Read the May 3 meeting.

And now, the next question is about the Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Mayor Mrakas- Okay, Mayor, the meeting is now being recorded.

Phil Bacerra

Mayor Mrakas- Great, can you hear me okay.

Mayor Mrakas- Yes, we can hear you clearly.

Phil Bacerra

Mayor Mrakas- Great, thank you. Well, let me go ahead and reconvene the regular meeting for the Santa Ana City Council for May 3 2020. Let me just begin by making some opening remarks. This meeting is taking place within person attendance and by teleconference via zoom, the public may access the meeting via the Santa YouTube channel or the city's website, please bear with us as a technology may disrupt the flow of the meeting. and let me begin by apologizing to everybody. I'll be joining you virtually a little under the weather. I sound a lot worse than I feel, but nonetheless, just to be cautious,

Phil Bacerra

I didn't want to get any of my colleagues or anybody else sick. I'll go ahead and turn it over to the clerk to see if she can call roll.

Thank you, Mayor. The request to speak on any agenda or non-agenda items within this district. Can you call roll? Forgive me, I'm so sorry. Council member Hernandez?

Present.

Council member Lopez?

Council member Mendoza? Present. Council member Mendoza, oh, thank you. I was going to mute you. Council member Peñalosa?

David Penaloza

Present.

Council member Fan? Mayor Plotem Becerra? Here. Mayor Sarmiento? here great thank you council member lopez just joined us excellent uh madam clerk before we

Phil Bacerra

proceed to the pledge let me go ahead and have you make your announcements

thank you to request to speak on agenda or non-agenda items within the city's jurisdiction with the exception of public hearing items 34 and 35 please dial star 9 from your phone or click on the button labeled raise hand from zoom at this time please hold your comments until the mayor opens the public hearings, our public hearing for items number 34 and 35 only. Please announce your name and word or neighborhood you reside in within the city of Santa Ana for the record. Thank you.

Phil Bacerra

Great, thank you. Let me go ahead and call on council member David Peñalosa to lead us in the pledge of allegiance. Council member, if you'll please lead us in the pledge.

David Penaloza

Thank you, Mayor Sarmiento. Figueroa, please rise and join me in facing our flag. Put your right hand over your heart and follow along. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America

and to the republic for which it stands,

David Penaloza

one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Phil Bacerra

Great, thank you for that. Let me go ahead and now call on Rabbi Stephen up. Einstein is leading us in words of inspiration.

O God, you have called us unto life and set us in the midst of purposes we cannot measure or understand. Yet we thank you for the good we know, for the life we have, and for the gifts that are our daily portion for health and healing for labor and repose for the ever renewed beauty of earth and sky for thoughts of truth and justice which stir us from our ease and move us to acts of

goodness and for the contemplation of your eternal presence which fills us with hope that what is good and lovely will not perish. For all these, we give thanks and pledge ourselves to use these blessings wisely. Amen.

Phil Bacerra

Thank you, Rabbi. Thank you for those words of inspiration. Let me go now to the ceremonial presentation segment of the meeting. I'm going to go ahead and call in Mayor Pro Tem Becerra to give a proclamation of recognition to Bayer on their 75th year anniversary.

If I have Drew and the rest of the Bayer crew come forward.

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it it it it it it it it it it it it Good evening, everybody. So today I wanted to recognize Santa Ana company that's been here for quite some time. So the Bear Paint Company, which was founded in 1947 by Otho Bear Jr. and is one of the largest manufacturers of paint and paint application products in the United States, Mexico, Canada, and Chile. The Santa Ana-based company comes from humble beginnings of wood stain batches being made in a family garage. I believe that was in Alhambra, right? Or Pasadena. Or Pasadena, okay. Close, right? Close.

And then becoming an industry leader, I'm sorry, becoming an industry leading coating and applicator manufacturer with its corporate headquarters just down the street from the Santa Ana Auto Mall in Southeast Santa Ana. The Bear family bought the first parcel of land that the Segerstrom family ever sold. And that land happens to be just off Alton, probably about walking distance from my house over in Ward 4. That original Santa Ana plant is still in use today and originally was, if you know the Segerstrom family, in the middle of a huge lima bean field, right?

So it's still being used today and it's not in the middle of a huge lima bean field anymore. more. Today there are over a thousand employees working in Bear's Santa Ana facilities and 136 of them are Santa Ana residents. Bear Paint has also been generous in contributing paint and materials towards restoring and maintaining some of the beautiful murals that we have here in Santa Ana. So on behalf of the City of Santa Ana and our City Council, I wanted to congratulate Bear Paint on their 75th anniversary and thank them for all the contributions that they've made to our community. So Drew, would you like to say a couple words?

Thank you, Councilman Becerra. Bear's been really happy to be part of this community all these years. Many of our employees live here in Santa Ana, and we like to call Santa Ana our home. When we had a chance to move, we moved within the city. We used to be off Sagerstrom and Harbor, and we were really happy to find property very near the auto mall. That's our new world headquarters and I'd like to thank my team members Allison and Mason here with me tonight and we're very pleased and appreciate the honor. Great thank you for being here. Thank you sir.

Phil Bacerra

Great congratulations to the bear family on their 75th anniversary. Let me now call on Council Member Fernandez who is going to present the next proclamation.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

Thank you, Mr Mayor if if it's okay if we can continue to the next Council Member awaiting on the participant.

Phil Bacerra

Will do let me go ahead and call on Council Member Lopez who's going to be presenting a certificate of recognition to the Orange County Fire Authority on their 35 on to Chief Henry for his 35 years of outstanding service so Council Member Lopez I'll turn it over to you.

Jessie Lopez

All right. Hi, everyone. I see the guys are here with you today.

We usually travel in a pack. I've got some girls over there too.

Jessie Lopez

I know. All right. So this is yours, Chief. Hi, everyone. So today we are here, and I have the really great honor of recognizing Chief James Henry, and I work with the chief because I also have the privilege of working with OCFA as one of their board of directors.

Jessie Lopez

And, you know, Chief Henry from the moment that I've met him has always been so respectful and kind and always just willing to share as much history about the agency with me about the organization has made sure that I tour some of the stations here in Santa Ana, and goes, you know, above and beyond to make sure that do you have any questions, you know, do you want to understand what's happening and I really appreciate because it's a really big board and a lot happens at the meetings. But you know, one of the things that I learned when I first came on board was that the Chief has been with us for a really long time.

Jessie Lopez

And this year we're celebrating his 35th anniversary, sorry. And so we just want to congratulate you, Chief, because when we talk to the other folks that serve alongside of you, that serve the residents of the city here, you know, they say that you're a very caring chief, that you have a really strong work ethic, that you don't ask, you know, your colleagues to do anything that you wouldn't do yourself. And I think that goes a really long way. And, you know, they also say that you lead by example, that you're very respectful, that you value all of

Jessie Lopez

your relationships, not just with, you know, the folks that you work with, but the partners here at the city and that you really love and admire the strong culture here in the city of Santa Ana, that you love the food, the tacos, everything that is here, and you know that you have the utmost respect for the residents here, which is very, very important to me. And every one of them, I think it's fair to say that they would say that they're really proud to serve alongside of you. And you know the men and the women who choose to work alongside Chief Henry know that they are

Jessie Lopez

going to work for a chief that is hard working and that knows he will not ask people to do anything that he can't, hasn't, or will do himself. And Sanana is and always has been his first choice of where he wants to work. So thank you Chief for your 35 years of outstanding dedication. We definitely look forward to working with you many, many more years. However, I think people also would be excited for you to, you know, go away and enjoy, you know, vacation. So Santa Ana residents, please help me in congratulating Chief Henry for 35 year anniversary. Sorry.

Jessie Lopez

And I have to say, I did not ask the chief for permission to do this because he would have told me no. So chief, would you like to share some words?

On behalf of the city and the city council, thank you very much for all of this. I'm not a a public person per se. I'm very humble, but I will say thank you for this. I've always enjoyed working someplace where I could do the most good. And I've loved this community. I've spent 35 plus years here. And we get a chance to serve the community in so many different ways. You know, I've had the opportunities of delivering babies and comforting loved ones who's lost a spouse after 50 or 60 years. And I just wouldn't trade any of that. It's a calling for all of us.

The men and women that serve the Orange County Fire Authority and the ones that serve this community are committed to excellence and integrity and pride, and they serve your community every day with all of that. And I couldn't be more proud to be a part of that group and to be a part of that leadership that brings them here. So thank you on behalf of everyone. Okay, thank you for this award. and thank you for all of you. And no, I'm not retiring next month or anything like that. I'm still gonna stick around for a little bit longer just to be a pain in somebody's, no, I'm just kidding. Just to continue my path.

I've got a few things left that I wanna do, but thank you for this honor. It very means a lot. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Phil Bacerra

Thank you Councilmember Lopez and congratulations Chief Henry. Yeah nobody wants you to go away just yet so appreciate all the service you've done for all of us here. Let me go ahead and now call on Council Member Mendoza who's going to be presenting a certificate to El Mariachi Santanero for their outstanding contributions. Council Member Mendoza.

Thank you, Mayor Sainto. I am very honored to present this certificate of recognition to Mariachi Los Santaneros for two reasons. Because as they come up, they are a local mariachi band and we are a representation of our culture right here in this in the great city of santa ana so and since i'm not available to be in person i have asked my colleague david um

to help me present and I will give you a little background on what it is that Cinco de Mayo represents for our culture and our heritage. So Cinco de Mayo or the 5th of May is a day in which many celebrate the day of Mexican army's victory over France at the Battle of Puebla during the Franco-Mexican War on May 5, 1862. So this is not to be confused with the actual Mexican Independence Day, which is September 16th,

but May 5, Cinco de Mayo, is a very significant date in the culture of the Mexican families. Cinco de Mayo has evolved into a commemoration of Mexican culture and heritage, particularly in areas with large Mexican-American populations, such as our beautiful city right here in Santa Ana. Cinco de Mayo is an opportunity to celebrate Mexican identity, promote ethnic consciousness,

and build community bond in this. When I think of Cinco de Mayo celebrations, Mexican culture and heritage, there's a certain type of music that comes to mind, which is mariachi music. This is one of the most beloved forms of traditional music. In the spirit of Cinco de Mayo, several members of El Mariachi Los Santaneros are here with us today. And I welcome Alex Mascoro, Abel Diaz, Mayra Cortes, and Dylan Rivera.

David Penaloza

Thank you, Councilwoman Mendoza. I don't mean to interrupt, but I figured I was standing up here, wanted to not just take up space. So thank you for that. And I want to hear welcome El Mariachi Los Santaneros. One thing that I want to highlight is that the youngest one behind me is 16 years old. And the oldest one is only 26, about 10 years younger than me almost. So I'm impressed. And it's El Mariachi Los Santaneros. So I am half qualified because I'm a Santanero, but I have no musical talent whatsoever.

David Penaloza

So I can't be part of the group. But like my colleague, Councillor Mendoza said, we're left off. Alex Mascorro is the lead and founder of Mascorro Productions Inc. He was born and raised and still lives in Santa Ana, and he attended the mariachi program at Dell High Center and continues his mariachi education at Santa Ana College. So, without further ado, I'd like to recognize the certificate

David Penaloza

to Mariachi Los Santaneros in the spirit of Cinco de Mayo, which is not Mexican Independence Day. It is where the Mexican army beat the French in the Batalla de Puebla. So tomorrow or Friday, whenever you guys are out for happy hour, remember that. Tell that to a friend. It's not Mexican Independence Day. It's when the Mexicans beat the French in the Battle of Puebla. And it's significant because the Mexican army was about the 10th the size of the French military, and they were still able to beat them. So, you know, Viva Mexico. So anyways, with Maria Celos Santaneros,

David Penaloza

and I'll make sure to get a copy for, is there only four of you or is there? Okay, so I'll make sure to get eight of these so that you could each have your own copy at home. Okay, so without further ado, they would like to perform which song? Cielito Lindo.

And if you wanna give any words before you perform, you wanna just let the song start.

All right, so I want to thank the city Sanana. Without the city, I would not have been able to form this group. I was born and raised here, I still live here. I formed this business along with videography, a mariachi music business. I'm currently getting my credential program to teach in the school district as well. So everything about this group is just santaneros. I actually wanted to give a little bit of another fun fact about Cinco de Mayo to add on about the French army and the Batalla de Pueblo. If it were not for the Mexican army to fight off the French, the Confederacy in the United

States would have had an advantage against the Union. So in a way, Mexico helped win the Civil War in the United States. So it's very connected. That's the reason why Cinco de Mayo is very popular in the United States because it helped defeat the confederacy indirectly so that's just a little fun fact um and then another thing i wanted to say is that um usually there's actually nine of us uh but you can catch all nine of us this saturday at the art walk from 8 to 10 pm we'll be walking around taking requests so you guys can sing with us so i encourage that and speaking of singing with us we're going to be

doing cielito lindo in spirit of santa ana and i encourage and invite the whole crowd to sing with us here's cialito lindo thank you

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Everybody. Oh, ay, ay, ay.

Cantay, no llores, porque cantando se alegran, cielito lindo, los corazones. Oh, ay, ay, ay.

Cantay, no llores, porque cantando se alegran,

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Thank you so much for the

David Penaloza

Thank you so much, Alex. One question. Back in January, my mom turned 70 years old and I couldn't find the mariachi if the life depended on me. So for everyone listening, where can we book you? If we're having a quinceanera or a wedding or a birthday, not a wedding anytime soon, but a party, a birthday party.

David Penaloza

Cough, cough. Where can we book?

Sure. Website, Facebook. Yeah, so I guess the easiest way at this moment, I do have business cards, but I can provide my Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook page. At Mascorro, that's M-A-S-C-O-R-R-O underscore productions. Again, that's at Mascorro underscore productions. Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube. Thank you.

David Penaloza

Thank you, Alex. So we'll make sure to tag you on social media. I believe. I have a phone here.

Thank you.

Phil Bacerra

Great. Thank you for that presentation, Councilmember Mendoza. Thank you, Mariachi Los Santaneros. Only at a Santa Ana City Council meeting while you guys hear Mariachi live and in person. Let me go ahead and turn it over now to Councilmember Peñalosa who's going to be presenting a proclamation to Eva Barrios for National Crime Victims' Rights Week. Councilmember, it's all yours.

David Penaloza

Thank you, Mayor Sarmiento. Please have the Barrios family and Mr. Felipe join me up here, please.

David Penaloza

How are you, sir?

David Penaloza

Come on over. You guys can join us.

David Penaloza

So I would like to present on behalf of the city of Santa Ana, the mayor and the city council, a proclamation recognizing National Crime Victims' Rights Week, which is April 24th through the 30th. And joining me here today is Eva Barrios and her family who, in honor of Victoria Barrios, her memory, and on behalf of crime victims who have survived and have inspired many to continue to fight. Today the City Council declares April 24th and the 30th, which was just a couple days ago,

David Penaloza

as National Crime Victims' Rights Week. Accepting this proclamation today is Eva Barrios and several members of her family. Eva is the mother of Victoria Barrios, who was only 18 years old when she was senselessly killed on August 30th, 2019. National Crime Victims' Rights Week provides an opportunity to recommit ourselves to ensuring that accessible appropriate and trauma informed services are offered to all victims of crime serving victims and rebuilding their trust restores hope to victims and survivors as well as supports thriving communities with the help of our

David Penaloza

dedicated professionals and courage and strength from survivors we will be able to overcome systemic barriers that certain communities face in obtaining justice. We could learn more about resources available to you as a victim of crime on our city website at www.santa-ana.org forward slash departments forward slash police. Santa Ana's Family Justice Center is also located at our Santa Ana Police Department headquarters, which offers a lot of resources for victims of crime.

David Penaloza

Santa Police Department's open house is this May 14 and more details will be available soon. Coffee with the cop is also on May 19 at the Starbucks located on 2303 South Bristol Street, which will be more available for resources there. Informational materials is also available in the Council Chambers lobby today. And with me is the family of Eva Barrios, who we remember. And it is my promise to you that our Santa Ana Police Department is doing everything possible to bring justice to your family and to Victoria.

David Penaloza

So if you guys could please, I don't know if any of you want to say a few words.

Thank you.

I just want to say thank you to our city officials, law enforcement, and all the community that honestly continues to just show us so much love and support. It is imperative that we remember the victims who often suffer senseless tragedy. So just thank you, and I am honored to be here. Thank you.

Thank you.

Phil Bacerra

Thank you for that proclamation and I wish I were there to support you all in person. Eva, Felipe, the entire Barrios family, we are not going to rest until we find you justice as was said. Let me move along to the next proclamation. I believe Councilmember Hernandez is ready now with his. I'm going to go ahead and turn it over so he can make a proclamation presentation to Neutral Ground declaring May 2022 as National Mental Health Awareness Month. Councilmember, I'll go ahead and turn it over to you.

All right. Neutral Ground, you want to make your way up here?

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

And please bring any of your guests with you.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

Can we make some noise for that amazing performance and the amazing presentation by my colleagues today?

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

Thank you. We got a lot of beautiful things happening today.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

All righty. Wow. So thank you all for joining us here today at City Hall. Today is May 3, 2022, and I am honored and humbled to present a proclamation declaring National Mental Health Awareness Month and presenting it to Nati Alvarado with Neutral Ground. Today the city is presenting this proclamation and we wanted to recognize National Mental Health Awareness Month. Neutral Ground centers its services in prevention, intervention, and mediation for young people ages 14 to 24 and families residing in Santa Ana.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

All of their services address found in the hierarchy of mental health needs are as follows. hope, rest, empathy, humor, self care, self transcendence, self compassion, healthy relationships, coping strategies, treatment, and support. With the support of the Life Center in collaboration with the Orangewood Foundation, Pathways of California and Orange County Superior Courts Youth Development Court Program, Neutral Ground manages and operates a transitional living home, a housing program called Not These House.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

Nathi's house offers a home to young men and women, young men in need of a second chance and provides shelter for some of our most vulnerable youth. It is my privilege and honor to be joined by Nathi Alvarado, the founder of Neutral Ground and Nathi's house. Please make some noise for Nathi.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

Nathie, on behalf of the mayor and city council, we want to thank you for all that you do to help improve the lives of the individuals that we have in our community that face mental health challenges. It's important for me standing up here because I come from a family that grew up in the Arteza Pilar neighborhood. Many men in my family on both sides, mom and dad, that fell through the cracks, many ended up in the prison system, and we know that poverty is a byproduct of mental health challenges that we face in our community, and not the you're a shining example that we can and we are rewriting the story. Congratulations. Thank you.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

So without further ado, it is our honor to present to you a proclamation recognizing National Mental Health Awareness Month as a month of May. Thank you, sir.

Thank you very much, Councilman Hernandez and Mayor and the rest of the Council. um monitor to do this it's a privilege to be able to serve our community and the families and individuals and loved ones here in our community it's i'm born and raised here it's it's my heart parents born and raised here so i brought some of our team with us a couple of them are not here actually my daughter brie and my soon-to-be on friday son-in-law samuel are not with us today because they're getting ready for their wedding and i told customer penalosa he had to come and maybe he could catch the girdle and get married. But I could say a lot about it,

but I would like to bring up a gentleman that we've worked with his son for many years and dealing with mental health and that's Chuck.

How are you guys doing? I'd like to thank Nathie's health for my boy. He does have mental health issues and he was in and out of mental health facilities and Pastor Nath, he opened up his home to my boy. And like the gentleman said, we all fall through the cracks and we need someone to help us up. And that's what this home does. It helps my boy and he's been there for a while already. And my wife wanted me to say to make sure to thank him and that she could actually sleep good at night now,

knowing that he's in a safe place. And the things they provide there at the home, you know, the group sessions and all that, that they help these guys with, you know, and like I said, going to these mental hospitals, I see people like you and I, and I don't know if any of you have any family members that are mentally ill, but this program really helps them, and i'm proud of to have them there at the house all right thank you

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

thank you with that being said thank you everyone for being here today we honor you and we celebrate your contributions to our city thank you very much

Phil Bacerra

Thank you Councilmember and thank you Nathi for receiving that proclamation on behalf of National Mental Health Awareness Month. Let me now call on Councilmember, I believe it's Councilmember Fan and Hernandez who are to be presenting a proclamation to the Lao family so I'll turn it over to you two.

Thai Viet Phan

I also would like to invite our colleague, excuse me, Mayor Pro Tem, Bill Decerra to join us with this proclamation.

Thai Viet Phan

Madam City Clerk, please stop having me follow cute young children, our mariachi bands, or anything of the sort.

Thai Viet Phan

And we'd like Commissioner Alan Wu, as well as the Lao family to follow us, come up here.

Thai Viet Phan

May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. Today, we recognize the history, culture and achievements of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the city of Santa Ana. Accepting this proclamation today is the Lao family.

Thai Viet Phan

May is not only a month for Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders to celebrate and educate, but also a time for all Americans to actively participate and take actions to educate themselves. themselves. The Lao family ancestors came from the Cantonese speaking Toisan region of China in the late 1800s and early 1900s to help build the railroads in the US and to look for better opportunities to support family living in China. Unfortunately, they subsequently faced vehement discrimination and government sponsored racism in light of the Chinese Exclusion Act of

Thai Viet Phan

1882, which was an absolute 10 year ban on Chinese laborers immigrating to the United States. Fred Lau immigrated to the US in 1927 and gained his US citizenship as an outcome of fighting as a medic in World War Two, and subsequently brought his wife and other family members to the United

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

States. The Lau family have been stakeholders in business in Santa Ana since 1948. owning several grocery stores and businesses is the first of which is Santa food market on first in Bristol. I wanted to take this opportunity to share the impact that the law families had on me. They have known my grandparents my great grandparents who initially arrived here from Jalisco Mexico, and they settled on second and Baker Street, and the law family knew my great grandmother since before my grandparents were born.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

And for many of my family members gave us our very first jobs. And one of the things you said to me was that you said, you know, I'm Chinese from the from the face, Mexican in the heart. And and one of the things about my family that you had an impact on them was you. You guys were the only place we would go and buy our groceries because of how you made us feel. You made us feel at home. And and that is why we're celebrating you guys today. Fred accomplished in his entrepreneurial dream of starting the legacy business in Santa Ana, and has been instrumental for the Lao family legacy in Santa Ana, as well as a catalyst for

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

further expansion. The Santa Ana food market is managed by Fred Lao's sons, Wally, Guy, Lou, and Kenny, who is now passed. For those that know Kenny, if you were a regular at the Santa Ana food market, you would attest that he was one of the funniest guys in Santa Ana. It was always uh putting a smile on shoppers faces as a direct result of the sacrifice from past generations the new generation of laos are college educated and consist of college professors engineers lawyers and entrepreneurs now to celebrate the diversity that we have here in the council

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

we have a vietnamese council member the first of its kind in santa anna and a filipino uh council member and council member mayor poten becerra so mayor poten becerra if you could do us the honors of just finishing off our last two bullet points here. Thank you, Councilmember Hernandez. And

it is important that we celebrate diversity, hence why here we are today celebrating Asian American and Pacific Islanders here throughout the city. You know, one thing to keep in mind is that the first ever Asian American elected to the City Council was elected when I was born. This is going back to 1977 and thankfully the tide has turned where now we see this diverse inclusionary council we have council member fan shortly coming after me and here we are together so with that i want to say thank you to the law family thank you to my colleagues and uh congratulations on the successful business here in santa anna

So first and foremost, I would like to thank Councilmember Hernandez, Councilman Pham, Mayor Becerra, and the rest of the Council for honoring our family, our family's contributions to the City of Santa Ana tonight as part of API Heritage Month. My name is Stephen Lau. I'm a fifth generation family, Lau family member that's been in the US. So as noted by the council members, the Lao family has a rich history spanning all the way back to the late 1800s, where we were brought from the Guangzhou region in China to build the railroad,

which helped unite the United States from the west to the east coast. And like all immigrants, our family came for better opportunities. And later on down the road, my grandfather Fred Lau brought his family and started grocery stores as noted, which still stands today at 1216 West 1st Street, the crossroads of Bristol and First.

And besides being entrepreneurs, we all are, as noted, we're college educated. And in fact, my father, who was a former educator and professor at Santa Ana College, he also worked for the city. He encouraged me to pursue higher education as I have a master's degrees and I'm working on my second master's degree. And he also encouraged the youth of Santa Ana to obtain a college degree as he really emphasized education and upward mobility, whether it's a customer employee and many of them have done very well for themselves.

So our family, we have worked very hard to get where we are, but it wouldn't be remotely possible without the support of the Santa Ana community. So I would like to thank you all for your time. And it's been an honor to speak to you all tonight. And thank you once again for honoring our family.

um

thank you guys thank you guys

Phil Bacerra

thank you thank you council members for that presentation and thank you to the lao family for for receiving the proclamation for Asian American and Pacific Islander heritage. But let me go ahead and now go to the staff presentations that I believe we have a presentation from the Orange County Transportation.

And thank you, Mayor. This is Christine Ridge City Manager. OCTA will not be joining us tonight. We did invite them, and they are happy to come in the future when they have a major update to provide. But in place of that, we have our own Public Works director who is going to give you a presentation on the status of the construction. So I'll turn it over to the bill Saba.

Good evening, May.

okay

good evening mayor mayor potem and member of the city council tonight i have an update for you on the OC streetcar construction and closures.

The platform installation from Pacific to Bristol and Santa Ana Boulevard from Pacific to Bristol closure, the closure of the south half of the street to accommodate construction of the second streetcar station stop at Bristol which is the red line on on the map closure began today on Tuesday May 3rd on Santa Ana Boulevard from Pacific Avenue to Bristol Street the following traffic configuration will be in place westbound traffic will remain open that's the green arrows

full closure of the south side of the street local access only that's the red line local access only will be provided to and access to residents and businesses will be maintained at all times when exiting driveways on the south side of the street travel eastbound and perform a u-turn at the end of this raised median to merge with traffic with traffic and westbound lanes eastbound

travelers are detoured north on pacific to eastbound civic center drive to to the southbound bristol and left at san anna boulevard that is the blue arrows as you can see there will be a detour from Pacific to Civic Center down to Bristol to avoid going east on Santa Ana Boulevard. That closure is planned to be four to five months.

Track installation on Santa Ana Boulevard from Bristol to Flower. The closure of the southern and half of the street to accommodate construction eastbound for the streetcar tracks. That is the red line on the map. Closure began today, Tuesday, May 3rd. On Santa Ana Boulevard, from Bristol Street to Parton Street, the following traffic configuration will be in place. Full closure of south side of the street, local access only. That is the red line. eastbound and westbound traffic shifted to the north side of the street those are the green

and the yellow and the sorry green and the blue arrows on the map full closure of the street parking on both sides of santa anna boulevard so there will no be no parking on either side of santa anna boulevard in that section partial intersection closure at baker street which is yellow square. Advanced notice will be provided if driveways, restrictions, or full intersection closures are necessary. This work will take from four to five months.

Track installations on 4th Street.

4th Street closure on Bush intersection and Main to push closure. Closure of Bush intersection to accommodate construction of the eastbound streetcar tracks, concrete sidewalks, curbs, and gutter replacement. That is the red dot on the map. Closure of main to bush to accommodate construction of eastbound streetcar tracks and associated improvements. That is the red line on the map. Closure began on Wednesday, April 27th. The following traffic configuration will be in place.

Full closure of Bush intersection for vehicle traffic and pedestrians. That is the red dot on the map. That will be closed. Motorists are detoured to 3rd Street from Broadway to Lacey. Those are the green arrows back and forth. Eastbound, westbound. Pedestrian access to businesses will be maintained on both the north and south side of 4th Street. To access businesses on 4th from Main to Bush, a pedestrian will be asked to use the Main Street intersection or intersection. To access businesses on 4th from Bush to French,

pedestrians will have to be asked to utilize the Spurgeon Bridge. This work is estimated to The work for the intersection is estimated to take four weeks. The work for the 4th Street from Main to Bush is estimated to take from four to five months. And that is the red dot and the red line on the map.

OCTA is holding a public meeting on Friday, May 6, this coming Friday from 830 to 930 at the Frida Cinema located at 305 East 4th Street this coming Friday for the public to attend.

Phil Bacerra

With that, I am open for any questions. Thank you for that presentation, Director Saba. Let me go ahead and bring it back to the council

to see if there's any questions or comments. Mayor Sarmiento, this is Mayor Pro Tempessara. Go right ahead. Thank you. So this is good news to hear that we're seeing that the OCTA and the contractor are expediting construction. The frustrating thing though is that I'm hearing it from our staff and not from octa i see delilah snow in the audience and i point out delilah because i can attest that um i was at a meeting at her store with octa staff and they said that if we

invited them well no actually take back the community asked why is an octa at each council meeting and octa staff told everybody in the room that they would only come if invited so let me ask staff, did you invite OCTA staff? Yes, we did. And so here they are, not here. It's disappointing because if you wanna be a partner with this community, you gotta hear the good and the bad. And there is some good news that OCTA is giving. I mean, the idea of expediting construction and hurrying up through that segment of 4th Street is great news, but it's disappointing because when I go down there at night, I still see lack of security guards.

And to be clear, because I know the retort from OCTA will be, well, that's what police are for. And yes, police are there to enforce our local laws, and our police are not giving that up. But just like the average person here, you want eyes on the streets. We need that assistance. And when you've got a street that's blocked off because of construction, and the entity that's doing the construction won't provide that security that they've promised, it's very disappointing. So maybe that's why they're not here, because they want to hear this sort of commentary and i'm sure that even if i wasn't here there's plenty of people

here in the audience that are willing to say that so anyways i'm just going to express my frustration that octa couldn't be bothered to be here um but i will at least on some sort of silver lining express my appreciation that at least they're expediting construction thank you mayor thank

Phil Bacerra

you for those comments any other comments

Phil Bacerra

All right, seeing none, we'll go ahead and move along to the next item. That is the update. Yes?

I was jumping ahead of you. I apologize.

Phil Bacerra

Sorry, City Manager. Go ahead. You've got the next item as well, the update on the homelessness.

Yes, so honorable Mayor and Council members, we're going to do a homeless update. We have some of the reoccurring topics, but as requested, we are going to cover the care court, the governor's proposal for care court. And tonight this homeless update is going to be given by Ken Gamitzky, who is our part-time homeless services manager, and he is really the one that is on the street level and is best adapted giving this presentation as well as answering any questions you may have. Ken Gamitzky.

good evening mayor and council even when I'm not here I sit at home and I watch the council meeting just like everybody else so I knew I'd be here to answer some questions that came up last time and I'm looking forward to having that discussion

tonight we're going to talk about ongoing cult activity and highlights our efforts with the smart program something called the homeless management information system or HMIS the governor's care court proposal and the system of the homeless navigation center

let's start with Colt

in March Colt continued its daily coordinated responses throughout the city Colt contacted 335 different individuals that were experiencing homelessness providing outreach services as well as enforcement action when necessary they conducted 417 cleanups of various sites and of various sizes these cleanups are generally larger in scale and require more time to perform than routine public works cleanups this was up from 399 cleanups in february

colt performed or was engaged in 112 arrests for the issuance of citations for various offenses and Colt placed or assisted in the placement of 80 individuals into some form of shelter.

Now our update on SMART. And again, SMART is the enhanced partnership with CityNet that we're engaged in as we address homelessness.

If you look at the screen, you'll see that between December 1st of 2021 and April 25th of 2022, the SMART team has engaged in 2,528 outreach contacts, has provided case management to 838 individuals currently experiencing homelessness. 418 individuals have been exited from the streets of santa anna that's into shelter into families into permanent supportive housing any number of different mechanisms to get people off of the streets

508 total covet 19 engagements what i think is truly important is to look towards the bottom and see 3,666 calls dispatched. That's 2,311 that came in directly from our community, 519 calls that came from the Santa Ana Police Department or the Orange County Fire Authority, 465 calls by way of the mysanta anna app and 371 proactive contacts what i also find interesting

you would like to share is in discussions with the san anna police department what i'm hearing is is that calls for service in regards to homeless related homeless related activity are dropping dramatically meaning that as calls for service can be sent to smart that is freeing up our officers time but just as importantly when you consider as we have talked about here many many times

the amount of time that it takes law enforcement to respond to a call for service can be protracted depending upon the call for service type on average smart is reporting that they have a 24 minute response time I do know because I've talked to several of you about this that response time is not 24 minutes across the board however on average smart is responding in about 24 minutes which is a fairly I think impressive response rate

considering how long we know that it takes our law enforcement to respond to some types of calls

smart operates seven days a week from 8 a.m to 9 p.m and I would again like to bring to the attention of the community that the smart phone number is 714-242-3706

next i'd like to discuss a highlight that i consider to be a true reflection of all of the different components of the santa anna homeless response to an incident of teamwork in the field an encampment with two individuals sleeping in front of a business that was opening was observed Colt officers contacted the individuals who were sleeping and spoke with them about shelter and various resources that could be offered the two males explained they had medical issues and

when I talk about medical issues if you look on the picture on the upper right you'll see an individual with large abscesses all on his right leg what you can't see is even larger abscesses on his left leg and the other individual had similar types of medical issues

aside from the medical issues these individuals had warrants and that prevented them from being able to go to shelter colt officers immediately contacted the smart team and the smart team smart team arrived on scene to support colt colt and smart together identified these medical issues which included severe infections of all of their legs based on long-term narcotics use both males were suffering from cellulitis and severe cases of MRSA one

we'll just say that the injuries were severe

officers explained that a medical response team could come to the location to address their wounds and try to get them further medical care through a recuperative care facility because again these individuals were resistant to even go to the hospital if you look up at the center picture above the slide seven you'll see the county's mobile medical response unit that is staffed with a doctor and medical professionals the medical response unit arrived

on scene provided triage and medical assistance for our two homeless individuals with the medical issues after they had worked on them for some time they managed to secure locations at a recuperative care facility and those individuals were transported to that recuperative care facility

Next, we have the Homeless Management Information Center system. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the federal agency that provides homeless-related funding to state and local governments, requires participation in something called the Continuum of Care, or the COC.

Involvement in the COC requires the use of a computerized data collection system which the county has named HMIS. HMIS is used to measure homelessness and the effectiveness of related service delivery systems and is the primary reporting tool for HUD homeless service grants as well as for other public streams of funding related to homelessness.

We had an opportunity to speak to one of the council members in regard to data collection as it pertains to homelessness, and this is an example of what HMIS information is available.

211 OC designated by the can be Continuum of Care to operate HMIS and is the lead agency for the County of Orange based on all the information that they receive from all of the outreach and engagement that is provided by not only the county but the nonprofits throughout the county this data set is populated now as it sits now it's stagnant but if you go to 2-1-1 and you click on any of the different items such as 510 people in street outreach it then changes all the data to

reflect what disability information specifically ties to that street outreach how many clients has left domestic violence and are now on the street this information is powerful as we look at what are the different needs our homeless population has

this is a different set of data that is also collected by way of hmis

next council requested further information on what's being referred to as the community assistance recovery and empowerment court proposal

as it is proposed this is a framework to deliver court ordered mental health and substance abuse Disorder Services for Individuals Experiencing Homelessness. CARE Court is progressing through the state legislature as Senate Bill 1338, authored by Senators Tom Umberg and Susan Telemontes Eggman. I have been following this and found that there is quite a bit of discussions going on in regards to that.

core components of care court care court is a proposed framework to deliver mental health and substance use disorder services to individuals who need it it connects a person in crisis with a court-ordered care plan for up to 12 months with the possibility to extend for an additional 12 months the framework provides individuals with a clinically appropriate community-based set of services and supports this includes court-ordered stabilization medications wellness and recovery supports connection to social services and a housing plan you can

imagine that this is probably going to have quite a bit of difficulty as it works its way through the legislature how it's planned or proposed to work a referral occurs an individual with untreated schizophrenia spectrum or other psychotic disorders who lacks medical decision-making capacity may be referred to the court by a family member behavioral health provider first responder or other approved party to provide care and prevent institutionalization

following a clinical evaluation will be provided the civil court would order that a clinical evaluation occur and appoint a public defender and something referred to as a supporter court reviews the clinical evaluation and if the individual meets the criteria the court orders the development of a care plan the care plan is developed by county behavioral health the participant and the supporter including behavioral health treatment stabilization medication and a

housing plan court reviews and adopts the care plan with both the individual and county behavioral health as party to the court order for up to 12 months county behavioral health care team with participant as well as the supporter would begin treatment and regularly review and update the ongoing care plan as needed as well as a mental health advanced directive for any future crises court provides accountability with status hearings for up to a second 12 months if needed

successful completion and graduation by the court participant remains eligible for ongoing ongoing treatment supportive services and housing in the community to support long-term recovery mental health advanced directives put in place for any future crises

staff continues to monitor 1338 as it moves through the legislation and I believe that all of you on the dais and everybody at home know about as much about this as i do as it continues to change and morph as it works its way through the state legislature

lastly what i know you have all been waiting for is our update on the santa anna police or city of santa anna homeless navigation center

Yesterday, the temporary woman's emergency shelter, which is housed within the homeless navigation center, opened in the southeast corner of our site. the emergency shelter ordered by u.s district court judge david carter includes a woman's only residential area for a limited number of women separate restrooms for shelter and staff office spaces for staff two exits that flow through a two-hour rated fire corridor and

exterior path of ingress and egress this emergency shelter area is currently separated from the rest of the building through locked access doors and temporary solid barricades as the construction continues more dorms and staff rooms will become accessible of key importance four women asleep on streets of santa anna on sunday night took the courageous step to accept shelter monday afternoon in speaking to these women i knew two of the four the key difference in accepting shelter yesterday

versus the many times before was the shelter was in santa anna close to their doctors close to the social service appointments they had they needed and wanted to stay in santa anna which is their home Each one of these women is already working with CityNet and the Illumination Foundation to secure permanent supportive housing. But while they wait to become document ready and secure that permanent supportive housing, they will finally be safe inside of our shelter.

The photos shown on your screen provide a snapshot of the progress of this site. last week the asphalt was replaced and parking striping occurred over the weekend

and every day is another new challenge

the second floor continues to move forward with completion of restrooms and the installation of carpet I saw pictures the carpet is in

the ability to open the remainder of the shelter is directly tied to completion of the second floor based on the fire alarm and the illumination foundation staff needs as they move forward in providing the wraparound services for the homeless population that we will be paying for

here it comes although a completion date remains difficult to specifically identify It will be arriving very soon.

I know that each and every one of you on the dais, as well as everyone I work with and deal with within City Hall, asks on a daily basis, when will the shelter be done?

It remains a moving target. it we have had promises and promises and promises and then it's something new and then it's something else that's new I can simply assure you that your city manager your assistant city manager and your executive directors have thrown virtually everything they can as far as support towards the completion of this shelter.

If the contractor decides or requests for some kind of inspection, your inspection team is there. When the fire department needs to inspect the fire alarm or the fire sprinkler, we have received above and beyond service from them. When public works is asked to come out and help move things and get the shelter ready, Nabeel has been incredibly gracious. every single one of your executive directors has stepped up and is doing their part to try to get

us to the finish line I would love to be able to tell you it's this date but I have never in the past and I will not tonight lie to you I can just tell you we're close

I am ready for any and all questions.

Phil Bacerra

Thank you for that presentation, Mr. Gminste. Very thorough and brace yourself. Just kidding. Let me go ahead and bring it back to the council for any questions or comments. Anybody want to start?

Phil Bacerra

All right, I see a council member Hernandez.

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

Thank you, Mayor Samantha Impressive, how you caught me. You're not here in person, but thank you for your presentation, sir. My question pertains to members of the public. So recently I got a call from a resident that was by First and Sullivan and said that there were people experiencing homelessness there that wanted assistance that live by the mobile homes that are there. And a lot of the times people that are driving home, you know, you see somebody, you know, after a while you get to know them and they had requested some assistance and they live there adjacent to this parking lot and said that after I had made

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

a request to have somebody go out there to help them, that nobody showed up, that they were watching for over two hours so could you confirm how can members of the public ensure that the contacts that they're making that there is follow-up

i followed everything until the last part how can the general public ensure that the contacts that smart is making that there is follow-up or the contacts they're making to you is there's

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

follow up yes so do we have a system that is conclusive that says um we have identified or we have not identified that said individual that needs assistance so uh specifically for

your instance i reached out to the smart team and i had them dispatched i can call the smart team team and find out when they were dispatched what time they arrived and who they spoke to I have the ability to do those kinds of things just like if anybody wanted to call the watch commander and find out what the the answer to a call for service might be so I have the ability to go back and follow up on any call for service that the smart team is dispatched to okay and I'll be more than

willing to give my email address out and anybody that has any issues or problems with the smart team response can send me an email and i'll be more than happy to check into it and get back to

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

them thank you sir and for members of the public let's say in this instance um you live by um a location where there is a a small group of people that are that are seeking shelter um how can they go about requesting services and assistance for people that are willing to get that help so

the city's preference is that individuals continue to use the my santa anna app the best way for us to ensure that something happened with that request is to put it into a system that doesn't rely on word of mouth, but it's data driven, and that that data then gets pushed that we can then follow up with and say what happened when this specific incident was addressed. I will say this. It is my experience that a lot of people that the normal everyday

person talk to who's homeless will say, I am willing to go to a shelter right now. And when the Colt team or the smart team show up and say, okay, we're ready to go, there's hesitancy. And there's generally some hesitancy that we would say, how about if you come back in an hour? Or I have to do this and this and this, how about if you come back tomorrow? Because when these individuals choose to take that step, it is a courageous act on their part. It really is.

And so just because they tell somebody who wants to help them, who's not part of the system, that I'm willing to go, I'm willing to go. If they're willing to go, we have places for them. We do. They may not like some of the rules or some of the regulations. We don't have as many couples' beds as we should. And some people are unwilling to be separated from their partners, even for short times. So when we're talking about sheltering individuals, it is an incredibly complex thing.

and we just have to continually remind ourselves that when these people do decide to go we have to have a place for them that will work with their needs thank you sir and my last question

Johnathan Ryan Hernandez

is how many follow-ups happen before a person does commit to saying i'm ready to go get that help

so i have a lot of experience in talking to people but i think maybe it takes more time if a cop goes up to you a hundred times maybe you're less maybe a little more resistant but i can tell you that on average in talking to city net it might take a minimum of 20 contacts that's a minimum of 20 contacts to develop a a rapport it was funny i was at the shelter this morning when another lady was transported and dropped off she's been living at the corner of

uh third and baker i believe it was for some time and they had tried and tried and tried city net said that they'd probably gone up to her and talked to her for 30 times however today they said how about if we just take you over to this shelter and you can take a look and see if you want to stay and she got there she got all excited she had her cigarette walked over and gave me a hug it was a good day and decided she was going to stay and try to make it work

it's a big step for her big step for her but Santa Ana had a place for it was a good day

Phil Bacerra

thank you sir that concludes my question thank you sir excellent comments excellent responses just to the AV team when you pull back this way it really helps me see who has their hands raised and I can totally call on you that way it makes it a lot easier that way I'm not guessing by voice But I see I see Councilmember fans hand up and I'll call on her and whoever's ready can can be ready to go after that.

Thai Viet Phan

Thank you. I guess it's not so much questions but a request regarding care court. I I understand the reason for it. You know, there are a lot of folks who are experiencing homelessness who are unable to take care of themselves. they have medical needs but frankly it also evokes a lot of fear in my heart because we know that there is also you know one some for example in the conservatorship world it's very hard and the people who are most um affected by conservatorships tend to be those with uh

Thai Viet Phan

whether it's a mental disability or physical disability and frankly everybody's heard about free britney and that's someone who's a multi-millionaire super famous pop star who was under a conservatorship for you know over a decade so i worry with a program like this that we end up going back into a system in which we do start to institutionalize people that we feel we start taking away their decision-making ability and their ownership of themselves and i know it's a difficult balance with with public health their own health and and you know we 5150 folks when

Thai Viet Phan

we fear that there's a harm to themselves or others but it's temporary so I just I guess as you know information about this moves on I would love to continue to get updates about how this legislation changes and how it might affect us here in Santa Ana and it could be an email it It doesn't have to be, because I know bills change with every committee. Thank you.

Yes, ma'am, we'll provide that.

Phil Bacerra

Thank you, council member.

Phil Bacerra

Council member Lopez.

Jessie Lopez

Thank you, Mayor Salmiento. So,

Jessie Lopez

Ken, I have a question, because I get pinged a lot on this. This is like the number one issue in our area, and it can you have a law enforcement background, so I think you would be your you're able to answer this question. For folks that report seeing people that are nude. Can you please explain the process of what kind of enforceable action that is?

so the city of Santa Ana has a municipal code against public nudic nudity nudiness public nudity nudity not nudiness so there's a municipal code for that There are also California Penal Code laws that apply to people being in various forms of undress, but in order for those laws to kick in, generally they have to be doing something for some type of sexual gratification.

But that being said, our public nudity, San Ana Municipal Code, talks about areolas being exposed, genitalia being exposed, the buttocks below the cleft, I believe.

Jessie Lopez

So if a San Ana resident sees that, what is the process for them? What should they do and what should they expect out of our police department?

minute so misdemeanors not committed in a police officer's presence cannot be enforced so there's a difference between the felony and a misdemeanor felonies much more serious crimes if a resident sees somebody robbing somebody else and the officer doesn't see that robbery the officer can make an arrest because it's a felony for misdemeanors a misdemeanor an officer has to see that crime occur in their presence so unless the officer sees the public nudity they can't do

anything the general public does have the ability to make a private person's arrest for that however

Jessie Lopez

those so in short you're saying if i see someone nude at the park in the street and i call sapd and they don't see it that's not an enforceable action correct yes okay thank you i'm just trying to explain it no i know i know and i just want to i want the i want people to understand that because that's one of the top concerns that i often get questions about and i will tell them that and they'll be like you're lying to me and I let them know like this is the information that I have received from our department um so another question that I have for you is and I actually

Jessie Lopez

would love our code enforcement manager to come up here if he's able to

Jessie Lopez

thank you

Jessie Lopez

I don't know about that. Can you explain to the public the role of private businesses in collaboration with the city?

Okay, so good question. Because, you know, to put it mildly, we try to balance the universe, right? So we understand that the city has a responsibility and we have a commitment to help.

But we're taking a perspective that private property owners have to make some type of investment in helping us try to address some of those concerns, especially a private property. So, for example, when we get a court enforcement type of concern regarding homeless or transients. We have to balance this perspective from the private property owners, when they're being concerned that folks are going to property trespassing or taking stuff or sleeping within their their perimeter. But we can't just squatting kick them out for the sake of removing folks if they're not doing something illegal.

That means that private property not has to do certain things. This is where the famous 602 form comes in the no trespassing. This is the whole point about folks putting in additional lighting, right? Trimming some bushes so that folks don't don't live or use that as part of their sleeping purposes. So they can then take advantage of the homeless services that we provide, right? Making sure they secure, for example, the trash can area. So it's not used for sort of for vandalism or access or rather criminal activity.

So when we go out there, we try to look at those type of perspectives, making sure that the property has some level of responsibility in addition to the city providing services. So it's a balanced approach. Okay, thank you. And for it. So I clarify, and sometimes, though, we are required to notice this, and I said in a mild manner, where it's a corrective aspect. But again, like extra lighting, right? Securing some items, making sure that the property is vigilant and maintained adequately goes a long way. If a property looks abandoned or that folks are not interested in maintaining the property,

then you're gonna get that level of attraction.

Jessie Lopez

Okay, thank you, Eduardo. And I think that's really important for the public to understand because we want to, and we wanna be able to have these partnerships with private businesses, But I do not believe the city of Santa Ana should be subsidizing all of the cleanups on behalf of these giant corporations. I don't think that's fair for our residents. And so I know Alvaro, the planning staff, code enforcement, we get emails on a daily basis. And these are some of the two top questions that we always get. And so I wanted to have this dialogue, you know, in the open so that people understand, you know, what is the process?

Jessie Lopez

What is the train of thought behind how we are doing things now? So those are going to be all of my questions. Thank you.

To your point also, when you talk about these big property owners and not wanting to subsidize them, that's specifically why the city attorney filed these suits against Union Pacific Railroad. for exactly that.

Phil Bacerra

Thank you, Council Member. Anybody else? Mayor Pro Tem and then Council Member Vignoloski.

Thank you, Mayor Sarmiento.

You already know where I'm going with this, right? 24 minutes, huh? That's what they tell me. That's what my data shows. Now, before you got here, last time our city manager had to hear me say this, there lies, there are damn lies, then there are statistics, right? We all know that adage. um you know I I could go around and tell everybody to use the my Santa Ana app I know from my own experience using it it is efficient it is effective I hear other people tell me it's efficient effective I have very rarely heard somebody tell me no way no they never cleaned

up the graffiti it took them two weeks to do it on the smart line though that's all I'm hearing I have not heard any of the success stories I have not heard somebody say 24 minutes no we we We saw them in 12. No, that is not happening. So I know today's an update. But I would say as you're taking the feedback from this council, understand that what we're hearing from the community, what we're experiencing ourselves, because I'm out there, it's not working, and and the responses are terrible as far as timing wise so the idea that as i said last time if if calling smart is meant to be the substitute

for calling pd just for the response i'm not talking about the type of response but just for folks that aren't going to get into the weeds of who does what and when all they know is they're calling a number that they have on the fridge and they expect a response they're not getting it so that that is a concern for me um the shelter completion just just so we're all clear the the requirement for the shelter comes from judge carter correct through the uh settlement

the man the the idea that we have a shelter in place comes from a settlement with the federal court yes sir okay so so our our tenacity in pursuing this is to um uphold the obligation that we entered into correct as well as the city's commitment to deal and do our fair share for the the homeless. Correct. But I'm saying is that I mean for for all because most of the time our shelters, even prior to not having Red Hill and Dyer, we were not seeing 100% occupancy in those shelters, correct?

No, it was about 75%. Okay, okay. I wanted to, you know, kind of echo what Alvaro Nunez talked about when it comes to the private property owners. I want to thank Council Member Lopez for bringing it up. You know, when I brought up my council member item last meeting about having contact information at these shopping centers, it's because you have these large out of town corporate property owners who don't seem to respond when it comes to maintaining their property.

God knows if our grass is overgrown. I know I'd see Alvaro and his team. But the thing that's so frustrating, because it's one thing if it's a smaller site, but especially for Ward 4 down in South Bristol, we're seeing so much activity. And a lot of that activity could be resolved by simply putting up gating, lights, extra cameras, things that would deter criminal activity. And we're seeing neglect. for those that know on the south end, we've got one shopping center where there's one person covering the entire shopping center that goes almost three quarters of a mile in length.

That's ridiculous. It's understaffed. And so I appreciate the dialogue between my colleague and Mr. Nunez because it's crime prevention through environmental design accepted. And that's something that law enforcement has always preached and planning has as well. But I want to ask you, uh ken or maybe it's alvaro so god forbid we actually have property owners that say hey you know what maybe there are some ways that i could deter criminal activity on my property with some improvements and by the way we've had some shopping centers even in my ward that have actually

been proactive in doing this but for those that are on the fence and are looking for advice on what improvements they should do for their property who should they contact from city staff So I know that I speak for Alfredo Nunez as always and say that I know his staff is more than willing to go out there and and take that meeting. I know that the police department has staff specifically trained in septet, and I will also go out and go talk to anybody about what are some things they can do to better target, harden their property so that not only do they have to spend less money on damage, but

but there'll be better neighbors for the community. Alvaro? Yes.

So that is the key. So the idea is to make sure that when we offer advice, we don't make it worse. So, and I'll give a good example. There's this property that really stands out and then people surprise me. Hey, how can we don't put gates in the little soffit areas, right? Why don't we just make sure that it's guarded so people don't sleep when the business is closed?

But there are also other requirements right building code requires fire code requirements, so we have to be sure when we make recommendations to address one issue we don't complicate it and then ensure those folks, you know, using that business, but that being the case like we do with South Bristol. Some of them didn't respond to the original emails request for meetings. So we're calling them out and we're saying, hey, can you do Tuesday at 9 or can do Tuesday at 10? Right. So the idea is that we have to be proactive. We have to be very diligent that this takes a little bit of planning and time.

But it is, you know, us and court enforcement going out and we're also going with the like Ken said, the PD there, because we have folks that deal with the public safety issues. And we make those typical recommendations. We're going out to the whole property says, okay, what can you do? Trim the bushes, like we said, put some extra lighting, make sure that there's a lock in that water faucet, right? If that electrical goblet does not be used, take it out. Things that make it an attraction so it doesn't become a problem. If we require them to install some level of gates, as long as they're open during office hours, then that's okay.

If it's vacated, we make sure that if there's things that are locked, there's folks not being locked inside a building in case of an emergency. So that's why that takes a little bit of time, but that's what we're doing. So to answer my question, they're calling you then? Us and security, but yes, it's a team effort. Oh, no, no, I mean just in regards to if a property owner wants city input to improve their property. Yes, and we'll probably put that on the website moving forward.

Okay. And by the way, Alro and Ken, thank you guys, because honestly, the two of you, you've done a lot to help us on South Bristol. I know we're long ways away from getting to where we want to be, but I know that we're making the progress. So thank you guys for that. And Mayor, that's all I have.

Phil Bacerra

Thank you, Mayor. for 10. Council Member Peñoloso.

David Penaloza

Thank you, Mayor Sarmiento, and thank you, Mr. Gaminski, for the presentation. I'm going to ask a question again that my colleague asked because I want to make sure that we hear it twice if what you're telling us is what's supposed to happen. I have a niece and One's 10 years old and one's four. The nephew's four. Occasionally they tricked me into taking them shopping to Target mostly to get LOL dolls and all this other stuff. So we're walking out of Target and we come across, it's happened already, where we come across a naked man

David Penaloza

just acting all over the place, in the parking lot, on Bristol and Alton, usually around the railroad tracks, but bouncing back and forth, crossing the street. Can I call 911 because there is a man exposing himself to my four-year-old nephew and 10-year-old niece?

I can tell you that you can call 911 anytime you believe that there's an emergency. Whether 911 will take the phone call or tell you to call the regular phone number, that's up to 911.

But to your point, any time that somebody is running around naked, my first thought is not that they're just running around naked is that they're running around naked because they're either experiencing some type of drug delirium that has caused them to decide that their body's overheating and now I have to take off all my clothes, which happens all the time, and should necessitate an immediate law enforcement and probably fire response to make sure that that person's okay or if that person is having some kind of a psychological event that required

them to take off all their clothes and run around crazy then they're probably a danger to themselves a danger to others a danger to traffic what council member Lopez talked about was what can be done I took that as what can be done as far as enforcement I'm telling you that you as a Council member or any other member of any other resident of the city of Santa Ana has the right to call the police department anytime they believe they have an issue.

But more importantly than that, the what you're talking about about people running around naked should, in my belief, necessitate some type of public safety response.

David Penaloza

Okay, now if the person were to just be standing there naked near the parking lot, exposing themselves to minors, my four year old nephew and 10 year old niece, would that be considered indecent exposure to a minor? there, therefore necessitating some kind of either obviously paramedics to get them help because no one just hangs out naked outside a shopping center or law enforcement to make sure they're there or help them cover up because I'm not going to do that if I'm with my four

David Penaloza

year old nephew and 10 year old niece which because they're watching that too. Are they not victims of indecent exposure? exposure and I I'm trying to understand if that because is that would be a misdemeanor yes but

that doesn't cover indecent exposure um that would be the SAMC violation what you're discussing for the most part most of the calls for service since we're talking about naked people most of the calls for service that I have been a part of and responded to or seen very rarely do we see fully naked people about most of the a the calls for service in regards to some type of nakedness are people urinating in public and people call about that being an indecent exposure

or people defecating in public which happens as well as people that walk down the street with their pants around their knees and they just keep walking any of those responses any of those issues should necessitate some type of law enforcement or ocfa response to make sure that person is okay i believe at a minimum i believe that somebody from the smart team should go out and try to contact them if the person still remains exposed when the officer's there

then that is a violation of samc for nudity for public nudity if a person wishes to engage in a private person's arrest when the officer wasn't there that's another step that can be taken

David Penaloza

Okay, so I guess I'm just trying to understand because like my colleague, I oftentimes get, you know, get tagged, we all get tagged on these videos on social media and get sent these videos via text or email of just nudity and it's troubling that our families have to deal with this and live with it.

David Penaloza

So would they be able to call 911 at first? I mean, to...

As stated, council member, if you see somebody running around the parking lot at Target completely nude, I think that's probably an unusual incident that would require some type of response. I think that that person is probably having some type of mental issue or some kind of narcotics related issue.

David Penaloza

Okay.

I believe that if they're running in and out of traffic, that always necessitates a 911 call and a code three lights and siren response from law enforcement to try to keep that person out of the intersection or out of traffic so that not only they don't become injured, but anybody doesn't become involved in a traffic accident trying to avoid them.

David Penaloza

Okay. Thank you. That clarified that part. I just wanna make sure that our residents know that they are able to call law enforcement and report this, whether it's Seguetto CFA or police, because the instances that I've come across, it's not just a quick exposure and then cover themselves up, it lingers. So if a police officer were to show up within 20, 30 minutes, they would probably see the same exposure that was just experienced by my four-year-old nephew and 10-year-old niece. but appreciate it Mr. Gaminski thank you understood sir thank you thank you uh council member Mendoza

uh thank you mayor Toronto my question to officer or actually um Mr. Gaminski is that That number that you handed out earlier, I believe it was 714-242-37-06.

Is that the number that a homeless individual or someone else who is trying to help a homeless individual when they call to get the some kind of services let's say the homeless person that refuses to have the other kind of services or to go into a shelter but maybe they don't help with medications or maybe just the bath or washing their clothes someplace what number can they call

all to just get uh let's say some services so you're a little difficult to hear ma'am but i think i understand your your question with that being said the smart team that can again be reached at 714-242-3706 they can offer assistance not just for shelter opportunities but they can connect homeless individuals with all kinds of different non-profit service providers based on whatever needs that individual has if a person is trying to help someone else get out of homelessness

then you can call that number to get information in regards to helping thank you i appreciate that that was my question and i would also like to to personally thank you for the clearing up the homeless issue that occurred on Sunday over on Sullivan and McFadden. It was clean and really nicely done by the time I got back. So I was concerned for the pedestrians that were in the area. So thank you very much for clearing that up so quickly. Yes, ma'am, thank you.

Phil Bacerra

Thank you, council member. Thank you, Ken, for that presentation and for responding. You know, we did have quite a few questions and answers, but these are more informational. So this should be information that we are providing or direction that we're giving to staff, as opposed to having an exchange because then we could be going beyond the scope of what this item is. and if we need to have a more thorough q a maybe what we do is agendize this madam city manager so that way we don't get ourselves into trouble but uh ken i just wanted to thank you personally

Phil Bacerra

because i know that you attended along with me uh uh supervisor foley who represents district two at the county board of supervisors i think last week or the week before um the only hearing I've ever been invited to by the by a supervisor that represents this district. So in the 15 years I've been here, that was the one and only time that I've ever been invited to to that chamber to discuss the issue and the crisis of homelessness. And so Ken, you did a great job. And just so all of you know, the whole point of that discussion was to call mayors from different cities throughout

Phil Bacerra

the county and try to figure out how much we've all spent and aggregate that together on trying to address the the issue of the impact of homelessness on on our communities and really the supervisor's purpose and point was to demonstrate that these are monies that should have rightfully been spent by the county towards these efforts and towards these services so So, Ken, you did a great job. To other people's points about the response time when it comes to CityNet, what I'd like to do is, I know 24 minutes is probably not something that we all

Phil Bacerra

probably find a lot of satisfaction in because I know I've had some residents call. I've had to call myself and it's been more extended. We know that sometimes these encounters, because we're dealing with humans and not just simply painting over a wall, you can get through that really quickly. But when you're dealing with a person going through crisis, going through an episode, it does take time. You don't just go in and out. So what I'd like you to do is, and take this just more as a comment, let us know what support you need to maybe improve that response time.

Phil Bacerra

I am heartened to hear that our officers are being relieved of having to deal with some of these responses so they can do more police core functions and respond to those. So that's all I will say on that. with respect to care court, I completely agree with Council Member Fan's point about just this really delicate balance of, you know, being too invasive when it comes to violating a person's own civil liberties and rights. And she's right. There was a time that, you know,

Phil Bacerra

most folks were institutionalized and kept in congregate care and were basically just held

Phil Bacerra

The problem is, is that now we have swung sort of the other way, and we are dealing with people who don't have the ability to make informed consent as to whether or not they want to be on their own or whether or not they want to be services so right now the big city mayors are struggling with this whole issue of care courts and I think all of us to a to a person of the big city mayors are struggling with this whole issue of care courts and I think all of us to a person of the big city mayors Mayor Mrakas, Mrakas, Mrakas, Mrakas, 13 mayors have supported the care courts in concept there's still some details that are being.

Phil Bacerra

Mayor Mrakas, Mrakas, Mrakas, dealt with through the legislative process I believe it just made it out of the legislative Senate legislative committee, so it will be very difficult because for me. you know, I am very concerned about violating a person's own personal independent and autonomous rights. But at the same time, you have those have to be balanced against the rights of those families that live in our in our community, in our city, that are low income people of color. And they also have a right not to have these these impacts on their community. So these are very,

Phil Bacerra

very profound difficult questions but i think that uh the governor and his team that are proposing this uh they're creating a good forum for those uh who are concerned about this because i know that the aclu and disability rights california have already filed uh a strong opposition to the care court concept but i think that at least we're having the conversation uh i think a good result will come out of it and this conversation needs to be had because whatever we're doing now we're spending millions on capital improvements and creating placements and continuums of housing

Phil Bacerra

but if people refuse those placements and those services then all this money will be spent fruitlessly and not really trying to accomplish the goal that we all want which is to provide people help and provide people a roof over their head and services so they can transition back into society. So that is it. I will make sure I keep you all posted on where the big city mayors land on the care courts issue. But let's go ahead and move along to the next item, which is Madam City Manager, do we have, excuse me, Madam City Attorney, do we have anything to report out

Sonia R. Carvalho

on a special closed session? Mayor, Council members and members of the public, we did notice um several closed session items this evening i want to announce that we did not get to the third personnel item but we do not have any reportable action thank you and my voice is going very

Phil Bacerra

quickly i'm probably going to be fading fading fast uh so i did want to call something out of order before we get to the public comments i wanted to see if we can call items number 12 through 14 which i believe are uh council member hernandez's appointees uh to commission so uh Madam Clark, do I have those numbers correct? Is it 12 through 14?

That's correct, Mayor. If we can have council vote on those items before I administer the oath.

David PenalozaItem 12

I'll make a motion to approve or move the items.

Second.

Great. Council members, please vote.

Mayor, I don't see you on here. Did you want to go ahead and announce your vote?

Phil BacerraItem 12

Yeah, I'm a yes. For whatever reason, my device isn't working up, so I'll just have to voice vote the next the next few things. I'll be yes on that on all three. Thank you.

Okay, motion carrying 7-0 with council members, Hernandez, Lopez, Mendoza, Peñalosa, and Mayor Potembecer and Mayor Sarmiento voting yes. Thank you.

Phil BacerraItem 12

Are they here to have the oath administered or are they-

Yes, if I can, yeah, if I can ask if you're still in the council chamber for

Jose Mario Fernandez, Daniel Cornelius, and Roberto Herrera. If you're here, if you would please come up.

Council members, did you want to administer the oath of office?

You can't. You have done it before.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

Okay, please raise your right hand. I state your name.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

Thank you. Do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California.

and the Constitution of the State of California

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

against all enemies

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

foreign and domestic

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

that I will bear true faith and allegiance

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

to the Constitution of the United States

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

in united states and the constitution of the state of california and the constitution

of the state of california and a constitution's to california

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

that i take this obligation freely but it takes it's obligation freely

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

without any mental reservation without any mental reservation

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

or purpose of evasion or purpose of evasion that i will well and faithfully discharge

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

will well and faithfully discharge

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

the duties upon which i am about to enter the duties upon which i'm about to enter

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

we're about to enter yes yes congratulations thank you for your service thank you so much

Phil BacerraItem 12

congratulations everyone thank you for administering that oh uh council member uh let me go ahead and uh move along to the public uh comment section of the meeting now this is where members of the public uh either present in chambers or on the phone or virtually will be addressing us um uh pursuant to the brown act the city council may not enter into any discussion at this time we will hear from members of the public that are physically present then hear from those that are on a conference call or zoom and i'll ask the clerk if we have anyone that wishes to speak

Phil BacerraItem 12

in person or uh via zoom and for those that are in person i'm going to go ahead and turn the microphone over to um uh mayor protem becerra to go ahead and call on those members of the public that are physically present and then he can hand it over to the clerk to go ahead and call on those

that are online or virtual thank you mr mayor as the mayor mentioned we will now hear from members of the public that are physically present here in the council chambers so i'm going to go ahead and call up three at a time if a first person could come forward and others line up behind them uh first we'll have delilah snell followed by anna padilla and then followed by i believe it's maria

Phil BacerraItem 12

perez uh mayor pro tem this is uh the mayor once again let me let me i forgot to mention one thing just for those that are in the public maybe physically present or waiting online we do have a request from staff to continue item number 35 which is a public hearing on the cannabis ordinance so if anybody's waiting just so you know we will be moving that item pursuant to staff staff's recommendation just so nobody has to wait in chambers any longer that they that they need to or wait in line or wait on the line so i apologize i delilah but uh i just wanted to go ahead and mention that for others that may be waiting thank you mayor pro

thank you mr mayor go ahead and delay okay uh good evening city of santa anna mayor and council my name is delilah snell i have a business in downtown santa anna and i live in wilshire square i have four things to bring up um this construction like the unearthing of the ground here has brought up many issues but i want to try and be as short as succinct as possible number one thank you for all of your work in fighting for downtown you have gone to town hall meetings there is actually one this friday at nine o'clock at fourth street market um you've gone on tours of the downtown

you've called you texted you met with community and you've shown concern because this is concerning and a crisis the way this project has been handled communicated and executed is an insult to merchants, this downtown community and this city. Please continue to do the work to help us. We notice this and we are watching what you do. So please help us in this emergency. Number two, I was at a meeting back on March 9th with Council Member Bacetta, hoping to meet with the CEO of OCTA. He did not show up, but his staff was present when I called out the staff as to why they were not.

We were absent from the last council meeting, which I believe was on February 15th. I was told that quote they needed to be invited. Well, here is the invite and where are they? Where is OCT to own the work that they do in answer to the city at large? A community forum a year too late this Friday is not enough, and they need to be putting their best foot forward for us. Not a year too late forward and OCT must adopt your leadership by creating a business interruption fund like the city has done and like LA Metro has done.

They must create a program to bring relief from the harm that they are causing, and this Council has to help advocate for us. Number 3 the intersection of my business is on fourth and bush, and a block in each direction is completely closed off. I worry for emergency services to come to this area. They are completely cut off. You can't get I don't even think you get a fire check in there. It's it's kind of terrifying to me. I hope you know about this, and you should go and see it because it's stressful to see let alone think that what can happen. if we don't have access to help. Number four, many of us on Forest Street are upset

and have been damaged, but I hear and think of others who have been damaged by this disaster project. This street has been sandwiched by construction. Santa Ana Boulevard has been torn up for a year and it's just a block away. Why has this not been addressed? There are plants growing out of the ditches and rust on the tracks on Santa Ana Boulevard. I have talked to several third street businesses and they feel the damage with cancellations for reservations daily and they have negative impact. In fact, assistance needs to be mitigated to other areas outside 4th Street, because this is not just a 4th Street problem.

This is a downtown emergency. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Next, Anna Padilla, followed by Maria Perez. Good afternoon, Mayor Sarmiento and Council Members, Mayor Pretend Bracerda. Just really quick, I feel like we're being very vocal about the problems and some of you have visited us and know exactly what's going on. I was prepared my statement was completely directed to CTA but they're not here. I was very surprised because they are on the agenda, then I'll see a presentation directly from them. So I'm just going to change my speech and then just ask you for your help.

Katrina Foley, it's really pushing the Board of Supervisors to give us some relief, and we need relief from everybody right now. I know we got some relief from the city, which we really appreciate, but it's not being enough. These businesses and counting myself, we cannot survive with the with the amount that we've been receiving from the city, because the need is greater than that. And more right now there's really Taqueria Guadalajara was completely close, like his entrance to to go to his to his restaurant was completely closed off so he has no customers coming in at all for like three days. We've been calling OCTA.

We've been trying to address with them what happened there, what there was no route for him to get, for anyone to get access to the Taqueria, and they don't seem to solve the problem. So right now we're just going to every single person that can help us. So we will want to get your support with the supervisors. We can get an email from you. We can get a letter sent to the Board of Supervisors to approve those funds that Katrina fully presented this relief program from them we'll really appreciate it because like again we're trying to get any any help that we can get from right now so thank you for your attention thank you

maria perez and then followed by juliet castro and then followed by not the alvarado Maria?

of jugs and sandwiches the name Chevita. I have more than 20 years in this country and many years I have been selling tamales on the street 4. I have had difficult moments in this country, like the loss of a house by recession. Without forgetting the strong period we have lived with the pandemic, I have been improving and learning to manage my business in the best way possible. I have dreams and dreams to fulfill that today are affected by the OCTAS projects. We do what possible possible by generating more sales, making changes and improvements

in the problems that are being closed and closed. We insist that the OCTAS company should be responsible for supporting economicamente a los negocios que están siendo afectados quiero ser muy clara para que no se piense que queremos aprovecharnos o sacar ventaja de esta situación estamos solicitando el apoyo de octa porque su proyecto afecta directamente el proyecto de nuestras vidas que son nuestros negocios respetable alcalde y concejales pedimos por favor que nos apoyen abogando por nosotros

to help us with resources and money for affected businesses. Help us please. Thank you.

Good evening to all. First of all, I want to thank the mayor and the city council members for all the support, the financial support that the city has given us. This is good. It's helped a lot, but it's not enough. We have had many, many losses in our businesses, especially since this work is supposed to extend until 2024. I have a juices and fruits business, Chevitas, and I've been in this country for over 20 years. I used to sell tamales on 4th Street, and I'm working hard to keep my business going,

But and I've been working hard since ever since I've been here, even going through the loss of a home due to the recession and the pandemic that has affected us and impacted us. But we are working through it. I'm working through it little by little. I do have my goals and my dreams and aspirations, but this these have been affected by OCTA, and I'm trying to improve. I'm trying to make improvements in my business, but the streets are closed.

And OCTA is responsible, so I believe that OCTA should give money, help us financially, for the affected businesses. And I want to make this clear, we do not want to take advantage of this situation. But I think that OCTA needs to support the businesses because their work is affecting our livelihood, is affecting our businesses. So Mayor and City Council, we respectfully request that you help us financially, that OCTA help us financially, the affected businesses. Please help. Thank you. Thank you. And Juliet Castro.

construction, no va a ser suficiente para seguir manteniendo pagando nuestros negocios que estén abiertos también. Y yo sí les me gustaría que les que hablaran con la con los del Octa, que nos ayudaran porque esta es un problema que está afectando a mi negocio. Estoy en el segundo piso y no tengo la la gente que está pasando. Está cerrado y no pueden subir a mi negocio. Estos The most few months that come to me are going to be more difficult. This week I have been in my business. I have no clients for two days. I have made one to two clients. The prices that I do in my beauty salon are not sufficient for the rent

that I live here in Orange, which is very expensive. The rent of downtown Santana is also expensive. We need to help more throughout the year. And the Octa, that we are more human to help. We are friends, we are not enemies. We are helping this economy only for one year or more. But for all this time, we are not sure of us because we are present. We are Latin workers who are working day to day to be able to keep our business open. We are not doing anything wrong, we are only working. We want our doors to keep our business open

and we don't want to lose our business, because for me it's my only job I have and I take it out so I can pay my rent. To the council here in front of the council, I ask you to vote so that you continue to pass and bring us the help that you have made us right now. Thank you.

Good evening. First of all, thank you all for your help. But i'm here to tell you that the help you have given us is not enough to take us through this construction project through to help to help us keep our businesses open. Please we need your help in talking to octa to help our businesses. This has affected our businesses. My business is on the second floor, so i'm not getting any food, foot traffic, because the streets are closed. And I'm foreseeing that the upcoming months are going to be very, very hard for me.

Over the past two days, I only received one or two clients over two days. This is not enough to pay this the high rents. The downtown Santa Ana rents are even more expensive. So we need your help to from OCTA to help us. And we want to be friends. We don't want to be enemies. But this is not about us. We are working hard and we need to work hard to keep our businesses open. So this is we need we need the help from OCTA for our businesses to keep open, to keep our businesses going.

This is my only source of income to pay my rent and my expenses. So I'm asking the city council members to help us as you have helped them helped us in the past.

All right, next up is Natia Alvarado, followed by Roberto Herrera, and then followed by Daniel Estrada.

Thank you, Mayor Cemento, Council Member of City Manager Ridge, for allowing me to speak today. I want to read a few names to you. Alfredo Gonzalez, Eddie Velazquez, Marisa Ibarra, Luis Ponce, Ralph Rocha, Frank Avila, Miguel Cortez, Paul Castro, Ernie Larios, Zeke Larios, Richard Brothers, Tony Perez, Gilbert Rodriguez, Terry Ross, Roy Villa, Jerry Castro, Nando, Victoria Varios, Alexis Alba, Roberto Izzelo.

These are not just names. These are people from our community. They're people that had loved ones, families, brothers, sisters, tios, tias, and they were killed by gang violence. They go all the way back to when I was 14 years old, the first one that I experienced. I seen him die in front of me on the corner of Civic Center in Fairview. His stomach puffed up right in front of us. We're just kids, and he was shot. I say this for a reason today. As you know, we've we just had this murder with this young boy from Century High School.

It was murdered, his cousin in the front seat and a 16 year old in the backseat. By the grace of God, they weren't shot. We just had a boy who was stabbed a couple weeks ago.

I, Councilwoman Lopez reached out to me. People from the district reached out to me because there was kids hanging out in front of the memorial all night long, drinking and making noise and what have you, mourning their friends the way they only know how.

I say this because, you know, here we are 1974, when I was a young boy to today, and there's been no intervention. We've invested in our police department millions of dollars, millions, and yet they have not put nothing interventionist in our streets for prevention. Why it makes no sense here. I mean i'm talking about all and that's only some of the deaths. That's only some names that I pulled up. I could have pulled up a lot more names.

I don't speak with disrespect to my council. I speak from passion and concern for the city that I've been born and raised in and I live in, and my parents were born and raised here. I speak from a man that gives his life back to the streets. But this is ridiculous, because I can't I don't understand how we have not been able to put money into prevention. You know, in in November 7, 1991, I was on the bus I was going to Saddleback College coming back home and Magic Johnson AIDS. You know what they dumped a bunch of money into that, because that many people prevention are alive today.

We haven't done much in that. I think they gave me $30,000 to help a little bit of the park. I mean, come on, there has to be something more. I reached out to our police chief. I'm not just some dude. I'm a guy that has a relationship with past Chief Walters, other chiefs. I reached out to work with them. They didn't even work with me. And I'm not throwing anybody on the ball. I'm just saying the truth of a person that lives here, pays taxes here, and cares for his community. But I believe that we need to work together somehow, but there's nothing. It's like, I can't, I don't trust you. What do you mean you don't trust me?

When I'm in the street working with community, we could work together and help something in our community. Am I upset with that? Sure I am. Because I'm not just some dude. I'm a person that loves our community. I give back to our community. And we have to do something within our community. You know, Boys and Girls Club, great. But we're not in the 70s no more. You can't go to Boys and Girls Club. You have to cross territories. Not the 70s no more. That don't work no more. So there has to be more. There has to be some more finances that go into intervention, prevention. San Antonio Police Department just did a big old RICO act.

They arrested a bunch of guys. Those guys didn't start out like that. They started out probably playing ball, having a dog, playing sports, whatever. Something happened that could have been preventative. But there's a lot going on up here, but there's no preventative, and it doesn't make sense. So my heart is this, that you please hear me. No disrespect towards whatsoever. I love my city. I live here. I'm going to die here. i just think we need to do more it makes no sense 1974 2002 20 2022 and there's no still nothing going on but yet thank you so much thank you nati

and not so get some preaching i i kind of forget the time there thank you nati i appreciate that next up roberta herrera followed by daniel estrada followed by i believe it's lucia gonzalez Hi, Council. I first want to thank Councilwoman Jessie Lopez for placing your faith in me and executing this position as a commissioner. I'm very blessed to be able to serve the city of Santana in this capacity. At first I thought it was a small task, but that is far from the truth.

There is so much the Parks and Rec Commission oversees from our city libraries to the Santana Zoo, the parks themselves, and the recreational programs and community services. that accompany them. Soon the watershed parks master plan will secure for the next decade the various opportunities for community members to enjoy the parks and green space in our city. I take pride in representing the city of Santana. This is my home. I will work hard to execute the duties of a commissioner. I am choosing to be sworn this evening on this book by Kelly Lytle

Hernandez City of Inmates. Reading this book was a watershed moment for myself. Dr. Hernandez's interest and research to locate the origins of mass incarceration in Los Angeles led her back in time to the subjugation of indigenous communities in the Tongva Gabrile basin. Her book shows that what is underpinning mass incarceration is settler colonialism. As Dr. Hernandez mentions, the United States is a settler society. As such, its cultures and institutions are rooted in a particular form of conquest and colonization called settler colonialism.

She goes on to say that settler colonial projects like the conquest of the Tongva Basin were not predicated on extraction nor nor exploitation. rather settler colonial projects seek land. And on that land, colonists envision building a new, permanent, reproductive and racially exclusive society. I mentioned this because where we are matters and the land and green space that we currently occupy matters. As a commissioner, I have to be very cognizant of that and our role as a city to do better. I'll close with this quote to remind us why we need and unwavering commitment to address colonialism and conquest today.

Dr. Hernandez says, invasion is a structure, not an event. It is constant. It is dynamic. It is ongoing. It is ubiquitous. Simply put, in a settler society such as the United States and Santana, the days of conquest are not over. And this holds meaning for all of us today. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Daniel Estrada followed by Lucia Gonzalez.

All right. Hi, everybody. I'm Daniel Estrada, born and raised. I was born at, you know, a community, a coastal communities hospital, and I've pretty much lived in every single award in the city over my lifetime.

You know, because rent keeps going up. So you got to find somewhere more less expensive. Come here today. I work at the San Diego Piscale District. I'm an avid tutor at Saddleback High School, where I graduated from. And I work with students to get them prepared for college. But on my side time, a lot of my side time, I devote to journalism. So community journalism is something that is missing here in Santa Ana. I believe the last time we had a newspaper was in 2015 that sent in a register until the Orange County Register moved to Anaheim. So I'm the co-founder of the Santa Neto.

It's a new online newspaper that will begin reporting on happenings here in Santa Ana from city council to the school board and more. I believe that something else have been caught off guard sometimes by the amendments established by these committees, including yourselves. A lot of our residents opinion on sites like, you know, Sanana problems and your Facebook pages sometimes hoping to get acknowledged. And sometimes they fall on deaf ears. Most of the time anyways, at least. We as a community of a newspaper hope to bring the gap to bridge the gap.

I'm sorry that exists between the residents and our elected officials to create a better informed Santa Ana for the young and the old. I'm not here asking for money, nor am I asking for an endorsement for that matter. We don't take buyouts or endorse any candidate because that should be up to the people themselves, not a newspaper. local journalism serves as a check and balance of our government. This was true in 1971 when the Nixon administration bar the New York Times from publishing the Pentagon Papers and the Supreme Court voted for the newspapers saying that

the papers were made to serve the governed not the government. So we elect you as residents, we elect you to represent us so that you can do good and represent our values and our opinions not personal beliefs so um i only have 30 seconds but um it's about time the community to really understand how much of a difference they can make because we're all in this together we're all santaneros we all love this city we all want to see this pretty the city prosper for our children and for the younger generations. So anyone that can log on to santanero.org will soon see the stories that matter alongside

see opinions authored by santaneros to the issues that matter to them most.

I think that's pretty much it. My time's up. So I appreciate your time. Thank you.

Up next is Lucia Gonzalez, followed by Perla Dionisio.

Good evening, Mayor and other members of the Council. My name is Lucia Gonzalez and I'm a resident of Ward 3. I'm speaking on agenda item number 31 and ask that you vote against allowing SAPD to use military equipment. According to AB 481 section 7071 paragraph B, any law enforcement agency that wants to continue the use of military equipment needs to, and I quote, submit a proposed equipment use policy to the governing body and make those documents available on the law enforcement agency's website at least 30 days prior to any public hearing concerning the military equipment at issue.

It is still not on the website and the only way I was able to access the military equipment use policy was through a Voice of OC article. Also according to section 7071 subdivision D1A-D and I quote the governing body shall only approve a military equipment use policy pursuant to this chapter if it determines all of the following end quote. A the equipment must be necessary because there is no reasonable alternative for public and officer safety and while military equipment will definitely keep officers safe it will not keep the people of the city safe only resources do

and it will definitely not keep you safe if you're low income black or brown b the policy must safeguard the public's welfare safety civil rights and civil liberties historically military equipment used by sapd has been used to infringe on our rights to protest and assemble i have been personally tear gassed by SAPD I went to the George Floyd protest in Santa Ana and my friends were hit by rubber bullets and most of the people who attended this protest were very young. You guys can blame us and say that people were damaging property but in what world is property more

valuable than human life? SAPD responses are still very uncalled for regardless of whether you think the protest was violent or not. See the military equipment must be cost-effective cost effective compared to the alternatives, but policing and military equipment doesn't get to the root of the problem. Crime is caused by unmet need, whether material or financial or emotional. For this fiscal year, this council voted to spend 40% of our budget, meaning $141 million on criminalizing and punishing our community. And I don't see how this is cost effective at all. D, if prior uses did not comply with the use policy,

measures must be in place to ensure these issues are solved. And I honestly find it so hilarious that police chief Valentin mentioned SAPD's use of force complaint process as a safeguard in the agenda proposal because from 2016 to 2020, none of the use of force complaints have ever sided with the community. A vote for this policy is a vote against this community, so I really hope you all make the right decision. Thank you. Thank you.

I have Perla Dionisio followed by Jackie Cordova and then followed by Victor Mendez.

Buenas noches, mi nombre es Perla Dionisio and I wanted to talk to you specifically and give you like a little bit of history on to what is it that our community needs.

Anthropologists agree that the first sign of civilization happened 15,000 years ago when a femur was able to heal and the person was able to live. This was a time in which you either had to run or you had to hide and someone actually took care of this person and fed them shelter them kept them warm kept them safe

gave them shelter and that's what we need here we don't need military equipment to enforce a ridiculous curfew during an uprising a youth uprising against racism such actions show what your intentions are with our community, which is the history of this country, a country that was born out of violence, out of violence against Black and Indigenous people around the world, the violence that is upheld

and perpetuated by the policies and by your pen. And before my time is over, again, I host a weekly community book club, and I wanted to read just a definition of what the word love and how bell hooks defines the word love.

Affection is only one ingredient of love. So to truly love, we must learn to mix various ingredients, care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment, and trust, as well as honest and open communication, which is something that this city has negated the community. And it's not new. Again, these systems were created by your ancestors.

These systems were created on the pillaging and raping of our children, which continues in our downtown, aided by our very own SAPD. So I just want to open communication.

and I would like to ask you to care about us, because we are humans, we are Santaneros, we grew up here. I am 41 years old. These kids, these kids are living in the same conditions that my students do, same conditions that I did. All I'm asking is that you care and that you learn to love us.

Jackie followed by Victor Mendez.

Gracias, Perla. Hello community. I am Jackie. I'm a mother of Santa Ana. I'm also an elder.

My comments tonight are specifically directed at the city manager, Ms. Ridge.

May 5th is a national missing and murdered native women and girls awareness day a time when the indigenous community and our allies were read and gathered to remember honor and give voice to women whose stories have not been heard congress passed a resolution creating the designation to honor hannah harris northern cheyenne who went missing and was found murdered on the cheyenne reservation in july 2013. our Our system is inherently racist. Our kids wanna know who do they call when the cops murder them, murder their friends,

murder their parents. Last week I saw you in the federal building. I told you you should come join me for the trial against the police officers that murdered David Sullivan in the city of Buena Park. They weren't even on patrol. They were just running errands. And they happened to come across this kid that needed some mental help. They ended up shooting him and murdering him. They're still on the police force. And this family has to see these people every day that murdered their children. We've been at war with Santa Ana PD since 2017 when they unleashed this hell upon us.

We try to correspond with our PD over these things. We never hear back from them. We never hear from our chief of police when we call them asking why these cops were sent in SWAT gear against the parents sticking up for our community members, protecting ourselves at the Delhi Center on May 30th, 2017. I email my counsel all the time. I have only heard back one time from Ms. Nelida Mendoza. She said my messages end up in her junk mailbox.

Like your community is saying, we know what's going on out here. You have the roster of our nonprofits that need to be funded in an instant. We could be funded in an instant. We preach nonviolence to our kids. Meanwhile, the cops come out here in SWAT gear ready to kill us in a second when ordered by these racist pigs. Where's the men from the OCTA to show up to answer to my community when they're decimating us? Where's the racist Todd Spitzer when he doesn't show up to the DA candidates forum at the Delhi Center? Who's handling all of these things?

And these men who have a grips on us. I never hear from any of you people.

Next is Victor Mendez, and that I believe is our last in-person speaker.

Thank you. Item 30 on the budget update. A couple of small discrepancies. Somehow $5 million dropped off between the first table and the second table. It took me a little sweat to figure it out. The second table was right. But these types of inconsistencies that perhaps lead to, you know, lost costs and other things. So we definitely need to tighten up some QA. The other peculiar fact in that report was they talk about how the budget is 60, the revenue of the budget is 63% realized at this point. And how are we gonna realize 37% in the last 25% of the year?

So that doesn't really kind of, you know, come up, you know, doesn't kind of really necessarily reconcile. You know, maybe we're under reporting, maybe we're over forecasting, but I'm just kind of interested how you're going to realize remaining 30% in the last 25% of the year. You know, it doesn't kind of make sense. On top of that, you're actually going to get more money than you expected. So those are kind of nitpicks. But on the big picture, obviously, the short term, we look very good. the long term has some clouds around it let's be honest measure x is going to fall off by 33

in a couple of more years and soon it'll be down to nothing so what are we going to do you're facing you know a 12 million dollar funding gap in your workers compensation you have 38 million dollars in liabilities you're going to have to pay over time calpers discount is now below seven percent which means you're increasing your pension contributions you're probably still ahead of game but that's going to probably go up a little bit and also more importantly that the growth of all the sales revenue is induced by the highest inflation we've had in 40 years so we have to

start taking some steps here and i think the time is good you have the resources the ability and certainly capacity to start looking at your finances and how you can do things better and also maybe open up some funding for these people who are asking for their needs to be served rather and kind of continue business as usual. But I think, like I said, now is the time to do it. You have the resources. Let's use it. Let's try to make something good happen the longer term. And item 31 on the police military ordinance. From my perspective, I think the best equipment we can do

for our community with respect to police officers is to train them in intelligence, train them to be good communicators, tell them, train them to be empathetic, training that they can navigate complexity in an increasingly complex world and how they negotiate this new paradigm of policing. To me, that's the best equipment an officer can have in today's world. That said, with all this equipment, do we really need it? What's our history in using it? Why do we have it? You know, these are the questions we should be asking. You know, why do we have to acquire some because another law enforcement agent, he has it.

This is not a sandbox on whose toys are bigger. It's about making the best thing possible. This is going to require leadership. Lastly, I have never seen the police use the type of force that's being mentioned in some of these comments. I was there that night over at the community college, and they were pelted the police were pelted with rocks and bottles, and that's why they responded. The people there were not innocent. The community college technological center was being broken into. Glasses were, you know, windows were being broken. This was not a peaceful riot.

I was there in 1970 when Ruben Salazar was shot and killed by the L.A. County Sheriff's Department right there in Laguna Park. I know what use of force is. I saw it when I was 11 years old as I marched against the Vietnam War. what happened that night in front of the community college was a restrained response thank you thank you thank you madam madam clerk do we have anyone waiting to speak online yes we do thank you mayor pretend

speakers on the queue may provide their comments on agenda non-agenda items within the city's jurisdiction with the exception of the public hearing items 35 and 36. When unmuted, please announce your name, ward, or neighborhood that you reside in within the city of Santa Ana for the record. To request to speak again, you dial star 9 from your phone or select raise hand from Zoom now. Before unmuting callers, I'd like to begin by reporting the following summary of emails provided as of today. We received one Santa Ana resident concerned with process for seniors and people with disabilities to receive Section 8 housing.

Item seven on the OC streetcar update, one Santa Ana business concerns with vandalism to property due to construction, and one Santa Ana business comment to increase business interruption fund. Item 29, four residencies not disclosed in support of the resolution. Item 30, one Santa Ana resident commented to reduce funding for police and redirect funds to community programs. Item 31, one Santa Ana resident and one residency not disclosed in opposition to the item.

Item 36, support one Santa Ana organization to item 36. Item 37, one Santa Ana non-organization, a Santa Ana organization provided various comments and concerns. And with that, Zoom ID Alfredo Torreblanca, if you would please select the microphone icon on your device. Thank you. You may proceed with your comment. You have three minutes.

Hello, everyone. My name is Alfredo Torreblanca. I live in central Santa Ana, and I want to talk about a program that the city used to offer that note that the city no longer offers. So that program is the Catalina Campout summer camp that the city used to put on. So through this program, the city's children experienced many activities for the first time. I was lucky enough to go as a counselor at the age of 15, and through that I got my first time camping, and only my fourth time going to the beach in 15 years. And I know I'm not the only one that that experiences this growing up.

I grew up in Santa Ana, and I know that programs like these that allow underprivileged students and Santana and opportunity for once in a lifetime experience should be of importance.

I've seen children in this program develop such a sense of self-sufficiency over the course of a camp out, going from asking where to throw away dirty dishes to helping others wash theirs and asking where they can help more in the kitchen and asking how they can help out more throughout the camp, as well as seeing their walls break down and open up to friends that may be outside of the community or outside of their schools, people that they might not have even interacted with if not for programs like this. growing up living through adversity and troubled times, I can really close up our mental borders

and cause us to grow up too quickly. And I want our city doing its best to allow kids to be just that, children. I want them to move for programs that allow kids to play and to grow. And after years of being forced to do everything online, I'm really seeing a need now more than ever for our kids to reconnect with nature and with each other. We mustn't let the pandemic stunt the growth of social and emotional intelligence in our youth. So again, I'm talking about the city of Santana, Carolina Campa program, and I just want to ask that the council agendize a conversation about reinstating this program.

I think it was a great program and it can help so many kids, especially now post-COVID. Thank you. Thank you.

Zoom ID is Sui Vasquez, if you would please select the microphone icon on your device to unmute your call. Thank you, you may proceed with your comment.

Hi there, can you guys hear me? Yes, we can hear you. Okay, great. Hi, my name is Sui Vasquez, Sanana resident, currently living in Ward 5. I would also like to provide the council comment regarding the Catalina Camp Out program. During summer, I remember talking to my friends about just how excited we were like just for school to be let out and our plans. And one of the things that we would always talk about is participating in the Catalina Camp Out program.

Not only were some of us able to come as campers, but we're also excited to come back as volunteers I helped other campers experience these experiences that they probably would have not had before.

I had the opportunity to come back as a CIT, where I was able to work with a number of Santa Ana residents. Detective Carolina helped them experience fishing for the first time, helped them experience what a campfire was. some of these kids I still work to this day and still and these kids became the best of friends. Opportunities like these are important for the youth in Santa Ana to experience because especially now as the previous speaker stated with the pandemic kind of disrupting all all social activity within the youth in Santa Ana. It's important that these kids make up for

the lost time and what better way to do it than not only to reconnect with with other people their age but also experience nature is something that they're not able to experience here in the city of Santa Ana or in any other local areas. Yes, I do urge City Council to agendize a conversation and help bring back this program as it truly benefited many students here.

um many students here in the city of sanana um yes my hope is to bring back this program not for this summer but next year's summer so that we can um so we can help these students experience um what carolina was and what the parks and rec of the city of sanana can offer to the residents of sanana and uh i yield my rest of the time my rest of the time thank you zoom id deandre

Valencia, if you would please select them. Thank you. You may proceed with your comment.

Good evening. My name is DeAndre Valencia and I'm with the Building Industry Association of Southern California. Thank you for the opportunity to comment tonight on item 37 related to the WHO's funding. This council recently took aggressive actions that will reduce the amount of funding the city has in the WHO. The idea you're considering today will go one step further and reduce the amount of housing you can produce with your existing funds. While I understand your voting history calls for continued support of this language and approach,

I hope you will change your position and accept that unmitigated, skilled, and trained requirements reduce housing opportunities. Thank you.

Thank you.

Zoom ID Mario, if you would please select the microphone icon on your device to unmute your call. Thank you. You may proceed.

Okay, so I'm also advocating for the return of the Catalina camp out. Catalina Island located 40 miles off the coast of Long Beach is where the city of Santa Ana would host its annual Catalina camp out for 70 adolescents to would be approximately 20 staff members and counselors. I was one of those counselors. Every year I would see dozens of kids step out onto that boat and they would be eager yet shy for the journey that lay ahead to later break barriers in order to be themselves. This trip consisted of five days and four nights sleeping under the stars.

Catalina allowed kids and teens the opportunity to truly experience the outdoors in a way many kids in Santa Ana are not typically able. The majority of time is spent playing games and And during this playtime, friendships and memories are made. From tug of war to group sandcastle competitions to freeze tag to connect for, there are a myriad of camp traditions that returning campers will reminisce on and hold close to their heart as they grow up. Something as simple as luggage transportation, tent setup, and home cooked meals goes a long way when building camping experiences.

And the home cooked meals from our chef, games, and beachfront access make the collective efforts of the campers and staff all the more rewarding. In Santa Ana we have a saying, it takes a village. We bring this saying with us to Catalina. For many campers it is a life-changing and challenging experience to be away from their parents for five days. It takes a challenge, it takes a village to soothe the heartache that comes from such a responsibility. It takes a village to turn that feeling around and create a newfound sense of pride in oneself. At the end of the trip, we know for certain that those campers lucky enough to attend

the Catalina camp out take the lessons and memories and experiences of their village with them back into the concrete jungle. Thank you.

Thank you.

Zoom ID Tim Johnson, if you would please select the microphone icon on your device to unmute your call.

Hi, everyone. Tim Johnson, resident of Ward 3. Thanks for taking my time this evening. Sorry I wasn't able to join you in person. A couple items. Item number 28, as someone that serves on a commission, I would hope that we can continue to meet via remote means via Zoom, especially considering I think we have at least two council members that are in this meeting remotely.

item number seven and number eight. I would implore the council to consider making taking public comments prior to this time on those those items. Those are, you know, the council had an opportunity to speak into it after hearing Commissioner Gaminski as well as City Manager Ridge. I'm sorry not Commissioner against Gaminski but you know who I'm talking about and I don't think it's quite fair for us to to wait until now after that those items have been spoken about. In terms of the the the 4th

Street construction, it's a I'm relatively familiar with downtown and I'm struggling to get around down there. So I can imagine if someone that's coming to one of our great restaurants outside the community, how they're gonna struggle with that. So we just need to hopefully speed that up a bit. But at the same time, don't forget about South Main Street because that's a disaster right now. I drive that pretty much every day and it's very, very difficult. The pavement is brutal. Item number 30, the revenue update.

So, Major X is going from is going to be from our original budget 65 million to a third quarter adjustment to 84 million dollars. Let that sink in a little bit 19 million dollar increase. We need to come up with a plan for that and so I urge urge the Council to do that take this opportunity right now to consider a major X stabilization fund, similar to the pension stabilization fund to where you know if you have kids or once we're a kid and your parents talk to you talk uh talk to you about finances they probably said hey uh you know spend

a little bit on yourself give give some of it away to to others in need but then save a lot of it and we need to do that with this especially when we're talking about the increase um you know this was originally a 60 million dollar um uh budget item when it was originally passed it's now at 84 million dollars we need to be saving a large portion of the seconds left for the sunset period um that that will be upon us quicker than we uh than we like otherwise we're going to end up like one of our neighbors in westminster and really struggling thank you very much for your service i appreciate

it thanks thank you zoom id carla juarez if you would please select the microphone icon on your

device yes thank you good afternoon my name is carla juarez i'm a resident in santana and i am calling just to remind some of the city council members who have run your campaign and some of we all ran your campaigns to defund the police. So that's to defund the police. And then there's other talks about moving funds from the police and to other areas, especially all this need.

We have a lot of need like in building community, building youth, helping youth. But I am, I want to remind you of the defunding the police because I hope that you guys make a stand on not even defunding them by taking a stand on not providing any more funds to them. The police department already takes more than 50% of our budget. That's more than 50% of our budget and I don't understand where the funds are coming from, But I see that there's a lot of funding for their equipment or more personnel.

And where does this money come from? If not, if they already take more than 50% of our budget, why is it that we keep giving the police department more money? Well, we're asking like families, single mothers to do what they can for what they have. The police department already has more than 50% of our budget. Why are we funding them? Why are we giving them more money? Why are we buying? Why are we funding more equipment for them? Especially not just any type of equipment like hand sanitizers.

We want to put military tools on their hands to use against residents. Because that is what you're going to be using it is going to be against residents. And if you already believe that mental health is an issue, a real issue, and you want to respect the fact that we all have some issues.

Providing a material base, any kind of equipment to the police department is not helping your community, and it's providing even more money to the police department. So I hope that you really, really reach into yourselves when you went out to your communities and said that you would defund the police. We're not even asking for the funding. We're asking for you to stop giving the money. 15 seconds left. No more money, not even for a pencil, not even for hand sanitizers.

If single moms could do do with whatever little money they get from babysitting or cleaning houses, they could you do with the 50% more than 50% of your time is up. Thank you.

Okay, Mayor that that was the last virtual caller.

Phil BacerraItem 12

great thank you uh so i am going to ask for the uh council's indulgence right now i'm slowly losing my voice so i wanted to see if we could advance two items before ice kind of turn the reins over to uh to uh mayor pro tem on on the rest and the balance of the of the council items um i believe that we have item number 35 uh madam clerk that um is the public hearing on the amendments to the cannabis ordinance and and that is a public hearing

Phil BacerraItem 12

that staff has requested that we continue to June 7th so if the council doesn't mind why don't we go ahead and take that up that way we can go ahead and open the public hearing on that I believe there may be a public speaker and we can put that matter and approve it for its continuance so So if we can call that item. So this is the time and place to open a public hearing on item number 35, which is ordinance amendment number 202201, which is to address the medicinal cannabis retail consumption lounges and all the other amendments that are discussed.

Phil BacerraItem 12

And I will open the public hearing and ask if there are any members of the public, Madam Clerk, that wish to address us on this item.

Mayor, we do not. we had only one in person but they had already left they informed us that they left the meeting

Phil BacerraItem 12

got it so i know there's a presentation maybe we could take that presentation uh at the continued date um so uh why don't i go ahead and entertain a motion from the from the council to continue uh to june 7th per staff's recommendation and we can go ahead and keep the public hearing open and and we'll simply go ahead and reopen it on the June 7th.

Mayor, may I suggest that we continue it to June 21st?

Phil BacerraItem 12

Actually, that's an excellent suggestion. I'll go ahead and second that. That makes more sense given the depth of work that needs to be done here. So there's a motion and a second. Any other questions or comments?

Hearing seeing none, council members, please vote.

Phil BacerraItem 12

Mayor Mrakas, M.D.: And i'm a yes, Madam clerk my device continues, not to be responsive for me.

Councilmember Mendoza, did you want to voice your vote as well?

Okay, we'll mark Councilmember Mendoza's absent. Okay, so motion passes five to with Council members Lopez, Peniel, Osa fan, Mayor Potembe, Sarah, Mayor Sarmiento voting yes, and Council members Hernandez and Mendoza absent for just this item.

Phil BacerraItem 12

Great. Let me if I can just once again, just ask for indulgence on one other item before I exit, which is item number 33. And that is the appointment of council members to now what is going to be a standing committee transitioning from an ad hoc committee to work with the sanitary unified school district on a joint council city council collaboration committee so let me go ahead and just bring this before us and you know i'm not sure i don't think there's

Phil BacerraItem 12

a presentation right madam city manager on this i think we've no sir we just are hoping that you do some appointments tonight excellent so i'll bring it back to the council but but normally what we've done on some of these transitional uh uh matters where we've had ad hocs converted to standing committees we've kind of opened it up to the uh members of the ad hoc committees to uh you know to move on to the standing committees um you know just because there's a little bit of institutional memory uh unless there are some council members that are on the ad hocs that that no longer want to be on the standing committee.

Phil BacerraItem 12

So I was simply going to recommend that, you know, the ad hoc committee members, if they have no objection to be considered for the standing committee on this joint school district collaboration committee.

Jessie LopezItem 12

I don't have an objection.

Jessie LopezItem 12

I don't have an objection.

Phil BacerraItem 12

Do the members of the committee or anybody have any questions or comments? More than anything, this is directed, I guess, also towards the ad hoc committee members if they would like to continue serving.

Jessie LopezItem 12

I don't know if you can hear me, Mayor Sarmanto. I said I don't have an objection, and I would appreciate the opportunity to serve on the joint ad hoc or joint subcommittee. Sorry.

Phil BacerraItem 12

All right. I guess maybe mine would be considered a motion to reappoint those members of the ad hoc to the joint committee.

David PenalozaItem 12

And then you're sending them. I, I, I, to quick point of clarification, I don't remember who else was on there. Do we have those names? I think it was Hernandez and Mendoza.

Phil BacerraItem 12

Got it. Okay. Yeah. But I wanted to be respectful of them if they wanted to bump off as well. So.

They're not here, so I don't know. Council member Hernandez is just walking in there. Mayor, one moment.

Phil BacerraItem 12

He thought he could get away, but he couldn't, so.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 12

Yes, I would be honored to still serve on that committee.

Phil BacerraItem 12

Great, and do we know Madam Clerk if Council Member Mendoza is on?

Council Member Mendoza is not on.

Jessie LopezItem 12

Mayor Saranto, I actually have a question and I'd like to propose something to you because the staff reports read that it could be a point you can make an appointment of three or two and i think just for efficiency purposes are you open to appointing two members of this council

Phil BacerraItem 12

i'm fine i mean i i mean it's really not an appointment by me it's by the council it was just more of a suggestion to have the ad hoc just again transition to the standing committee but um you know i don't know where uh council member i i you know don't want to speak for council member mendoza whether or not she'd like to continue serving that i want to be respectful of her And that's her discretion and her time. So why don't we do, if we can, maybe we could appoint the two Council members, you know, for now, and maybe we wait to see if, can we add Council Member Mendoza on at some later time,

Phil BacerraItem 12

Madam City Attorney, like at the next meeting, if she's, you know, if she's present, we can ask her.

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem 12

Yes, or if you wanted to do that without asking her, you could always do the appointment and then mayor thank you i was just going to say i'll

David PenalozaItem 12

make a motion to approve all three ad hoc members or to appoint all three ad hoc members to the subcommittee and then if council member mendoza chooses not to serve i guess she could just drop

Phil BacerraItem 12

off that's that sounds good that's probably a second that i'll second that all right we have a motion to second council members please vote

And I'm a yes.

Thank you. Motion passes with 6-1. Council members Hernandez, Lopez, Peñalosa, Fan, Mayor Potembe, Sarah, Mayor Sarmiento voting yes, and Council member Mendoza absent for this item.

Phil BacerraItem 12

Thank you, everybody. And again, I appreciate your indulgence. As you can tell, my voice is about ready to go. I've had to kind of mute myself before coughing a few times already. But I did want to say, you know, for the record, I'm supportive of the items on the consent calendar.

Phil BacerraItem 12

The only clarification I wouldn't suggest on item number 29, it looks like section number one of the of the resolve clause, Madam City Attorney should be should clarify to say that just to be consistent, that it should say to end child marriage for anybody under 18 for it to be consistent with the whereas clauses so that's the only thing I found but with the exception of that I'm completely supportive of the balance and I will turn it over now to capable hands of uh mayor pro ten becerra good night everybody thank you good night mayor sarmanto

i hope you feel better uh get some rest uh colleagues let's get through this uh if you would indulge me before we jump into the work study session i'd like to uh take the consent calendar uh see please announce any items that you'd be abstaining from um and then i'd also like to know which ones you'd like to pull and then maybe we can approve the balance of the calendar before we go back to the work study session. So let's go around the horn. Council Member Lopez, do you have

Jessie LopezItem 12

anything to abstain or pull? Nothing to abstain. Well, I think I'm going to pull 26. All right,

David PenalozaItem 12

Council Member Lopez pulls 26. Council Member Penaloza. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem Becerra. I'd just have a brief comment on item 2027.

All right, Council Member Fan.

Thai Viet PhanItem 12

I'd like to abstain from item number 19 as the Rancho Santiago Community College District is a client of my employer, Red Hand and Tucker. And if it is pulled from the agenda, I will leave the room during discussion. Thank you.

Thank you for that, Council Member Fan. Council Member Hernandez. Good all around all right Council member Mendoza are you with us?

Yes, I am here.

Did you want to abstain or pull any items from the consent calendar?

No, I am fine.

Okay, and I will be pulling items 16 and 27. So I'll entertain a motion excuse me motion for the approval of the remainder of the items. I'll move the item. I got a motion from Council Member Hernandez.

Jessie LopezItem 12

Okay, sorry, I actually will not be pulling 26.

Yeah, you got 26 polled. Will not be pulling it, okay. So as of right now, I've got items 25, 16, and 27 being pulled. So I have a motion on the balance. Do I have a second? I'll second. All right, I got a second from Council Member Paloza. Let's call the vote.

Council member Mendoza did you want to announce your vote yes thank you

motion carries with six one with council members Hernandez Lopez Mendoza Pinalosa fan and Mayor Potem Becerra voting yes and Mayor Sarmiento absent for this

Thank you, Madam State Clerk. So I'll ask my colleagues, what would you prefer? Would we want to jump into the work study session, or would you like to take the three items on consent that were pulled?

David PenalozaItem 12

I would say we just take the three items to get it out of the way.

I would say so as well. Let's do that. All right, so let's jump to item 16 and the lucky winner on that is me. So I will go ahead first. Can I have Judson Brown come forward, please?

thank you Jensen um so so real quickly uh this is in regards to the quarterly report for housing division projects for the uh period of January to March 2022 uh so my my concerns are we received 76 applications for the first time home buyers down payment assistance um that were sent out i'm sorry 76 were sent out four were returned and only two of those four applications were approved so my question to you is what does our city staff need from us to get more applications approved is i mean because the way i look at it is it is it something that you need in order to conduct more

outreach are you guys going into say the market rate apartments where these are folks that you you know, they can afford a down, I'm sorry, they can afford mortgage, but maybe not a down payment, especially given the escalating costs of purchasing a home here in central Orange County. What do you need from us? Yeah, great question. Thank you very much, Mayor Pretem.

The thinking and the question is exactly on my mind as well, because about six months ago, we came to city council and we requested approval to double the amount of funding we were providing to moderate income families to 80,000 per household and increase the amount of assistance for low-income households to 120,000 and as you can see in the results we're seeing the same results so relative to our outreach I don't think there's an issue with our outreach I mean 76 applications isn't bad it's about the number of families who are actually qualifying and able to qualify for the assistance and qualify

for uh you know our first mortgage in order to purchase their first home uh and in addition to that this week uh working with our tremendous pio paul we're sending out a mailer to all 85 000 households throughout santa anna uh with information on our our down payment assistance program i included in that um so you know six months later i think what what uh we need to do is come back to city council revisit those those amounts per household and possibly recommend to to increase those amounts again so that we can get more families into homes that needs to

that that that priority is still our our priority and uh we need to uh get more families into homes thank you for that justin i my my uh input would be we need more outreach i i saw what we did with the Section 8 vouchers, and I saw emails, I saw social media posts, I saw all sorts of avenues that were exhausted to get the word out. I would ask you to work with our CMO and our PIO to really push the word out there, because I think there's a lot of folks in town that would take advantage of it, and if it's a matter of qualifying, again, please let the

Council know what it is that we need to do to assist you, but I think that this is a program that helps stabilize our neighborhoods and our community so the more that we can do to get this word out there and granted eighty thousand dollars would be not seem like a lot today given again what it would take to uh qualify for a down payment but eighty thousand that is still a chunk of change and especially for folks depending on where they're trying to purchase so uh judson thank you but again please come back to us let us know what you need to get the word out there and i believe

this items are receiving files so i don't think we need to take a an official action on does any

Jessie LopezItem 16

my colleagues have any uh comments on this item i do have a question thank you um

Jessie LopezItem 16

do you hear back from people that go through the process and say you know the the eligibility is a concern for them or just the process in general you know what the feedback that

we hear is that the most difficult part of qualifying for the process for for our assistance is qualifying for that first loan right so we can offer the $80,000 we can offer the $120,000 but the family still has to qualify for that first loan in order to purchase their home and and it's just the qualifying for that first loan and and then pairing that with our with our assistance is uh is extremely difficult okay got it thank you

Thai Viet PhanItem 16

thank you council member council member fan uh judson so actually your comment your response just made me wonder do we uh have any relationships with any local credit unions banks something like that um i know that there are some um organizations out there that do try to work with folks and banks i know it's different after the crash right uh banks are now more um what even when i was trying to get up uh my mortgage approved or my first loan it was you know paperwork on paperwork and And both my husband and I were working and all that stuff.

Thai Viet PhanItem 16

So I guess I'm not exactly sure, you know, do we say, hey, typically a bank would approve it if you have this amount of, you know, down payment, plus this is what your income should look like or whatever, and maybe work with some banks to see if it's possible to have that relationship too. I just don't know, but I just wanna throw it out there. Thanks.

All right, thank you, Judson. Thank you to my colleagues on that good input for him to take back. So our next item is item 25, and that was pulled by Council Member Penaloza, and that's regarding an agreement with Valley Maintenance Corp to provide custodial service of city parks, restrooms and park buildings.

David PenalozaItem 16

Council Member Penaloza, please. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem Becerra, and thank you to my colleagues for indulging me. The reason I pulled item 25, which as the mayor pro temp status to approve an agreement with Valley Maintenance Corporation to provide custodial service at our parks and city park restrooms and park buildings. For a term from January 1 through 2022 through May 31. first i pull this madam city manager because within the staff report it says that valley maintenance corporation is the current contractor for these services and parks and rec is satisfied

David PenalozaItem 16

with their work um i just want to get some clarity on what kind of of um i guess

David PenalozaItem 16

sir i wouldn't use the word surveillance but kind of monitoring of the park restroom maintenance do we do. Because I just today during my lunch break from work because I have nothing better to do I was driving by and pulled over at Delhi Park because I knew this item was coming up and I poked my head in the restrooms. And just the side of them I would rather risk an accident than having to use those restrooms at Delhi Park. And sorry for that but that That was a reality just because they weren't, you know, they're not clean. And Memorial Park restrooms, I see them often and they're not clean.

David PenalozaItem 16

I don't see how any parent with their child or adult would want to use those restrooms in the state that they're in. So I'm asking also because just knowing how expensive everything is and seeing that this This is only $490,000 a year.

David PenalozaItem 16

And knowing that we have 50 plus parks with restrooms that need cleaning. What are we cleaning these restrooms weekly? Is there a schedule? Is it daily? Are there other contractors that we contract with to clean these restrooms? How are we, how do we say that we're satisfied with their work?

Right. Thank you, member, Council Member Penalozio. We, the restrooms are clean typically twice a day. We have park inspectors that come in after the cleanings and they inspect them. Once they inspect them, they can be trashed right after that. So we have a very hard time with, I mean, we could clean them five times a day. And I'm not sure that we would keep them clean all the time, but they're twice a day. And our park service inspectors, it's a pay for performance contract. So they go in and inspect to make sure that they've cleaned everything.

Some of our restrooms are in poor condition. So even if you clean them, they still look dirty, but you can't sanitize them. So I understand what you're saying.

David PenalozaItem 16

So so our park restrooms are cleaned twice a day, twice a day.

Correct. If there's a fence, it would be it would be additional.

David PenalozaItem 16

Okay, that is, I mean that's great if that is the case.

Yes.

David PenalozaItem 16

I'm going to make sure to one day hang out outside.

We have reports of when the inspectors go in and inspect the cleanings. So if you're interested in those, we can share those with you.

David PenalozaItem 16

Are they self-submitted by the contractor, these reports that they went to clean this restroom twice a day?

I'm not sure if they sign off in the restrooms, but I can double check to find out. But we know what time they claim them, and then we have inspectors come in after their cleanings and make sure they've done what they're supposed to do. If they don't, then we deduct from their contract.

David PenalozaItem 16

Okay, so I just so that we do have city inspectors that inspect after daily each park, each park restroom. Yes. Okay. And I'm asking that because the price of the contract is low. I mean, it's half a million dollars. It's a lot of money. But now we're doing twice a day for 50 plus parks. It just seems like that is a really low amount for the amount of restroom parks that get cleaned out twice a day. and I personally, you know, is rare when I would find the park that's clean, a park restroom that's clean to use. But, so I guess if you could provide that for me

David PenalozaItem 16

to see, you know, how we monitor this. I mean, if it's just a self-reporting by the company that they clean this restroom, any information you could provide would be helpful because I mean, if we need to increase this contract so that there's additional cleaning. That's also something that we could potentially bring back and look at at a future date. But I'm personally not happy with the state of our restrooms at any of our parks that I've seen in the last couple of months. So putting emphasis on our park inspectors looking after each of these restrooms would be, I would be happy to see. Okay.

David PenalozaItem 16

So with that, that's it, Mayor Pro Tem. With that, I will make a motion to approve item 25.

All right, we got a motion from council member Pelosa. Is there a second?

Thai Viet PhanItem 16

I'll second.

Thank you, council member Fianz. We got a motion, a second. Let's call the vote.

Council member Mendezza, did you wanna announce your vote? My vote is yes. Thank you.

Motion carries 5-2 with council members, Lopez, Mendoza, Peñalosa, Fannin, Mayor Patem Becerra voting yes, and council members Hernandez and Mayor Sarmiento absent for this item.

Thank you, Madam State Clerk. And excuse me, we are at that point of the work study session. do you have a presentation or somebody to make a presentation did you want to hear item 20 consent item 27 I think that was I apologize good call oh I was just testing good job all right so item 27 which um I pulled along with I know Councilmember Penelosa wanted to make comment um honestly I was just going to make comment to say um I wanted to thank Sandra Umberg uh for the funds that he secured for the installation of that universally accessible playground over at Thornton Park.

I hold my monthly community office hours over there at the Kiwanis All Access Park and some of that equipment definitely needed an overall. So thank you Senator Umberg for that funding. Those are my comments. Council Member Penaloza. Thank you Mayor Pro Tem and you took those words

David PenalozaItem 27

right out of my mouth. I just basically wanted to thank our state senator, Senator Thomas Umberg, for his advocacy on behalf of the city of Santa Ana at the state level. I know oftentimes us as as council members up here send our funding request letters to or in support of something to our state legislators or our members at the federal level, our congressmen, and sometimes we hear back and sometimes we don't and sometimes we get you know four million dollar grants that go towards our park system, our zoo. So just wanted to thank them. And just so that the community could

David PenalozaItem 27

see the kind of work that our state legislatures and our federal partners, you know, have and the effect that they could have and change in our city when we when they advocate on our behalf. So thank you, Senator Umbrick for this. That's it, Mayor Parton. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member

Senator Penalosa, does anybody else have any comments? Council member Lopez.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Yeah, thank you. I also wanna thank Senator Umberg and his office for bringing millions into our communities. Many of these millions are going straight into War 3 to benefit the Sioux and other parts. And so I'm really looking forward to staff continuing to communicate with the Senator's office and continuing to bring resources for Santa Ana residents. Thank you.

Thank you for that council member Lopez you're right we've got Ward 3 and Ward 4 benefiting from that so thank you for pointing that out. Alright now, Madam City Clerk, are we ready to do a work study? Did you want to vote on this item? Oh, I again, thank you. I'm just trying to crank this thing along and I'm just making a motion to approve. Thank you for that second. So we got a motion second let's cast our votes.

My vote is yes. Thank you, Councilmember Mendoza.

Okay, motion carries 6-1 with Councilmembers Hernandez, Lopez, Mendoza, Peñalosa, Van, Mayor Potemba, Sarah voting yes, and Mayor Sarmiento absent for this item.

Thank you, Madam City Clerk. And okay, third time's the charm, right?

Yes, thank you. So the lobbyist registration assessment, I actually do have a consultant who has been, who was hired by the city to do research on what the council had requested. Back at November 16th council meeting, the council requested that an analysis of a lobbyist registration policy, identifying the impacts present findings to council. So the purpose of this work study session is to hear direction from council to formulate a lobbyist registration policy that will serve its need in an effective and efficient manner.

And with that, I'll give the floor to Andrea Miller and give her the opportunity to present their findings.

And you can share your screen, Andrea.

Thank you very much, Daisy. I assume everyone's able to see the screen that now we do have a PowerPoint presentation. As Stacy indicated management partners was engaged by the city to research lobbyist registration requirements adopted in peer agencies and then use this research to assess the current requirements in Santa Ana, the relationship between existing state local reporting requirements and present some best practices based on on comparable agencies for consideration by the mayor and city council this evening as part of your efforts to promote ongoing transparency with respect to city operations.

We did provide a report that's included in your agenda packet and that report does have a chart that summarizes the ordinances that have been adopted in some of the peer agencies. This evening, we'd like to go through the PowerPoint presentation. It really provides just kind of an overview of the research project and then open it up to questions from the Council and obtain some direction as to next steps.

We did have a chance as part of our analysis to review the Council presentation. I know you've had a discussion about lobbyist registration requirements previously. We interviewed some of your staff members, then watched the council meeting. We also took a look at some of the communications that have been provided to you, and it formed the basis for the research. And we started with this discussion about what is lobbying. Most of the definitions indicate that lobbying relates to communication with any public official or staff or executive branch government official to influence any legislative or administrative

of action but consistent with some of the council comments the evening that you discussed this not everyone who engages in lobbying is a lobbyist many of the definitions that have been adopted by cities exclude various individuals such as legislatures that are doing business on behalf of the government constituents that are making calls to policy makers government employees that working within their positions and members of the media. So the requirements if the council were to pursue implementing requirements in Santa Ana, the definition would determine who is responsible for

complying with those registration requirements. One of the items that we were asked to look at was the existing regulations in Santa Ana. You do have registration or you do have requirements that adopt or affect lobbyists. You have a couple of city code sections. One of those requires that persons that are doing business with the city may not make gifts to public officers or employees within 12 months of decisions. And then you have another section that really supplements existing state regulations and you make public access available to information related to campaign

contributions through a link on the city's website, really intending to make this very convenient for members of the community.

We were asked why some cities have adopted lobbyist regulations and really this goes to the idea that you're trying to promote transparency in the government decision making process. It is important the work that lobbyists do they often bring information to the government They have access to resources that government agencies may not have with respect to information. But there's also this push and pull between the information that they have available to them. But you also don't want to have those special interests control the political process or drown out the voices of the residents in your community.

So it's an attempt to moderate moderate the influence in the decision making process, and then encourage ethical behavior from lobbyists and government officials.

The California business and professions code does identify information that lobbyists can be required to disclose by cities, name and contact information for the firm and for the lobbyists themselves. information related to each of their clients, all gifts that are payments that have been made by the lobbyist can be required to be disclosed. So the business and profession code is fairly broad in terms of what cities can actually require in terms of disclosure.

In looking at cities and the codes that have been adopted, we identified agencies and looked at those that were most closely associated with Santa Ana in terms of population, and then we added some of the larger peer agencies because we were desiring to get a broad segment of the different types of requirements that might be implemented. We selected eight cities. Their populations are included here to give you some frame of reference as to their size in comparison to the city of Santa Ana.

We did receive responses from several of agencies, but Bakersfield, Riverside, and Stockton have not adopted regulations requiring registration by lobbyists. Of the other cities that did provide copies of their ordinances, they vary in terms of their definition of lobbyist, including the exclusions, although there are some similarities. Most of them do require registration and have fees associated with that, and then they also have established fines and penalties for failure to disclose.

Most of the definitions of lobbyists that we identified require some kind of monetary compensation for the work. This was raised by members of the council when you discussed this during your last meeting, but most of them did have some monetary threshold. They also provided definitions in terms of the frequency of contacts with government officials, the duration of those contacts. contacts and as I indicated a few moments ago there were exclusions so recognizing that members of the media professionals your staff members would be excluded from being required to

are often required excluded from being required to register

We've attempted throughout this presentation to provide an example from some of the most complex regulations, but the table that you have in front of you lists each agency that responded and provides the information within those categories that I mentioned earlier in the presentation.

So in Anaheim's case, Anaheim has identified a lobbyist that would be subject to registration as any individual or entity who receives $500 or more in consideration in a calendar month other than reimbursement for reasonable travel expenses to communicate with any elected or appointed official of a city for the purposes of influencing them in a decision. In Anaheim's case, they also preclude them from lobbying regional agencies that the city is a member of.

They do have exclusions related to employees, people acting within their official capacity and professionals that are providing information to the organization. But you can tell from the chart that was provided in the more comprehensive report that's included in your packet that Los Angeles defines lobbyists differently. Long Beach has a very complicated ordinance and definition, but again, each one of them has attempted to define the lobbyist in terms of the amount of money that they're receiving and what their purpose is.

Peer agencies frequently included deadlines for registration, information that was required. We noticed that some of the ordinances are very detailed and follow the business and professions code section, while others don't require reporting as frequently or require as much information. And then many of the agencies required annual and quarterly reports.

We use Long Beach as an example in Long Beach's case registrations required within 15 days of qualifying as a lobbyist. The annual registration shall be renewed each year by January 15. And in their case, you're responsible for disclosing clients, the legislative or administrative item that you've been engaged to influence and that any payments you've received.

Disclosures are required every six months, and then the city is retaining those responses related to lobbying and the reports that are being filed and maintaining them in a way that's usable to the members of the community, and they also cannot provide gifts to public officials.

We really spent a lot of time with the fines, fees, and penalties because we heard comments from council members that you wanted to ensure that the penalties for violation were really commensurate with what the crime is or what the violation was. Peer agencies typically did require some type of fee for initial registration, a fine for failure to register and potential penalties. Again, it varied though, and it appeared that many of the agencies attempted to try to graduate the fines based on continuing violations so that the earlier violations had lesser penalties.

fees. Los Angeles, for instance, requires an annual registration fee of $450 plus $75 per client. They do that to try to make sure that the larger lobbying firms are paying more money because they're paying on a per client basis. Violation may be prosecuted as a misdemeanor, and you can't be a lobbyist for one year after conviction. However, in talking to officials that administer the city of Los Angeles program. They said that that was prosecution really occurred when it was an ongoing violation. They did also implement a late filing penalty because they found

that some people, lobbyists, just weren't familiar with the filing requirements. So they have a late filing penalty of $25 per day, but they've placed a cap on that not to exceed $500. And they have imposed civil penalties although they've used those infrequently civil penalties though also have a cap of two thousand dollars again in your packet you have a complete report that provides a table of the requirements in the various cities the five cities that do have or i'm sorry the six cities that do have registration requirements and at this point we're able to answer any questions

And really the threshold question is whether you want to pursue a lobbyist registration requirement. And if so, definition of lobbyists would be critical. The types of exclusions that you'd want to include. What types of information are you interested in making available to the members of the community? And how do you perceive the fines and penalties should be handled based on the varying degrees of violation? And with that, we're available to answer any questions.

Thank you Andrea that was an excellent presentation i'm going to turn it over to my colleagues does anybody want to jump in and share your thoughts on this.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

I just have a brief comment mayor pro tem and just wanted to share my support for the item.

Okay, great Thank you. Councilmember Pham.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

Thank you, yes, I am very excited for this I remember when I was I think on the planning commission the charter ad hoc had brought something like this both mayor pretend and councilman penalosa and i was supportive of it then because frankly i'm new to politics and you're learning about who's who who's influencing whom who has relationships where and some of them are long-standing and i think it is important that not only people running for office know that but the public know that so i'm very supportive of this item a few questions that i do have

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

for our consultant is i do you have a recommendation because one of the things that i'm most concerned about is we're not los angeles right we don't have at least i don't think we have a ton of big lobbying firms coming around knocking on my door all the time and we don't have 20 council members or whatever working full time to do this so um that seems to be extremely complicated but i wanted to see if you had an inclination of what you think might be a um a good or something that

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

you might recommend for a city of our size and our complexity you know one of the things that

and stepping back away from the cost and the fees um i think one of the things that we noticed was that maybe the easier systems for both the city to administer but also for the lobbyists themselves are the ones where the forms are prescribed so you have a specific form that they're being asked to use and then they're doing it online so I would I would start with that I you know I I think you can reduce the complexity a lot by making it very clear what's expected and then making online type forms available.

In terms of the money, you know, what we attempted to do, because, you know, this obviously is, you want to collect the money so that you can recover the cost for administering the program, and there will be some cost for administering the program and making the forms available, and then of course making them available to your community. I think if you look at the table and glance through that first column, it gives you a sense of, or I'm sorry, the last column, it gives you a sense of what people are being asked to pay.

LA was one of the higher ones, but San Diego charges a registration of fee of $154.05 plus $31.09 per client. so again you can kind of see the range los angeles was again very high

anaheim charges a registration fee of 100 so you know again i think you want to recover your costs but i do agree that based on the complexity of the organization you may not be interested in charging the same types of fees that some of the larger cities are

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

I guess my question was more directly related to the definition of lobbyist. For example, in Los Angeles, it's saying anyone who's compensated to spend 30 hours or more in any consecutive three months, that seems really high. But obviously, again, we're not LA. We don't have this many council members to lobby, but I might be wrong. So that's kind of where I

wanted to get your thoughts on that. I think I would lean, I apologize, I thought you were asking about the other one, but I would lean more toward setting the, rather than the hours, whether they're being compensated and set an amount, like for instance, Anaheim, $500 or more in a calendar month. I think that's a little easier to administer rather than the hours, because then you're really placing a burden on the lobbyist organization to do timekeeping and and look at whether or not they're lobbyists or spending time with each of you, each of the council members.

So I would, I would really think it'd be easier to administer $500 or more in a calendar month or $250 or more in a calendar month rather than basing it on time.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

Thanks, that's really helpful. And that's, that would also be my preference. Frankly, you have pay stubs, it's easy to check.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

If there was an issue of needing to audit or something like that, you can check that more easily. And especially as employees, you might not be tracking billables like an attorney would, depending on what you're asking. That's right.

The other thing that I think is kind of just something to consider, you want to make the information available to the public so that they know who's attempting to influence governmental decisions but you also don't want to create such a burden for staff or for the community to look through and to try to really understand the reporting so i think making it much simpler is easy for the community to see who's influencing so it gives them the the level of transparency that it sounds as though you may be looking for but doesn't create such an administrative burden

that staff's attempting to or in a position where they have to attempt to evaluate and understand the reports and the community's not. And so I think, again, a simpler ordinance would probably be beneficial and accomplishing what you want without creating an undue burden.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

So just speaking to my colleagues regarding the requirements looking through this chart, I did generally like the Anaheim requirements. Its name, contact information, employer, employer contact information, and a brief description of the issue that they're looking to lobby. And I think, you know, we can call that the issue or topic or project. And that way we know what they're trying to do. And regarding the definition of lobbyists, the Anaheim one is not bad.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

I also thought the, the, I thought the San Diego one was okay too. you. My main issue is that I personally would like to see even nonprofits be included in the definition of lobbyists if the individual is being paid as an employee director, etc. Now, and I did like the exception, however, under the Santa Monica exception that says that officials are members of neighborhood groups that are not compensated are exempt. So just those specific clarifications because we have obviously a lot of neighborhood associations

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

and they're not getting paid and I frankly anyone not getting paid in my opinion is not a lobbyist they're just an interested party thank you thank you for that councilman pillows up

David PenalozaItem 27

thank you mayor pro tem and thank you for the presentation I just also wanted to voice my my definite support of having an ordinance, a lobbyist registration coming forward to us. And I would definitely wanna see it be expanded within our city charter as well, because like everything else, you know, there's anyone could just, any new council could just come in and change something like this, like we've seen in the past.

David PenalozaItem 27

I do, the only hesitation I have today is the, is how can we do this so that staff the the amount of staff requirement is is minimal um or making it easy and seamless because as we we already see currently today with many of the of the things we have in place and things that we have to do such as public records requests um you know we can't there isn't enough staff to manage this internally so we definitely require the the hiring of additional staff so i would want to make sure that we could secure those positions

David PenalozaItem 27

and fund them before we move down this line because like everything else we want to make sure that it's sustainable within um individual departments of who would um you know keep keep an eye on this on and and control it this lobbyist registration which i would assume would be the the city clerk's office. So I would wanna make sure that that department has the resources to be able to manage this is the only hesitation I have to do this today. But it is something I wanna see. So I guess Madam city clerk, just as we move forward into this budget cycle,

David PenalozaItem 27

I would ask that we keep in mind, I guess the desire, which is most of this council is what I've heard so far of seeing these things implemented and how can we work with your office and making sure that your office has those resources available so that we could get these things moving. And I would definitely, I wanna thank Council Member Pham because I definitely wanna see an equal approach

David PenalozaItem 27

about who is considered a lobbyist. I know there are tons of nonprofits in the city that do have a funding source that oftentimes they're here advocating for something, trying to influence something, meeting with all of us, trying to influence policy, and there's also funding behind that. So that would also require a registration of a lobbyist. Because that's what they're essentially doing is lobbying for certain policies. So that's it, Mayor Pro Tem, and thank you.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Okay, Council Member Lopez. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Jessie LopezItem 27

So I think the last time we discussed this was in November of 2021. So I'm trying to recall all of the things that we discussed then, and Andrew, I thought your presentation was great. but I'm wondering if you got to compare the language that we discussed, you know, back in November 2021 with, you know, the rest of the cities that you presented to us. I'm just curious about that.

So what I did, you did, your memory is correct. You did talk about this some months ago. And so I had a chance to look at the provisions that were presented to you as part of your transparency, our sunshine ordinance. And maybe most critically, we watched the videotape of your meeting actually a couple times to make sure we really understood where each one of you were coming from. And that really helped to drive the report that you see today and that's why we focused on some of these very specific areas to give you options.

So, you know, for instance, I heard very clearly that council members were concerned, wanted to make sure that someone that was being compensated was included as a lobbyist. But, but yet people that really are members of the community advocating on behalf of some local park or something of that nature and are not being they're just truly members of your community that are not being paid as lobbyists would be excluded.

And that's why we spent more time really breaking out those fines and penalties because there was a concern that you didn't want to immediately charge someone with a misdemeanor because they didn't file their requirement required documents on time so again you notice this chart is really attempting to address and provide more detail to you related to those issues that were raised during that discussion.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. So, you know, some of the questions that you had for us was what exclusions do we want to see? How should the lobbyists be defined? Do we desire an ordinance, which I think we all understand that we do? What information should be reported? What fines and penalties? And I remember from our last conversation, some of the things we had talked about were in terms of how we had or how lobbyists had been defined in the lobbyist registration, like proposed ordinance, we were going back and forth between the dollar amount, which

Jessie LopezItem 27

was 250. And I heard you say that that's the best way to kind of define it as opposed to, you know, trying to track hours, which I agree. And I think also, and staff can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think nonprofits were included in the language that was presented to us last year, but I could be wrong. I also saw that some cities like L.A., other cities have a 10 day period requirement and our language proposed 15. Do you have any thoughts on the difference between 10 and 15?

I don't, but I think 15 and I and I'm just thinking about the steps that you've taken in terms of the publications of your agendas. I think a little bit longer may be helpful or maybe make it so that the person that's looking at your agenda would have the ability to go online or to figure out if they've got an agenda item they're particularly interested in. And so you want it to be soon enough that someone that's looking at agenda items would be able to also then know who might be attempting to influence on that particular item.

Okay, got it. Thank you. Yeah, and so I'm thinking since you want a longer period for your agenda items which makes sense it gives people in the community a lot longer to try to prepare themselves for the council meetings you probably want to have that reporting time somehow coincide with that.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Okay, thank you. And I remember, you know, we had also talked about the penalty violation provision in here, not necessarily wanting to, you know, cite people at the very first violation, right, but we wanted to have some process in place where people would not take advantage of the system and and have some sort of dollar amount and I see what other cities have done so that's really helpful for me um andrea i have a question for you do you know if other cities and their agenda packets they include you know some of the registrations or filings that folks file with the city because i

Jessie LopezItem 27

know people it's public information and people can have access to it but do you know or does their city attorney know if other cities include that in the agenda packets

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem 27

Councilmember Lopez, I'm not familiar. I didn't work on this report that's coming from the city clerk's office, but that's something I can look into and report back to you. Okay, thank you.

Okay, and just with respect to that I think one and it actually kind of dovetails on the prior council members comments to it appeared that really some of the most effective systems were the ones that were being done online and where residents could easily access the information online. So I think that really is critical in terms of reducing the allocation of staff time that it would take to implement this and administer it effectively, but also being available online so that people can check that. The City of Los Angeles said that because the information is available online, they do often

also alert as part of their staff reports where there are large lobbying efforts being undertaken but that they really rely on the community to actually go to that online system and look to see who's lobbying or who's attempting to influence related projects good to know thank

Jessie LopezItem 27

you um so i guess for staff because there's there's no staff recommendation in here but my direction for staff or my feedback for staff would be i would like the council maybe to compare the original lobbyist language that was presented to us in november with perhaps anaheim i heard anaheim be mentioned um and if we could work out the kinks you know with the council in terms of the dollar amount that was included in there um if everybody's fine with the 15 days the inclusion of the non-profits um and the registration fees um because i think we have a good document and

Jessie LopezItem 27

it's just about the little details now that we have to figure out amongst ourselves so that's

feedback thank you thank you for that uh council member mendoza do you have any uh comments or

feedback yes i'm fine with that all right i like that uh council member fan you wanted to add some

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

short comment um this is for city staff dovetailing on what councilmember lopez mentioned And in looking at this ordinance, I would like to see us add a button or a link onto the Agenda and Minutes page, the landing page. So once you get to Agenda and Minutes, it says about the agenda. I'd like to see a button or link that says lobbyist registration or lobbyists, and people can, as people update it, folks can come to that whenever, and they can compare it to the agenda. Because as I mentioned, I'd like to see if someone is registering what item they have lobbied on um i don't think that'd be too hard

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

because it would just link to where the information is being uploaded and people can cross-check

themselves thank you thank you for that councilmember fan um excellent presentation just a couple of comments from here um i i agree about the definition uh including non-profits and i I would also include as far as who would be reporting, as far as contact with council members, but also EMT and certain key staff. I mean, we already have that in our Sunshine Ordinance that we would want our certain key staff to disclose their calendars. And so I think this would be something that they should also comply with as well.

With the registration fee, I like the sliding scale idea because not every company is built the same way. And so for those that are more of a smaller firm versus larger firm, I know Councilmember Pham brought up a good point in that while we're not Los Angeles and we don't have lobbyists talking to us about 100 projects, but at the same time, I would say that really it's more subject matter that's important. I know in Los Angeles, that's when folks are registering there, there, or I'm sorry, filling out the reports up there, they typically talk about who they've

talked to on staff, and then what projects. So I think that's important. That kind of dovetails into something I've already asked staff to do here, which is when we have land use items on our agendas, both Planning Commission and City Council, that it also lists the applicant, because while typically a property owner would be the subject of the land use action, it's it's typically somebody that's helping them apply for the entitlements and process it so to have that disclosed would be helpful uh and uh Councilmember Penelosa brought up you know the cost

and I think that you know having this be you know sort of a cost recovery if possible I think it's important that we try to make sure that we have the appropriate amount of staff staff overseeing this. I think that what everybody is saying from our consultant to folks here on the diocese as far as making it easily accessible, not just for transparency, but I think just for being able to maintain it and for everybody to be able to see what's going on. So if something's missing, it can be easily identified. It's easy for folks to immediately see once something is uploaded, just like our, as council members, when we

we upload our 460s and our form 700s so that's all I have so um Madam City Clerk I'm pretty sure you've got a little bit of a direction from us I would just ask I conclude with this question

so what's our next steps at this point um what we can do with unless Andrea did you have any other questions that you need or clarifications um no order to okay okay thank you I just wanted I didn't sure that I covered that. So at this point, what we can do is put all of these items together, work with our city attorney's office about bringing back an ordinance, and then we can ask council to see if there's any other changes that wanna be made at that point.

Do you, I mean, is there a calendar at this point? Do you have a expected timeframe?

I do not. It's gonna take, I'm gonna have to see how long it takes for us to generate a report and then work the city attorney's office and see what that looks like okay perfect thank you for that um

hey guys it's not even 10 o'clock yet we're already at the business calendar who would have thought huh i know i know i know i know a little excited okay a little excited there um so our next item is our fy 2021-2022 uh third quarter budget update do we have a presentation from staff

Yeah.

We do have a short presentation, but if the city council would like, we could just go straight to questions. It's up to the council. I would like to see the presentation with my colleagues. Yeah. Thank you. Especially I like the part that it's short, right? Okay.

All right. So good evening, Mayor Pro Tem and City Council members. This third quarter budget update is a receive and file item. This presentation will focus on general fund revenues and expenditures, along with the impact, the latest staff vacancy report and an update on the capital improvement program. Based on the latest information, our estimates for sales tax, both Bradley Burns and Measure X, are increasing again by a total of $8.9 million. Actual plan check revenue received exceeds the original budget estimate due to several large projects.

Overall, we expect to reach revenue that would be another 2.8% increase from the last time that we provided you information with the mid-year report. We have updated the 18% reserve calculation to reflect the higher revenue estimate. At this time, we expect the general fund balance to exceed the 67.5 million reserve requirement by 29.9 million. This is a status of our general fund revenue. As of March 31st, the city has received 63% of expected revenue,

which is in line with projections because we do have a two-month approval period after June 30th so we will continue collecting revenues related to this year for 60 days after the fiscal year ends the city has spent 72 percent of its general fund budget also in line with expectations approximately half of the city budget is for employee compensation paid twice per month and city has already paid its pension debt and the fire authority received one month in advance as of march 31st we had 153 funded vacancies or nearly 12 percent of our budgeted staffing

the adjusted capital budget of 304.7 million includes prior year carryovers for multi-year projects as well as new appropriations for fiscal the current fiscal year and adjustments throughout the year as of march 31st we expect capital spending to exceed 76 million and we just wanted to give you a heads up to expect a request for significant carryovers to the next fiscal year again for multi-year projects your next budget presentations will focus on the proposed budget for the new fiscal year that begins on July 1st. Your dedicated city council budget workshop is on May 12th with a followup scheduled for your regular meeting

on May 17th. Your June meetings will include the public hearing and consideration of the annual budget ordinance. And that concludes my presentation and we're ready to answer your questions. Thank you for that. Let's just go around the horn. Council member Hernandez.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

Thank you for your presentation, Director Downs. No questions on my end.

Thank you. Thank you for that. Council Member Fan?

No questions. Great. Thank you. Council Member Penaloza?

David PenalozaItem 27

No questions, Mayor Pro Tem. Just a quick comment with regards to the parks and rec and the police department. I would hope that these funded vacancies are making an effort in hiring those critical positions, especially in parks and recs, since we are opening back our programming. And I know that there was a lot of programming that was, I guess, stopped essentially over the last two years. So I hope we're moving towards bringing those positions back and as well as our library, A lot of funded vacancies that should be filled. I know it's hard right now,

David PenalozaItem 27

but just whatever we need to do within our human resources department as well to expedite the hiring, obviously of qualified and quality people, I would appreciate. That's it. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem.

Thank you, Council Member Lopez.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. Hi, Kat. Sorry if this is repetitive. I just wanted to know.

Jessie LopezItem 27

I know that you know last year the Council approved a plan to reduce the pension liability costs, and I also know that it's still you know I think 20% of our general fund if I'm not mistaken, and you know, keeping in mind that measure X is going to go away. with this extra $10 million that we have, are we using any of that money to kind of go back into the pension liability fund or?

We do have a proposal in our upcoming budget to put some money away, one-time money into the section 115 trust. Back on March 15th, when we asked for early direction from the city council, we introduced the idea that we would want to put that savings into a section 115 trust and at that point in time we didn't get any different direction from the city council so we are looking to put that in our upcoming budget okay perfect that's all that i have thank you thank you uh council member mendoza

uh thank you mayor pro tem um the questions that i had were clarified by by the earlier um council members so i don't have any questions thank you thank you for that um mine is more just

is more of just a comment um i i feel like the higher tax revenue that we're seeing is probably reflective of some of the current economic you know influences right we've got inflation we've got you know this infusion of stimulus from the feds and states so i feel like a lot of the spending that we're seeing locally which is wonderful for our books but at the same time it's not something that we should get too comfortable with because I feel like that's a short-term bump, but really that's not something that we're going to see as a consistent trajectory.

Would that be fair to say? We agree. And to that end, in our upcoming fiscal year proposed budget, we do have a lot of one-time spending proposed. Okay, perfect. Thank you for that that was a great presentation so we'll go ahead and move right along to our next item item 31 regarding the policy pursuant for the use of military equipment by san anna pd right thank you

mayor pro tem and we do have a presentation that our chief of police is going to kick off i do want to make a couple clarifications before he gets started the item before you is to amend an ordinance it is not to purchase any military equipment it's to not to spend any money in police department and another item i want to point out to you is that there are a lot of individuals that do object to a program that's out there and it's called the 1033 program and that's where entities local law enforcement agencies get military equipment from the department of defense

this is not that and in fact the city does not participate in that program and real quick just

further clarification so to that point this item is more to satisfy assembly bill 481 correct you're Correct. Okay. Chief, please. Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem, City Council, and the City Manager just covered everything I was going to cover. That was easy. With that, I will introduce Commander Matt Sorenson, my training commander, who will go over a very brief presentation on the nuances. Again, as the City Manager said, this is simply to comply with Assembly Bill 481.

And again, it's important to note that even before mandated by legislation, I directed a policy to disengage, to stop receiving items through the 1033 program, Department of Defense. So that was no longer the case even prior to this legislation. This is about definitions that the legislator has chosen to move forward with, and all police departments have to comply. So with that, Commander Sorensen.

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem and City Council. Basically, the City Manager and the Chief just did my presentation for me, so we'll get through this real quick.

Yeah. So like the Chief said, back in 2020, we discontinued our use of the 1033 program, and even at that time, we didn't have a lot of equipment. It amounted to 19 rifles and six weapon optics, and that was it.

So as a result of California Assembly Bill 481, which was signed by the governor in September 30th of 2021, it created government codes 7070 and 70 through 7074. And the intent of the legislature at that point was for law enforcement to provide greater transparency regarding the funding, acquisition, and use of what they defined as military equipment. More specifically, it was designed to provide greater oversight with regard to receiving decommissioned equipment through the Federal Department of General Services Defense Logistics Agency, otherwise known as the 1033 program.

As you're aware, most of that equipment would come free of charge and therefore would not meet the purchasing thresholds of various councils. And at that point, even the city leaders didn't know we had the equipment. uh government code to go through the legal requirements very quickly uh government code 7071 says that we shall approve and obtain approval but from the governing body by an ordinance adopting a military equipment use policy prior to engaging in any of the following one is requesting equipment made available under the 1033 program seeking funds for any defined

military equipment acquiring any defined military equipment either permanently or temporarily collaborating with another law enforcement agency in the deployment or use of military equipment. So for example, if we didn't have a piece of the defined military equipment and another agency did, without this ordinance, we could not use it. So we have to have it to even borrow anything. And then using any of our new and existing military equipment, which is really why we're here today.

part of the process going on in 7071 is no later than may 1st the agency has to seek to continue the use of existing military equipment acquired honor before january 1 of 2022 we have to engage in this process of getting this ordinance approved as one of the speakers said earlier today the governing body should only approve the policy if it's determined to be the following the equipment necessary because there is no reasonable alternative to achieve the same objective of officer and civilian safety. The proposed policy will safeguard the public's welfare, safety,

civil rights, and civil liberties. And if purchasing the equipment, the equipment is reasonably cost effective and prior equipment used complied with the policies that were in effect at the time. To address one of the concerns that was made during the public comment, obviously, we want the most in public engagement as we can get with regard to this. And to that end, as the law required, we published our policy on the internet on March 30, along with all of our other policies that are currently on the department's website. And then that's

how the voice of OC ultimately got our policy to publish it in their article on April 13. If approved, this policy will be posted just like all of our other policies, procedures, training materials that are readily available on our department's website.

So to give you an idea of what we actually have, this is not all encompassing of what the law covers as far as defined military equipment. This is solely what we have in our possession at the police department. a mobile command vehicle we have two armored rescue vehicles we have less lethal launchers and their associated munitions specialized firearms and ammunition of less than 50 caliber so what this would cover is our patrol rifles and our rifles that our swat team has noise flash diversionary devices commonly known as flash bangs any munitions containing chemical

agents with the exception of the oc spray that every officer gets issued their little five ounce can breaching munitions are long-range acoustic devices essentially our big pas our tactical robots and uh unmanned aerial systems which we don't have but i added it to this policy because we're currently researching the technology and we would have to have it integrated in this policy should you choose to approve the purchase at a later date

you know we use this equipment in conjunction with our ongoing progressive training practices and the department uses it in direct support of our de-escalation strategy

current policies and procedures governing the use of the equipment and they've been in effect ever since we acquired any of this equipment regardless of what the time frame was is obviously use of force policy our control devices and techniques policy our firearms policy officer involved shootings and deaths first amendment assemblies policy our 40 millimeter less lethal launcher guidelines procedures our incident command team procedure our armored vehicle deployment for patrol procedure and then our swap procedure manual

i just wanted to highlight this of the 10 items in the pd's inventory five were purchased with Council approval because they met the purchasing thresholds and that is the mobile command vehicle, our armored vehicles, the less lethal launchers and munitions, the long-range acoustical devices, and then the rifles associated with patrol rifles and the SWAT team rifles. The only reason any other items on the list did not go to Council is because they didn't meet the purchasing threshold. And with that, I'm available for any questions. Thank you. Thank you for that presentation. Before I turn it over to my colleagues, I

want to ask our Madam City Attorney, so the item is listed under our business calendar, but the recommended action is to approve the first reading of an ordinance. Would that normally be done through a public hearing?

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem 27

So not all ordinances require public hearings. Any ordinances amending your land use code require public hearings. Certain ordinances require public hearings. I'm speaking here with the chief assistant city attorney because most cities who have been doing this have been publishing the public hearings within those 30 days after they publish on their website. There is some state guidance which is simply saying that you have to adopt the ordinance or the policy in a public forum um given that we are up against the deadline my recommendation is that we take

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem 27

action um on this under the um idea that we this type of ordinance on its face does not require a

public hearing so the requirement's not there and then what is that deadline that we're up against

Sonia R. CarvalhoItem 27

it was would have otherwise been april 30th but we're we're close okay perfect all right thank

you for that so with that um i'm going to go around the horn i know you're eager but i'm going to go this way. Council Member Lopez, you want to start us off?

Jessie LopezItem 27

Sure. I don't have any questions about the presentation. Actually, Chief, I just want to say thank you for your proactiveness and making sure that this was something that, you know, the department under your directive made sure that they weren't taking because of it was going to come down to state law anyway. so thank you for that i appreciate that um but i don't have any questions on the agenda item or the presentation for right now thank you uh council member pillows

David PenalozaItem 27

no comments mayor pro tem just thank you uh police chief valentine and um staff for the presentation in making this as we know this assembly bill is now here but i appreciate the police department's effort to be proactive and get in front of this thing and and be as transparent as we can with any equipment that we have so thank you thank you for that council member thank you so just rolling back

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

a little bit um i just had a question about the 1033 program i know we're no longer participating those before my time when you removed it but i guess i understand that there are both controlled equipment and uncontrolled equipment that may be beneficial to the city obviously i don't want us have tanks rolling down the street but um i guess you know was it just not benefiting us at all is that why we removed it or was it a perception issue because i know there are other you know non-weapon items that our military surplus that was potentially available also yes and thank you

for the question um it's it was a combination of things i think uh sitting back and evaluating uh post this most recent era of civil unrest, most recent, because there's been several over history, really looking at what equipment did we have, right? And the commander will confirm that it was items that were very old and dated. And I think a lot of, some departments, they engage in the 1033 program because it's free of cost. Frankly, it's, you know, cool to say that you got something from the military.

And I'm not, you know, critical of the military, but my perspective is that if we need a piece of equipment, then I am to come to the city manager or to this council and ask for that piece of equipment, no matter what it is. And so any quality equipment can be purchased in the civilian side.

And so my position was why not do that? And so we took inventory of what we had, which wasn't much, and it wasn't, you know, critical items. And so we took inventory and then simply returned them. And it was a policy decision that I made. Some departments still continue to engage in the program and that's their decision.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

I was just curious about that, because I like free things.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

So now regarding this military use equipment policy and looking at the definition, it was quite broad. I believe, well, you can actually go back to the slide. I think.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

So actually I have it on my screen. So I I guess the reason why I wanted us to kind of reiterate that much of these items are typical policing, you know, tools, and they're not like I said tanks rolling down our streets and i would not support something like that just letting you know but um but i think it is important to talk about how the definition is is quite expansive and um and that we are doing this in order to to use some of these materials because i believe that if we are working in

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

conjunction with another agency we have to have an effective policy in place correct so for example if you just had you just had a press conference about our the police department's incredible work with the FBI yes regarding the Mexican Mafia the 31 members of the Mexican Mafia that we were able to apprehend so congratulations on that but I understand that if we don't have this policy in place sometimes we can't collaborate or there's some issues with that is that correct correct okay

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

Okay, so I think it is really important that we do have these policies so that we can collaborate with other agencies to do the difficult and long ranging work that we are trying to do. The other comment I wanted to make was regarding unmanned vehicles I think you're talking about their drones I think that's just a fancy term for drones. I personally and these are not weaponized drones these are not like I think the reapers that are going over to the Middle East or in war these are literally just really expensive commercial drones that you can see or real estate agents sometimes use when they fly above the fancy developments to

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

sell their homes I would like to see us pursue something like that or I know you're looking into it um i do think that that is a way of monitoring situations when it's difficult um to get into you know you're following somebody or whatnot but i would like to also see a drone use policy that moves forward if it is something that we do i believe the city of irvine does have a relationship with ocfa for their drone pilots program that helps monitor wildfires and whatnot so i would love to see that come back if it is something that the city of Santa Ana PD finds useful.

Do you have a comment on that? Yes, absolutely. I already have a commander and a team assigned to vet out all the logistics of what would be a drone policy. And I'll give you one very practical use that is a human asset force multiplier and that is we can put that up in the air and actually go put eyes on a situation before we decide what type of response there is on the police side. There's some communities that are starting to use that technology. So we're actually putting eyes on a scene. We could patrol South Bristol just on a rotation,

let's say, for example. And if there's something that's observed, then we dispatch officers. So it's multiple uses for it, not just a tactical environment.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

Thank you. And my real, my only concern really is when we bring that policy forward, if we choose to, is that we also ensure that we protect, obviously, the privacy of our residents and whatnot. And then the other issue I wanted to bring up is commander in your presentation, because one of the members of the public had mentioned that she did not see the policy being posted 30 days prior to today's hearing. I believe your your slide did state that it was public on the Internet for since March 30th. correct? Okay. And so I just wanted to triple confirm that we did in fact comply with state

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

laws requirements and that we actually exceeded the number of dates required.

Yes. And a matter of fact, I've been checking the website every day to make sure there's no hiccups that it's still been there for the full 30 days as required.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

Great. Because the website did get updated. So I'm glad you did that. Those are all my I have a lot of comments for now, thank you.

Council Member Hernandez, better up.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

Yes, thank you, sir. Thank you, Chief, for being proactive and putting us at the forefront of good practice as a police department. My question pertains to, sir, to what type of equipment would this ordinance pertain to? Is it the equipment that you listed during your presentation, officer?

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

yes okay and that was the five purchased items that that that were agreed upon by a

past council correct no it that includes the the list of defined military equipment in the presentation so it's actually one two could you please repeat those sir yes it's a mobile command

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

vehicle a mobile command vehicle is that in layman's terms what would that be

It looks like a big RV, but it allows us to push our incident commanders out into the field where we can get better situational awareness, have people reporting into us directly versus being stuck in the fourth floor of the station where our EOC is.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

So does that vehicle have an exit where an officer could stand outside of the vehicle, still be protected, but still see what's in front of them or surrounding them? I don't want to use the term tank.

it's not what I'm thinking it is is it no okay no wait picture an rv okay but the insides it outfitted with a dispatch center we've got multiple computer screens so we can get like the downlink from the sheriff's department helicopter can stream its video into our mobile command post

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

and we have a full dispatch center with computers okay so that would be one of the items what are some of the additional items? The armored rescue vehicles. Armored rescue vehicles. Is that a vehicle that commonly would be looked at as similar to the structure of a tank?

I would disagree. It is an armored vehicle. So it's got ballistic protection all the way around it. It doesn't have tracks like a tank. It doesn't have a gun like a tank. Things like that.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

Okay. And what are some other items?

Less lethal launchers and the projectiles associated with them. So that would include 40 millimeter rounds. It would include bead bag rounds, which are fired actually from standard issue shotguns. Our rifles, which are patrol rifles, which are also the same rifles that the SWAT team uses. So AR-15 style, semi-automatic, although most military ones are full auto.

Okay.

uh noise flash diversionary devices or flash banks okay uh munitions containing chemical agents which the only type of chemical agents we use is tear gas and pepper spray common terms okay breaching munitions long-range acoustical devices our tactical robot

and if we considered purchasing drones in the future okay when were these items uh chief valentine when were these acquired and how were they acquired oh um over over many years uh these these items were not acquired uh yesterday or in the last quarter or year we've acquired them over time and they've been replaced as well over time uh let me um Take you back to 1997 and the North Hollywood shootout.

The scene was multiple police officers pinned down with revolvers, not able to protect themselves and much less the community. So we're very cognizant of equipment acquisition and it has to have a defensible purpose. and so for example the long-range acoustic device the lrad large device that sends out a certain can i say very loud uh noise directional and it and it can have an impact to redirect behavior of

human beings right uh to bring down their uh nature in terms of wanting to engage in physical confrontations etc so and there's justification for each one of these um and so the the lens here again is um officers are faced with um some some very um terrifying moments uh that they need to be equipped with the right equipment to respond to and uh and bring calm uh to the community and to the incident that they're that they're faced with and again my perspective was if they need need any equipment there needs to be background investigation on it itself and then if we're

going to purchase it it should be the city that purchased not the military what's left

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

over from the military that we acquire thank you for your answer chief I want to cite a study that was done by an assistant professor of global studies at Gardner Webb University named Casey Dillahantney. And this professor's research shows, and this is a credit to you, Chief, for being proactive in regards to the 1033 program. But what the research evidenced was that police departments that got more equipment from the military kill more civilians than departments that get less military gear. The finding from research on the 1033 program. So I'm happy to see that you were at the forefront of making sure our city didn't engage

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

in getting more equipment. And this was a finding that was recently confirmed and expanded by Edward Lawson Jr. at the University of Southern California of Carolina. And in this study he and his co authors found that police agencies that received the most military gear. A year subsequent after receiving this equipment resulted in an increase and more civilian killings. More than doubling that of police departments that didn't receive equipment through the 1033 program.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

So that's a credit to your leadership that you put a stock to that while other departments continued it. However, I do feel that there are a number of items that we have here, Chief, of equipment that is doing more harm than good. I think the militarization of police, it doesn't reduce crime, nor does it contribute to making the perception of officer safety that much more safe.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

I think when we take a look at our policing strategies as a city, my goal is not to have an overly aggressive department where we see a potential increase in civilian casualties.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

My concern is that there are young people in residence that do right now presently have a distrust. I don't want that distrust to be there between law enforcement, but it's there. and i think a lot of the times these these types of equipment reinforce why that distrust is there um so my question is to myself it's a rhetorical question why do we see our residents as someone not worth helping that we have to enter these communities militarized this way what message are we trying to send this is rhetorical question what message are we trying to send to neighborhoods

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

in the woods when we enter a crime scene and treat it like a war zone. And the reason why I felt the need to share this chief is because if the data isn't enough, I am happy to share my experiences with my colleagues and with members of the public and remind them that on September 28 2021 there were police officers present senate pd high-ranking police officials within our department there were street closures at multiple different precincts there were helicopters there were spotlights there was two different police departments anaheim pd sanana pd departments with

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

hundreds of millions of dollars in budget. There was Anaheim PD SWAT, there were police dogs, there was tear gas, there was concussion grenades, then there was pistols and rifles. But what resulted was an unarmed man still getting killed by police, shot dead 22 times. So my concern is that your potential ask of having drones what good is drones gonna do when we have a, one of our own militarized items that was listed here was pressed against this gentleman's vehicle on September 28th.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

Had officers inside this vehicle, officer outside of it, aiming the gun at him, but yet those officers couldn't identify that this individual in the vehicle was unarmed. How is a drone gonna help us do that when people that are standing

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

literally against a vehicle for hours, couldn't come to terms that a man in a vehicle was unarmed and subsequently he was killed. There were two different departments there. Nobody that day got it right, but everything could have went right. So my question to you chief is, why is there still a need for militarized equipment and then potentially drones if we're not getting the job done right now?

So I can't comment on that incident in particular, because as we all know, there are multiple ongoing investigations regarding one incident. So let me comment generally on your comments. The Santa Ana Police Department does not approach policing from the standpoint of, you know, approaching neighborhoods and being overbearing, being aggressive, and bringing in military equipment. They did that day, though, sir. I'm sorry they did that day again. I prefer not to talk about that particular incident because it's under multiple investigations.

Of course, I wanna I wanna address the policing in Santa Ana right that incident aside. So this equipment that's listed here that we're complying with the assembly bill we acquire to deploy on incident specific circumstances. So your patrol officer who's going from call to call to call that's taking reports as conducting general investigations. They're not deploying this equipment.

That's what we're talking about is this is traditional equipment that's assigned to police departments and to police officers to do their jobs in elevated tactical situations. we need the equipment in order to be trained and prepared to handle those incidents those are the minority of incidents so the the run of the day uh response is an officer in a standard uniform yes they're armed with a pistol um and and not none of this tactical elevated tactical equipment it may be in a vehicle it may be back at the police station in the event we need it it's It's inventoried.

It's we keep a tight discipline on it. So it's not, you know, a flowing everywhere and it's inventory regularly by the training commander and his division. So the equipment is needed to handle those elevated tactical situations that the community very much wants us to respond and handle them in a disciplined orderly fashion. So the again going back to just our standard operating procedure is not to deploy these on a regular basis during a regular shift.

I don't know. There is no ordinary call no no ordinary call out there, because you know, helping someone walk across the street can turn into a deadly situation, unfortunately. So I don't know if I answered your question without getting into the details of course that one incident.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

No worries. So I guess so that we don't isolate that incident, I guess for for for common practice. If we have an you know a situation, I guess what is the protocol in which we decide? Here's a crime scene where we do have to utilize a chemical agent, or we do have to utilize you know in this event utilizing a a armored vehicle. I mean, what do these circumstances look like? Is there a protocol when we decide as a department, okay, at this point, we now have to deploy XYZ?

Absolutely. And that speaks to the policies that Commander Sorensen mentioned. We have several that overlap that touch these types of equipments. And it's really, it comes down to the initial responding officer. They may contain a scene and then they'll have to call a supervisor. Some of the deployment of some of these devices require specifically supervisor approval. I have a watch commander on duty 24 seven. They're going to be aware of some of these tactical items are deployed to the field as well. They monitor the radio 24 seven. So there's there's definitely we have protocols.

We have policies in place, and then there's above everything. It's it's a focus on de-escalation. That's that's our core approach on handling any call for service, whether it's a homeless person seeking services or an armed barricaded suspect who just shot someone and killed someone. We always want to deescalate the situation, but our approach on an arm barricaded suspect is going to be very, very different than someone just seeking services.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

Right? Absolutely. And then my last question, sir, is what type of equipment does require a supervisor approval?

I'll let my training commander kind of delve into that one. This, you know, we also are cognizant of our policies that we don't want to hamstrung our officers in the field. You know, going back to North Hollywood that happened in an instant. And so to sit back and let me call my boss, and my boss's boss, that's just not practical right. So in instances such as that we're going to deploy what we need to contain the scene. So, but I don't know if you can add more to that, Commander Sturgeon. So, sir, to keep it simple, all of the equipment that I mentioned to you requires at a minimum

supervisory approval before deployment. When we start getting into noise flash diversionary devices, the armored vehicles, those require minimum of watch commander approval and or it'll even bump up to the SWAT commander has to approve any deployment of swat assets uh in advance and we have very strict criteria on when the swat team can be activated under what circumstances and things like that which is all covered in policy and procedure thank you sir that concludes my question thank you chief thank you councilman um councilman pelleza did you have another comment yeah thank you mayor pro tem

David PenalozaItem 27

I think just for the public sake, I think it's important to also remember that although this list of quote unquote military machinery isn't ideal, you know, the United States Department of Homeland Security developed the urban area security initiative funding program, which we commonly know as WASI, which provides funding for local emergency first responders to enhance security and overall preparedness to prevent, respond to, and recover from acts of terrorism. And in 2006, the Department of Homeland Security also designated the cities of Anaheim

David PenalozaItem 27

and Santa Ana as one urban area. And given the fact that we have the resort district in Anaheim that deals with millions of visitors a day, and the federal courthouse in the city of Santa Ana, It is on the list of high potential terrorism attacks. I know that when that armored vehicle was purchased two or three years ago, it was using WACI funds, correct? Chief Valentin? Correct. And I know that it's not our police department saying this is something that we need and we're going to use general funds.

David PenalozaItem 27

It was purchased with federal funds that are designated for high on the list of terrorism areas like Anaheim and Santa Ana, correct? Correct. And so I personally would, you know, feel comfortable and knowing that given the area that we're in, dealing with, again, high potential terrorism targets as a federal courthouse, Disneyland Resort, that we have those tools available within the region so that we could our first responders could could proactively

David PenalozaItem 27

respond to in the event of an emergency god forbid but um i think that's also something that we should should put out there so that the public knows what how the these some of the items on that list were purchased and they were not also not purchased with general fund dollars within the city And if I was made incorrect on any of that chief, please interject and you are correct. Okay, thank you, sir.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Council member Lopez. Yes, I thank you mayor pro tem I actually just have a strike suggestion for the Council as we're continuing to discuss this you know it's military equipment dash for under. I believe it's under subsection B.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Actually it's two under the purpose. And the last line where it says, additionally, the ARVs may be deployed as display for community outreach events. You know, we're talking about tactical vehicles.

Mass, where are you?

Jessie LopezItem 27

What page? yeah so it's the military equipment dash for the draft page

Jessie LopezItem 27

section two at the top

okay i'm on section two on page two of the ordinance for no it's the um i believe it's the exhibit oh the policy the actual policy yeah i think so let me see councilmember lopez is it the one that

Jessie LopezItem 27

707 it's this document where it's yeah 707 that's our that's our draft 7 exhibit 2 page 4.

Jessie LopezItem 27

okay purpose yes the last line where it states additionally the arvs uh may be deployed as displays for community outreach events and because these are tactical vehicles and not toys My suggestion is going to be that we strike that last line. Again, I do believe that these should be used in emergency situations because I do understand that we are the county see and we are subject to you know emergencies. And so I would like for that last line to be struck from the policy.

excuse me just for clarity so so you're suggesting that we're in removing that line we're not able to uh bring uh some of this equipment to community events which i might add are very very popular

Jessie LopezItem 27

i'm saying that i would like to see it struck okay um

i support that sure okay thank you for that Anything else?

Jessie LopezItem 27

No, that's gonna be it. Thank you.

Chief, did you wanna respond? No. Okay. Well, thank you for that. I wanted to provide my comments. First of all, thank you, Commander and Chief for being here and that presentation. I know that this whole item is in response to state legislation, that's why we're doing this, but it is in line with the transparency that I think all of you hear from the council that we want with our police department for our community. You know, my first concern was what was already brought up about the 30-day access to the list, but Commander, you addressed that, and so it's been available through two means, both city website and Voice of OC's link.

You know, it's remarkable to think that North Hollywood was as far back as it was, but I mean, I mean, I still remember seeing it on TV and I still remember thinking, you know, as it was going on and that it was kept going on. That's what I mean, obviously the danger of the officers. But what I what was struck in my mind was it wasn't just a quick shootout. This was something where officers were pinned down and outgunned. And, you know, I mean, I'm not a law enforcement professional, but I imagine it changed a lot of tactics, a lot of ways that you address certain issues.

But North Hollywood is also not, thank goodness, not the standard incident that our officers face. But I know that we would not be doing anybody any favors by having our officers not be prepared and being ill-equipped. I mean, the last thing I'd want on any of our consciences is if we were to say, no, you can't have a piece of equipment, and the lack of that equipment resulted in the loss of life. So I understand that, but I also share the sentiment of some of my colleagues in that, you know, we're not trying to roll out the Soviet tanks in Red Square, right?

we're trying to you know show that this is a police force that's there to serve the community while at the same time though be able to protect our community be able to make sure that our officers are safe while they do that so again knowing that north hollywood is something that happened and it's something we would have to be prepared for but also thank goodness it's not the standard so um i support you having the equipment but obviously i think the concern of just openly rolling it out there may not be the best look for a PD that's not trying to look like a military outfit.

The other issue I had, you know, Council Member Lopez brought up a specific line to strike. I actually had a question regarding a section and is our city attorney still here? Are you standing in? Okay. So section 707.6 says the department is authorized to acquire additional stock of items listed here from other law enforcement agencies or cal oes in the event of an emergency when approved by the chief of police or designee i guess i'm more concerned about the emergency because i know that within our muni code and we've had to exercise this obviously during the pandemic

when we activated um emergency protocols i know that a long-term emergency is far different from uh well i guess it's probably in line with this because this is not the way i read this this isn't a simple you know contacting the watch commander to get the okay this is acquiring additional stock so the assumption is that you know you're going to the shelves and you go oh you know we could use a little more of x or y or z and so um if it's done that's a little bit askew from what's stated in previous sections in this proposed policy. This is saying that in an emergency, worst case

scenario, that you or your designee would be able to acquire the stock. But I guess I would want to see emergency defined a little better. But having said that, this is where I'm going to look at our city attorney. I feel like we might already have that defined in the municode. Can you confirm that way in other words when we talk about an emergency a city emergency something that 707.6 seems to be addressing do we have language that kind of further curtails what exactly an emergency would be uh mayor bro time thanks for your question in this context um i don't believe

we do that would address the emergency in this very specific context um we do have in the municipal code under chapter two i believe it is um a comprehensive scheme that relates to emergencies and the authorities and the powers that are available to city officials in the emergency situations but um i don't believe it would address this in this very specific context of the um the acquisition of military equipment like this thank you for that you know what i would ask then if we um move the item if we were to include council member lopez's um striking of that one

line um what i would ask that staff also do and i usually like to come prepared with specific language but i would ask staff to further define the emergency and i i don't see that as something that would change what this is here i just want it better defined but i i still want the option that obviously in a worst case scenario in an emergency i would want the chief or the the chief's design need to be able to acquire the stock necessary but again i just feel that we should have a little bit more of a clearer definition of the emergency not necessarily

trying to overly restrict i just want it to be clear so that everybody's on the same page that's all that is um but i those are my comments um chief unless you have anything to add i'd like ask my colleagues if they have a motion except i think we have another question councilmember

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

fan yeah i'll just bring up so many good points and now i have more questions um i did want to go back to councilman lopez's um comment i i am generally supportive of that i do agree with the sentiment that these are tools not toys but um you had a reaction to it and i really want to understand why that provision is in our policy and what is the purpose of bringing them out to community outreach events obviously well maybe you don't know but my husband was uh air force and so we've gone to air shows and you know we got to walk into these big aircrafts and airplanes and see these

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

displays and they're really cool but um yeah i just wanted to get your perspective and the department

effective on that yeah and again if it's the pleasure of the council to not be able to do that i'll take that direction uh if and many of you have attended events uh we have a open house on the 14th i think of this month in a couple of weeks so we'll be in the front of the police station and uh children and families look forward to coming and taking that photo op uh with the

equipment. They're not toys. They're not toys. Let me be clear about that. But it is an open house to display the various equipment that we use to perform our duties. And so, but again, if that causes consternation, no problem. I will tell you that we'll get asked, officers will get asked repeatedly, where is this, this, and this. They've come to expect it at different community events. And so, and if I could also address the same time because it's there's a lot that's being covered. We don't deploy these assets as a normal course of business.

We simply do not. The normal course of business you see is a black and white standard police car. And then all most of this equipment is standard traditional police equipment. that's what you see in the field day in and day out right so with regards to uh you know my reaction is because i've participated in many of these events throughout my entire career i attend them now as the chief of police i have staff i encourage them to bring out anything that they want to show and tell right not toys but the community very much looks forward to seeing these

items, taking photos with them, talking about the items, how do the officers use the equipment. It's an opportunity, believe it or not, the other side of this coin is community relations. That's the purpose. But again, if it's an issue of optics for the council, understood,

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

we won't deploy those items. I think this is just specific to the ARV, right? I don't have strong feelings either way. I mean, I've never attended one of these events, but I think it is interesting. You know, you have the perspective and I do understand. And then my other comment was specific to emergency services. So the way I read it was it was a little bit related to because we've mentioned Cal OES. So in my mind, it's a little bit related to like an act of God, natural disaster or something like civil unrest resulting in the need for additional items and I think it's

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

in division 15 article 4 division 15 we do have the emergency services division that discusses all of that so I guess maybe Mr. City Attorney kind of clarifying that it does have a lot of different types of emergency definitions local emergency emergency services emergency operation

state of emergency if i can make a clarification council member and that's why i first read the article as well but it's just saying that if we were to acquire stock of items from other law enforcement agencies or cal oes that's how it's used in that sentence i thought the same thing i'm like oh well if it's defining an emergency we can look towards cal oes but this is to acquire

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

from them yes i just mean um when i think of something like that it it creates a context of what we're trying to define as an emergency and so if we're getting something from caloes in my mind it's because our public safety officers require something to respond to maybe a natural disaster because that's what typically caloes does but uh that's just going toward what councilor excuse me mayor pro tem bacero is mentioning as what is an emergency is an emergency an active civil unrest situation and we do need additional materials and so you need to make the

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

call to Irvine PD or is it you know whatever else we don't know and that's what we want to know the

public should know also absolutely exactly thank you always always want to give examples uh the Los Angeles riots six days of continuous city burning to the ground so uh we don't want to be hamstrung in any policy that we bring forward to be able to have that reach to bring whatever assets that we need and cal oes you are correct would probably be support assets because our other frontline assets are depleted for example in addition to mutual aid mayor pro tem i have uh

David PenalozaItem 27

thank you i just wanted to thank you again once again chief for for this policy and presentation I also wanted to voice my support of having anything you would want to bring to these community events, whether it's night out with a cop or trunk or treat or the pancakes with Santa and pancakes with the cop that you do during the holidays.

David PenalozaItem 27

I know, and I've been to all of them, and I've seen how popular these, any of these things are for kids and families to see and learn about. And part of it is also educating the community of our police department and the resources that they have. What I do also want, I'm going to bring up my four-year-old nephew again. When we went to night out with the cop last fall or last year, I remember him crying because he missed the police dog demonstration.

David PenalozaItem 27

I mean, I told him about it in the morning and he was so excited to see it and they were late and they missed it. So he was trying to get me to ask if they could do it again. And I was like, the dog's left, you know, sorry, buddy. And seeing all these kids just put on this SWAT gear and, you know, maybe aspire for a career in law enforcement. And I think that's what's happening. You'll see as we move on, and I've heard it little by little, trying to chip away at programs like that, community events like that, programs like PAL, because in the eyes of a lot of these organizations that are running around,

David PenalozaItem 27

It's we are training kids to like and look up to police officers, and that is not the the the agenda. It doesn't fit the agenda that all these groups have their agenda is to train kids to hate and despise law enforcement and be scared of them. So any event that would give, put you guys in a positive light or help kids look up to or enjoy, you know, going into a tank or the command center is going to be frowned upon, unfortunately, with some members of the council.

David PenalozaItem 27

So I just want to voice my support of having anything you guys want to bring out to any community event, because it's one of the most popular and favorite things that our kids see. and the, I've been to hundreds of community events in the city and none of them see the foot traffic that our police community events see. So thank you. I don't know where this is gonna go, but it's unfortunate, but thank you, Chief.

Well, with that, I'd like to go ahead and close out comments and see if we can get to a motion.

Jessie LopezItem 27

yeah i'll make a motion to approve with the um suggestion that i made for striking out the language and the definition on emergency as council member may or pretend to sarah requested

okay so we have a motion do we have a second

all right i'll second it for the sake of either discussion if there's no further discussion um

Jessie LopezItem 27

And sorry, Mayor for time I just want to say, this is not about attacking you or the department I was just alluded to, you know, I, you know that I have the utmost utmost respect for you. I'm not the one you know running around with you know who's not going to be mentioned, so if we want to do that we can go there, but I would like for us to remain respectful of one another.

Thank you. And if I may, I don't take your suggestion as disrespect at all. I just, I'm obligated to comment on, you know, over 30 years of experience in the department and experience. Chief, thank you. I mean, your input is valuable. So, we have a...

David PenalozaItem 27

Chief, thank you. I don't know where that came from, but appreciate all the good work you're doing, always.

all right with that let's let's go ahead and cast our votes we have a motion to approve in a second let's go ahead and cast and mayor pro tem can you read so it was just

David PenalozaItem 27

to include her strike out of the language to i believe the motion was the two amendments children enjoy and then what was mine was to further define the emergency okay so i guess i I would make a substitute motion to approve the policy as is, including to the further define emergency and leave the community engagement events in there. Okay, so we have a substitute motion. Is there a second?

you know i'll go but i'll second it okay so we we've got a motion a substitute motion and a second and that substitute motion is uh the only amendment would be to further define the emergency and that would be in um just to be clear uh section 707.6 so with that madam city clerk or i'm sorry my colleagues let's go ahead and cast our votes on the substitute motion

Council member Mendoza, would you like to announce your vote?

That's a yes for me. Thank you.

Okay, motion passes with council members Mendoza, Peñalosa, FAN. MAYOR POTEM BECERA VOTING YES. COUNCIL MEMBERS HERNANDEZ AND LOPEZ DISSENTING AND MAYOR

SARMIENTHO ABSENT. THANK YOU, MA'AM STATE CLERK AND THANK YOU, EVERYBODY. LET'S MOVE ON TO ITEM 32. STAFF IS REQUESTING DIRECTION RELATED TO OUTDOOR DINING. THIS SHOULD BE GOOD.

THANK YOU, MAYOR. THE ITEM BEFORE YOU IS REALLY TO ACCEPT THE INFORMATIONAL REPORT, WHICH IS IN THE STAFF REPORT, AND TO GET YOUR INPUT ON WHAT WE WOULD LIKE TO PROCEED WITH, which is doing an ordinance to establish some type of permanent outdoor dining we do have a short presentation if you would like that presentation or we can answer questions it's

your um your choice if it's a short presentation would you guys like to see it

okay i think we got some uh bites so yeah let's go ahead and do it this is the good stuff

and it has pictures in it so executive director meantime

Thank you, Daniel.

Thank you, May Potem and City Council. We're presenting this item before you tonight with a request for direction for us to prepare an ordinance looking at permanent design standards and regulations to help us move forward. Beginning in May of 2020 and responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, the city enacted Executive Order No. 5, 2020 in May, authorizing restaurants and certain businesses to have outdoor activities so that they can weather through the economic challenges of the pandemic.

the city also participated and allow the installation of food islands and park it on public sidewalks and streets parking spaces and closure of certain roadway segments within downtown very quickly we also developed a ticket outside program providing guidance for outdoor business operations citywide

under the ticket outside initiative the city facilitated over 29 permits including nine parklets including nine parklets the city also worked on work with a professional designing design and contractor to ensure that we have a high quality design as well as construction for the parklets and the finish include wood decking sage shales solar power visual lights outdoor furniture and sanitizing station this effort was further complemented by the santa anna safe outdoor dining program using a half million dollar initiative provided by the county of orange

first supervisor district under this initiative the city provided over 20 yellow blue restaurant along first and 17th street that are outside of the downtown area receiving funding to help create dining patios for their use on their site. The next few slides are examples of and then also a short video for the first time. I have a short video featuring the completed work under both programs.

So this is a patio that was created and it's located at 1st New Hope.

This one is located at the Osaka restaurant, Oaxaca restaurant at First and Susan.

This one is at the El Chilingo, El Rincon Chilingo, and it's also on First Street. I'm sorry, at 17th and Baker.

And this one is the El Pico de Gallo Grill. This is at 17th and Flower.

This is some photos of what happened before we had those patterns in place. As you can see through the previous slides that there were significant improvements to what was being used by some of these businesses.

This is a short video.

Hello, it's a community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community community

Thank you.

We'll be right back.

the completed product is of high quality meeting our highest expectation standards our goal tonight is to ask for city council direction to provide directions for city staff to develop permanent outdoor guidelines design and standards and draft in an ordinance form and come back to the city council for consideration to permanent adoption. We believe these regulation will be helpful in terms of creating pacemaking, placemaking for the city's food and beverage industry. These structures continue to be used by restaurants,

visitors, and residents of the city alike today, even though COVID measures are beginning to be lifted. so um with that concludes my staff report and I'll be happy to answer any questions

um thank you Min for that that was that's a great presentation nice video well done um let's let's go ahead and uh bring it back to Council for uh comments Councilmember Hernandez

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

fantastic presentation Director Mintai um I am fully supportive of seeing you guys roll this

out thank you sir thank you councilman hernandez uh councilmember lopez yes i i love the outdoor

Jessie LopezItem 27

dining program i'm very supportive i want to see it be here forever um and i hope that we can do outreach to the other restaurants that um maybe don't have it yet or possibly maybe not know about it but very very supportive and i um you know in downtown tanana i really enjoyed with some of the streets i know this is a sensitive topic right now but i really like that some of the streets were made more walkable to folks um with the closures and the restaurants in the middle i i would love to see something like that happen and be permanent thank you and i think uh we're

also sensitive to the current events uh at some point in the future we may be able to bring something uh for consideration back to the council thank you for that uh council member pham thank

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

you and thank you council member Lopez for bringing up the walkable streets because I think we we had a conversation about this at dinner after a council meeting at a restaurant in downtown and and really being able to have the parklets is really the owner said is the only reason why he survived the pandemic and so we're very supportive of that I have talked to Nabil I think it's a real deal and I screwed up and realized that 4th Street is going to have the streetcar so it's not safe to make it pedestrian only, even with the streetcar.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

But I think there are other areas in downtown that we can try to do that I know right in front of chapter one kind of that whole areas blocked off right now I'd love to take a look to see what we can do. I am supportive of this program. The other thing I do want us to look at though is obviously parking. As a planner, you know, we or when we approve CUPs or we approve projects, we're saying, you know, you need X number of parking spaces to accommodate and which is where one of the parklets are on the west side the first photo that you showed parking in that area can be really rough sometimes which

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

i'm not trying to say no we shouldn't have parklets um in and save it for parking but i do think that it's important for us to kind of look into that or see if we are approving this type of park um parklets and it's taking up parking spaces in some plazas if we can add parking somewhere else on the street etc i don't know um i just want to make sure that we're looking at that because sometimes they're taking up you know five six seven parking spots thank you thank you for that

David PenalozaItem 27

council member pinloza thank you mayor pro tembacara and thank you um min and mabil for all the work with this with this ordinance it's when it first came up in 2020 if you remember min i was very supportive and even from then I said this needs to be permanent moving forward just because of how popular it is with the public and with the businesses. I mean the businesses saw in many of the restaurants in downtown told me that they saw better profits with the outdoor dining they had than they had ever seen in their previous years in operation before COVID. So it was

David PenalozaItem 27

definitely a popular thing and and even just myself i frequented the orange circle downtown sanana more often to eat outside because it just it felt cool it was like everybody would compare it to you know having never been to europe but comparing it to european dining out on the street like they've had for ever and ever and i think just knowing that i mean today that's why I don't watch the news anymore, but it was a new COVID wave coming this summer. You know, at the same time, we're also not going, we don't know how many waves are coming eventually,

David PenalozaItem 27

or if it's gonna get bad again and whatnot, all these variants, you just don't know. So I am very supportive of seeing a permanent ordinance that allows for outdoor dining throughout our entire city. because it is a benefit to these businesses. If they don't want to have outdoor dining, that's fine. Don't have them, but there are many that would like to have it. And I know members of the public really enjoy that aspect. So very supportive of seeing something come back in. So I'm looking forward to meeting with you and just going over ways how we can make it better than it was before. So thank you.

David PenalozaItem 27

That's it, Mayor Pro Tem.

Great, thank you. Council Member Mendoza.

Similarly to my colleagues, my support for outdoor dining is very strong. I agree that there is something about outdoor dining that just brings in more customers and so it's better for our businesses and their increased profits mean that we get um some of that revenue and that it turns into services for our for our residents so i support

this ordinance great thank you thank you for those comments um you know i'll just conclude all it took was a pandemic to get us to enjoy the outdoor dining aspect right um you know one of the good things and thank you men and your team because we were one of the first cities in Orange County to get out in front and enact outdoor dining options and not just simply allowing it but actually helping our businesses and guiding them to develop what I would consider attractive parklets that some are still in place today. So this wasn't just astroturf, some lawn chairs and a tarp.

I mean, these were some really creative things that we do see on 4th Street. I'm glad Councilmember Lopez brought it out first. I didn't have to be the first, but I agree. I think if we we should be looking at vacating some of these streets, you know, we're you as a planner. You're not an engineer. This is not about just trying to keep vehicles flowing through. In fact, if anything, looking at more pedestrian flow. And you know to one segment that comes up that I believe Councilmember Fan was alluding to is that segment of third street between Broadway and Sycamore.

that to me is like number one candidate. It makes all the sense. There's no impact to any existing ingress and egress with the development of Third and Broadway. And then with the existing outdoor dining that you already had pre-pandemic with the restaurants along Third there, it just makes all the sense. And with the other businesses next to that restaurant that was taking advantage of Third Street being closed down, I don't believe it's closed down now. But when it was, it was amazing. So I appreciate that. I also agree that parking is one thing of concern, because in some locations it's not a big deal, right?

Where you have a large shopping center, and you take away 4 or 5 spaces for outdoor dining. It doesn't really impact the overall parking situation. But in some of the smaller shopping centers, whether it's the West Side, whether it's other parts of Central Santa Ana, you may have those impacts. so i'd want to know kind of how you would address that or what what would be the methodology of determining those impacts um and speaking of methodology the the other thing would be you know i look at this as something that you know when we think of a conditional use permit we're

okay with the use but we see it as conditional based on the unique situation of each space And so in this case here, I don't think any one outdoor dining experience is the same, right? I think what you would see next to a restaurant like Chapter One is going to be different from what you saw at Pico de Gallo, right? So I think there's differences, and I'm looking forward to what staff will propose. Is it something where maybe certain situations really just are an over-the-counter permit with a checklist that they abide by?

Maybe if they have certain factors involved, maybe it does get pulled into a discretionary permit process. I don't know. I would look to see what you guys bring back to us. But for the most part, I would just say that this is a great thing. i'm glad that we're finally taking advantage of our um our climate we have such beautiful weather here it's it's amazing that we haven't done more of this um and again it really took a pandemic for us to take a step back or actually take a step forward and do some of this stuff so um with that this item is just for direction so min do you feel you have enough direction from us i do okay perfect

Well, thank you, everybody. On to our next item. So item 33. We've got Oh, I'm sorry. Just kidding. I'm 33 is done. We are end of the business calendar going into public hearings. We only have one tonight since 35 was continued. So Councilmember Pham. Thank you.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

So I have to announce my recusal for this item. um when looking through the list of potential recipients of the grants one of them is hurt family clinic who is a client of my employer not myself but my employer rattan and tucker and in speaking to our city attorney i was informed out of abundance of caution um i should recuse myself so i will do that so i will leave the room while you all discuss this public hearing item thank you

Thank you for that Councilmember Pham. Thank you for disclosing that. And so then there were five.

So going forward, Staff do you have a presentation for us? No sir, we actually don't have a

presentation on this one. We can, we're available to answer any questions you may have. Staff's recommendation is to approve your commission's recommendations for the awards. This is our

Community Development Commission correct yes okay so um on this I guess I will uh let's see um opening the public hearing on this item Madam Clerk uh please provide the uh instructions to the public who would like to make a comment on the public hearing item only um if if there's

any member of the public who would like to provide a comment um and joining us by way of zoom because we did not get any in um in-person speaker cards if you would please dial star 9 from your phone or select raise hand from zoom now and mayor pretend we did not receive any written communication and we have no one um wanting to participate virtually in providing a comment and we didn't

get any input person speaker cards okay thank you very much madam see madam state clerk um so on that i will uh look to my colleagues for any comments or motions um

yeah this is um council member mendoza i i support the issue as it is and i will make a motion to

approve motion to approve it as is i'll second with a comment okay so council member so council Councilmember Mendoza with the motion, Councilmember Hernandez with the second with comment.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. So I had initially met with our Community Development Agency and made the request for us to remove Notties Gang Prevention Program and Summer Night Lights Program and any program that was going to focus on intervention and prevention efforts directly working with community members. And my reasoning for that was I wanted to see these programs get general fund support. But with that being said, I think that I think that I just want to move the item as is. And when the time comes for budget discussions, I'll advocate there.

I appreciate that. I think that's a great suggestion. So we've got a motion. The second we've had discussion. Anybody else want to provide comment?

Seeing none. Colleagues cast your votes.

and mayor pretend would you like to close the public hearing that'd be a great idea so we'll

go ahead and close the public hearing and then i will ask my colleagues again to cast their votes

council member mendoza would you like to announce your vote please my vote is yes thank you Thank you.

It's waiting.

David PenalozaItem 27

My vote is a yes, Madam City Clerk.

Thank you. Okay, motion passes with council members Hernandez, Lopez, Mendoza, Peñalosa, Mayor Potem voting yes. Council member Fan recusing and Mayor Sarmiento absent.

oh outstanding all right uh thank you for that madam c clerk uh so we are done with our public hearings um i believe we need to go to the housing authority is that correct that is correct so uh my adjourning the um the council meeting and then opening up our our housing authority uh madam clerk could you please call roll authority member hernandez

Present. Authority member Lopez. Here. Authority member Mendoza. Present. Authority member Peñalosa. Present. Authority member Fan. Here. And Vice Chair Becerra.

Here. And let me just real quickly correct myself. We weren't adjourning the last meeting. We were recessing to come to the Housing Authority. So, Madam Clerk, do we have any speakers for items with the Housing Authority agenda?

We do not. and i did want to also make mention that i'm part of the consent calendar item usually we don't have an excused absence but we do tonight so i just want to make mention of that thank you

for that um does any authority member wish to make a motion or second on the items before us

i'll move all right we got a motion to move the consent is there a second I'll second. Okay we got a motion by fans second by Penaloza. Please cast your votes.

Council member Mendoza would you please announce your vote?

Council member Mendoza?

Okay, it looks like she may have lost her.

Oh, and we got it. Okay, thank you. Council Member Hernandez.

Okay, thank you.

What's the tabulation?

Okay, so authority member Hernandez, Lopez, Pinalosa, Fan, and vice chair Becerra voting yes. and then with authority member Mendoza and chair Sarmiento being absent fantastic thank you all

right we'll go ahead and adjourn the housing authority meeting and reconvene the city council meeting at this point in the evening we have only the um council member requested items so I'm going to turn it over to council member fan for her item item number 36. thank you mayor pro tem and

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

This is actually an item that both Councilmember Hernandez and I worked on together, and there is an attached draft resolution of apology. This is a really important issue and actually was a community driven issue. It was something raised by a member of the community to me, and in somehow I got connected with Councilmember Hernandez, and we both realized that we were aiming for the same goal. And I also want to specifically mention Commissioner Planning Commissioner Alan Wu, who has been incredibly helpful in this and integral to the process as a representative of the Chinese American community here in Santa Ana.

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

We I think the City Council has been doing a lot to represent our community the best way we know how. and for me it's really important that in order to move forward and bring progress to the city and make improvements and improve lives we also have to recognize the history and the legacy that we have inherited and part of that legacy is yes really incredible culture and changes and being the first or you know being the leader of wonderful policies but it also means recognizing the history

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

of hate and discrimination that previous city councils have promoted and one of which one major example that i didn't find out as a lifelong resident of santa anna until only a few years ago is that Chinatown here in Santa Ana was burnt down because of city council direction, city council action based on unsubstantiated racist claims of a medical incident. And it was very interesting to see that all of that government action was directed based on

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

on claims and allegations for unreliable sources, sources who have made racist comments in other arenas too. So this draft resolution is really a way for us to apologize to the Chinese American community, but also to recognize the incredible benefits and the incredible achievements that they have made here in the city of Santa Ana, as well as the United States of America. And with that, I would also ask that if we move this item forward or that we move this item forward,

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

we also hold a ceremonial signing of the resolution like we did with the rent stabilization ordinance because I do believe that this is something that is important. It is something that communities should come out to support and it is something that we should truly celebrate. Councilmember Hernandez. Oh, sorry.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 36

Mayor. Thank you. Councilmember Fan. I'm humbled to join join you and members of our Chinese community and Asian Pacific American community. This was something that I learned about when I was a child. because of my close relation to the Lao family. A lot of my family members worked for them at the Sanana Food Market and Alan Wu's wife Ruby Wu is the president of the neighborhood association in which I live and where I'm raising my family. So I remember just being a young boy and learning that there was once a Chinatown and where the Rite Aid is now located,

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 36

that was one of the first Chinese restaurants that we ever had in the city of Santa Ana, which subsequently was also burned down. So I am supportive of seeing a resolution brought forth, because there were hundreds of Chinese immigrants and descendants who were forcibly removed from their homes. Their businesses were burned, and they watched as they lost everything that they worked so hard for. And oftentimes we forget about the contributions that Chinese Americans and immigrants made to this country. And in the city of Santa Ana, one of the things that I'm most proud of

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 36

to serve on this body is that my colleagues here, something that is important to all of us is we want to right those wrongs. And I am in agreement with Councilor Murafan. I would like to see us have a resolution signed similar to the way that we did rent control. And furthermore, I'm looking forward to working with my colleagues on bringing back a Chinatown Memorial and enacting it right there at the corner of, I believe, 3rd and Bush. Yes. So I'm looking forward to seeing this get done. And I'm very honored to work alongside my colleague, Council Member Fan, Alan Wu, and leaders in the Chinese community

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 36

and Asian Pacific Islander community. Thank you.

Thank you for that. And Council Member Penelosa.

David PenalozaItem 36

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. And thank you, Council Member Fan and Hernandez for bringing this forward. this is something that is long overdue. It's a sad, sad chapter in this city's history. And we need to recognize it, recognize the mistake that was made by previous leadership here. I was just going over the resolution, and there were also thousands of residents involved that stood there and celebrated this atrocity, along with the fire marshal, that direction did this. So I'm definitely supportive of seeing this come before us.

David PenalozaItem 36

I'm supportive of having in an event to sign this resolution. I think what would be great to do is do it at the site and make it along with a memorial. Maybe as we move into this budget year, find funding where we could possibly look into having a memorial. I know that a lot of these sites are private property, but maybe if we could find a nearby public area or in partnership with one of the property owners there that would be willing to do this, do the memorial as well as a ceremony to recognize this resolution.

David PenalozaItem 36

But with that said, those are my comments fully supportive. Thank you to the two of you for bringing this forward and to the community. I know Commissioner Allen Wu worked hard on this and we recognize that, so thank you.

Great, thank you for those comments and some great ideas. Council Member Lopez.

Jessie LopezItem 36

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. Yeah, council members are very supportive of this item. I do believe that we can acknowledge atrocities and learn from them and move forward in a better way. So very supportive, thank you.

Thank you for that. And council member Mendoza.

I know she's on there she's just not responding all right well councilmember fan wanted to make

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

one more comment so go ahead yeah just a clarification um councilmember Penielos I'm so so happy that you support a memorial because uh councilmember uh Hernandez and I have met with both our city manager and assistant city manager to work on a timeline and of course our mid-year budget update requested funding for this. However, for the resolution of apology, I would like it to happen soon after the signing of the resolution if it is brought back at the next city council meeting. I think it would be quite symbolic to have it signed during Asian American Visigal Under Heritage Month, and to do it.

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

I do whether it's at City Hall or at the site because the site now is private. It's a parking lot.

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

So we'll we can figure out the details, but I would just like it to come back sooner and we'll have more parties as we work on this.

David PenalozaItem 36

I agree with that. Thank you, Councilmember Pham, because no offense city staff, but I don't want to. That would mean we'll see it four years from now. So, you know, the sooner the better. We could we could do the memorial.

Thai Viet PhanItem 36

Liam. We do have a spreadsheet with a timeline on it thanks to Assistant City Manager Mendoza.

Mayor Pro Tem and Council Members, all we have to do since Council Member Fan did author this resolution is have a quick review by the City Attorney's Office and a staff report so we can make the very next meeting so you can get it done in May. Thank you for that and I'll just add my

two cents of being in support as well. I think our city has a very proud history. Unfortunately, Unfortunately, we do have some dark chapters, and this is a very painful one. You know, as somebody, you know, Chinese were absolutely taken advantage of in many parts of our country. I know because my grandfather worked along many alongside of many of them up in Delano. So it's just it's really a shame to know that what this talks about happened here in Santa Ana.

So I think this is a very appropriate way to, you know, come to grips with this and actually acknowledge our past and celebrate the progress we've made. You know, as I mentioned earlier tonight, you know, you've had thus far three Asian Americans elected to the council. You know, you go from a time where literally you're burning them out of the city and now they're sitting up here on the dais. So I think we've come a long way and it's wonderful to see that progress. You know, looking at the draft resolution, it says that the incident happened on May 25th.

So having it have having the signing happen during May would be very appropriate to commemorate what has happened and where we're going today with this resolution. So I just would voice my support for that. I think everybody's spoken. I don't know that Councilmember Mendoza is back or not so we'll just go ahead and move on to the next item which is my item item 37 discussing requiring the use of a skilled and trained workforce for affordable housing projects that utilize city funds so really where this item goes

is that in 2017 our city entered into a community workforce agreement with the la orange county building trades council and that agreement stated our city's commitment to using skilled and trained workers to build our city's public works project over a certain threshold last month we the council adopted the new housing opportunity ordinance and that requires the use of skilled and trained workers if a project opts to pay the in-lieu fee instead of constructing the amount of affordable housing units required in the who well there are many flaws in my opinion with the new who

i'm bringing forward what i believe to be one remedy tonight for consideration by my colleagues that would be in line with the spirit and intent of our city's policy with the community workforce agreement that item is to require any new affordable units that are constructed with the use of any city funds including funds from the inclusionary housing fund to be constructed with a minimum of 30% local skilled and trained workers as defined in public contract code section 2601. 30% threshold would be consistent with the requirements that were just recently adopted

by members of this council in the new who that are placed on the market rate housing units. This council has been very supportive as far as using local skilled and trained workers to build City funded projects and this item would further that commitment by putting our money where our skilled and trained workers are building housing, no matter what type of housing is being built. So those are my comments on this item. I'd be happy to go around the horn. Councilmember Fan, would you like to begin?

Thai Viet PhanItem 37

Yeah, I'd love to take a look at this. It was really interesting to me that I think a member of the Building Industry Association was not supportive of this. But I would like to get more information as how this works out or what type of effects it would have. I am curious because obviously projects that use public funding pay prevailing wage, and that is a big aspect of requiring skilled and trained. but I would like to see you know what the effects are whether it's regulatory costing etc. I do want to say that funding for affordable housing projects is not the same as funding for for-profit projects

Thai Viet PhanItem 37

right affordable housing projects require I guess sometimes it feels like a rain dance but really bringing together not just the cities who funds but a bunch of other state and federal funding to to make it work and when there are costs overruns it's sometimes you know you have to go find additional grants or whatever it's not just a small decrease or a decrease in profits but I do agree that we should look at how skilled and trained would affect our affordable housing projects in the city because I think this council in general supports making sure workers

Thai Viet PhanItem 37

are treated well and not just paid well thank you thank you for that council member fan uh

Councilor and Paneloza.

David PenalozaItem 37

Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem Becerra. I just wanted to voice my support for this item, Madam City Manager. So make sure it's noted that I am supportive of seeing

David PenalozaItem 37

this firstly study, let's see if, you know, what, because I want to make sure that it doesn't break these projects to the point where they can't build, but I am supportive of seeing this looked into and seeing how we could enforce this thank you thank you mayor proctor thank you for that council

member lopez okay and uh council member mendoza looks like she disconnected okay now at least it's final right um and then council member hernandez is not here um madam city manager that's okay um would it is it possible to bring back as an informational item not necessarily any sort of um ordinance or anything at this point i certainly can't do that perfect thank you very much

check us out we already got through all the business huh so let's get through this let's uh close out uh council member comments i'm going to start all the way at the other side council member lopez

Oh, I'm sorry. While you're looking for yours. Madam city manager.

Mayor Pro Tem, I won't take that personally. I told you I was trying to get this thing done.

You forgot about me. And I know recently I haven't been making any comments, but I do

have a couple of exciting announcements. So I did want to pass on that OCTA is hosting an OC streetcar public meeting at this Friday at Frida Cinema. It's from 8 30 a.m. to 9 30 a.m. And then our public works agency is sponsoring the neighborhood block transformation contest that will recognize and reward residents of winning neighborhoods who make significant aesthetic improvements to their parkways and their properties and that information can be found on our website. And then the police department as the chief had mentioned earlier They are hosting an open house and a hiring expo.

So to your comment, Council Member Penalozio, we are hiring. Our HR department is very, very busy. The hiring expo and open house is this, not this Saturday, next Saturday, May 14th from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the police department. And that is it.

Great. Thank you very much. And I'm going to return back to Council Member Lopez.

Jessie LopezItem 37

Thank you. So I recently attended the graduation with the wooden floor, and they received an award from Ovation for all of the great work that they do, you know, in the Santa Ana community. And so, you know, I just want to thank them for all of the generational impacts that they're making with the young people here in the city of Santa Ana and in Orange County. And so I can't think of another organization that is more deserving than an award. And I just want to thank everyone at the wedding floor for inviting me and sharing that special moment with me. I also want to thank Congressman Correa for the $2 million that he

Jessie LopezItem 37

brought to the Discovery Science Center. It's really great to see you know our leaders at the state and congressional levels funneling down resources and I really appreciate that. That concludes my comments. Have a good night everyone.

Great, thank you. Council Member Pellows. Thank you Mayor Pro Tem. I just wanted to

David PenalozaItem 37

to publicly thank our library director, Brian Cernberg for that fantastic event on Saturday. I know many of our city departments were involved. I saw finance out there with the budget table and it was a good turnout and happy to see events like this again and see people come and enjoy them. So thank you for that. And that's it, Mayor Pro Tem, have a good night, everybody. Thank you for that. Council Member Pham.

Thai Viet PhanItem 37

Thank you. I did have some closing comments, and this is relating to my position as the director of the Metropolitan Water District, and it's really important because it is regarding the water conservation mandates. Governor Newsom did have an executive order requiring that. You may have read it in the news, but as drought conditions continue to worsen, the Metropolitan Water district has issued a mandate to impose the first ever outdoor water restriction the restriction which limits outdoor watering to one day per week applies to parts of los angeles ventura and san

Thai Viet PhanItem 37

bernardy counties that rely heavily on imported water from the state water project so while metropolitan's mandate does not apply to san diego specifically in working with staff we want to to support Governor Newsom's Executive Order N-7-22, calling on all Californians to reduce our water use. So therefore, the City of Santa Ana and staff will be bringing this back. We'll be amending our existing water conservation program in a future council agenda item and adopting our own measures and water use restrictions. So really, we have to come together to conserve water

Thai Viet PhanItem 37

during what we did come together to conserve water during previous droughts and we need to come together again. We want to specifically thank the community for all your efforts to use water efficiently. Actually, Santa Ana is one of the best at doing this and I hope we continue. So let's just do our part and make sure that we get through this together. And that's all. Thank

you. Thank you, Council Member Fernandez. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. I just want to thank our

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 37

our residents and staff who contributed to this meeting, residents for attending the meeting. Want to give our city manager props for hiring Brian Sternberg. The event on Saturday was amazing. I also attended Willard's event and that was a beautiful community celebration. And I want to send condolences to the family and the mother of the young man who lost his life last week. Any loss of life is tragic in the city. And my heart goes out to you. And however I could be of assistance, please know that my office is here for you. If you wanna talk to someone, or if you just need some direction

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 37

with maybe mental health support. Thank you everybody. Have a good night.

Thank you for that. Just a couple of quick announcements. I'm gonna be holding my monthly community office hours on Saturday, May 7th at 10 AM over at the George Upton All Access Park over at Thornton Park. Another fun community event that's coming up will be the active military service banner unveiling ceremony that we're going to hold on Monday, May 23rd at 2 p.m. over at Bomo Coral Park on MacArthur, right next to Fire Station 76. 6, we're going to be unveiling banners that folks in our community who have family members that are active military service members will have the opportunity to purchase and have

displayed along MacArthur Boulevard to show the pride that they have in their family members that are serving our country in the military. And since we will not have a regular meeting until May 17th, in advance of Peace Officers Memorial Day, which is annually observed on May 15th, I wanted to acknowledge, acknowledge, excuse me, and express my appreciation to those peace officers that lost their lives in the line of duty, especially to the four officers that the Santa Ana Police Department has lost in the line of duty over the years.

officer Edwin Jensen in 1931 officer Nelson Sasser in 1969 officer Daniel Hale in 1977 and Sergeant John Aguilar in 1998 our city is eternally thankful for their service and and what they gave up for our community I actually thought we were going to end after midnight I was going to end with me the fourth be with you but hey I'm okay with May 3rd so with that I want to thank all my colleagues for a good meeting, productive meeting and efficient. And with that, thank you, staff. Thank you, everybody. And have a good night.