Read the April 16 meeting.

!

Thank you.

Thank you.

© transcript Emily Beynon

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

guitar solo

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Recording in progress.

Valerie Amezcua

Thank you. Good evening, everybody. I hereby call the Santa Ana City Council meeting to order. This meeting is taking place with in-person attendance and by teleconference via Zoom. The public may access the meeting via the Santa Ana YouTube channel or the City's website. Please bear with us as the technology may disrupt the flow of the meeting. Madam Clerk, please conduct the roll call.

Jennifer L. Hall

Thank you, Mayor. Councilmember Becerra? Yes. Councilmember Hernandez? Present. Councilmember Lopez? Yes. Councilmember Penaloza? Yes. Councilmember Vazquez? Present. it mayor pro tem fan here mayor mesqua president the records show four members are present that is

Valerie Amezcua

a quorum thank you madam clerk are there any additions or deletions to the closed session agenda there are none do any council members need to announce our abstentions to any closed session items hearing none madam clerk do we have any speakers for closed session mayor and council

Jennifer L. Hall

there are no in-person or zoom speakers for closed session and we did not receive any e-comments related to the closed session agenda items thank you we will now recess this portion

Valerie Amezcua

of the meeting to consider the items listed in closed session thank you

recording stopped

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

guitar solo

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

guitar solo

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good night, everyone.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Recording in progress.

Clerk. Noch.

Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch Noch

Valerie Amezcua

Madam City Clerk, please start the meeting.

Jennifer L. Hall

Yes, Mayor. Go ahead, please.

Valerie Amezcua

I hereby reconvene the San Anderson City Council meeting to order. This meeting is taking place with in-person attendance and by teleconference via Zoom. The public may access the meeting via the Santa Ana YouTube channel or the city's website. Please bear with us as the technology may disrupt the flow of the meeting. As a reminder, this is a meeting to conduct the business of the city. As Mayor, I'm afforded the opportunity to call for a recess or a break or even to clear the meeting room if a meeting becomes too disruptive to properly conduct business warnings will be provided prior to any action being taken

Valerie Amezcua

we appreciate your cooperation for everyone's safety per the fire marshal please do not stand or place objects in the aisles in front of the dais along the back wall of the council chamber or in front of the entrances and exits to ensure that all members of the public may watch and participate in the meeting without disruption designated media areas for filming and photography are marked if you have any questions please see our PIO guidelines for members of the news media and anyone else who wishes to film or photograph the meeting are available in the lobby during City Council

Valerie Amezcua

presentations and oaths of office guests of individuals being recognized are invited to come to the front to take photos madam clerk please conduct the

Jennifer L. Hall

roll call council member becerra here council member hernandez council member lopez here council member penaloza president council member vasquez president mayor pro tem fan here mary mesqua present and i see council member hernandez that's correct seven members present madam clerk before we proceed to the pledge of allegiance please make announcements Thank you. For members of the public who are on Zoom or teleconference, to request to speak during public comments on any agenda or non-agenda items within the city's jurisdiction, you must dial star 9 from your phone or click the

Jennifer L. Hall

button labeled raise hand from Zoom now in order to be in the speaker queue and called once public comments commence. Thank you. Thank you. The first item on

Valerie Amezcua

the agenda is the Pledge of Allegiance. Councilman Penalosa, may you lead us in

David Penaloza

the pledge please. Absolutely, Mayor. Thank you. If you could all please join and rise and face our flag and put your right hand over your heart and follow along. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Valerie Amezcua

Thank you very much. At this time we're going to do words of inspiration. We'll be provided by Police Chaplain Barnett. Please come to the podium.

Welcome, sir. Simple little prayer. Lord God, I want to begin tonight by just saying thank you. I want to thank you for everybody in this room that's a public servant, that they've chosen, Lord God, to live their lives in a strategic and significant way to make a difference in our community, to make a difference in our lives. I pray that you would bestow upon the wisdom that they need to make decisions, that our community would have favor and blessing because of everything that happens here. and Lord tonight we want to be especially thankful also Lord for those to be honored for their service, for their achievements

their accomplishments especially when I heard the children's voices bless them tonight and Lord bless our men and women in law enforcement, the men and women in the fire authority, those that are willing to put their lives on the line for us, bless this night in the name of the Lord, Amen

Valerie Amezcua

Madam Clerk, are there any additions or deletions to the City Council agenda?

Jennifer L. Hall

Yes, Mayor. Thank you. Just noting for the record that a revised agenda was posted on April 10, 2024 with the following changes. Removal of the recipient for ceremonial presentation agenda item number 2 and withdrawal of agenda item number 7, the ACC-OC presentation. No other additions or deletions.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 2

Thank you, Madam Clerk. at this time we're going to do a proclamation presented by councilman becerra to the orange county fire authority declaring may 4th 2024 is international firefighters day

Valerie AmezcuaItem 2

come on up

Phil BacerraItem 2

hold on i think they're coming up thank you mayor meskwa we uh have some activity down the south side of town so we'd like to go ahead and move this uh recognition up if i could have chief Chief Henry and his team, come on up.

Thank you.

Phil BacerraItem 2

Hawk, how come Parker Samaritans doesn't do that?

Phil BacerraItem 2

Just kidding, guys. Just kidding. So today we are recognizing Air National Firefighters Day, coming up on May 4th, which also happens to be the feast day of St. Florian, regarded as the patron saint of firefighters. St. Florian organized and trained an elite group of Roman soldiers whose sole duty was to fight fires. International Firefighters Day is an opportunity for us as a city to express gratitude to our current and former firefighters and to pay tribute to the courageous firefighters who have

Phil BacerraItem 2

sacrificed their lives in the line of duty. Such as Los Angeles City firefighter Jacob Fuerte who tragically lost his life just a few days ago while he was struck, I'm sorry, when he was struck and killed by a vehicle while helping a crash victim on the 101 freeway in Studio City. He was killed helping another person doing what we know that every firefighter's instincts are. International Firefighters Day serves as a commemoration of the ultimate sacrifice made by firefighters and for this reason we express sincere appreciation towards our firefighters for their unwavering dedication and service to our

Phil BacerraItem 2

community, often at a great personal risk. Firefighters display a personal and physical commitment and willingly place themselves in harm's way to protect lives and property. They have a rich tradition of honor, selflessness, and duty, exemplifying a steadfast commitment to serving others. We appreciate the exemplary dedication of Santa Ana's firefighters who responded to, get this, 31,872 calls within our city alone last year. We are most grateful for their swift response to emergencies,

Phil BacerraItem 2

their diligence in mitigating risks, and their effort in preserving the safety and prosperity of our community. We encourage all residents to join in expressing profound gratitude and and admiration for the dedication and sacrifices that our firefighters make. We urge our community to honor the memory of past firefighters who made the ultimate sacrifice and continue to support all firefighters who serve selflessly, especially those who serve the great city of Santa Ana. So today on behalf of the Santa Ana City Council is my honor to declare May 4th, 2024 as International Firefighters Day

Phil BacerraItem 2

here in the city of Santa Ana. So with that, Chief Henry, would you like to say a couple words?

Thank you to the city staff, to the council, the mayor, to you sir. We're a humble group so we're not comfortable being out in front like this. We just are regular people that go to work every day and do a job just like many of you do. I am excited though I think this might be the first time bagpipes have been played in the council chambers. I don't think it'll be the last, but I appreciate it. I'm proud of the men and women that serve the Orange County Fire Authority. I have a special place for the people that serve this city because of the number of calls we go on. I like to brag amongst all my

peers that we are the busiest division, busiest battalion, and every day we get a chance to help people and make a difference. So thank you for this honor. More importantly, thank you to the the men and women that serve every day on the front lines.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 2

Thank you.

Thank you.

Take a song.

© transcript Emily Beynon

Valerie AmezcuaItem 2

Wow, powerful. Very powerful. So I'd like to call up Ivy Nguyen, please, for her outstanding act of heroism And those that are all with her, please join her. Mr. Boyd, Principal Boyd. I believe Brandon's in the audience, a young man that she saved. If you could please come up as well.

Hi, Ivy.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 2

So I'm going to turn it over to the Girl Scouts. I just want to say, Ivy, I'm very proud of you, and I'm honored to recognize you up here, the certificate from the City of Santa Ana when we're done here. but for your act of heroism so thank you it's all yours

thank you come on down this way

Mayor Mesquita and City Council members thank you for this special opportunity to address you and to spotlight one of our amazing Girl Scouts on this public stage she is so deserving of being recognized by her community I am I'm honored to be here today representing Girl Scouts of Orange County and on behalf of Girl Scouts of the USA Chief Executive Officer Bonnie Bartikowski to present the Medal of Honor and a congratulatory letter to Ivy Nguyen.

As most of you know, the Girl Scout organization is dedicated to building girls of courage, courage, confidence, and character who make the world a better place. Ivy exemplifies all of those characteristics, especially the courage part. Last year, a summer pool party almost turned tragic. Because of Ivy's calm under pressure, quick thinking, and most importantly, her actions, she saved a life. A while back Ivy took part in our Girl Scout first aid training and used the

skills she learned when her friend Brandon was in trouble and needed life-saving measures. She had enrolled in first aid training thinking it would be useful to know but never thought she would use it one day. That one day came and I know Brandon and his family are forever grateful for her knowledge and courage. We at Girl Scouts of Orange County are also grateful and so incredibly proud. Ivy Nguyen is a hero. On behalf of GSUSA CEO Bonnie Barkowski,

it is my pleasure to present the Medal of Honor Lifesaving Award to Ivy Nguyen.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 2

Thank you. This is for you. So you want to say a few words?

First off, I would like to thank my parents for raising me into the first I am today. I would also like to thank my sisters and my leaders from Troop 1255 for always challenging for challenging me and raising me and helping me follow the Girl Scout law. I would also like to thank my principal, Mr. Voight, Brandon and his family, and everyone else who has been here today to support me. And thank you.

I'd just like to say how extremely grateful I am to Ivy because without her I wouldn't be here today.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 2

Once again, congratulations from the City of Santa Ana and thank you again for saving Brandon's life. We're all happy he's here with us. And thank you to your parents as well. So let's take a photo. Council, if you want to come down and join us.

Thank you. Let's say Girl Scouts on three. One, two, three. Girl Scouts.

I'm significantly shorter.

Thai Viet PhanItem 2

Okay, hi. Good afternoon, everyone. Mayor Pro Tem Phan here. And as many of you know, I'm the first Asian woman and the first Vietnamese American elected to the Santa Ana City Council. And as such, one of the things that I have always fought for and that one of the things I want to highlight in the city of Santa Ana is the history, culture, and heritage of the Vietnamese American community here in our city.

Thai Viet PhanItem 2

April 30th is Black April. And I'm going to tell you just a little bit of the history of what that is. I actually know there's a lot of people who don't know what Black April means, what it stands for. On April 30th, 1975, the nation of South Vietnam fell to communist forces, marking the fall of Saigon and the beginning of one of the largest mass exoduses in modern history. history. Some of you may have seen a black and white photo of a tank charging through the gates in Saigon, now known as Ho Chi Minh City. While that was a tragic event for the

Thai Viet PhanItem 2

Vietnamese people, the fall of Saigon also ushered in the beginning of the Vietnamese American community and the Vietnamese diaspora around the world. Since those first years of the mass exodus, the community has come together annually to celebrate what we collectively collectively call as Black April. In Vietnamese, it's called Thang Tu Dinh. So between 1975 and 1995, more than 3 million Vietnamese people would leave their homeland in search of a better life and in flight of persecution. And the majority of those would settle right here in the United States, particularly in

Thai Viet PhanItem 2

Orange County and Santa Ana. Many people know it as Little Saigon now, but fun fact, if you had come over in the first or second wave, people still call it Santa Ana. Because the first groups of Vietnamese refugees who settled in Orange County settled right here in Santa Ana, including my family. So Little Saigon is a marker of our resilience. It recognizes our past and in many ways what we hope for the future of our family and our community. So with over 200,000 residents, Orange County's Little Saigon is the largest concentration of Vietnamese people outside the country of Vietnam.

Thai Viet PhanItem 2

30,000 Vietnamese residents live right here in Santa Ana, as of the last census that I checked. That's more than in Fountain Valley. Valley. And so today I wanted to recognize Black April and I wanted to present this proclamation to someone in our city who has long worked to highlight and share the history and the culture of Vietnamese American people in the city of Santa Ana. So please welcome up Tram Le, Arts and Culture Specialist with a Community Development Agency.

Wow, thank you Mayor Pro Tem, Mayor and the Council. On behalf of the Vietnamese American community and on the 49th anniversary of the fall of Saigon, it is an honor to have the city of Santa Ana issue a proclamation for this momentous day that changed millions of lives just as Mayor Pro Tem had said both Vietnamese and American. This war and its aftermath is very much part of American history. Little Saigon or as we called it growing up being the first and second wave Santana was started in Santa Ana with a pho restaurant, a grocery store, and a few other storefronts. And to this day, Vietnamese

Americans are continuing to add to the pages of history with their accomplishments and how they build and uplift the neighborhoods and communities they live in. This proclamation will ensure that younger generation honor the past while building towards a more inclusive future. Thank you again.

Thank you.

Phil BacerraItem 4

So next we have Councilmember Hernandez who has a proclamation to present to the Southern California Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health declaring April 28th as Workers Memorial Day. Councilmember Hernandez. If we can please bring SoCal

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 4

Kosh up to the front otherwise known as Southern California Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health.

Thank you.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 4

All right, thank you. Today, April 16, 2024, we are presenting a proclamation declaring April 28th as Workers Memorial Day. We are presenting this proclamation to Southern California Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health, otherwise known as SoCalCOSH, as well as Sylvia Hernandez. Let's please give a round of applause for them.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 4

We're in the beautiful city of Santa Ana, and Santa Ana is a worker's city, a community that was built by workers. It's important that we understand that only workers create value, only workers create credit. So I wanted to begin there. This year on April 28, 2024, the City of Santa Ana is designating Workers Memorial Day in solidarity with domestic workers and day laborers. The city calls upon residents, workers, unions, community, and faith-based organizations to join in raising awareness, acknowledging the importance of promoting safe and healthy workplaces.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 4

The inception of Workers Memorial Day aligns with the passing of Occupational Safety and Health Act in 1970. The establishment of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, otherwise known as OSHA, on April 28, 1971. Accepting this proclamation today is Sylvia Hernandez, a member of the Southern California Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health. Additionally, we are also joined by participants from the Clean Up Campaign, spearheaded by local union SMART 170, workers from the Maintenance Cooperation Trust Fund, MCTF, and domestic workers from Nuestras Manos are in attendance.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 4

Let's please welcome them with a round of applause.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 4

SoCal COSH is dedicated to advocating for safe, healthy, and secure employment for all of our workers. Their mission involves addressing the underlying causes of work-related injuries, illnesses, and at worst, fatalities. They do this through building coalitions. They do this through direct action. They do this through education. They do this through leadership development all throughout California. We extend our gratitude today to SoCalCOSH and our allies for their persistent efforts in championing proposed legislation aimed at enhancing workplace safety, enhancing workplace safety regulations for domestic workers

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 4

including housekeepers, nannies, day laborers, and home care employees otherwise known as domestic workers. Today we declare April 28th as Workers Memorial Day in solidarity.

Good evening everyone. My name is Silvia Hernandez and I am a very proud organizer and trainer of SoCal COSH here in the county of Orange County. And I'm going to introduce some of the activists in our network. Without them, we can not do the work that we do every day. We train, we advocate for laws, new laws, and we support every working campaign in the Southern California. So first I'm gonna call the janitor Nelly Diaz to share some of her story.

Thank you Nelly for being here.

acid, degreasing, and those chemicals when we used them, they didn't give us any kind of protection. And when we used them, because we had to... I worked in the kitchen area in a restaurant, and when I used them, I had to light the stoves, and when I lit the stoves, I had to put the acid,

Thank you. Thank you, Anely. So she was working in the kitchen and she's a cheesecake company and she was working and cleaning the kitchen. And with some chemicals, without any protection, she was injured in one of her eyes. So he's suffering, still suffering that. And that's why it is important for us to reach out to every worker. Now we are going to call Kingspan for his testimony.

Matthew. Thank you. Please.

.

All right.

Excuse me. Thank you for being here today, and I appreciate the opportunity to be able to speak in front of you guys. I represent Kingspan. I've been an employee for going on two years now and you know there's been a lot of a lot of injuries and stuff like that in the workforce as well as my fellow workers who continue to struggle in this environment trying to make the working working areas a little bit better today

we want to remember you know all the workers who you know continue to go into work day after day and try to you know provide for their families as well as you know take care of them their selves and a lot of these people that go into to work don't realize that it may be their last day. We want to acknowledge the families who have lost loved ones on the job. We also want to recognize thousands of workers in Santa Ana that continue to work under conditions that put their health and safety at risk.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2022, there were almost 3 million occupational injuries and illnesses reported. How many more cases went unreported? In 2022 there were 5486 fatal work-related injuries. 504 of those fatalities occurred in California and although we don't know how many have occurred in Santa Ana, one death on the job is too many. No one should have to go to work wondering if it would be their last. We are concerned workers and we urge the City of Santa Ana to bring awareness of health and safety issues on the job not

only on Workers Memorial Day but every day. Every day thousands of workers are exposed to many health risks at work and many times without their knowledge. Workers are losing fingers, experiencing traumatic eye injuries, and inhaling chemicals at their workplaces. Workers are experienced back, knee pain, any physical pain. Many times even after legal battles and settlements and extensive medical treatments these workers are left with permanent damage and chronic illnesses. How do we ensure we are creating good jobs? We the workers

at Kingspan have experienced these health and safety issues at work. Our efforts to denounce issues has helped us create a safer work environment but the fight continues we invite you all to continue supporting our campaign throughout history the labor movement has fought to create safer work environments and make workers whole we want good jobs and safe jobs for all workers in Santa Ana thank you we also have the California Coalition for domestic workers here in

Santa Ana we are gonna ask Claudia Palacios to talk about the domestic work issues.

Hi everyone, good afternoon. Thank you so much for this proclamation, City of Santa Ana, for taking a step toward protecting the most vulnerable workers. Workers Memorial Day is very special to me as an organizer as an artist it is a time where we reflect on the massive losses that happen when there aren't protections in place at work for the most vulnerable workers so low-wage immigrant workers my name is Claudia Palacios I'm the education and outreach coordinator manager at the California domestic workers coalition we're a statewide coalition of

organizations, community-based organizations that are reaching domestic workers and who are house cleaners, nannies, home care workers. We are advocating to expand and enforce the rights of these primarily immigrant women who do the work that is needed to do all other work. These are the people who take care of our homes, take care of our children, our elders as we go to work. This proclamation shows clear support for the inclusion of domestic workers

from California in occupational health and safety labor laws. Currently, domestic workers are the only workers who are excluded from health and safety laws and we know this is rooted in a legacy of anti-black racism and slavery in this country. Our movement is grateful to cities like Santa Ana who are not afraid to stand and be on the right side of this historic fight. And I just want to share a slogan that we often say for Workers Memorial is we mourn the dead but fight like hell for the living. Thank you.

And we just want to hear the words of our co-director from Southern California Coalition for Safety and Health here in Southern California, Eddie Sanchez.

Hi, everyone. My name is Eddie Sanchez, co-director for the Southern California Coalition for Occupational Safety and Health, SoCalCOSH. I first want to thank Sylvia Hernandez for pulling us together in this wonderful moment. I also want to thank the city for recognizing Workers Memorial Day three years in a row, by the way. A special thank you to this council, special thank you to council members Hernandez and Lopez for your support.

So just important to mention that Workers Memorial Day is more important than ever. For folks here, I think some folks have been in this room for about two hours, maybe about an hour. It's important to know that a worker passes away on the job every 96 minutes. minutes. So in the time that some of us have been in this room, a worker has lost their life. So this proclamation is so important to remember the fight that we have to continue protecting those who do the work that keep our communities running and additionally continuing to fight for those who are still here. So remembering those who we've lost and continuing

to fight for those who are currently here still with us. Something that's important for us to remember is that work unites all of us. All of us have worked at some point, all of us are still working and we have this common struggle and common effort or common common interest in ensuring that workplaces are safe. And that commonality was once reflected in the United Farm Workers. And what they would do to represent that commonality or that unity is they would do this thing called the Unity Clap. Are folks in the room familiar with Unity Clap? I see some heads nodding.

And the Unity Clap was a moment to remember the heartbeat that we all share as individuals. And we want to take a moment to do the Unity Clap to reflect that we are all together united and that we're going to continue protecting one another and empowering with empowering one another so if you can join me in very slowly we're just gonna clap it's gonna get faster faster and faster

thank you all Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Vamos a sacar un foto.

Yes.

If anyone from the council would like to come down for the picture, please do.

Yes. Back. Let's go.

THANK YOU.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 4

NEXT WE HAVE COUNCILMEMBER LOPEZ, PLEASE, TO THE OC HABITATS DECLARING APRIL 22ND AS EARTH DAY.

Jessie LopezItem 4

Are there a present? Oh yes, I see them.

Jessie LopezItem 4

Alright, so bear with me. I feel like death inside. My throat is on fire. But I didn't want to miss tonight because I am very happy to be presenting this proclamation and recognition for Earth Day to OC Habitats. And every year on April 22nd, Earth Day commemorates the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970. And today we extend our appreciation to Orange County OC Habitats for its dedication to diversifying, educating, and mobilizing the environmental movement within our community. And Stacey Grable's visionary leadership is founding.

Jessie LopezItem 5

Founding in OC Habitats in 2017 demonstrates a deep commitment to the preservation and safeguarding of habitats and species within Orange County. And from humble beginnings with seven volunteers and three board members, OC Habitats has grown into a beacon of environmental stewardship, expanding its monitoring programs to encompass inland areas.

Jessie LopezItem 5

OC Habitats has forged invaluable partnerships with esteemed entities, including California State Parks, Orange County Parks, Bosa Chica Conservancy, California Coastal Commission, USFWS, and CDFW, demonstrating a collaborative approach to protecting sensitive ecosystems and wildlife habitats. Since 2018, OC Habitats has provided educational programming to local schools, offering curriculum-aligned content that fosters environmental literacy and awareness among students.

Jessie LopezItem 5

The organization's commitment to experiential learning enriches the educational experience and instills a profound connection to the natural world. OC Habitat's collaborative efforts with like-minded organizations such as OC Coast Keepers, Project Grow, the Huntington Beach Wetlands Conservancy, and others have furthered the cause of environmental education and habitat restoration throughout the county. OC Habitat's dedication to habitat restoration, exemplified by a minimum of one restoration event per month in partnership with local entities, underscores its commitment to community

Jessie LopezItem 5

community engagement and environmental stewardship the diverse and inclusive nature will see habitats volunteer base reflects a shared passion for habitat conservation and environmental sustainability encompassing individuals of all ages backgrounds nationalities nationalities and experiences and I really especially want to thank OC Habitats for all the work that they do in our city for all the park cleanups that they help collaborate with my office but more importantly for the well-being of our residents and I just want to thank them for their dedication to the

Jessie LopezItem 5

city of Santa Ana they are a Santa Ana based non-profit and for those of you that work in non-profits you know that sometimes the work is very demanding and you don't get a lot of pay for it so I really want to appreciate all the work that they do under the hot sun to pick up debris free, really anything that we find in the creek month after month. And so to their board, to their local staffers, to Stacy, and to the members, I'm really grateful for your partnership and for the work that you do on behalf of our residents. And I do hereby proclaim April 22nd, 2024 as Earth Day and commend OC Habitats and its

Jessie LopezItem 5

members for all the work that they do in safeguarding the natural treasures of our region and inspiring future generations to cherish and protect our environment. Thank you. Gabby?

Hello everyone and good evening. I'm Lindsay, a staff member here at OC Habitats. First off, I would like to say thank you to Councilwoman Jessie Lopez and all the work she does with us to make the work we do in Santa Ana possible. And to all the representatives here from Santa Ana, we thank you. We couldn't do this work without the amazing community we have here so a little bit about OC habitats we are a very small nonprofit here based in Santa Ana we do our mission is conservation and we do this by restoration monitoring programs and our education programs our restoration programs like councilwoman

stated we work throughout Orange County we work at Huntington Beach wetlands Conservancy the City of Santa Ana and Upper Newport Back Bay with Project Grow these are great opportunities to get young people involved and get their community service hours and also teach them a little about the environment we have a couple monitoring programs going on our newest one is our sea urchin monitoring we go out to all the tide pools in Orange County and we look at population sizes of sea urchins we use that then to determine the health of our kelp forests which is a very important habitat for our marine systems and also

for us it's a very valuable carbon sink finally let me get on to our education programs our education programs is by far the most important work we do we travel all over Orange County and we visit title one schools who are underserved and we provide them free programs to help supplement their next-gen science standards. We also provide Girl Scout and Boy Scouts programs and public education by doing guided hikes. Most of these programs are free and available to anyone who is interested. A lot of our work since

it is nonprofit is funded through our dedicated hard work of our volunteers, the community around us, and our amazing government agencies. And I'll throw it to Gabby to talk about our work with the City of Santa Ana.

Hi everyone, my name is Gabby and I just want to say thank you again to Council Member Lopez and also the Council and the Mayor here to recognize us today. I want to move forward first with saying that we do have a lot of staff members and interns who we want to recognize first off. They couldn't be here with us tonight, but as we've stated, as a non-profit, we heavily rely on volunteers, as well as grants and donations in order to keep the work we do going. A little bit about how we started in Santa Ana. Being born and raised in Santa Ana, this passion of mine for environmentalism grew here and started with the parks

that I would attend around Santa Ana. And so my ability to learn and move forward with my environmental stewardship was rooted and grew in Santa Ana. And when I began my internship with OC Habitats, I was able to reach out to Council Member Lopez and firstly ask her if there was anything we could establish to grow this environmental relationship with OC Habitats and Santa Ana. us and so thankfully she was very welcoming and very accommodating and just we were able to start monthly cleanups at Santiago Park which is a part that I

would go to all my childhood and so it is with a lot of gratefulness that we are able to not only educate the public about maintaining our natural spaces but also how important it is to recognize how little of that we have one of the concepts that we focus on is the concept of poor park regions and so essentially what that means is the parks to residents ratio is quite low in Santa Ana what that means is that there aren't there isn't enough park or natural space to accommodate how many residents we have especially in comparison to other

Orange County cities and so to not only have these events where we where we We emphasize how important it is to take care of the environment, but we also emphasize how important it is to take care of what little natural space we have within Santa Ana and also to provide that autonomy back to the residents of Santa Ana of how they can care for their environments and how that can spread back to the community in social settings and education about environmental stewardship. And so once again, thank you again to Council Member Lopez and the City of Santa Ana for for not only growing into this partnership,

but also recognizing the work that we do and the importance of environmentalism and also Earth Day. So thank you again to everybody.

CONGRATULATIONS.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 5

THANK YOU. COUNCILMEMBER VASQUEZ AT THIS TIME REPRESENTING LATINO HEALTH ACCESS DECLARED NATIONAL CHILD ABUSE PREVENTION MONTH. THANK YOU.

THANK YOU, JENNIFER.

Hello, hello. How are you doing?

Benjamin VazquezItem 6

How's that?

How are you doing?

Benjamin VazquezItem 6

April marks a national child abuse prevention month, a designation initiated in 1983 through presidential proclamation. Concurrently, the Orange County Child Abuse Prevention Center was established under the Reagan administration, marking a pivotal moment in our commitment to safeguarding children. Throughout this month, families and communities unite in a concerted effort to acknowledge and prevent child abuse, recognizing its profound impact on society. Creating an environment that prioritizes the safety, health, and security of our children and families necessitates collaborative efforts across all sectors of our community.

Benjamin VazquezItem 6

community, a community that prioritizes early childhood development, parental support, and maternal mental health lays the foundation for nurturing families and fostering the well-being of children. For over 30 years, Latino Health Access has been an integral part of the Santa Ana community, dedicated to ensuring that our children and youth grow up in environments free from violence, where they feel secure and protected.

Benjamin VazquezItem 6

Embracing a holistic approach, Latino Health Access has not only raised awareness about child prevention throughout workshops, resource fairs, and programs, but also has empowered families with the knowledge and resources to identify and disrupt cycles of violence for future generations. Today, the City of Santa Ana proudly acknowledges April as National Child Abuse Prevention Month, calling upon each member of our community to unite in our shared responsibility to protect our children and protect their well-being. team.

So on behalf of Latino Hot Taxes, the FACT Family Resource Centers, and all the amazing youth leaders that are up with us today, I want to thank Councilmember Vasquez for this proclamation. Thank you for raising awareness and helping us preserve the wonder of childhood, which is the slogan of our yearly campaign. campaign. Even though our monthly campaign is coming to a close at the end of this month, we provide services and resources all throughout the year and we hope that the council and the city citizens can join us in the remainder of our Blue Ribbon campaigns and our resources.

Thank you and we hope that you continue to support the safety, happiness, and well-being of our children and youth.

Claudia Morales abusada a los cuatro años y no hubo una buena respuesta para ella. Su mamá también es abusada, joven abusada de los 15 años. Y este es un quiste muy fuerte en la sociedad, donde se guarda silencio, donde creo que todavía hay mucho trabajo por hacer. Es duro, pero por eso hoy digo, wow, un día de proclamación de prevenir. But I think we have to strongly enforce the care of our children. Today I declare myself a mother because I have a four-year-old child

whom I take care of, protect, his childhood, his innocence, and one day I want healthier minds, not disturbed by child abuse. So thank you, Mr. Vázquez. Gracias a todos los que se enfocan en que los niños y los jóvenes tienen que ser cuidados fuertemente. Así es que esperemos que este sea solo una proclamación y el trabajo sea día con día, por hablar, por generar la empatía y la confianza para el niño y para el joven, y aún para el adulto lastimado. Muchísimas gracias. Y bueno, el trabajo está aquí.

Gracias.

So, just to translate, she was talking about how she herself comes from a story of child abuse and how recently she also met an eight-year-old who has been abused and how her mother was also abused. So, this is a very big problem in our society that is usually kept quiet. and she mentioned that now is the time to take action it's time to step up and make some changes and she wants to thank councilmember Vasquez for taking that step and helping us bring awareness to this issue

Now if you want to step on the back, go ahead.

Okay.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 6

Great. Thank you all for the presentations. Madam City Attorney, do you have anything to report out of closed session?

Yes. Thank you, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, members of the council, and members of the public. There were four matters on the closed session this evening and one reportable action. On item number one, the City Council voted six to zero with no abstentions to approve settlement in the amount of $153,017.12. The Mayor, the Mayor Pro Tem, and Council Members Hernandez, Penaloza, Becerra, and Vasquez voting in favor.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 6

Is that it? We're good? All right.

Yes, thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 6

This is the time of the meeting for the City Council to receive comments from the public on agenda and non-agenda items. Madam City Clerk, please explain the public comment procedures. Thank you, Mayor.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Excuse me. Pursuant to Resolution No. 2023-047, speakers are requested to address the City Council directly and to refrain from profane language, racial epithets, and libelous or slanderous statements that disturb the decorum of the meeting. pursuant to the Brown Act the City Council may not enter into discussion at this time per the mayor's direction speakers will have two minutes for comments to a limit of two hours before calling speakers I'd like to report the following summary of emails provided as of today we received a total of 82 e-comments 12 on non agenda topics one on item number 23 4 on item 25 26 on

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

item 27 and 29 on item number 29 those comments were distributed to the city council and posted to the city's website we will now hear from members of the public that are physically present in the council chamber followed by those on the conference caller zoom to provide comments on the agenda and non-agenda items please state your name and the ward or neighborhood that you reside in for the record i'll be calling speakers three at a time if you could please line up in the center aisle when you hear your name first three speakers uriel chavez tomas fernandez and jorge rodriguez

um

as new rules, etc., etc., which is not fair for the children I represent, and for all the members of California Youth Sockelly, and also the companions who are here present, they have the same situation. So, thank you. I hope that point is taken into consideration. I repeat, it is something for the community. Thank you and good night.

Good evening everyone, council members, mayor, here again to bring some items regarding the program. The program, my name is Uriel Chavez from California Youth Soccer League and other organizations and here to talk about sports and here with different organizations talking about for for youth and for the adults. I was here about a month ago and met with the Parks and Recreation staff with America, and we were told that our organization was going to be put down to number three

due to the percentage of residents of the city. Our percentage is 87.3%. I had a meeting today with her and brought the percentages, but she said that we have to wait six months before we will be put in to talk to her and we would put in number two because this is the based on the rules

but their policy does not say that we have to wait six months they're just she's bringing up or making up new rules as she goes along and it's not fair for for the kids, for the organizations, for the adults, and for everyone who is here. There are many people who are sitting here in the same situation, and thank you, and please consider this, because this is for the community, thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Tomas Fernandez, Jorge Rodriguez, Wellington Bennett.

Good evening, my name is Tomas Fernandez. I represent United Club Soccer League, which is the oldest soccer league in the city of Santa Ana. I'm speaking for myself and also 12 other soccer leagues with children, young adults, men, women in the city of Santa Ana that are being denied the opportunity to play soccer for dumb reasons. I'll have a few to explain. We've been coming every two weeks and we will continue to come until we get the opportunity to be heard. We have a very large number of young adults who are inactive right now because they're not allowed to play or the prices are too high.

Some organizations are being forced to pay up to $7,000 a month, which is ridiculous. With so much to say and so little time, I want to focus on one other item which is important to us. We have a soccer division that is called 7 vs. 7, or Futbolito like we call it. And they told us we cannot play it anymore. The reason it was given to us by Parks and Rec, that was a recommendation from Public Works because it was damaging the grass. We've been doing this for years. We had a meeting with Public Works. I want to thank them, by the way, for their kindness, professionalism, and transparency, and they never said it.

In fact, they have the honesty to send an email, which I'm going to leave right here, where they have no objection. Councilmember Lopez, you were there in the meeting and they had the audacity to lie in our face that it was a recommendation for public works, which it never happened. I'm going to leave this right here.

What's going to happen next? Crime rate is going to grow with all this inactive kids, gang, violence is going to grow, anxiety, depression. And when this happens, ladies and gentlemen, you will not be able to talk to the press and say you never know about this. You will not be able to talk to the residents voters of Santa Ana in their eyes and say you didn't know about this Something needs to be done Immediately. We have hundreds of kids that are being denied the opportunity to play for two or three people your time is up Thank you. Thank you for your time. See you in two weeks

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Jorge Rodriguez followed by Wellington Bennett and Lana Mulholland

Jorge Rodríguez the community or it doesn't also negado a las puertas tan cerradas podemos traer programas donde podemos educar a los coaches very kines on ellos chicas background porque tenemos programas como como ellos pueden actuar con en caso de algún un problema de violencia o algo con los menores pero no hay esa oportunidad en realidad departamento de parques y recreaciones no tiene idea lo what he's doing, how is it possible that they put us to train children at 8.30 at night?

I've asked them, give me an example of a sport that at 8.30 at night you take your children to have that activity. There has been no response because they don't know what they're doing. And as there are many things that are happening, we have met with the Department of Public Works, we are discovering many things that have been told to us as lies,

good evening my name is Jorge Rodriguez representative of Santa Ana DSP and like Like Tomas said, Parks and Recreation does not know what they're doing. And as Councilmember Becerra said, these activities are needed, very well needed for our community.

Because these are educational programs. Soccer is education for the community. The doors have been closed on us. now we're not able to bring our coaches to check their backgrounds as if there's for them to prevent any violence among the youth and Parks and Recreation does not know what they're doing they want us to train our kids at 830 in the evening 830 at night and I'd like to ask you this what sport is there that you you will take your kids starting at 8.30 p.m., 8.30 at night.

We've met with Public Works as well. We found out many lies. There's lots of other different information. So as he said, we're going to be coming every two weeks until you listen to us. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Wellington Bennett, Lana Mulholland, Janet Brown.

Good evening. Buenas tardes. I'm here, my name is Wellington Bennett, and I'm here to talk about the Juneteenth. I hope the Mayor and the City Council will reconsider their idea of not having us run our Juneteenth program, event. event. I've been in this city for 44 years and in 44 years we have always run the Juneteenth,

not some outsider that come in and tell us what to do. We do it because we represent and we give honor to our ancestors who died to get us this, till this day. So we hope that you guys would consider or reconsider your idea of not letting us do our own thing.

It hurts. It hurts a lot that you guys take this step and we pray that we have the opportunity to do our own thing once again.

Just let us go and be happy and do whatever we do. So thank you and may you guys be blessed and remember, November is coming. Good night and buenas noches.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Lana Mulholland, Janet Brown, Joe Andrade.

Hello, honorable Mayor Emezquez and members of the Santa's City Council. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak this evening. My name is Lana Mulholland. I'm the property manager at Metro Town Square, Square, which is located adjacent to South Coast Plaza.

On behalf of nearly 100 tenants at our 41-acre center, one of the largest and most important sales tax-producing shopping and dining centers in Santa Ana, nearly two years ago, Related of California started meeting with every single tenant at the shopping center, small and large. They presented the vision for a dynamic, highly walkable, mixed-use makeover of our once-bustling shopping center. All the tenants were excited. Now our tenants are frustrated, angry that the much-needed and long-overdue related Bristol plan to redevelop and dramatically upgrade our aging and outdated 50-year-old center

has not been advanced to formal hearings before the Planning Commission and the City Council. Council. All of 98 leases are going to expire in 20 months. That is December 31, 2025.

Forty-one acres could become vacant. Yet there's no extended leases in place beyond the end of December of next year. We are risking the take of having a vacant 41 acres in Santa Ana. To prevent this, tenants, I need to be able to renew their existing leases this calendar year. But until Related Bristol is approved, we can't be moved forward on any of this. Uncertainty, failure, creating, relocating tenants. I have people coming in all the time that are saying that they possibly want to leave.

Related Bristol will generate nearly 11 million annually and much...

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Lana, your time is up.

Can I say one more thing?

Please advance this project now. Thank you. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Janet Brown. I'm with the office of Congressman Lou Correa. And the Congressman asked me to come this evening to read a letter he wrote regarding the needle exchange program. And it reads, Dear neighbors and fellow community members, members. The purpose of this letter is to express my concerns and opposition to the needle exchange program in Santa Ana. Since 2016, the Orange County Needle Exchange has been the source of great contention for city leaders and community members due to public health and safety concerns. The effects and risks of this program center on statistics

that show the program does not have adequate resources to prevent or properly clean up the needles that end up as litter creating a clear threat to families and children's using public spaces such as parks libraries and sidewalks throughout the city the harm reduction Institute in the state of California states that out of the 300,000 needles that are provided to 500 people annually only about a hundred and eighty thousand are collected leaving a hundred and twenty thousand needles unaccounted for while it is important to reduce disease and overdoses for the homeless population in our community it

is also important to be aware of the effects and risk that could impact the thousands of people who live in and visit the city of Santa Ana I join with with Mayor Valerie Emescua and community members to urge the Harm Reduction Institute and California Department of Public Health to find an alternative way to provide clean needles to those the program is intended to serve and one that keeps used needles out of our parks and playgrounds. Respectfully, J. Luis Correa, member of Congress. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Joe Andrade followed by Jeffrey J. Jensen and Larry Marshburn.

Good evening, Council. My name is Joe Andrade. I'm from ward 6. I'm speaking on Agenda 28. As you guys know, most of you know, that in our association, not only ours but Lacey's, We've had many problems since 30 years ago, even more, when my mom was alive. Trying to get all this injustice, environmental injustice out of there. We've had to start with the crematorium that we've had in our place. We've had a trash hauler.

We've had car repair places with paint, industrial workers, construction workers, semi-trucks, buses, all this in our little neighborhood. And we've been fighting since back then. My wife and I got together 22 years ago, and she, when she moved in, helped me. and my mom trying to get rid of all this stuff with the neighborhood. We've tried, we've tried, we've tried. We've taken you guys out and explained to some of you

what we've had there and we showed you. Now we're asking you guys to help us.

And that's all I've got to say, thank you.

you good evening mayor city council staff chief my name is Jeff Jensen I'm a business owner and resident of downtown Santa Ana I sent an e-comment earlier with all the information that's on the document that i have here for you guys to read at your leisure um and this is just some real quick rapid fire info going into uh budget season i want to talk about parking meters downtown santa ana has three parking meter zones willard zone 8 a.m to 8 p.m monday through friday dollar an hour dollar 40 with the app midtown zone 8 a.m to 8 p.m monday through saturday dollar

an hour $1.40 with the app downtown zone 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Sunday $2 an hour $2.40 with the app downtown is the only zone that goes till 10 p.m. is seven days a week and cost $2 an hour more than most Orange County Beach cities during peak season more than downtown LA we make it easier and less expensive for customers to visit and patronize downtown to spend money on retail food and beverage and events between the cost of parking and the measure x tax it costs more for everything in downtown most expensive cup of coffee in orange county city hall civic

center and the courts are closed after 6 p.m after 6 p.m people are here to spend money in downtown here's how we fix it may sound counterintuitive but it will generate tax revenue two different suggestions compiled with input from over 30 businesses in downtown suggestion one amend the two ordinances 2015 and 19 that created this mess relax or eliminate parking enforcement ticketing so heavily that it's deterring customers and business from returning to downtown mass ticketing on art walk nights on 4th street all the way till 9 59 p.m make all meters the same hours 8 a.m to

6 p.m at the same rates as the lower willard zone make all zones free on sunday all meters should have the ability for credit card debit card capability uh simplify signage and a lot more for you guys to go throughout your leisure so thank you larry marshburn followed by lisa magana and yadira carion good evening honorable mayor mezca and city council members my name is larry marshburn i'm a retired fire marshal and a proud santa ana homeowner living in the beautiful neighborhood of south coast shores i'm here tonight to urge you to do everything possible to advance proposed related Bristol project

and formal hearings before the Planning Commission and the City Council. Like many residents and local businesses in South Santa Ana, I'm excited about what this visionary project will mean for our community and the entire city of Santa Ana. I have really familiarized myself with this project, actually, and it's a wonderful mix of apartments, dynamic new retail, restaurants, everyday services, as well as senior housing and 13 acres of much-needed open space. and I believe as proposed a related Bristol will be transformational in many ways what really caught my attention about this project as a career first

responder of course I saw my fellow lads tonight is how this related Bristol project will improve our public safety in this area the access to it is excellent it really is good as far as reaching every part of it and also the The developer plans to establish a 24-7 security and maintenance of the project, as well as they're offered to, at their cost, a substation for city law enforcement within the project to ensure that all the Santa Ana residents can visit it without concerns for their safety. As a local resident and a career public safety officer and a homeowner,

and I plan on living my remaining years here, so I'm going to tell you that, I really strongly encourage you to move forward and set hearings for the related bridge of Bristol related Bristol project and approve it this important project for us this is very special with the multiple economic and community benefits that I feel that the community really could miss out on if they don't approve it so please take action now I really would love to have you do this but I do want to finish by saying how much I appreciate every single one of you and the effort and time you people put in doing this watching this tonight

is educational itself so thank you very much for hearing me lisa magana followed by yadira carion and senorino gomez hi i'm lisa and i just wanted i live on logan and stafford and i just want your guys's help because we have so many companies coming in we i just went home home yesterday, there was a big semi truck delivering this big old machine and they're asking like the neighborhood to move their cars so they can get through when they don't even fit.

The city just fixed up Lincoln and the other day a truck crashed into it and kind of messed it all up. You guys are spending so much money, you know, fixing it and these companies are coming in and destroying it. I can't even let my kids go out because these men are driving so fast in these trucks. I don't feel safe with my daughter or my son playing outside. You know, my grandma has been fighting for these companies to get out of here. And all of you guys always say, oh, it's so historic, this neighborhood.

But you guys are letting all these companies come in and kind of destroying it. it's not staying as beautiful as it should and I hope we have your help and get them out of here because I would like my kids to go to the park that is named after my grandma I can't even let them go because they're not safe these trucks are going so fast up and down and they're drinking in their yards and if you drive by you can see the beer cans on top of the wall because that's where they choose to leave them. And I just ask for your guys' help. Thank you.

Thank you. Buenas noches, miembros del consul, mayor. Buenas noches. Mi nombre es Yadira. Vivo en la ciudad de Santa Ana por 20 años. Me preocupa la inseguridad de mi comunidad. Tengo hijos que viven conmigo. no pueden conseguir vivienda porque la vivienda es demasiado cara y pues no es justo para ellos y me gustaría que dieran sus votos a la proposición 25 gracias buenas noches

good evening my name is yadira members of the council mayor i'm a resident of santa ana for for 20 years and I'm concerned about the safety of my children, my children, safety of the community. My children live with me and they cannot afford housing because it is very expensive and it is not fair. So I'm here to ask you to vote yes on 25. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Next three speakers, Senorino Gomez, Maria L. Gomez, and Oscar Gamero.

the danger that we have, the dangers that exist in the streets. And apart from that, if they put neighbors that we don't know, they will come in and out, the people that we don't know, and we don't know if they can live near the children, or if there are people who are wanting to sell illegal products, or all those things. So what we want is the security of our city, and that is the reason why we are fighting hard for this, and that we always have peace in our community, since we have lived for so long,

and we know of so many people who have had some problems about that, and we don't want there to be more problems, having people coming and going, saliendo y seria mas mas traffic oh yeah mas de lo que tenemos muchas gracias

good evening my name is Eferino Gomez I've been Santa Ana living Santa Ana for 30 years and I want to thank you for having passed number 25 we don't need that we don't need short-term rentals there's a lot of traffic that comes with it there's dangers in our streets and if we have people neighbors that we do not know i don't know who's going to live there who's going to be near our children or if they might be selling illegal items we are concerned about the safety of our city and we're working hard to

keep the peace in our community and we know many people over the years many people have had issues with this and we don't want any more problems we don't want to cause any more traffic thank you very much for listening

when I started my name is Maria Gomez trabajo en el convention center in Anaheim for the sanyas vivo en la ciudad de Santana y debido a que no hay vivienda accessible a preso accessible para las personas in Santa Ana tengo que vivir en la casa con mi hijo su esposa sus dos hijos mi hijo mi hija su esposo y por eso les pido por favor que que prohíban el alquiler a corto plazo, porque como dijo mi compañero,

llegan personas a vivir a la comunidad, personas que no sabemos de qué lugares vengan, y pues por eso necesitamos que prohíban el alquiler a corto plazo. Gracias.

Good evening. My name is Maria Gámez, and I work in the Anaheim Convention Center for about 10 years, and I live in Santa Ana, and we cannot find affordable housing in Santa Ana for the people in Santa Ana, so I have to live with my son, with his wife, with their two kids, with my kid, with my daughter and her husband. So I'm asking you to ban or to forbid short-term rentals. rentals. We, it's not fair for the people and we, like my friend said, we don't know

who's going to come and leave people who we don't know where they're from. So I'm asking you to please ban short-term rentals. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Next three speakers, Oscar Gamero, Elizabeth Galindo, Reverend Wesley Menke.

jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo jo con respecto al voto 25, porque como ustedes saben, las viviendas en Santana están encareciendo de una forma que es difícil sobrevivir para nuestras familias. Los BNB están encareciendo honestamente todo, y aparte hay cosas que no están bien. Aparte de que encarecen nuestras viviendas para nuestras familias, es difícil poder pagar viviendas.

así que necesitamos por favor que reconfirmen el voto para nuestras familias y nuestros ciudadanos en la ciudad de santana por favor se los pedimos a los ciudadanos y trabajadores que somos la mayoría de los compañeros que trabajamos en hoteles en diferentes ciudades gracias

Good evening, Mayor and City Council. I want to thank you for voting for us. I'd like to ask you to reconfirm your vote for us for Santa Ana on number 25. As you know, housing is very expensive and it's very hard to find good housing. Everything is getting too expensive. housing is very expensive and it's hard to pay for our our housing so I'm asking you to reconfirm your vote for families for the citizens of Santa Ana because of all the citizens and the workers in Santa Ana most of us work in hotels in different cities as well thank you very much

Thank you.

me mama al medico porque la renta son muy costosas mi mama tiene una enfermedades crónicas y esto hace que vaya recurrentemente al médico a veces tengo que elegir en trabajar o llevarla ella al doctor porque el dinero no me alcanza para cubrir mi renta por favor esta noche vote sí a la medida número 25 gracias

Good evening. My name is Elizabeth Galindo, and I'm a worker for Anaheim Hilton for over seven years. And I want to thank you for the ban on short-term rentals at the last meeting. I have to live with my mom, and I have to have at least two jobs in order to pay for the rent. Sometimes I cannot take my mom to the doctor because I have to pay the rent. The rent is too high. Sometimes I have to, my mom has chronic illnesses, and sometimes I have to choose between going to work and taking my mom to the doctor because I don't make enough money.

So please vote yes on number 25. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Reverend Wesley Menke, followed by Ana Gomez and Ana Romero.

Wesley Menke, Morrison Park.

muchos trabajadores como ustedes. En vez de prohibir totalmente, ¿por qué no unemos? ¿Por qué no desarrollar una regulación justa? ¿Por qué no crezca tu unión con más miembros en vez de quitar sus trabajos totalmente? Yo muevo que punto número 25 de la agenda cambia. Tallamos un poquito para permitir una cantidad fija de alquileres de corto plazo, como hoteles, en regulación y impuestos.

Había una vez una pareja de inmigrantes, llamaron Abraham y Sarah, que no pudieron tener hijos. Un día recibieron a tres desconocidos como huéspedes a corto plazo. Eran ángeles, eran Dios. Los huéspedes dijeron que finalmente la pareja van a tener su bebé, que se llamaba Isaac. Mira qué bendición pudiéramos recibir en nuestra ciudad. Vida nueva, renacimiento.

If our beautiful city receives short-term guests in an ethical and responsible way, please cut down on 25 so that we don't only prohibit, but regulate a fixed amount of rents. My house is your house.

Good evening. My home is your home. I'm talking to the hotel workers and others.

You want to, there's an issue with accessible housing. We want to have safe neighborhoods and some of you work in short-term housing and you want to ban and this ban, the entire entire banner or full ban of short-term housing is going to hurt the workers. So why not instead of banning the short-term workers, we join forces, we join together to find something that is fair, that have fair requirements, and why not your unions could have more members. Number 25 could be changed to allow fixed short-term rentals, just like hotels, to have

to have regulations and so that they can pay taxes. There's a story, there's a couple of people, a couple that, immigrants, that were called Abraham and Sarah, and they did not have any children. And then they were visited by three strangers. They visited them for a short term there. And they were angels. They were angels. They were from God. And they, after that, they were blessed with a kid. his name was Isaac, why not receive the blessing for our city, this necessary life, the new life,

the renewed life. This beautiful city can have short-term rentals if it's done ethically and responsibly. Number 25 does not have to be a full band, but regulated to have fixed short-term rental housing. So my house is your house.

Good evening. My name is Anna Gomez. I live in Ward 3. I am here regarding agenda number 25. I believe if council members had all the facts pertaining to short-term rentals, we would have a different outcome. Based on that, I respectfully ask council to repeal the urgency ordinance, take agenda item 25 off calendar, and request the Planning Commission to resume their work and research on short-term rentals. We do need to address the shared economy. Our ordinances and regulations that are in place right now are very archaic. They're not into the 21st century and there's lots of changes that we need to make.

That is a quote from a city council member back in 2015 when short-term rentals came under the radar for the city of Santa Ana. At that time, the city council members were all supportive of the shared economy, the importance of bringing in the city in line as well as the codes. Nothing has happened since then. In regards to the city staff report and the urgency ordinance, it contained faulty information or incomplete data. Both the urgency ordinance and state that short-term rentals remove housing stock that could be otherwise available for long-term or sale.

The number of short-term rentals reported in Santa Ana is 1,100, as reported by the GRANES, which I believe is a software solutions of information on short-term rentals. The numbers were collected from various short-term renters platforms. What wasn't disclosed is that one short-term rental can be listed on two or three or four platforms. What does that mean? One listing can be reported four times. That adds to the 1,100 that was reported as short-term rentals in the City of Santa Ana.

Granius even states on their website, it is very common for a single rental unit to be advertised across multiple listings and as a result, you will see a higher number of listings in your jurisdictions compared to the number of rental units when the 1100 short-term owners were reported did granius removed duplicate listings that would actually give the city a clear picture of how many are really in the city also the types of short-term owners would have been your time is up thank

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

you next three speakers Ana Romero Mario Alvarado and Richard Austin

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Ana Romero.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Mario Alvarado.

Buenas tardes. Mi nombre es Mario Alvarado. Soy residente de Santana. Nací aquí. Vivo en el Distrito 5. The last meeting I came to talk about the project they want to establish in the city, to establish a syringe program in the city of Santa Ana. Since then, me and two other residents have established a petition on social media and also using the documents of the city to obtain signatures in opposition to that program.

Since then, I have been invited to different community events and visited the neighborhood associations. Something in common with these events is that the participants are against the project that wants to establish the exchange of syringes here in Santa Ana. me pidieron que viniera a hablar hoy en español porque muchos piensan que para firmar esa petición necesitan ser residentes, necesitan ser ciudadanos y invito a los residentes de Santa Ana, a la comunidad de habla hispana que firme esas peticiones

que no necesitan ser ciudadanos, no necesitan ser residentes para firmar esas peticiones que nos ayuden, que nos apoyen para que también este concejal y los trabajadores de la ciudad, los líderes de la ciudad that we can send this petition to our state representatives. Today we heard from Representative Luke Correa, who is also against this project. Please help us, sign the petitions, and join us so that this project does not reach Santa Ana. My name is Mario Alvarado. I am from Barrio 5.

Good evening. My name is Mario Alvarado. I'm a resident of Santa Ana. I'm here with number, ward number five, and at the last meeting, the city brought, talked about a project that is coming, that might be coming to Santa Ana, the needle exchange program, and there's a petition. We're gathering signatures. I got together with a couple other people getting signatures, and we were invited to to go to different community events. I've attended several neighborhood associations,

and one thing that these people that attend the neighborhood associations and these community meetings have in common is that they are against the needle exchange program. I was asked to come to this meeting to speak in Spanish because many residents and citizens are thinking that they have to be residents, and many people who speak Spanish think that they have to be residents or and or citizens to sign the petition and that is not true you do not have to be a resident or a citizen to sign the petition so I'm here to ask you to help

us to join us with the City Council with the leaders of this city and we heard today from representative our state representatives we heard from a representative from Luke Correa's office so we're asking you to help us to sign this so that we do not have this needle exchange program in the city of Santa Ana I'm Mario Barado from district 5

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Richard Austin Ruben Hernandez Jonah Breslau good evening my name is Richard

Austin I'm a former major in the United States Marine Corps and a resident of Santa Ana for over 25 or 23 years, excuse me. Thank you for the opportunity to speak on the topic of short-term rentals. I'm a vice president of the mortgage division for one of the major banks and the regional business development manager covering Fresno to San Diego. My focus and primary focus for my employer is affordable housing. It's extremely difficult as you all know to meet the goals and help the people that need it most, but we're trying. And I applaud the City Council for your efforts and some of the successes that you've had. Projects in

downtown around Main Place Mall and the future Brandywine project coming on First Street, I work with them. There's so much more to do. Those are just to name a few of the projects. And looking at short-term rentals, it's easy to say that they contribute to our lack of housing, but the facts do not support that. The The facts are supply and demand that drives everything. So low supply of resales because people do not want to give up their sub-4% interest rates, and that is a fact. Low supply of new homes. The builders miscalculated and made a mistake two years ago when rates started to rise that sales would be impacted,

and they would have standing inventory. But because of the lack of resales, it didn't happen. And now they're scrambling to catch up so that there's a lack of developed lots, unfortunately. So now they've got to get them all through all the red tape. These facts mean that there's a lack of rentals because there's no houses. If you don't have houses in the resale and you don't have houses, they're scrambling for it, then there's not going to be enough for the rentals. It's not going to happen. Short-term rentals had nothing to do with getting us into the situation or

exacerbating the problem regardless of what the opponents say. I get my facts

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

from... Richard your time is up. Thank you very much. Ruben Hernandez, Jonah Breslau, Michael Andrade.

Good evening, honorable mayor, members of the city, Santa Ana Council. I think tonight I'm here on behalf of SAU Local 721 to strongly oppose the need to exchange program. Now, there's members here that represent the community. I'm here representing city of Santa Ana workers. workers and this obviously letting this slide in our community is going to put our membership, our work is in harm's way. Just wanted to keep it simple. I hope you take consideration in not allowing this in our community. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

»» Thank you. »» Thank you. »» Thank you. »» Thank you. »» Thank you.

Good evening, honorable mayor and council members. My name is Jonah Breslau. I'm a research analyst at United Here Local 11, and we are here tonight to thank you all for supporting a ban on short-term rentals in Santa Ana. And when you took those votes that really stood up for the long-term residents, like there are hundreds of members who live here in Santa Ana and who work here and work all over the county. It's very important that we stand up for housing. We're in a housing crisis. And as you heard, one of the issues is supply and demand. Short-term rentals take housing off of the long-term

market and reduce the supply of long-term housing. So for that reason, we thank you again for all your support. You'll hear more from our members about their stories, their struggles with housing. you'll hear about the impacts of these policies and other areas and the success they've had for example in Irvine so thank you all for your time and attention and have a good night

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Michael Andrade followed by hung win and Miguel Bautista good evening all my name

is Mike Andrade resident of Logan neighborhood legacy of Logan neighborhood the strong community I'm here standing before you to ask you our our regarding agenda 28. um it's dear to my heart regarding the issue that we've been concerning our neighborhood businesses that have no consideration for the residents of the logan neighborhood just to paint you a picture of what goes on on a daily basis you've heard residents but to speak in for in front of you of issues that occur on a daily basis

you know what we hear every day and what we see every day smoke smog adjacent for neighborhoods smoke that goes into housing these are all images that if you live there you would understand and this is the reason why i stand before you to make that change to move forward to beautify this little neighborhood into what it was before. My grandmother stood before you about four, not before you, but before others 45 years ago with the same fight and her family continues on with that fight. And it's not only about the family, it's about the residents. It's a humanity

thing. The health of humankind that live adjacent to businesses that have smog that, you know, every hour of the day, banging, noise. I mean, I could paint the picture on and on, but I'm sure you guys get the gist of it. Standing before you is my family to show you residents that live in this neighborhood. And you've heard about three other family members that live in this neighborhood. And I know there's other conversation going on regarding this neighborhood. And I just ask of you if this change needs to happen and needs to happen soon.

And in closing, there's adjacent crematorium that smoke that comes into my house. I've had a number of family members that have cancer. I'm not saying that's what the cause of it, but it could be a prime issue for that. So I just ask of you is think about it and change 28. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

next speakers hung huynh miguel bautista susana cruz

apologies for my nervousness um good morning mayor or evening mayor and council members my name is hung huynh i'm from fisher park two years ago i was fortunate enough to purchase that property that house with the intention of providing a home for my two boys once they're grown recently we made the decision my wife and i to put this property for short-term rental to both maintain it as well as generate revenue enough to secure that property for my kids we prioritize keeping touch with our neighbors ensuring we are they're well informed of our

situations and our rental agreement i personally walked my neighbors through my property and talked talked about highlighting the efforts to preserve it for our children. Just to let you know, my sister lives two blocks from that property. My brother lives a little bit away, half a mile away in Main Place Mall, the new apartments in Main Place Mall. That's why we love it here in Santa Ana, and that's why we want to keep it. We meticulously screen our tenants. We inspect the property each and every single time after the stay, maintaining a pristine

condition for the benefit of our neighborhood. We've never encountered any issues with any of our tenants, and we talk to our neighbors regularly. I'm here today in hopes that the city find an equitable solution regarding short-term rentals. I strongly believe that we provide a valuable service to the community by offering lodging options for families that visit Southern California, thereby boosting tourism and revenue for the city and the surrounding areas. I understand the city's need for revenue. I think with models of short-term rentals, such as those implemented in the City of Orange,

it provides successful examples of collaborations between single-family homeowners, owners like myself, and the city to generate revenues through taxation with proper regulations. We can contribute this for our neighborhoods and really solve the issues of shortage of properties. Thank you.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council members. My name is Miguel Bautista. I'm here with Unite Here Local 11. Again, we come here tonight to thank you for your vote in the last session. Your vote has protected your long-term residents and hundreds of our members.

As you all know, many cities across Orange County have already passed strict regulations on short-term rentals. Because they recognize that short-term rentals remove long-term housing from the market, at least 11 cities in Orange County prohibit short-term rentals in some form, like the city of Irvine, which has banned short-term rentals in 2018. They saw a rental cost drop of 3% on average within two years. a drop that was even greater in areas hardest hit by short-term rentals. Meanwhile, unhosted short-term rentals in Santa Ana have increased by almost 300% since 2019,

driving up rents and displacing tenants. Santa Ana needs to continue having its short-term rental ban, just like other cities have. I urge you to vote yes again on item 25 tonight, prohibiting short-term rentals. Let's keep residents housed and our communities intact. Thank you for your time.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Susana Cruz, followed by Elliot Lewis and John Ramirez.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Hello, Valerie.

Thank you for everything that you do, counsel, for all your guys' hard work. And I'm going to say this in Spanish because I want it for my gente.

for favor no making case that's heading us saying parted the nuestros hijos vamos al revés hemos luchado tan fuerte para tener mejores parques una mejor comunidad para deshacernos de todas las drogas de todo el mal que pasa nuestra ciudad y ahora vamos a ir al revés coming on was a transport a control all of us is the same as all of you know is a total city close or you tell you story you know this quella para semana consejera de drogas y alcoholismo me

familia en mi casa you have a leo todo esto para no tenerlo en casa ya hora lo vamos a star dando I mean you remain t no podemos darles a nostros hijos los material is para las escuelas pero si podemos darles a los drogadictos lo que necesitan para hacerse peor addicts de lo que ya son it's not fair thank you

I was born in Santana 55 I've lived for 55 years I have 10 kids that are raised by myself as a single mother and I get up every day thinking how I can help my community thinking how I can serve my community to make a better community for my kids that I've been living here for 55 years I'm here to ask you to please

don't say don't accept this needle program we don't want needles to be part of our children, part of our community. And this is, I've been fighting this, we want better for our kids. We don't want drugs, we don't want any anything bad for kids. We were fighting drugs and evils and now we're going backwards. We're We've done a lot for our parks and our community and for drugs, eliminating drugs, and now it seems like we're just going backwards.

The needles are just going to help addicts. I'm going to school right now to be an alcohol and drug counselor, and I'm fighting at home to not have this, to not give these. Now they're going to have free or be given freely these needles and our kids need to be protected. We don't want, we don't have enough, we don't give our kids enough school materials but we are giving the drugs, drug addicts what they need to use drugs. It's not fair.

My name is Elliot Lewis. I'm the CEO of Catalyst Cannabis Co. We operate a dispensary here in Santa Ana and different storefronts throughout the state. I want to compliment City Council and your bold and progressive move that you guys took in December of 2022, reducing the tax rate for cannabis business here as much needed relief in Santa Ana. We always want more, but we appreciate what we got it was one percent that was automatic and two percent was something that you had to qualify for we qualified straight away we turned this is january of 2023 we turned our paperwork in

straight away right this is something that would take 30 minutes an hour tops to verify and it has not been done and we've had a great relationship with staff i don't want to go out of my way to throw them under the bus but at the end of the day if this was a tax it would have been collected it's a tax credit it hasn't been honored and here we stand a year and four months later from when it's passed and we haven't got it it amounts to about 280 000 in an industry that's suffering now keep in mind the state has rated us twice at gunpoint for being late once over a

misunderstanding when you don't pay your taxes on time at the city they threaten to suspend your license and they take other action and when there's a new tax and a new fee they are all over it as fast as they possibly can be so i would just humbly ask that this issue get taken care of and look again it was a very progressive act but if the red tape doesn't allow you to get it then what's the point and we're here for the workers and we want them to get what they have coming so as an act of civil disobedience in all respect I will be sending cremo credit memos 90 days should have been more than that for my

payment of taxes starting now so instead of sending the monthly tax you will get a credit memo from catalyst cannabis Co and hopefully that will escalate this issue and if you want to come and get the money we could discuss why this didn't get approved how it should have been thank you all respect John Ramirez

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Jhon Ramirez, Shedrick Collins, Elvia Espinoza.

Good evening, Mayor, Councilmember, and city staff. My name is Jhon Ramirez. I'm a resident of Ward 2, and I've lived here in the City of Santa Ana my entire life. I'm here to speak tonight in support of Item 27, the resolution opposing the needle distribution program in our city. You know, this is the common sense issue that we should all be on board with and be supportive of this resolution. I can see outsiders being supportive of it, but our residents should all be on board and support it.

I lost my place.

A needle distribution program just means more needles will end up in our public parks, our sidewalks leading to schools where children and teens walk to and from every day. I'm in the neighbors of Santa Ana Facebook group. Most of you are familiar with that. And just last year, one of our residents in that group posted a video of a transient throwing a used syringe over the fence into her friend's backyard where her friend's child plays every day. That child could have easily picked that syringe up and let curiosity get the best of them. But luckily, that didn't happen this time. We don't need stories like this repeated,

repeated but that's exactly what's going to happen if this needle distribution program comes to our city council members I encourage you all to vote yes on this resolution opposing this program for me from being implemented in our city this is a matter of public safety and public safety should be your number one priority to us residents as our elected representatives lastly to Councilman Becerra I want to say thank you for declaring May 4th as International Firefighters Day My uncle was a firefighter his whole life, starting with the Santa Ana Fire Department, then eventually with OCFA before retiring.

I'm going to let him know about this, and he will appreciate it. And I appreciate it. So, again, thank you, Councilman. And that was a beautiful entrance and exit with the backpipes, too. Maybe we have more of that.

And this concludes my comments. Thank you, Mayor, Councilmembers, city staff, and to all our fire and police personnel present tonight. Have a good evening and stay safe.

Good evening, Mayor, City Council members. My name is Shedrick Collins. I'm a longtime member of Orange County. I've been here 30 years. I came here by way of Texas, joined the Marine Corps, and I've stayed in Orange County since I've been here. I said that to say because I've been serving my country and serving my community for the majority of my life. I've been doing work in the city of Santa Ana for over 30 years now. The reason I'm here tonight is for Item 29, the Juneteenth Festival. Orange County Heritage Council has been working very closely with the city of Santa Ana for the last three years,

and we put on two very, very nice events for the county and the citizens of this county. and to hear that the city manager and the mayor have open bid this event that we created to outsiders and not even sat down and talked to us and included us, made this an inclusive conversation about Juneteenth and how it impacts our community. What we're trying to do is preserve the legacy that has been put on by our forefathers.

We came here, what, three, four years ago, and we asked to put this event on, and the city of Santa Ana embraced it. Everyone was all up in arms about diversity and inclusion, and now it's just a checkbox that you're using it for. You know, how are you going to have a white organization come take over an event that directly impacts people of color, and then you're offering us $2,000 to train them to put on our event?

That makes no sense, and we're not going for it. We are prepared to let everyone in this county know that we are not supporting this event unless you give Orange County Heritage Council. the opportunity to put on this event thank you

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

next three speakers elvia espinoza ruby rivera rene hernandez

hello my name is elvia espinoza and i have worked in the kilton costa mesa for 30 more or more years and i am living in santa ana for the same time in bristol neighborhood Thank you for the short-term rentals for the last meeting. Rent is sold high in Santana, and I live with strangers and family in order to pay the rent. Now my family moved to Riverside to afford a place to live. For this reason, please vote yes tonight on item 25. Thank you.

Hello, City Council and Honorable Mayor. I came here today to oppose the needle distribution that the HCI is trying to implement. As someone who was born and raised in Santa Ana, I have seen the efforts of our community has put into making our city beautiful again. When we implemented this program from 2016 to 2018, we can see from the data that it was a failure, leaving about 250,000 needles on the streets in harm's way of children and the community. As someone who has a little sister that walks home from school and has already encountered dangers from drug addicts, I am scared.

What are the chances of her being exposed to a needle on the ground and being contaminated? What are the chances that she will encounter a drug addict high out of his mind and he assaults her? I personally walk my dogs every morning and what are the chances that they stumble upon a trashed needle and hurt themselves? This program makes it easier for drug addicts to get high. That's all it is. How is this truly benefiting drug users? How is this helping the people that we see slumped over on the sidewalks and bus stops? Not only are we exposed to public drug use, but the trash and encampments that they leave behind.

Needle distribution would just be adding to the problem. We should be helping them stay off of hard drugs, not encouraging it. If we truly want to help these people, this is not the way. For example, mandatory rehabilitation centers and actually enforcing the law for public drug use. Leaving our community filthy and dangerous is not the way. We need to find better ways to help those that truly want and need it. I ask for our council to please oppose the needle distribution and keep our community safe. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Renee Hernandez. I'm born and raised in Santa Ana. I'm a longstanding city employee. I'm here on behalf of SEIU. I represent the part-time bargaining unit. I wanted to express in our concern about the needle exchange program on how the program is unsafe to our employees as well as our residents. I'm going to share a couple of situations that we employees have encountered. There's been several needles that been

been found at City Hall in the toilet seats dispensers, which was unsafe for any resident as well as an employee that wants to go to the bathroom safely. Needles were found in City Hall, the library area, in the bushes. The program brought hundreds of unhoused individuals individuals. Also, in the area of the flag of the plaza, where they had camped, unfortunately

there was situations where they didn't have any restrooms. So they went in buckets. One of our employees that's coming out of the garage happened to be coming out and someone someone happened to dispose of their waste on the side of the wall, just dumping it over and apparently our employee got splashed. One of our employees also on their way to work at the library, her lunch got snagged while walking to the library on her way to work.

work. So I want you to consider some of the safety issues that this needle exchange that causes. So we oppose this needle exchange program. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

The next three speakers, Lizette Arachiga, Danny Vega, John Kaczorski.

Hi, my name is Lizette. I live here in Santa Ana, born and raised. I just am very opposed to the program. There's other failed programs like in Pittsburgh, Indiana, San Francisco. And didn't you guys do this a while back? So why do it again? Why are we providing needles to drug addicts? coming from a family member that is a drug addict I don't think this is a solution and also like Susanna over there she pays 395 for a needle she's diabetic why don't you have programs for diabetics I'm sorry I just don't feel

like that's fair so I mean and like even on Main Street there's a bunch of drug drug addicts like literally shooting up and I'm seeing them like do heroin how How come you guys don't do anything about that? Just saying.

And there's like a lack of cleanup. Do you really want kids exposed to that? I don't, honestly. So I just feel like that personally, I do not wanna see that in my city. And I just feel like it'll increase more of a note, like people having overdoses versus actually helping them maybe actually give programs to prevent them from doing drugs in the first place that's all i wanted to say thank you

good evening mayor and city council my name is danny vega of residence of war three i wanted to submit the signatures collected through an online petition opposing the nido distribution program it was created by Commissioner Mario Alvarado Florida Park Neighborhood Association president Jeffrey Katz and myself and just over a week we collected over 1,200 signatures I would also like to submit these signatures that award five resident Carla Hernandez collected from her neighbors so thank you Mario Jeff Carla and all the residents who really stepped up this past week so now I'll make my public comments and I speak on behalf of

of myself and my family. I read the e-comments submitted by the executive director of HRI, and I'm saddened to hear that they felt unsafe coming here because of internet insults. But I'll have to be honest, I am actually glad they didn't show up because HRI said that they would win against, they would win because they were more relentless than their enemies, meaning Santa Ana residents, and they went on to say that they were done mincing words and playing politics with these people so I was afraid of what they meant by that and what they were capable of when entering a room full of

said enemies there is a failure on the part of HRI and people especially those outside of Santa Ana to understand why Santa Ana residents are opposed to this anytime a program comes to our city just as this there's always a negative impact to the community whether it's expected unintended and sometimes because of the utter failure to operate the program as promised if you don't know what i'm talking about visit mha on main street the methadone clinic on first street or the many shelters we have look around and you'll see what i'm talking about so when hri mentions in their e-comments that we hope that 60

percent of uh that the 60 return rate is an understatement and we hope that we will be able to collect more and that we hope people are going to use that use our program when you use disposal kiosk in the community i'm sorry to say it doesn't give me confidence it's time that other cities do their part thank you

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

next three speakers john kachariski chuck elms ronnie carmona

Good evening everybody and Mayor, Honorable Mayor Meskla and Councilmembers. I'm here to speak on behalf of Agenda 27. My name is John Katuriski and I'm the POA President for the Santa Ana Police Officers Association. I represent 500 members, a third who are non-sworn, and that's dispatchers, correctional officers, parking enforcement officers, and that's just to name a few. And right now we're understaffed. I'm here to oppose the

needle exchange program. One, it's harmful for the community, and two, it's harmful for our members. We're gonna have more calls for service, longer response times, and right now with our dispatch being so understaffed, there's gonna be more 911 calls. I have the opportunity to be the PAL coach. I've been doing this for the last three years. I coached the grasshoppers for the last three years and I'm currently the coach for the Sluggers. I have to be there before we have

practice, before we have games. And it's unfortunate. It's unfortunate that we found paraphernalia, people slummed around, and this is going to be continuing. If this goes through, we're going to have even more of it. And it's unfortunate that our youth has to witness this. I think we're all here together and we all could agree with something. We all care about Santa Ana. So if we oppose this, because the reason being, we need to make sure that we all believe in Santa Ana deserves something much greater. I'm happy to be here with SCIU, with SALMA, with CASA, and PMA.

me yo me amo John Kaczynski is oil president de la policia de Santana yo vengo a poseer este intercambio de heringas y gracias y muchas buenas noches

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Chuck Elms followed by Ronnie Carmona and Monica Suter good morning or good

Good afternoon or evening. Been here so long. Madam Mayor, members of the council, my name is Chuck Elms. I've been a city employee for over 25 years. I serve as a police commander in the Investigations Bureau and I'm also the Police Management Association President. I'm here tonight on behalf of the men and women of the PMA and quite frankly the entire police department and our community to speak in opposition to establishing a needle exchange program in the city of Santa Ana. The PMA in solidarity with the other bargaining units here, including the POA, opposed the needle exchange program for two reasons.

The negative impact and safety concerns to our community, first and foremost, and then to our city staff. When I was a young police officer, I was stuck by a hypodermic syringe. As a result, I was required to undergo six months of blood tests to ensure I was not exposed to any life-altering, potentially deadly disease. Needless to say, this was a grueling six months for me and my family, and I would not wish this on anyone, not anyone in our community or the police department.

Introducing 300,000 plus needles a year into our Santa Ana community will increase the safety risk to all city staff, including our police department employees. Not only are there communicable disease concerns, but at present day, there are many synthetic drug variations that require injection with a hypodermic syringe that have proven to be fatal. The most obvious is the current fentanyl crisis. Even fentanyl residue from a discarded syringe can kill a human being. 300,000 plus needles per year in our community will surely cause a safety concern. Needles used to inject drugs are

commonly discarded in public places, parks, parking lots, schools, bike paths, and other and public transportation this is frequented by community members and our children and I ask that we oppose this exchange program thank you

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Ronnie Carmona

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Monica Souter.

Good evening, Honorable Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, and City Council Members. I'm here regarding Agenda Item Number 27. And we are here regarding that in solidarity with our labor workers. workers. We represent nearly 900 workers and we strongly oppose reinstituting any kind of needle exchange quote unquote program here in Santa Ana. The prior version of the program served as more of a distribution program than an exchange program and there was no process to ensure that the needles came back. This led to worker safety issues that have been

talked about and for those handling the quality of life team which is a multidisciplinary team and for all employees and parks library public works janitorial code enforcement police departmental we also represent employees there as well as our our brothers and sisters in blue and office workers who were accidentally stuck with needles thereby impacting their own and their family's personal health. We represent worker safety in all these areas. You've heard about other statistics on the program, I don't need to repeat those, but the bottom line is that the program lacked transparency with no public

records of incidents and despite all of those bad incidents the heroin addictions and so forth did not decline unfortunately. And we do understand and and have empathy for the serious drug issues in this country. That does not change. But unfortunately, these types of programs do not lead to the results that we need for a positive result. And even kids in libraries and things have been impacted. So it's bad for workers, children, and the Santa Ana community. So we do not support that program coming back in respect to item 27. Thank you very much. Have a good night.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Next speakers, Dale Helvig and Celeste Rivero.

Good evening, Mayor, Council Members, City Staff. I hear I am here also to support the resolution on item 27 six years ago this program was there we were told by as a community we could not pick up the used needles we didn't stand for that and we weren't going to stand for having the needles in the playgrounds and letting them pick it them up and getting injured And as you heard, six months of testing if you get stuck by one. So we picked them up.

We filled up jars, two-liter jars of needles in one day on Santiago Creek. So it's real. Now, what's interesting to me is HRI has said they're basing their information on the rate of incidents and at Santa Ana has the highest rate. What's also interesting is the Orange County Health Agency publishes this data yearly and they say that there's 270 new HIV cases that were listed. Santa Ana has in the

neighborhood of 50 so they have a rate of 14 or something. They exclude communities that are less than nine instances but what is real is they may have a higher rate and they don't show that the transparency is totally lacking in this area they should show the rate of every city in Orange County not just Santa Ana and whoever else is in second place we need to fix that and what's also interesting is nobody talks about what goes into the needles where are

they going to get their drugs to go into the needles we're going to be a shop for the drug dealers as well your time is up thank you next speaker Celeste Rivera

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Mayor and Council, that concludes the public speakers that are present. We'll now begin with the Zoom speakers.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 6

Madam Clerk, can you tell me how much time we have left, please?

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

36 minutes.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 6

Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Speakers on Zoom, when unmuted, please announce your name and the ward or neighborhood that you reside in within the City of Santa Ana for the record. Caller whose phone number ends in 136, please unmute and make your comments.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

phone call. Ending in 136.

Hello.

Sorry, can you hear me? Yes, go ahead please.

I sincerely ask the public not to be manipulated by these people. What they are not telling them are all the ways that this program has for the health of the entire community. For example, Santana is the community with the highest numbers of diagnosis of VIH in Orange County. And it has been demonstrated that programs like this help reduce these numbers.

public health in our community. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Next speaker, Natalie Dempster. Please unmute. Good evening. My name is Alondra Salazar

and I am Santa Ana born and raised. I'm a medical student and I'd like to say that it is not fair that you're providing false information to the community community regarding the needle exchange program. The people who are behind this, the people who are asking you to sign the petition are presenting false information. I'm asking people not to let themselves be manipulated. This program supports the community. Santa Ana – there's many ways that this program supports the community. Santa Ana has the highest rate rate of HIV in Orange County and it's been demonstrated that the numbers can go down

with a program such as this. The legal exchange program has programs to help drug users to leave drugs or anti-drug programs connected to it so the people who are collecting the signatures are not telling the truth. Say no to this. Do not sign the petition if you care about public health in the community natalie dempster

hi thank you my name is natalie dempster and i live in park santiago in ward 3 and i have been a resident of santa ana for eight years i am speaking on behalf of my family who is adamantly opposed to the needle exchange program i just want to thank council member becerra and mayor emesqua for their proactive work in opposing this program my 18 month old frequents the newly renovated park in park santiago and loves it there i thank you for your work daily and keeping that park so nice for all to enjoy it is incredibly dangerous and puts public safety at risk

bringing this needle exchange program to the city of santa ana once again and i cannot believe that we're actually having to fight this again nowhere else in orange county would this program even be proposed so the fact that it's even being proposed here is infuriating. Children should be our first priority and their safety specifically. It makes my stomach turn thinking about a child picking up a needle and contracting some kind of lifelong injury and frankly children shouldn't even be exposed to having to see needles around the places that they frequent. The needle exchange

program would ruin any kind of progress the city has made in improving public public spaces and parks and the city of Santa Ana has taken the brunt of programs for the entire county and I say no more so I urge you to support item 27. thank you

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

next speaker on Zoom Layal Bhatta please unmute and make your comments

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Leal?

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Next speaker, David Carbajal.

Hi, can you hear me? Yes, go ahead. Good evening, City Council. My name is David Carvajal, and I'm a resident of Ward 6. I was born and raised in the beautiful city of Santana, and I'm calling in to oppose the Gen Item 27. Turning our backs to proven strategies that improve quality of life is wrong, plain and simple. This resolution sends a clear message to people who use drugs in and around Santa Ana that their lives and well-being don't matter. Local governments must rely on scientific data and on the expertise of public health experts

to make informed decisions. Data shows that syringe service programs are an effective public health intervention to prevent new HIV and hepatitis C infections. The CDC reports that syringe service programs are associated with an approximately 50% reduction in HIV and hepatitis C infections in the U.S. The CDC, alongside public health experts and physicians, have been urging local and state governments to implement syringe service programs for over three decades in an effort to end the HIV epidemic.

What is probably most important for people listening to understand is that Santana constitutes the highest rates of HIV and hepatitis C infections in the county. This is a public health crisis. Additionally, when people who inject drugs have access to syringe service programs, they are three to five times more likely to seek substance use treatment. Lastly, contrary to the messaging that syringe service programs create more syringe waste, the syringe service program being proposed by the Harm Reduction Institute includes a dedicated hotline where you can report

syringes and a team will come pick them up in your area we have to support public health

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

strategies like this thank you and good night mayor and city council that concludes the speakers that were in the speaker queue when we started public comments i believe there's

Valerie AmezcuaItem 6

one there madam clerk she's asking how does she unmute okay the speaker i called earlier yes

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

Layal? Bata? There should be a microphone button.

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

It appears unmuted but we cannot hear. Layal?

Valerie AmezcuaItem 6

All right. We'll move on. Thank you. Thank you for making the effort. I appreciate it.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 6

That's all the speakers?

Jennifer L. HallItem 6

That's the speakers. all the speakers that were in the queue when we started public comments thank you okay at this

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

time we're going to go into the consent calendar items 8 through 26. i'll say this slowly as they're all returning to their chairs 8 through 26 are before us council members please announce any items that you'll be abstaining from due to conflict if there are any requests to pull an item from the consent calendar for further discussion let me start councilman vasquez i have nothing to pull i'm so sorry thank you councilmember lopez

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

item 12. councilman panelosa nothing mayor councilmember hernandez just a brief comment on

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 8

on item 20 and item 24.

Phil BacerraItem 8

Council Member Becerra? Yes, I'd like to pull items 21 and 23.

Thai Viet PhanItem 8

Mayor Pro Tem? Nothing to pull, but I will announce my recusal from item number 21 as the City of Irvine is a client of my employer, Rattanah Tucker, and since it's been pulled, I will leave the room while it's being discussed, thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

Thank you, I'm gonna pull item 21 and 22.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

That's it. Go ahead, Madam Clerk. Is there a motion to pass?

David PenalozaItem 8

Mayor, I'll make a motion to approve the rest of the consent. I'll second.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

Second by Councilman Hernandez. Let's prepare to vote.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

Actually, I want to go on record. I'm sorry, Madam Clerk, before you go. I want to go on record for item 25 that I'm a no vote. And I understand it's a second reading. I just want to be clear.

Jennifer L. HallItem 8

Mayor, I'm sorry, I'm having some technical difficulties here. If I could go ahead and do a roll call vote on the consent calendar with the exceptions of item 12, 21, 22, 23, brief comments on items 20 and 24 and a noted recusal on 21 from Councilmember Phan and a recorded no vote by the Mayor on item number 25. but for the remainder of the consent calendar i also pulled out of 27 27 that is um on business calendar so it will be separately discussed yeah go ahead thank you council member becerra yes

Jennifer L. HallItem 8

council member hernandez yes council member lopez yes council member penaleza yes council member vasquez yes mayor pro temp fan yes mayor mesqua yes vote is seven eyes no nays motion carries to to approve the consent calendar with the noted exceptions of separately pulled items and a six to one vote on item number 25 with the mayor voting no. Motion carries.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

Thank you. Can we administer the oath of office please to Esperanza Martinez for the Rental Housing Board and Ignacio Rincon for the Historic Resource Commission? You can please come forward if you're here.

Congratulations. Congratulations. Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Constitution of the United States and Constitution of the State of California against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I require true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of California, that I take this this obligation freely, without any mental reservation, or purpose of evasion, that I will well and faithfully

discharge the duties upon which I'm about to enter. Thank you.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 8

Mayor, the first item pulled is item number 12 by Councilmember Lopez.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

I'll wait until she returns to her chair to get started.

David PenalozaItem 8

So should we go on to the next item?

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

Yeah, why don't you go to the next one while she's doing that, please.

Jennifer L. HallItem 8

A comment by Councilmember Hernandez on item number 20.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

Go ahead, Councilman Hernandez.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 8

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I just wanted to thank our city staff and Parks and Recreation today item 20 We approved amending an agreement with LOC architects to increase the design services for the Santa Ana Zoo educational hub building project I want to highlight the tremendous work that is happening here because We as a city are very fortunate to have a zoo Zoo. We're the only city in Orange County that has its own zoo. And Santa Ana is proud to have the largest amount of monkeys in California here at our zoo. But our zoos should also

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 8

represent a place where families can receive education, where they can receive services. And today we approved an agreement that is going to help make that possible. So I just want to thank my colleagues and our city staff. Thank you.

MS. Go ahead, Matt.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 8

MR. Yes. And then, Director Hock-Scott, did you have any comments that you could share about this project

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 8

thank you director saba and public works um the public's going to be a beneficiary the good work that is happening between these two agencies so thank you

Valerie AmezcuaItem 8

madame click we'll go back to 12 please yes mayor pulled by council member

Jessie LopezItem 8

lopez yes thank you um i just really wanted to thank staff and the neighborhood leader from fisher park Park and the residents from Morrison Park. This work began about three years ago with a small group of residents who approached our office and sharing concerns about the speeding and the traffic safety issues for pedestrian and cyclists. And so I really want to thank everybody for their patience. It's been three years in the process and I'm really glad to see that Public Works went out and got grant funding for this and I'm really excited about the intersection changes that are gonna come not just to

Jessie LopezItem 12

flower and memory lane but all of all along that corridor corridor to help prioritize the safety of bicyclists and pedestrians I'm very excited about the ADA sidewalks the curb ramps the bulb outs the race medians crosswalks and the traffic signal modifications and the bike lanes i think they're going to be changes that are hopefully welcome and used by our community members and i want to thank again the neighborhood leaders that were involved in this and our staff for pursuing this project and three years later here we are finally discussing it at the council level and so thank you very much for your support

Valerie AmezcuaItem 12

and for your help and i'll make a motion to move the item i'll second the comment um nabila thank Thank you to you and your staff. I know we had a conversation about the ball belts, I think they're called. I'm not a fan, but I hear you're going to make them look really, really pretty and put nice flowers and trees and things of that nature because somebody's going to run into them. I just hope it's not me. I know they're meant to slow traffic down, and I just see the problems on Main Street with them. So thank you, and I want to let the active city manager know

Valerie AmezcuaItem 12

that you said you were going to make them pretty and flowers and trees there so thank you very much appreciate it let's vote please the vote is seven ayes no nays motion carries

Jennifer L. HallItem 12

The next item is item number 21.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 12

Thank you very much. I pulled this item. I just have a quick question. And I read everything, but I just for those watching and for information, who would come up? This would be?

Alvaro NuñezItem 12

It'll be Nabil. Nabil? I just have a quick question.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 21

Thank you, Nabil, for coming up. It says the City of Irvine shall provide the city a 1.1% fair share of funding for Flower Street at Segerstrom Avenue and a 1.1% fair share of funding for Flower Street and MacArthur Boulevard. There's no fiscal impact to us here in the City of Santa Ana, but could you tell me the amount, please, of what Irvine will be paying?

The estimated amount at this point of time is, let me get it, For one of the intersection is $37,000 and for the intersection Flower and MacArthur will be-

Valerie AmezcuaItem 21

I'm sorry, can you say the amount again?

$37,000 for the intersection of Flower and Segristrom and $45,000 for the improvement for the intersection of Flower and MacArthur. And those are estimated, as you mentioned, as 1% of the cost of the improvements.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 21

And what is the total cost?

For the first intersection is $3.4 million, and the second one is $4.5 million, today's dollar.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 21

Thank you. I have no other questions. I just wanted to know what Irvine was paying, and I really appreciate you answering my questions. Sure. Anybody else have any questions related to this project? Yeah. Go ahead, Council Member Serra.

Phil BacerraItem 21

Thank you, Mayor. Mayor, I also ask for this item to be pulled. So the city of Irvine is requesting an amendment to the MPAH so that they can reclassify Red Hill between MacArthur and Main Street from a major six-lane highway to a four-lane, or I'm sorry, primary four-lane arterial. So as the Mayor and you've already discussed, so the two intersections that would be impacted with this alternative if they decided not to go forward with it would be, let's see, Flower-McArthur and Flower-Segastrom. So on Flower and MacArthur, they would want to add an eastbound right turn lane.

Phil BacerraItem 21

And then at Flower and Segastrom, they would want to add a westbound right turn lane. So the first mitigation would essentially take out two homes at the southwest corner of Flower and MacArthur so that they could, in Irvine, not widen the street or widen it either way. But the point is that the two intersections that are impacted by a project a mile and a half away are in our city, and they would take out two of our existing single-family homes.

Phil BacerraItem 21

That's just one mitigation. Then the second mitigation is for Flower and Sagerstrom. And that mitigation shows that you would have to create this right turn lane that would go over a railroad track and a county flood control channel. And we know how easy it is to do projects with the county flood control folks, right? right? So that's the two mitigations that they're proposing in their study. And then on top of it, in the study, just, and I know you didn't give us the full study, it's just select pages of it, they don't even know what intersection is in which city.

Phil BacerraItem 21

They called out Flower and MacArthur as being in the city of Costa Mesa.

Right. I know, I saw that in the analysis, but it is in Santa Ana.

Phil BacerraItem 21

Oh, no, I'm pretty sure it's in Santa Ana. I know that. I just don't think that the consultants do which gives me some pause because they're proposing mitigations To me I could be wrong, but it looks like it's been done sight unseen They don't realize what they're proposing and then for us to say well it may or may not happen But I'm gonna go ahead and approve this mitigation I want to work with Irvine and I want to come up with a way to help them do what they're trying to do along LONG RED HILL, BUT I'M NOT GOING TO DO IT BY SACRIFICING TWO EXISTING SINGLE FAMILY HOMES. I'M JUST NOT.

Phil BacerraItem 21

SO WHAT I'M GOING TO MOVE TO HAVE HAPPEN IS TO CONTINUE THIS ITEM, TO HAVE YOU GO BACK TO IRVINE AND THE CONSULTANTS AND TALK ABOUT HOW THESE MITIGATIONS CAN BE AMENDED, BECAUSE I CAN'T SIT HERE AND APPROVE THIS WHEN WE'RE TALKING ABOUT IMPACTING TWO EXISTING SINGLE family homes that are a mile and a half away from this small stretch of uh rope in irvine so my motion is to go ahead and um table this item until staff's ready to come back with um amendments to these mitigations i'll second it oh go ahead councilman palace no just i'll second

Valerie AmezcuaItem 21

and i'd like you to ask everyone for some more money

Valerie AmezcuaItem 21

All right. Let's take a vote, please, if there's no other comments.

Jennifer L. HallItem 21

A motion by Councilmember Becerra, seconded by Councilmember Panaloza to table item number 20, I'm sorry, 21, and have staff work with OCTA and Irvine related to amending the mitigation measures.

Jennifer L. HallItem 21

COUNCILMEMBER HERNANDEZ?

Jennifer L. HallItem 21

THE VOTE IS 6 AYES, 1 RECUSAL BY MAYOR POTEMP-FAN. MOTION CARRIES. ITEM IS TABLED.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 21

THANK YOU. WE'RE GOING TO GO TO ITEM 22. I PULLED THAT ONE. And Bill, I just have a really quick question.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 22

Maybe Council Member Becerra is going to jump on this one. Bill for item 22, can you come up please?

Is that okay, Mr. Soudavandri?

Valerie AmezcuaItem 22

So in here it says the scope of work includes installing a 2,000 gallon diesel and then you're removing the existing 4,000 gallon. Can you tell me why we're going from 4 to 2?

Valerie AmezcuaItem 22

Sure, it's on item 22.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 22

How does that benefit our community?

The scope of the work is really to remove-I'm sorry? The scope of the work is to remove existing underground tanks that are in our fire station being used by OCT, Orange County Fire Authority, and rebuild those tanks, diesel tanks, above ground and do away with the leaking tanks that we have underground right now. now. Well, actually, it does benefit the groundwater because leaking tanks are bad news for groundwater and it's to our benefit to remove all these tanks that are leaking. Did that answer your question?

Valerie AmezcuaItem 22

Right. So I'm asking, we currently have a 4,000 gallon tank, correct? I don't know, Cesar, you want to answer? Thank you, if that's okay. I just want to know, why are we going from 4 to 2,000?

It was based on a request from OCFA and probably the footprint of the tank or the station itself would not allow for a larger tank, higher profile tank.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 22

I see DC Henry behind you. Sir, you want to come up? I'm just asking to make sure we have enough, right? So I want to be clear there.

Yes, ma'am. So I believe the scope of work is to remove a gasoline tank as well as a diesel tank, because there's two at that station.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 22

Okay.

And we've decided that we don't need a gasoline tank or tank there, just a diesel to fill the trucks. So we have a gasoline tank at one of the other stations where our fire prevention people and community ed people fuel up. So I believe that's the case. There's two tanks that we're removing.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 22

Perfect, that answers my question. Thank you so very much. Thank you, that's all I have. Anybody else have any other questions on this item? If not, thank you. Thank you, let's prepare to vote.

Jennifer L. HallItem 22

councilmember Hernandez yes but is six eyes no nays with a temporary absence by councilmember Penaloza motion carries

Jennifer L. HallItem 22

mayor the next item is item number 23 pulled by councilmember Becerra

Phil BacerraItem 22

Thank you. So this item is the amendment to agreement with Protection America to provide security at transportation drop-off and pickup locations used for the Santa Ana Navigation Center guests. So who would this be? Would this be Director Garcia?

Alvaro NuñezItem 23

Mike Garcia, yes, correctly.

Phil BacerraItem 23

So the front page of the staff report states the security guard is placed at the shuttle location 12 hours a day six days a week to engage with clients disembarking slash awaiting app excuse me awaiting the navigation center shuttle and ensure that these clients do not loiter engage in criminal activity or cause issues or concerns for surrounding businesses so where is this shuttle location because the staff report is it deliberately ambiguous or where is this location that they would be servicing other than the navigation center.

So it's also servicing the bus stop that serves bus line 59, which is in front of Sonesta Suites, which is at the northwest corner of Dyer and Redhill, 2600 Redhill in Santa Ana.

Phil BacerraItem 23

The reason I'm asking is because, again, the report was ambiguous, but also, too, we received communication in regards to the security at the Santa Ana train station. I just want to clarify because, yes, it is important to have security at the train station, but I want to make sure this contract does not cover the security at the Santa Ana train station.

It does not cover that anymore. They are now strictly working at this and that's the suites.

Phil BacerraItem 23

And it wouldn't need to cover the train station because we're not transporting folks from the navigation center over to the train station, correct? Okay, great. That's all I have. Thank you. With that, I will go ahead and move the item.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 23

is there a second a second thank you that's required to vote

Jennifer L. HallItem 23

mayor pro tem is a yes i heard her say thank you and the vote is six eyes no nays with a absence by okay councilmember penaloza just recorded a yes vote vote is seven eyes no nays motion carries mayor the next item is a comment by councilmember hernandez on item 24. thank you thank you madam

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 23

mayor and our clerk i just wanted to pull this item because today we approved a contract with patrol solutions llc for event security services at city events to update the rates and amend compensation terms from annual amounts to not to exceed 450,000 for the entirety of the agreement this is going to ensure that the city of Santa Ana events that we have many of which are loved by the residents whether it be the summer concert series mid-autumn festival movies in the park Juneteenth Chicano Heritage Festival 4th of July I would just wanted to share on the record

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 24

I know last year we had some events where we we paid overtime to have police and law enforcement There I think that the role of having our law enforcement at these city events is important But with deterring traffic with ensuring that exits and entrances that that presence is is is very very much visible But having this contract that we just approved we increased it. I just want it to be on the record I'd like for us to ensure that we're utilizing our security guards. We just approve a contract so that way if we have a city event where we need an abundance of security on the ground,

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 24

this contract should help us fulfill that need so that we can be more fiscally responsible when it comes to spending our monies on overtime. Just wanted to be on the record about that. Thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

Madam Clerk, I'd like to make a comment since this item was pulled just for a comment. I'm supportive of the item, but I don't want to mistake the two. At the Chicano event, there was a stabbing and multiple fights, and we do need police presence. And so it's very important that we have police presence on top of the security, in my opinion, because security may not be able to handle some of the situations that our police department can. can and so although I do support the item I also do support our Santa Ana officers being present

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

to keep our community safe those are all the comments I have thank you mayor if I may go ahead

Phil BacerraItem 24

council member sir thank you I just kind of want to echo some of what you just said I don't want to pun intended handcuff our cops when it comes to how they determine how to keep an area safe or keep an event safe. I think this is meant to be something that augments your ability. It's not meant to supplant or replace your presence there. And as the mayor mentioned with the one event, I was under the understanding that officers were asked to stay kind of on the peripheral of the event. And I would ask that if you believe there's a reason to be throughout the event and

Phil BacerraItem 24

not just on the edge of it, I would ask that you go in there so that we don't have a repeat of what happened last year. Those are my comments. Thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

Thank you, Ice. You know, other comments? Let's prepare to vote.

Jessie LopezItem 24

I have my hand up.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

I'm sorry?

Jessie LopezItem 24

I have my hand up.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

Oh, I don't see you. Go ahead.

Yeah.

Jessie LopezItem 24

I just want to state that if, well, this is going to move forward, but that you speak with them because when that incident happened at the park, they did not intervene. It was other community members that stepped up to separate people. and so if we're gonna hand out a contract of almost half a million dollars, then I expect a little bit more. Thank you.

Jennifer L. HallItem 24

Mayor, this item was already approved on the consent calendar.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

Perfect, let's move forward, thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

All right, we're gonna go to the business calendar now. It's the end of the consent calendar. Item number 27.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

Go ahead, Madam City Manager.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

I'M SO SORRY, MR. CITY MANAGER. I WAS LOOKING OVER HERE.

Alvaro NuñezItem 24

THANK YOU, MAYOR, CITY COUNCIL. WE HAVE A PRESENTATION BY THE CITY MANAGER'S OFFICE REGARDING A RESOLUTION OPPOSING THE NEEDLE EXCHANGE PROGRAM. AND PRESENTING FOR US IS OUR GOOD KEN GOMINSKI.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

THANK YOU. GO AHEAD.

Good evening, Council. I'd like to thank you for evaluating this specific item. The city has been engaged with the California Department of Public Health for some time.

Before I retired from the Santa Ana Police Department, I had personal involvement and engagement with Orange County Needle Exchange Program as it operated within the Civic Center. I personally picked up many, many needles. I personally observed many, many needles. I observed that OCNEP operated a program that was flawed and had many, many issues that presented themselves to our community.

The city of Santa Ana, the county of Orange, worked very diligently to have OCNEP stop these practices.

Subsequently, the Harm Reduction Institute began operating on 4th Street within the City of Santa Ana. Through diligent efforts, through code enforcement and our city attorney's office, it was determined that HRI then did not have a business license or a certificate of occupancy, and they eventually HRI HAD TO CLOSE. OF INTEREST IS WHAT BROUGHT HRI TO OUR ATTENTION AS A CITY WAS THE COMPLAINTS FROM THE RESIDENTS AND BUSINESS OWNERS SURROUNDING HRI OF INCREASED

NEEDLE DEBRIS, CONGREGATION OF INDIVIDUALS UTILIZING NARCOTICS AND BLATANT AND OPEN NARCOTICS USE IN AND AROUND THE LOCATION THAT HRI WAS OPERATING.

After HRI closed, they then came back and requested again through the California Department of Public Health that they now wanted to operate a full syringe services program, SSPs or SEPs, syringe exchange programs. Personally, I look at them as syringe distribution programs because in the application, most of us would consider an exchange to be a one-for-one.

However, this is not the case.

HRI believes that if a person shows up on a needs basis, they can request as many needles as they want. want, and HRI will provide those needles.

No questions asked. We heard today some absolutely fantastic community members. My favorite was the young girl who talked about her fears, who talked about experiencing needle debris. She was brave to show up today. She was brave to stand up for something that she thought was right. She was brave to have her voice heard.

The California Department of Public Health approved HRI last year against the city of Santa Ana's strenuous opposition. opposition.

However, our legal team found that they had not engaged in meaningful dialogue, which they are required to in the legislation. Therefore they rescinded that approval, and now we find ourselves again having HRI, having asked the California Department of Public Health to establish a syringe exchange program within the city of Santa Ana. We are working with the California Department of Public Health to establish dates where they will come down and meet with our

executive directors, our police chief, and you as elected officials. You will be notified when those dates are so we can schedule them appropriately. Following Following those meetings, the California Department of Public Health will open up a comment period for 45 days. The city encourages all residents, whether you think that syringe distribution in the city is a good idea or a bad idea, the city encourages everybody to take their opportunity and respond to the California Department of Public Health to have your voices be

heard and to ensure that our voices from the residents and the business owners and the stakeholders that live work and die within the city of Santa Ana are represented and not the many many people from across the country from across the the state from across other counties that think this is what we need in our city.

Your voices must be heard.

Today's action by the Santa Ana City Council will in fact again affirm not only to our residents and stakeholders, not only to the county of Orange, which also strongly opposes this. but it will reaffirm to the state of California that the residents of the city of Santa Ana do not want need or desire this service within our

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

jurisdiction thank you so thank you before I open it up I'm going to make some comments I just want to say that on April 6 we had a neighborhood Association meeting and thank you to the city staff that were present as well as Councilman Becerra and Councilman Penalosa and in that meeting the neighborhood leaders came out as well as other neighbors and expressed their concerns and the fact that they do not want the needle exchange in my hand to give to the city managers eight pages of signatures from leaders elected officials and leaders in the community so I'll leave that with you as well also I have

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

A letter of opposition from the Orange County Firefighters Association. From the Orange County Sheriff's Department, who not only sent us a letter of opposition, but he's also forwarding to the governor's office. From SEIU.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

From the mayor of Tustin, the mayor of Mission Viejo, because I sent an email, a letter to every mayor in Orange County asking for a letter of support for opposition. Letter from San Clemente mayor. We have Fountain Valley coming in, Mission Viejo, Yorba Linda, Newport Beach, Supervisor Sarmiento, Chair Wagner, also Southwest Carpenters, Orange County Labor Federation, Laborers Local 652. The list goes on and on and on. And I want to thank the city staff, Commander Andrade and all those that were there, Mike

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

Garcia to give a presentation because this is not something that we want in our community, I think. Ken, you made it very clear. We do not want that here. I just want to share what Commander Andrade did a phenomenal job on his presentation. And one of the stats that he put in information, because this is what HRI is using, you know, intravenous drug users right so this is very important Orange County has a population of 3.3 million and Santa Ana has a documented population of 300 in May 109 thousand people therefore 17 ID you related HIV cases in Orange County

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

actually equates to 0.0005% of the population. That's correct. 0.005 of the population, but yet they have chosen to come to Santa Ana because we have the highest rate. And so people have made comments that we're using fear tactics or you know we're misleading or we are not supportive of people who have addiction. I have family members who have addiction problems. I have some that are in prison that have a long history of addiction issues.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

I personally am not going to hand them a needle to use because then I'm saying it's okay. Go ahead and use and let me just tell you where you could go score too. I think Suzanna made it very clear and so So as the mayor of this city and as a resident, my family's here, my nieces, my nephews, my father, and everybody who spoke, you know, we cannot have this back in our city. And I'm so happy to see that the residents have stepped up. They're writing letters to the governors. We have all these people who are supporting us and all these groups.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

And you guys have done a phenomenal job addressing us, and the city attorney's office has done great. Thank you very much. And, Tamara, you were with us that Saturday. and we really appreciate it and it's really about the community the community is speaking very loud mr city manager very loud there's a small percentage that is not and i'm not using fear tactics and it's not for optics it's the right thing to do we are the county seat and as i said in that in that forum but we get nothing for it other than we're the county seat rah rah we get

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

a cookie we're the county seat but we get all these programs and we do a lot for our community we we do the best job in the county if not the state with housing i know people come in and talk about housing what have we met and exceeded by 2400 percent of housing right so we have two shelters in our city we have social services here we have probation here we have parole here we have So we're living homes. We have sex offender homes. I think the list can go on and on.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

We do not need HRI coming here and dropping 300,000 needles in our community and only picking up 180, they think, and leaving 120 in our community. Did I get those numbers right, Council Member Becerra? Did I flip them? So, I mean, think about that. They're going to pick up 180 and they're going to drop them only where you tell them you live. So if I live in the corner of go right, go left, that's where they're going to drop off the needle. And if I sleep on the corner of east and west, that's where they're going to drop it off. So I just really want to thank you guys for all of the work that you are doing.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

I want to thank all the mayors throughout the county who have sent in letters. I want to thank all of my labor brothers and sisters. I want to thank POA, the commanders, the PMA. I mean, I think I haven't been sitting here that long, but some of you have been here a long time. when have you ever seen PMA and POA together together it's historical so on the same issue that we do not want the needle exchange the fire departments made it very clear when we have people in our community like Dale who comes up to say you know they had containers full of needles

Valerie AmezcuaItem 24

and the cost Mr. City Manager to hire a company to pick up needles would be over a million dollars correct so we we cannot afford this and we don't want this so those are my comments and if you'd like to speak as council members please push your button so I can call on you anybody I don't see it here I apologize let me start with you councilman Vasquez man can you check it's not working thank you I want to

Benjamin VazquezItem 24

thank all the speakers who came out and spoke for this resolution Santa Anna rose up and it was a resounding no to the needle needle distribution I want to thank all the staff for pushing back and fighting the state to push us upon us you've been fighting for a long time and I appreciate your work across various departments it's been a united front here in Santa Ana this program has not served us it has not service in the past instead it created more victims victims of us, of Santa Neros. And for this, I will vote in favor of this resolution. Thank you.

Phil BacerraItem 24

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I want to begin by thanking everybody who took the time to express to this council their concerns about the detrimental impacts that this proposed needle distribution program will have on our community. From all the residents, whether they showed up here tonight or signed petitions, to our firefighters and their union, Local 3631, to our police officers and their unions, POA and PMA, along with SEIU, who represents our other city employees, our vital city employees, who have been impacted by past needle programs. because our city's concerns are not coming from a fear of the unknown.

Phil BacerraItem 24

Unfortunately, our city's concerns are coming from the actual experience trauma caused by a program that previously operated in the heart of our city that left over 250,000 needles in our libraries, in our parks, and on our sidewalks and streets. The current proposal is worse than the previous version. They are proposing a mobile distribution of needles where they admit in their own application that they will not pick up a hundred and twenty thousand needles of the three hundred thousand that they plan to distribute throughout Santa Ana a hundred and twenty thousand needles

Phil BacerraItem 27

you can get pricked with one they're gonna do it a hundred and twenty thousand times that this group calls themselves a harm reduction Institute what a misleading name they're not reducing harm in Santa Ana instead Instead, they're increasing harm in Santa Ana. They should change their name. It's not harm reduction. They're harm increasing. If this program were to operate in Santa Ana, its harm would spread beyond our city limits. The needles distributed here would find their way throughout the cities of Orange County. That's why it's important that residents, elected leaders, and stakeholders, not just

Phil BacerraItem 27

here in Santa Ana, but throughout Orange County, join Santa Ana in opposing this dangerous proposal. The resolution before us tonight is an important statement of how the county seat, the capital of Orange County, is ready to stand up and be a leader and protect not only Santa Ana, but Orange County, the county that its founders helped create 135 years ago. Thank you, Madam Mayor.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

Thank you. Anybody else want to speak up?

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

Pastor Hernandez?

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

Yeah, sure. Sure. Are you not able to see the request? I can't see it. No worries. I'm going to keep my comments brief. As a council member representing Ward 5, the needle exchange program originally took place in my district at a time where I was not the elected official. I have heard the concerns loud and clear from my neighbors in Washington Square, in the Willard neighborhood, in Artisa Pilad, in the Flower Park neighborhood. neighborhood. And today our council will take a unified stance on addressing public health and keeping our residents safe in their parks and in any city-owned amenity. So this program

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 27

is very much the intent, I believe, was supposed to address the long-lasting struggles that we've had in our city related to addiction, related to people experiencing homelessness. I'm very concerned that what was being presented to us is not going to accomplish the goal that we have of addressing addiction, substance abuse disorders in a dignified manner. That is why I'm supporting city staff's opposition to the needle exchange program. That's the end of my comments. Thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

Thank you. Council Member Lopez.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Thank you. Thank you, Ken, for that presentation. I think you touched about something important, right, that this is not new work to the city. This is something that staff has been working on that, you know, precedes this council. And unfortunately, last year we had to go through this process. And I want to thank staff for all the work that they've done. And I learned about it in early May last year through Supervisor Sarmiento. And at the time, Chief Valentin and the former city manager, Ridge, they opposed this as well. And so ever since then, and I remember the city releasing a press release at the time

Jessie LopezItem 27

to notify our residents, and the supervisor helped draft a link so that residents of our city could easily just click on it and send an email. So I want to thank him for his efforts as well. and ever since then it seems like this ball has been rolling and I want to thank staff for taking the leadership position that you have in attendance various community meetings drafting letters on behalf of the council answering questions from the community and for me when I when I first read this application it was not clear how they plan to collect or track the things that that they were going to distribute.

Jessie LopezItem 27

And that was a serious concern.

Jessie LopezItem 27

Because I think of the demographics of our city and the history that we have with the implementation of the program. And people know that I do a lot of work in the creek. And when we start our creek cleanups, we establish a safety process or procedure because these are things that have been found in the area in the past. And so like many other communities, to me the most important thing is that we seek a tranquil and peaceful life where our voices will be equally considered.

Jessie LopezItem 27

And I am not an enemy to public health initiatives, science or evidence-based data, but I believe that our families are the backbone of our society and particularly this county. they do the work that other people cannot or will not and it is imperative for me that they are taken into consideration and when basic questions around their application cannot be addressed that's a serious concern that nobody here can ignore and I know nobody from our staff can ignore either and so that being said you know this to me is a systemic issue because of how the way

Jessie LopezItem 27

this county has really sidelined our residents in the city for many years and we know that this would not be allowed to operate in any other city in this county and for those reasons you know that is why there's been so much i think attention brought to this issue from different people up here and from staff members and i want our staff to work with the county's health officer AS IT HAS BEEN OFFERED TO US. BECAUSE I THINK THAT LINE OF COMMUNICATION SHOULD ALWAYS REMAIN OPEN. I ENCOURAGE RESIDENTS TO GET INVOLVED. I KNOW THAT THE CMO'S OFFICE IS GOING TO BE PROVIDING TEMPLATE LETTERS. SO THANK YOU FOR AGAIN

Jessie LopezItem 27

GOING ABOVE AND BEYOND CREATING THAT EXTRA WORK THAT YOU DON'T HAVE TO. GO AHEAD.

Alvaro NuñezItem 27

JUST SO YOU KNOW, COUNCIL MEMBER, THE TEMPLATE LETTERS ARE ALREADY IN THE CITY WEBSITE. BOTH AS A PETITION AND A SAMPLE letter as well as the information who direct those letters to perfect thank

Jessie LopezItem 27

you I really appreciate it and I also just in closing I want to thank the Board of Supervisors they passed a resolution last year right in May of last year when we first learned about this so it's very it's a new thing that we feel supported by the county of supervisors and I see you laughing because I know you know it's true and I want to thank the supervisor I really want to thank the delegation for getting involved and finally i want to thank sciu local 3631 the carpenters and chief rodriguez i know that you've been very informative whatever

Jessie LopezItem 27

we requested data wise you've put your office has provided and i appreciate that and again to all of you that help carry this work on an everyday basis that are not at the front lines or often highlighted in on social media i just want to thank you council panelosa thank you mayor i i first off

David PenalozaItem 27

want to to thank everybody that came out today to speak in support of this resolution unfortunately this isn't anything new and this is something that we've had to do multiple times in the city we keep having to fight this battle i don't know why but but it just it seems that we have to do it every year I want to thank every single representative that came out today to speak every neighbor and members of our city staff that have been working tirelessly over the last couple of years to to put this resolution together and

David PenalozaItem 27

and as well as our mayor one of the the things that is stated by the harm reduction institute is that they hope to have a 60 recovery rate of their needles that is a d as the mayor said it there would still be 120 000 discarded needles left in our streets and i'm just going to say it shame on the harm reduction institute and shame on the executive Executive Director Carol Newark, who can't even manage and take the time to show up today.

David PenalozaItem 27

She goes on Twitter, she goes on Instagram, berates Santa Ana residents, berates the city, and causes enemies. Well, if protecting my residents, our parks, our neighborhoods, and our kids makes me an enemy, then I'm your worst nightmare, and I'll happily be it. it. So please continue the fight, Santa Ana residents. We are relying on all of you to stand up and fight for our city. With that, I will happily support this resolution.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

Thank you, Councilman Pan. Mayor Peralta.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

Thank you, Mayor. Thank you to staff as well as all the public speakers. You know, I try really hard whenever we're making decisions regarding policies to focus on facts, the data, think about them, weigh them, and the facts and data just isn't here to support this type of program. Number one, they say that Santa Ana has the highest rate of HIV and AIDS infections in the county, okay, but when they break it down, right, in Orange County, the transmission of AIDS and HIV, only 6.6% is transmitted through needles.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

So you're looking at 93.4%, I'm sorry, I can't do math, I'm an attorney, is from other sources. So why are they not reducing harm by addressing the 90% that is getting HIV and AIDS? And how is this happening? It's a sexually transmitted disease. We have facts. the county has done research it shows us that in this case maybe sex education condoms prep all these other options are available to educate our community and to provide for those who need it to ensure that this is not passed along

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

except they want to do a needle exchange program in a community that does not want it and I think councilman Penielosa you mentioned like why is it that we We have to fight for this every year. You know what? I'm just going to come out and say it. It's because they think it's easy to pick on a working class community of color. They think it's easy to demand to put a program here by folks who don't live here, have nothing to do with this community, don't have to go to the parks, schools, and live at home here every single day because they think we're not going to show up and fight.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

They think we're not going to bother to say anything because we're busy working two jobs, because we have to speak multiple languages and translate for our parents and you know do all the things we need to do to get by. They think that they can just force us to do this but I think what we've seen in Santa Ana is that it's not so easy to bully us and to force us to have programs that's gonna benefit other cities. And you know again let's talk about facts right. Drug and alcohol deaths between 2018 and 2020 this is also from ochealthinfo.com

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

we have zip codes in costa mesa fountain valley hundon beach garden grove san juan capistrano dana point and lake forest fullerton all with higher rates than most of the city of santa ana why do they pick on santa ana again because they think that a working-class community of of immigrants are not gonna show up and fight this. And I'm really supportive and excited that this is not just an issue that is this council, it's not an issue of a few members of staff, it's an issue that our county government supports and fights. I mean, when has the county ever been in support of the city of Santa Ana?

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

And here we have a supervisor who said, "'You know what? "'This matters.'" And we have our state and federal representatives who said, this is not okay. hey, you cannot continue to pick on the city of Santa Ana, and they've done it for years, for decades. They decided to put more homeless shelters here than anywhere else. They decided to open cold-weather shelters when we knew that we had space for our own residents. They said that there's only going to be 500 people in the entire county that's going to be served by this program for 300,000 needles. That's a lot of freaking needles for 500 people, right? That's 600 needles a year.

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

for 500 and as a reminder only 50% of those who are houses in or in Santa Ana actually come from Santa Ana so you're again demanding that the lowest income community the community with the highest percentage of people of color bear the burden for the rest of the county who refuses to step up who refuses to put you know skin in the game who refuses to do the right thing by their community members and so with that i'm so supportive of this resolution because it's just not okay and i'm so glad it's it's time that we fight this and you know all of us here

Thai Viet PhanItem 27

are state and federal lobbyists they're gonna have to do their jobs and i look forward to the state having conferences with us and actually consulting with us because i'd love for them to see or I'd love for them to show us how they're getting to the public safety numbers who's the expert on their staff who's gonna tell us that they know Santa Ana public safety issues better than our residents and our staff members

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

and the members of this council thank you thank you mayor Pro Tem um can I believe they have to have meaningful conversation correct or meaningful communication meaningful consultation meaningful consultation so they want to to meet with city staff the police chief city manager only mr. city manager I think Ken had talked about a 45-day window for the community to be involved and I know at the town hall the community was very specific to say and I'm sure people tonight would agree that they want to have an in-person meeting

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

with HRI if they that's it's meaningful correct so so for us and like we said

Alvaro NuñezItem 27

at the meeting on Saturday. So there's two formal and informal aspects to address this. The city is in discussions, in fact city staff, both Tamara and Ken from the city spoke already to the Department of Public Health on October 15th to discuss and request more dialogue. And that's exactly the issue. How do we define minimal consultation? We feel that has to be person to person, live. that means the state of California in Sacramento has to come to our residencies here so to intend that we maximize and open that dialogue that's

Alvaro NuñezItem 27

the key component we obviously want to make sure that local law enforcement and public health officials are involved because that's the requirement of legislative action but more importantly to make sure that executive directors City Council members mayors also impacted not just from Santa Ana right but the Orange County Supervisors Office and of course our residents are so involved so we are very diligently adamantly requesting more face-to-face

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

meetings here in our city and thank you and I'll go back to say that I understand they were here last year when I was the first elected and we pushed back city did I did we all did right and so supervisor did and again I'll hand you these letters and you know whether it's supervisor Foley supervisor Supervisor Sarmiento, Chairman Wagner, and Sheriff Barnes is also here, so please include him in meaningful conversation if they come to town, because it's very important, because it's not just, as you indicated, it's not going to just affect Santa Ana.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

And then all the mayors that are writing letters of support because everybody understands that if it comes to Santa Ana, which we're not going to allow it, knock on wood, we're all going to wear shirts, right, and say not in Santa Ana anymore. Mikey doesn't live here anymore. more and so we need to make sure that all of the mayor's are aware of that day that we have the meeting the the date so that they can also be present because they are all writing letters of opposition because they know it may start here but it's going to bleed into their cities it's not going to just stay

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

here and so we do not want that and so I really appreciate all the work and I really want to thank you because we have the community town hall town hall on Saturday and on Monday afternoon by 2 p.m. the template letters were up on our on our web page the signatures the template for signatures was up it was all posted there's the email for no needles Santa Ana dot org and so your office really worked hard and followed through at all the city staff and so I want to thank you for that and and with that we are going to it sounds like like Madam City Clerk, if you could do a roll call.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

But before we do that, I'd like to read Section 1, 2, and 3, if you allow me, please. So here is the City Council does hereby resolve as follows. Section 1. The City Manager is hereby directed to take all necessary steps to work with key stakeholders, including City staff, elected officials, and members of the community, community to strenuously oppose HRI's application and provide CDPH during the consultation process the following relevant and material information. 1. Historical and current data, statistics and information demonstrating that HRI's NEP will

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

result in the exposure of an overwhelming number of used, discarded and uncollected syringes and parents syringe litter into the community that will negatively and detrimentally impact the public's health safety and welfare number two the significant financial impact and burden HRIs NEP and the resulting syringe litter will have on city resources including numerous local law enforcement agencies in the county ie Santa Ana PD Orange County sheriffs and all the local

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

surrounding police departments HRIs lack of transparency accountability and trust in the community due to the refusal to work collaboratively with the city please also include the fire department because this will also affect the fire department section 2 the city clerk shall certify to the passage and adoption of this resolution and enter it into the book of original resolutions section 3 the resolution shall take effect immediately immediately upon its adoption

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

by the city council and the city clerk shall attest to and certify the vote adopting this resolution so at this point madam clerk if you can do a roll call please

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

there a motion i make a motion i'll second

Jennifer L. HallItem 27

a motion by mayor mesqua seconded by councilmember penalosa to approve a resolution of the city council of the city of santa ana announcing its strenuous opposition to the establishment of a needle exchange program in the city councilmember becerra absolutely yes councilmember hernandez yes councilmember lopez yes councilmember penalosa yes councilmember vasquez yes Mayor Pro Tempian? Yes. Mayor Meskwa? Yes. Voters 7 ayes, no nays. Motion carries. Great. Thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

Mr. City Manager, thank you very much. And I'll leave all these with you. If you could just share with the council members the letters, please. I appreciate it. Thank you.

Alvaro NuñezItem 27

Thank you, Mayor.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 27

Item number 28 is related to a 45-day moratorium. Mr. City Manager, do we have a presentation?

Alvaro NuñezItem 28

Yes, we do. from the planning building agency at least planning manager percent nor did

his request for a moratorium thank you mayor good evening members of the City Council for discussion this evening is item 28 this is a proposed 45-day moratorium on industrial activities and permitting in the transit zoning code Code area.

The recommended action this evening before the Council is to adopt an urgency interim ordinance by a four-fifths vote. In other terms, this is a moratorium. And the area to be covered by the proposed moratorium is Specific Development Number 84, also known as the Transit Zoning Code. The purpose is to address current and immediate threats to public health, safety, and welfare due to irreconcilable land use conflicts within the area and due to a growing increase in community complaints resulting from recent severe incidents in this planning area for reference the transit zoning code or specific

development number 84 is highlighted in the map on this slide and encompasses about 450 acres in the center city of Santa Ana and 100 blocks of some of the oldest neighborhoods including Lacey and Logan in downtown for background a 45-day moratorium would go into effect immediately if approved by the City Council this evening what it would do is effectively establish a pause on the issuance of permits business licenses certificates of occupancy and other types of permits such as land use entitlements in the transit zoning code area

area. During this 45-day pause, it enables staff to evaluate options for either extending the pause or returning to City Council with permanent recommendations to address the growing health, safety, and welfare issues that are increasing in the transit zoning code area. To do so, to extend the pause or the moratorium, it would require a four-fifths vote of the the City Council as well as a report back from the City Council within 45 days.

For some background on the Transit Zoning Code and sort of how it's led to where we are with tonight's recommendation, in June 2010 the City Council adopted the Transit Zoning Code which created a special plan area for the Center City that encourages the development of mixed-use developments and transit supporting infrastructure to create a multimodal transit neighborhood with mixed-use villages in the center city of Santa Ana. In doing so, in 2010, the City Council adopted general plan amendments to set up new land use designations such as district center and urban neighborhoods that supported that

vision. At that time, the City Council left in place the industrial zoning in the transit zoning code by creating overlays that allowed those industrial land uses to continue in this special plan area. Those overlays with the heavy and light industrial basically allowed those industrial uses in the transit zoning code to continue to operate, build, and expand, even though the general plan going back to the year 2010 was updated to allow mixed-use zoning in this area. So since 2010, a lot of these industrial businesses have remained.

They've also changed ownership and undergone intensifications or expansions. As the transit zoning code has built out with new residential land uses, like projects like Rafferty and Lacey Crossing that we've seen growing in the area, the amount of conflicts between industrial and residential mixed-use land uses has begun to increase and become become more noticeable, as resulting in evidence by growing code enforcement complaints and community complaints in this area. Some of the areas that the community has cited as being impactful are impacts from odors, dust, traffic, noise, vibrations, and other documented impacts.

In 2022, the City Council adopted the Comprehensive General Plan update. date. And at that time, the city was forced to take into account environmental justice policies required by Senate Bill 1000. And thanks to community advocacy and the vision of the city council at the time, the general plan that was adopted, which is in place today, includes 77 actions that are meant to specifically address environmental justice. These actions target topics like air quality, noxious uses, water safety, and residential lead exposure exposure in soil, and other public health conditions that I described earlier.

In furtherance of these goals, the Planning Division established the Neighborhood Initiatives and Environmental Services Section, which has been tracking and monitoring these land use conflicts in the most impacted neighborhoods, such as Lacey and Logan. As part of this action to create the NIS Section, Environmental Justice Action Committee has has been created and actually recently had its first kickoff meetings. But more importantly, the NIS section of planning has been helping collaborate with outside agencies such as the county and Orange County Fire, Southern California Air Quality Management

District and other outside agencies that are tasked with tracking industrial uses and their own permitting and evaluating how they're affecting quality of life and contributing to environmental harm in this area. area. Regarding code enforcement, in the past nine months alone, code enforcement has investigated 33 commercial and industrial properties in the transit zoning code area. These investigations include site visits where staff, not just from code enforcement, but also planning and outside agencies have gone to specific industrial sites to investigate community complaints.

complaints. We've also been joined by partners from outside agencies like Southern California Air Quality Management District as well as the Orange County Fire Authority. There are 17 active open cases that have resulted in notices of violation in this code area, and these are dealing with topics like illegal storage, land use violations, zoning, property maintenance, unpermitted work, business license and certificate of occupancy issues that all stem from impacts that have created impacts in the fields of odors, dust, traffic noise, vibrations,

and other impacts mentioned earlier. As an example of like a zoning violation, this includes when a business, for example, has a conditional use permit and is operating outside the scope of what the planning commission originally approved. The close proximity of these active industrial cases during a short period is leading to a public nuisance situation that's harming public public health and safety and general welfare of residential neighborhoods, both existing and new, that are stemming again from this concentration of code enforcement cases in the surrounding vicinity.

So how this fits into where we're at today, in October of last year, the city council approved a contract with MIG, a reputable consulting firm that is assisting the city with its comprehensive zoning code update. And MIG and city staff have already conducted extensive interviews with stakeholders such as members of the City Council and the Planning Commission to learn more about topics of importance to these bodies as well as community members and important stakeholders in the city and even at this stage so early on in the zoning code update process it's become

extremely evident that these land use conflicts in the transit zoning code are requiring immediate addressing due to the exigent circumstances and failure to to immediately address these land use conflicts that is the target of this proposed moratorium will further exacerbate the demographic and environmental justice challenges that these neighborhoods in the transit zoning code such as Lacey and Logan have grappled with since their founding, which often predates the practice of zoning even as we know it today.

Based on a CEQA review as well, this effort if adopted by the city council tonight would not be subject to CEQA or further CEQA analysis pursuant to sections 15060C2 and 15060C3 because they're not projects that would result in any new physical damage or physical changes to the environment. And so if approved this evening, a notice of exemption would be filed and there's no fiscal impact associated with the action tonight. So based on this information and background, staff is recommending that the City Council Council adopt the urgency interim ordinance for the 45-day moratorium as stated in the

recommendation and find that it's not subject to CEQA or further CEQA review as stated on the slide. I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have this evening. Thank you. CHAIRMAN BRYANT LISERSON.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

Thank you very much. Councillor Becerra. Councillor Becerra. Councillor Becerra. CHAIRMAN BRYANT LISERSON.

Phil BacerraItem 28

Thank you, Madam Mayor. And, Ali, thank you for the presentation and thank you, staff, for bringing this item forward. Also, thank you to the residents of the Logan and Lacey neighborhoods, especially Sam Romero, Joe Andrade, Michael Andrade, and your family, for your tenacious vigilance in defense of the residents in your neighborhood. THE RESIDENTS OF THESE NEIGHBORHOODS HAVE BEEN EXPERIENCING A GROWING AMOUNT OF CODE ENFORCEMENT VIOLATIONS FROM THESE NON-RESIDENTIAL USES THAT ARE IN CONFLICT WITH THE EXISTING RESIDENTIAL PROPERTIES, AS ALI MENTIONED, THAT HAVE BEEN THERE LONG BEFORE THESE NON-COMMERCIAL

Phil BacerraItem 28

USES AND I LIKE THAT, ALI, LONG BEFORE EVEN ZONING. I MEAN, LONG BEFORE ZONING. SO OUR COUNCIL ADOPTED A GENERAL PLAN UPDATE THAT PRIORITIZED ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE AND and taking actions to implement tools that address the public nuisances caused by some of these industrial businesses that are harming the public health, safety, and general welfare of the residents of these neighborhoods. I support this urgency interim ordinance so that we can immediately protect the public health, safety, and welfare of the residents of the Logan and Lacey neighborhoods from these conflicting non-residential land uses

Phil BacerraItem 28

and give our staff the opportunity to prepare the necessary policies to address these issues and limit the ability of these non-residential uses to proliferate through the Logan and Lacey neighborhoods. So with that, I'll go ahead and make a motion to adopt an urgency ordinance pursuant to California Government Code Section 65858A, adopting a 45-day moratorium on the approval, commencement, establishment relocation or expansion of industrial industrial uses within specific development number 84 zoning district and find that in accordance with CEQA that the proposed action is not subject to the requirements of CEQA

Phil BacerraItem 28

that's also second your motion second day go ahead Thank You mayor I just want

David PenalozaItem 28

to before I think staff for all the work they've done I had to give a shout out to the family for their years and years and decades actually of advocacy for this neighborhood as well as as every other resident that has spoke up it's been years years and years and years way before i was even on the the council uh way before any of us were on the council way before staff was even here and ali you said it best that this has been an ongoing never-ending problem in these neighborhoods and i know that back in 2020 when this general plan was getting was moving up you know through through the city staff there was

David PenalozaItem 28

an effort by many of my colleagues who none of them are here anymore to approve the general plan and and I knew that there were still many things missing there that would fail to protect neighborhoods like Lacey and Logan so I'm happy that we were able to stall it and happy to be able to move it and and have my colleagues are here now who helped ensure that these protections for these neighborhoods are in the general plan and yet it's not perfect there's still many many things that that we we want to address which is why we're we're moving forward with these with these

David PenalozaItem 28

ordinances that we have been over the last couple of years uh i want to thank uh congressman luke correa as well as our state representatives as back as tom daly and senator omberg and and assembly member valencia who are all aware of the the problems that many of these these different industries are causing in the neighborhood and have in one way or another tried to help in in their capacity to address these various issues the crematorium being one of them i mean it is it is harmful and it is depressing to know that there are residents and there are kids that

David PenalozaItem 28

live among these industries so thank you city staff for working on this uh hopefully this is is just one of many things to come I know that there are many issues that we still need to address I know mr. Andrade calls very often and whether I answer or not just know that your message is related to city staff daily and Alvaro our acting city manager here will not let me lie they they know and and chief chief Rodriguez knows about the numerous, not just the, the, the industry problems that we have in

David PenalozaItem 28

these neighborhoods, but everything from traffic to, to the loitering, the crime that goes on among these areas. So thank you. And I hope us, a code enforcement and city staff is looking into the alcohol consumption on these businesses and the loitering and open drinking that was was mentioned by one of the speakers tonight. So thank you for that. And thank you, Mayor. Councilman Hernandez.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 28

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I want to thank my colleagues. I agree with Councilman Becerra and Peñalosa. This has been a longstanding issue for residents in the Lacey and Logan neighborhood. I want to thank my colleagues who were here on the council when we approved the general plan, as well as our former mayor, Vicente Sarmiento, and now supervisor. I specifically want to thank Councilmember Becerra because we walked the Logan neighborhood I remember when I was first elected Logan was part of my district and I remember that walk vividly where we talked about the crematory being behind residents homes we talked

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 28

about at the time there was two-way streets behind the the railroad and since then it has been a collective effort for us to address those quality of life issues but what we're able to accomplish today in in supporting the urgency interim ordinance is we're going to be protecting disadvantaged neighborhoods neighborhoods like lacey and logan rank at least 90 or higher in heavy air pollution attributed to indicators describing exposures to particulate matter diesel particulate matter air toxics cancer risk toxic

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 28

releases of to air and hazardous water proximity in addition to that residents in the logan neighborhood are also exposed to fire incident and other pollution concerns some of those concerns are as recent as august 29th of 2023 there was a fire that happened at the crematory and this facility this fire lasted for 10 minutes and all of that all of those ashes you know then linger above people's homes the very place where they're supposed to raise their kids have their barbecues um you know that's the quality of life that we're giving our neighbors i don't think so

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 28

but what we're also doing today is we're also uplifting the neighborhoods lacey and logan neighborhoods are more dense than the city as a whole combined population density is 15 531 persons per square mile whereas the cities is 12 471 people per square mile and lastly i just want to touch on how Logan is a historically disadvantaged community. It is the oldest Mexican American neighborhood in Santa Ana. It's one of the oldest neighborhoods that is predominantly

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 28

Mexican in Orange County. Originated as early as 1886, it was largely settled by 1900 before the practice of zoning was enshrined by village of Euclid versus Ambler Reality Co. in 1926. Restrictions and covenants based on race during the first half of the 20th century limited Mexicans and those of Mexican descent to buy land in very few places. One of those places was Logan. There was an all-Mexican school that once existed in Logan.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 28

By the early 1920s, Logan neighborhood comprised of residential, industrial, commercial, related land uses, and issues further exasperated by the rail lines. fuel storage to pots, and the construction of the Santa Ana Freeway between 1947 and 1956, it's time that the Logan neighborhood and the Lacey neighborhood take their community back. Those are my final comments. Thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

Council Member Lopez.

Jessie LopezItem 28

Yes, thank you. I just really want to thank our staff, and I want to thank all the organizations like OCEJ, MPNA, UCI, all of the organizations that I'm not naming right now that are not coming to the top of my head that really pushed for a meaningful general plan. I know that that was not, I know I made staff a little crazy, but we really had a vision of what we wanted, what the safeguards we wanted to see in the general plan, because when we're talking about the Logan and the Lacey neighborhood, these two neighborhoods have experienced over 90%, have been burdened by over 90% of pollution. So just think about that,

Jessie LopezItem 28

how that compounds time and time and time again. And now with the new EPA rulings, regulations, that clearly have verified, right, what so many advocates have talked to and linked about the public health issues living next to industrial uses are now, I think, solidified. And so this is a really great moment for the city. And I wanna thank our staff, our planning department for all the great work that they've done. And I know that, you know, we often talk about the bad businesses, but there are good businesses in the neighborhood too, mom and pop shops that I want you to be mindful of. So thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

Thank you. This is not working. Mayor Pro Tem, did you have anything you want to say? So I'm going to be really brief. Thank you to the city staff. Great job on this. Thank you to the Andrade family and everyone else who came up. And yes, Joe, we do, I do answer your calls, even on Mother's Day. Councilman Penalosa does not, but I do. I just had to remind you that it was Mother's Day, and I needed a break to be with my family. But it's wonderful to see your son Michael here with his family and all the other families that spoke, and your mom and my grandma

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

and my family go way, way back. And so I just want to take a moment that this council, before I came on here you guys passed a general plan back in 2022. um we're now in 24. so mr active city manager i want to thank you and the city staff for bringing this forward today it took two years and you've only been the active city manager i believe 10 days you know the timeline 10 days five hours 60 seconds or something it's 12 working days 12 working days no one's counting but but i

Alvaro NuñezItem 28

I will say this though, it is a very definitive moment as far as-Historical moment. It's a historical moment. We are addressing our historic environmental justice area. We committed to this some time ago. This is a testament to the planning and building staff, our executive director, Maintai, planning, our court enforcement division, not because that's where I came from, but the reality is that we were determined to make this one of our top priorities.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

And that's why I wanted to say this is that it is a historical moment and you've only been here what 12 working days you said I get that right but you knew and your staff everybody knows here what this means and so you know from the month before I was elected you know I should talk to Joe and Sam because I was on the school board right but the moment I got elected I got the phone call okay It's time, got to get to work now. And so I'm glad that they hold me to that and they hold me accountable. And so I really appreciate it that in your few days that you've been here, you and the staff made this a priority.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

This is historical. And I will say that, you know, when Councilor Hernandez mentioned the fire, I got a phone call and when I hung up, I sat there for a minute in my living room and I thought, imagine Imagine if you're barbecuing outside during the fire and what is falling on your food. And I asked Joe one time, Joe really just kind of telling me what's coming out of there. And when he did, I was like, oh gosh, it's awful. I just want to say it's awful. It is so bad. And the fact that it, I'm glad we're doing it today.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

It's historical and it should have been done a long time ago, but I'm very happy that we're doing it today because the families deserve that. They deserve that and so much more. And I know, Joe, your mom is watching from above saying it is about damn time. That's what she's saying. That is what she's saying. It is about damn time and thank you. She might say thank you, but I know she's saying it's about time. and so i don't know who has their phone on but please turn it off and so i just want to say that you know this is a historical moment for the santa ana city council um and for the families that live

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

in logan and lacey and again in the short time that you're here you and emt all the city staff you knew that this was a priority because i know joe calls you as much as he calls me um so i don't know if you pick up your phone but I pick up my phone and so Alvaro doesn't pick up his phone okay am I the only one who picks up the phone I just want to know but no I just really in all seriousness I want to say thank you thank you for the Logan and Lacey families who are pushing this and and I and Joe Joe take a vacation for a few days but let the city staff deal with

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

this now and so to all the city staff that worked on this thank you all very very much because now the I know that it takes time to get things going but now we can get going and the people that live in those that Logan and Lacey can know that they know now and we're gonna do something about it and so active city manager I do want to thank you because when this came up and we had a gender review I was like wow it's a bad damn time and so you made it very clear that it was a priority so thank you with that there's a motion on the floor and

David PenalozaItem 28

there's a second mayor really quick I just wanted to state for the record that

I just called Joe to let him know and he didn't answer don't worry Joe's gonna

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

call me in the morning I know he will he's gonna call me tomorrow and say thank you ma'am thank you but you forgot to mention this so anyways with that again you know to the Andrade family to all the families in Logan and all serious you know the andrade family i know your mom's watching from above and she's very pleased with all this and so um i don't want any more fires at the crematorium that is absolutely just unacceptable unacceptable so um i know we don't want the crematorium i wasn't going to say that so loudly and publicly like you are but we don't want it and um it's just unacceptable so

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

So thank you for making this a priority since you've been here for 12 days. All right. Let's prepare to vote.

Jennifer L. HallItem 28

This is a motion by Councilmember Becerra, seconded by Councilmember Penaloza to adopt an urgency ordinance with the title read into the record by Councilmember Becerra and make the CEQA determination that the proposed action is not subject to the requirements of CEQA.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

Do you want to do a roll call?

Jennifer L. HallItem 28

I have the electronic voting up.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

Is it working? So far.

Jennifer L. HallItem 28

Mayor?

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

I voted.

Jennifer L. HallItem 28

Council Member Lopez?

Jennifer L. HallItem 28

Is that working? Do you want me to voice your vote? Yes. Okay, perfect. The vote is seven ayes, no nays. Motion carries. Urgency ordinance is adopted. Seek a determination.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

Bravo.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 28

Bravo, bravo. This is the end of the business calendar. under next item is item number 29 was requested by councilmember Hernandez councilman Hernandez let me turn it over to you Thank You madam mayor I'd like to

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

thank the residents from our city who came to today's meeting to share their input as well as the residents who emailed the council sharing their support for the Orange County Heritage Council continuing to lead the Juneteenth Festival. Today we are discussing and considering providing direction to our city manager regarding the Santa Ana Juneteenth Festival being led by the Heritage Council. Whereas Juneteenth is the oldest known annual observance commemorating the abolishment of slavery in the United States, it is the oldest African-American holiday in this country. Juneteenth Independence celebrations

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

took place on June 19th, 1865 when Major General Gordon Granger led Union Union soldiers into Galveston, Texas. It was there that Union soldiers delivered the news that the Civil War had ended and enslaved African Americans were free within any state. In 2021, the Orange County Heritage Council brought a Juneteenth Festival to Santa Ana. The event was led independently by their organization. This event pulled permits from the city of Santa Ana and was hosted at Centennial Park. The event brought together educators, businesses, black churches, performers, and Santa Ana families. The event was sponsored by members of the Santa Ana

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

City Council at the time, Santa Ana elected Jesse Lopez, my office of mine, as well as Mayor Vicente Sarmiento. The event was a tremendous success. It brought multiple generations of Santa Ana families together and it highlighted the many contributions to the city from the African-American community. notable contributions such as Helen Marie ship founding the black history parade with her children in 1980 in the beautiful city of Santa Ana off of the rate the off of the intersection of rate and Willits which is now known as black history square we've also created ceremonial

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

street toppers at the original parade route off of Willits that began with her children children, commemorating the memory of Miss Helen Marie Shipp. We also have the notable contributions of Dorothy Mulkey's historic victory for fair housing where she challenged Prop 14. Ed Carruthers two Olympic championships and his fight to ensure that children with disabilities were included. He was one of the members who advocated for the Special Olympics. He spent decades teaching our students at Santa Ana College. He now has a park named after him in Ward 5 at Carruthers Park.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

The City of Santa Ana officially hosted their first Juneteenth Festival in partnership with the Santa Ana-based Orange County Heritage Council in 2022. The event was hosted at Centennial Park and brought together thousands of residents, with performances from legendary groups like the Delfonics, Slum Village, Howard Johnson, and many more. Keynote speakers of the event were residents from the Santa Ana community, such as Santa Ana's first black police officer, first black officer in the County of Orange, Hardin Lambert. The pastor, Daniel Michael Lynham, who was the

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

founder of the Orange County Black Panther Party's chapter. Darlene Futrell with National Action Network, organization founded by Reverend Al Sharpton. The City of Santa Ana subsequently hosted their second annual annual event in partnership with the Heritage Council in 2023. Many of my colleagues attended this festival, some did not. The City of Santa Ana, through hosting the Juneteenth event with the leadership of the Heritage Council, not only brought together the history, the culture, and education, but the presence of families to celebrate Black history was very diverse. It wasn't singular to Black families.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

It included Mexican families. It included our Caucasian brothers and sisters. It included members from the API community, all of which contributed to this Juneteenth celebration. The event included performances of a diverse roster of artists, Talib Kweli, Shirelle, DJ Battlecat, and Santa Ana's own Lighter Shade of Brown and many more. The Juneteenth Festival is a success because the city partnered with the Orange County Heritage Council. The Heritage Council brings 45 years of expertise in creating authentic celebrations for the black community.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

Their knowledge and understanding of Juneteenth cannot be overlooked. They founded the Black History Parade in Santa Ana off of Raitt and Willits in 1980, and it existed in the city of Santa Ana for over 35 years before it was eventually sent to the city of Anaheim. Throughout the two Juneteenth events that we had there were a number of challenges in areas whereas the city could have made improvements and where we could have made much better progress working with new partners in the Heritage Council. Ultimately we had a number of challenges that were

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

very unique to the city. We were the first city in Orange County to host a Juneteenth festival and And with that being said, there were a lot of areas as to where the city could make improvements. When we look at Santa Ana and the Juneteenth Festival, it began on the heels of the black community, leading it independently in 2021. Now, why is that date so important? important because it wasn't until June 15th of 2021 that our Senate unanimously passed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act, establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

It passed through the House of Representatives by a 4-15-14 vote on June 16th. Subsequently, the City of Santa Ana followed suit and we funded a Juneteenth festival. We funded it at $75,000. The second year, we increased that funding and we also increased the amount of people who attended the Juneteenth Festival. Black history should be led by the black community and that is why when you look at the City of Santa Ana's website website I encourage you to type in the search bar Juneteenth. Every single item related to Juneteenth will have the Orange County Heritage Council's stamp

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

on it. Whether it's Barbara Junius sharing the history of Juneteenth in Orange County. A black woman from Huntington Beach who worked collaboratively with Santa Ana's Helen Shipp. Where the Juneteenth celebration started in Orange County was in Huntington Beach. But the collaboration between a woman from Huntington Beach and Santa Ana inspired residents to form their own Juneteenth event in our city. And that is why I am making the request that my colleagues join me in requesting our staff bring back a report on the Juneteenth event. That one commits the city to hosting a Juneteenth event with the

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

Orange County Heritage Council taking on a lead role as the event partner to the celebration. I would also like staff to include an additional second option which is for the city to sponsor the Juneteenth event being led by the Orange County Heritage Council similar to how we have sponsored the OC Pride parade taking place in downtown Santa Ana. That concludes my first round of comments and And I would like to put a motion on the floor for us to direct our city staff to join us and bring in back a report on the Juneteenth event.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

For one, that commits the city to hosting a Juneteenth event with the Heritage Council taking on a lead role of the event as a partner to the celebration. And number two, for us to include a second option, which is for the city to sponsor the Juneteenth Festival being led by the Heritage Council. I'm requesting those options be presented to our city council.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

Thank you, Councilman Hernandez. So, first of all, I want to address a comment that was made earlier that the city manager and the mayor changed things. The mayor does not have any part to do with bids or RFP process. I want to be really clear on that, so I don't know who shared that information, but it is inaccurate and dishonest if somebody said that. The mayor, me. I have no influence on an RFP. I do not engage with city staff on RFPs. I do not tell them what to do when it comes to RFPs. There's only three people that work for this council, city manager, city attorney, and the city clerk.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

So if I give direction or I ask for something, I ask for something, it's only from those three. So I want to be really clear because if somebody told you that the mayor moved this or the the mayor change of that is a lie so with that I also want to ask madam city attorney I see the council members item and and thank you councilmember Hernandez but there's there's no action on here and so we already have a legal binding RFP process so either mr. city manager or madam city attorney somebody please

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

address this we did have a for 2024 an RFP process regarding the Juneteenth festival that process has begun in closed and there has been a contract

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

signed I'm sorry did you say there was a contract sign yes okay Thank You mr. city manager I have no further comments because we are in a legal contract with with an organization. So with that, any other comments? Councilman Vasquez.

Benjamin VazquezItem 29

Yeah, I don't think he called for that. I heard he wanted to report back.

Benjamin VazquezItem 29

I am supportive of our community that came out tonight to speak about this. Moving forward, we should have local control. This is a discussion of, I believe. I am supportive of the Heritage Foundation. foundation we must be sure that a local community supports any entity that wins an RFP for a cultural event event planners must also have a knowledge of local history and culture to make the fest a cultural festival a true Santa Ana event as we as we push off new RFPs new

Benjamin VazquezItem 29

places i want to make sure that we have some kind of rubric that that supports the local folks who know this community to make sure that they're able to present back to our community so they see i'm here of what we do and uh those are my comments thank you thank you councilman lopez yeah i mean

Jessie LopezItem 29

i heard the request for a report i don't think that's harmful and i know that the council members office will or can work with staff to figure out specifically what should be shared out with the full council so that we have a better understanding of how we envision a future event

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

madam mayor just for clarification the direction provided today is it's not touching on the rfp but subsequent to the event that we have this year, this would start a clean slate asking staff to bring us something back so that we can look forward.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

So you're talking forward years you'd like to have, make sure that we're very clear and transparent about the RFP process.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

Absolutely. That's good.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

Okay, perfect. Thank you for clarifying that. Of course. Any other comments? Any other comments? Yeah, go ahead.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

Mr. City Manager, I just have some questions.

Sorry, I have a cough drop.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

So you're, excuse me, Council Member Hernandez, you're saying that this report or this Council Member requested item has nothing to do with the current Juneteenth event that's happening this June 2024?

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

Yes, and given that there are state laws that we have to abide by as it pertains to RFP, we're not able to discuss or provide any direction related to a contract that has already been approved. which is why the the item mentions nothing of an RFP it provides very clear direction that this this would be moving forward into the 2025-2026 fiscal year this would allow us to to be prepared with ample time to not only have a report but to work collaboratively with leaders in the black community specifically the Heritage Council on how we can bring a authentic Juneteenth

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

celebration that the residents and city can be proud of sir you can't engage

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

with the council at this time I'm really sorry I understand that sir but we can't do business like this thank you thank you sir I really appreciate it go ahead

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

mayor for time thank you for that clarification because I it seemed like there was some confusion right a lot of the speakers were talking about this This year's Juneteenth, you've clarified that this item has nothing to do with this year's Juneteenth. So again, there's not been a request by this council to, one, exit any signed contractual agreements with an event producer. Two, I guess I just wanted some clarification because whether or not we go forward with an rfp in the future or not there has been some i think uh confusion about the process and what

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

happened uh mr city manager if you can clarify to me there was some residents who had said or some community members who had said oh they didn't know about this why is it being you know shared with an outside group it's my understanding that before or at least when the rfp went live or even before the RFP went live and available to the public, city staff had communicated specifically with members of OCHC regarding the availability of the RFP?

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

So once the RFP was announced on November 13, there was a communication via email to the organization on November 14. In addition, there were, according to the executive director of Parks and Recreation, and some verbal discussions also with some of the group leaders.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

Group leaders of OCHC?

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

Yes.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

Thank you. And then my other question is, do we know if any members of OCHC or those representing OCHC had access to the RFP?

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

I see Director Scott nodding. No? No.

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

But we can say this again. Again, we did send an email to the formal organization's email. We can attest to that. We can say that we had verbal communications and we can provide that in our update if that's what you want to know. So we had a period of the RFP. We had a closed application process.

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

Fortunately, the organization did not submit an application, so we were not able to evaluate that. That we can tell you textually and factually.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

Thank you. Thank you. And I'm asking these questions because I'm trying to clarify what's happened so that there's no confusion or misunderstanding that this was somehow a process that happened in the dark or that we did not share this information with the community. In fact, OCHC, who has been a partner with us, was given multiple opportunities in advance, even, of an RFP going live. And then once again, while the RFP was live, there was no application submitted, which there was nothing barring any organization from submitting an application and demonstrating their ability to hold a fantastic event.

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

That is correct.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

Thank you. And, you know, I would like to see, I guess I would support a report coming back of what that looks like. But I have to say, you know, for me, one of the things that I've had or we've had to deal with in this city is how do we treat everyone as transparently and on an even playing field as much as possible? In the past, we've, I, and I think many members of this council have had issue with previous members of the council treating their friends, people that they know better than other organizations. We fought that. We dealt with that.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

And then now we have to treat ourselves and our friends the same way. What is the standard? Is there a public application? and how do we ensure that everybody has access and ability to apply for that? Can you confirm with me, or at least from your perspective, we did not prevent anyone from submitting an application who could submit an application?

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

That is correct.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

Okay, thank you. And so with that, you know, I'd be supportive of a report coming back, but one of the things I want to say is I guess I'm not sure what is the criteria that we're going to put in place. we have a partnership program right in the city for Parks and Rec we have a sponsorship program in the city for Parks and Rec and we have a program that allows the City Council to excuse me I think those are the two main ones that we have for Parks and Rec that is formalized and if an organization wants to go through with that they can apply and go through that process too so with

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

With that, I guess I would like to see a report, but I'm not really sure what else there is to say aside from kind of following the formal processes that we've put in place to prevent anyone and everyone from deviating from the rules that we set for ourselves. Thank you.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

So I want to step into that area where Tamara or Laura is going to pull up the red card on us and say we can't have these discussions, right? So the Councilman made a motion for a report for the future. There was no other direction other than a report for the future. We all know the RFP process very clearly up here. We do not and we cannot and should not tell any department you're going to hire this band or that band. There's a process. There's a RFP process, request for proposal.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

So, and you, the city staff, handle those and bring them to us. So we don't, we can't sit up here and play favorites or say, you know, you must look like us. We can't say those things. We can't. .

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

Sir, I understand that. . is a black organization sir i understand that this is black city and we are responsible for what the facts we don't want to recommend our thank you sir um but legally i mean madam city attorney we cannot say i can't say i want somebody to look like me to get that rfp correct can you Can you talk about that, please?

The RFP process should be evaluated on the merits of, you know, what services are being requested and then the proposal setting forth how they're going to provide those services, not taking into account any sort of protected class.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

Thank you for clarifying that because I do not, would hate for us to get into a situation where we're granting an RFP because they look like me. So again, there was a request for a report on the future of Juneteenth for the next fiscal year. And I believe you got a second. Any other comments?

Mayor, if I just may clarify, I apologize. But this is a discussion item, and so typically with the council member generated items, we just hear from any council member that wants to discuss

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

us and we didn't need a motion and I thought that but I just want to correct so do you understand Mr. City Manager we're good yes we do all right good we're going to move on now okay mayor and

David PenalozaItem 29

then I just had a comment too first want to thank the Orange County Heritage Council for coming out I mean you guys do good work however you know it it's hard to deviate from a process and I think I was trying to understand what my colleague, Councilman Hernandez, is requesting with this report and starting a clean slate. But that's what we did last year is we started a clean slate. And because we're awarding tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars, it needs to be a clean process. And an RFP where anybody and everybody has equal access to apply and go through.

David PenalozaItem 29

SO I WOULD JUST HOPE THAT AS WE MOVE FORWARD, WE WORK WITH, WE CONTINUE TO WORK, BECAUSE I KNOW STAFF HAS, WITH EDUCATING THE PUBLIC AND THE VARIOUS NONPROFITS AND GROUPS OF HOW TO GO THROUGH THIS RFP PROCESS SO THAT WE ENSURE THAT THEY HAVE THE AMPLE TIME AND OPPORTUNITY TO APPLY. AND WE DID THAT, RIGHT, ALREADY?

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

AS FAR AS MY REVIEW OF THE PROCESS, YES.

David PenalozaItem 29

OKAY. I JUST HOPE THAT WE CONTINUE TO DO THAT. WE WILL. FORWARD.

Benjamin VazquezItem 29

COUNCILOR VASQUEZ? Thank you so much. I just want to add my position that was that when we have an RFP, I talked about not what somebody looks like, but their knowledge of local history and culture. So it wasn't about what you look like, but to understand of what you're representing. That's it. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

And thank you for clarifying that. I just want to be clear that if it's a Caucasian person that can do whatever event it is, that's what happens. If it's a Vietnamese person that can run the event because they have the knowledge and they get the RFP, then that's what could happen. Because you said look in the mirror. So if I'm looking in the mirror and I see Mayor Pro Tem and she doesn't look like me, I don't want us to assume or I don't want to assume that we have to give it to her. So you said that. I just wanted to clarify that. And also for legal purposes, we cannot make those kind of comments or move in that direction.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

So we have to be very careful. so mr city manager you're clear on everything that you need i think i am perfect just one

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

additional comment madam mayor thank you so much i just wanted to thank the orange county heritage council for coming out and sharing your guys's public comments and i also want to respond to the to the comments that are made about the city making decisions based off merit i implore my my colleagues if they want to make an educated decision go to the city of Santa Ana's website type in that search bar Juneteenth the only organization that is going to pop up on the two pages of I mean several items that are going to pop up is the Orange County Heritage Council's work the Juneteenth festival

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

was inspired by the Santa Ana residents who came together those are residents from the black community this event should be led by residents from our city and from the respective community members who were affected by 400 years of slavery, much like we have the Fiestas Patrias event being led by the Latino community who is celebrating Mexican independence. These events are about cultural competency, inclusivity, and ensuring that all of our residents have a seat at the table. And I just want to speak transparently as a council member how the Juneteenth Festival was brought forward is all of us in 2021 were very new to being elected.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

A number of us brought different events to the dais. Councilmember Phan brought Mid-Autumn Festival at $30,000. I introduced Chicano Heritage Festival at $30,000, as well as Juneteenth. When we finally finalized the budget process in 2022, I made a motion to increase Juneteenth from $30,000 to $50,000, Chicano Heritage from $30,000 to $50,000, Mid-Autumn Festival from $30,000 to $50,000, as well as Indigenous Peoples Day. I made an equitable decision to uplift four impacted communities and I believe that Santa Ana needs to continue to have that stance in being odious to any form

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

of discrimination racism or anything that is going to make people feel excluded whether you're Asian white black Mexican whatever your religious beliefs are you have a place here in Santa Ana and you are welcome I want to just thank my colleagues for the dialogue today and I implore my colleagues to just think about the message that we're sending to the black community Orange County's black population is only 2% meaning the amount of infrastructure that exists is very limited for the black community to advocate for resources however 80% of hate crimes in Orange County are

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

targeting black people and so for us as a city that has over 30 years of working with the heritage council they had the longest lasting parade in the city's history until it was defunded and pushed out i don't want history to repeat itself which is why i'm doing my due diligence to fight for my constituents thank you thank you councilman hernandez mr city manager

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

you clear we're good yes i am thank you so very much okay let's move on now to city manager

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

your comments please i just want to thank the mayor and the city council for the actions on item um 27 and 28 as you can see we're moving in a direction where our policies are really advocating for our residents and we're changing some of those aspects that we keep talking and talking over and over again and hopefully you see some real determination and decisive action when we

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

set up those policies for your review thank you thank you mr city manager councilman vasquez we're going to start council member comments please thank you mayor uh just for everybody

Benjamin VazquezItem 29

to know we have a few events coming up april 20th uh mancantas and anna it's a volunteer day everybody come out to jerome park and help out is there another park i don't know they're going to

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

We're gonna meet there.

Benjamin VazquezItem 29

We agree, but I'll go on my own. Also, on the 20th, there's also a concert, the music on Main Street, community concert series. The aristocrats are playing at the OC Musician Union Hall. So go down there, it's down on Main. April 27th, Santa Ana Fun Run. And we also have coming up at the library on Saturday as well. I WANT TO THANK COUNCIL MEMBER OF MAYOR PROTEM, FAN, AND SUPERVISOR SARMIENTO FOR HAVING A BEAUTIFUL RESOURCE FOR YOU. I'M SORRY I COULDN'T MAKE IT. I WAS AT THE ETHNIC STUDIES CONFERENCE. I WAS AT MY PRESENTING.

Benjamin VazquezItem 29

BUT THANK YOU FOR BRINGING ALL THOSE RESOURCES TO A COMMUNITY THAT'S IN NEED. WE HAVE 28% ARE HOUSING INSECURE AT VALLEY HIGH SCHOOL, WHICH IS ONE OF THE HIGHEST NUMBERS in the whole whole district so really appreciate you thank you i'll give you a hug uh later i want to thank uh supervisor sarmiento for fixing and beautifying and transforming the flood control channel imagine that he came and he fixed the flood control channel beautified it i make it a bike he made a pathway that connects first street to friendship park to jerome park right right where I grew up. So I really appreciate the work of Supervisor Sarmiento

Benjamin VazquezItem 29

and the Flood Control Channel. And with that, have a good night. Council Member Lopez.

Jessie LopezItem 29

Yes, thank you. I just want to remind the community that my office is hosting office hours on April the 20th at Park Santiago. And as always, we're gonna be partnering with the local coffee business. So come out if you're a coffee connoisseur and try out something new. And also, I hope to be better by then. And happy early Cinco de Mayo. For those that don't know, Cinco de Mayo is a holiday that commemorates Mexico's victory over the French Empire. And the victory was led by General Ignacio Zaragoza, known as the Battle of Puebla. And so I hope that you enjoy your holiday, but please don't drink and drive.

Jessie LopezItem 29

Please be mindful of your speeds when you're driving around the city in the neighborhoods and stay healthy

David PenalozaItem 29

counseling thank you mayor I just want to give a quick shout out to CDA and the housing division at our city staff and congratulate them and announced that we were I was able to be last week with with the mayor at mayor I'm s quad 7 a.m. and a couple members judson was there um at the kennedy commission and affordable housing clearinghouse and and um breakfast awards where legacy square uh was received uh the highest honor project of the of the year award uh in our city and in ward six uh it was

David PenalozaItem 29

very special to me because legacy square was one of the very first projects that i had a hand in in approving and and moving through the process here at the city as a newly elected council member and then uh when i spent uh four and a half years on the orange county housing finance trust was also one of the first projects that we helped fund through various funding sources the city as well as the housing trust and it was nice to now that that project is completed in the lacy neighborhood and also huge shout out to the Lacey neighborhood who also had a hand in seeing what that project and development would be it was every

David PenalozaItem 29

everybody made this happen so it was nice to be recognized at that our city staff was recognized for their work and in getting this project moving and I would just ask our acting city manager that that award be given to the housing department shouldn't be in your office how about oh you've been here a day but

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

I'm teasing I'm teasing. I was holding it for 48 hours.

David PenalozaItem 29

Teasing but I just wanted to congratulate our housing division every day they're doing great things to house our community and ensure that there's affordability and a diverse housing stock in our city so thank you. Thank you

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

Councilman Hernandez. Thank You madam mayor I just want to thank my colleagues for today's dialogue and I'd like to thank our city staff for all of the hours on end that you guys put into making these council agendas thank you for your patience with all of us I want to thank the residents who showed up today and shared your concerns especially in regards to the needle program we heard you light up loud and clear we had a unified voice today which is great and I want to also just thank my colleagues councilman Vasquez council member Lopez and supervisor Sarmiento for recently last week

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

unveiling a brand new park in in the Casa Bonita neighborhood we have friendship Park which is now connecting the Santa Ana Gardens bikeway from Monta Vista down to first Street so this was only made possible because we have a supervisor that understands that dirt roads you know aren't attractive we we We had these dirt roads that existed in the Casa Bonita neighborhood for many years. These roads would flood during the times where it would rain. Now we have a safe walkway for residents to use their bikes between Monta Vista to First Street.

Johnathan Ryan HernandezItem 29

We have Friendship Park in the Casa Bonita neighborhood. And then we have safe routes to school for students who live adjacent to the community. and we also recently unveiled some protected bike lanes along Willits from Fairview to Bristol so I just want to thank Public Works and just thank our residents again for their input that's remember Sarah thank you man mayor I

Phil BacerraItem 29

wanted to start off by just saying thank you to my colleagues for from said yeah presenting a united front when it comes to our opposition as a City Council and as a city when it comes to this needle distribution program so i really want to thank all of you because it's important that we show united front something like this because we keep fighting this over and over and they do think that we're going to somehow show weakness and obviously tonight was a great display of strength and that shows that we're not going to show weakness i want to

Phil BacerraItem 29

thank staff for putting together the groundbreaking ceremony over at george upton all access park to celebrate the construction of the new and improved playground. And I also want to thank staff for keeping access available to the recently resurfaced basketball courts that now have lights. So thank you, Hawk and Nabil, for making that happen. My next monthly community office hours will be held on Saturday, May 4th at 10 a.m. But for just this month, I'll be holding my office hours through Zoom. And finally, I want to express my appreciation to Mayor Meskwa and my colleagues

Phil BacerraItem 29

for adjourning tonight's meeting in the memory of legendary Santa Ana College baseball coach Don Sneddon. Coach Sneddon passed away recently at the age of 72. Don Sneddon set the California Community College baseball record for career wins. Coach Sneddon won an impressive 1,072 games, three state championships in 1993, 1995, and 1996. He also had 16 conference championships. championships. His teams at SAC never finished with a losing record. They were never below 500. He was named Conference Coach of the Year 16 times, including five straight seasons from 2007

Phil BacerraItem 29

to 2011. Coach Stenn was inducted into the California Community College Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame and the American Baseball Coaches Association Hall of fame in 2020 as a baseball player don sten was an ncaa division 2 all-american with cal state fullerton where he played for another legendary baseball coach in agi garito don sten brought an enormous amount of pride to santa ana college and to the city of santa ana and he will be truly missed that's my comments for tonight thank you thank you mayor protein thank you mayor

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

so a couple announcements well first i'd like to say thank you to everyone who came out It's, you know, we had a lot of recognitions and proclamations and that always feels so great because we're recognizing members of our community, different groups, and that just brings me a lot of joy. The first thing I'd like to say is on this past week, on the 11th, we had our Los Amigos High School Youth Forum. It's the second year I've done it. It's probably about a hundred high schoolers, mostly juniors and seniors, who come out and ask questions about government and some of the issues that they think is important to be addressed.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

I will share with you the very long list of issues raised by these students, but it was so incredible to hear young people be invested and interested in how to make the community better. I'd like to say that one of the biggest issues they had questions about was public safety, particularly in public transit and schools. So I hope that we can talk to, you know, OCTA and whatnot to deal with that because these kids have to take the bus to go to school and they can't do that if they don't feel safe on these buses. On the 13th, thank you so much to Council Member Vasquez for giving a shout out to our health fair. It was incredible.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

It was originally meant to be at Centennial Park, but due to concerns of rain, we did move it at the last minute to Valley High School. Though Valley High School is not in my ward, it definitely serves residents in Ward 1. I'd like to thank the Orange County Social Services Agency and Cal Optima who signed up residents, community members on the spot for CalFresh and CalOptima in multiple languages. I'd like to thank Supervisor Sarmiento's office for reaching out to me and my office to make this work for our residents.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

We share the same residents. We are here to serve the same residents, and we should be collaborating with each other to serve these residents. I want to thank CAP OC for doing a fresh food distribution for community members. We had over 800 people come despite the impending rain and despite the last-minute location change. I want to thank City Manager Nunez and the City Manager's office for being supportive of this program. And I want to say, you know, we did the health fair because it provided free dental screenings and free vision screenings and provided glasses on the same day.

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

In fact, my Ward 1 council rep, Lizbeth, who I have to thank so much for doing the hard work on behalf of the Ward 1 team to bring this forward because working people in the city of Santa Ana don't always have vision and dental insurance. Working people in the city of Santa Ana don't always have access to doctors who will take their insurance. And working people in the city of Santa Ana don't always have doctors who speak their language or make them feel comfortable. I thought we were gonna have more kids. We had a ton of seniors come out because they don't always have

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

Access to those doctors and there are always long lines and long waits So I'm just really grateful and the reason why I pushed for those services is because my sister Didn't get glasses until she was seven so for three years in school she was struggling because she couldn't see and how many of our students our residents struggle in school because they can't see but for a cheap pair or free pair of glasses and so to me this is a health issue that we have to address because it's going to make our community safer and better and brighter and i really want to give a special special thank you to san anna unified school

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

district and specifically trustee Caitlin Brazier-Ezevez for within four days being able to allow us to switch the location to making it happen making it so exciting and fun we had performers from the local Valley High School and community I was just so impressed and thank you to city manager for coming by and seeing what we can do and what it means when we collaborate with each other. Just two quick announcements on April 24th that is Wednesday next we oh well there is a Denim Day for those of you who do not know April is sexual

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

assault awareness month and Denim Day is commemorated on April 24th due to a horrible ruling in Italy in which a woman who was assaulted sexually assaulted her assaulter was deemed not guilty because she wore tight jeans and so on denim day at 2 p.m. in steelcraft and Garden Grove thank you to my dear friend councilwoman Kimberly Swinn Benalosa I gotta add that for making sure that the county is aware of this and so if you can please take a picture wearing jeans wearing denim hashtag sa am so that more people can be aware of this

Thai Viet PhanItem 29

really important issue and finally on may 1st at santa ana college from 5 to 8 pm the ward 1 team in conjunction with santa ana college is going to hold a law panel for high schoolers and college students who are interested in becoming attorneys we are going to have speakers who are santa ana attorneys or residents who grew up in santa ana thank you thank you mayor pro tem mr city manager

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

wouldn't it be great on April 24th at all city staff can wear jeans I think

Alvaro NuñezItem 29

the email already went out that yes all right that's wonderful thank you so I'll

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

be short on April 20th we have a special meeting so long as there's a quorum this council will be meeting on April 20th from about 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. I'd love to hear all the great work the supervisor Sarmiento is doing mr. active city City Manager, please reach out. We need street medicine. So hopefully he's got some money for that as well. It's great that he's cleaning up things, but we also have some really major issues that we need to address, which is the homeless and street medicine and things of that nature. And I know you'll get on it. So I want to thank, from day one that the needle exchange program came up, the Harm

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

Reduction Institute dropped the gauntlet to say we were enemy number one. The neighbors of Santa Ana, Danny Vega is the host of that site, they were on it from day one. Danny Vega, Jeffrey Katz, Carla Mario Alvarado, Alberta Christie, John Maris, and so many other people. I can just name all these people that were, you know, getting online, signing petitions, you know, just doing so much, sharing it with everybody about the needle exchange. change so everybody and I can't mention everybody everybody who's been involved getting signatures spreading the word standing up and saying no more no more

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

in Santa Ana go go somewhere else I want to say thank you thank you because we cannot do it by ourselves we have to do it together and to all the mayor's that have submitted letters throughout the county and the Board of Supervisors and Sheriff Barnes and all the other electeds thank you so very much for the support that you're giving the city of santa ana to make sure we can keep hri out of our city because we do not want the needle exchange here nor do we want it probably anywhere in orange county for that matter also i do want to say you know i would like if we could mr city manager we

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

have a great wonderful first-time homebuyers program and i really would like it to be pushed out you know put up in our police department on all of our city floors I know we've talked about this a couple times I've talked to Mike about this as well there's a lot of people who work for us and still do not know about this program and there's people in our community who do not know that we have this amazing first-time homebuyers program with up to I think a hundred and twenty thousand dollars of assistance right to purchase a home in the city of Santa Ana for first-time homebuyers and so we really need to get that out to our

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

community to all of our staff whether it's a police department you know here in City Hall wherever they are we need to share it so be great I know with the budget we send out snail mail for the budget survey I don't know I'm sure you guys will get creative and do something but we need to share with people because what happens is those funds don't get spent and people miss an opportunity to purchase a home under that first time homebuyers also I want to just say that I had a wonderful coffee with the mayor this weekend at the assistance league it's a beautiful location thank you to all the staff that came up and

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

distracted city manager thank you for coming out as well and then councilman panel those already covered the affordable housing award it was wonderful it was a great award and congratulations to the city of Santa Ana for this award. And going back on April 6th, I apologize. Assemblyman Valencia was with us and Congressman Correa. They stayed with us for the whole event. And so it's wonderful to have their support. Senator Umberg's calendar, he was not available, but he's also in support. So thank you. I want to close with this, Mr. Active City Manager and Active Police Chief, Robert Rodriguez.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

There has been three motorcyclists killed, I believe, in the last four weeks. And then we have pedestrians that get hit by cars all the time. But the three motors, the people on the motorcycles, it's very concerning to me. So I know it's a speed issue, it's a third issue, or the other driver's issue. I'm not sure what it is. But we know in our city, we have pedestrians get hit by cars. I believe we have the highest rate of pedestrian car accidents, correct?

That is correct, ma'am.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

And we have the highest rate of fatalities?

We have a high rate of fatalities, yes.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

So I don't know what the answer is other than to say I know there's a lot on everybody's plate, but I would really like us to evaluate what we can do, whether it's to start a campaign around traffic safety, start a campaign around speeding, getting more tickets. I'm not saying that's the answer, but we have to do something because we've had three deaths in just a few weeks of motorcyclists and maybe they were speeding maybe they were I don't know and I don't ask you for those reports it's not my place to ask for that but I do know the pedestrians a

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

motorcycle you see the car accidents I mean we just have to either one educate our community put up signs the bill with flashing lights and say slow down put put cameras out, give tickets in certain areas that you find with the traffic study that there's high rate of speed in certain areas of our city. But it really bothers me, I know Councilman Penalosa and I were talking about it, just really it bothers us that they're dying on our streets. And three sounds a lot, but one is too many.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

and what can we do as a city to really address that and I'm not talking about tons of overtime as I know somebody will say that I'm not asking for that I'm saying what kind of you know they will what kind of study can we do to address this and address it the right way where if it is about giving speeding tickets we're doing that if it is about putting cameras in areas where there is a lot of of accidents and then we do that or I don't know the answer I think you are you are the experts and but it is very concerning to me chief no yes I agree

with you and then we are looking at in our traffic division to implement strategies on how to impact and reduce traffic related fatalities how long

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

would it take you to get back to us to give us something I'm not going to give

direction I'm just asking it should take us at least a month I would say to provide some kind of a strategy or a couple strategies on how to reduce

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

traffic fatalities all right great thank you I look forward to that and and with that I would just say you know we do have the 5k run please please please please sign up and come out and then we have the main canto main canto I know I I will not be there and I think a couple of the other council members will not be there because we have a special meeting that day on April 20th. So please go out and volunteer and we look forward to you doing that too. Help our city look beautiful. Did you want to say something? Me encanta. Me encanta. Me encanta. Me encanta. I, yeah.

Valerie AmezcuaItem 29

Councilman Perales always makes fun of the way I speak Spanish so it's okay. He's going to give me trauma. Anyways, with that, I'm going to adjourn this meeting.

Recording stopped.