ed that for the purposes of meeting our rena goals I feel uncomfortable not knowing you know what these units are actually going for and are they actually affordable or if they're actually you know going outside of those categories and then we're really not being clear and transparent with the community on our affordable housing stock there's a another twist in there too and that is the data that we got back from our survey indicated that a significant number of our ADUs are actually not going being rented to the general public they're being used by family members and often are not charged any rent so and there's sort of there's two ways to look at it one is that those aren't really even rental units but on the other hand they're providing housing for real people who because they're not paying anything you know they they are almost certainly low-income people they're they're you know it's probably relatives who are not making enough of an income to be able to go out and and rent a place without help so there are there are there are many factors involved and we we just can't we have so little control we do the best we can with accounting but I agree with you and and you know my philosophy and I think the city's goal is to simply get as much you know yes we want to track our numbers for for the rena targets and we do have to meet those requirements or attempt to but really we just want to build as much affordable housing as we can right yeah and and thank you for those one similar question related to this is there any financial calculation that's made to determine you know you know there's a unit that's less than 650 square feet in the community like what's being charged for that and what units that are over 650 square feet are going for because financial information I think it will be helpful for us moving forward yeah and this was this was sort of a quick and dirty with the survey we had it the it was a survey that was sent out to the owners of the 80 years and it it was we tried to be as simple as possible because the simpler it is the more responses we get and it broke the 80 years up into it I think it was like 200 I think I think actually we stopped at 650 so it was is your is your unit below 650 and then if it was above it went up I think in about 200 square foot intervals and then we ask the price again in I don't remember now what the what the price intervals were but it wasn't a specific price it was an interval of 100 or 150 or 200 I think it was 150 and then when we compared that we had to extrapolate because you know the the cost of the unit needs to be based on the number of bedrooms so to make it fair we were very conservative and assumed that they were all one bedroom or fewer and that it was a one person family and that's probably not true at all there's there's many 80 years that have two people in them and there's many 80 years that are more than one bedroom but this is a conservative look so if you factor that in and and accounted for the number of units that we counted as moderate units that might actually be housing more people and so and have more bedrooms so they would actually have qualified for low we're probably still our numbers are probably still going to track in another five years or so so it's it's not as bad as it could be and I have one follow-up question is that are the results from that survey available like is there a way for us to receive no they were it was a it was a confidential survey because we're doing everything we can to get people to respond no but I mean in terms of like this a summary of the results from those surveys that could be available for council so we can see the number of people surveyed square footage what people are charging because the result I can go back and see if I can find that yeah that'd be great and then we probably have to do some cleanup because it was you know we were just doing quick and dirty for our own purposes okay and if there's an opportunity for us to provide direction maybe not today but you know for a similar effort to be done I think it'd be beneficial for us to kind of see where our rental housing stock is at and then and then I just want to make a point that when there are multiple people oftentimes living in ADUs the unfortunate thing is that the cost isn't shared between the two individuals oftentimes we see people charging based on the number of individuals so for example if you have a house and there's a couple that's renting out a room sometimes they'll get charged more because it's not a single individual and so that also can complicate things and I understand that as well but I just want to thank you again for pulling this together and I think that you know there are further discussions that need to be had over how we can collect more data and better understand what's happening in our rental housing market so thank you mm-hmm thank you council member Cummings council member Brown thank you well I was going to save it for later but since the council member Cummings brought it up I just wanted to follow up a little bit on the that question around ADUs and how they're designated and I understand the survey was I remember when we got some information about that survey and it was really helpful in getting a better understanding and not making the function so I appreciate that it is a few years old and it was a survey of existing ADUs and we know that the ADUs that are being built are not necessarily going to they're not going to necessarily be at the same rent level for a variety of reasons where I'm in the cost of producing an ADU is going to automatically lead to increased rents right so if you have one it's been there and you're already on your home it's a very different scenario so and I'm just in general I don't I think I say it all the time I'm I'm skeptical of the affordable by design concept in communities like ours in particular so I'm just wondering if you the 650 foot cutoff was that something that was determined here and I know that's a that's a that's a cutoff that's used for other purposes when thinking about ADUs and you know permitting but is that something that we could think about reducing this work footage because yes yes that the survey that we used for this was actually designed Sarah Noisy designed it when she was working on the ADU ordinance year and a half ago and so it it wasn't it wasn't actually intended for this purpose but it provided us with that information and it was our intent to create a survey that would be specifically for this purpose and to to do it probably every other year but we kind of got this was not a good year for that we we had more work and less time this year so I'm hoping that that we will have that in place in time for next year so we'll have a better survey better information we'll ask about smaller units and you know the hardest thing is to design it so that people will actually answer it appreciate your efforts and I'll just put in a plug for you know taking making it a priority to do some of that surveying we don't have a rental registry so we're we're kind of we guess a lot we're you know shooting in the dark so you know as we move forward it would be really great to hear about your from staff about thoughts on how to how to make that survey informative and something that people will respond to thanks thank you council member I'm not seeing any other council members with their hands up so I'll go ahead and take it out that public comment and I have phone number ending in 0030 nine to unmute and available well that's on the field I would just calling to echo what council members brown and and Cummings mentioned regarding the ADU affordability in the the arena progress report I I really you know want to encourage the city to produce as much low income affordable housing as possible and certainly ADUs could potentially do that I just worry that that the the numbers of new produce newly produced ADUs aren't necessarily or shouldn't necessarily be considered low income or moderate income because we are using you know a rental survey that's a couple years old I would hope that the city commits to having an annual survey for this sort of thing or a rental registry so that we actually know what the numbers are and I'm worried that you know the justification to HCD in trying to justify using the there's a for example 100 low income ADUs below 650 square feet that we're counting in our low income arena numbers HCD will want justification for that and I don't know that we can really say you know a two or three year old survey that we did of existing ADUs satisfies this requirement I don't want to you know curtail production of ADUs at all I just want to have some more realistic numbers and I would hope that you know we're able to produce as many ADUs as possible and accurately reflect them in in our arena numbers I just don't know if the methodology that we're using right now to do that is is accurate or not thank you thank you thank you bring it back to council and this again is item to accept the 2020 general plan and housing element annual progress report and submit it to the california office of planning research and office of housing and community development council member coming thank you may I add one quick question for for the legal council or maybe for the for someone else I'm planning but to Mr. Stone's point and to some points that were brought up I'm just wondering is there a way the city could create policy that would policy around deed restricting ADUs that are produced for the purposes of rental housing I think to the point that was just brought up you know one of the things that brings to mind is that if someone builds a 800 square foot unit or and they've built it in 2017 and someone builds one today you know they could that if one was considered you know moderate income back in 2018 you know there is the potential if it remains at that level of affordability that will go down over time and it'll help fulfill some of those needs of course showing that hey you know this unit is still being rented at this low rate and therefore it actually is helping us meet our affordability numbers so I'm just wondering if there's any way to deed restricting so that we so that some of these units that at one point are for moderate incomes will end up in those lower income categories versus kind of not having any deed restriction which pretty much doesn't really allow for us to keep those for those units to stay within those categories and they can be moved up at any point in time I can jump in on that and then Cassie you can fill in any additional information if you'd like and thank you for that question councilmember Cummings it's certainly something that I'm sure many are interested in we actually don't have that ability under the state law the state regulates what things we can require as part of ADUs and the affordability restriction is not one of those and so when you saw Sarah Noisy pop on the screen a few moments ago during that discussion I think that was the point that she was going to raise but I'm not aware of unless it's a voluntary requirement so you know we can still offer the the fee waiver if someone wants to have this and wants to pay prevailing wage or if someone wants to do that so you know there have been the instances where a developer has offered that for example as a way to exceed the requirements if they're doing the plan development for example and they want to provide additional public benefits and so that's what I would comment related to that affordability restriction being needed to be voluntary and then I would chime in and I know that Catherine works very closely with HCD with respect to what can and can't be counted in each income category so I see Sarah might want to add something on the ADU and affordability restrictions that appears and then I'll ask Catherine to highlight some of the comments that she's had because I know that she communicates directly with HCD about the timing of the survey and the question that you had there Council Member Cummings The law come down last year that the next time we update our housing element which for us will be in 2024 we have a requirement to show in there some programs how we're going to promote affordability for ADUs so we will have a whole you know put on our thinking caps moment when that comes around jurisdictions are a year ahead of us in that cycle where that's going to be required so we'll be able to hopefully gather some good ideas from other jurisdictions that have you know had to cross that bridge before we do Catherine did you want to add in as well on the yeah I can just say that the survey was done in spring of 2019 and the data that we're looking at now is for the year of 2020 so it is not I would not consider it out of date at this point we do we do want to do another survey and someone said that we should do it annually and I'd love to do it annually except that we have to deal with this is something that people fill out voluntarily and we don't want to get survey fatigue because then we won't get any responses at all and so that was the thinking behind every other year we figured that the data would be up to date enough and it might help us get a better response rate okay thank you I know you were going to I wasn't sure if you wanted to weigh in please got it covered nothing beyond what he said thank you thank you okay I'm happy to move the staff recommendation to accept the 2020 general plan and housing element annual progress reports direct staff to submit the reports to the California Office of Planning and Research and the Department of Housing and Community Development and we'll just express again you know the need for us to really figure out a way to track this housing because I'm just you know just in conversations with people who are renters in the community it's just really concerning that some of these units you know might not be staying in as affordable units and if we really are going to commit to making sure that we have a large stock of affordable units and Santa Cruz that we you know have a really good understanding of whether units are remaining in those categories or if they're getting you know pushed into other categories so so that's my motion okay do you Council Member Brown second that I think the motion was to accept the report for submission and I'm just trying to think about a way to include some direction to the to staff and I know you're already thinking about ways to do this and and planning to do it but include direction to staff in next year's process bring your thoughts to the recommendations to Council on how to more accurately capture levels of affordability for non-dead restricted units so I'm just trying to think about like including that as part of the direction today so that we know that's the goal that we want to pursue so if my if the motion maker is willing I'd like to just include that as a second piece can I just clarify in terms of that do you want that as part of the motion or do you want it as just direction to staff I don't know putting it in the motion will just I think make it more clear so if we could do that just in addition direct staff to return to in preparation for next year's annual report return to Council with recommendations on how to that's capture affordability levels in non-dead restricted units that are categorized as well-income so the motion will be to accept the 2020 general plan on housing element annual progress report and to submit the reports to the California Office of Planning and Research and the Department of Housing and Community Development and direct staff in preparing the 21 2021 annual progress report form Council help me out here of next year's planning process levels of affordability in non-dead restricted units categorized as affordable or maybe Cassie you can weigh in this is a so I'm understanding just trying to understand so the the the action is really it's basically we're required every year to submit the annual reports according to the calculations and the I mean Catherine you mentioned that this is really basically pulling data and then entering it into the statewide into a statewide form right and so I'm just trying to I don't Catherine do you do we do we make that decision then on how we count those do those calculation and then we just put those numbers into the form correct well I just want to make sure I'm not restricted that is if they're deed restricted there's there's no that's just counting the numbers but for the non-dead restricted we have you know we could just call all of the all of our ADUs above moderate income but that wouldn't be accurate either and that would be detrimental for us and so we have developed this methodology before we had done the survey we used to do online survey of rental prices but that was not accurate either because that just showed what was available at that point in time and the things that are advertised are generally going to be the higher priced units because the lower priced units never get advertised they just get passed onto your best friend so there is a there is a element in here that that we have some discretion over how we categorize these units as long as it's a methodology that that we that passes the straight face test basically and specifically I had brought this to HCD last year and I noticed in their in their directions this year they actually mentioned an informal survey as being one method of establishing affordability for non-need restricted units so this is something that they they recognize as being a valid thing to do the data point they want to they want to collect but today so if councillor I just want to I just want to make sure the staff can do you know that it fits with you know so it sounds so we could include so it would be to include an updated methodology to count include an updated methodology to account for non-need restricted units reported that when it matters you have the language written Sandy I'm just trying to make sure I'm capturing it because I yeah thank you I don't have a written I apologize this was not planned in advance here but since we're having the conversation I'd like to reflect it so so the what I'm hoping we can get to is it's a direct staff in preparing the 2021 annual part report to include recommendations to so to include an up an updated methodology is fine if you but recommendations simply an updated methodology for and you can take out recommendations that's all I to do for to include an updated methodology oh l they reflect levels of affordability for non-need restricted units that are categorized as low income yeah I would change four ways to in order now that I'm looking at it in order to more accurately reflect it's not accurate you know so more just you know more precise more accurate to more accurately reflect levels of portability for non-need for non-need so that Council Member Brown yeah this is a principal planner Matt Sanwa I was just wondering could you clarify are you are you looking for options presented from staff for this or a specific methodology presented well I I guess that's why I use recommendations rather than methodology to start out with because I I don't want to I don't want to make it so precise that it it spies your hands in terms of you know how to basically I'm just trying to get at how it is that you know you all are thinking about how to more accurately reflect what is low income and what isn't and you know it's a standard based on serving you know other you know maybe perhaps reducing the square footage to you know for the affordable by design category I don't know that it so does that make sense like it may not necessarily like a menu of options but just what are some of the ways that you've come up with to try to better capture lowing the level of low income units available that are non-dead restricted so I don't know if it's yeah either yeah yeah thank you I I prefer recommendations if it makes you feel like it's a little more like it fits better with what you might do coming moving forward then let's leave it that way yeah I I do like that language better we're going to be starting on our the housing element update next year most likely so that work in thinking about that that Sarah mentioned and looking at what other cities are doing we may or may not have started that at that point but we can certainly include whatever we have at that point in the report next year so Bonnie they would take out and and update a methodology and just go recommendations to council is that clear for staff okay thumbs up either the three affordability levels or affordable housing because low income just restricted to that one designation and I think that there's moderate low and very low restricted units all non deed restricted that were indeed restricted so just really trying to get at standardization so so Bonnie if you go back I think you can put that you can undo that deletion yeah the back side there say it again income housing that's the housing so the maker of the motion I'm just most concerned about reporting on low income and very low income very low is pretty much always need restricted in my understanding so but that's fine to include them okay great thank you okay so we have a motion to accept the general plan with the direction to staff and I'll go ahead and ask for a roll call though please council member Watkins aye Calendari Johnson we built a break into the meeting today so we will go ahead and take a break and reconvene at 430 that's public we will start item number 23 which is the downtown plan expect expansion project at 430 so thank you everybody turn on your cameras we'll go ahead and get started I think we're just looking for Martine council member Watkins when you are ready and turn on your camera and we will go ahead and get started humor items today next up on our agenda is item number 23 downtown plan expansion project for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if this is an item you want to comment on now's the time to call in using the instructions on your screen the order will be a presentation of the item by staff followed by questions from city council we will then take public comment and then return to the council for deliberation and action our presenter will be Sarah Noyce with senior planner with our planning department and Matt Van Wa principal planner with our planning department so I'll go ahead and turn it over to them and again this is item number 23 the downtown plan expansion project so Sarah and Matt I'm not sure who goes first but I'll turn it over to you guys thank you mayor hello council members members of the public I'm sure there are lots of folks that are following this item I know we did receive quite a lot of correspondence seems like folks are really interested and engaged on the project which is great rezoning action this is not a rezoning action we're trying to just sort of send a geographic scope of where we're low-prey at earthquake we've updated this plan you know several times in the course of its life in the early 2000s in the mid 2010s most recently we limits in certain areas and that's allowable you know downtown is a place where housing belongs and that was also sort of part of the housing voices process that we went through just a few years ago was about creating more opportunities for housing downtown we've been looking for ways to address our housing needs it's combined that with last year the requirement of the rebrand is that projects that are approved city-wide we also have an opportunity because this is now create some new economic opportunity for city workers and local city businesses we were approved we are on a timeline 2023 giving us you know between two and two and a half years to to complete the project we were thinking maybe we'll go north maybe we'll go west maybe maybe we'll also go south maybe we can do all three of these things and so we started by kind of making conversations with stakeholders in the cities that downtown businesses some other major areas were involved you know thinking about which way we want to go with the downtown expansion so as I mentioned with the grant you know we do have a specific goal of increasing housing units that can be built in the city coming out of the beach south of Laurel plan and the general plan is this idea of connecting downtown with the river and beach areas both to make it you get from downtown to the beach and the river but also so that visitors have a more natural connection and understand humanities into downtown to have a meal and to visit our local businesses to be more of Santa Cruz the direction that we expand to create more opportunities for public amenities and infrastructure existing location has always we've always intended to be temporary you know the existing stadium was never intended to be a permanent facility so we're aware that that use is going to change at some point so it would make sense to that some point we also then have this opportunity to work with the warriors and set some standards and use allowances to accommodate a permanent arena which then could really be a public amenity so it serves the warrior's needs and then it also provides another a modern event venue for the city which we don't currently have a fully modern event venue and then of course going along with events our economic opportunities I think every downtown business owner knows when game nights are happening because it does have such an effect our economy and visit our local businesses moving into COVID recovery always being some cognizant of the city's budget we wanted to just identify that that continue to meet its needs moving forward so in thinking about have around our job became obvious to staff that we weren't really going to be looking at expanding north connecting to the beach and working with the warriors like that's not really the place that would meet these goals and then thinking about expanding to the west we very quickly run into a historic district and a lot of really sensitive historic structures and single family homes that we wouldn't necessarily be expecting to redevelop or turn over so the idea that we could create more housing capacity by expanding the west for district to fall apart under those historic preservation regulations more detail also here so we started by mapping out you know what it would be existing like you know where the historic structures how far does the floodplain extend what's the geography you know where are the nature slopes stuff like that and then we take into account the zoning the current zoning in general plan because we do know that are more difficult to develop and assembling small parts that could be redeveloped for housing is really telling readily or easily universe of options that we might be you know if you go all the way over to Washington Street and start there and thinking this is great we could have this big new area of downtown like there's all this opportunity here for creating more housing creating more jobs creating new public amenities because there are some of these larger helping in the next 20 to 30 years you also when you go all the way out to Washington you capture a huge amount of you know existing established the neighborhoods we're capturing some you know recently you know less than 25 years old noticing them to redevelop kind of we've got this most complicated option without necessarily getting like that really high yield in terms of what we would expect the parcels to to redevelop as maybe that's a good boundary and again that has a lot of the same problems you're capturing this this on Cedars Spruce and Sycamore that's you know already developed it is already also identified in our zoning code with the neighborhood conservation overlay zone you know come in and we zone and we designate this area for a lot of change the police station is also on this on Center Street here that's the PF parcel you see on the left side there's just there are a number of uses on Center Street that you still aren't really capturing the you know the bulk of you know we might expect to redevelop and kind of turn over it's already identified is CBD a lot of these large parcels which we know are going to be key opportunity sites already to downtown recommendation are we working or are we working with you know 120 parcels if we go all the way out to Washington and that's just a really different level of complexity and like timeline that you would have in a process so you know once we kind of once we got to this point internally it kind of seems like there are a lot of reasons that we as staff can't really be recommending Center Street or Washington as appropriate boundaries I mean this neighborhood conservation district is a number and complexity of the of parcels and so the the sensitivity much more challenging process than in our existing budget and when we lay out the pros and cons River Levy hearing is going to be happening with the Warriors soon boundaries for the purposes of coping and for you know issuing an opposite community in terms of you know we have no assumptions about that right a range of SIRs and a range of height limits you know there are portions of the existing downtown plan that are still only 35 feet height limit which is what the existing height limit is through most of this area assuming that this whole area is going to go to 85 feet there's going to be a really robust public participation process seeing residents existing landowners and also the broader community about how area and what kind of change we want to see what kind of accommodate in this area so that is all yet to come and we're just trying to get our proposal out we're hoping we you know we do understand that time is of the essence for some of these you know property owners and opportunity sites and so we thought we could save a little time by I know that's a preliminary boundary so we can issue the RFP and that there there will be an extensive public process around what land use intensity is what land use is and what the urban design is of this whole area a big number of units that would be increased in this area it would be premature at this point these are things that we in mind as we move into the planning process about you know what is the right number of units for this area and you know what are the right requirements for inclusionary and replacement units does it make sense to have them be different from our existing standards elsewhere make sense here and we would want to kind of we want to consider all of that in the context appropriate in this neighborhood people really interested in can be no net loss I mean people really a concurrent process so one place is downzoned and another place is upzoned at the same time this process won't be complete for two years minimum the council if the community wants to pursue a general plan amendment of that would be complete and effective until all of it's complete comment we made in the staff reporting to make sure that we have enough money to fund the whole project and the whole sequel process the property major property owners contribute funds to the city to support to do a thorough process so the money comes to the city the city manages the process the consultants and then the developers or property owners get and then an individual project has a lower for a big development project to do one without the we can accommodate that in our and it will take a little bit of time and you know we want to do this right so is that council's discretion to decide you know will black the areas currently zoned cbd-e and rtc at on pacific and center streets as shown in the attached map for questions Sarah this this is math and law principal planner I would just can you go back to the recommendation page I just I just wanted to make one brief clarification there we should add to the recommendation number two to have at that the end there instead of for inclusion in the expanded downtown plan it should be for inclusion in the analysis and and general plan rfp scope for the expanded downtown plan I let me imagine I thought I was not did you catch that language without that that would just clarify that a little bit better that this I got it that this boundary is just for the for the scope and analyzing it as part of the scope then the actual downtown plan thank you even to act with Sarah I will go ahead and change from council and then I will take it out for public comment and then we'll we'll deliver a and take action after public comment are there questions from council on this item okay see oh okay council member coming then I want to start by thanking the staff for pulling this together um I'm a little well I want to appreciate to the clarification around the preliminary considerations I'm still a little concerned because a lot of members of the public reached out expressing concerns about us moving forward with designating these boundaries before there's been any kind of community input process just like to get a better sense of you know one of kind of why that step hadn't been taken to get some community input I mean at a minimum it would have seemed appropriate to at least have this go to the planning commission and I know back in August of 2020 was kind of when the council had mentioned you know really wanted to work with the warriors to create a permanent home so there's been you know months of kind of to work with the warriors and have a permanent home and so I'm just kind of one city council this is a major this is going to be a major rezoning and so just really want to understand a little bit get a little bit more clarification on what this means if we're saying preliminary you know approval because that this really does need to go to the planning commission I mean that's like the role is to weigh in on these decisions so before we do anything that's going to be permanent I think it's really critical that it goes to them and that there's an opportunity for the public to weigh in because that's one of the the things that's been expressed in a lot of the emails is that we're going to make a zoning change and we haven't had any community input thank you for that question that is really you know really important I saw those emails as well from folks really concerned that we were you know circumventing a public process kind of was like you know what are we going to drag hi this is the best option and they're like well obviously this I I shouldn't assume I can be surprised about community input I assume we are absolutely we are going to be involving the planning commission you know this is going to be undertaking expected to be consulted and I you know I appreciate that I I do hear that as a as a critique you know and I've heard all of that that they wanted to have a public process but I didn't see comments that the boundary should have done this differently I just wanted to add as well that you know this this project hasn't even started yet just this really is preliminary and we're looking to just get an idea what to get the consultant to to come back to with us on a on a scope and and a budget and those those were vastly different depending on the areas that we chose and based on how much money we had and and what we wanted to give the consultants to get a good proposal back from them you know really just to get an idea of what what the order of magnitude is for what this plan will be and so that's really what where we've come to with this so far that order of magnitude is is is really just this more focused area and that that can of course change and when this project officially starts you know that's that's when we're really going to have this significant public process that's going to involve a lot of a lot of public meetings going to involve planning commission and so once we get a consultant on board and really start studying this area more and you know get a get a community engagement strategy from the consultant you know that's when we're going to see that kick in a lot more and really engage the public in that way so in this instance it really is this preliminary step before the project even begins sure thank you and I and you know thank you for the the comments I'll just say you know there's there are recommendations that the council has made on a variety of different policies and although it seems like you know from the public that you know we're not getting a lot of pushback that it's likely something that's going to be adopted I feel like we still send those items to our different commission so that they can weigh in and it's really important because I feel like you know I'm getting emails from commissioners the expressing concern that they have one they haven't had a chance to weigh in and the other is that they haven't it doesn't sound like they've been meeting right like in the so I don't think they've met the last two times for their regularly scheduled meetings and please correct me if I'm wrong but I reached out to a number of them and they said you know they haven't been meeting regularly lately and so if the if there isn't anything on that their agenda this is something that even if they are in full agreement they could have weighed in on and it's beneficial for us because when we get these comments from the community saying hey there's been no input you know we can say at least the the planning commission has weighed in and here's where they've landed and it's quite possible that they all agree with staff's recommendation and I'm not opposing what the staff's recommending it seems like a you know it's appropriate for this plan but you know part of our role as government officials is that we're supposed to be doing everything we can to uphold the trust of the community and the trust of the governmental process and if the community you know if they perceive or if it seems like we're trying to rush these processes and especially when it comes to land use and development because if we change the zoning in these areas that's going to have an impact on those property values there's concerns about the people who are living and housing around there and how they're going to be impacted and just getting that that having those conversations and having that opportunity for the community to weigh in just really helps us to really know that we're trying to do our best to have the community you know engaged and involved in this process and that we're not trying to kind of you know rezone things or change boundaries without them without giving them and without giving you know our commissioners and our bodies an opportunity to weigh in and so that's it's one of the concerns that I have just how we're moving I really hope that we can move quickly with this process but I do want to you know just encourage that we're trying to do our best to engage with our different the other bodies that are supposed to be weighing in and really trying to increase that public input and and I don't think that you know it would really delay it would if anything it would like demonstrate that we want to hear from the public we're you know wanting to have their trust and move forward in a way that brings them with us so yeah I do want to see how we can help work to bring this forward in a way that really demonstrates to the community we're trying to have them engage in this process thank you council member Cummings I've got council vice mayor Brunner council member Watkins council member Brown and council member Callentary Johnson in that order please great thank you thank you so much Sarah for going through that I think my question is also clarifying with the community response we received an input I'm wondering how much of it is in the language of how it was presented and and even in your report you started off saying this is not a rezoning this is for the purposes of obtaining an RSP for the project within this grant timeline so not a rezoning and in the public process in the future there is opportunity for that to happen the boundaries could change for example during that public process for planning commission presentation right yeah so as we get into the you know that is the core of it is what are the uses that we want to see here what are the intensities of use that we want to see here and oh we we sort of we phrase sort of we understood I can only apologize for that you know I I understand that folks are everyone to like continue to stay involved that wasn't maybe clear in the written document and so I want to be extra clear right now this action that you are taking today involves no change is what we determined to be the best option to look at in terms of obtaining an RFP and okay and then my second question tied to that was with your recommended boundary the yellow portion of the map it would be released in April or May and with a deadline in June so is that kind of like a three month process in the staff report it says if if we do that's recommended then that would get returned the the results in the summer July let's say and so the RFP would then be three months from then what would that look like yeah so September yeah so to go out and do public process we're prepared to do that we certainly can go out and have these conversations you know we would expect that to take a few months and sort of wrap up by the end of the spring and you know later in the spring and we sort of like May June so we would then work on issuing the RFP in July and so we're trying if give us the chance to like push through and get a contract potentially back in June and just complicated process and you know a little more wiggle room in terms of time I think it's gonna okay those are my questions thank you thank you Vice Mayor Council Member Watkins yes thank you Mayor and thank you Vice Mayor for your clarifying questions and I appreciate the clarification and language Sarah asking this is simply a proposal for a plan in 2017 I feel like this was also identical proposal to have a way to extend potentially towards the beach to align that portion as a component of the downtown plan so this didn't really seem to me like really out of the blue and I'm wondering if Lee or others want to speak to that because I sort of remember that being uh kind of the next stage that we anticipated coming with that plan and then as well thank you Council Member Watkins I'll jump in on that because that predated Sarah's time with us and what I'll say is that the idea has been in front of the council a number of times in fact the first time may have been you know well let me let me start by first saying for decades there's been a goal to really better connect our downtown with the beach and to really you know draw so many of those millions of tourists that visit main beach and Cal's beach and draw them into our downtown so that they can experience that that great aspect of our city and hopefully you know stay for dinner or decide to you know uh spend money in our shops so standing goal what I specifically recall is that and so I don't recall as part of the downtown plan in 2017 if there is any specific discussion about later expansion into the downtown there may have been but that's been sometime but I do remember that when we brought and I may get them confused this was the when we brought the leap grant this one's the reap grant when we brought the leap grant to the council and we identified the housing element as the preferred project what we said is believe that one was $310,000 if we've got extra funds from that after we go through the housing element process let's dedicate that towards a an expansion of the downtown plan and I believe but I'm not sure that that is that may or may not have specified to the self when we brought the reap back we were more general and we said hey let's expand the downtown plan the reap requires that we that we extend housing capacity that we expand housing capacity and so that's when we got the the green light from the council to expand and at that time we were thinking you know well we're going to go we might go north we might go west we might go south and we'll engage the community to figure that out given the multitude of things that sarah talks about in terms of timeline the amount of budget that we have the process that we need to undergo which will likely be an environmental impact report after an analysis of various alternatives alternative development scenarios and growth patterns in that area then we would conduct an environmental impact report those those are you know significant periods of time and the farther out we go the more complicated that gets the more and the less opportunities that we have to do in-depth community outreach if you know we do because the the end timeline is set you know we have to get it done by the time that the grant is there so all of these things factored into our consideration but you're right there has been some discussion I can't remember the initial parts but the the council has considered this at a point in the past thank you council member brown thank you yes I so I wanted most of my questions have been asked and answered for the most part but I do I just want to echo my colleagues concerns about the apparent speed with which this is coming and a decision is to be made and thank you very so much Sarah for clarifying the so everybody's clear about what we're at being asked to do here today and I appreciate all your work but it does seem that we we tend to be we tend to get into this pattern I feel that is it's it's difficult to reconcile with you know the public in public input and public engagement and interest in the decisions we make so we what I find happens often is we make decisions where they say oh it's like this is really just the beginning and you know we're we're going to work on this later but then it doesn't really end I'm not sure quite how to say this much that public engagement and openness doesn't seem to really come afterwards and so then we the council or the public is presented with a proposal either ordinance change or a particular project that is pretty fully baked and and people get frustrated because the only thing they can do at that point is either oppose potentially take legal action you know or support and so making this more of an iterative process seems like it would be to our benefit so I really just wanted to echo what council member Cummings was talking about in that regard in terms of the role of the planning commission it seems to me that this is this is a pretty traditional role for the planning commission to be involved in these kinds of decisions and these kinds of processes and I'm just wondering about the the concerns about the delay being you know potentially three months to do a community engagement process couldn't the planning commission perhaps put it on their agenda have a public hearing have some discussion make create a more open process for a limited period of time so that we don't delay but there there is a space to have some of that conversation and help people understand what's coming next so I'm just wondering if that would be a possibility like a middle way to maybe have a little more time and put it out there so that's just a kind of a question comment and then my other question is if you could or someone could just give us a encapsulate what these changes would allow might allow us to do the city to do or developers to do businesses that is not allowable under the current designations because I think another thing that I've heard is the like in particular with density bonus we're already talking about potentially 50% increase over the current zoning and so do we really want to go there right I mean we kind of did that in the downtown along the river in certain places to have increased that height but do we really want to go there and I think that the question that that the public really needs to be involved and so just wanted to if you could just kind of help us understand what those key differences are I know it's complicated the zoning rules and all of that and so I'm not asking for an overview of that just more like you know we could have you know seven stories or we could have more mixed use or you know we could have these other functions just a little rundown sure yeah absolutely thank you for those questions so I will I'll respond to your first you know question comment first about like could we involve the planning commission in you know having some of this outreach to you know mitigate the delay and the only word I would change their delay it's not really I wouldn't call it a delay we have time we we can do to make up that time throughout the rest of the if we think we're going to end up re-or if we think there are other reasons to take this boundary out for more public process you know we could involve the planning commission that might be a useful way to do it um yeah you know the planning commission will be involved with this outreach and really reaching people like really the greatest way to do that so I don't know if that would be my first to out from the people we've already heard from facts with the existing residents maybe doing having some online cerns and looking at these three options of boundaries and like thinking about that so we haven't laid that all out right away if you know if that would be necessarily be my first choice in terms of doing effective outreach um by the land use issues so involving them does I might before we go too much further I we have a number of council members haven't answered questions so I'm just hoping we can maybe just instead of to kind of solve each question is maybe there may be maybe we can get through questions and then we're going to deliberate afterwards so you know I don't want to get too much out before we're really being able to deliberate and also to respect the public right so keeping an eye on height in some places up to 50 feet of height in some places 75 and in some places 35 feet of height so um you know South of Laurel would be determined through this you know planning process we would work with the community to figure out what the right intensity was and you're very you're absolutely correct you know the density bonus does allow for up to a 50 percent intensity bonus when you're providing a high level of affordability with the project and that's true throughout the city so in terms of you know what we might what we can see currently under like the current state law and affordability components so it is a density bonus project so that's sort of one example of what could be done currently and you know they're having standards that can only be developed out under the density bonus and having standards that really allow conforming projects will have inclusionary to be built without the need for a density bonus because part of this process is part of the objective standards process the density bonus is absolutely a component that we have to take into consideration and that we can't necessarily control I'm gonna let's see Martine I just Martine Bernal I saw you did you want to comment also Martine on this sorry I just saw your hand come up so if if council members don't mind I'll I'll shift it over to Martine for whatever his comments might be yes thank you I just wanted to just jump in with respect to the the timing issue and question obviously the the intent of staff is to go through a thorough process and to have you know appropriate to community input into the process however it's also important to recognize that one of the most significant reasons for wanting to move forward with this is in order to facilitate any kind of warriors project moving forward and so as you may hear from them later they have an urgency in trying to move forward with respect to a project and so that is really what we're trying to balance here there's no project that's pending in particular project or anything that's waiting for this however the process for moving forward with any kind of project private project particularly facility there's the timeliness to that and this would this is one potential tool that could facilitate moving down forward and so the longer this process takes the more difficult and challenging it'll be to be able to move forward with any kind of project with the warriors so I just want to point that out that that's a significant issue and a reason for wanting to begin the process and to you know expedite again in a way that is as quickly as possible however that's needed to move forward so I just want to highlight that council member commentary Johnson is next thank you so much thank you Sarah for the presentation and clarifying all our questions and thank you Martin that was actually a question I had is if if we could really clearly articulate the urgency for an expedited decision-making process and then also to go back to I mean I think you clarified Sarah but just to reaffirm and maybe hear from Lee that this is not circumventing a public process this is putting forward a preliminary plan so we can move forward with this grant proposal so I want to just hear that from both of you again and then my follow-up question to that is could you speak to what the public process would look like and reaffirm Sarah's statements from earlier council member count Sarah Johnson that yes this process will undoubtedly have a very robust public outreach and engagement component one of the things that I would expect to happen which is often the case in terms of the early stages of the RFP whoever is selected through the RFP process that consultant will one do background research right at the beginning and two will come up with an outreach and great and engagement strategy so I don't want to presuppose what those elements would be particularly as we're emerging from the COVID era and you know we may or may not have in person opportunities for engagement and creative ways to meet people where they're at in the community as you know we would encourage in a non-COVID time but certainly there will be a strong outreach engagement component whether that is electronic if we're if we're still in social distancing mode or whether that is able to occur in person and oftentimes when the community engagement strategy is developed it specifies you know before these key milestones we're going to go out and get community feedback so that we can build that into what our initial alternatives that we're considering are and then once we've got alternatives put together understanding what that initial feedback is we go out to the community again and we say hey here are the alternatives what do you think is best about this one and that one and this one and then oftentimes what we'll find is it's not one of those alternatives that's selected but that's sort of a mishmash of those and say you know the community liked this part and they didn't like that part and so then once that is brought together they'll often be like okay community we heard what you said here is a here's a plan that we think kind of best encompasses what we've heard and you get feedback on that then there is the sequel component and through that sequel analysis there is environmental review of all of those components including alternatives so you know the the initial alternatives that were considered oftentimes become the alternatives that are plugged into the EIR and so then there's analysis of all of those where there's additional opportunities for community feedback and then how that happens you know electronically or you know through surveys or online you know that's yet to be seen but but I would expect those as kind of the general checkpoints okay thanks thank you for providing that and just you know thank you to you Sarah and Lee and the team for doing all of the work that you do to to bring it to this point that's to consider launching some process great see no other councilmember hands I'm going to take it out to the public now and I see two hands there and I do want to yeah thank Sarah and Matt and if you guys can stay on the line I'm sure there'll be additional additional questions and just from my comments I would just say that I I understand sort of the thinking that's going on going in behind this and also understand the interest in the warriors is something that's obviously really important to the community so trying to trying to look at that balancing of hopefully working with them into the future so thank you for the presentation though okay I'm going to go out to the public first person has the phone number ending in 5724 and we can hear you sorry for the dog good afternoon my name is Chris Murphy President Santa Cruz Warriors first and foremost I want to say thank you to council member city staff for the time and hard work serving our community during these times and in this issue you know just wanted to say you know the warriors are committed to the Santa Cruz I want to stay in Santa Cruz long term we just need a long-term arena solution you know the Santa Cruz Warriors are about a lot more than just basketball games we've worked hard to support the community through countless events and programs like re-do-achieve in our local schools also recently donating over 50,000 meals to second harvest food bank you know we've also supported numerous civic projects like river levy beautification with the coastal watershed council community serving missions like the resource recovery center post wildfires last fall and the current COVID-19 vaccination center has a permanent arena a permanent home in Santa Cruz will help us continue and expand that work our arena project expectations are to form a primarily privately funded project that hosts basketball music art entertainment other community benefiting events we look forward to sharing ideas and collaborating with the community once we fully know what the possibilities are for the site we want to stay in Santa Cruz we just need to move with some clear momentum forward toward a long-term long-term arena solution thank you very much for your time thank you Chris uh next up I have uh phone number ending in 0030 go ahead please unmute yourself office on the field again I was just uh you know I think the city has an opportunity this evening to basically what you're doing is you're selecting the scope community homework aside that what are going to be some of the best options for the downtown to expect you know the most responsible thing to do is to make that homework assignment as robust as possible and that means um including scoping out all the way to to Washington street whether or not Washington street is ultimately selected that's you know a very long process that will involve lots of community input and but I think it's the responsibility of the city to to have that on the table as as an option so that you know there are just there's more opportunities for the public to be involved in the process I think the the larger area will probably have received more you know press coverage and maybe generate more controversy which is actually a good thing if we want public participation and and so I think it we we even if you know it's not ultimately selected going out to Washington street I think it's still worthwhile you know doing the work to figure out you know what what the public wants and what some of the the feasible options are so that's why I would suggest having a as robust of of a community engagement process and robust of a review of the various options as possible and and include as an option going all the way out as far as Washington street thank you thank you next public member is 0193 that's your end of your phone number press star six please phone number ending in 0193 we're ready for you if you press star six you'll be unmuted since that's the previous call I pretty much said what I was going to say so I'll be brief which is simply that the planning director has pointed out that this whole area of land is the logical place connecting the downtown with the beach um and and it's a it's a very long laborious extensive time consuming process and we should take advantage of it to talk to all the people in that area particularly about what they would like to have happen because it's an area that just makes sense for the city to extend in in the downtown and to say that and I understand that the short term thing is to get the warriors into their place but the long term thing is really to deal with that area in a way that makes sense for everybody until the long term growth of the city and um um now is the time to do it because you're doing it and all good to do it thank you I was muted next up is phone number ending in five six five two and you're unmuted go ahead please hi thank you mera filipini here the importance for community engagement and input from the public has come up as a priority to council a number of times today this boundary decision would undoubtedly affect a large portion of the community members who have not been informed about it let alone asked for input on it this agenda item is a big deal and it's nice that public input is being promised by staff for further down the process but it was also previously indicated for this part of the process when it came up before council on October 13th it was tagged on to the REAP grant application for funding toward affordable housing at that time staff made it abundantly clear with repetition that there would be community engagement before the hiring of a consultant or the establishment of boundaries for any downtown expansion associated with the grant reviewing the recording confirms this the original language of promotion today is expressly circumventing the process that was originally delineated by staff and accepted by council in your previous motion passing this without that necessary community engagement with threatened community trust in the current city council as councilman Cummings has brought up with rightful concern Sarah has indicated that you do have time to engage with public input process at this stage so please do so however if you consider this motion today please edit the motion to state explicitly that it will not include boundaries for expansion of the downtown plan and that it is instead specifically approving an RFP for a consultant with loose ballpark of what staff recommends for expansion zoning but that any such establishment of new boundaries would include a public input process thank you thank you next step is item or excuse me phone number ending in 0836 please press star six to unmute council members my name is Ed Porter and I'm calling to say that I listened very carefully to what staff had to say a few moments ago and all the question was brought up whether or not this matter would be referred to the planning commission and the answer was it's not necessary to do that I think we shouldn't have a planning commission if that's the decision we have a planning commission for the purpose of considering matters like this staff is saying that we're contemplating a major planning process of course it should be referred to the planning commission there's no doubt in my mind furthermore if we're going to continue in the in the manner that we did in January of approving building in excess of our building height we need to have a community conversation about that and it certainly needs to be on the table to reconsider building heights of 70 feet if in fact the state density bonus is going to allow higher heights than that in any place in our downtown thank you very much thank you believe that is the end of the folks who wanted to speak is anyone else in the public wanting to speak to this item there's one person what they're asked right that'll phone number ending in five three six two can you hear me good evening yes this is Judy Grunstra and I could picture you know a wonderful connection from the town to the beach if it's done right um so but I do think the public needs to weigh in early and uh otherwise it could be a disaster so I think you should have learned by now that the public wants to weigh in and it's not a good idea to cut corners at the start of a process so um I'm looking forward to something that public can participate in fully and um right from the start thank you yeah we don't know the warriors could be putting pressure on every other community that is making them an offer and we shouldn't be held hostage to that okay thanks thank you I will go ahead and go back to council for additional questions of staff and deliberations council member Watkins please make a motion at this point all things when I want to just say I appreciate the clarifying comments made by staff to help us better understand what's before us and really the instituting of an RFP that will essentially kick off a public process also recognize the timeline and the end date that's essentially in place and how to expedite that and also do our due diligence in terms of the process and the what I took away was also a deductive approach to why you landed in the recommendation that you did create this ingenuous type of process when you already had a predetermined understanding of what that would look like but then to kick off the process knowing that that could be the approach for the community input is sort of how I was able to take that away also want to acknowledge the contributions that were brought up stepping up and partnering to support our community amongst some really challenging times I've frequently seen partnerships that have been really geared at giving back to the Santa Cruz community and the timeline associated with the permanency of the location for them I had a one sort of question and I'm wondering maybe this could be in the RFP is that it says would be to go to the planning commission essentially to community input as sort of that first we wanted to speak for sure I'm happy to jump in there yeah that that can be is certainly a approach is you know with the initial kickoff going there would be a good opportunity for hearing from the commission you know it's tough to have dialogue with the you know three minutes and so that would that could certainly be an early component to to go to the planning commission and hear back from them and welcome public comment at the same time but I would say that you know that is that would not and I don't think this was your intent at all but just for the members of the community that would not supplant any of the other community outreach efforts that we would do that would allow for additional engagement that's right yeah it would just be sort of the preliminary first steps to have their input and awareness around this as well and then while I have you you know I welcome if there's any corrections to what my statement was in terms of what I took away at the high kind of level of of what the presentation and clarification have been if I could see the recommendation and then I want to give that one more read and then I I think in terms of moving our deliberations forward I'm happy to make a motion so Sarah I emailed Bonnie some tweaks just to clarify that that second part Bonnie do you have that or I could share it if that's easier I do have it it might be easier for me if there's changes okay great a couple of suggestions to really clarify for the community what the word what step we're taking here so the there's a number one okay oh sorry obviously where's number one okay number two would change there and and I'll let you read it so I'm not reading over folks but essentially establishing a preliminary boundary okay I can go ahead and read the motion as the motion would be to issue a RFP a request or proposal to secure consultant services to manage the regional early action planning grant funded projects shown on the attached maps for inclusion in the analysis in general plan RFP scope for the expanded downtown plan that would be that was the original proposed motion now the alternative that you emailed Bonnie is what I'm about to read next right please that's correct with the additional text underlined okay and so the other alternative would be then to select the areas currently zoned CBD-E and RT-C south of Laurel Street as shown on the attached maps as the preliminary boundary that could be refined later for the inclusion in the scope for the request of proposals for an expanded downtown so I think I'm more comfortable with the alternative to language and I appreciate you coming up with that so my motion would be to move forward with number one and the alternative language for number two and then maybe it doesn't necessarily have to be kind of a component of the motion but to direct the staff as a component of the RFP and commission weigh in the outreach prioritized for the and early consultation in the process is what I think the intent was to go to them sort of right off the bat for early consultation in the outreach process yeah there you go thank you I second that everyone calling a robust community an engagement process what I'm hearing from staff that that that that will be part of the process this motion passed it will kick off with the planning commission giving consultation and then we'll move into a robust community engagement process I wanted to just echo what my colleague councilmember Watkins said about how the warriors have contributed to our community and the civic engagement and I wanted to further just point out that beyond the amazing civic engagement and recreational and entertainment that they provide there's a significant amount of funding that comes to our community from the warriors being here approximately $130,000 in general funds and approximately $300,000 to the public trust these are these are estimates that I asked staff to give me so that's significant and it aligns directly with our re-envision Santa Cruz our interim recovery plan in infrastructure in financial stability and revitalization of downtown so I think that's really important for us to keep in mind as we make these decisions and move forward is that the warriors are fond and they're wonderful and they contribute significantly to the vitality and sustainability of our community so thank you Council Member I have Council Member Cummings Council Member Golder and Council Member Brown Thank you Mayor I just have my colleagues and thanking Chris Murphy and the Warriors for their ongoing communities support and you know just want to express that we you know we kicked off these conversations last year and these conversations have been you know ongoing as well around creating a permanent home for the Santa Cruz Warriors there's a ton of people in our community who appreciate them being here and I think we want to do everything we can to support this effort I do also want to thank my colleague Council Member Watkins for the language that was included around directness to the Planning Commission I understand the urgency and I think to the comments that were brought up by the community you know this came before us back in October of last year when we were discussing the recrant opportunity and I think we really need to you know stay committed to trying to have community process as a part of this and I know that sometime has gone by and there's a sense of urgency but you know at a minimum having to go to the Planning Commission for their input I think is really important I do want to point out that there were Planning Commission meetings that were scheduled but then canceled for January 21st for February 4th for March 4th and for March 18th and these all could have been opportunities where this item could have gone to the Commission come to us and then we could have you know in the sense you know with knowing how urgent this is to get moving forward you know we could have had these these recommendations come to those meetings get input and while it's not the broadest and most robust community input and engagement process these bodies exist for a reason their appointments that are made by council members and we are you know we vote these individuals in to provide us with recommendations on very major community decisions and so I think it's really critical that we include them in these processes and in this instance in particular there were four opportunities for this item to go to the Planning Commission prior to it coming into council because there were no items heard at those meetings and I think that you know if we are to if we want to maintain public trust we do need to have some kind of public input process and the planning commission is one of those bodies that is there for us to get input from I would as part of the motion I'm wondering if this could go and I'd like to hear maybe from staff and from other council members but I think it would be good given the urgency if this item could go to the first meeting of the planning commission in April it's unclear what level of changes needs to be made if we're you know directing that these if we're allowing for these preliminary boundaries to be considered and then sending it to the Planning Commission and that we're going to finalize these boundaries at another point is is it possible for this item to go to the first meeting in April of the Planning Commission and and then receive input on the proposed general plan and zoning changes and recommendations from that group and then I don't know if it would need to come back then or if those recommendations would be included but then you know come back after we've had more community outreach but yeah I think that you know if we can get a sense at a minimum from the Planning Commission what their thoughts are and you know other input that comes to that meaning we've heard from other people today members of the community today are expressing extending the boundaries further than what we're recommending so obviously there is a difference in what you know what the community thinks about in terms of the boundaries so I guess I'd like to see if that might be an amendment but would like to ask staff if it would be possible for this to go and I would imagine this report itself could go along with the some notes on the discussion that we've had today sir thank you council member Cummings I think you kind of hit the nail on the head in terms of your question your follow-up question which was when you said I'm not sure what the outcome what we would do with that is so what I would be asking is would the intent to be for you to for us to come back and have the council select those boundaries at a later date or would it be just to go to the keep the planning commission sooner rather than later meaning as early as possible in April and I think you know pros and cons to each if if you wanted us to come back to the council there would be a delay I can't say that you know we would not get an RFP I mean it's a really tight schedule to get an RFP completed and back in front of the council by June so even if we you know jumped on this and brought it to the council and if if the council's desire is to not select the boundaries until the planning commission has weighed in the earliest we would be back in front of the council who would be august with a consultant if you wanted to just if you just wanted us if you wanted to say like here are the general boundaries but go to the planning commission and get their initial thoughts and considerations then that would not have a delay on the project we would we would be able to go ahead and draft that RFP and then the the only the only negative I would see with that is we wouldn't necessarily have the consultant on board for that initial discussion but you know they could always go back and view the tape they just you know they may bring additional ideas that you know could benefit the conversation so you know pros and cons to each approach and you know timing being the the key consideration depending on whether or not you want this to if you want to direct us to make the bound the preliminary boundaries known as part of the RFP or if you want to come back and make that preliminary boundary decision decision later I guess given that these aren't final boundaries it seems like if we adopt the preliminary boundaries but then we have the planning commission to weigh in on this and we're not going to finalize the boundaries I don't see that as being a problem I think that's also what the community is concerned with is that if we were to because because with reading the report the way it was drafted and prior to our meeting today I think the many members of the public thought that we were going to finalize these boundaries today and that was the you know walking into this meeting those are the concerns that I came with so we're not going to finalize the zoning boundaries and just preliminarily designate them that's an operate that won't delay us you know going through this RFP process if that will then also allow for these preliminary boundaries to go to the planning commission and receive input you know I'd see that that first meeting with the planning commission to really help inform you know and be an opportunity for our commissioners to weigh in for the community to weigh in even more and if there's a need to change those boundaries I would imagine that would come up and that's going to come back to us at some point in time so that's kind of my understanding where we're at and I guess my concern is you know given that the planning commission could have weighed in at these other meetings that were canceled is it possible for us to get this to them as soon as possible because it sounds like we really want to get as much input as possible and we really want to have our plan commission weigh in on this item so I just have a quick clarifying question about the motion just make sure I'm clear and then we've got four members queued up so the question is is the question the timing of the first of the meeting in April just trying to clarify for the motion maker is that really the intent is not this so the boundaries are not going to be drawn that there will be a long public process a two-year public process to basically draw the boundaries basically it sounds like over many considerations so is the intent council member coming to try to just get the planning commission involved as soon as possible the motion maker as well I mean I think that that's I'm not sure if that was part of that direction but it going to the planning commission and be prioritized for early consultation but I do you know I'm trying to reconcile the the fact that there's community concern because this could have gone under the planning commission and hasn't and then reconciling that with the urgency of you know needing it to go needing us to get this community input because the times the clock's ticking on this so and I imagine that that input would also be useful as this goes to further community as we receive more input from the community on what the zoning should be yeah unfortunately I don't I don't think we can go backwards so I mean I think your intent really is to try to get it to the early to the first meeting in April and Lee is that possible on your end? Sharon I'm checking our schedule is that that agenda goes out later this week and I'm just pulling up the info right now while I'm waiting for this to load because I've got a swirling week here the we were not able to send this to an earlier planning commission because the item was not ready I just want to make that clear that Sarah has been focused on the objective standards work and so that's why it hasn't been to a planning commission and so you know from a perspective of RFPs they're not typically sent to the planning commission that's not to say that they can't be and for something like this you know we're happy to do that if that's the will of the council but just in terms of like addressing the comments of like why wasn't this sent to the planning commission beforehand the report that came to the council specified that you know we were going to go into outreach and come directly to the council it didn't say we were going to come back and go to the planning commission there's nothing that that requires that we go to the planning commission there's also nothing that says we don't have to except for that timing aspect you know so when we when we do those things we add an additional time and as as we've heard you know the the warriors do have a interest in moving this forward sooner rather than later and so you know we we want to support that but also if there was not a clear path if if we felt that it wasn't entirely clear and we weren't sure about which direction to go we wouldn't have brought this to the the council at this point in time we would have gone out to the community and said hey you know what do you guys think about these pros and cons so I just wanted to to provide a little bit more background on on why we ended up where we did and so I'm not I think that we can I'm not seeing any issues you know we could present this report to the planning commission at the April 1st meeting and you know they could weigh in and then I would just ask for clarification with respect to the intent of the council with regards to are you are you saying move forward with the RFP with the preliminary boundaries and then just bring this to the planning commission or are you saying I'll turn this back Lee if you don't mind to the motion maker because I've got to choose the one that can provide that direction I appreciate that thank you mayor and thank you Lee and I think what I would say is there I don't as the motion maker don't have an interest in wanting to further delay but do want to prioritize as indicated in and item number three for our planning commission to weigh in as you know as an early the consultation as as basically written on the on the motion here I do think that you know I really appreciate I'll see your comments Lee in regards to just the the not sort of intentional approach to keep out a commission body but the divergent workload needs right essentially is what I'm hearing as well as wanting to also include them moving forward in terms of this just really being the very beginning of the process so I I think for item number three I think really covers what I'm reading mainly in the friendly amendment other than wanting to prioritize that go before them at the earliest convenience which if I'm hearing from you Lee that that this could be that before them in April but I wouldn't want that to be placed it's not my intention as a motion maker to replace us moving forward with direction to issue the RFP at this time so I I mean at at least that's how I that's how I'm presenting it I don't know if the second year of the motion feels differently council member Caltari Johnson I you're you're you're you're in agreement with council member Watkins that's that's correct yeah so are you so the earliest consultation you feel like is providing that direction so the friendly amendment is is not being accepted in its entirety I mean what it could be is just to incorporate that the early consultation be the presentation of this agenda item at their first meeting in April but wouldn't preclude us from moving forward with direction and approval of the RFP at this time right yeah I think it could be both at both ends if you will I think your your number one captures the intent to issue the the ready to have requests for a proposal okay okay I will move on to council member Brown council member Bruner council member Golder and council member Watkins are you your hands still up or you're gonna you're good okay council member Brown yeah so I I just want to thank my colleagues council member Watkins thank you for being willing to you know to include some additional language around inclusion the planning commission in this process I think it's really important that we we do that and I don't I'm not saying this because I want to open up another can of words about what goes in the motion but I did just want to add that you know the downtown commission also has a really important role to play in this and and did in the downtown recovery plan and so you know I hope that they're also prioritized to be involved in this process early on and so I want to just say that and then a couple other comments you know I I recognize the interests that and the need that the warriors have to try to get some clarity on where things are you know where we're headed moving forward for their own planning process and I want to support that I want to support them as much as possible I absolutely agree with my colleagues with Council Member Calentari-Johnson and Watkins in their appreciation for what the value added that the warriors bring is not just economic you know activity but really you know a commitment to our community so I I just and I want to thank Chris Murphy for you know all the work that you do and in coordinating and leading that effort so I do want to make sure that we're not I guess I'm just wanting to say and Claire be clear that I am not looking to in asking for additional public engagement or the Planning Commission to be involved or the Downtown Commission to be involved trying to delay this process I just would like to see it be as iterative as possible so that when we we do get to that point of making a decision people will feel like they have been heard that that input has been um you know incorporated and I think it'll just be a smoother process kind of on the you know down the road if we do that up front so I'll I think I'll leave it there but thank you everyone for working together to get this motion together thank you Council Member Brown Vice Mayor Bruner thank you I wanted to comment on the motion and I'm glad the friendly amendment that Council Member Cummings brought in and it was just clarified my question in terms of item three of the motion of Direct Planning Commission to be prioritized for early consultation in the outreach process and I wanted to know if the motion maker intended that to be in regards to the RFP but even though number one states that so it sounds like we are the motion is to go ahead with the staff recommendation of the identified yellow boundary for the purposes of obtaining RFPs and in commission to take a look at those staff recommended boundaries yellow boundaries at their first meeting is that correct anybody's understanding the following zoning process moving forward with these proposals and I just I want to make sure that clear and understood because I really share the concern that our committee members have called in and written about I also want to firmly urge that we make a commitment to really support the Santa Cruz lawyers in their needs with moving forward a permanent arena and staying in Santa Cruz and you know what they've contributed to our community to the economy what they bring I think it's really important for us for them to hear a commitment from us in whatever way that looks that they will be able to move forward with a permanent arena and I just think you know identifying those six goals in this staff report was was all very valuable and important and you know number I think it was number three was working with the Santa Cruz lawyers to establish those design standards so I really want to emphasize that we make that commitment and it's part of this piece but I don't know how that you know piece can really be solidified in and of itself you know irregardless of the whole picture we move forward if there was a way to do that so thank you for clarifying with the friendly amendment that was what I had in thank you Vice Mayor I have Council Member Golder Council Member Golder question or a comment somebody else made it and I just want to say thank you to everybody for your thoughtful and thanks everybody for your comments when you called in I did want to acknowledge one more contribution that the warriors have made to the community and I just think it's sort of something that sometimes gets lost is that this investment in our youth that's kind of like a future investment when we talk about prevention of drug use or homelessness or other other things that we're trying to work on now when we work on pro-social activities like the warriors provide the the reading read to achieve program they do with the schools and just the tickets they give away to inspire kids to have access to see these athletes in action and I can't thank Chris Murphy and the warriors enough for that future investment in our community in terms of the youth and I do look forward to seeing what the process looks like as far as as community engagement goes in contributing to this very early process of this we have a motion and council member coming did you have more on the on this item two really quick items one I just wanted to clarify for council member Bruner and some of the newer council members last I think it was August 11th of 2020 the council voted to send a letter of support and commitment to wanting to to see a permanent home for the Santa Cruz Warriors so I just to the questions you had I just wanted to let you know that we that's kind of what started this process was that item that came on our agenda in August of 2020 so we've we've sent those letters out and just to remind the community that the council did support and made it clear to the warriors that we do want to try to create a permanent home for them here in Santa Cruz and then the other question I had I just wanted to get clarification from the the staff so what I know we've talked a lot about the zoning changes and everything today but what what are some of the next steps going to be so you know we're going to secure consultant and then are we going to when do we expect something to come back to council with kind of like a timeline and you know really the different time the different opportunities for engagement with the public that's a great question what I would say is that when we come back with the RFP consult the selected consultant from the RFP that contract will contain the proposed process now it's it probably won't be very specific as I noted before you know they'll probably say an early task is creating a community engagement strategy but it will be broad in terms of saying like we're going to engage the community at steps a b and c in roughly these time frames but it won't necessarily dial in how that will occur but you'll have a decent understanding the number of touch points you know so they'll say you know we'll have four community meetings and we'll have two survey monkey or something you know okay they'll they'll basically set the parameters of this is what our work scope is going to include so you'll get a general idea when that comes back these zoning boundaries is that correct in terms of the specific boundaries what could happen is as part of this process when we're going out to the community the community could say you know well we would prefer if it was this way or that way and you know they could say well if that's the case then you know maybe right here these parcels or maybe a property owner comes along and says you know I own these three parcels right here and I would like to be included and you know maybe we hadn't thought about including them because there are three small parcels that we didn't expect to redevelop so you know through that process it will likely be an iterative in process where you know we're working with the community and we're refining those boundaries what I would expect to happen as part of this and what is is typically the case is there will be check-ins with the council so you know when we get to certain stages in the process we'll say hey you know let's bring you know a typical one is before we select a preferred alternative to go study in the EIR we'll typically bring that to the council and say council you know this is the direction we're heading we don't want to go do 10, 12, 14 months worth of work if you're not on board with the direction that we're heading and so you know during those check-ins you'll get an opportunity and we can highlight you know here's what we've heard from the community this is why we made these tweaks this boundary was here and we contracted it because you know this was happening and this boundary was here and we expanded it because that was happening and what do you think so so it's it would be an integrative process in that respect appreciate that feedback because I think it helps for members of the public to understand that this isn't going to be an ongoing process and we're not finalizing boundaries and that there's going to be opportunity to engage and if we need to change there's opportunity to do that as well so thanks that concludes all my comments on this item thank you council member council member Golder your hand is up did you want another comment I did I had one more question I wanted to ask and it was has there been an attempt already or is it part of the process to reach out to the property owners in that yellow zone and maybe some of the the other I don't remember the letters but you know the ones that are close in there to see what their thoughts are in this process and I mean I know there's some properties that I can think of that just seem underutilized or maybe ready for some revitalization and so I just was wondering that you broke up a little bit so if I if I didn't if I don't cover a part of your question let me know but we have so when council made that direction back in August we initiated conversations with the Santa Cruz Warriors and so we have been in conversations with the Santa Cruz Warriors and some of the key landowners in that area where they may have a a potential opportunity for a stadium so we've had a series of conversations with them we have not done any broader outreach we haven't done we haven't kicked off an outreach other than talking with the the Warriors and some key landowners there some of the larger parcels yeah that's that's what I was wondering and but the but through the process you'll reach out to the other other property owners as well I'm sure without a doubt both within whatever boundaries but also you know from a broader range you know one of the the great things about the downtown is that it draws everyone from the community and it really is the heart of our community and so we expect that this will have interest not only from the immediate area and the landowners that are directly affected but also the larger community who will be affected by the overall look and feel of our downtown and I have to say like I was a little embarrassed that I didn't know this until recently but I didn't realize that the Sycamore Street isn't really considered that's not considered part of downtown is that is that's why I was confused I was like I used to live on Sycamore Street I thought I lived downtown so the downtown plan different people have different visions of what downtown is but the downtown plan itself stops on the southern boundary at Laurel surprising to me thank you yeah it is somewhat confusing because some of the same zoning districts you know it's still the central business district zoning designation CBDE farther south so that can add to the confusion as well you can blame it on our zoning yeah okay great if I could I would suggest one clarification in the motion under the friendly amendment the first line where it says and receive input on the general zoning plan and recommendations I would say and receive input on the report presented as part of this item and associated recommendations if that's okay with the council I think that was that what the intent is is basically presenting this report as the kickoff that's a good catch yeah that's how I read it and I appreciate you correcting the language to reflect that more actively okay so the motion is before you it is to go without recommendation of issuing the RFP to secure consultant services to manage the regional early action plan grant funded project to select the areas currently zoned designated here in the motion language as the preliminary boundary that could be refined later for inclusion in the scope for the request of proposals for an expanded downtown plan and direct that the planning commission be prioritized for early consultation in the outreach process and that the intent of that would it be it would be going to the planning commission at the first meeting in April to receive input on the report presented as part of this item and associated recommendations and Bonnie I'll ask for a call though is this part acceptable to councilmember Cummings I did have a question about that the associated zoning that's what I'm wondering about because it's it's the zoning that's in the report is that that's considered the associated recommendations because zoning recommendations because that I think that that would capture me I was just trying to and I think that that is helpful just in sort of making sure that it is broad I would anticipate that there are going to be conversations about that the concern is that we're not really sure what those what the zoning is actually going to be that's going to be later but I think this is absolutely fine the way that it's worded now because I think that what the planning commission will naturally do is start delving into some of the thoughts that they have surrounding where the project may go with the updated downtown plan and future zoning that's associated with that and I guess the big thing from large zone that's been reduced and so if there's any input on that or people are bringing input and they want to weigh in on those different zoning boundaries that wouldn't stop them from weighing in on on what's been brought to us today with all the recommendations because the full report would be brought rightly yes the full report would be brought jump in here so when you say zoning you mean the three different options for geography right we're not zoning it yeah the report would be okay okay we were understanding that word a little differently so you're interested in having the planning commission see all three options and you know hear this whole same report and talk through why we are recommending the yellow one thank you Sarah for clarifying that okay Bonnie we'll go and do a roll call though Council Member Watkins Callentary Johnson that motion passes unanimously okay we've got three more items this evening that one was scheduled for half an hour and it took us two hours off we go so we have next up item number 24 which is the unified master fee schedule correction and code compliance fee structure update and I have Sarah Damion and principal management analyst and more landry code compliance manager as our presenters if for members of the public who do want to speak on this item now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen the order that we'll do item in is that there will be a presentation of the item by staff followed by questions from the council we will then take public comment and then return to the council for deliberation in action so Sarah and Laura welcome thank you for hanging in there tonight no problem can everyone see my screen yes we can fantastic so Laura and I will be talking with all of you tonight about fee schedule revisions what we will be asking for or from you make sure I can click this correctly is to essentially adopt their resolution to revise our city unified master fee schedule and there's a number of reasons for why we're asking you to do this tonight some of them are listed here on this slide we will not go over every single one we'll kind of give you some of the higher points a lot of the rationale is explained in our staff report for why we're looking at this how we are today so just some a little bit of overview and some general points before we really jump into the presentation I wanted to point out that we are not recommending any new fees as part of the resolution before you everything you're seeing today is revisions to existing fees that we have fees for service specifically for our department planning and community development these fees for services are different from taxes they're different from impact fees so we just wanted to make those clarifying points up front to put it in some context fees for services are things back in the good old days when people were coming in person to our counter and applying for building permits it would be the cost for the plan review for say for that building permit or perhaps a research fee from a planning staff even charges for copies so those are the types of fees for services that we're talking about again all existing none new our presentation tonight is going to be split into two sections I'll be taking care of this first part that really covers rental building and planning and then Laura will cover a more specific section of our fee schedule for code compliance and that will be structuring their existing fees to more flat rate fees it's important to note as part of Laura's that and the fees that I'm talking about today all of these fees for services their charges cannot exceed the reasonable cost to provide the service so you'll notice some attachments as part of the report specifically for Laura's section that provides the analysis and breakdown of how those costs were established for that proposed flat rate fee schedule so for this first section the problem you guys are helping me address really is that I have two different universes I'm dealing with two different fee schedules the city's unified master fee schedule which includes some but not all of our department's fees and then our department fee schedule our department fee schedule was was initially in a format adopted way back in 1987 there were a few fees on the schedule that were left there on accident and didn't make its way to the city's unified master fee schedule so this resolution will correct that issue with the adoption of the city's unified master fee schedule in 2017 there were a couple of minor technical errors related to some of our fees all of this you guys will be able to see on table A of our staff report for everything I'm talking about in this section but some of those technical errors really cause some inefficiency particularly for the admin team when it comes to making adjustments every July and January so making those corrections will really ease that annual and bi-annual adjustment for myself and for the folks within our within our administrative division there's also as part of the 2017 fee study there was a large component that was related to cost recovery and for those departments that our divisions they should say of departments that did participate in that cost recovery study they receive increases every July to try to get to that cost recovery period if you guys recall that unfortunately not all of our divisions participated at that time so that further split up our schedule and put some of the building fees on our old schedule where they did not receive their CPI adjustments for their hourly rates so that's another thing we're hoping to correct through this resolution another funky part of it is just the fact that because we have this old fee schedule in the city's new one we now have two different CPI schedules which from an administrative standpoint has been a nightmare the old schedule says that CPIs happen in July of each year and the new schedule says they happen in January so those are some of the things again you guys can reference Table A of the staff or Fort for the very specific ones but for at least this first section that pretty much covers and what we're trying to accomplish with consolidating everything on the unified master fee schedule so with that I'm going to pass it over to Laura for the co-compliance section Hi Laura Welcome Thank you Sarah and good afternoon to the council members I'm Laura Landry and I will be presenting the fees for co-compliance services the title for the municipal code provides tools for staffing needs to date compliance the tools include notice of violation cost recovery administrative civil penalties and administrative citations just to name a few while we prefer voluntary compliance the tools and title forward can be used in situations where an owner is unwilling to comply today we're here to discuss cost recovery one of the tools entitled for with the currency schedule costs are recovered through double fees of permits and a reinfection fee this is problematic for property owners who are working towards compliance and would require a to go through the permit process they will ultimately pay more than the property owners is unwilling to comply and does not require a permit also the current schedule or the currency schedule does not require does not encourage compliance it does not outline the events and the enforcement process and the costs that are associated with those events next slide please in developing the fee structure the following six goals were identified clarity consistency accuracy fairness low administrative burden to track time and to encourage compliance while the goal is always to gain voluntary compliance and situations where there's an active code case all parties would know what costs may occur if a case does not move towards compliance the cost would be consistent and accurate and fair regardless of the complexity of the case staff would also spend more time working on cases and less time tracking costs next slide please in developing the fee schedule we considered two methods charging out of an hourly rate and a flat rate based on triggering events we selected the flat rate method due to the complications with the hourly rate one with the amount of time staff spent tracking costs and the other property owners would not know how much the process would cost them and also it wasn't an ideal method for encouraging compliance on the other hand a flat fee rate the flat fee rate method provided fairness, clarity and may improve efforts to achieve compliance it would be less of an administrative burden and flat fee rates ties the cost to a specific event in the code enforcement process property owners would know exactly what is the enforcement actions or costs with delayed compliance trigger and event are the same for every case regardless of the complexity it provides clarity, fairness and consistency here we have a list of trigger and event that were identified as incurring costs the fee structure is included in the attachment seven of the staff report the costs of each are reflective of an analysis the code compliance specialist performed and represent an average time spent on a variety of cases which are included in attachment 10 of the staff report as a note the reinspection fee is a range scale fee that is based on the number of violations and possible involvement of multiple agencies for example a simple a single violation with by one agency would be less than a reinspection of multiple violations by multiple agencies I will now hand it over to Sarah created this slide just for convenience of what the recommendation was from the agenda but at this point if you guys have any questions this is the opportunity for that and I'll put it back to you Mayor thank you Clara and Laura for that report and the agenda report was really thorough and very clear on kind of the objective at least it's my reading of it to try to try to try to sort of gather the ducklings as we as we shall say put everything in one spot one timeline one schedule so very helpful I will open it up to any questions by council members any none okay I'll bring this out to the public for questions I see there's a question someone from the public with phone number ending in 1705 press star six to unmute yourself please hi thank you for taking my comment tonight I note the staff report says that co-compliance provides an important public service vital to protect the protection of public health safety and quality of life I completely agree with that and I appreciate the work co-compliance does however there are some issues with the way co-compliance is run currently co-compliance accepts any complaint without any evidence and there is no absolutely no consequence for a party making a false report I had four complaints filed against me within two years all of which were determined to be non-meritorious the department closed them which I appreciate however the department's default is to that the inspector go onsite and investigate even if the resident doesn't want that so I really wish that the department before they revised their fee schedule they revised their practice so that this doesn't happen anymore and that they don't waste their time investigating non-meritorious complaints and they don't impinge on the residents who don't want them there thank you very much thank you I will take it back to council then is there any questions or any direction on a motion tonight council member Cummings wondering if staff might be able to follow up to that co-compliance and then I'm happy to make a motion as well like to answer that one or Lee I'm not quite sure who that's in the staff level go ahead Laura if you'd like to respond your camera went off and maybe she wants me to reply no yes council member Cummings that is something that we have already discussed within our division and it is something that has been addressed so it's it's something that's recent I do appreciate the comment from the public and I just want to inform you that there is something that a conversation that has already happened and it's also been part of the process now thank you I'm happy to move the staff recommendation so this is a resolution revising the united no the unified master fees schedule correcting fees for planning zoning and building moving all planning and community development department fees from the department fee schedule to the unified master fee schedule updating certain fees by consumer price index adjustments and changing co-compliance fees from actual costs to flat rates identified in exhibit A great council member Watkins I'm prepared to second the motion so we have a motion to approve the staff staff recommendation gate by council member Cummings but a second by council member Watkins and Bonnie we will go ahead unless council members have any other questions you know not seeing any okay we will go ahead and have a roll call vote please I did have one question sure sorry I just did I know this is staff brought up in the presentation the differences between and the conflict between you know using CPI I think it was from July versus January so when would the fee schedule be updated for like have there been any updates in January of 2021 and when would the updates I guess would they after this would they yeah if they've already occurred yeah I'm just trying to reconcile the alignment of the different schedules and when they would kind of come into effect trust me it's been a doozy for me too so we have adjusted them for the ones that they've missed through 2017 based on January CPI that they've missed and so that they can cleanly be updated this January 2022 that sounds so weird yes okay great thank you that's all my questions thank you councilmember Cummings Fawney can you do a roll call vote please councilmember Watkins talentary Johnson vice mayor Brunner frozen frozen yeah now we're moving on to item number 25 on our general business agenda this is the emergency ordinance um temporarily extending the moratorium preventing commercial evictions for non-payment of rent as a result of economic losses related to the coronavirus pandemic for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if this is an item you want to comment on now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen the order will be a presentation of the item by staff followed by questions from the council we will then take public comment and then return to the council for deliberation and actions and I will go ahead and turn this over Cassie I'm assuming it's you since I see you and not Tony so thank you and I'm going to be immediately passing it over to Stephanie Duck in our office who has prepared a short presentation and I'm also aware that Bonnie Lipscomb is on the call and she's available to answer questions as well great thank you welcome Stephanie hi everyone since a good afternoon but maybe good evening at this point I don't have a presentation but as you just said this is a proposed emergency ordinance to extend the city's temporary moratorium on commercial evictions for non-payment of rent as a result of economic losses related to COVID-19 pandemic I think most of the details and confusing executive order names and ordinances are all laid out in the staff report but I just wanted to give you a brief kind of high level overview and then see if you had any follow-up questions so as you are aware the city previously adopted an emergency ordinance imposing a temporary moratorium on both residential and commercial evictions the city's authority to do this came from an executive order issued by Governor Newsom which suspended state law that would preempt or restrict a local government from imposing limitations on commercial or residential evictions in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic on August 31st of last year Governor Newsom signed and took the law assembly bill 3088 which imposed a temporary statewide eviction moratorium for non-payment of rent for residential tenancies but was silent as to commercial tenancies 80388 preempt the city from either extending or adopting any new residential eviction moratorium ordinances however on September 23rd of last year Governor Newsom issued executive order number 8020 which extended a local jurisdiction's authority to impose commercial eviction protections through March 31st of this year he then extended this authority again an executive order number 321 with the ability to impose commercial eviction protections through June 30th of this year so while the commercial eviction moratorium adopted by council last year has likely been extended by Governor Newsom's most recent executive order our office recommends out of abundance of caution that the city council consider adopting this new emergency ordinance imposing a temporary moratorium on commercial evictions for non-payment of rent as a result of economic losses related to the COVID-19 pandemic happy to answer any questions if needed like I said I think there's a lot of ordinances and names in there so happy to help clarify thank you Stephanie Bonnie did you have anything to add Bonnie Lipscomb no a mayor I think Stephanie said it all I you know in general you know we're supportive of this continuing through June just to give that level of assurance to businesses in the midst of trying to get back on their feet as we hopefully move from the red tier to the orange tier that this is a level of assurance that the city supports them their rent continues to be due and so that's something that they'll need to negotiate with their landlord if they find themselves unable to pay at this time but they won't have to worry about evictions which is really critical thank you thank you and thank you Stephanie I'll go ahead if council members have questions I see council member Cummings and council member Golder thank you mayor I just had one question I know there's a number of different timelines that were brought up and I know that the residential eviction more time was mentioned and so I was just wondering when the last date was for the executive orders the state level on the timeline so the the last date for the executive order if you're talking about the one that that contains the language for residential moratoriums as well as commercial eviction moratoriums that expired September 30th and that was through executive order 71-20 but then the governor in executive order 80-20 continued to extend the the initial executive order that this all stemmed from but just left out the residential language and so from from moving forward from there he only referred to commercial eviction protections which were until March 31st and then now June 30th thank you council mayor if if I could just add to that you know separately at the state level the governor signed SB 90 or 91 into effect which protects the residential so I just wanted to make sure that we presented as part of the city managers a report on a companion bill in the house a few months ago and so there are pretty extensive protections for residential in place at this time as well as funding great thank you for clarifying that okay any other questions by council members thank you Stephanie and uh for your work on this appreciate it I'll go ahead and take it out to the public now for comments I am not seeing any hands up in the public so I will go ahead and come back to the council council member golden I was just ready to make a motion that's why they raised their hands so far so um but I see people raising their hands so maybe people have more comments yeah uh no the motion on I'm going to second oh okay okay yeah so I can read that uh I make to make make a motion to adopt an emergency ordinance preventing commercial evictions for nonpayment of rent as a result of economic losses related to the coronavirus pandemic for so long as authorized by the governor and a second by council member Watkins yep Bonnie will do a roll call vote unless there's any further questions by council members I'm not seeing any hands up okay let's do a roll call vote mm-hmm council member Watkins aye passes unanimously so we will move on to our final item no we still got nope we do have us this will be our final item of the evening um next up is agenda item number 26 which is the parks and recreation annual report for members of the public who are streaming this meeting if this is an item you want to comment on now is the time to call in using the instructions on your screen the order will be a presentation of the item by staff followed by questions from the council we will then take public comment and then return to the council for deliberation in action the staff presenter tonight will be Lindsay Bass our principal management analyst with our parks and recreation department and the item is a motion is to accept the fiscal year 2020 parks and recreation annual report welcome Lindsay her video is not on see her in my queue Lindsay are you able to press star six to join us yeah there she is hi there we can't hear you though we're not getting any there you go great how about now hear you now welcome apologies apologies sorry for the late technical difficulties I know Tony is here as well and he's coming in the meeting okay great just a few moments I'm Erin city council will be share my screen here I'll go ahead and jump into it here yeah go ahead Tony all right thanks mayor all right well thank you yeah thank you so much for the opportunity to talk about the parks and recreation departments annual report this is our first one first attempt at this so we're bringing this to the council this evening share with you and share with the community and get your feedback on this report gives direction for future years and how this can be most helpful to the council and for the community looking toward the future so yeah so really the purpose of this annual report the reason that we are doing this is to summarize the parks and recreation services and the scope of our operations to the community this is an opportunity for us to benchmark the work that we're doing for the community for the council and lend to just a more informed discussion on budget and discussions throughout each year it's also a mechanism for us to sort of provide a state of parks and rec each each year prior budget discussions and again it'll help us lead into those budget conversations and help shape priorities based on the different situations that we are facing in a given year so with that I'll send it over to Lindsay and then we'll just go through a short presentation here tonight and hope to open up to council for some feedback and discussion here tonight I'll send it over to Lindsay for now Lindsay we can't hear you what did we say we were going to do what were we able to deliver on where did we run into challenges and why was that year on year both internally and so just really quickly again we'll move relatively rapidly here but wanted to just start quickly with our mission again just primarily for the community here which is providing environments experiences and programs that originalize of residents and build a healthy community so we're actually this is something that Lindsay will talk about a little bit later on but want to work to refine our mission and vision and so forth but for now this is really summarizes the work that we do in the department in 2020 you can see some of our key overarching goals here but wanted to just provide a bit of a snapshot on the parks and recreation department as a whole so in fiscal year 2020 our budget was just over 17 million that includes the war budget as well we had 84 full-time employees maintained over 1700 acres of parks and open spaces and beaches and maintained 34 miles of trails just some of the high points this is a park system that is easy and worth bragging about it's an amazing park system here in Santa Cruz and something we can all take great pride in and put a lot of love and care into certainly but a couple of the high points 96% of our residents and Santa Cruz are within a 10-minute walk of a park that's among the highest in the country we have nearly three times the park acreage per capita than the national average and as everyone knows we've got world-class surf breaks and skate parks and public spaces and amenities such as West Cliff and Santa Cruz Warf and on and on I could talk about this a lot in terms of what Santa Cruz Parks and Rec is what the park system is what recreation does and services to the community but I would just summarize and say that really Santa Cruz Parks and Rec is really at the heart with a green economy and it's right at the heart of health and all policies as well our three pillars in parks and recreation are health and wellness social equity and conservation so it's almost identical to health and all policies it's right in line the work that we do every day is right in line with that so I'm very proud of that work I'll send it back over to Lindsay to talk a little bit about some of the department highlights that you will see captured in the annual report great thanks Tony these achievements we did want to highlight the few from each of the major goal areas that Tony just more than 20,000 city trees in creative ways one of which was the virtual recreation platform that they stood as an example of working families child care program child care so that people that needed to go to work but had kids that were home from school could continue to do so and bring home that paycheck in addition this construction work came to a halt in the fourth quarter of park improvements composed in the report and then $15,000 in scholarships provided to our friends of parks and recreation non-profit group and over 2700 hours donated by volunteers to maintain important park speech and open spaces now these are the achievements that we wanted to highlight for fiscal year 20 which was a very unique year but I would be remiss if I didn't tell you that in a more normal year we service over 130,000 people who benefit from our classes camps events and sports leagues not to mention our wharf west cliff and our multitude of parks and amenities as you look at this list of achievements one thing that we reflect on as we see this list though is you know some commonalities to our success and those include the fact that we wouldn't be able to do these things and achieve without dedicated it would not be able to do these things without incredible community partners our work really does take a village and so our success wonderful inspiration work in partnership for many to that end flexibility this year was a great example of so this has very real direct impacts on people and we saw that both in the work that I mentioned that our recreation department did but also in the work that our park teams did to maintain outdoor spaces that became essential refuges for people and the onset of the pandemic so I could go on much longer than that but I'll turn it back to Tony to tell you a little bit more challenges that we faced in 2020 thanks Lindsay he wanted to use the annual report to to also again as we're thinking about benchmarking to to think about and reflect on some of the challenges that we face in 2020 and we'll use this I hope to use this component in our annual report moving forward just to reflect on the challenges that we're facing and hopefully address those so that in future annual reports we can say hey we we resolved that no problem we moved on from that that crisis or that challenge but in the report you'll see that we flagged and we really created a highlight with respect to staff safety so this was an item that the Parks and Recreation Commission reviewed in 2020 and was a really critical item for us within the department we've taken a lot of steps within the department including working on a new uniform policy you'll see us glowing neon yellow in the coming months as we move to different logo vests and different uniforms out in the field and work across the park system to improve communications we had kind of some old school flip phones across the department before but now we've moved to smart phones and that allows us to communicate better but it also allows us to document and improve our work order system and internet tracking as well so we're taking a lot of steps within the department but that's an item that was a big priority and a challenge for us and I would be remiss to not include that that this isn't just staff safety but this is really public safety and so it's a broader discussion on how to make sure our parks are safe and it's a collaborative effort with the police department the neighborhood parks team in particular to enhance staff and public safety the second item Santa Cruz parks and open spaces continue to be among some of the most commonly used spaces probably in the county by individuals experiencing homelessness and the city's outdoor living ordinance is really begun to address challenges and you know with respect to this this factor but this will definitely continue to be an issue both for the individuals living in the parks and experiencing homelessness but also for a natural environment and the public seeking to access parks so identify that as an ongoing challenge for the park system the third item pandemic driven impacts on the department from the pandemic impacted the department and in a number of ways we canceled a lot of events we've had to close parks it's a number of different factors and so Lindsay highlighted the way that we've used these challenges to create opportunities so virtual programming for an example was a way that we utilize the challenge or embrace the challenge to create an opportunity I think on this on this item in particular you know it's something that between the city manager and the c