figure. So, you know, people can get elected. You just have to go and have 20 people put you on the ballot.

that's all it takes for each ward and for me to keep it simple on this whole thing because the way I look at it just to simplify my whole view on this me as a council member I am the council member for the entire city of Santa Ana I represent all you so I work for everyone so if I have a say on you you should have a say on me to make it even but if I'm doing this hey you don't have a say. I can keep getting elected by the same group of people over here and tough luck. So you know that's the way I look at things very very simple. If I'm going to have a say over

you you should also have a vote or a you know a say against me yes or no. That's the way to keep it all even. And so again I suggest we do some homework. Got to do the homework. 19 different ways of doing this and no one here has has even told us how we're going to do it and so for the moment uh oh another thing uh madam clerk of all the cities that have been sued regarding this how many of them had ward dis uh wars or districts i'm not your knowledge yeah i'm not aware of any

city that had um nomination by ward so every city thank you ma'am so every city that has been sued who didn't have any wards or any districts. So for at the moment, that's all I gotta say. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem Martinez. Would you like to speak? The board was on part of the add-off. He has no comments. Mayor, I'd like to go ahead and move the item. I'd like to move the item with giving staff direction to-Well, wait a minute, let me let other people discuss first. Well, you can still discuss. If there's a first and a second, then there's opportunity for discussion. I'll second that motion. Thank you. For option two. All right.

Great. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So first and foremost, I'd like to thank all of you who came here to address us about this issue. And thank you, Councilman Fat Buoy from the city of Garden Grove. I want to just tell you from the very beginning, I have never opposed district elections. And I welcome diversity and democracy and transparency and accountability. One of my issues, and I think I've always been clear about that, and it's been on the voice of OC, it's been the Orange County Register. When we want to talk about cities, and I just want to put some things into context. I just hope, Mr. Mayor, you get me more than three times.

This is a very sensitive issue. And so I want to start off by this. Currently now, there are 408 cities that are elected at large. 408 cities. And the reason being is, if you don't know the difference between a charter city and a general municipal law city, state mandates general law cities to have plurality voting, and the majority of them are at large.

That's state law. There's currently 122 cities who are charter cities, who have their own autonomy, who have their own constitution, and pretty much don't have to follow what state laws as it pertains to elections. More importantly, out of those 122 cities, there are the big 11 cities in California. Out of those big 11 cities, there are charter cities.

And out of all those charter cities, seven of them are district elections. And they're not by plurality where winner takes all like in this system. they have a runoff. So if you want to talk about accountability, wanting to make sure that you have the right person in office, and you talk about you want to be one of the big 11 cities and you want to be comparable to them, you would support the geography method and the voting method because currently now it is silent

on the recommendation that's being made here to go to district elections. The method is not spelled out. But currently, the city of Santa Ana, just to give you some context, the current system that we have, we have the voting geography that's by district, by ward, which is that hybrid that many of you spoke about. But it also has an elected at-large mayor with six council districts, but it's by plurality. So that means that if four of us run currently now in this system, the person that receives the most votes wins.

Currently now, the recommendation that's being provided to us, because it's silent and it's not spelled out, it's saying that we're moving towards the same kind of voting system based on plurality. So let's say that we do decide to go to district elections.

This means, for all intended purposes, we won't talk about race here because I know it's important to talk about, but just say that we have four people running, say, in District 2. And out of those four people, and I'll use this analogy, we have three members who are pro-growth, want to see more development in this city, and we have one member who doesn't want to see any more development in this city.

the election happens, the likelihood of who gets elected, and there's stats on that, that the no growth candidate possibly can win by very few votes because the three growth candidates are going to split the vote. So when we talk about that we want to move towards making sure that we are not splitting votes, that we are not assuring that whoever decides to run has the voters get to choose the right candidate.

And the way to do that is that you have to go on to a runoff. Seven of the largest 11 cities in California have a runoff system. so you go into a June election and the top two then go into a general that's if you want real fairness and you want balance and you want to make sure that you get the right people to represent you that's the kind of discussion that we need to be having and I didn't hear that yet as of yet and so I would ask our clerk and I have a recommendation and I'll do my substitute

motion and what I'm recommending. Obviously, you're probably not going to get the support for it, but Madam City Attorney, I do want to ask, currently now, just in case they say that it's not true, but can you currently tell me what election method is spelled out on your current resolution, or is it the status quo of plurality voting?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

As currently drafting, we made no changes to the existing process of plurality voting.

Thank you. Next, under Section 400-401, it's kind of silent if there will be a reset in district, a reset in term limits. Can you please inform me that the clock will not reset for either this mayor or this city council?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Council member, as I read section 401 qualification of members, that's section 401 of your charter, I'd like to read that into the record because I believe it is absolutely clear and explicit. A person who has served three consecutive terms of four years each shall not be eligible for appointment nomination or election to the office of council member, this is where I think the relevant language is, regardless of wards represented by that person during such period. cannot serve for another term until they have sat out for eight years. That's the existing language in Section 401 of your charter,

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

which is not being proposed to be amended at this time. If the council desired to change that language, they would need to place a measure on the ballot addressing term limit changes.

Thank you. So the devil's always in the details, and the voting systems we choose can have a major impact on the type of candidates who can run for office and who will get elected. Hence, the City Council should evaluate the current methods and evaluate the various other election methods to ensure that the election method is determined by a process and not be politically driven. We must also recognize that no election method will be perfect, and I understand that. The bottom line is that choosing an election method requiring setting priorities and various criteria

and making trade-offs to provide the system that best works for Santa Ana. That's the real conversation that we should be having with our constituents to making sure that we're moving in the right direction because obviously if you go by district elections in this current system that's not being spelled out and you do plurality voting, you're going to get the same issues. And let me tell you that the system that Anaheim has, They have a traditional at-large system that didn't have geography, which means that they could have lived anywhere in the city.

Santa Ana has had, and I will be the first to tell you, that it's not a perfect system because how many of us have tried to outseat our mayor, right, on this council?

That doesn't mean it's not perfect.

How many? And we've got to have some laughter, Mayor. How many? And people say, well, so many people shouldn't run because we're going to split the vote. Obviously, what has happened every single time? We split the vote. But it's not because of the geography. It's the method of plurality voting. You have to understand that there's various different methods and you need to make sure which one we're going to do to make sure that there's the appropriate representation. And so at this point, Mayor, those are my comments now.

Thank you. Now I've got Councillor Dina Heddo wanting a comment, your comments. Go ahead. I want to make sure that it's clear on plurality. We're still talking about plurality within the district, not plurality as the whole city. I want to make that clear. So when she said plurality, I don't want people to be confused. She wasn't talking about the whole city. She was talking about within a district. But this kind of reminds me of when CNN had their town hall with the students from Fort Lauderdale, the survivors of the school shootings.

And when they asked an elected official, are you going to support removing AR-15s from the stores? or are you going to stop taking money from the NRA? And someone says, well, I support public safety, but I think we should go this route. When people don't answer something directly, I always say if you support something, then gosh darn it, vote for it. You know? I mean, let's not make up these other issues here. Ladies and gentlemen, I ran for school board in 2000, the Santa Ana school board. There were three incumbents, nine candidates.

nobody knew me from Adam except my students that I taught at Lathrop intermediate conventional wisdom says I shouldn't have won because you had three incumbents who had their base and had been around these were pretty powerful incumbents I was a top vote getter there why because I started walking in March because I registered people to vote and I registered people to vote by absentee ballot at a time where that wasn't occurring it wasn't as popular as it is today. I'm saying that any scenario could happen. You could have three people that have one position

on an item and then one person who doesn't have that position. That doesn't necessarily mean you're going to split the vote. It's whoever goes out there and hustles. Whoever goes out there and talks to the voters and convinces them. What that does, it gives you an opportunity to have a platform and to be able to do it and use the shoe leather instead of using campaign funds. you have the opportunity to do that so how if you want to go to plurality I would ask our mayor pro tem I mean if you want to go to a runoff would you then support ward elections if you had ward elections and then there was a

runoff would you support ward elections then

not yet but I've got comments here on the left

Councillor Solari. Thank you Mr. Mayor. You know I think a key question is you know do we want to be about the politics of inclusion or the politics of exclusion you know and I would argue especially with what's going on at the federal level that this council and this community ought to be about the politics of inclusion. I think as we saw you know the many speakers that you know seemed about 95% for this direction that it was a very inclusive very very diverse audience and and i appreciate that you know in in the past this issue generally has come up i haven't

always been a fan of it because i i think there are benefits to the hybrid system but now having been back a year i could see the benefits of smaller districts where council members can be closer to their residents i think that would be a good thing uh also i know in reflection and doing my financial reports uh you know despite not wanting to spend so much money in that last election I spent $130,000 of my own campaign dollars I'm a good fundraiser so I was able to do that over some time but most folks can't and that shouldn't be the only element to being

successful and another key difference and this is the most crucial one is we've heard from Vietnamese residents in writing before a more important letter today you know we had the criticism that hey I think there's enough Vietnamese Americans and Asian Americans that you're probably in violation of the California Voting Rights Act. We as a city did our due diligence, hired a demographer, and they generally said, yeah, I mean, look at the numbers, look at the maps. A good case study, for example, is a candidate, Jessica Cha, Asian American woman, did very well on the West End,

not so well elsewhere, and didn't win. You know, she's a case study right there.

You know, the issue was raised on why aren't we looking at a bunch of other ways of doing elections? Well, I think the council committee and the public has spoken very specifically about just moving from at-large elections to by-ward elections. They get it. They understand it. And you heard a lot of support for it. And at the end of the day, voters are going to have, as Council Member Sarmiento said, two, three months to study it and make an informed decision in June. Let the voters decide.

Also, you know, I've seen and heard, you know, residents from my own ward in Ward 3, but also in other parts of the city where they feel that the current system, it's hard for them to get their candidate of choice. And this system being proposed addresses that. The California Voting Rights Act speaks to that. Another big thought that I have as it relates to issues like this and demographics. I once heard when I was at OCTA that demographics in a city is really a snapshot in time. You know, today it's largely a Latino city, but it wasn't before. We have a good mix of Asian Americans today. It may not be like that in the future.

What we need to do is to do the right thing.

Historically, there's been transition here that there will continue to be. I think it's the time to do the right thing. I know there's been question about, you know, is this an intent to reset the clocks, and I don't think you have anybody up here from the dais or city attorney or staff saying that that is an intent of this change. I think my colleagues and the staff made it very simple that there's just one change, but it's a significant change that can have a powerful impact on having voters be more impactful in choosing candidates of their choice.

So with that, you know, I'm supportive of the motion that was made by my colleagues and seconded and look forward to further discussion. Thanks.

Okay, if I may, Juan, let me make a comment, then I'll go to Mayor Pro Temer yourself and we'll continue.

One question I've got of our city attorney is that this motion basically implies, if you read towards the latter part of it, that there's fiscal impact and in essence $200,000 that would have to be spent in order to conduct this special June election. One question is, if we were to wait until November, what would that cost be? Would it be less? Would it be the same? What would it be in November? The estimate received from the registrar voters is about $30,000.

$30,000 versus $200,000. That's correct. All right, so there's a big delta there. Second question is, in order to do this, we need to appropriate an adjustment. It'd have to be basically appropriation within the budget. Under what methodology or what logic would we be able to do that if this vote doesn't receive five votes? If it receives four votes, how do we carry this out, or do we?

I guess it's a $64,000 question from that old TV show.

Go ahead. Mayor, you mentioned what is the vote requirement for the appropriation. Is that what you're asking?

Yeah, if this motion does not receive five votes, what happens?

Because you need five votes for an appropriation adjustment, correct? That's correct. That's correct.

You need five votes for this appropriation as recommended.

All right. So my next point is that I believe that right now we have a hybrid. People have to live in certain parts of the city, but everybody gets to vote. And in return, every one of us up here have to respond to everybody within the city. And believe me, all of us get phone calls, take meetings, go out to all parts of the city. I haven't met a single council member that had said, well, I've got to take care only of my ward.

So right now I think we would lose that if we go to district elections. We would lose that inherent responsibility that exists between an elected official right now and the entire city. And Santa Ana happens to be a very dense city. There's a lot of people in 27 square miles. and as a consequence of that, I don't think it's impossible for folks really to know each other and for elected officials to know people throughout the city, and I think that works well.

I also believe that if this really, really, really is good policy, we ought to go through more of a process. It's one thing to have a discussion occasionally, periodically. somebody throws out an idea. It's another to go through a deliberate process and say, you know, what are the best practices and what is the best form, and if we're going to do it, how is it really going to benefit the city? To me right now, you know, I see that we're doing it

at the 11th hour, literally. If we don't do this now, you miss, you know, the June election, and then you're in November, and I say no big deal. If it's good public policy, take your time to do it in November. But at the same time, I see a real urgency to do it in June. And by doing it in June, it then goes into effect in November. And why is it that urgency? You could do it in November. For that matter, you could get the new census results, and then you could do it. At this point, and let me ask the city attorney, we hired a demographer.

Ms. City Attorney, we hired a demographer. In your opinion, did that demographer conclude that we're in violation of the Voter Rights Act?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

So, Mayor, the advice provided by the demographer was to me as the attorney, under the attorney-client privilege. I'm happy to answer that question. I would need you to waive that privilege because it is I have that report in front of me and I'm happy to do that But I that was given as an attorney-client privilege document. Would you need a vote to waive that privilege? I would need a vote to waive that privilege

Are you are you requesting that vote or can you answer some of the question?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

I

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Can answer the question in the sense that the letter that you received today that I guess I could I could tell you what liability issues are. Under CVRA, liability in my opinion sometimes looks like strict liability. Proving disenfranchised voters is a very easy test to achieve. And I just, you guys, we've done this before, I don't like to speak to liability in public regarding my client, unless my client tells me I can do that. And I'm not trying to be evasive, I'm trying to do my job.

But I am asking you, we have time to respond to that letter. I believe there's 45 days.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

If you want to talk about process, I'm happy to say the elections code, as I read earlier today, there is a presumption in that elections code that you can adopt a resolution of intention within 45 days from the date that you receive the notice, which is today. And if you do that, you limit your liability to no more than $30,000, as long as you outline the steps that you're going to take and you give them a timeline.

So there's no inherent law or action that has to be taken today. And I would further argue that it's suspect that we get such a letter during the council meeting. I mean, it didn't come a week ago or a few days ago. During the council meeting, this letter magically arrives. And you're telling us that we have 45 days to respond. Another question that I have is that pursuant to the Brown Act, we have to properly notice people on matters.

Would we have to take a vote that would waive that need as it relates to this issue, i.e. this letter that came that talks about liability, doesn't the general public have the right to have notice and to be aware of it before we act based on that information?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

It would be my opinion that if you wanted to have an extensive discussion about the letter and to agendize, for example, that resolution of intention, we would have to put that on an agenda. If your desire was to adopt the resolution of intention, we would need to come back and agendize that.

Got it. Thank you. So with that, I think Juan wanted to speak and Michelle, and then I'll go to Vince and David.

Just a quick thing that, you know, if we were to do this, also, we've got to think about the numbers of the population. We have a census coming up, correct? And then that's when you redraw the lines, and we don't have those numbers. So why are we going to make a decision based on all data? And I'd like to know what kind of data the people used in this letter that we got magically that appears while we're up here. You know, this is all being orchestrated, I think. It's being rushed. and it's not fair to the public so that's all I have to say thank you

mayor Pro Tem Martinez mr. mayor I'm gonna put my motion on the floor and I know there'll be a lot of discussion and a lot of way knows base but I but I just want to put it out there and so you know obviously with this change there is it going to be a change in form of government in regards to finances right we have one budget you go into district elections obviously the accountability that each member is going to have when they live in a district, the scrutiny is going to be extremely high. But unfortunately, there is no money dedicated now to us, and even more so in this system,

now that you're going to be held responsible by those constituents that vote for you and you're unable to get some of the changes needed, whether it's in a park, whether it's trees, whatever have you, that can cause some issues. And so I have always been, Santa Ana is the 11th largest city in California. It's probably one of the only few cities left that doesn't have a full-time mayor and council or a hybrid portion of like Long Beach where it has a full-time mayor and it has a part-time council

where each of those council members receive a budget of $250,000 and an office to have their staff so that the constituents can hold that council member accountable. And so those are two options that I want to bring to the table. I've always brought in the first one, but if we do decide to go district elections, I think it's important for us to make sure that you give those members who will be running for office in 2018 the resources to be good elected officials. Secondly, I would recommend moving from the city's voting geography free from district and voting method plurality to a bi-district election with a mixed system

of a mayor and two councils that would be at large. Unfortunately, as I looked at the current law, we would actually have to report that, but I just wanted to state that to the fact because we have to bring that back. I wanted to state that as well. And Madam City Attorney, I have a question. if this council decides to go to district elections and it has its mayor elected at large and doesn't have a runoff and say those folks that are in a district have a runoff is there any legal challenges because out of the seven of the 11 largest cities

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

they all have a runoff including the mayor so i have not had anyone do an analysis of that anecdotally all I know is in researching this issue there was a city in the Inland Empire recently who due to as a result of a lawsuit, a CVRA lawsuit, went ahead and changed to at district elections but they did not change their at large mayor and that same person who sued is suing again. We don't know the outcome of that. That's at the superior court level and that occurred recently. So I don't know what their theories are, but it must have been based on something happening within their demographics and their numbers.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

But I don't have any more information than that.

Great. Thank you. And so I just wanted just to bring that up because it's a possibility. The other thing I would recommend is a creation of a redistricting commission by resolution with options to include either an independent commission or an advisory committee of the city council. This body would be tasked with helping the city council with its maps for redistricting. Finally, the city should consider adopting campaign finance regulations by charter or by ordinance. If the city is serious about getting special interest out of Santa Ana elections, it must also be considered a public finance program.

As of today, only seven charter cities have adopted small donor matching fund programs where small contributions generally of under 250 from city residents are matched at the local government ratio that eventually would help remove a lot of the special interests that we're talking about, big dollars coming into elections. And then finally, I would ask the city council to look at fixing the loopholes on using independent expenditures and also using partisan select committees to fundraise money.

If we truly want to talk about having accountability, making sure that we take big interest out, there is a loophole currently now on this city council where you can move towards using your select committees and you also could use independent expenditures to raise money. and folks have done this up here on this council if we really want to move in that direction and Mr. Councilman Tenaher, if you're willing to support these things that I've said, more than willing to support you in district elections with the runoff, but making sure that we have true democracy and what I just said, that is true democracy for this city of Santa Ana.

Additional comments?

Councilmember Sarmiento. Yes, thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I think what we're saying up here was better articulated by some of our speakers who came up and spoke. I think it was more plainly spoken. I think the points were very, very clear. So we can poison pill this thing to death and say we should do runoffs. We should add salaries to each council member. We should add staff. I mean, we could just go over and over. I think, you know, Council Member Theanajero's analogy was very accurate. I think if you're supportive of this, you're going to be supportive of this. This first step needs to be taken. We could have spoken about runoffs.

We could have spoken about staffs being added to council members. We tried that in the past. We could have spoken about compensating council members better. Look, that didn't happen. We're here on the eve of a deadline that we're facing, not because it was imposed or self-imposed by us, But we asked for this question to be brought before us months ago. Months ago, we asked that the demographer send a report. It was delayed for whatever reason. Now we're faced with a deadline because the only reason why this is important that we make the deadline before March 9th is because there's three seats that are going to be vacant.

And if those aren't selected by district elections, it's a whole generational change that we're going to have to wait for. Those seats will be occupied for the next 12 years. And so district elections won't have an impact for a very, very long time. Now is when the voters should have a right to apply. Again, this is simply a question of giving the voters the right to go ahead and make that decision. This council obviously is challenged with that decision. We're not having a good, strong consensus on it, but I think that this is the appropriate decision. This is the appropriate question to ask.

Now, Madam City Attorney, I had more of a technical question for you because somebody said, well, what do we do with lawsuits or threats of lawsuits that we receive at the 11th hour? We've received plenty of lawsuits and threats of lawsuits at the 11th hour. I remember attorneys coming in challenging our SQL analysis or challenging one project or another, and lawsuits that are about maybe six inches thick being planted on our desk. and it happens right on the eve of a council meeting. So this isn't anything rare. This isn't anything new. It happens all the time. What we're looking at now is a real threat of litigation

that was filed by the Asian Americans Advancing Justice. Given that, wouldn't that threat of litigation trigger our ability to access funds from the liability fund, which would only require a majority, not a supermajority?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

So the city currently does not have any rules or regulations for accessing that particular fund, unlike what we have in other budget areas. I think ultimately that decision is made by our finance department, but it has been my experience that when we have had threats of litigation, there are previous examples where we have used the liability fund as the method of pain to settle those claims or to address the resolution of those claims. That has been our practice.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

I'm not aware of us using the appropriation requirement when that has happened, but that would be up to staff to address that issue if they have other examples that I'm not aware of.

Well, that's my understanding as well. Given that, go ahead.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Well, I was just, I, forgive me, because this is one of my pet issues, but a specific thing that comes to mind was, I think it was a year or so ago, we had potential liability at one of our stadium, I think it was at our stadium, addressing the use by members of our public, and we accessed our liability fund at that time as well to address that liability.

Thank you for that explanation. And given that, I think, I'm not sure if there was a substitute motion on the floor. If there wasn't, I would simply make a friendly amendment to the motion to, in the event that we have to appropriate funding for this, at this point, I would say that that liability fund be available for us to access to fund the special election.

I'll second that. I'll accept the amendment. So at this point, Mayor, I'd like to call the question.

Mr. Mayor, just a brief clarification. I would word that as using funds from the current fiscal year's liability fund in an amount not to exceed $30,000 for use for election costs, demographer costs, and outreach, just so we can be inclusive of what the related costs are going to be to deal with the issue before us. I'm agreeable.

All right. Those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Those opposed? No. No. We have three no's and four a's. Okay, let's go on to the next. The motion passes. The motion passes.

I don't know that it passes. I mean, it's four yeses, three no's. I think two be determined. What happened in the process? I think we heard from the city attorney that it's a four-year majority vote.

What about noticing the public?

So we're not going to notice the public? Is that what it is? No, wait. I need to know, did that motion pass or not pass? Ms. Bryan, yes. Ms. Bryan.

Passed 4-3, but what I'm telling you is I believe that you need five votes for certain things. They say you don't.

City Attorney, she's our official attorney on this.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

The RFCA was written to the City Council with the facts that we had at hand when we wrote the report. The facts that we had at hand when we wrote the report was that we were telling the City Council that to adopt these resolutions, you needed five votes to make an appropriation. And the reason you needed five votes for that appropriation was there was no monies available to address an election.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

what is different from what we did at that time we wrote and released this report to what's happened now is moments before this council meeting started there was this letter written by a legitimate lawyer from a legitimate organization threatening litigation against the city and i'm listening and it i heard a motion was made that because of that threat of litigation although in other instances i'm sometimes given an opportunity to go assess and look at that you, the council, have decided as a matter of that letter to use your liability fund to pay this. In consulting with staff, I am told that that money is available.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

It's in the budget. And in those cases where money is available for that purpose, an appropriation is not necessary.

Thank you.

Motion to say we move on. I still believe it's illegal.

I think it's illegal, too. I mean, how come? I thought we were going to be challenged. When it's a lawsuit like that, don't talk over me. I thought we have to allow the public to hear about this. Why don't you be quiet for a second?

Thank you. Be respectful.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

Council Member, may I address your question?

So regarding notice for the public, I thought we have to have a notice for the public or do something. We have something of this magnitude. Don't we have to have time to research it? We haven't even researched it.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem —

As I mentioned, in past occurrences when we've received threats of litigation, I've asked for the opportunity to review and to look at the potential threat and to give you an assessment. In this case, as I've said to you and was in your staff report, CVRA lawsuits have the strict liability standard. We have, I've also given the council the option that you had 45 days to address this, but at the end of the day, it's a vote of the council that determines what action you're going to take.

I see. Thank you for the clarification. Thank you.

thank you so let's go on to the next item

mr. may I believe next item is item 80a which addresses some projects or properties and two of which a couple of which are close proximity to my home therefore I'm going to be recusing myself from that item. All right.

So I would entertain a motion on item 88.

Mr. Mayor, I have a comment.

Go ahead.

And definitely I support and want to thank C&C Development for all the good work that they have been doing and the properties that I do have. I just had a question for staff because I want to put it on the record. So sometimes things can be confusing. What we're asking here today is to make some adjustments for the proposed management fee. but as you read you don't ever see that that fee that increase is not going to be going to the renters their rent will continue to remain the same the the cost would be more towards the city of Santa Ana they probably will incur

won't get won't receive as much money as we have in the past and so I just want to state that for the record is that a true statement yes thank you mayor

Portel Martinez this will not impact the general fund it will impact the program income for the funds that were used to finance the loans originally, including our home program account, our neighborhood stabilization program account, and our housing successor agency account. However, the loans, as you stated, will be paid in full when they're due.

Fantastic. Thank you. And I'll move this item, Mr. Mayor.

I'll second. Those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Those opposed. Motion carries. Thank you, everybody. Next item is...

Mr. Mayor, can we continue this item? Because I have to get going. Yeah, let's continue the next item.

studies but then i have to let's continue talking about um 85a all right let's continue that item i would now uh move us on to the housing authority i call it to order and entertain a motion so moves i'll second those in favor please say aye aye aye those opposed motion carries i will now

move beyond housing authority member comments and bring it back to city council and

a speaker on it but we continued 85a so we're not going to hear that um affordable housing fund policies and procedures are going to take off no i'm going to stay here

for this one and then i'm leaving i'm not going all right we'll do that one then i'm going to

leave because I'm not going to participate on the commercial cannabis non-retail and other uses

who's leaving

well then you're not gonna have a yeah David currently now let's think we'll have what we'll have corn we don't necessarily need to take action but we

can give direction thanks fantastic the first item you can stay for yes go ahead

Let's start WIS1.

Thank you, Mayor. Members of the Council, we are here tonight to present a draft of our proposed affordable housing funds policies and procedures. This is in follow-up to the recommendation approved by City Council on June 20, 2017 to direct staff to develop a policy and criteria for the allocation of future affordable housing development funds.

Following the direction we received on June 20, these draft policies and procedures have gone through a six-month review process. Beginning in September, we held our first work-study session on these draft policies and procedures with our Community Redevelopment and Housing Commission. Following that, with direction and revisions from our CRHC, we then brought it back to the CRHC for approval on October 25th. Then on November 13th, we presented the draft to the Economic Development, Infrastructure, Budget and Technology Committee. The EDIBT Committee provided direction to staff, requested more information on specific

items and also requested staff to hold a stakeholder workshop. On December 19th, we held a stakeholder workshop in which 15 stakeholders attended the meeting ranging from Jamboree Housing, AMCAL, and CNC Development to the Public Law Center and Kennedy Commission. Following the stakeholder meeting, we integrated the feedback we heard and then brought back the revised policies and procedures to the EDIBT Committee a second time on January 8th. At their January 8th meeting, the EDIBT Committee requested additional revisions, which have been incorporated into this draft.

The draft policies and procedures have also been made available on our website for the past three months for public review and comment. Our next step is to bring the draft policies and procedures to City Council for consideration on March 20th.

With approval by City Council, these policies and procedures will guide how our limited affordable housing funds and land assets are allocated, committed, loaned, and monitored for affordable housing development. The goal and intent is to provide a transparent, open, and fair process for the allocation of our scarce affordable housing resources. Among competing private and public interests for how our affordable housing funds are allocated to address what is one of the most pressing issues in our community,

these draft policies and procedures provide a framework upon which our staff and residents can trust and rely upon for the transparent and effective administration of our limited affordable housing resources. We have heard from our Community Redevelopment and Housing Commission, from stakeholders in the community, and from the EDIBT committee with substantial feedback, and everyone is in support of these draft policies and procedures as provided to you today.

The content of these policies and procedures is comprehensive, starting with the type of affordable housing funds we currently have available. The balance of funding sources available is currently published on a quarterly basis as an exhibit to our Housing Division quarterly report. And future sources of funds that become available, like funding through the SB2 or SB3 legislation, will also be covered by these policies and procedures. The majority of the policies of most interest to everyone is our proposal, submittal, and review procedures beginning on page 9.

These are our policies and procedures for how a proposal may be submitted and reviewed by the City. The remaining sections cover our pre-loan commitment procedures following approval by City Council, our loan terms and closing procedures, project monitoring and reporting, and an in-depth overview of our funding sources currently available. Our presentation will go in-depth on our proposal submittal and review procedures beginning on page 9.

Our proposal submittal and review procedures provides three opportunities for the submission and review of a proposal. First, an open RFP process. Second, a City Council-initiated proposal review. And third, a buy-write funding for housing process. For the open RFP process on page 9, proposals may be submitted at any time, and the RFP is continuously open throughout the year. This provides for an opportunistic process so the City will not miss out on a site for development. It also addresses a concern we heard from the EDIBT Committee as well as our interested stakeholders at the stakeholder meeting.

How it works is that there will be a quarterly deadline for the review of proposals. No proposal or potential site will ever be 90 days away from a quarterly deadline for review and submission to our City. However, a proposal must receive a minimum score of 75 points by the review panel in order to proceed forward to City Council. Currently, our RFP process takes approximately 120 days, and we anticipate this process to be shorter. For the second process, the City Council initiated proposal review process on page 10.

Staff understand that Council members may have specific projects or sites in their ward where they want to see affordable housing. In response, staff are proposing a City Council-initiated proposal review process that can allow Council members to support affordable housing development in their wards. For the City Council-initiated review, a City Council member may request review of a proposal directly. The developer will then pay for an analysis by the City's real estate advisor, currently Kaiser Marston Associates,

And following the analysis by the City's real estate advisor, City Council will then be presented with the analysis and will be asked to provide direction to staff on the proposal without any staff recommendations. Approval of the proposal to move forward will require at least five votes due to the commitment of City funds.

And third, our proposal submittal and review procedures provides a buy-write funding for housing policy process on page 11. This process includes that a developer may submit an application for buy-right funding for housing to the city. The project must be located in a zone designated as buy-right for housing development, where the project approval does not require any discretionary actions by the city. And after the application is submitted, staff will immediately, as soon as possible, form a review panel to consider the developer's application for buy-right funding

using the same scoring and selection criteria from the open RFP process. This will expedite staff review of the project in a buy-write area. Only units serving households at 30% area median income or below may qualify for this process, and the maximum per unit subsidy shall not exceed the maximum per unit subsidy limit set by HUD for the home program because of the lack of the financial analysis by the real estate advisor. This policy only applies to local funds, which are currently our inclusionary housing funds because all of our federal funds must go through a federal procurement process.

The RFP competitive selection criteria on page 12 applies to the open RFP process and the buy-write funding for housing process. This is only a sample of the criteria, but it follows the general principles provided on the bottom of page 11 to significantly increase affordable housing opportunities for large families, three- and four-bedroom units, benefit of higher percentage of units for extremely low-income households with deeper affordability, support projects that are cost-effective with low operating costs, meaning implementing green building techniques, increase affordable housing opportunities for special needs populations

including homeless individuals and families, persons with a disability, and seniors, and support projects that are located in areas currently underserved by affordable housing developments. Following direction from our EDIBT committee, timeliness of the project was also moved up as the next highest scoring section after a level of affordability in target population because as we all know, and as Mayor Patel Martinez communicated multiple times before, we need affordable housing now. These criteria may be modified by staff from time to time to address practical requirements arising from a particular solicitation.

With this, this is the end of our presentation. We will be returning to City Council on March 20th with the recommendation for approval of the draft policies and procedures

that have been have you have received tonight wow thank you thank you judson i appreciate your presentation i don't think we're going to be able to give action we obviously have lost a quorum here so i'll go ahead and hopefully if others come back um thank you for your presentation is there

any questions right now just since it's a work study it's it's it's exchange of information but we're not taking called to take action there's no action on the agenda correct

so we could still no we actually have an opportunity to give action it was on the council on last meeting but because certain members of the council were not here we decided to move it to this to this meeting but obviously we're facing the same issues again so different different council members and so but we can take um direction it was um and so i guess we're not gonna be able to so you can give your input and then hopefully you could come back for uh up or down so that the main my two one comment

and one request one is i i wanted just my comment is uh to staff uh with regard to bringing this forward we've had issues in the past where there's been lack of clarity and and and there's uh uh it's just been very sort of ambiguous and it's caused some challenges as to basically how we direct our housing funds so I appreciate staff being proactive and bringing this forward and my request is I'd like to be able to set up a meeting Judson with yourself your office I'd be interested in delving into this

little bit more more extended with more questions beyond tonight's meeting so So thank you again, and if you can help me coordinate. Perhaps Julie, if you could help me with that. Thank you.

I didn't want to step on Councilman Benavides' last comments, so I wanted to catch those. But thank you, Mayor Pro Tem, and thank you for bringing this back. I know that the last time that this was brought before us, I wasn't present, and I know I was part of the committee when we made some of these recommendations. So thank you to staff. Thank you, Judson, for bringing this back to us. I think most of what we have here in the report and the presentation that you gave was addressed and you incorporated some of our comments that we made in committee. So we appreciate that.

Basically, the story is we need more housing, but we need a lot more affordable housing, right? And we need to have affordable housing that reflects the needs in our community. So you can have affordable housing that are micro units, that are single bedrooms, but those aren't really the type of unit mix that we need. The type of unit mix that we need are for multiple families. We need multifamily housing that is two and three bedrooms. And so I applaud those developers who have come out and done three and four bedroom units and included those in their unit mix.

And the other priority that I know is reflected here is that we have a lower AMI. And so I think, you know, taking those into account, if they're not reflected clearly, I'd like to make sure that we have those included and embedded in our policy, that we don't do 80 percent, we don't do something that's close to moderate, but we try to go as profound as we possibly can. We know that the subsidy is higher when that happens, but we also know that the need is high. So to the extent we do that and it reflects the priorities that we've mentioned tonight in committee and in the housing element, I think that takes us a long way.

And, of course, the procurement guidelines that you have now I think will help us hopefully navigate through some of the trickier funding of projects in the past. So with that, those are my comments. And so I don't think we can move anything because we don't have a quorum, so we're just commenting generally. So, thank you.

So with that, I think I've given all my points at the committee, and all of it was articulated by Judson that's in the report. I just think moving forward, it's an opportunity for us to make sure that we're able to provide stability and consistency with our developers. I think that's very important for them, especially if we're wanting to make our priority to build on more affordable housing with funds that we currently have. and so with that Mr. City Manager we don't have a quorum so we're going to bring this back to the next council meeting and hopefully we can take some action so now we have a yes

I have recused myself on this next work study

so do we want to take action I know you weren't here Councilman Solorio but it's affordable housing policy do you support it if so do you want to we're here but I know Councilman Benavides wanted more information so do we want to continue this item to the next council meeting

Well, as I understand it today was to be able to present, do a work study session to present the proposed policy and procedures, and it will be agendized for action at the next meeting, correct?

Okay, fantastic. So we're going to be moving on to the next study session, which is commercial cannabis and non-retail and other uses.

Mayor Patima Martinez, I want to clarify the friendly amendment that was made to item 65A. Because apparently there's been some, what's the number? 65B. There's some confusion on how the friendly amendment was phrased. phrase so the idea is 30,000 in addition to the election costs of 202,000 and the reason for that 30,000 I mentioned is for the demographer and outreach costs so

the you know there was a friend the original motion by councilman Benavides and and second by you know council members are mean so I just want to make sure that folks understood that the connection with the 30,000 and the election cost was with that sentiment.

Thank you, Madam Mayor Pro Tem. I'm glad that clarification was made because I think, again, it could have been misunderstood by staff. And I know that the City Manager has implored me to make sure that our motions are much more clear. Because sometimes by the time we state them or restate them on the dais and staff interprets them, it could be interpreted differently. So I always try to have the city manager almost restate the motion so we make sure that staff understands. But that was clear and that's the way I understood.

And it's an amount up to that amount because we really don't know from the county exactly how much they're going to charge. So it's an amount of the $202,000 plus the $30,000 that would be the friendly amendment. so it's it's buffer uh language and buffer amount so and i believe that is the understanding that

the city clerk and i got out of the motion so basically the 30 000 is above and above the amount that we had in staff report that's correct okay i think that that's what we understood

that that's correct thank you thank you great thank you so um did we get that for the record um

city clerk great thank you so of course city clerk do you do you need a revoke from that or that's No, that's actually what I originally had in my motion. Thank you.

But thank you for that clarification.

Great. Fantastic. So the second work study session, because Councilman Sarmiento has to recuse himself, and as I mentioned earlier, I had to excuse myself as well, but the mayor beat me to the punch, so I certainly, someone had to run the meeting, and so I've stayed here. If it's the city council, if it's possible for us to continue this item to the next council meeting, this work study, if not, someone's going to have to take over, and there's only going to be three members of this city council. So what's the pleasure of the council?

I think it has to be put over.

Yeah, that probably makes sense. It's a study session. Are there many in the audience that were here just for that item? One, so I think we might be... Okay, three. If there's public comment, we can maybe take public comments.

Councilman Sermon-Mancho, do you want to recuse yourself?

Yes, thank you, Madam Mayor Pro Tem. I'm going to recuse myself. I have a question before the FPPC on my ability to vote on these cannabis-related matters, and we still have yet to hear back from them. So I'm going to recuse myself out of an abundance of caution.

Fantastic. So I would like to make a motion to make Councilman Benavides the chair.

I'll second the motion.

Great. All those in favor, now I'm going to pass this on to Councilman Benavides.

Thank you, Martin.

Are these? There you have a good trip.

No, not these.

Specific to this item? No.

So at this point, we're going to move forward to public comments on non-agendized items. We have several speaker cards, first being Brandon Wells, followed by Kurt Dyer.

Hi there. My name is Brandon Wells. I've grown up in Santa Ana, part of the Santa Ana Unified School District and about to graduate from Cal State for what's in this semester. So a project, a partner of mine from also Santa Ana and I created is Apprentice Builds. It's a nonprofit. We just became legitimate last week. It aims to help at-risk youth and students in the Santa Ana area of high school age to learn hands-on skills that are not being taught well or sufficiently today. By building hot rods, something that interests them. Reason being, we both grew up in the area.

And although the schools have gotten a lot better about getting students to secondary education after high school, there's plenty of students that are still at risk and didn't have the guidance. So we developed this program so that these kids would have mentorship and learn the hands-on skills needed to become successful in the industry. The goal with this is to get these students ASC certified, enrolled in some kind of tech school so they can further their education or third an entry-level position in the industry. We look to your support from the city, from the council,

and from any kind of personal connections you may have in the industry, and we look to open a shop sometime in the next three months. Thank you. Excellent. Congratulations. Thank you for your comments. I'd be interested if you want to reach me directly to further discuss how we might be able to be supportive. Thank you. Next speaker again, Mr. Kurt Dyer, followed by Dale Helwig. Yeah, like my name is Kurt Dyer, and I worked for the United States Defense Department for half of my life, and I have never seen such a poorly organized meeting as the one I attended at the first congregational church March 1st.

The no on 2525 North Main meeting put on by the city of Santa Ana, where the city employees did all the talking, and hundreds and hundreds of my angry neighbors were yelled at to stop talking.

This is the speech that I was going to give at the Stop 2525 North Main meeting at the First Congregational Church March 1st, but was told by the city employees, no speech. So here I am. My name is Kurt. I live at 2543 French Street. We all live in a Box Canyon neighborhood. Edgewood and Santiago are the only ways in and out. Unless you're on foot, bike, or can fly. Each week I've been driving to the least expensive laundromat for 18 years.

And let me tell you, the bad billionaires were at the laundromat neighborhood and gone.

If I don't find a parking place in the neighborhood laundromat parking lot, no chance at a parking place in the neighborhood. While my laundry is rotating and tumbling, I walk the neighborhood. And notice the teams of locals moving cars right up to the edge of the ticket. And then tight bumper to bumper to get in one more compact car in between driveways packed with cars to the streets. Cops go light on parking tickets due to the compassion for the citizens.

We all walk in straight lines. But around the laundromat, it's like a right turn, left turn, left turn, right turn. Around the parked, packed driveways. It reminds me of marching in the formation with my United States Army Reserve Unit, the 6211th in San Francisco, Presidio. I think the Presidio doesn't exist anymore. Sorry.

What if I... Mr. Dyer, the light's been turned red, if you can conclude, please. Say what? The light there, your time allocated time has lapsed, so if you could please conclude your comments. Complete, completed. Yeah, I just got, yeah. Like, can I come back sometime and finish this off? Yes, sir. Every council meeting, you can have three minutes. The next one is on the March 20th. March 20th, yeah. Yes. I have a dream. I dream that the city haulers who were elected by us hear us and just say no to 2525 North Main Street.

Thanks, Mr. Dyer. Next speaker, Dale Haldig, followed by Patricia Coleman.

Well, I was hoping a few more would be around here tonight instead of just the three of you. But, you know, I read that the general plan is considered its constitution for all land use decisions. And as such, we should not be willing to change the general plan when a developer shows up and promises prosperity to the city. We have a housing plan, so let's follow it. The housing plan is to ensure that we maintain the vision, goals, policies, and programs of the city. The purpose for using specific development is for protecting the health and safety and general welfare of the people of the city.

I recently attended a meeting of the Park Santiago neighborhood with the Park Santiago neighborhood board and the developers, and it was the first time that we were actually able to get through the developers presentation. It was the third attempt. The downside was that all the great amenities that the new development promised to have for the residents there

is still not a reasonable use of the land. The size went from 517 units down to 505 units. This move is in the right direction, but it's still a long way to go to be acceptable. And I believe that the developer doesn't really take us seriously. The general plan should be taken seriously by all of you. Granting amendment changes and rezoning is the exception to the plan, not a course of normal business.

Again, I ask, why do so many people assume it's a done deal? After Wednesday, tomorrow, we'll have met with three of the Council members, and we look forward to meeting the rest of you soon. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Halving. Next speaker is Patricia Coleman, followed by Ben Lieberman, and then Sabrina Wilson.

Council members, thank you for hearing me tonight. I've been a member or a resident of the city long enough to remember the mayor coming out to campaign and going door to door for his very first election. So it's where we decided to raise our family. I wanted to say that I just came up here to say that I've been unfortunately really disappointed with how the city has handled and how the project 2525 has evolved.

because I was surprised to see, for instance, a vision plan that had density of unlimited high-rise and unlimited density, unlimited height with no discussion with the neighborhood. And my understanding is that you're working toward a collaborative relationship with the people. and I feel and a lot of other people feel that it's been disrespectful of the people to not be included.

This is a project that had discussion with a developer long before the people in the neighborhood were even let know that it existed. So I would appreciate you thinking about listening more to us and including the neighborhood in projects at an earlier time. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Coleman. Next speaker, Mr. Ben Lieberman. Mr. Lieberman is not present. The final speaker will be Sabrina Wilson.

Good evening. My name is Sabrina Wilson. My husband and I moved to the Park Santiago neighborhood of Santa Ana in December of last year. We relocated from the San Francisco Bay Area and were so excited when we stumbled upon this gem of a location. Their neighborhood is not only unique for Santa Ana, but for all of Orange County. Park Santiago is a neighborhood where each home is individual and unique, and there's definitely a sense of pride of ownership. Neighbors are friendly and look out for one another, and I felt like I had found my forever home. I've come tonight to provide you all with my input on the 2525 main project.

It's definitely not the right site for a 500 plus unit apartment complex. This lot actually happens to land right in my backyard. I share the property line with this location. There's definitely an invasion of privacy from my family and fellow neighbors that my fellow neighbors will endure with a five-story apartment complex towering over us. Tenants will be able to see into our yard and bedroom windows. This proposed project is extremely large, tall, and dense for this location. Traffic is already a major issue at the intersection of Main and Edgewood.

There is already congestion to get out of Park Santiago and onto Highway 5. This would only make it much worse to get out of Park Santiago, especially since they have it planned that the entrances and exits would be on Edgewood. The lack of parking planned for each of its tenants will have its residents and their guests spilling out into our neighborhood and blocking our driveways. Permitting streets is not an exception because that only increases annoyances to us as the homeowners to remember to have our guests place a placard on their car so they don't receive a $60 ticket for visiting us. I also worry about the lack

of communication from the developers and how trash of this community would be handled. I worry that they will have it out of the way for its renters and along the back wall of our property line to allow noise and rodents to inhabit. Please do not allow the rezoning to happen at this location. The proposed project is being is being proposed at the wrong location and it doesn't fit not only the feel of our community but the overall impact the community faces is significant. Please instead consider single-family housing or for it to remain professional office buildings. As you go to vote for this project, please remember the unique

vision of Parks Santiago, the homeowners who love where we live and have worked hard to be able to own in a diverse community like Santa Ana. So thank you for your consideration on this sensitive issue and for your continued support and hard work. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Wilson. We do have one final speaker, Mr. Letourneau. Chef Letourneau.

I have, Once again, thank you, and thank you for your patience for waiting out the evening. I wish the others were here as well. I've got copies of a resolution that I'd like to present on behalf of the Orange County Democratic Party, and it has to do with the demise due to the withdrawal of permission from the city of the needle exchange program. And I'd like to title my remarks under what we know and what we can prove. We can prove that needle exchange programs have been an effective and low-cost public health method for reducing infectious disease transmission, as well as an effective means of used needle retrieval.

We can prove that the country is being ravaged by an incredibly awful opioid epidemic in every state, in every city, in every state, and it is presenting itself in this city worse than in many other places. We can prove that Orange County is the fourth highest rate of HIV in California and nearly 1,000 cases of hepatitis C in Santa Ana, which shares the highest rate of any city in Orange County. and we can prove that 15.1% of these transmissions

have been as a result of needle usage. What we know is that for a long period of time, Santa Ana has been asked to share an unfair burden of this needle exchange program. But we also know, I see I'm running out of time, that each and every hour of each day of every week, of every month, of every year, there are new HIV and hepatitis C transmissions, each one costing hundreds of thousands of dollars over the course of a lifetime of people who are becoming infected. This program needs to be brought back. We need to work toward a multi-city approach. I agree with

that. I've heard that from you. And I think efforts are underway with Aid Services Foundation to make that happen. But I urge you, I implore you, I beg you for the sake of the people who are getting sick and dying to set up a 90-day reinstitution of this program. The solution to too many needles being found by people who aren't drug users is not to eliminate the meager program that was in existence to retrieve those needles. It needs to be a non-volunteer-based, beefed-up program that can three or four days a week with paid staff go out, retrieve the dirty needles, make sure they're disposed of in

in a safe and proper manner and make sure that the transmissions from the use of dirty needles does not continue to jeopardize the financial and physical health of the city residents and the county residents as well. So please take this resolution. I ask you to do something. Thank you to Council Members Tina Harrow and Council Member Martinez for working on a continuing basis to try to get a Band-Aid on this until we can get something bigger and better. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Terno. Your comments at this point will go to item 90A on our agenda,

which is as we close here, City Manager's comments. City Manager, any comments tonight?

Sure, Mr. Chair. I wanted to start off by announcing that the Community Emergency Response Team, CERT, and the departments of the Santa Ana Police Department, the Orange County Fire Authority, and the American Red Cross will be conducting a variety of community trainings during the month of March. Disaster preparedness and earthquake preparedness, fire safety, utilities, and fire suppression, and disaster medical operations will be the trainings that they offer this month. We have a schedule here, and it'll start as soon as tomorrow, March 7th, with disaster preparedness. March 14th, fire safety, utilities, and fire suppression.

The 21st of March, disaster medical operations one. And then March 28th, disaster medical operations two. In addition, so anybody who's interested in this can call us for more information. This information should be on the website. In addition, we have a job fair that's set at a work center. We'll be hosting another job fair on Wednesday, March 7th from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. tomorrow. Seven businesses will be in attendance looking to fill over 200 positions. The positions include sales, cooks, production, drivers, warehouse, and manufacturing operations.

The Santa Ana work center is located inside the Santa Ana regional transportation center, which is our train station on the second floor.

and then I'll just kind of brag a little bit in 2018 best water in the U.S.

for I don't know how many times we've won this award but the Santa Ana Municipal Water System won the 218 best water in the U.S. contest in the Berkeley Springs International Water Tasting Competition. So we have the best tasting water in the United States. The competition included water samples coming from all five continents Water was rated for appearance, aroma, taste, mouthfeel, and aftertaste. We are proud to have our water rank high for the fourth time and win the Gold Place Medal twice. This win reinforces the city's commitment to supply our residents with the best quality water at an affordable price.

And I just want to commend Nabil Saba and his team, who's back here. You know, they've been really good at knowing how to sample and send our water and just score really well. I'm really proud of them.

Did they use glass bottles? Did you use glass bottles?

Yes. Initially they used plastic when they first started off. It didn't work, yeah. Glass is the best way to preserve the taste.

I've noticed that when I drink a glass of wine, too. Anyway, I'm just teasing. Bad councilman. All right, let's keep talking.

Thank you. City Manager for council comments. Councilman Tiranjero. Thank you, Councilman Benavides. First, I want to thank the staff for, there's been a lot on your plate lately, and sometimes people don't quite understand that, but the life of our staff is pretty amazing. They come into work thinking, okay, today I have these five things that I have to get accomplished, and within a half hour they're already getting calls on other things.

And so it's just, it's been a very fascinating time to watch the transition occur and then just how everyone has been working very, very hard. I mean, there's some staff members that I haven't seen for a while because they're really swamped with work. So I just want to thank you for the work that you do. We have an event coming up next month, I believe, or actually at the end of this month. There's going to be a march on gun violence. I believe it's going to be at Centennial Park. I think it's going to be a great event. I know that a lot of students are starting to mobilize to make their voices heard.

I think it's a pretty interesting and historic time to see our youth as engaged as they are. I haven't seen this type of movement even here locally in quite some time, so I'm proud of them. I also have to put in a little plug. The district is going to have over 400 students participate this weekend on the district-wide speech and debate middle school contest. The top two speakers in every event will get a paid trip to Fort Lauderdale, Florida to compete at the national tournament against schools from all over the United States.

I believe this year the district is going to fly 46 students out there, which is a very nice group that's going to be representing. So I wish them all the best of luck. If you have an opportunity to come by and judge one of our final rounds, I think you'd be very, very much impressed by how articulate our students have become through this activity. Thank you, Mr. Councilman. Thank you, Councilman Tinajero. Councilman Salorio.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Benevy. There's a few items. First, I did see in a recent packet from our city manager, we are working collaboratively with our school district on an internship program to encourage standing unified students to work with our work center and for everybody to work with our employer community, to have job placements for our students over the summer months. I only would ask staff to also reach out to Garden Grove Unified,

because they do have high schools and substantial number of students in our city, and Orange Unified and Test Unified to see if they have similar programs so that other work center we could promote those as well. That would be a good thing. And also, this past weekend, the school district had a fantastic performance and outreach and entertainment program in our downtown called Boca de Oro.

And I know there were literally hundreds of students and parents attending multiple workshops and events and performances and discussions about their books. I know Councilmember Villegas showcased the book that he wrote. And then I know that Councilmember Tina Harrow had many of his speech and debaters there. They did amazing. So kudos to both, the school district overall. Finally, two related things. Maybe on our council agenda as part of the 90B item or as need be,

I know there are certain requirements for when council members do city business outside of the district that it should be shared with the public. And it would be good just to highlight. I know other communities will highlight what that specific requirement is. And it just kind of reminds everybody to share that. because for example on January 19th on behalf of the City of Santa Ana I went to the League of Cities Public Safety Committee that I'm on the big issue was homelessness and so future ones will have that topic as well I'm sure that

there's an upcoming meeting of the same group it's going to be in Pomona so as I get a little bit more information about that I'll try to share it with my colleagues and in the community so wanted to speak on those items as well

thank you thank you councilman Salorio councilman Villegas any comments no comments tonight it's a couple of comments that I have one is on one of the agenda items agenda item 20a we voted on a water some water main improvements and the the winning bid there came from a company in in Wisconsin second highest or second closest bid is more local not not in Santa Ana Orange County but Rico Rivera and I know that a couple of years ago we

we passed took action to provide some essentially to try to get more local

local businesses to be able to secure some of the business within the city to to in essence support local economy and local jobs job creation so something that I would ask of staff is for us to maybe revisit that ordinance to look at what at the formula to see if we are if we're providing enough of an intensive if you will or credit for a local business to be able to have secure some of these these bids with uh with the city this is a nearly three million dollar bid and it just would have been uh you know if

if there was possibility to have again more local uh people put to work on a project that size it just would be a positive thing for local economy something for for future another just general comment a number of years ago we went through a process a bond measure because our streets had reached a point of disrepair and I'm noticing that that was actually but probably about ten years ago now noticing some of those streets as neighborhood streets that we did a lot of work to be able to to to repair and and in some case reconstruct altogether are starting to show where

and we're starting to see some potholes starting to appear again.

So it's been coming upon us, and I know back then, part of the whole measure and the process went out and let the voters that we were going to be pursuing was this at the time was a $100 million bond project to be able to ensure that we repair our city streets and ultimately ensure that they don't get back to the place of district repair that they had been at one point. And at this point, again, the fact that we're starting to see potholes show up, we definitely need to look at how we're going to begin to address our streets so that they don't get to a place where they continue to deteriorate.

That's going to need to be a proactive approach. So I'm a city manager. I just would ask that I know that to Councilman Tinajero's point, there's so many things on everybody's plate.

although I hope that we would be able to figure out. I know there's been some discussion around strategy and some that the previous public works director had brought forth, and I just would ask for us to look at that. Some of us that are currently on the council have moved on, and it'll be inherited basically by the next council to be able to figure this out, but definitely we brought this up and we addressed it a few years ago, and hopefully it'll be something that we don't pass on something, an issue that will need to be addressed,

but rather than we come up with a solution now and pass on to the next council something that's been fixed and addressed. Last item here is we did have the district director for Congressman Luke Correa ask that we adjourn tonight's meeting in memory of Robert Bañuelos, who was a staff member for both the current congressman Correa and previously congresswoman Loretta Sanchez. And I think a lot of us had the opportunity to meet and work with Mr. Bañuelos

as he worked in the community, serving the community by way of his position with the congress members. I was able to find a short bio here that I would like to read. And Robert was raised on his family's farm here. He's a lifelong resident of Orange County and was raised on his family's farm in the area now known as Fountain Valley. Then Robert and the Bañuelos family were community-minded and regularly donated vegetables and livestock to the local food bank to help address hunger in Orange County. Robert's father was a World War II veteran. His mother worked on the space shuttle program at NASA.

son Robert worked for AT&T for 25 years and also worked for the Parks and Recreation Department in Orange County and was at one point Assistant Director at the Southwest Senior Center for a number of years and during his work with the Congress members his focus was in the area of serving senior citizens and U.S. veterans and their families. So tonight I would just like to adjourn this meeting in memory of Robert and with that meetings adjourn thank you very much good night

Thank you.