Recording in progress. Morning. I'll now call to order the regular meeting of the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors. It is January 25th, 2022, 9 a.m. Clerk, will you please call the roll? Supervisor Friend. Here. One moment please. Trouble with audio. Coonerty. Here. Caput. Here. McPherson. Here. Koenig. Here. Thank you, have a quorum. Thank you. We'll now have a moment of silence and the Pledge of Allegiance. Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. The Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Now consider late additions to the agenda, additions to deletions to consent and regular agendas. Are there any late additions? Yes, Chair Koenig and members of the Board. There is a late addition. It's to consider addition of a late item, agenda management system 12-140, to the consent agenda relating to the proclamation of local emergency, January 15th, 2022, tsunami as outlined in the memorandum of the Director of Office of Recovery, Response and Resiliency. There's a Board Memo printout. And this item will take action of the Board, majority vote to add it to the agenda. And then on the consent agenda, there's an additional, number 27, there's additional materials, revised attachment A, place this packet, pages 366 and 367. So you can now go ahead and vote on that late addition and then it'll be added to the consent agenda. Thank you. So we'll be voting to add the late addition as item 64. Sorry to burden you this morning with my... Thank you. I will be voting to add the late addition for the tsunami or declaration of emergency for the tsunami response as item 64.1. Mr. Chair, I'll move to add that item to the agenda. Second. Move by Supervisor Friend, seconded by Supervisor Coonerty. Any further discussion? Please call the roll. Supervisor Friend. Aye. Coonerty. Aye. Caput. Aye. McPherson. Aye. Ponig. Aye. Thank you, Motion passes unanimously. We'll now move to item four, announcement by Board members of items removed from consent or regular agenda. Any Board member like to remove any items from the consent agenda? No, I don't have an item to remove, but I'll probably, I might call on someone that is there in person if they wanna speak. Okay. Thank you, Supervisor Caput. We'll now move on to item five, public comment. Anyone wishing to make a public comment? Please approach the dias and line up. You will have two minutes to make a comment. We'll start by taking comments from folks here in the chambers and then take online comments. You may begin. Bob LaMonica, Santa Cruz. There are two Danerplex on the county building. Excuse me, sir, but we do require that you wear a mask at all times in the chambers. Thank you. LaMonica, Santa Cruz, thank you. There are two Danerplex on the county building. One coming up the courthouse steps. The other, the entrance to the district attorney's office. Their purpose is to cover up abuse of power. In 1987, the victim of DA Daners at fault bodily injury car wreck was blood tested and the DA was not. And he had just been drinking. Overlapping his June 1994 reelection, DA Daner directed time cards falsification, procedurally exonerated by board of supervisors resolution number 11495. Those two plaques are as historically revisionist as Confederate statues. You are accountable to history. You are accountable to local application of values. Board of supervisors, take down those plaques. Thank you. I gotta be able to make sure. Thank you. Over here. Yeah, well, we're just gonna come over here and show me something. Right. All right, good morning board of supervisors and Mr. Palacios, my name is Veronica Velasquez. I'm the SCIU 521 chapter president for county employees here at the county. I wanna acknowledge the county's partnership with SCIU. Yesterday during mediation, we reached a tentative agreement. We strongly believe that this agreement is an important step towards meeting the critical recovery needs of our community and workers. This agreement invests in the services that our community needs and relies on and sets a framework to attract and retain dedicated essential county workers. Our partnership with management yesterday ensures the county of Santa Cruz can be the best place to live, work and thrive with our families. Chesa puede? Onward. Thank you. Good morning board. I am Alicia Bonner. I am SCIU local 521 president and I am here on behalf of our members here with Santa Cruz. It warmed my heart that you guys reached a tentative agreement with our hard workers here. I hope that it fosters a relationship and a culture with our workers here because they deserve to be respected and to be valued. They are the frontline workers of this community. They reach every man, woman and child of the community. And I just ask that you guys continue a open and honest relationship to have a respectful relationship for your essential workers. Thank you. Thank you. Good morning supervisors. Good to see you all again. My name is Rico Mendez. I'm the chief elected officer of our union, SCIU local 521. We represent over 52,000 public employees and nonprofit employees spread across the jurisdiction of 17 counties. And Santa Cruz being one of the most important areas of our state in terms of frontline services, frontline workers and the needs of the community, the unhoused, the poor, folks that are pretty desperate for healthcare services. And we're really excited now that the work that these essential workers have done, these SCIU local 521 members that are on the front lines as public health nurses, mental health providers, child protective service workers, social workers, roads workers, this amazing group and amazing spectrum of types of work that the workers do here in Santa Cruz County that we have the honor to represent these workers in as a union. I'm proud that we were able to get to an agreement last night. I'm proud of the work that Veronica and the leaders have done to really paint the clear picture of why investment makes sense.  We encourage you as supervisors to of course vote yes when it comes before you and get the deal done. I also want to flag that this could be just the beginning of something really spectacular and amazing for the people that live here in Santa Cruz County, working together to draw down more funds from the state for mental health services, for the unhoused, for public health, for social services. That is a real possibility. So moving forward, getting this done and figuring out ways to invest even more in these critical services that the community needs is before us. Thank you so much. Good morning, supervisors and happy new year. My name is Becky Steinbruner. I'm a resident of rural Aptos. I want to begin with some good news. I think we all need some good news given the times. And I want to make it very clear that Central Fire Protection District is moving in a very positive direction toward district-based elections for their board of directors. I request that supervisors Koenig and Friend reach out to Central Fire and get information about this and make it very well known to your constituents about now is the time for them for us to take part in those redistricting lines. Central Fire District is doing a good job, but they really do need and want public input. On the consent agenda today, there are many things that I don't think should be on the consent agenda, namely the $5 million allocation to buy the Watsonville Community Hospital. That should be out in the open. That's a huge purchase. This is a huge deal. And I don't think it belongs on the consent agenda. That's item number 41 on your consent agenda. I want to point out the excellent Water Status Report, item 45, Water Resources Status Report. It's one of the best reports I've seen come out regarding this topic. But I want to point out that Cure Water SoCal Project is not all that it is trumped up to be. It will inject treated sewage water into the aquifer. There are alternatives. The City of Santa Cruz has completed a water rights EIR that would allow them to sell more water when it is available to this district and simply not pump. SoCal Creek Water District is not planning to use any, well, virtually none of the recycled water for irrigation other than the free water for 50 years they're going to give Twin Lakes Church to irrigate their fields. There are other ways and they need to do a better job of public outreach and being more transparent. I want to point out to you that item number 1933 are simply not transparent.  Thank you. I request that in the future public comment have three minutes rather than two because your consent agendas are full of things that people want to talk about. Two minutes is not enough. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Oh, good morning. My name is James. This is January 25th. The Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors. What are the 3,100 counties in the United States? I wonder how many are run just like this one. I'm going to choose to talk about the second AMBAG meeting that I ever witnessed. And I believe it was item 9B. Everyone in there was given information in late November and early December about something they needed to talk about that had to do with their individual cities and counties and districts, water supply. That meeting was on a Wednesday. The Thursday before everybody was given a complete revision of what was actually going on. What was interesting is at least five people of I think the 26 that were present were really asking questions and voted no on this. They said such things as the state agencies are not talking to each other and the state agencies are not talking to the cities and counties about what their needs are. I'll quote this shame on them. I did do a little bit of research to find out what that actual additional change was. I haven't found it yet, but something else that seemed kind of interesting. Many people don't even know what AMBAG is. It basically controls Monterey County and this county, but one of the head speakers used the words like we are the control organization.  So here we are dealing with corporate Santa Cruz looking at a corporate flag. And you guys don't support the people. You were never designed to support the people. This whole thing is a farce. When are people gonna come out of their trances? I mean, Carrie Mullen, that PCR test was never designed to diagnose anything. It was simply a duplicator. And those tests have given case numbers that are just completely false. So there's some issues going on. Thanks. Thank you. Anyone else here in the chambers that would like to speak? Thank you. Pull this down a little bit. Does that sound good? Okay. Well, good morning. My name is Stony Brook. I'm here speaking in regards to item 55 on the consent agenda. I joined you today actually as the president pro tem of the United Veterans Council for Santa Cruz County. UVC is the representative body for our veterans organizations in this county, such as the American Legion, veterans of foreign wars, blue star moms, the Marine Corps League, Military Officers Association, and numerous others. We see ourselves as the voice of the estimated 10,500 veterans in our county. I also serve on our Human Services Commission as vice chair and as your veteran liaison to this body. I've worked with the Veterans Village Committee since its inception. I wanted to share that the United Veterans Council voted in December, 2021 as unanimously in support of the creation and funding of the Veterans Village Project in Ben Lohman. The infusion of the home key funds outlined in item 55 today can make a major difference in how this project becomes a successful model for future efforts to house our at-risk and marginalized veterans. While the veteran village itself is not a temporary shelter or halfway house, the concepts of peer support wrap around services, onsite care, group, and individual therapies, and community integration can be replicated at other sites with great success. I wanna thank the board, the CAO's office, and everyone involved for your support in making the vision of our community is a wonderful place to live, work, and thrive. Thank you very much. Thank you. Let's call for speakers who are present here in the chambers. And we'll move to online. We have speakers who would like to make a comment through Zoom. Thank you. And as a reminder for those joining through Zoom, please use the raise hand icon now and you'll be placed in line to speak. Si se ha unido a través Zoom, por favor, hace click en el icono de la mano y estaré colocado en la fila para hablar. Chris Cottingham, your microphone is available. Great. Thank you, county staff and all the county supervisors for your consideration for the first Veterans Village in our county. I am the executive director of the Santa Cruz County Veterans Memorial Building Board of Trustees. We are the 501C3 nonprofit that has operated the Veterans Memorial Building in downtown since 1995 in partnership with the United Veterans Council as well as the county of Santa Cruz. In early 2020, our partnership evolved as we found ourselves at the beginning of a worldwide pandemic. The Veterans Memorial Building was the first emergency shelter to open and ran for 16 months, sheltering 45 people 24-7. During the pandemic, we began working with the Housing for Health Division and many other great local Santa Cruz organizations to support the re-housing wave program and answer the question of what's next. This included a survey asking over 100 people experiencing homelessness, what they needed most to support their journey of transitioning from homelessness to house. We raised tens of thousands of dollars in the community donations and grants and distributed over 100 kits that included first aid kits, solar cell phone chargers, hygiene kits and many other much needed items or survival. In addition, we helped support move-ins for over 50 people in the housing, including beds, linens, micwaves, groceries and other necessities. For the last two years, we have worked with the county side-by-side to rise up in the face of danger and care for our most vulnerable. This next chapter of our partnership is one of the biggest and most important yet. We are working toward the goal of ending veteran homelessness in this county forever. This project will provide 20 permanent supportive housing units for veterans in this community before the end of the year. This project has inspired new community collaborations between multiple organizations, public, private and non-profit to make real change. This grant would empower the veterans of Santa Cruz County to band together and to build their own sustainable community to support their most vulnerable. But this project is also a pilot for a bigger vision of how we can work together to change our community for the better. This will be the first veterans village in our county, but it will not be the last. Thank you. Colin, user one, your microphone is available. It is star nine to unmute on the phone. Hi, this is Marilyn Garrett and I again want to recommend the best-selling book, The Real Anthony Fauci, Bill Gates, Big Pharma and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Children's Health Defense and to read what said on the back cover of the book. Dr. Joseph Goebbels wrote that, quote, a lie told once remains a lie, but a lie told a thousand times becomes the truth. Tragically for humanity, there are many, many untruths emanating from Fauci and his minions, RFK Jr. exposes the decades of lies, Luke Montagnier, Nobel laureate from Tucker Carlson, quote, Bobby Kennedy is one of the bravest and most uncompromisingly honest people I've ever met. Someday he'll get credit for it. In the meantime, read this book, unquote. Next one, Bobby Kennedy's book speaks truth at a time when healthcare becomes health harm and untruth rules through anti-science and fake news, unquote, from Dr. Vandana Shiva, director of Naptanya and author of Oneness Versus the 1%. Mark Crispin Miller, professor of media studies at New York University, quote, the story of Dr. Fauci's rise and reign is actually all about the absolute corruption of our major institutions, government, medicine, academia, and above all, the press by Big Pharma and the Gates Foundation. Those of us who really do believe in science now have this book to help rid the world of that corruption, unquote. Please call her 0993, your microphone is available. Second call for caller 0993, it is star nine to unmute. Moving on to Amy Vandenberg, your microphone is available. Thank you, good morning. I have been helping veterans with employment, homeless veterans with employment for the past six years and I just want to voice a veteran's desire for this, a veteran's village, they are working but cannot afford to live in Santa Cruz, so I just wanted to represent them. Thank you very much for your time. Caller 0993. Oh, this is Gary. Am I on? Yes. Okay, it's too bad the supervisor didn't tell his supporters he was gonna keep the two minutes, in fact, I find that outrageous. He was attacked by the Panetta machine that said he had anti-vaccination supporters. I'm reading from the conclusion of a, it's referred to as a Stanford report but Stanford is doing an arms length. It's a person that was a fellow at Stanford and the conclusion of 65 reports that are available. It says both medical and non-medical masks are ineffective to block human to human transmission of viral infections such as COVID-19. Wearing fast masks, face masks have been demonstrated to have substantial adverse psychological and physiological effects including hypoxia, hypercapnia, shortness of breath, increased acidity and toxicity, aggregation of fear and stress response, rise in stress hormones, immune suppression, fatigue, headaches, decline in cognitive performance, disposition for viral infectious illness, chronic stress, anxiety and depression. And if anybody looks at information up, be sure you read it, it's been blocked by all of media and the global attempt to cull the population. And the people at the Community Foundation are connected with the Community Foundation of Silicon Valley and it goes back to Stanford and Frederick Terman who was involved with the Eugenics Record Office. This is about culling the population, thank you. Thank you. And we will bring it back to the board for item six for action on the Consent Agenda. Were any board members who would like to comment on items on consent? Hey, Mr. Chair, I'll start if that's okay. Yes, please. Thank you. The first item I want to just go and order item 23. I appreciate what you and Supervisor Coonerty are doing in the sense of requesting that there be a reduction of taxes at the state level. As you know, this board has discussed this repeatedly about the pressures it puts on the local taxation system from a regulatory standpoint. I don't, however, support the full elimination. It's not something the governor is asking for, the legislature is asking for. So I'm not really sure what is, what the purpose of full elimination will be. So I'll register a no vote on 23. On item 26, appreciate you and Supervisor McPherson on the remote meeting item. It just makes a lot more sense than the proposals we currently have it. Item 55, just a great appreciation to Stony Brook. It's good to see him back in the board chambers and all the remarkable work that he does on behalf of veterans. I think that this is an exciting project. And I look forward to it becoming a reality. Just jumping back to item 41, I'd just like to express my support for the $5 million contribution toward the hospital. This is a very difficult project to make a reality. Senator Layard and our assembly delegation are doing remarkable work at the state level to create the district. We have a very heavy lift here at the local level to try and find funding in a very short amount of time. And this is a very meaningful contribution toward making that happen for Supervisor Caput and myself and those that represent the South County. This is an absolute essential lifeblood hospital and it provides an absolutely necessary services to people, in particular those on MediCal in the South County. And as I know that even those that don't represent the area of the board has been very steadfast in ensuring that this hospital remain open and ideally in a form of public or nonprofit control so that we can ensure that people that generally don't have a voice in the system have a voice. And this seems like a very reasonable investment toward that. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you. Mr. Chair. Yes, Supervisor McPherson. Thank you. Yeah, I'd also like to comment on a couple items that were referred to by Supervisor Friend. The cash tax reform, I want to thank the Supervisors Coonerty and Coonerty for bringing this request back to the board. I've long supported reducing taxes to build a stronger more competitive cannabis industry here. For that same reason, I can support this request. I understand the consistency of Supervisor Friend and opposing it. I understand that. But do request the state with the hope that it'll cut back on the illegal cannabis trade because I think it will if we have it more competitive and price-wise. I too would like to comment on number 41, the Watsonville Hospital. And this is a significant investment by the county, not just in the future of our South County community, but really the health and well-being of our entire Santa Cruz County. I want to repeat how appreciative I am of CAO Carlos Palacios and the team of staff and community members, including Mimi Hall, our former health services agency director, for working on stabilizing the hospital. Thank you to the dedicated staff at the hospital during this difficult time that we've had with COVID. Without this hospital, our other regional providers would be absolutely overwhelmed. And our local community members would have to considerable trouble getting the care that they need. So this is a critical situation that we're in and I'm glad we're taking very aggressive action to see that the Watsonville Hospital continues serving the people of the South County in particular, but the whole Santa Cruz County. Item number 52, the Housing for Health Board. Thank again Supervisors Coonerty and Coonerty belong with Tiffany Contrallo-Warren from the Health Services Agency and our public defender Heather Rogers for being willing to serve on this board. As we know, homelessness is one of the most challenging issues we deal with in government and we must have effective ways to determine how we are going to use our resources and measuring our outcomes. This is critical for the general public to be aware of and to see what we are doing and whatever we're targeting our resources. On item number 55, again, it was nice to see Stony Brook representing the 10,000 plus veterans in our community. Thank you once again to our Human Services Department for continuing to support this proposed Veterans Village Project at the Timberlane Lodge and Ben Lohman in my district. While it is small in terms of the number of units this project really does represent the positive solution for housing a vulnerable set of community members experiencing homelessness. So thank you and good luck to all. This is a tremendous start and I hope we have many more projects like this, Veterans Village at the Timberlane Lodge and Ben Lohman. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have a few comments. So I appreciate your work, our work together on item number 23 on the state cannabis tax. The reality is the local governments are the ones who carry that the burden of enforcement and regulatory matters. And yet the state collects the tax, the bulk of the tax and it creates challenges for us both maintaining our local tax as well as the vibrancy of the market and the shift towards the legalized market. Item number 37, which is the Holistic Advocacy. It's a great new contract from our new public defender taking a new and integrated approach to public defense. I'd like to add additional direction that in the next six months, she returned with a report to the board. It could just be a consent agenda item with the outcomes that will be sought in this contract, whether it's for cynicism, employment and housing. And then six months after that, we're turned to the board with the initial data showing the efficacy of this program. Item number 41, I wanna thank the staff for their work on Watsville Community Hospital as the now outgoing board member on the Alliance Board, which provides the MediCal insurance to one quarter of our county residents. It's essential that this hospital remain open and provide excellent care to people, not only in South County, but MediCal members who need access to it and would be MediCal members, countywide would be affected if the hospital ceased to exist. Item number 55, the Watsvillage. It was great also to see Stoney. It's a great project. I'm very excited for this opportunity. I'm also, I also wanna recognize that for a long time, we've asked that homeless services be spread more evenly across the county. And I appreciate the Fifth District stepping up to make this transitional housing available for vets that provide an important service in our community. And finally, item number 63, which is a grant for our Davenport water tank several times in the last seven years, Davenport has needed, has run out of water, had their water lines severed by first storms and then fire this water tank creates more resiliency. And I just wanna thank the DPW staff for working hard to get this grant to help this community. Thank you. If I may speak. Yes, please, Supervisor Cabin. Thank you. Yeah, item 41, it's already been mentioned and how critical this is gonna be to the whole county because of South County can't handle the people we already have. Then it's gonna all be shifted to the other hospitals. It's a critical issue and this is a good start. And item 55, it was a pleasure to go out with Stony Brooks and see the area that they're looking at for veterans homeless services. And I think it'll be a great project. Hopefully we'll get it done. So anyway, thanks to everybody on the Board of Supervisors and the staff that have been working on this project for quite a while. And I don't know if there's anybody else. Stony already spoke, I was gonna ask him to speak on it. So I don't know if Keith or I'm sorry, Kevin, if Kevin is there to speak on it also. Certainly if there's a couple of members of the public that we're waiting for this time to make a comment, go ahead and speak. Well, I just wanna thank all of the support we're hearing from the Board members and from the County team that's led by Dr. Robert Ratner that's been helping us along with this. We're a small organization, but we've been working hard on this and we've gained an incredible amount of community support. We've been working on this for well over a year now. In fact, one of the projects that's up before us was a site that we had looked at early on in our research and at the time it wasn't available. But we were lucky. We came across Jay's Timber Lane in Ben Lomond and found it to be a peaceful tranquil place that really is a great addition to the healing of the veterans who will be able to reside there. And the Home Key grant of course is gonna be a major help to us. We will be acquiring the property we close on February 11th and we're hoping that the Home Key funds will help us in to expand the current capacity and provide room for more veterans and really create a community for those folks. The Board of Trustees, we're a small organization but we've really gained a lot of partners in the community with both the County and with the Community Foundation and others. And I can't thank everyone enough for all the support we've gotten on this program. We're really hoping that it's gonna be a great addition to the County and something we can all be proud of. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Hello everyone, hello supervisors. My name is Keith Collins and I am working with the Veterans Village project as well and I'll be working to oversee the operations of the project. And I'll first wanna start by thanking Supervisor Cabot for coming out and seeing us last Friday and in support of the program. Supervisor McPherson who are showing his support and of course, Supervisor Koenig for supporting us as we've been working on this project for about two years now. I just wanna assure that the Board of Supervisors that we have a great team put together with experienced developers, operation people like myself, support and operations from Jack who previously just spoke with the President of the Board, Stony Brooks, Chris Cottingham, we've put together a great team for this. Just wanna also add that this is a community project. We have supporting services from people like Gray Bears Association or Front Street will be working with us also to provide supportive services. Some of those services will include drug and alcohol counseling, behavioral mental health services, on-site case management and a wellness program and activities for the entire community. So we think this is a great project. We really appreciate your support on this project going forward. And we did recognize there's a long list of items for us to do and I can assure you that we've either completed or well on our way to getting those done here in the next week. So thank you all. Thank you. Chair Koenig. Chair Koenig. Could, we had an issue on the consent agenda with regard to one of these home key projects, specifically 2838 Park Avenue, Soquel. There was an electronic glitch in the posting of the agenda. If you notice, the numbering goes from 53 to 55. For some reason, item 54 due to unknown reasons wasn't actually posted. This item had to do with a loan to the Park Avenue project. And so I'd like to have Suzanne E say, get up and explain the item. And then what I'm gonna request is that if the board is willing to give additional direction to give me authorization to sign the loan, then we could complete this application in a timely fashion. So Suzanne, why don't you go and explain the item and then we'll come back to the board. Yes, thank you. Good morning, Chair. I hope you can hear me through the mask. Okay, so we had prepared item 54, which was proposing to provide a pre-development loan using housing low moderate income funds that we have in one of our special revenue funds for these types of uses. It would be a pre-development loan of $101,000 due to the entity that is the co-applicant for the Park Avenue project. The item was actually visible online if you looked at the link for the full packet. So people were able to read the report. It's just in that separate PDF that publishes just the agenda. Somehow it didn't get in that part, but it was visible to the public online. We think a reasonable approach to solve this problem would be that, oh goodness, sorry about that. Would be if you could give additional direction to the CAO as part of item, I believe it's 53, is that the right item? To sign a letter indicating that there is a conditional commitment of this loan and this funding to that project and that it will be approved on February 1st as part of the board's agenda on that date. So it would just be a conditional commitment letter. The issue is that there's a January 31st deadline for the first priority of the Home Key Funds and that's why we're all trying to get all three of these Home Key applications approved today. Understood, thank you. Thank you. Supervisor Caput, are you finished with your comments on the consent agenda? Yeah, I'm all finished. I was, Stonie Brook, he spoke on it already so I was gonna make sure that he spoke on item 55, thank you. Thank you, I have just a few brief comments myself. On item 23, some, my colleagues have already made comments but I wanted to add one additional reason to support this item which is as we see the increased application of fentanyl to all kinds of black market drugs. I think it becomes that much more important that we support the illegal market for cannabis to ensure that our son's daughters, friends do not become victim to this kind of lacing activity that could be fatal. Just in general, I wanna acknowledge all the incredible work on the consent agenda, whether it's item 37 for non-attorney advocates, item 41, the $5 million for the purchase of Watsonville Hospital, item 42 for healing the streets, item 52 for the Housing for Health Board. I mean, I think we're really seeing a sea change in the way that our community approaches health and homelessness, substance use, all the things that go into the situation that we all see in one form or another every day. I just wanna acknowledge all of the entire community's work and particularly on items 53 and 55. Back during the first round of home key funding from the state a couple of years ago, I know there are many members of our community who were disappointed that our county did not submit any applications. And so the fact that today we are submitting three on top of one that we approved at our last meetings for a total of four for the early round of application for this state funding is really incredible. It's a testament to our Housing for Health Director, Robert Ratner and Human Services Director, Randy Morris, as well as folks in the planning department for getting all these applications ready. And of course, as has been said, particularly item 55 with the Veterans Village, it's incredible that this project is here before us today. I know just a few months ago, it seemed it was surviving on a hope and a prayer and that prayer has proven strong. And with over $500,000 contributed from the community at large to make this project happen, the support of the Santa Cruz County Community Foundation and Santa Cruz County Bank. I know there's a strong team of community members behind this project. And as has been said, hopefully this is the first of a community driven model to help people recover from homelessness and we'll see many more in our county in the years to come. And that's all my comments. So with that, a motion would be in order on the consent agenda. I'll move or second either way. Well, I will with the recommended actions and especially on item 54. I think, do we need to stipulate that? So my understanding of the recommended action or the additional direction there would be for the CAO to sign a letter with a conditional commitment to make a loan on the Park Avenue project. Okay, additional direction on item 53. For item 53, got it. And Supervisor Coonerty had additional direction on 37, I believe, Supervisor Coonerty. Correct. So confirming that the motion is for the consent agenda with the additional direction on both 37 and 53, Supervisor McPherson, is that your motion? Yes, yes. Okay, and Supervisor Caput, you're seconding that. It'll be followed. Thank you. All right, motion by Supervisor McPherson, second by Supervisor Caput, please call the roll. Thank you, and I'll be calling two roll call votes to capture Supervisor Friend's no vote on item 23. This is for items 12 through 64.1, Supervisor Friend. All right. Coonerty. All right. Caput. All right. Supervisor McPherson. Aye. Koenig. Aye. Thank you now for motion, item 23. Supervisor Friend. No. Coonerty. Aye. Caput. Yes. McPherson. Yeah, aye. Koenig. Aye. Thank you. Both of those motions passed. We'll now proceed to our regular agenda and item number seven to consider an update on county strategic initiatives, including the first biannual progress report on the 2021-2023 operational plan, integration of the 2022-2023 proposed budget, redesign of Primo, process improvement, and release of new performance measurements and backboards, and direct the county administrative office to return on August 23rd, 2022 with the next update as outlined in the memorandum of the county administrative officer. And Nicole Coburn, our assistant county administrative officer. I believe you'll be leaving the presentation. Thank you, Chair Koenig, and good morning members of the board. I'm Nicole Coburn. I'm one of the assistant CAOs. I'm joined today by Elisa Benson, the other assistant CAO, along with Sven Stafford, a principal analyst in our office. He's currently online and will be driving the presentation. Sheriff Hart is also joining us, as well as Carolyn Burke from the planning department. Together we're going to be providing combined county strategic initiatives update to the board. This is our first combined update, and we're gonna be getting into more of all of our initiatives. Next slide. So the agenda for this morning, as I mentioned, the purpose is to provide an integrated combined update and show the interconnectedness of our various management initiatives. One of the critical steps that we're working on right now is integrating our budget more into our various initiatives, and we're gonna be discussing how we're doing that. The operational plan that we're currently in is for the two year period of 2021 through 2023. And one of the focuses of this operational plan is on equity and how performance measurement and data desegregation is supporting that focus. And Sven is gonna be talking more about that. And then we're gonna turn it over to Elisa Benson, who's gonna be giving a Primo update and talking about how better measurement supports building a continuous improvement mindset for the county that leads to continual improvements. Next slide. So this graphic should look familiar to you. It's how we've chosen to display the connectedness between our various strategic initiatives. As the board is aware, you adopted a vision for the future for our county several years ago in 2018. That's a six year strategic plan and that connects to our other initiatives. So the CAO and departments are working together to achieve that vision. We have performance measurement. That is asking for critical questions about how much the county is doing, how well we're doing it, are we making a difference and is anyone better off? And we're using that initiative to disaggregate data so we can ask better questions in each of those areas and more interesting questions as well. We also have Primo continuous process improvement, which is a system for taking those questions and developing better solutions on a continuous basis. We have our operational plan that's aligning our solutions and major work with our strategic plan goals. And then program budgeting, what you see there is the method for financing our major work and trying to accomplish our goals and integrate that with all of our initiatives as well. Next slide. So in terms of our budget integration, we are working on an online, new online budget as part of our Open Gov implementation. We're trying to integrate the budget with our strategic plan website, which is at sccwww.sccvision.us. We're trying to have more explicit ties between the financing and the budget and our operational plan objectives and providing much more detail online you currently see in our proposed budget document. We are also working on showing the budget more at a program level with that greater detail. We've been working with departments to generate functions so that there is much more granular level information and ties more specifically to everything that the county is doing. We're going to be publishing the budget online, but also making some print options available which we understand, you know, departments and the board need to see in different ways, but generally making the document more accessible and easy to navigate by having it in an online format. And then lastly, by providing the budget online, we're going to be reducing printing and providing an eco-friendly option. And so now I would like to turn to Sven who's going to be going more into detail on our operational plan and some of the accomplishments we've made over the last six months as well as provide an equity update. Thanks, and thanks, Nicole. Good morning, board. Next slide, please. There's the presentation here. So as the board will recall, we adopted the 2021 to 23 operational plan back in September with 180 objectives. Within that plan, there was a focus on equity that included 80 objectives. Within those 80, in the December update, we've completed seven, amended 12 and 61 are in progress and on time. And now I'm going to request that I be able to share my screen so we can jump to the operational plan website to give you all a little tour of what's published. So here on the operational plan website, you can see our total at the top of 180 objectives that we've completed, 16 total. Sven, we can't see your screen. Sorry, Sven, I need to move the secondary screen. Okay. Yeah, you can share. There we go. Excellent, apologies for that. So now you can see that we have 180 total objectives, the 16 have been complete, 37 are amended, all due to timeline adjustments, pushing the completion date out and 127 are in progress and on time. Up here, you can still sort the objectives by completion status, by when they're due and here in the various equity buckets that we have. So for example, we have under communications and education, our redistricting process that was completed. Again, all the completed objectives have verification link and documentation. So if you click on that, it takes you to the redistricting site. If we're back here and looking under county services, we have the agents of discovery, which is a parks project for a mobile app to encourage youth to use augmented reality to be active in their communities. And so again, the link takes you to the app where you can explore and get set up there. And then one equity objective that we wanna highlight also is a new public facing transparency dashboard for the Sheriff Corner. And so I'm gonna invite Sheriff Hart to come on and help us give you a tour of that work. Great, thank you, Sven. Good morning, Board Jim Hart, Sheriff Corner. And as your Sheriff, I've been committed to transparency and data sharing. And the data that you're gonna see today has been public information for a number of years through our monthly reports. It's been posted on our website, but this new dashboard makes it much more easily accessible to the public. And today we just wanna give you a brief preview of what is in the dashboard. The main page shows the crime rate and how Santa Cruz County compares with the rest of the state. Users will also be able to compare with local jurisdictions like the city of Santa Cruz or the city of Watsonville. And also compare against neighboring counties such as Monterey. Users will be able to compare different crime types such as property crime and then dig even deeper into subsets like vehicle theft or grand theft. This dashboard has a lot of great data through our partnership with our dispatch center, Netcom with one example being stop data. Sheriff's deputies take part in bias training to ensure that they're carrying out their duties fairly and impartially. And in the chart, here the colored bars represent the percentage of stops and the black lines represent the population. You can see that the chart and the stop data is close to the actual census data. We can also look at this data over time to better see trends and identify where we might want to adjust our training. I'd like to thank our crime analysts, Josh Castor for his work on the subject and we look forward to hearing feedback on the dashboard and improving it over time to deepen our community partnerships and commitment to keeping Santa Cruz County safe. Back to Spen. Thank you, Sheriff. We'll also be previewing later in the presentation a dashboard from the Planning Permit Center. With both of these dashboards, our intention is to have them up and live and available to the public by the end of this month. So by mid next week and we'll get a tour of the planning dashboard later. And now I'd like to transition to Elisa Benson to talk about Primo. Great, thank you, Spen. Good morning, everyone. Elisa Benson, ACAO and I'll be speaking about our Primo Continuous Process Improvement work. One, thank you, Sheriff, for just demonstrating what, how amazing data visualization. Just the same data, but put forward in a different way helps people ask different questions. And I just wanna draw everyone's attention to that center circle of our strategic management initiatives around data, that that is really the platform that is driving and unifying this work. And we've spent the last four years sort of developing the pieces and we're now at a place where we're trying to bring them together. And sort of how those different parts which feel a little bit distinct are actually unified and when you can see the alignment with them. So through the use of data, we're really able to articulate those desired results and have tools and data collection systems and conversation practices to have our staff and our managers engage with the work more specifically. And how performance measurement initiative has really linked to Primo is by creating new dashboards, it's make it, that's where we get the continuous part of the work. And I wanna just remind the board and the watching public, the Primo goal was to really create a common culture of improvement that's centered on customers, driven by employees and focuses on measurable outcomes. So what does that mean in continuous process improvement? It really means making data, visual, accessible and usable. So you start with understanding your process and being able to characterize it. And then you don't just stop there. You have to have that shared practice and a learning mindset. Primo Pi did some great work bringing employees together and then making some process improvements along the way but getting that baseline set of information to measure the effect and create a culture and a practice around continued review. You need to have that data dashboard. So I'm gonna pass it to Carolyn Burke and we're gonna be, we'll be previewing this is the public facing dashboard that's gonna be very, very important as the County moves forward on the unified permit center. And it really provides a place an invitation for curiosity for staff, the public to understand how things are working and how things can work better. So thank you to Sven for working with the planning team to develop this. And it's really how you make things go from one offs to continuous. Take it away, Carolyn. Okay. Thank you, Lisa. Good morning, my name is Carolyn Burke senior civil engineering planning and project manager for the unified permit center. We're excited to release the permit center dashboard and provide new insight into the work of our dedicated planning department staff. We're proud to highlight the quantity of work we can produce with finite staffing over 2000 permits in the last 12 months. And look forward to continuing to develop the dashboard to provide the public with more content and context regarding the overall permit process. We can start our tour by looking at the building permit dashboard which provides information on both the volume and cumulative time from building permit application to issuance. The data you see is still in the validation phase and should be considered preliminary until a public release later this month. So we dig into the building permit dashboard. You'll see that there are a lot of excellent ways to break down the median 32 days it takes from application intake to permit issuance. If we did, sorry. First you can see that about 75% of that time the application is under a county review and one quarter of those days are clients responding to comments on building plans. This figure is an aggregate of all permit review types. To find figures for individual review times we can click on the bar chart icon to view medium permit review times by the type of permit being requested. If we move to the line chart option we see many median approval times over the last year and users can sort that by permit type as well if they wanted to focus on, for example, ADUs. Finally, if we click on the map we can compare approval times and different zip codes throughout the county and may note, for example, the ADU approvals take longer in general up in the mountains where there may be more complicated environmental and safety requirements. There's a lot more data to explore and I encourage everyone to go to the website and look around when it goes live next week. The intention of the dashboard is to help the public ask better questions and show the public the wide variety of permits we issue and what they may expect in terms of cumulative review times. Well, there is a lot of variability in permit review times depending on type of permit and individual circumstances. We are focused on providing improved client tools to help our customers develop complete application packages and reduce approval times. We look forward to working with people who use our systems to make improvements as we learn from each other. I'd also like to thank planning staff members Annette Olson, Amy Wilbanks, and Brian Ruhman from our office for their work helping to put this together as well as Fen for his guidance and initiative in creating this amazing tool for the department and our community. And now I'll pass it back to Lisa. Thank you, Caroline. Again, this is the kind of work that really takes the concepts and gives us the ability to put them into practice. Next, yes, thank you. So just very quickly, today in our update, we wanted to really give us some time to explore how these things, how our initiatives are supporting each other. With that said, I wanted to give a brief update on our progress in terms of what we're calling Primo 2.0, a redesign and reboot. And really given the continuing demands of the pandemic and the recovery, we've been very, very mindful of the load that the county staff is carrying right now and how do we redesign our approach to continuous process and improvement in a way that's mindful of that and it's scaled. So we've been spending the last six months following up on the redesign topics that we shared with the board back in June. And really that's focused along with our green belts. That's really focused on that question of using data, measuring and those conversations around data. So we've made strong progress in developing those base, a basic tool for very straightforward, simple DIY project documentation because we found coming out of year one that just getting those baseline measurements was challenging for people. So that's one of the key points we're working on today. We're also re-crafting the workshop curriculum for both practitioners and managers. And we have a solid draft of that as referenced in our memo. And we'll be now taking that draft with a select group of departments to sort of work through and make sure this curriculum works here in our organization. And we're gearing up for prototyping our new approach to complex project lean project work through these 12 week more tightly constrained improvement prints as we're calling them. So that's underway and as mentioned in the memo where we will plan to get those things up and rolling and for broader County use later in the summer. So with that, I wanna just come back to that idea what we were doing differently today. And that was really focusing on how performance measurement and use of data is the connective tissue between the parts of our strategic initiatives. And we can now have that infrastructure in place to start practicing, learning by doing using the data differently. And if we use that data differently and we can really look at what we're honestly achieving are we meeting those results that the board and the public expect of us? And how do we, if we're not meeting them how do we move forward? And if we disaggregate the data we're able to examine if those results are inclusive and equitable. So all of this is as a change, it's a change of practice and it's gonna require tools and different resources. And we really appreciate what the board has done in supporting us in this journey. So we will be coming back to the board with another report in August. And we return this to the board for questions and then just our recommended actions of filing the report and then that coming back in August. But happy to take any questions on any part of the presentation today. Thank you for that excellent presentation. Are there questions from members of the board? Yes, Mr. Chair, I do have a question. First a note of appreciation for what went from concept to something much grander than concept and not that much time as far as really getting this transparency portal out, et cetera. But I did have a question in just regards to and Ms. Benson alluded to it but I was hoping to maybe get a very specific concrete example to understand the process. So Ms. Burke's presentation kind of went through, for example, planning and timelines and the amount of time it takes for an ADU, for example. And so I think that somebody may look at that and have some concerns about the timeline associated with how long it takes. But once we have the data out there just so I can understand internally, say in the planning department, how is that data used specifically to change processes in order to adjust it? Or are we making a determination that it's not a concern based on our X number of days? Where's the cutoff that's an acceptable amount of days? So just sort of the decision matrix in regarding to whether something's deemed an issue. And if it is an issue, then how it's actually modified moving forward. Okay, Supervisor Friend. Yeah, we see this tool as being used internally to track our ongoing successes as we implement process improvements. And these dashboards can also be updated to include goal times so that we can look at our performance relative to a commonly held goal projection. And as we move through over time, we can also track over time in the line charts. We can also include vertical lines when we implement different process improvements so that we can see how those have impacted our overall review times. Okay, Ms. Burke, well, I mean, as always, you always have an outstanding answer for these questions. My follow to that then is that part of, say, the 2.0 process of this?  Now it's gonna be taking a look across the systems. I mean, people already know internally. I mean, you're the ones who really informed this process that way. You're on the ground, but just since we are gonna be looking at comparators for reductions, I mean, one of this was also saying in the last two years or in the two years following, we were able to reduce times. And I'm definitely not trying to specifically call out planning, and this just happened to be that that was part of the presentation and the dates are very clear, right, in that. But that we've reduced X times by 25%. These are part of the other second part of what we do in regards to this report. I was just wondering when or how that happens now in this process, because now we've got this information. It's actually exceptionally useful information because there's a sense in the community about things, but now we've got data to actually answer the sense. But now I think, I mean, we may very well make a determination that these are acceptable timelines. I just wanna know how that decision's made and then when in this process this is going to be made. Absolutely. So one of the things that I'm eternally grateful to spend for is brilliance in being able to help take what we input into our permit tracking system, which is in for and be able to translate that into some graphical tools that we can use moving forward. And this really establishes the baseline for what our further process improvements are. I think that there are incremental process improvements that we can work towards as we implement different process improvements on our internal side. We hope to be able to implement a greenlining program, hopefully in the next month or so, that will allow us to include notes on plans to move them through the process sooner. Those are certain things that we can then track over time and see what type of impact that's having. And then we absolutely will take a look at what our objective realities are as far as what goals we can set forth for review times moving forward. This is the first step that was establishing the baseline so that we have something to measure it off of. We will also have internal dashboards that have different functionalities as well so that we can look at individual sections, performance and such if we're doing smaller, not full department-wide process improvements. If I could, could I ask, oh, thank you. So I just wanted to appreciate that, Carolyn. I think one thing that's important to note here is from a lean continuous process improvement perspective, that focus on those workflows, those processes within planning and within our new approach to this work, those changes need to stem from that management and staff's focus on that baseline. It's not the Primo office changing the target for them. What we wanna be able to do is they have that data to reflect on, be curious about, ask questions about. They need someone to come in and help work through a specific process redesign. We wanna give them those resources and tools and maybe that outside perspective. But again, the idea here is it's coming from the workplace that they are confident in the data that they're seeing and they have the space and time to have those honest conversations about what's working, what's not. Why are certain things taking longer? Why do certain things go faster? And that's that learning mindset and having the time to do that. And really having that visible process that sort of holds everyone accountable. And it's something that people all agree is credible is where you start that dialogue. So this is where it starts, but it's also the practice now. Sven's been working with departments over the last year, 18 months to develop dashboards. Now, what do we do with them? That's the question. That's the next sort of part of our journey as an organization is now we actually need to take these tools on a regular basis and engage with them. So that's part of where we wanna go. And it's, I think everyone's being brave and a little nervous, but we're stepping forward. And I remember when we first brought Primo to this board in 2018, we recognize this feels a little risky for us. And what we heard from all of you was like, we know, but we want you guys to keep moving. And I think these tools that are starting to mature, we're at a place where we can take a big breath and take a next step and move forward. Yeah, I appreciate that context from both you, Ms. Benson, as well as Ms. Burke. I mean, I view this as we now have a way to quantify the problems. And also by the way to quantify where there aren't problems even if there might be a perception of where they exist, equally important. I guess I still haven't maybe satisfactorily and this is just my, ma'am, I'm not probably communicating this well. I just wanna see where the next step is gonna happen. I mean, everybody's there. I'm in agreement that it should be driven by the department and the experts within department. It shouldn't be a top-down situation. But are we talking about at the next update we're gonna be moving towards? I mean, I'm looking for sort of the concrete steps of now how we effectuate change as a result of this transparency and data. That's ultimately the data simply informed where we do or do not have issues. And where departments now, I think then have to have a transparent discussion with the board about, well, I mean, I could reduce this to whatever, but it's gonna take X number of staff, for example, or some sort of technological advance, but whatever, that's where our role would come in. We're on a policy and budgetary side, more of a macro than a micro, but if we're all on the same page that this is the framework, then I'm just saying that now that I've built the foundation or you've built the foundation, the team's built the foundation, when are you gonna start building the walls, right? I mean, when is the next step going to come in that actually means that we've moved that toward? That's what I was hoping to, and maybe perhaps wasn't communicating very well about when the next step would come that way. Sure, if you wanna, oh, go ahead, Terrell. Okay, yeah, well, so we have a series of process improvements that we're currently looking at in-house. We'll be reviewing those compared to these data, the data that we have available at this time, and we will be looking to maximize our efficiency. So if you look at that data, you'll also see that the total number of building plan check staff is five that are reviewing the 2,200 permits. So we will absolutely be looking at our capacity issues in that respect. We have other studies underway in the planning department to look at our throughput for building plan check. And the reason why we're focused on building plan check is that for building permits, they touch almost every building permit, well, they do touch every building permit that comes through, so they can be a constraining factor. So we're absolutely looking at this in combination with what we have in our offices. And we hope to actually continue to improve the dashboard to include other figures such as that so that people can understand what the process is and then project reasonable estimates given our staffing resources so that we can be able to be transparent and realistic with what we have available. Thank you. I apologize for monopolizing so much time. I appreciate that this is a continuing discussion and I'll hand it back to you, Mr. Chair, for my colleagues to ask additional questions. Thank you. Other questions from members of the board? Mr. Chair? Yes. I'd just like to make a few comments. I have good questions and I appreciate the answers. But since this board has approved the county's first strategic plan as was mentioned in 2018, and I brought the process developed as we all have in hopes that county operations and services in our community would see a demonstratable improvement. And now that we have experienced this and the data from the past three years, three years, I can say with confidence the county is not only improving our performance, but we're doing so in a transparent way, which is critical. The next steps identified speak to the county's commitment to carry on with this, increase efficiency, especially placed about the two dashboards that we had up, one from Public Safety, thanks to Sheriff Hart and one for the Planning Department, serving the community. The credit for this tremendous work is a direct result of strong support of the CAO Carlos Palacios and the county executive team as before us today. And also all the workers who have committed to make county work better. And I'm truly appreciative of that because we wanna serve the county in the best way we can. One good question I have with, particularly as it pertains to planning and probably public works operations, with the CCU fire in the middle of all this, and for leaf taking over, how has that adjusted our expectations or the timeframe that we wanna do some of these things? I'm just curious to know what the impact of the CCU fire had with what almost 1,950 structures that were destroyed. Absolutely, so you're saying how does that impact the overall timeline for more broad planning-wide process improvements? Yes. Yes, so we will have a data for the CCU fire also available on the building permit dashboard. That's just a side note. We're still working on that data. Luckily with the ability to have the recovery permit centers staffed with four leaf staff, it has allowed us to our building plan checking staff that I was just noting Supervisor Friend that they can continue to focus on planning department work. So it shouldn't impact anything in that respect. Probably the largest impact it has on our staff is in our geologic review section who continues to interface with the geohazard clearances for the CCU fire process. I will say that our processing of permits, the process that we've set up for the CCU permits with the clearances ahead of the building permit application has been successful in many regards. And we're actually looking at how we can implement something similar in our building permit process for more complex projects. And so in that respect, it's actually had a positive influence on our overall trajectory of where we wanna go with the unified permit center and some of our streamlining options. So overall, we don't anticipate a significant impact on process improvements from our processing of CCU applications. Thank you. And again, congratulations to the whole team and county staff who participated. I think it's really critical that they have input because they're the ones that see the public day in and day out. So thank you for everything that's progressed to this point. Thank you. Thank you. Are there questions? Yeah, Mr. Chair, yeah, sort of questions, comment. I'd like to get a response, which is, so I think as everyone said, I think the transparency is fantastic. And now county processes are just so much more visible to the public in an easier, more accessible way. And I wanna acknowledge that that transparency is both challenging and can be a little bit scary. And it's also been done in the context of COVID and fires and number of economic challenges and beyond. And so credit to staff for really moving this forward. I wanna make two comments, which is, and I think they sort of piggyback on Supervisor Friend's comments, which is a couple of the objectives, it's starting to feel like a couple of the objectives have moved from community impact objectives to more like departmental to-do lists. Submit a plan, assess this. And that's, if I'm a member of the community, I wanna know, are we reducing greenhouse gases? Are we reducing or filling potholes? Are we reducing crime? Are we, what's the recidivism rate? Those are the things that I think the community wants to focus on and wants to be able to track. And like the public safety dashboard that sort of shows crime rising and falling, these would be the state or other counties or the cities within our county helps do that. I think what we're looking for as policy makers is an ability for the public through the board to be able to weigh in on setting these objectives. How much are we reducing our carbon emission standards by when? And then also to sort of talk about Ms. Burke's comments is, so how, what do we need to allocate more resources to do just because there's the limit on resources or staffing is limiting the outcome we want as a community versus what do we wanna get into the business of and what do we wanna get out of the business of? Are there ways to, from a policy point of view, to just simplify it so that fewer hands are even touching an application or they're deemed approved before. I think I talked about with solar, is there a way to certify solar installers so that we then just go back and if you're certified, we just do a spot check on 10% of the solar panels installed as a way to not say we're asking the same staff to just move it through quicker, but we're actually looking at an entirely different way of processing an application. And I think the transparency helps form that and the culture shifts and the conversations, but I think we need to be able to integrate the allocation of resources and policy objectives better and understand that in a world of limited resources, we're only gonna be able to focus on a few objectives, but we wanna move the objectives forward that the community is interested in seeing addressed, if that makes sense. Absolutely, and we're currently with development of the Unified Permit Center, we are looking at staffing resources because we are looking at increasing our presence and our availability to the public in a pre-application phase where folks can come into the counter and be able to get more information and have more comprehensive review packages. I will say that we are also, as I mentioned before, we're looking at implementing a pre-application clearance similar to what we've implemented in the CZU fires to be able to remove things entirely from the review queue if we can perform a short preliminary review prior to putting it into those routing queues, then that removes it, if it will have a direct impact on overall review time. Also, there's been certain streamlining measures taken in the CZU applications, such as deferment of review of certain technical reports that may only need to be used for compliance with the California Building Code. We're also looking at how we can reduce the number of those traveling through our system by just simply reducing the overall number of reviews, and those are the methods that we're hoping to employ to do that. So, absolutely, Supervisor Croninger, we are sharing your sentiment. Yeah, and by the way, let me just say, I think through the four-leaf contract and through these initiatives, me planning is getting asked these questions because you're brave enough to show up today, but I'm sort of across the county and the other departments, I think I'm trying to make the broader point, not just about planning, but about the other departments of when we say we're gonna move records online, great, but then how many, what does that translate to in terms of the overall number of customers who come in and request records? Are we trying to get 40% of them to be accessed online or 30% or what's the growth rate over time? What's the savings to the county? So it's just trying to make sure that when we're setting these objectives that they're customer-focused and community-focused and not internally-processed focused. Supervisor Cooneray, this is Nicole. I think we've made great progress in moving in that direction with the current two-year operational plan and with the training that we're gonna be developing and working with departments this spring throughout into the next fiscal year, especially as we're working on developing the next two-year plan for the next two-year period, we're hoping that objectives contain measures and targets across all the departments and you're seeing much more of that. It's been a real learning process for some departments where this is the first time they've ever worked on smart objectives, but I think that departments are beginning to better understand what those mean and to set those. And so we agree and we'll be moving, working with them to try to see more of that across the county. If I could add one more thing to that. And we really appreciate hearing this feedback and perspective from all of you on these moving pieces and where we go from here. I mean, yes, we're working with departments to develop new practices, but so are we. How do we integrate in our role of bringing information together and engaging with our departments about what's happening? These tools are for us to use and sort of test and try as well as our regular new business practices. So I think I find it really helpful getting that feedback. And so as we start thinking about what do we do differently? And what questions do we do differently from the CAO's office to support those practices by departments and what is our role in that? I don't have by Pat, here's the five things answer for you right now, but this makes me think about, okay, what do we need to do? And what are those steps and how we're gonna be proceeding on that maturity model of changing how we engage around these different pieces of the management initiatives? So I don't have a good answer yet, but we'll have a better one in August. But you're on mute, Supervisor Trinity. Sorry, I just wanna say I appreciate that and I recognize that all of us are trying to continuously improve. And so it's these conversations that help move it forward. Thank you. Any further questions? I'll just say thank you for your report. We've gone through some very difficult times and we're doing the best we can and you're doing the best you can to keep the public involved and they were available and we're actually working on every project that we can and doing a great job. So I appreciate the transparency and also letting the public know that we are doing everything we can. Thank you. I just have a few questions for yourself. The first is, what would you say is the target audience for these dashboards? I would say that it's a combination of the public. We're hoping the public can learn more about what the county is doing. But also departments, we really want to encourage them to be looking at the information and like Carolyn described, trying to set goals and targets and improvements on a continuous basis to see how department operations might be improved. Right, that makes perfect sense. So I guess just some feedback on that point. I see the interface kind of struggling right now between being accessible to as many people as possible and then also providing some very rich and meaningful data. I think given the ultimate fact that the people using it the most are likely to either be internal members of the county and departments as you said, or perhaps policy experts working for organizations on our community. I think it would be okay not to be afraid of the data and to bring that forward a little bit more. I mean, some of the interfaces, for example, half of the data presentation is devoted to an explainer. So I think just let the data shine a little bit more. And as you said, that's ultimately, the explaining piece can always, I mean, in many ways that's our roles as supervisors is to take this data and put it, explain it in a simple way to the public that people can understand. I think that's true of leaders of other organizations as well and department heads. The next question is what is the process for getting feedback on these dashboards within the departments? That's probably a good question for Sven. We have, I mean, we do have an email set up for the public to provide feedback. We did, and with operational plan objectives, there is a link on each objective. If the public wishes to provide feedback on any given operational objective, they can just click the link and it takes them to a forum, two, three field forum to submit that generates a comment to us. And so, you know, those are the main ways to provide feedback and interact right now. And we'd certainly be open to other ideas. And as far as getting feedback from folks in the different departments, is that something that'll happen? Does it happen now? Is it part of the pre-mode process? Or is it currently happening? Yeah, I know with the existing data that we have, you know, we do have periodic check-ins just to look at the, you know, make sure the data is up to date and refreshing properly and that it's still useful and accurate. So we do have that, we have ongoing trainings that we do with departments and department staff. We're actually writing the objectives and doing the dashboard. So that's something that we're, you know, continuously trying to improve. And I had one thing to that. I mean, when Sven and the team work with a department on building a dashboard, it's with the department. So that original construction is absolutely a collaborative effort where we do have some of the specific data presentation visualization expertise that does reside in the CAO's office. There are also plenty of pockets of that in our departments but that initial creation of the dashboard is absolutely a shared effort. So it's, you know, we're not taking their data and going in a corner and coming up with something. It's trying to come up with a framework that's gonna be meaningful both to their customers if they're public facing but also helpful from an operations standpoint. So it's a co-designed dashboard. That's great. I mean, obviously we want it to continue to evolve and that's only gonna happen if people are engaged. So I'm glad to hear that's happening from the beginning. And then I just wanna emphasize a point you brought up which is having these dashboards is fantastic. Certainly, as was mentioned today there's always tens, if not hundreds of items on our consent agenda and just the funding streams and the way all these programs work in the county it's very difficult to keep track of. And so having this, you don't know if you're moving the needle unless you have a needle and this is really, you know, the provide it's that needle and provides a measurement system for our county which has been lacking. And it's good that we'll be able to have it going forward. But of course the ultimate piece of this is not just the measurement but also the culture behind it, as you said. And I think, you know, those two questions you mentioned, are we doing things that make a difference? Are we doing things that matter? Is anyone better off? I think it's important that we establish in county culture that we all ask that question of the things we're doing every day. And then, you know, just look at the data and see how that interacts with, you know our own perception of how hard job is going and if we're working on something that matters because ultimately it's that engagement from everyone doing the work day to day that's gonna make a difference. And, you know, we talk a lot about lean principles and, you know, one of the main ones is continuous improvement driven from every suggestions from people doing the work every day long. So I just would, you know, use the opportunity to encourage everyone to ask those questions. Are we doing work that matters and that makes people's lives better off? And finally, who in the past has participated from the Board of Supervisors Office directly in the Primo trainings? I don't. I think we actually may have had the analyst for the board be part of the trainings. I know Jillian was originally part of it when she was in that role. But as we move forward, we're happy to have conversations about how to include representation from the board offices. Okay, great. Yeah, I wanna make sure that- We'll follow up. We're all on the same page. Absolutely. Thank you. We'll not take it to public comment on this item. Is any member of the public will speak? Yes, please approach. Thank you. My name is Becky Steinbrunner. I went to all the meetings when this first began back in 2018 and a lot of people did and we put sticky dots on things. So it's interesting to see that finally something may be coming that will really produce some change. And I really like that it can be and hopefully it will be integrated with the budget process. We need a lot better transparency on public works budget, certainly county fire budget. The type one engines that have just been purchased are out stuck in the mud. Was that really a good thing to do? I don't think so. So I also wanna thank the supervisors for your good questions. Particularly, how does the public weigh in on this? Data is good to have out and it is supposed to be for public improvement of processes, but I don't think just having an email link is enough. I think there needs to be more interaction with the public on this. For example, on the planning department, it was shown the median day is 32 days, but yet the bar graph showed it was more like 150 days. And I'm hearing, I appreciate Supervisor McPherson's questions relative to this easy of fire.  Why does someone who built a house in 2000 have to have a complete remake of their septic system when they had everything to code back in 2000? I wanna say in terms of public input and involvement, one good thing would be addressing that I only get two minutes. People here coming in only gets two minutes. I wanna actually say that since we are speaking on a specific item and we don't have a huge crowd today on to speak on this to try and you may have additional minute. Well, thank you. Does anyone speaking on this item? Thank you very much. It's gracious of you and I appreciate that. So allowing during general public comment time, I mean, we are relegated only to two minutes. Thank you for the additional minute here to speak on everything on the consent agenda and closed session and anything that we can't stay for the whole amount. I would like to ask that one thing that could happen would be that you could re-institute the citizen's ability to pull a consent agenda item. We used to be able to do that that was taken away from us. So important things on the consent agenda could be given more time like the hospital on which every single supervisor spoke today. So that's one thing.  They've got a lot of work and here's this process that is putting more demands on them and he actually called it stupid. I really appreciate Supervisor Coonerty's bringing it back that this needs to have a customer focus not just a to-do list for staff and that working together will improve things and I'm confident we will. And I want to see how it will be tied in with the budget. And I want to thank Supervisor Friend for his persistence in trying to get some more objective answers on goal setting. Thank you. Thank you for the extra time. Thank you. Is there anyone on Zoom who'd like to make a comment? There's one color, color two. Your microphone is available. A star nine to mute if you're calling in. This is Marilyn Garrett listening to the whole thing on my landline here. And I'd like to say I agree totally with Becky. I was the same point. You're talking about equity, certain words and quantifying problems. Equity, we used to have three minutes to speak during public comment and on every consent agenda item. You members of the board all comments on consent agenda items, but not members of the public who are muscled from doing that. That's not equity in any sense of it. I hear you refer to customers. We are not customers. We are members of the public who fund your supervisory pay. So refer to members of the public. Also, you're talking about transparency, but there's transparency omitted on certain topics like you, all the microwave sources. And personally, it's very painful for me at the board of supervisors chambers because on the roof of the building are all these radiation emitting devices and antennas and a 5G on a pool right out there at ocean and water in the media. Where's the transparency on the safety, the harm like people, radiation sickness causes weakness and fatigue, anxiety, depression, headaches, migraines, rapid heartbeat. There's a whole risk. You are not being transparent about the harm. That's omitted. And I have a question. This is the first time I've heard the term and I don't have a cell phone and I don't have a computer. What is dashboard? It sounds to me and I'd like a response to this question. Like this is the move to put almost everything on the computer online on wireless microwave radiation and not have in-person meetings or records available on paper. Could you answer that? Whenever I hear the word smart, I cringe because it means microwave radiation harm. Please respond. Thank you. Just a point of clarification there. I do not believe that this in any way, these dashboards will remove general information about county business that we continue to publish via paper. There's only an additional source of information available to the public for greater transparency into the county's processes. That's correct. Or other speakers. All right, with that we'll end public comment and return it to the board for action if the motion will be in order. I'll move the recommended actions. Oh, second. Motion by Supervisor Friend, second by Supervisor Caput. Any further discussion? Seeing none, please call the roll. Supervisor Friend. Aye. Coonerty. Aye. Caput. Aye. In person. Aye. Koenig. Aye. The motion passes unanimously. Thank you. You will now move on to our scheduled item for 1045 a.m. This is Zone 7, Flood Control District. And I will turn it over to Supervisor Zach Friend who is our chair of Zone 7. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Madam Clerk, do we need some time in order to elevate people to panelists from other jurisdictions? Yes, I am having difficulties promoting Dr. Bilisic. Thank you. I've granted you speaking options, but I won't be able to share your screen or turn on your camera, unfortunately. Okay. I'm not seeing Director Colbertson online. I believe that Director Colbertson has traditionally called into these. So are there any call-in numbers perhaps? There are two call-in users, Caller 9833 or calling user, sorry, calling user two with Marilyn Garrett. Director Colbertson, if you are on the line, please press star six to raise your hand and I can unmute your microphone. He's not appearing online. Thank you, Madam Clerk. All right, we are going to get moving then. We are going to call to order the Flood Control and Water Conservation District Zone 7 Board of Directors special meeting for January 25th, 2022. If we could have a roll call, please. Director Koenig. Here. Coonerty. Here. Nick Pearson. Here. Thank you. Abbott. Here. Billisich. Here. Hope Person is excused. Friend. Here. Lucas. Gonzalez. Parker. For the record, the last three were non-voting members. Chair, you have a quorum. Thank you. Dr. Strudley, are there any late additions to today's agenda? No Chair or Friend, there are not. We'll now move on to item three, which is rural communications. This is an opportunity for members of the community to address us on items that are not on today's agenda or within the Zone 7 purview, or is there any member of the community that would like to address us? Yes, good morning. My name is Becky Steinbruner. I live in rural Aptos. I want to encourage all of these Flood Control zones to seriously consider groundwater recharge using stormwater runoff projects. There are some in the county managed aquifer recharge projects. And I think that's a real good step in the right direction using stormwater in a positive way that can help recharge our groundwater aquifers. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anybody else on Zoom? There are no speakers on Zoom or in chambers. Thank you. All right, we'll move on to the consent agenda, which are, excuse me, we'll move on to item four, which is the approval of the Zone 7 board meeting minutes. Are there any changes to the minutes by any of the directors? Hearing none, is there any member of the community that would like to address us on item four of the minutes? All right, we'll bring it back to the board for action. I'll move for approval of the minutes. I can. We have a motion from Director Caput and a second from Director Koenig if we could have a roll call, please. Director Koenig. Aye. Coonerty? Aye. McPherson? Aye. Caput? Aye. Villicich? Aye. Friend? Aye. I think he motion passes with the attendance. I think we'll move on to the consent agenda with our items eight through 11, or is there any board member that would like to either comment on or pull an item from consent? Hearing none, is there any member of the community under our structure here? It appears as though people haven't had an opportunity to speak on a consent agenda item. Is there any member of the community that would like to address us on consent? I'm seeing none. Madam Clerk, anybody on Zoom? There's no one. And as a reminder. Please go ahead. I'd like to make a motion to approve. Sure. Okay, Madam Clerk, as you were saying. This is a reminder for those on Zoom. It is star six to raise your hand if you're on the phone, or please click the hand icon at the bottom of your screen to be placed in the speaking queue. Okay, well, seeing none on Zoom or in the chambers, we have a motion from Director Billisich and a second from Director McPherson if we could have a roll call, please. Director Koenig? Aye. Coonerty? Aye. McPherson? Aye. Caput? Aye. Billisich? Aye. Friend? Aye. I think he motion passes with the attendance. We'll move on to the regular agenda and this is item six, as the Board of Directors of Zone Seven to consider a status report on the Pahora River Flood Risk Management Project as outlined in the Memo of the District Engineer, and we have a Zone Seven Agenda Item Board Memo, Dr. Strudley. Thank you, Chair Friend, members of the Board. I'm here to provide you with a status update on the Pahora River Flood Risk Management Project and the pursuits that we are engaging in to try to secure ongoing state and federal investment and to move forward with local revenue sourcing for the project. So we continue to engage with the federal government, including the Army Corps, as well as our congressional delegation and other members of White House and other agencies in Washington, DC to try to secure federal investment in the project. We continue to receive very hopeful information through Congressman Panetta's office, as well as through other contacts in Washington, DC, that the values of this project are very strongly aligned with the administration's priorities. And so we're very hopeful that we are going to be able to secure federal investment in the project for those reasons. Again, as I've reiterated to the Board, really all the stars are in alignment on this project right now, and so this is the best time that we've ever had in securing support from the federal government for the project. We continue to utilize existing appropriations for the design phase, and we are awaiting, hopefully, the allocation of appropriations for construction funding. And there will be numerous opportunities for that over the next year, and we continue to engage. And I wanna thank, excuse me, director, excuse me, chair, Zach Friend, for leading that effort for us in Washington, DC, and assisting with connecting staff with important members on the Hill and other agencies that are involved with appropriations. On the state side of the equation, this month, we are re-engaging with the State Department of Water Resources to negotiate and secure our subventions, cost share agreement with the state, as well as to secure a grant agreement under our tentative award under the coastal flood risk, seasonly coastal watershed flood risk reduction grant program that was awarded to the district last year. It is still in very important and relevant to note the success that we have had with the passage and signing of SB 496. We have continued to thank profusely, Senator John Laird for his authoring and shepherding that bill through a very challenging legislative season last year. It is truly, remains a really groundbreaking law, one that provides 100% cost share from the state for our non-federal costs to the project, which effectively erases the capital requirements of funding to be placed on the public. So in other words, the capital investment side is essentially free to us, provided by the federal government through their appropriations for the project and the state subventions cost share agreement. So this is a very, very big deal for us and hugely helpful to the project. On the local side, the Pajaro Regional Flood Management Agency, the JPA that was formed to oversee implementation of the project, as well as to oversee long-term operations and maintenance of the existing levees and any future facilities that are built, that agency continues to advance through its administrative startup procedures as the agency begins to grow and walk and talk like its own agency. We, of course, we've had numerous board meetings already and the Zone 7 staff continue to operate under a services agreement that was struck between those two agencies to perform that administrative work for the JPA, as well as to advance the potential for bringing a special benefit assessment district prop 218 compliant proposal to that board. So in order to fully secure the federal and state appropriations, the project will need to provide assurances of long-term operations and maintenance viability to the federal and state government. And in order to do so, staff is currently in the midst of proposing to the JPA board the creation of a special benefit assessment district. That process is unfolding through the beginning of this calendar year 2022. And we expect to bring that proposal to that board's attention around April. We have had a continued success, again, on the federal side with Congressman Panetta's office. And I just wanted to mention that in addition to our pursuits for federal investment, what has really been helpful on that end is the engineering with nature program. The very benefits that are so attractive to the state that led to successful passage of SB 496 are also now being heralded finally by the Army Corps of Engineers as other valuable multi-benefit aspects. And the levy setbacks that are proposed as part of the project offer a lot of expanded space for habitat, for groundwater recharge, for other multi-benefit uses. And that is something that the engineering with nature program at the Army Corps of Engineers is interested in exploring with us. And the project has been labeled an engineering with nature pilot project by the Army Corps and carries that designation in its pursuit of federal appropriations for construction. So again, we're thankful to Congressman Panetta's office for shepherding those conversations and getting those conversations started for bringing Dr. Todd Bridges out for a visit to the Pahoa River levy system in November which would not have been possible without Congressman Panetta's assistance. Dr. Todd Bridges is the national program lead for that engineering with nature program. So these are all very good indications that we are continuing along a path of success and hope for a very bright future with the levy reconstruction project. And with that, this is just a status update. So the recommendation action is just to accept and file this status update and I'm happy to take any questions. Thank you, Dr. Strudler. Are there any questions from directors? Director Bilicic? I just want to say we've done such outstanding work and Mark, with your leadership, it's made all the difference. You've been able to make the contacts, you've continuously gone forward and we greatly appreciate all the efforts. We're almost there. Thank you very much. Thank you, Director Bilicic. Are there any other questions or comments on this item? Director Caput? Yeah, go ahead, Zach. No, please, I'm calling on you, go for it. Okay, that's fine. Yeah, I want to thank, you know, to get to the point where we are right now, it's amazing how many years we've been working on this and the critical part is coming up now for the local small match that we have to come up with. Losing in that election for where the property owners in the floodplain have to vote on it, there's, it can fail, it has to pass. This is an opportunity that the public and especially the people in the floodplain, it's critical. So anyway, I guess pretty soon we're gonna have that election and I'm looking forward to working on that. And I don't know, Mark, can you mention? I think we're gonna have a smooth transition. Congressman Panetta's been doing a great job and now we're gonna have Congresswoman Palofgrin. So there'll be a kind of a transition here right at the moment of, I'm hopeful that Congresswoman Zollofgrin joining in the fray will be advantageous to us. Congressman Panetta still retains jurisdiction over the lower part of the watershed and remains just as engaged and committed as he has always been. So that is very nice to see. And like I said, we hope Congresswoman Zollofgrin will assist Congressman Panetta in building a stronger base of support on the Hill for the project. So, yeah. Dr. Strudley, is there any member of the community that'd like to address us on this item? Thank you, Becky Steinbrenner as a rural apocryph. I also wanna thank Dr. Strudley because I didn't know you were a doctor now. Good job, that's a lot of work. And I feel like we're very lucky to have you here working for us all in this county. And you've helped move this project and other projects along in a very professional and positive way. And I just really wanna thank you. Regarding the special benefit assessment district that will be needed to be formed, having seen what happened in the Real Domar Flats with that special benefit assessment district getting voted down by the voters, it's going to be important that it's emphasized the benefit and the cost and what will happen if it doesn't go through. So, going the extra yard and I'm calling on the county supervisors really to talk with your constituents to make it clear what this is about and all of the work that Dr. Strudley and others have done and the benefit that it will impose as a balance of the cost. I think it was really unfortunate that the benefit assessment district in Real Domar Flats didn't pass and all of that work had to just go away. But at the same time, I was disappointed that the county didn't find a way to come up with some other means. So have a plan B please because these are tough times for all of us out there trying to pay our taxes, trying to keep our heads above water. So please have a plan B. Thank you very much. Is there any other member of the community that'd like to address us on this item? Madam Clerk, anybody on Zoom? There's no one on Zoom. All right, thank you. We'll bring it back to the board. It's an acceptance file. So this is an action item. If we could have a motion, please. I'll make a motion to accept this report. Oh, second. We have a motion from Director Bilicic and a second from Director Caput. If we've got a roll call, please. Director Koenig. Aye. Coonerty. Aye. McPherson. Aye. Caput. Aye. Bilicic. Aye. Friend. Aye. Thank you. Motion passes with the attendance. Thank you. We'll move on to the final item on today's agenda, which is as the board of directors of the Santa Cruz County Flood Control and Water Conservation District Zone 7 to consider nominations for the election of the Zone 7 Board of Directors, Chairperson and Vice Chairperson as outlined in the memo of the district engineer. And we have a memo for that item, Dr. Strudley. Thank you, Chair Farron, the members of the board, as is customary for the first meeting of the year to elect a Vice Chairperson and Chairperson for the board in conformance with our rules and regulations. That election is scheduled for the first regular meeting of the calendar year. In this case, it is a special meeting. The governance and administration of our district has been very effective under the incumbent chair and vice chair. And it remains very important to the success of the project in the pursuits of flood risk reduction in the Pajaro Valley to maintain that consistency and coherency as we move forward through really critical times related to federal appropriations for construction. And so we do have a staff recommendation for the incumbent chair and vice chair to be re-elected in those roles for the coming calendar year. So the recommended action is for the Vice Chairperson to call for nominations and that the board elect a Chairperson and Vice Chairperson for calendar year 2022 for Zone 7. Director Belsich. I just wanted to say that under your leadership, those last few years, we continue to move forward. And we have never seen anything like this. And I can't say enough about you, your leadership, the team, and I think it's an excellent idea to continue with you as chair. Thank you, Director Belsich. Any other board members? Any nominations? I'll move the recommended actions. That vice chair. I'm sorry. What's that director McPherson? Did that include the nomination for vice chair as well? Did it continue? It did. Yeah. Very well. So we have a motion. Is there a second on the nomination? Yes. Or we have a second from Director Koenig. Is there any member of the community that'd like to address us on this item? Seeing none in the chambers, is there anybody on Zoom, Madam Clerk? There is no one on Zoom. All right, thank you. We have a motion and a second. I'll bring it back to the board for roll call vote. Director Koenig? Aye. Coonerty? Aye. McPherson? Aye. Caput? Belsich? Aye. Friend? Aye. Thank you. Motion passes with attendance. And thank you all for nominating the two of us as chair and vice chair again. This will conclude the zone seven meeting. I'll turn it back to chair Koenig to reconvene the board of supervisors meeting. Thank you, chair Friend. We will now reconvene the regular meeting of the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors. It is 11.04 and we will proceed to item eight. Consider approval and concept of ordinance repealing Santa Cruz County code chapter 9.44, Live Oak Beach Permit Parking Zone, schedule ordinance for final adoption on February 1st, 2022 as outlined in the memorandum of the Deputy CAO, Director of Public Works, Director Machado. Thank you. And good morning, Chair Koenig and board of members. Good to be here this morning. And so the item before you is consideration for the repeal of County code chapter 9.44, Live Oak Beach Permit Parking Zone. A bit of history on this, I'd like to share. Early last year we were developing a expanded program, a revised program and we received a considerable comment from the community, not very supportive of the existing program, nor of the proposed changes to the program. We also received comment from Coastal Commission and that was in April. They actually stated that Coastal Commission does not support the permitted program or the modified program for 2021. In their view, the program should be discontinued entirely. That led us to action in April where your board recommended to pause the program for the year. Staff's recommendation was to continue, but due to consideration of comments from Coastal and from the public, the board chose to pause the program for last year. Last summer we did keep track of any concerns, parking concerns. We also coordinated directly with Coastal Commission to understand if there was a program that we should be developing to their liking, to the community's liking. We did receive correspondence from our partners at Coastal Commission. And again, they stated that they were not supportive of the Live Oak Parking Program or any fee-based Coastal Parking Program more broadly. They further stated that they did not think it would be a good use of county staff or commission staff time or effort to further work on such a program. That said, we came back to the board in October and our department recommended that the program be dissolved. The board supported that recommendation, which leads us here today. The recommended action today is to consider in concept the adoption of an ordinance repealing Santa Cruz County Code chapter 9.44, Live Oak Beach Permit Parking Zone and to direct clerk of the board to schedule a second reading and final adoption of the ordinance for February 1, 2022. That concludes my report this morning and I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have. Thank you. Any questions from members of the board for Director Machado? Just have one question. We saw as I worked with you and your staff at the beginning of last year, 2021, I'm trying to reform the program, but at that time, the Coastal Commission had issues with the program, but at least the fact that the program had existed gave us some leg to stand on in terms of the fact that there should be one going forward. So does repealing the program completely as opposed to simply suspending it for another year? Is there any, does it at least provide or maintain a legal ability to have some kind of program in the future? Or is there any reason why we should, why should we dissolve it completely as opposed to just continuing to suspend it? Well, I mean, clearly that's a policy decision for the board. I do believe that repealing the ordinance today would stop any future consideration unless we were to reconsider a new ordinance. And so it would be rather final with this action proposed today, but of course it is a policy decision. And so I would defer to the board if you wanted to keep the conversation alive for another year. If we were to create a new program, would it have any greater authority or be easier to do so under the existing ordinance or would it be better just to create an entirely new ordinance for a redesigned program? I think what I would say is that any modification to the program or creation of a new program will require Coastal Commission support. It will require a coastal permit. And to date, they continue to not support a paid parking program. And from our perspective, a paid parking program is the only way to make a program work in the area with any benefit to any of our community members. And so I don't know that keeping existing ordinance is gonna help us and any future ordinance will have to really resolve the issue of Coastal Commission's resistance to any sort of parking program that we could potentially operate and manage. Okay, thank you. And of course we have seen cases where the commission itself took a different position than Coastal Commission staff. And of course it has always been frustrating that we're the ones that are burdened with maintaining the infrastructure and actually managing the area. And Coastal Commission does not have those same charges but makes these sorts of recommendations. I would just say that as far as members of the public are concerned, I mean, the feedback was, I continue to hear people request that we bring the program back. Although, as you pointed out, much of the discussion was around what the fee structure should be. You know, it's difficult. I guess at this point I see that in the future, if we were to re-imagine the program, it would be substantially different. And therefore it would make more sense to simply re-approach it as a new ordinance. And also I think one thing we both realized, you as director with staff and myself and the office managing public comments about the program last spring, I think it was actually the high point of the year in terms of emails and comments we received. And so the marginal utility of a program and its ability to actually control some of the issues that folks are concerned about, driveways being blocked, and just maintaining general order in the beach area during the summer months. The expense of staff time and managing the program is far outweighs the few improvements we actually saw with the program in effect. And I think that actually we did hit on a good solution with the sheriff's office bringing over their school resource officers to the live Oak area during those summer months to help maintain orderly conduct by all visiting the beach. So, you know, I'm fine with the recommended actions today, recognizing that, you know, things may change in the future. And at that point, we would wanna re-approach the program with the new ones. Are there any members of the public that wish to speak on this item? Thank you for this report. Becky Steinbruner from rural Aptath. I did participate in those public meetings and it was going to look like, and it looked like this was gonna be expanded countywide. And so I'm really glad that the coastal commission has convinced your leadership to do away with that idea to allow for equitable coastal access by everyone. I am heartened that with a suspension of the program last summer, it was not a hardship. It sounds like on people living in those areas. And I appreciate that there was maybe some extra share of presence there to help with any problems. So I'm very glad to see that this is being repealed. It's very good move. Thank you on the basis of the people. And I do think that just for clarification, it would be wise for your board to consult with county council about any legal ramifications of doing this in terms of setting precedence for either a similar program or for other types of programs in the county. I also wanted to just point out that I remember that the money that was going to be generated from the new program in the Live Oak area was to support the private speech. And now with the dissolution of the Opal Cliffs Recreation District, I just wanna make sure that your board is looking at that and that that Beach Access will be maintained in a good way. And I'd really like to see that locked gate and fence go away. Thank you for taking this action today. I think it's a good move on support of the public and Beach Access for all. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone on Zoom who should make a comment? Yes, there's one caller. Caller, user two, your microphone is available. Thank you for your comments, Becky Steinbruner. There were right on the mark. We need equitable coastal access and permit parking does not sound worthwhile in to benefit the public or use of county time. And so I'm glad to see you're planning to repeal this and the coastal commission comments were quite valuable. So those are my comments. Permit parking, there's already too much of it all over. Thank you. Or another speakers. Okay, then we'll return it to the board for action. Mr. Chair, I'd like to first actually just provide a note of commendation for your work on this process. This is a very difficult situation for you to come into. You tried to bring a lot of the parties together. This has been a legacy program that's had issues from our board as well as from the community. And I think that you did what you could do to try and preserve access as well as ensuring that public works had what they needed and that the needs of the residents were made. So I just wanted to make sure that you get acknowledged for your hard work in this process. I will move the recommended actions. Second. Thank you, Supervisor Friend. We have a motion by Friend and a second by Coonerty. Any further discussion? I would actually just pose to one of the questions raised. I believe it was part of my initial line of questioning, but could County Council clarify that it's repealing this ordinance today in any way, preclude us from another parking ordinance in the future? No, we will not preclude you from doing another parking ordinance in the future. Okay, thank you. Any further discussion? Seeing none, clerk, please call the roll. Supervisor Friend. Aye. Coonerty. Aye. Abbott. Aye. McPherson. Aye. Koenig. Aye. Thank you, motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Thank you. We will now proceed to item nine. Consider the case transition plan for the Office of the Public Defender, the Proof of Edition, and unfunding of one full-time equivalent Chief PD Investigator, five full-time equivalent alternately staffed legal secretary, one to senior legal secretary, two full-time equivalent paralegal, one full-time equivalent receptionist, one full-time equivalent administrative aide, and one full-time equivalent senior social worker. Approve transfer of appropriations and fixed asset purchases in the amount of $15,000 for network switches and take related actions as outlined in the memorandum of the Public Defender. Public Defender Rogers. Thank you. Thank you. That better. Yes. Wonderful. Thank you so very much. Thank you, Supervisors, CAO, Carlos Palacios, and the county transition team for your unwavering support of the new Office of the Public Defender and for your commitment to ensuring a smooth transition of public defense services from the private firm of Bigum Christensen and Menzloff to our new county agency. Our mission guides our case transition plan to courageously defend the accused, to demand equal justice for all, to empower our clients with inspired advocacy in the courtroom and community. We're on a mission to elevate public defense one client at a time. Our transition plan reflects the values that we share with this community. We're courageous, compassionate, client-focused, creative, collaborative, and culturally responsive. And in keeping with this mission and with our values, we're committed to transitioning public defense services in a way that prioritizes continuous representation in orderly transition and exceptional service. We're committed to providing continuous representation. And what that means is that clients will have the same defense team throughout the transition, including a dedicated investigator and a dedicated attorney. Continuous representation is critical to maximizing consistency for our clients and minimizing disruption for our partners. We're working closely with BCM to reach this goal. BCM's attorneys have accepted positions with our agency and we're actively recruiting BCM's investigators and support staff to our team. We expect nearly all of BCM staff to join us on opening day July 1st, 2022, and we're grateful and privileged to have them continue this work that they've been doing for so long in this community. We're working with BCM to track new staff assignments as closely as possible to previous assignments to avoid the need to reassign cases. And for cases where continuous representation isn't possible, we've leveraged model practices to create a case transfer procedure to support seamless transfers. We're committed to ensuring an orderly transition. Communication and collaboration are key. I've met with over 50 stakeholders and the court's leadership team to discuss our transition plan, share ideas and strengthen our relationships with our court, county and community partners. I'll continue to make myself available to our partners and our community and especially our clients throughout this transition. We're working to develop clear procedures and workflows for first appearances, sharing evidence with the DA's office and case management. We're implementing a new case management system. We're working with BCM to digitize and transfer client files and our IT business systems analyst plans to test technology early and often to get the glitches ironed out before opening day. We're rolling out a crisis response protocol to anticipate and plan for challenges. We are committed to providing every client who is entrusted to us with exceptional service. Being client-focused means that during this transition and beyond, we'll put our clients at the center of every tactic, strategy and decision. We're recruiting and training skilled leaders to guide our agency. We're working with the seasoned defenders at BCM to develop strong defense teams led by respected attorneys with deep experience in our community. We're creating a training program to support our staff through the transition. And I'm excited to report that the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers has awarded us technical and training assistance to host a holistic defense summit to train our team and our community on model practices we'll be embracing. We'll have the opportunity to learn with their assistance about things like early representation, vertical representation and holistic defense. Throughout the transition, we'll continue to engage with our clients and our community and remain responsive to the needs of those we serve. This is a historic moment for Santa Cruz County as we work together to open our first public defense agency. We're confident that with your support, we'll transition services in a way that reflects our mission and values and moves us closer to our vision. It's our vision to lead the charge in transforming public defense to empower those we serve by honoring their experiences, amplifying their voices and offering real solutions to the root causes of system involvement. And it's in that spirit that I ask you to accept and file our transition plan and to approve our recommendations. Thank you so much for your time and support. We're looking forward to continuing to serve this community on opening day. Thank you. Are there questions from members of the board for public defender Rogers? Mr. Chair, I don't have a question, I just have a comment. I'm very excited about this transition. I think that we absolutely chose the right person and in many respects, the right person chose us too. We're very pleased to have you as Rogers. And it just goes to show with not just this initial transition plan, but some of the items that are on today's board agenda that Supervisor Coonerty had mentioned that we really are transitioning to the best form of indigent defense that we can within our county. And like a lot of things we do in Santa Cruz County, I think that we're gonna become a model in this way in ways that we haven't been before. And so I'm looking forward to this next chapter and I appreciate the work. Yeah, I would repeat that. I wanna thank Heather Rogers, our public defender for working to establish the transition for the casework that you're about to oversee. In the office, it's critical that we resource this office properly to have a smooth transition. And I appreciate all of the cooperation among our different justice partners to set this office up for very good success in the future. And congratulations to all. Look forward to it and be coming official in July 1st. Thank you. Supervisor Caput. Yeah, thank you. I wanna thank your staff. Also, it's been a very difficult time to do a transition. And somehow it seems to be working, so I'm all for it. Thank you for everything you're doing. Yeah, thank you. I wanna echo my colleagues' comments. And I think it's helpful that we have somebody from this community who has the relationships and shares the values as we build this new office. I guess my only question is, as you've begun to build this out, is there anything that has surprised you in a good or bad way about this transition that you hadn't expected? Well, thank you all for your support and thank you for an excellent question. You know, what's really surprised me, Supervisor Coonerty, is just the groundswell of support and collaboration that we've received in this effort. I wanna especially acknowledge Larry Bigum, Jerry Christensen, and John Menzloff, the entire team at BCM who already are looking forward to making this vision a reality and working very closely with us to make the transition as smooth as possible. So I think what this building and this new agency shows us is what we already knew about our county and our community. And it's that when we set our minds to do something, we work together to get it done. And I've been not surprised so much as just really grateful and tremendously honored to be working with so many talented people. And I have to also thank CAO Carlos Palacios, Nicole Coburns, Finn Stafford. Everyone has just had their oars oaring in the same direction to make this happen. It's been a big lift at a time when our county is facing so many other challenges. And I know that together we'll get there. Thank you. Yeah, I just wanna echo those comments. It was really enlightening reading your report and seeing your presentation as well as reading item 37 on the Consent Agenda today for non-attorney advocates to really paint a picture for me of how your office will be, will holistically approach the process of recovery for people who find themselves in need of a public defender to begin with. I was wondering if you could just comment a little bit more about how the non-attorney advocates will work with the senior social workers in your office to provide those kinds of services. Are they the ones that would ultimately receive kind of the handoff of those training and skills from the non-attorney advocates? How will they work together? That's a great question. I'm so excited to tell you more about this model because this agency that we're contracting with Partners for Justice, I think just has a tremendous model and a tremendous vision for public defense. And so the idea behind Partners for Justice is that it can be difficult for smaller communities like ours to embrace holistic defense and to build capacity to provide these services, especially if you're transitioning from a more traditional system. And so what we'll have in our office is at least one senior social worker will have three advocates. And what they'll bring right on July 1st is first of all, deep, deep training in holistic defense, in wraparound support, in trauma-informed practices that they'll share with our team. And so they come as client advocates, but also as advocates for holistic defense who embed in our office to help build us up and train us in what we'll need to do to do this work well. The other thing that they'll do is they'll engage in service mapping for us. And so part of what the advocates do is they come to a community and they reach out and they make all of those connections that you need to make to create a web to really understand what clients need in a given moment and how to link them to that supportive service. They'll develop an air base, a database for us, and they'll also reach out and make the actual human relationships with folks so that our database has a live presence behind it. And we begin to form the relationships that we'll need to truly provide holistic defense moving forward. And then on the ground with three advocates, we'll be able to have an advocate in our misdemeanor teams and two advocates in our felony teams. My hope is that we can initiate early representation, which means getting to clients as early as possible in the process to try to implement things like diversion or no files. They'll also be in the courtrooms helping our attorneys and our teams, navigate the difficult issues that come up when so many of our clients are involved in the system due to underlying issues like co-occurring disorders, hopelessness, depression, substance abuse, and they'll be there to work hand in hand with our attorneys to bring that soft touch and those holistic skills that will allow us to make connections and support our clients there. And then of course, back in the office, they'll be the ones who are making the calls to make sure that our clients are on the right list are hooked up with the right people, make their appointments, know where to go, know what's expected of them. And so these three people will be really doing a huge lift for us as we try to really embrace holistic defense coming from a model that has been incredibly client centered but hasn't necessarily embraced that social support piece of the puzzle as much as we'd like to in the new agency. Great, thank you for that explanation. Thank you for your question. All right, are there members of the public who'd wish to comment on this item? Seeing none in the chambers, is there anyone on Zoom? There is no one on Zoom. All right, then I will return it to the board for action. Motion would be in order. Move the recommended actions. Second. Moved by Supervisor McPherson, seconded by Supervisor Friend. Any further discussion? Seeing none, clerk, please call the roll. Supervisor Friend. Aye. Unity? Aye. Abbott? Aye. McPherson? Aye. Honig? Aye. Thank you, motion passes unanimously. Thank you. Thank you so much. That brings us to the end of our regular agenda. The board will now move into closed session. If there is no objection. And are there, is there anything, any reportable actions that will come out of closed session today? No, there are no reportable actions today. All right, thank you everybody and the next regular meeting of the board of supervisors will be February 1st. That is a week from today at 9 a.m. Thank you.