Speaker 1: Communication from Mayor Garcia and Vice Mayor Lowenthal, recommendation to request the city manager to convene a 12 member Queen Mary Land Development Task Force.
Speaker 0: Thank you. I'll go ahead and just begin. I think there's there's no question that one of our city's greatest assets is the Queen Mary. It's been a classic icon of our skyline. It's something that we know a lot around the world. We're known for, certainly as we travel and we hear people's love of the ship. We also know the ship is going right now through a massive renovation, historical renovation, which we're also very, very proud of. We have an opportunity, as we all know, that surrounding the Queen Mary is about a little over 40 acres of land that's adjacent that can be developed. It is a land that is in a in a in a development partnership currently with Garrison Investments, which has been a great partner with the city. They own that. They control the land lease on the land. But like a lot of great public projects, we I know myself and Vice Mayor Lowenthal, who represents that part of the of the city, believe it's now time to move forward, to really develop and think about what we build around the Queen Mary. We have this huge project with the Civic Center that we've that this council has been involved with. We have other great projects happening across the city, whether it's the pool or others that are happening in other parts of town. And so it's time to put together a community group to really advise development services and our city management team on this as we begin this process. The reason this is coming forward now is because Garrison Investments, which holds the lease on the ship in the land, has begun really intense conversations with the city over the last few months about their willingness to now move forward. They're ready to move forward, to develop, and the city needs to have a robust community outreach process, part of which will be this 12 member development task force. And so I want to particularly thank Vice Mayor Lowenthal. She's been working on this for a very long time. And as we all know, it's an important piece of of her district. Vice Mayor Lowenthal.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and I appreciate the mayor's partnership, as well as his leadership on this particular issue, which didn't start just from the time he became mayor, but from the time that he was on the council. Many of you know, I've had a love affair with the Queen Mary since coming to Long Beach. It is an amazing asset that we should all be proud of. I'm proud of the fact that in the last eight years, the city's performed a comprehensive survey of the ship and its assets and developed a conservation management plan to ensure that the restoration and preservation follows best practices. Many of you that are here today or watching from home or will be reading about this tomorrow, will have been part of the community that's asked why has it taken so long? And I have to assure you that the first and foremost task before us, when the Queen Mary's history was turning a corner, was to be sure that we preserved her as an asset. We preserved the historic aspects of the ship. And I am confident that that is the approach that was the right approach to take and one that we did take. And I know that the city and its residents are committed to maintaining this international icon and city landmark in the best possible shape for future generations to enjoy. That's something that I think a lot of us share in common. We want that because she has an incredible story to tell that spans multiple generations and cultures. And I hope that narrative continues for multiple generations into the future. Beyond the welfare of the ship itself. One of the best ways to encourage more tourists and residents to visit her and learn her story is to invest in the property around her. We have over 40 acres that surround the queen that can be invested in and I think we should. Mayor Garcia and I have been discussing these development plans with Garrison Investments, which is the ship's operator at this time. And we're very motivated to see this property reach its potential. It's a critical place. It's a critical piece in our efforts to attract even more tourists, investment and businesses to Long Beach. So this is a good time and project for residents and experts in related fields to help the developer and the city reach its full investment potential. This certainly reminds me of our volunteer committees for the Downtown Visioning Team. I know several of you have participated in that effort and subsequent downtown plan as well as the Queensway Bay Development and Project. If we think about the narrative that's gone on in the downtown, starting from the downtown visioning plan, this is the next chapter in that long narrative. This is something that began a very long time ago before all of us here was were seated at our at the dais. But it's certainly one that we have a true role in ensuring what the future of the Queen Mary can be. With all the changes coming to the pike. Many of these changes have come up recently. Good changes, Shoreline Village and the Downtown. I'm very excited about the prospect of this property improving as well and very excited about the opportunity for the community to continue to provide feedback for what the vision of this area should be. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Vice Mayor. Next up, Councilmember Andrus.
Speaker 4: Yes, thank you, Mayor. You know, I think I like to think the mayor and the vice mayor, because I want to thank for putting this item on the agenda tonight. You know, the queen mayor is one of our icon features in Long Beach. And the idea of the task force is a great indication that we will continue to move in the right direction to highlight our city's access. You know, since this community asset, I think it's a very important to have local community members on this task. And I'm very glad that you guys decided to look into this and make this one of our, you know, important items on the axis tonight.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Councilwoman Gonzalez.
Speaker 1: I, too, want to thank each of you for bringing this item forward. I know it's been a long time in the making and we've been talking about it and it's finally here. So I'm glad we're moving forward with this. I just had a quick question about the selection process for the committee. I understand it will be 12 members appointed by you, Mayor. There's a few different, I guess, pots of expertize that will be selected as well. Tourism, hospitality, design, will there be will the members be part of those different or how will that be selected exactly
Speaker 0: ? Well, I mean, I think the item is written down so that it were not too specific. We want to bring in people that have a variety of talents. But certainly I think the key component, of course, is residents. So they'll be downtown residents that actually are live with the impacts of any additional traffic or any issues there. But beyond that, we want to make sure that they're experts in a variety of fields and those are limited, but not to include but are not limited, of course, to hospitality and tourism and and other relevant architecture that would work.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Appreciate that.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Next up is Councilman Mongo.
Speaker 2: I too, want to speak on behalf of support of this item. I think that it's it's the right time. It's the right leadership of this city. And I know that the east side is looking forward to more. Types of events and things that we can come downtown and enjoy. The civic center down by the water that we're all going to embrace together.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilwoman Price.
Speaker 5: I, too, want to support this item and thank you and the vice mayor for bringing it forward. I agree that in terms of the economic development and the discussions that we've had as a council, there are specific categories of economic development opportunities that we need to target as a city, including retail sales and residential housing. And I'm hopeful that this space could be utilized to stimulate further economic growth and development. I do want to say, I think it's very timely that I'm really impressed with where the pike is headed. And I think Vice Mayor Lowenthal and the mayor and others who have helped bring the development of that project into fruition, because it's really coming together nicely. And again, it's targeting our chief economic development goal, which is to increase our revenue and specifically our sales tax revenue. So I think this is just going to add to the progress. And it is this is something that residents ask about all the time throughout the city. So I'm glad that we have something to report in terms of movement forward. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember Turanga.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mayor. I, too, want to lend my voice to supporting this issue. The only thing I have to say is what took you so long? I know that we've had a lot of important issues before us in the last year, and this is one of those situations that I'm very proud to lend my support to, and I'm looking forward to what arises out of the the task force, the recommendation they're going to make, because it's going to be going to complete the whole renaissance that we're going to be going through with downtown, with the pike, with the new civic center, and now including the Queen Mary. So I'm really looking forward to it. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Councilmember. And just to reiterate something the vice mayor said, because the leaseholder, of course, is gears is is a private firm, Garrison Investments. We're working on a on a timeline that works for both parties. And so we're both at the point now where it's time to move forward and and put a project together. Councilmember Austin.
Speaker 11: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I will support this. And because I think it is it's great to to build the task force. It's great to pursue economic development with input from our residents. I just want to remind you, you mentioned that stakeholders in the downtown will be included in this this task force. I would just not. Exclude anyone else from from the process, because we have this is a citywide resource. It isn't a six on the second district. But like our ranchos, they have board members and people engaged from all over the city like our our airport as well. So this is a citywide resource and I would just encourage that you look beyond the downtown for for qualified talent to be on this task force. Thank you.
Speaker 0: And that's actually part of the plan. So I encourage everyone to if there's fantastic people that please let me know, because we definitely want to do that. Councilmember Richardson.
Speaker 12: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to congratulate and applaud Vice Mayor Lowenthal and her leadership on this and you as well. Mayor Garcia, I think it's important, you know, the entire city seeing a renaissance, this important development happening in East Long Beach, in North Long Beach, in downtown. And I'm reminded of just this past week, I was in San Francisco on the waterfront and hanging out in a wind, checked out Ripley's Believe It or Not. And I went and visited an old ship that they had. And I was looking at a lot of the similarities that Long Beach has there. And and I was actually thinking about the opportunities on the other side of our waterfront. So I think it's really timely and I look forward to what comes out of this. Hopefully more fun. More fun downtown.
Speaker 0: Q Councilmember Superdome.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to reiterate Councilman Austin's words that while we have downtown stakeholders, let's not neglect the etc's, too. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Absolutely. Thank you. Any public comment on the item has come forward.
Speaker 3: Very good you. I fully support this. I think it's absolutely essential. I think the Queen Mary is an icon. It's one of the reasons why a year ago I suggested when they were going through wasting the money and renaming the the downtown transit mall station, that it should have been the Queen Mary station. That's an icon name, iconic name that would be recognized around the world. Downtown Long Beach doesn't ring any bells. One of the things that we should also consider is adopting a paradigm not unlike Disneyland. Because one of the problems I discovered and I discovered this a couple of years ago, about 14 months ago when I was talking to a couple on the on going down to Del Mar or on the bus. And I said, Had you been to the Queen Mary? And they said, Well, we were going to go, but it was going to cost us $46. And then I got inside of that issue. And what had happened is because of the heathens, come down and get on there free. They destroyed millions of dollars. They incurred they destroyed and damaged millions of dollars worth of property. So they have to they had to recapture that. So now they have a program, what you pay to get on, you can deduct from what you buy. So I'm suggesting one of the things we do is we just like if you're going to board a cruise ship, an airline. You get fingerprinted. You get a little passport for the day or the period of time, and that will scare away the element that we don't want. Nobody should object to paying those dollars. And I think we should be able to get the cost of a photo and a badge down to a negligible amount. So the people to keep it as a souvenir. That then will offset the cost of that, because I think it's absolutely essential to build up that iconic symbol of this city. And it's just sitting there and it just needs good management. The only thing I'm concerned about is that we get people on there, that committee that have zero experience in business and they're only experience is spending government money. So I would want to make sure that we have people that have operated and been responsible for PNL operations on a successful ongoing basis. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Thank you. Any of the public comment on this item? Please come forward.
Speaker 4: I heard on a Unsolved Mysteries that the ship is.
Speaker 3: Haunted as one of you guys going to get Ghostbusters out there. Just a little joke there.
Speaker 0: All right. Thank you, sir. Okay, let's see. Is there a more public comment on this Queen Mary issue? Just come forward.
Speaker 11: Yeah. I do like the idea of a fingerprint. I think we should. We work with the police department to run a criminal background check to see if anybody going on the Queen Mary is committing any acts of, for example, shoplifting or any other. Because we don't need a bunch of criminals on the Queen Mary. So I do. The thumbprint criminal background check. Thank you.
Speaker 0: Okay. Thank you. So with that, everyone. So with that, we're going to go ahead and go and please cast your votes. And if obviously, if anyone is interested that watching from the public, please contact my office or we're making the appointment soon. Please cast your vote on item number 11.
Speaker 1: Motion carries nine zero.
Speaker 0: Thank you, Madam Clerk. We're moving on to number 12.
Recommendation to request City Manager to convene a 12 member Queen Mary Land Development Task Force, appointed by the Mayor, including downtown residents as well as experts in tourism and hospitality, design and architecture, and historic preservation.